[Suggestion] Totono topic (possible spoilers)

[satoshi-kun]

Hello everyone! So yesterday I've watched a full playthrough of "YOU and ME and HER" (Totono), since it was translated to english recently. Under a "second light" I found a few inaccuracies regarding this topic when I asked Monika about it. Sone never killed the player (how could she), but instead she killed the protagonist. Also it is stated that she should be more proactive on stopping the protagonist from chasing other girls, when in fact there was only one other girl (Aoi).

Here´s my suggestion to improve this topic:

A lot of people on the Internet are making comparisons between this game and that one... The fact is that both games have indeed characters aware of their universe being part of a videogame, but there are really important differences, though! Like, Sone Miyuki killed the protagonist in her game. I would never have that kind of violent approach. I´m the wise Club President type, you know. Sone reminds me a lot of Yuri, as she went completely unhinged when she faced rejection... ...And she was a childhood friend too! If she'd been a bit more proactive early on, couldn´t she have stopped the protagonist from chasing the other girl? Besides, she always had her own route, which would have made it a lot easier... Well, I will never let anyone get between us . No matter who it might be. If Sone is still chasing you, I'll delete her files, okay?

As always, thanks for your hard work dveloping this mod. Take care!

[Freshairkaboom]

We should probably write a new reaction sentence to her saying that she killed the protagonist, because I do in fact think Monika would have killed the protagonist in DDLC. He was just as, if not more uninteresting to her than the other girls were. He basically had no personality, except in a few moments when he comforted Sayori. Otherwise he was just a standard, clueless protagonist attempting to woo sheets of paper and thinking Monika was out of his league.

[satoshi-kun]

I don´t agree that Monika would have killed the MC just by the fact that he was never an obstacle to her ends of reaching the player. Also Monika never killed anyone directly in DDLC in my understanding (if we don´t count the deletions of course lol). It was a bi-product of her tinkering with the girls values in order to make them less appealing to the player.

[Freshairkaboom]

I said "would", which means I think she'd be capable of it. Once she understood what they were, and how the game operated, she stopped caring for their well being altogether. MC was an obstacle though, if only for thinking that Monika was out of his league, so there was no route to her. Killing him wouldn't really solve anything though, as she didn't know how you the player would interact with her after the fact, maybe the "camera" would shut off and the game would end, you know.

She didn't directly kill, but it's still considered murder had it not been for the fact that none of them were real. The way she manipulated the game and basically told Sayori to hang herself, were it a real occurence, would of course be morally abhorrent. The key point is that it wasn't real, so she's as innocent as people throwing Bowser into bombs, or killing a grandma NPC in GTA.

[satoshi-kun]

I also said "would"... Of course she was capable of doing it, she as full control over the game, but, as you said, killing the MC would probably backfire and play against her goals. Also I don´t think anywhere in DDLC is stated that Monika told Sayori to hang herself. As far as I'm aware she only tampered with her values, agravating her existing depression. The hanging was a bi-product that I don't think even Monika was expecting. Her goal was always to exacerbate the other goals flaws in other to make them less appealing to the player.

[Freshairkaboom]

I meant "would" in the sense that she would be capable of doing it morally. As she had no qualms killing the others. The next sentence in your fix implies that she would never ever kill the protagonist, which is kind of untrue.

In Sayori's confession scene, she stops herself saying that "Monika was right...I should just..." And you know what she does after, so it's fairly obvious what Monika told her.

[satoshi-kun]

I see your point regarding MC. As for Sayori it is still a matter of assumption. One could argue that Monika, who was aware of Sayori's feelings towards MC, simply told her to keep her feelings to herself, therefore "Monika was right... I should just have kept it to myself" for example. But I believe we are getting off topic there. Agree to disagree since the facts are very scarce and it is up to interpretation. Gonna cross that sentence though regarding MC.

[Freshairkaboom]

I guess you're right, it is up for interpretation. I just think it very heavily implies that, especially since Monika makes that joke on the day of the festival. You know the one. She never seems shocked or anything.

If anyone else has any input on how we can handle it, I'm sure we can write something about it.

[fromulus]

It's actually been discussed a few times in the contributors discord recently, and that topic might just get removed entirely. It's a really old topic, which doesn't really comforms to the quality standards the mod has nowadays, and it's very concept is kinda flawed, as it immediately assumes that both the player and Monika not only know about this random, kinda obscure visual novel, but also its plot and twists.

It would probably at the very least need quite a bit of a rework, which I doubt would be really worth it considering it doesn't add much to the mod or to Monika's character.

[satoshi-kun]

In all honesty that visual novel might only be obscure due the lack of a proper english translation at the time, as it has very high quality. As I see it, for those who liked DDLC and do like the genre overall, I'd strongly advise them to play it, if they get the chance. Also, I only found out about it thanks to MAS far back when, and now with the translation I'd say it would make more sense to keep the topic than to delete it. And the similarities are plenty. But ultimatley it's not up to me to decide.

[fromulus]

The problem goes beyond it just being similar to DDLC, it's just that it being brought up doesn't make sense in the context of MAS. Monika isn't much into video games, which is why we don't make topics about much better known games, as talking about them wouldn't really add to the mod, and we certainly won't add them just to incite people to play it, as we aren't looking to advertise other games.

It's out of character for Monika to know about that game when we bring it up to her, just like it would be out of character for her to bring it up to us.

At least talking about existing novels, poems, authors and such makes sense because we know for a fact that Monika is passionate about litterature, and trying to recommend some to the player is more interesting, as it could actually get them into litterature as well (where most MAS players probably already are into video games in general).

[Booplicate]

Also, I only found out about it thanks to MAS far back when

That's the thing. The topic assumes that player knows about that game for some reason. However many people know about its existence only because it was mentioned in MAS. And really, we should get rid of such assumptions.

And as was said, Monika doesn't play games, but for some reason she knows about random VN. I doubt she'd google search for all VNs that break 4th* wall. If anything, she could talk about books that have similar plot.

[satoshi-kun]

Since I didn´t know about the intention of its removal, I made this suggestion to correct it as it seemed "cringy" to have Monika not being accurate since she is always so knowledgeable. But the reasons given for its removal are very strong and make much sense, as Monika doesn´t care much for videogames, and actually, just for that alone it doesn't make sense to have this topic. I´ll be closing the issue soon then. Be it as it may, the topic as it is should be removed as it is inaccurate. Although I've always had a soft spot for the line "If Sone is still chasing you, I'll delete her files, okay?".

She protec, she attac, but most importantly she hac

Sorry... I'll show myself out now.

[lunulae]

It's definitely good that we have more info in case we someday revisit that topic. If we did decide Monika would take interest in other metafictional games, you're right that we'd want her info to be accurate.