#we're tagging it

[1moremilgram-enjoyer]

Kotoko's Clothes Throughout HARROW

CW Death and murder, vigilantism, online radicalization, mentions of kidnapping, Little Red Riding Hood (so a wolf eating someone and animal death)

In my Kotoko brainrot arc (aka working on a full HARROW analysis), and I think it's really interesting how much Kotoko's clothes seem to change throughout HARROW. Changing clothes in general usually represents character change, which certainly fits how much Kotoko's attitude towards everything seems to switch up as she becomes more and more radicalized (presumably by online discourse seeing some of the other stuff in the MV) and violent. Not to mention the whole Red Riding Hood thing. Let's take a look!

(Btw, I'm not going to talk about the weird changing clothes at the end of the MV, where her clothes are completely different when she sees the kidnapping than when she actually kills the serial killer. It's too much of a mess for this post, so I'll leave it for the full analysis)

(This has probably been done before but you can't stop me from posting >:D)

So, there's four distinct fits Kotoko wears in HARROW, which I'll call White Jacket, Blue and Yellow Jacket, Foggy Forest Fit, Murder Fit. (Clarification: I don't think she actually killed the alley dude, I'm calling it that exclusively for the final murder)

Let's go one by one, in order of appearance. White Jacket shows up first. It's made up of, as you can imagine, a white jacket with red streaks, shorts of the same color, a black tank top, and white shoes.

The interesting thing about this outfit is that it shows up first, then completely disappears after Kotoko attacks the man in the alley. Even when we later see her back in the studio, by that point she's already wearing her red hoodie. This makes sense, as the primary color used here is white. In this MV, I believe white is being used to represent purity of some kind, while red represents danger and aggression. So in this outfit, we see a Kotoko yet untainted by violence (white), but who already has that latent danger lurking underneath (red streaks). Hell, for all we know, she hasn't even dropped out of the faculty of law at this point.

(T1) Q7: What did you study at university?

KY: For a while, I studied at the faculty of law. There's something I want to do, so I'm currently taking a break from studies, though.

But also worth noting, in that first shot, the red hoodie she uses to murder is already behind her. Again, latent danger.

Her shoes are also important, because for Kotoko, shoes are her murder weapon. But not these shoes. The white, pure shoes are those of an innocent individual. In this case, it's because she literally hasn't done anything with them yet.

Finally, the black tank top, which she shares with her "murder" outfit. Allowing myself to go a bit insane, this is the piece of clothing literally closest to her heart. The black doesn't represent evil, but rather grief and pain, I believe.

Becoming light-headed again, it all becomes crazy, the normalcy sought for, fading away, everytime death comes. The soul moves forward - I hate all the evils in this world, I feel like I’m about to break The surrounding net covered with poison

Want to find “HARROW” “HARROW” I feel like I’m going crazy after straining my nerves The person that can’t be saved, is now understanding the abnormality

(Note: I personally think the person being distressed (harrow-ed) is Kotoko herself, becoming distressed at the world's evils. I also happen to think she considers herself "the person that can't be saved" but that's for another time)

So yeah, Kotoko's suffering a lot. We been knew.

Next up we have the "field investigation" fit, the one with the blue and yellow jacket.

Apart from the jacket, she wears a cap of the same brand, Jacques Roulet (I talked about that in this post), and some shorts. As you can see, her shoes are generally hidden, but I think they're the white ones? Either pair would make some sense, but the white ones fit better since Kotoko never performs any violent actions in this outfit.

As stated, this is the outfit Kotoko uses to investigate outside. Going in person to check out crime scenes, talking to the one guy... Thus, the blue of her jacket likely refers to wisdom, patience, intelligence, that kind of thing. It's "calmer" than the colors of the other outfits, because Kotoko is not showing her more dangerous parts (red).

See, the main thing about this design is that Kotoko is being guarded when she wears it. Note that this is the only one where she doesn't show her undershirt, which before I related to her feelings. The cap serves to further imply that, she's keeping herself vaguely hidden. Basically, in this fit, Kotoko is both hiding her feelings and vulnerabilities, as well as "hiding her fangs", if that makes sense. Presenting herself as calmer, more put together, and more rational than she actually is.

