This is a supplemental story intended to be read after completing The House in Fata Morgana, reading early WILL spoil plot reveals.
Pace
Everyone is welcome to read at their own pace and post any impressions, theories, or questions at any time within this thread. Those of us starting together may loosely informally stick together, but please feel free to chime in any time!
Guidelines
Please use spoiler tags or collapse where needed and describe, indirectly, what point in the chapter they are a spoiler for!
When asking for help, do your best to provide context. Pasted text, screenshots, descriptions, etc. Unlike book clubs we can’t flip to relevant pages, so we may need a little help identifying exactly what is being discussed.
Feel totally at ease to ask questions or give your thoughts, any time! Clubs live and die by participation, and asking whatever question you have, no matter how silly it may seem, helps others who are reading it and even the answerer themselves.
Have fun, and do your best to interpret anything said with as much good faith as possible
We’re back! I like how it opened with that sort of “time to revisit” whatever it said. I think the little break was definitely the right call for me, feeling refreshed and ready to see more tragedy. I only read for a little bit, weekends give me less time to read on average, might pick it up later but we’ll see. I at least got to see a solid chunk of the opening if I put off continuing until tomorrow.
Spoilers to the 余興 ending
I’m a little annoyed with my reading speed, but outside one line nothing here was too hard to understand so that’s good. Lots of double checking the fancy words they like to use, but still.
Oof, what an opening. I couldn’t help screenshotting this image cause it’s so striking to me. Reminds me of the aesthetic of Silent Hill 3 with its horrible deep reds and blacks permeating everything. Poor Morgana, here we go again.
This sort of flips what we know about the slave rebellion on its head, and as far as I recall previously we were just given the implication ヤコポ was a slave for real, but the fact he’s already doing this sort of scheming does feel fitting for his character. I stopped when the conversation began with his sword fighting partner, but he’ll certainly be getting that guy’s help. The music is every bit as good and I feel like the visuals for environments might actually be even better somehow, this whole place is so moody.
I’ll try to keep updating thoughts as I go, with vague descriptions of where –
Spoilers through 酒場
They did it! I’m really interested to see ヤコポ’s development as a character because yeah, he has ambitions, but he’s way more full of empathy than anything we saw in the original story made him out to be. We knew he helped Morgana and wasn’t just a callous monster only but it’s still a step further than I had imagined the way he actually has to constantly put himself at disadvantages and sacrifice his own things to take care of her, and he’s the one criticizing everyone around him for their dulled empathy.
グラシアン has been a fun addition; I wonder what happens with him in the end. Nothing good for sure, with this game. Will it be ヤコポ himself betraying him eventually? I assume the lord who escaped will show up again to be an obstacle to ヤコポ’s rise to power.
Loving these backgrounds. The arrival in town is so melancholy – taking this story alone it’s a moment of triumph and really quite nice with the generosity on display, but we know how this ends, so that doom is hanging over everything.
I prioritized finishing the two novels I had started but now they are both done! \o/
Just want to get around the book clubs’ assignments first now (Xenogears included), and then I’ll join you. Should be going fast enough as this will otherwise be my main read
I’m still juggling too many things but probably going to, at least most days, be able to throw an hour or two at this at least.
Spoilers through... 二日酔い
Poor Morgana, most of my reading this session was her remembering her trauma. Force fed raw human meat while being made to feel like the slave being punished was her fault is about the most indignities piled on top of one thing you can get; it’s impressively evil.
The flashback with her mother shows largely what we already knew but IIRC we didn’t have this understanding that the blood thing was her idea in the first place. Mother of the year material – lies about her child to cover herself (I mean, given the time period and small village thing I don’t know what degree of ostracism or punishment could be expected from her telling the truth so this part might be necessary self defense?), builds off that lie to completely strip the kid of any chance of a normal life, and then gets scared of the outcome of her own actions in how the kid behaves, and when she isn’t getting any money out of her small child, sells her.
I read through ヤコポ throwing the drunks out of the bar but not too much to say yet. Generally I think having the light hearted scenes is needed to keep the tone from veering into pure misery, but like I said this story is marching into hell so it casts a long shadow over these parts in my head.
Yeah this opening shot, and seeing how much Morgana is actually cut up was quite the intro. Like yeah we’ve read about it, but seeing the CG of it drives it even deeper.
Yup, really makes me feel like I’m back in fata morgana, ready for more tragedy…
And don’t forget about the overflowing cup of blood…
How many hours have you played already that you are already discussing endings
I’m only 6k in, don’t feel like much has happened yet and having trouble getting in the story to be honest. But I’ll push through.
We’re doing Main story first right? There was an “extra” or “sub” option in the menu, can’t remember the word
Oh no nothing near that, it’s the end of the 余興, not an ending of the story. Just trying to vaguely mark where I am. Hope you get into it with a little more time. I’ve had a few moments of like, yeah, Fata Morgana already liked to show different perspectives on the same type of events a lot and that’s what we’re doing again, but I think it’s increasingly diverging into its own thing right now even if it’s following the broad outline we know.
I think my menu is different, cause I’m on that mod, but as long as it’s Requiem it should be the main part of that. Like if the story started with the short blood letting scene and moved to ヤコポ’s plan then you’re in the right place.
CG quality is remarkable; there’s a real artistic flair to this. So over this time skip we see how Morgana starts to open up and be able to act more proactively. Her sharp banter is pretty entertaining, and she’s still keeping up some saintly acts in her own way. I hadn’t considered how she’d have hidden her identity, but I guess it makes sense, if I’m not mistaken ヤコポ was first surprised to realize the girl he had taken was her, later in the story. Would be too obvious if him and the prostitutes knew about her.
