Lost Legacy Exemplifies Naughty Dog’s Cultural Crisis
There’s a discussion about Ocean’s 8 that positions its existence around whether or not it's necessary as a counterpoint to the Ocean’s reboot - the Ocean’s Cinematic Universe - if you will (what a world we live in) - that it was only made as a gender flip of the reboot that spawned two sequels, three films in total cast almost entirely with men.
My perspective is that as much as I generally enjoyed the Ocean’s reboots for what they were, Ocean’s Eleven should have been a cast entirely with women in the first place.
The heroes we both need and deserve.
Massive spoilers for the original 1960 Lewis Milestone version and the Steven Soderbergh one in 2001 of Ocean’s Eleven - Soderbergh’s flip is of-course that they get to keep the money at the end so that they have to potentially give it back in the sequel he knew he’d be able to make, whereas I doubt Milestone knew he’d ever get a sequel back in the early 60′s so the rub for film-making back then is to burn the money at the end. Nevertheless even for the early 2000′s, the boldest of moves would have been to cast it with women, not to be progressive but also to be progressive, tho that’s still an absurd thought that to cast women is progressive - but to be smart. Ocean’s 8 is a fantastic film, deftly written, paced, acted, shot and edited. Would the world have responded to it in like-kind? I know how *I* would have responded to it, I think you can answer for yourself how societal cultures may have responded at any point from 2001 thru to now. In any case, I have Ocean’s 8 on blu-ray. I love it.
A reader asked me whether I’d played Uncharted: The Lost Legacy after kindly reading through my bludgeoning of Uncharted 4, and seeing as they were patient enough to endure that blood-letting, I felt I owed them and probably Naughty Dog the time of day to give Uncharted-And-A-Half a chance, and I’m really glad I did. Fair warning, there’s a lot I didn’t like about Lost Legacy, and there’s going to be some more pain - a lot of pain. I don’t think any of my tumblr audience is quite on the rest of my socials, but anyone who’s connected to me anywhere else on the Wire was subject to my frustrations as I played thru the game on Saturday, including the blurred image of my Google Keep notes I took while playing the game in preparation for this journal. I keep notes now.
Nevertheless, I can say that on the assumption that the Uncharted series is wrapped, or at least in the narrative arc with these characters as we know them, that Lost Legacy is easily without question my favourite Uncharted game by far.
On that assumption that Uncharted is more or less done, now’s as good a time as any to take a top-down look at the franchise as a whole. I know I already did a fair bit of that in the last piece, but some broader thoughts on what the series does and says have solidified while playing Lost Legacy, and I’ll discuss them as a lead-in to my thoughts on the game.
Again - this is going to be riddled with spoilers for Uncharted: The Lost Legacy and most likely the entire Uncharted series, so if you’ve not played them and are interested in doing so, or don’t want to see them heavily critiqued, please stop here.
The first game was released in 2007 and was apparently in development for roughly three years. What was happening up to and around 2004 to 2007? September 11 had happened in 2001, the world was at war in the Middle East in Afghanistan and second invasion of Iraq had begun in 2003, Hurricane Katrina happened in 2005 - the same year the IRA ended armed conflict in Northern Ireland, 2005 saw the outbreak of H5N1 Avian Flu - topical right now. There are so many more, I can’t list them all here - lots of momentous events that in some way or another highlight community awareness in some way - that’s probably a bit of an obtuse statement but hopefully it’ll string together in a sec. What struck me and a bunch of my friends odd about the first, then the second and then somehow every Uncharted game since, is that Naughty Dog seem to choose an ethnicity for their antagonists and scratch the surface of “what if this element of their cultural violence is bad”, but then leave it so shallow that it remains a caricature and comes off as casually and carelessly racist. The first game frames the theme around Nazis, but the actual enemies are anything but. Yes, they’re intended to be mercenaries, but they’re hardly nondescript, they’re absolutely of very specific ethnicity.
From the second game onward, Naughty Dog seem to want to make use of real world settings and do some nuanced research on actual sociopolitical conflict and I always feel uneasy about how its presented. Lost Legacy begins much the same way and I worried about the tone going in. An active war-zone in India as gravitas to your setting that is then almost completely abandoned until the very end? This is my problem with how the writers treat setting in Uncharted. They use very real conflicts that have real-world consequences for people in which actual lives are lost to inject gravity into their narrative and then quickly discard it for the sake of shenanigans once the wise-cracking starts when the tone shifts gear and the characters themselves take centre-stage in the foreground.
Here’s the thing.
The character’s are enough.
I *love* these characters. Their story is fantastic. Nadine’s and Chloe’s story was the best and most cohesive of the entire series. Also it only took me roughly six hours to play thru and I only feel like half of that was wasted! That’s still probably being too generous but I’m grasping for positives, here. Still - I don’t know why the senior production team has never had confidence in the core of their product which is the charm of their characters and the play dynamic - Uncharted is primarily about *seeing* and *doing* - for the most part, unfortunately, separately.
The dialogue between Chloe and Nadine is extremely interesting, it is absolutely the best thing in the game, yet it keeps getting interrupted by stupid gameplay beats due to poor timing of rolling up on level locations. Uncharted 4 was supposed to have locations hidden around levels where you could engage in dialogue between characters but I barely found them - why hide such interesting content in your game?? It’s completely absurd. Then the only few I did find were between Elena and Nathan altho I really don’t think those were meant to be hidden, and they were so poorly written and I hated them so much, I didn’t care to discover any more. Again - no disrespect at all to Nolan North and Troy Baker whom I absolutely adore and respect, but I didn’t find anything engaging or interesting *at all* about the brother narrative. I didn’t care one bit what that nonsense was about. What about Sully? Where’s Sully’s story?? I’m just so - so glad we got a story for Chloe, and that at least Nadine got some great screen time too as a part of it and that it all presented so well.
Before I continue to praise what went well, there are a few things I can’t let pass. While the driving has thankfully improved and controls quite well now, the exclusion of a minimap or GPS HUD element is interesting. I’m fairly certain it’s intentional as to not detract from the game’s clean, cinematic look, to not break immersion, but this just generates a horrific breakdown in actual player experience for me. Without any navigational assists, I constantly got lost and stopped every 20 meters to check the map, frequently driving into dead-ends, off cliffs and past where I wanted or needed to go. The game isn’t a 30 hour open-world experience with distinct and varied landmarks the player will familiarise themselves with and learn to navigate by, for the most part the level is fairly homogeneous in object geometry.
Some of the puzzles take far too long to mechanically execute, in particular the smashy-slashy statue block jumpy stupid whatever it’s called one and the sliding shadow motif. It doesn’t matter that neither actually takes too long once you know the solution, it’s that they feel long and then are actually over-long and also not interesting to mechanically execute. This is due mostly to clunky character animation and animation smoothing, and part of Naughty Dog’s overall obsession with being cinematic which is something I’ll return to towards the end of this piece, something which has been a strength but will ultimately be to their detriment. While cinematic visuals might be a benefit for traversal, it’s something that absolutely does not suit puzzle-solving. In the example of the statue-block puzzle, the hard reset each time the player is hit means laboriously jogging all the way back to the beginning and starting again - it’s just poor puzzle design having to begin again from a full reset. There’s no satisfaction in having to remember the whole thing and while I didn’t look up the solution online, I’m willing to bet many people will have just dialled up a clip on YouTube and copied it without figuring it out themselves. This is a failure of connecting what’s satisfying about moving in your game and what’s satisfying about solving puzzles, something Crystal Dynamics understood far better in the Tomb Raider reboots, in particular the second outing (Rise of) with their much more environment-centric puzzling.
The sliding shadow puzzle just simply takes way too long to jog around the space, then clip onto the hot-zone for each lever, wait for the animation to lift it, wait for the animation for the pieces to slide, rinse, repeat. Once you know what you have to do, it’s overly frustrating actually having to do it.
It brings me to a weird quirk of design where the puzzle designers perhaps don’t understand something that the environmental designers do. Maybe they didn’t get the same little notes in the Slack channel, or Trello board or Teams pin or whatever. Uncharted level-design has almost no back-tracking, less in each successive game, and it’s almost entirely absent from Lost Legacy - you’d have to look closely to realise you’re navigating the same area you came in thru and almost always moving over it in a different way that’s been modified - now it’s flooded, now there’s a bridge, now you’re swinging or leaping or climbing where you weren’t etc. I feel like this is the Hidetaka Miyazaki Souls/Borne effect of level design in which environments are designed to be both realistic and practical.
Great! Good for the level designers.
Did the puzzle designers not get that note? Maybe they did. I need to stop thinking that every poor optimisation is a symptom of ignorance - that’s bad form on my part. What’s more likely is it’s a symptom of either bad leadership, poor tool implementation, lack of time or too narrow or strict an observation of representative vision - by which I mean - they can’t change the way the characters move or animate just for puzzles, because it has to be consistent with the cinematic representation of the game as a whole - and that sucks lemons. It means the overall play experience suffers for the sake of the overall cinematic experience except executing a puzzle isn’t cinematic unless it’s expansive...
Like the positive example I’ll give of the light reflector room.
Shoplifted from Uncharted 2′s giant knife that has Nathan climb all over a giant knife, Lost Legacy’s light reflector room has slightly less climbing but is a much larger space, more impressive and a much better example of good puzzling in Uncharted. It’s not difficult to solve but again (I think again?) I’ll argue that you don’t come to Uncharted for difficult puzzles - you don’t come to Tomb Raider for difficult puzzles, either.
The puzzles in these games should be mostly environmental because they feel good solving them, and solving them should be more about the doing - the playing - and the playing should be moving - running, jumping, climbing etc.
Both the giant knife and the reflector room are a joy to execute because they’re fantastically realised - large cavernous environments that aren’t annoying to navigate, that give you time to appreciate both the scale of the spaces and the details the designers and artists have put into them. Lost Legacy’s is more impressive because you do a lot more puzzling and spend much more time in its vastly larger space, culminating in combat that usually I would be ho-hum about, but I guess exhibits more animation and destruction tech which while scripted, is still impressive nonetheless given how extremely difficult it is to have interactivity still occurring.
I have a few things I want to mention before I begin to wrap up, given it’s going to be a very long wrap - I’d say I’m taking cues from Joseph Anderson but I’ve always been this verbose.
