I've said it before but thank you so much for this, OP. Since I became physically disabled I can't hike to anywhere a wheelchair cannot roll and I miss this. Thank you for letting me see it again.
Why I think Shiguang can be canonically read as romantic
(I will only be using the donghua for reference, so no Studio Lan retweeting those fanarts (lmao) nor those especially gay manhwa panels (lmao x2) nor even the songs ("chase you to the end of the world, just to say your name once more" my beloved).
It's important to start off by saying that I'm aware Director Li said they ended up not making Lu Guang a girl because they didn't want romance to be seen as a must in Shiguang's relationship by the audience (and because he feels that "bros can have a good heart-to-heart connection with each other"). In my opinion that was a great move since it allows more freedom with how they write them than they'd have otherwise. I also think viewing Shiguang as queerplatonic is a great read too and it doesn't diminish their love for each other nor the importance of their relationship at all.
With that said, despite Director Li's words, there's been things that had me going 🤨 as someone who likes to adhere to canon relationships and read into the writer's intentions, so I wanted to share why I personally see them as romantic.
EPISODE 2
We've all seen this coming, right? Most obvious parallel ever, and in the second episode no less. We all know the similarities between both relationships, so I will just touch on those I consider the most important ones.
Lin Zhen and Yu Xia have gone to college together, and since then decided to start a business of their own - named after a mix of their names. They've been shown as being really close and having no romantic relationships. Lin Zhen also says that Yu Xia's happiness is her own, and then it's shown to us that she's gone through years of unhappiness just for Yu Xia. I believe you can replace their names with Lu Guang's and Cheng Xiaoshi's in your head without me writing all this again. And I'm not even going to get into the most obvious parallels like the special noodle recipe for each pair.
I think it's safe to say that Lin Zhen and Yu Xia are implied to be romantic. From that "one noodle" scene, to the close shot of Lin Zhen grabbing her hand, etc.
Now, I want to get into a writer's point of view and pose two questions:
1. What's the purpose of this episode, when even those which seem episodic connect to the overarching plot of season 1 (even the missing kid's case, as it leads to the involvement with the police)?
2. If we answer the previous question with the conclusion that it's meant to show us the nature/development of Cheng Xiaoshi's and Lu Guang's relationship, what does that say about it?
"Partner" in Link Click
Continuing with episode 2, what really got me thinking about the romantic intentions in their writing was the constant mention of marriage and anything in relation to it.
(may I remind everyone that the driver's comment was said when Cheng Xiaoshi was complaining about Lu Guang lmao)
They're telling us through "show don't tell" (for example, when Lin Zhen kept on eating the noodle despite knowing they'd kiss) and, also, connotations. They are presented to us as business partners, but then the entire episode goes on to tell us that there's more to them by tying their relationship to things percived as romantic. So what they want to really tell us is that beyond simple business partners, they're life-long partners.
And then, after establishing this kind of connotation to the word partner, Cheng Xiaoshi says this to Lu Guang in the next episode:
This doesn't stop at them. While it's the most obvious example, I think partnership in Link Click is intended to be seen as romantic, or at the very least dancing somewhere close to it. Let's go even further and take a look at our fully canon, heterosexual relationships and see briefly how their story is written:
1. Dong Yi and Xu Shanshan: both of them chose the comfort of each other's presence over moving on with their respective futures. Dong Yi had so much faith in their relationship and their love that he couldn't choose a life/future that didn't have Xu Shanshan - choosing to not go back to his family home nor go to that interview, and instead waiting for Xu Shanshan to define their relationship.
2. Liu Siwen and Ouyang: Siwen spent his entire life training with the purpose of getting his father-in-law's respect and marry Ouyang, going every year over and over to fight him. His perseverance and his undying love for her allowed Siwen to do the (seemingly) impossible.
3. Chen Bin and his wife: they're a tragedy. His wife understood Chen Bin the best, enduring feeling lonely because she loved him and wanted a future with him. But their relationship was cut short, so they promised each other to be together in a future life to make up for the time they wouldn't be in this one.
With this + the pictures I attached, it seems like Link Click has set this theme of "love is a life with you" for its romantic relationships, a partner that will fight to stay because they can't see a future that doesn't have their beloved. Going back to episode two, this applies even to the noodle ladies. When Yu Xia remembered what actually matters to her, she went back home - to the start, to her hometown. And, most importantly, to Lin Zhen.
