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#*fleshes out my characters with memes*

grumpy-limsan-customs-cat · 17 days

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Info Tidbits - Eurie

B A S I C S

Name: Athell Eurie (Originally [REDACTED])

Nicknames: Eurie

Age: Late 30s

Nameday: 7th Sun of the 7th Moon

Race: Elezen Wildwood (Sharlayan)

Gender: Female

Orientation: Aethersexual, doesn't care about gender

Profession: Researcher of Aetherology, occasional adventurer with her Red Mage abilities.

P H Y S I C A L A S P E C T S

Hair: Dull earthy brown, with ends dyed in striking warm orange hue.

Eyes: Aether Blue.

Skin: Tanned warm brown.

Tattoos/scars: A tattoo covering the top part of her face, like orange paint brushed over in a cross-pattern, a scar crossing diagonally over her right eye.

F A M I L Y

Parents: Alive and kicking in Sharlayan, but Eurie prefers not to talk about them.

Siblings: None.

Grandparents: Never mentioned outside vague statements of burdens that come with family accomplishments.

In-laws and Other: Eurie's teacher in Aetherology and Red Magic, not spoken of fondly like with everyone else Eurie knew in Sharlayan.

Pets: Void Insect Specimen #1 - or Vis1, a shinies-obsessed voidbug that was given to her to use for her research. Fervently experimented on, but closest Eurie has for a pet.

S K I L L S

Abilities: Expert in Red Magic, leaning more towards Lightning-based magic over the others. An ability she calls "Sensitive hands", being able to get a feeling of someone's ebb, flow and state of aether through touch.

Hobbies: Her research, collecting monster parts, examining and experimenting on (consenting) people.

T R A I T S

Most Positive Trait: Observant, intelligent and friendly - when it suits her.

Most Negative Trait: Utterly self-serving and self-centered with dubious moral code at best.

L I K E S

Colors: Blues, purples and reds - though she prefers to wear only the latter.

Smells: Charred things, the smell of electricity in the air.

Textures: Fur and leather.

Drinks: Tea and coffee.

O T H E R D E T A I L S

Smokes: Doesn't.

Drinks: Doesn't drink alcohol, she hates the way it dulls the senses.

Drugs: Addicted to aether and chases that high of power through drinking Ethers and other dubious means.

Mount Issuance: Doesn't have a mount of her own.

Been Arrested: Not yet at least.

Tagged by: @wpip-raham Thank you!

Tagging: @meandering-mind @eorzean-wayfinder @ffxivaltstars @ffxivtribehydrae @nekun-uul @thorneyes AND YOU

#ffxiv #tag meme #basic info meme #Athell Eurie #Another excuse to flesh out the new elf #She might be my most Evil-leaning character....

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gazihsah · 9 months

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Body Language Character Meme: Magnus Fythe

Bold what happens ♥ Italic what sometimes happens

DEFENSIVENESS.

arms crossed on chest / crossing legs / fist-like gestures / pointing index finger / karate chops / stiffening of shoulders / tense posture / curling of lip / baring of teeth / tail lashing / pinned ears / intense look

REFLECTIVE.

hand to face gestures / head tilted / stroking chin / peering over glasses / taking glasses off to clean them / putting earpiece of glasses in mouth / pipe smoker gestures / putting hand to the bridge of the nose / pursed lips / knitted brows / lip chewing / hand on chin

SUSPICION.

arms crossed / sideways glance / touching or rubbing nose / rubbing eyes / hands resting on weapon / brows rising or knitting together / lips pressing into a thin line / strict unwavering eye contact / wrinkling of nose / eyes narrowing

OPENNESS + COOPERATION.

open hands / upper body in sprinters position / sitting on edge of a chair / hand to face gestures / unbuttoned coat / tilted head / slouched shoulders / relaxed posture / feet pointed outward / palms flat and facing outward

CONFIDENCE.

hands behind back / hands on lapels of coat / steeped hands / smirking / baring teeth in a grin / rolling shoulders / tipping head back but maintaining eye contact / chest puffed up / shoulders back / arms folded just above navel

INSECURITY + ANXIETY.

chewing pen or pencil / rubbing thumb over opposite thumb / biting fingernails / hands in pockets / elbow bent / closed gestures / clearing throat / “ whew ” sound / picking or pinching flesh / fidgeting in chair / hand covering mouth whilst speaking / poor eye contact / tugging pants of clothes / jingling money in pockets / tugging at ear / perspiring hands / playing with hair / swaying / playing with pointer or marker / smacking lips / sighing / rocking on balls of feet / flexing fingers sporadically / chewing on lip / pacing

FRUSTRATION.

short breaths / “ tsk ” sounds / tightly clenched hands / fist-like gestures / pointing index finger / running fingers through hair / rubbing back of neck / snarling / revealing teeth / grimacing / sharp eyed glowers with brows drawn together / shoulders back, head up / clenching of jaw / grinding of teeth / nostrils flaring / heavy exhales / tail lashing / pinned ears

Tagged by: @bunboi-shinya (thanks!)

Tagging: OH GOD UHHH SHIT IDK WHO ELSE IS DOWN FOR THESE, yell at me in the comments or dms if you want in for these!

#FFXIV #Character Meme #Magnus Fythe #Viera #Male Viera #THANKS FOR THE TAAAAG #forgot how much I missed tumblr-core posts like these tbh #like fr #these single handedly were the reason why one of my miqo OC felt so well fleshed out imo

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ultramarine-spirit · 2 years

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in the novel why claude so refuses to let Athy leave the palace alone? I remember that Claude did not allow athy to leave the Palace and every time she asked him to go to a tea party he always refused very strongly, even after athy returned to it he still had a hard time allowing athy to leave the palace alone.

I don't think there's another reason other than Claude being very, very overprotective of Athy.

To be fair, Athy had... more than a couple of near-death experiences (some of them because of Claude's own fault lol), so I can understand him to a certain extent. Plus she's a princess, the only princess and heir to the throne, so her going outside of the palace is a pretty risky thing, overprotectiveness aside. And Athy made it a point that she didn't want to go with guards, so despite her being a magic user and being more than capable of taking care of herself (as proven by her surviving for... months? outside of the palace during the amnesia arc), it still would be dangerous.

But a thing that I really liked about Claude and Athy's relationship development in the novel was that, when Athy returns and Claude still didn't have his memories back, she is like "okay, this kind of dynamic can't go on, I'm going to be more independent and you are going to have to trust me and be okay with it". And so she has her own birthday party (Claude being uninvited lmao) and goes outside of the palace. Of course, Claude is uneasy about it, but he lets her do it anyways, since he'll give Athy whatever she wants. Athy says that she wants to change their broken relationship and build trust between them, have an actually healthy father-daughter bond (this is a very mature thing of her to do just after going through incredibly traumatic events).

