Infamous if (band wip) chap 3 (457k wrds) released (9/08/2024)

[djinnism]

I can’t fault Seven for leaving. I can’t fault them for being upset over how callously the band treated a delicate situation. I can fault Seven for bottling up their feelings and then exploding at their best friend/SO in public. But we’ll all have different opinions. I love the drama of it all regardless, those little moments where you can see where things might have gone different, but couldn’t because of who these characters are (and because the plot needs narrative tensions, haha).

I think Seven would have taken the situation personally regardless of the way MC voted. They’re not exactly a cool, collected, rational person. To them, even participating was the betrayal, and not overriding the majority vote was the cherry on top. Which is, I think, where a lot of the conflict comes in — Seven seemingly didn’t see Jazzy, Devyn, Iris, and Rowan as equal contributors to the band with equal authority to Seven and MC. They were supporting players to his and MC’s dream.

@JBento

It is, because the game literally tells you it is.

Thank you, yes I don’t know why people keep insisting that the band made a nonsensical decision. It was kind of cruel, but I can follow the logic. Maybe they should have ignored the metrics and hoped against hope they would change, but that’s a stupid way to run a business. Would the band have continued to grow regardless? Sure, but probably not to the extent that they grew individually. And Seven leaving and flourishing themself is testament to that.

@LiliArch

Yeah, the point of insisting you’re fine and bottling it all up is to not let anyone know what you’re actually feeling.

Right?! If you’ve resigned yourself to suffer in silence, suffer in silence.

[charger]

i’m on the fence re: seven saying im fine situation. i don’t think it’s fair to tell someone you’re fine and get mad at them when they believe you. at the same time, MC has known seven basically all their life. they’re potentially dating, too. they just watched seven basically be fired from their dream job and did fuck all. they SHOULD know seven wouldn’t be okay with that. come on. it’s either really selfish or really stupid of MC to actually believe seven.

seven was an asshole post-breakup imo, but MC was also a huge jerk and deserved to be broken up with. they both kinda suck in my eyes

[LiliArch]

@djinnism

I can fault Seven for bottling up their feelings and then exploding at their best friend/SO in public.

Yeah, the point of insisting you’re fine and bottling it all up is to not let anyone know what you’re actually feeling. It’s not to blow up about it a month later. You’re doing it wrong, Seven.

@Revan_Alek_Shan

when Sev says they’re supposedly fine that should be a red flag from the start and yes the mc should have noticed given the whole bff/lovers for who knows how long

But what were they supposed to do, if it was all too late to be concerned anyway since the vote had already happened?

[loomy]

@charger

i really do think the band just doesn’t respect the MC at all…

tbh i have been riding for them since day one but i have to agree with this now lol. i’ll give it to them that it doesn’t seem fully intentional but it’s clear they do not put enough consideration towards the MC and honestly only think about their own feelings. jazzy included which makes me so sad!!! her situation makes it a lot more understandable tho obviously.

i love pain and suffering tho so im excited to see how the full chapter plays out

[Revan_Alek_Shan]

Adding onto some things I noticed regarding Seven is he already has clear abandonment issues to begin with and is bad at handling his feelings so yeah when Sev says they’re supposedly fine that should be a red flag from the start and yes the mc should have noticed given the whole bff/lovers for who knows how long detail.

[batmansrobin]

@erinrae26381

Why would they ever leave, especially when they’ve been insisting since the vote that they’re fine?

Because Seven was already a lead singer, had always wanted to be a lead singer, and was open from the beginning that it was their dream? Hence why they started the band in the first place? The band was nervous to even bring up that they voted, so everyone was well aware it was a painful situation. Why wouldn’t Seven leave?

But also, this just isn’t my point. The point of my critique is on the storytelling. This isn’t really a “who was right and who was wrong” discourse. It’s “should I be coming away feeling like the PC just didn’t understand or give a shit about Seven at all? Because I did and I think that’s kind of weird, maybe something is off with the storytelling here” discourse.

