crustlord12
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I can't believe I saw what you wrote, and still just instinctively opened the spoiler. Monkey brain needs to slow down
JelF547
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Or you should just trust your intuition and enjoy it
fdsasdf_p
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PhiloPhilo
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throwawaysponge
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Waifulover359
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How is Akira's deceased older brother and pareidolia even related? I've completely lost track of what's going on with the theories in this thread lately
Moonflare
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79 and Moyo are "freelancers" aka supernatural entities that call themselves "children of the clockwork", and seem to change allegiances between gods throughout the game. They are seen (presumably) serving HOPE multiple times (like collecting Akira's sperm inside his church).
The concept of "freelancers" partly comes from the bunny observer that tries to change camps from HOPE to Wires during the plant council in the Sekai Restoration event.
That Nozomu is related to Pareidolia in being a god they can pledge allegiance to is a jump in the fact that the previous "USER1" (or maybe not a user at all, but HOPE's predecessor at least) was also called Nozomu aka "the horny ball of light". Thus the jump is that HOPE which is the current USER1 is also Nozomu, instead of his son or someone that simply inherited his legacy.
The event "tick tock tick tock", which has AmIOKay and a reflection of Akira having sex in front of him, is theorized to actually be Nozomu and Sekai having sex in front of him. If that's the case, what Sekai says would point to HOPE being their son instead: "we can get pregnant with a new HOPE, teach it to reset the world and touch it sexually if it can't".
There isn't enough evidence as to the relation between Nozomu and HOPE yet. All we know is that Nozomu (god and brother) both died. If HOPE is an entire new thing or one of his aspects reborn we don't know.
Edit: for those interested in this part of the lore, I recommend rewatching "first contact" which seems to recount the car accident, and how, from it, all of the gods seemed to spawn (or become relevant). It's an interesting read, even though it's too confusing to serve as evidence of anything by itself.
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Fire Lord Zuko
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I think 79 and Moyo work for HOPE, for now at least:
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I don't think it's Himawari, simply due to her role as a hostage and how she's treated in "Untitled" by Long Maya:
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Where in the game is stated that she's a hostage? Not snarking just miss that, if true.
I always took that scene to be an argument between two "coworkers," but then again, my hermeneutical reading of the game is deeply agnostic to the
Fire Lord Zuko
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Himawari is a hostage both in the sense that Akira (her father) is being threatened and also her very own existence with Long Maya's threat to 'remove' her from the show if she doesn't comply. We learn exactly what this entails in a previous event:
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Ah. Like I said, my reading of the story is slightly different then most others on the sub. As various narrators and...uh..."entities" are aware they are in a game, I take these to also be references to that conceit.
"The Show" and "The Game we are all playing" are the same thing. Akira can't be "removed" without the game stopping, and if the game stops, nobody "exists" anymore.
They also tell Himawari that "some would say the worst is yet to come" which is absolutely going to be the dark path, but again, in order for any of us to experience the "good paths" outside of cheating, we must.
But I also get that this game is a hermeneutic minefield, and considering that almost everybody is an unreliable narrator I don't really trust any firm reading yet.
PhiloPhilo
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Zuko answered this better, but just to add, Himawari is another 'freelancer' type of character, at least to some degree. She's not on the level of the users or others, and isn't in a position to 'fight back' so to speak. Her disgust in this scene despite ultimately (and begrudglingly) going along with it when threatened shows that she doesn't really have much choice. Not necessarily a hostage, but being forced to comply in this instance. We know she has her own endgoals or motivations, but she works with others when it makes sense to or she has to.
I wouldn't be quick to view the story or characters through one lens, either. There's a lot we don't know for sure, and the symbolism and themes also seem to work against a single direct inspiration or message. Abrahamic religion and mythology plays a large part, but in somewhat dubious ways and with too much else going on to match perfectly. The users all seem to embody certain traits or concepts to some degree, but this is also not clear-cut.
DeSkel15
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Something interesting that I don't think has been brought up yet, is that Moyo is apparently very fond of The Shapeshifter/Himawari:
I'm also still curious about Moyo's "growth":
Can't help but wonder if that's where Nao-chan came from, but if not...just what exactly was going on?
Perhaps she was modified by Pareidolia or Sekai, hence the change in her "constitution" and recent appearance with Sekai?
Edit: Also considering The Shapeshifter's appearance on the Untitled show which is usually hosted by Moyo (or at least this segment was), on top of Moyo's fondness for her and being upset that she wouldn't return, one could assume that The Shapeshifter/Himawari was a guest on the show prior to this.
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I'm also still curious about Moyo's "growth":
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Perhaps she was modified by Pareidolia or Sekai, hence the change in her "constitution" and recent appearance with Sekai?
Edit: Also considering The Shapeshifter's appearance on the Untitled show which is usually hosted by Moyo (or at least this segment was), on top of Moyo's fondness for her and being upset that she wouldn't return, one could assume that The Shapeshifter/Himawari was a guest on the show prior to this.
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Moonflare
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I don't think anyone would disagree with that. It's pretty clear they're the same thing. If all the evidence wasn't enough, Pareidolia has said so himself when he explains why his writing pattern changed so many times.
I agree with PhiloPhilo however that it seems a bit eager to dismiss part of the lore under the umbrella of "well, it's just supernatural mumble jumble since they're all in a game and it's all the same thing anyway, and Akira is the one thing that matters because he's the player". I'm not saying that's wrong, but it's also very limited in the scope of what has been presented.
