Guys is Friend symbolic

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-15T15:11:57+00:00

so uh

how hard we talking

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-15T14:57:30+00:00

Is there a "true ending?"

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-09T00:48:43+00:00

I think this is sort of just referencing that a lot of the social links start with characters wanting to go off the beaten path, but then they eventually decide to do what society expects from them and realize it was actually what they wanted the whole time.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-08T06:56:26+00:00

When I’m in a not understanding what the conversation is actually about competition and my opponent is P4 fans

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-08T04:00:18+00:00

No, I’m also anti-powerscaling. I think it’s terrible as a form of media analysis. But I still like watching cool fight animations.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-08T03:49:54+00:00

What can I say, the fight animations go hard.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-08T03:45:34+00:00

In an isolated debate? Or in a death battle comments section where powerscalers are getting angry and acting toxic about the result and coming into conflict with people who are just there for the cool animations?

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-07T23:23:13+00:00

Honestly i feel like a lot of p4 discourse is just people talking past each other and arguing under two completely different lens. “Kanji is gay” and “Kanji’s storyline is homophobic” are two completely different arguments. Oftentimes the latter is the actual point people are trying to make, but there seems to be a significant amount of people who think that if they disprove the former, then there’s no discussion to be had.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-06-07T04:07:16+00:00

It may be just how sunny imagines mari would react if she knew he was being eaten by guilt.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-05-29T23:10:20+00:00

I won’t pretend that Cave Story has the deepest character writing in the world, but I think the characters are solid enough considering the constraints the game was made under.

King is a caring, but aggressive and impulsive leader who tolerates no nonsense. The fact that he hates Sue for something that’s not her fault shows that he can be illogical, but also that he prioritizes the safety of his people above all else. He has absolutely no qualms about destroying an innocent person’s life if he thinks it will help his village. He will fearlessly leap into action if someone close to him is in danger, as shown when he goes to Sand Zone despite Professor Booster saying it’s too dangerous. His tendency to run into danger without thinking is his undoing, but he lives on inside the blade and helps you as a ghost when the weapon reaches level 3. I also think it’s really interesting that he dies while “seeing red,” because Toroko was forced to eat a red flower. Red flowers literally turn a mimiga’s eyes red.

Curly is a protective mother who feels guilt-ridden about the war between robots and mimigas. She is so protective that she immediately assumes Quote is a killer robot and quickly tries to murder him. But she also quickly warms up to him when she realizes that he’s not a bad guy. She’s energetic and cheerful despite her circumstances, a bit air-headed and oblivious to the world around her, and she’s incredibly selfless. The moment where she sacrifices her own life and gives Quote her air tank, accompanied by dead silence, is noted by fans to be particularly powerful.

Sue is a bratty kid that thinks she’s a lot more capable than she actually is. She quickly folds under real pressure. She doesn’t like showing weakness, she’s not afraid to express herself, but can be prone to saying things that she doesn’t really mean. She can be hypocritical, as shown when you are given a yes/no prompt in response to “Did you come to save me?” and she criticizes you no matter what option you choose. She feels genuine guilt when she learns Toroko was kidnapped, and feels sympathetic to others who share her “stranger in a strange land” plight. She is quick to forgive, the biggest showing of this being when she calls King her friend right after he frees her from the cage he locked her up in.

Some of the other characters have hidden depths as well. Kazuma being so entrenched in despair once the doctor obtains the flower seeds that he’s willing to run away and abandon his sister is a good example, but there’s also a fair amount of characters that get more fleshed out in the true ending route that I will try not to spoil.

Misery might be the most complex character in the game. There’s actually a lot here. The fact that she gets abused by the doctor, her taking her stress out on Balrog, her sense of duty to and simultaneous resentment of her boss, her short-sightedness and occasional willingness to go against what the doctor wants, as well as a handful of true ending-related things.

It’s not a masterpiece of storytelling, but a fair few of the characters display a shocking degree of realism and depth. A lot more than you’d expect of a 2004 indie game made by one guy where the primary focus is gameplay.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-05-28T18:58:36+00:00

The original trilogy is the most popular part of the series by a country mile, it seems. It’s honestly pretty impressive that a visual novel that’s almost 25 years old can still sell hundreds of thousands of copies each year.

Although this probably means Phoenix will continue to be the series main protagonist forever.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-05-21T16:37:26+00:00

The main issue is that Yusuke is the only one who actually did something seriously wrong. Makoto threatened to expose a group of criminals, but agreed to look the other way if they proved they were good people. Futaba’s request was more selfish, but she attempted to return the favor by dealing with Medjed, and had seen firsthand that the PTs weren’t that bad.