It's not the same as the manhwa scenes when Claude apologizes to Athy and cries, or when he opens up to her before the coronation, but I think that narratively they serve the same purpose of moving forward their relationship, and them finally being honest with each other. For me, they are the natural conclusion to Claude and Athy's arc in both versions, because WMMAP's main point is that family relationships take effort and time, they require mutual understanding and honesty. Real love is not just a thing automatically granted by blood ties or magic, that is a naïve notion that the narrative goes very against of and actively calls out.

In the novel scene, Athy then says that she'll always tell Claude beforehand when she plans of going outside, and that she'll always come back. As long as Claude waits for her, she won't disappear forever, because that is her home. "Where you are is where I should return to", because he would always be her dad, and she would always be his daughter.

From my point of view, Claude's overprotectiveness of Athy comes from his lonely life and fear of abandonment. Diana promised to be with him forever, and yet she died and left him alone. Athy almost died more than once too. He fixiates on her good bye to him at the debutante because of that, and he is afraid of Athy growing up and building her own family in the manhwa for that very same reason. Claude is terrified of Athy leaving him behind, in one way or another. It's understandable, considering his backstory and characterization, and that's also why I find it so beautiful that Athy takes it into her hands to reassure him that such thing won't happen. In both novel and manhwa, she takes the initiative of building real trust between them, while also demanding that Claude apologizes for hurting her and that he changes his unhealthy behavior, and reaffirming her own independence (not asking for it!).

I know this is probably not where you wanted the conversation to go, but I couldn't help myself. Their development is one of my favorite things about WMMAP.

#i honestly LOVE how Athy takes the initiative to fix their relationship #(and their whole family's unhealthy dynamic in the manhwa lmao)#i know i'm always going on about lucathy but i really appreciate how sincere and fleshed out Claude and Athy's relationship is #i wouldn't say i'm a Claude stan but while i know it's a meme to say he's a trash dad i have to give credit where it's due #he may be an asshole and i would do anything to kill his LP self and there may be dozens of better manhwa dads #but i love Claude's arc and growth from a character stand point #so well done #i love even more that it's Athy the one that takes the first step #it's Athy the one that tries to heal their broken bond #she isn't 'fixing' Claude. she is acknowledging they both need to change if they want to have a sincere relationship #and it's just SO good #they may not be the most sugary sweet father-daughter duo but they'll always be my favorite #i just can't find this kind of depth and development in other family-focused manhwas #also WOAH look at this rant. i'm very sorry anon i'm sure this isn't the answer you were asking for lmao #tagging this cuz i liked this meta thingy i wrote #who made me a princess #i suddenly became a princess #suddenly became a princess one day #wmmap #sbapod #sbap #athanasia de alger obelia #athanasia #athy #claude de alger obelia #claude wmmap #wmmap claude #wmmap meta

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raposarealm · 10 months

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Let's see... A good character for bingo...

How about Sana? She's one of my favorites, and I can't remember if you've had her sent in before (Or if I sent in her, even. /lh).

SNAAAAA You're right, nobody's sent her in yet

Shieldmaiden design that contrasts with the horrifying weapons she can summon, timid child who becomes an unmovable force to protect her loved ones, her Doppel being straight up terrifying, I really love her design and character~ Her background is somewhat relatable (but I got the metaphorical finger from the school system instead,) but I'll admit to being biased on perception and heacannons relating to it because of Daisuke ^ ^;

Oh and her magic. I'm always on the fence on invisibility magic/abilities, because they're often badly-utilized in-story, but Snaa's being able to hide her presence and not her appearance per se is a neat twist on that. And the story lets her magic be a lynchpin from time to time, and it's cool!

Poor child's been through the ringer. A+ character for sure

#so far this is the only submission i've gotten thanks mate!#i'm still taking submissions though! (seriously please yell characters at me)#look i need to stress: i love her design.#i'd like to think if i were a meguca i'd have a uniform similar to hers ^ ^;#she hits things with her shield and then summons a bunch of chains and what i think are morningstars? to beat the shite outta the enemy #i have some headcannoning on how her magic and weapons would work but they're not fleshed out much yet #my favorite headcannons for meguca are about their magic/weapons >:)#i won't put this in the main tag because sometimes ask memes annoy folks #crystalmemoria #futaba sana #ask meme #character bingo #rapo answers

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soulsilversprings · 1 year

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💞 for the writer ask!

Thank you Julia!!!

💞 What's the most important part of a story for you? The characters, the plot, the worldbuilding, the technical aspects (e.g. grammar), the figurative language, etc.?

Characters, I think! I tend to write more ship/character study fics than plot-driven stuff, so being caught up with my main characters' most important episodes and capturing their voices/the way they would think is really important to me. (But, since I like trying to write for multiple characters & ships and Pokémon has so many episodes, it can get a little overwhelming at times hahaha 😅)

#thanks for the ask!!#ira answers #was originally gonna say a combination of characters and plot #but my plots are usually just like #'ash + drew + jants meme + go'#or fleshing out episodes (usually so that they conform to my ship agenda)#or using songs as inspiration #i am but a simple one-shot writer and that's okay :')

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alteredphoenix · 2 years

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It’s funny how as much as I love playing elves in MMOs (read: WoW) I’ll role a beast race character first thing in others such as Argonians/Khajiit in ESO, Charr in GW2, and Mi’qote in FF14 (ironic, considering how much I loathe the portrayal of catgirls), but I can’t bring myself to main a tauren because the anti-heroic/villainous elements they do have - read: non-Horde Grimtotem tauren - is insignificant next to the more heroic/lawful aesthetic that comprises them.

I think part of the reason is because, for someone that’s supposed to be their racial leader, Baine is...pretty much a non-character. I guess he can be forgiven for that one-dimensionality due to his age - and I think he can be considered young - but if you were to put him next to pre-Legion!Anduin he may as well be almost the same character, just he’s a cow-guy and not a human. Then again, even pre-Legion!Anduin has strokes of leaning into anti-heroic qualities a’la using Void magic on his allies in MoP, but he’s still mostly good.

Baine is such a non-sequitur that for all intents and purposes he’s Just There. And, like, okay, I don’t mind him being good but I do mind him not being fleshed out enough to make him stand on his own and apart from Anduin.

So, yeah, that’s my take on why I don’t roll tauren (except the one I do have, but he’s an alt and I just use him for farming mogs).

