#and I've been saying that the most tragic thing that happened in my playthrough is gale finding a woman who could peg him | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

agnol117 · 5 months

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i haven't thought of myself as my deadname since i was fifteen.

this wasn't intentional, but i don't think it was unintentional, either. i'd adopted the name "Agnol" online by then, taking a word i'd learned in french and chopping off letters until i was left with a word that was just sounds, and wasn't necessarily masculine (it's worth noting that "Agnol" is also the name of a superboss in Pokémon Colosseum, and that may have inspired me, but i don't recall ever reaching that boss). this wasn't really for trans reasons, not at the time. if you'd asked fifteen year old me about it, i probably wouldn't have had anything positive to say about being trans, if I had anything to say at all. but even then, there was a sort of sense in my mind that "deadname" was my body, while "Agnol" was me, in a way that was separate from my body.

in addition to all of this, i'd been playing as the girl in any game that let me since Dragon Warrior III on the gameboy color. truthfully, this came in waves, especially in Pokémon games -- i'd make a girl character, get embarassed about it, restart as the boy, get frustrated that that didn't "feel" right, restart as a girl, and repeat the cycle. eventually i just took to getting both versions, one to play "publically" at school as the boy, one to play on my own as the girl. and while all this was going on, i played around with names. i won't go through them all, but suffice it to say that it took me a while to settle on "jill," a name that feels right in a way i'm not going to get into here, and by the time i did i was pretty willing to actually acknowledge that i was, in fact, trans. i was also, by this time, thirty-one. it had been a rough decade and a half, and even then, i'd spent quite a lot of that time actively avoiding thinking about gender stuff.

all of this now brings us to Earthbound. there's gonna be pretty heavy spoilers here, and while it is a thirty year old game and most of what I've got to say has been kinda brough into the pop culture knowledge of Earthbound, this is your chance to turn back.

i'd been using "jill" as my name for characters when i could for about a year and a half when i got to my first playthrough of Earthbound. i'm not out in real life, because for reasons involving my health and safety, i can't be. so i was jill in games, in the places i could be. but, well, as much as i wished it didn't, that always felt like a character i was playing. and really, that's to be expected. much as i might wish i was, i'm not a pokémon trainer. even things like OneShot, where you as player are ostensibly a character in the story, didn't really feel like i was really "there." it didn't really feel like me.

Earthbound changed that.

at a certain point in Earthbound, you're prompted to enter your name. notably, the game specifies that it's asking for your name. you, the player. it verifies this later, but after that, you still have like four more dungeons to go through and a bunch of story shit happens and honestly i forgot it happened.

and then you get to Giygas.

i have a lot of feelings about this fight, but really, most of them aren't relevant here. the important part is how the fight ends. you reach a point where your characters cannot damage Giygas anymore. that's actually underselling it -- the fight reachs a point where you can't even understand what Giygas is doing to your characters anymore. it's become a meme at this point, but "You cannot grasp the true form of Giygas's attack!" is legitimately terrifying. you're not even fighting a clearly defined opponent anymore. you're fighting the background.

and Paula prays.

the game kind of obliquely hints at this, but having played Mother (which is, in retrospect, a truly tragic name for the series) previously and knowing that when you fought Giygas in that, you beat him by singing a lullaby at him until he has a mental breakdown and leaves (it's that kind of series), i kind of expected this. Paula prays, and as she does, various other characters in the game sense it, and they pray for you and add their strength to yours. and then, after praying a bunch of times and getting help from so many of your friends, your prayers stop working. Paula's call is absorbed by the darkness. but she tries one more time, and someone answers.

you.

the player.

the name you put in.

this was...moving. this touched me in a way that i struggle to find words for. i said in a previous post about this that after beating Earthbound, i had to go take a nap, and i wasn't kidding. it has been a week since i finished the game, and i'm still trying to process this. because they called out to me, and they did so using the name i've picked for myself. they needed me, and the me they needed is the me i've been trying to be for so long. for so long that when i first felt that longing, that feeling that i wasn't who everyone was telling me i was, i didn't have the words for it. i didn't know it was a thing i could feel. and Ness and his friends needed me. the person i want to be. the person i really am.

and my god, that just meant the world to me.

#jill plays games #earthbound #trans thoughts #trans #transfemme

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voicefromthecorner · 3 years

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"Y'know, this mess is gonna have repercussions upstairs. But hey, at least things are back to normal. Right? "

"...What? You seem down."

"Hey, it's their world. They get to decide what to do with it. We just..."

"Heh, some folks just can't take 'no' for an answer."

(My screencaps of the gang were awful, I'm so sorry, Beat. Got a good shot of Shiki's real form at least.)

So I mentioned during the Hamilton thing that I saw in advance the change made to this cutscene from the original DS version. To talk about it now, it is of course the fact that when Hanekoma says "you seem down", Joshua used to actually look down, with a small yet distinct frown on his face. But here, that's been changed to a small yet distinct smile.

