#it's like.. it feels like i talk about yosuke's internalized homophobia all the time... even though i NEVER ACTUALLY DO

[crosswindtakeoff]

souyo will never not be good. like the whole town in visibly pining for u and u go for yosuke hanamura the one guy who is trying to hide it and doing the worst possible job

they r so loser4loser

also literally any getting together souyo drabble mayhaps?

LIKE LITERALLY imagine being the guy who basically saved Inaba and the world , you're a team leader because you make smart and level headed decisions.

And then you see Yosuke, this bumbling idiot who doesn't even know how to thunk before he speaks and you're like. Yeah yes. This one.

In terms of getting together... I think it's so so important that Yosuke confess first. His internalized homophobia is such a large hurdle he needs to get over bc he's like basically almost confessing the entire game ("Like you. You're really special to me." ??????) And then backing out immediately.

And Yu is both... patient but slightly intimidated by the way Yosuke approaches the idea of being gay,, he wants to give Yosuke the time to overcome his own feelings because he's not stupid. He can yell that Yosuke likes him or at the very least is struggling with accepting the fact that he's queer.

But I mean. There's also that part of him that is scared of rejection. He's still just a teen and he can't bare the sting of having Yosuke say no to his face, especially if it's going to be coupled with some statement about how he's "not gay" in a slightly upset? Disgusted? Offended? Tone. Yosuke is his partner who he trusts and cares for deeply and the idea of him being Disgusted or uncomfortable around him feels like the end of the world.

Basically Yu is anxious and emotionally constipated and Yosuke *needs* to overcome his struggles before this can work so I think a huge part of really overcoming it is him confessing first

NOW HOW THE CONFESSION GOES... You KNOW it's started by Yosuke doing something a little bit gayer than usual, followed by silence, and him yelling "BYE" and running away while he processes for a bit. Bonus points if its a build up of things over one week and it really makes him think.

For example: asks Yu to practice kissing for a future gf, says "love you!' When hanging up the phone one night, instinctively reaching for his hand to not get lost in a crowd, etc. It has Yosuke constantly on edge,, all those emotions he tried to stuff down are coming back full force, and now he can't even look at Yu without feeling warm in his chest.

And one night, on a whim of adrenaline an impulse, he runs all the way to the Dojima residence (bc he's dramatic. Too dramatic for over the phone.) And the moment he sees Yu opens the door he just blurts out "I THINK IM IN LOVE WITH YOU."

There's. A deafening moment of silence that's quickly followed by embarrassment as he realized he just yelled this over the Dojima's having dinner. Oops.

Anyways, Yu would ask him to come in and they'd talk upstairs about. Well about everything,, they talk about Yosuke, how scared he was to admit to this part of himself... why he felt that way but realizing he needs to stop caring ehst others think because it hurts him to hide it... and because he loves Yu and knows Yu would never judge him. Yu talking about his internal worries as well, worried that Yosuke would avoid hum like the plague or be annoyed with him for liking him.

And then... they just kinda lay down together and slowly recount all the moments they've had together. The first time they entered the TV world, riding scooters together, Yosuke pulling him out of the Mitsuo hallucination, how angry and protective Yosuke had gotten not just over him, but especially Dojima and Nanako at the hospital, saving the world... everything.

And reiterates "You're really special to me, partner..."

LETS GO GAY PEOPLE

[disaster-caster]

what are your feelings about the persona 4

THIS. THIS IS THE MILLION DOLLAR QUESTION REALLY. i love talking abt my interests dnbcjsjxnsksns

persona 4 is not my favourite persona game, but it’s not a bad persona game either. there’s parts of p4 that i really really love — hell, kanji is one of my favourite persona characters of all time, and that’s a pretty coveted spot considering akihiko sanada is up there as well.

there’s SO many parts of p4 that are done really well, but i find that lots of character arcs and moments lack the gut punch and emotional finisher if that makes sense. there’s definitely arcs and s. links that are the exception (nanako, dojima, kanji to an extent etc) that i think are the exception but that’s what they are — exceptions. the norm, imo, don’t always reach the emotional payoff i like in persona s. links.

the biggest elephant in the room for me is yosuke. i adore yosuke, and i like what he’s set out to be character-wise in the beginning. but in removing his romance they’ve turned his internalized homophobia (which he externalizes @ kanji) into just plain homophobia. and it’s vicious too, honestly i don’t even know why kanji stays friends with all of them with the way yosuke treats him. an internalized homophobia and overcoming your own insecurity (which is already a focus in yosuke’s link) would have added far more connection and empathy for him. instead he just seems like a dick, which SUCKS because he really is a genuinely sweet kid, yosuke has moments that i ADORE. but it gets undermined by his homophobia that is never meaningfully acknowledged.

despite all of that though, persona 4 is the first persona game i recommend to people. it has a fun narrative that is easy to understand and get into. small town murder mystery is so much fun & investigating for clues is one of my favourite parts of p4.

so i guess my answer is : it’s complicated! i love p4! but i also have my reservations about it. that is all!

