• No, he does not taste like fish, Yes I know you've giggled about that at least once so I may as well knock it out of the way
• Considering he's been confirmed to smoke and it's safe to say he eats from the vending machines pretty consistently, he usually tastes like cigarettes and chips
• Occasionally, he may taste like other snack foods, namely: Chocolate, Peanuts, Hard Candy, and those weird prepackaged vanilla cookies
• At first he didn't want to kiss you at all, even when you two got your confessions out
• His mouth is so inhuman and sharp, with rows of shark-like teeth... It made him really nervous about kissing you for a long time
• What if seeing it up close made you not like him very much anymore? What if it just doesn't feel right to you? He'd rather avoid making you uncomfortable like that
• There's only so much defensive sarcasm and passive aggression can do for you, and it isn't gonna fix heartbreak
• Makes fun of you for even wanting to kiss him, have you SEEN him??
• Will accuse you of having a thing for fish 💀
• You're going to have to kiss him first, he isn't gonna pop that safety bubble himself
• That first time, his whole body locks up, breath held for the long moment it takes for him to process what's actually happening
• He relaxes slowly into actually kissing back, that familiar wall coming down
• After this, he'll start initiating them
• At first it's these stiff little pecks on the cheek and corner of your mouth, but he quickly gets a taste for you
• When he starts kissing you directly, he gets hungry for it, starting to sneak them in any time he can find
• The kisses get longer and slower and easier for him, humming into every one of them so affectionately
• He's needed the touch for years, so naturally he's going to have his hands on you the whole time. Yes, all three of them.
• Likes to pick you up, means you can't get away when he goes to tease you about wanting to kiss such a scary thing like him
• Absolutely gives you little snake kisses, his tongue flicks out at you a lot when he's giving you smaller kisses
• That mean ass mouth doesn't get any nicer, but at least you get kisses for putting up with it
• He's going to nip and nibble at you too, overall getting really comfortable with the mouth affection
• He does this all the time, too, and most enjoys bothering you while you're trying to work by sneaking up and biting your neck
• Seriously tho, how is he so quiet?? He's huge???
• Oops, hickeys! He's too pleased with leaving marks not to ❤️
I've seen plenty of hot takes, both on here and in the fandom at large, wishing that that they wish that Yuu wasn't there in the game and whatnot. I think the real issue that people actually are taking umbrage with is a lack of control and the player character's amount of presence in the story.
Yuu in the game is a player avatar that is supposed to represent you or your oc. They are also my go to example of how not to write a player insert character. They have almost no personality. Your dialogue options are super limited. Characters routinely ignore your input and pretend like you never said anything.
Worst of all, they have no impact in the plot. Sure, they get the characters to work together, but I feel like some of that would happen even if Yuu wasn't there thanks to people tending to work together in life and death circumstances. The only real instances where they were truly a main character was just in the Prologue, Book 3 and somewhat Book 4. Every other arc, you could take them out and it wouldn't make any difference.
There are even cases where Yuu is about to make a choice, but then other characters swoop in to steal their thunder. In Book 5, Yuu was about to stop Neige from drinking the poisoned apple juice, but then Rook and Kalim swooped in to do the same. It's just annoying.
Yes, a lot of this is due to it being a mobile title, but that's not an excuse. Plenty of other otomes like Obey Me are mobile games, too. None of them suffer from these issues, at least to this extent. It's simply bad writing to me.
TWST would've been a lot better if it was a role playing console game like Baldur's Gate 3. I honestly wish that was the case. Sure, there would be events that are set in stone like the Overblots, but you would be able to craft your own character and play in your own sandbox a lot better. Wanna kick Ace and Deuce to the curb after the prologue? You can do that. Wanna befriend some of the other characters or spend more time with ones like Malleus? You can do that, too. Wanna get a job at one of the locations across campus instead of being stuck as a janitor? You can do that. The possibilities are endless!
Instead you are locked into certain choices whether you like it or not. That's frustrating for a lot of players, myself included. I would make a lot of different choices than Yuu does in the game if given the opportunity like not befriending Ace and Deuce.
Someone mentioned this in a Reddit comment of all things that the game is just okay for what it is and suffers from a lot of writing issues, but it serves better as a sandbox to take the parts and come up with something more fleshed out and better yourself in fics. That sums up my thoughts on the game in general.
I think the lack of control and agency as the player character is why I tend to enjoy things like the light novel for official media and fanfic "retellings" more than the actual game itself. Those have actual main characters with a personality, agency, motivation and push the plot along like how a main character should.
^^^This right here.^^^
I love this animatic and find is fairly appropriate for this topic.
I have a draft in here somewhere talking about this exact subject, and maybe it'll get published one of these days but for now just know that the gist of it is exactly what you've said here: Yuu does nothing. Yuu can't make decisions. Yuu doesn't actually need to be there.
"Yuu" is (are) set up as a character that is supposed to be making waves at NRC by just being a normal decent person dragged into magic shenanigans. But after a certain point, you're right, the story doesn't bother to even give the MC anything to do. At best the MC is a victim of other people's plots, and the lack of agency makes it come across as less of a player insert than Yuu just being a camera that gives us a glimpse into the world of Twisted Wonderland instead of actually being there. You can see it reflected in the way events turn out too. There's about a one in three chance that you're going to get Yuu doing something relevant, but I swear the attempts are getting less and less common.
And, yes, it's one of the things that makes every other version of Twisted Wonderland so much more compelling than the main game (even the fan-made ones). A main character that actually has agency and makes the decisions that lead towards the ends of the story is way more interesting to follow than a supposed self-insert that goes anywhere the wind takes them.
Thank you for your take.
I also apologize in advance, because now you've inspired me to finish that essay and I know it's going to repeat a lot of these talking points, so similarities are inevitable. I will link back to this ask when it is posted!
Sneak peak at the next chapter of https://archiveofourown.org/works/54023692/chapters/136761961 ! I'm going to try to add art to the majority of future chapters :3
You were in a battlefield with your new hos- friend? G0n3r. Your fighting Kris?
You died. You died and now falling.
Falling more than you used to. You just had to reset and thing will go back to normal. Everything will be normal.
As it should.
R E S E T
Darkness all around your. You eyelid close as you breathe in. Wait, why does it feel more…There?
Your eye shot up, You look around the warm reddish leaf with a tint of purple, covering most of the sky contrasting orange ground.
Ground, you felt the ground. The air, it so cold. But it felt great, you were here, here, more than just a soul.
Your ‘heart’ quicken out of anticipation, you flap around your hand. Feeling the flimsy finger hitting each other, it hurt but you did it, there weren’t limit of this body. YOUR BODY
You can’t tell what you look like. But the first thing to do is to walk, right?
