#if I included vns in my thoughts

[stephschoices]

top 5 ros from IFs and/or VNs that has consumed your thoughts since reading about them?

Ooooooh that’s a good one 😩 (I’ll just do ifs and not vns bc I play more of those and that helps me narrow it down lol)

Based on how fast I became obsessed with them after reading about the ros I’ll say -

First is for sure Vargas from The Spirited: Origins ( @yuveim ) I love them sm my golden retriever teddy bear loml I can’t wait to smooch 🥰🥰🥰🥰

Noah from Novaturient ( @kalorphic ) bc I don’t usually go for villains but Ella made them a thembo and my heart wasn’t ready skfjdkdk

L from @esper-game 🥺 I’m so weak for a ro who is strict team leader and doesn’t think they deserve to be loved and will turn to mush when given the love 😭😭😭

Ivan from @fateunwritten-if bc I am also SO weak for an arranged marriage where one or both are actually secretly in love with each other 😭😭 and he’s also scary to everyone but mc ,, 😩💞 delicious

Marco from Blood Moon ( @barbwritesstuff ) one of the best friends to lovers I’ve read tbh,, Blood Moon was one of the earlier ifs I got into and I’ve been team Marco since day 1 he’s so 🥺🥺🥺🥺 literally adorable puppy bf I’d die for him

#lots of runners up but these were the first ones I thought of fkdndkd #if I included vns in my thoughts #I’d also consider cove from our life #or June from andromeda six #OR jay and jace from college craze #lol #thank u for the ask uwu #ask #anon

[bloodsuckerproxy]

Introducing...The Jacksons!

The family for my STNAF OC Lenny (find more about him here)

I knew when I made Lenny I wanted him to have a very different upbringing to Friend. I knew he was going to come from low-income and he's personally based off the type of people I grew up around and as. We also don't see this family type often enough and I wanted to show that :3

As always, STNAF belongs to @stnaf-vn and please check the game out!!!!

About the Family

Lil Frankie

28

5'9"

Protective, Cold, Selfless, Tomboy

Frankie was thought to be a boy during Ruby's pregnancy and so they were going to name her after Frank. Turns out she was a girl and they stuck with the name, opting for Frankie instead

She comes off as rude and cold, but she actually is just no nonsense and wants to keep her family/friends safe

Currently a bodyguard and does boxing on the side

Very salty she is shorter than Lenny

Daddy's girl

Frank

45

6'1"

Caring, Clumsy, Artistic, Sweet

Frank is like literally the embodiment of Goofy. He does his best but always seems to get hurt or break something. He means well though!!

Was a young dad (17) but did his best for his kids, including going back to school so he could get a better job once Lil Frankie was a couple years old

Currently a mechanic. Likes to make trash sculptures on the side

Very DIY. Taught Lenny everything about fixing things and making something out of nothing

Loves Ruby dearly. Will always find a way to gift her something. Knows her fave lipstick shades

Rebecca "Ruby"

45

5'9"

Assertive, Chatty, Caring, Motherly

Ruby was also 17 when her and Frank had Lil Frankie. She finished high school and worked through cosmotology school after the pregnancy

Currently a hair stylist and nail tech

Practiced doing hair and nails on Lenny since he liked spending time with her

She adores how sweet (and slightly stupid) Frank is and that's why they ended up falling in love. They are high school sweethearts fr <3

Will always welcome people into her home even if she can't offer anything more than a roof over their head or an ear to listen. Very selfless

Comes off as very gossipy but she will die with your secrets if you ask her to

Lenny

24

6'2"

Carefree, Open Minded, Optimistic, Punk

Takes after his dad in personality but is a total momma's boy

Ruby: Ruby taught him about fashion, makeup, nails, etc. and often practiced on him since he liked being pampered. He loves his mom a lot and her open minded nature made him the man he is today

Frank: Frank and Lenny don't need to say much to be together. They are very similar people and even though Frank's silly stories never seem to make sense, Lenny always listens. They love to make trash sculptures together or go dumpster diving

Lil Frankie: Frankie always had to look out for Lenny since he was a bit of a naive kid, but also when he got more into fashion. She would protect him despite the fact he could defend himself from bullies. He loves his big sister and he loves to annoy her (she pretends to hate it but she loves him back lol)

Anyways I wanna draw more STNAF once I have time fr fr :3

#stnaf #see thru need a friend #see thru need a friend oc #oc #original character #fanart #digital art #artists on tumblr #punk #midwestern #family

[nitrokiraru]

i finished listening to the takutowa drama cd! my thoughts/ig spoilers under the cut

MAN IT WAS SOOOO CUTE N WHOLESOME exactly what i expected. it was a little shorter (? maybe the madatowa one just had more tracks) but the story was sweet about how taku came to terms with himself and the clinic and towa. including some screenshots from the translation credit to yukirayu (also if anybody doesn’t want their translations reposted/screenshotted just let me know and i’ll edit it out!)

this. this was perfect. literally LOVED this towa completely taking advantage of this old man and his new muscles from getting out of fuckin PRISON. he’s so funny

JEALOUS TOWA!!!!!!! HE APPEARS u already heard of old man jealous yandere taku in the vn now get ready for Him. i loved this i love them bickering like a literal married couple BUT WHEN TAKU SAID THAT IN THE FIRST IMAGE I WAS LIKE??? n then i realized oh nobody knows they be fuckin it kinda makes sense but i would’ve been mad/jealous too idk

towa can lie all he want but i know he was jelly i can literally imagine what his facial expression was in this part. he’s such a lil tsundere i love him

this was oddly adorable towa is just like “again :)” and then taku’s just like Huh?.. it gave dmmd bad end

something i realized abt n+c drama cds (or just the dmmd and surodame ones i’ve listened to) they always have some sort of conflict in the middle. like they LOVE the miscommunication trope

my only complaint is that i lowkey wanted it to be longer. i wish we had tracks of towa and taku just hanging around in their appt or something..like i feel like they’re just peak married couple vibes and they could’ve explored that a bit more besides the main plot

but anyways i loved it! i wanna buy the other ones now even though i’m not particularly big fans of the other ships. don’t get me wrong i like all ships there’s just certain ones that give me more brainworms than others

#slow damage #taku murase #towa slow damage #takutowa

[symptomsofdeceit]

The very rough version of my VN demo is ready for beta testing!!

Please keep in mind that I haven’t finished the CGs or BGs yet, & my friend is still working on the music. I still need to customize the main menu.

The story is done though! There’s one evening + 2 full days and 4 endings in this!

I’d also like to remind everyone that my VN is 18+ and includes mature and disturbing content. I’ll put the content warnings at the end of this post.

If you’re interested in testing it out I’d love to hear any of your thoughts or comments! You can reach me here or through my discord @strawberrysquid0

Here’s the link to the rough demo!

Edit: I removed the link because I’ll be submitting the polished demo soon! Thank you so much to everyone who took an interest, tested this, & sent me their thoughts!! 🤍🤍

CONTENT WARNINGS: obsessive yandere behavior, stalking, manipulation, gaslighting, blackmail, threats of violence, non-consensual drug use, strong language, forced kissing, sexually suggestive topics and scenes, blood, gore, violence, murder, body horror, unsettling themes and imagery, and infectious disease (main characters will not become infected)

#symptoms of deceit #symptoms of deceit vn #yandere visual novel #yandere vn #male yandere

[nicohverse]

Entropic Float 2 Demo and Kickstarter Launch!

Picture a point-and-click adventure game. Now picture a branching, time-looping ontological mystery visual novel. Entropic Float 2 combines those into its gameplay concept: A point-and-click where you can never solve every puzzle at once. Where you have one key that fits two locks... And the only way to see what's behind the lock you didn't choose is to die, repeat the day, and try something different this time. With only you and your protagonist aware of the loop, seek an answer that earns new information. Through trial and error, solutions and murder... Can you find the way through this new Anomaly?

In early 2021, I started working on a project just for fun. Using the character creator and scene assembly tools of Illusion's Koikatsu, paired with the visual novel engine ren'py, I decided to learn to make a VN. A year and a half, over three hundred thousand words, and quite a bit of pocket money later, I released 'Entropic Float: This World Will Decay And Disappear' for free on steam and itch.io. 

Something that was never meant to be more than a fun exploration of a concept grew into a huge endeavor for me, a visual novel as long as any two Umineko episodes combined! I got guest artists, made plenty of art myself, and learned a lot more about coding in ren'py than I ever thought I would. After releasing the game, my friends were proud of me, and I've heard from a lot of people it connected with. It became the basis of what I want to keep doing creatively- Expanding on this world, telling its story, and finding those people it will resonate with.

That brings us to Entropic Float 2: Land Of The Witch. A sequel I've been planning since the first game released a little over a year ago now. It's a game that can't be free (though if you, for any reason, cannot purchase it- I care more about sharing it than I do about making money) and a game I want to create to that standard. There won't be assets made in a character creator or royalty free music this time. I hope to bring the Pine Creek Anomaly to the screen with my own two hands, and a little bit of help from freelancers. I want to make a point-and-click adventure worth paying fifteen dollars for, an artistic experience that constitutes a huge step up from the first game.

A demo is available to download and play from itch.io! Features already reflected in the demo include:

The general structure of the point-and-click gameplay; including travel between maps, item collection and use, and conversations with other characters.

Hand-drawn backgrounds (with minor animations) and talksprites.

Profile screens for each character and a memory-seeking system improved from the first game. Also improved from the first game is exposition being mainly in a linear-locked part of the story so it doesn't need to be repeated in different places so different players don't get confused!

Planned features yet to be implemented include:

Loop Randomization- The demo includes only the very first loop of the story, but in the actual timelooping gameplay, many factors will be randomized between loops. Characters and items will appear and disappear, characters will have different trustworthiness scores, and eventually, the weather will even change and impact puzzles and character behaviors.

Zones- Minigame areas that abstractly inform you more about a character and are locked behind obtaining certain profile notes and memories. The rewards for completing zones will be tools to access additional areas, such as Area 2 waiting beyond the broken bridge.

Characters- Several of EF2's characters don't appear yet in the demo, due to having their introductions tied to maps that aren't accessible in Area 1.

General Improvements- Characters currently only have one talksprite. The preferences page is still in the ren'py default configuration. Some music tracks recycled from the first game aren't the best fit for the situation. These are all things that relate to the current version being a demo. These are all things that will improve sooner if this kickstarter is a success.

Shortly after handling the Anomalous Clocktower in the Black Rock Desert, Kanatsune Ame was promoted. Now, as an agent of the Wish Task Force at a rank equipped to handle more complex Anomalies, he's received an assignment for another one above his pay grade. Pine Creek, an entire town that was wiped from the map and from all memory several years ago, only to suddenly begin dragging new victims inside within the last few months... Somebody inside this forgotten piece of miserable Americana decided to call out to the world that left it behind, and it's up to you to find out who that could be.

Thank you, as always, for reading!

#entropic float #visual novel #official content #visual novel gamedev #gamedev #indie games #indie gamedev #vndev #entropic float 2: land of the witch #kickstarter #crowdfunding

[medusian3y3]

Ask: Astrology Placements for Dancers, Gymnasts, and Yogis

I am thinking of doing a creative healing project involving pole dance, aerial silks /aerial yoga, and some sensual dance. To free the body, free the mind, and unite the body-mind connection for people with trauma (so a Somatic healing experience if that makes sense). This would combine music therapy, visuals, recorded performances, affirmations, and grounding work. I may even include some shadow work journals and additional grounding tools on the website. I want to gently guide others through evoking the root and the strength in their trauma (survival state) from where they feel most comfortable. All of these would be presented in an interactive format. I used to dance ballet but I am hesitant to start this project solo. I will be taking about a year to do this with the level of care and professionalism that I want to provide. Can you give me indicators/placements of the dancers/athletes mentioned? If you are a dancer of any kind feel free to drop your personal placements and any thoughts.

