#i need to come up with a tag for more meta or lore based discussion

[mastercrownmonday]

@cauli-flawa Since you asked in the tags, and for anyone else who was curious:

This concept art is included in a few articles/galleries on Wikirby (source).

It was screencapped from this video presentation, filmed at GDC 2023 and showcasing lots more official Kirby concept art—but as far as I can tell, no comment was made on Galacta Knight/the Master Crown specifically. The devs can't hide this ground-breaking revelation from ME, however!!

Curious to know what you all think. We've never seen the name "Another Dimension Bottom" used in-game, but considering both this concept art and the Epilogue bosses' allegiance to the Crown, the little guy probably has more to do with Another Dimension than what already meets the eye. (That's my theory, anyway...)

Why does no one talk about this... We need to talk about this

There are... lore implications. Maybe. The concept art probably can't be considered "canon," but it's food for thought...

[women-of-malevolent]

META - What "canon" is in Malevolent, for the purposes of this blog

TL;DR:

In order of most 'I accept this as meaningful to the story of Malevolent' to most 'do not bring me this crap'

Canon:

The podcast itself

The official podcast transcripts from the website (I edit out the emotion tags because I often find them redundant or disagree with their assessment /no offense; I super appreciate transcriptionist work! Thank you so much for providing the accessibility resource to fans who need and want it /genuine <3 )

I guess I'll hear you out if you think it's really important:

Call of Cthulhu lore

Original Lovecraft lore

Supplemental Q&A's on main podcast feed

Supplemental Q&A's on other social media

Just don't:

Patreon-locked content

Pay-locked content

Invictus stream / Patreon chats / Discord / speculation about author/writing choices

Malevolent is a weird story. I've seen it marketing itself as an ARG, or an alternate reality game. From Wikipedia -

"An alternate reality game (ARG) is an interactive networked narrative that uses the real world as a platform and employs transmedia storytelling to deliver a story that may be altered by players' ideas or actions. The form is defined by intense player involvement with a story that takes place in real time and evolves according to players' responses. It is shaped by characters that are actively controlled by the game's designers, as opposed to being controlled by an AI as in a computer or console video game. Players interact directly with characters in the game, solve plot-based challenges and puzzles, and collaborate as a community to analyze the story and coordinate real-life and online activities. ARGs generally utilize multimedia, such as telephones and mail, but rely on the Internet as the central binding medium."

So, what are the multiple media that make up Malevolent?

First of all, I want to explain for anyone who might not know all these details: Malevolent is a weekly podcast. Every week, ~15-20 minutes of story is delivered as a Chapter to the Malevolent Patreon Patrons. Each week, those Patrons vote on one big choice that the characters will make in the following week's episode. These Patrons are called The Voices. Every 4 weeks, those 4 story Chapters are collected into one episode called a Part and shared with the public. The Patreon also shares exclusive author interviews, commentary, silly songs/other miscellaneous bonus content, plus access to the Malevolent Patreon Discord channel, in which the author and his wife are moderators and off-and-on participants in fan discussions about the show (including commentary about character backstories, motivations, what ships are/are not canon, etc). Higher-paying tiers get access to more channels.

Most of Malevolent's listeners have access to the Parts as hour-long episodes, plus whatever supplemental material is shared on the podcast feed. A small contingent of highly financially supportive fans have access to everything.

With that legwork out of the way...

Below is a list what I understand to be all the possible layers of "canon" in Malevolent, followed by an explanation of how deeply this blog will consider it as a source. This list is in order from most canon (1) to least/not at all canon (9). More sources are added as they come up.

These numbers also (probably, maybe) roughly align with listener drop-off rates. Imagine funnel-like drop-offs in number of people who care enough to engage this ancillary of material. Also keep in mind the listeners who are tuning in for the first time, 20 years from now. How much will they get from this source?

The podcast itself - this will be the blog's prime canon source. This is the primary story source from which the vast, vast majority of all readers and listeners - now and decades in the future - have access to.

The podcast transcripts - this is its own category because the transcripts often editorialize (not a bad thing - just necessary product of translating one art medium into another). I've come away from episodes with a strong impression of one line delivery (ex: delighted), then find that in the transcript, it's described totally different (ex: disgusted). I will use the transcripts as my primary source for this blog. I usually delete the tone indicators. I also add MR. to Mr. Scratch's dialogue tags after he asks Arthur to call him that.

Call of Cthulu roleplay game - I'm not familiar with this and I don't think most listeners of the show will be, either. The relevance of this source will be considered on a touch-and-go basis.

H.P. Lovecraft extended universe - I have not read much Lovecraft and I don't want to start. The relevance of this source will be considered on a touch-and-go basis.

