A Turnabout Diverged

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ZetaAzuel
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by ZetaAzuel »

Just as a note, I'll start playing and streaming trials tomorrow after I come back from school. Which should be around 3:00 PM EST.
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by kwando1313 »

Aaaaand I've finished streaming all the cases. I'll let Zeta play through all of them and then we shall confer for the results.

Enigma and NN's Entry ~ Stream
Sami's Entry ~ Stream
DWaM's Entry ~ Stream
Last edited by kwando1313 on Sat Dec 21, 2013 1:46 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by Enthalpy »

[D]isordered speech is not so much injury to the lips that give it forth, as to the disproportion and incoherence of things in themselves, so negligently expressed. ~ Ben Jonson
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by kwando1313 »

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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by Bad Player »

(also it's only 12 minutes)
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by kwando1313 »

Bad Player wrote:
(also it's only 12 minutes)
(the best 12 minutes ever)
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by ZetaAzuel »

Alright let's get this over with. I'd like to make a long and drawn out opening about how everyone is a winner(lol) and stuff but that would take up too much time. Instead, I'll say that everyone turned in something, yep, that's what happened. And despite the shame we had growing in unheard of numbers, we still managed to pull out some pretty epic entries. That aside, let's just get to the point, the
RRRRRRRANKINGS.
Spoiler : Rankings! :
0th Place BP
1st Place Hersh
2nd DWaM
3rd Sami-Kjelle
4th Enigma + NN
5th Gav

Also don't complain of lack of colored text, it's all BP's fault. He wanted them and so here they are.
Kwands will be posting reviews in the future, I will as well myself but probably in the distant future.
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by NihilisticNinja »

'gratz DWaM. ^_^
"With good friends by your side, anything is possible. If you really care for each other, it makes everyone stronger! Then you'll have the will to succeed! The world is filled with painful things, it's sad sometimes, and you won't be able to handle it by yourself. But just know: If there's someone that you love, you'll stay on the right path. And you won't ever give in! As long as you keep that person in your heart, you'll keep getting back up. Understand? That's why a Hero never loses!"
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by kwando1313 »

Reviews abound!
Spoiler : Enigma and NN’s Entry. Obviously, this contains spoilers for their entry. :
So… Let’s get started with the first entry I played. Which was Butterfly of Justice, by enigma and NN. Quite obviously, it was by you two. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be opening the spoiler which reads “Enigma and NN’s entry”.

But yeah, let’s actually get started. Overall… It was okay. The story itself seemed quite DR-style (which, I guess is fitting because it’s based off of “And Then There Were None”). The music (well, at least when it worked) was fitting, for the most part. The characters themselves were different enough.

However, that being said, there were a few faults with the trial. Firstly, the reactions of the characters themselves seem waaaaaaay too muted. Like, they don’t seem worried or nervous in any way that they’re actually trapped inside an abandoned apartment building, nor do they seem too fazed when they’re confronted with the very real and likely possibility of death. Secondly, the logic for the contradictions seemed… Sketchy, at best, for the most part. And… Lastly, there kinda wasn’t any theme relevance. Though, that is understandable because of the fact that you ran out of time.

That being said, don’t lose heart. The foundations of this trial are quite good: It just needs a bit more polish and whatnot before it goes from just merely a “good idea” to a “great trial”.
Spoiler : Sami’s Entry. Spoilers for her entry lurk within. Maybe. :
The second entry I played was Summon Simulacrum, by Sami-Fire. Yay for entries that I played.

This one was quite off the wall in terms of things I’ve played on AAO. And, I must say, you did a very good job. Aside from those random bugs, everything worked out quite smoothly. The story, though simple, was quite effective. The characters were well written. Music was great. Diversion existed. The RPG system was quite good. All in all, I really enjoyed it. I don’t have very much to write here, but this type of innovation is something that I’d like to see from future things I play.
Spoiler : DWaM’s Entry. At this point, I just realized I haven’t really written anything spoilery at all inside the other spoiler tags... But this has legit spoilers in it. :
The third entry I played was Cascade Theatre, by DWaM. You totally realized that this was by DWaM from the spoiler tag on the outside.

But, let’s start talking about Cascade Theatre. Presentation-wise, this was phenomenal. In fact, probably one of the best presented things I’ve played on AAO, with just the sheer amount of prettiness. The style of writing is vintage DWaM-style, so, again, very well done. Of course, it was very, very theme relevant. (Badge end for best end still.) Characters, again, were handled well. Music was good. Plot was fine for me. So, all in all, really well done.

