#Game Analysis

[affectionatecorpse]

Okay so I see some people are debating what the monster from Still Wakes the Deep is. I'm inspired by the support from my Death Angel post, so I'm gonna try giving an analysis. Now science is not my strong suit, I'm much better at zoology, but here we go.

Of course, spoilers ahead!

So, the entity comes to light in act one. While Caz is being yelled at by his power drunk boss, Rennick, a worker going by the name Gibbo calls up to say there's an issue with the drill, something highlighted earlier by another worker. Rennick orders the drilling anyway, and thus begins the nightmare, as the drill seems to unearth and awaken a destructive parasite out for revenge. But I don't think that's as deep as it goes, pun intended.

Let's say, the creature is a parasite. A form of near sentient bacteria, though take that description with a grain of salt, I'm no scientist. Parasites simply cannot live on their own. That's an objective fact. They need a host. They exist within another for survival and breeding purposes, and multiply and spread through the body of another.

Parasites, bacteria and even fungi can live underground for years, and have been discovered to do so. Ancient lifeforms have been discovered just under the surface of earth, let alone deep underneath the ground and in the bottom of our oceans, one of the most complex and diverse biomes that our current science has barely scratched the surface of. It's highly likely this creature is a self replicating bacteria or parasite that was unearthed by the drill, and took up new hosts to survive in this change of environment.

But not every host worked. You can see half transformed, mutilated bodies everywhere, and some that haven't even changed at all. These bodies could not support the parasite and shortly died.

However, a few select hosts DID end up surviving; Gibbo, Muir, Rennick, Addair and Trots. It's unclear what sets these people apart from the others, and I don't know enough about this topic to claim an answer. But I certainly do think these folks died soon into the transformation, and are not fully conscious in the body. They frequently repeat terms and phrases, and never say anything you might expect from an entity possessing them, implying it's borrowing words and sentences that have been said by the host before, in other circumstances.

The entity plays with Caz's memories and definitely the others' too, though not all of them good. It wouldn't be a surprise to realise that's where it's getting information about it's host, as it reads the memories inside the brain to learn faces, names, and even the host's personality. Which makes me wonder, does it even realise what it looks like? Does the creature itself actually realise it's a parasite? Or does it completely and fully believe it is the person it's connected itself to? It almost downloads their personality and tries to pretend like everything is completely normal.

Let's talk about arguably the best monster (in my opinion), Muir. Muir moves about the area he frequently worked as what I assume was an engineer. He roams the familiar ground, almost unsure of why he's by himself. He often calls out to his coworkers, wondering out loud why they're treating him like he's different. Sure, this could be the real Muir's consciousness slipping in and out of the seams, but it's highly unlikely he would still be alive. Much like the zombie fungus, as it's often called, the host is not alive when the fungus is controlling it, and is merely a puppet. If the spiders it was corrupting could talk, I daresay, they'd be acting like them. Taking their place in the world, even if they don't realise it.

But every animal needs to eat. And eventually, that body is going to run out of tasty, tasty neurons. Like I said earlier, a parasite needs to spread. It'll breed, then spread to another to keep it's species alive. By infiltrating a 'pack' of animals, it will take anything to spread to the others. Which is exactly what the parasite does whenever it sees another human. Either that, or it will consume them, theoretically to feed the host so it stays alive, while keeping those tasty, tasty neurons for itself. You can almost see this process with Innes, as the elevator ascends without him, and you just faintly see Muir doing something in the distance. Likely consuming him for nutrients, as he was not connected to the parasite yet.

Next, there's Addair.

Addair, much like Muir, patrols familiar ground. Even though Addair himself wasn't even in that area when the drill struck. Now Muir was actively in that familiar space in the beginning, and it's safe to assume that's his place of transformation. But Addair was eating in the cafeteria when the incident happened, not deep down in the engine. Did he go down when the impact happened, while Caz was unconscious? Maybe. But the lights were fine then, and the engine wasn't the problem, so he didn't need a reason to. Plus, he doesn't seem like the type to be work dedicated, more inconvenience dedicated. Considering what I said about the parasite (badly) taking their place in society, did it go to his place of work after detecting that as his 'natural environment', per se?

Plus, unlike Muir, who greets the situation with quotes of confusion, fear and anxiety, Addair is instantly aggressive. Even an asshole like Addair is likely to panic if conscious in this situation, so the nervousness was Gibbo and Muir exclusive. But Addair and Rennick become immediately angry upon seeing Caz, as they actively disliked him in life, and so the parasite processes him as a foe to it's host. I thought that was neat.

Now another take I have admittedly heard from several other people, but I thought was worth mentioning. The monsters are incredibly similar to sea creatures. Which means this underwater bacteria was possibly leaking out already, and transforming our animals, not enough to completely corrupt them, but enough to twist their bodies. Think of the appearances of deep, deep sea creatures, such as the anglerfish. Isn't it possible this parasite was responsible for their uncanny appearance, in this universe? Muir especially looks like a spider crab, or perhaps even a bigfin squid.

Which again, is a deep sea creature. Rennick also reminds me of a blobfish once removed from the pressure of the deep sea. Addair seems very jellyfish-like, but may be something else very... tick-like. And even Trots gives me major merfolk vibes, with how untouched his torso is in comparison to his lower half.

This parasite could have been feeding off the neurons and breeding through our very ecosystem as the ground slowly gave away above it. The drill unearthing the source likely gave it a burst of control as so much energy was released at once, hence why it was so fast to literally spiral out of control.

But Scotland, by all means, is not the only place in the world connected to the ocean. Sure, they destroyed this batch, but other forms of this parasite live on elsewhere on earth. And the explosion may not have even destroyed it. It definitely would've destroyed the host bodies, yes, but certain bacterias can survive impressive damage, even heat hot enough to burn off human flesh. We'd best hope this is not one of those bacterias.

I didn't really get as far with this observation as I did with other horror studies, but I had fun nonetheless! Like I said, I'm really better with zoology (hence the sudden enthusiasm when I started on sea creatures), but I loved Still Wakes the Deep SO much that I just wanted to write down my thoughts. If you have any other theories, feel free to add them!

Also if I used your pictures/gifs and you would like me to add credit, I am so so sorry, I will absolutely add that as soon as you say so, I just got most of these off Google and couldn't find most the original sources. So yeah if you'd like me to add your name and mention, or you want me to remove it in general, feel free to just say and I'll add it, I don't bite I promise. Well... I won't bite YOU.

Sorry sorry, had to make a zombie reference--

[blackblooms]

I just really wanted to talk about VS yourself from the Hit Single Real mod of Friday Night Funkin.

It does a great job of communicating the essentials of its story through the way the song is presented. At first, boyfriend is meant by a creepy figure, which players would assume is some kind of evil doppelganger, but as the song progresses, you start to connect with yourself and eventually come to understand what he really wants as the song reaches its climax. Everyone of course talks about the amazing vocal part, but i think an underrated part of the songs are those brief but very hype segments where Yourself and Boyfriend begin singing and moving in sync. It's an obvious fit for the mirror imagery but i think it's also a great way to symbolize Yourself and Boyfriend managing to connect for a moment. Knowing the lore of Yourself definitely adds to the experience, but i think the essential part of the story is perfectly communicated through the song itself. Simply someone reaching out to an alternate version of themselves, seeking to find a voice that can empathize and relate to his pain and allow him to feel understood...

[fae-that-rambles]

OMORI AND STORYTELLING THROUGH CHARACTER DESIGN

I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I think it’s a very fun detail to over analyze.

SPOILERS AHEAD‼️‼️‼️

HEADSPACE

Upon first meeting the headspace gang Omori and Basil stand out very sharply. Omori with his lack of color, and Basil with the unique color of his hair and eyes. The two are clear foils; Omori is silent and keeps himself as far from focus as possible- While Basil is the group glue and focus before and after his disappearance.

Through the character designs and personalities, we are primed to connect and focus on Basil rather than Omori. Basil is pastel colored, a pacifist and a lover. Omori’s vacant eyes and silent knife-wielding nature are less inviting. Very often with RPG horrors, silent protagonists are overlooked in favor of supporting cast. Omori actively uses this as an aspect of its story. We’re supposed to focus on Basil- Sunny is supposed to focus on Basil

THE HORROR

This all lends to our first bait and switch- and our first of Basil’s complex role in the narrative.

Basil is our first glimpse into the horror themes of Omori- and this actively betrays the players trust. Again- Basil was our lovable safe character- We are primed to trust him. Then everything goes wrong (Sounds familiar).

The red eyes are obviously unsettling- again, betraying our trust by subverting the innocence of Basil’s appearance.

Furthering this! With Basil’s disappearance arrives Stranger

A shadowed figure resembling Basil leaving bloody footprints- Basil’s design has been completely subverted into something known and comforting- to a Stranger.

Omori and Stranger are an inverse of Omori and Basil’s design foils. Omori is white with black accents and eyes. Stranger is a full black silhouette with glowing white eyes. And they are of course just as much personality foils. Omori is danger and escapism under an innocent mask. Stranger is a frightening and cryptic individual who only aims to help Sunny. The bloody footprints are foreboding and unsettling- But they’re guides helping Sunny.

Adding on to this, Stranger and Omori’s design’s aren’t foils in the way of being opposites- they’re foils in the way of being compliments. They’re reflections of black and white- two sides of the same coin.

REAL WORLD BASIL

The introduction of real world Basil once again subverts previous expectations- I think for both the audience and Sunny. Setup as foils- opposites throughout the entirety of headspace, the Real World Basil and Sunny could not be more similar design wise. Their outfits are near identical; and their pale frail physiques are the same- even down to the height.

Despite everything set up in Headspace- Basil is by far the character most similar to us in Faraway town. As much as Sunny tries to deny it in his mind- he and Basil were heavily shaped by their shared history. They’re not opposites. Both have become reclusive in the days since Mari’s death, they both lost connections with the group, and both are riddled with guilt, fear, and self loathing. Sunny tries so hard to sever his connections to Basil in his mind, they’re in the exact same position.

Through the final fight with Basil, all of Sunny and Basil’s parallels are put to light. Both in the same clothes, living with the same crippling fear of what they both went to together. Both of their Somethings heightening their fear and crippling any rationality. Basil’s weapon- garden shears are an easy parallel to Omori’s knife.

