#we play ourselves

[daphneblakess]

books i read in 2022: we play ourselves by jen silverman

In the end, we are all entirely summed up by our single most public failure, and not by any of the nuanced, beautiful, difficult things we accomplished before or after.

[judgingbooksbycovers]

We Play Ourselves: A Novel

By Jen Silverman.

Design by Rachel Ake Kuech.

[bakugo-softski]

“I thought we’d go on chasing eachother forever” for THEM is…an actual fucking love confession. Like i really think we’re underestimating this guys!!! Kacchan is literally admitting he expected and WANTED TO HAVE IZUKU IN HIS LIFE FOREVER, OPENLY SOBBING IN EMPATHY FOR IZUKU AND WHAT THEY HAD TOGETHER. S O B B I N G OVER THEM LOSING *THEIR* DREAM. That is as close to a love confession as I’ve ever seen one you guys. He fucking loves izuku and now that he knows they won’t be able to go on chasing and competing eachother in their fun little plausible deniability dynamic I’m so FUCKING excited to see how their dynamic changes to accommodate kacchan continuing to keep izuku in his life now that theyve lost their “reason.” They fucking love eachother. They’re gonna start dating. They fucking ARE

[shalom-iamcominghome]

Person with no whimsy: Why are you trying to trick g-d with loopholes? 🙄🙄🙄🙄

[artharakka]

💀 *Rat music playing in the background* 🐀🐀

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Siffrin plays Disco Elysium AU: Featuring backseat gamer Loop.

[momhowell]

is the orange heart in phil's video intentional? I don't care. are dnp intentionally including various colored hearts in their tweets leading up to a rainbow of hearts before pride month? I don't care. are they geniuses or idiots? I don't care.

in the spirit of phil lester, happiness consists in making up little stories in your head and i like this one that we've created together

[dykedvonte]

I'm sorry the Brotherhood of Steel is so goofy in the show but the idea that not a single member thought "Maybe we should use a ball instead of fucking rocks" to play post-apocalyptic basketball is so funny and in character for how the BoS operates in general.

[gothyanki]

Imagine if Isabela got to visibly age. Just imagine how emotional it would be to see her with wrinkles and grey hair and all the body changes that come with getting older, knowing that DA2!Isabela’s life was about surviving from moment to moment and she probably never expected to live that long.

(Full disclosure: I haven’t played Veilguard, so this isn’t any kind of commentary on the game itself. This is just me being grumpy about Isabela’s design/outfit, because I’ve seen enough of that to know I Don’t Like It.)

[evermorepeyton]

64 quotes and maaaany comments acting like this person actually murdered someone or something pls

[shithowdy]

realized a drawing i'm doing rn is almost identically posed to one i did 8.5 years ago of a different oc, except the old drawing was instantly tainted by one of the players featured messaging me asking if i could take it down because their abusive, possessive rp partner saw it and got jealous of them "roleplaying behind their back" and i said "nah" and it became a whole Thing that i should have walked away from at that exact moment but didn't and the 6 months that followed contained some of the most truly condensed batshit i have ever witnessed in an rp community already well-known for its batshittery.

... anyway i love my friends. so happy to accidentally redeem the pose.

[lucabyte]

i am looking at nohats au 👀 please share more

So! NoHats! I'm going to grab you and use this to ramble. A Lot.

The NoHats AU is @samhainian's it's just that I'm the strange little freak who takes the words said unto me and executes on them. But I can still do a little explainer on what our overall thoughts and vibes are. (And, that we are in fact propping up a little box with some cheese under it here. 🪤 Please (PLEASE) feel free to pick up what we're putting down.)

We're far from the only ones exploring a "what if siffrin fucking died" AU, though the main difference with NoHats is the placement of the death in the timeline. Instead of being 'Mal Du Pays Wins' or 'Act 6 encounter goes horribly wrong', the death is… Just after the (literal) falling action.