#warcraft #i know ppl meme baine for just Sitting There through almost all of SL #but at least you can argue he had the most realistic reaction to being tortured in torghast - that's fine #but he needs *more*#not just his strengths but his weaknesses #i'm not expecting him to be edgy but he kind of sticks out like a sore thumb #next to ppl like rokhan - who doesn't even have a unique model but we get just enough of a glimpse to know his character #and thrall - who's one of the more fleshed out characters in the series #if anybody has to be the token good guy in the horde it's going to be calia - she fills that niche #thalyssra counts too but we see a bit of haughtiness in her w/ the druids in the suramar rebellion #so yeah listing all this makes baine *really* pale in comparison to the other horde leaders #fuck cairne has more of a personality than his own son & he died all the way back in cata #so that just tells me baine is waaaay overdue for some character development #anyway this was supposed to be a post about me talking about my beast race prefernces #which instead turned into a mini-rant on baine #so uhhh yeah

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bards-anonymous · 2 years

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Got a lot of sitting around to do today....and Im bored already

Anyone got any ttrpg character asks perhaps?? Even silly ones 😔👉👈 Got brainrot waiting for my games to start again

I got:

Harriett (Dishonored)

Doc Smiles (Fallout)

Callista (Fallout)

Jex (Starfinder)

Margo (D&D)

Addie (D&D)

Cassandra (Deadlands/just normal oc) (gonna be playing her in a Deadlands game here soon hopefully. Gonna cowboy-ify her) 🐴🤠

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rainsong · 2 years

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((You know I had to)) Aylin 💗 👠 💑 /// 1, 6, 19.

💗 has my muse ever been in love?

She definitely has been, but it was her first love, so it was the kind of love that was still untainted. She truly believed she'd have that "first and last partner" relationship, had dreams of the whole white picket fence and a dog thing too. Nowdays, though, she's not as optimistic.

👠 what was my muse’s last serious relationship like?

Her last relationship was actually her first. They dated during their last year of high school and then tried to date long distance for the first three years of college. She gave her all in that relationship but in the end, the guy just dropped her like she was nothing, stating her flaws and how he just couldn’t be in a relationship with her anymore. It definitely fucked with her head because she still wanted to be with him, and she felt like she was being unfairly punished for just being herself? Additionally, she was under the impression that everything was fine between them until suddenly, everything turned to shit and apparently, it was all her fault. Two weeks after their breakup, a mutual friend told her he was already dating another girl in his same school, so she assumed he had already been cheating on her before he broke up with her and was just looking for excuses to end their relationship. Before they did long distance, though, the two were very touchy-feely & very affectionate with one another.

💑 what are my muse’s requirements for a potential partner?

Loyalty is a definite must. When Aylin loves, she gives her all and she wants that person she gets into a relationship with to give their all too. She would never cheat on someone, and she expects that same respect back. Also, after her last relationship, she needs someone who will actually communicate with her. She has more respect for people who are just outright with what they want or don't want, than people who bottle up their emotions until it turns into resentment or irreparable damage to a relationship, so even if things lead to a fight, she'd still want to know why they might be feeling that way so that they both can find a way to fix things. She hasn't been in a relationship (just some flings here and there) since her first one, so it would take someone pretty special for her to get back into the dating scene again and actually be serious this time around. So far, she cuts things off with people before things get too serious, mostly because she knows she’s the one who gets attached pretty quickly & she definitely doesn’t want to get hurt again.

1) something this character is truly proud of.

How she hasn’t killed Hakan yet Her growth? Listen, growing up, she was very insecure, mostly because of her parents and then because of how her ex just dropped her out of the blue and allegedly cheated on her. It took her a loooooooooooong time to get to where she is now, to believe that she is enough, that people would actually be lucky to have her in their lives, instead of just her constantly thinking she’s lucky to have them in hers, to go from being very co-dependent on her friends turned family because they were the only people in her life she could depend on to finally just becoming her own person. She doesn’t show it a lot but she’s definitely emotionally scarred, and has a tendency to not talk about it? So she feels like this growth was all hers, and she’s very, very, very proud of the fact that her head and heart are no longer dark places of self-inflicted blame. She actually likes who she is now, instead of constantly asking herself what’s wrong with her 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

6) something they lost, but would love to have back

The way her parents gave a fuck about her. She knows she was never really wanted because she was an unexpected pregnancy that was the reason her parents got married in the first place, but she could still remember a time when she was very, very young, but was happy with her family, when her parents still doted on her. She doesn’t know why, but they started being around less and less, not showing up for awards at schools or her equestrian competitions. She never wanted for anything since they were loaded and while she appreciated their money, she wanted their presence and attention a lot more. For years, she’d been insecure about how she must have done something that caused her parents to lose interest in her or maybe she just wasn’t enough or wasn’t worthy of being loved. Now that she’s older, she knows better & knows they’re just shitty people and shittier parents but she still wants them to give a fuck about her. The stubborn part of her still can’t give up on them.

19) when they feel safest

She’s been an equestrian since she was young, so there’s nothing that makes her feel as safe as horseback riding. Wind in her hair, her strong, beautiful mare under her, nature all around them, the feeling of freedom and power, doing something she knows she’s good at. Even just being around the stables makes her feel safe and comforted.

#so even in ask memes i give you an essay sdfjbgjkdfg #( musings | aylin demir )#holy fuck i love aylin????#i mean i know she's my own character but i'm fleshing her out more and i would like to protect her from everything ????#( answered memes )

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btc-official · 5 months

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me: biusness is boomin baby haha its good to be da king

fleet of bulldozers: leveling a middle class neighborhood to make room for a Homunculous Factory so i can make living soyjak flesh caricatures of my various enemies

femboy secretary: um, miss boss lady~ the hoa president is on line 1, what do i doooo~ #196 #r/196 #196campfire

HALF LIGHT [Trivial: Success] - KILL HER KILL HER FUCKING KILL HER

me: okay tell her to fuck off. andthen put her thriugh anyway so ican also tell her tofuck off

giant lit cigar sitting on my desk, growing big cartoon lips: you better pick me up and gimme a kiss soon sugar… i’m burnin’ up over here and i can’t control myself much longer…

desk (sentient): whoah! is it getting HOT in here or is it just me?

“Objectum Nagito Komaeda”, my bit character that accidentally developed into a tulpa: it’s just my worthless opinion, but… i think you should fuck them both until they get pregnant!

D.A.R.E. lion appearing from the growing cloud of cigar smoke like mufasa: a-ok, dudette! put that ciggy out however you want, even if its with your splooge! cause it’s rad to be yourself, as long as yourself supports the war on drugs!

impact font meme caption over my head counting down to my death at all times: (starts going down really fast for some reason)

Realtor Kiryu (miles away in the comfort of his own home): eeyikes! i hope that strange woman from earlier Dame Da Knows the office i sold her is Baka Mi airTight!

