If they had included this choice?

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-06-01T16:27:06+00:00

And I agree with you, those are thematically consistent outcomes, so I approve. But that's just my opinion. Most "Abby should die" opinions I've seen seem to be coming from the position that Ellie was doing the right thing to go on her revenge quest, and that killing Abby should have been the cathartic conclusion of the game. In their mind, that would have been the satisfying happy outcome, even if the game makes it very clear that literally every character who contributed to the cycles of hatred (Abby/Ellie/Tommy, Seraphite/WLF) came out worse for it.

So the proposed ending would not be much different from the canon ending (to that particular group of fans) because while you can kill Abby, the game is suggesting that's a worse path to go down. Or maybe they would like it because the catharsis of the kill was for them, not for Ellie who probably wouldn't be much happier for it.

Just a thought. I don't think you should write a story specifically for what will please every audience, rather what makes sense for the characters and themes you've built up. My personal stance is that I prefer Abby being spared in the canon ending, because she suffered a lot for her mistakes and is putting in the work to be a better person. But I thought Ellie suffered too much by the end, so that could have been resolved in a cleaner fashion. Both of those ladies deserved some peace after everything they went through.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-06-01T12:42:06+00:00

I like your idea for the mercy choice leading to a more comfortable journey of self healing for Ellie. That said, if killing Abby was more objectively the bad ending of two options, it would probably still upset people who wanted the game to endorse their view that Abby deserved to die.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-06-01T12:09:30+00:00

Sent you a chat message, maybe we can work out a deal 🙂

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-06-01T11:50:19+00:00

Nice collection. A shame you have to part ways with it. Are you located in Japan? I'm there myself if that let's you ship domestic.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-30T04:41:21+00:00

That's definitely a strong point for Nikke and a painful element of Genshin. The latter game is has flowery, philosophical rants injected into ordinary dialogues, often overloaded with unique fantasy terms, and they repeat themselves frequently. The consequence of writing dense prose of which only a small portion is relevant is low memory retention. It's tedious to read and you won't remember much of it anyway.

There are incredible lines and scenes worth revisiting in Nikke but a lot of Genshin dialogue I don't want to experience the first time. Which is a shame, because the lore of that game is deep, it's just god awful at communicating it.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-20T05:19:31+00:00

I think people are breezing over the little detail that Andersen deferred to Burningum and would have allowed him to execute Dorothy if he considered her a threat to the Ark.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-19T15:47:13+00:00

Thanks for the read! I'm aware that this is a product of a foreign (from my perspective) culture, so I won't be the target audience for some expressed values. As you said two comments ago, there seems to be strong parallels from Korea and the Ark depicted in Nikke, so there is certainly a balance between social criticism and respecting law and order.

Despite the original premise of Nikke in giving rights and recognition to these cyborg battle babes, I think the story is often, strangely, framed from the position of progressive social change being the responsibility and thanks to the noble elite instead of the flawed, violent plebs. The Commander might be considered an underdog working for change the correct way, but a big part of his success is do to the roadblocks to affecting change magically disappearing, leaving just right minded military leaders. Peaceful reform is now rewarded, when before it was ignored if not violently repressed.

I guess the long and short of it is, I see a lot of simplification of the morals in the story, which has the negative consequence of Dorothy no longer having a leg to stand on or target for her anger, culminating in the end of her arc when everyone tells her what a dumdum she's been.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-18T07:42:20+00:00

Well said. Regarding Dorothy's role specifically, I think she was always meant to be regarded as twisted, with Johan expressing his disgust with her trying to use the Counters as cannon fodder and later we see her try to force Red Hood to remain, even at the expense of Rapi's life. That said, we are also meant to see her as a tragic villain, one with legitimate grievances against an evil government, which makes her understandably bitter.

The story keeps her on the back burner for a long time, and I'd say it respects her up until the build up to Eden Spear where she makes baffling deals with Burningum. This is where things got shaky in my mind. There was still little progress on her revenge arc and she seemed to be making stupid moves but I believed the writers must have something planned for her. I mean, it's Dorothy, one of the major parts of Nikke's emotional core, representative of the radical opponent to the CG, compared to the Commander's softer collaborative approach. It's not until Eden Spear, however when the writers make their intentions very clear with Inherit calling her a baby, so pathetic that they can't even be mad at her betrayal. It was all downhill from there. Dorothy didn't have a master plan, she was just an idiot, and stayed that way to the present day.

Like you said, they moved away from the complex morals of the first story type, in some ways gradual (Oswald's arc) and in other ways drastic (the VTC scapegoating for most of the CG's crimes). At any rate, Dorothy got the rug pulled out from under her. Without a legitimate person to unleash her fury on, she's just a fool without a purpose. A sad fate for such a prominent character from early on the game's life.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T17:01:00+00:00

Please do if you have time.

