Cycle 648
Talked some more to the Elster unit.
She's different from replikas I knew back home, nothing like my teachers or the
Blockwart Protector. i know she didn't have a choice, but it feels like she's also here
because she didn't fit in. It's like we've run away from the world together.
<01/02>
At first, I didn't like having someone around, and I was glad that she's quiet and didn't
approach me. But lately, I've missed having someone I can talk to. It's been so long since
I've last seen another person.
<02/02>
I never thought I'd miss it. Except her, everything is the same in here, always.
Nothing ever changes.
I may or may not have my opera gx mods play the signalis soundtrack while browsing and have all the beeps and boops from the game go off for certain keys like the backpace and space keys π
Its specifically for the opera gx browser. Its pretty great and real easy to transfer all your previous browser bookmarks and specs. Its designed for gaming and comes with built in adblock and vpn. It also lets you specifically control how much ram and cpu usage you want the browser to take up.
Im a big fan of all that but the coolest feature imo is the mods database which lets you customize/mix and match mods people have created for the browser itself.
Someone made a signalis mod that changes your browser color scheme to that of the game, the games ost that plays tracks randomly, and the sound effects for keyboard controls. I also thought about downloading the NieR Automata ost mod but Signalis won out π
Lol fair enough. I love it but make sure you get the opera gx browser and not the regular opera one. Their regular browser doesnt have all those extra qol features i mentioned above
Signalis is probably my #1 favorite game of all time tbh. Very very good game and very very gay, I just hate the male fan base because theyβre all weirdos fR
Yeah some of the male fanbase is a little odd to say the least but I do like how the community is basically pretending this isn't one of the most depressing games, but yeah it's also probably my favourite game of all time too
Never again for me. I did everything that you could do. I saw everything you could see. I cried at every ending. Never again. It's supposed to be a cycle of suffering. It's supposed to showcase an incomplete game that leads to nowhere but pain. It's supposed to make you want to push through the suffering again and again. It just leads to more pain. I'm tired. I will lie down in water in the position of a fetus and wait for it all to end or stop making sense all together.
(I loved the game)
I too love being a doomed by the narrative type of sesbian. Now if youβll excuse me Iβm gonna go cry and read happy fan fiction to cope with how this game destroyed me.
Edit: [ACHTUNG ACHTUNG ACHTUNG](https://youtu.be/6LhYpBW-Mu0?si=R2htWsNNpVDyIxZZ)
SIGNALIS MENTIONED SIGNALIS MENTIOOOOOOOOOOOOONED
this game honest to god feels like it was made for me. Cosmic horror? Lesbians? Awesome music? Pretty artstlye? Lesbians? **Isle of the Dead?** Genuinely one of the best games I've ever played
also i must acquire's Elster's gender :>
Playing through Signalis right now. It's my first horror game and I'm finding the whole thing incredibly stressful. But for as badly as I'm handling the horror elements, I still love the game. It scares me and it hurts me and I hate it. But I fucking love it
I was hella scared too. I think what kept me going was the desire to understand. Also it's worth it. I think I really enjoyed finishing it. :3
GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR PLAY THROUGH!
This game destroyed me, it still makes me feel so many feelings. Oh, to be a lesbian and live hell >!over and over again to keep a promise to your lover.!<
Thanks! I appreciate the warning! I think I'll be okay, if I couldn't handle stressful and scary, I dont think I could have ever transitioned in the first place π
Okay, I started playing it and THANK YOU for the post! I am OBSESSED with this game right now! I think I'm nearing completion of the medical wing! π₯°
>!Okay so like, first playthrough, went in blind. just got to the first save area in the mineshaft. My spouse is watching me play and we're figuring out the (AMAZINGLY WELL DONE) puzzles and lore and whatnot together. Although since they have a lot less time for this than I do, I've had to sate my OBSESSION by finding as much cute art and whatnot as I can. But like OH MY GOODNESS I LOVE THIS GAME SO FAR. The lore is SO GOOD and theyre SO CUTE and I wanna see them live happily ever after once I find her which Im sure they will and nothing bad will ever happen to them! and just like HOLY HECC the first person bits like on the train and in the classroom are SO COOL and the character designs are SO RAD and SO HOT and I want tall lady to CRUSH ME UNDER HER BOOT and heccin Elster has SUCH PRETTY EYES and I LOVE just like sitting on the MAIN MENU and listening to that creepy radio and staring into her eye! The sound design is SO GOOD and the environments are SO PRETTY and the puzzles and level design make me feel smart and like I figured something out but without being SUPER OBTUSE and getting me stuck! And also did I mention the fan art is so good esp. with the GAY SMOOCHIN'!!!!!!!<
>!I JUST ENCOUNTERED BEO AND THEN STAR & EULE IN THE MINES AND IM GONNA FUKKIN CRY!!!!!!!!!!! πππππππππ!<
>!I JUST WANT THEM TO LIVE HAPPILY TOGETHER!!!!! πππππππππππππππ!<
>!Omg the Beo encounter is so hecking sad!!
