#housemaiden sasasa

[naswoop]

After about a million drafts and over two years, this is finally done!

A couple things-- this animatic is very specific to the prologue, and I first started drafting it before In Stars and Time (the sequel/full game) was even announced, so there are some things that are noticeably different if you're coming from ISaT (the party's marching order, I didn't know what Sif's first death was at the time, Sif not knowing everyone's names...). This animatic is also suuuuuper Siffrin-centric. I love everyone else so much but this one's about the good ol' ~Time Loop Edginess~.

Maybe one day I'll actually make this into a proper video, but that day is not today. I just wanted to get this done before ISaT came out (and I've managed to do that! Yay me!!).

This was honestly such a delight to work on and I learned so much about digital art in the process (I finally found the "turn off anti-aliasing" button! Yay!). Please please please go check out @insertdisc5's games, they're so good!! I'm really looking forward to when In Stars and Time comes out!!

Here's a link to Sundial on YouTube.

[the-bitter-ocean]

oceaaaannn hiii! let's go with 3, 5, and 15 for the isat ask game c:

(MAJOR A6SE / 2HATS SPOILERS + FULL GAME SPOILERS AHOY) Thank you for the questions @dekupalace ! Since I’m going to be talking more in depth about the game for one of these questions I’m going to put my responses under a read more:

3- favorite soundtrack?

Oh god that’s such a hard question the whole game has certified bangers. The musicians at Studio Thumpy Puppy were not messing around or pulling any punches. The soundtrack of the game elevates literally every emotional beat. If I was forced to choose only one song out of the soundtrack my favorite track in the whole game has to be “How Can You Help Me, Stardust?” aka the theme that plays when you fight Loop at the Favor tree during act six. Hearing that for the first time while getting the full context of loop’s backstory made me go crazy. It was so fucking emotional and well done. That and it’s just objectively a super intense high energy song that makes me wanna dance around. If anyone deserves the coolest fight theme in the game, it’s Loop.

5- favorite optional event?

Ooh this is also a hard one! I adore a lot of the optional story events because each of them really shed light on Siffrin’s mental state /characterization, as well as gives depth to other aspects like the other character of the world building as a whole which strengthens the themes of the story. Aside from the obvious choice (2Hats Ending/ Act six loop encounter) I think my favorite optional event would have to be the “Who Was Phone” achievement (Change God event). There’s something so fascinating about learning about the Change God. Someone who clearly adores their certified little guy (Mirabelle) and is willing to offer words of kindness and assurance in her identity even if it knows she won’t remember in one instance..and then in the very same breath tell Siffrin that they enjoy watching Siffrin in the timeloop torment nexus because they’re curious to see how they change in a situation where everything is forced to stagnate. It was so genuinely fucked. I will think about it always forever.

15- anything you’d change about the game? be it game mechanics, a new feature, a change in plot, etc

Overall I’m pretty satisfied with the game both in story and gameplay actually. I think Adrienne did a good job writing and expanding on the characters and story that was set up in the prologue. The quality of life in terms of gameplay got improved since the previous game as well ( those who played the prologue can attest to this) . The fact that it was a in universe story reason as to why makes it all the more satisfying (if you want to know what I mean by that please read my mutuals @felikatze analysis about it here.)

I just am happy that Siffrin got to be happy in the end and stay with their family, to be able to talk things out and escape the loops. I know some people didn’t like that or expected a more darker/sadder ending or wanted the gameplay to be more challenging … my response to that is Literally Just Play Start Again: A Prologue. To me it would be extremely reductive to have Siffrin just suffer with no reprieve or escape from the loops (because that’s just a repeat of what happened in its predecessor) or have the group just split off from each other immediately after everything happened. It would have been extremely unsatisfying and ultimately missing the point of the themes of the game as a whole gonna be real lol.

The only things I’d maybe change or add is like it would’ve been cute to see Euphrasie and Claude be together/ reunite on screen in act 6. They should kiss. Lol. (That and just I would’ve personally loved to see Euphrasie in canon expanded on a little more but that’s not necessarily needed she serves her purpose in the narrative. I just like analyzing her and giving her more depth and I like when others do too, but that’s what fanart/ fics and aus are for so I’m not fussed.) 

