Illuminate A Brighter Future For Beyoncé

[rionaleonhart]

I'm now actually playing Zanki Zero: Last Beginning, a game I'd previously only seen Let's Played!

Zanki Zero never got a big audience, and I can see why. The gameplay is sort of offputting and frustrating, and it's easy to get stuck; I've had to turn to the Internet for help on many occasions. It tackles a lot of dark topics, which could limit its audience, and it's also poorly paced; most of the 'traumatic backstory' sequences aren't really relevant to the wider plot, so they feel like they're slowing things down.

But there's so much I love about this game!

The concept is unique and fascinating: eight human clones as the last remnants of humanity after the apocalypse, surviving by constantly transferring their memories to new short-lived clone bodies. I've never seen anything like it before.

I like the characters, and I love how intensely they bond in their bizarre, isolated situation, and I love that you can canonically pair them all up with each other. Short of Sense8, I've never felt so supported in my desire to see everyone in a big polyamorous tangle.

Everyone is self-loathing! There are some really cool plot revelations! My favourite pairing canonically attempts bondage while one of them has the uneasy feeling the other might be a murderer! There are tentacles!

('Oh, I gave Zen a paralysis-curing tentacle!' I exclaimed, when Ryo got paralysed. I switched Zen into the party and had him use his tentacle on Ryo. Ginger watched in great confusion. I'm still extremely curious about the exact mechanics of using your tentacles to heal your friends.)

The best thing I've discovered while looking through the menus: bondage artist Ryo can learn the skill 'Bondage Play', which reduces his stress level whenever he attacks an enemy with his tentacles.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that I absolutely understand why this game never got a bigger fandom, but I still wish this game had a bigger fandom. It's got a pretty much canonical OT7 and nobody's written it! (Outrageously, the fandom has also failed to exploit the fact that one of the characters is a bondage artist who can manifest tentacles.)

Comments

[wolfy_writing]

Everyone is self-loathing! There are some really cool plot revelations! My favourite pairing canonically attempts bondage while one of them has the uneasy feeling the other might be a murderer! There are tentacles!

That sounds amazing!

[rionaleonhart]

It is! The frustrating dungeon crawling is a lot easier to endure when everything else is so wildly relevant to my interests.

[kalloway]

Oh, this sounds interesting. No idea if I'll ever get to it, but I'll put it on my list. ^^;;

[rionaleonhart]

Excellent! If you do have a chance to play it, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

[aestivalis]

eight human clones

the uneasy feeling the other might be a murderer

pretty much canonical OT7

Getting me some "uh oh" vibes right here.

[rionaleonhart]

I did wonder what sort of story the conjunction of those lines might imply! To narrow down the potential interpretations: the potential murderer is definitely part of the OT7.

[i_wish_to_remain_nameless]

I am surprised that the tentacle manifesting bondage artist did not get more attention from the fandom.
I'm less surprised that the fandom is passing up the OT7 because I'm in a fandom where my favorite ship is an OT3 and most people just unadventurously ship one leg or the other (depending on whether they prefer het or slash) rather than realizing that all the pairings between these three characters can only work if the third one is there to mediate.

[rionaleonhart]

True! There are a few poly ships that have a strong following in fandom, but it seems that a lot of them get overlooked (and I have to admit that writing an OT7 might feel a bit logistically daunting). What's your OT3?

[i_wish_to_remain_nameless]

YooHanKim (Yoo Jonghyuk/Kim Dokja/Han Sooyoung) from Omniscient Reader. Every member of this pairing kills/is killed by every other member over the course of the novel. This is incidental to why I ship it though. I just noticed and thought it was funny.
I ship them because they care about each other so much they'd move heaven and earth for each other but can't just talk about their feelings like normal people.
I can give more details later but I want to go to bed now.

[rionaleonhart]

Every member of this pairing kills/is killed by every other member over the course of the novel ... they care about each other so much they'd move heaven and earth for each other but can't just talk about their feelings like normal people.

To be honest, this sounds excellent. Good taste in dynamics! (And sleep well!)