If you would like to give me personal tips, some of my placements are Aries SN(3H)/MRC(4H), Virgo MN(9H)/MRS(9H), Sagittarius ASC, Pisces VN(3H), Aquarius JP(2H), Libra MC, Virgo Lilith (8H), and Scorpio Chiron (10H - R) at 0'. My stelliums are as follows: 2H (Capricorn ruled with Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, Ceres, Eros, and Sappho) and 3H (Pisces ruled with Sun, Venus, Saturn, and Vesta). Special mention to 8H and 9H near stelliums. 8H (Cancer ruled with Virgo Lilith 0', Leo Vertex 8', Virgo Psyche 7', and Leo Chariklo 4"). 9H (Virgo ruled with Virgo Moon 10', Virgo Mars 24', and Virgo North Node 28', Libra Pholus 9', Libra Haumea 3', Virgo Makemake 11').

Love - Dinah / Lior Luna

#astrology #astro notes #astro placements #astro observations #natal chart #natal astrology #astro community #mental health #therapy #dance #gymnastics #yogi #yoga #aerial silks #pole dance #spiritual

[gear-project]

Annon-Guy: I was wondering that if you played them, what are your thoughts on the XBLAZE Games?

Secondly, what do you think of it's five main protagonists? Touya Kagari, Es (Her XBLAZE self), Hinata Himezuru, Mei Amanohokosaka and Kuon Glared Stroheim?

I actually *own* both Code Embryo and Last Memories on my PS3 Digital Library, though I haven't played them in years.

Vaguely speaking, the Xblaze "games" were the first time I seriously dipped my toes in to the Visual Novel Genre (aside Guilty Gear's Story Modes which are a derivative of the concept, early on).

From a somewhat casual perspective, I understand what Xblaze was trying to achieve, though I'd argue that other VNs have had much better execution and story-telling on the whole.

Still, being "part" of the BlazBlue universe did strike me as interesting, though I never did revisit the games for that purpose.

If I had the opportunity to play a full version of Dark War, I might have taken Xblaze in to deeper consideration on the story-telling front.

For Touya (when I learned about Dark War, his character arc's importance increased immensely... for reasons I won't spoil here.)

At the same time Touya reminds me of Naoto and his "Bloodedge Experience", though in Touya's case, he's a bit more passive compared to either Ragna or Naoto, which makes him less appealing in my humble opinion.

Es has two incarnations... the Es we "see" from Touya's perspective, and the Es we "see" in Lost Memories after a certain event occurs... I think her character development is something to witness if you haven't already. I actually really enjoyed that aspect of her, including how she later interacts with the Central Fiction cast.

Hinata, while her role in the story is no less important, is something of an odd-fit for the pacing of the story. We learn her secret along the way, but the way she behaves for much of the story implies she's very passive, much like Touya.

While it's true that Peace is always better than Conflict, when it comes to telling a story with drama, you at least need a character with some form of drive... Hinata would easily be mistaken for a background character if not for one key detail I won't mention.

I'm not really sure what they were trying to do with Mei, but I get that her "role" in some parts of the story fits in a grander history, so I guess that's something... But it's very easy to compare her to Rachel Alucard in that regard, and you either like her or you hate her for that reason.

Lastly, Kuon... I feel like Kuon could've used more screen-time for her parts of the story. She was a cool character, and a cool voice actress all things considered... but she just didn't get to be part of the story as much as the other characters did (though I assume they didn't want Kuon to upstage Es, but I think Kuon would've made a great rival for Es if written differently).

All things considered, I actually spent more time in Lost Memories than I did the original Code Embryo, so I'm not all that familiar with all the hidden routes in the story... I might revisit it one day if I get the urge, we'll see.

#This isn't a BlazBlue blog! #This isn't an Xblaze blog! #Visual Novel

[colourprinter]

Probably too personal thoughts, feelings, and ramblings around Our Wonderland

A couple of warnings, this will likely spoil all of Our Wonderland and this will likely get personal on the thoughts and feelings. It's a personal look (and total ramble) at this game more than anything.

If you haven't played or don't know what Our Wonderland is, I don't know how you found this but you can find it for free on this link.

To keep the spoilers hidden and to prevent forcing , I've put everything in the expand below.

I found this game from the Queer Halloween Story Bundle on itch, I was looking around what was in the bundle and enountered this game. I had already played a visual novel from the bundle that didn't gel too well with me so my hopes weren't too high.

I had no idea what this free game in a bundle had in store.

I was casual during the intro, I don't know when it hit but I knew I was locked in when act 2 hit and I saw what the meat of this game really is.

Something in this game sucked me right in, and wouldn't let me go.

I can't say I remember every detail but I was quickly emotionally invested, trying (and almost always failing) to keep Iggy alive and seeing how this friend group had completely gone off the rails, how their wishes twist around them.

Everything gave me the feeling I believe it was meant to, Gidget's advances on Iggy, Orlam, Buck's outright brutality, Genzou trying to get out alive while throwing the worst words at Orlam (I think he's just like that anyway) and Iggy having the worst time of his life.

While that doesn't sound like much, I don't usually get a reaction from a lot, the mix of visual and words hits just right... or wrong given how horrifying some of this is. Well, some things in the game would easily get a reaction...

For a bit of context for the next parts, I am aro/ace, something I truely discovered myself in the middle of a relationship, not that I hate being in a relationship but I think I'm completely incapable of feeling romantic love, there's just... nothing there. With being ace, I kinda resented the way my brain would react, litrally wishing sometimes that I was ace, glad I grew out of that for my own sake.

I also tend to feel awkward enough around sex in video games. I got goaded into the House of Hope scene, the first time the game crashed to save me and the second time I went dead slient and fixed my eyes down, only looking up enough to see the choices... I've now got an agreement to never have that happen again.

So obviously Gitget's sections got a big reaction from me, I thankfully haven't had any expriences close to anything like that, I could understand Iggy's perspective.

But enough about the horrible stuff for the moment, I'm not going to explain that, yes, seeing Orlam's and Buck's scenes were also shockers because eating human flesh and brutally murdering people are kinda bad things as well.

What I want to focus on next is something I currently only have one full perspective of, the romance. I usually verbalise everything to myself in RPGs and VNs, doing silly little voices for everyone (doing 6 children voices at the end hurt) so when I was given the choice of an ending... obviously, I chose the Genzou ending. Usually I'd feel awkward and stilted reading out the words but this time, it felt nice, I haven't done the other endings but I'm sure they're just as good, even if they're not, I got at least one good romance which given that this topples my fav VN romance (Slay the Princess which is pratically a joke romance anyway), I'm more than happy with it.

Niceness is over, I have another list topper, worst thing I've ever encountered in a video game, something so bad that even being foribly censored (I'm not checking if there's a visible version this time), it made me sick to my stomach. The tree and the infant in Her branches. Now I've played though and done some horrible things in video games, including child murder, but the way the body is described, the way everyone reacts to it. I can't call it anything below truely horrible and I'm putting this above freaking turn based RPG murdering children, I thought after that nothing would get me again (I think doing it actually knocked a screw loose because I've suddenly stopped being a goodie two shoes in video games, that's how bad that was). I mean this as a compliment but that is the worst thing I have ever encountered in any media.

And I think because I've felt these strong emotions where I haven't been hit so hard before, I've become completely pulled into it all. The fanwork contest was the first bit of my own art I put online in years and that kick started me getting back into art as a hobby, something I don't think I would have gotten back into if I didn't do that bit of Iggy art to prove to myself that I could do it if I put myself into it.

So... Carrot, thank you so much for this game of romance, fun, death and wishes.

If I land on my feet, I'd like to make a game with multiple acespec PoVs one day, much less horror though.

#our wonderland #ramblings #video games

[rinshiroufan]

An Analysis of Two Different (Yet Complementary) Endings: UBW in the VN and the Anime; and What They Mean

So I recently finished my re-watch of Ufotable’s unjustly maligned 2014-15 adaptation of Fate/stay night’s Unlimited Blade Works route; I thoroughly enjoyed myself, which wasn’t shocking at all—Rin/Shirou is only my favourite fictional relationship (not just romantic, but any kind of relationship). It did however induce to more thoroughly and exhaustively compare the anime original conclusion to the two’s story with the original ending as presented in the VN, if only because I suspect that a careful reading of the nuances of the characterization of both will yield some very fruitful results. It might seem a bit paradoxical at first, but I’ve come to find these two scenes while seen incredibly fondly by most Shirin shippers are in fact quite underappreciated—because there’s just so brilliant and intricate in the subtle ways in which they manage to weave in so much depth and substance into exceedingly simple and seemingly plain plot developments. They are insanely thematically rich, and people often are left far too dazzled and enchanted by the magic of the superficial writing that they miss the genius hidden beneath the surface.

We’ll start off with the comparatively simpler part of the analysis: the original conclusion to Rin and Shirou’s story.

The Ending in the VN

For the purposes of this analysis, I will be skipping all of the epilogue sans the final classroom scene; the reasoning is quite straightforward and should be readily obvious—most of what is of relevance to this analysis is basically confined solely to Rin and Shirou’s final conversation. This disclaimer might appear to be superfluous to some, but I decided to include solely due to my recognizing an asymmetry in the structure that I chose to employ herein—because the section posterior to this one will have to deal with comprehensively picking apart the entirety of episode 25 of the anime. There was a distinct possibility some readers might find the decision somewhat puzzling, so I think it would be no great harm to tell people what precisely they are getting into, though I consider the content itself will be perfectly sufficient in providing people with an understanding of the thought process behind it. So without further ado, let’s finally begin.

The crux of the conversation between Rin and Shirou that caps off UBW is her invitation to him to tag along with her to London as she goes to continue her training in becoming a proper magus—and Shirou’s reaction to her doing so. I will now post all of Shirou’s key internal monologues relating to the matter during his initial contemplation of the matter, omitting all of Rin’s elaborative comment interspersed throughout Shirou’s thoughts for comedic effect, in order to allow us to better understand what precisely the story is trying to communicate here.

She speaks casually, but I'm sure it's an amazing thing. …But London, huh? …That's certainly too far away. My father wasn't in the Magic Association. I'm just like him, and I don't like formal stuff.

[...]

…But I might be able to move there. I can start working more, study English, save up traveling and living expenses, and find a job over there…

[...]

No, no, let's say I am able to rent an apartment there. I don't know what kind of a place the Clock Tower is, but I'm sure Tohsaka will get even busier. …Then it should be better for me to go there after I become a proper magus by myself. Yeah, that sounds good. First of all, London isn't suited for me. I bet I'll faint if I go there and if it's filled with people like Kotomine———

It is at this point that Rin finally notices Shirou has wandered off in his thoughts and thus not paying attention to her—subsequently presenting what amounts to an ultimatum to him. But before we go into that, let us more carefully and studiously parse what we have been presented with here: a dialectic. A dialectic meant to represent Shirou’s inner conflict—an exceedingly minor and trifling conflict, no doubt!—between his ideological aversion and distaste for formal magecraft and the sorts of individuals drawn to it, and his curious desire to nonetheless follow Rin wherever she goes. For literary effect, the text chooses not to immediately explicitly reveal what might be behind this willingness to nonetheless move to London despite his misgiving, but anyone who has been paying even the tiniest bit of attention can easily deduce what might be the cause. Nevertheless, the story firmly establishes a key piece of information going forward—Shirou is not fond of the Mage’s Association. He would certainly not choose to associate himself with them of his own volition.

