Doki Doki Literature Club

I can already imagine it now:

"Wow (Your Name Here), your poem really sucked. How about you give it another shot? You'll continue where you last saved. It must have all been a bad dream—-wait, you didn't save?! Sucks to be you!"

Also, but Flowey and Monika motivation are kinda tie to the same thing: knowing about the metaphysis of the game cause them to crash and becoming something else.

Granted, Flowey didnt know he was in a game but it is pretty similar to Monika, which it would make Sayori the sans of the game.....

Now that is funny.

Actually, re:Flowey, Flowey kind of did know, or see is seems to hint to it. In the cutscene before the final Pacifist Route battle he says that he wants to keep you around because if you complete the game you won't have any reason to keep playing, and after beating the Pacifist Route, he'll ask you not to restart a new game and let the characters have their happy ending.

Resetting is an in universe ability of beings with enough Determination. And the game Asriel talks about is a game played with Frisk (who he perceives to be Chara) and not Undertale itself.

There's a meta-ness to the whole thing that makes a bit hard to tell.

edited 11th Apr '18 9:20:48 PM by sgamer82

For what it's worth, once you've gotten the True Pacifist Ending and open the game again, Flowey will beg you to not reset everything and let everyone live since they're perfectly happy the way things are.

Hey, I've been pretty into Doki Doki Literature Club since I played it last year. It's the first time I've enjoyed horror in a while, because it's a genuinely impactful and emotional game with some seriously twisted horror and upsetting undertones to it. I've had Your Reality on loop for a couple months, and I've just now dipped into fanfiction.

I wanted to ask you guys - do you think an "All-Purpose DDLC Fanfiction" thread would be worth creating? Just a place to share stories you write, or share stories you really liked reading. I've found two stories that I've liked, and this one I'm going through now is super twisted.

I'll admit the PC/MC keeps doing things and saying things that I find kinda dumb or otherwise generate a strong sense of ludo-narrative dissonance for me. Because I can't really immerse myself as strongly as they'd prefer, I'm taking a one-time joke about being the PC's subconscious, their repressed sarcasm and snarkiness (why would you even suppress that?) that they tend to ignore, and running with it. Don't have the vids for my playthrough updated, but I will sooner than later.

Repressing snark is the healthiest way to live...

Point randomness...

The artist of that MC-Monika AU did a few more pictures of said AU. http://vnixxir.tumblr.com/post/172784052938/tie-fullcolors-on-patreon-much-love-to-my

http://vnixxir.tumblr.com/post/172136574508/bump-fullcolors-on-patreon-much-love-to-my

Not sure if this is part of that AU, but this artist does seem to like Natsumoni quite a lot. http://vnixxir.tumblr.com/post/172458718308/this-aint-some-corny-yuri-manga-monika-god

edited 14th Apr '18 8:38:37 PM by marston

Anyone else for whatever reason come up with random headcanon about the PC (even though half of my speculations have been proven false by the narrative)? For example before learning he lived in a typical small, two-story house I pictured them living in what I like to call a "tinybox" apartment with a single bedroom, a kitchen/living room combo and a single bathroom. Kinda makes more sense for someone in their demographic to live in their actual house I guess, but that didn't stop me from doing ridiculous speculation about why their parents are never around: Dad was so attached to his Salaryman job that he literally lives in his office, and Mom just left one day and never came back for reasons nobody knows nor cares about for some reason.

Happy Painting with Sayori. This video came up in my recommendations and I think it was nice. I'm not sure what's the intention behind it, so I'm unsure how to judge it. I'm also unsure if it's improv or scripted. So, while I think that, say, the characters are slightly off, if that's not what they're aiming for it'd be pointless to complain, I think. It seems that this channel has other DDLC videos, thus internal continuity could explain that sort of thing (whether I like or dislike it).

I've also been watching Kizuna AI's playthrough of DDLC. The first two videos were amazing, but by the third my disinterest/dislike of Kizuna AI caught up. She was also dissing everyone left and right >///> pls no bully

I'll try to keep watching until at least the end of Act I, but at this rate she'll get there by episode 12 or something :/

@Paradoxial Stratagem: (583) I agree, but I won't actually go in detail because I don't want to spoil you. Though said "details" would be mostly my own interpretation/headcanon on the subject.

