#no spoilers just vague references to non plot relevant stuff

[celestialcass]

Finished system collapse! I put tags on some moments I’ll need to reference for fan art as well as the best, funniest dialogue moments.

I really loved it! I still think Network Effect may be slightly higher in my preference but every Murderbot Diaries book makes my ♡ happy so!!

ART continues to be my favourite non-Murderbot character and there is an extremely funny dynamic that ART has with another ship that I won’t spoil, as it’s only really shown at the very end.

Ratthi and Iris get a lot of focus, which is just wonderful because they’re delightful in every scene. We also get a new character Tarik who is charmingly awkward and probably the human most similar to Murderbot, which is funny and the contrast of how the humans razz Tarik constantly but are so gentle with MB… it makes me feel things. Ouch. But yay!

MB’s trauma is NOT minimized at all and is developed realistically and with the characteristic charm you might expect. There is no instant cure but we find MB looking more optimistic at the end than it starts out as.

The action and plot are similarly fast paced as the other books in the series! I would absolutely recommend this book and shall be rereading it shortly.

Thanks for coming to my TedTalk book review!

[avemstella]

so that archon quest, huh. Would be absolutely thrilled to hear what u have to say about fontaine act V :] i love all your takes on furina & neuvillette & fontaine as a whole, and of course childe [pretty much an honorary fontanian with how he unintentionally got wrapped up in everything whoops]

Oh boy, I have so many thoughts. To start with some non-spoilerly stuff: I loved it so much. I'm not sure if I'll say it's my favorite Archon Quest yet (I think I would have to go through some of the older ones), but I think it's safe to say Fontaine overall as an arc is my favorite. Even its weakest part (the prison stuff, tbh it was a pacing issue) was still really solid and the ending, while not perfect, really landed. Genshin continued the trend from Sumeru of having the playable characters really take the stage and god there were some great standouts (Navia/Neuvi/Furina to name my favs, but I also loved my fatui and there really isn't anyone I've disliked). And well, the quest (and Furina's chara quest) made me cry like a baby, so that's a win.

Tbh, I think my biggest issue, wasn't even really an issue with the story but just a case of I had a very clear idea of what I wanted out of it (the woes of writing speculative fic pfft) and when it wasn't that I'm like "awww darn". Thats on me, and I genuinely really loved what we got, but it do be like that sometimes haha.

Spoilers below, oh boy (also my Furina fic spoilers too lol).

Eldritch abomination Furina I'll mourn u forever. I can't complain because Furina splitting herself in two to go fuck u to the heavens is such a boss ass move I can't haha. Okay, but I will say, even if I'm probably the only one, I do wish they brought some Remuria stuff up in the main quest. They had the perfect set up with Ajax being there with his Greek myth references and just ahhhh, one can hope they do something with it later. But yes, just know it's my silly headcanon that Focalors just lied about being an Oceanid to Neuvi and is one of King Remus's fucked up Primordial Sea experiments that maybe caused the Abyss rift at the fall of Remuria.

But yes, Furina, Furina, I'm crying. She really destroyed the girl failure accusations in the most glorious way possible. She literally didn't fail once (either of her), she plotted out a plan to trick the heavens, give back what was stolen, and save her people and she did it perfectly. As you're probably well aware, I'm a big fuck u Celestia gal, so it was just so satisfying to see her just obliterate the throne (even when I was crying haha). And honestly, super relevant to the state of the real world, but her giving back sovereignty to Neuvi in my mind is a very clear decolonization metaphor. Ages past descenders came to Teyvat, killed the dragons and created their own order, and now Focalors is returning that power back to said dragon (or well, the dragon's heir, it's a bit vague if Neuvi's literally the old dragon's soul reincarnated or just the body).

The entire scene between Neuvi and Focalors was great, though I will admit I have one issue with it (and even then I go back and forth on it haha). Neuvi in that scene doesn't have a big attachment to Focalors. What I mean is that ultimately Neuvi only ever knew Furina (which side note I'll get into this next, but I do view them as the same person, but still), and with Focalors' 'death' he's not technically losing anything, the person he's sad over will still be there. Like don't get me wrong, he's very empathetic and can be sad over this person who is dying for them, but I feel like it could have been even more heartbreaking if he had met Furina/Focalors before the split, or he had interacted with Focalors somehow in the past, and so in this moment he wasn't just watching Furina's sacrifice, but the sacrifice of someone he shares memories with. But that's me being picky haha and not really a critique on the writing.

But yes, Furina! Focalors! As I previewed before, I'm going to come out swinging with a possibly hot take. They are, and always were the same person. Yes, Focalors is the divinity, but as we see after Furina is allowed to rest her persona, Furina is also super mature and knowledgeable. In Neuvi's flashback quotes of Furina, it's her softly giving important advice about living with humanity, which is what Focalors was all about. And much like Furina, Focalors loves preforming, she loves humans, she gets all excited about Furina and her future, and is sad she won't get to experience it.

Not to remotely downplay Furina's suffering (because holy shit my poor girl), but Focalors too played her role. Unlike Furina who had Neuvillette and all her friends post this, Focalors was all alone in the Oratrice, waiting for the day she had to kill herself. Furina, has the promise of a future, despite all the suffering she endured to get there. She gets the reward of a happy life as a human surrounded by people who love her, and while it was touch a go for a bit, she was told one day her play would end. In contrast, while Focalors didn't have the same anxiety that Furina had, Focalors knew from the beginning she would never get to see her people saved. Technically she, like Furina, didn't even know if it would even happen. She put her faith in Neuvillette to follow through, and while she had the utmost faith in him, she could never know for certain. But much like her mirror Furina, Focalors weighed her suffering over the people of Fontaine's, and never once faltered. Furina was willing to possibly kill herself via primordial seawater in order to keep up her ruse, whose to say Focalors wasn't the same. Smiling at Neuvillette until the last moment because she couldn't risk him interfering, hiding away her anxieties and sorrow, so he wouldn't look so sad. Furina's performance ended, Focalors' never will.