The medallion puzzles were excellent, in part perhaps because they felt like the closest thing to the Tomb Raider reboots’ challenge tombs. Some of them were silly and lazily implemented, the worst offender being you just had to shoot mans and get the medallion from the lock-box that the mans had put it in (pfft), but the best ones were integrated into the environment such that you may well have walked past or thru areas that were puzzles before you knew what they were. This brings up one of the most interesting things I’ve been turning over for quite some time now. Ben Croshaw aka Yahtzee aka Zero Punctuation may have first mentioned “chest high walls” in his first Gears of War video, but it may well have been an Uncharted game. I don’t remember but he will have thrown in mentions of all the generic cover-shooters as a catch-all for how the environments immediately telegraph that Combat™ will happen. It’s a particularly astute remark and speaks volumes of video game design - developers always seem to have very specific design language to separate traversal, combat and puzzling. While I clearly don’t care for combat most days, and yes - I do acknowledge there are some practical concerns for combat that can’t be avoided, I always envisaged design that blurred the lines between puzzle and environment so that you never quite knew what was and wasn’t a puzzle. Everything should be the puzzle. In some senses, Cyan’s old Myst games were a bit like this but in a very rudimentary and crude way - sure, they’re quite old now, but even those had very clear not puzzle areas. It’s a complex and subtle subject, but something of a study of games like Fireproof Games’ The Room would be in order. Understandably smaller scale, but the thinking behind it is definitely adjacent.
Final notes - the young Indian girl in the prologue has amazing animations that you’ll miss entirely unless you swing the camera yourself. A whole team of people or a single animator has spent hours on those animations - that a director or team leader hasn’t forced the player to see and appreciate them is a disservice.
Every section where you have to do something under pressure like run from mans shooting at you or dash through a lengthy section of crumbling cave network etc. is a horrible play experience of not knowing where to go. They’re trying to inject excitement by applying pressure but there’s no clear guidance and no dependence on player skill, so you end in bizarre fail-states due to going in completely the wrong direction that glitches cameras or scene time-outs resulting in check-points and the whole thing just doesn’t scan as a cinematic experience. I hate hate hate them - you’re subject to the same musical swell that’s supposed to be like a movie only to fail again and it comes off as b-grade and pathetic. Every game has had this problem and it is just straight bad design.
Three? Four? Games in a row, Naughty Dog have recycled;
being pursued on foot by an armoured vehicle crashing through level geometry while you have to run and occasionally shoot/fight mans,
driving down a shanty-town on a hill pursued by an armoured vehicle - perhaps the same one as previous scene
a big chase scene of lots of vehicles jumping from vehicle to vehicle shooting and/or punching mans that may or may not include...
a train combat sequence where you start at the back of the train and work your way to the front of it shooting mans as you go
This lacks creativity at this point. I think duplicating these once each - so you do them twice total across the franchise is fine, but they hit the same beats in the same way - exactly - every time they appear. It just strikes me as Naughty Dog just not knowing what else to do. At one point, I think it was in Uncharted 4, when driving down the shanty-town on the hill, I literally had a brain-fart not knowing which game I was playing because I swear we did it in 2 and 3. Did we do it in 3?? Look, I don’t know. But it’s getting old. At least we didn’t do it in Lost Legacy, but we did the train and I’ve had enough. I’ve had enough of doing the same things in the same way. It could have been a train but it should have been in a way that just wasn’t just another Uncharted train. It hasn’t worn thin, it’s worn out.
Overall, the games look great... but playing them feels like they’re stuck in PS2 and early PS3 era philosophies, like Naughty Dog haven’t evolved and don’t realise that people’s brains function much quicker and can process more, or that the media we consume, the games we play function at a higher level and we can digest more, we’re capable of processing higher functions. I’ve been playing Ubisoft’s The Division 2 and enjoying it more the more I play, much to my surprise. I understand the intent behind the gameplay is extremely different to the single-player experience of Uncharted, however there are some parallels in what it achieves animation wise;
The Division is also a cover shooter but of-course as a multiplayer, open-world live-service game, its intent is to telegraph to the player that the entire environment is a permanent play-space in which to always be playing. It utilises an information-rich GUI that is an always-on system with button icons telling the player what button to press over what surfaces to snap to, vault over, climb up, run to (and snap to cover), open and loot, interact with etc. I don’t know if these can be turned off but I like them on. It’s a pretty amazing feat that almost every environmental object has been mapped as a snap-to-cover and/or climbable object. For this reason, the character movement in Division is pretty quick and snappy, however it still manages to have a decent degree of natural human kinetics in the character rigging which is amazing. This means if you move-off from standing still, there’s a slight delay as your “weight” shifts, same if you change direction. When I say “snap” to cover, it’s not actually instantaneous, your character makes a movement and takes time to do so, yet it’s still not sluggish. Somehow the developers have worked at fine-tuning a balance between not-instant, but not too slow.
This is something that even in Lost Legacy, I feel Naughty Dog simply can’t do. The animations are decent during play - they’re outstanding during cutscenes (we’re getting there), but character models have a really awkward relationship with the environment. They clip awkwardly with ladders and buttons and wheels - with puzzles and levers - getting the grappling hook to prompt is again better than Uncharted 4 but still not ideal. I had far fewer glitch-outs than 4 too, which was a significant improvement, but I still had to animate back and forth a few times to get into hot-zones appropriately and with character kinetics not quite right, it wasn’t exactly easy.
And again to be fair, this stuff is suuuuuper difficult. I don’t mean to talk about this stuff like it’s cooking instant ramen. It’s so freaking tough. Rigging and mapping interactive character models has to be one of the most stupendously difficult things a developer has to do - making it work with all that scripting, getting it to play nice with all those assets and lines and lines of coding for the full experience. I have so much respect for game developers and what an astronomical task it is. So when I say I prefer one development team’s product over another’s, I don’t mean to say that the other team is absolute garbage - there are so many things that might contribute to that final product and we have no idea what’s been going on at Naughty Dog. If the team leaders and producers say they’re happy or even if they don’t, and the decision is made to ship, there’s nothing more they can say or do.
If there was one thing I absolutely loved about this game, it was the two main characters and the story that was told about them. I can excuse the main text as the catalyst that brought them together - even to the point that it’s a story about Chloe ultimately deciding what’s important to her. My issue with this comes full circle with the setting being in a real world conflict. There’s a bit of white savour complex in there in that Asav might be the narrative’s antagonist, but he at least is local. It’s not clear exactly what Chloe’s ethnicity is and I’m not here to judge what her stakes are in it because clearly her character has a sense of home and place in India, but she certainly also has a complex sense of being an outsider. So the point is not to judge, but the game also is unclear on its positioning other than she’s the heroic vehicle of deliverance. See what I mean about theme? This is what I mean by you could have just as easily written almost an identical story about Nadine and Chloe, with very similar interactions, tension, redemption and resolve - even with an antagonist, conflict and a happy ending, but either treated real sociopolitical issues with better care or not set your game in them at all. I’m all for setting games in the real world, but if you’re going to do it, do it right. I’m not the person to ask.
I need to be careful not to direct that criticism at the base-level developers nor at Claudia Black who is the manifestation of Chloe’s voice because she does an amazing job of bringing her to life. The casting of Laura Bailey voicing a black South African Nadine was much more awkward given Nadine’s ethnicity wasn’t decided when she was cast - again that’s on Naughty Dog’s leadership, but I won’t knock Laura Bailey for it. It’s easy to say she should have resigned, perhaps she should have, that’s an economical question only Laura can answer and I’m sure it’s not an easy one. Suffice to say, VO work isn’t lucrative.
What a side-track.
I don’t think I ever cared about Nathan.
I think I always cared about Elena, and not because WAIFU and also not because WHITE KNIGHT or whatever other bullshit reasons stupid alphagamerz will spit from their frontheads. Elena’s just more interesting, probably because Nathan is written like a design document and Elena’s written like a human being. Naughty Dog want to create a game about adventuring with lush expansive environments, shooty mcshooting and light puzzling. They want it to be cinematic and unrivalled in its quality and they have the smarts to build the tech around it, with Sony’s help. Backed by Sony money, they take VO seriously and do a great job at creating that cinematic experience, coupled with some above-par for video games narrative writing. The problem this introduces for me is Nathan’s raison d'être has to justify everything - action, tension, stupidity...
Nathan Drake really is the design document.
I feel like he’s just the unfortunate side-effect of being central to the game, and it’s typical of my character to just not dig the focus of things and get into subtexts a whole lot more. Often I get into things in the periphery, things adjacent - I don’t love or hate Shakespeare or for that matter Baz Luhrmann but Romeo + Juliet ‘96 is an amazing film and not at all because of the eponymous Romeo and Juliet and again, not for Leonardo di Caprio (spit!) or for Claire Danes (she can stay) but the absolutely divine cast of supporting characters (John Leguizamo will live in my heart forever oh baby).
That Nathan makes stupid decisions is already something that turns me off. That he makes poor decisions because... he’s an orphan? Because... he was bullied? Because... his brother left him? This is why he’s not transparent with his wife? Actually, he’s quite realistic. Except the people like him I’ve known in my life aren’t heroes - they’re pathetic or unreliable or abusive or dangerous. Elena is an adult. She’s not perfect either and that’s also great because neither am I. As a side character she has the conceit of being more nuanced, but as the contra to Nathan, she’s also mature versus his childishness. OOOOAAAAH EVERYONE LOVES A LOVEABLE MANBABY OOAAAH COMEON LIVE A LITTLE EVERYONE’S GOT A LITTLE CHILD STILL IN THEM SOMEWHERE yea fine, I get it, like I’ve said before, yes - he embodies the recklessness and playfulness in us, but that’s a confusing position for a game that frequently tries to ground itself in real world conflict to be taking. You’re reducing him to that but injecting complex and nuanced characters like Elena and now eventually both Chloe and Nadine? I’m telling you now - any male that doesn’t know when it’s appropriate to grow-up, when the time to set aside the playfulness and be TRUTHFUL AND TRANSPARENT WITH HIS PARTNER is a dangerous person and FUCK THAT NOISE. Nathan, as much as I do absolutely - make no mistake - adore Nolan North’s voicing - ends up being another Homer Simpson - as long as you laugh at his stupidity, you’ll excuse it, and you’ll excuse the hurt that’s done by it, and that shit doesn’t fly with me. His redemption was not earned. I say again - Elena should throw him into the sea.
Nadine ends up being a fantastic character, even if she’s given less narrative time, she’s a great example of her behaviour telling more story in contrast to Chloe getting to reveal her past and it’s nice to see them play off one another. I feel Nadine and Chloe as characters hit great story beats in ways Nathan didn’t get to with pretty much any of the other characters in four games - not Sully, not Elena, not his brother, not even Chloe - all told, we never actually get any back-story on Nathan and Chloe and I think we’re better off for it because I don’t care.