#if you say anything about co2 we're enemies now

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julesthequirky · 5 months

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The Choice: Chapter One

Summary: You find three of your favourite characters in your home. It shouldn't be possible, but there they are. In the flesh. How the hell did they get there? And surely there's a way to get them back? But as you get close to each one, the thought of sending them back proves difficult to comprehend.

Characters: You, Antiques salesman, mother, cute black cat.

Chapter Warnings: Pain in the ass mother, language.

W/C: 1,220

A/N: Soley thought of this idea just for that Spiderman meme.

The bell to the antiques store tinkled as you opened the door. As you stepped in, the proprietor of the store moved away from behind the counter. The place was cluttered, and everything in sight was for sale.

“Hi there, interested in purchasing something today?”

He was a kindly-looking older gent, who reminded you of your pops, and you couldn’t help but smile warmly at him.

“Potentially. Just browsing, for now.”

“Looking for anything in particular?” He enquired as you started to browse.

You shrugged. “Not really.”

He smiled then. “Ah. You won’t know what you’re looking for until it finds you.” He said with a twinkle in his eye.

You chuckled and nodded. Yeah, you could agree with that.

It didn’t take long for you to find something. Your eye had landed on a trifold oval picture frame. And for the price tag, you were tempted. Very tempted.

“Ah a lovely set. Baroque features in the detailing. Could do with a possible restoration, but a proper clean would also suffice.”

You fingered the tag again, it was a hundred dollars.

“Tell ya what. I’ll knock off ten bucks. How does that sound?”

You looked at him then.

“You don’t think I don’t know the look of someone finding an item they can’t walk away from? Darlin’ you got that look. You got it bad.”

It was just a picture frame. A dumb little picture frame, but why did it give you so much joy to look at? You weren’t much of a haggler and it would seem rude to haggle the price after he had already generously knocked off ten percent.

“Alright, you got yourself a deal.”

He shook your hand. “Excellent.”

He picked up the item and very carefully began meandering his way back to the counter with you following him. He set the item down gently and rung up the purchase.

“Such a pretty little find. And it was a shame that it had been hiding in a box, before coming here.”

You gave him a quizzical look and he held up a hand before disappearing into the back for a few moments and coming back with a small wooden box. He placed it on the counter in front of you. Your hands reached out towards it. The wooden box looked plain compared to the delicate and intricate detailing on the frame. It was finished with a dark varnish and what was with the strange script etched into the grain? Was it Elvish, or Sanskrit, or even Latin? You had no idea. A simple clasp locked the box. Easy to use. Either way, now you had a keepsake box also.

“It’s my understanding that the original owner had passed away and his living relatives didn’t want it and, well here it is.”

“Well, it’s their loss.”

“Of course, of course. If they hadn’t, then you never would have found it.”

He took your cash and then handed you the receipt. He bid you a good rest of your day as you lifted the box and the picture frame and made your way out of the store.

You placed the final photo in the frame. Slid the locks, and placed the frame on your sideboard, angling it so you could appreciate it all that little bit more. You sighed in contentment as three of your favourite fictional men smiled seemingly at you from beside your TV.

The door knocked and by the light raps you knew who it was. This time, you sighed heavily and muttered “God, give me strength” before going to open the door. You’d only opened it a crack before she started to barge her way in.

“Y/N, honestly, what are you wearing? Pyjama’s during daytime? I don’t know. Go put on some proper clothes.”

You looked down. Now you were annoyed. It was loungewear for God’s sake. Perfectly acceptable.

“Mother, what I’m wearing should be of no concern to you and its just gone five, and it’s a Saturday.”

She sniffed and made her way into your lounge. She tutted at the clutter.

“Don’t you ever tidy up?”

You rolled your eyes and sat down. “What did you come here for? To pick faults or was there an actual reason?”

“Your father—”

“Not my father.” You stated.

Your mother had married her partner not long after your father’s passing and now, she acted as though he had been in your life since birth.

She continued, like you hadn’t interrupted her.

“—and I have been talking. You know that nice young man that started last year, Cole—"

“Wait, you’re not seriously trying to set me up?”

Your mother looked a little put out.

“Well, it can’t hurt to get back out there. Get back on the horse or so to speak.”

You sat there shocked. Then it turned to anger.

“Are you ashamed of me? Are you ashamed that your one and only daughter is a divorcee!”

“Ashamed, no. Disappointed, yes.”

It was like a punch to the gut and the hurt stabbed at your heart. You’d suspected your mother had opinions on your divorce but to voice her disappointment a year and a half after finalization felt like a kick in the teeth. It left you speechless.

“Is that new? I have to say I don’t think it goes with the room. Who are those men? Are they from your shows? Honestly Y/N. I don’t know what to do with you sometimes.”

Your mother had continued to ramble on whilst you were still reeling from her comment. At that moment your all black cat slinked in, jumping up and made her way over to your mother’s lap.

“If you’re not careful, this is your future.” She said nodding to the cat.

You looked at her then.

“I think you should leave, mother.”

She turned her head, facing you. She looked like a goldfish with the way her mouth kept opening and closing. Then her lips pursed together, and she stood, with the cat leaping from her. She made a disgusted sound, discovering the amount of cat hair had malted on her. You handed her a nearby lint brush, and she furiously started scrubbing at the hair on her skirt. She then stood and bid you a good evening and purposefully walked to the door. Your mother didn’t wait, slamming the door on her way out. You scrubbed your hand down your face muttering about her audacity.

You plonked yourself on the sofa, grabbed the remote and turned on the TV. The cat had been fed and was currently God knows where, doing its own thing.

Halfway through Family Feud, a loud crash from what sounded like your kitchen alerted you. Your laugh cut short and Steve Harvey poked fun at a contestant's absurd answer, laughing on the screen. You jumped up, abandoning the snacks and ran to see the destruction, cussing your cat out along the way.

You stormed into the room ready to reem your pesky feline, grabbing a broom, threatening the extinction of treats for the rest of his life. But what you saw had you stopping in your tracks. Words died on your tongue. And what you saw, there was no rhyme or reason to it. In fact, it should have been physically impossible.

Dean Winchester stood in your kitchen, holding a case of pie.

#The Choice #julesthequirky's fics #spn fanfic #reader insert #beau arlen #big sky #dean winchester #soldier boy

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dreamtofus · 3 months

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masterlist

i've done it. now i can reblog to my heart's desire. i'll also add more characters as I write ...

send me a request and I’ll love you even if I don’t write it

also if u want a p.2 do anything ask

started: 2/1/2024

last update: 3/1/2024

♡ = smut

✿ = fluff

☆ = angst

☾= half fleshed out (no real ending)

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° .

