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So far the Yoosung path is adorable.
Woo, 1000 free hearts to celebrate the game existing for 1000 days!
And I guess if I had to wake up in the middle of the night thanks to a nightmare about zombies, then this was a good time for it, since it meant I got to read the 1:30am and 3:30am chats.
Is this email chain with a traditional Korean music group expecting me to know traditional Korean music references??? Not that I've been doing well with the cultural references I do get >.>
Oh gosh, Seven posted an image of the previous party two years ago, when Yoosung was back in highschool, and he was a TINY BRUNETTE.
(As a reminder, going right to left, top to bottom: Jumin, V, Zen, Seven, Yoosung, and Jaehee)
He was a model student back then, Seven blames college for him just gaming all the time now, but Rika died the day of his highschool graduation.... :(
It's hard to interpret hair colour in these games because you'll have Regular Korean looking types like Jumin and Jaehee, and then characters like Yoosung who canonically dye their hair, but then there's V with BLUE hair. So is it an Anime Hair convention thing? Or is V really a sensible grown-up Korean photographer with blue hair?? Should I assume Seven's hair is dyed, or that he's got some Scottish ancestry or whatever, or is he just A Korean With (possibly metaphorically) Bright Red Hair? (though I have seen fanart of him as a child with red hair so think it's not dyed)
I hadn't put it together before, but that party happened not long after Jaehee was hired. So she only helped with that one, and didn't know Rika very long comparitively. Seven says she was very tense and robotic.
If they did them every few years a couple times before that, everyone except Jumin and V would have been pretty young at the start, especially Yoosung.
Jumin: I remember, the day that photo that photo was taken, Seven asked me if I had hired a robot. And I said no, a robot would be cheaper.
Jaehee: So you are aware I'm a human being. I'm surprised.
Aw, Jaehee, I may not be your bae this time, but I still love you.
Yoosung referred to hearing MC's voice on the phone! See, that makes more sense! Maybe you just THINK you've never heard it because you're too busy listening to yourself talk, ZEN.
Yoosung's barely holding back from being all I LOVE YOU LET'S MEET AND HOLD HANDS AND KISS AND TALK ABOUT OUR FEELINGS.
Zen thinks it's better that Yoosung is more relaxed now than he was in highschool, which I can kind of see, but he's definitely using gaming to avoid feelings of loneliness, which is not great.
There's no good in-universe reason for Zen to have suddenly stopped flirting so hard, but it is making him much more bearable. I tried telling him to stop calling MC and he just laughed it off, sigh.
Jaehee describes a floppy disk as "a sort of storage device used twenty years ago" and I felt my soul leave my body. Anyway, Seven has one from when he got his first computer at 14, which feels like a Clue.
Ha! I am finally the right sort of nerd for one of these email questions! *Does NOT recommend a magnet bracelet to the floppy disk collector*
I went through and converted my hearts, so now I have 71 hourglasses and 19 hearts. 9 more hourglasses and I can unlock Jumin and Seven! Since I don't need to do that until I've done all...seven endings??? for Yoosung, Jaehee and Zen I should be good.
I am probably going to have to do all the bad endings at once for each character, since I only get 4 save files. Unlocking saves costs 5 of my precious hourglasses but I want to see them, and don't want to have to play the whole game SEVEN TIMES EACH. I think what I'll do is look up a walkthrough for every day at the end of that day, and see if there's any bad ends etc to use that day's save for, otherwise I'll overwrite it.
I'm probably just going to use a walkthrough to guide myself for later playthroughs, but I'm enjoying playing blind right now.
I'm still getting hearts for the other characters, it's possible getting too many is Bad but I was still nice to Zen when he twisted his ankle and felt like he'd become useless, because MC may not like him much but she's not a total asshole. And of course I am still nice to Jaehee.
