#the smoke room vn spoilers

[fullsaw]

Echo VN spoilers -

Ghosts don't exactly exist in the echo universe but remants of those who died can come back and become congealed with the agony and loss that already exists in the area

When flynn "talks" to "sydney" what he is really talking to is the leftovers of what sydney was, his hopes and aspirations being used as a conduit for the town itself to reel flynn in and use his body as the perfect vessel

When flynn becomes that vessel, hes no longer flynn: hes samuel, sydney, flynn and all of those who died in any previous hysteria

When "sam" manipulates chase its not sam, but instead a mix of sam and whatever he's become posthumously when he became part of the town itself

Even in death the residents cannot escape the cycle and are forever immortalized as literal echos of what they once were

[mellowmaidenhairs]

[h-worksrambles]

Important prediction for The Smoke Room:

Because Howly wrote the prologue and did the initial character concepts, William is technically a member of the ‘Howly Musclegut Boyfriend Squad’. As such, it is mandated that he will eat shit in every plot relevant fight.

[echoproject]

fade away without a trace

[ark-barkness]

⚠️ Mid Spoilers for Murdoch's route ahead ⚠️

Now let's talk about my favorite (?) fox in VNs, Murdoch Byrnes!

He's so precious, I can't 😭

[spicylavender]

i just know I'm gonna get spoilers for the end of Nik's route before I pick tsr back up, I'm sadly resigned to it. Happened to basically every other important beat from what I can tell cause people on Twitter and TikTok can't spoil tag for shit. I'm still gonna wait for it to be complete before I download any new builds but I just know I'm gonna refresh into like, a gore bad end cg one day and it's gonna absolutely ruin my week lmao

[kygerbearr]

can i get some information?

in hokkaido japan there's these rockets that hang from poles to show you where the road is when it snows over (due to the high elevation there)

also in arizona its illegal for a business to deny any person water because of how hot it is there. they also opted out of daylight savings time and all of america could also do that if they wanted, its just that every other state votes to keep it for some reason.

canada having bagged milk is actually only for the eastern side of canada. the western side of it not as much. also the backs of signs in british columbia are painted green

on google maps coverage of curacao, if you look down at the car there's a sticker on some of the roof rack on the car. this is consistent across curacao's google map coverage

buzz lightyear and woody are actually in the files in the original ps2 version of kingdom hearts 2 and a model for the world on the gummi ship menu is in some screenshots of early kh1 gameplay suggesting they intended on including toy story as a playable world from the very start i stole this image from reddit

polar bears are to my knowledge the only ursidae that actively hunt humans and are also the only carnivorous bears. at least i think. dont fact check it just trust me on this one

in gex 3 deep cover gecko for ps1 and n64, in the 3rd level Tut TV there's a sign on the wall that says "ankh if you're corny" but there's also an unused texture that says horny instead of corny this is the only image i have of it sorry that its small

thomas edison in fate grand order is a furry lion man who is every single president of the united states of america (past, present and future) built into one person. also his super move is proving God doesn't exist and he looks like this

this photo of the sun photoshopped into the background of a place is in the philippines and you can tell because of the color of the sattellite dish as well as the ads for cigarettes

thyis is a grizzly bear you can tell because hes brown. also they only really exist in alaska/canada/montana/wyoming-ish

oh yeah also tsela and yiska from the smoke room vn are names that are words in navajo. not exactly directly translateable as Diné Bizaad, the language of the navajo, essentially operates in "pictures". describing things and such. tsela can be translated to the best of my ability as "like stone"

while yiska essentially carries the message of "the night has passed" (used in both the word for Tomorrow and Saturday)

cynthia's last name, tsosie, essentially means "slender". I cannot provide an excerpt from my navajo-english dictionary since it's not in there, but it's also from 1958 and so its probably a little bit incomplete. the fact that she uses the name cynthia, a non-navajo name, reflects her decision to leave the reservation.