The issue is that after 600k+ words into this where we’ve been told repeatedly that the PC and Seven had dreams of making music and were very close and so codependent, we’re now disregarding that. Suddenly the PC is obtuse to who Seven is as a person, somehow unaware of how that situation could hurt someone that cared that much about music and how Seven is likely stuffing down their feelings, and the past 7-ish years they spent performing as co-singers and planning their music careers together was actually just for the Lols. Which again the narrative gave no indication of how any of that could even be possible. This colors the entire story in a different way because this is a major plot point that’s been given a lot of focus. The way it’s written currently doesn’t make any sense to me when you take into context everything we’ve been reading about these characters for the past two years, including the PC whose perspective was the one telling us how much they and Seven both wanted this, again, together.

It’s a storytelling critique, not a critique of people that don’t like Seven or think Seven should have handled things differently or of people that behave in ways that the PC does. If you like the way it’s written currently, that’s great, but I think the feedback is still valid for people it’s really not making a lick of sense for.

@strawberrydelight

I lean towards it being a fault in the writing tbh. Sometimes there are some options that are not super thought out and contradict other stuff I’ve noticed.

Yes, this is exactly the point I’ve been trying to make here too. It just doesn’t add up with everything else we’ve been told. I am hoping eventually things will be edited and clarified but right now, the way I see the entire story has changed and it’s very weird that I don’t know if that’s intentional or not. It’s something for her to look at, in any case, especially if there’s multiple people coming away feeling the same.

I understand we need conflict with Seven so the PC has to do them dirt in some way, but it’s still odd because the PC’s POV up until now told us music was something they always wanted to do together, and then they go and take the vote quite well. Weird but okay, maybe it wasn’t all that important to them in the end or they realized they wanted to be the sole lead once the opportunity was there - but either they cared about how Seven feels or they didn’t. And we were told that they did, several times. So even if they were happy about being the sole lead, not thinking about or considering Seven and just going along with everything is yet another head scratcher that conflicts with what we’ve been told for the past 600k words.

[fsix]

@djinnism

Thank you, yes I don’t know why people keep insisting that the band made a nonsensical decision.

I’m saying it was poorly thought out because that’s what it was – it’s done with very little actual metrics to speak of and by people who had no education in how to read those metrics beyond “oh look, some fans say that they like MC singing alone better than with Seven”.

Yes, the band gained some fans afterwards over the years, but would it gain less fans than that if Seven was still a co-singer? Maybe it’d have instead gained more, including those Seven has attracted on their own? The point is, we’ll never know.

And then there’s the whole aspect that even if we accept for the sake of argument that getting rid of Seven gained the band more fans, then it doesn’t change anything in that at the end of the day, Seven’s supposed best friends threw them under the bus because they were more interested in their own fame.

[EvilChani]

@batmansrobin

The issue is that after 600k+ words into this where we’ve been told repeatedly that the PC and Seven had dreams of making music and were very close and so codependent, we’re now disregarding that. Suddenly the PC is obtuse to who Seven is as a person, somehow unaware of how that situation could hurt someone that cared that much about music and how Seven is likely stuffing down their feelings, and the past 7-ish years they spent performing as co-singers and planning their music careers together was actually just for the Lols.

This is why I have to assume that the MC is just, if not a bad person, someone who really didn’t give a damn about Seven at all and only cared about themselves. It’s the only explanation for that internal monologue. No one is that stupid about someone they’ve been joined at the hip with for seven damned years.

And, even if the MC didn’t know Seven as well as we’ve been told, anyone with the slightest bit of empathy would’ve known how Seven was feeling given they repeatedly stated their dream was to be a lead singer. It’s like watching someone lose something or someone they love and expecting them to be fine with it, and believing them when they say they are, when you should know damn well they are not fine.

@fsix

Yes, the band gained some fans afterwards over the years, but would it gain less fans than that if Seven was still a co-singer? Maybe it’d have instead gained more, including those Seven has attracted on their own? The point is, we’ll never know.

Yes. And the “breakup” probably got them more attention (people love drama), which explains their minor surge in fans right after Seven left. They might have done better with Seven and MC as co-leads if they had just stuck with it a bit longer, or evaluated why the MC’s solos were better liked by a handful of their fans. Was it a different topic? A faster or slower beat? Catchier? You have two awesome song writers in the band… why not let them figure it out first, before throwing the founder of the band out on their ass.