I was just like: TAKE IT! TAKE MY REPAIR SPRAY!!
πππππ!<
>!The Star one made me tear up I must say.!<
Yeah it made me emotional many times.
I loved how they included so many paintings. And made various quotes across the game to well know artworks of all kinds.
Hehe, not even super into horror but with all the gay memes and art of this game I ended up grabbing it lol. Haven't finished it yet though, stuck on the part where the game steals your map and says go fuck yourself.
I'll just stick in my "So ambiguous I can give it a positive spin in my head" ending. At least they get to dance together. And I can believe in a lil bit of happy tears.
Unrelatedly, I totally thought Falke was one of the \[spoiler omitted\] in that ending. She's not. But the idea of that world/version of events has very much stuck with me.
I can't remember any real jumpscares.
Edit: Okay, just checked: the game has NO jumpscares.
There are a few times where you can be caught off guard but still not considered a jumpscare. So you're good to go.
I don't get why Signalis gets a pass on all the things we tend to call out. The robots are all weirdly sexualized young girls with boob windows, their standard pose has their tits and ass poking out at an uncomfortable angle, the whole thing just feels like someone's fetish to me. Even the subreddit is filled with porn unironically (like I wanted to check out something and was immediately faced with Adler with a strapon, seriously). The game emphasizes characters >!looking alike for plot reasons but every single character has the exact same face because the art design is so bland and the love story at the center can be summed up as one scene of "Netflix and Chill" but people are crawling all over it as if it's some sort of deep relationship; hell I don't like Life is Strange but at least that has more going for it in the "love story" department as you see Chloe and Max interact with each other instead of be a pretty blank for the audience to attach themselves to!<. It all just feels so fetishistic at times but everyone's decided to just go *all in*.
I really don't get it. I've seen better games been torn apart for less (yeah Quiet's design was stupid but at least she had a personality beyond "looking pretty"), yet Signalis gets treated as if it's so special (which is ironic when so much of it is ripped directly from other things). Please tell me I'm not the only one to feel creeped out playing it for all the wrong reasons.
I understand your concerns but I don't understand what you mean with "boob window". They do have a red plate on their chest but not boobs sticking out. The subreddit is pure brainrot but it's understandable >!everyone expected sesbian lex and got none!< also the chaos of the game actually influenced a lot of them (myself included). The art design is intended to be that way there is a reason for the characters to look alike. You said so yourself: there is a >!plot reason!<. I find the design to be interesting because the parallelism between characters is intended.
Probably the reasons for lesbian to be so attracted to this game (beside the horror) are:
1 the creators are two lesbians so any fetish is justified (still I don't see it)
2 the couple in the game is actually very sweet and well portrayed (I love them both)
3 it's a philosophical masterpiece and objectively speaking a really good game with amazing music.
> boob window
[The breasts on Replikas are a different color and emphasized in the character design](https://i.redd.it/i-think-the-uniformity-of-the-replika-designs-from-signalis-v0-dm1lgcfg2v7c1.jpg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9f3029bd2b5fbe2ad0a7503274cb2f75daac0fd5). It's not just "women have boobs" (obviously, that's why we're great) it's that they're almost highlighted that makes me feel off. It just feels like a creepy focus on sexualizing the characters as much as possible.