I'm interested in watching your playthrough, I just need to find the time to do it :<

@Mr Mallard: Hey, same here. I'm not usually into horror, but DDLC is great. There was an You Tuber who made different songs, inspired by the one you mentioned, except mixed with each other cast member's theme (as in, one for each). I especially like Natsuki and Sayori's versions. Have you heard them?

I'm not too much into fanfiction, so I'm unsure if we ought to have a thread dedicated to DDLC fanfiction. However, a few weeks ago I began writing a piece of DDLC fanfic that really hasn't gotten past the first page because I've been busy with college. That would make it the third fanfic (of anything) I ever wrote, the second one having been started the week prior to the third (and, similarly, hasn't gotten past the first page). Maybe fourth if I consider a few DDLC-inspired poems I wrote.

After releasing Episode 5 of my playthrough, I have to wonder if certain characters leaning on the fourth wall almost hard enough to have the camera fall over was intentional, or accidental from the writer(s).

and having recorded further than this, I just can't help but think: The Festival Will Never Come. Which is a shame, because if I could have been involved in such an event, I would have probably used that opportunity to go full Tyler Durden.

Your insights are pretty fun. That's all I have to say about that as of right now.

Suspiciously specific dialogue for the type of game is what comes from the characters...

Just come up with a more creative title than "all-purpose thread." I swear that's an overused, generic title.

I can't promise I'd participate (in fact, most of the Fanfiction threads I used to follow seem to be inactive), but it'll gain traction. I asked once about why certain games/anime/shows get massive fanfiction activity and others don't. Stuff like Naruto will because you can project all over it, while stuff like Breaking Bad won't because the characters Walter White and Jesse Pinkman determine a great deal of what happens in the plot, and it's hard to change them.

Something like DDLC, luckily, doesn't require the characters to be totally in-character - they're just detailed enough to be interesting and vague enough to be malleable.

Plus there's a thematic bonus of having a "literature thread" for a game about "a literature club."

That being said, DDLC is kind of a lightning in a bottle success I think, and it's not super well-known.

What I'm saying is, take your chances. Worse that happens is you don't get a lot of traffic, but in that case you get to post whatever stories you want and control which ones are shown.

edited 16th Apr '18 1:23:38 PM by Soble

@Vid Response: Glad some of you guys are liking it so far. I'll admit I've had moments where I've thought to myself, "Why the hell am I even doing this? I should be playing -insert stereotypically Dudebro/hypermasculine game I'd normally enjoy here-", but again the main reasons I've decided to have a DDLC Playthrough are because 1. It's free, 2. I wanted to get out of my genre comfort zone as a personal social experiment and 3. Kinda refreshing every now and again to step outside what I'm used to. When you play too many games that feel the same, they might as well be the same.

@All-Purpose Fanfic Idea: If that's something you want to do, then I'm all for it. I personally don't tend to write fanfics and usually prefer writing in my own universes. Oddly enough this game has a bit more fanfic fuel than I expected it to, and I can see why people like to write their own epilogues and whatnot (note: Have not finished the game yet). For example I can imagine the PC just running without the intention of stopping after a certain point, only for the world to destabilize and glitch out around them until the ground from under them phases out and they fall into a black abyss...only to wake up at the start of Day 1 as if it were all a dream.

I've been hitting the fanfic scene pretty heavily lately, which is why the idea came to me. I've found two stories so far that have really got me, with a story I came across out of boredom developing more of its own flair and OCs and stuff in a way I wasn't expecting to like so much.

I'd love to share them, but they're pretty spoilery. Hence a thread in the Fan Fiction forums with a healthy disclaimer.