But now that we have the set-up, we are almost immediately greeted with the pay-off—the previously posted CG of Rin’s brilliant visage in an adorable hunched over position and adorned with a radiant, loving smile, accompanied by the following text: 

"So, what will you do, Shirou?" She asks me gently, with eyes that see through me. "——————" My face turns red. Her words and expression blow away my humility and my dislike of the Magic Association. …This is what I mean by Tohsaka holding my weakness. I can't help it if I fell in love with her.

“Oh, why go silent now? I haven’t heard your answer yet.“

She keeps smiling mischievously. She knows what my answer is, but she's mercilessly attacking me. "Uh… I, um…" To be honest, London is too far away, but I can't imagine myself being taught by anyone other than Tohsaka. And I never even thought about parting with her. Most of all, I want to be with Tohsaka. "Be clear, this is important. Will you still come with me, even if it's as my assistant?" She looks up into my eyes. She looks so attractive that I feel like my heart will pop out of my mouth. "S-Shut up, you idiot…! You idiot, idiot, idiot! I-I-If it's so important, tell me about it in a more appropriate place! I can't answer you when it's so sudden…!!!"

I don’t know what’ll happen to me if I keep staring at her, so I look away. ...I still feel Tohsaka’s presence.

She’s happily watching my reaction.

"Hey, Shirou. What's your answer?" She murmurs gently. ………She's got me beat. Is it this hard to nod and reply honestly? "………" But I can't turn around unless I say it to her.

"……You idiot. Don't ask me such an obvious question." I meet Tohsaka's gaze and tell her my honest opinion. Her smile broadens at those words.

“And I never even thought about parting with her. Most of all, I want to be with Tohsaka.” That’s the key portion here. The internal tug of war between Shirou’s deep-seated hatred for the common amoral magi and the stifling environment of Clock Tower on the one hand, and his unbridled love for and admiration of Rin is decisively and unquestionably resolved in Rin’s favour. It was barely even a contest. Returning to previously discussed dialectic, it is noteworthy how Shirou considers moving to London at a later time than Rin so that he wouldn’t represent a burden for a Rin less likely to be able to spend precious time with him. Hell—the guy already starts making plans about how he’s going to move there without her even inviting him or expressing that she wants him to go with her! He’s so lovestruck that the mere mention of her moving to London has his immediately making preparations so that he can be with her. It’s odd to think that Shirou could possibly find some way to work more than he already does, but that’s not stopping him. Shirou’s internal back and forth weighing his options, contrasting his reservations towards moving to London with his obvious preparedness to go there for Rin’s sake, is presented as barely even really being a proper conflict; the outcome was determined from the very start. There was simply no other way this could have been resolved—Shirou wants to be with his Tohsaka.

But why is this the conclusion to UBW? Why precisely was it so important to finish the route like this, with this particular scenario, with this particular character dynamic? It might seem like this is just the logical conclusion to how the story should be: it’s hardly in-character for Rin, someone who is portrayed as someone who loves magecraft and finds it fun, to not eventually go to Clock Tower, given that one of the themes of the route is her and Shirou’s learning to walk their chosen path out of their own love for it and on their own terms; it also helps reaffirm Shirou’s love for her. But how exactly does this help cap off Shirou’s character arc? How does this serve as a fitting conclusion to his character arc taken in its entirety, including his conflict with Archer? The essential element here is Shirou’s invocation of Kiritsugu, prefacing the rest of his comments elaborating on his opposition to the Association; Shirou’s refusal to move to London is symbolically associated with his ideal. The core question of UBW of course is “Will or will not Shirou become just like Archer?” He is after all walking on the same path, headed to the same direction. What makes him so different? This scene is meant to answer that: his love for Rin. The entire scenario is a microcosm of Rin and Shirou’s relationship, showing why he won’t become Archer: he loves Rin more than he wants to pursue his ideal. Of course Shirou wants to become a superhero—but he wants to be with Rin even more.  Shirou will always treasure the precious time he spends with Rin far more than he does his adventuring. Whatever corner of the world he may be in, whatever conflict is afoot, no matter how faraway he may be—he will always find his way back home, the place where he truly belongs: with Rin. The girl who loves him, and whom he loves back.

And I really cannot think of a more fitting poem to end that scene than...

The Ending in the Anime

In episode 25 of the 2014 UBW TV anime adaptation by Ufotable, we finally get to see Rin and Shirou’s life together in London.

It makes for incredible fanservice, to say the least.

He’s giving her a headpat—SHE’S SLEEPING ON HIS SHOULDER!!! Thanks for humouring my pic dump; now, onto the analysis.

Within the confines of the anime, the classroom conversation between Rin and Shirou is quite heavily abridged, positioned very deliberately so that it may be carefully instrumentalized for the specific narrative purposes of the broader narrative of the London epilogue it is situated in. It is in short repurposed. We will have to return to the specifics of that later. For now, let’s begin analyzing how the narrative unfolds.

The epilogue has a three act structure, divided over three in-universe days. The first day acts as the set-up; the second day as the elaboration; and the final day provides us with the conclusion. Now, the first day is mostly fanservice, and this is not without reason: while it lays the foundation for Shirou’s inner conflict that we see unfold over the next two days, it is a mostly laidback story that simply invites us to enjoy Rin and Shirou’s nearly idyllic life in London. It’s a way to frontload almost all of the pure, unadulterated fanservice so as to allow for more narratively relevant elements to be positioned at the very end, which is precision-focused to delivering a fitting conclusion to Emiya Shirou’s arc—which isn’t to say that the latter portions of the story lack fanservice, or that the frontloaded fanservice has no purpose whatsoever; rather, the later fanservice simply has more thematic depth to it. The early fanservice meanwhile serves mostly to establish what Rin and Shirou’s life in London is like; it’s purpose is to establish what is at stake. Many have lamented that Ufotable cut a lot of the elements which were included in Nasu’s original script (most likely rejected due to the Ufotable animation staff’s qualms with having to do another exhausting 45 min episode), but ultimately it was for the better in my estimation; it resulted in far more focus. Instead of wasting time on the total mediocrity of a character that is Luvia, the existing story utilizes her wisely for a specific purpose—to establish just how much Rin has changed over the narrative. I mean, the girl went from freaking out at the suggestion she might be fond of a certain redhead to being so openly enamoured with him that’s she willing to throw down with other girls for flirting with him! The idealized portrayal of Shirou’s new idealized life with the girl he loves is interspersed with discussion of his receiving an invitation to join the Association—and the implications of that. The day ends with Shirou’s mentioning that his heart lies elsewhere; in his pursuit of the ideal.

The next day is fairly laidback as well, but also a bit more... contemplative. Rin and Shirou’s ruminations on the Holy Grail War and what they learned from it during their visit to Glastonbury aren’t exactly directly connected to the central conflict of the narrative, but they nevertheless help portray just how much more mature these characters have gotten, how much they have changed since the events of HGW. It’s important to have Rin portrayed in a much more serious light; after all, the beginning of the episode had her used as comedic relief. Yes, it’s a perfectly fine way to establish just how much Rin truly loves Shirou, but the conclusion to the episode ultimately relies on her being both loving and mature; she’s always been the more intelligent, level-headed and wise of the two, so it stands to reason that it would be quite prudent remind the audience of that as it becomes important once again. Once more, we are treated to a dialectic; the hopelessly in love Rin of the first day meets her antithesis in the wise, contemplative Rin of the second day, ultimately resulting in the synthesis we encounter in the final resolution to the narrative. Having Rin portrayed as being both more mature yet also more fun than Shirou also reinforces just how much more at ease she is at Clock Tower than he is.

On the ride back home, Shirou has a flashback. And we suddenly find ourselves back in Fuyuki, two years prior.

Cute.

Anyway, we return to our repurposed classroom scene.

What exactly is the goal of this scene? Shirou’s monologues, so crucial to the scene in the VN, are wholly excised. We can see Shirou’s blushing like crazy (I can’t blame him...), but we are otherwise left clueless as to his considerations whether or not to follow Rin to London. The thematic relevance of the scene in the VN is gone; no-one, going based solely on the anime, could possibly have realized that this particular scene was meant to be a microcosm of their relationship, showing my Shirou will not become Archer. If anything, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to say that the scene is just there to fill in the gaps about what happened in the immediate aftermath of the events of Fifth HGW and act as more Rin/Shirou fanservice. It’s the final episode, so why not just give your audience diabetes ten times over? Just look at it!

God, I’m really sorry if this many images bothers anyone—but I just can’t help it, it’s too cute and amazing.

But yeah... good fanservice. Doesn’t necessarily mean there’s anything thematically relevant or important to the characterization our heroes receive, right?

Well...

This... is what the episode is all about.

Shirou doesn’t want to betray Rin.

“Thanks for bringing me with you.“ Shirou is profoundly grateful to Rin for giving him this wonderful opportunity to be with her and spend time with her. He is so very happy to be able to cherish his time with the girl that he loves... but he can’t stay at Clock Tower. Rin is the only reason that he is happy there. He feels uncomfortable with the subject of his future there, too afraid to openly and honestly express his feelings to Rin, because he doesn’t want to break her heart. For all that Shirou has matured, he is still just a young man trying to find his place in the world, confused and scared; scared that he might have to abandon the girl he loves so dearly—scared of what she might say. He doesn’t want to spit all over her effort and hard work, all that she has ever done for him; fundamentally, Shirou’s conflict in this episode is about Rin. It’s about his struggling with the difficulties of maintaining the relationship that he has built with her, and his fears that it might not last. His fears that Rin wouldn’t understand what he’s going through, and reject him for it. And that in doing so... his fate will as Archer will be sealed.

But that’s not what happens. When he is finally forced to explain himself to her, he is surprised to hear that she isn’t mad at all. No, she’s wholly supportive of him! Encouraging, even! In fact... she’s the one reassuring him. Earlier in the narrative, Rin was Shirou’s foil as the down to the earth realist to his wide-eyed, idealism. Rin was the one with the self-esteem issues; Shirou was the one who kept charging at the impossible without a doubt in his mind about his chances of success. The confession was all about Shirou’s providing Rin with the necessary support to get back up due to his holding her in a higher regard than she did herself; to Shirou, she was always the amazing, incredible girl who never quits despite all the things weighing on her back. And now, in a beautiful symmetry... it’s her, the girl who didn’t think she had it in her to strive for the impossible, giving encouragement to him, the boy who never did quit, who now has doubts about his future... to never quit. Because she believes in him, just like he believed in her.