@fsix

Seven’s supposed best friends threw them under the bus because they were more interested in their own fame.

Exactly. I feel so bad for Seven now. The MC and band are assholes.

[strawberrydelight]

@batmansrobin

It’s “should I be coming away feeling like the PC just didn’t understand or give a shit about Seven at all? Because I did and I think that’s kind of weird, maybe something is off with the storytelling here” discourse.

Honestly me too, I feel like when these little flashback snippets come out I have to recalibrate the way I see MC, or at the very least an MC who voted against the demotion, because imho either I’ve misunderstood their reasoning, or they’re being portrayed the exact same way as an MC who agreed. Like I expect an MC who wanted Seven to remain a lead singer to be at least somewhat conflicted about the vote, not being fully on board? When you choose if your MC voted for or against, if they voted against it’s because “they couldn’t do that to Seven, no matter the reason” (paraphrasing I can’t remember the wording), so I expected them to not see this vote as fully justified at the very least? Even though they didn’t push against it. (Because they’re a people pleaser/Because they thought they couldn’t go against a majority vote/Because they were ambushed and confused etc. there are many many reasons for them not to say anything even if they had hated the whole thing) Except this dissatisfaction for Seven’s demotion never comes up again in their inner monologue (feel free to contradict me though I may be misremembering).

And Amy once said the MC would be able to be portrayed as resentful towards their friends because of the vote, but if they are on board either way, what would they have to be upset about? Then again they can totally just be a hypocrite about it and be mad without the right to be idk

I think some parts would need some different flavor text for an MC who was against the demotion tbh, and also for an MC that did! The former showing some inner conflict about demoting Seven/the vote and the latter being a liiiittle bit more cutthroat in it.

After all it’s big enough of a divergence to be inserted under the Seven relationship stat. If it changes nothing for Seven and nothing for us what’s the point of having it as a choice in the first place?

I lean towards it being a fault in the writing tbh. Sometimes there are some options that are not super thought out and contradict other stuff I’ve noticed. For example, there’s an option in an old Patreon short from Iris’ POV,

Summary

where she thinks about MC and Seven’s behavior after the vote, and you can select that your MC refused to get out of bed for a time and was doing so badly they had to be dragged physically out of it??? (Besides the fact that the band noticed that Seven was doing very very poorly. So why wouldn’t MC do the same?) And I’m sorry but no matter how much it was for the good of the band and a business decision if I saw that it was affecting my lead singer’s mental and physical wellbeing that badly I would dial it back immediately?? Not hope they get over it?? That’s just not friend behavior, it’s not even colleague behavior

I also can’t see Seven being mad with the same intensity with an MC who basically took it worse than them lmfao. I just assumed Amy did not think too much about it. it was just a small Patron thing after all

@erinrae26381

you not think that would then make it harder to justify the MC staying, if they were really that much more conflicted/bitter about it? I think that would make the whole situation less plausible, not more.

Not at all! MC is canonically a people pleaser with abandonment issues, once Seven left, the band was literally all they had. I don’t see it as a stretch that they wouldn’t leave them regardless of how they felt about the vote.

@charger

damn, either i never read this or i forgot about it. probably didn’t read it bc i don’t really like iris. but that’s another strike for the band. i tried to like them because they’re supposed to be MC’s friends, but honestly i think they suck and have always sucked. they’re terrible, awful friends to the MC

I don’t think they’re terrible but they’re definitely not acting great rn I find the occasional lack of tact and taking each other for granted to be so so very common in friendships that lasted more than a decade! Eerily well written I can’t wait to see how it develops as the MC goes through their character arc.

[charger]

@charger

if something my friends did caused me and my partner to split and they referred to it as breakupgate to my face

omg lol i forgot about that… this + sneak peek things zoo wee mama! bad friends, bad friends. all of them.

@strawberrydelight

For example, there’s an option in an old Patreon short from Iris’ POV,

damn, either i never read this or i forgot about it. probably didn’t read it bc i don’t really like iris. but that’s another strike for the band. i tried to like them because they’re supposed to be MC’s friends, but honestly i think they suck and have always sucked. they’re terrible, awful friends to the MC.