[raven]

wrt persona main characters and shipping (which is literally encouraged in the game so dont even talk to me). p3 is wild because many good parts about yukari come from her dating the protag but their actual relationship is like. you're doing all this... for HIM?! i dont like thinking about them together, but theyre literally real and true. It's similar with aigis. both of them lack chemistry but it feels like they NEED to date him for the narrative. ryoji also lacks chemistry. grow up. every other character should not date him. Grow. Up. femc is wild because i DO care about her relationship with aigis a LOT and the only thing that changed is that theyre both girls but can you blame me...? they explicitly change the relationship so that it's compelling. they're both girls!! We gave the robot internalized homophobia! femc somehow despite not being in any actual cutscenes with anyone has much more dynamic swag. next protagonist. p4 is definitely a similar level of bland to p3, but mostly outside of relationships, whereas p3 protag i can generally vibe with in his daily life but not his relationships. mr p4 is completely 100% undoubtedly carried by yosuke, who is the true main character of p4 for better or worse. Every other relationship in that game sucks. except ai. Shout out to ai. not that i want them to be together. i like that social link only if you start out dating her. #celibacy. #breakup. hes also a generally good older brother figure so I'll give him that. anyways, yosuke, yeah everything they did with him is crazy, this post is long enough. and now onto joker. Now thats a character with character. Do i have a bias towards women? possible. joker just hit everything for me. what made joker so different idk scholars will be looking into it but i think its definitely at least 75% the eyelashes. his chemistry with every man is great. women are definitely more hit or miss with him but thats because p5 was made by severe misogynists, not because joker himself is flawed. having a protagonist with an actual identity is definitely a good move from p5, especially because social links only have one path anyway. It's not like you can choose any stories at all, so you might as well just make the character a character. and reward the player for acting in character. Well there you have it. Tune in next time. im working on my phd dissertation for this series

[thatlittledandere]

1, 2, 3, 13, 14, 21, 24, 37, 38 and 39 for those writer questions. (Sorry for being so many at once I'm just curious)

fic writer’s meme

1, 2 and 3 already answered!

13.  What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?

You don’t need to write scenes chronologically! Changed my life.

14. What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across?

Those lists of words to use instead of “said” FUCK that. Also my high school Finnish teacher pissed me off, like, in general. And we didn’t even really WRITE fiction.

21. How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?

...Do I revise? *checks the definition of the word* Yeah it’s possible I don’t exactly “revise” after a fic is complete. Of course every time I open it to edit it or continue I go through what I already have and make alterations, but if all of that counted for this, it would be like asking “how many sessions does it take to write a fic” which is impossible to answer as it can range from one to dozens, even with oneshots. After I finish the last scene I post it and return to it, like, two days later to fix the typos lol

24. Have you ever deleted one of your published fics?

Nope.

37. Talk about your current wips.

Uuuuh I have WAY TOO MANY unfinished ones to mention and I’m not even sure which ones I’ve abandoned for good and which ones I’ll finish one day... But I started and two fics for Souyo week and I’m still PRETTY determined to finish them! 

One was... more of a vague idea than an actual plot, which is why I stagnated. But it’s my personal headcanon that while the seeds for Yosuke’s attraction to Yu were sown while rescuing Yukiko, Kanji’s dungeon is where Yosuke first started to... start to be somewhat almost aware of it. Like that’s where he had the first butterflies and/or the “wait a second” double take that he adamantly refused to acknowledge. And yeah that was supposed to be the fic for the Fog prompt because, uuh, steam is almost like fog, right? Yes I know what words mean

The second one was for the Stormy prompt. I made the storm more of a mood than a weather condition because I’m pretentious like that, and it was an argument fic. But then it spiraled out of control when more and more narrators kept forcing their way in and I got a case of bad conscience bc the reason for their argument was Yosuke’s internalized homophobia that he still wasn’t completely over and idk suddenly I started feeling guilty for exploring it constantly;; Like I haven’t even WRITTEN anything with that trope/headcanon yet but it’s always on my mind and it kinda feels like it’s all I can think or write about and like I’m somehow making light of other people’s trauma and yeah I’ll stop typing now

*clears throat* ANYWAY! I may or may not finish these one day.