Before, the "bad" choices involving Yoosung mainly involved ignoring/being mean to him etc, but now they lean more to being controlling, condescending, or treating him more like a pet (I know they're bad choices because I chose something else and got points)
Ohhh. Yoosung kept saying MC is like Rika, and I was a bit "please do not compare the girl you have a crush on to the cousin you saw as a sister", but then the game gave me the chance to agree (noope) And I realised, that's the toxic version of this relationship: MC as controlling, infantilising older girlfriend who doesn't want him to grow up. (MC has no canon age, but she feels a little older, if only emotionally)
Normally I don't like arcs where subby/younger guys have to "man up", but he's clearly unhappy with his life right now, and even taking the healthy options he's still endearingly into having MC boss him around. Thinking about her watching over him encourages him to study, aw.
I could do with less of him framing this as being "more manly" but never mind. At least in practice he's doing stuff like studying and cleaning his house.
Jumin was politely tolerant in the face of Yoosung and MC's blatant flirting, and gave Yoosung some moderately good advice about having potential but needing motivation that MC cheerfully seconded. And... so Yoosung got paranoid that something was going on between MC and Jumin. Dumbass. She's expressed more interest in Zen, just because the game wouldn't let me not.
Speaking of which, I've been pondering how to construct a MC who can navigate all the Zen stuff around Jaehee without being miserably jealous or finding all the dialogue options OOC. They clearly expect you to play someone who is sincerely expressing attraction to Zen, but screw that. I'm leaning towards a slightly unbalanced younger girl who is just SO INTO JAEHEE that she'll pretend to be into Zen because it makes Jaehee happy. Which is a bit weird but I like my femslash a little weird.
Coming up with an MC who really is into Zen for the Zen path is also going to require a little work, but that's a problem for after I've romanced Jaehee. I'm vaguely thinking his female equivalent, not necessarily an actual actor but cheerfully performative of Popular Girl.
I'm not normally into jealousy, but just had a phonecall with Yoosung where he talked about feeling jealous when MC talks to other people in the chat, and he didn't act like she'd done anything wrong or needed to change her behaviour, he was just...talking about his feelings. He apologised for being weird, and for needing so much reassurance, then got a little whispery and intense talking about how much he wants her to look only at him. I swooned a little. They're both avoiding putting a name to anything but I think both aware this is heading in a mutually romantic direction.
Ha! Seven tried tricking Yoosung again but MC persuaded him not to believe it.
Yoosung thought about his need for direction and motivation and is now considering becoming a game developer?? Cool!
Yes, yes, helping the disabled with Rika was very inspiring. *resists the temptation to click "did you have feelings for Rika", but I do wonder, it would help explain his resentment of V*
Haha, aw, "I felt like people were just teasing me when they called me cute, but not you." And then she says he's handsome and he's surprised but pleased. (Yeah, sorry Yoosung, you are by far the least hot character in this game, even including Rika, Ray etc. But MC doesn't think so and that's what matters)
Wow, and that's 100% completeness for Day 5!
I looked up a walkthrough just to see when the branches for bad ends are, and they're on days 5, 7 and 9. So if I make saves on those days I can go back and get the bad ends. Thankfully there are four save slots, so I can do that and have one left over to use while I'm playing.
I managed not to spoil myself beyond this, but the day 7 bad end does involve convincing him you're just like Rika. I wonder what happens! It's good knowing when the branch points are. I think I'm doing ok so far, though. I'm even getting better at convincing guests to show up to the party, though afaict that doesn't affect anything until the very end anyway.
I wonder if the day 7 branch happens at the start or end of the day. Guess I'll find out!
Maybe I should make MC a computer science major who dropped out and works in a convenience store or something, and she and Yoosung can make games together.
Zen and MC try to cheer Zen up about being unable to work because of his ankle.
Zen: If people like you and Jaehee are around me I feel loved
Jaehee: *quietly dies*
Yoosung has talked about wanting to meet MC in person, V is apparently against it for some reason? And he acts like she can't just...tell him where she is...Or have him tell her where he is! Afaict Korea's such a tiny country you can get between any two major cities in a few hours by train.
Oh man, Jumin's asking MC to guess Yoosung's major and I have no idea. He never talks about classes! Ha, and Jumin doesn't know either.