Their only major design difference is their eyes and hair. Sunny’s eyes still their empty black (or sharp red when stressed out) and Basil’s an eerie glowing blue. Even if they’ve developed in the same circumstances, the two have reacted very differently because of their personalities. Sunny avoidant and stoic, Basil desperate and erratic. Once again, the two are complimentary foils. No matter what form Basil takes, he and Sunny are tied together as reflections of one another, and the shared experiences that molded them.

BONUS- HIKKIKOMORI

In the Hikkikomori route you fight Stranger instead of Real life Basil. The Hikkikomori route illustrates a complete refusal from Sunny to acknowledge the truth of the incident, and this means erasing Basil as a person. Destroying every one of these parallels I’ve discussed.

Basil and Stranger lose their depth. Basil is resigned to the picnic basket with Mari and kept out of the way. He’s lost his right to focus and autonomy, rather staying a shallow memory vague enough to protect Sunny’s repression.

Stranger is treated as an enemy. He is solely Omori’s opponent and will be eliminated as such. All of Basil’s complexity wiped away with his death. Leaving that cardboard cutout- Headspace Basil.

Furthermore, the fight with Stranger (obviously) has direct parallels to the final fight with Basil. Basil and Sunny wear their identical clothes and fight as two parallels. Stranger and Omori are black and white enemies, as Omori refuses to acknowledge Basil’s connection and similarities to Sunny. He refuses the complexity Stranger represents.

[strunmah-mah]

So I saw this interesting post discussing the bashing of otome heroines, and the person i saw it from had some tags comparing the OBSCURA and Touchstarved mc's and the different fan response to them. Which go me thinking, but reposing to it there felt like it would have derailed that post, some I'm putting my thoughts here instead.

Basically the tags were an observation that OBSCURA's mc gets treated as their own character (Vesper) whose popularity is comparable to that of all the different love interests. Meanwhile Touchstarved's fandom doesn't seem to rally around one singular MC with everyone having own OC instead. This despite the fact that their both gender neutral blank slates you never even really see.

I'd noticed that too and got thinking of why that is, so here's my theory.

Name. Notice that I referred to OBSCURA's mc as Vesper, but didn't give a name to Touchstarved's mc? When asking what your name is OBSCURA auto suggests a name. There's a not insignificant number of people that when given an auto suggested name won't go to the effort of changing it. (ex My first time playing a Legend of Zelda game it didn't even occur to me to change Link's name despite it definitely being an option.) And despite still being a reader insert just the act of giving them name makes Vesper feel like a more defined then Touchstarved unnamed MC does.

Origins. Vesper is Vesper. Who they were before the start of OBSCURA doesn't really matter, no matter what you might hc they were like before the start of the story, they still enter the mountain with the skill set no matter what. Touchstarved's mc is deliberately fluid. They have three different possible backgrounds and which one you pick does effect the mc's skill set. Make your own oc is literally built into the game.

Presentation of information. Touchstarved is very upfront about their mc's motivations. You are cursed. It's very isolating and has caused you to hurt others unintentionally. You are looking for a cure. What your curse is is never really a question. That's a very different experience from playing OBSCURA. The games hook is "people don't go under the mountain unless they have a good reason, unfortunately you have a great reason" it does not say the reason, it's a great hook. So you play the game, you go under the mountain and you find out what you're looking for is . . . blue moon ichor. You have no context for what that is, it's not initially explained, but it makes people pity you. It's not until you meet one of the LI's that it's revealed you want the ichor. You only only learn about Vesper's motivations as they chose to reveal that information to others. It's an interesting story telling choice. For me, it was more engaging to have Vesper being just as much of a mystery as everything else, than Touchstarved approach of giving that information upfront, but it comes at a cost. The MC's are both supposed to be self inserts, but hiding that information puts distance you and Vesper again making them feel more like their own character than a self insert.

Choice. Atleast as far the demos go Vesper's choices matter more. Your choices change who you meet, if you get a partner to help you face the future, or if you fail to achieve your goal chapter one. The Touchstarved mc makes choices too, it gives you slightly different dialog and you then you move on with your day. The TS MC is a vehicle to meet that game's LI's, your choices change what side of them you get to see. In Obscura your choices affect Vesper first and fore most, which again gives Vesper a stronger sense of character.

Just to be clear, I don't want this to sound like me dunking on RedSpringStudios and say they can't make good characters. Boy can they! All five of their love interests are full of character and intrigue. It's like I said in point two, the "build your own oc" approach seems very purposeful. It's a fan response they've encouraged, even releasing bio templates that match the official bios of all the LI's. This is what they wanted.

What amuses me is that RottenRaccons did not seem to realize what they had done. They seem very surprised but pleased by how much fans are latching onto Vesper as their own character.

[sareisnot]

Lord Gwyn: The Perfect Anticlimax

"Dark Souls is a hard game"

To anyone who's even a little bit familiar with the franchise, this is an obnoxiously obvious statement. The game has held the title of THE "hard game" for so long, that not only has the statement "X is the Dark Souls of Y" become a cliche, but so has every subsequent mocking subversion of that comparison. To even acknowledge its obviousness, as I did, is territory so well-worn, that I'm at risk of falling through, into the hackneyed void. But it's still worth mentioning. It's a well-earned reputation. Not only is Dark Souls, on a purely technical level, difficult to beat, but its entire identity is based around its difficulty, if the name of the "Prepare to Die" edition is any indication. Its world is a punishing one, seeking to beat the player character down at every single opportunity, until they can't stand to move another step forward, lest they get thwacked by a swinging axe, skewered by a demon, swept off a cliff, or obliterated by a dragon with teeth where its torso should be. It's a game that crushes you down, intending to make very clear just how easy your character can die, and, importantly, just how unimportant your death will be. To these bosses, these titans, these near-gods, you are nothing but an annoyance. Many of these fights feel like climactic struggles against an ancient, near-unbeatable foe, who existed long before you were born, and has a pretty solid chance of existing after you've expired. When you enter the arena of Ornstein and Smough, the music swells, and the two knights flex the skills that they're going to use to kill you over and over again. Many of the game's bosses, try to tap into that sense of scale, of importance, of grandiosity, each of their respective battles feeling like they could easily be the final one.

Then, after a long struggle, you make it to the end.

The game's final boss is Gwyn, a towering figure who's been hinted at throughout the game, through dialogue and item descriptions. Even if you didn't pay much attention to the little pieces of lore that the game hands you, you're able to put together that he's a pretty important guy: the mighty Lord of Cinder. The buildup to his fight hints at an even larger presence than the other bosses. You travel beneath Firelink Shrine, your home base for most of the game, where you find a massive expanse of land, cold and dark, a mysterious coliseum-like structure looming in the distance, which is impossibly large, even so far away. As you get closer, ghosts of old knights appear to attack you. They are easily dispatched, but still a shock. The structure towers over you, emphasizing just how much space is needed to house this mythologically strong figure, and the power that he holds. You enter, and find…….a hollowed old man. He's slightly taller than you, dressed in robes, and wielding a flaming greatsword, but he's nowhere near the scale of other bosses. However, he rushes at you all the same. When you begin the duel, it feels different from the others. There is no dramatic, sweeping music. All you get is a somber piano, like something that would play during a funeral, rather than a climactic duel. It feels like Gwyn's theme is actively pitying him. Granted, it's appropriate for the fight. All Gwyn can do is swing is flaming blade, which you can avoid with ease. There's been some easier bosses, but at least they didn't feel like they WANTED to die. Besides, this isn't the fragile Moonlight Butterfly, or the starting Asylum Demon, this is the final boss! He should be challenging you! Putting all the skills you've learned to the test! He's a fucking King! Why isn't he stronger? Fighting Gwyn after you've fought everyone else feels like walking into the home of an old, dilapidated hoarder, and kicking him while he's down. If you've been practicing your parrying, its like doing the same, except with cleats. He just seems………tired. As pathetically destitute as you were at the start. He might as well just keel over when you walk in the door. You beat him, naturally, and then the game just kinda….ends. If you got the ending I did, you just exit the area, look at all the nice snake friends you just made, and then roll credits. For all the work you've put into getting here, and all the struggles you've had to overcome, it feels like a severe anticlimax, like the game is playing a prank on you.

But if you know anything about the setting of Dark Souls, you'd know that there's really no other way this could end.

"The world of Dark Souls is dying"

This is a phrase that, while not as oft repeated as the above, is also pretty common knowledge at this point. Lodran, the game's setting, is a desolate place, long past its glory years. Once a powerful kingdom, teeming with life and magic, it is now in ruin, every citizen either dead, hollowed, or left to survive amongst the numerous deadly creatures that now roam the land. Everyone who's still around at the start of the game is either destined for misery, or already there (Unless you're Andre. He seems to be doing pretty well, all things considered). Somewhere around the time Lordran has reached the end of its life cycle, is when the player character enters the story, albeit with a rather unenviable role. Your job is to essentially be the world's janitor, cleaning out the world's former main characters, most of whom are insane, and all of whom are well past their useful days (or, if you have the DLC, you get to see Artorias right as he passes this point). Unfortunately, most of them would like to keep being alive, so they're going to make that difficult for you, by turning you into red mist until you stop trying to kill them. Even the grandiose presentation some of them have can't entirely hide the fact that this is a rather sad state of affairs for everyone, especially for those who haven't really done anything wrong (I nearly cried at having to kill Sif, and I will never fight Priscilla). Fortunately, some of these bastards contributed to the world's current bleakness, so killing them provides at least a twinge of catharsis, albeit one that will certainly be gone by the time you move onto the next bastard. The goal of this whole clean-up process, is to prepare the world to either continue with the age of fire with you as the catalyst, hopefully without those brutes who were clogging the power vacuums, or plunge the world into a new age of darkness, now that it has been cleansed of its polluting influences.

The only mean to either of these ends, is to kill Gwyn, the Lord of Cinder, former ruler of Lordran, and one of the primary reasons that this world is such a goddamn mess. To sum up his actions without getting too deep into the lore's intricacies; Gwyn knew that his kingdom was destined to fall, due to the world's oncoming transition from the age of fire into the age of shadow. This transition was represented by the dwindling light of the first flame, the lifeblood of the kingdom. After utterly failing to rekindle it, Gwyn entered a final gambit to prolong the life of his empire, linking himself with the first flame, but burning himself, and many of his knights, away in the process. This left him as a hollow, doomed to languish in his kiln, until another unfortunate soul took his place, linking the flame to further prolong the changeover. In doing this, Gwyn went against the natural laws of his world, which didn't react well to having its transitionary cycle interrupted. The world fell into a sharp decline, becoming a desolate, unhappy place, festering with demons and monsters (many of whom were the result of the last time someone tried to rekindle the first flame), making life hell for anyone unlucky enough to still be around afterwards. Gwyn wanted to prolong the inevitable, prevent the death of his kingdom, and continue its prosperity, so he sacrificed everything. His realm has persisted, but in a state of undeath, having stuck around long past its natural expiration date, just like him. Gwyn's story can be properly summarized as what happens when someone is psychotically obsessed with preserving their power, even when that preservation only serves to make the world a substantially worse place. Gwyn, in his hollow state, is a symbol of Lordran's persistent deterioration.