Daryl Dixon

hurt ✿

broken tension ✿

disinfection ☾

bunny ♡

tipsy ☾

hurt me ☆ ✿ (not a p.2 to hurt LOL)

don’t let me freeze ♡ ✿ (my fav one I wrote)

burning desire ♡

anyway ☾ ✿

daryl grunt meme

115 notes · View notes

joyce-stick · 2 months

Text

An Essay About Slash Review of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, A Video Game Which is Very Good

(and also: has prompted many quite wrong rather bad takes)

An essay by Audrey of the joystick system

The very bad discourse and drama around The Coffin of Andy and Leyley has served to obscure the simple fact that it is quite a very good video game and this video essay is here to tell you about that.

Video version:

youtube

Previous video essay: Lost Judgment's Lost Plot

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Transcript:

Hi everyone. So. The Coffin of Andy and Leyley is really, really fucking good.

If you’ve heard of this game, you’ve probably heard of it in the context of memes, screenshots divorced from context, and/or capricious moral outrage. If you’ve not heard of this game, well, you’re hearing of it now! And good thing, too, because much of the coverage and discussion around this game that already exists has… been, let’s just say, not particularly earnest. I hope to remedy that at least somewhat with this video.

If you’ve heard about this game because of discourse, and come here expecting drama and hot takes, then, this may not be your video. Or your YouTube channel, even. Or maybe it is, if you’d like the delicious comments section. If you’re that sort of clicker, though— welcome! I’m Audrey of the joystick system, and this is the place where I (and my headmates) talk honestly about things we care about, and I hope you’ll hear me out a little and maybe consider staying and improving our viewer retention. Thanks, if you do.

So, to writ: My purpose today is to gush. I will be gushing here. For most of it. And as for what I will be gushing about, some of it will be gushing BLOOD, GUTS, AND DELICIOUS DEATH. I am entirely serious. The subject of today’s presentation contains mature content, including copious foul language and themes slash depictions of death, cannibalism, cultism, demon summoning rituals, parricide, dystopian social decay, and heterosexuality. Oh, and also a little bit of incest as a treat, I guess, but the incest is heterosexual, and that’s worse.

[long pause]

Excellent. You’re still here. So. This morbidly beautiful video game may not be for everyone, but that’s good, because it is instead for exactly me! A short plot synopsis of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley might go as follows:

if you're not watching the video listen to this for extra effect

Siblings Andrew and Ashley Graves are forcibly quarantined inside their apartment by the local authorities, with no food and even less hope for rescue. Their parents have abandoned them. Absolutely no one is coming to save them. In order to survive and escape this awful situation, they butcher and consume the fresh flesh of some guy who got himself soul vored by a demon that he summoned without a plan.

This conspicuously carnivorous crime, and their effort to cover their tracks, puts them in a fair bit of a deeper shithole than they are already in. So naturally they keep digging themselves deeper by committing even more crimes, AND in the process, also dig themselves deeper into their toxic codependent sibling relationship, which is going just great, thank you. Sure, Andrew almost killed his sister, but he didn’t, and that’s what matters! And she still loves him, so it’s all good!

This is of course a joke.

First thing I absolutely love about this game is the writing. It’s witty, intelligent, uncompromising, and just generally delicious. It holds nothing back in depicting the toxicity of the two leads and their relationship, resulting in two compelling characters whose flaws and few virtues perfectly complement slash exacerbate one another, resulting in a beautiful train wreck of a relationship dynamic that proves equal parts disturbing, mesmerizing, and hilarious.

The charming darkly comedic bite of the writing style also lends a lot of great character to the setting. This sardonically presented dystopian world is both richly detailed and fleetingly elaborated on, a commendable balance to have achieved, in my opinion. The first chapter of this game is hilarious not just because of the banter between Ashley and Andrew (which is terrific), but because it presents such a sharp satire of current year bullshit.

As just an example, I give you, one of my favorite jokes in the game:

I probably don’t need to explain the thing this is making fun of to you, but I will anyway.

The situation presented in The Coffin of Andy and Leyley’s first episode is very easily readable as an allegory for how disasters that are a direct result of ongoing 2020s late capitalist decay continuously fuck people over. In particular, this scenario feels like a direct commentary on both the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the Flint, Michigan water crisis. The former obviously has affected way more people but what both have in common is that they are crises created and exacerbated by malfeasance and/or negligence committed in the name of for-profit interests, and that the “response,” to them, such as there was one, has amounted to dehumanizing and marginalizing the victims while minimizing the issue, forcing the victims out of society’s wider view, and being reticent to punish the individuals responsible.

Just as the authorities responded to the water crisis and the worst excesses of the pandemic in real life, the authorities in The Coffin of Andy and Leyley impose half-measures designed to further restrict the freedom of the dirty undesirables who bear the worst damages, while merely shielding the upper echelons of society from the disaster rather than actually addressing or attempting to solve the issue. Most of you who lived through 2020 in the United States probably have experienced the frustration of being on the receiving end of this kind of policy.

During the pandemic, the quarantine was supposed to protect us, but for a lot of people it ended up doing quite the opposite. A lot of folks didn’t have any savings, and couldn’t get any since the employment market wasn’t exactly on fire, and our representatives had to be bothered way too much just to put out a pithy economic stimulus just to save face. Not to say that this all has stopped, exactly, as all that’s changed now is that we’re just, living with this situation, but.

It wasn’t literally a cop outside everyone’s door preventing them from going outside to not die, but for a lot of people, it might as well have been that! Never mind those who, y’know, had no inside to retreat to. Or were imprisoned during the pandemic and left even more unprotected! Or thrown out by their landlords! And so on. And, y’know, the big chain grocery stores keep throwing out all the perfectly good unsold food, so they’re already sending this message in all but, well… these exact words.

So, that’s why I think this joke lands. It’s exaggerated, but familiarly rooted, and that’s just good satire! It’s a joke which feels lifted right out of Invader Zim, which, I would put The Coffin of Andy and Leyley right about on the level of as far as both the tone it’s going for and the quality of its execution. Which of course, brings us to the extremes that these circumstances push its characters, and its plot, to.

Okay, so, also like Invader Zim, The Coffin of Andy and Leyley is hardly a polemic, nor is it a morality tale. Sure, there’s social commentary in it, but that’s just a nice side thing. It’s not a story about the otherwise innocent victims of an unjust society who are pushed to do terrible things by circumstances outside their control— it is, rather a story of terrible people, who, both because of their character failings, and the desperate situations they find themselves in, find themselves doing even worse things.

