another 2 star revamp... might be getting out of hand but idc lol. my first shiho one though, theyre my fav so i hope i got it right hehe
og 2 star under the cut!
I have seen an influx of posts on various social media sites organizing certain pairs in Vivid BAD SQUAD over others in terms of a relationship hierarchy. To put it more simply, people are insisting, for example, that "hamster headphones" and "coffee pancakes" are inherently closer than any other combination of the four. People are also making the opposite argument, trying to insist that "headphones pancakes" is a closer relationship than "hamster headphones", in one example.
I am writing this post to explain why you should not make these arguments. Not only are they reductive, minimizing the writing of some dynamics in favor of others, there is a bigger reason why you shouldn't talk about these dynamics in this manner— amatonormativity.
Amatonormativity encompasses a large set of societal beliefs that assume romance is inevitable, inherently good, and the ultimate form of relationship one can have. It is something deeply ingrained in various cultures, and people with unchecked amatonormativity often cause harm to aromantic people, such as myself. A big part of amatonormativity involves viewing relationships in a relationship hierarchy, where platonic relationships never seen as equal relationships to romantic relationships.
Now then, how and why does this apply to this debate on Vivid BAD SQUAD? After all, it's not like any of these dynamics are romantic in canon.
Except... when the fandom has these discussions, it ultimately comes down to the romantic ships they support. They always place the dynamics they see the most romantic chemistry in above the others, as it's what they interpreted from the text. How accurate these interpretations may be is irrelevant to this post, though.
What people are missing is that the relationship between the partners and non-partners in Vivid BAD SQUAD are indeed different, but this difference should never be conflated with "closeness". Contrary to popular belief, each dynamic of Vivid BAD SQUAD is well-developed— people simply ignore or push whatever props up their ships. People are so obsessed with shipping discourse that they're missing the point of this unit's relationships entirely.
Partners in Vivid BAD SQUAD's story have different boundaries and language compared to the bonds between teammates. However, the story makes a point that the partner dynamics are balanced and stabilized by the teammate dynamics. If it wasn't for An and Kohane, Akito and Touya might've never gotten back together in Main Story. If it wasn't for Akito and Touya, An and Kohane wouldn't have been able to resolve their codependency. VBS WL2 makes this even clearer— it has to be the four of them. Each dynamic is equally important. And this fandom needs to start treating it as such.
In the Leo/need Miitopia and MORE MORE JUMP! Clubhouse Games videos from the first SEKAI Game Day series, the members of each unit are given official Mii designs.
Strangely, some of these Miis contain errors or unusual design choices, such as Ichika's eyes being dark blue, Haruka's bangs being parted in the wrong direction, and Shizuku missing her mole.
Below the cut are instructions on how to make each Mii on a Nintendo Switch console (or Nintendo's online Mii Studio).
Leave skintone, face shape, and eyebrow style at default for all Miis. Or don't because frankly they were really low effort with these Miis in the first place and headcanons are more fun that using the same body type base for every character.
Eyebrows: Same color as hair. Thinnest possible setting. 1 stage wider apart.
Eyes: Page 2, 4th row, 4th column
Eye color: 4th row, 2nd column
Leave nose and mouth at default
Set favorite color to dark blue
In Leo/need's Miitopia playthrough her personality/job is set to Kind Mage
Recommended fixes: Unless you are a diehard blue eyes Ichika truther I suggest changing her eye color to grey. I'd also argue that light blue is closer to her image color (also the light blue on the mii maker is internally called sky blue. which is also the name of ichika's image color lol), but she does wear dark blue a lot ingame/on her unit outfit so either way is fine rlly.
Saki
Hairstyle: Page 5, 2nd row, 2nd column
Hair color: 8th row, 8th column
Eyebrows: Thinnest possible setting. One stage upwards
Eyebrow color: 7th row, 3rd column
Eyes: Page 2, 4th row, 5th column
Eye color: 2nd row, 7th column
Nose: 1 stage smaller
Mouth: 1st row, 5th column
Set favorite color to yellow
In Leo/need's Miitopia playthrough her personality/job is set to Energetic Popstar
Recommended fixes: Honestly there isn't really a good pick for the hair but one of the colors around the official one in the mii maker could probably work. Slightly more orangeyish
Haruka
Hairstyle: Page 3, 5th row, 2nd column
Hair color: 4th row, 2nd column
Eyebrows: Same color as hair. Thinnest possible setting. 1 stage wider
let me hear your thoughts, and with these true feelings, engrave them into those eyes.
-------------------
i'm very honoured to have done the page art for my most favorite event in the game for the @ready-steady-zine <333 thank you so much to tom for having me!!
again, go download the zine now if you haven't!!! everyone did such a lovely job and i hope y'all are like. marginally okay with my piece
stormborns
prguitarman
discoholicmusic
snowghoul
germansingergirl
titsay
areudirty