None of this information is directly handed to the player. Some bits are alluded to through snippets of dialogue and item descriptions, and the opening cutscene depicts one of the major inciting events of the narrative, but for the most part, it's a sprawling, multi-phased story, that is dolled out non-linearly, and piecemeal.

Now, with that context, let's cast a new lens on that fight…

After delving underneath Firelink Shrine for the final time, you come upon a desolate landscape, the Kiln of the First Flame looming in the distance. It's clearly well past its glory days, looking decrepit and sad. It is home of the world's lifeblood, but in name only. Now, it holds the last remnant of an age long past. As you approach, the spirits of old knights come to attack you, but they aren't much of a challenge, being just shadows of their former selves. They're victims, really; their loyalty has bound them to a sorry task, but they're in the way, and they weren't really living much of a life anyway. When you get closer to the kiln, it feels impossibly large, but also cold, and surprisingly dark, for something that's supposed to house an eternal flame. When you can see more details, it becomes clear just how long it's been falling into ruin. It feels abandoned, but you know its not. After all, you're here to end the life of its only resident. You enter, and find…. Lord Gwyn, a king who destroyed himself and cast the world into ruin, just to hold on to a formerly prosperous time. Lord Gwyn, whose refusal to let the fire die is the reason why you had to struggle through this entire journey. Lord Gwyn, whose death will mark the end of a era, no matter what you do afterwards. He charges at you, barely even conscious anymore, having been locked in this tomb for unknowable amounts of time. But he can't really fight you, at least not well. His strength isn't nearly what it used to be, now that he's a hollow, tired and worn-down, just like you were at the start. He's a pitiable figure, and the music knows. That sorrowful piano fades in, almost like something that would play at a funeral. But this isn't a funeral. This is a mercy killing. Spiritually, Gwyn died a long time ago. You're just putting his body to rest. When he's finally dispatched, it feels like an anticlimax. But of course it is. Gwyn is the embodiment of the world you've spent so much time exploring. Lordran has been denied a proper climax for so long, because he extended the story long past where it should have ended. He's been waiting to be killed for ages now. It feels only right that Gwyn be an easy, anticlimactic boss, because how could such a destitute figure be anything else?

"Dark Souls is a hard game for a reason"

The above statement is a simplified summation of why Dark Souls is one of my favorite games that I’ve ever played. It's set in a dying, hostile world, that's been brought to ruin by the violation of its natural laws. Thus, the game is insistent on making the player struggle at every turn, to make them feel just as downtrodden as the world they explore. Lord Gwyn is a example of just how thoroughly holding onto power can corrupt someone, leaving them as a husk, the scraps of their former glory existing only the in the memory of the people who are still forced to cope with the consequences of their selfish actions. Thus, his boss fight is an intentionally easy anticlimax, to emphasize just how far he's fallen, to the point that he can't even put up a good point. It's the themes of his character, perfectly melding with the gameplay. It's a perfect encapsulation of the game's best quality, how the experience of playing the game, reflects the themes and tone of its story. The reasons why the fight with Gwyn is the perfect anticlimax, and why Dark Souls is a near-perfect game, are one and the same.

[thecollectivefixation]

POPPY PLAYTIME chapter 3: Deep Sleep

WHATS UP GUYS It’s Queen here! I know it’s been awhile but I could NOT sit still after watching a gameplay of the new POPPY PLAYTIME chapter. Let’s just say I have got a lot to talk about and some possible theories 😼

__

Alright so, chapter 2 ended with us (the protagonist) and Poppy, who we thought betrayed us, crashing the train near Playcare. Chapter 3 begins with the aftermath of the crash or perhaps just a little after it, since the cutscene starts of with us being held by catnap and then being thrown into a trash compactor which is slowly closing in on us.

[Catnap throwing us down]

Now as the chapter further progresses, we run into plenty, PLENTY of different monsters that us as the protagonist must defeat in order to progress to the next part. However, as we know from chapters 1 and 2, there is always a tape that will help us with little clues and hints of the story along the way.

Also i can’t help but talk about the DETAILS in this game like how we can see catnap constantly stalking us around the map?

[Catnap stalking us]

Oh my lord I got the shivers when i first saw him in the corner of my eye. The fact that he appears for a like a millisecond each time, NUH UH.

ALSO WHO THE HECK IS OLLIE LIKE THAT KID SOUND SUSPICIOUS AS. But oh well at least he’s helping us get through the game……….. right? 😄☝️

Alright continuing on, we had little hints and snippets of the backstory and lore in the other chapters, however we never really got the explanation of what truly happened to playtime co. And all our fellow employees along with it. I still cannot believe that the protagonist is the last surviving employee I mean what about that letter in the first chapter?

[Letter from Poppy Playtime chapter 1]

(Also another theory that It may have been a lure by the prototype.) and the fact that the only reason the protagonist survived was because they didn’t go to work ‘that’ day…. GUYS😭💪

The story starts to thicken as we learn about the smiling critters which include the oh-so terrifying creature, Catnap.

One of the tapes in this chapter tell us how Catnap’s real name is Theo, short for Theodore. Theo was actually a child at the Playtime co. ‘orphanage’ who was further named as ‘experiment #1188’ otherwise known as Catnap. We also come to learn that Theo/Catnap worships the Prototype (aka experiment 1006) and sees him as his god, his saviour. Which can be understood since Theo had a near-death experience and apparently the prototype saved him. (This was before he was turned into Catnap.)

So obviously, as the protagonist we end up defeating Catnap at the end of chapter 3, and remember how the prototype appeared to drag away the remains of Mummy long legs’ body? Well here we go again guys. After we electrocuted Catnap and he was set aflame, the prototype appeared as a sort of ‘saviour’ for Catnap.

There are many theories on this scene, about whether the Prototype was offering help, or whether he was actually planning to kill Catnap all along. But with the way Catnap was kneeling and almost sort of worshipping the prototype, it was like he was accepting death.

[Catnap kneeling before the Prototype]

We all know already that Catnap worships the prototype, as heard from the tapes and seen in one of the scenes. Including from the trailer.

[Scene from the trailer]

So this should be obvious. Catnap wanted to be made as part of the prototype, and in his final moments he still worshipped him as best he could. The prototype, after possibly collecting Huggy wuggys body, then dragging away Mummy long legs body, and now finally, Catnaps body, is perhaps using all these creatures to form himself an indestructible body, which us as the protagonist, will have to be prepared to face one day.

[The prototype dragging Mummy's body away in chapter 2]

Guys the prototype is so freaky LIKE IMAGINE SEEING A METAL SPIKY HAND SLOWLY CRAWL UP TO YOU IN REAL LIFE BYEEEEE

As an employee, we knew the experiments were taking hold. We came back 10 years after the downfall of Playtime co. Because perhaps we felt guilty? Or was it all just for the truth of what went on ‘that’ day? All these poor children were being experimented on to become live mascot creatures, and now we are after the truth of what happened and we have finally understood one important part of what truly happened.

This is when ‘The hour of Joy’ comes in.

[The hour of Joy tape]

In the end of chapter 3, Poppy feels the need to finally tell us the truth and she shows us a tape which we are inclined to watch. The tape reveals the experiments (the creatures) rampaging inside the Playtime co. Facility and killing all the employees that are present.

[Playtime co. Employees dead, sprawled around the floor]

The tape includes: Huggy Wuggy, Mummy long legs, the little smiling critter creatures, numerous Miss Delights, Kissy Missy, Boxy boo and Catnap.

The tape can be watched here.

With this tape, we learn that the experiments started a rebellion against the employees on the day ‘The Hour of Joy’ occured which was August 8th, 1995 (keep in mind that the game occurs 10 years later, now in 2005.) The rebellion was led by the Prototype, and he used the toys to lead the rebellion, making sure every employee, no matter if guilty or innocent, was to be murdered in cold blood.

Now the reveal of this tape and especially the backstory of what happened to all the employees is INSANE. My bones were quaking from how well the plot was put together and how the story turned out even more darker than we had thought. It’s crazy how all these children placed in the orphanage were used as guinea pigs for a sick experiment. There’s another theory that Poppy used to be Elliot Ludwigs (the founder and overseer of playtime co.) daughter. And the experiments started with her since she apparently passed away and Elliot wanted his daughter back so he had her be experimented on and she become the doll, Poppy.

[Poppy, the doll]

Also a theory that is circling around is that us, the protagonist, who used to work at Playtime co., was actually an important executive who had a big role in the experiments that were going on. Which is CRAZYYYY like the story is slowly getting revealed to us bit by bit as we progress through each chapter.

Anyway the game, the LORE is crazy y’all. WHAT’S MORE IS THE ENDING OF THIS CHAPTER… HELLO??? THE CLIFFHANGER. Honestly thought that Poppy was gonna betray us again BUT NUH UH. WHAT HAPPENED TO KISSY MISSY??? WHY DID IT SOUND LIKE HUGGY WUGGY WAS THERE AND oh my lord looks like we’ll have to find out, IN THE NEXT CHAPTER! DUN DUN DUN!!!!!!!!

— Queen.

[mickeys-malarkey]

Pt. 3/3: My BATDR Timeline & Plot Twist Theories!

First, I think both BATIM and BATDR take place sometime between 1978 and 1991. I already suspected BATDR was happening in the ‘80s based on the fact that card readers – which have featured in many of the environment screenshots we've seen – were invented in 1979...

…and Audrey's clothes and hairstyle look very 1980s.

Then they released the images of Audrey's office, where her chair and desk lamps also look very 1980s, and the wallpaper and flooring looks pretty 1970s…

…and @inkdemonapologist pointed out that the type of bankruptcy we see documents for in Joey's apartment didn't exist until 1978…

…and I remembered that Joey's apartment also had a newspaper whose headline took place in the future— Princess Diana's 30th birthday which, as TetraBitGaming on YouTube pointed out, would be in 1991 since Princess Diana was born in 1961. She should be two years old if BATIM were really taking place in 1963!