the name Begay is also a real life navajo surname that is an anglicization of biye', which means his/her son. i wish i could speak more on the accuracies within TSR's clifford route regarding navajo culture and history but that would be spoilers. all i will say is that the soap thing was a very real thing that was commonplace

speaking of clifford, his last name Tibbits could be a reference to Howard Clinton Tibbitts, a photographer who was well known for his photographs along the sites of the southern pacific railway which encompassed Arizona and into Apache and Puebloan territories. and yes, even Utah. rather telling

anyways that is an amount of information

[crowroboros]

samuel ayers analimean analysis

I'm going to hold off on going too in-depth with Sam cause I really want to wait until TSR has a bit more content in all of its routes, just so I can really take a look at his whole character arc across the VN. I'm also not caught up with the most recent updates, so I'm not the most familiar with where his character stands currently in Nik's route (which the past few updates has been focused on from what I've heard). Spoilers for both The Smoke Room and Echo.

Samuel Ayers I find very interesting. Compared to Chase or Cameron—both of whom express a dislike of religion and a distaste for letting it influence how they live their lives— Sam really does live and die by his beliefs. There are so many times where we hear Sam's monologue in which he talks down to himself as if he himself is "tarnished" or "sinful". I do think part of this is a result from him murdering Jack in the mines as one of the first things he convinces himself of is that Satan is with him in the mines and is ready to drag him to hell for killing the guy. Now, I'm not religious nor am I familiar with the Christian God so I cannot and will not comment on the objectiveness of Sam's views but it's clear that Sam sees the Christian God as something to be feared. It creates an interesting dynamic in which Sam often grapples with his actions and sexuality and other things deemed "sinful" while also being a very self-serving person. His motivations throughout TSR aren't tied to anyone but himself, and what he agrees to in every route is ultimately focused on getting himself far away from Echo. That's the whole reason he went into sex work in the first place, to get money to head further westward (after failing in the mines). And with being gay being heavily stigmatized and outright dangerous, especially in a very Christian area, it adds yet another layer of self-loathing to Sam. Though in terms of sexuality, he doesn't seem to dislike himself due to his same-sex attraction but rather due to his work. I don't ever remember him being ashamed of being into men or anything, though he often refers to himself "whore" in a derogatory way. Overall, in terms of religion, Sam seems so wary towards his own beliefs and the idea of a God. With him both wanting to achieve his own happiness and goals but being terrified—if not outright convinced—that what awaits him is eternal damnation.

Sort of related to that is the way Sam almost justifies the way he seems to be trapped in Echo as if it is something he deserves. He desperately wants to get the hell away from Echo and his old life, to the point of being openly bitter and melancholic when thinking about the town and his life up to that point, and yet he really does seem to think that it is just how things are meant to be for him. It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy when taking Echo into consideration. In Echo's timeline, he doesn't leave the town and dies there slowly and painfully. And then the Samulation lives on in Echo for decades after that, continuing the town's cyclical nature. I think that this is in part due to Sam's aforementioned views on himself in the context of his religious beliefs. With how much he sees himself as "sinful" it makes sense that he'd justify the shitty things that happen to him as part of some "divine punishment". Speaking of the Samulation. I think it's a pretty good look into Sam's bitterness towards the world and the situation he finds himself in. Cause it does reflect a lot of Sam's personality—his sarcastic humor, his aloofness, the bitterness I mentioned—but it lacks a lot of what makes Sam nuanced. Sam is all those things, yes, but he is also rather accommodating and agreeable as well. Sam has this almost naive outlook and tends to romanticize things he hopes for. That's part of why he fell for Jack's scheme so easily and so quickly. But the Samulation lacks that. It has his memories, but it isn't very multi-faceted. This part is more of a theory than an analysis but I think it manifested like that due to the circumstances of Sam's death: Mangled and crushed under the weight of Mr. Bronson's van in a town that he hates. What a shitty way to die. If somehow, through the supernatural nature of the town, a simulation of Sam managed to live on after his death, it makes the most sense to me that it would mostly take the form of his mind in his last moments. All of the other aspects of Sam's personality wouldn't be present while he dies in such an agonizing way, but his anger and bitterness towards the world—towards Echo—probably would. Again though, just an idea. It isn't confirmed. I just wondered why the Samulation was both so similar to Sam yet much more aggressive and spiteful than the Sam we see. That could be why.

