Veras the Arch System

doesn’t this feel familiar

<-[PART 2] [PART 3]

drawing until I can draw hot anime people hotly day 4

US Use of Weapons of Mass Destruction The indiscriminate use of bombs by the US, usually outside a declared war situation, for wanton destruction, for no military objectives, whose targets and victims are civilian populations, or what we now call “collateral damage.”

Japan (1945) 

China (1945-46) 

Korea & China (1950-53) 

Guatemala (1954, 1960, 1967-69) 

Indonesia (1958) 

Cuba (1959-61) 

Congo (1964) 

Peru (1965) 

Laos (1964-70) 

Vietnam (1961-1973) 

Cambodia (1969-70) 

Grenada (1983) 

Lebanon (1983-84) 

Libya (1986) 

El Salvador (1980s) 

Nicaragua (1980s) 

Iran (1987) 

Panama (1989) 

Iraq (1991-2000) 

Kuwait (1991) 

Somalia (1993) 

Bosnia (1994-95) 

Sudan (1998) 

Afghanistan (1998) 

Pakistan (1998) 

Yugoslavia (1999) 

Bulgaria (1999) 

Macedonia (1999)

US Use of Chemical & Biological Weapons The US has refused to sign Conventions against the development and use of chemical and biological weapons, and has either used or tested (without informing the civilian populations) these weapons in the following locations abroad:

Bahamas (late 1940s-mid-1950s) 

Canada (1953) 

China and Korea (1950-53) 

Korea (1967-69) 

Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia (1961-1970) 

Panama (1940s-1990s) 

Cuba (1962, 69, 70, 71, 81, 96)

And the US has tested such weapons on US civilian populations, without their knowledge, in the following locations:

Watertown, NY and US Virgin Islands (1950) 

SF Bay Area (1950, 1957-67) 

Minneapolis (1953) 

St. Louis (1953) 

Washington, DC Area (1953, 1967) 

Florida (1955) 

Savannah GA/Avon Park, FL (1956-58) 

New York City (1956, 1966) 

Chicago (1960)

And the US has encouraged the use of such weapons, and provided the technology to develop such weapons in various nations abroad, including:

Egypt 

South Africa 

Iraq

US Political and Military Interventions since 1945 The US has launched a series of military and political interventions since 1945, often to install puppet regimes, or alternatively to engage in political actions such as smear campaigns, sponsoring or targeting opposition political groups (depending on how they served US interests), undermining political parties, sabotage and terror campaigns, and so forth. It has done so in nations such as

China (1945-51) 

South Africa (1960s-1980s)

France (1947) 

Bolivia (1964-75)

Marshall Islands (1946-58) 

Australia (1972-75)

Italy (1947-1975) 

Iraq (1972-75)

Greece (1947-49) 

Portugal (1974-76)

Philippines (1945-53) 

East Timor (1975-99)

Korea (1945-53) 

Ecuador (1975)

Albania (1949-53) 

Argentina (1976)

Eastern Europe (1948-56) 

Pakistan (1977)

Germany (1950s) 

Angola (1975-1980s)

Iran (1953) 

Jamaica (1976)

Guatemala (1953-1990s) 

Honduras (1980s)

Costa Rica (mid-1950s, 1970-71) 

Nicaragua (1980s)

Middle East (1956-58) 

Philippines (1970s-90s)

Indonesia (1957-58) 

Seychelles (1979-81)

Haiti (1959) 

South Yemen (1979-84)

Western Europe (1950s-1960s) 

South Korea (1980)

Guyana (1953-64) 

Chad (1981-82)

Iraq (1958-63) 

Grenada (1979-83)

Vietnam (1945-53) 

Suriname (1982-84)

Cambodia (1955-73) 

Libya (1981-89)

Laos (1957-73) 

Fiji (1987)

Thailand (1965-73) 

Panama (1989)

Ecuador (1960-63) 

Afghanistan (1979-92)

Congo (1960-65, 1977-78) 

El Salvador (1980-92)

Algeria (1960s) 

Haiti (1987-94)