Maybe, at the time, they didn't mean for these two to be clues, since they seem to have rolled the date backwards a bit from the newspaper one; but at this point it feels pretty clear when BATDR takes place, to me. And I'm even more certain than I already was, after finding out that this image from the JDS website…

…is titled “museum” (good work yoinking it, @halfusek /gen 👍🏻), that we know the ink dimension's new home: Nathan Arch Sr.'s private Joey Drew Studios museum that he mentioned he was curating in TIOL (meaning it's existed since around 1972).

“Over the years, I have collected every single piece of the studio memorabilia I could find to restore it to its former glory, to create, in a sense, a private museum that gleamed with the true vision of Joey Drew…” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 2

Also, besides the fact the museum image has clearly aged, here's some more evidence that at least a few years have probably passed since Bendy was purchased: it generally takes a fair bit more time (years!!) to make movies/documentaries, as Archgate Pictures seems to have made about Joey, than it does to make shorts.

As for BATIM, I think that time has been moving as normal outside of the loop, we were just seeing a repeat of that significant day in 1963; Henry and Joey have been trapped in the ink dimension for somewhere between twenty and thirty years, and the bankruptcy paperwork and Princess Diana newspaper were pieces of the real world leaking into the memory. This explains how there seems to be evidence of Audrey in BATIM and how BATDR is still supposedly neither sequel nor prequel to BATIM despite all the evidence that it takes place long after 1963! They're happening at the same time!! I wonder if Audrey is the daughter of the little girl we hear at the end of BATIM? So, Henry's (great-)granddaughter or Joey's (great-)great-niece?

Now, onto my big theory: the plot twist.

If they handle it right, it would be really, really cool if “break the cycle” really doesn't just mean “end the time loop” but also “break the cycle of abuse/trauma” and a lot of the huge cast of not-so-innocent characters wind up with the potential to get redemption arcs. I have an idea of exactly how they might be planning on even providing the opportunity for Joey.

Victor McKnight commented this on his Artistic Hallowing music video and pinned it:

Those last two sentences. “Make sure you're watching every second! You don't want to miss any vital information. 😉” Does that not sound to anyone else like he's got insider information? Now, I want y'all to watch these music videos that either Victor himself or his brother Noah were suspiciously involved in all of (and one of which is supposedly a BATDS song but for some reason involves Audrey) and tell me if you notice any patterns.

This one seems to be a duet between Sammy and the Ink Demon, both singing to Audrey. Sammy mostly sings in the default sepiatone, asking us things like “Can you see me? Can you feel me?” (that feels so… sad… and desperate…) and telling us things like “make sense of the consequence we witnessed on that day” (Excuse me, you're telling me that there was a consequence for something on a specific, significant day that we witnessed?? 👀) The demon, on the other hand, mostly sings when the grayscale effect is on, and seems to just be playing a stereotypical villain roll until you notice “be forced to believe what I see” (why would we even give a crap about what you're seeing /srs? How the actual heck would we see what you're seeing /gen? You don't even have eyeballs, bro /j) and “be damned in this evil received” (how do you receive evil that damns you? Maybe by being abused and becoming an abuser in response?).

Two apparently-separate characters singing with the same voice but very different tones and outlooks on the situation, still both singing to Audrey, in this one. One mostly sings in the default sepiatone, again, at first seeming more hopeful, helpful, and friendly until you start noticing ominous comments like “you've made mistakes, accept the change. You will be punished too” (*incoherent noises* 🚨🚨) and “welcome to my dream . . . you still think you are safe in my dream.” The other mostly sings when the grayscale effect is on, again, and seems much more aggressive and seductive until you start noticing comments like “take up your weapons, just leave my friends be” (why is this stereotypically evil-seeming character both telling us to take up weapons, not just letting us have them, and asking us to leave his friends alone with them?).

More hints that the demon who will rise and presumably is most important to the story is linked to grayscale, in this one.

And, in this one, Sammy's asking if the grayscale-linked demon is the one who will set him free (as he claims to be in the first two videos).

Across all four of these first videos, there seems to be an overall “things change when we switch from the default sepiatone to grayscale” and “grayscale is dangerous and seems hopeless but it's important and linked to truth and freedom” theme…

…You're telling me that Sammy and his followers' past (BATIM?) selves were worshipping an imposter demon…? And the truth will be revealed in BATDR…?

Hum, hum, hum… fascinating. I'd noticed the sepiatone vs. grayscale split and imposter vs. true savior thing long before I read the books; for the longest time, I thought it meant we would be dealing with a Henry-Bendy and a Joey-Bendy, as I've been seeing people theorizing. But then I read TIOL, and discovered what I think is evidence that this info is indeed canon and was not left on the cutting room floor while BATDR was in development limbo.

Nathan makes a very strange note on Joey's story about the Sparkle Unicorn speakeasy…

“…I remember this night well. Though I remember it being at the Bee Room, gold and black, not silver as the main design aesthetic. Doesn't really make much of a difference though, I suppose.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 44 (emphasis added)

Nathan remembers that night in sepiatone, Joey remembers it in grayscale.

Now, I've seen all kinds of theories all over about how Wilson actually “banished/killed the ink demon…” “Wilson took advantage of some sort of blip in Bendy's existence that happened when Joey died,” “Wilson got rid of him by purifying him and turning him into Dapper Bendy,” “Wilson got rid of him by fusing him with either Henry or Joey,” “Wilson got rid of him by trapping him in Henry's loop,” “he didn't, Wilson's just another liar manipulating everyone,” etc…

What if we're looking at this from the wrong angle? What if the point is that, whatever happened, neither of the BATDR Bendys is the original soulless monster we see in BATIM and the books? What if, whether they share a body or are separate, there are two human souls involved here? What if one of those souls is the “new evil” in the ink dimension, not Wilson, who may have been meddling in ink dimension affairs since 1963?

Going back to the time frame I propose BATDR is happening in… Joey was born in 1901, which means that if Nathan was 18 or 19 when Joey was just turning 16, then he was born in 1899 or 1898. So, in 1978, Nathan would've been 79 or 80, and in 1991 he would've been 92 or 93. Especially considering the clues that point towards Nathan having been a smoker, it wouldn't surprise me if he's straight-up already dead in BATDR. Mayhaps for 211 days? During Loop 414…? Could this be why the BATIM loop is different, with Henry apparently not remembering anything that previous versions of himself could? The now-previous owner of their prison has died of old age and/or lung cancer? And could that be why the JDS museum has fallen into bankruptcy? Has Nathan Jr. taken over and isn't as ruthless a businessman as his father?

Itsjustjord on YouTube pointed this out in his trailer reaction, which when he said it set my Clue Radar off so that I went to the trailer again to get a closer look. And… well… *clears throat*

…Do y'all see this weird effect over Dapper Bendy? Compared to every other character we see in the trailer as well as the environment around him, does it not look as if we're seeing him, specifically, through some sort of cartoony filter? Maybe it'll only be in circumstances like this (far away in weird lighting) that the edges of the illusion will fray in-game, based on the other teaser image we have of him, but it definitely looks off to me.

Especially with what I now suspect Allison and Susie's situations were in relation to Nathan, I think that the ink creatures’ perfection vs. imperfection has nothing to do with how pure/good vs. impure/evil their hearts are as we've been lead to believe/is the conventional surface-level reading, but instead how intact vs. broken their hearts are. I think that the more horrific the ink being's appearance, the more the soul inside was abused while it was alive. Allison isn't a perfect Alice because she's a better person, it's because she obeyed Nathan and wasn't made to suffer as severely as Susie, who Nathan chose to be his next Isabel. So, why is one new Bendy (apparently created after Joey lost everything, I suspect even being made to watch his Shoulder Angel's murder before being murdered himself) so much scarier than the original (created before Joey lost everything) and the other so goshdarn perfect, proportions and all?

Maybe the banning of everything related to Sammy's demon cult and Henry under Wilson's rule has to do with his decades-old mission to keep the Creators from joining forces, as well as everyone including himself feeling like they're finally free from The Great Puppet Master?

I love Dapper Bendy's design as much as everyone else!! He's positively adorable, and it would also be a nice outcome if the baby boy is exactly what he seems and just a precious lil friend to love forever; but I theorize that Dapper Bendy is the perfectly sane, untraumatized, and truly evil one, that (assuming we actually get choices in BATDR, unlike in BATIM) his route, no matter how things seem in the moment, is the wrong one, that he's Nathan. And I think Freaky Teeth Bendy (that's been my nickname for him since we first saw him and I'm sticking to it lolol) is the damaged as heck but able to be saved one, that his route is the correct one, that he's Joey. I also think that we won't get to see either demon for what they really are – won't be able to get the True, Broken Cycle, “Joey's Redeemed & Nathan Faces Justice” Ending – unless we somehow unlock Grayscale Mode like we could in BATIM and gain the ability to see Joey's truth. Until then, we'll be seeing the demons the way Nathan wants us to see them. Through Nathan's tainted, gaslighting, sepiatone filter.

If I'm right, the fact that they did choose these color palettes is so perfectly poetic~! Sepiatone is what happens when black-and-white images have been chemically altered for preservation purposes; Nathan's altered our perception of himself, Joey, and all the events surrounding them, and his version of events is much more resilient. Meanwhile, Joey's would be more pure and unaltered but easily destroyed— including by himself, with his Illusion of Living coping mechanism… The only thing that could make it more perfect is if not only do we get to see Henry in BATDR, but when we do he's an angelic toon… *Vibrates with excitement*

Please, please, please, JDS, let me be right about where you're going with this!! Cause this would genuinely be so freaking cool…!! 🙏🏻 I hope that we eventually get to “rejoice with our founders,” as Artistic Hallowing says, when they're reunited.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk, rofl. Congratulations on making it through the ramblings of a hyped AuDHD fangirl (though, I guess we already knew you were capable, if you've read TIOL. I could do a whole nother rant on evidence that Joey's basically confirmed canonically ADHD(+?), my freaking gosh). 😝

Read the Rest of the Original Analysis/Theory: Part One �� Part Two • Unexpected Part Four

BATDR Analysis/Post-Playthrough Theory Revision: Part One • Part Two • Part Three • Part Four

[crystallinecardinal]

So I was thinking about Starlo and Chujin

Hi. I love overanalysis. It’s in my blog title as “lore enthusiast.” Most of this probably means nothing and was unintentional, but I’m like an English teacher when it comes to media I like and am scrounging for canon content— I will see something that might have capital I Implications if you think about it hard enough, and I will shake you by the shoulders and go “WHAT DOES IT MEAAAN”

Which brings me to Starlo and Chujin and a thing I noticed while looking through the Spriter’s Resource for Starlo references. Long rant and UTY spoilers below the cut.

