Mind Blind (04/30 Demo Update. A Story Where You Are NOT The Chosen One!)

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That part was already in there when Glitch’s route home was first uploaded! I tried it once just to see what would happen, but I don’t think my Button would ever actually fake-propose so soon lol, unless Glitch was safely in the friendzone! So far he’s not though :eyes:

I have to agree: Button/Glitch interactions are pretty great! :heart:

I read through all the visions, and none of them seem to be super great regardless of which one you choose…I’m scared now :fearful:

For my Snickly people, how do you feel about it now, given the circumstances? At one point I was all for it, but now my Button is all :grimacing: :grimacing: at the concept of being a conduit of Snickly’s romantic tension for the foreseeable future.

Also…I felt kinda weird about how Sally just like…changed into Nick’s old sweater (at least in my playthough) after her shower. I get that she’s supposed to be like family, but dang that was a little too familiar for me. :grimacing:

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Ugh sally should be wearing mcs sweaters tho

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Did they change something recently? For me she changed into my MC’s sweater. Maybe its because your character was a girl or something or I just read it wrong.

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Sally only wears Nick’s sweater if you’re trying to set them up. Otherwise, she wears MC’s sweater.

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How do you set them up?? I thought I had my Button doing that, but Sally came out in one of his Giant sweaters lol.

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I’m curious about this as well, since so far the pairing doesn’t seem too popular. So let’s put it to a vote! I’m open to reworking the current execution. (As of five seconds ago, for example, you can now decide to matchmake the two without eavesdropping. As it currently stands, Sally still needs to enter first, but I’ll probably change that too after reading comments.)

Snickly, Yea or Nay?
  • Yea.
  • Nay.
  • Hey (i.e. “Not setting the two up personally, but otherwise don’t really care”)

0 voters

Also, please consider leaving comments on this thread with specifics. What about their dynamic do you like/dislike? What could make it better? Would your opinion be different if Sally wasn’t an RO? Reading targeted feedback helps me improve. And I do read it all, even if I often don’t have time to respond!

For those trying to set up Sally and Nick: It only works if you’re not in love with her.

Also, major thanks to everyone for reporting typos and bugs! I think I’ve now fixed all the issues reported on the forum, other than maybe the one missing chapter image–I reuploaded the file, but it still doesn’t seem to working and I can’t figure out why. Maybe I’m subconsciously projecting via bad coding the fact that that route makes me sad? :sweat_smile:

I’ll give some thought into people’s suggestions about Kent’s tie, although I think the best thing would to have that option appear in a later scene to demonstrate that the relationship between the two is growing closer (especially since Kenna needs a comparable option). I’ll also consider more positive responses to K’s reappearance in Chapter 2 despite the fact what a Ment not revealing they can read Button’s mind is suuuuper unethical. Button can be not bothered, but objectively speaking the whole thing is pretty sketch.

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I kinda viewed it as a “You didnt ask I didnt tell” kinda thing. So my MC would be embarrassed but not offended per say. Especially since he basically was planning a wedding and K just stood there listening lol. I’d like an option where we just simply greet them again though. Kinda like the flirt option but without being a total creep about it :joy:
As for Sally Nick set up my MC is going for it. I did find it weird she was wearing one of his shirts without at least asking though. Kinda just felt weird.

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That makes sense! I’ll take another look at the passages. A more neutral response shouldn’t be too difficult to include.

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Damn was hoping for way more nays

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Okay so here is my deal with Nick and Sally:
I personally have nothing against them being together but, to me their personalities seem incompatible. Maybe it’s because they are both positive sunshines or whatever but for most of their scenes I kinda cringe. During the hospital scene, I wanted to let Sally see Nick but she can’t expect to see him before his own sibling sees him (especially because they weren’t in relationship yet).

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I love this update! As usual I was cackling madly through my dread and terror.

(this is my first time using the forums, so please forgive any formatting errors - I’m not 100% sure how hiding spoilers works. SPOILERS BELOW. just in case.)

Summary

I’m so glad to have Nick back <3. It’s funny, He actually hasn’t appeared much in-game, but his presence is felt even in his absence. I imagine humorous my Button softly interjecting “ghostbusters!” when appropriate, dancing (badly) in otherwise perfect silence and darkness on their way to the kitchen. Poor John.