JUMIN FOUND A KITTEN. I wonder if Yoosung will end up taking care of it as a responsibility thing. If this path ends in femdom, game dev, and cats I will be most pleased.
Haha aw Yoosung has basically no internal filter when he's on the phone and he seems to be trying very hard not to express his sexual attraction to MC. This whole path is making me nostalgic for the sweet, dumbass, slightly younger college boys I was into back at that age.
(Though they generally weren't quite as much of a dumbass as Yoosung)
There was a conversation about ADHD on a discord I'm on last night and I'm wondering if that might describe some of Yoosung's issues. I mean some of it is just grief, but he was talking about getting hyper and unable to control his thoughts. Though maybe that was just horniness lol.
As much as it would be cute if Yoosung became a game dev, the one thing he seems to actually enjoy doing is cooking.
It's occurred to me that doing the bad ends will require multiple real time days of me just saying shitty things over and over and watching my given LI be sad. Maybe I'll just do the ones that require you to ignore them for a day...
Aw, even Zen has noticed something's going on it MC and Yoosung and wishes the well. He's a decent enough guy when he's actually himself.
Wait, never mind, he "joked" about snatching MC away. Jaehee said women are not objects to be owned. Too right, Jaehee! But later he apologised, and I think he is sincerely and justifiably worried about Yoosung, who he described as his younger brother.
The last three chats today are called "Just like Rika", "Rika's Shadow" and "Rika and [Name]", so I'm guessing that thread will be resolved tonight. At...11:30pm /o\
Got to 80 hearts!
Yoosung, if you're going to just assume MC looks like Rika I am going to make her, like, black and chubby with short hair.
Zen: I wonder if Jaehee secretly has a boyfriend she never told us about. She's pretty, has a hot body, and the skills too lol
Jaehee: NO SUCH PERSON EXISTS
Ooh I caved and briefly looked at tomorrow's chats and there's a bunch of glaring red BAD END branch points.
Things aren't resolved yet but they're definitely heading towards Yoosung having to confront the way he's projecting his feelings about Rika onto MC.
So far the Yoosung path is adorable.
Woo, 1000 free hearts to celebrate the game existing for 1000 days!
And I guess if I had to wake up in the middle of the night thanks to a nightmare about zombies, then this was a good time for it, since it meant I got to read the 1:30am and 3:30am chats.
Is this email chain with a traditional Korean music group expecting me to know traditional Korean music references??? Not that I've been doing well with the cultural references I do get >.>
Oh gosh, Seven posted an image of the previous party two years ago, when Yoosung was back in highschool, and he was a TINY BRUNETTE.
(As a reminder, going right to left, top to bottom: Jumin, V, Zen, Seven, Yoosung, and Jaehee)
He was a model student back then, Seven blames college for him just gaming all the time now, but Rika died the day of his highschool graduation.... :(
It's hard to interpret hair colour in these games because you'll have Regular Korean looking types like Jumin and Jaehee, and then characters like Yoosung who canonically dye their hair, but then there's V with BLUE hair. So is it an Anime Hair convention thing? Or is V really a sensible grown-up Korean photographer with blue hair?? Should I assume Seven's hair is dyed, or that he's got some Scottish ancestry or whatever, or is he just A Korean With (possibly metaphorically) Bright Red Hair? (though I have seen fanart of him as a child with red hair so think it's not dyed)
I hadn't put it together before, but that party happened not long after Jaehee was hired. So she only helped with that one, and didn't know Rika very long comparitively. Seven says she was very tense and robotic.
If they did them every few years a couple times before that, everyone except Jumin and V would have been pretty young at the start, especially Yoosung.
Jumin: I remember, the day that photo that photo was taken, Seven asked me if I had hired a robot. And I said no, a robot would be cheaper.
Jaehee: So you are aware I'm a human being. I'm surprised.
Aw, Jaehee, I may not be your bae this time, but I still love you.
Yoosung referred to hearing MC's voice on the phone! See, that makes more sense! Maybe you just THINK you've never heard it because you're too busy listening to yourself talk, ZEN.
