🎮 The RPG Realm

When I was in middle school, I had a major obsession with Japanese RPG horror games. Some of the classics I remember most clearly are Ib, Mad Father, and Dreaming Mary.

As a native New Yorker, I frequented art museums for school projects and in my own time, with my favorite being the Whitney. I would stand in front of a painting and imagine it were a doorway to an alternate realm. I stood at an angle such that no one else was in my frame of vision, so that everybody around me disappeared. What would happen if I could walk into it?

There were quite a number of jumpscares from Ib. In one of them, a painting of a woman chases you down with her arms crawling on the floor. That being said, what I remember most from the game is not the fear-inducing atmosphere, but rather the connection between Ib and Garry, and how Garry’s kindness helped Ib return to the world she came from. Garry moved the heavy statues that blocked her way. He’d give her candy to calm her down. He would risk his life to save her.

In one of the endings, Ib forgets Garry because of a girl named Mary who eats the candy that Garry gave to Ib. Mary is actually a painting but wants to live her life as a human in the real world. In order for her to do that, she needs to sacrifice the life of a person. I’ll leave it to you to guess who that individual was.

ib-reunited-ending

Unfortunately, there isn't an ending where Mary, Garry, and Ib can all be saved. But like any other RPG series, you can experience multiple endings depending on the decisions you make in the game. If you think about it carefully, the RPG realm is pretty much a simulator of life with an undo button.

Over time, I’ve come to realize the flaws in working towards something with the expectation that you’ll get the same amount of effort you put in return. Not everyone is going to reciprocate the good that you contribute to society, and many people won’t even bother to give it a second thought. On the other hand, we hardly think of ourselves as the villains in the eyes of another.

We all pretend to be the heroes on the good side
But what if we’re the villains on the other? —Stella Jang - Villain

I’m sounding overly critical here, but there’s a difference between being a pessimist and a realist. Heroes and villains, virtues and vices, good and bad… we’re so used to thinking, seeing, and breathing in black and white, when in reality there are so many grays in-between. I think Ib encourages us to seek the colors underlying those hints of gray.

In the end, we’re all just trying to live our best lives. Isn’t that right?

mary-corse-art

The one I chased and grasped was the cruel binary system.
I want to be fascinated by the place where dreams continue—the world.
I was drowning, deeper than the sea.

—sasakure.UK - Little Cry of the Abyss (feat. Toki Asako)


🎵 Songs I listened to while writing this:

Porter Robinson - Something Comforting
JVNA LIVE - Dimensions