#s also worth mentioning that said first guy can ? also die without leaving a corpse? just turn to ash??

[lonelyquail]

ok so while my ds is getting sand poured into it at alarming rates I'm thinking about how jrpgs in specific have a really weird desync with How Important Death Is. like some address it better than others but it very frequently happens where if you take a step back youll go "am I wild or is everybody just like, Really down with murder in this game". and consequences for said murder, especially in a characterization sense but even just actual physical consequences, don't really happen? unless it's a vehicle for conflict but like. when it is a vehicle for conflict it feels weird because why are These Guys actually taking the fact we killed somebody in broad daylight seriously and coming after us for it while all the other npcs and even the main party took it like it was another saturday evening

see I Think where the issue lies is in the fact that everything is in its own little world when you're in a battle? like. when you fight an enemy and you get leather out of it it's seen as something the enemy Drops and not. their hide. when you defeat a character in a battle it does just feel like you Defeated them. unless there's dialogue afterwards that says otherwise you don't even mentally assume you killed em you just wounded them enough to make them flee or dissolve or whatever. and it's Weird to just. have that assumption there because for a lot of games it really isn't clear if you're killing them or defeating them !!

that last point is extra important when you have the specific brand of Skittish Hero / Noble Hero Who Doesn't Kill People / Rational Hero In Way Over Their Head or whatever where you really don't think they Would kill a guy just to get them out of the way. in that case it's REALLY weird because it's hardly brought up. even if it Is brought up that that guy Sure Did Die the mc doesn't tend to actually have a reaction ??? and I don't know why this is ???? like Any written reaction would be more interesting than nothing even if the guy doesn't have a full on crisis about taking another life having them go "oh shit, The Consequences" would be nice. really anything except (oh cool we can advance the plot now).

I will also mention that Some deaths do matter plot wise but very frequently what makes them matter is how much of it is linked to an in game battle I think. if your mc just finishes a fight and comes back to the overworld and the guy's Disappeared or Dissolved or whatever it means they don't matter. if the guy's still around after the fight it means it's more significant, especially if they're still alive but wounded or Really Shaken Up. because this clears up the indistinguishable line between if a battle is lethal or not and if a character decides to deal a finishing blow now it's Way more telling of their character. even though this is basically the same thing that happened in the (killed In A Battle) scenario. just with more dialogue. I will also mention that the person who deals the finishing blow is Rarely Ever that good hearted protagonist and often they'll even go :0 at somebody else committing a murder despite them instigating and helping murder quite a few people. just. In Battle. so it's less bad. I guess.

this is leaving out the fact that in party deaths are often a Major Major Blow because like. ok that's fair. that's A Guy You Knew that's understandable. anyway I don't really know where I'm going with this I just think it's interesting how in these types of games death can swap from not mattering at all to mattering a Lot and if u don't think about it too hard u don't even question it. I'll probably be putting some examples in the tags idk

#i will note that in this specific instance most of my party Is actually super down with murder like vocally #so its less weird but it Is weird that the mc does. Not Seem The Type. #i mean not to say he should have tried to spare everybody i think its kinda neat that he doesnt but #if the fact that he doesnt was brought up at all thatd be interesting. have him acknowledge he killed a dude #but no hes just kind of standing there like (ok what next) no leaning one way or another #these would all be interesting reactions if they were actually Brought Up in dialogue but no its just. oversight #anyway this is about sand but ive also felt this about live a live and even bits of twewy #like specifically in lal the fact that the edo chapter Exists and killing people is just Battling Them made me look at Every Other Chapter #thru a lens of (okay am. am i killing these dudes.) and the answer is I DUNNO #like the guy exploded into a cloud of mist theres no way hes Not dead but its STRANGE #this felt most noticeable in the imperial china and present day chapters because they had mcs who decidedly did not feel down with murder #specifically present day because masaru is fighting this guy for the crime of killing a guys. and woa. he killed a guys. with his Hands #i think theres only a handful of deaths in lal that actually mean anything and you can tell which they are because they dont explode #like in You Know The Part with The Character I Cant Say that guys i think the only time defeating an enemy Leaves A Corpse #ok actually thats a lie the Other Guy I Cant Say in The Chapter Before That also died like that and that was equally important #s also worth mentioning that said first guy can ? also die without leaving a corpse? just turn to ash?? #depending on where u go with him. which is weird right. thats weird right. #maybe that just means (hey youre not supposed to feel bad about him dying this tiiiime) #anyway its 5 am ill post this in the morning #vee shut up

