#splipslips

So obviously one of the big things the game makes a point to drive home both in its world building and the natural cycle of going through and beating the game is that Change is a Very Big Thing.

You can’t move forward without Change (part of why Siffrin is stuck as long as they are is because of their resistance to Change and what it means for them at the end of this quest, the Change and end that will occur after talking to Euphrasie) and it’s something that Adrienne even talked about in one of the asks they got (idk where but I remember reading it) and it’s that every other member of the party would have gotten out of the loops much quicker than Siffrin, even though they more or less wanted the same thing as him (to stay together even after they beat the King).

And this is all really interesting for a number of reasons, but the one I’m focusing on right now is how the dismay and refusal to make any kind of Change and the outcome of this refusal varies between Loop and Siffrin in SASASA vs ISAT.

And I’m gonna talk about it.

For this, I want to start with Loop.

Loop obviously was in the loops a lot longer than Siffrin (no matter how long certain people have been having Siffrin loop in those yt vids where they’re at 10K loops or smth ur not canon get out) and even by the end of it, the relationship between them and the group is so degraded they don’t even see the group as real people anymore. When Loop gives up, it’s them giving up on their wish, but not in the way that Siffrin gives up his.

Loop gave up on themself, the whole shebang, but specifically what I’m looking at is the way they gave up the wish and immediately made another wish. They never accepted it as an end of their relationship with the gang (even if honestly at this point it was wayyyy past that) instead they gave up on EVERYTHING. On ever finding a way out, on THEMSELVES, on there anything being anything left of/for them in this life. And some of that could arguably have manifested into them become Loop and their position as Loop, but that’s for another time.

Siffrin on the other hand, kinda gave up on their wish, but they didn’t give up in the same way and same sense and not as self destructively as Loop did. Him giving up his wish wasn’t the end of him, at least not immediately, and that gave the family time to come in and do the whole final battle thing where it eventually comes out they all want to stay together for the foreseeable future, yadda yadda yadda.

The main difference is that at the actual end of the loops for both of them, Siffrin accepts that at some point, what he currently has with his family will come to an end. There’s a whole conversation with Odile about it, god I loved and cried at the conversation, but it’s accepted and acknowledged that as long as this is a beginning for the group, there will at some point, in some way, be an end. A Change. And Loop did not accept this, never got the chance to, because of how their loops went, how they stretched so long that when they gave up there was nothing left to give or hope for; they never made it to the point Siffrin gets to because they didn’t have help and an annoying ass star as a guide as a form of informed support, and never got the chance to have this acceptance. They give up on staying with the family, and then (even if not intentionally) eradicate the entire timeline. Or universe or whatever.

Loop and Siffrin were both unwilling to Change. They were stuck for as long as they were and when they were in Siffrin’s case (you only ever make progress in ISAT when there is some kind of deviation from the script, after all) because they didn’t. want. to. deviate. Which again, the rest of the party, if they had been looping, would have gotten out a lot faster because they don’t have this unwillingness to Change.

But with where Siffrin got to at the end of Act 5 (thanks to Loop) they were able to be convinced by the party and that’s the difference.

He was able to make that acceptance. To accept Change.

And that’s why Siffrin was able to win, in a way, I guess.