Having a quick squiz around tumblr reveals the obvious and rampant shipping of Nadine and Chloe and I couldn’t be happier. I think Naughty Dog knew what they were doing. There were so many moments. Those moments were for us. I think they were subtle enough that the fragile manbabies would have missed them but there’s no fooling us. Some of the babyboiz would have been seething thru their mouthbreething hairmouths and I’m sure probably took to the internet but that’s OK, they can remain unfucked incels for the rest of their lives or worse, serviced by whatever unwashed creatures want to dare fondle them in the dark. The elephant ride and that whole conversation was almost enough for me to forgive the absolute disaster that was Uncharted 4. It was given enough time to breathe, it was absolutely beautiful, and just when you thought they were going to terminate it and apologise for making things too awks, it concludes just perfectly and you get a phone picture that doesn’t have Nadine in frame, yet her presence in that picture is definite, pervasive and emotional. Again, some people may have completely missed it and maybe it chalks up to life experience, but as completely contrived as an artefact of complete fiction as that whole sequence might be, it was one of the most wonderfully tender moments ever created in a video game and I wonder if it makes the whole affair worth it.
In the Uncharted 4 piece, I threw in a few barbs about the most meaningful interactions, and in Lost Legacy, what I really loved was Chloe taking photos of things she thinks are beautiful and interesting on her phone, and feeding the elephant - these were the most meaningful interactions in the game. I love that the photos on the phone didn’t serve any gameplay utility at all, they were there because her character wanted to document her travels, because she thought what she was seeing was cool, and any time in the game, you could pull out your phone and look at what you’d seen. It was such a good and important decision to have the very first picture to be the Indian girl in the market, as that rather than the local conflict, does more to ground you and Chloe as a character in the setting. The game never forces you to look at it as a reminder, but you know it’s there.
I did steal these from the internet, sorry - so if they’re yours, let me know and I’ll be happy to take them down - this one in particular, seeing as it’s a photomode capture. I should have taken my own but I don’t do photomode caps on my first play-thru and there’s no-way I’m replaying this ever again.
It took five games for Naughty Dog to finally get some decent character writing, but a part of me still feels they couldn’t have existed without all the dross of the other games. There’s this immense amount of back-story and labour both the developers and the players had to slog thru to get to this point, and I feel as tho we get here and there’s just too little to show for it. I still really enjoyed the story that was told, the sense of character I felt, but a lot of that was contingent on the Uncharted universe in situ. Lost Legacy feels like a combining of all of Naughty Dog’s narrative motifs - the earnest redemption, the moment of tenderness and connection centred around peaceful animals - it’s a greatest hits of Naughty Dog in the best way possible because each narrative beat hits perfectly. I’m glad I played it with two characters who endeared themselves so much to me, that I truly cared about.
I’ve spend a lot of time praising the strengths of writing for at least Lost Legacy, but for each thing I’ve enjoyed about at least these two characters, there have been so many things I’ve been critical of. I feel like in order to get to the tiniest bit of enjoyment, I had to suffer thru so much. Honestly I don’t know if it really was worth it. It’s hard to know given that who I am now and where my tastes are and have developed as a consequence of my experiences, and I definitely would not replay any of those games again - so where does that leave me? I can’t go back and play The Last Of Us and I absolutely won’t play the second game, I just can’t do Naughty Dog games now, I don’t have it in me.
Naughty Dog have spent the better part of two decades developing tech for visual fidelity specifically for the Playstation hardware platforms (PS3 and 4). They’ve also been doing it by overworking their staff, many of which have left out of frustration or necessity. The problem they face is that as industry tools in general improve, there will no gap between games developed by Naughty Dog and any other contemporary studio from a visual perspective. Make no mistake - the Uncharted games are absolutely chock-full of objects, geometry and animation - somehow miraculously so on the Playstation platform in comparison to other games with the exception of other first-party and exclusive games receiving similar support from Sony such as Guerilla Games’ Horizon Zero Dawn and Sucker Punch’s forthcoming Ghost of Tsushima. There are probably other similar examples for the previous generation on PS3.
Yes, there’s a certain style of game Naughty Dog create as far as narrative goes but because it’s becoming more cinematic, that style is judged more and more by cinematic standards and at best it’s barely semi-professional aside from the outstanding voice work. There are few striking visual motifs that set Naughty Dog games apart from a design perspective, and the gameplay and mechanical constructions that once distinguished them at least a little from others are ever diminishing at increasing rates - more-so as their work practices make the level of quality they set out to achieve ever more unsustainable.
Lost Legacy encapsulates a lot of what I feel about video games as a whole at the moment - as an industry and as a culture. It’s a snapshot of a culture that’s achieving wonderful, beautiful things that are in ways huge - immense, yet somehow can feel so small in comparison to some of the challenges it faces. It’s an industry and culture experiencing a period of great upheaval, where after years upon years of malpractice, terrible things somehow still endure. It’s a space where sometimes it feels like a battle to find the tiniest shred of beauty buried in the dirt and ash, and there doesn’t seem to be an end to the frustration that working thru it brings about while grass-roots labourers continue to be burned.
Like many things in life, both at my age and at the level I guess a person gets to at the exposure rate of a thing, I’ve cut back a great deal on my engagement time with video games, so I’m a lot less patient with the functions and mechanisms of a game. There’s a labour element of video games that I feel developers might think is somehow necessary and there’s a component of that which is true, just not quite in the way they think it is, and it takes a unique frame of thinking to break out of traditional design to understand it. Again I’m not saying there’s anything special about how I understand games - there’s nothing at all original in my thoughts - I’ve shoplifted them wholesale from a hundred other people back from when I used to read Gamasutra and even now when I read designers and the people I follow and talk to on Twitter etc. There’s also absolutely nothing wrong with traditions and the people that enjoy them - just because they’re not my thing any more doesn’t mean they’re bad. It just means I’ve moved to something else and I shouldn’t engage with them.
That, I think, is what I’m waiting for. Kentucky Route Zero, Howling Dogs, Dear Esther, Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture, a whole bunch of others - these are the games I feel are pushing past the boundaries of tradition. Then the moments Uncharted takes itself out of its traditions - Nadine and Chloe’s elephant ride, Chloe’s phone pictures, Elena and Nathan’s house tours especially as Cassie - that’s when I think now you’re running! Run with it! Look, I’m still playing The Division - I’m still moving and shooting and enjoying it.
But we can do so much more.
Many developers are doing more.
We as an audience need to play more
All of us together need to do and play more.
(The epilogue is me figuring I talk a lot of shit about AAA games and nary a word about KRZ, Howling Dogs, Dear Esther and the rest and I get it, but oooooo howdy is it really difficult for me to talk pragmatically about games I actually love)
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May 30th-June 5th, 2020 Creator Babble Archive
The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from May 30th, 2020 to June 8th, 2020. The chat focused on the following question:
What flaws does your protagonist possess, and how do you show this in story?
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
he tends to run away from things and people!
i show this by having him run away from things and people!
She's reckless and always thinks she's right. I show this by having her follow her opinions into dangerous situations haha
I have no idea how to answer the second part of that question
My antagonist
also reckless and always thinks she's right
what a pair
wow, you guys are typing a lot.
eliushi [a winged tale]
As the only wingless child, Florence is used to others ostracizing her. This causes her to believe that she’s worthless or at least a crappy replacement for her mother since she has trouble reading. This is shown by her being passive when confronted with the other winged children and tolerant being left behind. When her mother disappears, her first thought is to find her mother (to make sure mom is safe of course) but really because she feels she can’t possibly fulfill the roles her mother did for the winged community.
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
man i gotta read a winged tale seriously
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
For my comic uh lmao. It's been touched during OIYD!'s ctp chat but Cara tends to think critically on her romantic relationships, and thus even when things she goes well, she has her doubts and tries to end it before it develops lmao. Also she runs from her problems a lot (been addressed by her friend Ana through their last discussion). She done goof a lot of things but OIYD! will be pushing on her to how she gonna deal with those mistakes and her shortcomings too.
also like i guess how its depicted uh through dialogue and her body language. she physically closes herself off a bit when Ana was roasting her, and upon meeting with Richie too. so yeah lmao
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Phaedra's faith and devotion to her patron goddess is, to her, a great strength - but in light what she'll have to go through, it could very well be the source of her breaking point. She's never had to consider other perspectives - to her, the line between good and evil is as clear as the horizon, and no one can tell her otherwise. I haven't gone into it much yet, apart from a few sentences in the first chapter, but it'll become painfully clear later. Her family has dutifully served the goddess for generations, and as such, Phaedra has effectively put all her eggs in one basket, and is extremely proud to have done so. As time goes on, we'll see how that works out for her...
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
AAAA
blurred lines between good and evil
I love that
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
Hooooh boy! My characters are basically just big buckets of flaws and personal issues. Izrekiel's flaws: * As a result of his amnesia and past traumas that still have an effect on him despite his inability to remember them, he changed from originally a fairly passionate, happy person to a rather reclusive and distrusting mess. I try to show this with his reluctance to speak much of the time, and how difficult it is for him to befriend Agatha. * He's also very quick to anger, which I show later in the story when he gets into somewhat petty fights with people. * Oblivious to even the most obvious of things, he often misinterprets people or misses nuances altogether. He is definitely not a social butterfly and comes off rather awkward most of the time. It happens a lot when someone makes a joke around him, and he just stares silently. * The rest are big ol' hefty spoilers! Agatha's flaws: * She can be incredibly bossy or "mom-ish," especially to her younger sister, but also to any random person whom she deems needs help. This is shown pretty obviously with her immediate urge to "fix" Izrekiel. * Definitely overbearing. She has the best intentions of friendliness, but she will stick her nose so far into your business that her nostrils will flatten. Mainly, she asks a lot of questions, and it can be rather annoying and obtrusive. * She also has a habit of not listening to what her younger sister, Maret. has to say. She often unintentionally ignores her, thinking her more "adult" issues to be far more pressing.(edited)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Sunny: -She’s fiercely independent. As a result it takes her a longer time to trust people and tell them what’s wrong. -Doesn’t like the idea of people telling her what to do, because she craves the sense of control she was denied in earlier years -Dislikes showing sadness since it makes her uncomfortable. So she defaults to anger instead. As a result, she’s more likely to lash out in anger and regret the actions she did in the heat of the moment. -Sunny needs to realize that people aren’t inherently monsters either, that people can be morally grey. Her black and white morality may be challenged in both her writing and her relationships. But we’ll see about that. Liam: -Pretty blunt about criticizing people. He grew up in a critical household but needs to learn that there are different ways to give criticism -Highly uncomfortable with conflict. You’ll find him trying to fix the issue as fast as possible and when that doesn’t work...he’ll flee and even outright lie. It makes him seem untrustworthy and unreliable. -he loves his family. But they are his biggest fears too; the fear of disappointing them, the fear of losing their love. -for a calm guy, he tends to hide a lot of incredible self loathing and guilt. How that will affect his relationships, particularly sunny, has yet to be seen.(edited)
chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]
Nyx thinks with her axe. She’s pretty clever if she has to be, but her usual approach to problems is „off with their head.“ The consequences off that are what drive the majority of the story - she nearly gets herself and the people around her killed. The big problem is she‘s a drifter - she rarely sees the consequences of her actions.
chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]
Nyssa‘s a bit spoiled and soft and while she overcomes that easily enough, it‘s the combination of her believing she can fix absolutely EVERYTHING and her incapability of dealing well with failure that brings her to her breaking point.
eliushi [a winged tale]
I really love that I can identify with everyone’s character flaws and that makes it all the more relatable
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
Lead girl: Naomi Belfry had to deal with fleeting moments of affection from her parents trying to give her a stable childhood altho everything came crashing after her father's absence. Trying to keep this spoiler limited, like children in her position, she escaped reality through imagination lens and her obsession in her interests in forensic and observation. - I plan to show this, whenever something perks her interest, whether it's witnessing a crime scene, dangerous object or observing people at parties. Naomi also lacks a sense of trust in others due to broken promises but it conflicts with her yearning for companionship and love. Will see how she juggles her different sides. I plan for her to be morally gray. Trisha Bennett: She is a big-hearted girl and loyal friend to Naomi. Despite the rumors of the Belfry clan, Trish sees the lonely girl who tried to push others away. Trish's flaw is that she always puts other's happiness before her own. From a young age, she cared for her siblings, sometimes her grandma. Everyone basically pushed responsibility to her, due to her inability to say no. She listens to Naomi's rambles about a new mystery she's discovered.(edited)
FeatherNotes(Krispy)
nervously stares at the dumpster fire that is Trigger Elliot
eliushi [a winged tale]
Give us all the FLAWS
FeatherNotes(Krispy)
there's so many ! Trigger's biggest flaw is his constant running away from his problems and taking ANY sort of responsibility. He takes his short comings out on those around him, and is constantly in a bad mood in the comic. His biggest hurdle is his past with his ex GF, Boggmouth, to which is his biggest fear and one that he's been trying desperately to run away from (so far that he changed his name, dyed his hair, lost his glasses, etc) Vahn has many flaws as well, mostly surrounding them as a mystery and that inability to step up to the plate. They're similar to Trigger in running away from problems, as they are more comforted with familiar spaces than new territory of becoming more or something else. Vahn also has a past they have yet to deal with!
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
wow i really like reading people's different character flaws! Krispy, your character Trigger is such a complex character. I should get on reading it (edited)
eliushi [a winged tale]
I’m curious how everyone thought of their flaws for their characters. Did they come to you naturally? What would you say makes a flaw compelling to read/draw/experience?
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I don't really make a character and then go, 'alright, time to add some flaws.' Like.... the same trait or even the same action can be seen as good or bad depending on who you ask?
eliushi [a winged tale]
Totally agree. A trait when taken to the extreme can be a flaw (too kind —> becoming a doormat). How do you make sure that flaw is the “right” one or the one that most fit with your character and plot?
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Even the extreme-ness may be different depending on who you ask. Some people may feel it was 100% justified; others may feel it was too extreme, or even the opposite, not enough!
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I like to imagine how those flaws would work in real life. If those flaws carry the story and force the characters to develop/face consequences, I usually include them
eliushi [a winged tale]
So true keiiii and I like that approach shadow!
So what makes a trait a flaw for you keiiii
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
like look at all the disagreements IRL...
I don't like to divide character traits into flaws/virtues, personally. Like, yes, there are times I notice a trait and go "oh yeah, that's totally Bad, totally a flaw." But as a storyteller, I don't use that kinda judgment as a primary tool. I guess it's in the same vein as the whole 'no one is a villain in their own story' school of thought?
eliushi [a winged tale]
That’s fair!
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
It took awhile to develop my character's flaws! I start out drawing the character for fun. For some characters, I made them with intention of flipping Anime tropes, I felt some of them are so shallow, I want to flesh them out in my own stories. So as I write, their flaws are reflected in their upbringing. The personality gets revised over until I have certain ideas in mind, then their flaws come along with the creation process.? I have two sides of my brain cell where, I want to draw these children in a fun, safe environment. Then I got this other side, influenced by teen stories/games where I want to give them risks, be delinquents, have messy choices. I gravitate to stories of teenagers finding themselves?(edited)
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
What I do pay close attention to is: do the characters have major disagreements ever? If the answer is no, then I may have a problem.
eliushi [a winged tale]
All the juicy conflicts
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
I think I gravitated toward portraying a flaw I knew I had when I was younger. Something I'm able to look at with a more critical eye, now that I have more experience. Something I can portray both critically and sympathetically - so people can still like the character, but want them to grow past their flaw.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
like, even if I don't think of a trait/action as bad, SOMEONE in the story would probably not agree with it. Stuff like that.
And vice versa
I do think HoK focuses a lot on greyness as an undertone, though. Not every story would benefit from this approach.
eliushi [a winged tale]
I like to design my flaw aligned to the LIE the character believes (in reference to character arcs) and see what sort of negative consequences that will be interesting for the characters to try and overcome
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
In my previous comic, almost every major player was BAAAAD, and that was the point of the story.
But HoK is not like that.
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
ooh the Lie that a character believes? That's interesting, Eli.
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
I think that makes for a good sympathetic protagonist - we're all told things that we may have to unlearn, or learn to read differently. For the protagonist, it's an awakening to the truth of the world around them. Their job as a protagonist is to accept that awakening, for better or for worse.(edited)
eliushi [a winged tale]
Yeah I like to approach character arcs using this reference https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/character-arcs-2/amp/ the flaw comes easier to me once I have the specific LIE developed
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ooooh that's a good one Eli and to piggy back off of you, LadyLazuli, a lot of character flaws I chose were observed from either close friends, family, and even myself! There's something about intimately knowing about these flaws that you can see how it unfolds in real life
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
this would be so helpful, I have a teen character for my slice of life, that I couldn't figure his flaws out, other than being anxious. Will look into these books.
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
You can try! It would help a lot I read somewhere that one of the reasons Princess Mononoke had such great characters wasn't because they were inherently good or bad.
Rather, they each had differing goals and that is where the conflicts are.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Yeah, one moment in that movie that really shines in that aspect IMO was when Ashitaka talks to Eboshi, and she retorts, "so you want us fight the samurai instead!" (i.e. instead of fighting the forest animals) This was not treated as a big moment in the movie; it was quick and pretty understated. Nonetheless, I feel it really hit the nail on the head with that particular theme.
like, "our disagreements are distracting us from the TRUE enemy: this third party!!!" is totally a valid theme, but it's not the only resolution in that kinda situation. I'm glad Princess Mononoke went for a different direction.
They did have a third party (heck, a fourth party too), but it wasn't what the whole situation was about.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I’m curious how everyone thought of their flaws for their characters. Did they come to you naturally? What would you say makes a flaw compelling to read/draw/experience?
yuh that's a good question. I just kinda look at the experiences I had so far or what my family or friends experienced and I'm like "what is a good thing about this flaw, what is not so good?" like there's some juggling to figure out like in some situations its great and others it's just lmao pain.
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
In my case, I didn't really "think of flaws" for my characters. My characters just kinda popped up in my head, and as I got to know them, their traits—both good and bad—revealed themselves to me.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
for Cara's case its like lmao idk. a reflection of how my mom and I handle dealing with romantic relationships, and just seeing where that goes lol
for Richie, it's like that but what we like in men/masc-presenting folk but take it up to 10x and see what happens LMAOO
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
So basically it could be a case of veering one trait into the extreme
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
(Also, I totally agree that the characters in Princess Mononoke are stellar! Especially Ashitaka and Eboshi.)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yeah, but I also made sure there's nuances too since they aren't a true reflection of our own chimera they need to stand out as their own characters after all, not a voice piece
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Yeah, the scene I still remember from that movie was when lady eboshi showed ashitaka around Irontown and he sees how she helps the lepers and the women be empowered. It showed that she’s a morally grey character
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I always like messing with that kind of of diacomtomy between people and just lmao idk I just like seeing that despite differences things are connected lol
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I really like the Disagreement-focused approach. Where would the characters disagree with each other? With YOU, the author? Would they ever call you out on something? Would you agree or disagree with the callout?
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Also tuyetnhi I agree. While we can also include flaws of our own, there comes a time where our characters eventually develop into their own person
It’s like watching your child grow up
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I learned that young durring my RP days in the early 2010s
lmao
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
And when Ashitaka reveals a rather selfish thought of his. Eboshi: Does that arm of yours want to kill me? Ashitaka: If it would lift the curse, I would let it tear you to pieces.
(I've watched this movie way too much throughout my life tbh )
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I really like the Disagreement-focused approach. Where would the characters disagree with each other? With YOU, the author? Would they ever call you out on something? Would you agree or disagree with the callout?
@keii’ii (Heart of Keol) absolutely! Your characters won’t always do what you want. Sometimes they have ideologies that make you want to shake them or disagree. Because in the end, the characters aren’t you
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I actually didn't see that as particularly selfish about Ashitaka (and I think that's a good thing that we see these differently)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
They will make mistakes that you might not in real life. let them.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yeah lmao that's why in cara's situation I'm like "same" but also "Noooooooooooo why u do that"
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
@shadowhood (SunnyxRain) And they might not even see those actions as mistakes, depending.
And YOU will make mistakes (or "mistakes"... again... depending) that the characters wouldn't make
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
even stuff I don't even realized from other friends who looked at Cara and they're like "she's her biggest cock block; it's that personality." lmaO
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
You don't know how many times I've wanted to slap the shit out of my characters
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
honestly
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
@shadowhood (SunnyxRain) And they might not even see those actions as mistakes, depending.