Sally’s vision scene was really effective. How weird is it to suddenly be faced with a major, scary part of your BFF’s life like that? And Sally struggling to assure Button that she’s fine?? When she clearly is not??? Very upsetting, thank you. I just want to give her a hug :frowning:

All of the visions were upsetting and alarming. Rosy’s in particular was creepy as hell. I thinks it’s not the presence of the body, so much as the extremely matter-of-fact tone. My pet theory is that the “Wiseman” Rosy addresses is actually secretly Uncle Gary. They’re in cahoots, and Button is the mysterious prone figure… being hauled off to some fate unknown…

I am super curious about how Sally’s powers work. She says that her brain needs a day to recharge - does this mean that she can only deliberately trigger a vision once a day and that they’ll still happen at random, or is it that all of her visions need recharge time? Do precogs need training to be able to accurately describe their visions as they happen? Do they just automatically relate what they see? I think it’s been mentioned somewhere that Sally sleep talks predictions, so the second one? ALSO Sally says that “there’s nothing (she) can do to change the future” is she just being pessimistic? because if emotion biases her powers, then surely not all of her predictions are accurate? Or is it that they are accurate, just incredibly misleading and lacking in context? (how meta…) I don’t really expect any answers to these questions lmao, I’m just thinking out loud…

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I considered voting “hey” but ended up voting “nay.”

I think, for me, it has nothing to do with Sally being an RO and more to do with Sally being MC’s best friend (or codependent partner, depending on your view of that “friendship”).

Also, I agree with @Kadaku that I don’t feel they’re particularly compatible. Sally gives me… immature vibes. I can’t pinpoint what exactly does it for me, perhaps it’s things like the expecting to see Nick first or the way she was during the class exercise agains Nox & Glitch, but I just feel like she’s childish.

The main thing is that we don’t really see Sally interact with Nick much (or at all?? I think at all???) so to then be expected to support her pursuit of Nick is just… weird since there’s no indication that Nick feels similarly. My MC loves her brother to pieces, and would definitely not help Sally without knowing that Nick wants that (and probably wouldn’t want to help even if she did know because of the awkward position it might put her in). Plus, between the pouting when she can’t see MCs comatose brother first, the wearing Nick’s shirt without asking, and tbh, even the hospital bedside confession, it feels more like Sally has a childish infatuation/obsession than an actual grown ass interest. (Admittedly, MC’s interest in Gray can read somewhat similarly, but I think that’s more because Gray is either dense or pretending to be clueless so the flirtation never gets reciprocated. BUT, my Gray MC likes him because he’s a sweetheart and very obviously cares about her.)

Also agree with @QuixquillianParadise below point about Sally seeming to care more about her feelings for Nick than MC.

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The problem for me is that sally almost feels like a little sister to my mc. I don’t see the relationship working at all. Like the older brother and childhood bff -~> sister just feels weird. I wanted to vote nay but than I questioned myself, am I being selfish! Truthfully I can see my mc trying to sabotage Sally and Nicky rather than setting them up. Like as the post aboves noted Sally feels no different than nick other fangirls. No chemistry whatsoever, like doesn’t nick think of her as a child, his sibling bff. Just feels weird.

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For one thing, Nick and Sally barely interact unless the MC very specifically wants them to, which means no one can really see how they are together. Consciously or not, this may be to prevent the reader from feeling “forced” to ship it, which is fair, I suppose, but which might be contributing to lack of Snickly fans. That, and the ship name - it reminds me of a whiny mustache-twirling villain draped in black. It also sounds rather similar to “sickly”.

Ship names and non-existent interaction aside, I’m not a fan of what’s currently in the game regarding the ship. Currently Sally comes off as kind of borderline obsessive over Nick, rather than just caring for his wellbeing. She also has kind of a strange attitude of entitlement to him, which comes through especially in the hospital scene and really turned me off from ever shipping them, though I suppose my interest in a Sally-romancing playthrough might be leaking in there. Still, that was the moment where I sort of made up my mind: no, I’m not setting them up, not even on my Gray playthrough.

In addition, the hospital scene also has the effect of unintentionally showing “Sally cares more about Nick/her feelings for him (more the latter in my opinion, tbh) than the MC” because she wants to go in before them, which really does come off quite badly, and makes me, and I’m sure many other who wanted a close friendship/romance with Sally (or close relationship with Nick), resentful of the route

Their personalities don’t seem to work very well together either, in my opinion, as has already been said.

That’s most of it, I think. Though I see now (upon reading it) that many of my points have previously been touched on by the post above me, I hope it’s still helpful anyhow. :blush:

EDIT: Forgot to add that her being a RO makes some difference to me, but I’d feel at least half the things about the pairing I do now even if she weren’t.

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Personally, Nick’s my absolute favorite character, so the option to give him some romance in his life makes me pretty happy.

However, I do find that it’s a little bit hard to get invested (at least right now at the beginning). I think for me it’s that we haven’t really seen them interact at length, so I can feel a bit of a disconnect. I think given the time I could see a more genuine connection between them, but as of now it feels… odd?

I really do love both of them, and I think it could be a really interesting pairing. I think the scene at the hospital stood out to me as strange. I agree with @QuixquillianParadise that it did come off as Sally caring more about her own worry and feelings than Button’s. I see why letting Sally in first makes sense flag-wise, but my Button would definitely not have been happy with Sally, even though she understands worrying about Nick.