Yoosung's barely holding back from being all I LOVE YOU LET'S MEET AND HOLD HANDS AND KISS AND TALK ABOUT OUR FEELINGS.
Zen thinks it's better that Yoosung is more relaxed now than he was in highschool, which I can kind of see, but he's definitely using gaming to avoid feelings of loneliness, which is not great.
There's no good in-universe reason for Zen to have suddenly stopped flirting so hard, but it is making him much more bearable. I tried telling him to stop calling MC and he just laughed it off, sigh.
Jaehee describes a floppy disk as "a sort of storage device used twenty years ago" and I felt my soul leave my body. Anyway, Seven has one from when he got his first computer at 14, which feels like a Clue.
Ha! I am finally the right sort of nerd for one of these email questions! *Does NOT recommend a magnet bracelet to the floppy disk collector*
I went through and converted my hearts, so now I have 71 hourglasses and 19 hearts. 9 more hourglasses and I can unlock Jumin and Seven! Since I don't need to do that until I've done all...seven endings??? for Yoosung, Jaehee and Zen I should be good.
I am probably going to have to do all the bad endings at once for each character, since I only get 4 save files. Unlocking saves costs 5 of my precious hourglasses but I want to see them, and don't want to have to play the whole game SEVEN TIMES EACH. I think what I'll do is look up a walkthrough for every day at the end of that day, and see if there's any bad ends etc to use that day's save for, otherwise I'll overwrite it.
I'm probably just going to use a walkthrough to guide myself for later playthroughs, but I'm enjoying playing blind right now.
I'm still getting hearts for the other characters, it's possible getting too many is Bad but I was still nice to Zen when he twisted his ankle and felt like he'd become useless, because MC may not like him much but she's not a total asshole. And of course I am still nice to Jaehee.
Before, the "bad" choices involving Yoosung mainly involved ignoring/being mean to him etc, but now they lean more to being controlling, condescending, or treating him more like a pet (I know they're bad choices because I chose something else and got points)
Ohhh. Yoosung kept saying MC is like Rika, and I was a bit "please do not compare the girl you have a crush on to the cousin you saw as a sister", but then the game gave me the chance to agree (noope) And I realised, that's the toxic version of this relationship: MC as controlling, infantilising older girlfriend who doesn't want him to grow up. (MC has no canon age, but she feels a little older, if only emotionally)
Normally I don't like arcs where subby/younger guys have to "man up", but he's clearly unhappy with his life right now, and even taking the healthy options he's still endearingly into having MC boss him around. Thinking about her watching over him encourages him to study, aw.
I could do with less of him framing this as being "more manly" but never mind. At least in practice he's doing stuff like studying and cleaning his house.
Jumin was politely tolerant in the face of Yoosung and MC's blatant flirting, and gave Yoosung some moderately good advice about having potential but needing motivation that MC cheerfully seconded. And... so Yoosung got paranoid that something was going on between MC and Jumin. Dumbass. She's expressed more interest in Zen, just because the game wouldn't let me not.
Speaking of which, I've been pondering how to construct a MC who can navigate all the Zen stuff around Jaehee without being miserably jealous or finding all the dialogue options OOC. They clearly expect you to play someone who is sincerely expressing attraction to Zen, but screw that. I'm leaning towards a slightly unbalanced younger girl who is just SO INTO JAEHEE that she'll pretend to be into Zen because it makes Jaehee happy. Which is a bit weird but I like my femslash a little weird.
Coming up with an MC who really is into Zen for the Zen path is also going to require a little work, but that's a problem for after I've romanced Jaehee. I'm vaguely thinking his female equivalent, not necessarily an actual actor but cheerfully performative of Popular Girl.
I'm not normally into jealousy, but just had a phonecall with Yoosung where he talked about feeling jealous when MC talks to other people in the chat, and he didn't act like she'd done anything wrong or needed to change her behaviour, he was just...talking about his feelings. He apologised for being weird, and for needing so much reassurance, then got a little whispery and intense talking about how much he wants her to look only at him. I swooned a little. They're both avoiding putting a name to anything but I think both aware this is heading in a mutually romantic direction.