[sseizonsha]

Leon and Survival

Motivations and Guilt as an Agent of Death    

  The Biohazard universe requires the audience to suspend disbelief, particularly in regards to the protagonists surviving events where others would have died. One could argue that this is merely protagonist armor for the sake of thrills and playing the game, but if you’ll allow me, I’d like to get a little more symbolic and meta about this fact. 

  Leon is defined most prominently by two things: his tenacity, quick-thinking, and improvisation in the field, and the severity of the loss he experiences when he fails to save people in need. This eventually leads Leon to become the jaded and a little more distrusting version of what he used to be. But what’s most important here is despite this, Leon never loses his penchant for gambling on a snowball’s chance in hell. He never loses his idealism. He never stops believing he can help someone.

    If I could let myself be facetious for a moment: Leon S. Kennedy. Leon Sentimental Kennedy. Leon Self-Sacrificing Kennedy. Leon Serve Justice Kennedy. Leon, ever the Survivor. 

    I have touched on this before in my exploration of Leon’s PTSD, but I really need to stress for anyone and everyone willing to listen: Leon does not take the term “survivor” as a compliment or as something to be lauded, and he prefers not to be referred to as such. At best, he uses it ironically in order to make fatalistic, derisive jabs at himself. The term serves as a reminder of all the people he’s failed and all the innocents he’s lost. This is also why, in Degeneration when defending Claire’s expertise, he omitted the fact that she wasn’t the only Raccoon City survivor in the room.

   For Leon, helping others get to safety supersedes everything, including direct orders from top brass on mission; at the root of it, seeing others get out and survive IS his mission. Take, for example:

The important scene in RE2 leading up to and following Robert Kendo’s death, in which Leon shows serious emotional compassion for Kendo’s family and demands that Ada not keep the truth from innocent people. He explains that helping people is the only reason why he’s even here, that he cannot and will not allow her or anyone else keep the truth quiet. 

 When Leon and Helena are walking through Ivy University and come across the man looking for his daughter. Helena insists that they don’t have time for this, to which Leon responds, “We’re making the time.” 

   There is nothing more important or valuable to him than another’s life. Therein lies the  greatest source of scarring and trauma for Leon: most of the people he stops to help end up dying anyway, and he is left standing over his friends’ and charges’ bodies, asking himself what exactly was the point of it all. 

   One could argue that this signifies Leon being protected by a force greater than himself. But you could also argue that Leon is that very protective force acting upon others. It is a secondary role, certainly, as his main career and role is to protect and serve and keep others alive. But no less important is this one: in which Leon S. Kennedy assumes the role of a psychopomp in the Biohazard universe.

    Greek for “conveyer of the soul,” psychopomps serve a crucial role in most mythologies in that they exist to guide the recently deceased to the afterlife without hitch. It is important to note that many psychopomps do not exist to judge the soul; that they simply guide them to the next stage of passing. They are described as liminal beings: able to pass through both the land of the living and the land of the dead. 

Below the read more I will explore these three defining aspects of Leon as a psychopomp. This is already a long post. Take a breather, maybe. Get some water. Get some sleep. 