Supplemental interviews, episode commentary, Q&As available on main podcast feed - The author very regularly provides thoughts on the story and writing of Malevolent. I will consider this source as little as possible. If you have some information from here you think is important for me to hear, I will consider it; but please understand that 1) the VAST majority of listeners will not hear this, even if it's not cost-gated; and 2) not everyone who hears it believes/respects authorial self-reporting. No offense but no way

Twitter/X, Reddit, YouTube, or other social media commentary - similar to 5, with less weight because even fewer listeners will ever find this or seek it out. Also, social media is highly susceptible to internet decay.

Invictus CoC games - not considered. I might look into these later (WAY less thoroughly than the main WoM blog), but also I might not. These are Call of Cthulu games that were DM-ed by the author of Malevolent. There are some overlapping characters like Anna Stanczyk and Frank Uphill. Even if you're into these pls you have to admit that most of the Malevolent listening audience will not watch them.

Supplemental, Patreon-exclusive content - NO. If it can't be accessed without paying or signing up for a website, naw.

Semi-private discussions from heavily gated discord groups - NO. Let's not

Speculation about the author - NO. This includes speculation on whether or not ____ is intentional, or why writing choices were/weren't made.

[rainbow-hammock]

Ok Redwall fandom, I need to scream into the void for a bit here; there were some posts in the tag awhile back theorizing some elements of Slagar’s past, and thinking about that got me thinking about the Kingdom of Malkariss and, more specifically, the Wearet.

Guys, we need to talk about the Wearet.

Possible spoilers for Mattimeo and Loamhedge, for those not familiar with all the books. I’m gonna put the rest under a cut because this got to be quite long, though a lot of it is just me divulging some personal theories I’ve developed.

So the Wearet is essentially this mutated crossbreed creature, right? By itself, it’s not the most shocking thing in the series, as there are multiple instances where an antagonist has been keeping some monstrous creature in captivity--think the Gloomer from Mossflower, or the Dirgecallers from The Bellmaker, etc. Furthermore, Razzid Wearat (the main antagonist in Rogue Crew) is also a hybrid of some sort*.

(*though he’s specifically listed to be a different sort of hybrid, and we also have very little information as to Razzid’s origins, so I’m really not going to include him in this meta.)

(Apparently there’s also a Wearet in The Lost Legends of Redwall games, but I haven’t played them and I’m not familiar with the game’s lore in relation to the books, so I won’t be discussing him.)

But in the specific case of the Wearet of Malkariss, I feel like there’s reason to believe that this crossbreeding was done on purpose, and it makes for some nasty implications of what goes on behind the scenes in the underground kingdom.

Look, the Redwall series is pretty well known for being quite dark at times for a series aimed at children. The kingdom of Malkariss is without a doubt, a pretty horrible place to be--it’s a secretive but extensive underground kingdom built on the backs of slaves, ruled by a mysterious tyrant who is outright worshipped by his followers. A lot of people in the fandom would agree that the Kingdom of Malkariss is a cult, and personally, I don’t think that’s too much of a stretch. 

I could dedicate an entirely separate post to theorizing about the kingdom of Malkariss, but I will say that there is a lot we don’t know; we don’t know where Malkariss came from, how his kingdom came to be, much less how long he’s been there. As already stated, Malkariss and the kingdom he has created are very secretive, and while he does have some level of notoriety in some circles, for the most part he doesn’t seem to be incredibly well known. Slagar’s band of slavers know OF the kingdom, at the very least: in chapter 7 of Mattimeo, Slagar’s henchmen “moan [with] despair” when they find out they’re going to the kingdom of Malkariss because it’s said to be a “realm of nightmares”. However, they don’t seem to know much about what’s involved; they try to ask Slagar about it at several points, and seem genuinely surprised when they encounter obstacles like the Painted Ones and the giant gorge.

Furthermore, in chapter 17, when we meet the Stump family, Jubilation tells Matti and the other young captives that his family never go to the south because it’s where the slavers go. His mother, Rosyqueen, tells Matthias and his company the same thing later in the same chapter, but also says that “no one knows what lies beyond the great Southern Plateau.”

However, on the other hand, it’s referenced multiple times that Malkariss has a LOT of followers at his command, and he seems to have amassed quite a bit of territory, which could indicate he’s been in the area for quite some time and it’s bigger than we think--and you have to consider that all those rats that make up his horde have to come from somewhere. They need spaces to eat, sleep and train.

It’s also a fact that they’re born and raised to serve the kingdom: when Slagar offers up Vitch as a “gift”, Malkariss rejects him because he was “not born of the Host, [and their] ways are not known to him.” (Mattimeo, ch. 43). Based on this information, I think it’s pretty safe to say that there were probably areas of the kingdom dedicated to families and children, though we never see it.