However, there's still the yellow. I think that one's meant to represent fun; Kotoko still enjoys what she's doing here. It may even be somewhat stylized as a thunderbolt, because electricity is usually related to excitement. As shown in her T1 Voice Reveal distorted line:

...Fufu... This feels so good.

(I would like to say that she obviously doesn't do vigilantism just for fun, because that's a weird take I've seen mentioned. She has other reasons, she just happens to enjoy it a bit)

The point is that this "fun" is still muted in comparison to the blue of the jacket, because it's essentially in the background. Kotoko's analysis and investigations are the most important parts of these scenes, the fact she happens to enjoy vigilantism is sort of incidental.

Last note for this one, having a "yellow streak" means being cowardly, but that doesn't really apply to Kotoko so we ignore it.

Then we have the outfit seen in the forest scenes. Red hoodie, white tank top, white shoes, black shorts. This one remains the same in all of these scenes.

The important thing to note here is that, because this is the one outfit we see exist inside her mind, this is how Kotoko sees herself, or more likely, how she would like to see herself. Note the black tanktop of despair (Milgram makes you say some ridiculouos shit huh) has been replaced with a pure white tanktop, because Kotoko doesn't want to be sad and hurt. Obviously. Similarly, her shoes remain white even after she attacks Oshii, because she still considers herself "innocent" in the sense of "justified."

Still, though, her hoodie is the red one she wears while murdering. Because she considers herself dangerous and powerful. And she is, girlboss stay winning (preferably away from the other prisoners though).

One important thing which many have pointed out before me is that, by virtue of wearing this red hoodie and being in a forest with wolves, this outfit seems connected to the story of Red Riding Hood. How exactly is a fun question, especially since Red Riding Hood is a fairy tale and thus doesn't have an official version, but let's see.

I imagine you know the gist of the story. Red Riding Hood (RRH) is a girl tasked with delivering food to her grandma, who is sickly and thus weak, but along the trail finds a wolf who asks her where she's going. The wolf then goes ahead as RRH gets distracted, and the wolf ends up eating the grandma and disguising as her. When RRH arrives at the house, she notices the grandma looks slightly different, before she gets eaten too. In later tellings a huntsman comes in and cuts the wolf's stomach open, allowing the grandma and RRH to escape unharmed, somehow. The wolf is also insanely resilient evidently, as it's still alive at this point, but the humans fill its stomach with rocks and then it dies.

... This story is a lot darker than I remembered.

We already have a few superficially shared themes with Kotoko. Protecting the weak, calling out deception... wolves-

In particular, being devoured by the wolf could be seen as Kotoko being consumed by the radicalization which led her to murder. This is especially notable because of the actual underlying themes of Red Riding Hood. See, the story is generally interpreted to be about "rites of passage" and rebirth, where RRH exiting the wolf's stomach is the rebirth. Generally it's connected more to children growing up and going through puberty, but for Kotoko we need a more general reading. As I said before, changing clothes is sometimes considered a symbol of change of character, and Kotoko certainly changes a bit throughout HARROW. For example, by forming an idea of what a "win" entails in the context of her vigilantism.

Stained emotions, what is winning or losing?

“I didn’t mean to offend”, “I won’t do it again” How many wins in a row?

Hell, one of the last lyrics in the song, which plays over a scene of the foggy forest, explicitly says it.

Newly born “HARROW” “HARROW”

And if you need any more symbolism, Red Riding Hood is also sometimes interpreted as representing natural cycles, with the girl being the sun (that's why her cloak is red) and the wolf being the night "eating" her, before dawn (when the girl gets out of the stomach). A completion of one of these cycles is also a symbol of change and rebirth;

Goodnight “HARROW” “HARROW” Laugh and I can get to like myself

so when Kotoko says "goodnight" to herself, she's making an oath to change, say goodbye to the old her and greet dawn with a new version of herself, one which she actually likes ("laugh and I can get to like myself").

And there is an actual cycle referenced in the video. The moon in the forest scenes is always a waning moon, except at the end, where it's a full moon, which is not just connected to werewolves and thus indicates Kotoko "completing her transformation and getting her fangs", but it also represents the end of the lunar cycle. Again, rebirth.