[erinrae26381]

@EvilChani

No one is that stupid about someone they’ve been joined at the hip with for seven damned years.

You don’t think it’s plausible that two people can change in key ways (esp in their teens/early twenties) without seeing it? Or just avoid the obvious because it’s easier than dealing with it? Idk, yeah, some people can be that stupid lol.

@EvilChani

And, even if the MC didn’t know Seven as well as we’ve been told, anyone with the slightest bit of empathy would’ve known how Seven was feeling given they repeatedly stated their dream was to be a lead singer.

Could Seven’s friends have expected that they sacrifice that part of the dream for them all to find success and fame? Is that an unreasonable expectation? Is it unreasonable to hope or expect that Seven would do that for their friends? Why does Seven get to have what Seven wants here, even if something else might be better for everyone? I’ll reiterate that we literally do not know what would have happened vis a vis the band’s success if nothing had changed. And however anyone feels about it, the characters certainly didn’t know. They made their decision. They were doing what they thought was right in the moment.

Everyone kind of sucks here. Everyone’s being kind of a bad friend. Everyone kind of has point. Everyone’s being kind of self-centered. Everyone’s aiming for a dream and maybe everyone is hoping that they all share one dream. Clearly they didn’t in the end.

@strawberrydelight

I think some parts would need some different flavor text for an MC who was against the demotion tbh, and also for an MC that did! The former showing some inner conflict about demoting Seven/the vote and the latter being a liiiittle bit more cutthroat in it.

Do you not think that would then make it harder to justify the MC staying, if they were really that much more conflicted/bitter about it? I think that would make the whole situation less plausible, not more.

If I’m not mistaken, we’ve already had conversations in the past year wondering at why the MC is even still around, because people wanted to play an MC who would leave with Seven. The more upset the MC can be about the vote/the band’s treatment of Seven, the stranger it becomes that they’re even still in the band at all. And then there’s no story?

I think people need to try and come to terms with the fact that the MC feels the way that they do? I think we should be asking “what else happened” to get us to this point, rather than declaring it all to be nonsensical because we’re barely out of chapter 3 and we don’t have answers yet.

And maybe take POVs with a grain of salt; between Amy deliberately avoiding spoilers when she’s writing them and characters just being straight up biased, they are not The Objective Truth.

@EvilChani

What’s better for “everyone”, to be honest, isn’t Seven’s motivation, nor should it be, because the band isn’t some borg hive mind who exists only for the betterment of the group.

The band shouldn’t… make decisions for the good of the band? Seven is a part of the band, too??? I think you’re being unreasonable, haha.

@fsix

I think when you expect someone else to make a sacrifice so you can benefit, then that’s primarily selfish. Trying to apply “the needs of many etc” or trying to portray that as “reasonable” doesn’t really change it.

OK? Yes, I said several time they were all being kind of self-centered. But that doesn’t automatically make the idea of sacrifice/compromise unreasonable, imo. Nobody handled this well, but I’ll always argue that making a change to the band’s structure is… a normal sort of business decision.

@fsix

The most obvious things to consider – is it actually beneficial to try to appeal to a subset of our present audience? What’s the ceiling of what we can obtain this way?

And so this is what you, dear player, think with the benefit of a broad oversight and whatever your individual perspective and experience. Why do these fictional characters have to think this way, too, in order for their decisions to make sense for them? Why not try to understand their motivation from their own perspective? I can’t help but feel like you’re skipping this.

@EvilChani

And for Seven… I don’t see why the hell Seven should be expected to give up their dream for a bunch of assholes who, for all intents and purposes, just voted them of the band (“Here, have a tambourine and go stand in the corner, hahaha!”).

See above for my response to fsix. Anyway, I think you’re being disingenuous with this interpretation of the writing.

I see this as how it all felt for Seven, but I this isn’t how it went down iirc.