And… Now people want me to talk about how I don’t think this is super duper grimdark. So, I’ll go explain why I don’t think it’s super grimdark. Firstly, I’ll need to put a bit of context behind my point of view. What I noticed is that Cascade Theatre similarly parallels 1984 in terms of structure: Normal life -> Something happens -> Seemingly grim, dark, and despairing end. But, the thing about 1984 is that George Orwell specifically included a certain part of the book: The appendix. The appendix in 1984 is this long thing about Newspeak, its grammar, its structure, and how it will eventually phase out Oldspeak (which is just regular English). But… There’s one really important thing to note here about the appendix in 1984: It’s all written in the past tense. So, what exactly does this mean? One common theory is that this shows that the regime of Big Brother collapsed and that this is just a historic legacy to show what their regime was like, which paints a much brighter outlook upon the events of 1984. So now, instead of Winston Smith’s actions just doing nothing and his acceptance of Big Brother aren’t the end, and instead, the totalitarian regime of Big Brother collapsed in spite of their actions to stop it. The proles, in the end, did rise up and take down Oceania. But, the key thing is how odd and out of place the hope spot seems in 1984.

Similarly, this happens in Cascade Theatre. The true and non-gloomy ending is seen in the strangest way: By skipping the introduction. So, this is already an external point to the regular Cascade Theatre (which is quite similar to the 1984 appendix). In addition, the true non-gloomy ending is quite different from the rest of the endings in its content as well as its tone. So, what does this mean to me? Well, the sheer fact that it’s so different is a really important and key point. The fact that it’s different usually imparts a “PAY ATTENTION TO ME, I’M REALLY IMPORTANT” meaning. So, what exactly does this ending show us? Instead of Nick going off to take vengeance, and Edgey going off to kill himself for his failure… We see Polly and Edgey facing off in court. Nick has moved on past the events which have happened in the past: No longer is he trapped in the past and grieving, he instead has moved forward with his life and began to think about how to live his life. Edgeworth is quite similar to this as well. Instead of moping about and saying “HOW COULD I HAVE PREVENTED THIS FROM HAPPENING WAAAAAAH.”, he’s decided to work towards getting Nick to forgive him for the events which lead to Maya’s death. No longer is he moping in the past, but instead, he’s decided to look to the future and take matters in his own hands.

So, why do I say that Cascade Theatre isn’t super depressing? It’s because the fact that the ending shows that the ultimate message of the entry is not to continue wallowing in despair: Instead, it’s showing that despite all the failures and misadventures and doom and gloom you can face (which is shown with the various other endings), no one is beyond redemption. Everyone can redeem themselves. No one should cowardly take their own life to avoid this fact. In fact, the message itself is just a light that’s hidden amongst the darkness of the case. The major issue with the message, however, is the fact that you can’t let yourself wallow in the darkness which is created by the case. You have to look beyond the case itself and realize that while the main part of the entry itself is heavily shrouded in darkness, you need to go look at the appendix and realize that the darkness is the part that will fade away, not the light.

But yeah, that’s my view of why Cascade Theatre isn’t just all about super heavy grimdarkness. If you wanna talk about it more, just, well, reply, I guess.
Spoiler : BP’s Entry. Which you know nothing about. Mwahaha. :
I randomly streamed BP’s Entry, if you guys remember. But, I’m not giving you any details about the case name itself.

Still, what BP gave me was quite short. What was given was quite well done though. (And that totally was the best 12 minutes of my life~)
Spoiler : Heshy’s Entry. Spoilers abound are within. :
Heshy made an entry called Turnabout Nanoha. And it was amaze. Best trial ever. It was heart-wrenching to choose between saving Nanoha or Fate at the beginning. (I mean, how could you do something like that to me Heshy. ;_;) And then, topping it off with that epic Wolkenritter battle with the Jewel Seed (surprised you went that route, actually) infused Asura? Was really awesome. And of course, the characters were all very true to canon. The OCs you added were super amaze. (Annah for best OC in this) The music was super great as well. (Yay for Nanoha music~) I ALSO CAN't BELIEVE THE AMAZE SPRITES YOU HAD (Vita was still the most 'dorbs, obviously). And of course, the theme relevance was off the charts. Basically… BEST TRIAL EVER.
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by Enthalpy »

I have to question Kwando's reasoning. Responses are in bold. Note that I intended to double-check against the stream kwando posted, but it was unclear at what point the "true end' began, so I am going largely off memory.
Spoiler : :
Firstly, I’ll need to put a bit of context behind my point of view. What I noticed is that Cascade Theatre similarly parallels 1984 in terms of structure: Normal life -> Something happens -> Seemingly grim, dark, and despairing end.