Not to mention the fact dawn breaks in the last scene.

You get it? Natural cycles being completed, being reborn, etc. Kotoko transforms herself significantly as she kills the "wolf", probably the serial killer dude.

And yet, her clothes in these forest sections never changes. To me, this shows a disconnect between how Kotoko sees herself and the way she actually is.

Timelines - 20/6/18 Kotoko: Treat you [Amane] like a child? Hah, you’ve got to be kidding. Back when I was your age, I was already the person I am today. 

This is demonstrably false. I just spent several paragraphs talking about how much Kotoko changes throughout HARROW, let alone during the last 8 years of her life. The point is that Kotoko doesn't realize how radicalized she's becoming while browsing all the websites we see her going on during the video. And you know, there's probably some interesting social commentary and character complexity to talk about there, but if I get too much into it I will be here forever, so I'll leave that as food for thought.

Anyways, you may have noticed I'm not really talking about the pants. You're right! Moving on.

Finally, her murder fit. Same red hoodie as last one, but with a black tanktop and black leggings.

Her shoes are also different, a pair of men's shoes which are also her murder weapon. You see how they're (primarily) grey instead of white? Get it? Because she sees herself as only good and morally right, but she's (say it with me everyone) morally gray.

(Using both spellings to bother everyone)

I've already talked about how her red hoodie represents her violence and danger, literally covering up her black tank top of despair (might as well just run with the term).

Finally, I know I haven't been talking about the pants since I didn't see anything too interesting, but the change from shorts to leggings did catch my eye. However, I think that may just be a more 'practical' change as opposed to a 'symbolism' change. I imagine that if you're doing something illegal like beating up some dude in an alley, you'd feel more comfortable the less skin you showed, even if rationally there shouldn't be any way to identify Kotoko just by her legs.

I know I wouldn't kill with shorts and a t-shirt, but give me some leggings though, and I'm already looking at Amane's mother like she isn't dead enough yet-

Ehem. Disregard that last point.

Well, that's the end! As I said, I'm not gonna deal with the change of clothing at the end of the video, because to explain that I would have to explain an entire murder theory and talk about how I don't actually think Kotoko ever saw the exact scenes we see in the small room with the wooden floor, etc, which is all just too complicated for what's supposed to be a relatively short post. I'll address it in my full analysis, but there's too much going on for me to explain it here. With that said, I hope you enjoyed reading! Take care!

[1moreff-creator]

Firstly, good luck on the LGI video !! I think anyone who even tries to analyze tha embodiment of a stroke (/pos) that is that video deserves a medal, a hug, and a therapy session Secondly, considering you are a Veronika stan I was wondering if you had any theories in regards to her backstory, as I really feel like besides Hu and maybe David, she is the character who we know the least about in terms of her past. And I've been thinking about that a lot, especially since I think she will play a massive role in the conflicts of Chapter 3 (similar to the role Ace has played in Chapter 2) And considering what her secret is theorized to be by basically the entire community, her comment about how she used to be an outdoors person (implying something happened that made it so she wasn't one anymore), her lolita fashion sense implying that her family is at least somewhat wealthy because god those dresses are expensive, and whoever the fuck Alyssa Belyaeva is. I feel like she has some juicy stuff that's just waiting to be speculated by more people

Thanks for the well wishes! I probably will need therapy after that video, geez.

Anyways, no more David here, let’s talk Veronika! You are right in calling me a stan, even thinking about her is enough to get me to smile like a dummy. And you’re right, there is so much to speculate on with this freak! I agree she’ll probably have a bigger role soon, and there is clearly something that went deeply wrong in her childhood. Otherwise, how would she get this awesome? I love her.

I can't get anything conclusive for obvious reasons, but I have come up with what I think is an interesting theory about her backstory.

CW: Self-harm, speculation on child neglect and psychiatric wards

First, let me compile everything you brought up and a few more things.

+Veronika used to be an outdoors person, but isn’t anymore. She even likes skateboarding! Presumably because her talent requires her to be indoors a lot, but there’s a good chance there’s something more traumatic at play.

+She despises boredom over all else, and at times, not even horror is enough to satiate her thirst for thrills. “That's why I liked horror for such a long time. […] But in the end, fiction is only fiction”. Tsumugi kinnie spotted!