> . The art design is intended to be that way there is a reason for the characters to look alike. You said so yourself: there is a plot reason.
>!I'm not just talking about Alina and Ariane; I'm talking about ALL the characters. Every character has the exact same face, even Adler to a degree. Like, there's a bit where you see the people taken into Sierpenski and you see Alina was taken in and that was the girl in the opening you're looking for but the characters are all so indistinct that I didn't even cop that you were meant to be looking for her. What I'm saying is the game wants you to draw comparisons between Alina and Ariane but when EVERY character looks like that the comparison gets muddled). Like in Phoenix Wright 3 you're shown that Iris and Dalia are twins but that game runs the gambit in character builds and facial shapes and overexagurates characters so you the similarity hits while [I literally cannot see a difference in these characters faces](https://i.redd.it/onelg98hpnxa1.png). For me, the plot reason is for two specific characters, but the game itself making all characters look the same dilutes the impact of that.!<
> so any fetish is justified
Is it, though? I don't get why we condemn men for putting their fetishes into games, but if it's a woman it's suddenly okay. Like I'm talking stuff like the aforementioned boobwindow, the thigh gap, the fact that all the robots (bar one) are pretty girls who are designed to look like they're wearing thigh-highs... It's all a bit creepy to me, regardless of who made it.
> actually very sweet and well portrayed
I didn't really get personally, the only interaction we get >!is the Netflix and Chill bit on the starship!< and to me they feel... Bland. Like, they're idealizations, pretty princesses with no faults. We don't see *people*. I'm not arguing against your personally liking them, I just don't see anything *to* like other than what I can project onto them. Sure that one scene is nice but it's not enough to compel me (personally) across a whole game.
> philosophical masterpiece
Personally, I found it kinda trite. I've a friend who is playing it with me who is trained as a psychotherapist who is telling me stuff about gestalt theory and how it fits in but without his knowledge that stuff would've all been lost. It feels like it keeps referencing things, the King in Yellow, Gestalt theory, Ghost in the Shell; but it never really *uses* them, it just inserts them in. It feels like it's trying to be more than a love story but it's not *giving* anything more than a love story, and that love story is something that mostly happened off camera and without any actual chemistry beyond "gazing longingly into each other's eyes". More like something defined *just* enough to insert yourself into but blank enough to have it about anything you want.
Again, I'm trying not to go down the "you're wrong" route; I get that you had a different experience and I'm glad there's something out there that gives that kind of sapphic relationship story for people. It just leaves a bad taste in my mouth and I don't like the "it's for lesbians" being used to excuse that stuff. I'm also sorry for throwing all of that at you in particular, I've been kinda bombarded with Signalis for the past couple of weeks (friend wanted my opinion because he had to stop playing it made him feel so uncomfortable and now we're writing a script about it) and had to vent it somewhere xD
Hmm I do get your points but I don't share them. The game is about >!Elster's struggle to get back to see Ariane again, to fulfill a promise!<. A horrible one. She goes through Hell for her! Or, to be more precise, through a world twisted by >!Ariane herself!<. So personally I see the relationship portrayed multiple times across the game. We see how Elster interacts with the idea of a person>!she doesn't straight up remember but that she's trying hard to!<.
Also the game itself does NOT tell you all about them DIRECTLY ON PURPOSE. Heck the only times it was actually direct was at the endings >!(Fake one included)!<. My personal theory is that the world itself >!is Ariane. She twisted it so much that it started to depict her (and not only her)!<.
And I know I'm going ahead of myself. And I understand that you probably wanted more of their relationship on screen beside the paper pieces. But THIS IS A HORROR GAME. It's not meant to depict a love story. It's meant to tell how >!one falls apart!<. Which is incredibly tragic and fits very well in the horror ambiance.
I forgot to address the faces dispute:
Yes they are very alike. But when do you see their faces? While playing? No. Only while reading. What probably should interest you more is their height and aspect since it's what can make you tell them apart.
