@arcann tagged me bc somehow they KNOW i need to finish my 2nd playthrough!

TRAITS

Your “canon” trait combination? I did Mystical and Keen Eye on my first playthrough and i honestly really liked it. Combining a more “practical” trait like Keen Eye and a more ‘emotion” based trait like Mystical really balanced the interactions between the characters and environment for me in a way that didnt make one or the other seem useless

What 3rd trait would you add for hardcore mode? After genuinely thinking about it probably Talk to Animals. I have no clue how useless or not it would be in Hardcore Mode but i love all those critters and any extra info is good info, right? 2nd choice may be Street Smart for obvious reasons and a more practical application!

What trait are you least drawn to? Hot. I have heard it can open up more but it kinda seems like it could be a free pass for MC to be the Worst while still being buddies with people just bc they’re attractive and idk how i feel about that. I also don’t really flirt too much even on romance routes. I’m sure the writing would still be incredible tho as nothing has felt like a let down yet!

Coolest trait? I just started a Streetsmart + Talk to Animals combo and i really like Streetsmart so far. Seems like the one I might choose if you only got one option instead of 2! Will have to finish the playthrough to confirm my thoughts tho bc i surprisingly miss Mystical, at least in trying to outstubborn Sybil (even if it doesnt work)!

ROMANCE

Who are you romancing? I have my first MC who i guess is closest to my “canon” playthrough branching off with different saves bc i am unsure if staying single or romancing Reese or Kaneeka is more in line with the personality im developing for her. Kaneeka is a fellow goth so of course i love her and my MC is punk as hell so theres some crossover there, but also horror movies and weird fucked up body horror art is always fun as hell so theres my boy Reese. But honestly the friendships have been fulfilling enough that i wouldnt need MC to romance anyone i guess.

What romance are you least interested in? Waynes is probably 50 shades of fucked up and i dont personally want to give it a shot but i might for a really weird MC so strangely i might have to say Stella? Not that she isn’t the sweetest but i kind of like her with Tabitha potentially, even if its not a Canon Thing.

Who would you romance if every character was eligible? Still Reese, Kaneeka, and Avery. They all have good interactions with the MC and although the game isnt 100% done yet at this point im not sure other characters would have the same amount of friendship built up to where i would want to start a romance.

MISC

What character would hurt the most if something bad happened to them? Avery honestly. Theyre very mellow and friendly and one of my MCS faves and i would be pissed if i fucked up something and got them seriously hurt.

Would you stay in Scarlet Hollow once the week is over? Im not sure there will BE a Scarlet Hollow once the week is over. Either it will be wiped out by Supernatural Shenanigans or the strike will end the coal mine (as it probably should) and everyone will have to move anyway. Even if somehow the town is Fine my MC is probably going to die or something bc holy shit Mystical is feeling very foreboding.

Who would you vote for dog mayor? I think i will know for sure when i finish my Talk to Animals playthrough. I take this stuff very seriously after all.

Not tagging anyone bc i am unsure if anyone else has played it yet but YOU SHOULD.

How about Fluff 38 for Tabitha, dear Maxy?

38 - “I'm not scared but if you are, you can hold my hand.”

You make yourself comfortable on the couch, a bowl of popcorn on your lap and Tabitha by your side. She shivers slightly and you grab the blanket draped over the back of the couch to cover her with it. You turn your attention back to the TV as the Halloween theme music begins to play. She shivers again, curling her body into yours and you quickly connect the dots. 

You turn your head to look at her, her delicate features illuminated by the light of the TV. "I'm not scared but if you are, you can hold my hand." She looks down at your outstretched hand before meeting your eyes, quickly nodding her head. She takes your hand in hers and she grips it tight, despite the opening credits being the only thing on screen. 

By the time you're halfway through the movie, Tabitha has climbed onto your lap, her face buried in your neck more often than not. You're not sure how it happened, but with your arms wrapped protectively around you, you're not complaining. 

