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idecidedtopassout · 4 months ago

Text

literally just posted it and reread it and i already found some mistakes?? the opening paragraph says "signalis doesn't have a sad love story what's going on" but i meant isat. the way i speak sometimes is so confusing. Akane's dress and ring I mentioned are the one junpei gave to her sooo many years ago as an engagement ring. This really is incomprehensible.

Random analysis of the parallels between Zero Escape and The Locked Tomb (feat. In Stars And Time and Signalis)

Foreword before the foreword, spoilers for all of these in their entirety. Except for ISAT which is only being spoiled, like, the first quarter maybe. I noticed tlt and ze were randomly glued together in my mind and couldn't parse why. tlt has so much more in common with signalis but they couldn't be more standalone, even though I love both for much the same reasons. Instead, signalis and isat are not glued, but, like, siblings in my head. And that's weird. Signalis doesn't have a sad love story. What's going on??

So I wrote an essay. A messy essay. I don't think i'm ever gonna post much here, but if this is an interesting read for even a single person then that's really nice to know. And if it's not then I have it saved here, at least.

Anyway, here it is:

So my main issue here is figuring out WHY tlt and 999 are grouped up together in my head, by association, even though they shouldn't. Even though every single thing i can think of as of writing can be applied to signalis and ISAT (which I also love), or one of the first two, but it doesn't. I'm kind of figuring it out as I write this, so sorry for the messed up format and structure. I edited like 4 sentences after writing

so much of tlt is also about identity and love and what those mean both in isolation and together. like it's very much exploring eternity too in a very similar way,, a lot of it is intersecting! the only thing it doesn't do the same is iteration, and i feel like that's The Big Divider. because iteration is such an important binding force in signalis and it's themes that it's more like, the medium of its ideas in a way? which makes it really hard to meld together with anything else like that. it does Not meld together with isat (for example) in my head but it feels closer to it just because of said iteration being how you experience and unravel the whole story, the emotional core. and i feel like i struck that point right. it fits, it makes sense in my head. but 999 and tlt are not doing anything the same either, so why doesn't it apply there? tlt is so much unreality, and ze doesn't have that in common at all. gtn maybe works? because it's "set amount of people are brought -- mostly independent of their wishes -- to an unknown, mostly abandoned place, and made to solve problems", but it is so not the end of it.

My thoughts as to why they resonated with me so, so much, are that They're different kinds of loneliness, which was a topic I've cared a lot about in media since i was a kid. So that's kind of the thing i'm focusing on when i'm thinking about them, whether I like them or not. They have unique lenses on it that feed into their themes: For signalis, it's iteration, self, and perception. A sort of Ship of theseus situation, where everything is doomed to corrupt into itself into something unrecognizable. Even so, Elster will always try to remember her promise. She will still always try so hard. And she will always fail. And it will never end. I've talked a lot about signalis and i did a lot in the messages too so i'll cut this here. Tlt has the self, with all of the Ianthe and Palamedes talk, with souls, with the resurrected lyctors. With names. And it does also consider eternity, but not as a tragedy. It considers eternity as nature, and it considers change. It considers love as sacrifice. So many examples throughout the books of relationships end up sacrificial, with either the epitome or the exception (depending on how you see it) being Paul. Lyctorhood's parallels with romance should not be understated. And this is what it leads to in my mind. Pair this up with eternity and boom, that's the focus of the narrative, i feel. Nona doesn't fit unless it shows Paul and Alecto as final results, but i think the reason Tamsyn decided to make it a full book, as fun as the worldbuilding is, is specifically to show us Cam and Palamedes in detail. What they do for each other. How they feel. How they think. What qualifies them to become the exception/epitome. And then the books tie together in this. ISAT is. uh. I won't give too much away from fear of spoilers. I'm considering here Siffrin, The King, and Loop. These 3 have a VERY seriously spoilery thing going on but it also heavily links to how eternity and iteration gently changes and numbs the self. You feel this SO hard especially when skipping dialogue. You never want to skip. You always wonder if you miss something. You often times do and don't realize it. Love plays a role in the premise, in the characters, and throughout the game, but mostly as a carrier for its loss. How you don't want to lose it. How you will, regardless. How it's your fault, and your fault alone, but also not really. About communication, and about how to anchor yourself THROUGH time, to other people. And how that anchor can keep you from being alone, and how that can help you go through eternity. If i were to link this (rather forcefully) to tlt and signalis, it would be how lyctorship leaves you alone for eternity, and how that's absolutely to your detriment, but how simply being with someone you love makes that eternity worth it. For signalis, it's how even if you get lost through abstraction, through layers of yourself, through repetition, even if all else loses meaning, love will still be there as long as you are willing. Be it romantic, platonic, or simply the joy of staring at the sky. It's about forgetting, and about remembering to not forget yourself. For 999 I'll do a short summary of the plot of it all right now though because you might need it for this one. Though this is kind of a shout into the void, to keep this thought alive somewhere, I feel like 999 might be the lesser known of the 3? And if you know it, this is like, still what I ended up processing to get to my point so oops sorry you still need to read it.