Just an offhand comment but I swear I went 4 years learning Japanese without seeing the word 敬虔 and suddenly it’s everywhere. Good chance to finally nail that one down in my memory.
I stopped this session at the point when マリーア left to go back to bed but I love the first meeting with ジェレン. The energy in the music is infectious and they’re clearly having so much fun playing with what can be achieved with movement in 2D images. Big fan of her bouncing around the room, excited to see more. Dreading what happens to the 娼館 even more now. She better get away safely. I guess the aftermath of that event is when we’ll see ヤコポ change for the worse. I really like how his short temper is being specifically applied to getting mad when people disrespect the prostitutes.
I wonder how it would feel like to play this game first, before playing Fata Morgana. Or playing it in between. Like at the time where Morgana was telling her backstory, I had felt that it could have more impact if we could have seen it, not just being told. Basically what we do now.
Yeah I’m curious, parts of this would have to be retooled because IIRC some of this is not spelled out as directly until later, but I do wonder about the impact of exploring it in this depth now vs how it showed up back then in a more one-sided perspective. Would like to revisit this thought as we get further.
Spoilers to -- a choice!
There was higher potential for amusement in the other choices, but I just couldn’t bring myself to give the flowers to anyone but Morgana, who wants them just as little as you’d expect. Deep down we know she wants to be chosen, though.
ジェレン is proving to be a nice foil for everyone here. With Morgana it’s the appeal of feeling more normal, unburdened by her fucked up past and the visible signs of all of that. It’s a smart direction to take her character, getting outright jealous of a 娼婦 and then feeling worse about it. Poor girl. For ヤコポ too, I liked the little conversation where she makes the assumption that he’s doing all of this because he’s dreaming of a better, more altruistic world, and it’s clear that he’s already shut himself to that sort of possibility. He doesn’t intend to fix things; he just wants to be the one looking down on others, and that’s the seed of what he’ll eventually become. Nonetheless, we’re still moving pretty slowly with his development into that; at this stage without knowledge of the future he’s predominantly a nice boy.
I wonder what that noblewoman hiding her face ヤコポ ran into was about… didn’t read past making the choice and seeing the immediate scene after so I’m suspended in the midst of the festival, still.
痣 can basically refer to any kind of skin marks, birth marks but also bruising and other stuff. I think all of that is the result of the blood letting and the conditions she spends so long kept in. I think it’s implied when the nobles call her a witch and are about to attack her, it’s in reaction to the way her face has started to look. You’ll see soon that she didn’t know she looked like that and they talk about trying to heal her face.
For some reason textractor has been continuously getting fussier about this game; the last few times I’ve had to retry attaching a few times to get a proper hook, and occasionally it just throws up errors. Very odd. One day I came close to just saying forget it and reading without it, which is at least nice that I can do that these days.
Spoilers up to seven more months pass screen
Read the next little scene but this seemed like an optimal point to mark progress.
Well here we have the big scene we’ve been building to. The music and art together with the writing in this VN is still really good at tugging on the heartstrings. Morgana can’t take the cognitive dissonance and nightmares anymore, lashes out, ends up having a sort of panic attack, but in the end it all leads to these two finally opening up, somewhat. In one sense I feel like Fata Morgana is pretty straightforward which is why I struggle to find good things to say about it sometimes – I think the characters have good depth but we’re very clearly keyed in to what they’re feeling when it’s important (eg Morgana no longer wanting to acknowledge being 神の子 because she finally wants to be like everyone else) so it’s harder to find an angle that feels like I’m analyzing more than, just, repeating, heh.
That said, mostly what’s on my mind right now, besides thinking these scenes have been executed well, is that I like this expansion showing us more of Morgana as a character because for all the importance she and her pain had in the original story, its structure necessarily kept exploring her as a character separate from the things she goes through at arm’s length. It still feels awful knowing where this is headed, but it’s nice to see what she was like when she was allowed to be a normal person for a little while.
Sorry! Haha. I’m a little unsure exactly how much I’m reading because the texthooker duplicates lines when a line stays on screen and adds more. By character count most of these days I’ve been aiming for about 20k but that’s inflated by the duplication so my real number is somewhere below that. IIRC my texthooking was always jankier than yours, probably a product of using the mod.
Might slow down a little with other clubs on Friday and the weekend.
Took a quick glance at someone’s Youtube playthrough and based on that I might be getting close to halfway through already, so that’s cool. Recently made a list and, including in progress clubs, I’m in the middle of 9 things, so I’m looking to get a few finished
Definitely faster than me! I played three days, 16k, 16k, 8k.
Very inconsistent how much time I have on a different day.
I will have the same slow down on Friday haha.
Haha cool! It will be finished soon then. Even at my pace (which is not slow, you are just very fast xD), might be less than a month!
Ok yeah for reasons both expected and unexpected I’ve been busier and not able to focus as well today. Read a little through big events though
Spoiler, just met ジネーヴラ
I kinda stopped right after she introduced her plan mid-scene.
A lot of my reading this time was about ヤコポ’s feelings and between this and Trails I sure am in the problematic romances Wanikani clubs. Well, he never said anything, but that’s quite an age gap. Different time and whatnot, moving on.
Cause right after, the event I’ve spent this whole time dreading finally happened.
Horrible, but those colors are immaculate. I hope we see ジェレン again, but if we do I can’t imagine it’ll be in good circumstances. I have this feel the 領収 is somehow behind the attack, I mean I always assumed he would die in the revolt and it’s weird he’s gone this long without some sort of revenge attempt. I wonder why ヤコポ was spared, though. Maybe it’s about hurting the people close to him and leaving him alive to regret it?
Whatever it is, it sucks. I guess here’s the start of his obsession with power. Looking forward, with a little mix of dread, to seeing how that goes.