Andrew and Ashley commit the cannibalism the first time in large part because they kind of have to do it. No food! Cop outside their door actively deterring them from getting food! Out of options! So they do it. They could probably be excused, if only they were given a fair trial. Which they realize they’re not going to get. So yeah. It’s understandable that they do it. And that they kill this one cop, who very much has it coming.

But they do not have to keep doing it! And gosh grief, do they keep fucking doing it— so many its. They really do not stop digging that hole that they are in. Even the first time that they do the cannibalism, when they kind of really have to do the cannibalism, Ashley is just a little bit more excited about doing the cannibalism than she probably should be.

I love this kind of delicious edgy dark humor. I love stories that go for it, imagine the worst possible people they can, and also try to make that funny. I love this about Invader Zim, that it presents a character who is unquestionably a monster, but also has relatable human desires like wanting to fit in and being concerned about looking weird or abnormal, but has those feelings for very different reasons and acts on them by committing some very despicable crimes. It really gets at a deep-seated darkness that I and a lot of other fucked up traumatized queer people who were little kids when this show aired have, the catharsis of visualizing some of our worst intrusive thoughts while evoking the emotions that pushed us to imagine this kind of fucked up shit.

I’ve loved this kind of thing since we saw Heathers when we were 14. Heathers is an absolutely incredible film that you should check out, by the way, and about which we failed to properly or interestingly articulate our thoughts a few years back. Its lead protagonists, Jason “J.D.” Dean and Veronica Sawyer, are similarly relatable characters who have familiar feeling flaws and emotionally resonant trauma hangups, and also function as very toxic enablers of each other’s worst traits, leading them to work through those feelings by, y’know, murdering their classmates!

Heathers made us realize just how exactly mentally ill of a 14 year old we really were when we were 14, and I love it for that. So. So fucking much.

That was ten years and change ago.

We are still a mentally ill 24 year old.

And Andrew and Ashley Graves, if I had to sum them up, are basically J.D. and Veronica, if they were in their twenties, siblings, and also way, way, way worse.

And I love them.

So, obviously. Ashley and Andrew are hilarious. At least, I find them to be such. They’re terrible, and awful, and amazing, and Ashley is such a girlboss. She is one of the most God Forbid Women Do Anything characters ever.

Anyway! I’ve talked about the cannibalism, and the dystopia, and the characters, and why all of that’s good. I’ve also forgotten to talk about the part where they evade an assassin, and, also a host of other things.

I love that this game has so many fun little optional interactions with NPCs, objects, and items, that you can totally miss. I love how the narration hints at the solutions to puzzles by snarkily referring to things you can interact with as what their purpose is to the characters rather than what they are, this quip about the mop that you clean up a murder scene with, the interactions that Andrew has with these cultists who suck at demon summoning, the excellent in-game art and the brilliant visual duality of Andrew and Ashley’s character designs, this line where Andrew is upset that life is so hard for them as fugitives from the law because they can only find this one shitty motel that takes cash and doesn’t ask them for their ID, and also the music, which is royalty free music made by people unassociated with the developer but is nonetheless perfectly suited for the game.

So much about this game is stuff I find so completely brilliant, and I have so little to criticize, that I think we’d probably be here all day if I kept going. So.

Let’s spend a thousand ish more words talking about the parents.

When The Coffin of Andy and Leyley begins, the protagonists’ parents are absent. You can optionally find two early references to them early on— one, if you interact with the bed in their bedroom, and encounter the shocking revelation that “Your parents have FUCKED on this bed.”

The second, is if you interact with the phone, the game dutifully informs you that,

You’re probably less than five minutes into the game at this point, barely begun solving the first puzzle, which prompted you to “find nutrients to not die.” And of course, this says about all you need to know. These children have been abandoned. But if it needed to be any clearer, the game later delivers unto you a flashback to prior in the story, when Ashley desperately calls Mrs. Graves for help after they leave and go move to a hotel, and later a new house, to which the kids are of course not invited. And this specific scene, specific line, here, fucking hit me:

“And I don’t want to hear these lies about starving anymore.”

Emphasis mine.

Even as Ashley and Andrew escalate the severity of their crimes which gradually come to have less and less to do with their need to survive as the story goes on, I find it very hard to not be on their side at least a little bit, and this is easily the biggest reason why.

I have had this phone call.

Not this exact specific phone call, of course. Obviously, I’ve never been locked up in an apartment with an armed patrol outside my door whose job it was to gaslight me while ensuring that I starved to death. Obviously, my mom has never said those exact words.

But gosh grief and fuck me if it’s never felt like she has. She may as well have fucking told me that, with all the things she told me I was lying about. And who fucking knows, maybe she did say those exact words to us, and we repressed them. I don’t know. I am very not done working through all the bullshit that she gaslit us over.

*sighs, preparing to vent*

I have called our mother and had to beg her to pay for food. I have called her and had to beg to pay for our rent, while our parents were supposed to be supporting us studying abroad. I have called her and begged her to forgive me for daring to use just a few of the thirty dollars our parents used to send us to live with every month back then, to buy a drink or a movie ticket or something. I have had to concede to our parents financially holding us hostage, had to go the last week of the month on a shoestring diet while waiting for them to graciously deposit another thirty dollars into our bank account... so that we could continue eating. I used to relish February, the shortest month, for being the one part of the year in which I had to stretch out that thirty dollars the least. And once, I pleaded with our mother to pay for us to move to another apartment when the landlord suddenly kicked us out of the current one, abruptly and obligatorily switching gears from arguing with her to kissing her ass through our gritted teeth, under threat of our parents cutting off their financial support of us completely, abandoning us in a foreign country where we had no money, no job, and barely spoke the language.

And one day, after I stopped dancing to their tune, they just stopped listening, stopped even pretending to want to help. After nineteen years of escalating emotional and physical abuse and neglect, they abandoned us. And one day, after I spent months working 10 hour days every week Ubering food around for tips, sending my resume, filling applications, making calls, stopping into places to ask for work, all to no avail, for months, and desperately plugging the Patreon page of this very YouTube channel praying that some generous soul with money to burn would solve all our problems. All of this still wasn’t enough, and wasn’t going anywhere, and I’d run out of money and was short on rent on the one sublet room we could get that cost exactly three hundred dollars…

And I called her, and I asked her for help. I really didn’t want to. I wanted to hear nothing of her again. And she said to stop lying. To stop bullshitting her that I couldn’t get enough money, or find a job.