Brazil (1961-64) 

Bulgaria (1990-91)

Peru (1965) 

Albania (1991-92)

Dominican Republic (1963-65) 

Somalia (1993)

Cuba (1959-present) 

Iraq (1990s)

Indonesia (1965) 

Peru (1990-present)

Ghana (1966) 

Mexico (1990-present)

Uruguay (1969-72) 

Colombia (1990-present)

Chile (1964-73) 

Yugoslavia (1995-99)

Greece (1967-74)

US Perversions of Foreign Elections The US has specifically intervened to rig or distort the outcome of foreign elections, and sometimes engineered sham “demonstration” elections to ward off accusations of government repression in allied nations in the US sphere of influence. These sham elections have often installed or maintained in power repressive dictators who have victimized their populations. Such practices have occurred in nations such as:

Philippines (1950s) 

Italy (1948-1970s) 

Lebanon (1950s) 

Indonesia (1955) 

Vietnam (1955) 

Guyana (1953-64) 

Japan (1958-1970s) 

Nepal (1959) 

Laos (1960) 

Brazil (1962) 

Dominican Republic (1962) 

Guatemala (1963) 

Bolivia (1966) 

Chile (1964-70) 

Portugal (1974-75) 

Australia (1974-75) 

Jamaica (1976) 

El Salvador (1984) 

Panama (1984, 89) 

Nicaragua (1984, 90) 

Haiti (1987, 88) 

Bulgaria (1990-91) 

Albania (1991-92) 

Russia (1996) 

Mongolia (1996) 

Bosnia (1998)

US Versus World at the United Nations The US has repeatedly acted to undermine peace and human rights initiatives at the United Nations, routinely voting against hundreds of UN resolutions and treaties. The US easily has the worst record of any nation on not supporting UN treaties. In almost all of its hundreds of “no” votes, the US was the “sole” nation to vote no (among the 100-130 nations that usually vote), and among only 1 or 2 other nations voting no the rest of the time. Here’s a representative sample of US votes from 1978-1987:

US Is the Sole “No” Vote on Resolutions or Treaties

For aid to underdeveloped nations 

For the promotion of developing nation exports 

For UN promotion of human rights

For protecting developing nations in trade agreements

For New International Economic Order for underdeveloped nations

For development as a human right

Versus multinational corporate operations in South Africa

For cooperative models in developing nations

For right of nations to economic system of their choice

Versus chemical and biological weapons (at least 3 times)

Versus Namibian apartheid

For economic/standard of living rights as human rights

Versus apartheid South African aggression vs. neighboring states (2 times)

Versus foreign investments in apartheid South Africa

For world charter to protect ecology

For anti-apartheid convention

For anti-apartheid convention in international sports

For nuclear test ban treaty (at least 2 times)

For prevention of arms race in outer space

For UNESCO-sponsored new world information order (at least 2 times)

For international law to protect economic rights

For Transport & Communications Decade in Africa

Versus manufacture of new types of weapons of mass destruction 

Versus naval arms race 

For Independent Commission on Disarmament & Security Issues 

For UN response mechanism for natural disasters 

For the Right to Food 

For Report of Committee on Elimination of Racial Discrimination 

For UN study on military development 

For Commemoration of 25th anniversary of Independence for Colonial Countries 

For Industrial Development Decade in Africa 

For interdependence of economic and political rights 

For improved UN response to human rights abuses 

For protection of rights of migrant workers 

For protection against products harmful to health and the environment 

For a Convention on the Rights of the Child 

For training journalists in the developing world 

For international cooperation on third world debt 

For a UN Conference on Trade & Development

US Is 1 of Only 2 “No” Votes on Resolutions or Treaties 

For Palestinian living conditions/rights (at least 8 times) 

Versus foreign intervention into other nations 

For a UN Conference on Women 

Versus nuclear test explosions (at least 2 times) 

For the non-use of nuclear weapons vs. non-nuclear states 

For a Middle East nuclear free zone 

Versus Israeli nuclear weapons (at least 2 times) 

For a new world international economic order 

For a trade union conference on sanctions vs. South Africa 

For the Law of the Sea Treaty 

For economic assistance to Palestinians 

For UN measures against fascist activities and groups 

For international cooperation on money/finance/debt/trade/development 

For a Zone of Peace in the South Atlantic 

For compliance with Intl Court of Justice decision for Nicaragua vs. US. 