Focalors was so certain she couldn't be human, but as we see from the Oceanids it was totally possible. And even more vitally, we see from the other Archons it's possible. They might fumble around a bit (some more than others, looking at u Ei), but they are learning and immersing themselves with their people. While not an Archon, it's the same with Neuvillette. Focalors should have had the same opportunities as Furina and the rest (mostly because she is Furina), but the world isn't kind, and that's why her sacrifice hurts.

If u can't tell I have a lot of feelings about Focalors/Furina and while I can appreciate a joke about Focalors giving Furina anxiety, I'm also like, they are literally the same person working together, she deserves the world (all of her).

But yes, I can go on and on about Furina, but for now I'll move onto our boy Childe. To get it out of the way, a little disappointed that we really got no answers about him. Poor guy didn't really have any lines. Also, not big on Skirk's design, mostly the outfit. Putting her next to Dain and uh, yeah (like don't get me wrong don't mind the color scheme and all, but could she not have gotten some kind of armor. Or look more like Foul Legacy or something idk).

But onto more happier notes, I'm so happy to see Childe finally getting to do well in a fight. I know it's a meme for him to get beaten up, but my dude is the Vanguard, let him win sometimes (he doesn't technically win here, but he was fighting an eldritch whale monster for ages and helped save Fontaine, I'm giving it to him). And Skirk, while her design is mostly less to be desired, I'm winning on guessing her hair and eye color haha. Also, while I'll always love my version, I'm liking her personality so far. Her yeeting Childe, while I admit took me out a bit (I thought she threw him farther into the Abyss and was like, "uh guys, yall worried about my poor boy here???" and then was a bit baffled at them saying he was fine) was so fucking funny. It's cool to learn "Foul Legacy" refers to a literal person, and I found the fact that Skirk's relationship with Foul is basically the same as her relationship with Childe very amusing. And it seems she's Khaenri'ahn, maybe? Also, I thought she was listing off her master's other names at first, so when she said Gold I got super hyped that I guessed correctly about the narwhal being Rhine's in my fic, but then they were like nope pfft. I'll take it as a win.

Sidenote, Alice and Rhine where are yoooouuuuuu.

Ultimately, while I enjoyed the Childe and Skirk stuff, it really just feels like a set-up for later stuff. Which isn't really a problem, but I was hoping we'd get something a bit more concrete. Like, I thought we were going to get answers about the "it" that Skirk saw in him, and it would have to do with the Narwhal, but now it seems those were mostly unrelated??? While I did find baby Ajax accidentally waking up a big world eating monster up kind of hilarious, it did feel a little incidental, if that makes any sense. Like, Fontaine's doom was an accident and not the result of anyone's choices. But that might just be a me thing. (and the quest needed more Arle, where was she??? my not really based on anything theory is that whenever we get Furina (or maybe Nevui's) 2nd character quest, Arle will be the boss fight. A reverse of the normal final Harb boss fight during the Archon quest)

Okay, because I really don't want to end on a downer (as I said uptop, I genuinely adored this quest haha), here are some minor spoilers from the Narzissenkreuz Ordo quest that have me by a chokehold.

I wasn't ready for a sudden Ajax. What does this mean??????

And this one just makes me laugh. Whichever Ordo member wrote this, I vehemently disagree with u and am on Khaenri'ah's side with this one. I'd much rather have bread then some higher power nonsense. In my fic I tend to write Khaenri'ah more akin to a modern nation than a fantasy one, and its nice to see me vindicated pfft.

Other random notes, enjoyed that the Fatui weren't just cartoonishly evil in both the main and world quests. I like some nuance. I saw that Sandrone hint, that was fun. Though it makes me wonder when we'll get Columbina lore (especially because if the theory about Harbinger boss fight order based on the Constellation circle is true, she should be showing up soon. Though also I half think that order will break because if it doesn't, it means Sandrone will probably be the final Harb boss which is an odd choice.) As revealed on Furina's weapon, Egeria being around during Remuria raises so many questions around the timeline of events. Genshin pls tell me when the Archon war takes place in all this pls (if they tell us in some lore I haven't read yet, whoops). (also on egeria, I mourn my version but hey, she exists in my heart and in my fics pfft. I can't wait to write her in smfwtwd and venti fic, though she's getting a new name for confusion and better symbolsism)

the contrast between Neuvi and Furina after the quest is so funny and sad. Neuvi "Furina is the best, I want her to be happy". Furina, "Everyone hates me, Neuvillette most of all, I can never face him again." And the other Archons, they are all like Furina, wow u are so cool (which just highlights Neuvi's utter disdain for them other than Nahida haha).

And most vitally, Furina and Venti should be best friends. Musically inclined performers who definitely aren't plotting to overthrow the heavens. I think they are neat (they also both have Latin names!).

[ahiijny]

First impressions of Symphogear XDU Global

... from someone who’s never played gacha and in fact didn’t even own a phone until as of 2 months ago

Oh, the screen’s in landscape aspect ratio, okay.

“The latest game data will be downloaded (110 MB). Wi-Fi connection is recommended.” I’m on Wi-Fi, that’s fine.

Hm, my phone only has 32 GB of storage and it’s already more than half full, will I be okay?

The Japanese dialogue audio is still in this, noice.

Oh, so this basically the first episode of season 1.

“Croitzal ronzell Gungnir zizzl...” Kanade transformation :)

“Superb Song”. Personally, I’m fine with this choice of translation; I’m pretty sure it’s what the creators originally intended, too. But “Swan Song” still sounds much cooler, doesn’t it :P Also, this song. Goosebumps, every time...