Not too long after, I swore off all contact with her, and eventually also with our father. And every time I have spoken to either of them since, I have made no secret of how I feel. Because if I get nothing out of kissing their ass, why fucking pretend.

My family is not poor. They own their house. They own, and leased out, a second house. Their house is full of fancy IKEA furniture and various other niceties, they’ve renovated the place at least twice, they live in a nice, safe neighborhood, they have an attic and a basement, they at one point paid for multiple plane tickets for us per year while still refusing to let us eat on any more than thirty five dollars, an extra five dollars we also had to beg them for. Our dad has a lucrative tech job. All of this, and they insisted, while refusing to answer questions about their finances in any detail, that they couldn’t afford to help us go to where we wanted to go for college, that they had no place for us in their house, that they couldn’t afford three hundred dollars of rent to help us have a roof over our head for one more month.

So when I read this delightful jaunt of a chapter of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, where Andrew and Ashley break into their parents’ new huge house to steal all their shit, and Ashley says “This is some rich people stuff!” about their fireplace,

And when their mom says, “there’s no room to keep housing you here indefinitely,” and the internal monologue says, “even though it’s way bigger than the old house.” It’s both an entertaining mockery of the attitude of the typical American family, how first you’re your parents’ property for eighteen years and then you’re turned out on your own to face the world without their support, and how the fuck are you supposed to live like that, to figure out how to live your life in the face of that, to meaningfully be a fulfilled person in that situation, especially in a time, when, no, mom, I can’t pay a college tuition on a waitress salary like you did back in the fucking nineties, you c--t,

Even though they have an extra bed in their basement and a perfectly good couch and plenty of space for another bed besides, and a vegetable garden, and a kitchen, and all these other middle-class petty bougie niceties, the Graves mom says, “sorry, we can’t keep helping you,” and. And. I read all this, and I think,

“I understand why Ashley wants to fucking flay these people. I understand why she wants to K1!L them.”

I cannot tell you how much catharsis the ending of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley episode 2 gave me. I cannot convey the weight of my gratitude that someone out there validated my anger and my specific fucked up power fantasy with their art. I didn’t even ask them to. I probably would’ve eventually done it on my own. But I’m so glad that someone did it for me.

If I ever hypothetically meet Nemlei, somehow, and have some cash, I will happily buy them a drink. Hopefully, by paying this excellent game’s ten dollar cover price, I already have!

I know you’re not watching this, but on the off chance this reaches your ears, I just wanna say thanks. For giving me a safe, legal, regret-free, socially acceptable, non-violent outlet for the rage I feel towards my parents.

Well.

Mostly socially acceptable.

Meow.

This game is not finished, as you may have noticed if you’ve gone to check it out on Steam. It ends on an ambiguous and open note, but in my opinion, a perfectly satisfying one. Nemlei could disappear absolutely, never release the proper ending of this game, and never make another game again, and I would not be mad. I've already got more than my money’s worth and then some. So. Yeah. I’m happy. Count me as happy!

I kinda wanna start talking a bit more about the branches of the second episode. I wanna say how it’s a brilliant idea to have two separate story arcs for the two variations of this episode’s ending, and how I hope that that’s executed on as beautifully as the rest of the game already is. I wanna talk about the ways in which Andrew and Ashley’s mom is ambiguously humanized despite being so obviously terrible. I wanna talk about the dialogue Andrew does when his parents offer him a chance to make amends, and he has doubts, if you choose to let him have them, and how I would probably also have doubts in his position, and not be able to follow through without my lovely evil cannibal sister pushing me towards… the thing. I wanna talk about this line, where Ashley talks about why she likes eating people, and how it’s so equal parts poetic and macabre and edgy bullshit and that that’s such a beautifully balanced cocktail of emotion to nail and Nemlei totally fucking nails it

I WANT TO GUSH FOREVER. ABOUT THIS GAME. AND I WANT NO ONE TO STOP ME.

Alas, I will stop myself.

And move on to the elephant in the room!

THE FUCKING.

Mom: “But that-.... That doesn’t make any sense.” Mom: “Why would you not-......” Mom: “Ah, I get it.” Andrew: “..........??” Mom: “You fuck her.” Andrew: “Wha— HUUUUH?!?!!?” Mom: “Oh that is disgusting! Andrew, she’s your sister for god’s sake!” Andrew: “I haven’t done anything!? What the hell, mom!?” Mom: “Then what does she give you that makes it worth all this?” Andrew: “W-well that’s none of your business, is it??” Mom: “I knew something was off… How did I fuck up so bad? I’m the worst mother ever..!” Andrew: “No! I mean yes you are, but I have never—!” Ashley: “I’m baaaa-ack!!!” Andrew: “Now of all times!?” Ashley: “I got the money! Did you miss me, handsome?? Did you? Did you??” Mom: “...........................” Andrew: “(I WANT TO DIE!!!!!!)”

Okay. So. I said I didn’t want to talk about this. But I’m talking about this game. I can’t not talk about it.

Yep, it’s hot takes and drama time!

So, not too long ago, Nemlei deleted their Twitter, their Itch.io, their everything, their entire online presence. The Steam page for The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, which used to list Nemlei as the developer and publisher, now lists “Kit9 Studio.” It is the only game to their name on the platform. A community forum post from said entity known as Kit9 announces that “the developer” (no name given) “has decided to permanently and completely terminate their activities online from here on.”

I don’t know exactly what happened, or why they did this. There’s a lot of people around who sure think they know. But in brief, as neutrally as possible: Nemlei, or someone close to them, was doxxed, or at least sought out as a doxxing target, by one or multiple users of an online forum. Their supposed crime? Making a video game “for degenerates.”

I don’t know who did the doxxing. I don’t know what their motive was, and for my own sanity, I am not going to look. I am choosing not to care. The most important and most obvious fact at hand here is that Nemlei’s creation has been met with controversy amongst social media users, and about one or two hack video game outrage journalists, who seem to have nothing better to do or say. And it seems clear that the doxxing wouldn’t have happened had they not been met with this negative attention. And all because of this.

Not the cannibalism, not the parricide, not the demon sacrifices. No, um, the one implied sex scene.

And it doesn’t even actually happen! It’s just a premonition of a possible future event that Ashley and Andrew supernaturally receive. It’s not particularly graphic, it doesn’t yet go anywhere, and it’s a short scene on an optional route that the game actively forewarns you about. You have to be trying to see it on purpose.