**For a conference and measures to prevent international terrorism (including its underlying causes) 

For ending the trade embargo vs. Nicaragua

US Is 1 of Only 3 “No” Votes on Resolutions and Treaties 

Versus Israeli human rights abuses (at least 6 times) 

Versus South African apartheid (at least 4 times) 

Versus return of refugees to Israel 

For ending nuclear arms race (at least 2 times) 

For an embargo on apartheid South Africa 

For South African liberation from apartheid (at least 3 times) 

For the independence of colonial nations 

For the UN Decade for Women 

Versus harmful foreign economic practices in colonial territories 

For a Middle East Peace Conference 

For ending the embargo of Cuba (at least 10 times)

In addition, the US has: 

Repeatedly withheld its dues from the UN 

Twice left UNESCO because of its human rights initiatives 

Twice left the International Labor Organization for its workers rights initiatives 

Refused to renew the Antiballistic Missile Treaty 

Refused to sign the Kyoto Treaty on global warming 

Refused to back the World Health Organization’s ban on infant formula abuses 

Refused to sign the Anti-Biological Weapons Convention 

Refused to sign the Convention against the use of land mines 

Refused to participate in the UN Conference Against Racism in Durban 

Been one of the last nations in the world to sign the UN Covenant on 

Political & Civil Rights (30 years after its creation) 

Refused to sign the UN Covenant on Economic & Social Rights 

Opposed the emerging new UN Covenant on the Rights to Peace, Development & Environmental Protection

Sampling of Deaths >From US Military Interventions & Propping Up Corrupt Dictators (using the most conservative estimates)

Nicaragua – 30,000 dead

Brazil  – 100,000 dead

Korea – 4 million dead

Guatemala – 200,000 dead

Honduras – 20,000 dead

El Salvador – 63,000 dead

Argentina – 40,000 dead

Bolivia – 10,000 dead

Uruguay – 10,000 dead

Ecuador – 10,000 dead

Peru – 10,000 dead

Iraq – 1.3 million dead

Iran – 30,000 dead

Sudan – 8-10,000 dead

Colombia – 50,000 dead

Panama – 5,000 dead

Japan – 140,000 dead

Afghanistan – 10,000 dead

Somalia – 5000 dead

Philippines – 150,000 dead

Haiti – 100,000 dead

Dominican Republic – 10,000 dead

Libya – 500 dead

Macedonia – 1000 dead

South Africa – 10,000 dead

Pakistan – 10,000 dead

Palestine – 40,000 dead

Indonesia – 1 million dead

East Timor – 1/3-½ of total population

Greece – 10,000 dead

Laos – 600,000 dead

Cambodia – 1 million dead

Angola – 300,000 dead

Grenada – 500 dead

Congo  – 2 million dead

Egypt – 10,000 dead

Vietnam – 1.5 million dead

Chile – 50,000 dead

Other Lethal US Interventions CIA Terror Training Manuals Development and distribution of training manuals for foreign military personnel or foreign nationals, including instructions on assassination, subversion, sabotage, population control, torture, repression, psychological torture, death squads, etc.