I'm going to stop this post here. Again, TSR isn't finished yet so I don't want to go too deep into Sam's character cause his development isn't done yet. So his relationship with other characters and the overall narrative and how it all shapes him will have to wait. I definitely will make a part 2 to this in the future cause this guy has a lot going for him.

[chaoschenoo]

Queer Itch.io VN List

So IDK when I'll be able to post art again so here's another bit of content. Queer visual novels from itch.io. Not all of these are itch exclusive so you steam only? Feel free to check. Oh these will be 18+. Four things going in; 1.) Not all of these are finished. I'll be breaking it up between finished and unfinished.

2.) A lot of them are furry because the furry VN and queer VN venn diagram is a pair of nested circles.

3.) Spoilers, will be light but they will exists.

4.) Mostly MLM because that's the place I tend to live.

Coming Out On Top: 5/10

Starting with Coming Out on Top because it's the most average of the list and the quinessential baby gay VN. It's cute, fun, funny, sexy and has the depth of a brook at best. Light fun but has a couple of issues one with stereotypes, the other with power dynamics it adamantly doesn't want to think about because sexy.

Nekojishi: 6/10

Nekojishi is a bit more interesting than Coming Out on Top. Has more depth by and large but is also more fun than deep. Cute characters and while I cannot speak to cultural fidelity the husbandos are all in front of an interesting situational backdrop.

Full Service: 5/10

Similar to COoT, hot guys, sexy CGs, fun and silly moments with big personalities for the husbandos. But doesn't really explore the conflict beyond having something to spice up the romance, tempted to dock points for an infuriating mascot character.

Human Cargo: 6/10

Has a bit more going on between the ears than the baseline but the plot is still more a vehicle for the husbandos. Hot CGs, very cute, a good bit of soft moments and the romance feels at least a bit like an earned climax to the relationship.

In Case of Emergency: 8/10

So this is where we've broken the 'plot as car for husbandos' glass cieling. This is one that definitely has something more going on than date hotties. I dock a little bit of points for it being a bit hard to parse towards the end as to how interactions gets a good ending. BUT gets points for it being the start of the relationship. It feels like the MC matters to the route but not like he 'fixes' their problems. They're all on the road to a better place. Be warned a bittersweet game.

Adastra: 9/10

So I did play Echo first which makes me a bit of an oddity apparently. I think that was a part of the reason the emotions of Adastra didn't hit me quite as hard. Like I was expecting the other shoe to drop. Also since I was waiting for that I also spent much of the early game frustrated by 'Marco's' choices. That said Amicus is everything the Echo fandom wishes Leo was.

Arches: 8/10

Arches is going here before Echo for a reason despite being a nominal sequel, but also... I have so many mixed feelings here. It's an objectively good story, it makes me feel things. It's also REALLY depressing and I feel genuinely conflicted about if it's a very good or very bad representation of schizophrenia.

Echo: 10/10

Yeah I know it's the bloody posterchild for the subversive dating sim, it's also why the spoiler tag exists. Because Echo sets up as a dating sim meant to evoke nostalgia and then devolves into a psychological horror on the level of one of the classic Silent Hill games. Also Leo is the Ur-Furry Thirst Trap and the fandom shows just how terrifyingly effective he is at it. Horror and tragedy in equal measure. And at the end so I can start the unfinished list with it's prequel...

UNFINISHED: There are enough here that are so solid despite still being updated that I needed to keep the list separate. They would get points docked for not being one but I didn't want that to reflect on how evocative they are.

The Smoke Room: 10/10

The prequel and chronologically first game in the Echo Trilogy. Set one hundred years before Echo shortly before the 1915 hysteria and following Sam, a sex worker at the local Saloon. It's charming, unnerving, tragic (especially given Echo ESPECIALLY WILLIAM'S route if you know you know.) All the husbandos and side characters are delightful and charming in their own ways.