@keii’ii (Heart of Keol) exactly! Hence these are the Lies they might have developed! They might have lies they grew up with that don’t match with ours
And yes....there are times I want to facepalm whenever I see my characters make a mistake I wouldn’t have. But I know that they’ll eventually develop out of it....or face natural consequences.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Anyone else here doing more grey-focused stories? Not every story needs to be that, you can have very mature stories that aren't grey. But yeah
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I have a very grey character
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
I mean... I guess it depends on labeling. I have very strong opinions, but I feel like my characters could very easily be seen as grey by others
Especially my villain
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I think "grey-focused" is less about the characters and more about the narrative, but yeah, it's pretty case by case
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I think in that case Cara would be considered .... light grey?
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
This character did something VERY bad, and his actions have caused people to be split about his actions But he has deep regrets and guilt about it, even though it was a necessity at the time(edited)
Whether or not people forgive him or understand his motivations
Only time will tell
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
Oh yeah, my narrative definitely can be seen as grey.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
since it's her narrative focus in the story but as there's some dark moments, most of it is just her just figurings thing out
dark moments as in lmao "i'm hurt in the feels"
not life death situations lmao
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
I switch between perspectives a lot in WotP, so it definitely can be seen as grey
chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]
I don’t like grey morals that much, actually. My favourite narrative device is genuinely good people working at cross-purposes. Nobody is evil, or grey; but their personal histories and goals set them into conflict with each others.
These histories often cause or are brought by their flaws, too. But a flaw doesn‘t necessarily make you grey.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I don't mean grey as "an even mix of good and bad." I meant more like, the narrative does not take sides.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
for Richie, i guess for his development as something that is a mere figment of fantasy and trying to be like "wow I wonder what being a person is like?" and he might just become a grey character if he ever experiences Cara's world lol
ahhh
yeah this story is probably pretty grey then lmao
chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]
You can have a narrative taking side and still be good-people-in-conflict.
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
There is one scene I wrote where the morally grey character meets someone who he’s affected. She hates him, but understands his motivation. Both of them have a heart to heart and agree that they were simply two people who were involved in a tragedy, and it hurt everyone.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
That's a thing too! But I'm specifically curious about stories where the narrative does not take sides
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
So in the end, it was a scene where the audience can sympathize with both, but these characters are in conflict
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I feel you can't really have a character who will be universally seen as 50:50 good:bad. Different people will have different opinions about the same character.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
that's so true like
idk, i guess this is an annoyance when protraying folks
and i'm like "ya just make it like it is, if you're intimate with their background or have relevant experiences with it"
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
In real life you’re going to meet people who may not like you
Some may even hate you
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
that's why I'm like gearing Cara as like that lmao
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Not everyone is going to agree or like you, and it’s the same with charavters
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yepppp
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Just because another character dislikes your main protagonists does not necessarily make them a villain
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
That's what I'm thinking too. I may see a certain character of mine as leaning more good, and another as leaning more bad, but I know my readers are likely going to disagree. I call my villain a "villain" because he opposes the "heroes," but honestly, I know that a large part of my readerbase is going to take his side in the end.(edited)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
In every villain’s mind they are the heroes of their own story
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
It reminds me of a quote from the Inheritance series
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I don't 100% agree actually, but I do agree with something in the same vein
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
[me looking at my story] "who really is the antagonist? it's probably all of you" [points at 3 characters at the same time]
lmao
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
like not everyone actually thinks of themself as heroic -- but most will see their choices as reasonable given the circumstances.
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I agree. Probably should have reworded it as “everyone thinks they are the protagonist of their own stories”
A protagonist can be “villainous” too.
Also tuyetnhi lmao you have so many antagonists
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
omg I missed this really good convo on Princess Mononoke, I LOVE Lady Eboshi's character. I was busy talking about character writing for another show(edited)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Yes she is a wonderful character! Let’s use her as an example
In her own mind she sees herself as a protagonist defending the leper’s and the women
And having to fight her way to the top from being a slave
She could have her own story herself!
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
it's like Cara has to fight her dreams, her family, her firends and her self as a cock block ya LMAO
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Eboshi is fantastic. She's not good, she's not evil, she's just a person doing what she thinks is best. Even if she ends up doing more harm than good, her aim is to protect her people and strengthen her town. She does some truly heroic things as well as some heinous ones. And I love how Ashitaka lands squarely between the two factions - in his own way, because he seeks peace, he almost acts as a villain for both the gods and the humans. SO COMPLEX it's lovely.
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
aggressively throws love at Studio Ghibli
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
A related question that's fun to ponder is, who or what do they blame when things don't go well? (Obviously the answer's gonna vary a LOT depending on the circumstances, but something fun to think about)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
lmaoooo oh man
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
Gosh, that's a great question.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
Cara would blame herself if it's something she consciously done wrong, but if it's something out her control she'll blame the person or thing she thinks caused the inconvenience.
Cara: "Stupid sexy... man coming out of my dreams looking..... ass"
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Don't we all wish we had a stupid sexy dream man to blame
(maybe not but lol)
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
Izrekiel would blame himself. Agatha would blame the powers that be. Ryukou would blame Izrekiel. Maya would blame Ryukou....
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Hmmm that is a good question
Sunny blames others in the heat of the moment, but she’ll think back and regret it
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
for Richie uh lmao he blames himself for most things.
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Liam blames it all on himself, and won’t tell anyone
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Phaedra blames herself initially. Then, as with all things, deflect the blame to Ocean Satan.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
if it something Cara done tho, I think he'll have to do some mental gymastics that he isn't outright hurting her feelings but getting his point across (hypothetical situation here lmao I need to draw faster)
ocean satan lmao
Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)
I feel that energy from him tbh
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ocean Satan/lucifer probably has his own fan following tho
Chethanists
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Fata Morgana! Or the Bone Church (RIP)
but yeah, when the origin of all your world's problems is a single entity - BLAME IT
very easy
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
just like blaming an alternative god for the misfortune of humanity lmao
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
In my story, Naomi might go into deep thinking if things don't go well. It means the mystery got deeper and she wants to find out why did it not go well? It depends, I should write a case where the blame can go easily to someone, but the MC has a different reaction than others.(edited)
It depends on situation, I'm trying to think about something that makes the character blame someone? Jasper might be the type of kid, who self blames his own incompetence.(edited)
Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)
Thorn is impressively good at figuring out how to assign blame/responsibility to the right parties in the right proportions, but to be fair, he's had a lot of therapy
varethane
That thing about never having a character everyone will like is so true-- I feel like the most consensus I've ever had was over Teeko, the main character of my previous webcomic. Almost everyone agreed that she was a cinnamon roll, but there were others who considered her irritating (or at best, found her irritating at first but then got to like her)(edited)
I'm pretty sure the lead of my new comic will be significantly more polarizing
Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)
(He has PTSD from a dragonslaying mission that went bad, where he didn't give the order that made it all go wrong but was in a strong position to stop it and didn't, so Responsibility been kind of a major theme in his brain ever since)
varethane
Her major flaws are that she's kinda selfish and impulsive, and while I have a whole Arc planned, that type of character is just guaranteed to rub some readers the wrong way
Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)
Meanwhile, Leif is very well-conditioned to assign responsibility to "anything and anyone except my country's leaders and system of government"
Which is also changing over a long-term character arc! And there's definitely debate in the comments sections at any given stage about how reasonable he's being now
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
My favorite flawed character ever is Leona from Prague Race. I loved that comic but not gonna recommend because it is on forever hiatus. I'd never seen her flaws before in any other character and yet felt them deeply. Her flaws are to the point where you're not even sure if she is a good person. https://www.praguerace.com/comics/1438038533-06.jpg https://www.praguerace.com/comics/1438197522-07.jpg https://www.praguerace.com/comics/1438802007-08.jpg(edited)
varethane
She isnt, at all, but I still love her as a character ahaha
(Well okay she is a little bit at least)
eliushi [a winged tale]
Ahh I remember Prague race
It’s fantastic. I really enjoy the antihero/unconventional qualities Leona has(edited)
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
i LOVE her
I love her look
I love her attitude
she is like
my favorite character ever in webcomics
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ahhh so is her flaw having her desires supersede others?
Or desiring entertainment even at the cost of hurting others?
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
She is exceptionally curious, to the point of recklessness(edited)
eliushi [a winged tale]
A related question that's fun to ponder is, who or what do they blame when things don't go well? (Obviously the answer's gonna vary a LOT depending on the circumstances, but something fun to think about)
Flo: blames herself Ash: blames anyone but Flo Ice: blames anyone but themself Bell: blames the person who is deemed logically wrong
I think Leona’s flaw is self-centredness. AFAIK it’s because she is going to die? Terminal illness? then she feels the world owes her everything
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
She was like that before that happened though
Like in the opening where she drags her friend into a sketchy shop and plays with the mysterious artifacts and falls into a new world
eliushi [a winged tale]
Ah so just a selfish character then?
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
All the while being like
"hey neat!"
eliushi [a winged tale]
Disregards others’ boundaries for her amusement and purpose
It’s a great flaw to explore
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Oh that one is a very good flaw
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Before this point it was more disregarding her own life for her amusement and purpose
It's her own fault she has a year to live
eliushi [a winged tale]
It’s all starting to come back haha
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
So basically she’s self entitled
Those types are tough to pull off
If there’s one character flaw I want to see more, it’s characters that struggle with taking a stand
eliushi [a winged tale]
For sure. I find antihero and passive protagonists especially difficult to write/draw
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
i might be the opposite because people complain about my protag being too passive lol
He just wants to live
/not live
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Hmmm, I’m the opposite actually! I dislike conflict so I try to either run away or hide when it happens
So for me it’s easier to write someone who is scared of conflict and is seen as a coward than someone more active
eliushi [a winged tale]
Eli did the proactive choice to follow the minor goddess right? I see that as having agency
I meant more of writing them as compelling characters
Especially as protagonists
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
ahhhh i'm glad
i agree that stories usually read better when the main characters have a goal
it gives you a thread to follow throughout the story
eliushi [a winged tale]
For sure. Having a clear external goal to augment the internal one is key
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
What if the main character’s goal is not having a goal
Or being viscerally against the goals of everyone else
eliushi [a winged tale]
Against the goals is a goal in itself I think haha
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Where it’s seen as against the cultural norm to have one....like Eli
Omg full circle lmao
eliushi [a winged tale]
But if the goal is to be passive then... that’s where I find it is difficult to write compellingly
Unless you have side characters that boost the agency
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
ugh can't talk about eli while talking to eli
i got confused lol
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I think with those types it works with other characters also having goals
Exactly Eli!