+Whenever she finds something exciting, she can’t help but get addicted. That’s an odd way for her to phrase that, but sure.

+She has a deep interest in psychology and horror, as we all know.

+Like you said, it’s possible her parents are quite wealthy, as she enjoys expensive lolita fashion, as well as “weird” and “exotic” foods, apparently.

+Her favorite color is white in the presence of other colors, as it makes them stand out, and her least favorite is white without other colors, since she considers it soulless. What a weirdo /affectionate.

+The hidden quote on her page is “Once something is broken, it can never be pieced together in quite the same way again. The same goes for people.” Spooky!

(I’m not bringing up Mai on this post, no shot I’m getting into that mess again)

+Her secret is most often speculated to be “You only took on your talent to distract from your incessant need to harm yourself for fun”. Now, watch that be Levi’s and she’s actually the murderer without remorse, I think that’d be funny. But yeah, the self-harm secret is most likely hers.

+Alyssa Belyaeva is/was her dearest friend, the person who gifted her the green triangle earring she wears.

This “dearest friend” is so odd. Like, on one hand, the fact the dev originally neglected to name her because they didn’t want to put too much emphasis on mostly unimportant characters (I wish I could find the actual wording they used, but I can’t see all the answers of the Q&A for some reason) would suggest she’s not too relevant. But on the other hand, her impact is literally etched into Veronika’s design via the earring, and…

Well, listen. She was Veronika’s friend. Not only did Veronika like her, which already implies something’s wrong with her, Alyssa actually liked Veronika back. Oh, there is something wrong wrong with this girl.

So, yeah, don’t know if she’s going to be relevant. I tried looking up the green triangle, see if it meant anything, but I didn’t see anything that looked related. I also looked up Alyssa’s name to see if it meant anything. “Alyssa” means “noble” or “truth”, which I don’t get anything from, and “Belyaeva” is just derived from “white (blond) hair”. Wikipedia, make up your mind, is it white or blond?

Although that does give me a headcanon idea, that Alyssa has white hair but dresses very colorfully, and that’s why Veronika’s favorite color is white in the presence of others.

Yo, watch me get attached to a character we have even less information on than goddamn Elliot Cuevas and Felicity Giles.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, the problem with Veronika is clear. There’s a lot there, but we’re also missing a fuckton, which makes it really hard to theorize about her. It feels like we’re missing some kind of through-line which actually connects all the loose concepts surrounding this girl. The most sensible answer here is that it’s impossible to gather anything conclusive about her backstory within the bounds of sanity.

…

But you didn’t ask me to speculate so I would remain within the bounds of sanity, did you? You wanna see the craziness come in, yeah? Well, let’s go crazy.

The Inevitable Descent Into Insanity

Veronika likes skateboarding.

It’s something I mentioned off-handedly before, but let’s think about it for a second. While there is such a thing as an indoor skatepark, when most of us think of skateboarding, I imagine most of us jump to the idea of skateboarding outside. I feel, if Veronika truly only liked indoor skateboarding, that would be made more explicit, you know? Like how Levi’s profile states he likes “suckers (candy)”.

And if that’s the case, we can gather three things.

>Veronika isn’t bored of the outside.

>Veronika isn’t scared of the outside.

>More people need to draw Veronika skateboarding /lh

This is a bit of stretch, and I don’t have any more evidence she doesn’t have trauma from being outdoors, but that’s not all for boredom. She clearly enjoyed playing in the playground, which was indoors, but was still ultimately a playground. That makes her being bored of the outside even more unlikely.

But if she didn’t get bored of the outside, why did she pick up a talent that is explicitly only possible indoors? Well, I want to take a closer look at how that secret is worded.

“You only took on your talent to distract from your incessant need to harm yourself for fun”

What’s interesting here is that she only took on her talent to stop herself from harming herself. This could imply that, while she obviously enjoys horror a lot, she doesn’t enjoy it as much as what she was doing before. After all, if she did, she would have also picked it up simply because it was more fun, and the secret’s wording would be odd.