Errant Kingdom: 6/10

I would award it a higher score but between being bought, unfinished, and having been slow to update I'm worried it's a dying project. I am more sympathetic to the slow updates because every chapter is functionally three chapters as each origin point is a genuinely different story even when they are at a converging point such as the speech, or merchant's party. The art is beautiful and the characters are fun and interesting. I truly hope it's still in development.

Andromeda Six: 7/10

Also in development hell but getting slightly more updates and has a valentines day side story that is complete. Sci-fi story about an amnesiac with a crew of mercs on the wrong side of a successful coup. There's twists and turns some obvious some much less so that make it engaging. Fun romance options for straight mlm and wlw.

Repeat: 9/10

Repeat OOZES charm, it's fun, has a shockingly fun core of mystery hilarious and engaging characters. Fun and sexy CGs. And a lot of heart that makes the tragic lows hit just that much harder.

Santa Lucia: 8/10

Fun with an Echo-esque mystery and horror subplot. Engaging and been following it for a while. That said I do dock a little points for the routes not intersecting with the main plot as well as Echo which inextricably links the two. Still overall a very good time.

Socially Awkward: 9/10

Hilarious and also incredibly charming, bonus points for all the characters being incredibly similar to actual people I know. It makes the whole friend group cast likeable and realistic. Even the trash goblins like John.

Soulcreek: 9/10

Interesting, intense, one of my favorite genres, good art, but has some frustrating moments early game similarly to Adastra. Ultimately not enough to really drag it and the mystery and setting is MORE than enough to keep you clicking.

Dawn Chorus: 10/10

Okay so this one's a bit of a cheat for me. It's only a 10/10 because it's my comfort VN. Dawn Chorus is like a warm bowl of soup or cup of tea on a cold rainy day. It's cute, sweet, and character driven with an undercurrent of tragedy for many of the characters that makes you hope for the best.

Shelter: 10/10

Remember how I said Soulcreek's my facorite genre? Well so is Shelter. Fantasy that's secretly a Post Apocalyptic sci-fi. It's got mystery, uses the Visual Novel format in unique and amazing ways. Also puns, SO FUCKING MANY PUNS. The world building Raus does here drove me to dip my toes into the setting with a fic it was that inspiring.

[fostersffff]

*sidles over* so.....heard you got upset over ZTD......I'm something of a ZTD hater myself....idk if you have the mental RAM to really get into it rn considering your current projects but I'd love to hear you complain about it at length

So, granted, it's been... seven years (!!!) since I played it, so I don't remember every minor detail, but I can absolutely talk at length about The Fucking Stupid Thing That Fucking Sucks And Makes (Almost) Everything Bad In Retrospect

(big dumb spoilers for ZTD beneath the break)

Of the (admittedly few) VNs I've read, nothing has deflated me harder than getting to the Transporter Room. 999 did a really good job of building up to the idea of morphogenetic fields, and VLR then took that concept and slowly ramped up the "power level" with shifting, so the player could accept greater feats of psuedoscientific nonsense. But that was the universe, and the suspension of disbelief held.

Then, in a single fucking gameplay segment, Uchikoshi went "oh yeah ayylmaos are real and they left an Actual Time Machine that works in the exact specific way that I need for the plot to happen the way I want it to". It cheapened basically everything else that happened afterwards, too! Like, Sigma and Diana realizing Phi is their daughter should be an emotional megaton, and it felt like that at the time, but there something gnawing at me that has since widened out into a cavern because the way they got there was so unbelievably convoluted and unearned.

Delta also sucks in a way that is... kind of what I was expecting? Living up to the hype from VLR was always going to be a long-shot, but then he actually gets lamer as time goes on. On the subject of "shit not being introduced", he gets a set of powers that is effectively parallel to shifting called MIND HACKING because there's literally no other way that he could manipulate the events of the game into happening the way they needed to, so he just got a set of powers that could manipulate the events of the game into happening the way he needed to.