Ha! Seven tried tricking Yoosung again but MC persuaded him not to believe it.
Yoosung thought about his need for direction and motivation and is now considering becoming a game developer?? Cool!
Yes, yes, helping the disabled with Rika was very inspiring. *resists the temptation to click "did you have feelings for Rika", but I do wonder, it would help explain his resentment of V*
Haha, aw, "I felt like people were just teasing me when they called me cute, but not you." And then she says he's handsome and he's surprised but pleased. (Yeah, sorry Yoosung, you are by far the least hot character in this game, even including Rika, Ray etc. But MC doesn't think so and that's what matters)
Wow, and that's 100% completeness for Day 5!
I looked up a walkthrough just to see when the branches for bad ends are, and they're on days 5, 7 and 9. So if I make saves on those days I can go back and get the bad ends. Thankfully there are four save slots, so I can do that and have one left over to use while I'm playing.
I managed not to spoil myself beyond this, but the day 7 bad end does involve convincing him you're just like Rika. I wonder what happens! It's good knowing when the branch points are. I think I'm doing ok so far, though. I'm even getting better at convincing guests to show up to the party, though afaict that doesn't affect anything until the very end anyway.
I wonder if the day 7 branch happens at the start or end of the day. Guess I'll find out!
Maybe I should make MC a computer science major who dropped out and works in a convenience store or something, and she and Yoosung can make games together.
Zen and MC try to cheer Zen up about being unable to work because of his ankle.
Zen: If people like you and Jaehee are around me I feel loved
Jaehee: *quietly dies*
Yoosung has talked about wanting to meet MC in person, V is apparently against it for some reason? And he acts like she can't just...tell him where she is...Or have him tell her where he is! Afaict Korea's such a tiny country you can get between any two major cities in a few hours by train.
Oh man, Jumin's asking MC to guess Yoosung's major and I have no idea. He never talks about classes! Ha, and Jumin doesn't know either.
JUMIN FOUND A KITTEN. I wonder if Yoosung will end up taking care of it as a responsibility thing. If this path ends in femdom, game dev, and cats I will be most pleased.
Haha aw Yoosung has basically no internal filter when he's on the phone and he seems to be trying very hard not to express his sexual attraction to MC. This whole path is making me nostalgic for the sweet, dumbass, slightly younger college boys I was into back at that age.
(Though they generally weren't quite as much of a dumbass as Yoosung)
There was a conversation about ADHD on a discord I'm on last night and I'm wondering if that might describe some of Yoosung's issues. I mean some of it is just grief, but he was talking about getting hyper and unable to control his thoughts. Though maybe that was just horniness lol.
As much as it would be cute if Yoosung became a game dev, the one thing he seems to actually enjoy doing is cooking.
It's occurred to me that doing the bad ends will require multiple real time days of me just saying shitty things over and over and watching my given LI be sad. Maybe I'll just do the ones that require you to ignore them for a day...
Aw, even Zen has noticed something's going on it MC and Yoosung and wishes the well. He's a decent enough guy when he's actually himself.
Wait, never mind, he "joked" about snatching MC away. Jaehee said women are not objects to be owned. Too right, Jaehee! But later he apologised, and I think he is sincerely and justifiably worried about Yoosung, who he described as his younger brother.
The last three chats today are called "Just like Rika", "Rika's Shadow" and "Rika and [Name]", so I'm guessing that thread will be resolved tonight. At...11:30pm /o\
Got to 80 hearts!
Yoosung, if you're going to just assume MC looks like Rika I am going to make her, like, black and chubby with short hair.
Zen: I wonder if Jaehee secretly has a boyfriend she never told us about. She's pretty, has a hot body, and the skills too lol
Jaehee: NO SUCH PERSON EXISTS
Ooh I caved and briefly looked at tomorrow's chats and there's a bunch of glaring red BAD END branch points.
Things aren't resolved yet but they're definitely heading towards Yoosung having to confront the way he's projecting his feelings about Rika onto MC.
