#its just that romantic relationships between playable characters

[randomnumbers751650]

I finished Itto’s story quest and I have to say that he’s not as dumb as he seems. He’s not very smart, indeed, but I don’t think his IQ is as negative as some memes portray. In fact, I thought him to be quite quick-thinking and capable of discerning good from bad options under pressure, indispensable qualities for a good leader. The issue is that when confronted by problems that require puzzle-solving or more logical thinking, he’s really not good with that and will try to solve it banging his head against the problem until it’s solved – with very mixed results.

I really think that if Itto had a different education, he could’ve grown different. Grandma Oni taught him to be a gentleman, the basics of life, but not differential equations. He doesn’t seem the type that would sit his butt in class, but there are many stories of geniuses that were doing all kinds of crazy things to not stay in class, just like Itto would.

But, at the same time, it made me think of a rather sad AU: if she was swapped with Sara, getting to the Kujou clan. Takayuki would take advantage of Itto’s strength and use him to terrorize his rivals, depriving him from any form of love. General Itto would’ve be a terrible sight, scaring off anyone who happened to be in his way, but an ultimately sad man who was taught nothing but loyalty to ideas that just benefitted Takayuki’s shady deals. He’d be his attack dog (with no concept of stealth, that’d be Kuki’s role, General Itto’s invisible hand, but she tries to befriend him, but he’s so closed, still they both have absolute trust in each other). I feel sad just by imagining it.

But, as a tonal whiplash, Sara would be adopted by Grandma Tengu, who’d love her unconditionally. It’s easy to imagine her becoming a magical girl tengu, proclaiming sappy “In the name of justice, I will punish you!” speeches before taking down evil-doers with her incredible speed. She’d be a ray of sunshine in everyone’s lives, even if she’s a bit bird-brained (she’d fall for the glass trick, maybe that’s how she lost her vision during the decree). Her gang would have some romantic name like Holy Quintet (it used to be Holy Quartet, but she convinced disgraced detective trying to recover his honor Heizou to officially join it) and they’d do poses.

In the vision hunt decree, Itto and Sara would have a cat-and-mouse game (since her specialty is speed), but he’d get her vision eventually. So, they have their notice board war, with her wanting her vision back, challenging him many times. Even after her vision is returned, she still challenges him because she realized how sad he is and decided she’d be his friend, trying to have a fight that would be fun for an oni, since she learned from stories onis liked to fight.

#genshin impact #arataki itto #kujou sara #ittosara #i wrote the post to not be too shippy in romantic terms #but i like them together #in my opinion #mihoyo knew what they were doing #when they designed them #its just that romantic relationships between playable characters #is a risk #for any of them #anyway itto is really the best boy #and sara deserves more love #since she grew up with so little of it

[the-gamer-guide]

Top 15 Games Like Summertime Saga In 2023

Do you remember the captivating story of Summertime Saga? With its unique take on a high school-based narrative and witty characters, this game was one of the best entries in its genre. If you’ve already finished playing it and are looking for some similar experiences that offer slightly different adventure-filled stories, then look no further. We have curated a list of the top 15 games like Summertime Saga for gamers, who appreciate nonlinear story developments, fun characters, and rewarding achievements. Keep reading to explore all these exciting titles right away!

Top 15 Games Like Summertime Saga

If you're ready for a different kind of second-life experience, then Snow Daze: The Music of Winter is worth checking out. Unlike other simulation games like Waifu Academy and Melody, which offer more risque gameplay, Snow Games offers an enjoyable journey through the peaceful winter season while letting players express themselves musically. 1. Waifu Academy

In 2018, Irphaeus shook up the gaming world with Waifu Academy, a visual novel game now available on Steam and various other platforms. It invites its players to high school as a male protagonist, taking part in tales of romance between him and strikingly attractive female characters famously coined ‘waifus’ by anime fiends. You must navigate through different social situations while developing relationships with these virtual ladies to achieve educational goals- dating sims meets visual novels! The versatility of storylines offers multiple paths for completing this mature-rated experience; make sure you're ready before entering Waifu Academy! 2. Ladykiller in a Bind

Ladykiller in a Bind by Christine Love provides an immersive experience with its deep exploration of identity, gender roles, sexuality & relationships from a mature perspective. The player can choose to take on the role as either male or female and find themselves disguising their character for all sorts of interactions aboard this cruise ship set game. Not only is it up to them to win over others' affection but also confront tricky aspects such as power dynamics, control & complexity of consent - bestowing whoever plays the responsibility not just to have fun but think critically about it too! 3. Snow Daze

Snow Daze, the adult-themed visual novel game from Outbreak Games, has captured the attention of players around the world. Players take on a student role with their step-siblings during an exceptionally long snowstorm created for intense social and romantic challenges. Even though there are many games like Summertime Saga, Snow Daze stands out due to its immersive and engaging plot. With several story arcs available to explore and endings dependent upon choices made within each arc, this game offers unbeatable replay value as well as anime visuals tailored specifically to adults who seek graphic sexual content and nudity in gaming experiences. Perfectly suited for those looking to get lost in intriguing storylines through an interactive medium, Snow Daze is sure to make its mark among fans of visual novels! Must Read: Top 10 Games Like Fortnite In 2023 4. Sisterly Lust

"Sisterly Lust" is a steamy visual novel game that follows the story of an unexpected reunion between step-siblings. Developed and published by Perverteer in 2018, this adult content dating simulator features multiple endings depending on how you navigate through its risqué scenarios of romance and social interaction within your family home. With high re-playability value built into each play, "Sisterly Lust" promises players nights full of naughty drama! 5. Coming Out On Top

Get ready to take a deep dive into the diverse world of "Coming Out On Top", an adult-themed visual novel game from Obscurasoft. This groundbreaking title released in 2014 follows protagonist Mark Matthews as he journeys through life - navigating social and romantic struggles while also feeling his way through self-discovery when it comes to sexuality. The player is presented with various story paths and outcomes which evolve based on their choices; offering immense re-playability value all wrapped up within mature themes like sexual content & nudity that are intended only for adults. 6. Dreaming of Dana

Experience a heartfelt story of romance and discovery with "Dreaming of Dana", an adult-themed visual novel from Ptolemy Games. Released in 2017, the game follows Nathan, who returns to his hometown for his mother's wedding and unexpectedly finds himself reconnecting with childhood friend Dana - in more ways than one. On top of its engaging narrative that diversifies based on player choices, this title features mature content such as sexual themes and nudity intended only for adults. Whether you're looking for new love or lost memories - everything is possible when dreaming...of Dana. Must Read: Top 15 Games Like Skyrim In 2023 7. A Town Uncovered

Enter "Sunshine Bay," a quiet town with its fair share of secrets. As the player delves deeper into this mysterious world, they uncover dark and erotic revelations in an adult-themed visual novel game - Town Uncovered! Developed by indie studio Geeseki and released in 2017 on PC via Steam, players must use social interaction to navigate various romantic scenarios while unraveling their new home's hidden secrets. Experience mature content such as sexual themes or nudity within captivating storylines specially developed for adults – are you up for it? 8. Monster Prom

Ready to rev up your dating game? Enter "Monster Prom", the smash hit multiplayer rom-com sim that has players navigating a twisted high school world, where seemingly innocent prom dates are truly out of this world...literally! Developed by Beautiful Glitch and released in 2018 across various platforms including Steam, the game follows a student's three-week race against time to win over any one of an array of monstrous characters - from demon princesses to pun-loving ghosts. Experience vibrant visuals combined with witty dialogue and multiple paths through richly branching storylines for highly repayable date night adventures sure to delight fans everywhere - with or without friends alongside you as four-player support amps up fun competition style. 9. Amber’s Magic Shop

Step into a mystical world of romance, adventure, and fantasy with Amber's Magic Shop - the ultimate visual novel game developed by Winter Wolves. Play as heroine Amber who inherits her grandfather’s magical shop in search of true love and destiny! Guide baby steps towards success in managing this special store full of enchanting items crafted using your wand's powerful magic. Get to know all kinds of customers & other characters while you make choices that will shape not only their relationships but also their fate of yourself within the game's multiple endings... But beware; due to its explicit content, some scenes are designed for adults only, so choose wisely young mage! Fans have already embraced "Amber's Magic Shop" providing glowing reviews from many satisfied players worldwide! 10. Crusoe Had it Easy

Crusoe Had It Easy invites players to embark on an adventurous journey of survival, romance, and mystery! Take the role of Robinson Crusoe as you are stranded with a mysterious woman named Friday. Throughout your stay on this deserted island, you must bravely make decisions that may determine not only your fate of yourself but also your relationship with Friday. How will you interact? What tasks should be prioritized first - such as building a shelter or finding food? Be mindful, there may be more than one ending based on what choices are made along the way; don't forget that 'Crusoe Had It Easy' contains mature themes and is unsuitable for some audiences! 11. Harem Party

Enter the fascinating world of "Harem Party", a visual novel/dating sim game developed by the Japanese company Sekilala. This anime-style masterpiece will take you through an enthralling journey where, as the main protagonist, your choices and decisions matter. With multiple female characters each with unique personalities and storylines for you to interact within this mature content adventure - it is up to YOU who ends up being part of your harem at the end! Will you be able to find true love or have all hope dashed? What secrets from these exotic ladies await if their hearts are opened and won over? Take on this epic experience today only within Harem Party. 12. Dual Family

Step into a reality with two sides: the adult-oriented visual novel game, "Dual Family". You are given complete control to become both husband and wife in this domestic drama. Your decisions will determine how things unfold for their family as you navigate through multiple branching paths full of sexual content and other mature themes that take your story down unexpected roads toward one of its various endings. Although it has garnered mixed reviews due to its explicit nature, fans can't get enough - an audience eagerly awaiting wherever these choices may lead them! So if you're looking for something unique & risque, grab hold and find out what lies within Dual Family now available on PC platforms everywhere. 13. Mythic Manor

Immerse yourself in the captivating world of Mythic Manor, an anime-style adult visual novel game. You take on the role of a male protagonist who inherits his mysterious late grandfather's mansion and its inhabitant's ghosts, demons, and other mythical creatures. Your decisions will have powerful consequences as you explore branching paths with multiple endings throughout your journey. Uncover hidden secrets while managing this magical estate, customizing leveling systems that unlock exciting new scenes for deeper immersion into this enchanting realm - intended only for mature audiences due to explicit content, including sexual themes. 14. Taffy Tales

Take on the role of Nathan and become immersed in Taffy Tales, an adult-oriented visual novel game developed by UberPie. Return to your hometown after being away for several years, branching paths with multiple endings await as you interact with characters such as family members, friends, and other townspeople while making decisions that affect their story outcomes. Level up along the way unlocking new scenes and dialogue -but beware! This explicit content has not been rated lightly; it is intended only for mature audiences looking to explore more than just a typical 'kiddy' tale. Reviews? Mixed opinions from critics suggest caution should be exercised when playing this one. 15. Melody

Melody is a visual novel that is highly compelling and immersive. This narrative focuses on the journey of a young girl and her attempts to stay connected to her grandfather, affected by dementia. She must confront complex emotions as part of this arduous struggle, making it an emotionally resonant tale. The visual experience enhances the discussion of complex emotions, depicting each scene in stunning detail. Through interactive dialogue and fully formed characters, the game follows Melody on her journey of self-discovery and encourages players to consider the idea that memories can be stronger than physical reality.

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, as you can see, there are plenty of great options for playing games similar to Summertime Saga. Some of these suggestions are comparable in terms of gameplay or story, while others take the same genre but offer a new twist. Whatever type of game you like to play, there is something compiled here on this list that will surely make your summer more enjoyable. Whether it’s a dreamy romance, exploration-building simulation, or a musical adventure, these top 15 games like Summertime Saga have got something for everyone. We hope this article on the top 15 games like Summertime Saga has inspired you to try something new. Read the full article

[insanehobbit]

a twenty-five thousand word post about a twenty-three year old “debate”

As time goes on, I’m baffled that it remains a commonly held opinion that:

The LTD remains unresolved

SE is deliberately playing coy, and are (or have been) afraid to resolve it.

To me, the answer is as clear as day, and yet seeing so many people acting as if it’s a question that remains unanswered makes me wonder if I’m the crazy one.

So I am going to try to articulate my thought process here, not because I expect to change any hearts and minds, but more to get these thoughts out of my head and onto a page so I can finally read a book and/or watch reruns of Shark Tank in peace.

To start off, there are two categories of argument (that are among, if not the most widely used lines of argument) that I will try NOT to engage with:

1) Quotes from Ultimania or developer interviews - while they’re great for easter eggs and behind-the-scenes info, if a guidebook is required to understand key plot points, you have fundamentally failed as a storyteller. Now the question of which character wants to bone whom is often something that can be relegated to a guidebook, but in the case of FF7, you would be watching two very different stories play out depending on who Cloud ends up with.

Of course, the Ultimanias do spell this out clearly, but luckily for us, SE are competent enough storytellers that we can find the answer by looking at the text alone.

2) Arguments about character actions/motivations — specifically, I’m talking about stuff like “Cloud made this face in this scene, which means be must be [insert whatever here].”

Especially when it comes to the LTD, these tend to focus on individual actions, decontextualizing them from their role in the narrative as a whole. LTDers often try to put themselves in the character’s shoes to suss out what they may be thinking and feeling in those moments. These arguments will be colored by personal experiences, which will inevitably vary.

Let’s take for example Cloud’s behavior in Advent Children. One may argue that it makes total sense given that he’s dying and fears failing the ones he loves. Another may argue that there’s no way that he would run unless he was deeply unhappy and pining after a lost love. Well, you’ll probably just be talking over each other until the cows come home. Such is the problem with trying to play armchair therapist with a fictional character. It’s not like we can ask Cloud himself why he did what he did (and even if we could, he’s not the exactly the most reliable narrator in the world). Instead, in trying to understand his motivations, we are left with no choice but to draw comparisons with our own personal experiences, those of our friends, or other works of media we’ve consumed. Any interpretation would be inherently subjective and honestly, a futile subject for debate.

There’s nothing wrong with drawing personal connections with fictional characters of course. That is the purpose of art after all. They are vessels of empathy. But when we’re talking about what is canon, it doesn’t matter what we take away. What matters is the creators’ intent.

Cloud, Tifa and Aerith are not your friends Bob, Alice and Maude. They are characters created by Square Enix. Real people can behave in a variety of different ways if they found themselves in the situations faced by our dear trio; however, FF7 characters are not sentient creatures. Everything they do or say is dictated by the developers to serve the story they are trying to tell.

So what do we have left then? Am I asking you, dear reader, to just trust me, anonymous stranger on the Internet, when I tell you #clotiiscanon. Well, in a sense, yes, but more seriously, I’m going to try to suss out what the creator’s intent is based on what is, and more importantly, what isn’t, on screen.

Instead of putting ourselves in the shoes of the characters, let’s try putting ourselves in the shoes of the creators. So the question would then be, if the intent is X, then what purpose does character Y or scene Z serve?

The story of FF7 isn’t the immutable word of God etched in a stone tablet. For every scene that made it into the final game, there are dozens of alternatives that were tossed aside. Let us also not forget the crude economics of popular storytelling. Spending resources on one particular aspect of the game may mean something entirely unrelated will have to be cut for time. Thus, the absence of a particular character/scenario is an alternative in itself. So with all these options at their disposal, why is the scene we see before us the one that made it into the final cut? — Before we dive in, I also want to define two broad categories of narrative: messy and clean.

Messy narratives are ones I would define as stories that try to illuminate something about the human condition, but may not leave the audience feeling very good by the end of it. The protagonists, while not always anti-heroes, don’t always exhibit the kind of growth we’d like, don’t always learn their lessons, probably aren’t the best role models. The endings are often ambivalent, ambiguous, and leaves room for the audience to take away from it what they will. This is the category I would put art films and prestige cable dramas.

Clean narratives are where I would categorize most popular forms of entertainment. Not that these characters necessarily lack nuance, but whatever flaws are portrayed are something to be overcome by the end of story. The protagonists are characters you’re supposed to want to root for

Final Fantasy as a series would fall under the ‘clean’ category. Sure, many of the protagonists start out as jerks, but they grow through these flaws and become true heroes by the end of their journey. Hell, a lot of the time even the villains are redeemed. They want you to like the characters you’re spending a 40+ hr journey with. Their depictions can still be realistic, but they will become the most idealized versions of themselves by the end of their journeys.

This is important to establish, because we can then assume that it is not SE’s intent to make any of their main characters come off pathetic losers or unrepentant assholes. Now whether or not they succeed in that endeavor is another question entirely.

FF7 OG or The dumbest thought experiment in the world

With that one thousand word preamble out of the way, let’s finally take a look at the text. In lieu of going through the OG’s story beat by beat, let’s try this thought experiment:

Imagine it’s 1996, and you’re a development executive at what was then Squaresoft. The plucky, young development team has the first draft of what will become the game we know as Final Fantasy VII. Like the preceding entries in the series, it��s a world-spanning action adventure RPG, with a key subplot being the epic tragic romance between its hero and heroine, Cloud and Aerith.

They ask you for your notes.

(For the sake of your sanity and mine, let’s limit our hypothetical notes to the romantic subplot)

Disc 1 - everything seems to be on the right track. Nice meet-cute, lots of moments developing the relationship between our pair. Creating a love triangle with this Tifa character is an interesting choice, but she’s a comparatively minor character so she probably won’t be a real threat and will find her happiness elsewhere by the end of the game. You may note that they’re leaning a bit too much into Tifa and Cloud’s past. Especially the childhood promise flashback early in the game — cute scene, but a distraction from main story and main pairing — fodder for the chopping block. You may also bump on the fact that Aerith is initially attracted to Cloud because he reminds her of an ex, but this is supposed to be a more mature FF. That can be an obstacle they overcome as Aerith gets to know the real Cloud.

Aerith dies, but it is supposed to be a tragic romance after all. Death doesn’t have to be the end for this relationship, especially since Aerith is an Ancient after all.

It’s when Disc 2 starts that things go off the rails. First off, it feels like an awfully short time for Cloud to be grieving the love of his life, though it’s somewhat understandable. This story is not just a romance. There are other concerns after all, Cloud’s identity crisis for one. Though said identity crisis involves spending a lot of time developing his relationship with another woman. It’s one thing for Cloud and Tifa to be from the same hometown, but does she really need to play such an outsized role in his internal conflict? This might give the player the wrong impression.

You get to the Northern Crater, and it just feels all wrong. Cloud is more or less fine after the love of his life is murdered in front of his eyes but has a complete mental breakdown to the point that he’s temporarily removed as a playable character because Tifa loses faith in him??? Shouldn’t it be the other way around?

Oh, but it only gets worse from here. With Cloud gone, the POV switches to Tifa and her feelings for him and her desire to find him. The opening of the game is also recontextualized when you learn the only reason that Cloud was part of the first Reactor mission that starts the game is because Tifa found him and wanted to keep an eye on him.

Then you get to Mideel and the alarm bells are going off. Tifa drops everything, removing her from the party as well, to take care of Cloud while he’s a catatonic vegetable? Not good. Very not good. This level of selfless devotion is going to make Cloud look like a total asshole when he rejects her in favor of Aerith. Speaking of Aerith, she uh…hasn’t been mentioned for some time. In fact, her relationship with Cloud has remained completely static after Disc 1, practically nonexistent, while his with Tifa has been building and building. Developing a rival relationship that then needs to be dismantled rather than developing the endgame relationship doesn’t feel like a particularly valuable use of time and resources.

By the time you get to the Lifestream scene, you’re about ready to toss the script out of the window. Here’s the emotional climax of the entire game, where Cloud’s internal conflict is finally resolved, and it almost entirely revolves around Tifa? Rather than revisiting the many moments of mental anguish we experienced during the game itself — featuring other characters, including let’s say, Aerith — it’s about a hereto unknown past that only Tifa has access to? Not only that, but we learn that the reason Cloud wanted to join SOLDIER was to impress Tifa, and the reason he adopted his false persona was because he was so ashamed that he couldn’t live up to the person he thought Tifa wanted him to be? Here, we finally get a look into the inner life of one half of our epic couple and…it entirely revolves around another woman??

Cloud is finally his real self, and hey, it looks like he finally remembers Aerith, that’s at least a step in the right direction. Though still not great. With his emotional arc already resolved, any further romantic developments is going to feel extraneous and anticlimactic. It just doesn’t feel like there’s enough time to establish that:

Cloud’s romantic feelings for Tifa (which were strong enough to launch his hero’s journey) have transformed into something entirely platonic in the past few days/weeks

Cloud’s feelings for Aerith that he developed while he was pretending to be someone else (and not just any someone, but Aerith’s ex of all people) are real.

This isn’t a romantic melodrama after all. There’s still a villain to kill and a world to save.

Cloud does speak of Aerith wistfully, and even quite personally at times, yet every time he talks about her, he’s surrounded by the other party members. A scene or two where he can grapple with his feelings for her on his own would help. Her ghost appearing in the Sector 5 Church feels like a great opportunity for this to happen, but he doesn’t interact with it at all. What gives? Missed opportunity after missed opportunity.

The night before the final battle, Cloud asks the entire party to find what they’re fighting for. This feels like a great (and perhaps the last) opportunity to establish that for Cloud, it’s in Aerith’s memory and out of his love for her. He could spend those hours alone in any number of locations associated with her — the Church, the Temple of the Ancients, the Forgotten City.

Instead — none of those happens. Instead, once again, it’s Cloud and Tifa in another scene where they’re the only two characters in the scene. You’re really going to have Cloud spend what could very well be the last night of his life with another woman? With a fade to black that strongly implies they slept together? In one fell swoop, you’re portraying Cloud as a guy who not only betrays the memory of his lost love, but is also incredibly callous towards the feelings of another woman by taking advantage of her vulnerability. Why are we rooting for him to succeed again?

Cloud and the gang finally defeat Sephiroth, and Aerith guides him back into the real world. Is he finally explicitly stating that he’s searching for her (though they’ve really waited until the last minute to do so), but again, why is Tifa in this scene? Shouldn’t it just be Cloud and Aerith alone? Why have Tifa be there at all? Why have her and her alone of all the party members be the one waiting for Cloud? Do you need to have Tifa there to be rejected while Cloud professes his unending love for Aerith? It just feels needlessly cruel and distracts from what should be the sole focus of the scene, the love between Cloud and Aerith.

What a mess.

You finish reading, and since it is probably too late in the development process to just fire everyone, you offer a few suggestions that will clarify the intended romance while the retaining the other plot points/general themes of the game.

Here they are, ordered by scale of change, from minor to drastic:

Option 1 would be to keep most of the story in tact, but rearrange the sequence of events so that the Lifestream sequence happens before Aerith’s death. That way, Cloud is his true self and fully aware of his feelings for both women before Aerith’s death. That way, his past with Tifa isn’t some ticking bomb waiting to go off in the second half of the game. That development will cease at the Lifestream scene. Cloud will realize the affection he held for her as a child is no longer the case. He is grateful for the past they shared, but his future is with Aerith. He makes a clear choice before that future is taken away from him with her death. The rest of the game will go on more or less the same (with the Highwind scene being eliminated, of course) making it clear, that avenging the death of his beloved is one of, if not the, primary motivation for him wanting to defeat Sephiroth.

The problem with this “fix” is that a big part of the reason that Aerith gets killed is because of Cloud’s identity crisis. If said crisis is resolved, the impact of her death will be diminished, because it would feel arbitrary rather than something that stems from the consequences of Cloud’s actions. More of the story will need to be reconceived so that this moment holds the same emotional weight.

Another problem is why the Lifestream scene needs to exist at all. Why spend all that time developing the backstory for a relationship that will be moot by the end of the game? It makes Tifa feel like less of a character and more of a plot device, who becomes irrelevant after she services the protagonist’s character development and then has none of her own. That’s no way to treat one of the main characters of your game.

Option 2 would be to re-imagine Tifa’s character entirely. You can keep some of her history with Cloud in tact, but expand her backstory so she is able to have a satisfactory character arc outside of her relationship with Cloud. You could explore the five years in her life since the Nibelheim incident. Maybe she wasn’t in Midgar the whole time. Maybe, like Barret, she has her own Corel, and maybe reconciling with her past there is the climax of her emotional arc as opposed to her past with Cloud. For Cloud too, her importance needs to be diminished. She can be one of the people who help him find his true self in the Lifestream, but not the only person. There’s no reason the other people he’s met on his journey can’t be there. Thus their relationship remains somewhat important, but their journeys are not so entwined that it distracts from Cloud and Aerith’s romance.

Option 3 would be to really lean into the doomed romance element of Cloud and Aerith’s relationship. Have her death be the cause of his mental breakdown, and have Aerith be the one in the Lifestream who is able to put his mind back together and bring him back to the realm of consciousness. After he emerges, he has the dual goal of defeating Sephiroth and trying to reunite with Aerith. In the end, in order to do the former, he has to relinquish the latter. He makes selfless choice. He makes the choice that resonates the overall theme of the game. It’s a bittersweet but satisfying ending. Cloud chooses to honor her memory and her purpose over the chance to physically bring her back. In this version of the game, the love triangle serves no purpose. There’s no role for Tifa at all.

Okay, we can be done with this strained counterfactual. What I’ve hopefully illustrated is that while developers had countless opportunities to solidify Cloud/Aerith as the canon couple in Discs 2 and 3 of the game, they instead chose a different route each and every time. What should also be clear is that the biggest obstacle standing in their way is not Aerith’s death, but the fact that Tifa exists.

At least in the form she takes in the final game, as a playable character and at the very least, the 3rd most important character in game’s story. She is not just another recurring NPC or an antagonist. Her love for Cloud is not going to be treated like a mere trifle or obstacle. If Cloud/Aerith was supposed to be the endgame ship, there would be no need for a love triangle and no need to include Tifa in the game at all. Death is a big enough obstacle, developing Cloud’s relationship with Tifa would only distract from and diminish his romance with Aerith.

I think this is something the dead enders understand intuitively, even more so than many Cloti shippers. Which is why some of them try to dismiss Tifa’s importance in the story so that she becomes a minor supporting character at best, or denigrate her character to the point that she becomes an actual villain. The Seifer to a Squall, the Seymour to a Tidus, hell even a Quistis to a Rinoa, they know how to deal with, but a Tifa Lockhart? As she is actually depicted in Final Fantasy VII? They have no playbook for that, and thus they desperately try to squeeze her into one of these other roles.

Let’s try another thought experiment, and see what would to other FF romances if we inserted a Tifa Lockhart-esque character in the middle of them.

FFXV is a perfect example because it features the sort of tragic love beyond death romance that certain shippers want Cloud and Aerith to be. Now, did I think FFXV was a good game? No. Did I think Noctis/Luna was a particularly well-developed romance? Also no. Did I have any question in my mind whatsoever that they were the canon relationship? Absolutely not.

Is this because they kiss at the end? Well sure, that helps, but also it’s because the game doesn’t spend the chapters after Luna’s death developing Noctis’ relationship with another woman. If Noctis/Luna had the same sort of development as Cloud/Aerith, then after Luna dies, Iris would suddenly pop in and play a much more prominent role. The game would flashback to her past and her relationship with Noctis. And it would be through his relationship with Iris that Noctis understands his duty to become king or a crystal or whatever the fuck that game was about. Iris is by Noctis’ side through the final battle, and when he ascends the throne in that dreamworld or whatever. There, Luna finally shows up again. Iris is still in the frame when Noctis tells her something like ‘Oh sorry, girl, I’ve been in love with Luna all along,” before he kisses Luna and the game ends.

(a very real scene from a very good game)

Come on. It would be utterly ludicrous and an utter disservice to every character involved, yet that is essentially the argument Cloud/Aerith shippers are making. SE may have made some pretty questionable storytelling decisions in the past, but they aren’t that bad at this.

Or in FFVIII, it would be like reordering the sequence of events so that Squall remembers that he grew up in an orphanage with all the other kids after Rinoa falls into a coma. And while Rinoa is out of commission, instead of Quistis gracefully bowing out after realizing she had mistaken her feelings of sisterly affection for love, it becomes Quistis’ childhood relationship with Squall that allows him to remember his past and re-contextualizes the game we’ve played thus far, so that the player realizes that it was actually Quistis who was his motivation all along. Then after this brief emotional detour, his romance with Rinoa would continue as usual. Absolutely absurd.

The Final Fantasy games certainly have their fair share of plot holes, but they’ve never whiffed on a romance this badly.

A somewhat more serious character analysis of the OG

What then is Tifa’s actual role in the story of FFVII? Her character is intricately connected to Cloud’s. In fact, they practically have the same arc, though Tifa’s is rather understated compared to his. She doesn’t adopt a false persona after all. For both of them, the flaw that they must learn to overcome over the course of the game is their fear of confronting the truth of their past. Or to put it more crudely, if they’re not lying, they’re at the very least omitting the truth. Cloud does so to protect himself from his fear of being exposed as a failure. Tifa does so at the expense of herself, because she fears the truth will do more harm than good. They’re two sides of the same coin. Nonetheless, their lying has serious ramifications.

The past they’re both afraid to confront is of course the Nibelheim Incident from five years ago. Thus, the key points in their emotional journeys coincide with the three conflicting Nibelheim flashbacks depicted in the game: Cloud’s false memory in Kalm, Sephiroth’s false vision in the Northern Crater, and the truth in the Lifestream.

Before they enter the Lifestream, both Cloud and Tifa are at the lowest of their lows. Cloud has had a complete mental breakdown and is functionally a vegetable. Tifa has given up everything to take care of Cloud as she feels responsible for his condition. If he doesn’t recover, she may never find peace.

With nothing left to lose, they both try to face the past head on. For Cloud, it’s a bit harder. At the heart of all this confusion, is of course, the Nibelheim Incident. How does Cloud know all these things he shouldn’t if Tifa doesn’t remember seeing him there? The emotional climax for both Cloud and Tifa, and arguably the game as a whole, is the moment the Shinra grunt removes his helmet to reveal that Cloud was there all along.

Tifa is the only character who can play this role for Cloud. It’s not like she a found a videotape in the Lifestream labeled ‘Nibelheim Incident - REAL’ and voila, Cloud is fixed. No, she is the only one who can help him because she is the only person who lived through that moment. No one else could make Cloud believe it. You could have Aerith or anyone else trying to tell him what actually happened, but why would he believe it anymore than the story Sephiroth told him at the Northern Crater?

With Tifa, it’s different. Not only was she physically there, but she’s putting as much at risk in what the truth may reveal. She’s not just a plot device to facilitate Cloud’s character development. The Lifestream sequence is as much the culmination of her own character arc. If it goes the wrong way, “Cloud” may find out that he’s just a fake after all, and Tifa may learn that boy she thought she’d been on this journey with had died years ago. That there’s no one left from her past, that it was all in her head, that she’s all alone. Avoiding this truth is a comfort, but in this moment, they’re both putting themselves on the line. Being completely vulnerable in front of the person they’re most terrified of being vulnerable with.

The developers have structured Cloud and Tifa’s character arcs so that the crux is a moment where the other is literally the only person who could provide the answer they need. Without each other, as far as the story is concerned, Cloud and Tifa would remain incomplete.

Aerith’s character arc is a different beast entirely. She is the closest we have to the traditional Campbellian Hero. She is the Chosen One, the literal last of her kind, who has been resisting the call to adventure until she can no longer. The touchstones of her character arc are the moments she learns more about her Cetra past and comes to terms with her role in protecting the planet - namely Cosmo Canyon, the Temple of the Ancients and the Forgotten City.

How do hers and Cloud’s arcs intersect? When it comes to the Nibelheim incident, she is a merely a spectator (at least during the Kalm flashback, as for the other two, she is uh…deceased). Cloud attacking her at the Temple of the Ancients, which results in her running to the Forgotten City alone and getting killed by Sephiroth, certainly exacerbates his mental deterioration, but it is by no means a turning point in his arc the way the Northern Crater is.

As for Cloud’s role in Aerith’s arc, their meeting is quite important in that it sets forth the series of events that leads her to getting captured by Shinra and thus meeting “Sephiroth” and wanting to learn more about the Cetra. It’s the inciting incident if we’re going to be really pedantic about it, yet Aerith’s actual character development is not dependent on her relationship with Cloud. It is about her communion with her Cetra Ancestry and the planet.