.....oh my god this is getting confusing
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
ack now i got confused in the opposite direction
i think
eliushi [a winged tale]
Exactly shadow. Hence I designed ash, ice and bell to be strong voices to counteract quiet Flo
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I love me some well-written passive characters TBH
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
mm i agree. if the mc doesn't have a lot of agency, other people need to to drive the plot forwards
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Yeah! I did the same thing by having sunny be outspoken and Liam be the one that runs away
And she ends up having to call him out on his shit!
I wonder if their passivity can be both a strength and a weakness tho
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I think I actually gravitate more towards passive ones than to overtly proactive ones, with all other factors being hypothetically equal
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
stares at Danbi
eliushi [a winged tale]
But I find there’s a point in which your passive character needs to make a change for their arc; stasis = death. Ultimately depends on the narrative and theme and with a negative arc it’s something to play with
Danbi is not passive I don’t think
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Hmmmm danbi has a passive nature But you’re right now that I think about it
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I think part of it is I'm currently in the "I need to take a break from those ultra-motivated shounen action MCs" phase
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Me: Eli is passive! Eli: no Shadow: Danbi is passive! Eli: no
:p
eliushi [a winged tale]
I find the passive protagonist is like the boy in hyouka
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
what's he like? i haven't read/seen that
eliushi [a winged tale]
Or a lot of those anime’s where the love interest or others drag them into things
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ahhh those types
You’re right about those being hard to write about because they can become satellite love interests
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I'm thinking more along the lines of, when the story itself isn't about WE RESOLVE THIS BIG CONFLICT YES
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
With no motivation except for their friends/love interests
eliushi [a winged tale]
https://hyouka.fandom.com/wiki/Houtarou_Oreki
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I have not actually read this, so not sure why this is the example to come to my mind, but: there's this manga? in which humanity is facing extinction, but people are just calmly accepting instead of panicking or rebelling. They're not trying to fix things, they're just living out their lives
varethane
In Wychwood, Felix is an extremely passive character (it's one of his biggest flaws, he's absolutely terrible at standing up for himself and..... I mean, atm he doesnt really have any opportunities to make decisions for himself, but if he does he second guesses himself and ends up doing nothing lol)
eliushi [a winged tale]
I see that as more of a choice of acceptance keiiii
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ooooh okay I see Eli
eliushi [a winged tale]
But I mean we all have different definitions and thresholds we refer as passive
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I mean it's okay for us to define "passive" differently, as long as we're aware of how the different definitions affect the discussion
eliushi [a winged tale]
Yep yep
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
If I knew we were all going to die and there was nothing i could do about it, I think I'd just live out my life too. Spend time with family and cook good food.
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
In that case there is one character I have like that, but the reason he’s passive is because his hyperperfectionism has marred him and he’s severely depressed now
eliushi [a winged tale]
I’m more referring to a narrative passive character https://www.jimenainovaro.com/blog/2019/9/7/passive-protagonist-how-to-tell-if-you-have-one-and-how-to-fix-it
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Anyway, HoK is like that: it's not about FIX THIS BIG PROBLEM WITH THE WORLD. The world does have massive problems, and there are multiple groups of people trying to fix, delay, or otherwise address those Big Problems in various ways. But the story itself is not about that.
eliushi [a winged tale]
Right so if the story is not about saving the world, in relation to the actual theme of the story, I don’t think Danbi is passive
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
ELUISHI
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
mm we're talking about the benefits of passive characters but that link is "how to fix it" ah
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
YOU’RE HERE
eliushi [a winged tale]
Oh hai!
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I feel like that article is written with the assumption that you want the readers to root for the MC, which I think is.... not necessarily what you want.
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Hello????
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
ah
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
It depends on what kind of story you want to write I guess
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yeah like lmao root when you feel like it worm
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Yeah
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I guess for my story it's just lmao done out of my curiosity and just seeing that to form.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Full disclosure, I do not read fast enough to have read the entirety of that article by now (edited)
eliushi [a winged tale]
Exactly shadow
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
But I think that also brings up an important point
eliushi [a winged tale]
https://threekookaburras.com/blogs/news/14720925-writing-tips-whats-wrong-with-a-passive-protagonist perhaps another viewpoint
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
WHAT is the "ideal reader reaction" you want with the story? (can break this down to "with this one scene/ arc" etc)
(can also have multiple ideal/desired reader reactions for the same story/ arc/ scene)
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
ooh that's an interesting question
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
(I also really like parentheses)
eliushi [a winged tale]
I feel like that article is written with the assumption that you want the readers to root for the MC, which I think is.... not necessarily what you want.
I recall you mentioning HoK is more like a character study. I think more conventional storytelling want the audience to be invested in the protagonist
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
i honestly don't really have an answer
just want people to know these characters and this world
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Personally the reaction I want....is for other people to learn along with them
And hopefully touch their hearts
And yeah keiiii you DID mention that it’s more focused on character development at one point
eliushi [a winged tale]
Ideal reader reaction by act 1: exciting adventure here we go! Act2: oh no Act 3: oh that makes so much sense why everything is happening but how will they succeed Act 4: hope
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
OH that’s what you mean?
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
What’s an act four
eliushi [a winged tale]
Oops I meant season
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
I think. My four chapters are similar to Eli's
eliushi [a winged tale]
(Season 1 is act 1; seasons 2&3 act 2 and last season is act 3)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
for me, like if to make my characters relevant to the audience isn't the main goal. like relevant characters doesn't equate to folks understanding to the nuances of their struggles. at least for me. I just want to write the story for the sake of it and what folks react to it uh lmao that's their reaction. stick for the ride if you want to see things panned out is my mind set
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Arc 1: people are excited then sad...what the fuck shadow Arc 2: oh my god oh my god this happened it’s chaos angst time Arc 3: melancholic but going up in a way Arc 4: AHHHHHHHHHHHHH Arc 5-7: this is sweet as hell
eliushi [a winged tale]
Yeah I should rephrase: there can be many reasons why you want the audience to NOT root for the protagonist (ie protagonist is a serial killer and the reader is more keen to know if justice will be served)
But these are done intentionally and the protagonist is not passive in the narrative sense(edited)
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
Act One: Buildup Plot Point: NO NO NO NO Act Two: angst Plot Point: Act Three: Ships
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
like, I don't necessarily want anyone to agree with any of the characters. But I want people to be able to see why they think or feel the way they do. More importantly, I want people to FEEL that their (the characters') feelings are real and powerful. So I guess for every arc of HoK it all comes down to: "my heart is breaking and healing at the same time"
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Natasha I relate to the ships coming in later part
same
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
I’m tryna have at least one ship sail in act two XD
eliushi [a winged tale]
I live for the AHHHHH and
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
dang I just love throwing curveballs
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
we can tell
eliushi [a winged tale]
Shadow will draw the ships for me
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Oh the AHHHHH part is a ship
YES I DRAW ALL THE SHIPS
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
The is my favorite part of the story
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
not saying which ship tho sorry
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
Aside from the ships
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
lol
if I have to break up the structure for OIYD!
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Yes the is a good scene More please
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
... nah it's too soon to share ask me again in 5 years or somethin
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
@Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!) mood
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I'm like lmao i'm on ch. 3
and it's early to draw some conclusions of what structure i had set up, but I do have a clear idea where I want going with it. just... have to draw it lol
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
Dude I’ve basically scripted my act three and I haven’t even gotten to my first major turning point
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
same mood, same boat
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I’ve only scripted up to arc 2
And I’m already feeling the chaos
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
for me uh.. I guess its main arcs are there
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
My act one is the most solid, followed by act three. I’m slowly figuring out the middle XD
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Because shit gets dark in the end of arc 1
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
but I had chopped off like 8 chapters lmaO
Deo101 [Millennium]
I script... like one scene at a time if that..
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
so it's a lot shorter than it was originally intended but at least
it is more impactful for me lmao
just non canon content now lol
eliushi [a winged tale]
You got this Natasha!
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
YEAH!
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I also can't script super ahead, at least with this story. With my previous comic I scripted like 2+ years worth of content in advance
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
oof that's my first webcomic lmao
and ... I stopped after the first chapter lmao
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
What reader reactions I want for my comic? Uhhh... Volume 1: Pretty world! And also some mysteries... Volume 2: Even more mysteries... culminating in the moment Volume 3: IT'S EVERYTHING I COULD'VE WANTED
Deo101 [Millennium]
yeah my next comic I'm planning ive got a script for like a whole thing but for this one im like "hmm... what seems fun?"
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
For me, I think the main factor is that the previous comic was heavily dialog-driven (you could convert it to an audio drama with minimal changes), while my current comic is very visual (you really can't convert it into an audio drama...)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
EVERYTHING WE WANT CLAIRE?!!?!
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Everything you want
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
EVERYTHING?????
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Yes
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
man, it must have some good cheese in there
Deo101 [Millennium]
oh are we answering what we want our readers to think?
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yea
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Yiss
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I'm like "I'm not qualifed to answer this because lmao"
Deo101 [Millennium]
I want my readers to be like oh this is fun! the whole time, i think
dont want it to change, want it all uphill
no stress or nothin just fun times
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Deo reading your webcomic is like going to the beach Pretty chill
Deo101 [Millennium]
hell yeah!
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Space beach!
Hey my rank just changed!
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Wha
Deo101 [Millennium]
when you read my comic I want you to feel like youre sittin poolside with a cool drink and some sunglasses
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
it does have that vibe yeee
Deo101 [Millennium]
fuck yeah thats everything I could want babeyyyy
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
It has mojito pina colada vibes
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
aww yeee
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Mine is just sangria
WITH SHOTS
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I guess for OIYD! is just "bloody mary please say sike"
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Is eightfish’s like....champagne
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Refreshing glass of ocean water
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Is this the "what drink would your comic be" topic?
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
lmao
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
salty
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
salt
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Yes
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
Ooooh good question
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Time to bring up my answer to that question again: "liquid bacon fat, so that it stays in your heart forever."(edited)
Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)
Hot chocolate
Dark chocolate kind
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Holy shit that’s two sides of the spectrum right there
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Omg keii
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
keii idk how I feel about that if I'm gonna have caradiac arrest reading your comic lmao
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Heart Attack Of Keol
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Clogging my arteries oh lord
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
You're killing me today kei
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Omg
But wait is Phantomarine also a glass of ocean water
Deo101 [Millennium]
not read it yet but I feel like its that blue drink from applebees
do you know the one im talkin about, the one with the shark gummy in it
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
whaaaaat
We don’t have Applebee’s here do explain
YES?!