“The latest game data (130 MB) will beIn the background downloaded” More downloads? Also, that “beIn” isn’t a typo, the words were weirdly mushed up against each other in the app for some reason.

Symphogear XDU OP! Noice. I’ve seen this before on YouTube, but it’s still really awesome. And it contains a few minor spoilers for GX (Carol and Elfnein and the Autoscorers), noting that for future reference.

Miku in this OP is just so cool! A scenario where Miku became a main Gear user, that would’ve been nice. Alas, canon, it was not to be...

Kanade and Serena are active Gear users in this too, noice. But there are two Gungnirs and two Airgetlams now?...

“Gjallarhorn” Oh, so this is the parallel dimensions relic I’ve heard so much about.

“Please enter player name / *Player names can be changed later / *Names can be up to 10 characters long”. Okay.

Oh nice, Ryouko’s explaining the app.

“6 kinds of quests: Main Quests, Hexa Quests, Event Quests, XD Quests, Side Quests, and SP quests” Uhhhhh that’s a lot.

“You can choose one friend who will follow you into battle.” Oh, is this like the pair system in Touhou 11?

This quest is called “Diva of the Battlefield”.

Ohhhh this is the very familiar general everyday life memoria OST (I don’t know the name) that I’ve heard on the YameteTomete site before. You know, that one.

They translate Andou’s nickname for Hibiki as “Bikky”

"Custodian”? Is... is this foreshadowing? Or just a translation quirk? Do Japanese schools even have custodians? (I thought the students do all of the cleaning)

“Imyuteus amenohabakiri tron...” (looks like they mashed it all up into one word)

Okay, battle start.

Waaaaaaait what why are Chris and Hibiki here?? This is too early in the plot!

I am plot confus

Is this just one of those things where you have to be like “it’s part of the game mechanic” and try not think too hard about it?

Huh, and the Gear users and the Noise exchange attacks automatically?

Like... I barely need to do anything?

This reminds me a bit of the game mechanic in Mega Man Battle Chip Challenge, where the battle is mostly automatic based on your arrangement of chips in your “program deck” beforehand, and the only interactivity is your ability to slot in a special attack at any point during the battle (but you can only use your L and R chip slots for this, and you can only use them once).

Yay, battle won.

“MA1-1: Diva of the Battlefield”. I like numbering schemes.

“So she’s the Valkyrie of the Special Disaster Response Team Section 2... The only one who can stand up to the Noise?” Huh, so they do use the word “Valkyrie” in these translations, interesting

“Soldier A: "Whoa, I suggest you stop right there, soldier. You saw nothing and heard nothing. Is that clear?"” Heh :) Ah right, it’s supposed to be confidential.

According to Hibiki, the day one bonuses are amazing.

This onomatopoeia just looks kinda funny for some reason :P

Bikki pls

(Also, sorry about the volume bar, I’m still not used to taking screenshots on a phone)

The little girl calls Hibiki “Missy”.

"Balwisyall nescell gungnir tron…" Hibiki’s first transformation is just not the same without Synchrogazer :/

Got Song Stone x5, owo neat. I don’t know what these are though

Looks like that’s the end of the tutorial!

Ack so many unread notifications

Oh right, there’s some Attack on Titan crossover event going on, I’ll have to check that out later

Reading some of the news posts. Dunno what limit breaking is.

Hm okay, let’s try some of these free gacha rolls.

Why is a gacha roll so fancy graphics

“AME NO HABAKIRI DATTO” Noice

Wow why so flash

Let’s try more of these

“Ayumu Takasaka” Ah, a person whose name I don’t remember. iirc she’s one of Tsubasa’s classmates.

“WARUKUNAI WA NE” Yes, thank you Maria :P

Drop rates, Song Stone log, hmmm

Reading through the FAQ

“A: You may only upload game content for non-profit purposes (including personal use as a hobby.” I wonder if this excludes monetized YouTube channels. Not really relevant to me in any case though, my channel has 4 subscribers.

“Q: I want to learn more about the Symphogear anime and merchandise.” “A: We are not able to respond to any inquiries outside the scope of the Symphogear XD Unlimited app.” wat

Okay, let’s read through some of these "Rights and Agreements” pages.

Skimming through the terms of service. Lots of this reads as generic lawyer boilerplate, not tailor-made for this app, but rather feels like it was adapted from some very standard and thoroughly vetted template. Like, there’s stuff in here talking about using a robot/spider/site search/analysis application, but doesn’t that only apply to websites? Can you robot crawl an app server?

And it talks about it being prohibited “posting photographs or the like of nudity with a high degree of exposure” but is it even possible to post photos in this app?

“a. a. Posting or sending messages for the purpose of buying, selling, or exchanging...” there are two a’s here :P

Oh here we go, more topically specific ToC stuff. “Use of in-app currency” “Song Stone” hm okay.

Heh, the music changes to the XDU OP if I open the "Credit” page.

Hm, what’s this “Rights” section?

Oh, here we go, a bunch of software licenses. Mostly Apache, some MIT as well. And some without a specific name.

Interesting...

Anyway, hopefully I don’t get too addicted to this, I have a lot of other work that I still need to be doing.

But it’s nice finally starting to have a vague inkling about what all the Japanese XDU players were talking about :P

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Part 0.2

Be aware that this is not a blind playthrough! This will contain spoilers for the entire game, regardless of the part of the game I’m commenting on. A major focus of this commentary is to talk about all of the hints and foreshadowing of events that are going to happen and facts that are going to be revealed in the future of the story. It is emphatically not intended for someone experiencing the game for their first time.

Last time, as we began this commentary, Team Danganronpa had a terrible way of bringing in their successful auditionees, all of the pregame characters were horrendously slow on the uptake, then they stopped existing, letting me stop complaining about the flimsy portrayal of the outside world until chapter 6 and meet this story’s actual characters that I actually like (and a few that I don’t). We met Kaede and Shuichi, and now they’re about to head out of the classroom and meet everyone else.