To put it in other terms, all else being the same, Aerith could still have a satisfying character arc had Cloud not crashed down into her Church. Sure, the game would look pretty different, but there are other ways for her to transform from a flirty, at times frivolous girl to an almost Christ-like figure who accepts the burden of protecting the planet.

Such is not the case for Cloud and Tifa. Their character arcs are built around their shared past and their relationship with one another. Without Tifa, you would have to rewrite Cloud’s character entirely. What was his motivation for joining SOLDIER? How did he get on that AVALANCHE mission in the first place? Who can possibly know him well enough to put his mind back together after it falls apart? If the answer to all these questions is the same person, then congratulations, you’ve just reverse engineered Tifa Lockhart.

Tifa fares a little better. Without Cloud, she would be a sad, sweet character who never gets the opportunity to reconcile with the trauma of her past. Superficially, a lot would be the same, but she would ultimately be quite static and all the less interesting for it.

Let’s also take a brief gander at Tifa’s role after the Lifestream sequence. At this point in the game, both Tifa and Cloud’s emotional arcs are essentially complete. They are now the most idealized versions of themselves, characters the players are meant to admire and aspire to. However they are depicted going forward, it would not be the creator’s intent for their actions to be perceived in a negative light.

A few key moments standout, ones that would not be included if the game was intended to end with any other romantic pairing or with Cloud’s romantic interest left ambiguous:

The Highwind scene, which I’ve gone over above. It doesn’t matter if you get the Low Affection or High Affection version. It would not reflect well on either Cloud or Tifa if he chose to spend what could be his last night alive with a woman whose feelings he did not reciprocate.

Before the final battle with Sephiroth, the party members scream out the reasons they’re fighting. Barret specifically calls out AVALANCHE, Marlene and Dyne, Red XIII specifically calls out his Grandpa, and Tifa specifically calls out Cloud. You are not going to make one of Tifa’s last moments in the game be her pining after a guy who has no interest in her. Not when you could easily have her mention something like her past, her hometown or hell even AVALANCHE and Marlene like Barret. If Tifa’s feelings for Cloud are meant to be unrequited, then it would be a character flaw that would be dealt with long before the final battle (see: Quistis in FF8 or Eowyn in the Lord of the Rings). They would not still be on display at moment like this.

Tifa being the only one there when Cloud jumps into the Lifestream to fight Sephiroth for the last time, and Tifa being the only one there when he emerges. She is very much playing the traditional partner/spouse role here, when you could easily have the entire party present or no one there at all. There is clearly something special about her relationship with Cloud that sets her apart from the other party members.

Once again, let’s look at the “I think I can meet her there moment.” And let’s put side the translation (the Japanese is certainly more ambiguous, and it’s not like the game had any trouble having Cloud call Aerith by her name before this). If Cloud was really expressing his desire to reunite with Aerith, and thus his rejection of Tifa, then the penultimate scene of this game is one that involves the complete utter and humiliation of one of its main characters since Tifa’s reply would indicate she’s inviting herself to a romantic reunion she has no part in. Not only that, but to anyone who is not Cl*rith shipper, the protagonist of the game is going to come off as a callous asshole. That cannot possibly be the creator’s intention. They are competent enough to depict an act of love without drawing attention to the party hurt by that love.

What then could possibly be the meaning? Could it possibly be Cloud trying to comfort Tifa by trying to find a silver lining in what appears to be their impending death? That this means they may get to see their departed loved ones again, including their mutual friend, Aerith? (I will note that Tifa talks about Aerith as much, if not even more than Cloud, after her death). Seems pretty reasonable to me, this being an interpretation of the scene that aligns with the overall themes of the game, and casts every character in positive light during this bittersweet moment.

Luckily enough, we have an entire fucking Compilation to find out which is right.

But before we get there, I’m sure some of you (lol @ me thinking anyone is still reading this) are asking, if Cloti is canon, then why is there a love triangle at all? Why even hint at the possibility of a romance between Cloud and Aerith? Wouldn’t that also be a waste of time and resources if they weren’t meant to be canon?

Well, there are two very important reasons that have nothing to do with romance and everything to do with two of the game’s biggest twists:

Aerith initially being attracted to Cloud’s similarities to Zack/commenting on the uncanniness of said similarities is an organic way to introduce the man Cloud’s pretending to be. Without it, the reveal in the Lifestream would fall a bit flat. The man he’s been emulating all along would just be some sort of generic hero rather than a person whose history and deeds already encountered during the course of the game. Notably for this to work, the game only has to establish Aerith’s attraction to Cloud.

To build the player’s attachment to Aerith before her death/obscure the fact that she’s going to die. With the technological limitations of the day, the only way to get the player to interact with Aerith is through the player character (AKA Cloud), and adding an element of choice (AKA the Gold Saucer Date mechanic) makes the player even more invested. This then elevates Aerith’s relationship with Cloud over hers with any other character. At the same time, because her time in the game is limited, Cloud ends up interacting with Aerith more than any of the other characters, at least in Disc 1. The choice to make many of these interactions flirty/romantic also toys with player expectations. One does not expect the hero’s love interest to die halfway through the game. The game itself also spends a bit of time teasing the romance, albeit, largely in superficial ways like other characters commenting on their relationship or Cait Sith reading their love fortune at the Temple of the Ancients. Yet, despite the quantity of their personal interactions, Cloud and Aerith never display any moments of deep love or devotion that one associates with a Final Fantasy romance. They never have the time. What the game establishes then is the potential of a romance rather than the romance itself. Aerith’s death hurts because of all that lost potential. There so many things she wanted to do, so many places she wanted to see that will never happen because her life is cut short. Part of what is lost, of course, is the potential of her romance with Cloud.

This creative choice is a lot more controversial since it elevates subverting audience expectations over character, and understandably leads to some player confusion. What’s the point of all this set up if there’s not going to be a pay off? Well, that is kind of the point. Death is frustrating because of all the unknowns and what-ifs. But, I suppose some people just can’t accept that fact in a game like this.

One last note on the OG before we move on: Even though this from an Ultimania, since we’re talking about story development and creator intent, I thought it was relevant to include: the fact that Aerith was the sole heroine in early drafts of the game is not the LTD trump card so people think it is. Stories undergo radical changes through the development process. More often than not, there are too many characters, and characters are often combined or removed if their presence feels redundant or confusing.

In this case, the opposite happened. Tifa was added later in the development process as a second heroine. Let’s say that Aerith was the Last Ancient and the protagonist’s sole love interest in this early draft of Final Fantasy VII. In the game that was actually released, that role was split between two characters (and last I checked, Tifa is not the last of a dying race), and Aerith dies halfway through the game, so what does that suggest about how Aerith’s role may have changed in the final product? Again, if Aerith was intended to be Cloud’s love interest, Tifa simply would not exist.

A begrudging analysis of our favorite straight-to-DVD sequel

Let’s move onto the Compilation. And in doing so, completely forget about the word vomit that’s been written above. While it’s quite clear to me now that there’s no way in hell the developers would have intended the last scene in the game to be both a confirmation of Cloud’s love for Aerith and his rejection of Tifa, in my younger and more vulnerable years, I wasn’t so sure. In fact, this was the prevailing interpretation back in the pre-Compilation Dark Ages. Probably because of a dubious English translation of the game and a couple of ambiguous cameos in Final Fantasy Tactics and Kingdom Hearts were all we  had to go on.

How then did the official sequel to Final Fantasy VII change those priors?

Two years after the events of the game, Cloud is living as a family with Tifa and two kids rather than scouring the planet for a way to be reunited with Aerith. Shouldn’t the debate be well and over with that? Obviously not, and it’s not just because people were being obstinate. Part of the confusion stems from Advent Children itself, but I would argue that did not come from an intent to play coy/keep Cloud’s romantic desires ambiguous, but rather a failure of execution of his character arc.

Now I wasn’t the biggest fan of the film when I first watched a bootlegged copy I downloaded off LimeWire in 2005, and I like it even less now, but I better understand its failures, given its unique position as a sequel to a beloved game and the cornerstone of launching the Compilation.

The original game didn’t have such constraints on its storytelling. Outside of including a few elements that make it recognizable as a Final Fantasy (Moogles, Chocobos, Summons, etc.) and being a good enough game to be a financial success, the developers pretty much had free rein in terms of what story they wanted to tell, what characters they would use to tell it, and how long it took for them to tell said story.

With Advent Children, telling a good story was not the sole or even primary goal. Instead, it had to:

Do some fanservice: The core audience is going to be the OG fanbase, who would be expecting to see modern, high-def depictions of all the memorable and beloved characters from the game, no matter if the natural end point of their stories is long over.

Set up the rest of the Compilation - Advent Children is the draw with the big stars, but also a way to showcase the lesser known characters from from the Compilation who are going to be leading their own spinoffs.  It’s part feature film/part advertisement for the rest of the Compilation. Thus, the Turks, Vincent and Zack get larger roles in the film than one might expect to attract interest to the spinoffs they lead.

Show off its technical prowess: SE probably has enough self awareness to realize that what’s going to set it apart from other animated feature films is not its novel storytelling, but its graphical capabilities. Thus, to really show off those graphics, the film is going to be packed to the brim with big, complicated action scenes with lots of moving parts, as opposed to quieter character driven moments.

These considerations are not unique to Advent Children, but important to note nonetheless:

As a sequel, the stakes have to be just as high if not higher than those in the original work. Since the threat in the OG was the literal end of the world, in Advent Children, the world’s gotta end again

The OG was around 30-40 hours long. An average feature-length film is roughly two hours. Video games and films are two very different mediums. As many TV writers who have tried to make the transition to film (and vice-versa) can tell you, success in one medium does not translate to success in another. 

With so much to do in so little time, is it any wonder then that it is again Sephiroth who is the villain trying to destroy the world and Aerith in the Lifestream the deus ex machina who saves the day?

All of this is just a long-winded way to say, certain choices in the Advent Children that may seem to exist only to perpetuate the LTD were made with many other storytelling considerations in mind.

When trying to understand the intended character arcs and relationship dynamics, you cannot treat the film as a collection of scenes devoid of context. You can’t just say - “well here’s a scene where Cloud seems to miss Aerith, and here’s another scene where Cloud and Tifa fight. Obviously, Cloud loves Aerith.” You have to look at what purpose these scenes serve in the grander narrative.

And what is this grander narrative? To put it in simplistic terms, Aerith is the obstacle, and Tifa is goal. Cloud must get over his guilt over Aerith’s death so that he can return to living with Tifa and the children in peace.

The scenes following the prologue are setting up the emotional stakes of film - the problem that will be resolved by the film’s end. The problem being depicted here is not Aerith’s absence from Cloud’s life, but Cloud’s absence from his family. We see Tifa walking through Seventh Heaven saying “he’s not here anymore,” we see Denzel in his sickbed asking for Cloud, we see a framed photo of the four of them on Cloud’s desk. We see Cloud letting Tifa’s call go to voicemail.

What we do not see is Aerith, who does not appear until almost halfway through the film.

Cloud spends the first of the film avoiding confrontation with the Remnants/dealing with the return of Sephiroth. It’s only when Tifa is injured, and Denzel and Marlene get kidnapped that he goes to face his problems head on.

Before the final battle, when Cloud has exorcised his emotional demons and is about to face his physical demons, what do we see? We see Cloud telling Marlene that it’s his turn to take care of her, Denzel and Tifa the way they’ve taken care of him. We see Cloud telling Tifa that he ‘feels lighter’ and tacitly confirming that she was correct when she called him out earlier in the film. We see Cloud confirming to Denzel that he’s going home after this is all over.

What we do not see is Cloud telepathically communicating with Aerith to say, “Hey boo, can’t wait to beat Sephiroth so I can finally reunite with you in the Promised Land. Xoxoxo.” Aerith doesn’t factor in at all. Returning to his family is his goal, and his fight with Bahamut/the Remnants/Sephiroth/whatever the fuck is the final obstacle he has to face before reaching this goal.

This is reiterated again when Cloud is shot by Yazoo and seemingly perishes in an explosion. What is at stake with his “death”? We see Tifa calling his name while looking out the airship. We see Denzel and Marlene waiting for him at Seventh Heaven. We do not see Aerith watching over him in the Lifestream.

Now, Aerith does play an important role in Cloud’s arc when she shows up at about the midpoint of the film. You could fairly argue that it’s the turning point in Cloud’s emotional journey, the moment when he finally decides to confront his problems. But even if it’s only Cloud and Aerith in the scene, it’s not really about their relationship at all.

Let’s consider the context before this scene happens. Denzel and Marlene have been kidnapped by the Remnants; Tifa was nearly killed in a fight with another. This is Cloud at his lowest point. It’s his worst fears come to pass. His guilt over Aerith’s death is directly addressed at this moment in the film because it is not so much about his feelings for Aerith as it is about how Cloud fears the failures of his past (one of the biggest being her death) would continue into the present. If it was just about Aerith, we could have seen Cloud asking for her forgiveness at any other time in the film. It occurs when it does because this when his guilt over Aerith’s death intersects with his actual conflict, his fear that he’ll fail the the ones he loves. She appears when he’s at the Forgotten City where he goes to save the children. The same location where he had failed two year before.

This connection is made explicit when Cloud has flashes of Zack and Aerith’s deaths before he saves Denzel and Tifa from Bahamut. Again, Cloud’s dwelling on the past is directly related to his fears of being unable to protect his present.

Aerith is a feminine figure who is associated with flowers. That combined with the players’ memory of her and her relationship with Cloud in the OG, I can see how their scenes can be construed as romantic, but I really do not think that it is the creators’ intent to portray any romantic longing on Cloud’s part.

If they wanted to suggest that Cloud was still in love with Aerith or even leave his romantic interest ambiguous, there is no way in hell they would have had Cloud living with Tifa and two kids prior to the film’s events. To say nothing of opening the film by showing the pain his absence brings.

A romantic reading of Cloud’s guilt over Aerith’s death would suggest that he entered into a relationship with Tifa and started raising two children with her while still holding a torch for Aerith and hoping for a way to be reunited with her. The implication would be that Tifa is his second choice, and he is settling. Now, is this a dynamic that occurs in real life? Absolutely. Is this something that is often depicted in some films and television? Sure - in fact this very premise is at the core of one my favorite films of the last decade - 45 Years — and spoiler alert — the guy does not come off well in this situation. But once again, Cloud is not a real person, and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is not a John Cassavettes film or an Ingmar Bergman chamber drama. It is a 2-hour long straight to DVD sequel for a video game made for teens. This kind of messy, if realistic, relationship dynamic is not what this particular work is trying to explore.

(one of these is a good film!)

By the end of Advent Children, Cloud is once again the idealized version of himself. A hero that the audience is supposed to like and admire. We are supposed to think that his actions in the first half of the movie (wallowing in his guilt and abandoning his family) were bad. These are the flaws that he must overcome through the course of the film, and by the end he does. If he really had been settling and treating his Seventh Heaven family as a second choice prior to the events of the film, that too would obviously be a character flaw that needs to be addressed before the end of the film. It isn’t because this is a dynamic that only exists in certain people’s imaginations.

If the creators wanted to leave the Cloud & Aerith relationship open to a romantic interpretation, they didn’t have to write themselves into such a corner. They wouldn’t have to change the final film much at all, merely adjust the chronology a bit. Instead of Cloud already living as a family with Tifa, Marlene and Denzel prior to the beginning of the film, you would show them on the precipice of becoming a family, but with Cloud being unable to take the final step without getting over his feelings for Aerith first. This would leave space for him to love both women without coming off as an opportunistic jerk.

This is essentially the dynamic with Locke/Rachel/Celes in FFVI. Locke is unable to move on with Celes or anyone else until he finally finds closure with Rachel. It’s a lovely scene that does not diminish his relationships with either woman. He loved Rachel. He will love Celes. What the game does not have him do is enter into a relationship into Celes first and then when the party arrives at the Phoenix Cave, have him suddenly remember ‘Oh shit, I’ve gotta deal with my baggage with Rachel before I can really move on.’ That would not paint him in a particularly positive light.

Speaking of other Final Fantasies, let’s take a look another sequel in the series set two years after the events of the original work, one that is clearly the story of its protagonist searching for their lost love. And guess what? Final Fantasy X-2 does not begin with Yuna shacked up and raising two kids with another dude. And it certainly doesn’t begin with his perspective of the whole situation when Yuna decides to search for Tidus.

Square Enix knows how to write these kind of stories when they want to, and it’s clearly not their intent for Cloud and Aerith. Again, the biggest obstacle in the way of a Cloud/Aerith endgame isn’t space and time or death, it’s the existence of Tifa Lockhart.

A reasonable question to ask would be, if SE is not trying to ignite debate over the love triangle, why make Cloud’s relationship with Aerith a part of Advent Children at all? Why invite that sort of confusion? Well, the answer here, like the answer in the OG, is that Aerith’s role in the sequel is much more than her relationship with Cloud.

In the OG, it wasn’t Cloud and the gang who managed to stop Sephiroth and Meteor in the end, it was Aerith from the Lifestream. In a two-hour long film, you do not have the time to set up a completely new villain who can believably end the world, and since you pretty much have to include Sephiroth, the main antagonist can really only be him. No one else in the party has been established to have any magical Cetra powers, and again, since that’s not something that can be effectively established in a two-hour long film, and since Aerith needs to appear somehow, it again needs to be her who will save the day.

Given the time constraints, this external conflict has to be connected with Cloud’s internal conflict. In the OG, Cloud’s emotional arc is in resolved in the Lifestream, and then we spend a few more hours hunting down the Huge Materia/remembering what Holy is before resolving the external conflict of stopping Meteor. In Advent Children, we do not have that luxury of time. These turning points have to be one and same. It is only after Aerith is “introduced” in the film when Cloud asks her for forgiveness that she is able to help in the fight against the Remnants. Thus the turning point for Cloud’s character arc and the external conflict are the same. It’s understandably economical storytelling, though I wouldn’t call it particularly good storytelling.

As much as Cloud feels guilt over both Zack and Aerith’s deaths, it’s only Aerith who can play this dual role in the film. Zack can appear to help resolve Cloud’s emotional arc, but since he has no special Cetra powers or anything, there’s little he can do to help in Cloud’s fight against the Remnants. More time would need to be spent contriving a reason why Cloud is able to defeat the Remnants now when he wasn’t before or explaining why Aerith can suddenly help from the Lifestream when she had been absent before. (I still don’t think the film does a particularly good job of explaining this part, but that is a conversation for another time).

Another reason why Zack could not play this role is because at the time of AC’s original release, all we knew of Cloud and Zack’s relationship was contained in an optional flashback at the Shinra mansion after Cloud returns from the Lifestream. If it was Zack who suddenly showed up at Cloud’s lowest point, most viewers, even many who played the original game, would probably have been confused, and the moment would have fallen flat. On the other hand, even the most casual fan would have been aware of Aerith and her connection to Cloud, with her death scene being among the most well-known gaming moments of all time. Moreover, Aerith’s death is directly connected to Sephiroth, who is once again the threat in AC, whereas Zack was killed by Shinra goons. Aerith serves multiple purposes in a way that Zack just cannot.

Despite all this, though Aerith is more important to the film as a whole, many efforts are made to suggest that Zack and Aerith are equally important to Cloud. One of the first scenes in the film is Cloud moping around Zack’s grave (And unlike the scene with Aerith in the Forgotten City, it isn’t directly connected with Cloud’s present storyline in any way). We have the aforementioned scene where Cloud has flashes of both Aerith’s and Zack’s deaths when he saves Tifa and Denzel. Cloud has a scene where he’s standing back to back with Zack, mirroring his scene with in the Forgotten City with Aerith, before the climax of his fight with Sephiroth. In the Lifestream, after Cloud “dies,” it’s both Aerith and Zack who are there to send him back. Before the film ends, Cloud sees both Aerith and Zack leaving the church.

Now, were all these Zack appearances a way to promote the upcoming spin-off game that he’s going to lead? Of course. But the creators surely would have known that having Zack play such a similar role in Cloud’s arc would make Cloud’s relationship with Aerith feel less special and thus complicating a romantic interpretation of said relationship. If they wanted to encourage a romantic reading of Cloud’s lingering feelings for Aerith, they would have given Zack his own distinct role in the film. Or rather, they wouldn’t have put Zack in the film at all, and they certainly wouldn’t have him lead his own game, but we’ll get to the Zack of it all later.

The funny thing is, in a way, Zack is portrayed as being more special to Cloud. Zack only exists in the film to interact with Cloud and encourage him. Meanwhile. Aerith also has brief interactions with Kadaj, the Geostigma children and even Tifa before the film’s end. Aerith is there to save the whole world. Zack is there just for Cloud. If it’s Cloud’s relationship with Aerith that’s meant to be romantic, shouldn’t it be the other way around?

Let’s take a look at Tifa Lockhart. What role did she have to play in the FF7 sequel film? If, like some, you believed FF7 to be the Cloud/Aerith/Sephiroth show, then Tifa could have easily had a Barret-sized cameo in Advent Children. And honestly, she’s just a great martial artist. She has no special powers that would make her indispensable in a fight against Sephiroth. You certainly would not expect her to be the 2nd billed character in the film. Though of course, if you actually played through the Original Game with your eyes open, you would realize that Tifa Lockhart is instrumental to any story about Cloud Strife.

Unlike Aerith’s appearances, almost none of the suggestive scenes and dynamics between Cloud and Tifa had to be included in the film. As in, they serve no other plot related purpose and could have easily been cut from the final film if the creators weren’t trying to encourage a romantic interpretation of their relationship.

It feels inevitable now, but no one was expecting Cloud and Tifa to be living together and raising two kids. In the general consciousness, FF7 is Cloud and Sephiroth and their big swords and Aerith’s death. At the time, in the eyes of most fans and casual observers, Cloud and Tifa being together wasn’t a necessary part of the FF7 equation the way say, an epic fight between Cloud and Sephiroth would be. In fact, I don’t think even the biggest Cloti fans at the time would have imagined Cloud and Tifa living together would be their canon outcome in the sequel film.

Now can two platonic friends live together and raise two children together? Absolutely, but again Cloud and Tifa are not real people. They are fictional characters. A reasonable person (let’s use the legal definition of the term) who does not have brainworms from arguing over one of the dumbest debates on the Internet for 23 years would probably assume that two characters who were shown to be attracted to each other in the OG and who are now living together and raising two kids are in a romantic relationship. This is a reasonable assumption to make, and if SE wanted to leave Cloud’s romantic inclinations ambiguous, they simply would not be depicting Cloud and Tifa’s relationship in this manner. Cloud’s disrupted peace could have been a number of different things. He could have been a wandering mercenary, he could have been searching for a way to be reunited with Aerith. It didn’t have to be the family he formed with Tifa, but, then again, if you were actually paying attention to the story the OG was trying to tell, of course he would be living with Tifa.

Let’s also look at the scene where Cloud finds Tifa in the church after her fight with Loz. All the plot related information (who attacked her, Marlene being taken) is conveyed in the brief conversation they have before Cloud falls unconscious from Geostigma. What purpose do all the lingering shots of Cloud and Tifa in the flower bed in a Yin-Yang/non-sexual 69ing position serve if not to be suggestive of the type of relationship they have? It’s beautifully rendered but ultimately irrelevant to both the external and internal conflicts of the film.

Likewise, there is no reason why Cloud and Tifa needed to wake up in their children’s bedroom. No reason to show Cloud waking up with Tifa next to him in a way that almost makes you think they were in the same bed. And there is absolutely no reason whatsoever for a close-up of Tifa’s hand with the Wolf Ring on her ring finger while she is admonishing Cloud during what sounds like a domestic argument (This ring again comes into focus when Tifa leads Denzel to Cloud at the church at the end - there are dozens of ways this scene could have been rendered, but this is the one that was chosen.) If it wasn’t SE’s intent to emphasize the family dynamic and the intimate nature of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship, these scenes would not exist.

Let’s also take a look at Denzel, the only new character in the AC (give or take the Remnants). Again, given the film’s brief runtime, the fact that they’re not only adding a new character but giving him more screen time than almost every other AVALANCHE member must mean that he’s pretty important. While Denzel does have an arc of his own, especially in ACC, he is intricately connected to Cloud and Tifa and solidifies the family unit that they’ve been forming in Edge. Marlene still has Barret, but with the addition of Denzel, the family becomes something more real albeit even more tenuous given his Geostigma diagnosis. Without Denzel in the picture, it’s a bit easier to interpret Cloud’s distance from Tifa as romantic pining for another woman, but now it just seems absurd. The stakes are so much higher. Cloud and Tifa are at a completely different stage in their lives from the versions of these characters we met early on in the OG who were entangled in a frivolous love triangle. And yet some people are still stuck trying to fit these characters into a childish dynamic that died at the end of disc one along with a certain someone.

All this is there in the film, at least the director’s cut, if you really squint. But since SE preferred to spend its time on countless action sequences that have aged as well as whole milk in lieu of spending a few minutes showing Cloud’s family life before he got Geostigma to establish the emotional stakes, or a beat or two more on his reconciliation with Tifa and the kids, people may be understandably confused about Cloud’s arc. Has Cloud just been a moping around in misery for the two years post-OG? The answer is no, though that can only really be found in the accompanying novellas, specifically Case of Tifa.

Concerning the novellas, which we apparently must read to understand said DVD sequel

I really don’t know how you can read through CoT and still think there is anything ambiguous about the nature of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship. The “Because I have you this time,” Cloud telling Tifa he’ll remind her how to be strong when they’re alone, Cloud confidently agreeing when Marlene adds him to their family. Not to mention Barret and Cid’s brief conversation about Cloud and Tifa’s relationship in Case of Barret, after which Cid comments that “women wear the pants,” which Barret then follows by asking Cid about Shera. Again, a reasonable person would assume the couple in question are in a romantic relationship, and if this wasn’t the intent, these lines would not be present. Especially not in a novella about someone else.

Some try to argue that CoT just shows how incompatible Cloud and Tifa are because it features a few low points in their relationship. I don’t think that’s Nojima’s intent. Even if it was, it certainly wouldn’t be to prove that Cloud loves Aerith. This isn’t how you tell that story. Why waste all that time disproving a negative rather than proving a positive? We didn’t spend hours in FF8 watching Rinoa’s relationship with Seifer fall apart to understand how much better off she is with Squall. If Cloud and Aerith is meant to be a love story, then tell their love story. Why tell the story of how Cloud is incompatible with someone else?

Part of the confusion may be because CoT doesn’t tell a complete story in and of itself. The first half of the story (before Cloud has to deliver flowers to the Forgotten City) acts as a sort of epilogue to the OG, while the second half of the story is something of a prologue to Advent Children (or honestly its missing Act One). And to state the obvious, conflict is inherent to any story worth telling. It can’t just be all fluff, that’s what the fanfiction is for.

Tifa’s conflict is her fear that the fragile little family they’ve built in Edge is going to fall apart. Thus we see her fret about Cloud’s distance, the way this affects Marlene, and Denzel’s sickness. There are certainly some low moments here --- Tifa telling Cloud to drink in his room, asking if he loves her -- all ways for the threat to seem more real, the outcome more uncertain, yet there’s only one way this conflict can be resolved. One direction to which their relationship can move.

Again, by the end of this story, both characters are supposed to be the best versions of themselves, to find their “happy” endings so to speak. Tifa could certainly find happiness outside of a relationship with Cloud. She could decide that they’ve given it a shot, but they’re better off as friends. She’s grateful for this experience and she’s learned from this, but now she’s ready to make a life for herself on her own. It would be a fine character arc, though not something the Final Fantasy series has been wont to do. However, that’s obviously not the case here as there’s no indication whatsoever that Tifa considers this as an option for herself. Nojima hasn’t written this off ramp into her journey. For Tifa, they’ll either become a real family or they won’t. Since this is a story that is going to have a happy ending, so of course they will, even if there are a lot of bumps along the way.

Unfortunately, with the Compilation being the unwieldy beast that this is, this whole arc has to be pieced together across a number of different works:

Tifa asking herself if they’re a real family in CoT

Her greatest fear seemingly come to life when Cloud leaves at the end of CoT/beginning of AC

Tifa explicitly asking Cloud if the reason they can’t help each other is because they’re not a real family during their argument in AC. Notably, even though Cloud is at his lowest point, he doesn’t confirm her fear. Instead he says he that he can’t help anyone, not even his family. Instead, he indirectly confirms that yes he does think they’re a family, even if is a frustrating moment still in that he’s too scared to try to save it.

The ending of AC where we see a new photo of Cloud smiling surrounded by Tifa and the kids and the rest of the AVALANCHE, next to the earlier photo we had seen of the four of them where he was wearing a more dour expression.

The ending of The Kids Are All Right, where Cloud, Tifa, Denzel and Marlene meet with Evan, Kyrie and Vits - and Cloud offers, unsolicited, that even if they’re not related by blood, they’re a family.

The ending of DVD extra ‘Reminiscence of FFVII’ where Cloud takes the day off and asks Tifa to close the bar so they can spend time together as a family as Tifa had wanted to do early in CoT

Cloud fears he’ll fail his family. Tifa fears it’ll fall apart. Cloud retreats into himself, pushing others away. Tifa neglects herself, not being able to say what she needs to say. In Advent Children, Tifa finally voices her frustrations. It’s then that Cloud finally confronts his fears. Like in the OG, Cloud and Tifa’s conflicts and character arcs are two sides of the same coin, and it’s only by communicating with each other are they able to resolve it. Though with the Compilation being an inferior work, it’s much less satisfying this time around. Such is the problem when you’re writing towards a preordained outcome (Cloud and Sephiroth duking it once again) rather than letting the story develop organically.

Some may ask, why mention Aerith so much (Cloud growing distant after delivering flowers to the Forgotten City, Cloud finding Denzel at Aerith’s church) if they weren’t trying to perpetuate the LTD? Well, as explained above, Aerith had to be in Advent Children, and since CoT is the only place where we get any insight into Cloud’s psyche, it’s here where Nojima expands on that guilt.

Again, this is a story that requires conflict, and what better conflict than the specter of a love rival? Notably, despite us having access to Tifa’s thoughts and fears, she never explicitly associates Cloud’s behavior with him pining after Aerith. Though it’s fair to say this fear is implied, if unwarranted.

If Cloud had actually been pining after Aerith this whole time, we would not be seeing it all unfold through Tifa’s perspective. You can depict a romance without drawing attention to the injured third party. We’re seeing all of this from Tifa’s POV, because it’s about Tifa’s insecurities, not the great tragic romance between Cloud and Aerith. Honestly, another reason we see this from Tifa’s perspective is because it’s dramatically more interesting. Because she’s insecure, she (and we the reader) wonder if there’s something else going on. Meanwhile, from Cloud’s perspective it would be straightforward and redundant, given what we see in AC. He’s guilty over Aerith’s death and thinks he doesn’t deserve to be happy.

Not to mention, the first time we encounter Aerith in CoT, Tifa is the one breaking down at her grave while Cloud is the one comforting her. Are we supposed to believe that he just forgot he was in love with Aerith until he had to deliver flowers to the Forgotten City?

And Aerith doesn’t just serve as a romantic obstacle. She’s also a symbol of guilt and redemption for both Cloud and Tifa. Neither think they have the right to be happy after all that’s happened (Aerith’s death being a big part of this), and through Denzel, who Cloud finds at Aerith’s church, they both see a chance to atone.

I do want to address Case of Lifestream: White because it’s only time in the entire Compilation where I’ve asked myself — what are they trying to achieve here? Now, I’d rather drink bleach than start debating the translation of ‘koibito’ again, but I did think it was a strange choice to specify the romantic nature of Aerith’s love for Cloud. I suppose it could be a reference her obvious attraction to Cloud in the OG, though calling it love feels like a stretch.