block limit reached so hold on i need to separate this in 2 parts

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idecidedtopassout · 4 months ago

Text

The third game is mostly dealing with destiny and control, and how by pure chance a perfect domino has been layed out such that a single snail crossing a runner's path becomes the slow catalyst for humanity's end. The mind jumps go kinda crazy in this one and it was REALLY low budget so not all of it is relevant, but we find out that Junpei joined a detective firm to try to look for Akane, even going undercover in the black market for years, to have a slightly better chance of finding any clue. He finds out she'll be at some social experiment meant to mimic life on mars and what challenges astronauts will face, so he buys an engagement ring, goes there, and plans to propose. but then some other guy traps them in a killing game that, this time, guarantees people's death. He's so jaded and pissed off that they bicker way too much, but the important part is that Akane keeps distancing herself from him, knowing that this is what her absence did. But if she stopped now it'd all be for nothing. and this is why 999 maps so well onto tlt!!!! for me!!!!! it's not just gtn! because i don't care about jod (as much as akane is similar to him). I don't care about the ressurection (as much as that's similar to her plan). I don't care about other selves and identity. What I care about here is the emotional core -- Junpei and Akane, and Gideon and Harrow. They drive everything. They are the reason for this parallel. More specifically Junpei as Gideon. They're both idiots who love the other very much. They both have a martyr complex. They both die, and Harrow and Akane reluctantly use their sacrifice, and will live to regret it for the rest of their lives. The sacrifice lives on. The sacrifice becomes bitter, sad, a lonely shell of their former selves. And yet the love, warped and strained and tainted, still binds them. THAT'S why i love both of them so much. That's why they're so interconnected in my head.

Random analysis of the parallels between Zero Escape and The Locked Tomb (feat. In Stars And Time and Signalis)

Foreword before the foreword, spoilers for all of these in their entirety. Except for ISAT which is only being spoiled, like, the first quarter maybe. I noticed tlt and ze were randomly glued together in my mind and couldn't parse why. tlt has so much more in common with signalis but they couldn't be more standalone, even though I love both for much the same reasons. Instead, signalis and isat are not glued, but, like, siblings in my head. And that's weird. Signalis doesn't have a sad love story. What's going on??

So I wrote an essay. A messy essay. I don't think i'm ever gonna post much here, but if this is an interesting read for even a single person then that's really nice to know. And if it's not then I have it saved here, at least.

Anyway, here it is:

So my main issue here is figuring out WHY tlt and 999 are grouped up together in my head, by association, even though they shouldn't. Even though every single thing i can think of as of writing can be applied to signalis and ISAT (which I also love), or one of the first two, but it doesn't. I'm kind of figuring it out as I write this, so sorry for the messed up format and structure. I edited like 4 sentences after writing

so much of tlt is also about identity and love and what those mean both in isolation and together. like it's very much exploring eternity too in a very similar way,, a lot of it is intersecting! the only thing it doesn't do the same is iteration, and i feel like that's The Big Divider. because iteration is such an important binding force in signalis and it's themes that it's more like, the medium of its ideas in a way? which makes it really hard to meld together with anything else like that. it does Not meld together with isat (for example) in my head but it feels closer to it just because of said iteration being how you experience and unravel the whole story, the emotional core. and i feel like i struck that point right. it fits, it makes sense in my head. but 999 and tlt are not doing anything the same either, so why doesn't it apply there? tlt is so much unreality, and ze doesn't have that in common at all. gtn maybe works? because it's "set amount of people are brought -- mostly independent of their wishes -- to an unknown, mostly abandoned place, and made to solve problems", but it is so not the end of it.