If that’s the case, and Malkariss and his enormous horde have been around for awhile, this could indicate that by the time he appears in Mattimeo, he was working to expand his kingdom, or at least the spaces underground. What does this have to do with the Wearet? When the Wearet is introduced, Nadaz calls him “The Slavemaster”. Sure, Malkariss has got lots of followers, but having a great scary-looking creature under your control overseeing the construction could be a good show of power to both slaves and follower alike, so I think it’s less likely that the Wearet existed before Malkariss created his kingdom underground, especially if the expansion he’s supervising is a more recent project. 

But then how did the Wearet come to exist at all? I posit that there were ferrets/weasels/stoats living in the kingdom of Malkariss. There might even have been other Wearets. But they were being kept deep underground, possibly for the sole purpose of creating (and later, maintaining) the Wearet line. Here’s why:

The Wearet is described as “somewhere between a ferret and a stoat.” (Mattimeo, Ch. 46). The thing is, there’s absolutely no mention of any mustelids (ferrets, stoats, weasels) serving within the kingdom; according to the book, the residents of the kingdom of Malkariss (at least, those that aren’t slaves) are made up of entirely of rats.

The only exception is its king, Malkariss himself, who is a polecat (aka a wild relative of the domestic ferret). 

You’d think that if having other mustelids around to do things like lead his army and serve him was important to Malkariss, there would have been some evidence of it.

Now let’s fast forward to the book Loamhedge, which takes place many, many years after the events of Mattimeo. As the title implies, a group of Redwallers return to the Southern Plateau, aka where Loamhedge AND Malkariss used to be. Guess who they encounter?

^This guy. Kharanjul. 

Another Wearet.

Remember the giant gorge everyone had to cross in Mattimeo? Kharanjul lives in caves along its walls. It makes sense that he’s not in the exact same location, given that there was a giant cave-in, but he is definitely within the same vicinity. If we’re going off the assumption that the kingdom was a lot bigger than what we saw in Mattimeo, it would make sense that there are tunnels and caves everywhere underground along the plateau, so even if one large area had been lost to the collapse, it doesn’t necessarily mean that all of it would have. 

In the same line of thought, it doesn’t necessarily mean that all of the creatures living in the kingdom of Malkariss were lost, either. The rats in Kharanjul’s army could even be their descendants.

Speaking of descendants...when his followers are singing his praises, they specifically reference how Kharanjul has “the blood of Wearets” running through his veins. (Loamhedge, ch 36.)

Unlike Malkariss, though, Kharanjul’s army consists of “mainly ferrets and weasels, with a scattering of large rats among them.” (Loamhedge, ch. 42). But if the kingdom of Malkariss had consisted only of rats, then where did the ferrets and weasels come from?

And another thing: we know that in real life, it’s definitely possible to make hybrid animals out of different species--a horse and a donkey make a mule, for example. 

(Yes, Redwall is a fictional world made up of anthropormorphized animals and we have to have suspension of disbelief, blah blah blah, but go with me here.)

When I dove into this rabbithole, I found this website, which is essentially a compilation of reports referencing instances of hybridization between different animals (in this case, mustelids). 

There was one segment that stood out to me:

Would you believe it, it is actually entirely realistic for something like the Wearet to exist!

Furthermore, this tells us two things:

1. It is possible for a stoat and a ferret to produce fertile offspring. (The Stoat x Ferret hybrid in the referenced study apparently produced four successive generations.)

2. A stoat and a polecat could (hypothetically) produce fertile offspring. 

Look, we don’t know very much about the Malkariss Wearet. We don’t know how much Malkariss was involved in his creation. The Malkariss Wearet’s existence could have easily been a fluke. though apparently, and there’s no good way to put this, but polecats can get around, if you know what I mean, so he may have been a lot more “””””involved””””” than is comfortable thinking about. 

But if we take into account that a stoat and ferret hybrid is capable of producing multiple generations of fertile offspring in the first place, PLUS the fact that there is another Wearet present in the exact same vicinity, hundreds of years later, AND there is now a notable population of mustelids in the area...it leads me to believe that Kharanjul was not a fluke. 

Headcanon time: if we go off of the whole “it was a cult” thing, the shift from worship of Malkariss to worship of Wearets is how the remnants of the kingdom ended up evolving after the destruction of the kingdom, especially if the survivors consisted of the creatures used to create the line in the first place. Aside from the giant statue, we know that his rats carved a mural in his likeness, so there are probably lots of similar likenesses scattered throughout the tunnels and caves that make up the kingdom. I could see creatures interpreting these types of effigies as a tribute to a creature like a Wearet, especially if a lot of what was known about the kingdom of Malkariss was lost over time. 