But nothing else in CoLW really gives me pause. It might be a bit jarring to see how much of it is Aerith’s thoughts of Cloud, but it makes sense when you consider the context in which it’s meant to be consumed. Unlike Case of Tifa or Case of Denzel, CoLW isn’t meant to be read on its own. It’s a few scant paragraphs in direct conversation with Case of Lifestream: Black. In CoLB, Sephiroth talks about his plan to return and end the world or whatever, and how Cloud is instrumental to his plan. Each segment of CoLW mirrors the corresponding segment of CoLB. Thus, CoLW has to be about Aerith’s plan to stop Sephiroth and the role Cloud must play in that. In both of these stories, Cloud is the only named character. It doesn’t mean that thoughts of Cloud consume all of Aerith’s afterlife. Case of Lifestream is only a tiny sliver of the story, a halfassed way to explain why in Advent Children the world is ending again and why Cloud has to be at the center of it all.

Notably, there is absolutely nothing in CoLW about Cloud’s feelings for Aerith. Even if it’s just speculation on her part as we see Sephiroth speculate about Cloud’s reactions in CoLB. Aerith can see what’s going on in the real world, but she says nothing about Cloud’s actions. If Cloud is really pining after her, trying to find a way to be reunited with her, wouldn’t this be the ideal story to show such devotion?

But it’s not there, because not only does it not happen, but because this story is not about Aerith’s relationship with Cloud. It is about how Aerith needs to see and warn Cloud in order to stop Sephiroth. By the end of Advent Children, that goal is fulfilled. Cloud gets his forgiveness. Aerith gets to see him again and helps him stop Sephiroth. There’s no suggestion that either party wants more. We finally have the closure that the OG lacked, and at no point does it confirm that Cloud reciprocated Aerith’s romantic feelings, even though there were plenty of opportunities to do so.

I don’t really know what else people were expecting. Advent Children isn’t a romantic drama. There’s not going to be a moment where Cloud explicitly tells Tifa, ‘I’ve never loved Aerith. It’s only been you all along.” This is just simply not the kind of story it is.

Though one late scene practically serves this function. When Cloud “dies” and Aerith finds him in the Lifestream, if there were any lingering romantic feelings between the two of them, this would be a beautiful bittersweet reunion. Maybe something about how as much as they want to be together, it’s not his time yet. Instead, it’s almost played off as a joke. Cloud calls her ‘Mother’, and Zack is at Aerith’s side, joking about how Cloud has no place there. This would be the perfect opportunity to address the romantic connection between Cloud and Aerith, but instead, the film elides this completely. Instead, it’s a cute afterlife moment between Aerith and Zack, and functionally allows Cloud to go back to where he belongs, to Tifa and the kids. Whatever Cloud’s feelings for Aerith were before, it’s transformed into something else.

Crisis Core -- or how Aerith finally gets her love story

The other relevant part of the Compilation is Crisis Core, which I will now touch on briefly (or at least brief for me). In the OG, Zack Fair was more plot device than character. We knew he was important to Cloud — enough that Cloud would mistake Zack’s memories for his own -- we knew he was important to Aerith — enough that she is initially drawn to Cloud due to his similarities to Zack — yet the nature of these relationships is more ambiguous. Especially his relationship with Aerith. From the little we learn of their relationship, it could have been completely one-sided on her part, and Zack a total cad. At least that’s the implication she leaves us with in Gongaga. We get the sense that she might not be the most reliable narrator on this point (why bring up an ex so often, unsolicited, if it wasn’t anything serious?) but the OG never confirms this either way.

Crisis Core clears this up completely. Not only is Zack portrayed as the Capital H Hero of his own game, but his relationships with Cloud and Aerith are two of the most important in the game. In fact, they are the basis for his heroic sacrifice at the game’s end: he dies trying to save Cloud’s life; he dies trying to return to Aerith.

Zack’s relationship with Aerith is a major subplot of the game. Not only that, but the details of said relationship completely recontextualizes what we know about the Aerith we see in the OG. Many of Aerith’s most iconic traits (wearing pink, selling flowers) are a direct product of this relationship, and more importantly, so many of the hallmarks of her early relationship with Cloud (him falling through her church, one date as a reward, a conversation in the playground) are a direct echo of her relationship with Zack.

A casual fling this was not. Aerith’s relationship with Zack made a deep impact on the character we see in the OG and clearly colored her interactions with Cloud throughout.

Crisis Core is telling Zack’s story, and Tifa is a fairly minor supporting character, yet it still finds the time to expand upon Cloud and Tifa’s relationship. Through their interactions with Zack, we learn just how much they were on each others’ minds during this time, and how they were both too shy to own up to these feelings. We also get a brief expansion on the moment Cloud finds Tifa injured in the reactor.

Meanwhile, given the point we are in the story’s chronology, Cloud and Aerith are completely oblivious of each other’s existence.

One may try to argue that none of this matters since all of this is in the past. While this argument might hold water if we arguing about real lives in the real world, FF7 is a work of fiction. Its creators decided that these would be events we would see, and that Zack would be the lens through which we’d see them. Crisis Core is not the totality of these characters’ lives prior to the event of the OG. Rather, it consists of moments that enhance and expand upon our understanding of the original work. We learn the full extent of Hojo’s experimentation and the Jenova project; we learn that Sephiroth was actually a fairly normal guy before he was driven insane when he uncovers the circumstances of his birth. We learn that Aerith was a completely different person before she met Zack, and their relationship had a profound impact on her character.

A prequel is not made to contradict the original work, but what it can do is recontexualize the story we already know and add a layer of nuance that may have not been obvious before. Thus, Sephiroth is transformed from a scary villain into a tragic figure who could have been a hero were it not for Hojo’s experiments. Aerith’s behavior too invites reinterpretation. What once seemed flirty and perhaps overtly forward now looks like the tragic attempts of a woman trying to recapture a lost love.

If Cloud and Aerith were meant to be the official couple of the Compilation of FF7, you absolutely would not be spending so much time depicting two relationships that will be moot by the time we get to the original work. You especially would not depict Zack and Aerith’s relationship in a way that makes Aerith’s relationship with Cloud look like a copy of the moments she had with her ex.

Additionally, with Zack’s relationship with Angeal, we can see, that within the universe of FF7, a protagonist being devastated over the death of a beloved comrade isn’t something that’s inherently romantic. Neither is it romantic for said dead comrade to lend a helping hand from the beyond.

SE would also expect some people to play Crisis Core before the OG. If Cloud and Aerith are the intended endgame couple, then SE would be asking the player to root for a guy to pursue the girlfriend of the man who gave his life for him. The same man who died trying to reunite with her. This is to say nothing of Cloud’s treatment of Tifa in this scenario. How could this possibly be the intent  for their most popular protagonist in the most popular entry of their most popular franchise?

What Crisis Core instead offers is something for fans of Aerith who may be disappointed that she was robbed of a great romance by her death. Well, she now gets that epic, tragic romance. Only it’s with Zack, not Cloud.

If SE intended for Cloud and Aerith to be the official couple of FF7, neither Zack nor Tifa would exist. They would not spend so much time developing Zack and Tifa into the multi-dimensional characters they are, only to be treated as nothing more than collateral damage in the wake of Cloud and Aerith’s great love. No, this is a Final Fantasy. SE want their main characters to have something of a happy ending after all of the tribulations they face. Cloud and Tifa find theirs in life. Zack and Aerith, as the ending of AC suggests, find theirs in death.

Cloud and Aerith’s relationship isn’t a threat to the Zack/Aerith and Cloud/Tifa endgame, nor is it a mere obstacle. Rather, it’s a relationship that actually deepens and strengthens the other two. Aerith is explicitly searching for her first love in Cloud, revealing just how deep her feelings for Zack ran. Cloud gets to live out his heroic SOLDIER fantasy with Aerith, a fantasy he created just to impress Tifa.

There are moments between Cloud and Aerith that may seem romantic when taken on its own, but viewed within the context of the whole narrative, ultimately reveal that they aren’t quite right for each other, and in each other, they’re actually searching for someone else.

This quadrangular dynamic reminds me a bit of one of my favorite classic films, The Philadelphia Story. (Spoilers for a film that came out in 1940 ahead) — The single most romantic scene in the film is between Jimmy Stewart’s and Katherine Hepburn’s characters, yet they’re not the ones who end up together. Even as their passions run, as the music swells, and we want them to end up together, we realize that they’re not quite right for each other. We know that it won’t work out.

More relevantly, we know this is true due to the existence of Cary Grant’s and Ruth Hussey’s characters, who are shown to carry a torch for Hepburn and Stewart, respectively. Grant and Hussey are well-developed and sympathetic characters. With the film being the top grossing film of the year, and made during the Code era, it’s about as “clean” of a narrative as you can get. There’s no way Grant and Hussey would be given such prominent roles just to be left heartbroken and in the cold by the film’s end.

Hepburn’s character (Tracy) pretty much sums it herself after some hijinks lead to a last minute proposal from Stewart’s character (Mike):

Mike: Will you marry me, Tracy?                      

Tracy: No, Mike. Thanks, but hmm-mm. Nope.

Mike: l've never asked a girl to marry me. l've avoided it. But you've got me all confused now. Why not?

Tracy: Because l don't think Liz [Hussey’s character] would like it...and l'm not sure you would...and l'm even a little doubtful about myself. But l am beholden to you, Mike. l'm most beholden.

Despite the fact that the film spends more time developing Hepburn and Stewart’s relationship than theirs with their endgame partners, it’s still such a satisfying ending. That’s because, even at the peak of their romance, we can see how Stewart needs someone like Hussey to ground his passionate impulses, and how Hepburn needs Grant, someone who won’t put her on a pedestal like everyone else. Hepburn and Stewart’s is a relationship that might feel right in the moment, but doesn’t quite work in the light of day.

I don’t think Cloud and Aerith share a moment that is nearly as romantic in FF7, but the same principle applies. What may seem romantic in the moment actually reveals how they’re right for someone else.

Even if Aerith lives and Cloud decides to pursue a relationship with her, it’s not going to be all puppies and roses ahead for them. Aerith would need to disentangle her feelings for Zack from her attraction to Cloud, and Cloud would still need to confront his feelings for Tifa, which were his main motivator for nearly half his life, before they can even start to build something real. This is messy work, good fodder for a prestige cable drama or an Oscar-baity indie film, but it has no place in a Final Fantasy. There simply isn’t the time. Not when the question on most players’ minds isn’t ‘Cloud does love?’ but ‘How the hell are they going to stop that madman and his Meteor that’s about to destroy the world?’

With Zerith’s depiction in Crisis Core, there’s a sort of bittersweet poetry in how the two relationships rhyme but can’t actually coexist. It is only because Zack is trying to return to Midgar to see Aerith that Cloud is able to reunite with Tifa, and the OG begins in earnest. In another world, Zack and Aerith would be the hero and heroine who saved the world and lived to tell the tale. They are much more the traditional archetypes - Zack the super-powered warrior who wants to be a Capital-H Hero, and Aerith, the last of her kind who reluctantly accepts her fate. Compared to these two, Cloud and Tifa aren’t nearly so special, nor their goals so lofty and noble. Cloud, after all, was too weak to even get into SOLDIER, and only wanted to be one, not for some greater good, but to impress the girl he liked. Tifa has no special abilities, merely learning martial arts when she grew wise enough to not wait around for a hero. On the surface, Cloud and Tifa are made of frailer stuff, and yet by luck or by fate, they’re the ones who cheat death time and time again, and manage to save the world, whereas the ones who should have the role, are prematurely struck down before they can finish the job. Cloud and Tifa fulfill the roles that they never asked for, that they may not be particularly suited for, in Zack and Aerith’s stead. There’s a burden and a beauty to it. Cloud and Tifa can live because Zack and Aerith did not.

All of this nuance is lost if you think Cloud and Aerith are meant to be the endgame couple. Instead, you have a pair succumbing to their basest desires, regardless of the selfless sacrifices their other potential paramours made for their sake. Zack and Tifa, and their respective relationships with Aerith and Cloud, are flattened into mere romantic obstacles. The heart wants what it wants, some may argue. While that may be true in real life, that is not necessarily the case in a work of fiction, especially not a Final Fantasy. The other canon Final Fantasy couples could certainly have had previous romantic relationships, but unless they have direct relevance to the their character arcs (e.g., Rachel to Locke), the games do not draw attention to them because they would be a distraction from the romance they are trying to tell. They’ve certainly never spent the amount of real estate FF7 spends in depicting Cloud/Tifa and Zack/Aerith’s relationships.

At last…the Remake, and somehow this essay isn’t even close to being over

Finally, we come to the Remake. With the technological advancements made in the last 23 years and the sheer amount of hours they’re devoting to just the Midgar section this time around, you can almost look at the OG as an outline and the Remake as the final draft. With the OG being overly reliant on text to  do its storytelling, and the Remake having subtle facial expressions and a slew of cinematic techniques at its disposal, you might almost consider it an adaptation from a literary medium to a visual one. Our discussions are no longer limited to just what the characters are saying, but what they are doing, and even more importantly, how the game presents those actions. When does the game want us to pay attention? And what does it want us to pay attention to?

Unlike most outlines, which are read by a small handful of execs, SE has 23 years worth of reactions from the general public to gauge what works and what doesn’t work, what caused confusion, and what could be clarified. While FF7 is not a romance, the LTD remains a hot topic among a small but vocal part of the fanbase. It certainly is an area that could do with some clarifying in the Remake.

Since the Remake is not telling a new story, but rather retelling an existing story that has been in the public consciousness for over two decades, certain aspects that were treated as “twists” in the OG no longer have that same element of surprise, and would need to approached differently. For example, in the Midgar section of the OG, Shinra is treated as the main antagonist throughout. It’s only when we get to the top of the Shinra tower that Sephiroth is revealed as the real villain. Anyone with even a passing of knowledge of FF7 would be aware of Sephiroth so trying to play it off like a surprise in the Remake would be terribly anticlimactic. Thus, Sephiroth appears as early as Ch. 2 to haunt Cloud and the player throughout.

Likewise, many players who’ve never even touched the OG are probably aware that Aerith dies, thus her death can no longer be played for shock. While SE would still want the player to grow attached to Aerith so that her death has an emotional impact, there are diminishing returns to misdirecting the player about her fate, at least not in the same way it was done in the OG.

How do these considerations affect the how the LTD is depicted in the Remake? For the two of the biggest twists in the OG to land in the Remake — Aerith’s death and Cloud’s true identity in the Lifestream — the game needs to establish:

Aerith’s attraction to Cloud, specifically due to his similarities to Zack. This never needs to go past an initial attraction for the player to understand that the man whose memory Cloud was “borrowing” is Zack. Aerith’s feelings for Cloud can evolve into something platonic or even maternal by her end without the reveal in the Lifestream losing any impact.

Cloud’s love for Tifa. For the Lifestream sequence to land with an “Ooooh!” rather than a “Huh!?!?”, the Remake will need to establish that Cloud’s feelings for Tifa were strong enough to 1) motivate him to try to join SOLDIER in the first place 2) incentivize him to adopt a false persona because he fears that he isn’t the man she wants him to be 3) call him back to consciousness from Make poisoning twice 4) help him put his mind back together and find his true self. That’s a lot of story riding on one guy’s feelings!

The player’s love for Aerith so that her death will hurt. This can be done by making them invested in Aerith as a character by her own right, but also extends to the relationships she has with the other characters (not only Cloud).

What is not necessary is establishing Cloud’s romantic feelings for Aerith. Now, would their doomed romance make her death hurt even more? Sure, but it could work just as well if Cloud if is losing a dear friend and ally, not a lover. Not to mention, her death also cuts short her relationships with Tifa, Barret, Red XII, etc. Bulking those relationships up prior to her death, would also make her loss more palpable. If anything, establishing Cloud’s romantic feelings for Aerith would actually undermine the game’s other big twist. The game needs you to believe that Cloud’s feelings for Tifa were strong enough to drive his entire hero’s journey. If Cloud is shown falling in love with another woman in the span of weeks if not mere days, then the Lifestream scene would be much harder to swallow.

Cloud wavering between the two women made sense in the OG because the main way for the player to get to know Aerith was through her interactions with Cloud. That is no longer the case in the Remake. Cloud is still the protagonist, and the player character for the vast majority of the game, but there are natural ways for the player to get to know Aerith outside of her dialogue exchanges with Cloud. Unless SE considers the LTD an integral part of FF7’s DNA, then for the sake of story clarity, the LTD doesn’t need to exist.

How then does the Remake clarify things?

I’m not going go through every single change in the Remake — there are far too many of them, and they’ve been documented elsewhere. Most of the changes are expansions or adaptations (what might make sense for super-deformed chibis would look silly for realistic characters, e.g., Cloud rolling barrels in the Church has now become him climbing across the roof support). What is expanded and how it’s adapted can be telling, but what is more interesting are the additions and removals. Not just for what takes place in the scenes themselves, but how their addition or removal changes our understanding of the narrative as a whole vis-a-vis the story we know from the OG.

Notably, one of the features that is not expanded upon, but rather diminished, is player choice. In the OG, the player had a slew of dialogue options to choose from, especially during the Midgar portion of the game. Not only did it determine which character would go on a date with Cloud at the Gold Saucer, but it also made the player identify with Cloud since they’re largely determining his personality during this stage. Despite the technological advances that have made this level of optionality the norm in AAA games, the Remake gives the player far fewer non-gameplay related choices, and only really the illusion of choice as a nod to the OG, but they don’t affect the story of the game in any meaningful way. You get a slightly different conversation depending on the choice, but you have to buy the Flower, Tifa has to make you a drink.

So much of what fueled the LTD in the OG came from this mechanic, which is now largely absent in the Remake. Almost every instance where there was a dialogue branch in the OG has become a single, canon scenario in the Remake that favors Tifa (e.g., having the choice of giving the flower to Tifa or Marlene in the OG, to Cloud giving the flower to Tifa in the Remake). Similarly, for the only meaningful choice you make in the Remake — picking Tifa or Aerith in the sewers — Cloud is now equidistant to both girls, whereas in the OG, his starting point was much closer to Aerith. In the OG, player choice allowed you to largely determine Cloud’s personality, and the girl he favored — and seemingly encouraged you to choose Aerith in many instances. In the Remake, Cloud is now his own character, not who the player wants him to be. And this Cloud, well, he sure seems to have a thing for Tifa.

In fact, one of the first changes in the Remake is the addition of Jessie asking Cloud about his relationship with Tifa, and Cloud’s brief flashback to their childhood together. In the OG, Tifa isn’t mentioned at all during the first reactor mission, and we don’t see her until we get to Sector 7.

Not only does this scene reveal Tifa’s importance to Cloud much earlier on than in the OG, but it sets up a sort of frame of reference that colors Cloud’s subsequent interactions. Even as Jessie kind of flirts with him throughout the reactor mission, even with his chance meeting Aerith in Sector 8, in the back of your mind, you might be thinking — wait what about his relationship with this Tifa character? What if he’s already spoken for?

Think about how this plays out in the OG. Jessie is pretty much a non-entity, and Cloud has his meet-cute with the flower girl before we’re even aware that Tifa exists. It’s hard to get too invested in his interactions with Tifa, when you know he has to meet the flower girl again, and you’re waiting for that moment, because that’s when the game will start in earnest.

After chapter 1 of the Remake, a new player may be asking — who is this Tifa person, and, echoing Jessie’s question, what kind of relationship does she have with Cloud? It’s a question that’s repeated when Barret mentions her before they set the bomb, and again when Barret specifies Seventh Heaven is where Tifa works — and the game zooms in on Cloud’s face — when they arrive in Sector 7.

It’s when we finally meet her at Seventh Heaven in Ch. 3 that we feel, ah now, this game has finally begun.

It’s also interesting how inorganically this question is introduced in the Remake. Up until that moment, the dialogue and Cloud are all business. Then, as they’re waiting for the gate to open, Jessie asks about Tifa completely out of the blue, and Cloud, all of a sudden, is at a lost for words, and has the first of many flashbacks. That this moment is a bit incongruous shows the effort SE made to establish Tifa’s importance to the game and to Cloud early on.

One of the biggest changes in the Remake is the addition of the events in Ch. 3 and 4. Unlike what happens in Ch. 18, Ch. 3 and 4 feel like such a natural extension of the OG’s story that many players may not even realize that SE has added an whole day’s and night’s worth of events to the OG’s story. While not a drastic change, it does reshape our understanding of subsequent events in the story, namely Cloud’s time spent alone with Aerith.

In the OG, we rush from one reactor mission to the next, with no real time to explore Cloud’s character or his relationships with any of the other characters in between. When he crashes through the church, he gets a bit of a breather. We see a different side of him with Aerith. Since we have nothing else to compare it to, many might assume that his relationship with Aerith is special. That she brings something out of him that no one else can.

That is no longer the case in the Remake. While Cloud’s time in Sector 5 with Aerith remains largely unchanged though greatly expanded, it no longer feels  “special.” So many of the beats that seemed exclusive to his relationship with Aerith in the OG, we’ve now already seen play out with both Tifa and the other members of AVALANCHE long before he meets Aerith.

Cloud tells the flowers to listen to Aerith; he’s told Tifa he’s listening if she wants to talk; told Bigg’s he wants to hear the story of Jessie’s dad. Cloud offers to walk Aerith back home; he offered the same to Wedge. Cloud smiles at Aerith; he’s already smiled at Tifa and AVALANCHE a number of times.

Now, I’m under no illusion that SE added these chapters solely to diminish Aerith’s importance to Cloud (other than the obvious goal of making the game longer, I imagine they wanted the player to spend more time in Sector 7 and more time with the other AVALANCHE members so that the collapse of the Pillar and their deaths have more weight), but they certainly must have realized that this would be one effect. If pushing Cloud/Aerith’s romance had been a goal with the Remake, this would be a scenario they would try to avoid. Notably, the other place where time has been added - the night in the Underground Shinra Lab, and the day helping other people out around the slums — are also periods of time when Aerith is absent.

Home Sweet Slums vs. Budding Bodyguard

Since most of the events in Ch. 3 were invented for the Remake, and thus we have nothing in the OG to compare it to (except to say that something is probably better than nothing), I thought it would be more interesting to compare it to Ch. 8. Structurally, they are nearly identical — Cloud doing sidequests around the Sectors with one of the girls as his guide. Extra bits of dialogue the more sidequests you complete, with an optional story event if you do them all. Do Cloud’s relationships with each girl progress the same way in both chapters? Is the Remake just Final Waifu Simulator 2020 or are they distinct, reflecting their respective roles in the story as a whole?

A lot of what the player takes away from these chapters is going to be pretty subjective (Is he annoyed with her or is he playing hard to get), yet the vibes of the two chapters are quite different. This is because in Ch. 3, the player is getting to know Tifa through her relationship with Cloud; in Ch. 8; the player is getting to know Aerith as a character on her own.

What do I mean by this? Let’s take Cloud’s initial introduction into each Sector. In Ch. 3, it’s a straight shot from Seventh Heaven to Stargazer Heights punctuated by a brief conversation where Tifa asks Cloud about the mission he was just on. We don’t learn anything new about Tifa’s character here. Instead we hear Cloud recount the mission we already saw play out in detail in Ch. 1 But it’s through this conversation that we get a glimpse of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship — unlike the reticent jerk he was with Avalanche, this Cloud is much more responsive and even tries to reassure her in his own stilted way. We also know that they have enough of a past together that Tifa can categorize him as “not a people person” — an assessment to which Cloud agrees. Slowly, we’re getting an answer to the question Jessie posed in Ch. 1 — just what kind of relationship does Cloud have with Tifa?

In Ch. 8, Aerith leads Cloud on a roundabout way through Sector 5, and stops, unprompted, to talk about her experiences helping at the restaurant, helping out the doctor, and helping with the orphans at the Leaf House. It’s not so much a conversation as a monologue. Cloud isn’t the one who inquires about these relationships, and more jarringly, he doesn’t respond until Aerith directly asks him a question (interestingly enough, it’s about the flower she gave him…which he then gave to Tifa). Here, the game is allowing the player to learn more about the kind of person Aerith is. Cloud is also learning about Aerith at the same time, but with his non-reaction, either the game itself is indifferent to Cloud’s feelings towards Aerith or it is deliberately trying to portray Cloud’s indifference to Aerith.

The optional story event you can see in each chapter after completing all the side quests is also telling. In Ch. 3, “Alone at Last” is almost explicitly about Cloud and Tifa’s relationship. It’s bookended by two brief scenes between Marle and Cloud — the first in which she lectures him about how he should treat Tifa almost like an overprotective in-law, the second after they return downstairs and Marle awards Cloud with an accessory “imbued with the fervent desire to be by one’s side for eternity” after he makes Tifa smile. In between, Cloud and Tifa chat alone in her room. Tifa finally gets a chance to ask Cloud about his past and they plan a little date to celebrate their reunion. There is also at least the suggestion that Cloud was expecting something else when Tifa asked him to her room.

In Ch. 8’s “The Language of Flowers,” Cloud and Aerith’s relationship is certainly part of the story — unlike earlier in the chapter, Cloud actually asks Aerith about what she’s doing and even supports her by talking to the flowers too, but the other main objective of this much briefer scene is to show Aerith’s relationship with the flowers and of her mysterious Cetra powers (though we don’t know about her ancestry just yet). Like a lot of Aerith’s dialogue, there’s a lot of foreshadowing and foreboding in her words. If anything, it’s almost as if Cloud is playing the Marle role to the flowers, as an audience surrogate to ask Aerith about her relationship with the flowers so that she can explain. Also, there’s no in-game reward that suggests what the scene was really about.

If there’s any confusion about what’s going on here, just compare their titles “Alone At Last” vs. “The Language of Flowers.”

I’ll try not to bring my personal feelings into this, but there’s just something so much more satisfying about the construction of Ch. 3. This is some real storytelling 101 shit, but I think a lot of it due to just how much set up and payoff there is, and how almost all of said payoff deepens our understanding of Cloud and Tifa’s relationship:

Marle: Cloud meets Tifa’s overprotective landlady towards the beginning of the chapter. She is dubious of his character and his relationship with TIfa. This impression does not change the second time they meet even though Tifa herself is there to mediate. It’s only towards the end of the chapter, after all the sidequests are complete, that this tension is resolved. Marle gives Cloud a lecture about how he should be treating Tifa, which he seems to take to heart. And Cloud finally earns Marle’s begrudging approval after he emerges from their rooms with a chipper-looking Tifa in tow.

Their past: For their first in-game interaction, Cloud casually brings up that fact that it’s been “Five years” since they’ve last, which seem to throw Tifa off a bit. As they’re replacing filters, Cloud asks Tifa what she’s been up to in the time since they’ve been apart, and Tifa quickly changes the subject. Tifa tries to ask Cloud about his life “after he left the village,” at the Neighborhood Watch HQ, and this time he’s the one who seems to be avoiding the subject. It’s only after all the Ch. 3 sidequests are complete, and they're alone in her room that Tifa finally gets the chance to ask her question. A question which Cloud still doesn’t entirely answer. This question remains unresolved, and anyone’s played the OG will know that it will remain unresolved for some time yet, as it is THE question of Cloud’s story as a whole.

The lessons: Tifa starts spouting off some lessons for life in the slums as she brings Cloud around the town, though it’s unclear if Cloud is paying attention or taking them to heart. After completing the first sidequest, Cloud repeats one of these sayings back to her, confirming that he’s been listening all along. By the end of the chapter, Cloud is repeating these lessons to himself, even when Tifa isn’t around. These lessons extend beyond this chapter, with Cloud being a real teacher’s pet, asking Tifa “Is this a lesson” in Ch. 10 once they reunite.

The drink: When Cloud first arrives at Seventh Heaven, Tifa plays hostess and asks him if he wants anything, but it seems he’s only interested in his money. After exploring the sector a bit, Tifa again tries to play the role of cheery bartender, offering to make him a cocktail at the bar, but Cloud sees through this facade, and they carry on. Finally, after the day’s work is done, to tide Cloud over while she’s meeting with AVALANCHE, Tifa finally gets the chance to make him a drink. No matter, which dialogue option the player chooses, Tifa and Cloud fall into the roles of flirty bartender and patron quite easily. Who would have thought this was possible from the guy we met in Ch. 1?

This dynamic is largely absent in Ch. 8, except perhaps exploring Aerith’s relationship with the flowers, which “pays off” in the “Language of Flowers” event, but again, that scene is primarily about Aerith’s character rather than her relationship with Cloud. The orphans and the Leaf House are a throughline of the chapter, but they are merely present. There’s no clear progression here as was the case with in Ch. 3. Sure, the kids admire Cloud quite a bit after he saves them, but it’s not like they were dubious of his presence before. They barely paid attention to him. In terms of the impact the kids have on Cloud’s relationship with Aerith, there isn’t much at all. Certainly nothing like the role Marle plays in developing his relationship with Tifa.

The thing is, there are plenty of moments that could have been set ups, only there’s no real follow through. Aerith introduces Cloud around town as her bodyguard, and some people like the Doctor express dubiousness of his ability to do the job, but even after we spend a whole day fighting off monsters, and defeating Rude, there’s no payoff. Not even a throwaway “Wow, great job bodyguarding” comment. Same with the whole “one date” reward. Other than a quick reference on the way to Sector 5, and Aerith threatening to reveal the deal to cajole Cloud into helping her gather flowers, it’s never brought up again, in this chapter, or the rest of the game.

Aerith also makes a big stink about Cloud taking the time to enjoy Elmyra’s cooking. This is after Cloud is excluded from AVALANCHE’s celebration in Seventh Heaven and after he misses out on Jessie’s mom’s “Midgar Special” with Biggs and Wedge. So this could have been have been the set up to Cloud finally getting to experience a nice, domestic moment where he feels like he’s part of a family. And this dinner does happen! Only…the Remake skips over it entirely. Which is quite a strange choice considering that almost every other waking moment of Cloud’s time in Midgar has been depicted in excruciating detail. SE has decided that either whatever happened in this dinner between these three characters is irrelevant to the story they’re trying to tell, or they’ve deliberately excluded this scene from the game so that the player wouldn’t get any wrong ideas from it (e.g., that Cloud is starting to feel at home with Aerith).

Speaking of home, the Odd Jobs in Ch. 3 feel a bit more meaningful outside of just the gameplay-related rewards because they’re a way for Cloud to improve his reputation as he considers building a life for himself in Sector 7. This intent is implicit as Tifa imparts upon him the life lessons for surviving the slums, and then explicit, when Tifa asks him if he’s going to “stick around a little longer” outside of Seventh Heaven and he answers maybe. (It is later confirmed when Cloud and Tifa converse in his room in Ch. 4 after he remembers their promise).

Despite Aerith’s endeavors to extend their time together, there’s no indication that Cloud is planning to put down roots in Sector 5, or even return. Not even after doing all the Odd Jobs. If anything, it’s just the opposite — after 3 Odd Jobs, Aerith, kind of jokingly tells Cloud “don’t think you can rely on me forever.” This is a line that has a deeper meaning for anyone who knows Aerith’s fate in the OG, but Cloud seems totally fine with the outcome. Similarly, at the end of the Chapter 8, Elmyra asks Cloud to leave and never speak to Aerith again — a request to which he readily agrees.

Adding to the different vibes of the Chapters are the musical themes that play in the background. In Ch. 3, it’s the “Main Theme of VII”, followed by “On Our Way” — two tracks that instantly recall the OG. While the Main Theme is a bit melancholy, it's also familiar. It feels like home. In Ch. 8, we have an instrumental version of ‘Hollow’ - the new theme written for the Remake. While, it’s a lovely piece, it’s unfamiliar and honestly as a bit anxiety inducing (as is the intent).

(A quick aside to address the argument that this proves ‘Hollow’ is about Cloud’s feelings for Aerith:

Which of course doesn’t make any damn sense because he hasn’t even lost Aerith at this point the story. Even if you want to argue that there is so timey-wimey stuff going on and the whole purpose of the Remake is to rewrite the timeline so that Cloud doesn’t lose Aerith around — shouldn’t there be evidence of this desire outside of just the background music? Perhaps, in Cloud’s actions during the Chapter which the song plays — shouldn’t he dread being parted from her, shouldn’t he be the one trying to extend their time together? Instead, he’s willing to let her go quite easily.

The more likely explanation as to why “Hollow” plays in Ch. 8 is that since the “Main Theme of FFVII”  already plays in Ch. 3, the other “main theme” written for the Remake is going to play in the other chapter with a pseudo-open world vibe. If you’re going to say “Hollow” is about Cloud’s feelings for Aerith then you’d have to accept that the Main Theme of the entire series is about Cloud’s feelings for Tifa, which would actually make a bit more sense given that is practically Cloud’s entire character arc.)

