i have thoughts abt this hold on ✍
your average player does not listen to the voicelines of every single character, or track down every cutscene every single one is in. they might not even look at the cutscenes more than once. id be willing to bet they dont even look at cut/beta content. they go through the game, interact with the main storyline, maybe breeze through everything else for 100%, but dont go past the surface of the game and what they're presented with.
thats why all the popular characters and ships are some of the most prominent characters in the game, period. johnny, derby, zoe, gord, gary. (one exception; kirby and trent are up there too bc they're caught being gay and everyone loves their yaoi.) nobody knows who trevor is. nobody gives a shit about jerry, ivan, bryce, fatty, luis, etc. maybe people will have one favorite, or even a favorite clique, but all these minor background characters just arent in the spotlight and people dont have the desire to look at them all indepth. they're just enemies to beat up for fun after all.
making an oc is fundamentally different than researching existing characters, its art. oc interactions are just roleplay basically. its playing toys with the stage being bullworth. that's why it feels different than anything ingame, because it is Not the same. it will take a Lot of work to create a well adjusted character and make them feel real (and that doesnt often happen if they're not grounded and interacting with All cliques ingame, which people dont always do if theyre spending more time making their special blorbo for their own enjoyment). and on top of that some people just wont be interested in anything other than the version of the game they were presented. and thats Fine.
either way, think of it like two different playing fields. canon is the more traditional and 'safe' thing to engage with, and ocs are freestyling on the elements we have. people with ocs arent taking away fame and attention from canon characters, if you feel like they're taking up too much space in the tags then you're more than welcome to balance it out by posting like. moodboards or some shit yourself.
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