38. Talk about a review that made your day.

I feel awkward naming names sdsfsdgf but this one time I felt a fic came out really forced and then one of my favorite authors commented that it “flowed naturally” and I was so happy I showed it to my mom lol. And my April Fools mistake got a really long comment picking apart scenes and lines I had already forgotten writing by that point (next day, but I wrote it in a real frenzy). Oh and someone commented on one of my stupid joke fics that “the plot is actually really good” and yea... I think about it a lot.

39. Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?

Luckily I haven’t gotten any!

[thecottageinthedark]

Sorting Persona 4

Here again with another Sorting Hat Chats post! This one’s for Persona 4. Full disclaimer; this is based just on the game, not the anime. Also it’s behind a cut cause it is LONG. And has spoilers.

The system I’m using is explained here by @wisteria-lodge.

The Persona 4 MC, whose name is either Souji Seta or Yu Narukami depending on which supplemental materials you go by, is a really REALLY loud Badger secondary. His power is based on making Social Links with NPCs and shifting to become whatever they need-and also on patiently grinding to level up his attributes. And because he lives so much in this secondary-plus the fact that on a meta level he’s kind of a stand-in for the player-his Primary is hard to see.

But where it gets revealed in the end is the decisive moment when the ending you’re going to get is decided. The Investigation Team have discovered that Namatame’s been putting people into the TV, and thus are assuming he’s the murderer-and it’s become horribly personal, because one of the people he did that to was Nanako, and even though she’s been rescued, she’s deathly ill thanks to the TV World’s poison.

And now you-and the MC-have a choice. The IT are baying for Namatame’s blood, ready to kill. One Badger Primary method would be to appeal to the fact that he’s a person, you can’t just kill people….but nobody’s listening. Another would be to dehumanise him and say, he’s a murderer, he needs to die for the sake of everyone-going along with all the fury of the group. A Lion would lash out too-less because everyone’s doing it and more from their own gut feeling, but that would still lead to dead Namatame. A Snake might kill Namatame because he hurt Nanako...or, in the Golden remake, if they’ve done Adachi’s social link, they might cover for him. Either way, they’d be prioritising an inner circle member.

And all of those get you bad endings. Especially the Snake choice to cover for Adachi.

What gets the good ending, the happy ending where the MC is fulfilled and at peace, is to ignore all the emotion that’s running so high, and order everyone to step back and take time to think about whether the theory of Namatame being the killer makes sense. Pounce on the niggling little detail that doesn’t fit, and realise that the assumption everyone is labouring under isn’t true. And then prioritise the actual truth over personal loyalties or emotional reactions.

Bird Primary.

Because of course. This is a detective story. Your party are called both the Investigation Team and the Seekers of Truth. Even the title song hints at it; find the truth (Bird) by getting together with others (Badger).

Yosuke Hanamura’s a young, immature Snake Primary at game start, with the selfishness typical to that. His Shadow throws that back in his face, and he realises he doesn’t like being an asshole whose secret gut reaction to murders happening is ‘well at least I’m not bored anymore now something is happening in this dead-end town’.

So he does two things pretty much at the same time; he widens his inner circle to let in first Souji and then the rest of the IT, and he adds a model on top to let him care about things outside that circle. I think it’s a Lion model-a young Lion, just like his Snake, that edges into Glory Hound, but keeps hold of the idea that you should do certain things because they’re just right.

(It’s not based on the MC, though the MC is undoubtedly his most important person, who he even calls his partner. But then, as I said, the MC’s Bird is very quiet, so it’d be hard for Yosuke to perceive it well enough to mimic it. I think it’s actually based on Chie, who is after all the inner circle member he has known longest!)

And his secondary? Yosuke’s a support guy. He lifts his friends up. His family run Junes, and he leverages that connection to create a base location for the IT and secure a portal into the TV world that’s big enough to be usable. When Teddie comes to the human world, it’s Yosuke who gives him a place to stay. He’s a Badger secondary, and again, this makes perfect sense. The Lover sorting. No wonder so much of the fandom ships him with the MC.

Chie Satonaka is LOUD and BRASH and if you are a jerk she will KICK YOU IN THE FACE. She is so goddamn Lion Secondary, and utterly unapologetic about it.

Her primary, I think, is Lion again. The reason she has gotten possessive of Yukiko (as her Shadow calls her out on) isn’t that she wants Yukiko to be just hers-it’s that she wants to be Yukiko’s knight. Saving the princess is actually a textbook Lion cause. It lets her feel heroic and brave.