Both chapters contain a scripted battle that must be completed before the chapter can end. They both contain a shot where Cloud fights side by side with each of the girls.

Here, Cloud and Tifa are both in focus during the entirety of this shot.

Here, the focus pulls away from Cloud the moment Aerith enters the frame.

I doubt the developers expected most players to notice this particular technique, but it reflects the subtle differences in the way these two relationships are portrayed. By the end of Ch. 3, Cloud and Tifa are acting as one unit. By the end of Ch. 8, even when they’re together, Cloud and Aerith are still apart.

A brief (lol) overview of some meaningful changes from the OG

One of the most significant changes in the Sector 7 chapters is how The Promise flashback is depicted. In the OG, Tifa is the one who has to remind Cloud of the Promise, in a rather pushy way, and whether Cloud chooses to join the next mission to fulfill his promise to her or because Barret is giving him a raise feels a bit more ambiguous.

In the Remake, the Promise has it’s own little mini-arc. It’s first brought up at the end of Ch. 3 when Cloud talks to Tifa about her anxieties about the upcoming mission. Tifa subtly references the Promise by mentioning that she’s “in a pitch” — a reference that goes over Cloud’s head. It’s only in Ch. 4, in the middle of a mission with Biggs and Wedge, where Tifa is no where in sight, that a random building fan reminds him of the Nibelheim water tower and the Promise he made to Tifa there. There’s also another brief flashback to that earlier moment in the bar when Tifa mentions she’s in a “pinch.” Again, the placement of this particular flashback at this particular moment feels almost jarring. And the flashback to the scene in the bar — a flashback to a scene we’ve already seen play out in-game — is the only one of its kind in the Remake. SE went out of the way to show that this particular moment is very important to Cloud and the game as whole. It’s when Cloud returns to his room, and Tifa asks him if he’s planning to stay in Midgar, that this mini-arc is finally complete. He brings up the Promise on his own, and makes it explicit that the reason he’s staying is for her. It’s to fulfill his Promise to her, not for money or for AVALANCHE — at this point, he’s not even supposed to be going on the next mission.

The Reactor 5 chapters are greatly expanded, but there aren’t really any substantive changes other than the addition of the rather intimate train roll scene between and Cloud and Tifa, which adds nothing to the story except to establish how horny they are for each other. We know this is the case, of course, because if you go out of your way to make Cloud look like an incompetent idiot and let the timer run out, you can avoid this scene altogether. But even in that alternate scene, Cloud’s concern for Tifa is crystal clear.

Ch. 8 also plays out quite similarly to the OG for the most part, though Cloud’s banter with Aerith on the rooftops doesn’t feel all that special since we’ve already seen him do the same with Tifa, Barret and the rest of AVALANCHE. The rooftops is the first place Cloud laughs in the OG. In the Remake, while Cloud might not have straight out laughed before, he’s certainly smiled quite a bit in the preceding chapters. Also, with the addition of voice acting and realistic facial expressions, that “laughter” in the Remake comes off much more sarcastic than genuine.

It’s also notable that in the Remake, Cloud vocally protests almost every time Aerith tries to extend their time together. In the OG, Cloud says nothing in these moments, which the player could reasonably interpret as assent.

One major change in the Remake is how Aerith learns of Tifa’s existence. In the OG, Cloud mentions that he wants to go back to Tifa’s bar, prompting Aerith to ask him about his relationship with her. In the Remake, Cloud calls Tifa’s name after having a random flashback of Child Tifa as he’s walking along with some kids. Again the insertion of said flashback is a bit jarring, prompting Aerith to understandably ask Cloud about just who this Tifa is. In the OG, this exchange served to show Aerith’s jealousy and her interest in Cloud. In the Remake, it’s all about Cloud’s feelings for Tifa and his inability to articulate them. As for Aerith, I suppose you can still read her reaction as jealous, though simple curiosity is a perfectly reasonable way to read it too. It plays out quite similarly to Aerith asking Cloud about who he gave the flower to. Her follow ups seem indicate that she’s merely curious about who this recipient might be rather than showing that she’s upset/jealous of the fact that said person exists.

For the collapsed tunnel segment, the Remake adds the recurring bit of Aerith and Cloud trying to successfully complete a high-five. While this is certainly a way to show them getting closer, it’s about least intimate way that SE could have done so. Just think about the alternatives — you could have Cloud and Aerith sharing brief tidbits of their lives after each mechanical arm, you could have them trying to reach for each other’s hand. Instead, SE chose an action that is we’ve seen performed between a number of different platonic buddies, and an action that Aerith immediately performs with Tifa upon meeting her. Not to mention, even while they are technically getting closer, Cloud still rejects (or at least tries to) Aerith’s invitations to extend their time together twice — at the fire and at the playground.

One aspect from these two Chapters that does has plenty of set up and a satisfying payoff is Aerith’s interest in Cloud’s SOLDIER background. You have the weirdness of Aerith already knowing that Cloud was in SOLDIER without him mentioning it first, followed by Elmyra’s antipathy towards SOLDIERs in general, not to mention Aerith actively fishing for information about Cloud’s time in SOLDIER. (For players who’ve played Crisis Core, the reason for her behavior is even more obvious, with her “one date” gesture mirroring Zack’s, and her line to Cloud in front of the tunnel a near duplicate of what she says to Zack — at least in the original Japanese).

Finally, at the playground, it’s revealed that the reason for all this weirdness is because Aerith’s first love was also a SOLDIER who was the same rank as Cloud. Unlike in the OG, Cloud does not exhibit any potential jealousy by asking about the nature of her relationship, and Aerith doesn’t try to play it off by dismissing the seriousness. In fact, with the emotional nuance we can now see on her face, we can understand the depth of her feelings even if she cannot articulate them.

This is the first scene in the Remake where Cloud and Aerith have a genuine conversation. Thus, finally, Cloud expresses some hesitation before he leaves her — and as far as he knows, this could be the last time they see each other. You can interpret this hesitation as romantic longing or it could just as easily be Cloud being a bit sad to part from a new friend. Regardless, it’s notable that scene is preceded by one where Aerith is talking about her first love who she clearly isn’t over, and followed by a scene where Cloud sprints across the screen, without a backwards glance at Aerith, after seeing a glimpse of Tifa through a tiny window in a Chocobo cart that’s about a hundred yards away.

The Wall Market segment in the Remake is quite explicitly about Cloud’s desire to save Tifa. In the OG, Aerith has no trouble getting into Corneo’s mansion on her own, so I can see how someone could misinterpret Cloud going through all the effort to dress as a woman to protect Aerith from the Don’s wiles (though of course, you would need to ask, why they trying to infiltrate the mansion in the first place?). In the Remake, Cloud has to go through herculean efforts to even get Aerith in front of the Don. Everyone who is aware of Cloud’s cause, from Sam to Leslie to Johnny to Andrea to Aerith herself, comments on how hard he’s working to save Tifa and how important she must be to him for him to do so. In case there’s any confusion, the Remake also includes a scene where Cloud is prepared to bust into the mansion on his own, leaving Aerith to fend for herself, after Johnny comes with news that Tifa is in trouble.

Both Cloud and Aerith get big dress reveals in the Remake. If you get Aerith’s best dress, Cloud’s reaction can certainly be read as one of attraction, but since the game continues on the same regardless of which dress you get, it’s not meant to mark a shift in Cloud and Aerith’s relationship. Rather, it’s a reward for the player for completing however many side quests in Ch. 8, especially since the Remake incentives the player to get every dress and thus see all of Cloud’s reactions by making it a Trophy and including it in the play log.

A significant and very welcome change from the OG to the Remake is Tifa and Aerith’s relationship dynamic. In the OG, the girls’ first meeting in Corneo’s mansion starts with them fighting over Cloud (by pretending not to fight over Cloud). In the Remake, the sequence of events is reversed so that it starts off with Cloud’s reunion with Tifa (again emphasizing that the whole purpose of the infiltration is because Cloud wants to save Tifa). Then when Aerith wakes, she’s absolutely thrilled to make Tifa’s acquaintance, hardly acknowledging Cloud at all. Tifa is understandably more wary at first, but once they start working together, they become fast friends.

Also interesting is that from the moment Aerith and Tifa meet, almost every instance where Cloud could be shown worrying about Aerith or trying to comfort Aerith is given to Tifa instead. In the OG, it’s Cloud who frets about Aerith getting involved in the plot to question the Don, and regrets getting her mixed up in everything once they land in the sewers. In the Remake, those very same reservations are expressed by Tifa instead. Tifa is the one who saves Aerith when the platform collapses in the sewer. Tifa is the one who emotionally comforts Aerith after they’re separated in the train graveyard. (Cloud might be the one who physically saves her, but he doesn’t even so much give her a second glance to check on her well-being before he runs off to face Eligor. He leaves that job for Tifa). It almost feels like the Remake is going out of its way to avoid any moments between Cloud and Aerith that could be interpreted as romantic. In fact, after Corneo’s mansion, unless you get Aerith’s resolution, there are almost no one-on-one interactions at all between Cloud and Aerith. Such is not the case with Cloud and Tifa. In fact, right after defeating Abzu in the sewers, Cloud runs after Tifa, and asks her if what she’s saying is one of those slum lessons — continuing right where they left off.

Ch. 11 feels like a wink-wink nudge-nudge way to acknowledge the LTD. You have the infamous shot of the two girls on each of Cloud’s arms, and two scenes where Cloud appears as if he’s unable to choose between them when he asks them if they’re okay. Of course, in this same Chapter, you have a scene during the boss fight with the Phantom where Cloud actually pulls Tifa away from Aerith, leaving Aerith to defend herself, for an extended sequence where he tries to keep Tifa safe. This is not something SE would include if their intention is to keep Cloud’s romantic interest ambiguous or if Aerith is meant to be the one he loves. Of course, Ch. 11 is not the first we see of this trio’s dynamic. We start with Ch. 10, which is all about Aerith and Tifa’s friendship. Ch. 11 is a nod to the LTD dynamic in the OG, but it’s just that, a nod, not an indication the Remake is following the same path. Halfway through Ch. 11, the dynamic completely disappears.

Ch. 12 changes things up a bit from the OG. Instead of Cloud and Tifa ascending the pillar together, Cloud goes up first. Seemingly just so that we can have the dramatic slow-mo handgrab scene between the two of them when Tifa decides to run after Cloud — right after Aerith tells her to follow her heart.

The Remake also shows us what happens when Aerith goes to find Marlene at Seventh Heaven — including the moment when Aerith sees the flower she gave Cloud by the bar register, and Aerith is finally able to connect the dots. After seeing Cloud be so cagey about who he gave the flower to, and weird about his relationship with Tifa, and after seeing how Cloud and Tifa act around each other. It finally makes sense. She’s figured it out before they have. It’s a beautiful payoff to all that set up. Any other interpretation of Aerith’s reaction doesn’t make a lick of sense, because if it’s to indict she’s jealous of Tifa, where is all the set up for that? Why did the Remake eliminate all the moments from the OG where she had been noticeably jealous before? Without this, that interpretation makes about as much sense as someone arguing Aerith is smiling because she’s thinking about a great sandwich she had the night before. In case anyone is confused, the scene is preceded by a moment where Aerith tells Tifa to follow her heart before she goes after Cloud, and followed by the moment where Cloud catches Tifa via slow-motion handgrab.

On the pillar itself, there are so many added moments of Cloud showing his concern for Tifa’s physical and emotional well-being. Even when they find Jessie, as sad as Cloud is over Jessie’s death, the game actually spends more time showing us Cloud’s reaction to Tifa crying over Jessie’s death, and Cloud’s inability to comfort her. Since so much of this is physical rather than verbal, this couldn’t have effectively been shown in the OG with its technological limitations.

After the pillar collapses, we start off with a couple of other moments showing Cloud’s concern over Tifa — watching over her as she wakes, his dramatic fist clench while he watches Barret comfort Tifa in a way he cannot. There is also a subtle but important change in the dialogue. In the OG, Tifa is the one who tells Barret that Marlene is safe because she was with Aerith. Cloud is also on his way to Sector 5, but it’s for the explicit purpose of trying to save Aerith, which we know because Tifa asks. In the Remake, Tifa is too emotionally devastated to comfort Barret about Marlene. Cloud, trying to help in the only way he can, is now the one to tell Barret about Marlene. Leading them to Sector 5 is no longer about him trying to help Aerith, but about him reuniting Barret with his daughter. Again, another moment where Cloud shows concern about Aerith in the OG is eliminated from the Remake.

Rather than going straight from Aerith’s house to trying to figure out a way into the Shinra building to find Aerith, the group takes a detour to check out the ruins of Sector 7 and rescue Wedge from Shinra’s underground lab. It’s only upon seeing the evidence of Shinra’s inhumane experimentation firsthand that Cloud articulates to Elmyra the need to rescue Aerith. In the OG, they never sought out Elmyra’s permission, and Tifa explicitly asks to join Cloud on his quest. Rescuing Aerith is framed as primarily Cloud’s goal, Tifa and Barret are just along for the ride.

In the Remake, all three wait until Elymra gives them her blessing, and it’s framed (quite literally) as the group’s collective goal as opposed to just Cloud’s.

In the aptly named Ch. 14 resolutions, each marks the culmination of the character’s arc for the Part 1 of Remake. While their arcs are by no means complete, they do offer a nice preview of what their ultimate resolutions will be.

With the exception of Tifa’s, these resolutions are primarily about the character themselves. Their relationships with Cloud are secondary. Each resolution marks a change in the character themselves, but not necessarily a change in Cloud’s relationship with said character. Barret recommits to AVALANCHE’s mission and his role as a leader despite the deep personal costs. Aerith’s is full of foreshadowing as she accept her fate and impending death and decides to make the most of the time she has left. After trying to put aside her own feelings for the sake of others the whole time, Tifa finally allows herself to feel the full devastation of losing her home for the second time. Like her ultimate resolution in the Lifestream that we’ll see in about 25 years, Cloud is the only person she can share this sentiment with because he was the only person who was there.

Barret does not grow closer to Cloud through his resolution. Cloud has already proved himself to him by helping out on the pillar and reuniting him with Marlene. Barret resolution merely reveals that Barret is now comfortable enough with Cloud to share his past.

Similarly, Cloud starts off Aerith’s resolution with an intent to go rescue her, and ends with that intent still intact. Aerith is more open about her feelings here than before, it being a dream and all, but these feelings aren’t something that developed during this scene.

The only difference is during Tifa’s resolution. Cloud has been unable to emotionally comfort Tifa up until this point. It’s only when Tifa starts crying and rests her head upon his shoulder that he is able to make a change, to make a choice and hug her. Halfway through Tifa’s resolution, the scene shifts its focus to Cloud, his inaction and eventual action. Notably, the only time we have a close-up of any character during all three resolutions (I’ll define close-up here as a shot where a character’s face takes up half or more of the shot), are three shots of Cloud when he’s hugging/trying to hug Tifa. Tifa’s resolution is the only one where Cloud arcs.

What of the whole “You can’t fall in love with me” line in Aerith’s resolution? Why would SE include that if not to foreshadow Cloud falling in love with Aerith? Or indicate that he has already? Well, you can’t just take the dialogue on its own, you how to look at how these lines are framed. Notably, when she says “you can’t fall in love with me,” Aerith is framed at the center of the shot, and almost looks like she’s directly addressing the player. It’s as much a warning for the player as it is for Cloud, which makes sense if you know her fate in the OG.

This is followed directly by her saying “Even if you think you have…it’s not real.” In this shot, it’s back to a standard shot/reverse shot where she is the left third of the frame. She is addressing Cloud here, which, again if you’ve played the OG, is another bit of heavy foreshadowing. The reason Clould would think he might be in love with Aerith is because he’s falsely assuming of the memories of a man who did love Aerith — Zack.

For Cloud’s response (”Do I get a say in all this?”/ “That’s very one-sided” depending on the translation), rather than showing a shot of his face, the Remake shows him with his back turned.

Whatever Cloud’s feelings may be for Aerith, the game seems rather indifferent to them.

What is more telling is the choice to include a bit with Cloud getting jealous over a guy trying to give Tifa flowers in Barret’s resolution. Barret also mentions both Jessie and Aerith in their conversation, but nothing else gets such a reaction from Cloud.

It also should go without saying that if Aerith’s resolution is meant to establish Cloud and Aerith’s romance, there should have been plenty of set-up beforehand and plenty of follow-through afterward. That obviously is not the case, because again, the Remake has gone out of its way to avoid moments where Cloud’s actions towards Aerith could be interpreted romantically.

Case in point, at around this time in the OG, Marlene tells Cloud that she thinks Aerith likes him and the player has the option to have Cloud express his hope that she does. This scene is completely eliminated from the Remake and replaced with a much more appropriate scene of father-daughter affection between Marlene and Barret while Tifa and Cloud are standing together outside.

The method by which they get up the plate is completely different in the Remake. Leslie is the one who helps them this time around, and though his quest to reunite with his fiance directly parallels with the trio’s desire to save Aerith, Leslie himself draws a comparison to earlier when Cloud was trying to rescue Tifa. Finally, when Abzu is defeated again, it is Barret who draws the parallel of their search for Aerith to Leslie’s search for his fiance, making it crystal clear that saving Aerith is a group effort rather than only Cloud’s.

Speaking of Barret, in the OG, he seems to reassess his opinion of Cloud in the Shinra HQ stairs when he sees Cloud working so hard to save Aerith and realizes he might actually care about other people. In the Remake, that reevaluation occurs after you complete all the Ch. 14 sidequests and help a bunch of NPCs. Arguably, this moment occurs even earlier in the Remake for Barret, after the Airbuster, when he realizes that Cloud is more concerned for his and Tifa’s safety than his own.

Overall, the entire Aerith rescue feels so anticlimactic in the Remake. In the OG, Cloud gets his big hero moment in the Shinra Building. He’s the one who runs up to Aerith when the glass shatters and they finally reunite. In the Remake, it’s unclear what the emotional stakes are for Cloud here. At their big reunion, all we get from him is a “Yep.” In fact, when you look at how this scene plays out, Aerith is positioned equally between Cloud and Tifa at the moment of her rescue. Cloud’s answer is again with his back turned to the camera. It’s Tifa who gets her own shot with her response.

Another instance of the Remake being completely indifferent to Cloud’s feelings for Aerith, and actually priotizing Tifa’s relationship with Aerith instead.

It is also Tifa who runs to reunite with Aerith after the group of enemies is defeated. Another moment that could have easily been Cloud’s that the Remake gives to Tifa.

Also completely eliminated in the Remake, is the “I’m your bodyguard. / The deal was for one date” exchange in the jail cells. In the Remake, after Ch. 8, the date isn’t brought up again at all; “the bodyguard” reference only comes up briefly in Ch. 11 and then never again.

In the Remake, the jail scene is replaced by the scene in Aerith’s childhood room. Despite the fact that this is Aerith’s room, it is Tifa’s face that Cloud first sees when he wakes. What purpose does this moment serve other than to showcase Cloud and Tifa’s intimacy and the other characters’ tacit acknowledgment of said intimacy?

(This is the second time where Cloud wakes up and Tifa is the first thing he sees. The other was at Corneo’s mansion. He comes to three times in the Remake, but in Ch. 8, even though Aerith is right in front of him, we start off with a few seconds of Cloud gazing around the church before settling on the person in front of him. Again, while not something that most players would notice, this feels like a deliberate choice.)

Especially since this scene itself is all about Aerith. She begins a sad story about her past, and Cloud, rather than trying to comfort her in any way, asks her to give us some exposition about the Ancients. When the Whispers surround her, even though Cloud is literally right there, it's Tifa who pulls her out of it and comforts her. Another moment that could have been Cloud that was given to Tifa, and honestly, this one feels almost bizarre.

Throughout the entire Shinra HQ episode, Cloud and Aerith haven’t had a single moment alone to themselves. The Drums scenario is completely invented for the Remake. The devs could have contrived a way for Cloud and Aerith to have some one-on-one time here and work through the feelings they expressed during Aerith’s resolution if they wanted. Instead, with the mandatory party configurations during this stage - Cloud & Barret on one side; Tifa & Aerith on the others, with Cloud & Tifa being the respective team leaders communicating over PHS, the Remake minimizes the amount of interaction Cloud and Aerith have with each other in this chapter.

On the rooftop, before Cloud’s solo fight with Rufus, even though Cloud is ostensibly doing all this so that they can bring Aerith to safety, the Remake doesn’t include a single shot that focuses on Aerith’s face and her reaction to his actions. The game has decided, whatever Aerith’s feelings are in this moment, they’re irrelevant to the story they’re trying to tell. Instead we get shots focusing solely on Barret and Tifa. While the Remake couldn’t find any time to develop Cloud and Aerith’s relationship at the Shinra Tower (even though the OG certainly did), it did find time to add a new scene where Tifa saves Cloud from certain death, while referencing their Promise.

A lot of weird shit happens after this, but it’s pretty much all plot and no character. We do get one more moment where Cloud saves Tifa (and Tifa alone) from the Red Whisper even though Aerith is literally right next to her. The Remake isn’t playing coy at all about where Cloud’s preferences lie.

The party order for the Sephiroth battle varies depending on how you fought the Whispers. All the other character entrances (whoever the 3rd party member is, then the 4th and Red) are essentially the exact same shots, with the characters replaced. It’s the first character entrance (which can only be Aerith or  Tifa) that you have two distinct options.

If Aerith is first, the camera pans from Cloud over to Aerith. It then cuts back to Cloud’s reaction, in a separate shot, as Aerith walks to join him (offscreen). It’s only when the player regains control of the characters that Cloud and Aerith ever share the frame.

On the other hand, if Tifa is first, we see Tifa land from Cloud’s POV. Cloud then walks over to join Tifa and they immediately share a frame, facing Sephiroth together.

Again, this is not something SE would expect the player to notice the first or even second time around. Honestly, I doubt anyone would notice at all unless they watched all these variations back to back. That is telling in itself, that SE would go through all this effort (making these scenes unique rather than copy and pasting certainly takes more time and effort) to ensure that the depictions of Cloud’s relationships with these two women are distinct despite the fact that hardly anyone would notice. Even in the very last chapter of the game, they want us to see Cloud and Tifa as a pair and Cloud and Aerith as individuals.

Which isn’t to say that Aerith is being neglected in the Remake. Quite the opposite, in fact, when she has essentially become the main protagonist and the group’s spirtual leader in Ch. 18. Rather, her relationship with Cloud is no longer an essential part of her character. Not to mention, one of the very last shots of the Remake is about Aerith sensing Zack’s presence. Again, not the kind of thing you want to bring up if the game is supposed to show her being in love with Cloud.

What does it all mean????

Phew — now let’s step back and look and how the totality of these changes have reshaped our understanding of the story as a whole. Looking solely at the Midgar section of the OG, and ignoring everything that comes after it, it seems to tell a pretty straightforward story: Cloud is a cold-hearted jerk who doesn’t care about anyone else until he meets Aerith. It is through his relationship with Aerith that he begins to soften up and starts giving a damn about something other than himself. This culminates when he risks it all to rescue Aerith from the clutches of the game’s Big Bad itself, The Shinra Electric Company.

This was honestly the reason why I was dreading the Remake when I learned that it would only cover the Midgar segment. A game that’s merely an expansion of the Midgar section of the OG is probably going to leave a lot of people believing that Cloud & Aerith were the intended couple, and I didn’t want to wait years and perhaps decades for vindication after the Remake’s Lifestream Scene.

I imagine this very scenario is what motivated SE to make so many of these changes. In the OG, they could get away with misdirecting the audience for the first few hours of the game since the rest of the story and the reveals were already completed. The player merely had to pop in the next disc to get the real story. Such is not the case with the Remake. Had the the Remake followed the OG’s beats more closely, many players, including some who’ve never played the OG, would finish the Remake thinking that Cloud and Aerith were the intended couple. It would be years until they got the rest of the story, and at that point, the truth would feel much more like a betrayal. Like they’ve been cruelly strung along.

While they’ve gone out of their way to adapt most elements from the OG into the Remake, they’ve straight up eliminated many scenes that could be interpreted as Cloud’s romantic interest in Aerith. Instead, he seems much more interested in her knowledge as an Ancient than in her romantic affections. This is the path the Remake could be taking. Instead of Cloud being under the illusion of falling in love with Aerith, he’s under the illusion that the answer to his identity dilemma lies in Aerith’s Cetra heritage, when, of course, the answer was with Tifa all along.

Hiding Sephiroth’s existence during the Midgar arc isn’t necessary to telling the story of FF7, thus it’s been eliminated in the Remake. Similarly, pretending that Cloud and Aerith are going to end up together also isn’t necessary and would only confuse the player. Thus the LTD is no longer a part of the Remake.

If Aerith’s impact on Cloud has been diminished, what then is his arc in the Remake? Is it essentially just the same without the catalyst of Aerith? A cold guy at the start who eventually learns to care about others through the course of the game? Kind of, though arguably, this is who Remake!Cloud is all along, not just Cloud at the end of the Remake. Cloud is a guy who pretends to be a selfish jerk, but he deep down he really does care. He just doesn’t show this side of himself around people he’s unfamiliar with. So part of his arc in the Remake is opening up to the others, Barret, AVALANCHE and Aerith included, but these all span a chapter or two at most. They don’t straddle the entire game.

What is the throughline then? What is an area in which he exhibits continuous growth?

It’s Tifa. It’s his desire to fulfill his Promise to Tifa. Not just to protect her physically, but to be there for her emotionally, something that’s much harder to do. There’s the big moments like when he remembers the Promise in Ch. 4., his dramatic fist clench when he can’t stop Tifa from crying in Ch. 12, and in Ch. 13 when he watches Barret comfort Tifa. It’s all the flashbacks he has of her and the times he’s felt like he failed her. It’s the smaller moments where he can sense her nervousness and unease but the only thing he knows how to do is call her name. It’s all those times during battle, where Tifa can probably take care of herself, but Cloud has to save her because he can’t fail her again. All of this culminates in Tifa’s Resolution, where Tifa is in desperate need of comfort, and is specifically seeking Cloud’s comfort, and Cloud has no idea what to do. He hesitates because he’s clueless, because he doesn’t want to fuck it up, but finally, he makes the choice, he takes the risk, and he hugs her….and he kind of fucks it up. He hugs her too hard. Which is a great thing, because this arc isn’t anywhere close to being over. There’s still so much more to come. So many places this relationship will go.

We get a little preview of this when Tifa saves Cloud on the roof. Everything we thought we knew about their relationship has been flipped on its head. Tifa is the one saving Cloud here, near the end of this part of the Remake. Just as she will save Cloud in the Lifestream just before the end of the FF7 story as a whole. What does Tifa mean to Cloud? It’s one of the first questions posed in the Remake, and by the end, it remains unanswered.

Cloud’s character arc throughout the entire FF7 story is about his reconciling with his identity issues. This continues to develop through the Shinra Tower Chapters, but it certainly isn’t going to be resolved in Part 1 of the Remake. His character arc in the Remake — caring more about others/finding a way to finally comfort Tifa — is resolved in Ch. 14, well before rescuing Aerith, which is what makes her rescue feel so anticlimactic. The resolution of this external conflict isn’t tied to the protagonist’s emotional arc. This was not the case in the OG. I’m certainly not complaining about the change, but the Remake probably would have felt more satisfying as a whole if they hewed to the structure of the OG. Instead, it seems that SE has prioritized the clarity of the Remake series as a whole (leaving no doubt about where Cloud’s affections lie) over the effectiveness of the “climax” in the first entry of the Remake.

This is all clear if you only focus on the “story” of the Remake -- i.e., what the characters are saying and doing. If you extend your lens to the presentation of said story, and here I’m talking about who the game chooses to focus on during the scenes, how long they hold on these shots, which characters share the frame, which do not, etc --- it really could not be more obvious.

Does the camera need to linger for over 5 seconds on Cloud staring at the door after wishing Tifa goodnight? Does it need to find Cloud almost every time Tifa says or does anything so that we’re always aware of his watchfulness and the nature of his care? The answer is no until you realize this dynamic is integral to telling the story of Final Fantasy VII.

I don’t see how anyone who compares the Remake to the OG could come away from it thinking that the Remake series is going to reverse all of the work done in the OG and Compilation by having Cloud end up with Aerith.

Just because the ending seems to indicate that the events of the OG might not be set in stone, it doesn’t mean that the Remake will end with Aerith surviving and living happily ever after with Cloud. Even if Aerith does live (which again seems unlikely given the heavy foreshadowing of her death in the Remake), how do you come away from the Remake thinking that Cloud is going to choose Aerith over Tifa when SE has gone out of its way to remove scenes between Cloud and Aerith that could be interpreted as romantic? And gone out of its way to shove Cloud’s feelings for Tifa in the player’s face? The sequels would have to spend an obscene amount of time not only building Cloud and Aerith’s relationship from scratch, but also dismantling Cloud’s relationship with Tifa. It would be an absolute waste of time and resources, and there’s really no way to do so without making the characters look like assholes in the process.

Now could this happen? Sure, in the sense that literally anything could happen in the future. But in terms of outcomes that would make sense based on what’s come before, this particular scenario is about as plausible as Cloud deciding to relinquish his quest to find Sephiroth so that he can pursue his real dream of becoming at sandwich artist at Panera Bread.

It’s over! I promise!

Like you, I too cannot believe the number of words I’ve wasted on this subject. What is there left to say? The LTD doesn’t exist outside of the first disc of the OG. You'll only find evidence of SE perpetuating the LTD if you go into these stories with the assumption that 1) The LTD exists 2) it remains unanswered. But it’s not. We know that Cloud ends up with Tifa.

What the LTD has become is dissecting individual scenes and lines of dialogue, without considering the context of said things, and pretending as if the outcome is unknown and unknowable. If you took this tact to other aspects of FF7’s story, then it would be someone arguing that because there a number of scenes in the OG that seem to suggest that Meteor will successfully destroy the planet, this means that the question of whether or not our heroes save the world in the end is left ambiguous. No one does that because that would be utterly absurd. Individual moments in a story may suggest alternate outcomes to build tension, to keep us on our toes, but that doesn’t change the ending from being the ending. Our heroes stop Meteor. Cloud loves Tifa. Arguments against either should be treated with the same level of credulity (i.e., none).

It’s frustrating that the LTD, and insecurities about whether or not Cloud really loves Tifa, takes up so much oxygen in any discussion about these characters. And it’s a damn shame, because Cloud and Tifa’s relationship is so rich and expansive, and the so-called “LTD” is such a tiny sliver of that relationship, and one of the least interesting aspects. They’re wonderful because they’re just so damn normal. Unlike other Final Fantasy couples, what keeps them apart is not space and time and death, but the most human and painfully relatable emotion of all, fear. Fear that they can’t live up to the other’s expectations; fear that they might say the wrong thing. The fear that keeps them from admitting their feelings at the Water Tower, they’re finally able to overcome 7 years later in the Lifestream. They’re childhood friends but in a way they’re also strangers. Like other FF couples, we’re able to watch their entire relationship grow and unfold before our eyes. But they have such a history too, a history that we unravel with them at the same time. Every moment of their lives that SE has found worth depicting, they’ve been there for each other, even if they didn’t know it at the time. Theirs is a story that begins and ends with each other. Their is the story that makes Final Fantasy VII what it is.

If you’ve made it this far, many thanks for reading. I truly have no idea how to use this platform, so please direct any and all hatemail to my DMs at TLS, which I will then direct to the trash. (In all seriousness, I’d be happy to answer any specific questions you may have, but I feel like I’ve more than said my piece here.)

If there’s one thing you take away from this, I hope it’s to learn to ignore all the ridiculous arguments out there, and just enjoy the story that’s actually being told. It’s a good one.

#cloti

[sullustangin]

Fearful Avoidant Attachment and the Single Spy

Caveat:  I’m not a counselor of any sort, and I’m applying labels to fictional characters.  Don’t take this too seriously.