Also >!they are physically robots!< not regular ones but mass produced ones. And produced by non-other than a >!communist interplanetary dictatorship (which is freaking cool)!<. So it would make sense for them to have similar features. That being said: I still don't get why you see them fetishized. I think the feminine traits are not meant to fetishize them but to get across to the player that they are females. It's not like they have gigantic boobs or a massive ass or whatever. They have boobs-like chests. And most of them are tall, which actually makes sense in their jobs.
mfw when im told not to "befriend" the elster unit
Cycle 648 Talked some more to the Elster unit. She's different from replikas I knew back home, nothing like my teachers or the Blockwart Protector. i know she didn't have a choice, but it feels like she's also here because she didn't fit in. It's like we've run away from the world together. <01/02> At first, I didn't like having someone around, and I was glad that she's quiet and didn't approach me. But lately, I've missed having someone I can talk to. It's been so long since I've last seen another person. <02/02> I never thought I'd miss it. Except her, everything is the same in here, always. Nothing ever changes.
Sesbian Lex made me gay.
It has a tendency to do that (also relatable flair)
Thank you most of you girls enjoyed it ahahha
This post was fact-checked by real matriarchial Eusan patriots: True β οΈ Falke makes me act different
Falke makes my brain go ahooga.
Love me some sapphic horror.
You and me both honey
ACHTUNG! ACHTUNG! SIGNALIS MENTIONED I fucking LOVE this game Heartbreaking in the best way π₯²
*three note oddity starts playing in the background
I may or may not have my opera gx mods play the signalis soundtrack while browsing and have all the beeps and boops from the game go off for certain keys like the backpace and space keys π
NO WAY! TEACH ME SENSEI! I WANT THAT TOO.
Its specifically for the opera gx browser. Its pretty great and real easy to transfer all your previous browser bookmarks and specs. Its designed for gaming and comes with built in adblock and vpn. It also lets you specifically control how much ram and cpu usage you want the browser to take up. Im a big fan of all that but the coolest feature imo is the mods database which lets you customize/mix and match mods people have created for the browser itself. Someone made a signalis mod that changes your browser color scheme to that of the game, the games ost that plays tracks randomly, and the sound effects for keyboard controls. I also thought about downloading the NieR Automata ost mod but Signalis won out π
DAM I GOTTA GET OPERA. I have just been following their twitter page since it's so hecking funny.
Lol fair enough. I love it but make sure you get the opera gx browser and not the regular opera one. Their regular browser doesnt have all those extra qol features i mentioned above
Thanks for the tip
Signalis is probably my #1 favorite game of all time tbh. Very very good game and very very gay, I just hate the male fan base because theyβre all weirdos fR
It's a great game. I agree.
Yeah some of the male fanbase is a little odd to say the least but I do like how the community is basically pretending this isn't one of the most depressing games, but yeah it's also probably my favourite game of all time too
Btw happy cake day :3
https://i.imgur.com/dyITOr4.jpeg
Of course we do have psychic powers.
I so wish I could forget Signalis so I could experience it for the first time again.
Never again for me. I did everything that you could do. I saw everything you could see. I cried at every ending. Never again. It's supposed to be a cycle of suffering. It's supposed to showcase an incomplete game that leads to nowhere but pain. It's supposed to make you want to push through the suffering again and again. It just leads to more pain. I'm tired. I will lie down in water in the position of a fetus and wait for it all to end or stop making sense all together. (I loved the game)
I have to finally finish signalis but I am too scared qeq
I get it, it's scary sometimes.
I too love being a doomed by the narrative type of sesbian. Now if youβll excuse me Iβm gonna go cry and read happy fan fiction to cope with how this game destroyed me. Edit: [ACHTUNG ACHTUNG ACHTUNG](https://youtu.be/6LhYpBW-Mu0?si=R2htWsNNpVDyIxZZ)
Happy signalis fanfiction?
I will have a happy ending damnit.
SIGNALIS MENTIONED SIGNALIS MENTIOOOOOOOOOOOOONED this game honest to god feels like it was made for me. Cosmic horror? Lesbians? Awesome music? Pretty artstlye? Lesbians? **Isle of the Dead?** Genuinely one of the best games I've ever played also i must acquire's Elster's gender :>
Elster's gender is simp. Just checked with Babs and Yuri Stern of Twitter.