Another thing that jumps out at me is that 80% of how Mira was handled was actually Really Fucking Good, but the last 20% sucks so hard it, again, almost invalidates all of it. Smoking hot uninterested super babe dating The Biggest Loser On Earth who seems (to the player) like she's just there to have big titties for the player to look at is then revealed to be a violent serial killer who can only feel when she's murdering, which is the actual reason she's so uninterested and "dating" the loser is so she can murder him later. But then it turns out (checking the wiki real quick to refresh my memory) that one of her first victims was the loser's mom, which actually tied into everything else that ever happened in the series. And then they have the audacity to throw in the happy epilogue where they're like "BABE WE'RE MARRIED NOW AND WE'RE GONNA GO USE THE (fucking) AYYLMAO TRANSPORTER TO CURE YOU OF YOUR BRAIN PROBLEMS". Not everyone needs to have a happily ever after ending!

Carlos sucks too, but in a benign way for the most part? Like, he's there because they needed three people on a team, and he's a Main Character Man, and that's about it. It's very funny that the Grand Finale is him pointing a gun at Delta, like this has been his story all along, when it should probably be Akane beating him to death.

Also, the last and most obvious thing, the "style" of ZTD was always an annoying point, because even though the character artwork is gorgeous, they instead decided that they had to use some of the stiffest looking 3D models "to appeal to Americans" or something (even though the American fanbase evidently was cool with character portraits considering they bought 999 and VLR in the first place), made worse by the fact that it's originally a 3DS game, so even uprezzing doesn't help all that much.

I think that's all I can remember, but seriously: more than anything else, fuck that Ayylmao Transporter.

[terris-mayweather]

Echo VN update #4;

Alright, so! As I predicted, things have quickly gone to "WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK!?!?!?!"

So I absolutely feel for Carl. I have that bad anxiety and I feel so AWFUL for him. Everyone telling him to get his life together, critiquing him and his every move, etc. Like I know EXACTLY how that feels. And then Chase's moment of self-realization when he realized he became exactly what Carl didn't like?

O o F

AND THEN. AND THEN!!! OMG they have to go to the lake immediately after Carl completely botched his interview? Yikes-a-roni.

So! I did really love the lake scene, for the most part. (If you know, you know.) I appreciate how well it was written, the awkwardness and Flynn being his usual *sigh* Flynn self... But then Chase just fucking goes out and reclaims it! That was boss as hell, and eventually, everyone starts to come around too. It was really sweet, serene for a moment. And it was nice to have a TASTE of what could be.

(Blatant spoilers starting now)

Then everything fucking hit the fan and omg. I can't BELIEVE the genius and simultaneous DEVASTATION of sleep paralysis underwater, IN THE LAKE OF ALL OF THEIR SHARED TRAUMA, WITH CHASE NEARLY DROWNING ON TOP, LITERALLY TRIGGERING AND DESTROYING EVERYONE THERE!!!! OH MY GOD. *Flops over dead* this is too much. These poor people. They'll never go near the lake again. Whatever semblance of friendship they had is absolutely SHATTERED now. Omg. I can't handle it. Is there a good end? I doubt it now, because immediately thereafter we deal with the fucking crawlspace. And the nightmare dungeon apparently just underneath it!!!

Like what the hell?? Thoughts are manifesting?! And if thoughts are manifesting then no offense Chase, but you're the last one I want down there with me. XD But geeze. Everything got insanely fuck-y immediately. What is this 'other power' that is harming James Hendrick's ability to manipulate the environment? Also I love how the history of Echo is directly impacting this moment now, and that we are at just the tip of the iceberg of the trauma of this place. I know this prequel exists called The Smoke Room and I suspect James Hendricks has a lot to do with that too. And it's just- damn. I love how complex and layered this story has gotten, and the real horror and other elements just started despite me being hours into it already.