TL; DR: We don’t know exactly where the Wearet from Mattimeo came from, but its existence implies that there might have been mustelids present in the kingdom of Malkariss, possibly for the purpose of making Wearets. When Malkariss and the kingdom were destroyed, some of the rats and the mustelids used to make the Wearet appear to have survived and continued the Wearet line.

[zaph1337]

Monster Hunter Rating 27: Rathian, the Queen of the Land

I mentioned during the Rathalos review that there’s a reason why there wasn’t a lot to say about Rathalos’ behavior, and that I would discuss that here. The reason is simple: I was only talking about half of the species. Rathalos is the name given to the male members of the Rath family (AND LEMME TELL YOU SOMETHING, RANDOM TUMBLR-GOER READING THIS: ZAPH ISN’T TALKING ABOUT THIS KIND OF RATH!), so it’s time to see what the ladies are all about. Introducing the Queen of the Land, Rathian!

(How it appears in Monster Hunter 1)

(How it appears in Monster Hunter World)

(How it appears in Monster Hunter Rise)

Appearance: Rathians, obviously, look a lot like Rathalos, but there are some subtle differences besides the color. First, Rathians have a large chin spike to gore things they run/fly into. The spikes on their wings are also placed differently, being more spread out than they are on Rathalos. If you look at the MH1 render, you’ll notice that there are markings on the back of Rathian wings, rather than having them on the undersides like they are on Rathalos, who also have a different pattern. The final big differences that I see are the spiny hairs on Rathian’s wings, back, and tail.

Considering Rathian and Rathalos are meant to be the same species, it makes sense that they’d look similar to each other, but they have some differences that make them distinct. My only real gripe is that I don’t really like the shade of green they used, so I honestly prefer Rathalos’ design. Still, Rathian looks just fine. 7/10.

Behavior: Rathians are known as the Queens of the Land for a reason; even though they can fly perfectly fine, they patrol their territories on foot. But that’s because Rathalos already has the air covered, which brings me to an interesting aspect of Rath behavior: When they choose a mate, they stay together and hunt as a couple, as well as work together to guard their nest. Despite how strong Rathians are, they prefer to hunt smaller monsters like Velociprey/dromes and drag them back to the nest, while Rathalos grab larger prey such as heavy herbivores and weaker wyverns which they can airlift back home. This is apparently because Rathalos are the stronger of the two, but not only are Rathians still powerful enough to only be threatened by other apex predators, they’re larger than Rathalos are! Rathians are 75.6 ft long at largest and 37.8 ft long at smallest, while Rathalos are 73.8 ft long at largest and 37.4 ft long at largest. Yes, there’s barely any difference, but that just means that they should command the same respect that Rathalos do, since they should be just as powerful! Instead, monsters such as Plesioth find Rathians less threatening than they do Rathalos, which is moronic. It feels like the devs thought they couldn’t make Rathian an equal to Rathalos because it would make the latter less impressive, but by making the female Raths weaker it just comes off as (hopefully subconscious) sexism.

If Rathians are stuck fighting a monster that actually has a good chance of killing them, they can let out a special roar that their mates recognize as an SOS. If their Rathalos mates can get to them in time, then whatever attacked them has to deal with two of the most powerful wyverns around at the same time, which is likely a death sentence for anything but the most overpowered monsters out there. I like the idea of tag-team hunters, but I can’t get over the fact that Rathians are weaker than Rathalos for no good reason, and no, making Rathalos look better doesn’t count. 6/10.

Abilities: I can speak from experience here, too, because I’ve actually killed a Rathian in the Rise demo! Rathians have similar abilities to Rathalos, but there are a few key differences. First, Rathians seem to have greater proficiency with their fire abilities than Rathalos do, as they can spit out several bursts of fire at once. They can also charge their fireballs up to create a more powerful blast that ignites the ground, creating longer-lasting flames. 

Secondly, Rathians lack venomous talons, but that’s just because their venom is channeled to a different part of their bodies: their tails. They do this by doing an aerial backflip that swings their tail like an uppercut. The wiki says that the barbs on the tail are what injects the venom, but it also says that they can poison you with their tails even if you cut the clubbed tip with the barbs on it off, so its best explanation is that the organ that produces the venom is located near the tail’s base and not its tip. Finally, Rathians do more damage with their head-on charges because yes, that chin spike is indeed made to impale you.

Like I said, I’ve killed one of these before, but it didn’t come easy. They use their abilities rather effectively, and I doubt that the one I fought was a high-rank Rathian. Really shows you how dangerous these ladies are. 7/10.