This post has been kicking around in different forms in my prompt document for awhile.  I will start posting my Yavin fic this weekend.  A major element of this fic will be the dynamic between Theron and the playable character/love interest.  Their interactions will be informed by how I view his attachments. I’ve put some of this into the fic series already.

“Attachment” in the Star Wars universe is the idea, according to George Lucas, that Jedi should love everyone but not get attached.  “Attached” in this context is possession, greed, being willing to do things for individuals rather than the greater good, and ultimately the fear of loss.  Attachment is a negative concept in Jedi philosophy.

However, I would argue that while this philosophy is in the back of Theron’s head, Jedi attachment concepts are not what makes Theron’s personal life messy.  It’s the personal context surrounding that teaching and his life events that shape this.  So let’s look at real life attachment theory. 

In its most basic form, attachment theory is the idea that children need to develop a positive relationship with a caregiver to turn out ok. If the child is neglected, then they will have problems forming healthy attachments to others.   There’s a lot of caveats to this theory.  Some put the threshold of ‘must have positive relationship by x age’ to age 2 or age 5.  Others state that this is problematic, because if a child loses their caregiver and passes into the hands of a less affectionate or downright abusive caregiver, then their positive attachment formation by age x doesn’t count for much.

There are several different types of attachment that a person can have.  A secure attachment is what most healthy relationships are rooted in. People feel safe and secure within themselves and within the relationship. Jedi can be attached in this fashion, even if they don’t call it this; the Jedi have orderly boundaries and a clear understanding of what their associations entail. They have care systems for younglings and padawans, which were like pre-modern apprenticeships.   They are secure within themselves as Jedi and in their relationships outside the order.  They are at peace.

An insecure attachment has a flaw in it; something is wrong in how the person relates to themselves and others in relationships, platonic, romantic or otherwise.  One type is dismissive or avoidant; the attachments are actively avoided, so the person is often isolated and rejects others and their friendly overtures.  Another type is anxious or preoccupied; people tend to get very clingy or possessive with anyone they latch onto, which can cause the relationship to self-destruct (hi, Anakin).

Then there is fearful avoidant attachment, the label I think fits Theron Shan, our favorite high-quality spy and absolute emotional disaster.  In theory, Theron tries to avoid deep emotional attachments because he’s scared of being left behind or not having those attachments reciprocated. At the same time, he desperately wants those attachments and relationships, but the potential of failure makes him avoid or even sabotage the relationship.  That results in an on-going war between Theron and his feelings. To quote Psychalive, “the person [he wants] to go to for safety is the same person [he is] frightened to be close to. As a result, [he has] no organized strategy for getting [his] needs met by others.”

Why does Theron have attachment issues?

Some accuse Satele Shan or Jace Malcom of being “bad parents.”  There’s a problem with this premise: although there is a biological relationship, neither Satele nor Jace had a parent-child relationship with Theron. Jace didn’t even know Theron existed until the child was 26, so he couldn’t act in any capacity.  Satele gave Theron up to be raised by someone else; she opted out of the role of mother and did not talk to him as mother-and-son until Theron was 26.  There isn’t an abusive or neglectful relationship here because there isn’t a relationship, period.  Much like romantic relationships, it’s better to have no relationship than a bad one. Jace and Satele didn’t raise Theron.  They were strangers to him until he was an adult.  They were never his caretakers.  Who did Theron have attachments to?

Theron was raised by a Jedi named Ngani Zho, who had been Satele Shan’s master when she was a padawan. After Satele gave birth in a cave on some planet, Zho took the child and raised him as his own son.  This was irregular, honestly.  Jedi younglings that express some sort of control over the Force are typically put into a creche at the Jedi Temple; we’ve seen this in the Star Wars prequel films.  Guss Tuno references this in SWTOR, as he was chagrinned to be in class with a bunch of five-year-olds in bathrobes.  Theron was raised by Zho directly and they were constantly traveling, based upon comments we read in The Lost Suns comic and in the novel Annihilation. Theron never entered the creche because he never manifested signs he was Force-sensitive – not even a little like Guss.

Zho traveled with Theron until the boy was an adolescent. Then, Theron was told by Zho to travel to the Jedi Temple at Haashimut to receive more training; he could do no more for him.  The trip through a desert nearly killed the boy.  When Theron had recovered, it fell to Master Till’in to tell him he would not be a Jedi.  Ever.  

Instead of telling Theron or notifying Satele about the boy’s lack of Force aptitude, Zho sent him onward and then disappeared.  There is no indication that Zho told anyone where he was going or why.  When Theron met Zho again at age 23, the Master’s mind was scrambled and confused; he couldn’t give any answers to Theron about anything.  Was there a mission he had been set on?  Or did he just wander off on his own?

For storytelling purposes, it’s convenient to pair Zho’s departure with the aftermath of the Treaty of Coruscant.  In the year Theron turned 13 (3653 BBY), the Great Galactic War ended with the Treaty of Coruscant, wherein the Sith Empire enforced demands on the Republic.  The Sith won. Zho leaving could be tied to this (through a mission or quixotic urge), but the source material isn’t clear on the timing.  

Theron’s life suddenly became very uncertain.  His entire life had been built up to becoming a Jedi.  To some extent, even though he hadn’t done anything wrong, Theron probably felt like he was a failure.  We know he tried to fix this; in The Lost Suns, he acknowledged pursuing access to the Force through the Matukai Force tradition – being an ascetic. In Annihilation, he recalled and took particular umbrage at the “arrogance” of the Jedi – those that made him feel like any other path was second (or third or less)-best. This diminished over time, but the revelation about his lack of Force Sensitivity probably left Theron feeling very insecure about himself and who he was as an adolescent/young teen.

In terms of his relationships, Zho was gone with no forwarding address.  The man Theron called his father was no longer reachable, and for another ten years, there would be no closure as to what happened to him.  Zho had actively endangered Theron by sending him through a desert to Haashimut.  Did he gamble that the boy’s Force Sensitivity would manifest in a life-threatening crisis or something?  Who knows? Theron never went into the Jedi creche, so he didn’t have close peers or friends beyond pen pals at best.  Theron had not spoken to his bio parents at all to this point, and he probably didn’t know many (if any) non-Force Sensitive kids.  With his expulsion from Jedi society, Theron’s entire relationship network was gone.

This is important to understand -- Theron had been raised to not have attachments that would lead to selfishness or fear of loss, but he was raised to be able to love and care for others.  He lived in a structure that fostered good psychological attachments (secure attachments) to the order and to his fellow sentients without possessiveness or jealousy. Theron knew his mother gave him up. He knew one day Zho would give his care over to another Master.  He knew one day, he would leave the Temple to go out into the galaxy.   Theron knew how the galaxy worked and his role in it...

..and then it was torn away from him.  No more masters, no more knowledge of what came next, no way to ever work with his mother as a Jedi.  His life to that point had been an illusion -- he was never able to access the Force, and Zho knew it.  This left Theron as insecurely attached, as nothing that he anticipated for his life would ever happen, and he knew nobody that would accompany him into this new life. 

External to all this, the Republic Theron was raised to serve was on the losing end of war.  How the galaxy worked, as far as Theron knew to that point, was going to change.  After Till’in told Theron the truth, all we know is that he spent some time in Haashimut before going elsewhere. We the viewer have no idea what happened to Theron from adolescence until he was 16, when he entered SIS per Annihilation.  This may be a canon math/timing error, or it could be reasonable; Theron might have been able to get permission to join a government organization at 16.  If Theron was in foster care or a ward of the state or something else, whoever was involved didn’t make an impact worthy of mention thus far in SWTOR canon.

Theron described Zho in The Lost Suns as “never reliable.”  That was a 23-year-old looking back.  Yet, he referred to him as his father in Annihilation three years later, and even eight years later in SWTOR: KotFE, he mentions that “Master Zho would be proud.”  This seems contradictory.  Additionally, in both The Lost Suns and Annihilation, SIS Director Marcus Trant expressed concern about Theron and his issues.  Theron was a workaholic.  Being a workaholic is actually a sign of having attachment issues; a person attaches themselves to work, not people   Theron expressed desires to run away, go on vacation, and do new stuff… but he never did these things – couldn’t get away from the job.

Attachment theory states that a child has difficulty with attachments if they are abused or somehow neglected by their caretaker. The desert march definitely strikes me as falling into one of those categories, but again, Zho’s logic isn’t readily offered up to the viewer, nor are many details about Theron’s life as a traveling youngling.  That all said, Zho’s traumatic departure probably caused attachment issues that had no other herald.

Why do the labels “fearful” and “avoidant” fit Theron?

Theron Shan as the player met him in Forged Alliance SWTOR was a professional.  Flirting was ignored, mildly acknowledged, or, rarely, fully reciprocated. There was no physical contact between Theron and his asset. This doesn’t seem off or irregular until his romance is compared to that of Lana Beniko. She didn’t have the same issues expressing affection for her asset on Imp side; she touched their face and gave them a hug by the time the spies went under deep cover after Rakata Prime. Even if the player did not romance Lana, Lana herself was keen to make a team and bust open the conspiracy; she wasn’t as willing to go it alone.  

Avoidant people tend to refrain from contact, and they like being independent.  They don’t do well in teams.  Sound familiar?  Fearful avoidants also have the concern that they will fail their partner or that their partner will fail them.  If the player was Imp side, Theron was a jerk well into the Rishi storyline.  Eventually, Theron did come around.  His dialogue and follow-up letter reflect the fact that he actually did want these connections and attachments.  He enjoyed the time he had with the player.  

This is particularly pronounced if Theron was romanced by the player on Rishi and Yavin; first physical contact occurred on Rishi with a kiss.  If the player was Pubside, the fade-to-black and his comments on Yavin indicate they had sex.  Those episodes of affection, paired with the Pub post-Yavin letter and dialogue, really emphasize the connection that was formed.  Interestingly, Theron did not get a fade-to-black with the Imperial player. One might argue that he knew they were going to leave him, and so he couldn’t –wouldn’t—get attached.

…. And then Ziost happened. Theron refused to ask for help. He didn’t want to depend on that attachment.  He was distant on Ziost, regardless of how far the relationship went, and if Pubside, he declined a drink afterwards.

Whatever transpired between Ziost and the Eternal Fleet Incident, it’s clear that a romanced Theron and the player never defined their relationship.  There were certain boundaries that never were crossed.  He’d “like to think” the player is dreaming of him, but he didn’t want to presume.  Even after Theron got into a romantic relationship on Odessen, he still struggled with his ability to be attached, as evidence by his letters and expressions of affection and concern throughout the KotFE/KotET expansions.  

One might argue that the traitor element of the Nathema Conspiracy was partially caused by Theron’s attachment issues: his independent streak, his inability to ask for help, his lack of faith in others to do the job right (not telling anyone the truth), his lack of faith in himself (his willingness to understand why the player might dump/exile him). If romanced, he gave one of his Holonet messages the subject line “I love you,” but even then, he did not clue the player into his self-made mission.  Certainly, the Nathema Conspiracy happens because of Theron’s desperate desire to save the galaxy and the player at any cost – including the relationship itself and his life.

For those who let Theron live, the attachment issues have faded as Theron has gotten engaged/married and/or reformed a relationship with his bio parents… or the writers have moved on from Lana and Theron as companions.  Regardless, we have to keep in mind that Theron is closing in on 40, and he has grown as a character since he first appeared in Star Wars media at age 23 (baby and adolescent only in flashbacks).  His issues with his relationships, the Jedi, the Republic, and his bio parents have changed over the course of 17 years.  In the last story patch, people who have romanced Theron received letters from both Theron and his mother about how good the player is for him, and it’s very satisfying to see how far he has come.

How does this label of ‘fearful avoidant’ manifest in your fanworks?

Since not everyone is into fic, I’ll drop this behind a cut. 

Basically, my version of Theron wants love but is terrified of all the feelings and closeness that come with it.  When people get close, he draws away, but still wants them to be close.  Theron has had good relationships, but if it gets too serious, he runs.  That’s the case for his last major relationship prior to my oc; his Mirialan girlfriend was drawing a tattoo to mark their relationship, and she wanted him to meet the parents. Theron noped out of there pretty hard by taking a long mission off Coruscant and sort of forgetting to tell her.  There are several times where he takes a big step with Eva (my oc)– disclosure, physical intimacy, caring for her or letting her care for him – and then he just doesn’t contact her for the next few days.  He dives into work to avoid her.  Toward the end of their initial relationship, that will turn into weeks and months.  He is freaked out when he does things with her that are intimate, sexual or not.  He has a lot of fear that he will be left again, so he leaves first. 

Theron also sets up a lot of rules and boundaries that the partner has to dance around to get in.  After 300,000 words, I just completed a slow burn with the Rishi kiss, because Theron wouldn’t get involved with Eva until after the op to expose the conspiracy was over.  There will be more rules once they get to Yavin.  

When I was doing research on this, I read a clinical study that found that people with avoidant attachment issues are particularly fastidious about safe sex.  They don’t want attachments to their lovers in the form of a disease or a child.  Anxious attachments tend to eschew this and take the risk so they can be bound to someone. This is part of why I gave Theron a male birth control implant, but there will also be reference to his back-up (condoms) and back-up back-up (PreP) to ensure there aren’t any adverse consequences for him.

Theron is often alone, but that doesn’t make him lonely by default.  In part, that might be due to his avoidance of attachments.  Dude can pick up people at a bar and get laid. Theron isn’t adverse to sex, just intimacy.  He can find someone to hook up, but that doesn’t mean there is anything beyond sex attached to it.  Theron can and does get dates, and he can have relationships ... but that doesn’t mean he can make a healthy connection to the other person.  I think his issues are more emotional/internal than they are caused by not getting enough physical contact or affection from others.  People want to love him.  People reach out to him to be friends or have a relationship.  He just doesn’t want it; he avoids it.  I imagine that this is partly the case with Jace and his SIS coworkers.

The last fearful avoidant feature I’ll give Theron in my series is the tendency to idealize relationships after they’re dead and over. When the relationship is no longer available, it is held up and made glorious, partially to enable the person not to pursue a different relationship; it’ll never be as good, so why try?  This also calls in the tendency for fearful avoidants to fear not only screwing up the relationship themselves, but that others won’t live up to their expectations. Theron is a mess after the Eternal Fleet incident and never moves on from Eva.  It’s reasonable when he thinks she’s alive, but for a good two years, he thinks she’s dead… and he can’t.  With anyone else.

Unlike the game, I eventually send Theron to a therapist to deal with the fearful avoidant attachment issues.  I figure if I’m going to give a fictional character a real-world label, I need to give him a real-world solution that might work.

#swtor #theron shan #character analysis #theron thursday #jedi #jedi philosophy #ngani zho

[sirescumbag]

AA7 thoughts

So I just finished Spirit of Justice and then I heard about Ace Attorney 7 apparently in the works, so my brain decided this is the time to make up potential plot twists to be excited about that don’t actually exist. I know this is divergent from my usual fanart posting but here’s a very long text dump of some new stuff I’d be interested in seeing but will probably not happen because it is all very specific and caters to my own desires, probably not the fandom’s in general:

Phoenix is still there, but not as active as an acting defense attorney, though he’s still key to the plot (as a mentor, or to be used as emotional blackmail). He’s not playable (or if he is, it’s not for long), but more there as a plot point in a Maya sort of way (oh the turntables). This time, he’s the one under threat or danger. Instead of switching around from lawyer to lawyer, I think that Athena should undergo some more development as a main character this time around since Phoenix and Apollo have had their time to shine. The removal of Phoenix and being all alone, I think, would also be interesting in her character development

On that note, bring on the major character angst!! Having a big tragedy occur, with a fairly major character. Usually the tragedy pulled is a murder/death, but how about a different sort of tragedy-- a fate worse than death/on par with it to someone who is still alive? Someone is severely incapacitated, a psychological injury (classic old memory loss, or perhaps a genius who is reduced to a very limited mental capacity), coma, or even a temporary death (like with Petenshy, Edgeworth), or perhaps a kidnapping (not Maya this time, please). If it happens to a major character, it’ll have greater impact, BUT there’ll be fan riots if it’s not reversible. So have the tragedy with the character get resolved, but not in a deus ex machina way-- recovery is slow and angsty but filled with hope.

There’s often a focus on the past haunting you-- let’s try shifting this to the present! Building suspense on a case that is happening in real time-- I am fond of the idea of a serial killer on the loose in the present and the dread of suspense in present time throughout trials as they continue to kill and hinder key advances in solving the mystery.

Very often, there are personal ties in court-- both the prosecution and defense are tied together in some way in the past, resolving their own personal backstory. Instead of oneself, maybe let’s have some focus on a client instead? It might be interesting to see a lawyer get so deep into protecting a single client-- instead of a new client for every case, protecting a single person over multiple cases-- that they get roped into an outsider’s story instead. A little idea in my head is of playing around with maybe witness protection, or say (off the serial killer idea) someone is expected to be the next target for a murder and you are tasked with trying to protect them in real time (and then a tragedy happens to them that moves plot forward, bonus if players gets to build an emotional connection between you and the client).

In SOJ and DGS, the stakes were big on “saving the masses” and government reform-- the stakes can still be high, but instead of something lofty like reforming the world or community, instead it could focus on the relationships with the people immediately around you, protecting them, or just some good old self-preservation.

Newer characters like Athena being really fleshed out! Whether there are new or old characters, really build and explore the depth of their character beyond that of a plot point. Not just slapping on relationship labels that immediately trigger emotion but have no context beyond it (like the killing off “my best friend” Clay in DD, or the classic parental death). I thought the fleshing out of Dhurke and building an emotional relation to him in SOJ was a lot more effective in making it really feel like a tragedy than with Clay in DD.

For introducing any old characters, please show some personality changes due to age. Or, maybe! Even a 180 change from the personality from the original trilogy for intrigue-- what happened to the old person I knew (and have it be integral to the plot)? I know I griped about the old “ah That Event 5/7/10 years ago” past plot thing being used but I wouldn’t mind this being used as a part of plot development either

Maybe try to bridge the feeling of separation between the old trilogy and newer characters’ worlds by, instead of kind of sequestering them into their separate spheres of interaction to preserve nostalgia (like in Turnabout Time Traveler, where the old gang is all together in the same dynamic, Maya and Phoenix and Edgeworth, etc), have old trilogy characters interact with newer ones in significant ways and build their own unique bond. So, not just a passing mention where the old encounters the new, having the old interact with the new and build a bond through going through significant conflicts together (for example, this has already been mentioned but if Athena is the main focus of the next game, there could be an opportunity to explore this if she confronts Franziska in court!).

I know there’s already so many gimmicks added (Apollo’s perceive, Athena’s widget) but if there has to be something new added, instead of making it individual-specific, maybe have be similar to spirit channeling as a concept-- have it be a broad phenomenon in the world that plays a key part in causing a case, rather than a tool for discerning the truth of a case.

Or, if we’re sticking with the same gadgets/tricks, instead choosing to tamper more with the tools of the trade that were supposed to never lead you astray-- this has already been seen in DD, where Apollo’s bracelet led him to the wrong conclusion about Athena, and AA4, where evidence was tampered with. Perhaps instead of adding new gadgets, let’s manipulate, tamper with, lose, have it used against them in new ways!

The use of a civil case in SOJ was very much unexpected but in my opinion a very interesting one! Would be very interesting to see more in-fighting among the prosecutor group or within the defense attorney group and see how that moves the plot along. Messing more with the court system instead of adding new gadgets would also be interesting.

More threats during investigation, not just in court! Remember when von Karma tased you in the evidence room? Let’s have suspense in AND out of the courtroom.

I’m sure there’s plenty of interesting psychological phenomena that could be used to complicate court cases (for example, that use of Justice Minister Inga’s cognitive disorder in recognizing faces coming into play)!

Different approaches for moral ambiguity for clients using psychology-- we’ve seen this with defending clients who are actually guilty, or being blackmailed. I’d be interested in seeing a Jekyll and Hyde situation where 2 different sides of one person commit a crime, but one side is unaware of it-- and how a defense lawyer would handle this!

Exploring the plea for insanity in court! Double jeopardy! Escaped convicts! A murder whose trial to find a good jury has been delayed for a long time and is forced to find its resolution outside of court due to the murderer striking again!

Also, to pull in some stuff I read about elsewhere, after reading about moral psychology in Jonathan Haidt’s book The Righteous Mind and moral triggers that typically pull strong reactions (care, fairness, loyalty, authority, sanctity), I was also thinking about how ace attorney manages to build emotionally compelling cases in relation to this model. Ace Attorney imo so far has done pretty alright at hitting most of these triggers at some point to hype the emotion, but for the final case, it ends up being played in what I see as generally the same way (ex: character development starts from from my duty as a lawyer is my role as the defense/prosecutor into that of my duty is to find the truth, authority corrupt and that is bad, justice should be served fairly, I am loyal to my group of prosecutor/defense, also played with loyalty and betrayal in DD with Apollo and Athena splitting, also triggered sanctity a bit in SOJ with the religion, lots of other examples probably but that’s a few). I’d be interested in seeing these same moral triggers played upon in different manner for some variety! Maybe even pursuing some different themes than justice and truth and duty and all that jazz, but idk what else could be alright to explore cause the courts kinda embody all that and deviating to make a statement about other themes might not fit as well in the courts hmm

Also part 2, I wonder if there’ll be romantic undertone somewhere (or heavily implied) for any new or old major characters. Romantic love isn’t usually used with major characters as a plot point (usually platonic stuff, friendship, family, or duty to the truth is instead) but I’d think it’d be interesting if romance was used this time around as an emotional motivator to drive the plot

#ace attorney #ace attorney 7 #aa7 #i kind of wrote this all at once so it's probably really jumbled ahhhhfhhhh #basically i want that sweet major character angst #i might just end up making an AU with these ideas if they're not in AA7 because i want an excuse to see these in a plot hohohoh #anyway i'm trying not to have expectations but i got myself all excited anyway so here we are

[alphawave-writes]

For the character ask thing, Sigma!!!

Send Me a Character

And I will tell you my:

First impression

Let’s be honest, we all got hooked on that reveal trailer. Like, it was nothing, and still is NOTHING like anything Overwatch has ever put out. I wrote the very first Sigma fanfic in English (as far as I can tell, at least) [The title is ‘The sum of all things’ if you’re interested] and that basically gives you a very good idea of what I thought of him at the time. Namely, that he is a tragic character with a broken mind and earnestly trying to live with his broken mind and strange powers. That he is a man who may or may not be aware of the atrocities he might have committed, who has done so much bad despite trying to do so much good.  And then an anon here on Tumblr told me about his datamined lines about Harold Winston, and the rest is history.

Impression now

Don’t get me wrong, Sigma is still a tragic character altogether, but he’s a lot more goofier than I expected (in a good way). He loves food and is a messy eater. He cracks puns. He’s gentlemanly, and friendly, and a bit too trusting, and doesn’t like scientists who pursue science for the sake of discovery. His past relationship with Harold Winston has opened plenty of doors for his character, which I have taken to their most obvious extremes, including but not limited to redesigning Harold Winston as a fully fledged playable character. So uhhh...gotta thank Sigma for putting me on the Harold train. Even then, I definitely wouldn’t be on the Harold train if Sigma didn’t come in to the picture.

Favorite moment

The reveal trailer is still his best piece (and only canon moment, so to speak). I am excited to see how he develops in future cinematics, if he ever appears in them. 

Idea for a story:

Oh, god I have too many. I had an idea for a story based on the Halloween Flying Dutchman skin, where Harold is a captured naval officer forced to be a navigator on Sigma’s pirate ship. There’s a lot of romantic and sexual tension. The story keeps shifting between Sigma’s ghost tring

There’s another idea I had for a Lovecraftian AU, where Sigma gets into a freak accident that causes him to hear the voices of a cosmic entity. And he can hear the cosmic entity speak of its plans to rise up and take over the world, and Sigma, as the only person who can hear it and knows of the plans, has to be the one to stop it before his mind gets completely consumed by said cosmic entity.

And of course, all the numerous, infinite stories I could come up with about how Harold lives again so he can interact with Sigma and Winston and Hammond. I just want those four to be a family. A family can be two men, a genetically enhanced moon gorilla scientist, and a genetically enhanced hamster riding a modified mech of its own creation.

Unpopular opinion:

You could argue me shipping Sigrold is an unpopular opinion. I guess you could argue shipping Sigma with ANYONE in the cast is an unpopular opinion. 

I’m not a fan of Sigma x Reinhardt, but that’s more to do with what certain fans of the ship have said about me rather than the actual ship itself. (Also, can Sigrein shippers please draw them BOTH buff like they actually are? There’s a difference between making Sigma slimmer than Reinhardt, and making him slim)

Favorite relationship:

I’m the Sigma x Harold Winston person. The AO3 tag for them is 80% my stuff by now. I literally REDESIGNED HAROLD WINSTON AS A PLAYABLE CHARACTER. Of course Sigrold is my favourite ship, in both romantic and platonic settings. I could go romantic, silly, angsty, dark, the potential with them is quite literally limitless. And even though there isn’t much canon stuff about them, I’m sure they must have been at least good friends in the past, which makes my ship at least a little bit valid. 

Favorite headcanon

I like to think Sigma’s a dog person, solely because he reminds me of my grandfather, who owned German Shepherds that he named after stars and planets (Guess why Harold in ‘Evil Actions’ gains the codename of ‘Charon’? It’s because my grandfather had a dog named Charon.........look, my mind works in mysterious ways.)

#overwatch #overwatch sigma #siebren de kuiper #sigrold #This made me miss Sigma #I still love him as a character with all my heart #I'm always a sucker for tragic but well-meaning characters that try to defy the odds and their own limits #I can't 'love him' love him like a lot of other shippers because uhhh... #...well let's just say the implication of this character that resembles my granddad a lot #being in a gay ship with a biracial scientist who dies on the moon #is not something I can explain to any hypothetical future therapist of mine

[maxerikson]

The Character Development of Sonic the Hedgehog: A Character Analysis

The Sonic the Hedgehog video game series is one that does not require very deep or complicated stories to go with their games. Due to the simplistic nature of the franchise, its characters are probably best described as two-dimensional, which would be fine, because they don’t require that third dimension of depth. The main character himself, Sonic the Hedgehog, doesn’t even have much character development throughout the series; at least at first glance that would seem to be the case, but I am here to tell you all that Sonic the Hedgehog has gone through a lot of character development throughout his adventures, making him very three-dimensional. There are four key character arcs that Sonic has gone through over the course of the main series, and I’m going to go over all of them while examining Sonic’s development in the major installments.

-

From Loner to Team Player

I believe at the very start of the series, Sonic the Hedgehog was a loner, who had trouble making friends and might have even closed himself off to others. In Sonic the Hedgehog 1, Sonic was the only playable character, and the only other character in the whole game was the villain, Dr. Eggman. More characters appeared in later titles, many more, but none of them are people Sonic knew before Sonic 1. They were all strangers to Sonic when they first appeared. Another piece of evidence comes from Amy Rose. Several years ago now, Sega did a mock Q&A with Sonic, and one of the questions asked of him was why he wasn’t interested in Amy. His answer was because he was too busy with his adventures to have a relationship (although there’s also an inappropriate age difference between the two, with Sonic being 15 years old, and Amy being 12).

It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to think that this makes it hard to form any relationship, whether romantic or platonic. Being able to move as fast as he can, the world around Sonic is just too slow for him, and the people that were in his life before Tails and Amy likely just couldn’t keep up. Not only that, but his powers and his status as a hero likely make him a target, which would make him dangerous to be around, as if his super speed didn’t make him dangerous enough already. However, Amy would force her way into Sonic’s life, not minding the danger, and in the Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic met Tails, who was able to keep up with him thanks to his propeller-like twin tails, and tagged along on his adventure to stop Eggman from destroying West Island in his search for the Chaos Emeralds. Tails may have been Sonic’s first real friend in who knows how long, maybe even ever.

That being said, Sonic still saw Tails and Amy as people he had to protect, and he had trouble getting along with people like Knuckles, who was also quite the loner, although much more so than Sonic. Then Sonic Adventure 1 took place, and it seemed like Sonic’s fears were coming true. When the Tornado 1 was shot down during the first attack on the Egg Carrier, Sonic and Tails were separated. Sonic had no idea if Tails was OK, so he needed to find him quickly, but Amy just had to show up asking for him to help a lost birdie. Sonic never agreed to this, but when Zero arrived to capture Amy and the bird, Sonic was determined to rescue them, but Zero escaped with them. Sonic had failed to protect his friends, and he wouldn’t have needed to if he was their friend in the first place.

Sonic didn’t have long to dwell on this failure, however, because Tails almost immediately appeared in his Tornado 2, which he and Sonic used to attack the Egg Carrier, and this time successfully made on board, where they find out that Amy had already escaped custody...with help from an Eggman robot, no less! In this moment, Sonic has learned that his friends can take care of themselves, meaning he can have friends without putting them in danger.

The story for Sonic Adventure 1 had a central theme that was used as the inspiration for the main song, Open Your Heart. The story was all about how you need to open your heart to others, because closing yourself off will create a cycle of pain and hatred. This lesson was put into words when Sonic gave his speech to Tikal before the final boss battle, telling her why they shouldn’t just seal Chaos back into the Master Emerald. I believe Sonic wouldn’t have been able to make this speech at the beginning of the game, because it’s a lesson he’s been learning since the beginning of the series, and it had just sunk in. That speech is the climax of Sonic letting his friends be part of his life, but it isn’t the finale.

In Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic found himself framed for a crime he didn’t commit and thrown in Prison Island. How did he escape? He didn’t—at least not by himself. It was actually Amy who released Sonic from his cell while Tails was keeping Dr. Eggman busy. Not only could Sonic’s friends take care of themselves, but they can even be relied on to save the day when Sonic can’t. Sonic is shown to have learned this lesson when he gets trapped on the ARK, and about to be jettisoned to his apparent death; during that scene he tells Tails to take care of Amy, letting him know that Sonic has full faith in him to be a hero in Sonic’s absence. By Sonic Heroes, Sonic has become a true team player, treating Tails and Knuckles as equals as they worked together to stop Eggman.

A lot of this is intertwined with the next area of development I’m about to talk about, which is….

-

Sonic’s Confidence

Sonic the Character is well known for his confidence. A lot of people view him as cocky, but I’ve never seen him as such. However, I believe that’s because by Sonic Adventure 1, he’s already lost a good chunk of that cockiness (all games before SA1 had what I like to call ‘video game stories’, with little-to-no dialogue or cutscenes). One way a person can combat loneliness is by convincing themselves that they don’t need other people in their lives—they’re awesome enough by themselves! Sonic in particular wouldn’t need to try that hard to convince himself of this. He was able to defeat Eggman and destroy his base in Sonic 1 all by himself, and no-one even died. He got some help from Tails in Sonic 2 and 3, but he was basically support. Speaking of Sonic 3, this game basically started with Sonic, as Super Sonic, getting the super knocked out of him when Knuckles caught him by surprise. That definitely would have been a blow to Sonic’s ego. First Metal Sonic and now this gullible Knucklehead? Sonic keeps finding opponents who can actually go toe-to-toe with him.

Still, as far as Sonic was concerned, he needed to be as unstoppable as he believed himself to be. No-one else can do what he can, which means saving the world was his responsibility alone. Now I would like to point out something I said in the previous section: “Sonic had failed to protect his friends” in Sonic Adventure 1. Sonic experienced his first real failure, and what happened? Tails and Amy turned up OK without Sonic saving them. Sonic doesn’t always need to protect them, something that is further proven in Sonic Adventure 2, which also featured more of Sonic’s failure. First, he’s captured by G.U.N. after being framed by theft, then he meets Shadow—the guy who framed him—and learns that this lookalike can outclass him. First Knuckles, now this faker? Sonic keeps meeting people who can make dents in his ego. Speaking of which, he’s immediately captured by G.U.N. again, and needs Tails and Amy to rescue him. Then there’s the final boss battle, during which Shadow—who was fighting alongside Sonic—apparently dies, and although the two of them saved the planet from destruction, Sonic couldn’t save Shadow.