My thoughts as to why they resonated with me so, so much, are that They're different kinds of loneliness, which was a topic I've cared a lot about in media since i was a kid. So that's kind of the thing i'm focusing on when i'm thinking about them, whether I like them or not. They have unique lenses on it that feed into their themes: For signalis, it's iteration, self, and perception. A sort of Ship of theseus situation, where everything is doomed to corrupt into itself into something unrecognizable. Even so, Elster will always try to remember her promise. She will still always try so hard. And she will always fail. And it will never end. I've talked a lot about signalis and i did a lot in the messages too so i'll cut this here. Tlt has the self, with all of the Ianthe and Palamedes talk, with souls, with the resurrected lyctors. With names. And it does also consider eternity, but not as a tragedy. It considers eternity as nature, and it considers change. It considers love as sacrifice. So many examples throughout the books of relationships end up sacrificial, with either the epitome or the exception (depending on how you see it) being Paul. Lyctorhood's parallels with romance should not be understated. And this is what it leads to in my mind. Pair this up with eternity and boom, that's the focus of the narrative, i feel. Nona doesn't fit unless it shows Paul and Alecto as final results, but i think the reason Tamsyn decided to make it a full book, as fun as the worldbuilding is, is specifically to show us Cam and Palamedes in detail. What they do for each other. How they feel. How they think. What qualifies them to become the exception/epitome. And then the books tie together in this. ISAT is. uh. I won't give too much away from fear of spoilers. I'm considering here Siffrin, The King, and Loop. These 3 have a VERY seriously spoilery thing going on but it also heavily links to how eternity and iteration gently changes and numbs the self. You feel this SO hard especially when skipping dialogue. You never want to skip. You always wonder if you miss something. You often times do and don't realize it. Love plays a role in the premise, in the characters, and throughout the game, but mostly as a carrier for its loss. How you don't want to lose it. How you will, regardless. How it's your fault, and your fault alone, but also not really. About communication, and about how to anchor yourself THROUGH time, to other people. And how that anchor can keep you from being alone, and how that can help you go through eternity. If i were to link this (rather forcefully) to tlt and signalis, it would be how lyctorship leaves you alone for eternity, and how that's absolutely to your detriment, but how simply being with someone you love makes that eternity worth it. For signalis, it's how even if you get lost through abstraction, through layers of yourself, through repetition, even if all else loses meaning, love will still be there as long as you are willing. Be it romantic, platonic, or simply the joy of staring at the sky. It's about forgetting, and about remembering to not forget yourself. For 999 I'll do a short summary of the plot of it all right now though because you might need it for this one. Though this is kind of a shout into the void, to keep this thought alive somewhere, I feel like 999 might be the lesser known of the 3? And if you know it, this is like, still what I ended up processing to get to my point so oops sorry you still need to read it.

block limit reached so hold on i need to separate this in 2 parts

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idecidedtopassout · 4 months ago

Text

In the first game, Junpei, the main character, is abducted and put on a replica of the titanic that will sink within 9 hours. If he finds the exit, however, there is a guaranteed escape. Right after the first room he wakes up in, though, are 8 other people, one of which is Akane, nicknamed June, a childhood friend. They haven't seen each other since elementary (or middle?) school, were always together back then, and as they see each other those feelings gradually resurface and bloom as love. They're the emotional core of the entire SERIES. It turns out the reason they haven't seen each other was because akane, 9 years prior, was abducted by some guy and made to play the same exact game. She died, and only her brother could remember this. However, through some very very cool time travel thing i will not explain, she's been half-existing this whole time, remembering that junpei saved her from the future, and is forced to arrange the whole premise of the game, abducting junpei and the others, to save herself from the past. She has to convincingly play the actress the whole game, but she really does feel immense guilt throughout this. The game itself also uses its save system to elevate the story: you retain information from other routes, other futures, other possibilities. But only sparingly. Only when you have an epiphany. It is impossible to win the game on your first go-through, and you are destined for death, one way or the other. It's not really your sense of love that shines through time, space, and reality, but of care. Junpei does not want to lose her again. That's his only wish.