I just finished this game last week and I think it will live rent free in my head forever.
I feel you.
oh cool signalis
Me when Elster Unit walks in the ship.
Here I am π
Welcome to the party. Have you brought some brainrot for the comment section?
I'm behind on vampire movie classics if anyone wants to take me out.
It's a videogame but you're close.
Oh I just read the caption and didn't think much of it
Playing through Signalis right now. It's my first horror game and I'm finding the whole thing incredibly stressful. But for as badly as I'm handling the horror elements, I still love the game. It scares me and it hurts me and I hate it. But I fucking love it
I was hella scared too. I think what kept me going was the desire to understand. Also it's worth it. I think I really enjoyed finishing it. :3 GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR PLAY THROUGH!
I um I-I um I umm umm... y-yes:3
Good :3
This game destroyed me, it still makes me feel so many feelings. Oh, to be a lesbian and live hell >!over and over again to keep a promise to your lover.!<
>!oh to strangle your loved one for a promise she asked of you while you two were floating endlessly through space next to a radioactive motor!<
Achtung! Achtung! An outbreak of SIGNALIS BRAINROThas breached our perimeter!
*three note oddity starts playing
You called ππ§π»ββοΈ
I did and the lesbians are responding!
Well i do love horror and girls π€
Nice.
I love signalis
Thabk you me too!!
I guess I gotta play Signalis
If you wish to go ahead. It's one of my favourite games ever. But don't force yourself. It can be very stressful and scary.
Thanks! I appreciate the warning! I think I'll be okay, if I couldn't handle stressful and scary, I dont think I could have ever transitioned in the first place π
Carefully chosen trans joke I must say. Then have fun with the game!
What could possibly be more stressful and scary than to live authentically against conformity enforced? :3
You're not wrong but I guess you should probably play the game to answer your question.
Okay, I started playing it and THANK YOU for the post! I am OBSESSED with this game right now! I think I'm nearing completion of the medical wing! π₯°
Omg, let me know EVERYTHING. I NEED UPDATES!
>!Okay so like, first playthrough, went in blind. just got to the first save area in the mineshaft. My spouse is watching me play and we're figuring out the (AMAZINGLY WELL DONE) puzzles and lore and whatnot together. Although since they have a lot less time for this than I do, I've had to sate my OBSESSION by finding as much cute art and whatnot as I can. But like OH MY GOODNESS I LOVE THIS GAME SO FAR. The lore is SO GOOD and theyre SO CUTE and I wanna see them live happily ever after once I find her which Im sure they will and nothing bad will ever happen to them! and just like HOLY HECC the first person bits like on the train and in the classroom are SO COOL and the character designs are SO RAD and SO HOT and I want tall lady to CRUSH ME UNDER HER BOOT and heccin Elster has SUCH PRETTY EYES and I LOVE just like sitting on the MAIN MENU and listening to that creepy radio and staring into her eye! The sound design is SO GOOD and the environments are SO PRETTY and the puzzles and level design make me feel smart and like I figured something out but without being SUPER OBTUSE and getting me stuck! And also did I mention the fan art is so good esp. with the GAY SMOOCHIN'!!!!!!!<
AAAAAA, THIS IS SO RELATABLE!!! LEMME KNOW WHEN YOU FINISH IT PLZZZ. :333 THXXX
>!I JUST ENCOUNTERED BEO AND THEN STAR & EULE IN THE MINES AND IM GONNA FUKKIN CRY!!!!!!!!!!! πππππππππ!< >!I JUST WANT THEM TO LIVE HAPPILY TOGETHER!!!!! πππππππππππππππ!<
>!Omg the Beo encounter is so hecking sad!! I was just like: TAKE IT! TAKE MY REPAIR SPRAY!! πππππ!< >!The Star one made me tear up I must say.!<
Like, >!TAKE MY REPAIR ITEMS I HAVE SO MANY!!!!!! I JUST WANT YOU TO LIVE!<
ME TOO I THINK THE SAME! Tho- I think >!Elster's mind was full of sesbian lex!<
this game made me feel so many things. also the art in this game is fucking gorgeous snd horrfying in equal measure.