And there’s more. What I imagine most of us think when we read this is “Veronika got so bored of everything else, she started hurting herself to stave off her boredom”. But, at the risk of sounding morbid, how was she hurting herself? Because I feel most of us jump to the idea of cutting (that’s why everyone mentions her wrists being covered when talking about her secret), but that’s not the only way people self harm. And, sorry if this sounds insensitive, but cutting doesn’t really seem “fun” to me. Like, obviously all self-harm is bad for you, but that in particular doesn’t seem too entertaining.

Why am I talking about this? Well, I want to bring attention to something she tells Teruko in CH 2 EP 7:

Veronika: “The idea that I could screw up my life at any time, that I could make a fatal mistake that I can’t undo… That’s real fear. So it excites me.”

Veronika was seemingly talking about the killing game here, but what if she’s not? She seems to be talking as if she has more experience with this sort of thing than just the killing game. And in particular, the use of the word “excites me” is interesting when paired with the line I called out earlier: “Whenever I find something that’s exciting, I can’t help but get addicted”.

So, if she found a way to constantly put herself in dangerous situations where one mistake would cost her her life, she would get addicted to it. Is this fair to say?

And this is where I bring you back, and draw a link between her love for the outdoors, her secret, her talent, and this idea. I’ve connected the dots-

(I didn’t connect shit)

I’ve connected them. Here goes:

Whenever Veronika played outside, she would feel the need to injure herself and put herself in unnecessarily dangerous situations, so she could feel the fear of making a fatal mistake she can’t undo. She only took on being a Horror Fanatic to distract from this need, as indoors, there aren’t as many exciting ways for her to injure herself.

That insane enough? I feel it sorta makes sense. If you think about it, this would mean at some point, Veronika would have to decide between throwing herself at horror or continuing her path to becoming the Ultimate Skateboarder, and the only reason she chose horror was… well, she would need to really go out of her way to injure herself while watching a horror movie.

Meanwhile, whenever she was outside, it would be easier to harm herself. Stand on a swing (like we see her do in the series), fall from a height, ram into something on a skateboard. Most of the injuries wouldn’t be too severe, but they would add up, and depending on what she was doing, I imagine some of them could be a bit worse. And whenever that happened, she would feel more excited than before, get more addicted, and constantly look for ways to injure herself more, and worse, and worse. Perhaps even injuring herself before going out, so she could be in the maximum amount of pain possible.

But there may have been other reasons she was doing this. This is where the “wealthy parents” may come in. Stereotypically speaking, wealthy parents are often depicted as neglectful, more preoccupied with work than with their children. Think- Oh, well, think Mariabella, actually. That’s obviously not always the case, but it does happen.

And if this is the case, it’s possible she was also, subconsciously, harming herself as a call for help. As a way to get the attention she needed. There would have been better ways to go about it, but self-harming is sort of inherently irrational.

In fact, maybe I am really going completely insane, but I think there’s an exchange where something like this can be inferred? In CH 2 EP 2, when Veronika falls off the swing.

Veronika: “Ehehe! I’m fine! Don’t worry!”

Teruko: “I’m not worried about you. If your body was fragile enough to break from a light fall like that, then you wouldn’t have done something so stupid”

Veronika: “It’s fun to stand on swings, okay? It makes me feel tall. I didn’t know that these ones would be quite so slippery”

Veronika: “But really, I’m not hurt at all. The ground is very soft”

Now, let’s be clear. I am probably reading way too much into this, and this was probably just a quick way to transition to the point of the ground being soft. But it always struck me as odd that Veronika feels the need to tell Teruko she wasn’t hurt twice, even after Teruko had taken her at her word before.

So, hear me out, maybe that was force of habit. Like, she always (intentionally) injured herself while playing around, then Alyssa or someone else would be concerned about her, and fuss over her. Then, Veronika would have to repeatedly state she was fine, because the whole point was that she wanted to keep playing after hurting herself. And Alyssa would be concerned, but eventually brush it off with a laugh. Or, knowing the type of friends Veronika gets, maybe Alyssa would also have the habit of hurting herself alongside Veronika-

I am not going to get attached to a character we have only a name for. I am not going to get attached to a character we have only a name for. I am not going to get attached to a character we have only a name for-

Anyways, again, I’m probably reading too much into that line, it’s very likely Veronika just said she was okay again to get to the point about the floor being soft.