The second game is in the distant future. After the first, Akane disappears. She can't bear to show up to junpei all willy nilly. She feels immense gratitude, but knows this entire thing is inherently selfish, and thinks of it as an unpayable debt. Junpei is much better off cutting ties with her, but she knows he won't. He's much to sweet. Eventually, plot unrelated to them happens, and they end up meeting again in the 3rd game (this is still about the 2nd). Akane ends up ditching him again, knowing she has to yet again put others to great suffering in order to do what she deems the greater good. She knows she has no right to decide what the greater good even is, and is willing to die for it, but she can't stop herself. A virus [[bad virus, apocalypse happens, bla bla bla, this isn't really relevant, you can skip until a "come back here" i put in brackets]] that slows your brain processing down and eventually gets you to kill yourself called radical 6 shows up in 2028 and causes a massive apocalypse. Like tuberculosis, it has a long incubation period, and by the time they developed countermeasures so much of humanity died that the nations collectively decided to scorch a big portion of the earth's surface just to get rid of it for good. There couldn't even be war. [[come back here]] This is what Akane is trying to prevent by going all the way back in time, hopefully pulling off another paradox to prevent all this; even as her own present must still exist. This is why the 2nd game happens: two new people, called sigma (yes, like the meme) and phi (yes, they're both Greek letters) are put through hell to develop the whole mind jumping thing akane had going on and researched these past, like, 60 years. One of the people subjected to this is an old junpei and his adopted grandkid. Akane is dressed in a whole robe with gemstones identical to the ones she has on the ring. Junpei had one too, though he sold it long ago. They cooperated on this, both content to die for it. They lost each other long ago, but maybe their selves in this new future will do things differently. They can only hope. (by the way they may be straight but this is like. peak yearning. they love each other so much they can't stand it, but that same love crushes them under its weight. it's doomed yuri in my eyes.) This works, by the way. The minds of sigma and phi are sent into the past when Plot Happens, and then it's all in their hands.

Error posting this again so i'll cut again and do a 3rd

Random analysis of the parallels between Zero Escape and The Locked Tomb (feat. In Stars And Time and Signalis)

Foreword before the foreword, spoilers for all of these in their entirety. Except for ISAT which is only being spoiled, like, the first quarter maybe. I noticed tlt and ze were randomly glued together in my mind and couldn't parse why. tlt has so much more in common with signalis but they couldn't be more standalone, even though I love both for much the same reasons. Instead, signalis and isat are not glued, but, like, siblings in my head. And that's weird. Signalis doesn't have a sad love story. What's going on??

So I wrote an essay. A messy essay. I don't think i'm ever gonna post much here, but if this is an interesting read for even a single person then that's really nice to know. And if it's not then I have it saved here, at least.

Anyway, here it is:

So my main issue here is figuring out WHY tlt and 999 are grouped up together in my head, by association, even though they shouldn't. Even though every single thing i can think of as of writing can be applied to signalis and ISAT (which I also love), or one of the first two, but it doesn't. I'm kind of figuring it out as I write this, so sorry for the messed up format and structure. I edited like 4 sentences after writing

so much of tlt is also about identity and love and what those mean both in isolation and together. like it's very much exploring eternity too in a very similar way,, a lot of it is intersecting! the only thing it doesn't do the same is iteration, and i feel like that's The Big Divider. because iteration is such an important binding force in signalis and it's themes that it's more like, the medium of its ideas in a way? which makes it really hard to meld together with anything else like that. it does Not meld together with isat (for example) in my head but it feels closer to it just because of said iteration being how you experience and unravel the whole story, the emotional core. and i feel like i struck that point right. it fits, it makes sense in my head. but 999 and tlt are not doing anything the same either, so why doesn't it apply there? tlt is so much unreality, and ze doesn't have that in common at all. gtn maybe works? because it's "set amount of people are brought -- mostly independent of their wishes -- to an unknown, mostly abandoned place, and made to solve problems", but it is so not the end of it.

