"Hello! My name is Fuzz! Fuzz the Cat! Mascot for the June Archives!"
— Fuzz in Archive Announcement 1!
The June Archive and Restoration Project (or simply The June Archives) is a Digital Horror Alternate Reality Game web series created by Cerealbowlby that saw its first upload on April 12th, 2022.
It is hosted on Twitter, YouTube, and Sudomemo, and is a project dedicated to archiving animations that were created using the now defunct Flipnote Hatena (an online service where people who created Flipnotes can share them to others) on the Nintendo DSi.
But looking deeper into the project, it's revealed that the June Archives isn't what it seems at first glance. All of the Flipnotes have been corrupted, and this tells a bigger story involving the once-thriving Hatena City, home of the Flipnotes. Now barren and lifeless, the city is bathed in red light, encircled by a sentient void entity, and a giant cat clock looming above.
All the while, Fuzz the Cat, the mascot of the project, works with his staff to archive as many Flipnotes as possible, but he in actuality is a sinister figure with an ulterior motive, looking for something.
All in all, the series dictates Hatena's shutdown from the perspective of the Flipnotes and includes themes of the remembrance of things long gone (existentialism), the strong desire to live in the past (nostalgia), and trying to recapture those good times long past, no matter the cost.
The currently available videos can be watched on Twitter
, YouTube, and Cerealbowl's Sudomemo account.
The page is going through a clean-up.
This web video series contains the following tropes:
- Apocalypse How: The story of the videos details how the Flipnote Hatena universe is getting torn apart for seeming reasons of archival purposes, mainly by numerous unknown forces. And one of the videos claims that absolutely nothing can be done about it, especially with only half-an-hour to spare.
- Apocalyptic Log: The whole series is centered around the downfall of the Flipnote Hatena universe at the hands of the ominous cat clock, as well as the twisted desires of the Big Bad.
- April Fools' Day: The video released on this day in 2023 was simply a Flipnote to the tune of the "Chicken Wing" song, making it a first where there's nothing creepy going on. However, the three consecutive uploads after that subvert this drastically with the corruption affecting the Flipnote in some way.
- Bloodless Carnage: For the most part. Most of what happens involves flipnotes disappearing from existence. The only life claimed with a corpse to show is that of Kirby, who meets his fate at the hands of "Starface" with a star-shaped hole where his face was.
- Butterfly of Doom: In the second announcement video, it's revealed that Fuzz had planned to alter some things in the past to seemingly keep Flipnote Hatena alive, which is clearly going to cause issues in the present day. What's worse is that Fuzz is fully aware of this and doesn't care.
- Clap Your Hands If You Believe: According to this unlisted video, the more a memory virus spreads into the minds of others, the realer it becomes. Fuzz is implied to be such a virus who plans to make himself more real via the Flipnotes.
- Establishing Series Moment: The first video uploaded is the animation featuring the Flipnote Frog singing "Goodbye So Soon" from The Great Mouse Detective before being interrupted by Flipnote Hatena's end of service. This video, however, is a darker take on the idea, with the animation glitching out whenever the word "Time" is mentioned. Eventually, the animation crashes and it cuts to a realistic rendering of a dead frog (well, as realistic as possible within the program's graphic limitations). This sets up the horror tone and series formula of classic Flipnotes being corrupted into something darker, all of it revolving around the apocalypse in Hatena City and the shutdown of the service.
- Extremely Short Timespan: All the events happening in-universe take place in the last hour of May 31st, 2013, the day before Flipnote Hatena's services ended. The difference is that all of these are in different locations for the times.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: There's a few of these present to watch out for between the animations, such as messages only present for a moment, or clues to build links to other videos related to the in-universe plotline.
- Gone Horribly Right: One of the flipnote characters somehow managed to leap 10 feet in the air, making a bet with his friend that he can do it again. However, when he reaches that height the second time around, he starts floating in midair as the cat clock whirs into motion, his friend watching helplessly as he's warped away.
- Insomnia Episode: A multi-part set of animations revolve around a member of the June Archives suffering from sleeplessness and trying to work on stuff in the night. Needless to say, Fuzz soon gets in on it and tries to take advantage of this to claim one of the vials.
- Madness Mantra: OUR GOALS ARE THE SAME. OUR GOALS ARE THE SAME. OUR GOALS ARE THE SAME.
- McGuffin: The mysterious red phials that appear occasionally through the series. Fuzz seems to have great interest in obtaining them and they contain some great power and The Shadow fiercely warns to never break them.
- Moment Killer: In the second archive announcement video, Fuzz offers out a moment of silence for any flipnotes that couldn't be archived successfully. However, this moment is quickly ruined by Fuzz's phone ringing, prompting him to have to answer it.
- Mood Whiplash:
- The setup for most videos. They initially appear to be classic and popular Flipnote animations, primarily of a comedic nature, until something creepy happens that did not in the original. Then the black-and-white animation turns red and the characters are thrown into the overarching plot line about the destruction of Hatena City by an endless void and a strange cat clock machine. There are a handful of videos that are horror from the start, and an April Fools' Day one that really is just a harmless Flipnote animation.
- The two Archive Announcement videos open with Fuzz the cat, the channel mascot, being cute and friendly and thanking his supporters. Then in the second half, the background turns pitch black and Fuzz starts acting creepy and sinister.
- Nothing Is Scarier: The last step in the unlisted video for dealing with mind viruses simply states: "Pray that it's not already out of hand."
- Stylistic Suck: This is understandable, due to the simplistic art style of the flipnotes for their time. As the videos go on, however, there is increased detail in multiple scenes, such as backdrops and character closeups.
- Triumphant Reprise: As the hero steps up to prepare to fight the cat clock in the tenth video, a woodwind-esque version of Basshunter's "I Can Walk On Water" is heard, which serves as said hero's theme from his own flipnote animation. It's only fitting, since this very hero may be the flipnotes' final hope in the darkness they're being consumed by.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: This plotline is discussed during the "Chicken Wing" portion of the ARG. The titular character in question remarks about their fear of death, and how they wish they could live forever. And while it goes so far with repeated reuploads and recreations of the flipnote, it soon catches the flipnote's creator's attention, who promptly calls out the repeated stealing and reposting.