Equipment: If you’re worried that the devs just recolored the Rathalos equipment for Rathian, then good news: they actually tried this time! Yeah, there are a couple of recolors, but the majority of the weapons are unique. To prove it, remember the Sword and Shield that I showed for Rathalos? Here’s the Princess Rapier, the Rathian SnS from the same game:

See? Completely different! Rathian weapons are either Poison or Fire element, and this one definitely leans more into the Poison aspect, since plants and poison have a strong connection. This looks cool, but I can’t help but wonder where the smith got those vines and thorns from, ‘cause the only things that went into this weapon came from Rathians. Next up is a Hunting Horn that’s called the Valkyrie Chordmaker in the majority of its appearances, though the render I’m using come from MHO, which doesn’t have English names for equipment:

The reason I used the MHO model for this weapon is that it best shows off how pretty it is. There are several neat touches to it; the head may be a bell, but the handle is a flute, which, by the way, has the Rathian wing markings around the finger holes, and there’s a crown marking where the bell and flute meet, as well as a bigger crown that the bell’s leaves are emerging from. Those leaves also give the impression that the bell is like a flower bud and the handle is a stem. I just really like this thing, okay? To end off the weapons, here are the Dual Blades shared between Rathian and Rathalos in almost every game that has Dual Blades for them, the Twin Flames:

I like how the Rathian blade is bigger ‘cause that’s how Rathian and Rathalos actually are, though it makes the Rathalos blade look more like a kunai or dagger than an actual sword. Other than that, this is a sweet, symbolic weapon that becomes less sweet when you remember how you got the parts for it. As for the armor sets, they’re not recolors, either. Here’s the Blademaster armor from Tri:

The men’s set looks really cool thanks to the helmet, though I can’t help but be reminded of Reptile from Mortal Kombat when I look at it (Note: I have never played an MK game in my life, I’m just interested in the characters, lore, and sometimes even the meta). The women’s set, though, raises a question: why do you need a dress made of steel, especially when you’re probably gonna be dodge-rolling in it? Well, whatever. Let’s end this off with the Gunner set from Tri:

Well, that’s a shift. We went from lizardmen and warrior queen chic to military garb. I mean, it makes sense; not only are you a Gunner, but Rathians are the perfect color for making camo out of their body parts. Don’t ask me where the goggles came from, though.

The Rathian equipment is all great, apart from one or two recolors of Rathalos weapons. There were several weapons with cool designs that I couldn’t show due to my weapon limit of 3 and the fact that I didn’t like how small the renders were, but I think that the Chordmaker alone made up for that. 8/10.

Final Thoughts and Tally: Listen, if Rathalos was getting a high score, so was Rathian. They’re both impressive monsters with cool equipment, but I like how Rathalos looks just a bit better. Still, this is one queen that’s earned her throne, and no one’s taking it from her any time soon. 7/10.

[geoduinn-blog]

On why I adore Prompto, the transient heart of FFXV, and the power of bromance

So I wrote this pile of meta immediately after finishing FFXV and shortly before some similar analyses wound up on YouTube. While I agree with a lot of them, I don’t feel like they go far enough in exploring the gravity of the train scene and its impact on the story, so I decided to upload this almost a year after the discussion was relevant. Please excuse the outdated references to an ‘upcoming’ DLC for Prompto.

FFXV is a flawed game. It is plotted sparsely and structured contestably. It doesn’t make a lot of sense, and its light-and-darkness lore feels okay at best, contrived the rest of the time. I don’t even want to mention its treatment of gender, or I’ll never write about anything else (and maybe this game deserves that). But the reverence and joy I often felt while playing FFXV must not be understated. As annoyed and even angry as I am at SquareEnix in the aftermath of one of its best games in a long time, the fact remains – this IS one of its best games in a long time. This is certainly not because of the flawless execution of each of its individual parts, and definitely not because of any attempts to respect its non-male fans, but because of what generally makes a FF game a FF game – the unforgettable atmosphere, the commitment to the characters, and the miraculous success of key dramatic scenes in the face of insurmountable narrative ridiculousness.

This hybrid between a tumblr meta and an HSC essay will explore that success through the framework of some of my favourite elements of the game: a scene wherein the villain Ardyn tricks the young protagonist Noctis into harming his best friend; the relationship between Noctis and Prompto, the bestie; and the expression of the core themes of the story through the world and atmosphere that these elements create together. Themes of friendship, transience, and sacrifice will be explored, but all in all, this is just an unstructured meditation on some things I love about this game – an ode to the flawed FFXV, crafted in its image.

Ok so the scene I described above really cements Ardyn as one of the most detestable FF villains for me, while also making me love Prompto all the more. In a nutshell, Ardyn swaps bodies with Prompto, and Noctis, following the logic of the story, attacks this supposed Ardyn. While the scene relies on a really stupid narrative device, its positive effect on the relevant character arcs is proportionately strong. My suspension of disbelief has just been brutally injured by a magical technique that I didn’t know the villain possessed until two seconds ago, but the scene still somehow works. It’s such a typically FFXV thing – logically pathetic, but narratively powerful enough that I yelled at my TV.