I should start off by saying that Starlo and Chujin are similar, in a way. Both of them are nerds, although for different things. Both are said to be caring. Both dedicated their lives to their work. Both wanted to help monsterkind. Both loved Ceroba. Both had secrets.

These similarities have not gone unnoticed, I’ve found— both by the fandom and the devs of UTY.

(Transcript:

Sword: “It does make sense that, like, Chujin and Starlo are kinda similar, and Ceroba, yknow…. She has a type, I guess.”)

So it’s not a secret these two are similar, and it’s probably intentional to make them parallel each other.

But from there, we get to the meat of this post:

These sprites.

This is where I dive into a lot of overanalysis— I’m giving that as a warning before I start. My point here though, is that these two sprites feel incredibly similar in a way where I speculate if it was intentional or not.

I’ll play devil’s advocate first, though. I’m an artist. I draw things, mostly characters and creatures. Sometimes you just have two pieces looking similar— not because you intended it that way, but because the blocking and composition was best that way.

For Starlo’s sprite, the answer feels simple. All of Starlo’s talk portraits are front facing, so this one doesn’t have a need to be any different. If it was, it may feel out of place amongst all the other sprites, especially because there isn’t a reason for him to have this sprite in particular face a different direction. He isn’t looking around, and isn’t averting his gaze. He’s being direct. The best way to convey that is with eye contact (or at least, implied eye contact) via a front facing sprite. Additionally, even if Starlo was averting his gaze, with how UT’s talk sprites work, there are better ways to convey that than changing the way his talk sprite faces.

Starlo’s character as himself also contributes to the way this sprite looks. It’s a direct contrast to the loud, boisterous North Star. This is the monster behind the persona— one who’s a lot less confident, one who thinks himself a ghost to the people around him. A “nobody farmer,” in his words. When trying to get this across, art-wise, the way Starlo’s talk sprites look as opposed to North Star’s talk sprites are a perfect fit! It’s in the subtle expressions versus animated expressions. This is even down to how Starlo’s glasses are drawn, not showing his eyes behind them, giving him a much more distant look.

As for Chujin’s sprite, the answer also feels fairly simple. The sprite pictured earlier was for his tapes, where it would make sense for most of his sprites to be front facing. He’s talking to the camera, it’s a video log. Being silhouetted also works here— it makes him more mysterious in a way.

That’s what I have to say if you look at it JUST from an art point. However, we like to be a little silly in this house (my blog), so I’m going to overanalyze the hell out of this.

So. The pose.

I’m probably going insane at this point. I’ve already explained the most likely reason for the poses being similar, and don’t get me wrong, that’s probably the main reason why. But also— note the eyes.

According to the Spriter’s Resource, Chujin’s sprites usually have his eyes visible from behind his goggles.

But.

There are exceptions.

I think the reason for this lies in the same reason we never see Starlo’s eyes behind his glasses after he takes the hat off. I explained this earlier when discussing the artistic reasoning behind these sprites— not seeing Starlo’s eyes makes him appear more distant, which highlights the part of his character that’s much less confident in himself. We go from seeing his eyes (or at least, the shape of them behind his glasses, this is a consistency with UTY sprites I can talk about later) to not at all.

This is what makes Chujin’s sprites so important to me.

We’re meant to like Chujin. At least, before we know the truth. We’re meant to think he was always a kindhearted man, a loving father and husband, and a good mentor. All the good things. It’s only as the game continues that you see the imperfections. By talking to Dina, you see he didn’t like the Wild East due to what it stood for, and you learn of the time he came into the saloon all disheveled, uncharacteristically asking for a drink, only mentioning he thought he “saw a ghost”. You learn in the Steamworks of his research, and how he wasn’t as good at robotics as he was made out to be.

That’s what makes Chujin flawed, though. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, none of these things will make a player dislike him. As said— we’re supposed to like Chujin. An opinion and a mysterious saloon visit isn’t the end of the world. We also grow to learn more and more about him, and he seems just like a kind man with a love for robotics (even if he struggled).

And then we learn of Ceroba’s plan. And we learn of something hidden in the abandoned Ketsukane Estate.

This is the first time in the Pacifist route that we actually SEE Chujin, first in a photo.

Note the eyes.

We see Chujin’s eyes behind his goggles here! Once again— this is likely for the reason mentioned before. We’ve only been told mostly good things about Chujin so far! Here’s a photo of him and his family— how could this kind man be wrapped in anything suspicious?

Which then makes the sudden change in the tapes crucial.

We can no longer see his eyes— he’s grown distant, mysterious. This is the part of Chujin that he kept secret from even Ceroba, up until he was on his deathbed. It’s the part of him that isn’t necessarily the loving husband and father we know him as, but rather, this is the part of him that was a determined researcher on a mission. And therefore, Chujin goes from lively to cold.

I’m sure that last bit doesn’t ring any alarm bells at all.

Hey! Remember how I said Starlo and Chujin are similar in ways? This is where I get into that. I’m applauding you from behind my screen if you’re still reading.

I’m now going to talk about Starlo and Chujin as characters, as well as the parallels between the two sprites that started this analysis. For simplicity, I’ll break these into sections. Funky names for a funky reading experience, so I’m not just word dumping at you.

1) Got a secret, can you keep it?

Soooo. Chujin and Starlo’s secrets.

One of the first things that rings alarm bells for me is the situation in which both of the sprites I’m analyzing pop up in. Context is key. Specifically, both of the sprites are used when we’re learning the truth about each character.

For Starlo, we’re learning about who he really is, the monster behind the persona. He takes his hat off, reveals the monster underneath, and we get his new talk sprite. He’s finally stopping, for a second— taking a moment to break the act he’s been playing for YEARS. And he does it all to show Ceroba he’s still there underneath it all, as well as reveal to Clover who he really is. He’s at his most vulnerable state, revealing how he sees himself as a nobody, and a fraud.

For Chujin, we’re learning part of the truth of who he was, when he’s at his most morally dubious. We learn of his experiments, the ones he worked on and hid from his family until he was about to die— only then did he tell Ceroba. We also learn of his views and opinions, the reasoning behind them, and how he lied about his job at the Steamworks. He couldn’t bring himself to tell Ceroba he was fired, because he didn’t want her to think less of him.

So, the main points of this:

Starlo and Chujin both had their own secrets

Both of their secrets are revealed when these sprites are used

Both secrets reveal more about the characters’ identities

Both want to be seen in a good light

The main difference, I think, other than what the secrets entail themselves, are what they mean for each character.

2) Light and dark symbolism?? In MY overanalysis??? It’s more likely than you think

Chujin and Starlo’s secrets both weigh on them. Starlo doesn’t want to break character— he enjoys being North Star and wants to bring a smile to the faces of monsterkind. Chujin doesn’t want Ceroba to think any lesser of him for his mistakes.

Additionally, the reveal of their secrets marks two different things for their characters. For Starlo, it’s a step forward. For Chujin, it’s spiraling down.

This gets really fun considering these two sprites, and light and dark symbolism (not in the traditional good versus evil way).

Starlo’s in the light. He’s showing himself, he’s maturing. He’s being incredibly vulnerable for probably the first time in a LONG time, and finally breaking the persona. He’s working towards a better goal, accepting both North Star and Starlo as facets of himself, but it starts with taking off the hat. It starts with coming into the light, and letting the shadows fade away.

Chujin is silhouetted in darkness. As said previously, we only ever hear mostly good things about Chujin from those who were around him (barring Starlo, although that’s secondhand information, and by some extent, Dina). Martlet and Ceroba saw the best in him, a mentor and loving husband respectively. But as he rambles off to his tapes, shrouded in shadow and secrecy, we learn of what was happening behind the scenes: he reveals part of who he really was, and how much he hid away from those he loved, all away from the rose colored glasses.

3) “Your opinion is wrong” -Chujin, probably

To just point out more ways Chujin and Starlo parallel yet also contrast one another (which I will mention for the section after this as well): I think it goes without saying that Starlo and Chujin have opposite worldviews when it comes to humans.

Chujin believes the worst in humans, primarily due to the Snowdin Attack. He hates them— The War was when the blade was plunged into monsterkind’s flesh, and the Snowdin Attack was only a twist of the knife.

Starlo admires humans, maybe a bit too much for some monsters. He loves their stories, loves the idea of cowboys and Westerns, so much so he creates the Wild East with his posse.

This is what makes these two different, only strengthening the light/dark contrast. The ideas of hate and admiration fit well into that theme, don’t they?

Stick with me here. I promise this is going somewhere.

4) “Monsterkind’s Hero is a title soaked in blood.”

So, the aforementioned views of humans? This gets really fun when you apply it to the crux of Starlo and Chujin’s missions: to help monsterkind during their time underground.

Both want to be heroes, in a way. They both want to help. Of course, this is in different ways— but the main intention behind it is the same.

Chujin, as said, hates humans. He wants monsters to be brought to justice. After the Snowdin Attack, he decides that if he can’t help through Axis, then he’ll help another way. Thus starts Chujin’s dedication to his experiments, which he makes his work and eventually the rest of his life. All of it for a chance to help monsterkind when the time comes.

Starlo’s dedication to the Wild East is similar, in a way, yet directly contrasts Chujin. His admiration for humans and Westerns goes to the point he wants to provide monsterkind with their own “slice of the Surface.” He wants to see those around him smile— his own way of helping monsterkind when they’re still stuck underground.

My point here is that while they find different ways to accomplish their missions (and you can drag more light/dark symbolism out of this— Chujin hidden away in the shadows of the basement in the Ketsukane Estate versus Starlo out in the spotlight), both have so much dedication to it that it becomes their lives.

Chujin, although having a family he loved and cared for, let his experiments drive him onwards to the point it cost him his life. Starlo willingly gave up who he was to be North Star, letting the Wild East become his life.

5) Yes, and?

I could go on and on about more similarities and differences between Starlo and Chujin, but I feel like I’ve brought up what I need to for now.

Why bring all of this up in the first place, though? What’s the point of going on about these characters’ missions, or their secrets, or all the light and dark symbolism you could hypothetically draw from it?

Let me talk about those sprites again.