Anyway. Um JENNA?! WTF ARE YOU DOING HERE?! And on that note, where the fuck is everyone else and are they okay? Last we saw it kinda' seemed like Flynn and Leo were trying to kill each other. And who the fuck knows what's going on with TJ? I'm pretty excited for TJ's route, honestly, because I have gotten almost NOTHING from him at this point. God there's just SO. MUCH. I CAN'T WAIT TO READ IT ALL!!! But god I'm scared... X-X a bloody knife as a title screen for Sunday is seriously concerning me. X-X

(help)

Oh but we had a nice and lovely kiss between Carl and Chase. That was nice at least! =)

*thousand yard stare as I realize I have JUST started this section of the story*

[justscaliethings]

Oh yeah I've been playing Echo recently. Finished Carl's and Leo's routes and Route 65. Thoughts so far (spoilers for what I've seen):

1. I can see why this game is pretty much the most influential furry VN. The writing is really good even in these less polished routes. Especially the descriptions of the nightmares and the horrors and whatnot.

2. So far I like TJ the most, he's cute. Maybe Flynn too. I know a vague description of what happens on TJ's route and I know it will fucking eviscerate me. Like Leo's route was pretty heavy and it would've been heavier if I'd actually been in a relationship before, but it didn't really hit as hard as TJ's route sounds like it will. I half want to save TJ's route for last so the game ends on the empty note people say it ends on but his route has some important shit to Flynn's apparently.

3. Seeing a lot of people wanting to be boyfriends with Leo feels surreal lol. Perhaps he's in a healthier place after his route but like wow

4. The fact that there's backer characters in this game feels weird. I don't know how much they had a hand in their characters in the game but Raven felt extremely forced in and Kudzu felt very selfshippy. Not that that's a bad thing, but them being in the actual game feels odd.

5. TJ's kinda packin here lol

Anyways, theories so far: Chase definitely killed Sydney and TJ knows and that's going to affect his route, I think the guy that possessed Chase was the protagonist of the smoke room since i recognized the names as being from there. No clue about Chase's doppelganger or the guy that prevented the group from leaving though – I think his doppelganger is the one that is causing the hallucinations but I have no idea how or why.

[h-worksrambles]

You ever think how funny it would be trying to explain the plot of Smoke Room to someone who’s never played it? Because you look at it and you’re like, ‘oh, ok. Big buff furry dudes in the Old West. I see how it is’. But then you look at our main cast and we have:

A rough-around-the-edges sheriff who’s trying to solve a murder, while also covering up another murder. All while grappling with his own internalised homophobia. Oh and also the mob is still stalking both him and his ex-wife because he pissed them off years ago. 

An introverted miner (and precious cinnamon roll) whose life consists of unionising against his garbage bosses while trying not to be murdered by horrifying monsters down in the mines. But at least his gay tiger friend is trying to seize the means of production. So that’s something.

A wealthy bicon who comes here to escape a controlling and restrictive life amongst the aristocracy, and discover his sexuality and gender identity...buuuut who gets a wake up call about the horrors of colonialism after going on the worst field trip ever.

An affable playboy who busies himself with finding out the truth behind the horrors of the town to distract himself from his emotionally abusive family. Also the photos are haunted apparently.

...And threading this all together is a traumatised local sex worker who’s stuck playing group therapist to these chuckleheads while trying to hide the fact that he just killled a man and juuust might have brought supernatural damnation down on everyone’s heads.

And this game isn’t even halfway DONE!

[pluralmedia]

I would like to nominate Chase and Flynn from Echo (VN).

Major Echo Spoilers follow

Chase is possessed by the ghost of the late Samuel Ayers. At different points he will interject his thoughts though Chase. (Represented by a font change.) Examples include telling Chase that he is a liar for suppressing his memories of what had happened to Sydney or calling Chase a monster when he framed Carl as the writer of the final note. When Chase is indecisive about something, Sam will influence Chase into picking something. There are a few times where he influences Chase into doing something he does not want to do. E.G. demanding that Chase does not accept his death by Brian's hands. (Both are represented by the player making a choice.) Sam claims to have possessed Chase since he was a kid.

Flynn is a bit weird as halfway though his route, Sam switches from possessing Chase to him. (The pov character switches to Flynn/stays with Sam) Flynn near the end of his route starts hallucinating. He walks aimlessly (encouraged by Sam) to the Smoke Room where inside he sees an adult version of his old friend Sydney. "Sydney" is revealed to be Sam and after a confrontation, Flynn escapes back to reality to find himself burning alive in the mines. Sam reminds Flynn that he is still there. After Flynn's body turns monstrous, both of them start traveling though time to observe every murder in the town of Echo as the monster the fandom calls the Socketman.