So, most of this post will be the character introductions. Even if I don’t have anything specific to comment on about someone’s introduction, I’ll still give a brief summary of how I feel about them and how often I’m likely to mention them throughout this. If it wasn’t clear already from my comments about Kaede and Shuichi last time, I love them both and think they’re both great, interesting protagonists and will have a lot to say about them.

Kaede:  (Even though it’s a hallway, there sure are a lot of plants growing around here…)

This is presumably meant as part of the “story” that they’re secretly on a spaceship, and the plants are there to generate oxygen for them. Which… soooort of explains why there’s fewer plants later on when more people are dead? But of course they’re not really on a spaceship and don’t actually need the plants at all.

Shuichi’s Monopad is in his pocket and Kaede’s is in her backpack, but this begs the question of where the hell the other girls who don’t have backpacks are keeping theirs.

Interesting how the first non-Shuichi person you’re properly introduced to is the mastermind. Given that she’s a terrible person (and that even before the reveal she was not especially interesting), I don’t like Tsumugi that much as a character, but I can appreciate her role as the mastermind and that no-one but the Ultimate Cosplayer would have worked as well in that role. I’ll be pointing out a lot of hints to her true nature and things that she’s probably thinking about given she knows everything as we go along. I won’t be commenting on any of her myriad apparent references to other works of fiction, because like 99% of them are lost on me.

Tsumugi’s thing of ignoring them when they try and talk to her is a character trait they just kind of drop after this scene. I wonder if it’s because she’s still deciding what kind of “character” she wants to play. But also, you’d expect her to be stoked to meet all these other characters that she made, not ignoring them.

Tsumugi:  “My favorite Doraemon episode is #53.”

Number 53. Interesting choice of number, that.

You can investigate the girls’ bathroom, but…

Kaede:  “I doubt there’d be an exit, but just in case…”

…even though this is Kaede’s mindset when she goes in, she doesn’t notice the hidden passageway. You can look around, but it’s not there to find. She is not a detective.

Meanwhile, Shuichi can check the boys’ bathroom, but although he probably checks it way more thoroughly, there’s nothing in there for him to find, of course. Alas. If only Shuichi were less of a gentleman, maybe he’d have discovered the hidden passageway sooner and this all could have ended without anyone dying. (After all, Kyoko never gave a fuck about checking the boys’ bathrooms for hidden rooms.)

Rantaro is a pretty interesting character, but almost all of the stuff that’s interesting about his character is barely relevant in the canon storyline and he’s mostly there to provide interesting plot. Which is to say, I’ll still be talking about him quite a bit for the short time that he’s around.

Here, he’s finally had his memories wiped about everything from the previous killing game… and also his original talent. It’s a little odd that they’d do that – yes, he is the Ultimate Survivor now and the gamemakers don’t want him to be aware of exactly what that entails, but he also still has his original talent (apparently Ultimate Big Brother if we’re to believe Shuichi’s deductions when they hang out in the bonus mode?) and they could have kept his memory of that. Perhaps they erased that memory specifically to make him seem more suspicious, as a kind of handicap. It’s also convenient for the gamemakers that he has a talent which he couldn’t figure out for himself simply by knowing that he must have one, otherwise he could have just told everyone that his best guess was in fact his true talent to avoid coming off as suspicious.

Rantaro:  “We aren’t going anywhere for a while.”

Kaede:  “Stop that. We’ll escape soon.”

Rantaro:  “…You really think it’s gonna be that easy?”

Shuichi:  “Huh? What do you mean…?”

Rantaro:  “Nothin’. Just a feeling.”

Despite having had his memories erased, he seems subconsciously aware of how this is going to play out. It seems that when you only erase memories, they still linger and can subconsciously affect how someone feels, whereas when you overwrite memories with new ones, they’re totally gone.

…As soon as I typed that, I then attempted to enter the locked gym, and:

Shuichi:  “Ah, it’s nothing. I just… feel strange…”

Kaede:  “Strange? How so?”

Shuichi:  “Like… deja vu? I feel like I’ve been here before.”

Shush, okay, most of Shuichi’s pregame memories were completely overwritten. He never gets the slightest hint of déjà vu about having been that creepy fanboy.

Kaede:  “But we’ll probably be fine.”

Shuichi:  “…What makes you say that?”

Kaede:  “Because we have sixteen Ultimate students on our side! As long as we work together as friends, I just know nothing bad will happen!”

Aww, Kaede is being so adorably optimistic when she hasn’t even met most of the others yet.

Oh, hey, here’s Miu, otherwise known as The Worst Character. Almost everything about her is such a disgustingly gratuitous vehicle for fanservice and I hate it. I will be ignoring most everything she ever says, because nearly every time she speaks I just wish she would shut up and stop existing. Beneath the fanserviceyness she does have some vague potential for being an interesting character, though, so I will occasionally be mentioning that when the writing actually makes use of that potential to help drive the story.

(It’s a shame, because she really could have been a decent character – still not likeable at all, but interesting – but they only utilise that potential a very small amount of the time because clearly it’s far more important to the story to use her as an object of fanservice, right???)

Shuichi:  “Stop it… Leave me alone! I can wear a hat if I want to!!!”

This is the one good thing about Miu’s character introduction and it’s not even anything to do with Miu herself. This is far more forceful than Shuichi’s ever been since we met him, so it serves as a neat little hint towards his issues regarding his hat and why he wears it. While it’s obviously not for the perverted reasons Miu is accusing him of, he does wear it to hide his eyes from people (or rather, to hide people’s eyes from him) and he’s not proud of that fact.