The word "parallels" specifically implies that the two have such a high degree of similarity that the direction one takes will approximate the direction taken by the other. That both have an incident to incite a facially dark ending fails to show the similarities that a word like "parallels" requires. For instance, by that logic, I can argue that Cascade Theatre is analogous to several novels and tragedies. You've stipulated that the cycle holds true for Cascade, and I can show it true for Frankenstein or Othello. Frankenstein has a normal life until he becomes obsessed with immortality and, for his troubles, watches his friends, fianceè and family be murdered while torturing himself to death pursuing his creation until he dies, discouraging Walton from his arctic expedition. Othello has a normal life until Iago plots his downfall, and it ends with Othello's wife called a prostitute by Othello before she ends up dead, Othello losing his army position and having to live with the guilt of his wife's murder for the few moments before he offs himself, Othello's loyal general Cassio is crippled, Emilia is dead, and our only consolation is that Iago is to be tried for his crimes. Both of those meet the standard of parallelism that you place for 1984 and Cascade Theater, and on this basis, I can claim that Cascade Theater supports the Phoenix/Maya pairing. Both parallel structures had the protagonist's love interest die, so the dead person in Cascade must be Phoenix's love interest. This conclusion is absurd, which shows that the similarity between 1984 and Cascade Theater has not been substantiated, since that level of reasoning supports a clearly false conclusion.

You cannot use "similar to 1984" to argue anything about Cascade.


[Irrelevant section removed for brevity.]

The true and non-gloomy ending [of Cascade Theater] is seen in the strangest way: By skipping the introduction. So, this is already an external point to the regular Cascade Theatre. In addition, the true non-gloomy ending is quite different from the rest of the endings in its content as well as its tone.

I would disagree that it is "quite different" in terms of content, and I would even disagree that it is non-gloomy for reasons I will explain later. DWaM confirmed to me over xat that the true end was very heavily taken from previous endings. The three new elements are Phoenix and Mia, Phoenix's interactions with Edgeworth, and Phoenix banishing the hallucination of Maya, and all three of these are extremely similar to aspects of other endings. You are overstating the degree of difference.

So, what does this mean to me? Well, the sheer fact that it’s so different is a really important and key point. The fact that it’s different usually imparts a “PAY ATTENTION TO ME, I’M REALLY IMPORTANT” meaning. So, what exactly does this ending show us? Instead of Nick going off to take vengeance, and Edgey going off to kill himself for his failure… We see Polly and Edgey facing off in court. Nick has moved on past the events which have happened in the past: No longer is he trapped in the past and grieving, he instead has moved forward with his life and began to think about how to live his life.

I question the truth of this. I do not recall Phoenix thinking about his life in future, nor has he completely moved on. You say below that Phoenix has not forgiven Edgeworth, so you cannot also say that Phoenix has fully recovered from what happened. You can say that he has largely recovered, but in that case, you would be missing a critical qualifier.

Edgeworth is quite similar to this as well. Instead of moping about and saying “HOW COULD I HAVE PREVENTED THIS FROM HAPPENING WAAAAAAH.”, he’s decided to work towards getting Nick to forgive him for the events which lead to Maya’s death. No longer is he moping in the past, but instead, he’s decided to look to the future and take matters in his own hands.

I also have to question this. One of the two "branches" of the true end is Edgeworth is moping around and looking forward to his death, when his "debt of justice towards Phoenix" will be repaid. Edgeworth is visibly shaken in the present-day scene immediately before hand and in both scenes makes a comment about the foolishness of Wright. This is heavily indicative that he kept the same mentality, as all aspects we can see are common, and the moping is the ending.

So, why do I say that Cascade Theatre isn’t super depressing? It’s because the fact that the ending shows that the ultimate message of the entry is not to continue wallowing in despair: Instead, it’s showing that despite all the failures and misadventures and doom and gloom you can face (which is shown with the various other endings), no one is beyond redemption.

The assertion that it is the message of Cascade is critical to your argument, yet you have not defended it. There are two characters that could possibly have any tie-in to redemption: Phoenix Wright and Miles Edgeworth. The others have no struggle with the issue, nor is their redemption mentioned. Now then, we know that the message of redemption does not come through Phoenix. Phoenix finds no redemption; he has no role in this incident for which he would need redemption. From neither his action nor his inaction was there a reasonable expectation of Maya's murder, so he had no blame. There is no redemption without sin. The case makes this explicitly clear at one point. Turning to Edgeworth, here we find a man who is in need of redemption, but does not achieve it for reasons previously stated.

It is also worth considering the structure of the end. There are two branches, with a man winning or losing a game. The losing outcome features Phoenix at the trial, with Phoenix fine but unforgiving but Edgeworth in despair as stated earlier. The winning outcome focuses far less on Edgeworth, but does show Phoenix going to the Cascade Theater. The lights darken on him, and he says the Theater is where "dreams come to die." In one, Edgeworth is apparently darkened but Phoenix is fine, and the other we know next to nothing on Edgeworth, but Phoenix is corrupted? Combined with the setting, this strongly indicates that both cannot be saved, directly refuting your proposed theme.