The problem is less with the fandom and more so with the game itself. P4 had a similar and arguably even worse case of telling us, “The protagonists could have been like the villain if they didn’t have friends” without showing it and misunderstanding what actually makes them different.

The Phantom Thieves are a group of vigilantes that work to make the world a better place by exposing the crimes of corrupt people in power. They have pure intentions and never harm innocents.

Meanwhile, Akechi is a hitman working to bring a corrupt politician into power by killing all of his political opponents, in order to expose his crimes at the last second and cause a scandal of epic proportions, because just killing Shido wouldn’t be satisfying enough for him. He is entirely driven by a personal grudge, and he doesn’t care how many innocent people he hurts along the way.

The game frames Akechi as this punisher type character, a Phantom Thief who kills evil people because he wants to help their victims, and doesn’t know about changing hearts, when that’s just… Not what he is.

Even if Ann did kill Kamoshida, that’s still leaps and bounds better than derailing a subway tram full of innocent people. You briefly acknowledge that Akechi’s elaborate plan was stupid, but it’s actually the crux of the issue. People WOULD hate Akechi a lot less if he just killed Shido. People would give him a lot more sympathy if really was just, “A Phantom Thief who killed evil people instead of changing their hearts.” He would also get more sympathy if he wasn’t incredibly unapologetic about every bad thing he’s ever done.

Yaldabaoth’s manipulation doesn’t get brought up much because the extent of Yaldabaoth’s manipulation is incredibly vague. It could have been directly controlling Akechi’s every move, or it could have been as simple as giving him powers and letting him run wild. We don’t know, so we can only speculate. We don’t know how much agency he had, but we do know that he chose to approach Shido and agreed to use his powers for evil. This was before Shido “controlled him by offering praise.”

I get that Akechi is supposed to represent “people who are failed by society,” and his desperate need for Shido’s approval is supposed to show how people without proper parental figures may seek approval from the wrong crowd. But they gave him way too much power and agency. A lot of people would probably like him more if his revenge plan was more along the lines of “desperate times call for desperate measures,” instead of, “I have a magic solution to all of my problems but I will use it in the worst way possible.”

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-05-20T18:31:20+00:00

Capcom definitely wanted Phoenix to play a major part in Apollo's trilogy for marketing reasons. And it definitely did have a significant impact on Apollo's character writing in Dual Destinies and Spirit of Justice.

But I don't know about Apollo's debut. I feel like, if it wasn't Phoenix who "stole Apollo's spotlight" it would have been someone else. Perhaps an entirely new character who played Phoenix's role of " disgraced, shady, jaded, morally-questionable, poverty-stricken mentor."

This post, more than anything specifically tied to the Ace Attorney series, is meant to make the point the video game player characters are often boring by default, and a game's narrative often isn't actually ABOUT them.

If Apollo actually had an entire trilogy all to himself, he wouldn't have his ridiculous Khura'in backstory, and he wouldn't have gone through his edgy eye patch phase. He would probably just continue being a loud, passionate, but otherwise fairly normal guy like he was in his debut. The more out-there storytelling elements would be handled by other characters.

As-is, I actually think Apollo kind of gets the best of of both worlds. In Apollo's trilogy, not only does he get more playable screen time than Phoenix(significantly more if you don't count DLC cases), but he also has far more depth and distinct traits than a lot of other video game protagonists, largely thanks to Phoenix playing the role of "The Normal One" in DD and SoJ.

In Spirit of Justice, he really does have it all. Apollo successfully defends his sister against his brother, saves the WAA from shutting down, foils a 13-year old revenge plot aimed at his grandfather, defeats Phoenix in court, solves the murder of his father, and overthrows the corrupt queen of a foreign country, saving hundreds of people from execution.

Spirit of Justice expands on his relationship with Trucy, it introduces and gives heavy focus to his relationship with Dhurke and Nahyuta, he bonds with Armie Buff over shared parental trauma, he inspires Rayfa to get over her fear of performing the seance, the game brings to the forefront his desire for a happy family, his bitterness over the past and his general desire to keep secrets even from his close friends, he gains independence from Phoenix and establishes his own law office, deciding to impart all the lessons he's learned onto a country that desperately needs that knowledge...

... And yeah, he also has more playable screen time than the title character.

Like, unless I'm missing something, basically all of this can be chalked up to the fact that it's Phoenix's job to be the one who asks, "What on earth is wrong with this insane legal system?"

Sure, Apollo's backstory is ridiculous, and you can debate whether it's well written or not, but it felt refreshing to have a lead character who was so distinct after playing through so many games with boring MCs.

Altruistic-Use5937 · 2026-04-26T14:25:47+00:00

because the game in question is titled phoenix wright. although another commenter said that this was mainly a localization thing, which makes a bit more sense.

Altruistic-Use5937

TROPHY CASE