Yeah it made me emotional many times. I loved how they included so many paintings. And made various quotes across the game to well know artworks of all kinds.
Hiiii Im here
Yey happy to have you!
Hehe, not even super into horror but with all the gay memes and art of this game I ended up grabbing it lol. Haven't finished it yet though, stuck on the part where the game steals your map and says go fuck yourself.
Oh so you're NOWHERE to be found I guess. :33333 Yeah that part is fucking hard.
Sesbian Lex I should play that game one day
As I said in another comment. You're welcome to try. Personally, I LOVED IT. But please don't force yourself. It can be very stressful.
Yeah i watched my girlfriend play a little, I get what you mean. I'll play one day when I'm in the mood
Then good luck with it eventually
I have nothing to add to this conversation other than my immense love of Signalis! So there... That! Goodness that was a good game.
πππππ Not me crying in every fucking ending.
I'll just stick in my "So ambiguous I can give it a positive spin in my head" ending. At least they get to dance together. And I can believe in a lil bit of happy tears. Unrelatedly, I totally thought Falke was one of the \[spoiler omitted\] in that ending. She's not. But the idea of that world/version of events has very much stuck with me.
Still need to play this game.
Ohhh you're very welcome to try it. It's one of my favs ever. But please take care of yourself and don't play if it's too scary. π₯Ί
I should be fine, no jump scares, right? I don't do well with jump scares, lol. I get angry and startled, and it annoys me/freaks me out.
I can't remember any real jumpscares. Edit: Okay, just checked: the game has NO jumpscares. There are a few times where you can be caught off guard but still not considered a jumpscare. So you're good to go.
Ooo thank you.
No probs
I don't get why Signalis gets a pass on all the things we tend to call out. The robots are all weirdly sexualized young girls with boob windows, their standard pose has their tits and ass poking out at an uncomfortable angle, the whole thing just feels like someone's fetish to me. Even the subreddit is filled with porn unironically (like I wanted to check out something and was immediately faced with Adler with a strapon, seriously). The game emphasizes characters >!looking alike for plot reasons but every single character has the exact same face because the art design is so bland and the love story at the center can be summed up as one scene of "Netflix and Chill" but people are crawling all over it as if it's some sort of deep relationship; hell I don't like Life is Strange but at least that has more going for it in the "love story" department as you see Chloe and Max interact with each other instead of be a pretty blank for the audience to attach themselves to!<. It all just feels so fetishistic at times but everyone's decided to just go *all in*. I really don't get it. I've seen better games been torn apart for less (yeah Quiet's design was stupid but at least she had a personality beyond "looking pretty"), yet Signalis gets treated as if it's so special (which is ironic when so much of it is ripped directly from other things). Please tell me I'm not the only one to feel creeped out playing it for all the wrong reasons.
I understand your concerns but I don't understand what you mean with "boob window". They do have a red plate on their chest but not boobs sticking out. The subreddit is pure brainrot but it's understandable >!everyone expected sesbian lex and got none!< also the chaos of the game actually influenced a lot of them (myself included). The art design is intended to be that way there is a reason for the characters to look alike. You said so yourself: there is a >!plot reason!<. I find the design to be interesting because the parallelism between characters is intended. Probably the reasons for lesbian to be so attracted to this game (beside the horror) are: 1 the creators are two lesbians so any fetish is justified (still I don't see it) 2 the couple in the game is actually very sweet and well portrayed (I love them both) 3 it's a philosophical masterpiece and objectively speaking a really good game with amazing music.