Everyone can redeem themselves. No one should cowardly take their own life to avoid this fact. In fact, the message itself is just a light that’s hidden amongst the darkness of the case. The major issue with the message, however, is the fact that you can’t let yourself wallow in the darkness which is created by the case. You have to look beyond the case itself and realize that while the main part of the entry itself is heavily shrouded in darkness, you need to go look at the appendix and realize that the darkness is the part that will fade away, not the light.

I've already explained why I think this isn't the message, but I have a question for you. If the darkness fades away, then what was the point of having so much darkness all throughout the case? As a beta-tester, I can tell you that the good end wasn't even planned when the rest of the case was finished. I can also say that "to show all that could go wrong" doesn't seem like a compelling reason to include as many and as dark ends as DWaM did. So tell me, what was the reason?

Overall, I don't think there is a theme. DWaM realized his case was way too dark and slapped an ending on it. It may not be a bad ending, but it is wholly discordant with everything else in the case, and when there is so much "everything else in the case" that you can get rid of at least a third of it and not diminish the impact of the contrast, you have to question if they were really meant to be together. My anser is they weren't.
[D]isordered speech is not so much injury to the lips that give it forth, as to the disproportion and incoherence of things in themselves, so negligently expressed. ~ Ben Jonson
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by DWaM »

IT MIGHT NOT BE A THREEPEAT

BUT IT'S A THREE SOMETHING ALRIGHT

...But in all seriousness, thank you. And thanks for everyone who participated.

Now... I feel like there are some things that should be cleared up...
Spoiler : Cascade :
I can't deny what Enthalpy said - originally... well, the True Ending wasn't even there. In truth, my "message" at the time was that... there can't always be a happy end. That life, in its entirety, as one long, drawn out story, cannot always end happily. Good men will die for no reason, accidents will happen, lives will fall apart, etc., etc. Part of the message was... sometimes, there is no light.

But then I came to a realization (after Enthalpy's critique after initially playing the entry and my own look back on it) that... it doesn't need to be like that in this case. Sure, one can show that sometimes bad things happen, but in truth - this situation wasn't unfixable. It was just one individual's unwillingness to accept that life slapped him in the face. Likewise, for all the bad things that can happen, surely people can be strong to move on properly? To be honest, I'm not exactly sure - my understanding of humanity in general tends to lead me to making people just do stupid things. But, in any case, in the end what threw me over the edge was the fact that, as a story, it probably left the reader depressed and was far too long to deliver that message (which, some could argue was flawed to begin with, or that I chose the wrong event to portray it) and needed one more ending.

So... I added (or "slapped on", as Enthalpy said) the True Ending... kinda. (Way before the beta-testing actually began, the "Nick entering the Theater" stuff was actually there, as well as the option to drop the ticket - but it just ended there and you had to go through the entire thing all over again. And with me trying to hint at what the theater actually was, unsuccessfully I suppose, I imagined there would be one person who put together that this was a path to a better end.) I'd also like to note here, since someone said that the True End seemed way out of place - this was one of the reasons I made it hidden and "unintuitive", since making it come out of nowhere seemed... well, out of place. (I also tried hinting to the player there was more even after they'd seen everything.)

But that's not... really important now. What I would like to say is:
Both Edgeworth and Phoenix can be saved. That's what I was trying to show in the True Ending, at least. Phoenix gets the strength to move on (true, he hasn't exactly forgiven Edgeworth, but by that logic, families of murder victims should never be allowed to move on as long as the person responsible for it is alive) and Edgeworth, feeling guilt and knowing the mistake was his, vows to fix it - which he does, in the present day and finally makes peace with himself.

Finally, something else. About how the thing should be looked at when it's all said and done. While I admit that kwando's interpretation isn't the one I intended... Don't see why it isn't a valid one. Sure, you can claim "people shouldn't look into things that aren't there" but I... kinda like it. It's his view, presented to him with what was shown to him, without the knowledge of what I was intending when making the thing. Multiple interpretations are perfectly fine, in my book.

Don't see why there really needs to be an argument about this, really...
In any case, thank you very much.
...Oh.

And I think I'll actually be hosting the next one (dat promise to BP). Just... gotta settle some stuff first.
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Re: A Turnabout Diverged

Post by Gumpei »

Kotaro Uchikoshi wrote:A piece of work, whether it be a movie or a novel or a game, what is written and disclosed is all there is to it.
My cherished theory is, “Once a piece of work leaves the hands of a writer, it becomes the readers’ work, who is the receiver.”
So just because the writer says something as supplemental information, I do not want you guys to think that is the right way to interpret it.
What I have written in the game is all there is to it. So anything other than that I leave to the imagination of the reader.
I encourage all of you to let your imagination run free and add to the areas that have not been written yet.
And the answer that is born in your mind is the true answer.
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