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
drop a big salt chunk at the bottom of it and YEP that's Phantomarine
Deo101 [Millennium]
very sweet but there are like 2 shots in it so you will get 1: brain freeze and 2: more tipsy than u think!
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yuhhh
my mom always buy that drink deo
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I kinda want to try it now
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
It's good
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
Applebees come to Canadia plz
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
lmaoo
wait what
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
We canucks want to get a brain freeze pls
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
there's no applebees in Canadaland?
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Nope
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
omgGGG
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
We have a tims tho
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
also this might be getting a tad bit off-topic so watch out
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
okay tru tru lmao
dang tragic like
imagine making drink references in your comic and someone is like
"yo what is that? lemon juice?"
"........... lemonade?"
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Sorry rebel. We are just perpetually off topic
Deo101 [Millennium]
the page that had orange juice in millennium everyone was talking about the orange juice
and same with the page that there was milk
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
actually this would be an intersesting question like lmao if your comic still makes references to your native place of being
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
The logo was funny deo
And cute
Although at first I thought the cow was a space pig...
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
like having orange juice in space i'm like yaaaa lol
Deo101 [Millennium]
okay but the page with milk also had a murder skeleton
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
But space pig
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Skeleton milk
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Mmmm yes taste the calcium
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
so much calc
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Enough to bone milo
Deo101 [Millennium]
yeah everyone was like "he just wants the milk!"
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Page with the clock everyone was talking about the clock
The way deo draws inanimate objects is just
Really memorable
I guess
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
whu
Deo101 [Millennium]
you would be the first person in my life to have ever said that
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
omg
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
(or maybe you just don't have anything else more interesting on the page :p)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
The devil is in the details
Or should I say
bone milk
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Crunchy
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
i don'tt hink I can handle bone milk since i'm starting to develop an intolerance to lactose
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
I'd love to draw my ships but anxious brain thinks, I shouldn't because no one knows them
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I remember that there was a talk about the page on deo’s server
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
oh man ships worm lmao
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
And someone mentioned carbonated milk
Deo101 [Millennium]
I dont wanna think about carbonated milk
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
people like guessing Richie or Dean for Cara and i'm like ya'll missing the 3rd option
"it's the friends we made along the way"
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ot3 ayo
Deo101 [Millennium]
I think I was the one who mentioned carbonated milk though
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
dfjalkgjaeoifuiodj
Deo101 [Millennium]
gjsdaghsagjkhgjkasg
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
OT3
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
YOU WERE
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Do it I dare you
Deo101 [Millennium]
shadow big brain w ot3
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I meaaaaaaaan
I have a love triangle
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
if they were compadable with each other
probably LMAO
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
But if they get together
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
but lmAO
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
its a metaphysical paradox
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
AAAAA
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
But yeah I love the OT3 option
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
It would be actually interesting to see polyamory in a comic not about polyamory though
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
[puts down things to consider]
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Cara/Richie/dean
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I'm like I want to see as a possibiltiy
but it's also errrrrr enriched with Viet stuff and i'm like bruh
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I too, like Eightfish, dare you to do it
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
how that would affect Cara's relationship with her family
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
I agree Eightfish! I like the secret polyamory in a comic, like Marmalade Boy had a poly family and only when I was older, knew about it. I reread it, was like holy cow! It is a poly family(edited)
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
:000
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
same with Dean's too since they're both tradtional vietnamese families to some extent
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
(Apologies for taking forever to type this) "Maybe no one talks about Interesting Things in your scene because there is no Interesting Thing in your scene" used to be my big fear, to be honest. But I feel more confident after a recent epiphany, and if anyone else has that fear, please know that if YOU see Interesting Things in your story, that absolutely counts.
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
aww thank you!! I need that reminder.(edited)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I'm like man
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
It was a joke because deo's milk scene literally has someone being cut in half! But I do agree with you keii!
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
like I would like to, but I ain't poly and I don't want to mis represent those communties ya kno? riP
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
And there's bound to be someone who likes the same interesting things as you
Deo101 [Millennium]
yeah keiiii I worry a lot that all my comments are about asses or something because they just dont care about anything else i'm doing
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
Because Lavender Tea was on haitus since I thought my main lead boy was boring but I realized my friends do like simple characters which don't have to have complex pasts.
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
I'm always like "lol my comic is full of boring conversations" But then every once in a while I get someone who says they actually really like the boring conversations and that just makes me :)))(edited)
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
People like to hyperfixate on the weirdest things in stories
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
@Eightfish (Puppeteer) YES!!!!! Interesting Talky Scenes FTW
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Also I actually like the casual conversations you have eightfish
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Well like would you have as many reader if your comic was just ass panel ass panel ass panel? :P
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
like sometimes I see people asking "how do I make a talky scene interesting" and I'm like... BUT TALKY SCENES ARE INTERESTING???
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
people can have the ot3 in their dreams and I'll recognize that but for me lmao I'm like i can't
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
It is a little challenging to make talking scene interesting visually
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
ye
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
it is actually, like the way to keep it interesting I heard, is the angles, and not always focus on their face shots.
Deo101 [Millennium]
hands
give them an activity and focus on hands babey
LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)
OT3's, eh
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Background props and angles is what I show
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
feet
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
i guess suffering through complex angles in my panels do really pay off
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
I wanted to challenge myself to draw silent panels and minimal dialogue.
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I wonder if I sort of lucked out with HoK, in that the characters are often (though not always) locomoting while talking. That probably makes it easier to make it visually non-boring?
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Ladylazuli i see you eyeing that ot3
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
same, I like to draw background props, different angles.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
oh lord what u done shadow
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Beautiful things tuyetnhi what you talking about
Deo101 [Millennium]
ACTUALLY huge sidenote but you reminded me joichi, whats helped me get my writing way more to where I like it is every conversation being like "what if I took out all these speech bubbles?" and then actually going through and cutting most of them out
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
what u MEAN DFJAKGJDKFdjl
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
I think the ship shadow is thinking of might be more ot7billion
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
fkaljfdghakldfj what
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
the more the merrier
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
oh god
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
I have shipped OT3 before. I researched quite abit into Poly and started making a story on the side, just to understand the system and responsibilities. Just know that it's not perfect, but there's some differences(edited)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yeah, I looked into poly relationships to but lmao even with the research and asking first hands accounts, I don't think I can do it justice
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
... me with monagamous relationships tbh
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
like it's hard working with a person in a monogamous relationship but also doing the same with 2 or more oh lord man
it's a lot of work for the persons who inciated and participating in such relationship struggles
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
it is still a big challenge. The good things I did hear for poly folks is, a strong sense of trust, and balancing the love between other partners. Also consent always(edited)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yeah
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I’ve read testimonies of poly people and they stress that you need a LOT of communication
There’s a lot of trust and mutual respect needed to pull off poly
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
mhm
Deo101 [Millennium]
I'd argue you need that for any relationship!
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Actually yeah you’re right! Every relationship needs that!
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
I may stick with monagamy couples most of the time. The only time I'll draw poly is a mention of couples, i feel I'm not the right person to write drama about poly relationships yet.(edited)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I'm like thinking like for poly persons that working with 2 or more partners like
Deo101 [Millennium]
thats why I dont write drama about any relationship LMAO
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
I have thought about writing a poly relationship once but er....I was thinking of doing villains in a toxic one
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
how does that play out like... since I think the possibility with being burnt out with communication with multiple partners
and the partners themselves like their relationships with the main poly person's partners too
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
And showing how it deteriorates through time when one partner is abusive and it destroys the other two
Oh I’ve seen an abusive poly in real life before
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
oof
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
One partner chose to have multiple male partners
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
so I have rip
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
But her boyfriend didn’t want that...and the female partner wouldn’t allow him to have other partners
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
also uh same but it was one guy with women as his multiple partners
the guy had a toxic masculinity mindset.
and i'm like to my friend like " Are you still going out with him?"
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
was he cheating on them though, or was it consented? Because infidelity is different from poly. My poly friends can't stress that enough(edited)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
it was consented but from what I see it that for to established relationship he wanted like the women to be him as his partner
and they agreed to it
but he also was meeting with other women other than his poly partners
so i'm like
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Okay that’s....not good. And I think that’s what needs to be addressed a lot I wonder if there are comics out there that talk about poly relationships
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
idk. like if it works with them, that's on them but i'm like idk how I feel if my partner will do that when I agreed to be only monogamous to him
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
yes exactly. Yes there are and usually healthy poly relationship. I have to go find it, but not many comics.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
so lmao it didn't sit well for me due to my morals I guess
but if he, and my friend, and his poly partners had it work, I guess more power to them?
Eightfish (Puppeteer)
Okay but if your partner decides to be poly without you, that's not being poly, that's cheating
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
No, eightfish the thing is that they agreed to him seeking out multiple partners while being monogamous
so it's more like an poly-open relationship thing?
at least that's in my understanding
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
Not only that, banning your partner from seeking out others is hypocritical
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
like his partners doesn't have an issue with it
that's the distinction
idk man i don't understand well, and even equiped with this knoweldge I rather read other poly folks works about the subject than attempting poly relationship dynamics myself lmao(edited)
that's my two cents on it lol
yeah
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
like for some poly people, they like the idea of having multiple partners, so that there's less pressure to be a perfect partner. Some compare it to; having more than one friend? what do you guys think though?(edited)
Deo101 [Millennium]
idk I just have friends
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I say that's some valid points. like they're varying degrees
Deo101 [Millennium]
im not poly so I cant comment
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
and the poly experience is varried so there's not right all to be all so yeah lmao.
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
yeah I think so too. TBH, I was feeling mixed when they compare romantic partners to having multiple friends?
but because I think the love for a partner is much deeper, but that's just me?(edited)
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
I say it's valid if you feel that, but i know folks will beg to differ on other responses
I guess for my experience, friendship love can be deep as romantic love and i'm not nesssarly lacking if I don't have love from a romantic partner nor a platonic friend
it's varied, fluid, and if it works for your understanding... I don't see the harm
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
ah when you explain it, I can see why, I do see friendship can be pretty deep and emotional.(edited)
Deo101 [Millennium]
I think for me, I feel love very deeply for my friends and also my boyfriend. the differences are paper thin between the way love feels for me, it really comes down to "I chose him to be the one im kissin and stuff" cause its not even "spend the rest of my life with him only", because I fully want my close friends to be with me the rest of my life! I would love to live near or with them and see them every day, so its not that sort of foreverness thats different.
its not something that I'm self aware enough to be able to pinpoint.