Judgement

   One major quality that separates Leon’s character from many of the heroes in the Biohazard universe is that Leon's primary motivation is protecting innocents from villains rather than fighting the villains themselves; his personal stake in this fight is one based on compassion and the need for helping the victims and survivors. He doesn’t waste his time hating the bad guys more so than combating the corruption and greed that they stand for. 

  It is this nonjudgmental quality about Leon that allows him to see the world in shades of grey. He can empathize with motivations even if he doesn’t agree with them, and it’s for this reason why he can work so easily beside people like Ada Wong, Manuela Hidalgo, and Alexander Kozachenko. 

  With Leon as a psychopomp, this grey morality works for another reason: that a number of the characters who’ve died and had an impact on Leon all confessed some manner of sin to him before they died. More than that, they all acknowledge Leon in their own way. Below I will list some notable examples:

Marvin Branagh: Arguably the catalyst for Leon accepting his role in this fight, Marvin is first of many people to die in Leon’s line of service to the cause. When the Lieutenant insists that Leon leave without him, Leon refuses and says there’s still time. It is only when Marvin pulls a gun on him to save himself that Leon relents. Marvin names his guilt: “I tried, Leon. But I couldn’t stop it. We can’t let this thing spread. It’s on you now.” 

Ada Wong: (subverted) Ada Wong is an entire meta post on her own in regards to Leon’s feelings, but she deserves mention here. The pain of her betrayal, “Why couldn’t you just hand over the sample,” was later exacerbated with the knowledge that she chose (allegedly) to die on her own terms rather than allowing Leon to save her. Ada tells him that “It isn’t worth it. Take care of yourself,” before falling to her supposed death.

Adam Benford: The United States President and long-time friend of Leon’s, Adam was prepared to sink the USA’s reputation into the ground for the sake of the truth and taking responsibility. When he tells Leon this confession, Leon responds with surprise but ultimately with support: “Whatever you decide, sir, I’m with you.” Adam validates Leon and tells him, “I’ve always valued your friendship.” I imagine this is one of the last things he says to Leon before he dies by Leon’s hand.

Luis Sera: Did not intend to die by anyone’s hands, including his own, but his motivations for helping Leon and Ashley are driven entirely by a need to repent. “I am a researcher, hired by Saddler....The sample. Saddler took it. You have to get it back.” 

Liminal Beings

   Spiritual guides are so powerful in the fact that they have an uncanny ability to travel between both worlds (living and dead) with ease. The most obvious parallel of this is Leon’s sheer luck in getting roped into outbreaks of undead infections and leaving alive and relatively unscathed. Such an existence is a lonely one. While the psychopomp may have companions for a time ( mission partners or innocents in need ),  a rare few share his ability to travel between spaces; most often than not, those who follow from one destination must remain behind or move on. 

   When the psychopomp travels, it is often within a vessel which few can drive or operate, which is undoubtedly symbolic of the soul’s lack of control. In media and story-telling this is actually a trope known as the Afterlife Express. Leon S. Kennedy is often written and played in tandem with vehicular scenes, regardless of whether he is operator, passenger, or witness: 

The beginning of Resident Evil 2: In which Leon drives his own Jeep (in full control) and ultimately switches to drive an abandoned RPD police cruiser deeper into Hell; it is subsequently crashed into and destroyed by an oncoming semi. Leon is temporarily trapped in Hell and must survive and find another way out (via the endgame train).

The beginning of Resident Evil 4: In which Leon is being driven by someone else into the countryside Pueblo. He is shown to be gazing out the window, contemplating on prior events. It is a recollection of his life’s past---his---but the ones doomed to meet their deaths are the Spanish police, who up until seemed so deceptively in control of the situation. 

RE4: Ada driving the boat to the island. Again, subverted, as Ada does not die but chooses to leave the vehicle on her own terms.This forces Leon to take the controls and steer himself the rest of the way to his next area.

RE4: Mike and the helicopter. He meets and interacts with Leon just long enough to help guide Leon along his path; his death is a subsequent righting of roles. Leon witnessing Mike’s death and promising to honor him posthumously fixes this. 