Sonic has realized that he’s not invincible, but he also doesn’t need to carry the whole weight of the world on his shoulders, because his friends can help. We know Sonic has learned this lesson, because at the end of Team Sonic’s story in Sonic Heroes, Sonic admits to Knuckles that he wouldn’t have been able succeed in this journey without him and Tails, and thanks him; and you know this is a big deal because Knuckles responds with an expression of utter shock! Does this mean Sonic Heroes is the end of this particularly character arc for Sonic? No, because now Sonic was underconfident. Once someone realizes they’re not as amazing as they believed themselves to be, they begin feeling inadequate. This is best illustrated in Sonic Unleashed. At the beginning of this game, Sonic is at his lowest point. Eggman  not only defeated Sonic’s super form, but used the power from it to split the planet apart. As a result of this failure, Sonic was turned into a beastly werehog, and he accidentally gave someone amnesia (or so he believes).

Later in the game, Sonic is found by Amy, but she thinks she’s confused a stranger for Sonic, so she apologizes and runs off to find her crush. Considering how much Sonic finds Amy’s crush on him annoying, you’d think Sonic would be delighted by this, but nope! He’s clearly saddened by this, and we get a mopey werehog. That’s because his werehog form is a reminder of his failure, and of his self-perceived inadequacy; but then Chip regains his memories and reveals he’s actually Light Gaia. Sonic theorizes that this is why he’s still himself on the inside when he turns into a werehog, because Chip was with him that whole time, but Chip tells Sonic that it was all Sonic. It was Sonic’s own willpower that kept him sane. I would also like to point out that this is the first main series game in a long time in which Sonic is the only playable character. That’s why I think it’s very important that the main theme of this game’s story is about Sonic realizing the power he had inside himself all along, regaining his confidence and becoming Super Sonic once more to defeat Dark Gaia.

In short, Sonic went from being overconfident to underconfident to confident. However, he’s still very impulsive.

-

Chaos Impulse Control

It only makes sense that someone with super speed would lack patience, and while Sonic has always been shown to be pretty impatient, it wasn’t until Sonic Lost World that it came to be an important part of a game’s story, at least explicitly. I feel like there are examples throughout the main series where Sonic’s impulsiveness was reflected in gameplay and level design. The only examples I can think of from the top of my head though are two from Sonic Adventure 1. Perhaps one of the reasons that orca attacked was because it was startled by Sonic running through its enclosure at such high speeds? Maybe Sonic was the one who accidentally caused that avalanche he had to snowboard away from? Who knows? All I do know, is that Sonic Lost World was the first game that really made full use of Sonic’s impulsiveness.

In SLW, Sonic recklessly got rid of the conch Eggman was using to control the Deadly Six, which made things worse. Sonic’s impulsiveness then got Tails captured and almost roboticized. In the end, Sonic acknowledged his mistakes and apologized to Tail; so does that mean Sonic has learned his lesson? Well, yes, but I believe this will continue to happen. Allow me to repeat myself: Sonic has super speed. Living life with such a power is definitely going to be like living with attention deficiency and hyperactivity. The world is always going to feel too slow for Sonic, which means he’s always going to be in a rush to make things faster. It’s something he’s probably going to live with for most of his remaining life, even if he’s aware of it. Luckily, he has friends who can support him by helping him reign himself in, or by helping him fix his mistakes when he is unable to.

-

Before I move on to the fourth and final area of Sonic’s character development, you may have noticed that there are three major Sonic games I haven’t mentioned so far. That’s because Sonic doesn’t go through any development in Sonic Colors or Sonic Forces. On the surface, that seems to be the same for Sonic Generations, but just think about it for a few seconds: Sonic is traveling through his past during this game. He is seeing a lot of reminders of his past, which could make him think back and reflect on the lessons he’s learned since beginning his adventures on South Island, reaffirming those lessons onto himself; and don’t forget, there are two of him in this game. While Modern Sonic is reflecting on his past, Classic Sonic is getting a glimpse of his future; of the person he could eventually become and the lessons he’ll need to learn to reach that point.

Still, that’s mostly headcanon. It would have been nice if it were more explicit though, and Sonic actually talked about this stuff at least a little. At least we got Sonic telling his past self that his future “is going to be great,” clarifying that Sonic is happy with where he is in life, and that he doesn’t hold any regrets. Which begs the question: What else is there left for Sonic? Well, there is one more part of himself that Sonic is still learning about….

-

Sonic’s Powers

How is Sonic able to move so fast? So far, fans haven’t been given an answer, and Sonic doesn’t appear to know either. Remember when I said Sega did a mock Q&A with Sonic? Well, in that Q&A, Sonic revealed that he was able to run at super speed for as long as he could remember, with no idea how or why he has this power. Although we have yet to be given an answer in these games, we have  gotten at least one game where Sonic was shown to be thinking about it, and one where he might have been.

When Sonic and Shadow were working together during the final boss battle in Sonic Adventure 2, Shadow exclaimed that he figured out that Sonic is the ultimate lifeform, not Shadow. How...is this possible? Shadow was supposed to have been created by Prof. Robotnik to be the ultimate lifeform. There are hints in the game that Robotnik took inspiration from Angel Island’s hieroglyphs, which we know from Sonic & Knuckles depict Sonic, but I want to focus more on the game’s final scene, which shows Sonic thinking about what Shadow said, and how Prof. Robotnik was trying to create the ultimate lifeform.

“Am I really the ultimate lifeform? What does that mean exactly? Does it have anything to do with my speed?” These are likely the questions going through Sonic’s head after these events. That scene hinted at Sonic having questions about his own origins, and he might have been given his first real clue; but has this come up again at all during the series? Perhaps it did, in Sonic Unleashed.

Remember how Chip said Sonic was still Sonic even when he was a werehog because of the power inside of him? Is that just Sonic’s inner strength and willpower, or could it also have something to do with him being the ultimate lifeform? That’s probably what Sonic’s thinking at this time, but who knows?

-

Conclusion

Sonic began his adventures as an arrogant loner with impulse control issues, but over time he has grown into a humble team player with impulse control issues. It doesn’t seem like a huge difference, but I think it’s pretty important. The next, logical thing to do with Sonic as a character is to explore the origins of his powers, at least if we want to see more character development, but it isn’t the only option. Another path writers could take is relapse, and I think Sonic Forces has created an opportunity for this route, despite its awful story. At the beginning of this game, Sonic gets defeated and imprisoned for six months. During that time, Eggman conquered most of the world, all because Sonic was there, basically proving Sonic’s former belief that he needs to be the one to save everyone as correct.

If I had to choose though, I’d rather see more about Sonic’s powers. Still, what should Sega do if Sonic’s character becomes fully developed? Is it time for a reboot? No, not necessarily. There’s nothing wrong with a flat character arc, after all. Instead of having Sonic improve himself, future stories could exclusively portray the characters around them going through character arcs as a result of Sonic’s actions and his relationships with them. That’s technically already something we see in most Sonic games, but that’s while Sonic is going through his own character arcs, at least in the major installments. In minor main series Sonic games, like Sonic Rush, it doesn’t seem like Sonic goes through any development, but the characters around him do. That could become the norm if Sonic completes his development, and that’s OK.

Here’s the big question though: Was any of this character development intentional? Probably not. At the very least, I doubt it was planned by Sega’s higher-ups, and more like the result of individual writers each trying to create the best stories they can, and then all of that work put together created a happy accident. Honestly, it doesn’t matter. Sonic lived and learned to open his heart, and to work with his friends to become stronger together, while also acknowledging the endless possibility of what’s inside of him. Sonic the Hedgehog is my favorite video game character, and realizing all of this just makes him even better in my point of view. With this analysis, I hope I’ll get people to appreciate his character as much as I do.

#sonic #hedgehog #sega #character #development #analysis #story #video games

[mysmashplaythroughs]

Super Mario Advance Playthrough

Fighter: Princess Peach Toadstool.

Game: Super Mario Advance, Wii U virtual console (GBA). First Released on March 21st 2001.

Fighter Bio.

Princess Peach Toadstool, known as Princess Peach more commonly now is the crown Princess of the Mushroom Kingdom. She is famous and well liked both within her Kingdom and in a lot of locations outside of it. Peach’s role in the Mario series varies with her most common role often being kidnapped by Bowser, but other villains have also captured her before. Based on my estimate, I believe she has been kidnapped roughly 31 times so far in the games including all spin-offs. Sometimes these kidnappings take place before the game starts meaning she only appears in the ending, other times she’ll have a role in the game before it happens and sometimes it will be a short part of the game like for a single chapter in one of the RPGs. Often in that last example it relates to another one of her roles, being a playable character who is either a party member or optional character to play as, with her sometimes becoming playable after being rescued. In the cases where Peach is not kidnapped immediately, she’ll often tell Mario and the others what they need to do when a crisis is taking place, advising them where to head to next or setting them off at the start of the game on their quest. Being captured so often, one skill Peach seems to have picked up over the years is her ability to often stealthily slip around her captors, sometimes simply working out a way to send Mario assistance such as items and advice, and other times managing to spy on her captor’s plans. Often due to the location she’s being held in she is unable to fully escape from her captors however, or in some cases her sense of duty to her also captured people will make her not try to leave without them.

The Mario series doesn’t have a solid timeline, so a lot of this is just my own personal ideas, but unless a game is explicitly taking place in the past with Baby versions of the characters, I tend to just go by the order in which the games are released regarding character’s histories in the franchise, something possibly evidenced by a scene in Super Mario Sunshine where F.L.U.D.D. searches its databank and has data on Mario’s adventures prior to that game as past events. I also personally like to consider the Paper Mario series broadly canon to the Mario series as a whole so I will be including aspects from that here. Peach first met the Mario Bros and Bowser back when they were babies, with her first meeting with them being during the events of Yoshi’s Island DS. In this game Peach was one of the babies who the Yoshis are trying to help get home, with her ability when riding a Yoshi being to use her parasol which allows them to ride on high winds. The next appearance of Baby Princess Peach was during the Shroob invasion where her older self went back in time and was kidnapped by the Shroobs. Baby Bowser planned to kidnap Baby Peach, however he was interrupted first by the Baby Mario Bros and then by the invading Shroobs. Baby Princess Peach actually manages to not be kidnapped throughout the game instead remaining in the future Castle with a young Toadsworth who is her caretaker. Following these two events (excluding spinoffs with Baby Peach where she appears but there’s no story such as Mario Kart) the Mario Bros seemingly left the Mushroom Kingdom possibly for New Donk City. Despite their absence, Bowser didn’t attempt any more kidnapping plots for some time, possibly not until the Mario Bros returned to the Mushroom Kingdom following the events of Donkey Kong and Mario Bros. Super Mario Bros seems to be the first time Bowser successfully kidnapped Princess Peach taking over her Kingdom entirely until the Mario Bros managed to defeat him and save her. In the backstory to this game, Bowser apparently used magic to transform the people of the Mushroom Kingdom into various objects and then kidnapped the Princess to stop her from turning them back. It’s due to this as well as Peach’s abilities in some games that it seems she is capable of certain forms of magic, often of the healing variety. It is only rarely however Peach is shown to use these abilities.

When it comes to her personality, Peach was probably the earliest character in the series to have dialogue, with her having lines in the very first game and most others after, whereas other characters like Bowser would more often only have dialogue in the instruction book at most. In the very first game it was fairly basic with her simply thanking Mario or Luigi for saving her and offering them the chance to take on a new quest, which was a harder version of the game. Super Mario Bros 3 however had her show a bit more personality, with her making a joke to her saviour at the end of the adventure based on the infamous line Toad would tell the player in the original game, “Thank you Mario but our Princess is in another castle.” Before telling them she was just kidding. Peach’s personality varies a little from game to game, but usually the main aspects of it are that she’s kind, generous and when not captured is good at advising the others what needs to be done. Despite being fairly reliable, she can sometimes be somewhat whimsical, especially in spin-off games with her often enjoying frolicking and singing, and she can when pushed show a fairly strong angry side, with her either aggressively convincing a character such as Luigi to go and save his brother or reacting angrily to those who mock her. Finally, despite her longstanding friendship with Mario, she’s willing to tell him off if he’s getting too carried away, almost abandoning him and Bowser at one point when they start squabbling and she just wants to go home.

Friends: Princess Peach is fairly popular throughout the Mushroom Kingdom and beyond and as such a lot of characters know of her even if they haven’t met her before. Peach’s subjects seem to all adore her a lot with them often being depressed when she’s absent. Of her closer relationships, her closest arguably is with Mario, with him often rescuing her and sometimes her returning the favour. Their relationship tends to be teased sometimes as possibly romantic, but there are times Peach will find Mario a bit too overbearing. What is clear is that they trust each other entirely and when possible will often work together. Peach is close with Luigi also although not to the same degree as Mario, however she will still in some games treat Luigi the same way she does Mario in the ending when Luigi is the character being played as, such as giving him a kiss on the cheek. Later games have shown she extends this to anyone who helps her as a sign of gratitude, including Yoshi, Toad and Toadette. The next closest relationship Peach has is with Toadsworth her elderly steward who has taken care of her since she was a baby. Toadsworth often worries for the Princess’s safety and tries to accompany her whenever he can. Toad is Peach’s attendant and often fulfils Toadsworth’s role in his absence sticking by her side when possible. Toad is fiercely loyal to Peach despite his cowardice and will often try to help her out however he can.

Toadette is someone Peach gets along with, however the two don’t interact that often with Toadette often doing other roles to help Mario. Peach has a connection to the Yoshis due to them saving her with the other Star Children when she was a baby, however besides this there is only one instance of her ever riding Yoshi, which is in the ending of Super Mario World where she rides Yoshi on the journey back to his house after Bowser is defeated. Of the rest of the cast Peach seems to get along fairly well with most of them, with possibly her best friend being Princess Daisy who she often partners with in various sports and other games and the two will also act as friendly rivals when in competition with each other.

Enemies/Rivals: The relationship between Bowser and Peach seems to have developed over the years. Initially Bowser seemed to aim to capture Peach simply because she was the princess of the Kingdom he was invading and then because she could undo the magic he used to transform her citizens. Eventually however, Bowser seemed to develop an affinity for Peach, one which she does not reciprocate at all. Due to this, Bowser’s aim is always to kidnap Peach and try to convince her to marry him rather than just destroy her as with his other enemies. Bowser also at one point told his son Bowser Jr that Peach was his Mother, which led to her being shocked when Bowser Jr claimed this. Despite Junior revealing later on he knew Peach wasn’t his real Mother, he still referred to her as Mama and seems to like the idea of it, kidnapping Peach sometimes so she can be with Bowser. Although Peach does not get along with Bowser or his troops, she will work with them when needed, and in cases where Bowser helps against another enemy she is willing to do things such as send him a cake as thanks. Beyond this, Peach has had a few other enemies, often them being villains who kidnap her as part of their plan such as Sir Grodus or Cackletta. Peach has fought against a couple of villains herself including Count Bleck’s minions, Smithy’s Gang and Wart, leader of the 8 bits who invaded Subcon.

Crossovers with other Smash characters: Being from the Mario series, Princess Peach has had a fair few crossovers, although not as many as the Mario Bros themselves. Super Mario RPG had Peach playable as part of the party, and therefore she was also present when Samus made a cameo in the game. Link’s cameo in the game appears before Princess Peach joins the party, however they are still technically in the same game so I feel it’s still worth mentioning. Princess Peach similarly to Mario appears in the crowd for both the Megaton Punch minigame and Kirby’s Battle in the Boxing arena with King Dedede in Kirby Super Star and the remake Super Star Ultra. Princess Peach is a racer in Mario Kart 8, where there was a Mii costume for Captain Falcon, along with the Blue Falcon as a kart and two F-Zero tracks. In Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, there is also Link in both his Skyward Sword and Breath of the Wild incarnations as well as both default Inklings, two human Animal Crossing Villagers and Isabelle who are playable. Princess Peach is a character in the Game & Watch Gallery games and as such has crossed over with Mr. Game & Watch. In the NES version of Tetris, Pit appeared playing a harp alongside characters such as Princess Peach, Samus, Link and Donkey Kong.  Princess Peach is a character in the Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games series therefore crossing over with Sonic. Pac-Man has crossed over with Princess Peach in the arcade Mario Kart GP series. Whilst Princess Peach has never directly crossed over with any of the Hero characters from Dragon Quest, many of the Fortune Street games have featured crossovers with the Dragon Quest and Mario series, with many other Dragon Quest characters interacting with her. Finally, and perhaps most notably is a game where Princess Peach has a direct cameo and Mario doesn’t. (There is however a character based on him) In all versions of Link’s Awakening a character named Catherine sends a photo of ‘herself’ to Mr. Write (a character who is a clear reference to Dr. Wright from the SNES SimCity game who is also an assist trophy in Super Smash Bros) with him showing Link the photo which is a picture of Princess Peach. In reality, Catherine is a goat living in Animal Village. Whilst normally I tend to not include pictures or outfits in other games as cameos (Peach’s dress and parasol appear in many other series such as Animal Crossing for example) I felt in this case it was justified as the photo is part of the actual sidequest regarding the character’s identity rather than just being a background cameo.

Why this game?

Princess Peach has been playable in a few games so I had quite a few to choose from, Super Mario 3D World was one contender with Peach playing somewhat similarly to how she does in Super Smash Bros, however she lacked something specific in this game that I went for with my final choice. The other two notable options, Super Paper Mario and Super Princess Peach which was her starring role both had her play in a somewhat more unique way to how she did in Super Smash Bros, with Perry the Parasol being a big part of her moveset in SPP, whilst in SPM Peach only had her Parasol lacking her floating jump. Super Mario Bros 2 was the first time Princess Peach was playable, and most of her moveset in Super Smash Bros originates from the game, with not only her being able to float for a short time when she jumps, but perhaps the most unique aspect from the game being her ability to pull out turnips to throw as weapons, something she only does in SMB2. It was for these reasons I decided to go with Super Mario Bros 2 in this case, especially as those other games will still be covered later down the line on my list. When it comes to the version of the game I chose, I went for the Super Mario Advance incarnation rather than the original NES or Allstars version, however I will detail that more in the next section overall.

My past with this game.

So this game is one of the select few specifically from my childhood. I had Super Mario Allstars on the SNES with this game on it, but also I had the NES version as well. With the NES version the main thing I remember is just having the box with the picture of Mario on the front. Similarly to other games then I never completed this one, however it was probably the Mario game I got the least far playing. I believe I would only ever get to 1-3 before usually not making it past the Phantos to face Mouser. For some time I mostly remembered the game but didn’t really revisit it, it wasn’t exactly in the same class as Super Mario Bros 3 or Super Mario World even if I did have some fond memories of it for being so different. Probably the most confusing thing with the game for me back then was related to the cartoon show. In the cartoon show, Bowser is depicted looking different to the games, with him being mostly green with a crown on his head as opposed to his look in the vast majority of other appearances with orange scales on his body and only his head green as well as lacking a crown. Wart, the antagonist of Super Mario Bros 2 however, was all green with a crown on his head. Due to this, I believed that the King Koopa on the cartoon show was actually Wart (which might not be that outlandish as the first version of the cartoon show was based on Super Mario Bros 2, so it was likely King Koopa was just an amalgamation of Bowser and Wart, although this is DIC so the possibility of them just screwing it up is always the most likely scenario) Another perhaps somewhat unique source of this was my Grandma when I’d visit her as a kid, who would have various games I could play with my Cousins, and one she had was a card game called Super Mario Bros Blockbusting Card Game. Of course, being a big fan of Mario then I would love getting this out, especially as the big cards had artwork of the various enemies, powerups and the Mario Bros. What was interesting was this also had artwork of Wart as well as Bowser, which therefore for me back then looked even more similar, so I just assumed Wart was the King Koopa from the cartoons and Bowser was from the games. What helped with this was there were a fair few of the bosses from Super Mario Bros 2 who were cards in the set.

It was only with magazines I believe that I gradually learnt that Wart was the antagonist of Super Mario Bros 2, and at first I believed this meant he was the villain from the cartoon show till I finally realised the cartoon show wasn’t really relevant to the games at all and King Koopa was meant to be Bowser. I also at this time learnt probably the other most notable aspect of this game, that it wasn’t the original Super Mario Bros 2. Despite having Super Mario Allstars, back then I didn’t exactly look at the Lost Levels as anything else other than a weird version of Super Mario Bros I couldn’t get anywhere on, and it was only later I learnt that that was the game in Japan that was SMB2 and the SMB2 I knew had been another game altogether, Doki Doki Panic. What’s interesting is I believe apparently Miyamoto was more involved in Doki Doki Panic than SMB2 (Lost Levels) overall, so it’s not as if the game becoming a Mario one was completely out of nowhere. It’s also very interesting that so many factors of this game, things like Peach’s movement, Luigi’s distinct character design, Toad being playable and perhaps the biggest one being various enemies such as Bob-ombs and Shy Guys became a huge part of the Super Mario Bros series, with Bob-ombs appearing in the following game SMB3 (Which meant in Japan these enemies somehow went from being in Doki Doki Panic to Super Mario Bros 3.) The reason for this apparently was that they believed the original SMB2 (Lost Levels) was too difficult really to sell outside of Japan, something that tends to be mocked now, but personally I think it makes for a more interesting and unique sequel so I’m kind of glad it happened. It’s also interesting to me that due to this, outside of Japan Super Mario Bros fits a slight pattern I noticed with a couple of franchises on NES, where the second game in the series would be quite different to the first, then the third would end up being more like the first game again but expanded. The Legend of Zelda had Zelda II Adventure of Link which had sidescrolling as a major gameplay element before A Link to the Past brought the series back to how it was in the original game, Castlevania 2 Simon’s Quest was a lot different to the first game, but Castlevania 3 Dracula’s Curse brought it back to the gameplay of the first game, and with SMB2 it was radically different to SMB, but then SMB3 brought it back to the style of the first game.

Another big part of my history with the game, as with a fair few franchises, goes back to my experiences on the early internet, specifically Newgrounds flash animations again. Back then, there was a flash animation at the time called Rise of the Mushroom Kingdom which I really enjoyed. It was bloody and involved Mario dying and Luigi setting out for revenge, fairly tame compared to a lot of stuff on Newgrounds then and with some really nice usage of sprites. It was the second flash movie in this series however that involved Mario setting off to face the real villain behind the events of the first movie (which turned out to have been a dream) Wart that really made me appreciate SMB2 more. At the time I was really getting into messing around with sprites and Games Factory, trying to make my own games, so this flash movie made me look a lot more into SMB2 and all the unique enemies in it, with the various bosses such as Mouser, Tryclyde and of course Birdo and Wart being characters I wanted to see more of. This all led me to finally properly play SMB2 and beat it some time after I had beaten SMB3.

For my final history with the game, it relates mostly to Super Mario Advance, the remake of Super Mario Bros 2 that launched the Game Boy Advance. It was traditional at that point to launch a new Nintendo console with a Mario game, a pattern that would be broken only a few months later with the release of the Gamecube (which instead had Luigi’s Mansion, and the Wii wouldn’t have a Mario series game at all at launch.) This game was the first in the Super Mario Advance series and it’s arguably the version that was changed the most from the original game, with a few changes to the levels such as new giant Shy Guys and a fair bit more voice acting with all the bosses getting lines they’d say when you met them. This is pure speculation I’ve had since then, but I feel like they possibly picked Super Mario Bros 2 as they felt it was the game that they could risk changing most, and also that they changed it the most of the series so as to show off what the GBA was capable of with the voices and sprites. I remember when the GBA was the current console, Super Mario Advance was the game I’d tend to see most often being shown off in stores, even sometime after other games had come out. Despite this, it was probably the last game in the Advance series I got, but I’d say out of the Mario Advance series it’s the game I’d most recommend instead of or alongside the original or Allstars version as it’s the more unique experience. It’s due to this that I chose Super Mario Advance as the version for my playthrough rather than the others.

My Smash Playthrough.

I have actually played through this game fairly recently from start to finish, for a character much further down my list so the game is somewhat fresh in my memory compared to other games I’ve written about so far here. For this playthrough as it was the game I chose for Princess Peach I played through the whole game solely as her. In comparison I’d say she’s one of the characters who I prefer playing as due mostly to her extremely useful floating ability, with her downside (being her power which means she’s unable to pull vegetables or pick up enemies as quickly and a slower running speed) not really feeling too much of a hassle in exchange. I want to focus on Peach mostly, but Mario as always is the all-rounder having no real weaknesses nor gimmicks that make him excel in any area, Luigi has the best jump but is a little slower and less powerful than Mario (this is also the game where he first had his scuttle jump) and finally Toad (the character I played through the game as recently) is the fastest and most powerful but has the lowest jump, often requiring you to charge up a super jump (done by crouching down until the character starts glowing) to reach higher platforms. The plot of the game is that Mario had a dream one night where he went up a staircase and found a mysterious door. Opening the door he saw a vast world before him and heard a voice telling him this land was Subcon and that the evil Wart is causing suffering there. The voice tells Mario that only he can save the land and to remember Wart hates vegetables before Mario wakes up. The next day, Mario, Luigi, Toad and Princess Peach go for a picnic, Mario tells them of the dream he had and they all say they had the same dream. During their picnic they see a cave and look inside it, finding a staircase leading up to the same door from the dream. When they open it, they are once again standing before Subcon, with them this time entering which is where the game starts.

Probably the most immediate point for most Mario players to notice when first playing this game is how it is very different when it comes to a lot of the standard Mario mechanics, granted when the game came out this was following only the original Super Mario Bros, so it wasn’t quite as unusual. Some aspects remain the same, such as the characters turning small when they have only one hit left, however unlike in other Mario games their health is restored by finding hearts, with any amount of hearts over one bringing them back to regular size. Mushrooms are in the game still, but this time finding one and picking it up gives the character an extra heart (as well as fully healing them) which means they’re a lot less common than in other Mario games. This game also lacks any sort of power-ups such as the Fire Flower, with the only alternate form being brief invincibility when touching a Star. I quite enjoy the main mechanic used to fight in this game, being picking up objects or enemies and throwing them at other enemies to defeat them, it provides a fun and fairly unique style of gameplay to the other games in the series and creates fairly basic puzzles in some cases where you’re required to build a small tower of mushroom blocks as an example to be able to reach a high platform. Possibly one of the most infamous aspects of this game are the keys that are sometimes required in stages to get through a locked door. You are required to carry the keys similarly to other objects to the door, however when holding the key, the evil Phanto Masks will relentlessly pursue you, and only stop either when you use the key on the door or drop the key. Despite their reputation and giving me some trouble as a kid, nowadays I barely find them a problem as just throwing the key ahead of you usually gets them off your back long enough to travel a fair distance before they pursue you again.

When it comes to difficulties I faced playing the game, it’s a fairly easy game, with only two sections I remember really causing me many problems both recently and back during this playthrough. The first is a stage where you’re travelling across the tops of whales in the ocean. The top of them is a fairly big platform, although the middle of the platform will sometimes have water spout out of their blowhole. Touching this water from the side will hurt you which can be somewhat annoying, however jumping on top of the water that’s spurting out provides a platform. Perhaps the most irritating part to me is when you’re required to use the whales tails as platforms, mostly as they are very small and it can be very easy to slip off of them, leading to an instant death. The second and probably most irritating situation in the game for me are parts featuring you digging through sand. In these parts of the level there are layers of sand that you can dig by pulling them similarly to how you pull vegetables out of the ground. The problem with these parts are the Shy Guys who constantly walk from left to right, and will fall down the layers of Sand you’ve removed. Due to how little room you have to manoeuvre when you get lower in the sand, picking the Shy Guys up and throwing them doesn’t really work, often with them catching on a layer above and instantly walking back into you taking off health. The way I describe this sounds like it’s a design issue but it’s more just hard to describe and really makes sense when playing, it’s not unfair or anything, it’s just these sections are the ones I tend to die most at and find the most tedious, possibly simply due to impatience when it comes down to it.

The stages aren’t really ground-breaking, but when compared to the stages in the original Super Mario Bros I feel they have a fair bit more variety. The themes for them are grassland, vertical waterfall stages, desert stages, underground caves and snow stages, with some of them simply being at night. I still find the stages do some interesting things however with them not seeming just like variations of each other but often having a few unique features to them that makes them stand out, for example the very first stage is a fairly basic grassland, but the end of it has you going into a cave to reach the top of some hills, then climbing into the clouds before facing the boss. The levels are longer than those in the original Super Mario Bros, however there are less of them, with each world only having 3 stages, and the last world, World 7 only having two. The game is somewhat challenging, it was probably the one I got the least far in of the Super Mario Bros games as a kid, but despite a couple of issues I find it fairly simple to play through now, especially with Peach.

The Bosses are probably the more interesting of the first three Super Mario Bros games with there being quite a few variations, although some are repeated a few times. This game was the debut of Birdo who appears in a few variations. The most basic battle with Pink Birdo has her shoot eggs from her mouth at you, which you have to grab from the air and throw back at her. Red Birdo shoots eggs also, but varies it with some fireballs, so you have to be careful which projectile you jump onto and which you just avoid. Green Birdo is the final variation shooting only fireballs, requiring you to grab other objects from around the room to throw instead of eggs to beat her. There is a fourth sort of variation exclusive to Super Mario Advance, being the Robo Birdo. This boss fires eggs also like Birdo, however the eggs are giant and it also has a charging attack which requires you to grab one of the chains hanging from the ceiling to avoid. Birdos are usually the bosses of the regular stages in Super Mario Bros 2, with the third stage of each world having a unique boss to fight, Robo Birdo being one of these unique bosses who replaces a repeated boss in the original versions of the game. There are a couple of unique appearances of Birdo in the game however which I find neat personally, one of which is a Pink Birdo who appears at the very start of stage 4-3. This Birdo will always respawn when defeated when you leave the area through a door and return again. The reason why is that the eggs she fires are actually meant to be used to ride across a large chasm to reach the rest of the level, which is probably one of my favourite little gimmicks in the game.

Mouser is the first main boss in the game, a Mouse with sunglasses who likes to throw bombs everywhere, naturally the way to beat him is to throw his bombs back at him. I remember finding this boss a little annoying mostly as he’s on a platform above you, and only gets effected by the bomb if it goes off where he’s standing. Due to his erratic movements this can be down to luck somewhat as to whether he’ll stand in the right spot when the bomb explodes, although it’s hardly a difficult battle overall. What’s probably most interesting to me about Mouser is that he is probably the boss who varies the most between versions of the game. In the original form of the game, Doki Doki Panic he appeared as a boss three times, with a green eared version in stage 3-3 and a white furred version in 5-3. Super Mario Bros 2 replaced the version in 5-3 with another boss, and then Super Mario Advance replaced the green eared version with Robo Birdo, but actually had a second boss battle with the regular Mouser replace a second boss battle with another character. Tryclyde is the next boss faced all versions of the game, being a three headed snake that shoots fireballs and has to have mushroom blocks thrown at it. Interestingly Tryclyde appears again as a boss in SMB2 but in Super Mario Advance it’s replaced in it’s second battle by Mouser. Another odd factor with Tryclyde is in Super Mario Bros 2 it is red, but in the remake for Mario All-Stars and Super Mario Advance it is instead green with red patterns on it’s back. It’s particularly odd in this case as some enemies, Cobrats who are single headed snakes that appear in the game remain red in all versions. Tryclyde is more of a challenging boss than Mouser and caused me perhaps a death or two but wasn’t that tough overall. The next boss is probably the one I had the most trouble with, Fryguy a living flame. Due to being a flame, touching Fry Guy at all causes damage, so you have to throw mushroom blocks at him. What makes this battle more difficult is that Fryguy moves around a fair bit, and hitting him with the mushroom blocks due to this without being hit yourself can be a lot more tricky. On top of this, when you beat the first phase of the boss fight, Fryguy then splits into four smaller versions that can be just as tricky to hit and all need to be extinguished in order to beat him. Fryguy is probably second only to Wart when it comes to how often I’d die to him, and I think in this playthrough actually killed me more than Wart did. Clawgrip the crab is the final of the standard bosses in the game, throwing boulders at you which have to be picked up and thrown back at him. I remember this battle being a little tricky as landing on the boulders properly could be tough, and approaching from the side at all would cause you damage, but overall he was less tough than Fryguy to me. Clawgrip replaced the white Mouser and was the only boss who wasn’t in Doki Doki Panic (besides Robo Birdo.) Every boss is voiced in this version of the game and I find them fun little voicelines overall that make them more memorable, with lines like Mouser going “Here, have some bombs!” or Birdo’s “This is as far as you go!”