Without moving it too far, if Akira is removed, it could be that this Akira is removed. Therefore it wouldn't be an empty threat, but what has been done a thousand times already - and yet Moyo and Long Maya have remained. Furthermore, NAO says Akira is of no importance - and if she wasn't lying it could simply be that Akira as a player is important to you, the player, as he serves as a window into that world. It could be that if he's gone, what's gone is your window, not that world, or the entities that were supposed to be just "a part of a game". Hence, what is in danger is you, the player, because if you bought into the "stop playing the game", what could happen is that Akira loses the tiny spark of freewill he has in this (special) cycle, and goes back to being a mindless puppet (exactly what most of the entities want).
There are many things I'd add, but I've limited myself to what relates directly to my understanding of what you said. As always, I think it's too early to define things in LiL, at least to this extent.
I just don't get where the text even hints that she wants to "fight back." I think we can all agree that Himawari has a much better understanding of what's going on here than Akira or us, the players. Her line "...this isn't...how it's..." implies that she was told something about what's going on, and at least my reading is that she's been told that this is all to legitimately help Akira. While I don't work in the medical field, I have friends that do, and sometimes before you can fix somebodies body, you have to legitimately break their body. While it may not look like it to us because Akira is our POV character, this very well could be a situation of "If you don't have the stomach to do what we need to do here, then you're going to have to get out of the way."
As for choice... I would bet money Sel's read Camus. You always have a choice: you can always kill yourself. Just like both Akira and Himawari are offered non-existence but don't take it, we the players are told may times that we can....just stop playing.
Yeah, I'm open to pretty much every possibility at this point. I'm more inclined to make a list of things I'm almost positive Sel has read and/or studied. For example, I would bet that he was raised either Catholic or Orthodox, and if not, has fallen down the theological rabbit hole as it's fucking fascinating.
PhiloPhilo
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I remember this line but wasn't sure what to make of it. Part of me thinks it's just a snide jab, but it also wouldn't surprise me. Moyo is not exactly a highly intellectual being and probably just likes the nice shapeshifter girl.
This is an absolutely wild theory. In a good way. I don't know if I'm onboard but it absolutely caught me off guard. I personally think Nao-chan was more than likely just "made" specifically for [whatever her exact purpose is.]
It's hard to tell what parts of 79's actions and speech (or untitled show for that matter) is reliable or just a joke. The first time I read this event, I thought it was just a joke, but it doesn't seem unbelievable or out of character in any way, either. I'm not sure if that line's ever been addressed or hinted at again? but it's possible for something to come of it.
Moonflare
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If Himawari has been a guest prior, then it would probably mean she's a being spawned in previous cycles.
I'm also curious about Moyo's appearance in Kirin's event. No idea what to make of that.
I mean, if I was going to keep on tugging on this thread, I would agree in so much that the data always remains, right? Everything lucks in the game files in a jumble of references and files that means nothing until we double click on the .exe and become a "USER" ourselves.
But I am more inclined to thinking that the game doesn't keep looping when we don't play. I think it all just...stops. I guess there are other ways to read the snatching of our eye sight, but when sight is stolen form Akira, we too cannot see. I find it cleaner to think that then when we aren't playing, within the games logic, there is no existence.
I'm sure there are contradictions to that tho, as this game is dense.
I always thought that Mimawari was somehow from "outside" the cycles. I sort of thought seeing the aged up girls after DEATH BALL or whatever it was called was also our first real big hint that there is an "outside of the cycles".
PhiloPhilo
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A lot of it comes down to the can of worms that is Himawari's character. She's appeared in many other places and to other people, and her unique desires have been hinted at. It's clear that she does not share exactly and only the desires of another. We know from this scene as well that, for one, she doesn't agree with what's happening, and two, she's afraid of the repercussions she's threatened with. She doesn't necessarily want to "fight back" in this instance, as in initiate a confrontation — although that's likely because she simply can't — but she doesn't agree with it and doesn't seem to want any part of it. She also seems to disagree with 79's view of her role in the show and why she's there, which would add context to the entire event and her involvement, but she's cut off.
She absolutely wants to help Akira, though. She cares about him and has helped him and others in the past. That's likely why she's upset with his treatment in Untitled. That doesn't necessitate her knowledge of how exactly the show is run, why it's run the exact way it is, or the knowledge/true motivations of any other character, though. She certainly knows more than us (about certain subjects,) but it's not clear how much she knows about other entities, the cycle, or therein.
On the subject of medicine, I'm not a medical professional either, but I have taken medical/field-medicine courses. Some times you do have to "break" something, but that's usually not the case. If it is here, which there may be some argumentation for in-game, it's not clear if, or how and why Himawari would know that, either. We also don't know if everyone's idea of "fixing" or "helping" Akira is the same, either. Some people seem to want to fix him by turning him into the ultimate teenage-fucking monster. We have to be careful not to ascribe knowledge to characters without seeing them possess it, and we unfortunately don't know a lot about Himawari. I recently made a post rambling about why she even exists, and that much isn't clear (in my mind.)
Most of what we know seems to imply that the world does keep going, though. Some of my knowledge on this may have been changed in the early game rewrites to be fair, I'm not sure. But there have been seemingly thousands/millions of 'Akiras' that interacted with the world through the resets, but only this Akira is the one we see. It's also the one Maya says is "really you"* when she starts accepting that this Akira is the "real" Akira for lack of a better term. In the same way that the Maya in game currently isn't really "her" in Akira's eyes.
I'd agree that Sel takes a lot of influence and style from various sources, but I think it's for that reason that you can't really read the game in the same way you read a specific author or philosopher. It's frankly a jumbled mess in a lot of places, at least until we get concrete answers on some things and what they mean.
Edit: Just realized I've been listening to the untitled children's show theme for like five minutes straight...