I don’t mind that the game is sort of open ended and doesn’t answer all the questions. I think that gives artists, fanfic writers, Au makers and people who like to analyze the game more freedom to come up with their own interpretations for things that happened in pre canon and post canon which to me is more interesting. I know Loop disappearing at the end of the game in both endings is sad/ bittersweet but I wouldn’t necessarily change the way that was structured either. I like that their fate was ambiguous because it leads the viewer to come up with their own theories as to where they went. ( personally I love seeing stuff where loop gets to travel on their own and form a new life and identity outside of the loops and learn to heal, as well as post game getting to meet back up with the party and learn to navigate this new life/ change one step at a time. )

[justsalpals]

theory time (spoilers for the whole game, including optional epilogue content)

when learning the shield move Mirabelle mentions that she's been wanting to learn a reflect shield, but hasn't quite worked it out yet. this is presumably the shield she uses in order to freeze the king at the finale.

so how did she learn it in that final loop, despite not being able to every other loop? what's different? the process of crafting these new crafts (haha) is shown to be incredibly technical, so while I'm usually willing to vibe out on The Power of Friendship it doesn't really seem to fit here.

which leads to a headcanon I had a little while back, about our good friend Loop. I was thinking about all those off-shoot doors in the Start Again house, presumably leading to areas that Siffrin/Loop has explored top to bottom a million times over before sticking purely to the direct route towards the king every time.

and I thought, maybe, that Siffrin's first instinct after being slaughtered was also to think of shields. and maybe they were able to find that information in the house as well, and taught their Housemaiden her very own shield craft.

but unlike in isat, the shield never worked. so they stopped bothering to learn it by the time we get to them in sasasa.

taking this fun little headcanon and folding it into isat: maybe that's how Mira learned her reflect shield. because in their little information spill sesh, they stumbled into telling her what they knew about shield craft (not even really realizing it was different. because Siffrin has never really had the technical knowledge about their craft).

and the combination of that knowledge let her work out what she needed

[auncyen]

what are your thoughts on loop and siffrin’s hangout in the tree? it always seemed excessively cruel imo, just to prove that sif dying wasn’t the only way to loop. i feel like there were other ways, so i guess i can’t understand completely understand why they would do it.

had loop not pointed out the party dying or had the party managed to beat the king w/o sif, do you think sif would have still looped? Or at the very least managed to make it to the next day?

Anon. are you my loop. afheiohfe LMFAO I'm just. amused by the question because yeah tbh I don't really like the Loop hangout either. I get critical under the cut, so this is only getting a spoilers tag.

I think Siffrin was going to loop then. They probably would have realized what the flash was, or even just realized that the time of day means either the party's made it to the King or things have already ended badly for them, and now they're down a fighter. Siffrin does try to cling to hope at times so I can see him trying to persuade himself that Mirabelle would know the shield, she'd know to shield even if he didn't warn her right??? so maybe they didn't instantly die! but again, they're down a fighter. Even if they win the fight, surely they'd hate him for abandoning them in the final hour. I think he'd give himself a panic attack out of worry and guilt and shame and loop. Loop just hurried it up, probably because they were already hating themself (which, this sure makes it rich for them to try to point out to Siffrin later in act 5 that he's being an ass for saying mean things to the party LOL).

If you want my thoughts. This isn't in the ISAT tag because the hangout is one of the low points of the game for me. It was the "oh, we're just doing shock value now" bit of my first playthrough. I didn't think it made sense then just because how does the party get to the King anyway (even if they can still beat/avoid all the sadnesses without Siffrin and avoid the rock trap/find all the keys because they're like. being more cautious with them gone, they only have a 1/6 chance of correctly choosing the right path on both floors 2 & 3 unless Loop is actively guiding them. Which is an idea I've seen people uncomfortable with, but Loop is purposefully setting them up to die anyway????), and how does Siffrin not realize sooner "hey wait this is going too long what's going to happen to my friends" and panic over that sooner, and nothing in the rest of the game really changed my thoughts on that. Considering Isabeau is right in Loop's potential sight YEAH I FEEL LIKE THEY COULD HAVE COME UP WITH DIFFERENT WAYS OF PROVING IT.