Yes, this counts! Thanks!

They have been added.

[eldritchdraaks]

Furry Visual Novel Hell

Quick context for this post, it is written by my boyfriend who has been through furry visual novel hell over the past few days. He has not been on tumblr in years, and has shitposts running through his brain daily. I’m posting this for him because his thoughts need to be made public. I love this freak.

SPOILERS FOR: Echo, Route 65, Arches, The Smoke Room, and The Burrows.

His mad ramblings begin now!

I have no idea why im typing this but I just cant let all this bounce around my head with my classes starting up in a day.

SO, after a few rather poor lifestyle choices I stayed up watching videos of furry visual novels. This little rabbit hole led me down to a familiar visual novel by the name of Echo. I’ve heard of it through a video talking about the film everything everywhere all at once. The only other form of context I had with Echo was that its creator went to make the very well proclaimed visual novel by the name of Adastra. For anyone wondering, the one of the main characters of Adastra (A black wolf named Amicus) is part of the “You have never felt the warmth of a man” starter pack as seen below

(Sidenote: I am so fucking mad literally two of the characters there are from the Echo series. These motherfuckers are everywhere)

So after that, Echo was stored somewhere in my subconscious or something. Honestly the exact sequence of events escapes me but I do know that I was watching one of Samwiz1’s videos of him dicking around as engineers,I was just going down another twitter rabbit hole. In the video, the first game he joined had a group of 5 medic bots 3 of em with names of characters from The Smoke Room, A sort of prequel to Echo. As for the twitter rabbit hole, I think hoyoverse (the company that made genshin impact) released a new game going by Zenless Zone Zero. One of the characters you could play was a big bear bastard named Ben which Eld and I immediately latched onto. A few days later, I saw that someone modded Ben into a fighting game called Guilty Gear Strive as seen below

AND GUESS WHO HE WAS FIGHTING???

That twinky lookin stoat swinging his little scythes in the gayest way you could caught my attention. Then literally a few tweets below I find this

And there he is, in the replies I found the twink in question was named CLIFFORD GOT DAMN TIBBITS???? How can you find a cuter name than Tibbits?? Not only did it reveal his name but also the visual novel he comes from called The Smoke Room. (Also the coyote in the suspenders is in the You have never felt the warmth of a man” starter pack is from The Smoke Room).

So in a misguided attempt to find it, I confused it with another visual novel that I found out was called The burrows. The Burrows was one I found myself enjoying other than the tangled fucking mess that is Echo.

So im actually going to talk about echo first.

Echo is a story about an otter named Chase who returns back to his hometown, Echo, to work on a college project on the town in 2015. Echo is a dying mining town that screams southwestern gothic with a mysterious past. Chase joins his childhood friends a native American fennec fox named Jenna, his ex boyfriend a wolf from El Salvador, a timid lynx named TJ, a blunt gila lizard named Flynn, and a ram named Carl who smokes weed to cope with his demons.

The thing that ties them together was the death of their friend Sydney. In the story a lot of paranormal shit happens regarding the town of echo, possession by ancestors, straight up cursed cryptids, murder, all on top of drama and slight hints of romance. This is a bit too much for my brain to process whatever the hell is going on. The story is a mess and I don’t think I will ever be able to process it in it’s entirety. The only characters I really like are Jenna, Carl, and TJ. God poor TJ… OK SO I WENT THROUGH ALL THE ROUTES AND JESUS FUCK I don’t think that my insanity will end anytime soon but Flynn’s route really fucked me up. Its so fucked, all you do is go around in circles AND I STILL NEVER GOT MY AWNSER IN HOW THE SMOKE ROOM LINKS INTO THIS LIKE WHY IS SAMUEL POSSESSING CHASE AND EVENTUALLY FLYNN???