Meanwhile, Tenko also has an annoying character “quirk”, but at least the rest of her is a good and likeable person. Other than her degenerate males thing, she’s pretty great, but it’s just hard to unreservedly like her when so much of the time she’s being so unreasonably prejudiced towards half the cast. It’s to such an extreme that it makes it difficult for her to feel like a real person – which is maybe the point, since everyone here is “fictional” and was written from the ground up by being given fake memories, but even so it still just makes me unable to like Tenko as much as I wish I could.

I grew fond of Himiko by the end of the game, especially after her character development, but other than during that arc of hers, she’s not the most interesting or relevant character. I probably won’t be mentioning her especially often aside from then.

Oh, boy, here’s Kokichi. I’m going to come out and say right now that Kokichi is not one of my favourites and I personally feel he’s very overrated by the fandom. But, he’s also not one of my least favourites, since he is interesting. Because of this, I’m probably going to be mentioning him a lot, mostly to make a case for my interpretation of what is actually going on with his character.

The not-so-short version of my interpretation is this: Kokichi is pathologically convinced (for reasons that are never made clear) that humans are creatures who will always betray and backstab each other no matter how much they talk about friendship and trust on the surface. As such, he hates being part of a killing game where backstabbing is the goal and believes that not co-operating with others in a situation like this is the only remotely sensible course of action and anyone who thinks otherwise is a naïve idiot. The majority of his meaningful actions in the early game (that aren’t just him jerking people around and messing with them because that’s literally his talent) are him trying to prove to everyone else, often in a very underhanded and manipulative way, that this philosophy of his is right. In the later parts of the game, his plan to fool Monokuma and win the killing game is entirely him spitefully trying to get back at Monokuma and the mastermind for putting him in this situation that he hated in the first place and is not done with the primary goal of saving everyone else. He is not remotely selfless. He does care more than he lets on about the tragic things that happen, because he’s still fundamentally as horrified by killing as a normal human should be, but he constantly lies to himself about that, dealing with this awful situation in the most cowardly way possible and refusing to change.

And like. That’s interesting! I appreciate that. But the end result is that on the surface he acts like an annoying dick most of the time, and having a better understanding of why he does that once you’ve finished the game doesn’t make him any less of an annoying dick.

Meanwhile, there’s Keebo, who I was honestly expecting to like more than I did when I first experienced the game. He’s fine and likeable enough, but I usually really dig characters who are AIs that really want to be human, and Keebo didn’t quite do it for me. I feel like he could have done if the writers had focused on that part more, but he just spends most of his screentime being on the butt end of the most annoying characters’ annoyingness. Like here with Kokichi. This part of Kokichi’s actions – the part where he constantly bullies Keebo and treats him as less than a person – isn’t him being remotely interesting; he’s just being a dick.

Kokichi:  “…Oh. I’m just the supreme leader of an evil secret organization, that’s all.”

Kaede:  “What?”

Kokichi:  “I gotta say, it’s pretty impressive. My organization has over 10,000 members!”

Totally, Kokichi. It is the supremest, evilest organisation and definitely not just ten overgrown children playing pranks on people. (I was convinced on my first time through that he was lying about his talent and was really the Ultimate Liar. I can’t have been the only one.)

Shuichi:  “There are books all over the place… It doesn’t seem very organized.”

Kaede:  “Oh, does that bother you? Are you a neat freak, Shuichi?”

Shuichi:  “No, it’s just… I was wondering if someone was using it before us.”

I wonder if this is Shuichi already noticing the lack of books on top of the library’s moving bookcase and making a note to check it out later.

Here’s Maki Roll! …Except she won’t be Maki Roll for quite some time. She is messed-up and sympathetic and I love her and will be talking about her a lot.

Kaede:  “Um… Are you an Ultimate student, too?”

Maki:  “Yeah, that’s right. …”

Kaede:  (Huh? Is that it?)

Maki was probably hoping she could just leave it at that and not tell them what her talent is, before Kaede and Shuichi introduce themselves with their talents and she finds herself having to come up with a fake one to not seem suspicious.

(Also Shuichi is still being so unconfident about his talent and Kaede is still trying to get him not to be.)

Maki claims she’s not good at taking care of kids, but, while there are no kids here per se, she is going to turn out to be really good at taking care of other people.

Kaede: “But they say kids are very intuitive. If they like you that much… then they can probably tell how loving you really are, Maki!”

Kaede can tell Maki’s a loving person deep down! Clearly, Kaede is also very intuitive. (As is Kaito, when we get to that point. Which seems appropriate here, since in some ways Kaito is still a big kid.)

Kaede:  “You’ve chosen a perfect career for yourself!”

Maki:  “…It wasn’t my choice to begin with.”

Kaede: “Huh? What do you mean by that?”

Maki:  “…Nothing.”

Maki’s definitely accidentally talking about her real talent here.

Maki:  “Seriously? You think we can escape? Abducting Ultimates from across the country would require massive resources and planning. What makes you think a group capable of that would let us just walk out of here?”

She would say this – she already knows a thing or two about being trapped by a powerful organisation with no hope of escape. Makiiiiii.

Maki:  “Work together? With strangers? You’re a naive fool if you think you can end this so easily.”

And she’s another example of a person who is currently convinced that trusting people and working together in this scenario is a foolish thing to do. But unlike a certain someone else who also believes this, Maki has very clearly-defined and understandable reasons for doing so, isn’t going to be so self-righteous as to try and force her views on others, and will eventually be encouraged to change and start to believe in people, which makes her a much more enjoyable example of a character with trust issues to me.

I also like how she’s the only character who leaves after introducing themselves. She really doesn’t want to engage with anyone, does she.

Along with Maki in the library, in the game room next door we have the other self-loathing murderer, Ryoma! I enjoy how they’re both down here in the basement like they’re hoping not to have to talk to anyone.

Despite being such a weirdly incongruent bunch of traits, from his design to his voice to his talent to his backstory, Ryoma still manages to be a really genuine, interesting person. If he’d been a bigger part of the story he might have ended up among my absolute favourites, but I still like him a lot.