(This placement is because Sam is a comic book fan who thus has become used to characters being ripped away at the cruelest times by shitty writers. THANK FUCKING GOD adrienne is not that and isat is delightful yippieee, but, back on topic.)

Giving the party the full understanding of What Happened that you get by putting the death after black hole siffrin, but before the A6 encounter leaves an interesting gap to be filled. See, making Siffrin's death very much not Loop's fault means that… this once again reads (when not read as simply a tragedy...) as the universe doing what it sees fit to fulfull Loop's wish… Thus making Siffrin's death Loop's fault again, but only in their eyes. And only in a way they could express if they were honest about who they were…

And this is where having had excuse to waffle about my general Postcanon Loop thoughts the other day comes in handy, because Sam and I have that as our canon-compliant reading to begin with, NoHats plays off of a lot of the same readings of Loop's character. Namely: Uh Oh Somebody's Lying By Fucking Omission Again. (BECAUSE TO BE FAIR THIS TIME… HOW THE FUCK WOULD YOU HANDLE THAT?)

Now, neither Sam nor I are fanfic writers, so this has been a little bit trapped in our heads and DMs (and my unfinished art but,)

But our thoughts on how NoHats like… Goes.

Siffrin's death is peaceful, but that does not mean the aftermath of it is. I can't imagine the party takes it well, especially after understanding the circumstances of the Loops. (And, of note, in A5 where nobody had the discussion on what to do with each other's bodies should something happen…) But I'd imagine it traumabonds them somewhat (understatement of the century) and now knowing how the rest of the party feels, they resolve to travel together for the forseeable future.

The party track down Loop to deliver the terrible news, since they were clearly Siffrin's friend too, and invite Loop along to travel at least long enough to (let them grieve) get the burial over with. Loop, here, can be helpful in knowing what Siffrin would've wanted where the party would be at a loss. Loop, I think, takes a bit of a lead on the funerary aspects of it all, because, um. (Performing rites on your own body, huh?)

Then, as things are after a death, life just… Kind of has to continue on as normal. The party travel, pick up Nille, and get to know Loop as this mysterious new person. Maybe in this situation they might stay in Bambouche for a while to give Bonnie more stability since. They are probably taking it the worst. It would've come out of absolutely nowhere for everyone in the party obviously but god, for a kid? For A Kid?

It should be stated NoHats is not intended to be grimdark, just y'know. An exploration of grief. This is also why it's got a bit of a lopsided focus on Bonnie vs the rest of the party because hhrrhghghhghghhhghhghhh <- incoherent

Now, a crossroads.

How does the party discover Loop to be Siffrin? How long does it take. How much have the party embraced them as part of the family (especially with something as intense to bond over as this)?

There's the Odile option. Have her put it together and have to bring it up somehow. This could also be done by Isabeau, perhaps. He's smart. (which. God. If anything's the real Isabeau Torment Nexus it's this)

Then there's the other option batted around by Sam and I. The: The Universe Dislikes Duplicates option.

The items in the house that fzzt away when inspected. The Universe doesn't like there to be two of something, at least not when they're acknowledged. But one of something is just fine…?

Which is to say. I'm not a personal proponent of 'Loop getting their body back'. EXCEPT …… except this one time.

There's only one Siffrin now, so they don't need to be obfuscated to exist.

Consider, if you will. Loop swallowing their guilt for long enough to be comfortable. Falling back into old habits. Without another Siffrin around to compete for the niche of, they actually begin to act like Siffrin again. Not intentionally, it's just… The party is as welcoming as they've always been. And the party swears they keep catching glimpses of a face under all the light.

Then, one day, while still not fully human again, the resemblence becomes undeniable. Loop having not even noticed until everyone looks at them like they've seen a ghost.

Has it been months? How long have they kept up this lie? Is it even a lie, to them? They're Loop. But they were, once, Siffrin.

Even after explaining it, does that make it better or worse?