RE6: The start screen and Lanshiang. Leon rides a train with no known conductor steering the rails. The train is empty, save for himself; then with his companion, then with the soul he is sent to fight (Simmons.) 

RE6: The plane. The pilot is subsequently killed and mutates into a Lepotica. Because everyone on board, with the exception of Leon and Helena, are infected, Leon is forced to take the controls and land the plane as best he can. Leon crashing the plane and surviving with Helena attests to his ability to move between literal spaces; the corpses and zombies destroyed in the plane crash all move on to the next world.

RE Damnation and the tank:  While Sasha drives the tank and steers seemingly to his death against the Tyrant-Class mutant, Leon intervenes.

As a Guide

   Beyond everything else that’s been said---and beyond the obvious that Leon’s primary duties are protective detail and getting his charges where they need to go, Leon's presence serves as a reassuring boon to many of the people he comes across.

   Leon internalizes the deaths of everyone he fails to save. The main issue with this beyond the way it affects him is that Leon lacks the ability to see the reality of hindsight. Events in which an outbreak occurred (Harvardsville, Tall Oaks, Lanshiang) happened in a large enough scale that containment was nearly impossible. Sterilization was more or less the only way to eradicate the issue at hand. With or without Leon’s self-sacrificing and offers to help, the fact of the matter remains glaringly obvious to anyone else: 

   Most of the people caught in the chaos of these events likely would’ve died anyway.

   Leon stopping to help gave these survivors the chance to last longer than they might have otherwise. He took that snowball’s chance in hell and made it count for what it was worth. The truth of the matter is? Although he is written as psychopomp symbolically, he is first and foremost incredibly and literally human. 

   From the symbolic, spiritual perspective, Leon is incapable of realizing that it is not his job to stop all of these people from dying---it is simply his job to be there for them so that they are not alone. 

#meta. #leon s kennedy #biohazard commentary | ooc. #biohazard #resident evil #long post for ts #tw death #uh. #yeah so this is really long and 'm really proud of it and this is all thanks to luca for their suggestion. #someone tell me I'm good at writing #or someone tell me my love of leon fuckin' kennedy is real.

[antirepurp]

yea cool second shesh of dungo

tl;dr: black market was found, orryn eats corpses, a creepy woman wants to murder the whole fun gang now

Okay first up one of our friends, the one who plays Edge, came to the session two hours late because she overslept, so we played the first bit without her. We were going to use that time on a side quest but, well, plans changed as you’ll see.

The Fun Gang wakes up at the inn, aside from Edge who’s very much asleep. The crew has raw dirty potatoes for breakfast (Orryn liked them), and then mostly Ganma and Dutmeat, Dutmeat to a lesser degree, try to pry some info about the rumored black market from the inn keeper. He’s reluctant at first, but Lyle manages to convince him to tell the gnome kid a story about it and how to get there. Apparently there’s a sewer somewhere that leads into the place, and he also mentions something about certain bricks being in a certain order opening a door somewhere. The gang leaves a note to Edge saying that they went to the sewers, and then go off.

Dutmeat goes find the sewer the inn keeper mentioned. After that the gang goes to see if the notice board in town center has any tasks they could complete while Edge is sleeping. They find a mission involving some merchant’s vault (I didn’t write down other details about it), but before they can do much they’re confronted by some royal guards who think they’re suspicious. They question the fun gang...

...and Dutmeat crit fails and straight up tells them the Fun Gang killed the important lord everyone gives a shit about.

Orryn tried to explain that Dutmeat’s just hungover or something but that only makes things worse, and Ganma has to cast an invisibility spell to get everyone out of that situation.

Considering they’ve now been seen by some guards, and their crimes are now known, they decide to abandon side questing and go for the sewers.