Then there’s the non-self-loathing murderer, Kiyo. He’s a deluded creep and I don’t find him interesting or likeable and won’t be talking about him much except for maybe when the game hints at his true nature. He comes across as openly creepy enough that on my first time through I doubted whether they’d actually make him a murderer because that seems too obvious, but then, no, wow, he literally is just a straight-up serial killer, that sure is the laziest way to justify a character being driven to murder in a killing game.

The design of the wall is really weird. At first I thought it was the skyline of an actual city that they were in the middle of and there were just bars between them and the city.

Monosuke:  “It represents… the end of the world.”

This was another thing that made me consider the simulation angle, but I guess what it’s actually supposed to mean is the end of the fictional world that they’re a part of? Or perhaps the literal end of the world via meteorites that is supposedly past it.

The Monokubs claim it has no exits, but it must have one somewhere; they have to have got in somehow, and there had to have been a planned way out that didn’t involve Keebo blasting a hole in it.

Monokid:  “An Ultimate could probably climb it partway, but most of the time it’s impossible!”

There is somebody nearby who is definitely going to be getting reckless ideas into his head if he hears that. Don’t go encouraging him.

Kaede: “Shuichi… I’m not great at motivating others…”

YES YOU ARE THOUGH. Oh, Kaede.

And speaking of motivation, we’re about to meet…

Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars! Who is my favourite character in all of Danganronpa and up there among my absolute favourite characters in fiction, and he’s a large majority of the reason I wanted to do this commentary. There is so much interesting and fun stuff going on with him all the time and I will be talking about him a lot. Like, a lot. If you’re not willing to hear me talk at length about practically everything Kaito ever says and does, this commentary is not for you.

Kaito:  “What, are you complaining?”

Shuichi:  “Huh?”

Kaito:  “Quit complaining and grumbling, or it’ll turn into a habit.”

Almost immediately, he’s telling Shuichi one of his strongly held convictions, which he has a lot of and all of them are really good and interesting. Kaito is always of the opinion that you shouldn’t wallow in your negative feelings and make yourself feel bad unnecessarily when you could instead be working to try and improve things for yourself, even if it’s just a little bit.

Kaito:  “Sometimes you gotta be a little reckless to make your dreams a reality!”

Yeah, cheating his way into astronaut training early and having it somehow work out for him is a pretty good template for the kind of recklessness we’re going to keep seeing from him.

Kaito:  “Yeah, everyone told me it was impossible, but I never gave up! Not for a moment! That’s because… limits don’t exist unless you set them yourself!”

Also a very Kaito thing for him to say! He didn’t quite say the impossible is possible, but this is absolutely the same kind of principle. He firmly believes that they shouldn’t ever give up on something just because it might seem impossible at first glance.

Kaito:  “There are no walls you can’t get over! The same goes for that one!”

Shuichi:  “So do you have any ideas?”

Kaito:  “… Th-That’s not the problem!”

Kaede:  (Um… no, that *is* the problem. Geez, this guy sure talks a big game.)

Kaito does talk a big game, but it’s not remotely in the sense that he’s just trying to make himself look good without ever planning on backing up his words. Him not actually having any ideas for how to get over that wall doesn’t change the fact that he is determined to do so. He may be kind of bad at knowing how to put his words into action, but the intent behind his words is always, always genuine.

Kaede:  “I don’t plan on staying here long enough to need a room.”

Now who’s making bold statements they have no obvious way of backing up, Kaede? She and Kaito are really very similar, and that’s another thing I’ll be talking about a lot.

Out of the five selfless murderers in this game (there are *five* selfless murderers in this game it is so good), Kirumi is the one I’m least attached to.

Kirumi:  “I hold no opinions or desires of which to speak.”

This might be why, because there’s never any indication that this isn’t a true statement. Unlike the other selfless murderers, there really isn’t anything to Kirumi except her selflessness. The others still have their own desires, things they want for themselves, so that when they push those things aside to become a murderer in an attempt to save everyone, it really feels like a sacrifice. Kirumi… not quite so much. But she still is a selfless murderer, so I do still appreciate her quite a bit. Not sure how much I’ll have to say about her except for when she’s killed someone, though.

Here’s Gonta, the most precious gentleman! He deserves all of the happiness and all of the bug friends and is also one of my favourites. That said, his nature is so straightforward that maybe I won’t have too much to point out about his character here and so I might not be talking about him to an extent that properly reflects how much I love him, but I’ll certainly try.

I know Gonta didn’t speak in “caveman speak” in the original Japanese, but honestly it’s really not a big deal that they changed it for the localisation, because it does make sense. He was literally raised by wolves (well, not actually wolves as you learn if you do his FTEs) for ten years! Between the ages of probably like five and fifteen or something. Of course his skills in his human language would have deteriorated after not using it for so long. It’d be difficult for him to relearn the grammar rules after rejoining human society because it’s much harder to pick up language stuff subconsciously when you’re older, and no-one’s going to be giving a teenager lessons in basic grammar.

Gonta:  “This place strange, huh? Lots of plants, but no bugs.”

You know, how did Team Danganronpa rid the entire dome of insects except for the ones in Gonta’s lab? Did they just, like, spray pesticide everywhere and then vacuum up all the dead ones?

(Don’t tell Gonta that might have happened. He’d throw a fit.)

It’s such a shame that both of our protagonists are squicked out by bugs and so we never get to see Gonta having a happy friendly conversation about his favourite thing with someone.

Angie is pretty blah to me. Her slight creepiness and tendency to run away from any responsibility or meaningful emotions whatsoever by hiding behind Atua makes her just… not very interesting, or even that likeable despite her generally cheerful personality, in my opinion.

Aaand that’s everyone. Time to head to the gym.

Kaito:  “Hmm, it’s pretty spectacular seeing all 16 of us Ultimates gathered together.”