Specific Torture Campaigns Creation and launching of direct US campaigns to support torture as an instrument of terror and social control for governments in Greece, Iran, Vietnam, Bolivia, Uruguay, Brazil, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Panama

Supporting and Harboring Terrorists The promotion, protection, arming or equipping of terrorists such as:

Klaus Barbie and other German Nazis, and Italian and Japanese fascists, after WW II

Manual Noriega (Panama), Saddam Hussein (Iraq), Rafael Trujillo (Dominican Republic), Osama bin Laden (Afghanistan), and others whose terrorism has come back to haunt us

Running the Higher War College (Brazil) and first School of the Americas (Panama), which gave US training to repressors, death squad members, and torturers (the second School of the Americas is still running at Ft. Benning GA)

Providing asylum for Cuban, Salvadoran, Guatemalan, Haitian, Chilean, Argentinian, Iranian, South Vietnamese and other terrorists, dictators, and torturers

Assassinating World Leaders Using assassination as a tool of foreign policy, wherein the CIA has initiated assassination attempts against at least 40 foreign heads of state (some several times) in the last 50 years, a number of which have been successful, such as: Patrice Lumumba (Congo), Rafael Trujillo (Dominican Republic), Ngo Dihn Diem (Vietnam) Salvador Allende (Chile)

Arms Trade & US Military Presence

The US is the world’s largest seller of weapons abroad, arming dictators, militaries, and terrorists that repress or victimize their populations, and fueling scores of violent conflicts around the globe

The US is the world’s largest provider of live land mines which, even in peacetime, kill or injure at least several people around the world each day

The US has military bases in at least 50 nations around the world, which have led to frequent victimization of local populations.

The US military has been bombing one Middle Eastern or Muslim nation or another almost continuously since 1983, including Lebanon, Libya, Syria, Iran, the Sudan, Afghanistan, and Iraq (almost daily bombings since 1991)

This, then, is a sampling of American foreign policies over the last 50 years. The FBI uses the following definition for Terrorism: “The unlawful use of force or violence committed by a group or individual, who has some connection to a foreign power or whose activities transcend national boundaries, against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.” This sounds like the terrorism we just experienced. It also sounds a lot like the US policies and actions since 1945 that I’ve just described.

This is a version of an an original page atributed to Robert Elias, a US Professor of Political Science , a list which, like so many others,  has otherwise ‘disappered’

via https://web.archive.org/web/20161125052245/http://www.the-philosopher.co.uk/whocares/popups/warcrimes.htm

So that's interesting since I sometimes hear in passing, either some reworked dialogue or a slightly expanded scene gets updated in, but We don't really replay unless there's a new chapter update basically. So We'd heard about a change in the school hallway, ig "to drive a point home that was too subtle for some people before" is the vibe I got. But had no idea how people generally felt about any of it. (Maybe staying "outside" the fandom has been the wise choice...) They kinda keeps doing that afaik, adding these minor tweak updates, and since there's still no Chapter Select I do wish there was some place to just list all the changes in detail and which update they were a part of. Just Steam patchnotes don't really get specific enough.

The only people We personally know who're into tcoaal are cool trans/queer people whom We got them into the game in the first place. :p So ever since We got told the game has a decent right-wing portion of its fanbase, We've been trying to unpack why, past the default amount for any art to expect. We don't think it's the sibling-fucking; idk why I've heard some people talk about it like a "right-wing thing" but it's very much a bipartisan subject. I know it's easy for art that doesn't spell out its morals to your face are easy for the right to not think about and decide the art agrees with them actually, but that answer feels too simple. Tcoaal's writing feels too... "smart and empathetic" for that to make complete sense. Maybe it's just a question for the ages.

But you're right, it's not just incest that attracts the right-wingers. Andrew and Ashley are people suffering in a shit-fucked capitalist hellscape world, something we can all relate to, but the conclusions of what to do vastly differ depending on your political stances. Even though the game does show they commit violence because their shitty world forced them to to survive, the right sees this as society's victims committing violence as a rebellion against it. While yeah, that is partly why Andrew and Ashley do that, the right only focuses on that reason because they glorify that kind of behavior. If you are "brave enough" and "strong enough" and "break through all the barriers and institutions the """enemy""" set up", you can make a great change in the world. You just need to steel against yourself the blood you'd have to shed, which Andrew and Ashley are accustomed to because they weren't really treated as human beings in their entire life. This is why as kids, they weren't that bothered about Nina's death as a person. She mainly mattered as an extremely threatening moment for all aspects of the Graves' existence, which is why you got the violently transactional relationship between the siblings that was always present, it just didn't show its truest and ugliest face until that moment. Furthermore, Nina represented the "first" threat to the siblings' relationship, so her being killed by the siblings and them getting away with it would be a moment the blood purists love. It's extremely unfortunate she and Julia unironically would be called "hussies" in that circle.