People tend to grievously misunderstand what Rin says in this episode—it’s responsible for like 90% of the stupid takes on this episode and the future of the Rin/Shirou pair. She never claims that she will always follow Shirou around; she quite openly states that she eventually wishes to settle down at Clock Tower, because pursuing magecraft is fun, it’s her dream, and it makes her happy. She just doesn’t think that is necessarily incompatible with her being with Shirou. Just like Shirou had made a temporary sacrifice coming to London to spend time with her, so too will Rin now make a slight detour from her path to accomplishing her dream to support the most precious person in her life. It’s why I find it somewhat regrettable that Shirou’s monologues were removed from the classroom scene; it would have been nice to have it be readily apparent within the show itself without recourse to the VN that there’s a symmetry between Shirou’s going to London with Rin and Rin’s going on adventures with Shirou. I understand the omission, given the excellent execution, but it was nonetheless an imperfection solution; perhaps the only one there was. But I can still lament, can’t I?

Rin and Shirou’s relationship is going to face a lot of issues. It’s not going to be easy. A clash of wants is inevitable. But Rin is willing to make it work. She is going to make it work. For both of their sakes. The beauty of Rin and Shirou’s relationship is in its striving towards an ideal; it can never be perfect, but it still comes close to being so. Its imperfections make it more than perfect. Theirs is a relationship just like any other—filled with ups and downs. The proof of their love is not in the absence of problems, but in their having the patience, understanding and mutual respect to overcome them, together. Many people when praising the Shirin pair like to adduce its being the most “realistic” of the three VN relationships in its favour. I think such people are doing it a massive disservice by doing so. Shirin is wonderful because it’s a highly idealized version of a normal relationship. Just look at the episode! Their love story is a like a fairy tale! The entire story is about Rin and Shirou, partners in crime; just the two of them against the whole world. Falling love in the midst of a conflict filled with strange mystic mages and legendary heroes from the past. And yet... it feels so down to earth. It feels like something that could occur in your own neighbourhood. What makes me love it so much is this careful but amazing balance between reality and fantasy; it’s just the story of a boy and a girl falling in love... but it feels like a grand epic. Both of them are strange and downright weird people... yet they are also just two regular teenagers, doing regular teenage things. Two regular people, stuck in extraordinary circumstances where they don’t belong... and making the best of it. Together. And nothing exemplifies that more for me that this one final scene at the end of episode 25, perfectly encapsulating why they are so great.

Many people lament the absence of more physical affection between Rin and Shirou, in both the VN and the anime. I sympathize with such people; I myself wish we had gotten many more hugs, kisses and cuddling than we did. And yet... I feel as though in decrying what is not there, they fail to appreciate what was there. Because frankly, few things have made me as emotional as this one handshake.

#shirin #rinrou #shirou/rin #rin/shirou #shirou x rin #rin x shirou #shirou emiya #Emiya Shirou #rin tohsaka #tohsakarin #tohsaka #tohsaka rin #fate stay night ubw #fsn ubw #ubw #fate ubw #fate stay night #fate stay ubw #unlimited blade works #ubw anime #2014 ubw #visual novel #one true pairing #otp #romance #anime romance #anime #fsn analysis #fate analysis #fate stay night analysis

[kagdowo]

Ok to answer your tags. flynn is way too active (involved with the self/ self serving) and way too good at self care to be a seer. (also the idk about you until we've hung out enough and then i'll die for you but i'll never tell you but that's another thing entirely)

a good example of echo project seer would be cameron wilson from arches vn (seer of doom, dersite) or dave halloway (seer of time prospit)

Flynn just has too much of the akward cohabitation with his aspect too much of self imposed rules. and not enough of trying to foster pseudo mage like traits into other to be a seer.

altough yes you are right flynn is the ragest bitch to have ever raged. (you could argue that flynn ending and him spectatulary failing at self care by getting himself killed is a seerish trait. but the devil is in the details. seer hurts themselves with their opposite aspect. by misfiring their twin witch impulse (especially the women) terezi had relationship problems rose was alcoholic etc....

Mage get burned by their primary aspect while gaining instinctive non scholar insigth about it. (flynn get burned by rage when his fury against secrets and lie as well as general skepticism led him to be burned in the mine, murdoch get burned by blood with his abusive familly situation)

all in all flynn has all the akwardness the wanting to dance by their own rules the attuning to his aspect as personal insights of a mages.

i am literally a seer so i know one when i see one. P.S other fvn seers might include cordelia hendricks (seer of hope prospit) porter moore (seer of blood no idea of his lunar sway) and klaus from dawn chorus (seer of void, no idea for his sway either)

omg wow thank u so much for ur reaponse!! this was such a fun breakdown to read, and now that I’ve read it I wholeheartedly agree with u on flynn being a mage of rage.

i always had a hard time conceptualizing / understanding the mage class- like, i understood they suffer from their aspect in some way and in the process gain intuitive knowledge about it, but that was the extent of my understanding.

seers too- like, lmao now that i’m thinking about it i think i had an even looser grasp on seers than i had on mages! i didnt even know about the twin witch impulse stuff, or the stuff about fostering psuedo mages

it all makes perfect sense tho, and i’m a bit embarrassed i never really caught on to a lot of this before (especially embarrassed that i forgot seers were the passive to mages, not the other way around lol)

regardless tho, thanks so much for taking the time to write all this!! i especially love how u provided examples of other seers/mages in other fvn titles. (cameron as a seer of doom is so real but its also such a sad title, which tracks but still 😭)

i gotta ask if u’ve thought about the rest of the casts’ titles? i’ve thought about it a bit, but as shown, i don’t really have the greatest grasp of classpecting so a lot of what i have is really half baked

i think leo is definitely bloodbound and possible a prospit dreamer? or maybe he’s a prince and he’s just mirroring blood so he’s actually a prince of breath? or something?

carl feels possibly space or breath bound? maybe a page too?

jenna is either light or mind? as for class idrk

tj could be either void or hope? void cuz of syd and hope cuz of his faith and how he parallels flynn (lol i know very superficial). and as for his class… idk honestly lol

and chase… idk really lmao, maybe heart? since he’s sort of the heart of the narrative? don’t really know what class i’d give chase either tbh

and the sydney… probably doombound, right? or time, since his death sort of starts the clockdown towards the town’s undoing?

#echo project #echoproject #echovn #echo vn #sydney bronson #flynn moore #tj hess #chase hunter #jenna begay #leo alvarez #carl hendricks #hs #classpects #classpecting

[decepti-thots]

I’m genuinely interested in what the difference between a visual novel let’s play and actually playing the game. I’m guessing it’s something about making your own choice in the moment rather than watching someone else make *their* choice, but I’d like to hear your thoughts if you’d be willing to share.

For those wondering, this is in relation to my tags on this post!

So the thing I'm discussing in the tags of that post is specifically games criticism and theory, which needs to be understood in the way you might understand "film criticism" or "literary theory", to be clear. We're discussing the kinds of analysis of games-as-texts, games-as-art, which you might see in academia and critical circles around literature or film.

So one of the things that comes up when starting to talk about games this way is: what's a video game 'text'? Think about it. Any game that allows any amount of choice, any, however small or inconsequential, is a game that you can start arguing about what its 'real text' is, if nothing else. Does a video game text constitute all possible permutations taken as a collective whole, all considered with equal weight? (If so, is any analysis of really complex games 'complete' if it does not take every possible tiny permutation into consideration? Do glitches count?) Does the text comprise one specific playthrough? If so, is every critic or analyst technically approaching different, if interrelated, 'texts'? Does it just comprise the stuff in the game program in the abstract, and if so what does the player have to do with it in that case? All sorts of weird shit comes to the forefront when you bring the whole idea of 'a text' into games, basically, because it's harder to intuitively understand the boundaries of most games compared to, say, a film.

This has been a thing folks argue about for as long as serious discussion of games has been a thing, which is to say, decades. Personally, I favour an approach put forward and codified by academic Brendan Keogh, who focuses on looking at games as primarily understood through a phenomenological framework. In his book A Play of Bodies, he describes his understanding of the video game 'text' as being located not in a single static 'place', so to speak, but the 'circuit' that is created by the interplay between the person physically playing the game and the game program itself, and how each responds to the other. The game isn't what's on the cartridge or what the player does, it's the way those two things combine to create meaning. A game's text is the way that players interact with what a game 'is', and so the text inherently includes the act of playing it.

This is true even in experiences with low or functionally no interactivity, I will add, because the experience of not 'acting' in a situation where interactivity could be present but isn't is fundamentally different to not interacting because the medium does not allow you to, even if it seems at first glance the same. You expect most games to be highly interactive, so sitting and not being able to interact with them produces a specific experience that is not necessarily present in mediums where non-interactivity is taken for granted.

Which brings us to Let's Plays; even a non-commentary uncut LP video of a completely linear game/VN is a meaningfully different text to watch someone else play as opposed to playing it yourself, because the text of a video game involves what you are doing with it as part of that imagined 'circuit', even if what you are doing is very little to nothing. A video you cannot interact much with and a video game you cannot interact much with are different experiences even where all other information is functionally identical; thus, an LP of a linear visual novel and the visual novel as played are two interconnected but distinct texts, and while the former is both interesting and a valid text in itself, they are not the same thing.

Most critics probably won't take this exact view, to be clear- as I said, arguments about what's a video game text anyway are extensive and different approaches favour different ideas! But basically all of them will have some element of this in it, that even 'low interactivity' games are fundamentally imparting some kind of artistic experience to a player by the fact that you are playing them in a medium that takes interactivity to be the default. The infamous game Mountain lets you "do" almost nothing, but that carries different meaning when playing a game than when watching a video, because you know that the reason you can't is not the medium, but the choice made by the dev(s). In this way, anyone insisting that watching a video of a game gives you the same story information as playing it and so can be used to identically analyse a game's text is... it's like saying I can do film analysis because I read a novelization. I can do an analysis of the novelization, and that's a worthwhile thing to do, probably. But it's not exactly the same as the film, because some amount of information is lost and/or changed in the transmission between mediums. Different folks may take stronger or weaker stances on how important this difference is and what a game's text is best defined as, but you won't find many who argue even very very linear games lose no information in the swap from game to video format, and the ones who do I think are. Wrong. LMAO.

#disclaimer: massively paraphrasing and oversimplifying here #i am no academic on these matters lol. tbh i would recommend the book he's a lot smarter than me!!

[nitrokiraru]

shikis route finisheddd!

like the rin post this might be long. but yall. LMDAFNSJDIGKA i very much understand why he is controversial now. but to be honest i remember playing madarame's route from slow damage and seeing people be like "this is just shiki 2.0!" and i love madatowa so. i was kinda here for the campy 2000s toxic yaoi and clearly this was one of the blueprints. ok so lemme rly break down this bc i love rambling

this was so real... i think more yaoi should include piercings as a way of like. marking or claiming or whatever its called like i was fully like oh my Gootness. gave his ass a belly piercing...also did i mention i love shikis design like he truly served cunt. im very much into alternative fashion and subcultures n all that so i really do like his design

abt his endings... i thought the ending where akira becomes a whore for some reason was kinda funny LMAO like shiki was just like ugh. lemme go home to my hoe wife "who was it this time" LIKE?%6$#&7#2&# i think i liked hoe akira. the military ending was aiight i didnt rly have strong feelings abt it

ok lemme get into what i didnt like. i did NOT like the "good" ending LIKE THAT WAS NOT GOOD???? WHY IS HE IN A WHEELCHAIR i think i mightve missed something like i was here for the running away type ending until it was revealed shiki just became. that like idk you couldve just had them be delinquents together or sumn </3 but overall. i can def see why people wouldnt like this route but to be honest. i like mess. i had fun i thought it was entertaining shiki is hot those r my thoughts. that is all

now to doooo nanos route! then ill be done omg i feel like i flew through this vn so quickly

#shiki tnc #togainu no chi

[adelle-ein]

Nothing Supernatural Here: Lace’s not-very-nice AINI review/rant

ETA 01/04/23: WAY more people read this than I thought, so I went through and did a massive edit/cleanup. Fixed up the grammar and writing from “hasty rant” to “actually kind of a reasonable essay” level, threw in a few more details, and added some screenshots to break up the text chunks. Sorry it was such a mess, I didn’t proofread too much bc I genuinely didn’t think anyone was gonna read it :’)

When I finished watching AI: Nirvana Initiative on Youtube (because I could not afford to buy it, and I am happy every day that I did not dip into my grocery money to do so), I wrote a review. It was not a kind review. I hated the game and that very much shows. It seemed so harsh and mean when all the reviews were so glowing, when all my mutuals seemed to ADORE it, so I decided it was better to let this extremely mean review languish in the depths of my google drive forever.