Haha, look who else other than Kaede is excited to have a bunch of Ultimates in the same place.

Kaito:  “Don’t worry about it! Just leave it to me! If those teddy bears show themselves again, I’ll kick all their asses!”

Here’s Kaito doing something he’s going to be doing a lot of – declaring that he’ll do something about the situation they’re in. Which he’s usually pretty bad at actually following through with. But even so, the important point is that he’s trying to reassure and encourage everyone, and he truly wants to take action and solve things even if he’s hardly ever actually able to.

Note that when all the Exisals show up, Kaito is staring in shock at the red one specifically. Every time Kaito has some kind of interaction with an Exisal – which happens a few times – it is always that one. I like that detail. It’s going to become his Exisal, after all.

Gonta:  “Everyone, behind Gonta!”

Gonta is already trying to protect everyone! He’s such a good.

Maki:  “Hm, didn’t someone say they would ‘kick all their asses’?”

Kaito:  “Wh-What the hell? Nobody told me about these!”

I love that Maki is already making jabs at Kaito’s reckless idiocy, hee. And to be fair, if he’d known about the Exisals he probably wouldn’t have made such a bold statement.

Rantaro:  “Alright, chill out, no need to panic… We’re probably not in any danger. If they wanted to kill us, they’d have done it by now.”

(With that, Rantaro casually walked up to the Exisals.)

Rantaro:  “So… what do you want from us?”

More hints that Rantaro is subconsciously used to this kind of crazy stuff, with how calm he’s being compared to everyone else.

Monokuma:  “Even when the prologue is going way too long, I’ll allow it because you guys are cute. In fact, the very first prologue ever was only short cuz you cutie-patooties weren’t there.”

That sure is fourth-wall-breaking of him, except not actually.

Monokuma:  “Usually, ratings will plummet when mascots appear in sequels too much… But in this case, ratings are through the roof! All thanks to the cute Monokubs!”

Are you sure, though, Monokuma. I find that difficult to believe, but then again, the in-universe audience has some pretty weird opinions on a lot of things in this story apparently.

Keebo:  “It appears to be some sort of autonomous robot with a built in A.I., like me…”

This is a relevant point he brings up – Keebo’s existence proves that AI and robotics technology in this universe is advanced enough for a Monokuma to be completely autonomous. People should bring this up more than they do when discussing the possibility of a mastermind. Even if a mastermind might exist, there shouldn’t need to be one for the game to run. Monokuma is entirely capable of running the game himself. If the mastermind was murdered, the game wouldn’t necessarily have to end.

Ryoma:  “I want to ask something. How are we supposed to kill each other? Are you going to give us weapons?”

Kaito:  “What the hell, man!? What are you asking?”

Kaito would probably have reacted like that if anyone had asked that question, but I imagine it bothers him even more that it was Ryoma, hah. And I like that Ryoma’s being pragmatic enough to ask that, since he’s already more desensitised to the idea of killing than most people here.

Maki:  “Sophisticated experience?”

…Most people except Maki, who is trained in very sophisticated killing methods and yet is still disgusted by the idea of doing so as a game.

Monokuma’s long list of possible methods they could use to kill each other happens to include every single way in which someone is killed or almost killed in this game.

Kokichi:  “It doesn’t seem like it’ll be boring, though.”

Welp, Kokichi has already started lying to himself that he’s going to have fun with this. Didn’t take him long.

Kaede: (A lie… More like fiction… Like a story on TV… A scenario so removed from reality, we can hardly believe it’s happening.)

…Yeah.

Monokuma:  “Cuz the killing game is the only reason you’re here.”

It sure is. The only reason they exist, even.

Monokuma:  “It’s fun to watch the defiant ones eventually snap, and get their hands dirty…”

…he says, to Kaede. Oh.

Kaede:  (A sadistic story, no different from reality itself… And against my will, I was now a character in that story.)

Pretty much, Kaede, yeah.

The actual opening movie uses imagery of purple eyes on everyone’s shadow behind them, except for Rantaro, where the purple eyes are his own. Given that purple eyes apparently symbolise lying based on imagery in the trials, this is probably meant to symbolise the fact that everyone’s identities are “lies” – but Rantaro shouldn’t really be any different from the others, then, since he also has fake memories, just ones that were created for season 52. But obviously if they instead had Tsumugi be the odd one out in the opening, that’d be preeetttty suspicious.

---

[Next post]

[hungryego]

Why I love EGS so fucking much

I first checked out El Goonish Shive many years ago. If memory serves, this was in the early 2010s. I don’t recall reading much that didn’t feel like wish fulfillment and it didn’t draw me in so I left it. More recently, a friend of mine who I got into killsixbilliondemons (one of the best webcomics around today) and who reintroduced me to the Mistborn series recommended it to me. I vaguely remembered a few aspects but had no real memory.

EGS is a bit of a mess, really. This is because in its earliest days (2002, amazingly) it was poorly drawn, over-the-top silly, and more than a little problematic at times. Characters were not so tightly defined and there was a lot of nonsense. There was a magic gun that would transform people (mostly gender and furry stuff) but it was... kind of bleh? It’s hard to say. The author has admitted that at that time he was worried about reactions to any sort of trans-related theme so he overcompensated with the character’s reactions to Tedd’s... thing.

By the first real arc, Sister, things were starting to come together. I don’t really want to get into details, but that arc, while flawed, led to some amazing stuff down the road. It was also the first serious plot, which gave it more weight than a comic that was mostly random nonsense.

A bit later the Painted Black arc came and that was rather good. Still far from perfect, but Dan’s art style was drastically improving and Grace’s backstory was explained. It was also a lot darker than previous storylines. Don’t get me wrong - darkness is fun as hell but sometimes there’s too much and I think later EGS managed to set a balance between sadness and good cheer.