Okay. So I assumed straight up when Ardyn appears on the train and starts referring to Noctis as his ‘bro’, his ‘dude’, his ‘man’, that he’s just being a douchebag. I was ever so slightly suspicious that the game gave me only the option to attack Ardyn at this point, but I wasn’t exactly calm enough to question it when faced with the asshole who shivved my fiancé. I just wanted to shiv him back.

When he continues the gross façade with what seems to be mock surprise at the fact that Noctis is trying to kill him, it only serves to rile greater anger. Of course, he wants to kill you, you basket case. You’re just provoking him, now. Why are you acting like you’re one of us?

And then Noctis drops a few choice lines that will haunt me/him until the end of the game – things like “why have you been following us around all this time anyway; all this bad shit has been happening ever since you started tagging along behind us…” in other words, a violently sincere checklist of all of Prompto’s greatest fears. And this Ardyn, this Ardyn-who-isn’t-really-Ardyn, doesn’t fight back. He asks, disbelievingly, “Is that true?”

The horrible genius behind Ardyn’s plan is that it kills two birds with one stone – two beautiful, innocent, emotionally brutalised birds – by having them kill each other. What could be a worse fate for Prompto than finding out that his best friend doesn’t really love him; that, in fact, Noctis has been harbouring annoyance for him all along, and that this has festered into resentment the longer they stay together, and has finally become hatred now that the truth is coming out? What could be worse for Prompto than dying at Noctis’s hand?

At this point, let’s consider Prompto’s character. Prompto is a bit of a dork. He’s the same age as Noctis but has never considered himself as being in the same league as his friend, physically, intellectually, or socially. He has the lowest base stats of any of the four main characters. His defence sucks, his attack sucks, his magic sucks, and his HP is even worse than Ignis’s. His photographic hobby serves no practical purpose, unlike Noctis’s angling, or Gladio’s wilderness survival, or Ignis’s campside culinary creativity, which all mesh together ridiculously well. He’s the shortest in the group and the most feminine in appearance, and compensates the most (and apparently in the only way he knows how) with over-the-top body language and a tongue piercing and a wardrobe straight out of Hot Topic. Noctis even (affectionately) calls him a nerd on several occasions.

Prompto is painfully aware of his role in the group dynamic. He’s the annoying friend. The plebe in a party of royals. The self-conscious try-hard with no redeeming qualities, as far as Prompto himself is concerned. He is less aware of the strengths of his role, because they are not traditional male strengths, and because he is the only person in the group to successfully wield them.

Prompto is crucial to the main group because he is the best at maintaining relationships. He is the only one who is able to consistently offer the emotional support Noctis doesn’t let on that he needs; the only one with the courage to try to defuse the arguments between Gladio and the Prince, even at risk of harm; the one who puts aside his own anger to hold up Ignis when Ignis is stumbling blind through a swamp, fighting to stay himself while Noctis and Gladio just fight each other. When King Regis dies, not even Ignis maintains the level of composure and sensitivity that Prompto has. While the others crumble under an awkward and heartbreaking silence, Prompto softly attempts to comfort Noctis, while also instantly recognising that they need to flee, lest they face the same fate as Noctis’s father. While Ignis and Gladio sit in the dining car of the Tenebraean train in silence, Prompto attempts some semblance of normal conversation out of a desire to show Noctis that he is emotionally available.

His loud public persona and awkward tendencies mean that he comes across as slightly autistic or socially maladjusted. But he is far from stupid, and his reluctance towards anger and direct confrontation should not be mistaken for dullness. His instinct to support others just outweighs his instinct to respond to his own feelings.

But if he views these abilities as expendable, then why shouldn’t Noctis? By Prompto’s logic, the idea that Noctis might actually hate him and his loud, oblivious, materialistic personality is perfectly reasonable. That dramatic irony is the tragedy of Prompto’s character. It’s a tragedy that many players can recognise in some way, be it through themselves or who they once were, or through a friend or family member who underestimates their own importance.

Of course, Noctis does not hate Prompto. Far from it.

After chasing ‘Ardyn’ through the train car, suspended in a dreamlike state and mysteriously separated from his best friend, Noctis awakens to Prompto, lifting him to his feet. They scour the train together, stop the magitek troopers together, bring down a fleet together. So when Noctis sees Ardyn and Prompto standing atop the train, with Ardyn apparently having disarmed Prompto and now wielding Prompto’s gun against him, his reaction is instant. He bolts to save Prompto by throwing Ardyn from the train. It is at this exact, context-free, confusing, and somehow still earth-shattering moment that we realise Noctis has just flung his best friend off a moving train and is now stuck on top of it with Ardyn. Who proceeds to knock him out.