I have now edited, added to, and completed this review, and decided to let it out. It is extremely long. Like, stupidly long. And I still left out a LOT of things I hated.

I am not being nice, I am not pulling punches. I think AINI is the worst video game sequel I have ever had the displeasure of knowing exists as well as the worst VN overall I have ever viewed in full. I have really nothing nice to say about it at all. So please know that going in, and also know that if you try to convince me the game is good, I am probably just going to laugh at you because believe me: I cannot be convinced. I have tried so hard to like this game. I cannot, and it is one of my most hated pieces of media ever. This whole review is much more “hate” than “criticism.” Anyway. You have been warned.

Spoilers for AINI and AITSF, of course. Bear in mind: AINI, even if you have spoiler toggle off, inherently spoils AITSF. You cannot discuss AINI in depth without spoiling AITSF. The pre-release press releases were lying.

CWs: All AINI-typical content is discussed, including suicide, death, parental neglect and abuse, et cetera.

PROLOGUE

Nothing sums up my loathing of AINI better than the story of Tokiko’s body. When you find her corpse while playing as Mizuki, it’s a very clear suicide scene. Her wrists were slit, she's part of a cult, she’s been discussing suicide and being sliced in half, the game makes it very clear she's been suicidal in the past, et cetera. And yet Aiba immediately announces, with no further explanation, that she “does not believe this was self-inflicted” aka "this was not a suicide." She provides no evidence whatsoever for this little conclusion (other than the would being “deep?”), but as the player, it would be logical to assume that this is meant to be a "I know what this looks like, and it isn't it, assume this was murder" from the writers to the player.

And then, much later on when the Big Reveals are coming out, it is revealed that Tokiko did in fact kill herself in that very spot, in exactly the way it looks. She slit her wrists and cut herself in half using the Very Realistic Machine because of her cult beliefs and underlying depression. It was a suicide, exactly what it looked like, all along. No further explanation is given. Aiba does not even acknowledge her lie/error.

Great writing, guys.

A good mystery misleads its audience. But, uh...that's not misleading the audience. That's just straight up telling a lie to pretend there's a mystery when there isn't one. It was in fact the thing it immediately appeared to be. I looked at an apple, AINI told me it was an orange, and then later was like “it’s an apple.” Not even “it was actually an apple all along,” just “it’s an apple.” And isn't that just straight up what AINI is about overall? Blatantly lying to the player to pretend it has any depth, mystery, or interesting content whatsoever?

PART ONE: THE TWIST

We all know The Big AINI Twist. At least, if you are reading this, I assume you do. Instead of two timelines, one featuring Ryuki in the past and one featuring Mizuki in the present, Side Ryuki and Side Mizuki are intertwined (like DNA, for some reason, which isn't even really relevant to the story's alleged themes other than its almighty biological superiority unlike those icky adopted families...actually wait, that probably is the point. oops. You And I Are Halves Of A Whole Let’s Go.) You've been going back and forth between past and present all along, playing either as Ryuki (past/present), Mizuki (present), or Mizuki Two-Only-Exists-To-Pull-Off-This-Twist (past.) Only "Jin's" body was found in halves six years apart. All other bodies were found in the past, minus Tokiko who was found in the present. There was no mystery at all. And knowing what the player does about Jin and Uru by this point, the rest can quickly and easily fall into place.

Particularly clumsy that they have to spell out the DNA thing, huh. Of course, the characters have known this all along. To sum up, the "mystery" in AINI is entirely based upon the player being told a lie right after starting the game that continues throughout the entire story. A lie that was only told to the player, not the characters. When the lie is revealed, the answer becomes obvious. As soon as you see the timeline you learn that there was in fact little to no mystery all along, the obvious answer is the real one, and the only reason you as the player didn't figure it out hours ago is because the game was lying to you (and only you - not the characters, which would, you know, actually require some real fucking writing.)

This is where the game fails. Everything in AINI happens to pull off this ridiculous and yet boring literal twist. This is why Bibi (while I can't have anything against a character who is just Mizuki Again as a person, god I loathe Bibi as a plot device and the fact that she exists) is a thing and why she is inexplicably exactly like Mizuki. This is why Ryuki, Amame, etc don't get timeskip designs. This is why Shoma doesn't age. This is why Date was shoved hastily off-screen. This is why the AI Balls have so many conveniently timed memory issues. This is why nobody experienced any significant development in six years. This is why character interactions feel clumsy and forced, such as why Shoma's feelings about his dad's death ping wildly back and forth (because sometimes it happened six years ago.) Everything in AINI - characters, pacing, gameplay, FUN - was sacrificed in the name of one big twist, and that twist isn't even good. It's boring. It retroactively ruins everything about the game. It serves zero purpose except to yell "gotcha!"

AITSF misled the player, leading you to suspect Renju, Iris, So, Date, Boss, Shoko, and Falco in turn and all at once (because, in a sense, it was all and none and each of them.) AINI, on the other hand, doesn’t mislead. It just...lies. To me, that isn't really fun or interesting. It doesn't impact the characters, it is utterly meaningless -- except for making the player think there was actually more to the plot than the obvious answer for several chapters. In the end, the real solution to the entire case was just the obvious, boring answer. Jin and Uru share body parts and Uru was Tearer. The only real reveal is that Amame killed Uru and moved Tokiko's body, but that comes far too little far too late (especially bc after a few genuinely good and heartfelt scenes with Mame, we go to the final battle scene which frankly reads worse than the Harry Potter fanfiction I was writing on the Scholastic kids’ forums at age eleven.)

Seriously though, as an aside, that final battle scene is so horrifically bad I feel like it deserves its own paragraph. Maybe multiple paragraphs. I mean, what can I say? There’s no real final boss, just nameless mooks (one has a red shirt on, wow!) It’s another boring fight scene with no fun or creativity using the AI Balls’ abilities, just “press Z to jump” Heavy Rain-ass QTEs. Using "there are only three AI Balls, and whoever doesn't have one just kinda sucks" as a plot device is stupid. Ryuki's "death" was stupid and really served no purpose at all. There’s even more of Mizuki and Date's relationship being completely discarded, and Aiba being weirdly cruel to them both. Somehow a prerecorded message is capable of predicting every single thing that happens because...reasons, I guess. Kizuna has a gun and yelled the fuck word for the screencappable moment. Wow. And I guess the mopeds can fly now?? Maybe that should have come up sooner?? Not to mention poor pacing and bad lag making the whole ordeal feel even longer. It sucks that this clusterfuck came right on the tail end of Amame's somnium, which pretty much the only story/character thing in the whole game I genuinely cared about and the best scene. But Mame was absolutely overshadowed by this trash fire (and a playable epilogue even worse than the first game’s, which I also hated ftr.)

Back to “The Twist,” I cannot describe how much I hate every choice that went into this nightmare. So many terrible, terrible decisions had to be made to make the timeline change work, and it shows. Just for starters, we have Mizuki's backstory being rewritten and flung out the window, we’ve got characters willfully acting very stupid about when things are happening and exchanging painfully awkward dialogue, and important and meaningful and emotional reactions and scenes are constantly being skipped — all in service of one twist. One twist that only matters to the player. The timelines being scrambled does not affect Mizuki or Ryuki or anyone else one iota, because they already know what order everything is happening in! They have nothing to discover, since they’ve known from the beginning, even if their dialogue is crafted to tiptoe around that fact. The entire thing is only for the player. Why does Mizuki apparently forget Date is missing after the first thirty seconds of the game and never express any care for him, Iris, etc ever again? Why are there two identical Mizukis who somehow decorated their moped identically despite completely different upbringings?? It’s all literally just so this twist can work, so that there can be two interchangeable Mizukis. Other characters have to behave identically in past and present, and other obstacles have to be safely out of the way. There is no other way for the twist to work, and none of these actively game-ruining elements serve any other purpose. The end result is that AINI is…so stupid. It doesn't feel like a story. It feels like a bunch of elements put together around a central twist. No character gets to be an actual character. They're all walking clues and nothing more, and their development is purposefully stunted so they can act the same way in past in present. It hurts Mizuki most of all, and as devotedmizukilover420, this is what makes the game unsalvageable to me. The two Mizukis might be the dumbest "clue"/element/twist of all, because the whole thing makes entirely zero sense with AITSF (or any kind of logic, really.) You're telling me that all along, Boss has been raising an adopted daughter named Mizuki who looks exactly like Mizuki and that just didn't impact AITSF at all? Mizuki was living with Boss and Saito left Hitomi tied to a bomb in Boss's house — so Mizuki 2 just...wasn't home and missed that? Didn't care that her mom went missing? Meanwhile, Boss is just keeping this secret all along bc she wanted a super secret agent who was loyal only to her or whatever? (see my thoughts below on AINI's hot anti-adoption agenda.) Yeah, sure, right. Not to mention, "AITSF/Classic Mizuki was adopted by the Okiuras" is also bullshit. Even putting aside the way it slam-dunks the message and themes of AI1 Mizuki route into the garbage. Okay, she coincidentally has Shoko's unique hair color and exact face shape, and Shoko recounts when she was a newborn and hated her stroller and wanted to be held all the time, and Renju makes a clumsy comparison between Shoko and captive animals who give birth….but the Okiuras adopted Mizuki when she was three and there's no genetic relation. Complete and utter bullshit, and character-hurting bullshit at that. But it’s a necessary twist to pull off the dual timelines because we need to be able to have an 18-y/o (identically dressed….) Mizuki running around six years ago. I wouldn’t mind this so much if it didn’t impact Mizuki’s character, and her AITSF route, so heavily, but...it does. It ruins everything. AINI just hates adoption so much that it had to wipe out the pro-adoption message from its predecessor too (I will get to all this in more detail later - there’s just so much to hate about this game!)

Gotta say though, bold move to have a clone character and have the game’s conclusion be “Yes, the two clones are exactly the same in every way, they don’t have independent identities, nothing about their lives or experiences shaped them in any way, they are literal halves of a whole with no differences between them, and they’re totally okay with that and have no negative feelings about it.” Don’t think I’ve ever seen a piece of media do that before. Because, well, it sucks. It’s silly and stupid and just awful, awful writing.

