#dev asks

[tsunderswapofficial]

Hello, what happened with the update of the other part of TS Underswap? Was it canceled or is it just rumors?

We're still working on the game, bit by bit! Sometimes development can be pretty slow, since this is just a little hobby project and takes lesser importance over real-life obligations (i.e. work, school, etc.) -- but the game hasn't been cancelled, and we have no intention of doing so!

- Beeth

[devethe64th]

I’m very curious how you think William sees the other characters in silver eyes and vice versa 

oookay!!

there’s the obvious “above everyone else” thing, but there’s two other things i wanna talk about. and the third part.

1. his love for observing others

2. his whole theatrical view of everything

3. how others view him

alright, so for the first one (gonna drop my casual typing style for ease of reading)

In the first scene we see him speak (the first line of dialogue, actually) he’s described with an odd, uneven smile. This read to me like mild amusement mixed with a bit of scrutiny below the surface. Judging by future lines (Charlie not letting him look too hard into her eyes, him trying not to smile while reprimanding the group), William may have instantly recognized Charlie, and was observing how she had changed after all these years. He may have thought “oh, that’s where the third Charlie bot is, she has no idea what she really is”, but TSE was supposed to be a standalone book iirc, so i’ll ignore future parts of the trilogy.

There’s also that scene where Carlton is trapped in a springlock suit, and William takes “malevolent delight” in his pain and fear, and even laughs at his reaction to his scars, even turning around to let Carlton see how bad they are. He’s actively enjoying watching how other people react to his actions, like they’re lab rats and he’s a scientist experimenting on them. Remember that line that describes him fighting like a cornered rat? This ties into that really well, with that blurb in the same chapter that gives a bit of insight into William’s past.

There is another scene where he’s observing Charlie. Probably way more examples throughout the book, but i’d like to note this one in particular.

There’s something during William’s interrogation that stands out quite a bit for this. The line “Oh, you’re something beautiful, aren’t you?” may be interpreted as weird at first (for obvious reasons), but I believe there’s an explanation for it. William sees how broken Charlie is due to what he’s done, how stuck in the past she is (Ironic, huh? Will’s also quite focused on the past with Henry and Freddy’s), and finds it fascinating. He may see the amount of pain in her as the amount of pain in Henry before his suicide. Perhaps it’s a feeling he hadn’t felt in years, seeing somebody he knows and hates suffering.

I would also like to point out that before this line, Charlie asks how they can get out of the building, and William tells her that there’s no way out, only family. I interpret this as him telling Charlie to accept her fate and to join his “family”. This also kinda shows his jealously towards Henry’s family, as he wants Charlie to be killed by either him or the animatronics and to be with his instead. I know I said that future books didn’t count for this, but also interesting that it could also be William hinting at who he actually killed.

This whole idea that William loves to observe his creations/victims is also mentioned in one of his FFPS lines. “Fascinating, what they have become”. This is in reference to the other animatronics in the vents, and the player (if you believe it’s Michael Afton).

There’s a smaller, less significant scene where Charlie climbs the walls and electrocutes Chica. William watches from afar, smiling to himself while watching how she tries to escape the situation and save herself. Also this scene is funny for a reason i’ll write in a different post hehehe

Alright, to get into my second bit…

I think William views himself and everyone around him as actors, almost.

This thought hit me while rereading the scene where he kidnaps Carlton. As you probably know, Carlton is a jokey character, and cracks multiple jokes at William’s expense. William’s reactions to these jokes are quite interesting to me.

For the first joke Carlton makes (never trust a rabbit), William simply tells him not to speak, continuing with the “I was actually a murderer!!!” performance. Carlton makes another joke (What kind of name for a serial killer is Dave?), and William just ignores what he said, continuing to warn him not to speak. This next one is especially funny. William asks Carlton what he thinks he’s inside of, which Carlton responds “your girlfriend?”. William actually smiles at this, but then, with distaste, continues his script. Of course, the distaste could be from the bad joke, but I think it was William slipping up his “calm murderer act” for one second, then getting pissed at Carlton internally for going “off script”. Especially since when he continues, he says that he’s not in a costume, which Carlton didn’t mention at all.

This next line isn’t a joke, but it’s still interesting. William goes on to explain the springlock suits, and mentions Henry making them. Carlton doesn’t know who Henry is, so he’s like “who’s Henry?”. William is then actually caught off guard by the fact that Carlton genuinely has no idea who this Henry guy is by name, and then he needs to explain that it’s Charlie’s Dad. He’s kind of like “oh yeah, I always just saw him as Charlie’s dad.” Which causes William to just mumble “of course”. William still seems calm, but you can kinda tell that it threw him off and got under his skin.

The immediate happiness when Carlton goes back on-script too. He instantly smiles widely when he asks William how he knows what the springlocks do to the human body, and the previously mentioned laughter at his reaction to the scars.

Probably another example somewhere, but this scene is the most prominent case of William’s mental script.

Well, How other people see him?

Well, Charlie describes William during his first appearance as “immediately off-putting” and as having a “negative charisma”. A gut feeling that’s probably either Charlie unknowingly recognizing him, or just that overall vibe of “something’s wrong with that dude”. I’m leaning more towards the latter, as Jessica seems to share similar thoughts towards William, as seen when they’re both in the control room. (It could also just be both a weird vibe and that random feeling of familiarity.)

Later on, he’s described as a regular, unimposing-looking man. This is either his “Dave Miller” persona going perfectly as planned, or just him being a sickly looking guy. Even his attempts at looking threatening don’t seem to work, as shown in the scene where Charlie knocks him out. Overall, nobody takes him seriously as a threat until they realize he could actually kill them. The Carlton kidnapping scene is a good example, the scene where they let him into Freddy’s kind of shows this (and the gut-feeling thing mentioned above), Last main one is when he’s finally awake and not responding during the interrogation scene.