[djinnism]

@fsix

I’m saying it was poorly thought out because that’s what it was – it’s done with very little actual metrics to speak of and by people who had no education in how to read those metrics

You don’t actually need formal education in that. It’s not complicated: MC sings alone —> numbers go up. If the numbers are better every time MC sings alone, I think that’s a pretty good indication of what’s hitting with audiences. What else are they supposed to consider? There’s not secret data available to creatives that will tell them what will be most popular, and there’s not some special way to interpret it.

I know what you’re saying, that they made a slipshod decision without fully knowing if it would pay off in the long run and without knowing if the opposite would be true — but they can’t split the universe and test out both theories, and there’s nothing in-demo pointing to the idea that the band would be more popular if MC and Seven were still a duo, so I think the hypotheticals are just overcomplicating things. The vote created a deep wound and splintered Seven and MC’s personal relationship, regardless of the professional outcome.

[Jamo]

@EvilChani

Honestly, at this point, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if the MC was fucking around behind Seven’s back. And, if confronted, they would see nothing wrong with it. That’s just the type of person they seem to me now.

Wild conclusion, different perspectives or not. I think if you’re joined by the hip and spend pretty much every waking (and sleeping) moment with said person because the both of you can’t function without the other, it’d be pretty hard to cheat.

[EvilChani]

@erinrae26381

Idk, yeah, some people can be that stupid lol.

Okay, valid point. I’ve met some pretty stupid people.

@erinrae26381

Could Seven’s friends have expected that they sacrifice that part of the dream for them all to find success and fame? I

Um… no. If Seven’s dream was to be a famous lead singer, I don’t think being dropped to backup singer–a position already taken, by the way–is “part of the dream”. It’s like dreaming to be a doctor and ending up being the guy who sweeps the floor in a hospital. Saying you have to sacrifice your dream to attain your dream is illogical. You are, in effect, giving up on your dream. If Seven has to become a backup singer, better to do it with people they don’t know and who didn’t just spit in their face and tell them it was raining.

@erinrae26381

Is it unreasonable to hope or expect that Seven would do that for their friends? Why does Seven get to have what Seven wants here, even if something else might be better for everyone?

Seven is the one who started the band. The MC was supposedly either their bff or their bff/lover. What’s better for “everyone”, to be honest, isn’t Seven’s motivation, nor should it be, because the band isn’t some borg hive mind who exists only for the betterment of the group. They are individuals with their own motives, their own priorities, and their own relationships with each other and other people.

Seven’s thinking was what was best for them and the MC–with the band as a whole taking a backseat, because they would rather be famous with MC than ditch the MC and be famous with the band–while the MC was ready to throw them under the bus without a thought because their “friends” said so, then sit there like a brainless lump of crap wondering why Seven was upset. I mean, we know Seven was overly attached, but I can tell you that, if my husband and I had the same dream and started a band together, then the band members tried to oust him the way they did to Seven, I’d tell them to fuck off without thinking twice.

@erinrae26381

Everyone kind of sucks here. Everyone’s being kind of a bad friend.

That’s the thing. Seven does not “suck” and was not a bad friend. Seven was wronged and was betrayed.

@erinrae26381

I think people need to try and come to terms with the fact that the MC feels the way that they do?

Oh, I’ve come to terms with it. I’ve come to terms with the fact that the MC betrayed Seven, was a horrible friend to them, was a horrible SO to them, and never really loved them at all because they were too self-absorbed. As for what happened next, quite honestly, it doesn’t matter to me. That internal monologue told me everything I need to know about the MC.

@Jamo

I think if you’re joined by the hip and spend pretty much every waking (and sleeping) moment with said person because the both of you can’t function without the other, it’d be pretty hard to cheat.

You’d be surprised. I’ve seen one half of a couple like that manage to cheat on their SO. Quickies in the closet/bathroom/wherever are a thing for a reason.

@erinrae26381

The band shouldn’t… make decisions for the good of the band? Seven is a part of the band, too??? I think you’re being unreasonable, haha.

The band was having a knee-jerk reaction to a handful of fans liking the MC’s solos better. And they only had a handful of fans to start with.

As to your question, sure the band should make decisions for the good of the band, but the whole “this is just business” thing only goes so far. They treated Seven badly with this vote. Maybe one of them tried to make amends–we don’t know that for certain–but we do know the MC just asked if they were okay then went about their business and cluelessly wondered why Seven could possibly be upset.