For those still interested, I've managed to get Episode 6 of my playthrough up and running, although I've got Episode 7 uploaded as well due to a perfect recording opportunity last week. It's because of said opportunity that I'll have Episode 8 uploaded sometime tomorrow, and will be working on Episode 9. I'll admit due to the nature of the game's narrative, I've noticed that my tone is gradually starting to change as well. Specifically I'm not just fixating on being a snarky, critical type, but I'm starting to get rather speculative (can't help it, I'm the type that shows interest with speculation) I may also be making the MC sound like their mental state is slowly deteriorating, with hints that their physical condition is worsening to further reflect this.

I also do apologize if I haven't already for a rather inconsistent characterization with MC. I was originally intending to project myself onto him, but over time I've found his writing and actions to be so frustratingly idiotic, that I cannot function as anything but his subconscious (and I will be running wild with this idea, further damaging that already almost non-existent 4th wall because it's what I do). I really do suspect this was intentional on the writer's part.

edited 19th Apr '18 9:42:44 PM by ParadoxialStratagem

I started playing this game tonight. I could guess from the way people were talking about it that it was going to be one of those games, so I thought I would be ready...but I wasn't.

I don't remember the last time I played a game that made this profoundly uncomfortable. I'm normally pretty desensitized to dark stuff like this which is why I wasn't expecting it to land this hard.If you erase your save data to start fresh you can even see a lot of foreshadowing as to what the game is really about. I didn't think anything of Monika's "load me" in that one poem she wrote, but after playing the game the second time it sent a chill down my spine. And on the...erm, is new game plus the right term? On the word select screen I swear I saw chibi Yuri make this absolutely terrifying face once...this on top of all the extremely creepy interface screw stuff that was going on. dude, fuck this game lol. I'm guessing Monika is just going to drive everyone to suicide until she's the only one left? Don't answer that please, since this game obviously has a unique hook I want to try and figure it out myself before I ask for help to see if I'm doing anything wrong. I tried to reload to save Sayori but she committed suicide again so my intuition tells me that no matter what the game says, I can't actually save her. Plus that "special poem"...this game is evil.

edited 19th Apr '18 11:03:42 PM by Draghinazzo

The "new game" is commonly called "Act 2" by fans.

Basically finished the game.

Pretty good experience overall. I'm glad that I mostly stayed away from the hype and only had a vague idea of what this game entailed since I was really able to enjoy it on its own merits. Surprisingly good writing and a really great use of videogames as a storytelling medium.

I'll be on the lookout for what Salvato does next.

I'm thinking I'm just going to upload the playlist of my playthrough once I'm actually done with the game, posting my thoughts every so often. I'll admit I've gotten to the point where I'm starting to make the MC sound gradually more unhinged, which I find amusing for all the wrong reasons. I also keep having plenty of moments that I thought were good ideas, only to regret trying them (along with ideas I either thought were shit or uninteresting somehow turn out for the better). In the end it doesn't bother me too much tough considering one of the main reasons I've even made this playthrough in the first place was to experiment (and hopefully improve upon) with editing, and I begrudgingly admit I'm gonna need a better toolkit because skits, no matter how brief, are the kind of thing that require both good writing and good effects to avoid Special Effects Failure. While I'm not the kind of person who likes to intentionally upload bad stuff (if I don't like it, why would I think others would?), I've had more than a couple moments at this point where I really felt like I could have done things better.

So, uh... I made that fanfic thread. Feel free to post stories there, I would have thrown some recommendations in there but the spoileriffic aspect of the thread needed to be emphasised.

Mind you, I probably went way overboard. Let me know if anything needs to be toned down, I'm incredibly tired right now so I might have been a little bit tone-deaf.

Finally finished the game and yes, I deleted Monika's character file in Act III. Not gonna lie I feel like the rug was pulled from under my feet when the Not Quite Dead Monika decided to uninstall the game, because apparently the role of president corrupts everyone and designates the VP with a death mark. Not sure if I got the best ending because the cycle didn't repeat itself, but the universe was basically deleted also...which in hindsight was probably going to happen anyway once I uninstalled the program. I can't help but feel like I'm stuck wondering "well what now?", but regardless I feel like I got more entertainment value than I thought possible from this game. Props to Team Salvato.