The final two levels are the most difficult overall, not being as irritating to me as the digging through sand or whale sections earlier in the game, but more difficult stages overall than the others, with the first having you travelling across clouds with a lot of enemies and pits to overcome and the second being a big palace which is probably the biggest maze in the game. They are both however, probably my favourite levels in the game overall. I tend to have an affinity for cloud based sky stages and I find the palace a fitting final location. Wart is the final boss of the game and is fought in a room with the Dream Machine which he has been using possibly to create the various monsters that make up his army of bad dreams. The Dream Machine seems to perhaps possess some sort of sentience however, as in the final battle it starts shooting out vegetables which can be grabbed and thrown into Wart’s mouth to defeat him. Wart fights by shooting out bubbles and it is only when he opens his mouth to do so he can be hurt by throwing a vegetable in there, which was why at the start of the game Mario was told about Wart hating them as a hint. I remember having some trouble years ago with timing the vegetables so as to not get hit by the bubbles, but this time it went fairly smoothly and I beat Wart I think first time. With Wart defeated you go through to the next room and free the native inhabitants of Subcon from a jar, who celebrate Mario, Luigi, Toad and Peach defeating Wart and saving them before seeming to throw the defeated Wart out of the Palace. With this, the scene then switches to Mario in bed, revealing the whole game was a dream as cast credits for all of the enemies in the game go by, which in the original version of the game had a couple of mistakes such as Ostro, a minor enemy and Birdo’s names being swapped, which is corrected in this version. It’s a nice ending and for those who overanalyse these games like me, somewhat interesting as a few of the enemies who first appeared in this game such as Shy Guys and Snifits actually also appeared in Yoshi’s Island when Mario was a baby, so as this is part of a dream those memories might be related to them appearing in Wart’s army of bad dreams, although I know it’s probably nothing that deep overall. So overall, I enjoyed playing through this game, it’s not overly long or difficult and as a portable game back when it came out and the first example of what the GBA could do, it was very good overall I’d say.

Specific aspects about the game relating to Peach in Smash.

I’ve pretty much gone over the main aspects of Princess Peach in this game when it comes to Super Smash Bros, this game was the origin of Peach’s floating jump ability and her pulling turnips out of the ground to throw at enemies. In Super Smash Bros, very rarely Peach can pull other items out of the ground instead of a turnip, one of which being a Bob-omb, which is possible also in Super Mario Bros 2 where some of the tufts of grass when pulled will turn out to be a Bob-omb which has to be thrown away immediately or else it will explode on you. Other than this however, most of Peach’s other moves come from other games I will cover later, such as her frying pan being from Super Mario RPG, Tennis Racket and Golf Club from their respective sports series and Parasol from various other games. There’s nothing really to customise so that’s pretty much it for Peach’s appearance in this game.

Credits.

For information on this game including dates of releases I must give credit to Super Mario Wiki.

The screenshots in this post are taken by me using Miiverse before it shut down.

#Princess Peach #Princess Toadstool #Super Mario Bros #Super Mario Bros 2 #Super Mario Advance #Super Smash Bros #GBA #Wii U #Virtual Console #My Smash Playthrough #My Smash Playthroughs

[beneaththetangles]

Otaku Reader’s Corner: Komi Can’t Communicate, Love Me Love Me Not, and  Fly Me to the Moon

Fly Me to the Moon (Tonikawa), Vol. 3

Season one of Tonikawa may be complete, but Fly Me to the Moon, the manga on which its based, is continuing to roll out, and it remains superior to the show in virtually every facet. Volume three, released yesterday, focuses on Tsukasa and Nasa’s trip to visit his parents, in the process leading the couple through some friction and opening up the questions about Tsukasa’s background and identity more and more. However, never fear ye readers looking for your regular dose of sugary sweetness; the series still lives mostly in the world of cute interactions between the young couple and in plentiful humor, the latter of which was unexpectedly missing from the anime. ~ Twwk

Fly Me to the Moon Vol. 3 is available through Viz.

Love Me, Love Me Not, Vol. 6

Having been thoroughly captivated by the five previous volumes of Love Me, Love Me Not, I expected to enjoy volume six just as well—but I didn’t. What changed? Sakisaka-sensei’s technique and style certainly didn’t, as these chapters are in all ways a continuation of all that’s gone before. But while I’ve argued that the poor decisions and mental lapses of the four main characters are authentic to how 16-year-olds act, the characterizations have started becoming stale, with progressions only being very primary and obvious in nature, and little “true” character growth to speak of, and now joining the already weak and rehashed plots of the story in leading to a most mediocre volume. Seeing unexpected sides of the boys, however, counter some of the issues in volume six, which relies too much on mistaken interpretations for its shoujo angst (it should consult Maison Ikkoku for a more masterful way to achieve this). Most of all, I fear that Sakisaka is going down the familiar Ao Haru Ride route and creating “bad guys that really aren’t bad” characters; the earlier chapters had emanated something special, and I hope for a return to form by volume seven. ~ Twwk

Love Me, Love Me Not Vol. 6 is available through Viz.

The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten, Vol. 1

In this high school romantic comedy, next door neighbors Amane and Mary Poppins Mahiru grow closer to each other. The laid-back pace of their relationship’s development is lovely, and they have some genuinely sweet moments, but the story still left me underwhelmed. First, why do they get together? I don’t know. They’d never spoken before, but then Amane shoves an umbrella into Mahiru’s hand and runs off, and next thing you know, she’s cooking for him on a daily basis. Huh? This relates to a second issue: I don’t know who these characters are. Why does Mahiru take such care of Amane? Do they have any common interests or life experiences? Why are they both living on their own? And so on. The two leads eventually start to get characterization beyond “He’s slob who can’t cook and she’s practically perfect in every way,” but not nearly enough. The narration is also annoyingly heavy-handed at times: specifically, it dwells on Mahiru’s looks way more than necessary. The story also has excessively frequent claims that there’s absolutely not anything romantic about their relationship and they don’t have and can’t possibly develop any feelings toward each other beyond neighborly friendship; it felt like the author kept turning my way and giving these exaggerated winks. The second half of the book is noticeably better than the first, with more humor, more characters, more chemistry between the leads, etc. I can’t exactly recommend this on its own merits as a standalone volume, but there’s enough potential here that this might turn out to be a weak start to a worthwhile series. I think I’ll at least want to try vol. 2. ~ jeskaiangel

The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten Vol. 1 is published by Yen Press.

Neon Genesis Evangelion: The Shinji Ikari Raising Project, Vol. 1

About a year ago I was back in my hometown at the town video game store. It has a manga section where they will re-sell used manga for usually around $1 a piece. I saw a single copy of volume 1 of Neon Genesis Evangelion: The Shinji Ikari Raising Project sitting there and had to go for it. An Alternate Universe (AU) version of Evangelion? Sold. This series follows an AU where Shinji and company are not piloting Evas and Angels aren’t attacking Tokyo-3. His parents, both of whom are still alive, are working for the Artificial Evolution Research Center for some, at present, unknown purpose. Then, suddenly, Rei shows up in Shinji’s life and is living at his house. The first volume shows a Shinji that is oblivious to the love of his childhood friend (Asuka) and living a relatively normal teenage life in Tokyo-3. It’s weird seeing them in this context as it’s mostly a silly romance story with some future science fiction elements hidden in the background. The jokes hit well especially if you’ve recently watched the original series. I’m onto volume 2 now and interested to see where this goes. ~ MDMRN

Neon Genesis Evangelion: The Shinji Ikari Raising Project Vol. 1 is available through Dark Horse.

Our Crappy Social Game Club Is Gonna Make The Most Epic Game, Vol. 1

First of all, a “social game” is basically a mobile game, playable on various social media platforms (hence the name), and often with gacha elements. This light novel gives us a world where high school students actually form clubs to develop said games, and at least when it comes to the actual game development aspect, it’s very good. There’s quite a lot of detail on what actually goes into developing such a game and how they can be successful, and the titular club’s struggle to overcome their issues to make a game is likewise a good read and allows for good character development. This novel is also part romantic comedy, and while that aspect is more standard fare, it’s decent enough with a solid rapport between the main leads. Overall I definitely enjoyed this volume a lot, especially the game development part, and will be looking forward to more. ~ stardf29

Our Crappy Social Game Club Is Gonna Make The Most Epic Game Vol. 1 is available from J-Novel Club.

Reincarnated as the Last of My Kind, Vol. 1

Behold, a new entry in the reincarnation-type isekai sub-genre. What distinguishes this slice-of-life story is it’s focus on unconventional family relationships. Marcus the knight came home one day to find his wife had abandoned him, taking their daughter with her and leaving behind divorce papers; soon after, he also loses an arm in battle. In the process of retiring and returning to run his parents’ inn, he comes across the protagonist, a baby girl whom he adopts and calls Tina (short for Tinaris); while Tina’s species is still unclear, one can deduce from the title alone that she’s not human. Then Nakona, Marcus’s estranged daughter by his ex-wife, tracks down her father. The last major character is Lico (short for Licorice), a knight, alchemist, divorcee, and potential mother-figure for Tina and Nakona; her ex-husband abandoned her to marry Marcus’s ex-wife. Along with familial interactions full of challenges, complications, and heartwarming moments, as well as Tina’s efforts to mastery alchemy, there are also indications that a save-the-world plot might be brewing. As an added bonus, the hints that Lico will be a love interest for Marcus give me hope that this story will avoid a certain unsavory pitfall some other single-man-adopts-little-girl stories have wrecked themselves with. I quite enjoyed this volume and look forward to seeing how the story progresses. ~ jeskaiangel

Reincarnated as the Last of  My Kind Vol. 1 is published by Cross Infinite World.

Komi Can’t Communicate, Vol. 1

Komi Can’t Communicate is a cute, mostly wholesome series about a girl who can’t communicate. Yea, the premise is literally the title of the series. Upon entering high school, Tadano finds himself drawn to the very quiet Komi who happened to sit next to him. Over a series of chapters, he tries to get the nerve to talk to her only to find out she has a hard time talking to anyone. Her anxiety gets the better of her when she tries to even state her name in front of the class. Through a series of goofy stories, Tadano is trying to help Komi make friends. It is a lot cuter than I expected and a very fast read. I was through the first volume before I knew it with how easy it read. I definitely enjoyed the volume and am interested to see where it goes as Komi tries to make new friends. ~ MDMRN

Komi Can’t Communicate Vol. 1 is available through Viz.

#Manga #Light Novels #Tonikaku Cawaii #Fly Me to the Moon #TONIKAWA: Over the Moon For You #Omoi Omoware Furi Furare #Love Me Love Me Not #The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten #Otonari no Tenshi sama ni Itsu no Ma ni ka Dame Ningen ni Sareteita Ken #Neon Genesis Evangelion: The Shinji Ikari Raising Project #Shin Seiki Evangelion: Ikari Shinji Ikusei Keikaku #Our Crappy Social Game Club Is Gonna Make The Most Epic Game #Jakushou Soshage bu no Bokura ga Kamige wo Tsukuru made #Reincarnated as the Last of My Kind #Tensei Shitara Zetsumetsu Sunzen no Kishou Shuzokudeshita #Komi Can’t Communicate #Comi san ha Comyusho desu. #Komi san wa Komyushou desu #Otaku Reader's Corner #Articles #Author: TWWK #Author: MDMRN #Author: Jeskai Angel #Author: stardf29

[prokopetz]

Do you have any recommendations for good mouse only controlled games? No other constraints, I'm willing to try most anything.

Sure thing. I’m going to try to include a variety of genres, or else this post would just be a list of about hundred point-and-click adventure games:

Black Closet - A VN/virtual board game hybrid where you play as the president of one of those ridiculously powerful anime style student councils. VN-style relationship play is interspersed with cards-and-dice strategising as you attempt to solve mysteries and cover up scandals that could jeopardise your position, hindered by the fact that one of your minions – randomly determined each time you play – is a traitor.

cityglitch - It’s hard to describe this one… it’s sort of a neonpunk chess puzzler, I guess? Each puzzle takes place on a small grid, and each enemy and obstacle has very strict rules governing when it will move and how; your challenge is to figure out the winning sequence of moves for each board. For something with similar gameplay, but a bit easier on the eyes, you could try Beglitched, a self-described “cyberpink” puzzler that’s basically a strange hybrid of match-three and Battleship being played on the same board at the same time.

Dandara - Here we have a real rarity: a Metroidvania that supports a one-handed, mouse-only control scheme. The gimmick is that the protagonist is an angel who can only stand on holy ground, so movement is all click and drag: you hop from patch to patch with the left mouse button, while controlling your attacks with the right mouse button and swapping equipment via the scroll wheel. As far as personal preferences go, I’m more inclined to use the gamepad control scheme because it’s what I’m used to, but the mouse controls are totally playable.

Donut County - This one’s not even slightly subtle about taking its cues from Katamari Damacy – not that that’s a bad thing! Here you play as a raccoon with a remote-controlled hole (it makes sense in context, eventually), and your goal is to make stuff fall down the hole. There are some simple inventory puzzles, but mostly it’s a matter of put stuff in the hole > hole gets bigger > put bigger stuff in the hole. The mouse controls are slightly incomplete, as you need to use the keyboard to access the menu, if having to occasionally hit the ESC key is a deal-breaker.

Ghosts of Miami - This murder-mystery VN is quite possibly the most 1980s game ever made. Gameplay obliges you to balance dating-sim relationship management against Phoenix Wright style investigative play, with consequences for prioritising one over the other. If you’re a fan of the aesthetic, but you’d prefer to ditch the relationship sim in favour of pure investigative play, you might instead have a look at 2064: Read Only Memories, an updated homage to late 1980s PC Engine graphical adventures like Snatcher.

Heroine’s Quest: The Herald of Ragnarok - Sort of a cross between a point-and-click adventure game and an old-school D&D-inspired CRPG, this one features puzzles whose solutions vary depending on the class and skills you picked during character creation. Also includes light survival elements (e.g., exposure and starvation), though those can be toggled off via the difficulty options. 100% free to play – no episodes, no microtransactions.

Her Tears Were My Light - I had to throw in at least one romantic VN, being the total sap that I am. This one’s a cute little love story about the anthropomorphic personification of time courting the anthropomorphic personification of space. Has a neat gimmick whereby the “Undo” button is diegetically positioned as Time’s ability to experience the whole of history simultaneously; you’ll be abusing this a lot if you want the true ending. If you’d prefer your supernatural lesbians without a side of metatextual brainfuck, you could check out Heart of the Woods instead; conversely, if you want all the brainfuck (in multiple senses of the word!), definitely look up Heaven Will Be Mine.

Open Sorcery - Probably the most oddball game on this list (which is saying something!), this is a piece of choice-driven interactive fiction with light investigative puzzle elements that casts you in the role of a fire elemental bound to serve as a spiritual antivirus program for a small network of humans. Purely text-based, with occasional sound effects to punctuate certain events – you play by clicking links of various sorts. You might recognise the author from her previous work, 16 Ways to Kill a Vampire at McDonalds, which can be played for free via her website.

Please Don’t Touch Anything - Arguably more of a toy than a game, this one plunks you down in front of mysterious control panel without instructions or preamble and lets you experiment. See how many ways you can find to destroy the world by pressing buttons that ought not be pressed – there are at least a couple dozen!

She and The Light Bearer - I’ll allow myself one pure point-and-click adventure game. This one came out earlier this year, and is of a rather more modern style than the retro pixel graphics that characterise the bulk of the genre. The puzzles aren’t tough, but if you’re a genre newbie that’s probably a good thing – no moon logic here! If this one grabs you stylewise but you find you’d prefer something a little more brain-teaserly, also check out NAIRI: Tower of Shirin. (Okay, I lied – I’ll allow myself two pure point-and-click adventure games.)

She Remembered Caterpillars - A routing-based logic puzzler where you control a bunch of weird little mushroom critters whose ability to cross bridges and pass through gates is determined by what colour they are. Beautiful cel animation paired with amazing background paintings  – it’s one of the rare games that manages to be trippy without being hard on the eyes. Link Twin is another logic puzzler where the solutions are similarly based on routing, though in this case the challenge is devising a route for two characters who both respond to the same inputs without dumping either of them off the level, while LYNE brings the routing down to pure symbol-matching abstraction.

SteamWorld Heist - The third game in the SteamWorld series, this one blends pseudo-roguelike run-and-gun heists with tactical RPG mechanics and a novel combat system whereby individual attacks are resolved using a simple physics engine, letting you set up ridiculous shots that ricohet your bullets off of walls and ceilings to shoot your target in the back while standing in front of them. If you’d prefer a purer roguelike heist experience, you could also check out Invisible, Inc., while if you’d rather your turn-based tactics without the roguelike stuff, Children of Zodiarcs may be just the ticket.

Ticket to Earth - If casual RPGs with puzzle-based combat are your thing, you could do worse than Ticket to Earth. It’s sort of a simple match-three derivative, where your attack power each round is determined by the length of your movement path along matching symbols, while the colour of the symbols provides resources to power special attacks. Along similar lines, Shadowhand is also very good, though admittedly a bit more RNG-dependent than I prefer in an RPG; its combat system is based on 54-card solitaire, of all things!

#gaming #video games #video game recommendations #violence mention #death mention #food mention #swearing #ticky55

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

An Explanation of Why Louis and Violet are Both Terrific Love Interests [2/5]

+Why both romantic routes are not only amazing but better than other games I’ve personally played in the past.

+Why some people are idiots and get off on picking stupid fights.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Romantic Option #2: Warren Graham

Uhm.... Warren’s a person in this story, too.

He, uh, he’s really nerdy. He does some science shit. He has a huge crush on Max which is made very obvious by the everything about him. Uh..... he took a fist to the face and got a black eye because he was helping Max, uhm.... he took a picture that was pretty important to the plot... um....

I literally can’t remember anything else about him.

I couldn’t even remember his last name. I had to look up his wiki to remember anything about him.

That’s how forgettable he is.

Hell, fans of the game took his character and made him more interesting in fanart and fanfics than he ever was in the game! I remember more about THAT version of him than I do about the him in the canon of the game!

I gave you that whole bit about Chloe from memory. That’s how much more fleshed out and important she is within the game than Warren is. Everything I’m about to talk about here if from reading his wiki and remembering things that way.

We meet Warren and find out that he’s into nerdy shit like Max. He’s also obviously into her and does a shit job at hiding that fact, but then Nathan comes over and beats the shit out of him because plot.

When I first played, it was pretty obvious that Warren would be romanceable, and truth be told, I liked Warren. He was fine! He’s dorky and weird, but I thought he and Max could potentially be a cute couple, and so does the rest of the school since you can’t talk to any of the girls without them implying that Warren likes Max.

I kept waiting for Warren to be important, but it never really came! I mean, you could talk to him and help him with a science experiment [in which he fucking blows up] and you text him a lot. Oh, and you can go to a Planet of the Apes marathon with him which you never actually get to go to, but the game constantly reminds you that you’re going because Warren won’t shut up about it.

Let’s see, he also sends you instructions on how to build a bomb so that you can break into the principal’s office, and then he beats Nathan up, and then he shows up and takes a picture of him and Max that ends up being important in the final episode and then.... he doesn’t do much else.

Well, okay, he does talk about Max’s powers a little bit in ep5 and you can give him a smooch or hug him or disregard him completely.

And that’s about it.

........Wait a minute.

A boy with boyband hair who has extensive chemistry knowledge, knows how to make bombs, uses said bombs for pranks, gets fucked up by one of the antagonists AND was a throwaway character that the writers threw in there to further the plot along but doesn’t really do much so the fandom took him and made him better than the game ever gave him credit for...?

.....Welp, that’s a whole thing that I’m not gonna get into. One post at a time, folks.

ANYWAY

Back on topic, Warren’s a romanceable character, apparently. You can agree to go on a date with him and smooch him. You can tell people you think he’s cute. It’s fine.  

With all that about these two choices in mind, compare Warren to Chloe.

There is no comparison because Warren’s “romance route” is... is nothing! It’s a whole lot of little things that don’t amount to much! With Chloe, Max has all this chemistry and you spend 90% of the game with her! You forget that Warren exists until you get another text from him or another character brings him up!

You know what Warren feels like? He feels like a character that the writers threw in because they were worried that players wouldn’t want a tragic wlw love story between two best friends, who reconnect and fall in love over the course of five episodes.

Which, fair, because people are idiots.

Could they have made Warren more important? Sure, but like with Skybound and Telltale, they didn’t have an unlimited budget to pack everything they wanted into the game to make it better, and that’s not just limited to the relationships, that’s clear in the endings we got. And I’m sure that some Warren stans will read this and retaliate and tell me that he’s just as important than Chloe, I just don’t understand because I’m a shithead.

And maybe that’s true, but look me in the eye and tell me that if you took Warren out of the game, it would have drastically changed the story beyond repair.

Now, what does all this mean?

Compare Chloe and Warren to Louis and Violet as far as love interests go and how they were handled.

In TWDG, Louis and Violet are fairly even.

In LIS, Chloe and Warren aren’t even in the same universe. It doesn’t matter if you like Warren more, or if you like Chloe more, Chloe got more time and effort put into her story and romance than Warren did.

Think of it like this: Chloe is at a 90% and Warren 10%.  Louis is at 48% and Violet’s at 52%, and that’s depending on how you look at it.

If TWDG did the routes like this, then Violet would’ve been way more important, would’ve have ten times as many scenes with Clementine, and if you took her out of the story, the whole thing falls apart because she’d be 90% of the plot, while Louis over here would’ve been used as background noise and plot convenience once or twice. Sure, we would’ve gotten to know him a little bit, but not nearly anything substantial and not nearly as much in comparison.

That’s what we could’ve had, okay? The writers could’ve given us a single love interest and said: “We want you to pick this person... but we’ll also throw in this other person just in case y’all are homophobic/racist/fucking stupid/whatever.”

In conclusion: We were blessed with Louis and Violet who each got an arc and love story, both of which are fairly even. 

Have I made my point yet? No? You need more examples? Fine. I’ll give you another alternative to what we could’ve had, or rather, what we could’ve missed out on.

[Note: I want to add that I haven’t played Life is Strange 2, but I know that its playable character is also bisexual and can choose between a boy and a girl to romance, but I can’t comment on how well it did because I’ve yet to play it.]

[persona 4 and the relationships you can’t have]

This one time I tried to romance my partner but he was too busy trying to convince everyone that he’s straight to even notice.

Persona 4 is a game that came out in 2008, then re-released with new content in 2012 under the name Persona 4: Golden. The game follows your nameable protagonist who has just moved in with their uncle and cousin. During his year-long stay, he becomes involved in investigating mysterious murders while harnessing the power of summoning Persona. 

Great game, one that took over my life for about a year. Great characters, great voice acting, great story, great antagonists, and great romance and romanceable characters. 

While the romance is more of a side thing depending on if you decide to take that route with one of your social links, it’s still nice to have special moments with them to break away from all the TV murder and whatnot. 

And you have several great options to choose from! You’ve got Chie, Yukiko, Rise, Naoto, and then you’ve got several other girls around the school that you can start a thing with, but they’re not as important as those core four. 

Each of the girls has an incredibly well-written story and share a deep bond with you, the protagonist. So, the reason I’m putting this example here is that the choice between all these great girls is super hard, right? 

Wrong. 

Because when I played the damn game, I didn’t romance any of them. Not because I didn’t like them or because I didn’t want my character to have a romance, but because the asshole I WANTED to romance wasn’t an option. 

Because I’m not allowed to romance the dudes. 

And that includes this dude. 

Yosuke Hanamura

Remember that pin I mentioned about how great it is that Clementine’s bi because not only does it give us well-deserved representation but also allows the player to romance both girls and boys? 

The Protagonist of Persona 4 is not bisexual. 

I can only romance the girls because he is straight. 

But not really, because MY Protagonist pursued and sought after Yosuke despite the fact that the game would not let me romance him. Which is bullshit, because he clearly feels the same way, and no, that’s not my crazy brain making shit up. 

My entire playthrough was pretty much 

I won’t get into it because Persona is a long game and a complicated one to even try and explain to someone who hasn’t played it so that’s another rant for another day, but know this: 

Yosuke was the perfect opportunity to tell the story of a boy dealing with internal homophobia, falling in love with his best friend [PARTNER] after the girl he cared about died horrifically and faced his shadow learned to accept himself and his insecurities. The potential here was wasted. 

There are a shit ton more layers to that, but on the barest of bare-bones, that’s what I wanted. 

Hell, according to a bunch of people, Yosuke was going to be a romantic option, but they scrapped it! Insult to injury, I’ll say!

Comparing this to TWDG, you could argue that Clementine only gets to romance Louis and Violet, but some wanted to romance Mitch, Aasim, Brody, ect. 

Fair enough, but what I’m saying is this:

It sucked that I couldn’t romance the person I wanted to when I played Persona, and it still sucks every time I play a game and my person of desire is unattainable. This isn’t just Persona, that’s just the first game that comes to mind when I think about characters I always wanted a romance, but that includes all the other missed opportunities from other games, as well.

The Final Season is different. 

The writers of TFS could’ve said, “Oh you want to romance Louis/Violet? Oh no, sorry, we were gonna do it but we changed our minds! But, don’t worry, we’ll leave hint after hint that they have feelings for you but you can’t actively pursue them. Allow us to tease you with the wonderful romance that could’ve been! Midnight piano lessons! Conversations under the stars! Lots of smooches! You’ll never see it in canon!”

Or, they could’ve only given us one of them, but that’s the topic of the next game. 

In conclusion: They didn’t have to give us Louis and Violet or make them romanceable. If you want Clementine to have a relationship with them, you have the option to do that, which is something you can’t say with other games.

Continued in Part 3

#twdg louis #louis twdg #twdg violet #violet twdg #twdg clouis #clouis #twdg violentine #violentine #twdg clementine #clementine twdg

[gascon-en-exil]

Alright, Azure Moon is finished for a second time. I am abstractly planning a second Crimson Flower playthrough next, but at this point I’m running out of motivation to catalogue these things when it mostly comes down to a handful of new supports. It is interesting to see some of the characters interact differently to being on another side, or stuff like how the NPC who replaces Hilda in Chapter 19 is a female war master in an instance of FE breaking its own genderlock rules, but those moments are few and far between.

This run also let me experience the last three paralogues as well as the extra scenes of Mercedes and the Death Knight. I note that the Wave 3 description says that Jeritza will only be playable on some routes; Crimson Flower is an obvious choice as the DK is Edelgard’s ally and he’s conspicuously absent from Part 2 leaving Jeritza the free time to be in the playable army, but any of the others? Verdant Wind and Silver Snow have the problem of a cutscene with the DK as an enemy, and while Azure Moon lacks that they’d have to do quite a bit of rewriting around Chapter 20 unless Jeritza is only recruited after that map. A physical Gotoh unit, then? Great if he’s auto-leveled to something ridiculous for endgame, bad if he can’t get all his supports in CF.

And not that I needed a reminder really, but I appreciate even more now just how much Azure Moon has to screw Dedue out of screen time to produce feral!Dimitri. He’s not even present for the lategame scene where Dimitri and Gilbert interrogate a man involved with the tragedy of Duscur. Gilbert’s not a bad fit for the bland reliable adviser role, but Dedue’s absence in key scenes after his return is palpable. Of course, the AU where the two of them escaped Fhirdiad together would have them even closer together than they are in Crimson Flower, with five years of no one but each other for company. They’d be like the auto A/S-ranked power couple having already hammered out their relationship and barely in need of Gilbert or Rodrigue or *rolls eyes* Byleth for anything other than reminders of the pitfalls of unrestrained vengeance. Byleth S ranking either of them would turn into them being the guest of honor at their wedding - would totally screw with the self-insert thing.

On that note, I S ranked Sothis because the option was there this time. The support is every bit as random and comedic as expected, absolutely worth it. I still got the Dimidue and Sylvix endings which doesn’t surprise me as I was only using the harem in battle. Dimitri/Marianne wasn’t the powerfully romantic thing I’ve heard it played up as, more of a mutual understanding that could be considered quietly romantic for characters like them. Dimitri/Catherine was much more openly flirty, even with both of them carting around their same-sex attractions. Oh, and I can again confirm that you have to switch to the Japanese audio when playing the credits to fill in a slot in the music library. I assume the intention is that you have to have heard Rhea’s song and “Edge of Dawn” in both languages for it to register since the text of the music library doesn’t distinguish them.

#Fire Emblem #FE16 #Fire Emblem Three Houses

[cornyregans]

Young Love in Veronaville

  DISCLAIMER: Given the title, it should be rather obvious that this essay is about shipping. As someone who has been part of a plethora of fandoms over the years, I know from experience that this topic has a tendency to be a very slippery slope. As such, there are two things I want to make clear before we go any further. First of all, I do not ship all of the ships that are covered in this essay. That being said, I tried my best to be as objective as possible when it comes to analyzing everything despite any biases I may have. Second of all, just because I don’t cover your ship here doesn’t make it any less valid. Most of the things I’m going to look at in this essay are from a narrative perspective rather than an interpretive or personal perspective (with minimal exceptions). With that out of the way, I hope you enjoy!~

Obligatory Disclaimer Word Count: 157 words Essay Word Count: 2,246 words Obligatory Thank You Word Count: 126 words Total Word Count: 2,529 words

  Most of the premade families in The Sims 2 have ties to other households in their home neighborhood. This statement is also true in Veronaville where two-of-the-three premade extended families are involved in a generation-spanning feud, while the other household gets along with practically everyone. Much like in other neighborhoods, the relationships among the sims in Veronaville run the gamut in terms of how they can be classified; as there are acquaintances, enemies, friends, family, and romantic interests.

  While The Sims 2 is essentially a sandbox game where you get to decide how your sims live their lives, the developers have structured the premade neighborhoods so that some of these relationships are easier to achieve than others. This is especially true of the romantic relationships, as it takes much less work and effort to have sims already romantically involved with one another engage in romantic interactions than those who aren’t. When playing Veronaville for the first time, the romantic relationships are mostly set-in-stone among the adults and elders, with most being either married or widowed with no sign of moving on. The teenagers, on the other hand, are different story due to both their youth and the limited pool of interactions they can engage in while playing a mod-free game.

  Out of the seven premade teens in Veronaville, the developers offer the player quite a few prospects for most of them. To keep things organized, I will go through each suggested couple individually, from the most obvious to one that could happen should the player wish to go along with it. In each example, I will go over two things: their relationship in the game, and any parallels these potential couples may have to a work by William Shakespeare.

Romeo Monty & Juliette Capp

  Romeo and Juliette's relationship is at the center of the Veronaville narrative, making them the most obvious choice for each other within this batch of crazy kids. Upon first playing the Capp Manor, you will notice that Juliette already has a crush on Romeo and wants to go steady with him. This want is easy to achieve, as Romeo is practically guaranteed to accept. The Monty Ranch's tutorial involves Romeo inviting Juliette over for a make-out session, and Juliette is also practically guaranteed to accept both his invitation and his advances.

  Given the names of both sims, it should be obvious to anyone that the Shakespeare couple closest to these two would be the titular characters from Romeo & Juliet. These similarities are reflected in not only the neighborhood’s established narrative but also in both of their first and last names. There isn’t much else for me to explain here, as the parallels between both couples are far from subtle.

Puck Summerdream & Hermia Capp

  While Romeo and Juliette are the most obvious pre-established pairing among the Veronaville teens, Puck and Hermia are not too far behind. Upon first playing the Capp Manor, a look at Hermia’s relationship panel will show that she has romantic feelings for both Mercutio Monty and Puck Summerdream, but a closer look shows that she has a higher relationship with Puck than she does Mercutio. Should you choose to follow the tutorial at the Summerdream home and have Puck initiate his first kiss with Hermia (which is something both sims want), they will be caught by a jealous Mercutio, solving any love triangle these three were a part of.

  While both of these sims are based on two characters from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, there are some differences between how they are portrayed in the game and in the play. Unlike Romeo and Juliette, whose roles are relatively unchanged, there were definitely some alterations that were made in Puck and Hermia’s case. While Hermia’s transition between stage and Sims is largely left intact, Puck’s role in The Sims 2 is more akin to that of Lysander when it comes to him being Hermia’s intended love-interest.