So overall I like the idea of Snickly, but I’m struggling to feel as involved with it as I’d like to.

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I think I just tend not to like “background characters get together if you don’t romance them” plots in games, personally. If I did want to romance Sally, I’d feel like I was getting in the way of her and Nick, the ~true pairing~. Which i know is not what you intend! I think I’d be a little more receptive if Sally weren’t an RO but not overly?

In MB specifically though it’s sort of a weird thing to reconcile between “Nick and Sally are all Button has left” and “if Button doesn’t matchmake for Nick and Sally, they are a bad selfish person.” Maybe that last bit was just the vibe I got the one time I let her go in the room first, and you’ve since edited that? Or I’m just sensitive bc I guess I, personally, have been in enough situations where the two people closest to me start dating and I’m left out in the cold while they’re together and left to pick up the pieces when they break up. And I feel like my poor Button has already been through enough, she doesn’t need all that, especially when she doesn’t have a support network outside of them.

And Sally wanting to see Nick before Button, their own sibling, gets to – I think you phrased it as “permission to be selfish” on tumblr? But to me does note bode well for how much Sally would consider Button’s feelings if she were in a relationship with Nick.

I don’t have anything intelligent to add to what everyone else is saying about not feeling the chemistry between Nick and Sally – both not having seen them interact and them not seeming to have compatible personalities – other than “ditto”.

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Firstly I definitely agree with @bric and @Kadaku about their compatibility. Nick is grown person and Sally feels too childish for him. Because of this a lot about their ship feels kinda “forced”.

Secondly, Sally’s crush on him is sometimes creepy. Especially the hospital part, uh. I know it was already explained but I still feel like her actions were very selfish. I don’t want to be mean but she is pretty much nothing to Nick except Button’s best friend so what gives her the right to see him before Button.
Overall I am not a big fan of Snickly. I like Sally and Nick both the way they are but together they just feel wrong.

Edit: Also I forgot to mention that even if Sally wasn’t RO I would still find this ship awkward :upside_down_face:

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I ended up voting Nay. My MC sorta looks at Sally like a sibling, and even if I didn’t look at it this way, it be kinda weird because she gives me that childish, immature vibe. (also, sally and nick didn’t interact really with each other) Their compatibility clashes.

The part with Sally wearing Nick’s shirt without permission, pouting because she didn’t see Nick first in the hospital sorta made me annoyed at her for these reasons.

I like them just as they are, one being my brother and the other as just a friend.

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Btw, found the ask/answer explaining the whole Sally visiting Nick hospital scene. Idk how to do the thing where we link the post, so this is the explanation:

I tweaked the scene after reading your suggestion! Rather than change visitation order, however, I made the security guard a more an obvious threat. There’s an option to go first and intend for Sally to go after, but she’s banished when you exit–it now should be much clearer that this will happen, due to new interaction between Sally and the guard.

Part of my decision is that Button does make a sacrifice by allowing Sally to see Nick first. Because if Sally and Nick are set up, Button will no longer be at the center of the two’s relationship. They’ll have a connection outside Button.

Sally feels selfish for wanting to see Nick–it’s why she doesn’t ask outright. Tell her to go in, however, and you give her permission to be emotionally greedy. To prioritize her feelings over yours, which is (realistically speaking) the only way a romance between Nick and Sally could ever really work. Button can be the impetus for the two’s relationship, but they can’t be its focal point.

By letting Sally go first, Button indicates that they’re able to eventually play second fiddle. You’re metaphorically and literally stepping aside. Because when people in healthy committed relationships make decisions, their first instinct isn’t how it will impact their sibling or best friend (which is currently the state for both Nick and Sally). It’s to discuss plans with their partner.

Not every player may want to change this dynamic for Button, however. Either because sharing is hard, or they dislike Sally and Nick together. Which is fine! It’s an entirely optional subplot, and one which you have to deliberately work at to see.

To be clear, it doesn’t change my view. If anything, it makes my “nay” even stronger, because while I understand Sally and Nick essentially feeling like they need Button’s “permission” to pursue each other, the fact that Sally would choose THIS moment to try to get it solidifies that she’ll become a trash friend if she starts dating Nick, imo, and if that bleeds over to Nick becoming a trash brother, my Button might just become suicidal.

EDIT/s/n: Has anyone done a play through where MC generally reacts poorly to Sally’s existence? I’m curious if it’s possible for MC to NOT be friends with Sally. I know I’ve chosen to punch Sally in the nose before and chose that their relationship seems codependent, but I don’t recall it leading to their relationship not being considered a friendship.

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I also think that rather than “asking for permission” the scene kind of comes off as Sally expecting to be let in, in its current form.

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