Well, that’s all true. It is indeed a minor and avoidable scene, and the discourse about it has absolutely poisoned the well when it comes to the conversation about the game. But also, “uhh, it’s optional and not a big thing,” is inadequate as a defense. This is still content in the game that Nemlei actively chose to put in the game, and even discounting this, the themes of incest are all over the game. Ashley speaks flirtatiously to Andrew at basically every turn. Even if you avoid this specific scene, the incest themes are not something you’re going to just not notice, if you’re paying attention to the text.

All that being said, it’s not like this content comes as a surprise. The Coffin of Andy and Leyley’s Steam store page accurately represents the product! A brother and sister. Codependency and cannibalism. It’s not as if you don’t know what you’re paying for and choosing to play. You came here for this! Most of the people playing this are here for this! You have to figure that if they are fine with killing and eating people, they’re probably fine with fucking each other, or, eventually possibly eventually going to be, at least.

So you’d think, except that many people seem to unironically believe that the cannibalism is more moral than the incest.

Oh, god, I’m doing this right now, aren’t I.

So, I get it. While I’m pretty skeptical of the notion that cannibalism is not as bad as incest, I do realize that incest is, at the very least, the more taboo of these things, and that a lot of people are more uncomfortable with it than they are with the cannibalism and the murder. To quote the one positive and in-depth review available in any media outlet at the time of this writing, from Destructoid:

“This aspect is undoubtedly the most controversial element about The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, and I understand why. While cannibalism is a taboo subject, it’s present in mainstream games like Fallout as an option for players. Having incestuous themes crosses over into Drakengard territory, and even then, no option allows Caim to reciprocate Furiae’s feelings for him.”

"The Coffin of Andy and Leyley is horrifying and I can’t get enough of it" Andrea Gonzalez, Destructoid, November 12 2023

So, yeah, I. y’know. Get it. I know why. However.

I can point to a lot of things that Andrew and Ashley do wrong in this game. They are, as per the game’s premise, very not okay, not as individuals, and not together. Andrew is way too attached to Ashley, and Ashley is generally an awful person who is way too attached herself, and also, all too quick on the draw to take advantage of Andrew’s attachment to her to make him do what she wants. This is not a healthy relationship. And we’re here for it! It’s compelling!

But, I think it’s worth asking why it’s such a toxic dynamic. Is it because they’re siblings? Well, not really. It’s a dynamic that’s specifically possible with them being siblings, but it’s not because of their sibling connection.

The actual reason why Andrew and Ashley’s relationship turns abusive isn’t because their relationship is abusive by necessity or nature, but because Ashley abuses their relationship. And she is doing this for basically the whole game. Like, it is abusive the whole time. It doesn’t become abusive when their relationship takes its romantic turn. Does it become more abusive? I mean. Maybe. Maybe the romance exacerbates the abuse. I dunno, we’ll have to wait and see what the next episode says.

So, then, why is the notion of them possibly in the future having sex the elephant in the room here, when before that, they do so many objectively worse things that cause much more harm both to themselves and others? Is that really so much more of a bigger deal than the murder and the people eating?

Or. To phrase it Ashley’s way. You played a game about mutilating and eating your parents’ corpses, and getting laid is what you’re freaking out about?

Is the incest really that much more extreme, or are you just more disgusted with it?

And even if you are more disgusted with it. Even if we grant that it is, actually, somehow, more harmful for siblings to have sex with each other, than to do murder and cannibalism. Is this the hill you’re dying on? What you’ve decided is of such utmost importance and injustice that you decide to go harass some random indie dev who just wants to make a silly video game about a couple of siblings eating people?

Does it truly make sense to let your kneejerk moral disgust guide you to the conclusion that the creator of this game deserves to be persecuted for merely writing about and drawing a thing you don’t like?

Well, to answer that, we have to get into the question of whether or not “immoral fiction” is harmful, or “normalizing” things that are wrong. Does fictionally depicting an immoral action actually cause harm?

I could dance around in circles for a little while about the edge cases, and certain writers who are publishing bad or hateful material in bad faith, or fascist propaganda, which is of course always bad, or whatever other example I could use to qualify my point or list out an exception to appease the people who disagree with me, but, I’ll just cut right to the chase, and tell you the answer

No!

The answer is NO!

The thing about taboos is that they don’t make us more safe. They don’t protect us from bad things. All they do is protect people’s comfort by silencing people they don’t want to understand, and enable bad actors by keeping their victims in the dark, and denying them the ability to talk about it.

The only thing we end up doing by censoring stories about these uncomfortable topics, and making it socially unacceptable to talk about them, is make it harder to know. We deny ourselves knowledge. We deny ourselves a conversation about these subjects, we deny ourselves the ability to meaningfully understand them. We deny ourselves power, what little we have, as readers, to understand, and to critique, to reason.

There’s a tumblr post I really like. Well, a number of them, I really like, on this topic, but I’m picking this one, because it’s got a quote I really like. It talks about Lolita. That Lolita. And, now, I’ve never read Lolita, at least not yet. Lolita is a novel about child sexual abuse, told from the perspective of an abuser. It’s an uncomfortable book with an uncomfortable topic, and it’s not wrong to be uncomfortable with it. The author of this post acknowledges that.

But they talk about it. They talk about how it shines a light on its subject matter. The why and the how of abusers and their actions. The ways in which their victims suffer. How it shows all of this in a way that it only could from the perspective it takes. And, I’m just going to quote them. I can’t do anything else. They said it better than I could, right now.

“Embrace disgusting fiction and then fucking talk about why it’s nasty. Now YOU have the power over reality.” - tumblr user legsdemandias

The Coffin of Andy and Leyley has been ridiculed, joked about, hot taked on, made a target, drama-ed over, and so on, but it’s hardly been criticized. No one I’ve seen admitting to not liking it talks critically about why it’s disgusting to them, or tries to understand why it exists, or what it’s for. And this is most people’s reaction to most media that deals seriously with anything taboo. “I don’t get it. I don’t like it. It shouldn’t exist. Get it away from me.”

I’m annoyed that the medium, the art form, of video games, is valued so little by so many that this is the wide reaction when something like this gets popular. That the mainstream games journalism media ridicules it, and the creator gets threatened by an internet mob, and it falls on the weirdos and the freaks and the no-name YouTube uwu girls, to give it the serious consideration and recognition it deserves.

To summarize, The Coffin of Andy and Leyley is, in my opinion, a very good video game, and on its behalf, I am mad at video games.

Now, go on. You made it through this video. I told you the plot! You can probably stomach the plot! So go, go. Shoo. Go buy Nemlei a drink. If you want to.

Or, buy us, the joystick system, a drink! You can do that at patreon dot com slash joycestick, or, ko-fi dot com slash joycestick. You can buy us drinks in both of those places.

I’ve been Audrey. Thank you for listening.

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