And for Seven… I don’t see why the hell Seven should be expected to give up their dream for a bunch of assholes who, for all intents and purposes, just voted them of the band (“Here, have a tambourine and go stand in the corner, hahaha!”). I think sticking with the band would’ve been the worst thing they could do, at that point, since they were relegated to nothing. They were right to leave.

And @fsix said it before I could, so I’ll just quote it here:

@fsix

I think when you expect someone else to make a sacrifice so you can benefit, then that’s primarily selfish. Trying to apply “the needs of many etc” or trying to portray that as “reasonable” doesn’t really change it.

[fsix]

@erinrae26381

Could Seven’s friends have expected that they sacrifice that part of the dream for them all to find success and fame? Is that an unreasonable expectation? Is it unreasonable to hope or expect that Seven would do that for their friends?

I think when you expect someone else to make a sacrifice so you can benefit, then that’s primarily selfish. Trying to apply “the needs of many etc” or trying to portray that as “reasonable” doesn’t really change it.

I mean, at the very least if you claim to be friends with someone, then the decision should be left to the person who is supposed to actually make that sacrifice. Making a vote out of this where you basically force it on them, that’s just effectively invoking that old ironic saying about “the democracy of four wolves and a lamb voting on the meal”.

@djinnism

You don’t actually need formal education in that. It’s not complicated: MC sings alone —> numbers go up. If the numbers are better every time MC sings alone, I think that’s a pretty good indication of what’s hitting with audiences. What else are they supposed to consider?

The “what else they’re supposed to consider” is precisely what you get with actual education in the field, and the complicated part that people lacking said education think doesn’t matter.

The most obvious things to consider – is it actually beneficial to try to appeal to a subset of our present audience? What’s the ceiling of what we can obtain this way? “The numbers go up when MC sings alone”. Is that really always, or in some cases? If the latter, then why? How do the numbers go when it’s Seven who sings alone? Have we even tried that? How do they change if we replace some other member of the band, or the style? What even is trending, and can we take advantage of that? There’s this “intrawebs” thing that’s getting popular, what if we put our music there and see what opinions we get, as opposed to just what we hear at random gigs in dingy bars?

Or sure, you can just kick out a singer some of your current audience doesn’t like. Why would you even bother to consider the situation beyond that, it’s not rocket science and anyone can be marketing expert with no experience or education whatsoever.

There’s not secret data available to creatives that will tell them what will be most popular, and there’s not some special way to interpret it.

It’s not about any secret data but it is about ways you interpret it.

[strawberrydelight]

@erinrae26381

I think people need to try and come to terms with the fact that the MC feels the way that they do? I think we should be asking “what else happened” to get us to this point, rather than declaring it all to be nonsensical because we’re barely out of chapter 3 and we don’t have answers yet.

We were not asking “what else happened”, we were wondering about something in the story that to us seemed to clash with something that’s been previously established and confronting each other on whether we’re interpreting the story correctly. It’s not like we’re complaining that it should be different and Amy should change the story to please us. Should I immediately desist just because it verges in the writing critique territory?

Also I just made an innocuous suggestion

Whoops okay I misread what you wrote. Ignore that first part lol

@batmansrobin

Which is why I said above I understand now why being exes wasn’t even in the original idea. This is a major plot point and maybe Amy played it safe because Seven is a popular character so she added options that never fit her plans for the story and how little the PC apparently canonically cares about the shit show of the vote, but naturally that’s going to cause confusion and invite critiques of those elements of the story.

I disagree with the first part because even if they weren’t in love they still canonically loved each other platonically and were the most important person in each other’s life. So imho it doesn’t make it more or less acceptable.