I'm sure all the Horidori Institute stuff was coined solely to pull off the timeline twist — including the two Mizukis, our Mizuki's new backstory/canon superpowers (also stupid and takes all the fun out of her cartoonish super strength - just let things be fun, AINI!), and everything with Shoma. That only adds to the way this game just feels like a singular house of cards with one sole goal, and that goal is "to lie about the timelines and then reveal it was a lie at the very end." It's not even cleverly obfuscated, you just have an incorrect timeline and then you get a correct one. The big reveal just being "Mama tells you bc she has supernatural powers now — than straight up says there's nothing supernatural about the case" doesn't help. There was no way to skillfully incorporate that so they just drop it. And then move on. Because in the end, like absolutely everything else, it doesn't matter. The final battle is pointless and has nothing to do with the rest of the game because every aspect of this game was built around a twist that has nothing to do with its characters. Even the killers were designed and created completely in service to this twist. And yet, despite all of that, no real time or effort is devoted to revealing the twist, it’s just hastily dropped and then abandoned for good. Even the writers don’t like the twist, I guess!

Now, gaze upon what I genuinely believe is the stupidest line in the entire game, and what sums up exactly why it fails.

That’s right! There’s nothing supernatural here! Nothing fun, interesting, or entertaining. Nothing characterful, nothing that adds meaning or development. It was all just a very straightforward lie. What, you expected better? You thought, after the last game harnessed a supernatural twist that developed and added to its world and characters, that this game would too? You thought in a world of exploring brains and dreams, machines that slice perfectly in half, magical suicide plagues, and bodyswapping, that there might be more to the story? You goddamn dumbass. The game knew that you would think that, and it laughs at and mocks you for it. You thought the writers put in actual effort? You thought they cared about the world they were creating? That was your idiotic mistake. How silly of you! The most straightforward, boring explanation was the correct one. Nothing supernatural here!

And that's...part one of four. I said this was long and I meant it.

PART TWO: THE CHARACTERS

Another big issue with AINI is that it has no idea if it's standalone or a sequel, and as a result, it utterly fails to be both. AITSF characters get no development in AINI, to avoid spoiling their game. But they aren't really playing any roles at all. They stick out like sore thumbs because they have no reason to be there. They get no real introduction. The new characters are shallow, sure, and they only exist to serve the Plot Twist, but they do exist and serve a purpose. Why the fuck was Hitomi even in this game for all of two scenes? This seems like it'd be really jarring for a standalone player, since they now need to keep track of like…ten potential suspects. Except they aren’t really meant to be suspects, and they actually don't matter to the game at all. So Sejima, for example, is being super suspicious, but we returning players all know he can’t be up to much of anything. How is a new player supposed to guess that? Meanwhile, even on "no-spoiler" mode, massive spoilers get dropped for AITSF. Character backstories, motivations, the connections between them — they’re either implied or stated outright. You're kinda not supposed to know a lot of this stuff going into AITSF and, well, if you play AINI first…you will. Even "Mizuki gets adopted by Date" is a spoiler and that isn't hidden at all, but that's by far one of the more minor things. This isn’t even touching on Date being in his Saito body and voice by inexplicably wearing a custom mask, which is not only bizarre but terrible, terrible character writing (though I give it a pass because it keeps DC Douglas out of this game.) The writers tried to have their cake and eat it too, and as a result they just set the whole cake on fire.

The cast feels completely flat. Tama and Ryuki fit right in with the classic crew…because they serve no purpose, play no real role, and develop in no way at all. Ryuki is always just kinda There, with nothing much to do but pine over Date, fail to solve mysteries, and act “crazy” until he gets magically cured at the end. All the new characters kinda feel like retreading old ground with tweaked personalities and designs. Kizuna is a less bombastic Iris -- she gets kidnapped a bunch and likes conspiracy theories and sings and dances. Her dad is the Morally Dubious Rich Dad Bad At Parenting With A Shifty Past...Gen is a diner owner hopelessly in love with a teenager...Bibi is literally Mizuki Again...etc. I'm not surprised the AI1 cast has pretty much nothing to do — considering this is meant to be a companion game that doesn't spoil AI1, they can't really do much with them. They can’t even be considered as murder suspects, obviously (minus Amame, who really isn’t a returning character at all.) But also it's really disappointing how shallow they all feel. Iris is like…at least 80% more manic pixie dream girl than usual. Iit's not even being offset by her tumor, or her faking, or Saito faking, so that's exhausting. Date is literally just standing around making porno mag jokes or having them made about him (and they ruined the funny part, which is Aiba repeatedly lying to him and him repeatedly falling for it. Instead he just yells PORNO MAG POWER and gets tougher which is just...so not remotely funny at all.) Mizuki feels like a passive side character in her own game. Ota and Moma still just perv on Iris and do nothing of substance, with even the better aspects of their character now cleanly wiped away to prevent having to do any actual writing. The cameos were shallow at best. Even for our alleged MCs - it felt like instead of actually having Mizuki, Date, etc, we just got pieces of cardboard with "Mizuki", "Date", etc written on them in crayon. Cheap imitations.

Meanwhile, the writers still hate women, so that's fantastic. Seriously, revealing last minute that actually Gen has a thing for Amame (an incredibly creepy and obsessive thing) while she sees him as a fucking FATHER FIGURE is absolutely disgusting, and ruined their entire route as well as Gen as a character for me. To these writers, every woman immediately becomes a sex object once they grow tits, so of course their male characters are the same way. This makes me really glad they tossed Date to the curb and he and Mizuki barely interacted, because I would be miserable if they ruined that relationship the way they ruined Falco and Iris and now Gen and Amame. Mizuki’s of age now, after all, so she’s officially a sex object! Similarly, starting off Kizuna and Lien's relationship with an age gap and stalking was a shitty call and ruins their whole storyline too, when it could have been really sweet. Lien can't mature as a person because it would spoil The Twist, and Kizuna just goes from "mostly not sad" to "sad all the time" as the entirety of her development, so that really only adds to how flat both their characters are. (Don’t get me started on her whole disability arc, which felt thrown in for brownie points at best and was terribly handled as usual.) Mizuki makes sex jokes now. which feels really creepy coming from a school-age teenager we’ve previously known as a twelve-year-old, comments on how cute and young she is a lot, and constantly whines about wanting a boyfriend. Aiba even complains about Mizuki being flat-chested?? There's maybe a little less of the perviness than there is in AITSF just bc Date isn't playable, but what there is feels very creepy. I’m not surprised they kept this aspect but damn, it still sucks.

The side ends - you know, the CHARACTER ends, where much of AITSF's best work shone - feel like they were just kinda thrown in because they're expected. They don't feel as finished as the endings in AITSF. Gen/Amame's was just all over the place (I'm not even clear on what HAPPENED in half of it, let alone why, and Uchikoshi has since said a bunch of weird lies about it being followed up on in a “third eye” on his twitter. I’m not even getting into that, but if you believe a word he says, I invite you to look into all the times he claimed Santa and Snake would make a comeback in ZTD, or how Alice’s legend from 999 would be relevant to VLR.) Kizuna/Lien just kinda randomly cuts off. Shoma/Komeji was something at least, but it was really short and premature. I don’t know if explosion really counts as an ending, but it sucked too — why would a new player care about a big rock falling on the guy who only exists to talk about porn and neglect and bicker with his daughter? Just because Ryuki's in love with him (maybe, sort of, it will never be made explicit canon)? Meanwhile, returning players know they wouldn’t kill Date off, plus he's been in his most basic boring form all game, so they have no reason to really care either. What is even the point of this ending? Kizuna is just there to become disabled so Lien can have someone to be obsessed with and sad about, and he's just there to pick locks. Mizuki losing her eye -- you know, the thing a serial killer did to her parents, including Date -- is an afterthought at best. Blah. If this is supposed to be the "annihilation" of AINI, it…really, really falls flat.

The game doesn't know if it's a sequel or not, and like I said, trying to both have and eat the cake means the cake just gets set on fire. Hitomi is here for two scenes with no significance and just bloats the cast (I am not even going to get started on how flat and lame her and Date’s relationship has become. Feeling super bad for anyone who shipped them.) Ota and Iris keep showing up just to kinda be stupid for a scene (seriously Iris is EXTREMELY dumb in this, something went really wrong with those nanomachines and they fried all her gray matter) and then they vanish again into the distance of No Purpose. Date is an insufferable ass who only cares about porn magazines, mentions them in every fucking scene, now yells "porno mag power" when he activates that power (OVER AND OVER IN ALMOST EVERY COMBAT SCENE HE'S IN) and treats Mizuki like shit. And poor, poor Mizuki gets it worst of all — she's still a snarky, kinda bratty, tough kid, but that's all she is now. All that love and devotion and determination and kindness and intelligence? Gone. If she cares too much about her loved ones or thinks about herself too much, she would be unique from Bibi and the twist would be spoiled, and heaven knows we can't have that. Aiba is the only character who feels like herself, and even she feels overly cruel to Mizuki sometimes (and Date often.) I don't know why a new player would feel any attachment to these characters, and as someone who did play and love aspects of AITSF, I just felt cheated. It would have been better to not include any of them at all than to have these crappy imitations. Meanwhile, "no AITSF spoiler mode" spoils a ton of shit. Just reveal a connection between Iris and So on "no spoiler" mode, why the fuck not? Reveal that Shoko was abusive, she and Renju both died, and Date adopted Mizuki? Mention Iris having a "condition" that is now "stable" in one throwaway line for no goddamn discernible reason??? The game does all this and more. On no spoiler mode!!!

This game unashamedly hates its characters. And thanks to that, so do I. It really is a shame. It’s the epitome of “flanderization” in one single game, but it’s for every character, over and over again.

This is easily the most-reposted screenshot I’ve seen from AINI, which...says a lot about the quality of its humor and the relevance of its returning cast IMO.

PART THREE: FUCK ADOPTION

This is the first piece of media since Once Upon A Time on ABC that presents the unique and controversial moral of "fuck adoption." All in order to make Mizuki have an older clone sister. For the Twist. The same reason we do everything around here. Mizuki’s parents can’t just be shitty parents. they must be shitty ADOPTIVE parents, because ADOPTIVE parents suck and don’t love their kids.

But don't worry guys. Because Mizuki and Bibi are clones. Therefore they are biologically related. Therefore they GENETICALLY love each other. By the end of the game, Mizuki and Bibi, despite having barely met, love each other desperately, are the most important people in one another's lives, are never seen apart from each other and treated as a singular character, and are literally Two Halves Of A Whole, Let's Go. Because, you know. They're sisters, but the GOOD kind, the BIOLOGICAL kind, the ONLY real kind.

Gag me.

I saw screenshots of Date and Mizuki doing "I'm home" / "Welcome back" after he returns and thought, well, at least I'll get thrown a few crumbs to lap off the floor. Nope. Aiba has to specifically prompt Date into saying "I'm home," saying that Mizuki wants to hear it. He begrudgingly does so, Mizuki responds...but then says she didn't want to do that anyway and they move back on to the all-important Plot. Ouch. I seriously don't know how Mizuki route came from the same team. Date and Mizuki are barely tolerating each other at best here. They actually showed a lot more affection on the AITSF B routes, which is insane since that’s the route where OTA calls Date out for being neglectful. Meanwhile, Boss uses Bibi as a special agent and keeps her very existence a secret. Kizuna's dad doesn't really seem to care about Bibi either despite having raised her for years, and prioritizes his bio daughter. And as the cherry on top...the Okiuras treated Mizuki like shit because she was adopted all along, of course! Adopted parents are evil and bad, right? And bio parents would never mistreat their bio children, right? Right. Who cares if this totally throws Mizuki's arc in AITSF out the window? Even Bibi and Kizuna's relationship is never really given focus once Bibi is revealed. Bibi only really cares about Mizuki. Her REAL sister. Because they are related and that is all that matters.