My thoughts as to why they resonated with me so, so much, are that They're different kinds of loneliness, which was a topic I've cared a lot about in media since i was a kid. So that's kind of the thing i'm focusing on when i'm thinking about them, whether I like them or not. They have unique lenses on it that feed into their themes: For signalis, it's iteration, self, and perception. A sort of Ship of theseus situation, where everything is doomed to corrupt into itself into something unrecognizable. Even so, Elster will always try to remember her promise. She will still always try so hard. And she will always fail. And it will never end. I've talked a lot about signalis and i did a lot in the messages too so i'll cut this here. Tlt has the self, with all of the Ianthe and Palamedes talk, with souls, with the resurrected lyctors. With names. And it does also consider eternity, but not as a tragedy. It considers eternity as nature, and it considers change. It considers love as sacrifice. So many examples throughout the books of relationships end up sacrificial, with either the epitome or the exception (depending on how you see it) being Paul. Lyctorhood's parallels with romance should not be understated. And this is what it leads to in my mind. Pair this up with eternity and boom, that's the focus of the narrative, i feel. Nona doesn't fit unless it shows Paul and Alecto as final results, but i think the reason Tamsyn decided to make it a full book, as fun as the worldbuilding is, is specifically to show us Cam and Palamedes in detail. What they do for each other. How they feel. How they think. What qualifies them to become the exception/epitome. And then the books tie together in this. ISAT is. uh. I won't give too much away from fear of spoilers. I'm considering here Siffrin, The King, and Loop. These 3 have a VERY seriously spoilery thing going on but it also heavily links to how eternity and iteration gently changes and numbs the self. You feel this SO hard especially when skipping dialogue. You never want to skip. You always wonder if you miss something. You often times do and don't realize it. Love plays a role in the premise, in the characters, and throughout the game, but mostly as a carrier for its loss. How you don't want to lose it. How you will, regardless. How it's your fault, and your fault alone, but also not really. About communication, and about how to anchor yourself THROUGH time, to other people. And how that anchor can keep you from being alone, and how that can help you go through eternity. If i were to link this (rather forcefully) to tlt and signalis, it would be how lyctorship leaves you alone for eternity, and how that's absolutely to your detriment, but how simply being with someone you love makes that eternity worth it. For signalis, it's how even if you get lost through abstraction, through layers of yourself, through repetition, even if all else loses meaning, love will still be there as long as you are willing. Be it romantic, platonic, or simply the joy of staring at the sky. It's about forgetting, and about remembering to not forget yourself. For 999 I'll do a short summary of the plot of it all right now though because you might need it for this one. Though this is kind of a shout into the void, to keep this thought alive somewhere, I feel like 999 might be the lesser known of the 3? And if you know it, this is like, still what I ended up processing to get to my point so oops sorry you still need to read it.

block limit reached so hold on i need to separate this in 2 parts

6 notes · View notes

idecidedtopassout · 4 months ago

Text

Random analysis of the parallels between Zero Escape and The Locked Tomb (feat. In Stars And Time and Signalis)

Foreword before the foreword, spoilers for all of these in their entirety. Except for ISAT which is only being spoiled, like, the first quarter maybe. I noticed tlt and ze were randomly glued together in my mind and couldn't parse why. tlt has so much more in common with signalis but they couldn't be more standalone, even though I love both for much the same reasons. Instead, signalis and isat are not glued, but, like, siblings in my head. And that's weird. Signalis doesn't have a sad love story. What's going on??

So I wrote an essay. A messy essay. I don't think i'm ever gonna post much here, but if this is an interesting read for even a single person then that's really nice to know. And if it's not then I have it saved here, at least.