So why is Shiguang romantic? Why aren't they queerplatonic, or just best friends, or bros or whatever else? Because besides what I said at the start of the previous paragraph, Shiguang's relationship mirrors a lot of the romantic ones. Each story and author writes romance and other kinds of relationships differently, portraying them in the way they perceive "this is what this kind of love is like". And beyond life-long partners, I think that the key elements of romantic relationships in Link Click are the ones I highlighted in bold above in the 3 canon relationships part - which Shiguang shares, too.
(I didn't mention this before with the het couples, but I find it a little amusing that season 2 happened because a man wanted to go to the past and get his wife back (still fuck you Qian Jin) and then we find out Lu Guang did go back to the past and got his boyfriend partner back lmao).
"Friend" vs "Partner"
So where is the boundary between platonic and romantic? What marks the difference between a (best) friend and a partner?
There is, for example, Liu Xiao and Li Tianchen's relationship. They aren't shown to have any kind of romantic undertones and there's even the very real possibility of manipulation on Liu Xiao's side. They're also never labeled as nor call each other partners, but instead Li Tianchen says he "met a new friend" and Liu Xiao says he's "going to meet an old friend" years later. So we could say for now that they have a somewhat close relationship (we see Li Tianchen go against Qian Jin to give the phone to Liu Xiao), but never cross that "friend" label.
We can even bring Qiao Ling and the boys' relationship. She's never labeled as a partner despite taking part in the side job and, more importantly, being super close to both of them. She is very important and a cherished friend to Shiguang, so why not call her partner too? I think it's intentional. Since she's been given a familial role already (calling Cheng Xiaoshi her brother when talking to Li Tianxi), she can't fill a partner role. I wonder why? because it's supposed to be a synonym for a romantic relationship. who said that.
So even best friends (Qiao Ling, arguably what Liu Xiao is to Li Tianchen) don't enter this close space that is being a partner. It's different, it's beyond platonic. Or at least that's what they've been showing us for the past two seasons.
I could go soo much more into this honestly, because I do think the little hints thrown here (the music videos) and there (tiny seemingly inconsequential details) are worth to be looked at too, but I wanted to get into the core reason that makes me go "woah so they're In Love fr". I hope I expressed myself well ^^
tldr; the series shows us a divide between having a (best) friend and a partner, giving "partners" romantic connotations.
Please return us to a world where Notp and squick are used for a ship you don’t like instead of just making up a load of bullshit about how immoral it is or w/e lol
a short selection of concepts and phrases that used to be commonplace in fandom and we’d really benefit from making that a thing again:
NOTP: the opposite of an OTP (One True Pairing). It is a ship a fan strongly dislikes. The word is a portmanteau of ‘no’ and ‘OTP’ and thus is not a contraction of any particular phrase.
Squick: anything that is a deep-seated, visceral turn-off. Squicks may be shared by many fans or be specific to one; one person’s kink may be another person’s squick.
YKINMKATO, or kink-tomato: Your Kink Is Not My Kink, And That’s Okay: used to indicate support for fannish diversity and to distinguish between disapproval or kink shaming and simply having different taste.
DLDR: Don’t Like, Don’t Read: a phrase used to warn against complaints about an aspect of fic or meta. A “live and let live” philosophy of fandom, which places the responsability for avoiding content one doesn’t want to see on the side of the fanwork consumer, rather that on the creator’s.
SALS: Ship And Let Ship: similar to the above specifically about shipping tastes.
YMMV: Your Mileage May Vary: a phrase used to acknowledge that any given individual’s personal opinion on the topic at hand may differ due to their own tastes, standards, values, experiences, etc.
As the OP points out, all of these crucially imply no moral judgment of what they’re designing.
(definitions lifted more or less wholesale from fanlore’s relevant pages)
The Expanded Edition finally out! You can play it on Itchio and Steam.
New art, new sounds, new edit, new text, we touched up basically everything in the original game. As it is now, the game is as close to our vision as we're physically capable of manifesting.