But that’s not good for either of them. Damsel in distress is a shitty role, one that doesn’t allow Yukiko to be strong and capable herself, and Chie pushing Yukiko into that role is really straining their relationship. It’s also something that Chie herself knows is wrong-that’s why her Shadow accuses her of it. (“I am a Shadow, the true self...”)

So instead Chie changes gears, because oh look a new Cause just popped up! Find the killer and bring them to justice! And on top of that, there’s always sexist prats to kick.

Yukiko Amagi models Badger Primary, because it’s expected of her. Running an inn is a really Badger kind of job. She also models Badger Secondary, for the same reasons. She feels this is who she’s meant to be; sweet, gentle, socially adept, community-focused and hard-working. The traditional Japanese ideal of womanhood.

But it chafes. The weight of societal expectations feels crushing. She doesn’t want to do stuff just because she’s meant to, because people think she should. She’s an Internal Primary, and needs to follow the voice of her own heart.

And where that heart leads her...is back to the Amagi Inn, except now she’s decided that she’s doing this for herself. She needed to feel that she could actually choose to not inherit the inn, before she could realise that she wanted to run it. She’s a Snake Primary, and the inn is important to her because it’s hers.

Her secondary...actually I get the feeling she’s like Toph Beifong of Avatar, a Snake who likes to spend most of her time in neutral. She is delightfully quirky and weird, and owns that, but she doesn’t charge like a Lion and she’s comfy with wearing masks when the situation calls for it.

Kanji Tatsumi panics at the idea that he might be gay, and caretakes like a boss, and that might look at first sight like a Double Badger who’s scared that he might be one of the people he’s used to dehumanising. His Shadow screams that it wants to be accepted...but what calms it is when Kanji himself accepts it, and says that this resolution is about being true to himself. Kanji’s a Double Lion who burnt his primary because being given shit for the feminine, queer-coded parts of himself made him lose faith in his internal compass, worrying that it was leading him somewhere that he viewed as bad. Internalised homophobia’s a bitch of a thing.

Accepting his Shadow is the start of Kanji healing his primary-letting go of shame for being an oddball and telling the world to go fuck itself if it thinks it can make him conform. He does model Badger Secondary-as I said, he caretakes like a boss-but that’s more a thing he does as a gift to others. When it comes to solving problems, he charges in swinging, ready to beat up anyone from biker gangs to otherworldly monsters.

Rise Kujikawa is a cheerful, shameless Snake Primary, loving and ambitious. She became an idol to make friends, and enjoys the fame it gets her. And when she needs to take a break for the sake of her mental health, she has no compunctions about doing so.

But she needed that break because the idol life was stressing her out-unsurprisingly, it’s a really intense life. And the particular problem she had was to do with the conflicting expectations the public has of celebrities. Perfection is demanded...but so is authenticity.

Rise realised that she was face-shifting as an integral part of her career, and this knowledge sent her into a tailspin. The fans don’t like the real Rise Kujikawa-they like Risette. But who is the real Rise Kujikawa? She doesn’t know! It’s frightening! What if she’s just made of smoke and mirrors? How does she find out what’s underneath?

And the answer she comes to is that there is no real Rise Kujikawa...which is the same as saying that there is no false one. Rise is Risette is Rise, it’s all just her, adapting to the context as she needs to. She’s a Badger Secondary, and the act of performance is the true self.

And for her, that’s a good answer-it brings her peace. But now we need to talk about Teddie.

Because just hearing Rise say ‘there’s no real me’ sends Teddie into a Shadow crisis right there.

He completely fucking loses it. He’s a denizen of the TV world-he’s been immune to it all this time, never manifesting a Shadow, but this is what breaks him. And that just screams Bird Lion. It’s his Buzz Lightyear moment-or rather his first Buzz Lightyear moment, because there are two. This is the first, and he survives it by retreating into his Secondary. It allows him to bring Shadow Teddie under control...but this isn’t sustainable. He’s realised something terrible and can’t avoid that knowledge indefinitely.

And soon enough he admits it to himself (and to the MC). He is a Shadow, that somehow became self-aware. His Truth was never true. He can’t handle it, he has no idea how to even exist, and he outright tells the MC that he intends to commit suicide.

He recovers, though-and he does so because the MC tells him Nanako survived. That’s the first thing that gives him a glimmer of hope, because his Truth already had some Snakey elements in there about chosen people and ambitions. He comes back from the brink, reshapes his system to centre those Snake principles, and returns to the side of his friends.

Lastly, Naoto Shirogane, our other queer-coded character. (I’m using she pronouns for the sake of canon here-but I’m a firm believer in nonbinary Naoto, for the record.) I think she’s a Bird secondary-the only one of those here, jeez. She’s just so analytical. She’s a rapid-fire Bird too, Detective Prince working on a case, squarely in the middle of her comfort zone. But push her out of it-into a normal teenager social situation, say-and watch her squirm!