I’ve spent ages going on about Starlo and Chujin, and how they parallel, yet contrast each other. They’re foils, in a way. These similarities and differences are what make these two little sprites so interesting to me.

You could say it’s all because that’s what the scene needed at the time, and that statement likely has truth to it. I already talked about how. But the knowledge of the context of the scenes and these two characters is what makes me wonder if it all was done on purpose.

Chujin, shrouded in shadow, revealing a part of him kept secret from even those he loved most. His reasoning for his hatred for humans comes on full display, and he begins to formulate a mission, the same one his life would eventually fall to. If the royals won’t see how much he cares for monsterkind, he’ll show it himself.

Starlo, left in the Swealterstone’s light, revealing a part of him the Wild East knows nothing of. His mission starts to redefine itself, and it’s original intent becomes more clear. He only ever wanted to be someone. He only ever wanted to help. Maybe now, with the hat off, he can learn to make others happy, but not forget himself in the process.

A conclusion:

So. Do I think that these two sprites for Starlo and Chujin were intentionally made to parallel yet also contrast each other?

My answer is a big fat Maybe. I can’t be entirely sure.

Truth is, I’m not a UTY dev. I literally only discovered and got into this game a little over a month ago. I don’t know the true intent behind the spritework, I don’t know the conversations that happened behind the scenes. I am literally just A Guy ranting on the internet about a silly little fangame that I have brainrot over.

But! I do have a finalized game and commentary I can analyze, and knowing that some spritework details were intentional (the way that Chujin’s talk sprites face are made to match Ceroba and Kanako’s), I could see something like this being either intentional or a really fun coincidence. The type of thing the devs can look back on and realize “oh! That’s funny how I accidentally made that parallel. I didn’t mean to do that, but it works.”

I can only hope it was intentional. Chujin and Starlo are both incredibly interesting characters to me, especially in how they can be seen as foils. Something as minor as this I think just shows the love put into this game and these characters. UTY is just a great game overall, in my opinion.

But yeah! That’s my ramble, all because I was doing sprite studies and looking for references in the Spriter’s Resource for art. Hopefully I made at least some sense :)

[halfmaskshadow]

“It’s all Hylia’s fault, why doesn’t she talk to Zelda??? She only talks to Link thats bad” STFU STFU STFU

SHE LITERALLY DOESNT HAVE THE POWER OF A GODDESS ANYMORE????

She loses most/all of her power when reincarnating for the first time. She probably CAN’T talk to Zelda, much less awaken her power. The most she can do in botw/totk is 1. give Link health/stamina, which is something previous Links can do separately of her, and 2. give small quests and provide tips, which is little more than speaking. She can’t even give him rewards without an outside source of energy, she’s so weak.

Link DIES and is reanimated. Idk about you, but to me that sounds like something that would bring you closer to a (dead-ish) goddess. Hell, Zelda can talk to him through his mind! Maybe Hylia’s just riding that train since Zelda is (at least tangentially) her reincarnation. Hylia just doesn’t have the power or the physical form to talk to anyone other than Link.

Maybe the Hylia you speak to is just the ghost of sksw Zelda. Maybe she has no more power than your typical ghost. Maybe you should STOP FUCKING BLAMING HER for not having any power after nearly DYING trying to defend the world from a threat even bigger than Calamity Ganon. She played her role, she did her best, and now she should be at rest. The only reason she talks to Link is because she cared about sksw Link and wants to help his reincarnations the best she can. She never wanted this to happen, but she can’t break the curse of a dying god. The only thing she can do is defend her people with what little power she has left in her brittle, crumbling form.

Hylia’s statues are small and hunched over because at her heart, she is small and old and weak. She lived the life as a mortal and was never meant to return to divinity. Now she sits in her gilded cage and watches as people she can’t help plead with her, and she cries as the mortals she cares for die and bleed in a war that isn’t for them. She offers what little she has left, and fuels the champion with her frail spirit. And you laugh at her. You yell at her for not giving enough and you go and speak poisoned words to your friends about how she isn’t trying. She weeps and gives all that she has, but it’s never enough for you, is it? Take your cowardly ways elsewhere. We want you not.

(Also, “Hylia swoops in and saves the day and Link doesn’t have to lift a finger” doesn’t exactly make for a compelling game, does it? You forget that the story is in service of the game, not the other way around. We’re trying to give Link reasons to run around and chop at grass. Hylia is a story device to get Link health and stamina. It’s not that deep)

(I recognize that saying “it’s not that deep” after typing a whole essay is a bit hypocritical, but I never claimed to be the paragon of morality)

[theredhoodedcryptid]

(MAJOR SPOILERS FOR GOTHAM KNIGHTS GAME, specifically the Labyrinth)

An analysis of the Labyrinth and the BatFam

(In other words this post is really long)

So, I was doing some research on the Labyrinth for my fic (Silent Hearts and Silent Knights) and I found something very interesting regarding each BatFam members experience from Gotham Knights.

I'm using Rubi's video compilation of characters as my reference, I played as Tim in my play through and it's exactly like this video's Tim so I'm going on the assumption that there are no other possible outcomes.

Here's my keynotes for those who don't want to watch the video.

(I would like to say that due to the fact it is a game, some things aren't concrete. Rubi just goes back and forth in certain areas to trigger stuff whereas I just went under things to continue on.)

Things that happen regardless of the character (I call this the Beginning Sequence):

Character wakes up and starts walking, making various little comments. (Anything notable will be put under said character)

Character runs into spikes on wall, dies and wakes up (If you duck under the spikes the character will not experience this)

(Female voice) “Inside of Gotham’s walls…”

(Male voice) ”Rule you one and all…”

Character enters the "Flame Room", a small puzzle requiring you find the right path out.

(Voice of the Court) “Give up, it would be.. So much easier”

Character immediately hits a dead end and turns around only to find a different path then before.

Character enters the "Rotating Spike Room", which is pretty self explanatory: three large spinning columns with an assortment of blades that the Character must find a way around.

Bruce's voice expresses disappointment in the Character. (I can't remember if at this point if it's same thing said for each Character, but the point is the same)

Character stumbles, clutching head as they approach the first room (This is something every character does entering a "Major Room" moving forward)

Now, this is where things get interesting because the order and experience is different.

Somethings I want to quickly point out that are the same for every character in this section, which is certain rooms I like to call predetermined sets (all have two passages, left and right, but from my understanding they lead to the same thing):

Table Room: room is a half circle table with three dead court members wearing suits, candles and scrolls on the table, it's covered with spiderwebs and blood appears to be on the floor, and two statues behind them. A moth is floating around one of the candles. Laughter starts when character enters the room

Phonograph Room: room has two green armchairs with a table in between them and a floor lamp behind the left chair, a red circular rug with the Court logo in gold is under all this. On the small side table is a phonograph that plays old distorted instrumental music. The music echoes and distorts even more as you walk away (I wasn't paying to close attention but I think the song is different for each character, or at least a different part of the same song is played.)

Computer Room: room is bathed in red light. Its a rather large computer/monitor set up, reminiscent to the set up in the Belfry and the tech hums, images of Court members with a red filter. A dead Alfred sits in a chair near the set up. After examining the body it disappears in a puff of smoke and ash.

Here is each character's experience:

Jason:

Jason need’s a moment once he stands up before letting go of the marble slab (they all wake up on), also mentions it smells but never can identify what it is.

After the beginning sequence he enters the Table Room.

After leaving the Table Room he had a weird vision of himself dropping from the void ceiling floating towards himself in the air choking, then floats back and then up into the void ceiling.

Enters the Phonograph Room, after leaving the room Bruce's voice says something rather mean to him (I can't remember anything Bruce said to each of them, but it wasn't nice. Ya know, the whole point of this place)

Enters the Computer Room. After leaving the room he has a vision of himself “teleporting” around, pointing his hand at his head, maybe a gun?  Disappears into smoke and ash when walked through.

Enters a room bathed in green, sees a Lazarus pit, sees himself in normal clothes rise out of it with a crowbar which he raises above his head and starts attacking Batman. Court Members actively encourage him to kill stating they are the same, Real Jason says they're not. Vision characters disappear but the pit stays.

Barbra:

After the beginning sequence enters the Phonograph Room.

After leaving the room sees herself (maybe wearing a court mask) randomly teleporting towards herself, tilting head creepily before disappearing.

Enters Computer Room.

After leaving the room Bruce's voice says mean things.

Next she enters a room where Bruce’s grave is open, bats fly out of it and his voice calls out that he needs Batgirl for help.

After exciting this room she see's Batman's body get dragged around a corner, but we never see who does it.

Bruce's voice says some more mean things.

She stumbles into Gordon’s old office, Gordon complains about Batgirl. There’s a recording of Gordon’s death on the table, Babs feels guilty for not being there.

Dick:

After the beginning sequence he enters the Phonograph Room.

After leaving this room he see’s himself just fall out of the void, like his parents. His vision body is very dead and disappears when walked through/by.

Immediately after there’s the broken Bat signal, GCPD officers crying out that the city is falling and wonder where Batman is.

He then enters the Table Room.

After leaving the room he see’s a vision of himself being creepy/ kinda teleporting around, like Babs.

Stumbles into the next room, see’s his dead parents at the circus. Interestingly when they disappear they leave behind Court masks (maybe this refers to Dick’s own hidden ties to the Court)

Tim:

Tim is the only one straight up fall after waking up and trying to stand up, he is also the only one to explicitly state that is smells like death.

After the beginning sequence he enters the Table Room.

First vision is also of him creepily teleporting around, but unlike Dick and Babs, his version walks past him then dissolves. D and B’s versions forced them to walk through their visions. T's forced itself through him.

He then Enters the Computer Room.

After leaving the room he has the same Bat-signal vision as Dick.

Vision of himself kinda twitching and glitching on the floor before becoming limp and disappearing.

Enters the next room where the Robin suit is an a locker covered in cobwebs and "Wanted: looking for new Robin" posters. Bruce's voice is stating that he wants a Robin that's anyone other then Tim.

(I think I forgot it in a couple places, but every character experiences Bruce saying mean things)

And lastly every Character after their last vision sees Bruce stumble around a corner and disappear before starting the leaving the labyrinth sequence, which is the same for all of them.

So, here's my interpretations for all this. Specifically with how the Court plays on each of their fears:

Babs: When she became too injured to be Batgirl and became Oracle. They play on her fears about how she couldn't be there, even though it's not her fault. Mainly focusing on her dad.

Dick: Falling, literally. Failing both his parents and Bruce.

Tim: His fears about what Bruce thinks of him, about his place as Robin and his place in the family.