Anyways, that’s sort of the main idea of my speculation! That she harmed herself by playing outside to make it more exciting. All we’re missing is what made her decide to stop hurting herself, and an explanation for the quote on her page, the one about people breaking. I assume they’re likely related, but I can’t give a solid answer. So here’s a few possibilities:

>When her parents found out, they said she was “broken” and sent her to a (likely under 18) psychiatric ward. This could explain why she considers the color white on its own “soulless”. I mean, I doubt under 18 psychiatric wards look that depressing, and I couldn’t find conclusive images in Google, but I did see some white, so maybe! The reason I’m not too sure is that I really don’t know much about under 18 psychiatric wards, and while I did try to do some research, I don’t exactly feel like being in more lists than I’m already probably on, you feel?

>A bit more worrying, perhaps her parents were the ones who tried to “””fix””” her, and they did something bad to her. I can’t comment much more on this idea, as any further ideas tend more towards fanfic than actual speculation.

>Maybe the one who “””broke””” was actually Alyssa, and either she was sent to a psych ward or something happened to her that made her “soulless”. I don’t like tying Alyssa too closely to Veronika’s backstory, because of the whole “she might not be important” thing, but it’s there. However, it’s important to note, if something did happen to Alyssa, Veronika likely wouldn’t be at fault, otherwise it would likely be mentioned in her secret.

>There's also a possibility Veronika stopped self harming on her own or, more likely, with proper therapy (so proud of her if that's the case!), and the "broken" thing refers to something she'll do in the killing game. I don't know if what I'm about to say really makes sense, but while I've always imagined Veronika saying her line with her "shadow over eyes" sprite, I guess it's possible she would actually say it with one of her "Junko-ish" or "deranged smile" sprites. I'm imagining something like: she drives Arturo absolutely insane, laughs about how horrible he's gotten, and with a malicious, wide smirk, she tells everyone: "Arturo is broken, and nothing will put him back together again. How entertaining!" Something like that. I really just want her to do something extremely fucked up, I think she deserves to have some fun :D

And there's my whole theory about Veronika's backstory! Even though it's probably completely wrong, I hope it satisfied your craving for speculation on the resident freak. And thanks for reading! If you made it this far, you deserve a good friend that loves you just like you are, like Alyssa! Take care!

[blu-engineer]

favorite stan twins characterization is that they're both equally insane. stanley just gets more air time to show it off. loosely inspired by a post i read earlier but here's some absolutely insane things both of them have done

stanley:

drugged a person and turned them into an exhibit in the mystery shack

had a vegas wedding to a prospector-themed novelty dispenser

gave mabel a grappling hook

failed to steal an animatronic badger

chewed his way out of the trunk of a car

punched at least three bald eagles

is multiply divorced, possibly even with the novelty dispenser

committed premeditated murder on a llama

faked a heart attack to get on Wheel of Fortune

took his clothes off in front of a live studio audience on Wheel of Fortune

has a rivalry with a fifth grader, a grandmother, and a man who exclusively dresses like a corn cob

stanford:

pulled a gun on a bus driver when he wouldn't let a pig on board

directly assisted in mind-controlling ronald reagan during his election in 1980

gave mabel a crossbow

got bitten by a vampire bat and subsequently began sampling human blood

owns contraband outlawed in 9000 dimensions; keeps it in an extremely flimsy plastic case

"accidentally" set a hawk on fire

has exes ranging from as normal as his old college buddy to as weird as a triangle and an alien with 7 eyes who put a metal plate in his head

wears turtlenecks because he's hiding multiple tattoos he regrets, including one themed around "all star" by smash mouth

is an Extremely wanted criminal across hundreds of dimensions; was completely kicked out of one for card counting

is, bizarrely, super into the band Eurythmics

can see shrimp colors

[anistarrose]

the under-praised backbone of any fandom:

fan wiki editors

fan wiki editors who move the wiki off of fandom.com and to an independent host, especially

transcript writers

image description writers

fic rec list curators

translators

everyone who archives an ephemeral ARG or website-based lore dump

everyone who archives and preserves related media in general, for that matter

[chimchiri]

gideon & harrow OR rd and sf as cowboys please please please

It's the cowgirl necro and her gunslinger cav! Who is so damn extra she's got three guns: one left, one right, and one in pole position! (She swears the ladies love it!)