Anyway, here it is:

So my main issue here is figuring out WHY tlt and 999 are grouped up together in my head, by association, even though they shouldn't. Even though every single thing i can think of as of writing can be applied to signalis and ISAT (which I also love), or one of the first two, but it doesn't. I'm kind of figuring it out as I write this, so sorry for the messed up format and structure. I edited like 4 sentences after writing

so much of tlt is also about identity and love and what those mean both in isolation and together. like it's very much exploring eternity too in a very similar way,, a lot of it is intersecting! the only thing it doesn't do the same is iteration, and i feel like that's The Big Divider. because iteration is such an important binding force in signalis and it's themes that it's more like, the medium of its ideas in a way? which makes it really hard to meld together with anything else like that. it does Not meld together with isat (for example) in my head but it feels closer to it just because of said iteration being how you experience and unravel the whole story, the emotional core. and i feel like i struck that point right. it fits, it makes sense in my head. but 999 and tlt are not doing anything the same either, so why doesn't it apply there? tlt is so much unreality, and ze doesn't have that in common at all. gtn maybe works? because it's "set amount of people are brought -- mostly independent of their wishes -- to an unknown, mostly abandoned place, and made to solve problems", but it is so not the end of it.

My thoughts as to why they resonated with me so, so much, are that They're different kinds of loneliness, which was a topic I've cared a lot about in media since i was a kid. So that's kind of the thing i'm focusing on when i'm thinking about them, whether I like them or not. They have unique lenses on it that feed into their themes: For signalis, it's iteration, self, and perception. A sort of Ship of theseus situation, where everything is doomed to corrupt into itself into something unrecognizable. Even so, Elster will always try to remember her promise. She will still always try so hard. And she will always fail. And it will never end. I've talked a lot about signalis and i did a lot in the messages too so i'll cut this here. Tlt has the self, with all of the Ianthe and Palamedes talk, with souls, with the resurrected lyctors. With names. And it does also consider eternity, but not as a tragedy. It considers eternity as nature, and it considers change. It considers love as sacrifice. So many examples throughout the books of relationships end up sacrificial, with either the epitome or the exception (depending on how you see it) being Paul. Lyctorhood's parallels with romance should not be understated. And this is what it leads to in my mind. Pair this up with eternity and boom, that's the focus of the narrative, i feel. Nona doesn't fit unless it shows Paul and Alecto as final results, but i think the reason Tamsyn decided to make it a full book, as fun as the worldbuilding is, is specifically to show us Cam and Palamedes in detail. What they do for each other. How they feel. How they think. What qualifies them to become the exception/epitome. And then the books tie together in this. ISAT is. uh. I won't give too much away from fear of spoilers. I'm considering here Siffrin, The King, and Loop. These 3 have a VERY seriously spoilery thing going on but it also heavily links to how eternity and iteration gently changes and numbs the self. You feel this SO hard especially when skipping dialogue. You never want to skip. You always wonder if you miss something. You often times do and don't realize it. Love plays a role in the premise, in the characters, and throughout the game, but mostly as a carrier for its loss. How you don't want to lose it. How you will, regardless. How it's your fault, and your fault alone, but also not really. About communication, and about how to anchor yourself THROUGH time, to other people. And how that anchor can keep you from being alone, and how that can help you go through eternity. If i were to link this (rather forcefully) to tlt and signalis, it would be how lyctorship leaves you alone for eternity, and how that's absolutely to your detriment, but how simply being with someone you love makes that eternity worth it. For signalis, it's how even if you get lost through abstraction, through layers of yourself, through repetition, even if all else loses meaning, love will still be there as long as you are willing. Be it romantic, platonic, or simply the joy of staring at the sky. It's about forgetting, and about remembering to not forget yourself. For 999 I'll do a short summary of the plot of it all right now though because you might need it for this one. Though this is kind of a shout into the void, to keep this thought alive somewhere, I feel like 999 might be the lesser known of the 3? And if you know it, this is like, still what I ended up processing to get to my point so oops sorry you still need to read it.

block limit reached so hold on i need to separate this in 2 parts

#instarsandtime #zero escape #9 hours 9 persons 9 doors #signalis #tlt #the locked tomb

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idecidedtopassout · 1 year ago

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idecidedtopassout · 2 years ago

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i was asked earlier this year to do the cover art for @morphogenzine and had an awesome time fitting in tons of details from the whole series-- if you want some awesome fanwork and merchandise go check it out, preorders are open as i post this :) after the project is wrapped up i'll put up this piece as a print as well!

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