WAS IT TO CONTINUE THE CYCLE OF VIOLENCE AND SECRETS THAT ECHO LIVES ON??? god its so fucked, and Flynn actually becomes the monster Jenna talks about and TJ saw the day Sydney drowned in his endless pursuit of the truth of what happened as he wanders into the mines and turns into the plug-faced monster (prolly a wendigo) Jenna mentioned. So many questions… God its so fucked Speaking of The Smoke Room…

The Smoke Room is set 100 years before Echo and focuses on the ancestors of the main cast as well as the locals of Echo in 1915. Following an Albino Mountain Lion sex worker by the name of Samuel who was trying to leave Echo, but was ambushed by the guy who was helping him and out of self defense killed him in the mine. This murder sets the town ablaze with problems as Samuel and his associates encounter something is unleashed and latches onto a guilty party.

At this point, I just looked at Clifford’s route because he is admittedly adorable but kinda stopped there.

Then while browsing other Visual Novels I found this fucking affront to god only to find out its in The Smoke Room

And holy fuck I thought it was bad on my phone but it is so much worse on my computer. Something in the mines where I think Sam, one of his closest clients a badger that goes by Nikolai and a tiger named Yao are trying to escape the deeper part of the mines or something. What’s even worse is that it looks to be made from body parts of the main cast which is so fucked up in so many ways.

Then we have Arches and Route 65. Arches follows a bear and a coyote named Devon and Cameron in the town of Echo after its been abandoned in 2015. All I know is that the Coyote gets rufied and ends up dead in the mines. Route 65 is an actual prequel looking at the main cast of Echo at a Halloween party in 2008. Don’t remember what happens in this one other than character setup. ANYWAY, echo aside now I can talk about The Burrows.

This one I know from an artist that I like going by Captain Nikko. The Burrows follows Grey, a possum living in New Orleans in 1928. On his way to commit suicide, he stops into a bar run by a round rabbit named Virgil. He makes a deal with Virgil and he gives Grey a card and after a trippy sequence of infinitely falling, he finds himself in front of his old house in a field of yellow flowers. He meets 4 other souls, Mark a Maned Fox who works in a museum in New York, Gabriel a shark training for his school’s swim relay race, Ken a panther who is a cyclist, and Yasahiro a Japanese fennec fox that is an engineer.

When they suddenly disappear with Grey crying, the card Virgil gave Grey begins to glow and 4 other cards appear. Each of them have unique designs for each character, Though only Ken Gabriel and Mark are available at the moment. Each card Zaps Grey into the future with the order being Ken (1958), Mark (1965), and Gabriel (1987). You then find out that the reason that they are linked together is suicide. Grey then becomes determined to protect the character you chose. At this point, you go through the route, make important choices that affect the outcome of the route (only in mark’s route though as of late) and grow close to who you chose. I eventually broke down and downloaded The Burrows and played through the new content of Gabriel’s route and got damn i am unashamedly attached to this man. Like, he reminds me of myself of one point body image issues, feeling useless, jovial bastard. Mark has some pretty weird vibes that he gives off, lot of questions for him that will be answered hopefully soon. Ken is just really damn mean and beats the hell outta some kid that was messing his bike up. Hiro doesn’t have a route out yet so we know next to nothing about him other than he’s working with a german engineering company and he is thinking of committing suicide.

I would totally recommend The Burrows and not for you to binge the entire Echo project saga at 4 in the damn morning.

[cliffbars]

i just finished echo after having started with the smoke room and i am so so sad about what happens to sam in that timeline.... that was such a senseless death, which i guess is the point; that he wasn't able to get that closure or relief from his guilt. and also seeing the tsr cast fills me with such dread now... cuz yeah they could get new timelines with happier endings but at the same time we know what happens. we know how the story goes. it will happen eventually, in some timeline, in some route. they get hurt, they don't get happy endings, they stay in echo, they die, and their ancestors end up miserable. speaking of, for some reason the fact that duke is cliff's ancestor makes my heart just utterly break, because the way duke talks about him makes cliff sound like this bitter old man who stayed in echo out of survivor's guilt, and that difference between who duke makes him out to be and who he is in tsr just makes me wonder what horrible things are going to or could happen to him.