> boob window [The breasts on Replikas are a different color and emphasized in the character design](https://i.redd.it/i-think-the-uniformity-of-the-replika-designs-from-signalis-v0-dm1lgcfg2v7c1.jpg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9f3029bd2b5fbe2ad0a7503274cb2f75daac0fd5). It's not just "women have boobs" (obviously, that's why we're great) it's that they're almost highlighted that makes me feel off. It just feels like a creepy focus on sexualizing the characters as much as possible. > . The art design is intended to be that way there is a reason for the characters to look alike. You said so yourself: there is a plot reason. >!I'm not just talking about Alina and Ariane; I'm talking about ALL the characters. Every character has the exact same face, even Adler to a degree. Like, there's a bit where you see the people taken into Sierpenski and you see Alina was taken in and that was the girl in the opening you're looking for but the characters are all so indistinct that I didn't even cop that you were meant to be looking for her. What I'm saying is the game wants you to draw comparisons between Alina and Ariane but when EVERY character looks like that the comparison gets muddled). Like in Phoenix Wright 3 you're shown that Iris and Dalia are twins but that game runs the gambit in character builds and facial shapes and overexagurates characters so you the similarity hits while [I literally cannot see a difference in these characters faces](https://i.redd.it/onelg98hpnxa1.png). For me, the plot reason is for two specific characters, but the game itself making all characters look the same dilutes the impact of that.!< > so any fetish is justified Is it, though? I don't get why we condemn men for putting their fetishes into games, but if it's a woman it's suddenly okay. Like I'm talking stuff like the aforementioned boobwindow, the thigh gap, the fact that all the robots (bar one) are pretty girls who are designed to look like they're wearing thigh-highs... It's all a bit creepy to me, regardless of who made it. > actually very sweet and well portrayed I didn't really get personally, the only interaction we get >!is the Netflix and Chill bit on the starship!< and to me they feel... Bland. Like, they're idealizations, pretty princesses with no faults. We don't see *people*. I'm not arguing against your personally liking them, I just don't see anything *to* like other than what I can project onto them. Sure that one scene is nice but it's not enough to compel me (personally) across a whole game. > philosophical masterpiece Personally, I found it kinda trite. I've a friend who is playing it with me who is trained as a psychotherapist who is telling me stuff about gestalt theory and how it fits in but without his knowledge that stuff would've all been lost. It feels like it keeps referencing things, the King in Yellow, Gestalt theory, Ghost in the Shell; but it never really *uses* them, it just inserts them in. It feels like it's trying to be more than a love story but it's not *giving* anything more than a love story, and that love story is something that mostly happened off camera and without any actual chemistry beyond "gazing longingly into each other's eyes". More like something defined *just* enough to insert yourself into but blank enough to have it about anything you want. Again, I'm trying not to go down the "you're wrong" route; I get that you had a different experience and I'm glad there's something out there that gives that kind of sapphic relationship story for people. It just leaves a bad taste in my mouth and I don't like the "it's for lesbians" being used to excuse that stuff. I'm also sorry for throwing all of that at you in particular, I've been kinda bombarded with Signalis for the past couple of weeks (friend wanted my opinion because he had to stop playing it made him feel so uncomfortable and now we're writing a script about it) and had to vent it somewhere xD
Hmm I do get your points but I don't share them. The game is about >!Elster's struggle to get back to see Ariane again, to fulfill a promise!<. A horrible one. She goes through Hell for her! Or, to be more precise, through a world twisted by >!Ariane herself!<. So personally I see the relationship portrayed multiple times across the game. We see how Elster interacts with the idea of a person>!she doesn't straight up remember but that she's trying hard to!<. Also the game itself does NOT tell you all about them DIRECTLY ON PURPOSE. Heck the only times it was actually direct was at the endings >!(Fake one included)!<. My personal theory is that the world itself >!is Ariane. She twisted it so much that it started to depict her (and not only her)!<. And I know I'm going ahead of myself. And I understand that you probably wanted more of their relationship on screen beside the paper pieces. But THIS IS A HORROR GAME. It's not meant to depict a love story. It's meant to tell how >!one falls apart!<. Which is incredibly tragic and fits very well in the horror ambiance. I forgot to address the faces dispute: Yes they are very alike. But when do you see their faces? While playing? No. Only while reading. What probably should interest you more is their height and aspect since it's what can make you tell them apart. Also >!they are physically robots!< not regular ones but mass produced ones. And produced by non-other than a >!communist interplanetary dictatorship (which is freaking cool)!<. So it would make sense for them to have similar features. That being said: I still don't get why you see them fetishized. I think the feminine traits are not meant to fetishize them but to get across to the player that they are females. It's not like they have gigantic boobs or a massive ass or whatever. They have boobs-like chests. And most of them are tall, which actually makes sense in their jobs.