Even the villains love their biological son and will do lots of evil for him! Tokiko gives an entire speech about how much she loved her bio son even though she didn't raise him, to the point where she and her ex kidnapped a random child, groomed him into a cult, and gave his organs to her bio son. Kidnapped child meanwhile views her as his mom. On its own, I wouldn't think too much about it, but in conjunction with the Mizukis…this how adoption is treated in AINI. It is A Very Bad Thing. Adoptive parents do not love their children anymore. Both Mizukis go through two adoptive families and are treated badly or ignored by both, and this is just normal, I guess.

Also So suddenly seems to care about Iris, at least a little bit, despite his not giving a shit in AITSF. But, hey, they are biologically related....(I actually wouldn’t mind this if they like, did anything with it. But they don’t. Instead they totally destroy any depth So’s character ever had by making him a total horndog who runs around conceiving various serial killers. Wheee, the killer is the half-brother of the previous killer, and they are both the half-brothers of another character, because So can’t keep it in his pants. Seriously, what a stupid twist. Hilarious but stupid.)

The Komeji-Dois love each other and are very sweet. They are the only ones that seem to, though. Because blood. Genetics. DNA. As the only bio family with significant screentime, of course they actually love each other, right?

Also, side note, remember Ryuki's twin brother who died? He sure was significant huh :)

Part Four: Miscellany

The most baffling thing of all about how bad AINI is is its glowing reviews. Don’t get me wrong: people can like things I don’t. But the reviews I read were on so many occasions blatantly false. I saw claims that AINI has fewer or even NO dirty jokes, that it does not sexualize the 18 y/o characters, that Date and Mizuki’s relationship was explored more in-depth, that the game runs great on Switch, that the AI Vision lag was fixed, that spoilers are avoidable. All of these things are objective, and they were blatantly false. Every person I have talked to who played on Switch had lag and framerate issues even worse than the first game’s, and most of them reported at least one hard crash. AI Vision loading in high-res models is still a major issue that disrupts the game’s flow on lower-end consoles and PCs. Bibi’s mess of a Somnium just got its bugs patched a few days ago, in NOVEMBER, so you can actually play it without getting thirty game overs from touching unrelated objects. The dirty jokes are abundant and often about 18 y/o high schoolers (they even aged down Amame, which really wasn’t necessary at all - a 20 y/o and an 18 y/o can be friends, after all - just to keep her barely legal!) Date and Mizuki loathe each other. And “no spoiler mode” is, as discussed above, a fucking joke. I don’t know how this game of telephone got started or why so many big names lied in their reviews, but damn, it sure made the game even more disappointing when I realized that most of what I had read wasn’t even true. I have no idea why so many people who received review copies felt the need to lie. I have to assume they weren’t deliberate lies. But...how on earth could they have convinced themselves that this game no longer has dirty jokes? Or that there’s no lag, or bugs, or weird crashes? I get that Uchikoshi is funny and nice on Twitter, but we’re allowed to say negative things about his games!

And, on the note of Uchikoshi games, can we just say that the second time you come up with “disease that makes you kill yourself” it is less effective? Seriously, isn’t this just the same basic apocalypse plot as VLR/ZTD?? Why are we doing this again, it doesn’t work a second time!!!! aaaaaaargh

The quicktime events in this game suck so much. Just press a button to parkour. There’s no creativity, no unique use of Aiba/Tama’s abilities, no silly elaborate traps for the baddies or jokes or teamwork, just. Flip punch kick jump. Woo-hoo. The one time we do something vaguely creative it’s just exploding the damn porno vending machine and we already did that in the first game. AINI has no identity of its own.

Half To Whole is catchy but its lyrics suck. Gen/Amame BS AND Mame doesn’t get to sing. Most of the lyrics are random asides that don’t work with the characters or themes (but hey, Date, Ota, Mama, and Iris HAVE to sing about kappa catching, because it’s not like any of them got fuckall to do in the main game after all!) Mizukis whining about wanting boyfriends and singing in perfect harmony because they are not separate characters (and allegedly crying on the inside whenever they fight?? what??) Changing lyrics to make Ryuki sound straight (gay rights! Seriously why are we pretending Ryuki is gay representation??) It’s just an absolute trashfire. The only vaguely meaningful lyric is “Without you I am only half, I need to be whole” but even that one pisses me off, because it ties into the game’s ongoing weird idea that characters can only exist with one another, that they aren’t whole people alone. Especially the idea that Mizuki and Bibi are “two halves of a whole” - fuck you, they’re different people and they only just met! But no, they will never be independent people again. They don’t even get separate lines in the song outside of the first verse and otherwise harmonize everything (bless Mizuki’s VA for at least trying to give them different singing voices...). The one saving grace of an AI3 is that Bibi probably won’t get to be in it for spoiler purposes, so maybe Mizuki will get to do something without her (but probably not.)

In Conclusion (Fuck This Game)

AITSF felt like it constructed its character arcs, mystery, twists, lore, and gameplay all side by side to make one full story. AINI…only even bothered to have mystery, twists, and gameplay, and only the last one ends up working even remotely because so much was sacrificed for the mediocre twists. The big reveals of AITSF matter to the story and the characters, whereas the biggest twist in AINI has nothing to do with the game's universe and is just for the Frayer…then they do nothing with that concept anyway beyond a bonus ending. In the end, it's as flat and frankly soulless as everything else. So who cares?

My MOST hated thing about AINI is its "only biological family matters" thesis. My second most hated thing is how it takes a massive dump on every single character. And the third is how it just generally is an utter failure of a mystery with no depth whatsoever. I have always hated Bravely Second and held it up as an example of how to utterly fail a video game sequel, destroying the predecessor in the process. This game, however, is at least twice as terrible as Bravely Second. At least the aptly abbreviated BS did in fact manage to have some fun twists despite hating and flanderizing its entire cast; AINI couldn’t even pull that off. Calling it a cheap, forced cash grab the devs clearly never wanted to make still feels too generous. This game sucks.

TL;DR: AINI isn’t even half and will definitely never be whole.

#txt #aini spoilers #ainispoilers #aini // #aini critical #aini hate #aitsf // #that is the best i can do as far as tags i think #this will probably show up when people search aini but lbr #nothing i can do about that #and i need to have the spoiler tags on so #that's that #not expecting anyone to read this just. desperatelt want to get it off my chest

[melancholy-thots]

Long Overdue Talk of Coffee

I have no idea how I haven't talked about this on here yet. Probably because I talk at so much length in my real life about how much I love this game. Genuinely it has helped reignite my love for VNs, it is incredible. I'm talking, of course, about the incredible coffee shop sim Coffee Talk (including the much more recent sequel)!

Everything about these games is so cute and vibey. I'm just mixing these tasty beverages (irl tasty beverages are about the only way to keep my ass hydrated, idk why I'm so bad at drinking water), talking to these great fantasy characters about their lives, even helping them out occasionally.

I will say, I didn't get a screenshot of it apparently, but the new item mechanic is sooooo good, if a little infuriating at times. I love having this additional way to interact with characters and influence the story in a way that doesn't feel weirdly disconnected from how people work. Like yeah, getting a nice tea latte can set me on track for a good day, but you know what does that wayy better? Someone handing me my house keys that I thought I'd lost.

This one is just because I love Jorji, only cop I respect. Loves his daughter, afraid of ghosts, perfect man right here.

Having a log really is a necessity for me when playing games where it's possible to skip past dialogue. Sometimes my fingers get twitchy, game devs! Let me see the thing I accidentally clicked passed, especially if it's a really nice moment talking about overcoming tendencies towards prejudice!

This is just an advertisement for genmaicha. My favorite type of tea. Drink this shit every time I need a tasty beverage and also am okay to drink caffeine. Irl caffeine real dangerous for me, so getting to look at these cute drinks and do my cute latte art helps keep me safe. Truly the best game I have played in a long time.

#coffee talk #games

[fyodorkitkat]

Who do you think is the deepest character in diabolik lovers and whyyyyyy :3 (sorry if this is weird btw :,))

Tomà out here activating my dialovers derangement syndrome 🥲 ty ty ty also sry sry sry in advance 🙏💜

Minors dni with this post

This is not weird omg no one ever asks me about dialovers you need to understand I was into VNs including otome before I was into any anime (including bsd) and diabolik lovers is my longest term obsession that isn't music 💜🙏 This is mostly going to involve things from the games (because the anime was basically silly fanservice that barely scratches the surface for anyone) but I'll leave out drama cd stuff because I would actually need to go refresh myself on those.

Absolute novel under the cut sorry. also cw noncon, cw dubcon, cw abuse, cw csa, cw suicide, cw matricide

Anyone not familiar with the series who decides to continue pls be aware of these warnings and take care of yourself. Also pls understand everything I say is in terms of the series and setting. Absolutely nothing that happens in these games would make any of these characters redeemable irl. This is fiction and a trashfire Do-S fetish franchise. Trauma doesn't excuse abuse. I don't condone any of the bad behavior from this series irl. (Sorry since this isn't my sideblog I feel I need to explain this so ppl don't come at me thinking I'm excusing stuff for reals with this little analysis)

Also this is probably going to have spelling mistakes and horrific formatting because I wrote it on mobile so my bad on that too.

This was so hard to answer because so many of them have serious trauma, maladaptive coping mechanisms, and large amounts of growth throughout the various sequels. I think you could make the logical argument of depth for every single character. The Sakamaki triplets are def the most tragic of the first two games in this regard though (maybe only rivaled by the Tsukinami brothers once we get to Dark Fate because of the whole being the sole survivors of genocide thing)

But as a whole I think Carla and Shin deal with their predicaments in a more outwardly focused manner (which makes sense given their stories and roles as antagonists in their debut game) so I don't think I could objectively call them the deepest esp Carla even though he is my fave.

So out of the Sakamaki triplets I am going to go with Laito. Shocking I know because I have said before he is the one I am the most terrified of. But hear me out.

(I'm using HBD (haunted dark bridal) to refer to the first game, and MB (more blood) to refer to the second game going forward)

His first route in hdb is a stomach twisting mess of isolation, noncon, gaslighting and victim blaming. It is also the only route in that game where Yui tries to kill herself, which imo is really notable. Tbh the first time I played it I was so deeply uncomfortable I didn't really give his character a lot of thought. During replays and some of his drama cds though it def changed my perspective of him (in terms of the deepness of his character, not my dislike of him)

Here are my arguments in topical format because I don't really want to go through and do the research needed to refresh myself and make this chronological. Also if I am mistaken with anything I've paraphrased my bad it's because this isn't a real essay more of a rant that you might regret reading lol.

- Cordelia

We can't go into the rest of my arguments without the facts. He was groomed by his mother and experienced a childhood of CSA at her hands. And he is absolutely confused and suffering when he has his flashbacks. Yes he kills her with the other two triplets, but that didn't actually solve anything for him internally, and I think it is a pretty clear-cut argument that his negative traits and behaviors can be linked back to his unresolved trauma from this. He even says it himself too when he tries to project onto Yui and claim her hatred for him must be the same as his for Cordelia (though unnamed in his quote im pretty sure) that a hatred can run so deep that even killing the person won't relieve the burning. The other ironic part of this is that in the dialovers universe it is explained multiple times that the highest act of love for a vampire is murder. So. Every LI (Reiji, Laito, Ayato, Kanato) that committed matricide out of their hatred probably has some deeper more complex feelings going on than that. (You could also argue maybe a similar thing about Carla and patricide as well though he is Founder/First Blood not vampire. But he is more open about his reasoning and feelings around his parents and why he did what he did imo)

- His disdain of purity (plot twist. It's jealousy).