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
yeah!
Deo101 [Millennium]
also this is VERY off topic I feel
Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)
... very tru
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
oops, it was interesting though. I've been questioning about the differences between romantic love and friendship(edited)
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Paper thin differences between deep friendship and strong romance are actually pretty relevant to HoK Though probably still off topic for this week's topic
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
I feel like I'm arriving four years later to the party, but if we're talking about character flaws then oh boy do I have some for you! In O Sarilho, we have: - Nikita's big inability to open up to people and having absolutely no tools to deal with the traumatic things that happen around him. It's so much better to keep it all in, ignore the people who are trying to help you and just let it all come out through anger; - Shizuka always says the wrong thing. Always. It's her natural talent. She doesn't mean them that way but now they're out and that's what counts; - Franquelim avoids conflict (with good reason) to an almost complacent point; - Dária is completely unaware of her privilege and tbh her own sheer luck!!; - Steffano has some problems with making his intentions clear and privilege too, in a way he also a bad time standing up to his father's antics and correlates his relationships with how useful they are to him (and vice-versa)
eliushi [a winged tale]
I’m always curious about the creator’s process arriving at their stories and characters, including character flaws! I’m wondering how these flaws affect the character developments/dynamics and propel the story?
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
at least for me, I am trying to write a story about cooperation, so figures the major flaw my main character would have would be... being very uncooperative
FeatherNotes(Krispy)
(Osarilho is amazing and illustrates that perfectly )
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
()
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Oh nooooo I was typing a long reply and accidentally deleted it
FeatherNotes(Krispy)
F
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
OHNO I wAS LOOKING FORWARD FOr IT
looking at @keii’ii (Heart of Keol) is typing... with such antecipation
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
I should type in notepad and C&P but I never learn...
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
well, I think character flaws need to relate in some way to the major storyline, to the big events and themes of the story, but a lot of what I got comes from my interactions with other people, seeing what they think and also how I think and evolve and rationalize stuff... but obvs that all needs to be molded in a way that serves the narrative
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Anyway, I was starting to talk about my experience writing my previous comic, which was a conflict-driven story. What is the conflict (and/or theme), and why are these characters personally involved? What traits, goals, etc. of theirs keep them tied to this very unpleasant mess?
I didn't actually have to sit down for many days trying to figure that out. Once the biggest piece of the puzzle fell into place, the rest just followed pretty smoothly!
And the biggest piece of the puzzle was "what is it that I want to talk about with this story?"
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
yeah! that kinda tends to happen xd find the big piece and the others follow
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
So I think that's sorta similar to what @Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho said about cooperation. In my case, it was "romance can be VERY DESTRUCTIVE"
(I had seen too many "finding Mr/Ms Right fixes all of your life's problems" stories at that point in my life)
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
romance doesn't put bread on the table
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
So I had: - one extremely manipulative, baby-faced MC & his love interest (figuring out that he was manipulative was a part of the First Big Piece that fell into place) - one guy who actually found his True Love, married her, but still had serious problems. He had not even begun to resolve those problems when his wife unexpectedly died - another guy whose OTP was himself x his sister who did NOT want any of that (no assault happened, but that does not make this okay) They all had other aspects that I'd consider flaws, but you can see how those flaws are central to the story.
HoK, on the other hand, isn't really a 'there is something objectively terrible going on' kinda story. (I mean there is, but the story doesn't focus on that.) So I approach it from a different angle that I can't quite articulate/describe right now.
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
with terrible things it's easy to divide the characters in proactive/complacent axis
the "something terrible is happening, are you gonna do anything, or are you gonna let it happen?" but also the third option you are making the terrible thing
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Yus
Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho
some people transform into tigers.. to cope
carcarchu
i don't know if i've ever consciously thought about giving my characters flaws. all i think about is "this is the role they need to perform, and this is how they're going to do it"
keii’ii (Heart of Keol)
Yeah, it's not like an MMO character creation process: "pick body. pick face. pick strengths. pick flaws." It's a lot more.... simpler and complex at the same time
Nutty (Court of Roses)
In Court of Roses, Merlow's main flaw is that he spends so much effort making others happy and comforted that he entirely neglects himself. He's had a traumatic experience in his past, and since it's still fresh and painful for him, instead of opening up about it, he drinks to numb the pain, if just for the night. Until the nightmares awaken him, of course. While he is an extremely social boy and thrives off the company of good friends, he is so, so afraid of them getting caught up in his troubles. So much so, that after an especially terrible nightmare, he attempted to run away into the woods to escape them "being hurt" in some way. He's constantly putting others before himself. Hopefully he'll learn through the other main bards (especially Nocturne) to take care of himself without guilt, or in a self-destructive manner.
Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]
As I think of Eliushi's question; when I typically think of flaws, I imagine they need to effect the character's life or relationships with others. Some of my older teen or adult characters, I can naturally imagine their flaws, since they are closer to real people.
While my cinnamon roll-like OCs are a little harder to figure their flaws, it can't be too dark or out of character. I figure I'll figure it out as I carry on the story(edited)
sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)
Cricket is mean, antisocial, and irresponsible. All of the rest of the pirates hate her because she went behind their backs and did something destructive that got them all in trouble. She also has a learning disability that she's really hard on herself about, calling herself "stupid" for not being able to read. She also has no problem with killing or stealing.
Captain Harriet Hopper is more of an outwardly good person, with strong moral values and a general capability of commanding respect, but she has very low self confidence, second guessing her leadership decisions and often relying on reassurance and guidance from others rather than taking control of a situation.
The rest of the cast are pretty much just ruthlessly evil with only a few exceptions.
DanitheCarutor
Julian: - They're completely humorless, they do not laugh, they do not smile, everything is VERY serious business! When a joke doesn't fly over their head, they will not find any shred of humor in it. All jokes made by them are purely accidental. - Julian has no self-worth. Self-care is practically non-existent, they don't care about sleep, hygiene, eating and anything else that would help them feel even remotely better. Also, other than with Apollo, they will never stand up for themselves or give anyone lip unless it's to defend someone else. - They are an OCD level workaholic/cleanaholic, and will clean and keep themselves busy regardless of environment. While they did pick up good domestic responsibilities and work ethic at a young age, these positive habits have turned into excessively defensive ones. - They're a tiny ball of stress that second guesses themselves constantly. They are on edge nearly 24/7 about everything, especially when it comes to their partner and his instructions. - Very unambitious overall, they don't see themselves with a future so they don't try to have one. - Julian can have quite a temper and can be an absolute stubborn mule sometimes. They used to get in a lot of fights, especially when defending other kids, now they're like those grouchy old people who'll yell at you to get off their lawn. - They refuse help from others, seeing their own needs and presence as a burden they try to keep as low a profile as possible. I try to show these flaws through Julian's actions, interactions, the subjects they talk about, body language and appearance. Admittedly a lot of their personality hasn't shown through yet, currently in the comic their slew of mental health and domestic issues are overpowering who they are as a person, they're essentially living in survival mode. Later on their personality will start to show more, with their general flaws not being as heavily influenced by poor mental health and a bad environment.
DanitheCarutor
Apollo: - While growing up, his education wasn't taken very seriously by him or his family, in turn he slacked off a lot of school and now isn't the brightest bulb in the box. The lack of good education is also coupled with being very sheltered, he started out in private school then moved into homeschooling, so he never developed any significant life experiences. - He lacks basic survival and emotional comprehension skills. These skills were never encouraged or experienced during his upbringing, so he never developed them. - Apollo is very much a spoiled brat, he puts his wants first before considering other people. Although being someone with a general good nature, he tries to do his best with his close friends, he's just not very good at being considerate. - He is extremely gullible and overly trusting. If someone he considered a good friend told him you could create diamonds through your nose by snorting wasabi he would probably believe them. - Apollo doesn't have a whole lot of respect for himself, letting people use him and swindle him out of his money and possessions. His upbringing has a lot to do with letting people take advantage of him, but it also has a lot to do with his underlying guilt for past events, he just doesn't see himself as someone worth respecting. - He's a raging alcoholic due to the previous point. But he is very stubborn about it, insisting he does not have a problem, and that he can quit any time he wants to. - Apollo is a very lazy person overall, he refuses to learn basic skills, doesn't even take care of his personal and environmental cleanliness needs half the time. I try to show Apollo's flaws the same way I show Julian's, although with him there is a lot more focus on actions since he's a much more active person. His bad decisions are a major cause for some of the current predicaments in the comic, and have had a large roll in the story so far.(edited)
SPOILER
Tantz Aerine (Without Moonlight)
Fotis' flaw is that he lets emotion take over him and tends to jump to conclusions. He's very precocious and has had to grow up too fast (he's only 14 and has experiences not many adults have, or should have) but he's still young and inexperienced. He makes errors in judgment though he learns fast. When he thinks coolly he's more likely to make a pretty solid call. But when he's angered, or feels intense grief, or intense joy or desperation, he tends to make less informed choices. Unfortunately living in WWII and Nazi-occupied Greece makes for a very unforgiving environment for trial and error. It shows often in the comic when he talks about things with older people- people that fight with their own demons and challenges.
kayotics
Oh crap, I almost missed this topic. My main character has SO many flaws
Deo101 [Millennium]
and we love him for it
shadowhood (SunnyxRain)
it's not too late
list them!
kayotics
I must prepare myself
kayotics
Some classic Toivo flaws: - Serial romantic. He loves the idea of being in love, and is desperate for it. - Flighty. He's hard to keep around. He's afraid of commitment for various reasons, and coupled with the serial romanticism, leads to a lot of heartache for him. - Related to the last one: avoidant in general. If he can avoid talking about hard conversations, he will. - A lack of coping mechanisms. This comes out in a very real way in chapter 3 when it's revealed that all of the ghosts in his house are literal ghosts of relationships, made by him trying to avoid dealing with the breakups. - Impulsive and leaps before he thinks. He's the stupidest genius you'll ever meet. He's super smart, and pretty wise, but he's going to act first before he even thinks about it. (sometimes this is a positive thing, and leads to ingenuity) - Petulant. He's pretty childish a lot of the times. - Brash. This doesn't come out as much in the comic, but when he's dealing with new people or people he doesn't like, he can be quite rude.
I'm sure there's more but those are the big ones.
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