I do think her behavior makes sense based on her personality and circumstances. But her considering Tommy crazy just really rubs me the wrong way. He’s a college kid who lost his only family, of course he wants revenge. Madison still has Brody, and I’m pretty sure if she lost Brody, she would want revenge on whoever killed him.
It’s like when Reilly called Finn weak for not finishing off Layla. I like Reilly’s character overall and I think he has some good qualities, but that sort of comment will never sit right with me. If you’re not in someone’s shoes, you shouldn’t be judging them like that.
Yea ik, that’s what i meant, Madison is very aware and understanding. But she’s not very good in terms of empathizing with other people on their emotions. She knows about tommy wanting revenge but doesnt empathize with his vehemence to commit it because she didn’t know how much Tommy’s mom meant to him nor did she how intense his breakdown was, therefore she couldn’t understand his vehemence. The dialogue in the lake implies how she has a hard time empathizing with people that are in a situation or state of mind she hasn’t been in. Again, calling tommy downright crazy was definitely wrong and i really do hope we get to see more character development for madison where she realizes this herself and learns to process and express her thoughts in a more understanding and calmer manner.
To be fair there are a couple of people in the group who don’t like the tasks you assign them especially watch duty people seem to either be uncomfortable doing it and want to do something else or they’re insulted by it and think their skills could be used in a more productive manor this happens with several tasks not just watch duty(even though security is incredibly important ). So she isn’t the only who potentially has a complaint on what you task you give them, I’ve noticed she excels at hunting game, and other animals, which also lines up with her survivalist training(and doesn’t complain about it).
Also is she really putting on an act of superiority when she’s more capable and a lot less naive than some of the people in our group ? If anything she’s cocky, immature and wants to be treated as someone who can provide for the group instead of being put on the sidelines because people look at her age and not what she can contribute but she’s not pretending to be a capable survivor when she has the skills and has the intelligence to see how dangerous other people are now which is something other people are currently lacking That doesn’t mean she should talk shit about everyone just because she’s more skilled than others, even if she’s right about 3 people, she still doesn’t know enough about everyone else’s’ circumstances to label them that way.
That’s the thing, I’m not sure that Madison or anyone else actually knows what has actually happened to Tommy, because of 2 reasons: 1. I don’t think there’s been an instance where the MC was presented with a choice to tell people the cause and reasoning of Tommy’s trauma and behavior. Even though that instance when she judges him is the perfect opportunity to inform her of Tommy’s situation so she isn’t so judgemental and can actually understand where he’s coming from, the MC still doesn’t do it and 2 If she was robbed and her brother was murdered, she would definitely want revenge on the person.
So, unless this information was revealed off-screen,(which kind of sucks if that were the case, because the player should know if that information’s been revealed to the group) I don’t know how she would know anything about Tommy’s trauma, because I seriously doubt he’s walking around talking to people beside the MC about how he feels.
Being nosy again but I think a big chunk of the main reasons for Madison’s difference in attitude compared to Brody was because Brody’s personality was from his surroundings, whereas Madison’s personality was adapted for her surroundings, despite them having the same upbringing they had different beliefs and experiences forged by the circumstances of their surroundings.
I am referring to the first night at camp when you assign the watch duty shifts to everyone.
If you ask for volunteers, literally everyone volunteers for watch duty except Madison, Jillian, Woody and Nora (Nora because Reilly glares at her since he doesn’t want her to). Everyone else does it. Even Kelly, Parker and Brody are willing to stand watch. It’s not a matter of liking the task or not.
So the fact that Madison was all “hell yeah survival of the fittest, I will be practical and do what is needed to survive,” and then was one of the very few people at camp to duck out of a very necessary task rubbed me the wrong way.
I do think she will adjust in time to the reality, etc. The apocalypse is still very fresh.
Also this game has so many hidden paths LOL. I didn’t even realize people complaining about their assignment was a thing. Probably because I always assign the same 3 people to watching camp every playthrough - Tommy, Church and Bailey - and they don’t say anything about it.
I actually have very little sympathy when she uses this excuse. As someone who attended American high school in the 2010s, the notion of “good academics and intellectual interests = loser” has pretty much died out, and I have never met anyone my age who’s experienced any differently.