Now, let’s consider the relationship between the player and Noctis. Right from the start of the game, we occupy a space in the back of Noctis’s mind. We are the third-person in his RPG world, and while we have enough distance both visually and narratively to view him as his own distinct character, we are beckoned forward to identify closely with him, all the time. One of FFXV’s great strengths is its immersive power. Whether we are young and on our own clumsy journey into the responsibilities of adulthood, like Noctis, or whether the game serves as a portal into our past, it attempts to appeal to a universal sense of familiarity. It achieves this certainly not through the genders of the main dudes or the roles the game therefore assumes they should mould themselves to, but because the undercurrent of love is instantly recognisable to anyone lucky enough to have faced a challenge beside their friends. FFXV is about growing up by supporting the people you love and accepting their support in return, and as Noctis’s shadow, we get a first-row view of his appreciation of this. We feel his appreciation through the links we make to our own memories.

So, with this clarity of vision, in this spiral of dramatic irony with Prompto at the ugly centre, we know intrinsically that Noctis cares about him. This is not even something to be questioned. We see it in his affectionate exasperation and in the way his voice softens whenever he laughs at Prompto’s awful jokes. It’s in the sincerity of the scene at the motel, when Prompto admits his fears of inadequacy to Noctis, and Noctis tells him how much he values their friendship. We know how honest Noctis is in this friendship because his whole experience is one of helplessness in the face of destruction and thankfulness for what he has left – a lurching return to innocence, heralded by tragedy and softened by beauty.

But it isn’t only in these confessions that Noctis’s feelings are confirmed – it’s in the feeling that every moment the four friends spend together is precious and fleeting. The game is saturated with gentle scores and spontaneous bursts of music that ache to reflect the joy in the characters’ journey together. The lingering sadness in some of these pieces only reinforces the inkling that none of this can last – that they cannot be friends forever, because life has a way of ending things that should go on, and love hints always at sacrifice. Even game mechanics like the day-night cycle reinforce this feeling, as each sunset bathes the world in silence just a little too soon, and we think, ‘just one more fish, just one more hunt, just one more line of ridiculous, endearing dialogue’, but to push these boundaries would be to endanger our friends, and we are forced to retire for another night. The game sears moments of perfection into our mind, and in doing so, reminds us that each of these moments can only happen once. Every dungeon is new until you know what’s inside; every fish is a question mark until you catch it. (THIS IS A SERIOUS ESSAY I SWEAR.)

Prompto’s photos are perhaps the strongest mechanic of all when it comes to creating this sense of joyous ephemerality. What appears to be a game mechanic of little worth – indeed, what many hardcore reviewers criticise as a gimmicky addition to a weird bachelor party road trip of a game – holds arresting thematic relevance. Photography has been used in many games to express the irretrievability of a single moment, or to capture a second of the impossible (think of everything from Fatal Frame to Firewatch to Life is Strange – where photography exists in a game, it always provokes meaning, even if only sometimes offering a useful mechanic). Prompto is an indispensable member of the group – yes, because he’s funny, he’s kind, he’s supportive, and he puts himself in as much danger as anyone else to stop the Empire’s mad plans – but also because he is the group’s record keeper, the one producing proof that all of this happened. Prompto is the guy with the camera, and that means more than he can know. Noctis’s final request, after all, is to carry one of Prompto’s photos with him into death.

Let’s return to Noctis as a character, and try to understand the growth he experiences, leaving him at a point where he finally feels he can face that horrendous death in the absence of his friends. By the end of the game, he reaches a place  where he appreciates that he can fulfill his duty with only his friends’, fiancé’s, and father’s love to support him, despite that he will never see any of them again. He has accepted that the halcyon days of his closest relationships are gone forever. This is in large part due to the fact that he has proof of their time together. It is vivid in his memory even when the present feels like a dream – the sidequests and aimless travel easily last three-quarters of the full game, after all, and the endgame is more of a haunted epilogue than a true catharsis. It is in his ability to even sit on the throne, as alone, he would never have survived the return to a daemon-ravaged Insomnia. And it is in the final photo that he takes with him. Noctis is heartbreakingly aware that his power is all thanks to his friends, and his sacrifice is an attempt to reciprocate this love by returning them to a time when they were free.