ALSO TO FIX EXCELLUS

Because tangeants again lol

Recognise that its fuckin stupid and bigoted to expect us to believe someone is a villain INSTANTLY after seeing that they're queer, before they even do anything. Don't spend your entire damn game having the characters go "eww its that disgusting person of ambiguous gender we should kill them because gross" rather than.. Yknow.. "Excellus fuckin murdered those people". Recognise that literally doing this is gonna make your character LESS villainous and MORE sympathetic long before you finally get to goddamn showing them do anything bad except say "ohoho i wanna be a princess". And it'll make bunni REALLY PISSED OFF because nobody wants to feel sad for an asshole murderer yet THAT SADNESS IS FOREVER ENGRAINED IN MY SOUL NOW

Seriously fuckin hell it even made the heroes look less heroic! I felt like Excellus was almost justified in becoming a murdering selfish monster if she spent her entire life being treated that way by both sides in this big good or evil conflict. Why the fuck should she give a shit if she's being degraded? Like FUCKIN OBVIOUSLY murdering people and wanting to conquer a random japanese country as a mad dictator is not a remotely logical reaction to being misgendered. But like they could have changed some stuff and made a perfectly good sympathetic villain who gets manipulated by the bigger bad because of her sad past of being treated like shit and like she feels like this is her only option to be herself. And then maybe you can reignite her hope in the world and her self esteem and moral centre and help her redeem herself and team up with you to take out the real horrible fucks with no sympathetic motives. Instead she's friggin played as THE one who's evil cos she has no sympathetic motive. Like that's her whole Thing, she's supposed to just be selfish and greedy and horrid. Your damn bigotry somehow failed your own story as well as failing all trans people ever!

Or like yknow.. If you want an asshole fuckboi then actually write an asshole fuckboi. Scrubby scrub the trans = bad shit from this plotline and you do indeed have a selfish monster who murders a bunch of innocent people and gets his just desserts. You had a ready made simple character archetype and you were so preoccupied shoving your transphobic screed into your game that you fucked it up!

So yeah i think either make this goofy ohoho trans auntie a good character, make the asshole ohoho bad character a cis man, do both at once, or like even i'm not opposed to having a trans villain exist but like seriously make them a synpathetic villain. If they're the only trans character in the plot its already gonna send a bad message if theyre in the role of "worst most underhanded jerk villain", even if it WASNT also transphobic as fuck. So a sympathic trans villain or adding more LGBT characters so it doesnt seem like this one individual was designed to make a statement on your entire feelings for a minority.

ALSO

like seriously please do not do this stupid thing of mooshing every stereotype together from every LGBT identity and acting like theyre all the same thing?? Like man i fuckin HATE that anime trope that yknow.. The gay man says all this trans stuff cos he's ~just that flambouyant~ Like being a drag queen is what 100% of gay men are, 24/7, and anyone saying theyre a trans woman is just one of those drag queens who's really getting into character. Or just.. I dunno. I cant even wrap my head around what train of logic must have led to that stereotype in the first place! And its so fuckin annoying as a queer person trying to talk about why this is bad queer stereotyping, it just makes me extra sad to straight up not know what pronouns to use for the character so i feel like i'm being just as horrible to them as their creators were. Like man i've only settled on going for "she" for Excellus cos after years of looking into it it does seem like the original japanese was indeed specifically using stereotypes of trans women and not trans men or nonbinary people. Though all languages do seem to call the character male it seems pretty strongly to be a "i believe that trans women are men and can never be women" kind of thing, rathe rthan the character herself calling HERSELF male. She calls herself a woman in both english and japanese, and its just that the english has everyone else use male pronouns for her and added the non-canon "explanation" that she only acts like a trans woman because she has something wrong with her balls. (Ugh!) And in japanese on top of calling herself a woman she also uses feminine (and specifically trans/drag queen coded) variants of "I", and other common speech pattern traits used for negative stereotypes of trans women. Though again we do have other characters calling her a disgusting perverted man instead. Sigh!