[thirdtimed]

"all the budget went into this one" and it was for making custom personalized snails for his friends. im gonna cry

[me-beef]

@strangeravatar made a great point

i was gonna focus on the spike-hotboxing-celestia aspect but i got distracted somewhere along the way and i think i forgot what joke i was trying to make

but dont you think its interesting how many guards of the exact same color/body type she's managed to accrue?? i do

ooohh you want to go look at our stickers so bad

[all-horikoshi-sketches]

[crimeronan]

CDC finally fuckin' recommended the new COVID boosters for everyone in the US. letting my american followers who don't check the news know because i've been turned away for wanting to get an extra booster & now won't be anymore & it's Lovely. most americans are not going to get these and are going to grumble about them, which sucks as far as spread goes - but DOES mean u can schedule with ur local pharmacy sooner rather than later. please do so. ur immunocompromised friends and ur own body will thank u.

[syn4k]

[pinacoladamatata]

The Dread Wolf's Heart...

"Where I am going is terrible"

"It won't be terrible if you're with me"

[bitingbooth]

Thinking about indulging in masochism as a positive part of play. Like so often I see people talking about a sub getting hit for disobedience or failing to do something or even as just a passive thing that happens and like sure that has its place. But like what about a sub doing a good job so they can earn getting flogged? Warning a brat that you won't bite them for the rest of the night if they keep up the attitude. Offering to beat someone until they're crying as motivation for them to get all their work done? What if the violence was full of love? What if I want your skin to show the world how much I love and care for you?

[posalis]

"You can only be jealous of someone who has something you think you ought to have yourself." Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

[dalishious]

The Sanitized Lore of Dragon Age: The Veilguard

Tevinter is the heart of slavery in Thedas. This lore has been established in every game, novel, comic, and other extended material in the Dragon Age franchise to date that so much as mentions the nation. But in Dragon Age: The Veilguard, when we are finally able to actually visit this location for the first time… this rampant slavery we’ve heard so much about is nowhere to be found. It’s talked about here and there; Neve mentions The Viper has a history of freeing slaves, as does Rook themselves if they choose the Shadow Dragon faction as their origin, for example. But walking down the streets of Minrathous, you’d never know. Because Dragon Age: The Veilguard, for all its enjoyment otherwise, has one glaring issue: It’s too clean.

The world of Thedas is full of injustices. Humans persecute elves, fear qunari, and belittle dwarves. Mages of any race are treated like caged animals in most places. The nobility is corrupt. Although, Dragon Age has not always handled these injustices well, mind you. Many, many times I’ve found myself frustrated with moments that just feel like a Racism Simulator. But what makes it worth it, is when you can actually do something about it. These injustices are things that a good-aligned character strives to fight back against, maybe even for very personal reasons. Part of the power-fantasy for many minorities is that this fight feels tangible. I cannot arrange the assassination of a corrupt politician in real life, but I sure can get Celene Valmont stabbed to death in Dragon Age: Inquisition, for example. Additionally, these fictional injustices can be used to make statements on real life parallels, like any source of media. For example, no, the Chant of Light is not real, but acting as a stand-in for Catholicism, through a media analysis lens we can explore what the Chant of Light communicates on a figurative level.

When starting Dragon Age: The Veilguard and selecting to play as an elf – this should be unsurprising to anyone who is familiar with my bias towards them – I was fully prepared to enter the streets of Minrathous and immediately get called “knife-ear” or “rabbit”. But this did not happen. I thought perhaps it was just a prologue thing, but returning to Minrathous once again, there was not a single shred of disapproval from any NPC I encountered that wasn’t a generic enemy to fight. And even the generic enemies, the Tevinter Nationalist cult of the Venatori, didn’t seem to care at all that I was a lineage they deemed inferior before now. This is a stark difference from entering the Winter Palace in Dragon Age: Inquisition and immediately getting hit with court disapproval and insults. Are we now to believe that Tevinter has somehow solved its astronomical racism and classism problems in the ten years since the past game? Or perhaps are we to believe all the characters who have demonstrated Tevinter’s systemic discriminatory views were just lying or outliers? Because it makes absolutely no sense at all for this horribly corrupt nation to not have a shred of reactivity to an elven or qunari Rook prancing around. But here were are, and not a single NPC even recognizes my character’s lineage. And because this is so different from every single past game, it feels weird.