I don’t want to detail every story arc by any means but I feel like those two were important milestones for the comic. They helped me actually get into it.

As the story is today (obviously there are spoilers so, you know, don’t read if you're worried about that), there are a lot of fascinating characters, many of whom are queer. Actually, I’m pretty sure most of the main cast is some level of queer (the only one who I’m not sure of is Susan, but she has other issues that are treated well). Magic is abundant but surprisingly logical in that it is explained in a manner that is consistent and its rules generally don’t bend or break.

The basics of it in that world are as follows:

* Normal people can’t do magic, but they can acquire it through the intervention of magic immortal beings (who usually only give them marks in very specific scenarios or when they want to get something done as they can’t affect the world directly)

* People generally acquire magic in the form of a mark, which gives them access to one spell. Through practice (and often an intense event, emotional or otherwise), they can awaken and start acquiring new spells (chosen by magic, which has a will of sorts)

* Uryuoms have transformational powers and physical abilities that are like magic but internal in such a way that they have resistance/immunity to a lot of magic

Note: Uryuom aren’t aliens but are aliens and I’m still not really sure about where they came from. They featured heavily in some earlier stories (especially Painted Black) but haven’t shown much other than as background characters since then.

It’s worth describing the main cast and also some auxiliary queer characters of interest.

Note: in EGS, the word ‘transgender’ was used a lot with regards to transformation spells/technology, but trans characters in the standard sense of the word do exist. When I say “turned into” I’m referring to magic that physically changes their bodies, not their identities (which are separate).

Trans and/or gender non-conforming (identity is weird, don’t want to paste the label of trans onto certain characters):

Tedd Verres - arguably the main main character, although there are many arcs where they don’t show up much. One of the original two characters. Half-Japanese and born with some rather unique magical potential (and lack thereof), AMAB. Tedd has always been androgynous but would get extremely defensive if anyone referred to them as female. They learn about genderfluidity from Grace in a glorious moment. As the story currently is they are working out who they are, and since magic is going to change they’re dealing with the emotional ramifications of whether they’d rather be stuck as a boy or a girl in the likely event that magic changes.

Elliot Dunkel - the other first character in the strip along with Tedd. He starts out rough when it comes to gender stuff (see last panel here, first panel is flashback in following strip) but ends up zapped by a transformation gun and turned into a girl. Eventually he dispels it with a crystal but that creates a double under the ‘curse’ (Ellen, cis) and gives them both powers. Elliot’s is the ability to transform into a girl (and shapeshift under those parameters). He’s at first frustrated by the fact that he HAS to (because of the circumstances of his acquiring said powers he is forced to use up excess magic energy or else he’ll unintentionally transform at random times, something that would be rather inconvenient), but later on he realizes that he’s never really cared about being a boy or a girl and he was just dealing with societal baggage. Oh, and he develops the power to transform into a female superhero. It’s great. Realizing that he actually likes who he is and that being fluid is a part of who he is (all glorious moments of character development). Seriously, he went on a date with his girlfriend as a girl and it was so fucking cute and they are adorable together and just wow it was so cute. Elliot’s agender but also somewhat genderfluid. Also, mostly into girls but definitely enjoys men as well.

 Yes, both of the main characters (initially ‘boys’) later on realized that they were a variety of genderfluid.

Grace: Grace is part alien? (Uryuom insist that they are not aliens but their origins are still unclear), part human, part squirrel (Uryuom eggs can have DNA from up to twelve sources, to my memory). She’s a person of color who is a natural shapeshifter. I don’t recall where it is clarified but she doesn’t really have a sense of any sort of gender as she’s always been a shapeshifter and that’s just natural to her. Basically agender. Also, has discussed how human bodies shouldn’t be limited to characteristics of one gender, has explicitly discussed the lack of binariness to gender and sex and is just generally super wonderful.

There’s also one or two side characters who are trans and don’t have access to any sort of transformation powers.

Most relevant is Sam, a fan of an in-universe analogue of magic the gathering who is a closeted transguy (only is himself at tournaments). Also, an overdramatic doofus who is like one of those pokemon trainers who go on about wearing shorts because of how much easier it makes to run around. He is wonderful. He has a date (or a not-date because people are awkward) with one of the main cast members (Sarah) and as such is likely to become a recurring character.

It’s worth pointing out that of course EGS isn’t totally unproblematic (but what is, really?) and that in a world with magic transformation things can get a little weird but it’s definitely well done by more recent years. The stuff this year especially is just fantastic. Seeing characters break past socialization and realizing that they aren’t what they thought they were is fantastic.

Also, most of the other cast is some variety of non-straight:

Sarah (third character to be introduced) is bi (more into guys but definitely into girls too).

Nanase (Japanese) is a lesbian.

Ellen (Elliot’s female duplicated created by a cursed artifact) is a homoromantic bisexual (and dating Nanase).

Justin is super gay.

Also, a bunch of recurring side characters (or side characters who are definitely going to come back because of going on a gay date with one of the main cast members) are queer - Rhoda (bi or lesbian, person of color), Catalina (lesbian), Luke (gay, ethnically ambiguous), Ashley (Elliot’s new girlfriend, bi, east asian).

Lots and lots of gayness.

Apologies for general weirdness of the post. I’ve been dealing with a lot of mental health problems lately but I want to tell the world that EGS is one of my favorite webcomics and that whatever problems it has in its earlier years it more than makes up for. Give it a try if it sounds interesting.

Also, there are anime-style martial arts, founded by a man who mastered a few martial arts and watched way too much anime to the point of obsession and it actually works.

Dan Shive (the author) hasn’t explicitly stated his own identity but doesn’t really have a gender.

EGS tumblr - @egscomics

Also, reading the comic helped me realize that I’m genderfluid (not in a male-female sense but more of a female - nothing - weird stuff sense).

It’s good.