About the vote I won’t go into details but some parts of the sneak peek

Summary

make it obvious that mc is very easy to talk circles around even now, so it’s not too hard to imagine the band convincing them the vote was necessary and a sound decision back then even for those MCs who maybe initially saw it as unthinkable and were opposed. They tend(ed) to be much more of a follower than a leader and to capitulate to the will of others even at the detriment of themselves. This plus I got the impression that they more often than not tend to take people at face value, and the fact that seven had never been a person afraid to speak up before and said they were fine with it, made for a terrible combination that made them accept the vote even if they disagreed, for those MCs who did disagree, and without noticing the extent of seven’s hurt. (in the same way seven’s own flaws made for a terrible combination that resulted in their behavior after the vote)

So I see the base concept of their conflict to be believable, there’s just some parts of MC’s inner monologue that make them appear callously on board regardless of their own initial stance. Which is what had me scratching my head too. And okay… some stuff the band says too sometimes It just stood out to me as I read.

[batmansrobin]

@erinrae26381

I think people need to try and come to terms with the fact that the MC feels the way that they do?

And how the PC feels is… canonically fine with the situation and Seven being treated that way – regardless of how much they knew Seven loved music and wanted to be a lead singer, regardless of how they voted, regardless of the past 7-ish years of being co-singers and over a decade of being close enough to be considered family – and that makes sense? That’s the best path for Infamous to take? That feels good and right for the PC’s character even given everything we’ve seen in the past 600k words and all the choices we’ve made? We’re barely out of chapter 3, sure, but it’s still been over half a million words and two years of a very different relationship between the PC and Seven being built up on the page. It doesn’t make sense to emphasize how much they cared about each other, how they planned their music careers together, wrote all these songs and teehee’d on rooftops over their shared dreams, and even let them be exes, just to disregard that and have the PC be Chilling as sole lead and obtuse to Seven’s feelings. Which is why I said above I understand now why being exes wasn’t even in the original idea. This is a major plot point and maybe Amy played it safe because Seven is a popular character so she added options that never fit her plans for the story and how little the PC apparently canonically cares about the shit show of the vote, but naturally that’s going to cause confusion and invite critiques of those elements of the story. That’s just how it goes and something has to give and be clarified, either way. You can disagree, of course, but your disagreements have disagreements and they aren’t going to make the story sensical for people where it isn’t lol, the writing has to do that.

I think everything everyone has said seems like pretty reasonable and kindly worded feedback tbh.

@strawberrydelight

So imho it doesn’t make it more or less acceptable.

I don’t think it’s more or less acceptable either - hence why I’m in shock at how the flashback went down in general. My point was that I understand why it wasn’t in the original plans, because it still adds an additional sting so had I been writing Infamous I wouldn’t have originally planned on an ex route for the PC and Seven either.

@Jamo

I think we have different definitions of “fine”.

Yeah, we must. Because I read it. Several times. Scratching my head all the while, because that inner monologue still didn’t add up for all the reasons I’ve stated above.

@Jamo

And I wouldn’t take anything Mc says at face value

Also I’m confused on this point because my entire issue is with what the PC is saying. They are the conflicting and inconsistent element in the events for me. So their monologue is my issue. Again, I don’t care who is right and wrong in the Seven debacle and that’s never been my point.

@erinrae26381

I feel like you lose me with the “canonically fine” thing. I haven’t played every iteration of MC and I haven’t replayed the game in full in probably six months, but at least in my memory, I don’t recall the MC that I played feeling “fine” with the situation (of course, they let it happen).

Did you read the sneak peek…? Because that’s what I’ve been discussing this entire time and how their inner monologue in the flashbacks, which are the same regardless of the PC, goes against their entire characterization and the entire narrative of their relationship with Seven thus far. So this is actually in direct agreement with everything I’ve been saying. Yes

[dorquemada]

To face the music from different angle – how many well-known bands with two lead singers do you guys know? Like, The One Band To Rule Them All aka The Beatles probably technically count, but even they alternated between John and Paul regularly, and when they stopped touring and went to do their visionary stuff it became even more prominent. Other than them? Robert Plant, Mick Jagger, Ian Gillan, Ozzy Osbourne, Freddie Mercury, TIll Lindemann etc etc etc…always one lead singer. MC’s band was definitely onto something.

[loomy]

does silk sonic count. they are the best duo on the planet and i’ll stand by that x. 7 and mc coulda been them

[JBento]

Does Seven still make hurty faces at you if you don’t bus with them after they specifically tell you they don’t want you to be around them?