Also, given how the right also pushes "family values" (which is really another form of individualism) Andrew and Ashley being siblings facing against the world appeals to that. To the right, this really is family at its best, especially with the romantic aspect of "us alone against big dangerous world", and Andrew and Ashley mostly falling into the typical gender norms and roles. We also must acknowledge that Ashley does get mischaracterized and bashed on (pun unintended...) in those circles because she's not a demurely submissive woman, and they would actually think Andrew beating her is okay or even great, he's asserting his "right as a man after being denied doing that so long". The right-wingers wouldn't or don't want to see the horror that is boiling underneath that beating, all they see is fiction that validates their beliefs after being told they're wrong for so long. This misreading is so prevalent, TV Tropes actually lists the backhand moment in early episode 3 in its YMMV as a "Carthasis Moment". Yet TV Tropes, which is supposed to be politically neutral, frames it as "Andrew was abused by Ashley for so long and now fought back", but never says it's played for horror. The intent may be different, but the conclusion is the same: neither refuse to see the horror that lies underneath the violence.

Though part of me doubts the majority of them are even consciously aware of any of these stated points. Even by making theoretical arguments for them, I can only picture "it's just a game, you're reading too much into nothing" responses if this thread broke containment. I never like assuming the Right ever bothers to actually analyze the art they claim to enjoy; it's helped Us get this far.

Tcoaal has and will continue to drive me crazy (/neutral) for almost respecting the intelligence of its player too much. That Ashley and Andrew (the latter moreso) are pretty blatantly written to be conservative-minded as a natural reaction to their upbringing. Their "fuck you, got mine" attitude towards life. Yet their apparent damage and unhappiness is supposed to get you, a presumable human being with logic and empathy, to like... pity them at least, as the lost-causes they keep choosing to be?

We remember seeing a post of somebody talking about that scene where the siblings learn about the doctor, and OP getting upset at Andrew's "I don't care about single-handedly saving the world, I want to live quietly and die in relative peace" speech @ Ashley's suggestion for taking revenge for "the game pushing conservative messages" and We just couldn't bother explaining the nuances between what a work of art is actually trying to convey VS what a character inside that fiction does/says.

We just realized all this framing may even be deliberate. With how the very first major crime/taboo we see these two morons (<3) cross (even if it's not the first chronologically) is afaik a cartoonishly generic hypothetical someone might ask you at a party to figure out when you would consider cannibalism justifiable. (minus the two being literally stranded on an island) It wouldn't surprise me if most players were conditioned by the universe's "immediate survival precedes helping others" lesson to start painting every other action in the game under that lens. Because it's hard to argue morals in the face of literal survival instincts. But eventually that PTSD-like reflex wears off and it hits you these two are still throwing others under the bus, despite there being no immediate danger in quite some time. It's all they've ever known from the start (... of the game)

By now I know I should be used to the 'Andrew Did Nothing Wrong' members of the fandom... [Insert multi-paragraph rant about the long-standing cultural norm of pathologizing women over men. Re: Crazy Sister, "I can fix her" culture, etc] (He might be my "preferred" Graves, but simply because I can relate more to the obviously fucked up things wrong with him than with Ashley, personally :p)

And in a vacuum, I can sympathize with narratively preferring ambiguity in some places. Unbiased towards Renee or any character, I could get someone disliking Olive Branch for that reason.

