VN Ren'Py Pale Carnations [Ch. 4 Up 4 Public] [Mutt & Jeff]

[Ozymandias037]

This is the craziest part to me, the whole story revolves around the exhibitions and it's what keeps the cogs rolling, but the most enjoyable scenes are everything outside the exhibition day, at least for me, the more "wholesome" scenes such as the individual dates or game nights with our beloved cast of characters are what I enjoy the most. Even during the adult scenes in the exhibitions I don't have as much "fun", Hana being so involved now makes it really hard to act in certain ways knowing she'll judge you, im guessing it's going to get even worse with how much closer we are to her now, also the fact that our 3 Carnations suffer during them too, the Hug scene for Veronica was really well done and it made me realise how attatched I've gotten to the characters.

This is exactly it. The story may revolve around the exhibitions (although I would argue that it revolves around the Carnations and their problems/goals and the exhibitions are their means to an end), but that isn't what the story is. That's where a good portion of the porn comes in, especially the kinky stuff, but that's porn, not story. The story is everything else. The characters and their inner lives and motivations. The complex personalities and how they all interact with one another. That's what makes this game so much better than most of the others. The writing is really, really, really, really good. I've waxed rhapsodic enough about how I still can't believe I've found one of the most, dare I say, literary stories I've read in years in a silly porn game, of all things, but it's true. I can't get over just how good the writing is. And at the end of the day, that's why I spend my time here typing too many words on a forum devoted to porn games, because this one makes me care, and that's such an incredible rarity that it motivates me to participate in these discussions.

I certainly agree with you here. We have quite a span how we play the MC, from really nice to total douche.
The three LIs (Hana, Felicia, Sophia) I find most fitting, as named in posts above are for a "goodish" Edwin, meaning low to medium (at max) "asshole score", trying to comfort the pressure the Carnations feel, helping the women there when he can.

He's absolutely got a dark streak in him too, though, no matter how nice one plays him. I tend towards a "goodish" Edwin, personally, but even playing him mostly nicely, there are still plenty of scenes where he unleashes his urge to dominate, to be rough, to spew abuse, take pleasure with little or no regard for his partners, and more. And that's outside the exhibitions, when he's one-on-one with the Carnations. "Goodish," obviously, is as good as he gets. But even here, he has to grapple with his own impulses and his own responsibility for what happens to the women in the story. He's clearly a little disturbed by his own darkness, and by Kathleen's obvious desire to turn him into a total sadist like she is, and he worries about what his continued involvement in the club might do to him. He's not necessarily a bad guy, but he is absolutely not a cold, detached, unemotional person either.

Which is probably a good thing, because most of us (I would like to hope) would have trouble relating to a totally narcissistic sociopath as the protagonist of the story.

 

[Ummmh]

Not really. At least depending on background Edwin's issue in the past was excessive anger and the ways he'd give in to it, not lack of emotions. His mother taught him to control his emotions and to lie to people he despised about his feelings towards them (which i guess is the base for social chameleon or butterfly traits)

(Caveat before replying: I am not a trained psychoanalyst, but am somewhat familiar w/the field, and had major social disassociative tendencies myself, growing up; seeing people as behavioral patterns of varying predictabilities, rather than people, tho that bothered me as I could feel it was wrong. It was only in my 20s that this began to self-correct, after seeing strong counterexamples to my mode in certain other people)

Sociopaths do NOT lack emotions. They simply lack empathy and conscience, like psychopaths, but psychopaths are BORN that way, and DO tend to have (oft chillingly) muted emotions, while sociopaths BECOME that way from negative experiences, and tend to have difficulty regulating emotions. Sociopaths can apparently have a limited empathy that manifests more as a focus on loyalty to family and a small circle of friends, but lack real empathy or conscience.

Now..

MC is emotionally detatched and definitely has flat affect, but has a strong concern, as the story begins, as to whether or not he is a good person. People with no conscience or empathy do NOT ask themselves that question. EVER. It would never occur to them to even think about it, much less care.

MC has issues, and possibly some sociopathic tendencies, but an actual sociopath or psychopath would NOT have thought to advise The Carnations to have each others' backs; that sort of social/emotional awareness would just not have been there in such personalities; antisocial types are blind to such things.

