#i don't necessarily agree with him but it's very funny to see a grown man making the same arguments that lestappies on tumblr

[francolaplnto]

my dad became a chirlie yesterday

[goron-king-darunia]

Annon-Guy: Marta has her flaws, don't get me wrong. She was definitely pushy at the beginning. I just don't agree about her being manipulative. She does grow as a character in my opinion, she's just hampered by poor writing, miscommunication with her unchanged Post-Battle Quotes and putting her character development in the Journal. (Crossover Titles do Marta good though.) People who defend Marta make good points personally. But, I'm sorry for disagreeing on the subject of Marta here.

I mean, that’s very fair and she’s definitely not done any favors by having all her (alleged) development happen in the journal and she DEFINITELY got the shaft for poor writing. Her main arc could have been finally having the courage to face Brute, and then they did that and then just completely forgot to develop her at all and then were like “Whoops, game’s not over, let’s do the romance thing now real quick” and then they 100% fell flat with it. I think it depends on the crossover title. Rays I think did a good job, but from what I’ve seen in Crestoria (I haven’t played yet.) she’s, like, SUPER selfish. Emil goes through some shit and he’s just like “Okay so... this is Ratatosk.” And Marta’s just “Haha, great WHEN CAN HE LEAVE?” Like... In that one moment, Crestoria basically undid all the good faith I’d built up for her. Marta in Rays? 8/10. Actually has decent interactions with everyone else and isn’t so pushy with Emil since they’re post-game and just yadda yadda’s over the important shit and just starts with her and Emil basically being a couple and Emil seems fine with it so it’s WAY less uncomfy. Marta in Crestoria (just what I’ve seen, maybe she gets better) is like -1/10 for me because they somehow made me like her less. She literally treats Ratatosk (who in Crestoria LITERALLY EXISTS WITHOUT HIS CONSENT, HE JUST FUCKING APPEARED) as a COCKBLOCK. Her main concern seemed to be NOT what Emil went through, NOT what Ratatosk must be going through, but the fact that Ratatosk lives in Emil’s body so it throws a wrench in her being able to do kissy kissy things with Emil. DotNW canon Marta is, like, 3/10 for me. Cute design, has some good moments, had great potential, and was COMPLETELY MISHANDLED. Like, obviously this is to taste so I’m not trying to shit on anyone that likes Marta as is, but I think she could have been done SO much better if they dialed that clinginess down from an 11 to an 8 and actually gave her a consistent arc instead of waffling over it. What they did early on with her and Colette? That was good. Appropriately casting Colette as Marta’s “villain” and then having Marta learn that, no, Colette’s a genuinely good person. It works well with the overall themes that sometimes good people (Richter, Ratatosk, Lloyd, Marta, Colette, Emil) make terrible mistakes and that doesn’t make them bad people. Like, I don’t think Marta is a terrible person. I just absolutely HATE how she’s written and she’s NOT someone I can see myself being friends with if I met her in real life. But then Marta’s later arcs did her so dirty. Her arc that should have been about standing up to her dad got absolutely kneecapped by Emil’s man-pain and the arc that should have been about Marta learning to accept Emil and Ratatosk as they are was completely reversed as soon as it was over because she went right back to showing Emil preferential treatment and nothing about her DEMONSTRABLY changed. We’re told she changed but the fact that this change doesn’t carry through in the battle quotes or any subsequent interactions is just... terrible.  And the manipulation bit? I’m getting that 100% from the hot springs scene. In ToS, Zelos is framed as being a sleeze who’s taking advantage of a situation and Lloyd gets punished for his crimes. DotNW tries to do a call back to that but WAY WORSE because Marta LITERALLY ORCHESTRATES THE CIRCUMSTANCES by making Emil think he’s going in for a soak with the other guys, WAITING UNTIL HE’S ALONE, putting up a sign so no one comes looking, and then sneaking in to be alone with him. She’s not a manipulator of people necessarily, but she’s DEFINITELY a manipulator of circumstance and that does NOT vibe well with me. I get that the game was trying to make it cheeky and cute and they do try to make Marta look good by having her trying to take the blame for it, but the fact that she didn’t think about the consequences before doing it, or the fact that she DID and decided they were worth it anyway just... makes me hate her for doing it. And I think the scene could EASILY be fixed if, like. Marta had ASKED Emil to go to the hot springs alone with her and he agreed and they got discovered a different way (Too loud cheeky giggling might have been enough) If Emil had been part of it consensually and then everyone accused him of being a letch and then Marta tried to take the blame like “No, it was my idea, I talked him into it.” That would have been SO MUCH BETTER TO ME. Same fundamental interaction but makes Marta look a LOT better because she’s not being a puppeteer trying to get Emil alone. She’d instead just be a hormonal, slightly pushy teen girl trying to do grown up things with the boyfriend she’s trying to woo and Emil would be doing it willingly because he likes her back. Instead Marta’s just... ambushing him and he clearly wasn’t 100% into it. This wasn’t like a welcome surprise because when he finds out she’s in there with him he SCREAMS.  Like if we saw the same scene play out but with the gender reversed: A man orchestrating a situation where a woman is in a hot spring bath alone, then putting up a sign so he can sneak in and be alone with her and she was not expecting it and her first instinct is to SCREAM? Yeah, we’d view that situation as pretty gross. Putting it in context does help because the game is trying to establish that Marta is trying to court Emil and Emil’s at least shown to not be 100% opposed. But if Emil had been a girl and Marta a boy, Marta would rightfully have gotten the blame. So I just hate it on two vectors, because the characters are low key sexist for acting like Marta couldn’t possibly have been the one trying to be a letch (even though it was DEFINITELY EMIL THAT SCREAMED so maybe high key sexist...) and Marta’s just pulling strings instead of thinking about what Emil would want. Like, even if Emil was 100% down for a sneaky hotspring couple’s bath, I think he would have liked to know about it first hand instead of being surprised by it, because even if you think Emil was 100% down for it and only screamed because he was surprised, HE STILL SCREAMED. If Marta wanted to surprise him, she could have put up the sign FIRST, and then told Emil “Hey, so, I put up the cleaning sign so the hot springs are available for just the twooooo of ussssss~” instead of what she actually did.  Maybe I’m just putting too much importance on scenes that are meant to be funny, but even if that’s true, the writers are seriously hiding some very uncomfy messages behind a veil of humor and I DO NOT LIKE THAT.