She has a Bird Primary performance, too. But performance is the operative word here. She’s trying to look adult and smart and collected, in order to be taken seriously by the police officers she works with. And she is smart, mind you, but that’s not the why of her though it is the how. It’s not Naoto who goes ‘wait, let’s think about this, we need more information’ at the crucial point, but the MC, who really is a Bird Primary. Naoto was the one to suggest doing a little vigilante justice vis-a-vis murdering Namatame.

Her real Primary is Lion. Being a detective is a Cause for her, not a Truth, and she is blazingly certain of her own sense of what’s right-so much so that she doesn’t stop and check it against other people’s. And she inspires people! She doesn’t even mean to, and certainly doesn’t know why, but she is just so cool that people flock to her and admire her. ‘The Detective Prince’ is, when you think about it, a really Lion Bird kind of title!

Her Shadow has two issues with her. First, it harps on the gender angle. Hey, self, there’s that thing about your identity that you’ve been refusing to think about! You need to go poke at it! And then it breaks down into a scared child. Self, your performance is eating you alive. You need to do it, yes, the Cause demands it, but you also need to be able to stop sometimes and let yourself have emotions!

In short:

MC/Souji/Yu: Bird primary, Badger secondary

Yosuke: Snake primary, Badger secondary, models Lion primary

Chie: Lion primary, Lion secondary

Yukiko: Snake primary, Snake secondary, with Badger primary and secondary models that start out pretty unhealthy for her. 

Kanji: Lion primary that starts out burnt and begins to unburn after his Shadow fight, Lion secondary. Models Badger secondary.

Rise: Snake primary, Badger secondary

Teddie: Bird primary, Lion secondary. Falls dramatically and recovers by shaping his system to be more Snakelike.

Naoto: Lion primary, Bird secondary, performs Bird primary

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

An Explanation of Why Louis and Violet are Both Terrific Love Interests [2/5]

+Why both romantic routes are not only amazing but better than other games I’ve personally played in the past.

+Why some people are idiots and get off on picking stupid fights.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Romantic Option #2: Warren Graham

Uhm.... Warren’s a person in this story, too.

He, uh, he’s really nerdy. He does some science shit. He has a huge crush on Max which is made very obvious by the everything about him. Uh..... he took a fist to the face and got a black eye because he was helping Max, uhm.... he took a picture that was pretty important to the plot... um....

I literally can’t remember anything else about him.

I couldn’t even remember his last name. I had to look up his wiki to remember anything about him.

That’s how forgettable he is.

Hell, fans of the game took his character and made him more interesting in fanart and fanfics than he ever was in the game! I remember more about THAT version of him than I do about the him in the canon of the game!

I gave you that whole bit about Chloe from memory. That’s how much more fleshed out and important she is within the game than Warren is. Everything I’m about to talk about here if from reading his wiki and remembering things that way.

We meet Warren and find out that he’s into nerdy shit like Max. He’s also obviously into her and does a shit job at hiding that fact, but then Nathan comes over and beats the shit out of him because plot.

When I first played, it was pretty obvious that Warren would be romanceable, and truth be told, I liked Warren. He was fine! He’s dorky and weird, but I thought he and Max could potentially be a cute couple, and so does the rest of the school since you can’t talk to any of the girls without them implying that Warren likes Max.

I kept waiting for Warren to be important, but it never really came! I mean, you could talk to him and help him with a science experiment [in which he fucking blows up] and you text him a lot. Oh, and you can go to a Planet of the Apes marathon with him which you never actually get to go to, but the game constantly reminds you that you’re going because Warren won’t shut up about it.

Let’s see, he also sends you instructions on how to build a bomb so that you can break into the principal’s office, and then he beats Nathan up, and then he shows up and takes a picture of him and Max that ends up being important in the final episode and then.... he doesn’t do much else.

Well, okay, he does talk about Max’s powers a little bit in ep5 and you can give him a smooch or hug him or disregard him completely.

And that’s about it.

........Wait a minute.

A boy with boyband hair who has extensive chemistry knowledge, knows how to make bombs, uses said bombs for pranks, gets fucked up by one of the antagonists AND was a throwaway character that the writers threw in there to further the plot along but doesn’t really do much so the fandom took him and made him better than the game ever gave him credit for...?

.....Welp, that’s a whole thing that I’m not gonna get into. One post at a time, folks.

ANYWAY

Back on topic, Warren’s a romanceable character, apparently. You can agree to go on a date with him and smooch him. You can tell people you think he’s cute. It’s fine.  