A sociopath MIGHT feel appreciation for his mother doing porn to support him, but likely would not have maintained a real concern over reciprocating affection, if such regularly inconvenienced him; at some point, anger, impatience, etc, would have derailed the relationship into more negative habits.

My two cents. Not a shrink, but am fairly familiar w/the subject.

EDIT: In rare cases, a psychopath raised in a VERY loving home can have a sort of reverse effect to sociopathy, becoming more socially attuned and integrated. The one example I know of (a doctor who realized he was a psychopath, from his brain scans), nonetheless exhibited excessive competitiveness (w/n willingly lose games to his grandkids to spare their feelings), unwillingness to share food (IIRC), etc. MC is not overly competitive, shares food, and (importantly) thinks in terms of high ideals, not just material wants, whereas psychopathic speech patterns are natively almost exclusively materialist unless prodded into other spheres by outside sources

 

[ffive]

Hmm... I could swear I saw the option.
But oh well, maybe it's just something like a deja vu.

If it was really long ago perhaps it was before the inevitable breakup became part of the game, and so walkthrough would make it appear like it was possible for their relationship to continue.

 

[Idontplay]

EDIT
My mistake: the post in which we can find the walkthrough goes back to 2022, but the walkthrough was updated few months ago; I apologize.

 

[Simpgor]

The walkthrough is "only" two years old, so why should we think it is outdated?

I dont think they are saying the walkthrough was outdated but that if the last time someone read it was before Mina and Ian are "forced" to break up in game then the walkhrough would show you how to get a scene (1st scene with Mina) without them breaking up?

That or the guy just mandela effected himself

 

[reeroll]

(Caveat before replying: I am not a trained psychoanalyst, but am somewhat familiar w/the field, and had major social disassociative tendencies myself, growing up; seeing people as behavioral patterns of varying predictabilities, rather than people, tho that bothered me as I could feel it was wrong. It was only in my 20s that this began to self-correct, after seeing strong counterexamples to my mode in certain other people)

Sociopaths do NOT lack emotions. They simply lack empathy and conscience, like psychopaths, but psychopaths are BORN that way, and DO tend to have (oft chillingly) muted emotions, while sociopaths BECOME that way from negative experiences, and tend to have difficulty regulating emotions. Sociopaths can apparently have a limited empathy that manifests more as a focus on loyalty to family and a small circle of friends, but lack real empathy or conscience.

Now..

MC is emotionally detatched and definitely has flat affect, but has a strong concern, as the story begins, as to whether or not he is a good person. People with no conscience or empathy do NOT ask themselves that question. EVER. It would never occur to them to even think about it, much less care.

MC has issues, and possibly some sociopathic tendencies, but an actual sociopath or psychopath would NOT have thought to advise The Carnations to have each others' backs; that sort of social/emotional awareness would just not have been there in such personalities; antisocial types are blind to such things.

A sociopath MIGHT feel appreciation for his mother doing porn to support him, but likely would not have maintained a real concern over reciprocating affection, if such regularly inconvenienced him; at some point, anger, impatience, etc, would have derailed the relationship into more negative habits.

My two cents. Not a shrink, but am fairly familiar w/the subject.

EDIT: In rare cases, a psychopath raised in a VERY loving home can have a sort of reverse effect to sociopathy, becoming more socially attuned and integrated. The one example I know of (a doctor who realized he was a psychopath, from his brain scans), nonetheless exhibited excessive competitiveness (w/n willingly lose games to his grandkids to spare their feelings), unwillingness to share food (IIRC), etc. MC is not overly competitive, shares food, and (importantly) thinks in terms of high ideals, not just material wants, whereas psychopathic speech patterns are natively almost exclusively materialist unless prodded into other spheres by outside sources

very good summary. fun fact they are most commonly found in neurosurgeons or other surgeon jobs alike where the stress is high and the patient has high risk of getting crippled,killed by accident if the surgery goes wrong.
that is to say that those psychopaths are useful since an "average joe" would be clumsy and fuck up the surgery due to stress.
there was even a researcher who made list of the top jobs where you can find the most psychopaths.
to sum up ONLY IF raised in a GOOD environnment a psychopath can be useful for society at large .

 

[lustforsex]

I have a great desire to find out what is written in Felicia's winning essay. She asked to read it the next day when she's not around but I'm not entirely sure that will be in the next update