Ok ok ALSO BIGGEST FUCKIN FIX! dont draw the character like a horrible distorted cariacature goblin in an entirely different art style to everyone else. Seriously its so annoying how they tried to make you agree with "excellus is disgusting just for acting queer" by LITERALLY DRAWING A DISGUSTING CHARACTER. If you take away the weirdass overdetailed horror movie monster face, there is nothing ugly or even "manly looking" about her! She's just like somebody's perfectly normal chubby aunt or something. You could go out in any street all over the world and see five of her! I hate it cos its almost like psychological manipulation or something? Like i've seen so many lets players who arent bigoted but merely oblivious still agree that excellus is ugly and disgusting and comical because of it, cos all the implications of transphobia/homophobia flew over their heads and all they saw was a character drawn to look monsterous. And just.. This is so common. Its the overwhelming japanese stereotype of trans women. Draw them looking INFINATELY MORE MANLY than the cis male characters. So manly that it really hammers home how "obvious" it is that a man in lipstick or dresses "just looks wrong" and of course there's NO way they could ever pass and ha ha look how deluded they are that they think they look pretty. It's horrid. It really is. Seriously I like to point at Tabitha from Pokemon ORAS for a good counter example, cos he's also an ambiguously transgender character from a game that came out around the same time and by some weird coincidence they look very similar. Except for the literal entire face. The literal entire exact same face, just its drawn hideous and distorted on the one who's supposed to be a negative trans stereotype, and drawn exactly like everyone else on the positive one. And there's not one example in the whole game of anyone calling Tabitha ugly because he looks trans, or even insulting his weight or anything. Same damn character design, just drawn without bias and treated like a human being. I mean seriously right down to them having the small "evil eyes" but with Tabitha he's always drawn with them in a perpetual sort of happy face and then his pose with them looking similar to Excellus is supposed to be a BADASS MOMENT of this comic relief villain showing his worth! And hw literally has red eyes on top of it! His design is even MORE "evil" yet just not drawing it as a stereotype entirely changes the player's perception and he became beloved by many. Whereas with Excellus even the trans people in the audience couldnt relate to her and just felt fuckin sad.

Oh also i guess Excellus is implied to be a trans woman and Tabitha is implied to be a trans man? But i don't think game freak was trying to say anything about trans men being more valid or whatever, cos the first canonical LGBT character of any sort was a trans woman npc in the battle maison. And tabitha being trans isnt really confirmed as clearly as she was. i hope someday theyre able to confirm an LGBT main cast member but until then i will forever hold onto the glimmer of hope that was given to me by Beauty Nova.

Also seriously Tabitha and Excellus both also look EXACTLY LIKE ME IN REAL LIFE so I kinda took Excellus extra hard and latched onto the Tabitha headcanon so much more because it was good healing after all that nonsense. Tho I also did considee nonbinary Tabitha at the time, because his japanese name is a gender neutral one that's merely like 75% female, rather than a 100% feminine one. But then his old RSE design was very masculine so i think maybe a trans man is what they were trying to imply if they did indeed do it on purpose. Anyway i probably would have translated his name as Ashley cos it has the same "technically neutral but more popular with girls" aesthetic while also keeping the same fire pun as Homura. I have no idea how on earth Tabitha is supposed to be a joke, honestly. Tho i meam maybe he's just the one type specialist on the entire poke-earth who doesnt have a joke name?

ANYWAY thank you terrible transphobic stupid manga i read today for reminding me that i love Tabitha. And also the developers love Tabitha. And also all the characters in universe love him, like seriously the only difference between the devon dialogue of him and Shelly is that they mention the other scientists nicknamed him tabitabi. And its so cute how seriously they said it too?? Its like "our boss tabitabi,the most feared and respected genius man".

Lovv dat tabb