There’s a grate over the sewer made of iron, and it won’t budge. Lyle investigates it a bit, and finds out that there’s a slope at the bottom that’s very far away. He can fit through the grate, so a rope is tied around him and he’s lowered down. Lyle almost fucking dies because Ganma, who’s holding the rope with Orryn, crit fails and causes both of them to drop the rope, but Dutmeat catches it just in time so Lyle doesn’t fall to his death. He finds that there’s a tunnel at the bottom of the sewer and he like, finds a button if I recall correctly? And opens the grate. He also found a strange tunnel. The rest of the gang jumps down and they go investigate.

There’s a long-ass ladder down to the depths, and the Fun Gang goes down. It smells like piss. It’s not nice.

At the bottom is a dirty small pond of water, and a bunch of corpses. Orryn doesn’t like, loot them per say, but he does get some nice meat(TM) off of the fresher ones, for later snacking.

Anyway, the room is round and dome-like, and there’s four passages around it. There’s light shining from one of them, and Dutmeat investigates, finding two strange elves huddled around an half-orc corpse. The gang joins him, and they sneak into the room, still under Ganma’s invisibility spell. Ganma eavesdrops the elves, and finds out they’re eating the half-orc corpse. Orryn sneaks ahead and finds a strange brick wall, and points it out to the others.

And Ganma’s spell wears out.

And the elves attack, and one of them hits Lyle.

Fortunately Ganma manages to convince them the Fun Gang’s not here to mess with them, and they go elsewhere.

The gang investigates the wall. Dutmeat crit fails and cries a little, and no one else can find out anything about it either. After recovering from his epic fail Dutmeat finds out that there’s four bricks that are different from the others, two of them are magnetic, and all of them have arrows pointing to different directions on them. It’s puzzle time!

At first everyone tries trial and error but that doesn’t really work. Orryn really tries to help with the puzzle but because he’s not very smart and I’m bad at D&D (and also not very smart) he’s not very useful. And Dutmeat has to go and solve the puzzle for the gang. It involved the four passages from the dome room, they had arches with different kinda arrows on them. And the brick wall opens, and reveals a hallway! The gang goes ahead.

The hallway leads to an underground town full of crusty tents and jank buildings made of planks. It’s the gosh darn black market fellas. Dutmeat and Ganma go around asking if they could sell the mysterious black orb they found last time to some vendor. They offer it to a gnome, who wants to see it, so the two leave their weapons to the counter and go to the back of the tent. Orryn and Lyle are chilling at the front...

...when some thieves try to steal Dutmeat’s and Ganma’s stuff!

Lyle’s turned to a rock, so Orryn tries to yeet him at the thieves. Unfortunately he just drops the rock, so he dashes after the thieves. He grabs one of them, trying to intimidate them to giving back the stuff they stole, but it doesn’t work and Orryn gets hit across his face and cheek with a dagger.

Lyle comes to help out though, and throws a potato he saved from their breakfast against the thief so hard he’s knocked to the ground. Orryn tries to intimidate them again, it still doesn’t work but the thief decides the dagger he stole is not worth the effort and drops it.

Orryn and Lyle return to the tent, where the gang discusses the orb. Dutmeat and Ganma found out that no one’s gonna buy the orb probably, it’s of royal origin, and there’s only one person who might be interested, but apparently she’s kinda. Fierce. Or something.

Immediately after that Orryn and Ganma notice that a strange thiefling woman is standing among them. The others can’t see her, but she cackles all smug and shit and reveals herself.

I don’t remember her name, let alone how to spell it, but she’s the woman who’s after the orb. The only thing is, she’s scary as hell. The gnome that Dutmeat and Ganma spoke to? Yeah the woman cracked his neck and killed him after he told about her to the Fun Gang. She’s like, creepy and scary and thinks killing others is funny and entertaining and shit... basically very much bad news. She wants the mystery orb. At first Dutmeat is not giving it to her. She then suggests a game where she would hunt down the Fun Gang. And kill them. Lyle convinces her to change it to hide and seek, at which point Dutmeat gets so intimidated that he gives her the orb. But she still wants to kill the Fun Gang, since they accidentally ended up killing the lord that she wanted to murder. So she calls her goons on the gang, the same ones who they stole the orb from. She then flees with the orb.