Bonnie cuts through the betrayed, struck-nerve reactions with a sobering "I missed you."

… Anyway !

Yeah so that's the vibe for NoHats. As for LoopLoops? That's more nebulous. I think it can go anywhere really in the NoHats timeline. I err personally toward the "Loop continuously replays the last 10 minutes before Siffrin's death almost immediately after they find out and have to parkour their ass up the House in the most distressing situation possible to try and get them to hold on, just please hold on." (Remember! Siffrin can remember the contents of Loop's loop backs in the A6 fight!)

But there is the possibility that this happens months, or worse years down the road. One last Loop back. Throw it all away for the chance to just get that one thing you didn't know you even wanted but now know you NEED.

Misc:

Okay miscellaneous time.

This is where I admit that I have a bunch of unfinished NoHats art that I haven't gotten around to yet because I feel like a right tool being so obviously Loop-Centric with my fancontent (I AM . . I REALISE I AM NOT DOING MUCH TO BEAT THE ALLEGATIONS.) So like if people want to see that please say because euaghghghhfh <- the nervous.

this is like the most fucked up place to do isaloop fr. anyway.

one of Sam's mid-game observations that I'm just going to share for no particular reason is that Bonnie's hair shares a bunch of shapes with Siffrin's. The flick up at the top, the 3 pronged shape of the fringe… just something to think about.

Without 2 Siffrins around to compare each other to it'd likely be a lot harder to notice Loop's similarities. Doesn't mean that those similarities don't sting more in this context though.

If you do NoHats without LoopLoops. The concept of this all fading into memory years down the line while they just have slightly-glowy but otherwise regular Siffrin hanging out is fucked up to think about. Just like real grief. Augh

6. a peek into the original dms as a treat from us

[rolandkaros]

im gonna be a dickhead for a second cause this is actually pissing me off:

i NEED y’all to deep the fact that most of these players do not care about what this man has done. carlos will probably shake his hand on sunday. maybe even a hug. they will compliment each other during the trophy presentation. no doubt the players will be asked again about the trial and no doubt the VAST majority of them will give the same non-answers as in australia. many of them are friends with him. many of these ‘friends’ are your faves. i’m not telling you to change your allegiance or find new players to be fans of or anything of that sort (this is the nature of sports, unfortunately a lot of them are very very flawed people, including many of the players i am a fan of). but i cannot sit here and watch all y’all go on saying ‘omg carlitos needs to defeat the evil on sunday 😣😖😫’ he literally does not care. most of them don’t. please, for the love of god, for everybody’s sake, i need us to understand this.

[pushing500]

Randy Random is really trying to get the Jones' Boys some company...

Mechi knows when he's outnumbered.

Looks like we'll be rushed off our feet making bedrolls for a little while!

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[amtrak12]

HELP! I've fallen down a Bering and Wells hole again and can't stop watching fanvids. I misssssss them!!! 😢

[impmansloot]

I think that people in the fandom trying to overexplain stuff to justify devs' decision to reduce worldstate choices to a mere handful is becoming a bit.. unnecessary

"It's northern Thedas, how many of your previous choices actually matter there?" I'm pretty sure the majority of us do realize it but that's not the point. Sure, we can attribute any mindset to a recurring NPC to not overshare because your Rook is a stranger to them, but I think it's getting a bit ridiculous because again, the logic of it or plausability is not the point... any recurring character in inquisition could've not shared anything about their personal life by that logic but my question is, would that be fun though? Like, the majority of theories or "imagines" or possible explanations I've read sound plausible and make sense, but it's not fun, and it can flatten characters, and it certainly doesn't make it feel like the previous choices matter... in a game series where your choices should matter. Well, some of them.

I get it though, maybe it's some form of damage control/trying to calm people down. The fandom does need to chill a bit plus some people are really going too far (let's not send death threats to devs please), but overall, I think people are just… mourning in a way (or rather processing) and expressing their disappointment, which is fair. I certainly feel that.