Also iiirc, in my first playthrough I'd already done the Bonnie sidequest of them freaking out at Siffrin and making them loop by this time. I get that the Bonnie sidequest is optional but like. That sure doesn't help with making this hangout feel like cheap shock value.

I think. What I would have liked better. Is if maybe Loop had been trying to do something else and they accidentally established this. Example:

Loop tells Siffrin from the very start they can tell their friends about this and brings the matter up again at act 3 start. Even though it didn't free them from the loops it DID make that one loop better for them when their friends knew something was wrong (they didn't die horribly, for one), so I think they're thinking if Stardust lets everyone in on the full truth, and sooner, maybe they can help somehow!!! Maybe Odile can solve it!!!! 'Why are us two idiots trying to solve this alone!!!' Loop's thinking, and Loop just really, really wants to get out of the loops. So like. imagine a ISAT sus run being a little more similar to a SASASA sus run and Loop specifically baiting them to do that, maybe by suggesting that since they always loop when talking to the Head Housemaiden the loop ends at a certain TIME, this is TIME craft stardust, hurry it up and maybe you'll see something useful besides the roof hm???

What Loop is hoping for: Stardust gets the nice little bit of his family comforting him and getting them to open up a little, they get to hurt themself watching it through them, Stardust realizes 'hey I should talk to my friends' and actually starts telling them about the time loop at the start so they can all work through the information together, they just needed more brain cells on the problem so THEY FIGURE OUT THE GD TIME LOOPS AND LOOP GETS TO BE FREE.

What actually happens: *looks at how the sus run goes in ISAT* also since this is already altering what a sus run requires and how it turns out you could also have Mirabelle on edge and unintentionally taking it out on Siffrin, or Isabeau being horrified if Siffrin finally confesses about the time loops under pressure from Odile and Siffrin assumes Isabeau's disgusted about him hiding this (and not realizing like. Isabeau is actually horrified that his friend's been dying? and trying to handle that alone??? SIF), basically like just make it accidentally turn into a train wreck of a scene for a takeaway of "huh. Siffrin loops back from being upset, too." And then Siffrin is further convinced opening up = always bad and just gets more and more set in I AM NOT BLINDING TELLING THEM.

[fermented-writers-block]

On a slightly related note, now I can’t help but laugh at the thought of Loop and Siffrin accidentally confusing the hell out of each other over the topic of the rest of the party. Loop’s SASASA descriptions of the Housemaiden, the Fighter, the Researcher, and the Kid could potentially lead to Siffrin wildly misinterpreting who to look for. And on the flipside, the modern contexts Mirabelle, Odile, Isabeau, and Bonnie may have been transplanted into could be different or unfamiliar enough that Loop doesn’t initially realize modern Siffrin’s met their modern party for a while lol.

Also, I’m curious what kind of scenario you had envisioned for a modern AU of ISAT. A lot of the time when I’ve seen modern AUs of other series, they’ve been closer to Coffee Shop AUs where the narrative threat is considerably lower and smaller stakes, and usually in a much more mundane form. That led me to picturing modern Siffrin as less of an adventuring traveler, and more like a mundane person doing 9-5s in the effective looping of a job. Even in a modern world with horrors and threats, that would not necessarily be a kind of position that’d put him close to any sort of fighting or apocalypse preventing.

I keep thinking about how funny it'd be if Loop and Siffrin were from entirely different universes. Like if one was from a modern AU where craft technically exists but has been forgotten over the years, and the other one's just from... In Stars and Time. Regardless of whether it's Loop or Siffrin from the modern AU, I can just imagine Loop trying so hard to act as if they have any idea what Siffrin's talking about at all times

[sleeby-aubee]

More start again art because not enough content so I make more

@insertdisc5 I love your characters and game a lot

Siffrin and the researcher are really fun to draw! I wish my style made them look better lmao

[naswoop]

Start Again art dump!

HAND BLAM

[naswoop]

~The stack of plates~

[naswoop]

Deja Vu--

[naswoop]

Siffrin: I just wanted to end the fights quicker--

Bonus:

[naswoop]

The Housemaiden just gives me so much hope-