Text
Okayy I just saw Mahiru’s recorded footage… And …okay wow…. I lowkey think her death affected Yuno a lot cz the last words Mahiru told Yuno was… I WANTED A BABY .. like-…. AND ALSO THE FEEDING RATS WAS LIKE AN ACTUAL THING AND NOT LIKE INTROSPECTIVE THEORY????OKAY I WASN’T EXPECTING THAT PART OF THE LORE…
Text
takuya yamanaka i trusted you
PLEASE IGNORE THE ORAL CIGARETTES MENTION APPARENTLY I’VE BEEN SPREADING MISINFORMATION HEEELPPPP.
Answer
well i appreciate your confidence in me. i tried to remain coherent and on topic but i was goin thru it keeping all my tangents to myself. TLDR at the bottom;
tbh i do think it was kinda irresponsible of infold to suddenly switch it up after almost an entire year’s worth of heavily tweaking the eng translations, and ofc i think you’re well within your rights to feel uncomfortable
you should always prioritize yourself in these situations—especially fiction you can step away from, and should never actively torture yourself over something that isn’t even real. we’re all guilty of using fiction as escapism, but if you feel like you need to unmain/uninstall, then do it. or at least give yourself a break from the game. you’re not actually breaking up with someone, or hurting their feelings—Caleb is a fictional character, he will carry on as he is coded to do until the game EOS’s; but please don’t let FOMO be the thing that prevents you from taking the time you need to process your feelings. you can always check out the content on youtube
and, well, yeah, the inclusion of “My baby sister” was pretty shocking to me too, bc of all the hoops infold has thus far jumped through; all the quirky translations and word choices, the nonsensical lines, all the corny but undeniably sibling-coded nicknames in their vaguest attempt possible to edge Caleb as close to Xia Yizhou/Mahiru/Ha Wooju as they could without actually crossing the line
still, my mind immediately went to the ppl who play eng only, and i felt bad for them. infold just suddenly ripped the rug from under the eng loc players. didn’t even try easing them into it, just Caleb suddenly calling you “baby sister” in 4k after every little painstaking way it’s been danced around before
but just bc you don’t like it, to outright deny the source material is to live with blinders on… (and if ignoring it is fine with you, you can stop reading right here with the knowledge that i agree it was too sudden and very poorly implemented)
[[MORE]]ppl can deny it to themselves as they please but you know why Caleb’s love is compared to sin, why it’s considered forbidden, why he’d feel so damn ashamed to harbor romantic feelings in the first place—that burden is a core aspect to his character. it’s not just his red flags; the possessive, dark/morally grey character hiding behind a benevolent exterior. anyone who plays any of his early memories can see the guilt he’s steeped in; why would just a childhood friend feel such a way? sure there’s plenty things you can reassign his guilt to, plenty bad things he’d feel responsible for; but we all know this particular flavor of guilt is for his romantic feelings
and do you want to know how easy it would have been to set this trope up in a more palatable way for eng-only? imagine this as the first line of his Note entry: “My childhood friend who has become like a big brother to me.” compared to the actual entry: “My childhood friend.”
that, at least, would give you incentive to understand any guilt and fear and shame because somewhere along the way of growing up together, those developed familial feelings began skewing into something different. and it fits bc you were aware the entire time you’re not blood-related. and, wow, magically, suddenly a basis for lines like: “but we’re practically siblings, we shouldn’t feel this way” is set, and more cohesively fits alongside the og trope than what the eng loc actually got: “friend whom i grew up with in the same household, but only have had friendly, platonic but also not, feelings for the whole time, yeah it’s totally normal you would feel like a sinner for liking me.” (you can have that one for free, Infold)
and i don’t mean this in an accusatory way, but i don’t get what my being friends w/proshippers has to do with anything? unless you maybe mean that i’m desensitized by my friends? and if that is the case, then let me be clear that my friends do not send me anything i don’t want to see. and if i ever told them i was uncomfortable with anything, i know for a fact they would respect me enough to stop, and not throw tantrums, or write call outs or threaten in me in anyway.
ik i don’t owe anyone any explanations, but i’ll explain anyway that i don’t love Mahiru because he is the older brother (figure). but bc i do love Mahiru, i accept him for who he is in his entirety; i’m pulled in by him, his characteristics, his flaws, his personality, his red flags, the feeling(s) i get from him—everything about him as a character, and the way he scratches very specific itches in my brain. regardless of his role in the game, i would still hyper-fixate on him so long as he remained who he is at his core. the dude was my fav even before he was brought back as a love interest, and i had to actually reckon with myself after his announcement on how i would feel pursuing Mahiru’s route (obviously, he won lol…and tbf i’m also HUGE nojiken fan…so like, i was pretty much destined to lose the fight)
maybe it doesn’t bother me bc i’ve been playing the JP loc the entire time. it’s such a common trope in fiction/otomes that i’ve always just thrown an eyebrow up at bc i’ve never been interested in the character associated, until now
and now to sound potentially, concerningly, parasocial about a fictional character: you too need to ask yourself if you love Caleb, what is it about him that you love, and does that outweigh the “icky” feeling, can you accept him for who he really is? ask yourself what it is that drew you to Caleb bc, interestingly enough, the other four have aspects and crossover tropes if that’s all it was
or, maybe you decide you can continue on ignoring all other localizations and instances of direct translation; neither is a wrong answer as long as you’re not going out of your way to hurt anyone else—and even i dance around it when i write, if you’ve noticed, unless i feel like it can’t be avoided
TLDR:
all that to really say: yes, i think infold handled the direct translation poorly; no, i don’t think it’s wrong that you feel the way you do; no i don’t think it’s wrong he’s a love interest in an otome game; no i don’t think you’re immoral or incestuous if you pursue his route; yes, i think it’s wrong for ppl to attack others over this FICTIONAL character; yes, i believe everyone should just stick to their like-minded friends and have fun instead of wallowing in shit, oops, i meant drama
that being said, i recommend you just block anyone going out of their way to be hateful, rather than engaging to argue, for your own sake.
it always comes down to preferences of what sort of media and fiction you want to enjoy, and no one has the right to harass you over liking it or not—just like you shouldn’t be harassing other ppl for the same. hell, if you want to block me now, do it; i encourage you to do so if you think my posts will upset you going forward
take a break from the game, before resorting to deleting or switching to prevent the devastating feeling of having wasted your time/resources for nothing. and if you do decide to log back in, Caleb will still be there, happy to see you; and like i said before, he’s fictional. you won’t be hurting his feelings if you decide to log back in only to switch mains, just like you won’t be hurting anyone if you never log back in.
