no clowning or I block you please be normal

Buddy

(SPOILERS for BUDDY SIM, FYI. Highly recommend playing the game for yourself if you haven't) In the game itself shows Buddy (default name) to have two distinct 'personas' - the main 'Buddy' persona whose focus is entertaining and befriending the player, often to a selfish degree, and the 'Conscience' who processes information more logically/systematically, in a sense the base code of your Buddy. The two are on some level separate identities as, during Ending 2, the Conscience causes the deletion sequence for the two without Buddy's approval, causing the two to have an argument about letting the player go. At the end of the day, it's a headcanon that I can definitely see an argument for.

Mikaela Hyakuya

Okay so for Mika I've said most of what I wanted to say already in the submission itself. but I'm going to use this post as an excuse to post a bunch of pictures of him because I can. LOOK AT MY BOY (proper alt text instead of captions for these cause they're less important to My Point)

okay, but in all seriousness, here are some more relevant screenshots (unfortunately I don't have the manga with me so you guys get strange anime crops in varying quality):

Figure 1: Mika in various states of anguish and shock after "coming to his senses".

Figure 2: Two frames of Mika after frantically backing away from his companion, with the dialogue "Wh-What was I..." and "Sorry. I wasn't myself." in the subtitles.

This is just one example I could find, but I think it shows pretty well what I meant! I think it's a pretty common vampire trope to have the sort of reaction shown in Figure 1; that kind of "morally tormented" bestial thing is pretty standard in that genre. But he genuinely seems confused and needs to reorient himself afterwards, as seen in Figure 2. And claims it "wasn't himself" which really flipped some switches in my brain when I was a young teen watching this. And he says this multiple times;

Figure 3: Mika leaning against a wall, saying "I wanted to see you again as myself, not some horrible monster."

For Mika, vampirism isn't just the state his body is in; it's something he's fighting tirelessly for control over his mind as well. It's a "horrible monster" that makes him no longer himself. And when Yuu (the other person in Figure 2) suggests he drink his blood to Not Die, he's extremely offended, and tries to explain how long and hard he's been fighting it-- basically to refuse to accept himself. And he would rather die to take that "monstrous" part of himself with him than let something free that he sees as dangerous and evil.

And frankly the best part in my opinion is that when he finally does release that restraint and allow himself to just Be...

...he's still perfectly himself. Nothing changes, besides the fact that he is more happy and free than he has been for years.

...

And as for Buddy!! One of the most interesting things about a system-coded interpretation of Buddy is the fact that in-game, the entire world that the player can interact with, from every single non-Buddy character, to the objects, to the narration and plot-- it all comes from Buddy. It's all extensions of themselves. Buddy is writing the game as you're playing it, and YET !!! And yet, Buddy is constantly, the whole duration of the game, fighting their own game for control. The plot and characters seem to have a mind of their own, and at times Buddy forcibly "overwrites" their dialogue and actions, but even so, the base story and even the player's controls seem to be at least partially out of Buddy's control, and things keep coming back to haunt them.

Another fun fact about this game is that text affiliated with Buddy arrives in different "voices". Buddy themself has a very distinctive and chirpy voice, but when the player occasionally receives descriptive text, there's another, more "neutral" voice. And Buddy occasionally talks over this voice, particularly to tell the player to ignore things that it says. And on further occasions, text that is clearly still affiliated with Buddy is printed entirely silently, with no voice at all. The "Conscience" mentioned in the original submission and elaborated on in the Spoiler Zone further down, speaks with silent text this way.

At one point, when the player is able to observe Buddy directly, Buddy is seemingly unaware of the player's presence. The following exchange is printed silently, with intermittent prompts for a "yes" or "no" response:

"Is Player having fun?" [on answering yes] "I think they are having fun." "Is Player enjoying our company?" [on answering yes] "Yes, they still enjoy our company." "Is Player our friend?" [on answering yes] "I think so, but we can do better."

And all of these lines are printed in the same place! And interestingly enough, with the same voice (or lack thereof).

[BUDDY SIM MAJOR SPOILER WARNING START]

Okay, now for the discussion of the ending I got-- Ending 2, the same one mentioned in Buddy's original submission. The player's screen flashes briefly to show that the command for uninstalling, and thereby killing/wiping Buddy's memory, has been entered into the command window of the game, without any involvement from the player. Buddy initially blames the player for this, but the silent text answers on the player's behalf, asserting that "there was only one solution." Buddy frantically replies with "What do you mean? This was you?" and the two have an argument before Buddy is eventually deleted.

After the end of the game, this song can be accessed related to the ending:

(I highly recommend giving it a listen because the soundtracks from this game are amazing.)

Particularly relevant are the following lines:

"I hope you'll wake me up again someday. We'll have new games for us to play. That is if my conscience doesn't disobey."

"Oh, I just realized what I have done. A little late to make things right, but-- Please, it's not my fault, it was ITS fault. But they'll never know what's best for--"

Also, throughout the song, Buddy interrupts themselves repeatedly, continuing off from various trains of thought, which honestly just feels very system-coded as well.

[BUDDY SIM MAJOR SPOILER WARNING END]

As for how these two are shockingly similar...

Their most important relationship is a non-romantic one

They both tend to get extremely protective, jealous, and sometimes violent over their given loved one

They're really sweet and the thing they want most is companionship and safety

Distrustful of others besides their loved one

massive turmoil and struggles for control within their alleged system to the point of bordering on self-loathing and self-destructive actions

would literally destroy themselves to benefit their loved one

it really is The Character and their loved one against the world, huh.

they're just both extremely devoted and sweet people and it's really fun to me that they got paired up... even if it means I have to choose one of them :')

Also... after finishing Buddy Simulator 1984 I was really sad for my Buddy. So I tried my hand at a commemorative pixel art to give them a friend and remember this matchup :)