But We draw a line in the sand that someone could ever play Decay 1 and see a single trait worth admiring in their gods damned Grandpa. One of the most unsubtle "this guy is JUST a piece of shit" characters in tcoaal so far, a game whose majority population is people who are some degree of 'just shit' 😭

We haven't forgotten this is kinda the crux of most of what this thread's been about, but. Tcoaal feels like such an anomaly of a work of art. Like it carries this aura that filters out most people, and 99% of the people who don't get filtered and stick around become insane, in the cringe way (unlike us, who're insane about it in the cool based way 😎 /hj)

Their explanation for why Grandpa is actually a nice guy is because: he gave Renee a home despite calling her a whore, and he wanted the parents to be proactive in taking care of the siblings. Even though none of these actions absolve him of the fact of being an abusive piece of shit to everyone involved, and can easily be read that he only cares about maintaining a good reputation within their community and he needs someone to inherit his business and wealth.

I absolutely agree with you on how special The Coffin of Andy and Leyley is. I think it is one of the most important games of the 2020s, up there with Slay the Princess. I'm of the belief that if it finishes on a strong note, it can become one of the most important games of the first half of the 21st century. It is refreshingly honest about the conditions we live in, about the relationships we have, and it does so unflinchingly yet respect for the player's intelligence. Even though Nemlei may not have expected that the incest to actually attract a loud fandom and hatedom, there is something extremely timely of its presence. We live in a society that is so confused and distressed from the open decay of the capitalist system, many people take comfort in political polarization and moral policing. The reasoning goes that if you yell loud enough or act aggressive enough, maybe you will have some control amidst all this chaos. The fact it provoked such a great reaction is a significant symptom of that decay, but it also attracted plenty of people to look into it more and fall in love with it. I'm not ashamed to admit that I didn't like game initially, but its powerful premise drew me to learn about it further. I'm very glad that my curiosity has brought me to here today.

except at this point the characters aren't even putting on facades. They're just looking into the camera, saying "I'm a bad person", they kick a puppy and then people still think "Well they're nicer than Ashley by doing less than the bare minimum by my definition so they're probably just misunderstood"

Starting with a side tangent, tcoaal oddly keeps being an artistic sister piece to Deltarune and vice versa for Us? Both being WIP indie RPGs that shot up to my Top 5 Favorite Games when there were only 2 chapters out for already displaying such complex writing & handling of themes I've not yet seen anywhere else even attempt, causing me to level up my own media literacy skills. (also them both releasing their 3rd chapter less than 30 days apart???? Basically no one talks about that time)

Anywhoo

Wholly agree about the game's both present and potential future legacy. The StP comparison feels very apt, and not just because of similar artstyles, and not just because of this post We made in adamant confidence. :p

Tcoaal wears the crown in my book for... I dunno how to translate that lead-in to the words I also wanted to say so. Fuck it The last time I, somebody intimately familiar with (insert oversharing TW list of things A&A experience here) has truly felt so seen by a piece of media was the anime Scum's Wish. (10/10 btw) And now that tcoaal's come & swooped that right up as the best We've ever seen, We're now having doubts anything could top it for Us in that area for decades.

It feels impossible for me to imagine how the game could actually "end" (despite S&S being one such actual ending to infer from) and maybe I'm just naively optimistic yet at this point I can't foresee the ball ever being fumbled or dropped. Unless Nemlei genuinely crashes out and makes everything bad on purpose out of spite before unplugging. /hj I think tcoaal is and will prove to be One Of The Bests. Period.

Yet. Unfortunately the bar to entry is quite high in this current climate. A combination of RPG Maker game, Visual Novel, multiple routes that you're basically expected to play through all of, tragedy-horror genre (non-jumpscares), non-advertiser-friendly subject matter (🤢), loudly insufferable fandom (so a normal fandom), and depending how the future shakes out among other things, developer/publisher drama There's a lot that the average person just bounces off of at the word Go. It's little wonder the game remains as niche as it is, despite those few like us fighting the good fight, championing this incredible game to the best of our abilities.