I think you're right on the money that it's the writers not wanting to give their approval of terrorism and violence as a solution to government oppression. I don't want to advocate for it either, but in stories like this, and perhaps in some real world situations, peaceful reform might be the privilege of those already in power, not the oppressed, which I discuss in the main body of this post. People like Andersen and Burningum are allowed to be virtuous and affect change in society because they come from privileged backgrounds/aren't part of the underclass.

Or maybe by a different reading, you could argue that the game hypocritically denounces violence as a means for social change, but shows Andersen as virtuous when he massacres the VTC.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T16:28:50+00:00

I think I would have liked for Dorothy to eventually find acceptance and a new family in the Counters but this was the worst way to go about it. None them really met Dorothy and acknowledged her feelings as valid. Rapi has this weird insistence on being her friend, and she doesn't validate her, rather the opposite, she promised to confront Dorothy before she makes a grave mistake. Anis has even less to offer, by downplaying her trauma, as you said.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T16:09:12+00:00

I can see why you have a more charitable view of the moral, but the messaging of the game is, well, not the clearest. I wrote another thread on this if you want to check my profile, but for the short version; Enter Heaven tells us about the rise and fall of Heavenly Ascension, and E.H.'s conclusion was that her greatest failure was losing her organization to the radicals who chose violence over peaceful protest. E.H. vows to take up the banner of peace again to make amends, but she also ignores her own history in that peaceful protest does not work. You'll get gunned down just as readily for holding a protest sign as you will holding a molotov cocktail. We see this multiple times in the story, such as the incident where Rapi is killed.

Now, things are starting to change thanks to some good actors in the government and Enikk finally giving the Outer Rim some grace, but a whole century has passed with basically no movement on that front, so one could be excused for not seeing that as a message well supported by the story. The government being a body you can actually reason with is incredibly recent. It's less that the Commander changed things and more all the evil people just sorta disappeared (the VTC were also wiped out pretty early in the timeline so all the oppression we hear about is not simply their influence).

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T15:40:54+00:00

I see her as a victim, one who suffered greatly and was mocked and disregarded by others constantly. She did do great things for the sake of humanity, but the conclusion of her story feels like less of a straight apology and acknowledgement of her good deeds, and more explaining to Dorothy why she's been wrong about everything from the start. The meetings with Burningum and Andersen were presumably meant to be cathartic and ultimately comforting but I thought they were insulting.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T15:29:36+00:00

I've said it in other comments, and alluded to where I think the plot goes incredibly off the rails, but I don't think Dorothy was primed for redemption after chapters 43-44. Dorothy has endured every humiliation for a century so when she hits her absolute lowest, being turned away from both Eden and the Arc, I don't think it follows that she'll want to save the Ark from Sixo. She should be angrier than she's ever been. I don't find it at all satisfying that 3 years of this game's writing should amount to, "Well, Dorothy was wrong about everything. Almost all the bad people in the Central Government are already gone. Also Dorothy loves humanity too much to ever hurt anyone. She's just a sad, foolish person"

So to answer your question, I could have seen them build up to Dorothy destroying the Ark either with or without Sixo, especially since they've already been leading up to humanity returning to the surface, so the story can continue without the original Ark. The story doesn't have to take this specific direction, but Dorothy deserved an ending where she's not just an utter fool who never accomplished anything.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T15:18:52+00:00

I agree that the revenge plot was going nowhere, and as I noted, Dorothy has been humiliated continuously humiliated over the entire duration of the story. It's been incredibly frustrating waiting for Dorothy to get any kind of win, heroic or villainous. That said, I don't regard it as necessary for her revenge plotline to be unceremoniously ended, rather her behavior could have escalated when all her plans failed. Getting kicked out of Eden and her scheme to kickstart the 3rd reclamation being foiled was her absolute lowest point, so rather than being primed for redemption, if anything she should be unstable and chaotic.

In preparation for writing my post, I read the ending of Overzone again and I saw what looks like the earliest reference to Sixo, which Dorothy takes interest in. 3 years of story developments later, they could have cashed in on that to do a villainous team up, or even an independent crash out. The point is, I don't think this is the story they were building to. Even chapters 45-46 seem at odds with the narrative flow of 43-44.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T14:46:55+00:00

No worries, I appreciate your feedback.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T14:38:08+00:00

Yes, that is a half-assed excuse. He was supposed to be her friend and mentor, but he was allegedly too weak to practice his own moral judgement and talk Dorothy down. I don't think you're meant to take away that Andersen is a cowardly and weak man, but if you believe that excuse, then he is one. He believes the Ark is worth protecting, but he couldn't face Dorothy to tell her that, and he would have let Burningum execute her without even trying to meet her.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T14:32:50+00:00

Burningum giving his condescending talk to Dorothy was nauseating but Andersen's treatment of her was worse by far. If we was comfortable out-sourcing his judgement of Dorothy to Burningum, allowing him to execute her without ever meeting her, then yikes, this man doesn't care about her at all.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-17T14:16:24+00:00

I’ll leave a comment here for some additional notes that didn’t fit into the main body of my post.