Here is a wallpaper with a taste of a few things we worked on:
The demo of the game is updated as well. We hope everything works. It should work, but if you have any issues, do let us know.
We also put together a new art collection and the game soundtrack, in case you wish to gaze at Ilar’s face in high resolution while listening to our mournful melodies. ^^
We sincerely hope you will enjoy what we did with the game. After working on this for so long, we are more than ready to have people experience the story again. Do let us know what you think. ^^
Lots of love,
Nim and Ze
Interactive story about two magi trying to survive a failed ritual. Learn from their deaths and untangle the mystery before you. Guide their
Our Life: Now & Forever is a nostalgic Visual Novel where you create your own character and grow from childhood to adulthood with your two closest neighbors. It’s currently in development by GB Patch Games.
this whole arc is set in past before s1 and 2 right, so we know whatever happens we know itll be ok. so what are they showing us here
there was an interview where director mentioned he wanted to make ltc a reaccuring villain they cant fully defeat but that role seems to have fallen to liu xiao. so then how exactly is this show being planned anyway??? like it feels they should know what happened, like the plot, is it just a tweak or what are they making it up as they go? please no,
um, i feel like focus is more on mystery then drama, at least if its prequel, bcs there cant be tension if we know how it ends. so its not a prequel and they killed cxs off screen after s2 or it is and we know itll be fine. so we are only learning about stuff here?
then for s3, if its the last one. we see the 'final battle' that seems to be mentioned a lot, and finally get to see if we get a good or bad end. if its not, what can happen then. we saw liu xiao and ltc walking off together at the end of s2. ltc seems to have abandoned the idea of saving his sister and only wants to make other suffer(based on songs) and what is liu xiao's problem exactly??? well he seems to have a god complex at least, if he does actually have god level ability, well then our boy are fucked since he doesnt seem good. i mean. no srs what is his deal. no idea about xia fei either. vein at least. is evil. that much im sure of.
idk i dont want to think anymore i just want to know already
Do you know what we said to ourselves when we started the kickstarter? We were building some gameplay systems for The Hunger, and it was hard work. We said: "Boy, this thing is gonna take years, and it's already burning us out. We should do a ‘small thing, quick-like’, as a break. What if we made a definitive/director's cut of The Remainder? Shouldn't take us long, right? Four months should do it? Six tops?"
Fast forward to fourteen months later, we're finally going to launch it. I recently learned about a rule of production planning: Take what you think a project will need, and multiply it by pi, and you'll get the actual time you'll spend.
The math checks out.
Let's see just exactly how much we expanded the game, shall we?
It started at around 145,000 words, now it is 171,000. You can do the math there. Some of this is new deaths, some are new ending variations, and some just generally fleshing out things that were too thin or adding more flavour and interest in what we found to be bland. Now it should be a feast through and through.
On top of that, we pretty much re-wrote the entire thing over via several editing passes.
We added five new artworks, revised around twenty, a few of which significantly, composed four more ambient tracks, and added 467 unique sound effects.
Also, the new price will be 27.99 usd. This will not affect those who already own the game. Currenty the game is on sale on Itch so it’s a great time to grab it before the price increases. ^^
Once the new release is out on steam and itch.io, we will start producing the physical art, the prints, linocuts, CDs, and original artworks.
It will likely be another few months before all those are done and shipped out.
After that we're onto the next story in Taldun: The Longing.
[I.D.: An illustration of the main trio from Link Click, with Lu Guang in the middle. They’re all in casual clothing and accessories. Qiao Ling and Cheng Xiaoshi are close to Lu Guang; Qiao Ling is poking at his cheek and Cheng Xiaoshi is leaning against Lu Guang’s head. Qiao Ling and Cheng Xiaoshi are grinning widely while Lu Guang has a blank, almost bored expression but the blush on his face betrays him. Lu Guang has stickers on his face, pins on his shirt, and a red name tag that says, “Hi, I am [the birthday boy!!!]”. He’s holding a drink in his hand.
The background is blue with various colorful shapes over it. Around the piece is a white border that makes it look like a Polaroid photo. Over Lu Guang’s face are scribbles of cat ears and whiskers. At the lower-right corner is Lu Guang’s birth date, and at the opposite side reads, “happy 2_ !!,” with the number partially smudged out.]
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