With all that about these two choices in mind, compare Warren to Chloe.

There is no comparison because Warren’s “romance route” is... is nothing! It’s a whole lot of little things that don’t amount to much! With Chloe, Max has all this chemistry and you spend 90% of the game with her! You forget that Warren exists until you get another text from him or another character brings him up!

You know what Warren feels like? He feels like a character that the writers threw in because they were worried that players wouldn’t want a tragic wlw love story between two best friends, who reconnect and fall in love over the course of five episodes.

Which, fair, because people are idiots.

Could they have made Warren more important? Sure, but like with Skybound and Telltale, they didn’t have an unlimited budget to pack everything they wanted into the game to make it better, and that’s not just limited to the relationships, that’s clear in the endings we got. And I’m sure that some Warren stans will read this and retaliate and tell me that he’s just as important than Chloe, I just don’t understand because I’m a shithead.

And maybe that’s true, but look me in the eye and tell me that if you took Warren out of the game, it would have drastically changed the story beyond repair.

Now, what does all this mean?

Compare Chloe and Warren to Louis and Violet as far as love interests go and how they were handled.

In TWDG, Louis and Violet are fairly even.

In LIS, Chloe and Warren aren’t even in the same universe. It doesn’t matter if you like Warren more, or if you like Chloe more, Chloe got more time and effort put into her story and romance than Warren did.

Think of it like this: Chloe is at a 90% and Warren 10%.  Louis is at 48% and Violet’s at 52%, and that’s depending on how you look at it.

If TWDG did the routes like this, then Violet would’ve been way more important, would’ve have ten times as many scenes with Clementine, and if you took her out of the story, the whole thing falls apart because she’d be 90% of the plot, while Louis over here would’ve been used as background noise and plot convenience once or twice. Sure, we would’ve gotten to know him a little bit, but not nearly anything substantial and not nearly as much in comparison.

That’s what we could’ve had, okay? The writers could’ve given us a single love interest and said: “We want you to pick this person... but we’ll also throw in this other person just in case y’all are homophobic/racist/fucking stupid/whatever.”

In conclusion: We were blessed with Louis and Violet who each got an arc and love story, both of which are fairly even. 

Have I made my point yet? No? You need more examples? Fine. I’ll give you another alternative to what we could’ve had, or rather, what we could’ve missed out on.

[Note: I want to add that I haven’t played Life is Strange 2, but I know that its playable character is also bisexual and can choose between a boy and a girl to romance, but I can’t comment on how well it did because I’ve yet to play it.]

[persona 4 and the relationships you can’t have]

This one time I tried to romance my partner but he was too busy trying to convince everyone that he’s straight to even notice.

Persona 4 is a game that came out in 2008, then re-released with new content in 2012 under the name Persona 4: Golden. The game follows your nameable protagonist who has just moved in with their uncle and cousin. During his year-long stay, he becomes involved in investigating mysterious murders while harnessing the power of summoning Persona. 

Great game, one that took over my life for about a year. Great characters, great voice acting, great story, great antagonists, and great romance and romanceable characters. 

While the romance is more of a side thing depending on if you decide to take that route with one of your social links, it’s still nice to have special moments with them to break away from all the TV murder and whatnot. 

And you have several great options to choose from! You’ve got Chie, Yukiko, Rise, Naoto, and then you’ve got several other girls around the school that you can start a thing with, but they’re not as important as those core four. 

Each of the girls has an incredibly well-written story and share a deep bond with you, the protagonist. So, the reason I’m putting this example here is that the choice between all these great girls is super hard, right? 

Wrong. 

Because when I played the damn game, I didn’t romance any of them. Not because I didn’t like them or because I didn’t want my character to have a romance, but because the asshole I WANTED to romance wasn’t an option. 

Because I’m not allowed to romance the dudes. 

And that includes this dude. 

Yosuke Hanamura

Remember that pin I mentioned about how great it is that Clementine’s bi because not only does it give us well-deserved representation but also allows the player to romance both girls and boys? 

The Protagonist of Persona 4 is not bisexual. 

I can only romance the girls because he is straight. 

But not really, because MY Protagonist pursued and sought after Yosuke despite the fact that the game would not let me romance him. Which is bullshit, because he clearly feels the same way, and no, that’s not my crazy brain making shit up. 

My entire playthrough was pretty much 

I won’t get into it because Persona is a long game and a complicated one to even try and explain to someone who hasn’t played it so that’s another rant for another day, but know this: 

Yosuke was the perfect opportunity to tell the story of a boy dealing with internal homophobia, falling in love with his best friend [PARTNER] after the girl he cared about died horrifically and faced his shadow learned to accept himself and his insecurities. The potential here was wasted. 