It seems to me that Madison convinced herself that a stereotype was true, so that her conscience could be eased when she put on her “mean girl persona” at school. The reality is that nothing was ever stopping her from being both popular and smart. (Madison even mentions Hillary Miller in Book 1, an overachiever in their grade that she was friendly with.)
Minor spoilers, but a teen with high charisma and high intelligence can actually call her out on this later on. The MC in this case was able to be both popular and smart at their high school, while Madison let herself be constrained by limits that she set up herself, so she could feel better about treating others the way she did.
Depending on charisma levels, Brody changes his response if the MC claims that they weren’t treated well at the school. There are other examples, but they don’t come to mind at the moment.
And my point still stands there. Nothing was stopping her from being both smart and popular.
This came from the private alpha’s code, but I’m only sharing it because Jim had it as a sneak peek on a public discord channel. I’m not sharing anything that was never made public before.
“You could have been smart and popular. Nothing stopped me, you let it stop you.” When said by a high charisma and high intelligence MC, implies that they were able to be both.
I get what you’re getting at but this was in the point of view of an average person compared to a girl that belonged and raised to a very influential wealthy family that prioritized image to the point that from the Madison romance dialogue you learn that their parents actually made the twins learn ballroom dancing (lmao).
Her surroundings at school didn’t help either, comparing her friend group to brody’s you kinda start getting a picture of how much it affected her and her beliefs.
Brody intimidation lesson dialogue : Brody appears ill at ease with your teaching. “Look, if I have to, I will, but I can’t say that it sits well with me.” Then he closes his eyes. “But then again, I always had the guys from the team behind me. I guess they were the reason no one messed with me.” Madison empathy dialogue: You find Madison is rather quiet during your lessons, though she does seem to take them to heart. As time winds down, you can tell something is on Madison’s mind. With some prodding, she says, “Back at school, I had to work out which people were just kiss-ups and those who would be a friend. Sometimes you couldn’t tell the difference.”
Image was important for these two people, but madison’s environment was much more vicious and high stakes, making her needing to be more assertive and adapt to it.
I get what you are trying to mean, but compared to a regular or high average popularity individual there was a more immense amount of pressure on image for madison, I can imagine she built the pyramid while she was still young and less mature and realized too late when she got stuck at a very high point.
As a main brody-mancer i used to dislike her too, tried interacted and romanced her, learning more about her and her experiences I started to sympathize with her, at some points her talks were downright sad and often relatable.
You know, that actually makes more sense in that context. I didn’t really factor her wealth and family renown into it.
However, I still firmly believe that Madison hiding her passion for computer science is 100% her fault. While Madison’s family background may influence who she associates with, there really was nothing stopping her from having nerdy interests. I mean, her parents could have used their connections to land her an internship at Google or something.
I think madison hiding her nerdy interest is her own actions yea, but it’s understandable. When in the socialize with madison dialogue, you learn that she actually expresses an interest in the creative field of being a writer, which i think that she thinks her parents would dissaprove, i don’t know but it’s highly plausible since her family prioritzes th idea of wealth and people in the creative arts department are often associated with not being the most well paid.
She is rude and horrible to so many different people in the group, including both of my characters. I don’t like her. I only keep her around because her brother is nice. She’s also so self absorbed - she takes Kevin up on sleeping in the house but where does Brody go? There’s other examples but I need to replay the first two parts cause it’s been so long.
Lol, Imo a majority of Madison hate comes from people who don’t try to interact with her and made judgments based on their biases or projects their perception onto her based on the few interactions they had with her without trying to understand her reasoning for such actions.
In a way they’re more like Madison than they think they are, making judgments based on surface level observations and assumptions without taking circumstances and the environment into value.
I get people disliking her personality but i don’t think she should be grouped with keith out of all people.
If this is the case, it’s an error. The way I have it set up is that nonleaders can check the task board which sets a flag. A new option then appears to perform the daily task.
Yes it will be mostly platonic, but that’s not to say a teen romance with her is out of the question in the future. Since spoilers at this point are unavoidable without continuing to be vague, I plan to have a time jump in Part 4. All NPC’s will be open to the formerly teen MC.
It’s on my to do list, but I can’t guarantee it will make the first release.