The scene on the train and its brutal aftermath (yes, this essay thingy is still about the scene on the train) is a crucial turning point in Noctis’s journey. After Prompto is thrown form the train by none other than his best friend, who believed he was in fact Ardyn, Prompto is captured. Sure, there’s some as-yet-unpublished DLC that happens in the middle, probably involving more horrible experiences for Prompto, but we basically know where he ends up. Captured, detained, and tortured, and Ardyn seems to enjoy every second of it. When Noctis rescues Prompto, Iggy and Gladio in tow, he releases Prompto from the Shinra-esque rack he’s suspended on and supports his exhausted collapse. Prompto says, almost infuriatingly, “Tell me Noct… were you worried?” The millisecond it takes the decent player to hit “of course I was” and yell “I fucking love you, you prick” at the TV, Noctis is gathering himself for a reply. One almost expects anger, but instead, he replies with warmth and appreciation – not even pity. This seems to be the best possible response, because Prompto confesses he knew this was true – that Noctis would come to rescue him, and that the trick had been Ardyn’s design, and not a product of Noctis’s hatred. Their reunion is essentially a happy one, despite the circumstances.

Because this is FFXV, the scene feels slightly emotionally constipated as no actual reflection is afforded the exchange. The boys accept and go about their usual business (with the exception that Prompto, bruised and bleeding like everywhere, leans unmoving against the wall with a look on his face that suggests he’s probably going to be traumatised for the rest of his life). Noctis’s apparent calmness could come off as a little uncaring from a shallow analysis (AHAHAHA BUT WHAT DO WE HAVE HERE). However this is the first time in the entire game he has had any chill about anything. In short, he is returning Prompto a favour.

In long, he has come to terms with grief and better appreciates his role as someone who can bring stability to a traumatic time, and Prompto is a person who, for all his wildness, values that affection and stability, evidenced by the fact that he is usually the one providing it. Consider Noctis before this development. While a wonderful character, he was pretty typically a FF protagonist in his fear of letting people down, not being able to save someone, etcetera etcetera. Lightning couldn’t save Serah, Cloud couldn’t save Aerith, Tidus couldn’t save Yuna probably, Ashe let her fiancé and father die before she could raise a rebellion. Like her, Noctis couldn’t save Luna or Regis. For the whole first half of the game, his objective was to find Luna, to reunite with her, to bring her into the fold and finally marry her. Twelve years of betrothal come to a clamorous end when Ardyn murders Luna, and it echoes straight back to the death of Regis at the hands of Ardyn’s imperial army, at the start of the game. Losing not only his father and his lover but also his best friend would ruin Noctis. Talcott’s grandpa’s murder, and then Gladio’s injuries, followed by Ignis going blind, are the start of Noctis’s realisation of the length his friends will go to, to protect him. His reaction, understandably, is guilt. He hasn’t accepted his own political weight or the personal sacrifices he must make at this point, which is frankly a perfectly healthy and decent reaction to finding out that people are willing to die for you because your powers can save the world or whatever. We see how distraught Noctis is when Prompto falls, and he has to recount the ordeal to Ignis over the phone. No question from our end – Noctis cares immensely about Prompto.

At this point, he is still not the force of stability that we see him as at the end. It is through the next few days of quiet travel, the realisation that night is coming and will never end, and the slow, sad appreciation for these final moments with Ignis and Gladio that Noctis realises what everyone has been fighting for. They’ve been fighting for each other and for him, sure, because they’re friends, but they’ve also been fighting for that joy that they once knew and want to restore to the world. Prompto, too, has sacrificed more than a simple plebe should ever have been expected to sacrifice in this savage political diatribe, because he wanted to support Noctis. Noctis seems to realise, in this twilit interval between the open world of the past and the claustrophobic corridors of the future, that the time for him to become a stable force for his friend is now.

When Noctis frees Prompto from one of the most disturbing locations in the game, more akin to something from Amnesia than FF, his character arc completes. His developmental climax has already happened, and the endgame follows in swift, ghostly steps. Were you worried about me? Of course I was. The moment Prompto is thrown off the train marks a climax in Noctis’s grief about what they have left behind and what has been ruined. His reunion with Prompto forms an assurance that, despite the finality of this sadness, their adventure has fostered some future cure. The small, fleeting beacons of joy, now gone, signed a pathway toward eventual hope. Prompto will never recover, and Noctis will never be able to go back and stop what happened to him. But he is alive, and Noctis can make sure there is a future in which he can rest, and continue recording the passage of those moments vital to life.

We are important to each other. Our short time together was precious and transformative. The things we did together we may never do again, but to believe you mean any less to me because you’ll be in my past soon (OR because you’re a magitek trooper – surprise) is so, so wrong. That wreck of a bachelor party is the reason we made it so far.

And so this mess of an analysis winds to a close.

I’ve covered a few important points in this ridiculous monologue. The success of FFXV as an examination of transience and the power of friendship, probably. Some stuff about Ardyn was in there as well I think.

I don’t know. This game didn’t have a great deal of closure and neither does this essay. But I feel like there was some good stuff in there. I wouldn’t have spent so much time on it, otherwise. I wouldn’t have loved so deeply if that moment of perfection had never happened.

But all good things come to pass. The game, Noctis, this essay. That’s it.