There are a shit ton more layers to that, but on the barest of bare-bones, that’s what I wanted. 

Hell, according to a bunch of people, Yosuke was going to be a romantic option, but they scrapped it! Insult to injury, I’ll say!

Comparing this to TWDG, you could argue that Clementine only gets to romance Louis and Violet, but some wanted to romance Mitch, Aasim, Brody, ect. 

Fair enough, but what I’m saying is this:

It sucked that I couldn’t romance the person I wanted to when I played Persona, and it still sucks every time I play a game and my person of desire is unattainable. This isn’t just Persona, that’s just the first game that comes to mind when I think about characters I always wanted a romance, but that includes all the other missed opportunities from other games, as well.

The Final Season is different. 

The writers of TFS could’ve said, “Oh you want to romance Louis/Violet? Oh no, sorry, we were gonna do it but we changed our minds! But, don’t worry, we’ll leave hint after hint that they have feelings for you but you can’t actively pursue them. Allow us to tease you with the wonderful romance that could’ve been! Midnight piano lessons! Conversations under the stars! Lots of smooches! You’ll never see it in canon!”

Or, they could’ve only given us one of them, but that’s the topic of the next game. 

In conclusion: They didn’t have to give us Louis and Violet or make them romanceable. If you want Clementine to have a relationship with them, you have the option to do that, which is something you can’t say with other games.

Continued in Part 3

[raven]

first, fitting moment from persona q2 that i just played

and under the cut

so............. ugh. the first thing i want to say is that it does on the surface seem to be the same as any other persona games. specifically in the way it talks about women. like, p5 also had a lot of misogyny issues and uncomfortable moments, but once kanji gets introduced it frankly becomes heartbreaking. im just going to assume you havent played the game since you're asking this question so i will summarize: kanji's entire arc is about how he doesn't feel masculine because he likes to knit and sew. and because he's attracted to men.

so kanji's story opens up with him speaking to world famous boy detective naoto, and getting embarrassed when the protag and friends run into them. because he's clearly attracted to naoto. so he gets kidnapped into the tv world whatever we've all been there. his dungeon is a bathhouse, and his shadow (in this game you fight the shadows of your friends which represent their repressed selves that they're denying, we've all been there) is a flamboyant gay stereotype. well, but that is kanji, right? at the end, everyone accepts their shadow. well, kanji isnt not attracted to girls, hes just afraid of them because theyre mean to him. whatever, hes bisexual i didnt know that. except (grits my teeth) we'll get to it

after that kanji is officially a member of the investigation team which consists of yosuke. and some other people but yosuke is the only important person there. the school goes on a camping trip. on this camping trip, the girls fuck up cooking (its funny because girls should know how to cook) and there's a character there who literally only exists to make fun of fat people. then its time to go to bed and the main character and yosuke are sharing a tent. suddenly kanji breaks in and whatever can he stay with you in your tent. this leads to yosuke asking if he would be safe in the tent with him, since, yknow, kanji is gay. it's incredibly uncomfortable and not a throwaway line. it goes on for a while. it feels endless. and you can't speak up. your character has no option to tell off yosuke. no option to defend kanji. eventually kanji runs off to the girls tents to prove his heterosexuality or whatever. it's a really fucked up scene.

so basically, that's what happens through the rest of the game. kanji does something, yosuke finds a way to be homophobic. let's take a break here to talk about yosuke. who i don't even hate. he makes me upset and seeing him without warning makes me scared (sorry for the jumpscare at the top of this post) but i dont even dislike him because of what could be done with his character. because he's the protagonist's best friend. and look, im a fujoshi, but i think its easy to interpret him as having feelings for the protagonist. there's even a cut romance route that was voiced in english and yes i have investigated the rumors are true etc. and he could have an interesting story about overcoming internalized homophobia. and i would be rooting for him. but he doesn't. it's not in the game. so you just have him being absolutely vicious to kanji nonstop. (and also being a misogynist, but like, so are ryuji and junpei, and i like them) no growth, no investigation. he's straight up cruel to everyone, because he's a shitty teenager, but with kanji it's a fucking political statement it's just not something that can be brushed away especially with the rest of the game... which i will get to. but i just need to keep saying like yosuke could've had a great and intentional story in which he learns from his mistakes and becomes a better person. but it's not there and it's just hard to know what is intentional and meant to have been remedied, and what is genuinely what the writers believe. but i honestly give this whole part too much credit, because of my own projection on the character. he's just a miserable person written by miserable people. also, persona evolutions aka character growth is tied to social links which arent mandatory, so all story scenes are written for people who haven't played the social links in mind, so none of the characters can get any actual growth in their story scenes, so even if he did get better (which, like, his social link is not that bad, and he comes to terms with a lot of stuff even if it's not his homosexuality) the growth would never be shown with another character.