  In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hermia is caught between two men, her choice (Lysander) and her father’s choice (Demetrius). At the end of the play, however, she ends up with Lysander due to some fairy magic.

Mercutio Monty & Miranda Capp

  If you decide to follow the tutorial at the Summerdream’s house and put Hermia with Puck, you still have another easy choice for Mercutio in the form of Miranda Capp. While Miranda’s feelings for Mercutio are rather one-sided upon first playing Goneril’s family, a few romantic interactions between the two can easily fix that problem due to already having a good rapport with each other.

  Unlike other examples, the Mercutio/Miranda coupling seems to have its roots in two of Shakespeare’s plays. If you look at them with the aforementioned love triangle in mind, then these two serve as a parallel to A Midsummer Night’s Dream’s Demetrius and Helena. Mercutio, like Demetrius, starts the game with feelings for Hermia, while Miranda’s feelings for Mercutio are unrequited. However, much like how Demetrius and Helena ultimately ended up together, Mercutio and Miranda could easily become a couple should you have them pursue a romantic relationship.

  Without the love triangle in mind, Mercutio and Miranda’s relationship in TS2 could very well be a nod to The Tempest’s Ferdinand/Miranda coupling. In The Tempest, Miranda is the daughter of Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan; while Ferdinand is the son of Alonso, Prospero's usurper. Despite the tension between their fathers, Ferdinand and Miranda fall for each other over the course of the play and are married by the end. Mercutio and Miranda's situation is somewhat similar, with the former being a Monty and the latter a Capp; however, any marriage between them would have to wait in a mod-free game due to both starting off as teenagers.

Mercutio Monty & Hermia Capp

  As I said before, The Sims 2 is a sandbox game. While you could follow the tutorial at the Summerdream house and put Puck and Hermia together, you could also choose to forgo their first kiss and stick Hermia with Mercutio instead.

  By taking the love triangle involving these two and Puck into account, this coupling seems to mirror Demetrius and Hermia from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. While not as unrequited in this case, the fact that Hermia seems to favor Puck upon first glance seems to place Mercutio into the role of the romantic-false-lead. However, Mercutio could easily become the Lysander and Puck the Demetrius should you choose to pair Hermia off with the former instead.

Romeo Monty & Hermia Capp

  Unlike the other examples on this list, Romeo and Hermia do not have any sort of romantic feelings for one another upon first playing their lots. In fact, the only indication the developers give us regarding these two is that Romeo has a want to flirt with Hermia upon first playing the Monty Ranch.

  If we look at them from a Shakespearean point of view, it’s quite easy to see them as being a parallel of Romeo and Rosaline (Juliet’s cousin and Romeo's never-seen first love). Despite being what is referred to as a “ghost” character, Rosaline is the only female character outside of Juliet that Romeo is shown to have feelings for. This is paralleled in TS2 because Hermia is the only sim outside of Juliette that Romeo has a want to flirt with when first playing his lot.

What about Tybalt?

  Six of the seven playable teens in Veronaville have at least one pre-established romantic interest upon first playing their households. The exception to this rule is Juliette and Hermia's older brother Tybalt. While you are able to break up one of these couples and replace any of the girls with Tybalt (he cannot have a relationship with any of them in normal gameplay since he's related to all three girls by blood); the fact remains that the game itself does not hint that this is something you’re supposed to do.

  That being said, I do not think we should start any sort of debate here regarding any Veronaville resident’s sexuality, as that could be a topic all on its own. However, according to both SimPE, and a (mostly accurate) list I found on Tumblr, Tybalt is pre-programmed as having a slight preference for females. As a result, it’s unlikely that the developers intended for him to be romantically involved with Romeo, Puck, or Mercutio due to both his pre-established gender preference and the zeitgeist of the mid-2000s (mind you, this is coming from a Tycutio shipper). With Tybalt’s default sexuality in mind, let’s take a look at why he doesn't have a romantic partner preprogrammed into the game.

  First of all, Shakespeare’s Tybalt also lacks an obvious romantic interest. Sure, he has some sexual tension with both Mercutio and Romeo, but both instances are left up to interpretation. Much of his banter with Mercutio is laden with sexual innuendos; while the most obvious instance of his tension with Romeo occurs during his final scene before being killed. In addition to Mercutio and Romeo, the Baz Luhrmann film adaptation implies that he is involved in an affair with Lady Capulet (his aunt). That being said, given how the game is programmed, it is impossible for Tybalt Capp to do the same with either Goneril or Regan in a mod-free game (if there even is a mod for that at all).

  Personally, I think part of the reason Tybalt Capp doesn’t have an obvious love interest preprogrammed into the game can be found in his biography. Should you look at Tybalt's biography, you will see that he is “proud” to carry the Capp name. While carrying on his family legacy seems like something Tybalt would be keen on doing given his Capp pride, lineage is shown to be carried down the Capp line through the mother.

  This hypothesis regarding Tybalt’s biography is further supported when we look at the other premade families in Veronaville. Should Tybalt wish to potentially keep his Capp name and possibly pass it down to his offspring, he would probably have to marry a girl from a patrilineal family should the player choose to maintain the status-quo. Unfortunately for Tybalt, Bianca and Beatrice Monty are the only premade female sims in Veronaville to fit that description. While it is definitely possible to match Tybalt up with either of these sims, doing so betrays one of Tybalt’s other pre-established character traits: hating the Montys. In addition, the only non-Monty premade female sims in Veronaville who could serve as an option for Tybalt are Titania and Bottom Summerdream, both of whom are members of another matrilineal family. Should the player pair Tybalt up with either sim and choose to stick to the status quo, he would lose the Capp surname upon marriage, rendering him unable to pass it down to another generation.

  While the developers may not have chosen to give Tybalt a romantic story arc, that doesn’t mean he’s destined to remain single forever. Like I said before, TS2 is a sandbox game, meaning you get to choose how he lives his life regardless of the game’s programming and presented narrative. While Tybalt’s default gender preference shows that he prefers female sims, having him romantically interact with male sims can easily change that (since sexuality runs on a spectrum in TS2 rather than being fixed). As for Tybalt’s anti-Monty views, they can also be disregarded should you put the work into having him (and possibly the partner of your choice) make amends. However, if you decide romance isn’t for Tybalt and instead make him a literal prince of cats, that’s also completely valid. Like with all ships in TS2, there is no right or wrong answer on how to play the game. Ultimately, all ships and interpretations are valid because you, not the developers, are the one who decides how the story plays out.

Final Thoughts

  I will be the first to admit that I do not ship all of the implied pairings listed in this essay. Much like with other essays I have posted, as well as those that are still in progress, I always try to cast aside any biases I may have in order to show as many available options and interpretations as possible. In doing so, I feel like I can at least offer something to those of you whose views on Veronaville differ from my own.

  Naturally, I always refer to outside material in these essays in order to back up the claims. There is often a connection to be found, even if they don't align with my interpretation. I think this is especially true when it comes to the relationships between the premades, as many of them connect to Shakespeare or other relevant sources.

  I wanted to keep things simple for this essay, so I decided to give more of an overview of all the potential couples. While I could have picked apart every little detail, some of these relationships play a large part in Veronaville’s narrative that I believe they may need to be looked at separately from this particular entry. Many of Veronaville’s couples, whether they are mentioned in this essay or not, tend to have multiple layers in terms of both their dynamics and their Maxis-created story arcs. With that in mind, you will definitely see some, or possibly all of these couples covered more at length in the future.

Thank you so much for reading this essay! I hope you enjoyed even though this particular entry is nowhere near as long as my previous two. In fact, I think the entries on the Feud and the Tragedies will probably be the longest ones I’ll post on here; that being said, I do have a multipart project that I’m currently working on right now that I hope to post soon. 

As for next week’s entry, I’m thinking I might make it a two-parter since the essays work better as a unit. If I can get both done in time, I plan to post the first next Saturday and the second next Sunday. Once again, thank you so much for reading, I really hope you enjoyed!

#veronaville #sims 2 #sims #veronaville vault #tybalt capp #romeo monty #juliette capp #mercutio monty #puck summerdream #hermia capp #miranda capp

[teddystrap]

[神なる君と] Osananajimi Duo - Narumi

This game is like a time capsule from back in the pre-2012 days, before the do-S trend took hold and every playable guy became an abusive asshole. Our heroine has a feisty personality and witty comebacks, and the whole story is packed with funny moments - which just goes to show, Otomate can put out quality stuff... when they want to.

Incidentally I also really love the Shinto theme and the familiarity of rural small-town Japan, which actually makes me a bit nostalgic for the time I spent there.

[Synopsis] 17-year-old Kamiki Sakuya is helping out at her friend’s shrine, when suddenly some strange dude in wasou cosplay appeared under a *magical tree* and started babbling something about a 1000-year promise. When she came to, she had been made the Goddess of the shrine, to replace the current God - the aforementioned strange dude, Mikoto - for a short while until the hoshimatsuri (lit. ‘start festival’), an annual tradition of the town. The main routes take place within this time frame.

*

-Sakaki Narumi-

Narumi is Sakuya’s classmate, childhood best friend, and heir to the Kunihoshi Shrine. From a young age, he has able to see supernatural things, which made everyone think he's a freak and caused his parents to abandon him. His grandfather, the shrine owner, took him in and raised him as his successor. For a while he was bullied by the kids at school due to his abilities, and thus he developed a lone-wolf, withdrawn, thorny personality. Sakuya was the only person who genuinely accepted him unconditionally, and he pretty much fell in love with her at first sight.

Narumi's route basically runs on two ideas:

1. The social position difference, between him (religious minister/'servant') and Sakuya (Goddess). This idea was leveraged in one of his ema minigames, and in the beginning he sort of uses this as a cover up for the real reason they're forbidden to date:

2. It turns out, there’s a 1000-year curse that runs in his family:

1000 years ago, the Sakaki family were well-to-do religious ministers, and the town was protected under a shield by the gods. The family had a daughter, who fell in love with a demon. She let the demon into the town, and he ended up causing great destruction. As punishment, the gods stripped her family of their title and assets, placed a curse on her, and used her as bait to kill the demon.

Despite all this, however, she refused to lift her curse by renouncing her love for the demon and erasing all their shared memories. A certain god (ahem *Mikoto*) took pity on her and erased all her memories anyway #forherowngood, and she spent her last days roaming the land as an amnesiac, trying to reclaim something important that she couldn’t remember.

This curse forbids anyone in the Sakaki family from falling in love with a God or a demon. If they do, they will be gradually deprived of their five senses, until they finally become entirely cut off from the outside world. And for 1000 years everybody has abided by this rule... until Narumi. After Sakuya realised her feelings for him, she tried to confess to him, but got cockblocked left and right by Yakumo (who was probably used by Fate to stop her). Then she wrote him a love letter with hilarious spelling errors, and after he read it, he told her he felt the same way, but they could never be together. ;_;

‘Please be my weirdo.’

Narumi actually thought (mistakenly) that the curse will hurt her, but when Mikoto clarified that it will only affect him, he was immediately like, "LET'S FALL IN LOVE." XD ...It didn't take long for symptoms of the curse to manifest in him. He looked for ways to overcome it, and came to the hypothesis that the hoshimatsuri may be a test of the strength of their #lovebond vs #damnedcurse.

Near the end of the hoshimatsuri he was almost completely senile. So then Sakuya, who had been plotting her own #evilmasterplan all this time, couldn't take it anymore. She took him under the *magical tree* and planned to break their bond right there and then. But then Narumi was like STOP, WOMAN. At which point you have a choice whether to (a) accept his opinion or (b) ignore him because at this rate he's gonna turn into Ronald Reagan.

It sounds almost like she wants to challenge him to a bare-knuckle fistfight under this tree.

a. Good End: Well it turns out Sakuya didn't have to make this choice. While she's hesitating, Narumi kisses her to shut her mouth, and their love successfully overcomes the curse. One year later, Sakuya is being inducted into their shrine as a minister. They plan to go to religious university together to get their religious certification (can you tell I don't really know much about this lol),... and Narumi suddenly drops down one knee and asks for her hand.ヾ(｡>﹏<｡)ﾉﾞ✧*

b. Tragic End: Through a blizzard of... uhh... white light, Sakuya thanks him for the good times, before their memories are erased. A year later, she visits the shrine and sees him there doing chores. They don't recognise each other at all, but she suddenly gets a momentary flashback of their time together, and starts crying without knowing why. They part ways after exchanging some pleasantries. - This must be one of Otomate's favourite motifs, because it's a sad ending but still makes you feel warm and fuzzy, knowing that they are better off than the actual curse ending.

I feel this way about Life sometimes.

[Thoughts] Ugh, I cried so many times throughout the overall story/this route that I lost count (TдT). There's too many events to mention here, but the curse and its aftermath obvsly caused some kind of time warp, which transported Yorihito Jr. to the future to be mentored by Yorihito Sr. (the mascot statue of the shrine, who was actually modelled after Jr.'s likeness).

Also it's almost certain that Mikoto made Sakuya a Goddess to protect her and/or other people from something related to the curse, and it's just a matter of the rest of the routes enlightening us as to the links between the main characters and the past - who is a descendant of whom, and so on.

I like Narumi as a character, but the route felt like it dragged on needlessly, when he was trying to hide first the details about the curse and then his symptoms from Sakuya. Those things are pretty obvious to us (the player), so I couldn't help feeling a bit emotionally constipated impatient with him at times.

He does have his surprisingly candid moments, too, though. Like when Fuu-san teased them about being on a date and he just smoothly rolled with it (maybe because he thought at that time that they will never be together). And after he read Sakuya's letter, he told her he's always loved her, but they can't be together and he wouldn't tell her why. I can see why Sakuya got frustrated and went into WHYWHYWHYWHY mode after that. Guess it shows that, despite his usual maturity and poise, he's still only 17 and doesn't have the ability to manage both his own feelings and someone else's at the same time.

(On that count I think Yakumo actually manages things in a more adult way, even though he can appear rather mentally deficient at times.)

I wanna have ‘secret muscle training’ session with Yakumo-nii-san... if you get my meaning ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

I also love the way that Narumi and Sakuya support each other. She comforts him after he failed at making takoyaki, and in turn he consoles and encourages her about the future goals form. They really feel like equals, it's not all one-sided 'big-brotherly duties' like her relationship with Yakumo. (I can't help talking about Yakumo here because I just love him (ノ｡・﹏・｡)ノ❤. But anyway, he'll get my special attention in a later post.) 

One sweet discovery here is that Yuzuru(-senpai) might be a secret romantic. Just as Mikoto was about to repeat what he did 1000 years ago on Narumi and Sakuya, Yuzuru jumps in and is all like: STAHP, shouldn't you let these two choose for themselves? Aww. Assholes with a heart of gold are my favourite assholes in the world. (^o^)丿

#kami naru kimi to #otome #otome game #visual novel #idea factory #otomate #psp #sakurai takahiro

[ravenaveira]

OK I just need to go off about KH3 again

Im sorry your probably gonna be seeing alot of these posts because I am friggin PISSED and no Im not saying this ONE THING ruined the game for me or that the game is bad thats not my intention I personally gave the game a 8.9 so clearly I enjoyed it I just didnt enjoy THIS shit

The romance between Sora and Kairi omg its just SO BAD it makes my danm blood boil because it didnt HAVE to be this bad but you wanna know why it was so bad this game and worse than any other game in the franchise?

Because Kairi was off the island

You heard me right, Kairi being off the island and put onto the battlefield destroyed this relationship for good and turned it into the biggest friggin joke its ever been when before there were actually some decent moments between them but this? this was downright laughable and so forced it felt like Sora was being held hostage and forced to say and do the BS that he was and it just felt uncomfortable to watch

Like him saying ‘Im strong with you Kairi’ which apparently in JPN he said ‘your strong Kairi’ which somehow makes it better to some people but bruh both are equally bad and equally laughable because neither of them are true

Kairi’s not strong and never has been, Kairi is just a love interest and has never been anything else from the moment she was introduced all she was is Sora’s love interest and that was literally all there was and all there still is to her character

Oh well without Kairi Sora wouldnt be alive she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the real world and lit his way back

So tf what? she deserves a friggin medal because she ‘believed’ ? dont make me laugh, wow Kairi’s one big moment of use was just ‘believeing’ in Sora which literally every single other character does but when Kairi does it suddenly its the biggest contribution anyone could give her because thats literally ALL she did so yea bravo Kairi, you believed

And then everybody proceeded to nearly get bodied all over again xD nice save Kairi, you literally almost made everyone die TWICE

Know who ACTUALLY did something to stop it a second time? Namine, Lingering will, The past keyblade masters, Yen Sid, those are the ones who actually DID something that made a difference and ACTUALLY kept them alive this time

Kairi literally barely kept him alive, brought him back to the light, just for him to nearly die all over again and her whole role ends up being a total failure that changed NOTHING

So yeah congratulations, her biggest moment amounted to nothing

Oh and dont get me started on that stupid hug Sora gave Kairi when she was about to get struck down by Terranort

Bruh dont give me that ‘he was moving too fast’ or some crap like that so he only had time to do that, BULLSHIT did you SEE how fast Aqua came at Riku in the ROD? Sora managed to get between them and shield Riku with his keyblade in literal seconds, but with Kairi he just hugs her?

You see now why I say this ship is laughable in this game and forced af? that made no danm sense, even if he would of pushed her out of the way it would of made more sense then just friggin hugging her as if thats really gonna stop anything

Bruh Sora and Riku had a more believable romantic moment in that entire ROD moment with Riku saying Sora’s name and then Sora appears to help him save the day and they summon a friggin rainbow keyblade, and then Aqua is about to friggin body Riku with literally only seconds to react Sora manages to protect him

Now I’ve seen people try to argue well everybody really was useless or needed saving in this game so its not just Kairi

BULLSHIT and lemme tell you why

Yea its true people like Riku and Mickey who are far more experienced still struggled and needed saving but guess what? they were DOING something, they held their own they didnt just friggin stand there they put up a danm fight and DID something that actually CONTRIBUTED

I mean bruh Riku and Mickey were literally fighting by themselves at the end of the game against THREE PEOPLE, again BY THEMSELVES holdin their own while everybody else had atleast 1 person helpin them, Aqua with Ventus and Kairi with Lea but Riku and Mickey? solo and doin the danm thing idc if they eventually get defeated or knocked out or struggle alot the point is their DOING something or atleast friggin TRIED to do something

Aqua gets roasted alot too but we’ve seen what she can do in BBS, she held her own and even fought and beat Vanitas, again even if she eventually was defeated or knocked out etc like her Vanitas fight in KH3 again she friggin TRIED and friggin DID something

Ventus got bodied but again we’ve seen what he could do in BBS and Ventus is no pushover, he unfroze himself with sheer will power and his glare was enough to give Xigbar [now Luxu] PTSD everytime he sees him or someone who reminds him of him, he too took on Vanitas and tied even though he didnt WIN he didnt lose either so his performance against Terranort in this game I agree was underwhelming but understandable given thats still his friend but he still did something in the end and wasnt totally useless

People raggin on Lea need to STOP because its thanks to him Kairi didnt get friggin smacked down early on because he took the danm hit for her and got sent flying instead of her defending her danm self

Keep in mind Kairi and Lea got the EXACT SAME TRAINING and even HE reacted with common sense but Kairi? even AFTER SEEING Lea get sent flying after defending her that STILL didnt make her defend herself and she just friggin STOOD THERE

Or how about when both Kairi and Sora got knocked back and Lea literally fought Saix and Xion and Xemnas BY HIMSELF to protect them

Gtf outta here man and put some respect on Leas name because he DANM sure deserves it for all the crap he took from Xemnas and the utter disrespect of having his keyblade I assume broken or damaged, being shot by multiple lasers AND having his hand stomped on by Xemnas this man was still TRYING even with all odds against him and being clearly outmatched he still TRIED

Meanwhile Kairi just gets her arm grabbed, I wanna make this very clear

She is not lifted off the ground like Sora was with young Xehanort, she was not pinned to the ground, she was not backed into a wall, she did not have both arms forced behind her back NO

Her feet are planted firmly on the ground, she has one arm being pulled above her head but she has another free arm which may not be her dominant arm but is still better than having none and she does NOTHING

She doesnt try to get her other arm free from him

She doesnt struggle or pull away from him

She doesnt try to turn around to lessen the pain of her arm being pulled behind her

She doesnt stomp on his foot to try and get him to loosen his grip on her to give her a chance to break free

Know who was in a similar situation and handled it way better with no battle experience?

So dont tell me it wasnt friggin possible for her to do anything in that situation because thats utter bullshit and you know it, Kairi didnt even STRUGGLE she didnt even TRY to get free

She used her free arm to reach out for Sora to ‘save’ her though, but not to even attempt to free herself

Yet THIS is who people are hoping is the main playable character next game to go rescue Sora?

Girl couldnt even save herself yet yall think she can rescue Sora? what a joke but unfortunately some people are actually serious about this and actually want a playable Kairi after this travesty of a performance

Before yall had good arguments, Kairi WAS inexperienced and she DIDNT have any battle training so she really COULDNT contribute or do much but that all changed in KH3, now she DOES have the SKILLS and the TRAINING and the means to be able to contribute and DO something and theres absolutely no more excuses why she shouldnt

Kairi says herself, this time I’ll fight too, this time its my turn to protect you

And when she fiiiiiiinally gets the chance to do all that, everything the fandom has wanted and waited years for her to finally be able to do, this is what she does

THIS is Kairi off the island, THIS is battle ready Kairi, THIS is Kairi DOING something and by doing something I mean NOTHING but getting in the way like Sora said years ago when he left her back on the island which now makes total sense because this is what happens when Kairi goes with Sora to the battlefield

Now we know what Kairi is truly capable of if you give her a weapon and the training to use it, absolutely nothing

And people actually want playable Kairi next game xD

Honestly I somewhat blame the fandom for this because I wouldnt be surprised if Nomura tried giving her a more active role because the fandom desperately wanted this for years and I guess this was his attempt at throwin them a bone but to be perfectly honest? he should have just left her ass on the island atleast then she had an EXCUSE to be useless but because he tried to give the people what they wanted and actually gave Kairi combat skills he just made Kairi 100% justifiably hateable now and I am so glad to see more people finally turn on this chick because the excuses for her has finally run out and its about danm time she got the hate she deserves because Sora deserved better

I think thats the part that hurts the most, I can accept Sora dying but its HOW he died that I cant accept and do you even need to guess how it was? thats right, saving Kairi

Seriously FDB

Listen Nomura, you tried and failed miserably, its time to stop, seriously, its time to stop, Kairi had her chance and she blew it and now its time to let it go and bench her ass on the island like you been doing out of everybodys danm way and leave the rescuing of Sora to Riku and everyone else who is actually of some danm use and knows wtf they are doing

Kairi can just stay on the island and ‘believe’ since thats apparently all shes good at doing, let her just ‘believe’ that Sora will come back while Riku and everyone else actually do the work of getting him back and she just be there to greet him when hes back

Im hoping the secret ending is hinting at us playing as Riku trying to save Sora because Im all for that, but if they really try to shoe horn playable Kairi in after all the negative reaction from this game Im not saying I wont play it but it will definitely make the game unenjoyable if majority of it has you playing as someone you strongly dislike instead of Riku whos actually a pretty popular and beloved character amongst majority of the fandom while Kairi is descending to one of the most disliked

So Im hoping Nomura has learned from this and just doesnt even try with Kairi anymore, just stop it

This game would have been so much better if he’d just manned up and took the risk and just abandoned Kairi in this game by letting her actually STAY dead and Sora accepts this and moves on [of course over time not instantly] but with the help of Riku and everyone else by his side Sora’s able to move forward and live on keeping Kairi in his heart forever and at the end instead of what we got hes just sitting on the beach watching the sunset while everyone else is playing and he takes out and looks at Kairi’s charm remembering how he didnt get to give it back to her this time but then all of a sudden a paopu fruit washes up near his feet which is unusual but he picks it up and as he does notices something in the distance but is blinded by the sun but he can vaguely see Kairi before she fades away, similar to how Axel saw Xion here

Lets say Kairi is holding the other paopu too, and once she disapears Sora cries for a moment but wipes them away and smiles knowing that Kairi’s still with him, he then proceeds to take a bite of the paopu fruit which would tie in perfectly with the title screen showing Sora with his back turned and a bite taken out of the paopu hes holding

This way Kairi’s importance to Sora is still in tact but shes no longer here to get in the way or need saving AGAIN, her character ends on a high note and Sora grows from the experience realizing that he cant save everybody no matter how hard he tries some people simply cannot be saved and he just has to let them go even if he doesnt want to

But nope, instead Sora dies saving Kairi like in KH1 and its just not sweet, its not even bittersweet, its more of a slap in the face than anything and Sora has zero growth from this, it just changed from Kairi needing saving to Sora needing saving and honestly we JUST saved everybody else and already we have to save ANOTHER person? its just ugh man I cant

Theres plenty more things I didnt like besides this but this is the one thing that pissed me off the most because I never expected it to be THIS bad

Also I know I use Sora and Riku as a comparison alot but that isnt because Im some salty Soriku shipper whos just mad my ship aint canon because honestly I dont give af when it comes to Kingdom hearts pairings I could literally care less about any of them hell Roxas could marry a tree for all I care or form a three way with Ven and Aqua I DONT CARE the only pairing I ever had a problem with is Sokai and thats because of my strong dislike for Kairi more so than the pairing itself and I think Sora deserves better than Kairi so this isnt just some bitter Soriku shipper because like I said I DONT care but I do somewhat ship Soriku, just like I somewhat ship Roxion and RokuNami and some older ships more out there like Sonami or Namitas etc no one cares but you get my point

I dont care about Kingdom hearts for the ships theres far more important things going on than to be worried about some stupid pairing, but Sokai just leaves a bad taste in my mouth everytime its even mentioned

And now no matter what they do with Kairi or Sokai in the future it wouldnt change a thing because after KH3 its irredeemable, the damage is done and theres no undoing it unless you give it one long ass arc like Riku to slowly redeem it but I doubt Nomura cares about the romance and Kairi enough to actually dedicate such an arc for it so yeah the damage is DONE

My bet for next games playable characters, Riku, Aqua, Roxas, Ventus, Xion, those are the only ones who make sense to me since they all have the strongest connection to Sora and are capable fighters and I feel Aqua although not having a strong connection to him like the others she would wanna repay Sora for saving her so thats my bet

If anyone bothered to read this whole thing then lemme know who do you thinks gonna be playable in the next game?

Also if you like Kairi and Sokai thats perfectly fine this isnt to bash the shippers or demanding you dislike it cuz hey to each their own, Im just saying I DONT

#kh3 spoilers #fuck-kh3 ending #fdb-kairi #fuck-sokai #sora deserved better

[roaldseth]

For the ask thing: if no one has given you Roland thats a crime. Aaaand. Gale.

At this point in time—this late in the game—people probably understand that Roland is the default for me when dealing with ask memes, so it’s understandable that askers would want variety and ask about different characters. That, and I don’t typically receive a lot of asks… Unless you meant that statement in a different light. But, don’t be fooled. I am always at the ready for Roland, and always appreciate getting asked about him or sought out for expertise.

FYI AND DISCLAIMER: all answers are in relation to Digital Devil Saga unless stated otherwise. There is a couple of places I very briefly glaze over Quantum Devil Saga, but nothing that could be considered an actual Spoiler is said; no plot points. Considering QDS 3-5 are not translated, I feel a need to address that point, specifically with Roland.

ROLAND:

How I feel about this character

In short: he means a lot to me, more than I could ever try to explain. In length: not to sound like a fictionkin or get personal, but I feel a sense of kinship and understanding—friendship, too, even—with Roland. Although, this is due to the fact I’ve dedicated a lot of my time over years in understanding every possible encompassment. This bonding had grown from a conglomeration of both similarities of situations and years spent with him as a coping mechanism and hyperfixation, so connection and reverence seems like an unsurprising conclusion.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

1) Adil (OTP).

2) Greg, but only under certain circumstances. If his wife is involved, and she is not deceased, I don’t particularly ship Roland and Greg together. However, if the relationship is treated as one-sided (Roland’s side), past romance, comfort in confusion, or similar; then I’ll ship it.

3) Gale. It’s more of a “for fun” ship, since I couldn’t see them in serious, lasting commitment or domesticity, but being paired through their dynamic as two intelligent men tied through Lupa/Greg and Fred is interesting and entertaining.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Adil and Greg, the BrOT3.

My unpopular opinion about this character

A short answer is that Roland was an apt leader and a poor coward. His Avatar wasn’t Indra wrongly.

He doesn’t get the credit he is due. Many of his accomplishments get dismissed because something is stated in word and accepted as is rather than evaluated by his whole. The scripter/translator choosing “Actions speak louder than words” as his dialogue in the moment of a turning point within him is not solely about his loyalty to the Embryon. Its concept is the foundation of his story arch and how it’s framed. Two oppositions clash: the division between what he and others say about him in comparison to what he actually does and accomplishes in canon.

Then, there’s a different answer before I had thought about the leadership comment, which is less of an unpopular opinion, and more of not being a fan of seeing Roland and his drinking caricatured for comedic purposes. If there is one trait that has the possibility of being over exaggerated or backhandedly addressed, it is his alcoholism. I know I’m the one who just stressed that Roland’s story is framed in a specific way and that this part of his character (qualities and constitution) isn’t meant to be the primary focus. However, although his drinking habits is more of a precursor, it’s not something meant to be disregarded either, and separating it apart from his hardships (trauma, grief, stress, anxiety) corrodes its nature and severity. It’s not a punch line, and making it one devalues it.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I wish DDS Roland also had QDS Roland’s background as an EGG Facility employee. Even though his character makes sense as is, it’s very shallow and monochromatic. Having this extra context enriches his place and purpose within the overarching story. Each playable character and the series’ antagonists have ties to the Society in some way—except Roland. Instead, he’s just some random fellow who simply got lucky with surviving that long. If he had this background context, it would be akin to Angel, Sheffield, O’Brien, Real Argilla, etc. It’d simply make more sense.

I also understand that there is the possibility that this particular part of his character was not fully developed by the time Godai left the team and ATLUS finalized how Digital Devil Saga was going to pan out as a video game. However, I am not going to give Tadashi and ATLUS that credit, because the more that this information sat within me, the more I recognized reasoning and logics behind some of the things he says and does.

The game may never have said he was Karma, but it also never said he wasn’t Karma.

GALE:

How I feel about this character

He’s relatable—a steadfast and loyal tactician devoted to his role and service, struggling to understand (his own) emotions, and more readily understands through textbook knowledge. He is cautious with cause, creates conclusions based on the most reliable information, and is not one to trust in chance. Then in Quantum Devil Saga, he over explains and is excessively wordy: a trait I love in him. These points also connect back to generally liking keeper and the-brains-of-the-group type characters.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

1) Lupa.

2) Jenna Angel.

3) Roland. Refer back to the reasoning in the answer for Roland’s section.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Cielo. The two of them have the “one character is fun, energetic, and easygoing; while the other character is strict, static, and steadfast,” which is a good, clichéd combination because it works. They’re opposites that work well—and believably—with each other instead of clashing against each other. Their competition to convince God to revert the world “back to normal” in DDS2 shows how they’ve learned from each other; Gale being more laidback to grandeur and Cielo gaining some seriousness (outside of determination).

My unpopular opinion about this character

The closest thing I can think of is actually a popular fandom opinion, North American and Japanese, but it’s against what the writer has said. From what I’ve seen, Gale’s age is the “[We] recognize the council has made a decision, but given it was a stupid-ass decision, [we’ve] elected to ignore it” of Digital Devil Saga.

An excuse would be that his AI’s model was meant to be 20 years old while David Gale is a separate age, but considering Heat and Serph’s models’ ages match up with O’Brien and Sheffield, I don’t think this was the (intentional) case.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

An answer doesn’t come to mind, so I’ll say I’m happy and content with how Gale was treated.

[Give Me A Character, and I’ll break their ass down; from this meme.]

#thanks for the ask! #sorry it took so long #I was away #and I always have a lot to say when Roland is involved.