We repeatedly see him mock both Yui's purity and religiosity. He is arguably the worst out of all of the LIs when it comes to this topic, and hits this point right out the gate when he assaults her in the abandoned church. It is simultaneously a logical and also weird choice on his part to continue on with when you realize how unwavering her faith actually is, and if you do other routes before this one you are already coming in realizing no matter how much she "breaks", "changes", or "gives in" in other ways, she never actually abandons her faith completely even in future games when she is living quite literally in the demon world. Even in routes where she becomes a vampire she doesn't eschew God. However it is canon that she is a devout Catholic and that she originally wanted to be a nun (before the events of the game screw that up for her), so it is still relevant.

While it may have started as a way to try and break her down, it really becomes more and more clear through his routes that like a bunch of his other behaviors, he is projecting his own struggles onto Yui.

He is jealous of her purity, so he attacks it. He is jealous of her faith, so he attacks it. He is jealous of her unwavering belief in goodness and in humanity, so he just. keeps. attacking. it. Because seeing it exist in front of him hurts, but especially early on he isn't aware of his own emotions or why he acts the way he does. So many things in his routes and his monologues highlight the fact that Laito views himself as permanently dirtied by his past, and this behavior is tied to that.

- His inability to identify his feelings from his fake front and his use of sex to maladaptively deal with his trauma.

** I wrote way too much on this and decide nvm I think even if someone has only seen the anime his hypersexuality probably speaks for itself. Plus this is getting so long 😔**

-His lack of control in MB and "forced" behavior. His confusion over his own tears near the end of HDB.

There are various instances (esp in MB where his characterization is wildly different and desperate compared to HDB) where we see his mask start to crack, or realize that his mask wasn't actually very good to begin with and the exhaustion from the continous abuse in his routes has caused both Yui (and us as the reader) to fall for his bullshit more easily. He plays the part of a pervert, but Shu (who arguably is a massive pervert) calls him out in MB for being a phony. His behavior in MB makes him come across as desperate and out of control, as opposed to his calculated sadism in HDB. This all comes back to his inner turmoil, unresolved feelings, and trauma and we slowly unpeal those layers through the rest of the series.

I think at baseline it is really easy to dismiss Laito. I did from the beginning too. Plus he never stops calling Yui Bitch-chan no matter how many sequels he gets 🤦‍♂️ But that is just falling for his fake front, exactly what he wants you to do because then he can just keep carrying on without dealing with his bs and let off steam temporarily in the process. But under the surface there is a lot more going on. And he definitely is a character that has an insane amount of depth.

Sorry for the multi part novel. I don't even like him as an LI even in this series. But for a series with so many inconsistencies, retcons across games, and questionable writing choices, they did a good job with his character. I just need him to stay far away from both me and Yui 🥲 Imagine if you had asked me something that prompted me to talk about my faves 💀💀💀

#-Lue asks #sorry for not tagging the series to anyone who filters it i dont want my rambling mess in the main tag 🙏💜 #cw abuse #cw suicide mention #cw csa mention #cw noncon #cw dubcon #minors dni with this post

[good-boy-ren]

carrd ✦ sfw selfship✦ main blog ✦ art blog

[ ✦ ] ─ ro ‣ 30↑ ‣ they / them ‣ biro ace [ ✦ ] ─ chronically-ill artist, 07th expansion enthusiast, alice hnkna kinnie, Weird Little Guy enjoyer, and oushirou’s spouse! [ ✦ ] ─ this is my nsft selfship blog. i'll focus mainly on my beloved personal chewtoy and golden retriever boyfriend oc 💕ren 💕 and his AU counterparts!! 🦦💖🐐 full f/o list below. [ ✦ ] ─ i also have many VN and otome game f/os -- vns are my special interest! feel free to chat with me about them ^^ [ ✦ ] ─ kinks / preference list, tags, f/o list, and DNI/BYF are all under the readmore. (i interact from @nocturne-of-illusions -- updated 19 april 2024)

credits: 1 / 2 / 3

──⌈ kinks & preferences ⌋──

💚 LOVE 💚 soft dom, hands, gloves, light bondage, orgasm control, edging, collars, toys, praise, body worship, breeding (NO pregnancy), voice, scent, panty sniffing, oral, light possessiveness, monsters, excessive cum, (purposeful) aphrodisiac, outercourse, cumming in pants, premature ejaculation 🔶 SQUICK 🔶 heavy bondage, degradation, injuries (causing OR receiving), blood (except for nosebleeds), breath play, flagellation, watersports, scat, anal, rimming, emeto 🛑 ABSOLUTE NO-GOES, DNI 🛑 raceplay, ageplay / ddlg / cgl / sexual agere, noncon/dubcon/etc, incest, misgendering / detrans ⚠️ CURRENT BLACKLIST SQUICK TAGS ⚠️ "#bondage -"

[ ✦ ] ─ please let me know if you need anything else tagged!! i'd be happy to add to the blacklist squick tags if needed. [ ✦ ] ─ if you see stuff on my squick list that you like, still feel free to follow -- these aren't moral stances, they're simply not my thing, and i won't yuck your yum!! if you like things in the no-go list though... don't even bother... just leave.

────⌈ tags ⌋────

📌 [ my posts. ] ; 🎨 [ 046 art. ] ⚙️️ [ 046 wips. ] ; 💭 [ my thoughts. ] ✏️️ [ my scenarios. ] ; ✨ [ oc lore. ] ⭐ [ canon lore. ] ; 💤 [ 046 dreams. ]

⎯⎯⎯⎯ [ ♡ ]⎯⎯⎯⎯

[ official. ] ; [ imagines. ] ; [ affirmations. ] ; [ aesthetic. ] [ fashion. ] ; [ memes. ] ; [ misc. ] [ music. ] ; [ videos. ] ; [ voice. ] ; [ img. ]

⎯⎯⎯⎯ [ ♡ ]⎯⎯⎯⎯

[ asks. ] ; [ ask games. ] ; [ tags games. ] [ prompts. ] ; [ need to draw. ] [ other ppls ships. ] ; [ irl. ] [ resources. ] ; [ favs. ]

⎯⎯⎯⎯ [ ♡ ]⎯⎯⎯⎯

[ nsft. ] ; [ nsft ds. ] ; [ suggestive. ]

───⌈ top romantic ⌋───

🍄 [ lying on the blade of an emotion. ] - ♫      ¬ ren brunet (oc)      ¬ referred to as doc!ren 🧃 [ who is in control. ] - ♫      ¬ ren brunet (oc, villain au)      ¬ referred to as v!ren 🦦 [ can’t escape it. ] - ♫      ¬ ren brunet (oc, Just Some Guy™ au)      ¬ referred to as r!ren 🐸 [ look ahead. ] - ♫      ¬ ren brunet (oc, poke.mon au)      ¬ referred to as poke!ren

──⌈ primary romantic ⌋──

📷 [ phantom hearts. ] - ♫     ¬ shirogane oushirou (starry☆sky) 🦎 [ chasing starlight. ] - ♫      ¬ gray ringmarc (hnkna) ☣️ [ good in red. ] - ♫      ¬ mars (oc)

──⌈ secondary romantic ⌋──

🏹 [ purple eyes. ] - ♫      ¬ raven (tales of vesperia) 💣 [ lost in your charm. ] - ♫      ¬ sirius (starry☆sky, polestar au)

──⌈ self insert & misc ⌋──

🐐 [ been up all night. ] - ♫      ¬ ro (self-insert) 🦔 [ used to be easy. ] - ♫      ¬ ro (self-insert, pokemon au) ❤️ [ all rom. ]      ¬ all romantic f/os

──⌈ dormant romantic ⌋──

🐝 [ step on bug. ] - ♫      ¬ utsuro (jooubachi)      ¬ no longer actively tagging 🤖 [ city of ghosts. ] - ♫      ¬ nika (oc)      ¬ no longer actively tagging

───⌈ do not interact ⌋───

[ ✦ ] ─ NO minors, period. [ ✦ ] ─ this is not a roleplay blog -- do not solicit me for nsft DMs. this is simply a space for me to be horny over fictional characters. [ ✦ ] ─ i'm a staunch lgbtqia+ inclusionist. yes, including mspec lesbians. yes, including xenogenders. zionism and antisemitism both not welcome here. [ ✦ ] ─ i dislike the fetishization of CSA, incest, abuse, assault, etc. difficult subjects should exist in fiction, but i'm uncomfortable with them being sensationalized and sexualized. i'm also against real person fiction. [ ✦ ] ─ villain f/os are loved and appreciated here, but violently bigoted or fascist f/os will get you blocked. if you have to write an essay to find a loophole out of this... just assume i'll block you anyway. [ ✦ ] ─ i block liberally, and if you need to block me -- even if we're mutuals -- no hard feelings. curate your online experience. peace and love on planet earth.

──⌈ before you follow ⌋──

[ ✦ ] ─ DO NOT selfship with my ocs; they're very personal to me. if we aren't mutuals, please keep comments platonic. [ ✦ ] ─ i'm cool with sharing canon characters, but i'll respect if you don't want to share. if i gain a shared f/o and you're non-sharing, we can block each others' f/o tags, or you can unfollow (i won't be offended -- i'll understand why you did). [ ✦ ] ─ if i have non-sharing friends who share the same f/o, it's their responsibility to block each other and any tags, not mine. it's unfair to demand friends drop / not make new friends because of potential f/o overlap. [ ✦ ] ─ i tag general triggers as "#trigger -", and i tag the series "#pokemon -" and "#umineko -" / "#umineko spoilers -". if you need me to tag anything else, let me know!

───⌈ for your info ⌋───

[ ✦ ] ─ i observe reblog / ask game courtesy and appreciate it in return! i don't do chain reblogs or chain mail, but if you tag / send one to me, i appreciate the thought all the same!! 💗 [ ✦ ] ─ chronic illness makes me slow to reply. i'm not ignoring you; i just need time to put my thoughts together. and when i have flare-ups, i'll draft things and read / reblog them once i've recovered. [ ✦ ] ─ i also don't follow-back often due to low social battery. i appreciate seeing you in my notifs, though, and i love reading any tags on your reblogs!! 💖

#📌 [ my posts. ] #🎨 [ 046 art. ] #⚙️ [ 046 wips. ] #🍄 [ lying on the blade of an emotion. ] #🦦 [ can't escape it. ] #🧃 [ who is in control. ] #🐸 [ look ahead. ] #📷 [ phantom hearts. ] #🦎 [ chasing starlight. ] #☣️ [ good in red. ] #🏹 [ purple eyes. ] #💣 [ lost in your charm. ] #🤖 [ city of ghosts. ] #🐝 [ step on bug. ] #🐐 [ been up all night. ] #🦔 [ used to be easy. ] #❤️ [ all rom. ] #💜 [ all pl. ] #✨ [ oc lore. ] #⭐ [ canon lore. ] #[ nsft. ] #[ nsft ds. ] #[ suggestive. ] #[ imagines. ] #[ affirmations. ] #[ aesthetic. ] #[ memes. ] #[ misc. ]