shortly after kanji's dungeon, teddie becomes a party member, and he is one of the worst characters ever. hes worse than yosuke. so teddie is a bear creature who lives in the tv world but he can become a real boy when he enters the real world, and yosuke takes him in. which is a recipe for disaster. who let yosuke take care of a child. i mean, teddie was bad before, but with yosuke's influence there is no saving him. "mean to a child" THEYRE NOT REAL. THESE ARE CHARACTERS. teddie makes the game such a miserable experience. he is constantly sexualizing women and saying some bullshit. honestly i cant even like describe what he does but him just being in a scene makes me mad. seeing him makes me mad. i want him dead

before we go back to kanji's arc, let's discuss naoto, who is a girl. but i will continue to refer to naoto with he/him. because im my own god. naoto's dungeon in the tv world is a laboratory, and his shadow is a mad scientist who's about to give him the surgery. so he can become a real man. which he can never be because hes a girl. whatever. you can NEVER be my prince, naoto. UGH. through his social link you have him "coming to terms" with being a woman and what made him not want to be a woman. and none of it comes across very well. i dont think cis women say shit like "i wish i was born male". except me. anyways, i will say i think naoto's arc is poorly written, and there is no way you could make me see him as a girl, but i don't think it's actively malicious in the way everything about kanji is. it's just shitty and uncomfortable. there's also the moment when the team goes to the doctor to see if the tv world has had any negative effect on them, and they look at the measurements, and they see naoto's bust size, and do i need to continue? should i kill myself

oh, teddie's arc ends with him discovering he's a shadow, but because he believes in himself, he can be a real boy. he can be a human since he has the power of friendship and self love. that would literally be fine if it wasn't the same fucking game that naoto couldn't be a boy because he's a girl. that just pisses me off. it just pisses me the fuck off.

did you forget this post was about kanji? anyway, this post is about kanji. throughout the game he continues to reiterate that he is not gay. and also he continues to be funny and awesome and cute. and yosuke continues to hate on him. but it's okay because he doesn't need anyone's approval, because sewing and knitting are cool, and he's straight. because, remember? he had a crush on naoto. and naoto is a girl. so he's straight. i really do think that kanji and naoto are cute together. they have a sweet relationship. in naoto's dungeon, kanji tells everyone to stand back because everyone needs to deny their shadow at first. he just needs to get it out and they need to fight and then he can accept himself. this is because kanji has noticed a pattern in the dungeons because he's a genius, and because he genuinely cares about naoto enough to want to make that connection. like kinda tearing up thinking about it. but yeah theyre basically kind of cutes. but naoto is a girl. so kanji is straight. and i dont know. maybe im just not making the best argument with this, because kanji has clearly had bisexual tendencies in the past. and liking girls is known to be a bisexual trait. but the way it comes from this game. after like, 40, 50, however many hours of being homophobic to kanji. and kanji trying to convince everyone he doesn't like men. it feels like something much deeper than "he likes this one girl, and also many girls, and also boys." it's just exhausting.

and kanji's arc of being okay with his feminine hobbies is kind of a rarity in this game. at least he's being true to his heart there. compare that to yukiko's notorious social link in which she begins with wanting to have her own life and not inherit her family's inn, only to shift to actually really wanting to inherit the inn (not even) halfway through. because it's what society wants from her! never be your true self. never move away.

but anyway, this is literally just plot details. every time the investigation team hangs out, there are moments that just feel bad. there are so many lines that just feel. bad. it builds on itself and it compounds. it truly feels like a group of gay teenagers who are hellbent on keeping each other in the closet. which feels like an insane thing to say but like... god. if you know you know. if you have experienced their hangout sessions you have felt their negative vibes. it just feels so bad

theres also a drag show that commits to calling drag artists predators over and over again. and the fat joke character i mentioned earlier shows up several times. it's just kind of miserable. the type of shit kanji (and to a lesser extent, naoto) go through is genuinely the type of shit that keeps real people IN REAL LIFE closeted. like, that's the end point, i guess. this game did bad things to my brain, and being a lesbian is the only thing i can respect about myself, so i cannot IMAGINE what it feels like to be a teenager coming to terms with your own sexuality and being met with such vitriol. the message is to shut up and conform, while the game claims to be about accepting your true self. it just feels absolutely disgusting.

what about p4 strikes you as mean spirited?