I absolutely LOVE the game "My Friendly Neighborhood" so much, and I know, those who have seen my posts know this.
It's not just a resident evil inspired game (though that is the main gameplay inspiration), and the game isn't just about the puppet characters you're shooting down/helping on occasion.
The game literally starts with a woman on a talk show discussing how she "felt something, that felt more real than reality". Like that is a heavy quote/thought to start with. Then we hear about a car accident and that a storm is rolling in, and it just all tells us in a quick few minutes that this world (or the city at least) isn't a happy joyous place. The entire game starts with this odd heaviness that feels like it shouldn't be there, after all this is some "horror" game about fighting PUPPETS, but still that odd heaviness persists. As you load into the game and hear your player character Gordon and see the paper telling you what he's here for, you see more unfortunate info. You see he's on the verge of getting fired..
It's like a weird juxtaposition, like you came here to fight the muppets, not get depressed... And then you go in and meet Ricky and just like that the game goes into sesame street.
So uhhh... I started this post when watching another playthrough of the game in early August.... I uuummm... couldn't finish it cause the person playing didn't get Pearl's glasses and therefore would get the less than perfect ending and I really didn't want to watch it.
So I finished everything past this today/when posting. Not as detailed as it could've been if I'd been watching gameplay, but hopefully it still works... It ended up being a lot longer than I'd initially thought, so sorry for the long read.
So, a lot of people knew of the game through the demo that had released like, what? 3 years ago now? We didn't know the story or anything really, just that Gordon was fighting these muppet rejects (affectionate). We don't know much except that the puppets have been alone for a good while and are just a liiiittle too happy to see a human again.
By the demo's end we the audience assume more than we know. With the puppets' lines we assume a lot from the puppets attacking people, to them being left due to not being liked (having weaponry literally used on them as "props" for the show). We're all under this assumption that the puppets did something to cause them being alone... And then the full game releases.
As I said above it starts with some talk show about a woman discussing her depression and it switches to other channels, a guy eating a giant sub, some reality tv show about a guy talking about his ex, and a news story about an accident that had happened and hearing about it raining later in the night. It's a massive juxtaposition compared to what people were expecting, and just as the audience/player is reeling from all this info we're hit with the gameplay, with Gordon and his work file.
Just as you're given a moment to breathe, you read his file and see he's considered a "problem" employee who has to do well in this current task or he'll be fired. The entire game discusses how unhappy people are and how the world just isn't a happy place. But then as you're questioning what type of game you started up, you go inside the hotel and see the front desk has a chalkboard sign that says "ring me", and Gordon does. From there we meet Ricky the Sock and hear his little speech about the neighborhood being back on air.
From here the puppets are trying to be friendly (though a bit rough with it) and Gordon is trying to do his job. They're at odds with each other....kind of. We learn more about the story of the world here, about the war that caused things to go all gloomy, about how the studio was closed... All the while the puppets are still trying to make friends with Gordon and he's helping them as he can though begrudgingly (Pearl's glasses, the film convo with Goblette, helping Ray with the draining system, giving the dogs food, and playing the Piano with Arnold).
As we learn more about the characters and world we see that it's a pretty fractured place. We also find out that the puppets saw some of it. We don't know what they saw, but given how some of them became "unfriendly" we can only assume it was terrible. And I don't just mean that as a gloss over, I mean it was clearly awful given some of the unfriendly ones literally removed their eyes. So yeah, all of the puppets were abandoned by the humans and left to their own devices, got traumatised by seeing what was on tv instead of their own show, and tried putting it back on the air when they figured out how.
These puppets were left, abandoned, for so long by humans. They were left alone and eventually saw what people were doing and watching instead of interacting with them. They saw the worst of the worst but still chose (for those that didn't break) to try to help people by showing something nice on the tv. They wanted, truly wanted, to help people in the one way they knew they could. But just as they'd managed to find a way in, not a great way, but a way, Gordon comes in to turn the antenna off and end their efforts. We also see as the game plays out how Gordon doesn't really want to do it either, but his hands are tied.
His resolve is slowly but surely broken down as the game progresses, but because it's his job, his livelihood, he has to. He helps the puppets out where he can, both due to puzzles and cause it's only right to help them since he's already doing so much negative stuff to them (after all you can play without helping any of the ones I listed earlier). And by the end of the game he's helped them a lot, and suddenly Ricky hits him with one more question.
To help them get the show on the air correctly. And... he does. Gordon does what he can to get them on public access and eventually they get multiple companies offering to sign them up for a season or so. His ending monologue is literally about seeing the light in the dark again, coming out of a long depression and getting back into a nice swing of things.
The entire game is about how yes, the world is a dark place with a lot of things that go wrong, but you can't always focus on the bad. It's also about how even though the world isn't perfect/all sunshine and rainbows, that doesn't mean you should be another cog in the wheel and make it worse. Be the change you want to see, be the light in the dark. Be a friendly neighbor.
So are Liam's other pieces of work also in this Multiversal Fusion war too?
Yep! Here's a "few" examples:
Max and Icon (and Kirie) are being spied and hunted down by The Gray Horde and Syndicate of Steel.
Cordie would have a many times great granddaughter known as Cordie the 15th/Cordie Jr and she'd appear in Multiversal Fusion: Nexus Point.
Kali Aimes is currently roaming around the world doing her own thing and slowly becoming a cryptid (John is trying to find her) with the heroes bumping into more than once.
Monokuma, by the time of Multiversal Fusion: Nexus Point, has recently started a new partnership with a gameshow called "Puppet Games" and has made friends with Ponder.
I know it’s never gonna happen for a multitude of reasons, but could you imagine a SSTWL Ponder reference in TADC? I mean, he fits the vibe well enough. Like, imagine if Jax just pulled out a white rabbit puppet with teeth. Would be so fucking hype.