The goons are pissed, and attack the gang. Orryn wonders why everyone’s so hell-bent on being the ones to kill specific people around these parts, and gets hit with a sword by a half-orc.

At this point Edge has woken up and made her way to the sewers. She also met with the creepy spooky woman. But yeah she joins the others just in time to fight.

Lyle tries to get to higher ground, but crit fails and falls into mud, face first. Dutmeat hits other guy, who’s a small elf. Ganma hits the half-orc attacking Orryn real hard, causing the goon to bleed. He’s hurt bad, and real pissed. Edge tries to hit him with a spear, but misses. The half-orc hits Orryn again, much harder this time, and Orryn has like 3 HP (out of 8) left.

Orryn tries to bite the orc’s head, but manages to. Miss. Just biting the air all goofy and shit, which pisses off the half-orc even more.

Lyle tries to hit one of the guys with a bow, but misses his arrow. Dutmeat manages to almost kill the elf. Said elf casts a strange tar-spell on Ganma, trying to like constrain her like that, but she just brushes it off on her turn. Edge spears the half-orc, who just kinda. Grabs her spear and starts pulling her closer. Yikes.

Orryn tries to go for the skull chomp again but my rolls are TERRIBLE and he misses again.

Lyle arrows the orc to the knee. Dutmeat goes for the half-orc, going through Edge’s legs and stabs the orc in the balls the crotch. He still doesn’t die though! And the elf stabs Edge too. Ganma attacks the orc as well, and her sword gets lodged into his skull. He’s still standing. Edge got so pissed off she cast some, spell of anger and fire and cool, and like destroyed the elf in a fiery death of hell. It was rad.

Orryn is really tired of missing, and so am I. Once again he goes for the headshot, and (with some DM grace for character development’s sake) he finally hits, and CRUSHES THE ORC’S SKULL IN HIS JAWS AND IT FUCKING EXPLODES AND THERE’S BLOOD EVERYWHERE. It was cool. And Orryn got some HP back too.

Afterwards Edge gets a briefing of what’s happened so far, the bodies are looted, and Orryn decides to have a snack on the corpses because why throw perfectly good food away? Everyone got 5 gold from the bodies, that was nice.

Anyway, Dutmeat sells some of his loot, Ganma has some map and a book looted from the corpses, and Lyle investigates a ring he got from the loot. It whispers to him. It’s spooky.

The book Ganma got was some kind of a diary of the goons’. It details that the creepy woman wasn’t always creepy, but might be possessed by some strange artifact(s) she’s found over time. And she developed this obsession with murdering the Fun Gang after they robbed her from the lord’s murder. And she’s power hungry and wants to take over the world by killing lords? Not good :/

Anyway Ganma investigates Lyle’s ring. It’s magical, and has a spirit attached to it. She puts it on to talk to the spirit, and obtains a spirit buddy who wants to posses her, though they’d also give her “immense power”. Sounds sketchy, so Ganma refuses the offer, but the ring is now stuck on her, so yeah she’s got a spirit buddy.

The gang finds a shack to get some rest in, and everyone levels up to level 3. Orryn is so, so fucking tired and kinda shaken up and scared because fuck they have a murderer after them and 24 hours to shake her off. The adventure is no longer fun and games and it’s sad :(

but yeah session two! it was fun and cool but now im kinda unnerved because of the creepy murder woman and im scared orryn will die aksdhkaj (i mean i was already convince he’d die in that fight against the half-orc so yeah)

at least orryn got some strange character development out of it lmao

#shut up purp #dungo and drago