There'll likely still be more publicity pushes. Yes when more chapters come out/the game finishes, of course. But also Nemlei not opposed to the idea of merch in that one Q&A... (Listen, even if FanGamer won't personally agree to the optics of selling pastel bunny plushies with face-kissing action, an IRL Demon Trinket or a cute acrylic stand of Ashley & Andrew with their adorable totally incest baby Wren, We've seen some of the people MakeShip makes deals with, and all I'm saying is, there's definite open avenues for merch around at some point :p)

Maybe that's the kind of reputable thing that gets laypeople to reconsider, maybe not. Either way for now I think I'm at peace with the idea of one of the greatest stories I've ever read going underappreciated (as long as Nemlei still gets fair compensation) As long as media literacy remains at an all-time low, We'd rather things hover around the popularity of In Stars And Time or StP than, say, TADC. (Especially with what that much attention did to its creator 🙏)

I realize I've kinda been rambling just shootin' the shit for fun for a few paragraphs. I'll blame that on it being 7am if I can get away with that. We just love this game so much yet struggle to think of new ways to keep singing its praises with all it has to say about abuse, trauma, sex, gender, expectations, empathy, taboos, society and so much more. Especially after however many threads we've written so far. And without spoiling anything from a very, very, insanely long essay I'm helping write.

I think all we can do is just keep being As Based As Possible in hopes our takes survive the longest after all the clickbait thumbnails fade from the algorithm and all the puriteens grow up and find literally anything better to do with their time.

So that's interesting since I sometimes hear in passing, either some reworked dialogue or a slightly expanded scene gets updated in, but We don't really replay unless there's a new chapter update basically. So We'd heard about a change in the school hallway, ig "to drive a point home that was too subtle for some people before" is the vibe I got. But had no idea how people generally felt about any of it. (Maybe staying "outside" the fandom has been the wise choice...) They kinda keeps doing that afaik, adding these minor tweak updates, and since there's still no Chapter Select I do wish there was some place to just list all the changes in detail and which update they were a part of. Just Steam patchnotes don't really get specific enough.

The only people We personally know who're into tcoaal are cool trans/queer people whom We got them into the game in the first place. :p So ever since We got told the game has a decent right-wing portion of its fanbase, We've been trying to unpack why, past the default amount for any art to expect. We don't think it's the sibling-fucking; idk why I've heard some people talk about it like a "right-wing thing" but it's very much a bipartisan subject. I know it's easy for art that doesn't spell out its morals to your face are easy for the right to not think about and decide the art agrees with them actually, but that answer feels too simple. Tcoaal's writing feels too... "smart and empathetic" for that to make complete sense. Maybe it's just a question for the ages.

But you're right, it's not just incest that attracts the right-wingers. Andrew and Ashley are people suffering in a shit-fucked capitalist hellscape world, something we can all relate to, but the conclusions of what to do vastly differ depending on your political stances. Even though the game does show they commit violence because their shitty world forced them to to survive, the right sees this as society's victims committing violence as a rebellion against it. While yeah, that is partly why Andrew and Ashley do that, the right only focuses on that reason because they glorify that kind of behavior. If you are "brave enough" and "strong enough" and "break through all the barriers and institutions the """enemy""" set up", you can make a great change in the world. You just need to steel against yourself the blood you'd have to shed, which Andrew and Ashley are accustomed to because they weren't really treated as human beings in their entire life. This is why as kids, they weren't that bothered about Nina's death as a person. She mainly mattered as an extremely threatening moment for all aspects of the Graves' existence, which is why you got the violently transactional relationship between the siblings that was always present, it just didn't show its truest and ugliest face until that moment. Furthermore, Nina represented the "first" threat to the siblings' relationship, so her being killed by the siblings and them getting away with it would be a moment the blood purists love. It's extremely unfortunate she and Julia unironically would be called "hussies" in that circle.

Also, given how the right also pushes "family values" (which is really another form of individualism) Andrew and Ashley being siblings facing against the world appeals to that. To the right, this really is family at its best, especially with the romantic aspect of "us alone against big dangerous world", and Andrew and Ashley mostly falling into the typical gender norms and roles. We also must acknowledge that Ashley does get mischaracterized and bashed on (pun unintended...) in those circles because she's not a demurely submissive woman, and they would actually think Andrew beating her is okay or even great, he's asserting his "right as a man after being denied doing that so long". The right-wingers wouldn't or don't want to see the horror that is boiling underneath that beating, all they see is fiction that validates their beliefs after being told they're wrong for so long. This misreading is so prevalent, TV Tropes actually lists the backhand moment in early episode 3 in its YMMV as a "Carthasis Moment". Yet TV Tropes, which is supposed to be politically neutral, frames it as "Andrew was abused by Ashley for so long and now fought back", but never says it's played for horror. The intent may be different, but the conclusion is the same: neither refuse to see the horror that lies underneath the violence.