As an elf, you have the option to make a comment about how “too many humans look down on us” in one scene early in the game. You can also talk to Bellara and Davrin, the elven companions, about concerns that people won’t trust elves after finding out about the big bad Ancient Evanuris… but this is presented as if elves don’t already face persecution. It’s all so limited in scope that it could be all too easily missed if you are not paying very close attention, and coming into the game with pre-existing lore knowledge.

All this made it easy to first assume that the developers simply over-corrected an attempt to address the Racism Simulator moments. And if that was the case, than I would at least give credit to effort; they did not find the right balance, but they at least tried. However, the sudden lack of discrimination against different lineages in Dragon Age: The Veilguard is not the only sanitized example of lore present.

In Dragon Age: Origins, Zevran Arainai is a companion who is from the Antivan Crows; a group of assassins. He discusses in detail how the Crows buy children and raise them into murder machines through all kinds of torture. The World of Thedas books also describe how the Antivan Crows work, echoing what Zevran says and expanding that of the recruitment, only a select handful of those taken by the Crows even survive. When you start Dragon Age: The Veilguard as an Antivan Crow, you immediately unlock a re-used codex entry from the past, “The Crows and Queen Madrigal”, that says the following:

“His guild has a reputation to uphold. They are ruthless, efficient, and discreet. How would they maintain such notoriety if agents routinely revealed the names of employers with something as "banal" as torture.”

Ruthless, efficient, and discreet. Torture is banal. This is what the Crows were before Dragon Age: The Veilguard decided to take them in a very different direction. The Antivan Crows in this latest game are painted as freedom fighters against the Antaam occupation of Treviso. Teia calls the Crows “patriots”. And while I can certainly believe that the Crows would have enough motivation to fight back against the Antaam, given that it is in direct opposition to their own goals, I cannot understand why they are suddenly suggested to be morally good. They are assassins. They treat their people like tools and murder for money. Even as recent as the Tevinter Nights story Eight Little Talons, it is addressed that the Antivan Crows are in it for the coin and power, with characters like Teia being outliers for wanting to change that. It makes the use of the older codex all the more confusing, as it sets the Antivan Crows up as something they are no longer portrayed as.

I personally think it would have been really interesting to explore a morally corrupt faction in comparison to say, the Shadow Dragons. Perhaps even as a protagonist, address things like the enslavement of “recruits” to make the faction at least somewhat better. (They are still assassins, after all.) Instead, we’re just supposed to ignore everything unsavory about them, I suppose…

We could discuss even further examples. Like how the Lords of Fortune pillage ruins but it’s okay, because they never sell artifacts of cultural importance, supposedly. Or how the only problem with the Templar Order in Tevinter is just the “bad apples” that work with Venatori. I could go on, but I don’t think I have to.

It is because of all this sanitization, that I cannot believe this was simply over-correction on a developmental part. Especially when there is still racism in the game, in other forms. The impression I’m left with feels far deeper than that; it feels corporate. As if a computer ran through the game’s script and got rid of anything with “too much” political substance. The strongest statements are hidden in codex entries, and I almost suspect they had to be snuck in.

Between a Racism Simulator and just ignoring anything bad whatsoever, I believe a balance is achievable; that sweet spot that actually has something to say about what it is presenting. I know it is achievable, because there are a few bright spots of this that I’ve encountered in Dragon Age: The Veilguard too. For example, some of the codex entries like I mentioned, and almost all the content with the Grey Wardens thus far. It is a shame there is not more content on this level.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is overall still a fun game, in my opinion. But it’s hard to argue that it isn’t missing the grit of its predecessors. The sharp edges have been smoothed. The claws have been removed. The house has been baby-proofed. And for what purpose?

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The 2D vs 3D contrast of the sonic and shadow generation hubworlds cracks me up the more I think about it

Bonus:

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DRAGON AGE: THE VEILGUARD / inner circle