Both kind of work, but they change the way we see Joshua. What they have in common is that we see Joshua watching over Neku reuniting with his friends while Hanekoma notes that he's sad, which sounds to be a result of Joshua being told "no" or knowing the answer to be "no" in response to, most likely, being able to join them. I don't think there's much possibility of a different interpretation. For a time, I used to wonder if Joshua was unhappy with the results of the game, but that wouldn't makes sense since said results were his decision. When I realised the real reason he was so down, it was honestly kind of a shock to me that made me appreciate Joshua a little more.

I think that's why, after thinking about it, I ultimately prefer the original. Seeing Joshua openly unhappy about something, like sad unhappy, is so significant. He actually drops his mask, even for just a second, which is such a big deal for Joshua. I feel like it's a bigger impact because for something to finally cause that to happen, it must be really big deal.

Here, we get the sweet implication that Hanekoma can see through his mask, but we don't know how big a deal it is because the mask is still up. This could be really painful for Joshua or just a little disappointing and we wouldn't know which. Heck, Mr H could even be totally misreading him and he could really be fine with it. There's just a lack of certainty that this is a big deal to him like there was before.

Still, if he's smiling through the pain, then that's just another way to look at this scene with pity. Whether Hanekoma can read him despite his defences or whether Joshua is willing to let down those defences to his trusted friend. Whether Joshua is just sad to be excluded or able to smile because things are happy for other people. Both versions show a deeper side to him. Both versions give us reason to pity this hidden loneliness he feels. Both versions indicate that at one point, Neku (and the others, maybe) realised that Joshua wasn't coming and gave up waiting for him. And both versions show a closeness to Joshua and Hanekoma that's all the more tragic when you remember Secret Report 21.

This secret ending is short, and the obvious visual highlight is the chance to see Hanekoma in his full Angel glory, but the big reveal of it is that despite his incredibly enigmatic persona, Joshua does care and on some level wishes he could be friends with Neku.

*(side-eyes A New Day ending)*

And the tragedy is that he can't. I do feel like some of that is lost with that change, but it remains true. Proof that Joshua Kiryu has a heart.

And that's us! The liveblog of The World Ends With You Final Remix officially ends here!

I'll post some thoughts on the anime when I finish it and I'll do a substantially shorter liveblog/reaction to NEO. And heck, I might make a post or two for this game sometime in the future if something catches my eye.

But the story and the full content of this playthrough concludes here. I can't thank all of you who joined me for this, pitched in your thoughts, shared some of my dumb jokes and/or ramblings and in general just had fun following along enough. I've said it before, but it's worth repeating.

I feel like a lot of this liveblog has just been me unloading years of TWEWY love I've not had a chance to share with anyone before. It was a lot of work and it probably showed how new to the whole thing I was a few times. But it feels good to complete it and it was an honour while it lasted.

The future you choose is within you. I am glad to have had the chance to meet you.

#gamefromthecorner #the world ends with you #twewy #final remix #liveblog #playthrough #neku sakuraba #shiki misaki #beat bito #twewy beat #rhyme bito #twewy rhyme #joshua kiryu #sanae hanekoma #cutscene #twewy spoilers

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starsaver94 · 2 years

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I've noticed something really interesting about this fandom

So, I'm currently rewatching a playthrough of the third trial in Trigger Happy Havoc (I'm doing a rewrite for my younger brother), and it baffles me that the fandom says that Hifumi would SA someone, when he was canonically ready to kill Taka cause he thought he SA-ed Celeste

Meanwhile, you have characters like Miu that groped Kaede, made fun of trauma and dead people, SA-ed Kiibo (Kiibo said no twice, and Miu still pushed him into 'maintenance') and tried to baby trap Shuichi. Yet, she's loved by the fandom cause "She's funny" and people actually try to defend her LSE by saying "It's because of her past that she is like this"

Ummmm.....what? All we got from her past was that she was in a coma due to a car accident. She has abandonment issues, yes. But that......doesn't justify a literal r//pe

Meanwhile, people don't wanna get to know Hifumi, someone who only made sexual innuendos (which, I will say was A LOT more toned down compared to Teruteru's and Miu's). His past wasn't really tragic, it was relatively normal (in terms of a Otaku), but his motive video WAS his big sister. That honestly says a lot already

It just puzzles me how someone could say Hifumi would SA someone and Miu is such a precious wifey and poor soul, when there is canon evidence that actually goes against it

I think it might be because of how the character’s themselves are presented. Even though Miu is crass and vulgar, she is shown with an attractive design. While Hifumi is given the stereotypical nerd/otaku look (overweight and generally unattractive).

And while I don’t like pulling the gender card, I’m afraid that might also come into play here. Because while Hifumi does make lewd comments (albeit, like you said, relatively tame compared to TeruTeru and Miu), he does respect women and is willing to become a white knight for Celeste (btw Celeste, I still don’t like you). However, when it comes to Miu, most people in the fandom look past all of these things because, well… she female.

I mean if the scene with Kiibo or the LSE with Shuichi happened and the genders were reversed, then people would have been turned off and even disguised by those scenes. Again, I don’t like pulling this card, but it could be a possibility as to why people ignore or even excuse Miu’s actions.

#star answers #chat #character analysis #discussion #author answers

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