Though part of me doubts the majority of them are even consciously aware of any of these stated points. Even by making theoretical arguments for them, I can only picture "it's just a game, you're reading too much into nothing" responses if this thread broke containment. I never like assuming the Right ever bothers to actually analyze the art they claim to enjoy; it's helped Us get this far.

Tcoaal has and will continue to drive me crazy (/neutral) for almost respecting the intelligence of its player too much. That Ashley and Andrew (the latter moreso) are pretty blatantly written to be conservative-minded as a natural reaction to their upbringing. Their "fuck you, got mine" attitude towards life. Yet their apparent damage and unhappiness is supposed to get you, a presumable human being with logic and empathy, to like... pity them at least, as the lost-causes they keep choosing to be?

We remember seeing a post of somebody talking about that scene where the siblings learn about the doctor, and OP getting upset at Andrew's "I don't care about single-handedly saving the world, I want to live quietly and die in relative peace" speech @ Ashley's suggestion for taking revenge for "the game pushing conservative messages" and We just couldn't bother explaining the nuances between what a work of art is actually trying to convey VS what a character inside that fiction does/says.

We just realized all this framing may even be deliberate. With how the very first major crime/taboo we see these two morons (<3) cross (even if it's not the first chronologically) is afaik a cartoonishly generic hypothetical someone might ask you at a party to figure out when you would consider cannibalism justifiable. (minus the two being literally stranded on an island) It wouldn't surprise me if most players were conditioned by the universe's "immediate survival precedes helping others" lesson to start painting every other action in the game under that lens. Because it's hard to argue morals in the face of literal survival instincts. But eventually that PTSD-like reflex wears off and it hits you these two are still throwing others under the bus, despite there being no immediate danger in quite some time. It's all they've ever known from the start (... of the game)

By now I know I should be used to the 'Andrew Did Nothing Wrong' members of the fandom... [Insert multi-paragraph rant about the long-standing cultural norm of pathologizing women over men. Re: Crazy Sister, "I can fix her" culture, etc] (He might be my "preferred" Graves, but simply because I can relate more to the obviously fucked up things wrong with him than with Ashley, personally :p)

And in a vacuum, I can sympathize with narratively preferring ambiguity in some places. Unbiased towards Renee or any character, I could get someone disliking Olive Branch for that reason.

But We draw a line in the sand that someone could ever play Decay 1 and see a single trait worth admiring in their gods damned Grandpa. One of the most unsubtle "this guy is JUST a piece of shit" characters in tcoaal so far, a game whose majority population is people who are some degree of 'just shit' 😭

We haven't forgotten this is kinda the crux of most of what this thread's been about, but. Tcoaal feels like such an anomaly of a work of art. Like it carries this aura that filters out most people, and 99% of the people who don't get filtered and stick around become insane, in the cringe way (unlike us, who're insane about it in the cool based way 😎 /hj)

1 - Andrew is not clueless, he PLAYS DUMB when it's convenient.

2 - Andrew wanting to mark his territory is exactly why he WOULD give Ashley decent Sex Ed. If he doesn't, she's likely to get taken advantage of by SOMEONE ELSE. He, and only he, doesn't need her to be clueless to "take advantage" because Ashley just wants any excuse to be the center of his world.

3 - Ashley went to school, watched a ton of TV and has an older brother (that clearly is sexually active yet has no kids) that doubles as her actual parent. She's not some super isolated girl that lives in a farm, raised by a religious cult that taught her asking questions was wrong. She likely got some basic biology classses (or "classes") before/around the time she got her first period because SOMEONE had to explain to her how that worked and pay for the tampons/pads.