So, I’d say people view him as a seemingly normal, unassuming guy, probably down on his luck and blending into society quite well (maybe a bit of a loser). But, when you actually speak to him, there’s a strange vibe you can’t put your finger on. Like you know something’s really, REALLY wrong but you can’t prove it.

ah, not sure if you read all of that, but whew! i had fun writing this, connecting stuff together midway through and being like “woah wait i might’ve just done something!!” when i maybe didn’t do much… :P

tysm for the ask!!!!! :DD

[huckleberry-den]

hello...what music does modern regulus black listen to

Oh buddy don't get me started let me give you a list

I think he would be a emo virgincore loser like radiohead, the smiths, the cure, mitski, ethel cain, (I don't listen to her a lot but from the few songs I've heard GOD rip reg you would have loved her) the marías, (YES GAWD THEY'RE MY FAVOURITE BAND) matt maltese, and probably others but I can't think rn

[the-real-dev]

whos ur bf?

junooo 😙😙😙 @jayple-syrup hi baby i love u 😙😙😙😙

[stygian-eye-stories]

What is the dynamic affection system? How is it different from a normal "static" affection system?

It's nothing innovative. Just a lot of extra work >.>

It's also difficult to kind of explain what makes it different because VNs have a multitude of point systems to begin with. I can explain what my system does though.

Just like most point systems, most choices will affect affection in some way. The difference is that as the game progresses within each choice the scenes will begin to vary dramatically depending on affection level.

Heimos is actually an example of something closer to a 'static' system since he's the first iteration. In the later scenes of his game, the same conversations will happen with only mild line rewrites to address that he's garnered extra affection - unless it's the opposite. If you're on a bad or neutral run, you'll notice he's a lot colder and the MC is a lot more paranoid.

To me, a 'static system' is one where the points go up, but the dialogue only changes a little bit. The intended story marches on with very little variation in reactions to choices - even if they're weird. For example, imagine that you've been +1-ing a character for the entire game but randomly decide to make a very hurtful choice. In some games, this is just an automatic bad end. In others, there's a reaction to the choice, but that reaction is the same regardless of the affection level (with maybe a line or two different).

VV really showcase what I mean. The tone and sometimes the content of later conversations can vary dramatically depending on the choice made and what their respective levels are.

To use my previous example, if you've been raising Violo's affection significantly, he thinks that you're a good person who does the right thing. That's why, in a particular scene where if you're a good person you'll at least cooperate with him to save someone's life (in his mind), if you try to reject that idea, he is infuriated and gets violent for the first time in a while. He expects this at low. He's a bit miffed at neutral. He's heartbroken at Affectionate (but not as violent because his fondness has progressed to romantic interest), but at Attentive, he lashes out even more viciously than he does for the lower affection levels.

That's what I mean by 'dynamic'. The characters react to each choice depending on their affection levels instead of just what the choice is.

It's fun to see it played out (and to see people who like to replay games enjoying the new content), but after writing it myself twice now, I can see why this method is unpopular. It's tedious as hell. I get trapped in choice reactions for fucking 5 to 8k words (if not more at times), and you have to make sure that the code all works and that each choice loops well into the next post choice bit of narration despite the scenes possibly being very different.

It's why for WRBC and GSLH, I'm trying to figure out a modified system that doesn't check the affection at every choice but only at key ones and for little extra bits of dialogue. That way, I can use that modified system for that pipe dream game of mine.

[catlaila]

hi, just read this delightful fic (https://archiveofourown.org/works/39898779/chapters/99903420) w baker andrew. it has parts where the baking instructions are in italics and every time it feels like a cooking cut from dungeon meshi. every time I hear senshi's voice describing how to bake delightful pastries. doesn't help that senshi and andrew have the same body type in my head. also thoughts on kabru = neil?

you know when i did a sharp pivot from aftg to dunmeshi content i was worried people would be like hey what the fuck is this but thankfully i’ve found my people! first of all thank you for sharing this fic i WILL be reading this asap. i would’ve never imagined senshi-andrew parallels but oh yeah! im fucking w it! for baking specifically, i think andrew would like that a lot more than he’d like cooking. baking is a science, and you need specificity or something WILL go wrong, and i think he would find a lot of comfort in that. i do find andrew would initially hate it but grow to be interested in following a consistent pattern to get a result, sort of similar to jean helping cat with meal prep. (also i totally agree with you on similar body types. death to lean skinny andrew!)

but oh wow. your kabru/neil comparison is so interesting and i totally see where ur coming from there. i think it’s also particularly interesting because i do find kabru to be an unreliable narrator who often downplays his own violence. i was so surprised when kabru immediately went to chimera falin and hit the human’s weak points, but then i was like, oh, duh. it’s people in particular that interest him far more than monsters have for laios (and also why i would love to talk about their foils in a separate post sometime!). in making a comparison, neil doesn’t care about riko because he also does not care for the monsters in his life! he is intimately obsessed with the connections he has with the foxes, but he is a violence in him that kicks in like a survival instinct. i think it’s 100% similar to kabru and his own instincts and violence.

i’m sorry for yapping but also thank you for giving me the opportunity to yap

[cyath]

mammon is the type of guy to point at you and say "this one's for you" and miss completely when playing basketball or something

Pfft- he is the type then he just would say sike nvm and then try again then miss, knowing his luck 💀

[rekindlevn]

THE GAME RUINED ME EMOTIONALLY AND I LOVE IT

trust us when we say that we ruined ourselves writing the demo alone... BUT WE ARE GLAD YOU ENJOYED IT!!