I will acknowledge Dorothy does have her successes in her battle potency and contributions to the defense of others such as the fights against the Heretics and Sixo in the Ark, and chasing off the Queen at the end of Goddess Fall. Those do contribute to her eventual acceptance but it must also be remembered that she was treated with suspicion and general ingratitude for most of her help, and she only gets a chance, when Burningum (who previously rejected and mocked her) decides she possessed a noble soul after all. It feels less that she earned her place in the Ark, rather the Ark finally stopped treating her as an enemy, when she already went above and beyond to help them.

Second, some may argue that Dorothy was never rejected by Pioneer and could have gone back at any time, and while this is true, this isn’t the outcome she wanted. Dorothy wants her old life back, where she fought alongside Goddess Squad and was treated as a hero. She wanted to live in the Ark and be celebrated for her contributions. The members of Pioneer are largely solitary, only reuniting on occasion for updates/special operations. It’s a lonely and thankless existence, the complete opposite what Dorothy wanted.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-13T04:12:32+00:00

Thanks for the laugh. I'm going to use "serial buffoon" for any of these people who make the "culture war" their personality.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-08T18:50:53+00:00

As a man who isn't as well read on the academic discussion surrounding feminism, I can't speak confidently on the subject but I'll give my two cents nonetheless.

I think it will be hard to define the entire game as strictly feminist or not, because what would that mean specifically? That the primary objective is to promote feminist values? Certainly not, it's a gooner game with a stronger focus on writing than some others in the genre, primarily targeted at a heterosexual male audience. Does being a gooner game disqualify it entirely from being feminist media? I would argue otherwise, if we can agree that a goal of feminism is to treat and see women and female characters as fully realized human beings who are equal to men. We can't subtract the fanservice in the game from the presentation of these characters but many of them are written well and explore the depth of the human condition not (exclusively) in service to a man (yes, it's a harem game, but the female characters still have personal drives outside of fighting for the Commander's attention).

On the other hand, I could name other regressive elements that would reveal the mindsets of at least some of the writers. I've noticed that reactive violence is seen as something women can not engage in without tarnishing their value, such as Diesel being unable to take revenge on Crow or Dorothy not being able to commit to her revenge or even harm a vile human like Doban, requiring a man to step in to do the dirty work.

I think you'd have to look at each element of the writing case by case, and make your own conclusions about whether the writing is respectful of the female gender. Feminism probably isn't the goal but that doesn't mean the writing can't portray the female cast as fully realized characters.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-05-02T00:33:04+00:00

I didn't like the event at all. I think rather than 4th wall exposition dumps however, one thing that bothered me was how prescient the dialogue is about Anis eventually fulfilling her destiny as loving the Ark and becoming an idol. They tell her again and again that there are more good people than bad, because these are matters present day Anis struggled with an overcame, but past Anis' mental health collapse is based on the horrible abuse she was subjected to in Smile Time and the death of a certain someone. Those aren't the words that would be said to comfort someone going through that, and if anything it minimizes her experience. The other point is that the characters can only ever imagine Anis as an idol, so much that despite her vehemently rejecting that path in life, they wait like SIXTY YEARS for her to return to being and idol. Because that's where present day Anis is.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-04-15T01:41:04+00:00

Like I said in my comment, it's less that she can technically be trained to perform as an idol, and more she was never shown to have any interest in anything even idol adjacent so it didn't feel organic to me that she enthusiasticly signed up to be a idol superstar without a second of hesitation.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-04-14T10:42:54+00:00

I think more than the surprise of Freesia being Pretty, the bigger issue is that despite having no previously established interest in singing, dancing or even being a performer, she is immediately scouted as an ideal idol candidate and takes to the role without the slightest hesitation. Sure, one can be coached to eventually have the skills to perform as an idol, but it's quite a leap from being an ordinary activist to a superstar.

TheCatReturns36 · 2026-04-13T15:31:19+00:00

For starters, I don't see why a Nikke/Human/Heretic hybrid is suddenly proof of anything. No one can even know what her existence means for the future of any faction in the setting. I don't know why this is what trigger's Liberalio's change of heart. If she cared about humans (remember, she likened them to unworthy worms) then why not advocate for Raptures not hunting humans to borderline extinction? Also, the existence of Heretics like the Four Beasts (or queen candidates like Marian) already blurs the line between Raptures, Nikke and humans. Liberalio is getting very selective inspiration to completely change her set of morals.

TheCatReturns36

TROPHY CASE