Jason: Here's where it's really interesting, Jason is the only one to have only one extra "room/vision" aside from the base ones they all experience. The Court tries once to hurt him with the Pit, and Jason firmly says that he's not that anymore. The court no longer tries after that. The others try to fight anything said, but rather weakly and they half believe it. Not Jason, he firmly says no. It's like after his death his fears aren't something the Court can understand or replicate.

I think it's also interesting how Tim differs from the others in some of the basic interactions, which I've already stated.

Anyways, it's rather late the time I'm writing this, but I thought it was really interesting. The developers could have stuck with the same base with only minor changes for each character, but they went pretty far out. It's one of the things that makes me love this game.

[gobbogoo]

Fallout 4: Great Ideas, TERRIBLE Teamwork

Ever since Fallout 4 released, I've been unable to ignore its gaping narrative flaws. I can forget bad writing, but missed opportunities? Those cling to my brain like tumours.

If you look closely, you'll realize Fallout 4's writers weren't BAD, they just failed to coordinate to a frankly spectacular degree.

To start off small, you've got stuff like Kelogg's ghost speaking through Nick Valentine, only to then never show up again. This is especially bizarre when so much time is spent exploring his character AFTER you've killed him. One writer put a LOT of effort into ensuring we quite literally know Kelogg better than our own son... only for others to not follow up on that AT ALL.

Now, let's look at The Institute. HEAPS of neat ideas, there:

You've got the existential/ethical quandary of Bladerunner androids, the thrill of hunting down a nebulous organization with eyes everywhere, the intrigue of a secret robot doppelgänger conspiracy! Then you finally get there, and your OWN SON greets you! He shows you this clean utopia of human advancement that perfectly contrasts the horrible wasteland above, and makes you wonder if the Institute really IS the best hope for humanity...

...and THEN someone goes "oh also we've been turning people into Super Mutants and releasing them onto the surface for reasons that ARE NEVER EXPLAINED!"

Those Bladerunner androids that could be used to pose all sorts of existential/ethical quandaries? Nah they're basically just enslaved humans. That doppelgänger conspiracy that necessitated the creation of androids? Completely irrelevant. Also they're isolationists who want to leave the surface alone, despite that contradicting literally everything they've been doing.

Again, you can see the EXACT division between different writers here. One person was trying to create an evil faction like the Legion or Enclave, another was trying to create a neutral, morally grey faction like Mr. House. The plot is caught between these warring visions and is subsequently shot to death in the confusion.

And all I can do is sit there and imagine what could've been.

[foodfightnovelization]

Foodfight! The (OFFICIAL) Video Game

Yes, you read the title right! No it's not the fangame I made a couple months ago, this is the real deal, the whole enchilada, the ACTUAL Foodfight! tie-in game! Shortly after ROTTEN: Behind The Foodfight was released, its creator Ziggy, myself, and everyone else in the Foodfight! community thought we'd found everything there was left to find. After all, we'd uncovered the workprint, the novelization, almost all the original footage, Ziggy had interviewed countless people who worked on the movie, some character models had even been found...so that was it, right? But as I hinted at in my last few posts, the Foodfight! story wasn't quite over yet.

Reese, a friend of Ziggy's, had reached out to one of the developers involved in the Foodfight! tie-in game that was set to be released alongside the movie, and shortly after ROTTEN came out, Ziggy also managed to get in touch with them. One thing led to another and we were sent a HUGE 10GB folder of art, documents, models, and footage related to the game. What you see above is a concept submission trailer created to show off the game and what it'd look like, similar to the pitch reel created for the movie itself. Needless to say, this blew our minds! If you've read my previous post on the subject, you'll know that up until now the only thing anyone had EVER seen of this game was a few seconds of grainy footage from E3 2006. To go from that to a whole stockpile of material from its development was INCREDIBLE! To learn more about how this found its way into our hands, I'll direct you to a blog post from Ziggy himself, explaining a little more about the game's developers (and relaying a truly hilarious story about Larry Kasanoff)

However, I want to talk more about the INCREDIBLE plethora of material included in the folder that was shared with us. Ziggy uploaded everything he was sent to archive.org, so I'll link it below if you'd like to peruse the files yourself, but keep reading if you want to know more about what's included!

Just to start off with, the footage from the above concept trailer and the assorted screenshots- doesn't it just look awesome? It's way more visually appealing than the finished movie ended up looking, for one thing, and it's seemingly inspired more by the early pre-motion capture footage than anything that came later on. It's also just mindblowing to finally see all this, to suddenly go from knowing basically nothing about the game to knowing so much about it! And best of all...doesn't this just look EXACTLY like a movie tie-in game from the mid 2000s? I mean, that shouldn't be too surprising, that's exactly what it is, but tie-in games of that era had a very specific look and feel and this just takes me right back to that. Remember the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory game where you're racing around on a trashcan lid, the Spider-Man game where you're running around Oscorp avoiding security robots, or the Incredibles game where you're rushing through a burning building fighting guys with flamethrowers? Doesn't this just look EXACTLY like one of those?

And you might be thinking "it's too bad we only have a few minutes of footage and some screenshots, I wish we could know even more about what the game would've been like". Well, your wish just came true! Buried deep in the files is a copy of the game's design documents, telling us EXACTLY how each level would've played out! (If you're struggling to find it, it's in AUDIO> Final Drop> FF> Docs) So not only do we get to see a ton of what the game would've looked like, we also get to see how the whole thing would've come together, with 26 action-packed levels consisting of a variety of different gameplay types. Looking at several other files, it seems like the number of levels may have been cut down to 15 later in development, but hey, it's fairly common for design docs to be more complex than the finished game. Regardless, reading about everything they had planned...this really is the ultimate stereotypical tie-in game. I mean, just look at some of these level descriptions! Isn't this every movie-based game you've ever played, all rolled into one? You can bet your boxtop if it had made it all the way through development, it'd easily have the honor of being one of the few tie-in games BETTER than the movie it was based off, although considering how the finished film turned out maybe that's not saying much.

Based on what the developers said in the article linked above, it's unclear exactly how much of the game was finished before it was cancelled, and unfortunately it's incredibly unlikely they'll ever be able to compile a build together to send our way. However, there's just SO much included in this folder it's hard to complain. Not only do we get basically a complete picture of how the game would've come together from all the documents, screenshots, audio, cutscenes and footage included, there are all kinds of additional files that are both interesting and incredibly useful.

Not only are there models and environments from the game itself (unfortunately the only character model included seems to be Dex), there are also models of the ENTIRE CAST taken directly from the earlier version of the movie! Every main character is here, from Dex to Sunshine to Mr Leonard, as well as a bunch of other models such as Dan's plane and cockpit. This is HUGE, and I can't wait to see what talented artists will do with all these resources. At the time I'm writing this, someone already ported several of the models into SFM (Source Filmmaker) and another made several animations in Blender!

I'm sure even more will happen soon, but right now this is pretty incredible. Who thought this would EVER happen? That one day we'd have models of every main character, a complete workprint of the movie from 2005, a tie-in novelization, footage of the long-sought after videogame, and so, so much more. In the span of less than a year, Foodfight! went from some of the most obscure lost media of all time to some of the most well-documented lost media of all time. We have so much there's no way I'd ever even be able to discuss it all, that's how far we've come in the past few months.

Seriously, I've barely even scratched the surface of what's in this folder. There are 3D cutscenes from the game, 2D cutscenes, concept art for the planned toy line, footage of prototypes of those toys in action, MORE gameplay footage, previously unseen storyboards not included in the workprint, raw audio of Charlie Sheen's voice sessions from the movie, tons of songs from the game, the entire score from the movie, and that's STILL not everything! I mean, holy chips! I STRONGLY encourage you to download the folder for yourself and take a look...maybe you'll even find something I haven't yet?

I really think that with this folder now out in the public, this is as much closure on Foodfight! as we'll ever get. I know I always say that and then there's some amazing discovery a few months later, but this is just such a huge smorgasbord of material that I don't even think we can count Foodfight! as lost media anymore...okay, we haven't found absolutely everything so it's partially found media at best, but could you really ask for more than all this? We have countless models from the movie, design docs and footage from the planned tie-in game, early drafts of the script, we know EXACTLY what the movie and game were going to be like before everything collapsed... now, if you're so inclined you can take all that and make something out of all of it, but me? I'm pretty satisfied just having the knowledge. Knowing what could've been before it all fell apart, getting to see so much I never thought I'd get a chance to see... right now, I'd say my Foodfight! cravings have been satiated. Unless another monumental discovery is unearthed anytime soon (at this point I wouldn't be surprised), I think there's really not much more to say. If nothing comes up in a month or two, I'll make a post showing off my personal collection of Foodfight! merchandise, an epilogue to the past year I've spent obsessing over this movie. In the meantime, I hope you all enjoy the absolute treasure trove of Foodfight! material that's been discovered! Dig through it all! Make something out of it! There's so much in these files, you could create your OWN Foodfight!, with blackjack and hookers!

[imalison]

Okay, so can we talk about No Good Noelle for a second. This game wasn't explicit or detailed as Tcoaal, obviously, but I feel like its endings were headed in a similar direction

We were given two choices, which led us to two contrasting endings.

Pretty similar to the decay and burial route.

In No Good Noelle

With the Ivy Route

If we choose to stay with her "best friend," no progress will be made in her life. She'll continue living in her shadows, working under her to make snowballs. Nothings new

She's literally good for nothing and remains the same. The entire narrative is basically what the title was all about.

She was given a choice

She could've gone with Yule

She could've made a change

But she chose to remain the same

Now, if we compare it with the Coffin of Andy and Leyley

There are two branches for this one as well. One will lead us to a brighter ending with questionable choices, and the other one will bring a closure to the story.

The coffin of Andy and Leyley

Basically them dying together

Again, nothing is new. It was already known from the start. They were simply following the title in a straight line.

It's like one step forward two steps behind

Basically, it brings us to the light that whatever we did in the game just gets thrown to waste in the end.

The progress we could've made with those little teasing moments and a hint of a new future gets shunned away, which is depressing

So, what I'm trying to say is that we are either basically doing something for a change or making zero progress what so ever

Either way, we got a glimpse of their story

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that there's a wrong choice.

One is just perfectly depicting their titles.

Noelle really proving that she's a no-good noelle,

and the decay ending really closing the tale of The coffin of andy and leyley

But the burial and yule route, both of them are chaotic, both of them emphasis on exploring another outcome

This time, all the interactions didn't go to waste

The choices led up to a change in the cycle. We broke out of it, and this new ending is progress in its twisted way.

It proves the title wrong, at least in some way

So now we can look at it from a metaphorical perspective

Noelle is still the same. She still can't make highly professional snowflakes, but when she teamed up with yule, she got out of the miserable life she was in. She refused to succumb under her mother or her best friend.

She refused to follow the regulations and cheat. She chose to be deceitful instead

Pretty similar to Ashley and Andrew not following the regulations of the society and burying their old selves figuratively.

This goes for the questionable route

Cause this is them growing as their own person instead of trying to fit in and following what's supposed to be right.

Denoting that the twisted path is actually the happiest one for the characters

—------------------—

Also, it's mind-blowing how well the titles fit both the routes. No good, noelle can also denote that she's bad. A warning sign that she might not be as nice as she seems after all. 'Oh, she is up to no good.' The same can apply for The coffin of andy and leyley, like I mentioned before.

Honestly, it's genius work.

[cintax3rror]

Good Morning Tumblr

I haven't done an analysis post in a little bit but I have gotten into Mystic Messenger again recently, now that I finally have enough to do 707's route, I'm late, I know...

This analysis may have already been realized by people years ago BUT I DONT CARE I LOVE SEVEN AND WOULD LIKE TO SHARE MY THOUGHTS WITH THE CLASS ok ty and ofc

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SPOILERS BELOW FOR 707'S ROUTE IF YOU'RE LATE LIKE ME >_0

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So this is about 707's robot dog that spits fire,

This dog was made by Seven because he simply couldn't focus, this dog is brought up again in the chat below.

Seven has feelings for MC by this point, he built this robot to distract himself from these feelings, love had been foreign to him up until this point. He doesn't like it and wants to push it away. That being said however, he only doesn't like it because he CAN'T be in love. While he would LIKE to have a life where he could be in love... he can't because of his job as a hacker who deals with a lot of dangerous situations, if he fell in love it wouldn't just be him that's in jeopardy, his love would be too. Furthermore, now that he's in love with MC, he's refusing it to not have her in harm's way. Even though he refuses to talk about his feelings, straight up denying it, he still doesn't hide his feelings totally. When I say that it's pretty obvious like duh Cintax there's context clues everywhere that he likes MC I get that but what I mean is I think he QUITE LITERALLY built his feelings. Remember that robot dog? It's a cute little thing but it's angry and spitting out fire. I may be heavily reaching here from this point on but stick with me, this dog, I think, is a manifestation of Seven right now. More specifically, his feelings. The dog is supposed to be a representation of how his feelings have made him the complete opposite of how he normally acts. Seven likes cats, no, that's an understatement, he LOVES cats. But the choice to make him build a dog instead speaks more volume to me... why would a cat obsessed person... build a dog instead? I know he doesn't HATE dogs (I think) but it's still a weird choice, why would the devs make him build a dog instead of a cat? If he wants to distract himself wouldn't he want to do that by building something he LOVES? Dogs have been seen as the complete opposite of cats for years before this one, as this is apparent, Seven is acting the complete opposite of himself BECAUSE of his feelings for MC. This dog is him, the complete opposite of himself who is a cat lover, he's completely lost because of his feelings and he hates it. The dog is spitting out fire, looking furious, he hates the fact he's in love and is in such a state of confusion and denial. He's so confused why he keeps worrying about her, why he keeps thinking about her, why he wants to hear her voice.

This kind of concept, he wants to enjoy it so much but because of his job he feels he can't indulge. Cutting back to the chatroom, Yoosung says, "Don't throw away the robot..." the reason as to why Yoosung cares about the dog so much is a bit blurry but I can read this as Yoosung saying "Don't throw away your feelings..." if we lean more into the assumption that this dog is a manifestation of Seven's feelings. This puts a whole new perspective. Yoosung doesn't want Seven to turn or toss away his feelings, he wants the opposite. Previously, I don't have screenshots for this one but when this dog is first brought up, some group members talk about how Seven should give MC the dog. And going with the metaphor I'm running with, this could be seen as a metaphor of Seven giving all his feelings to MC, messy part and all, it also shows the fire with how dangerous he is, part of his true self, almost nothing like how he was before due to his hatred towards his own heart.

Don't throw away your feelings Seven, though it feels like you have to.

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Idk if this is gonna be brought up later I JUST got done with day 8 as I finish writing this... help me. Who knew you needed a heart made out of netherite to survive this damn route I'M IN SHAMBLES OVER HERE. I KNEW THERE WAS MORE TO HIM BUT ???????????

Anyway, if you really read allat,, thank you, you're cool >_0

To patch the hole, here's some silly cats and until next time >_0!!

[thecollectivefixation]

POPPY PLAYTIME chapter 3 analysis… PART 2

ALRIGHT IT'S QUEEN AGAIN. I know, I know... IM STILL NOT DONE WITH POPPY PLAYTIME. But guys... I hadn't covered everything in the last post and obviously there are still many questions left unanswered. I'm going to see where these questions go and what answers I might be able to come up with. But hey, enjoy the ride! 😘💪

__

So first off, I didn't talk about the reversed audio that appeared during the hallway sequence after going into 'home sweet home.’ 😤😤😩THE ONLY REASON i didn't, was because I didn't hear it previously in the gameplay I was watching. However, I was just searching around other peoples gameplays and I heard this audio and so I decided to find out what it actually says.

[hallway sequence during ‘Home Sweet Home’]

The audio reveals: “I find your presence intrusive. After all this time you return, you come in here and you kill and murder, you pillage and destroy! Your presence was demanded 10 years ago and you didn't show up! 8/8/1995, you were supposed to be here. Why weren't you here? You missed the event, you missed the meeting, you missed the party! You have no right to be here. 8/8/1995."

So this confirms that ‘the hour of joy' did happen on the 8/8/1995 and that the game is placed 10 years after. Also what may confirm that we, as the protagonist came back because of guilt, is the writing on the floor. While walking through the halls as the reversed audio plays, what can be seen on the floor is the words: 'Guilt Haunts You’ These words also appear on other places such as walls.

[GUILT HAUNTS YOU]

Before this sequence we walked into red gas that seemingly makes us either hallucinate or fall into a gas-induced sleep. But either way Catnap can somehow control the people who inhale this gas, and perhaps the hallucinations they have from it. This can be proved by Catnap speaking through the radios and appearing for split seconds to stalk the protagonist.

[Walking into the gas-filled room]

Furthermore, it's interesting how the reversed audio was so accusatory. This further expands on the theory that the protagonist is an important figure in Playtime co. The experiments, or seemingly just Catnap wanted us there, 'demanded our presence' to be there.

Also you may be wondering who was speaking on the reversed audio. I believe Catnap was the one speaking, this is the most likely answer since during one of the tapes Catnap said a line and the voice he had was the same exact voice that was in the reversed audio. There are other theories but l'm sure it was Catnap speaking since he could have also been the one telling us "Don't move. Don't move an inch” and “Get up” during the end of the sequence as he was watching/stalking us the whole time.

Now, another question that we may be thinking about is, what happened to all the children in the Play-care orphanage during 'The Hour of Joy'? Now we know that many of the kids were used as test subjects for the experiments in order to find the secret to immortality or resurrect people who had passed away- Elliot Ludwigs child, for example. But there wasn't just a couple children living in the orphanage, there had to be lots more that hadn't been used for experiments yet.

[past children running through halls]

We know from Miss Delights conversation with Catnap the he locked the children away somewhere so Miss Delight couldn't get to them, and all the employees died. But Catnap said the children were safe, so what happened to them? The answer to this is that... We don't know yet! There are many, many theories out there and some say that perhaps they all got eaten, had already been turned into toys or are probably still alive out there, somewhere...

We have to assume that if they were still alive, the children didn't leave the factory because i mean, it should be obvious to the outside world if dozens of orphans came out from the ground and suddenly rejoined society. 😭 We know that there was a food shortage years after the events of ‘The Hour of Joy’ so it's hard to fully assume the children could have survived ten years in the factory, but really, who knows?

Obviously they didn't intend to kill the children, since Catnap wouldn't have locked the children away from Miss Delight. There's also another theory that says the prototype was using the poppy flowers to continue the experiments with the remaining kids, to turn itself human again. BUT! We won't be finding out until possibly the next chapter.

[Playcare underground orphanage]

About Miss Delight and the lore surrounding her, I don't really know a lot other than her conversation with Catnap from the tape and that she is one of the worst of the monster murders that occurred during ‘The Hour of Joy’. However I have read around that she was once a kind and sweet teacher, but when ‘The Hour of Joy' happened, her and her sisters were locked in a room by Catnap.

[miss delight]

Notes found in the game during the school section reveal that Miss Delight slowly succumbed to madness and went insane. She formed a makeshift weapon and called it Barb, even considering it as a living person later on (which is crazy 🙀). According to the notes scattered around in the school, being locked in the school for so long after ‘The Hour of Joy’ and being singled out by the other teachers to die first caused Miss Delight to go as far as cannibalising the rest of the teachers/her sisters, stemming from her desperation to survive.

Her desperation would soon develop into a twisted, sick obsession for bloodshed. Had Catnap not hidden the children from Miss Delight, she would have killed them all as well. 😔☝️

I know there are so many more secrets and questions needed to be answered but that's all I have for today. Poppy Playtime chapter 3 has shined new light on so many new possibilities and now that so much has been revealed, I'm sure that we will be able to come to a conclusion soon. Thanks all for listening, see you — IN THE NEXT CHAPTER!!!!!

— Queen.

[angelmeateater]

So I've been thinking back to, how, in Airdof's interview with Wendigoon he mentioned how he often gets emails from people, both atheist and Christian, sort of finding this amusing, marveling at how the game can be enjoyed by people with such different views. I think this really speaks volumes to the quality of the games writing and ideas, and I'd say there's definitely merit in the idea that Faith is a criticism of Christianity whilst also being in support of it. But really I think the through line between the atheist and religious interpretation that both sides of the interpretations often miss, and that is the fact that above all else Faith IS a criticism of the church whether that's intentional or not.

John's been kicked out by the Vatican for fucks sake and yet he spends the entirety of the game running round as a priest, let's reiterate that. John is not LEGALLY a priest, yet he decided to be one anyway because on some level the message of the game (as I have talked about in my previous rambling) is about how no one can tell you what to believe and by extension of that, there is no legal entity that can tell you how close to God you are.