Four Short Games About Pain
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- Опубликовано: 14 июн 2024
- The soft uncertainties are gathering round the smell of blood | Directly support me and watch exclusive videos by joining Nebula at go.nebula.tv/jacob-geller
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Games Shown: Grandmother, Anatomy, Exclusion Zone, Lethargy Hill, Grandmother’s Garden, Tenement
Music Used (Chronologically): Fathomless (Carrion), Dance with the Night Wind (Silent Hill 3), OST (Exclusion Zone), The Lab (Carrion), Prisonic Fairytale (Silent Hill 2), OST (Tenement), OST (Lethargy Hill), Echo River Central Exchange (Kentucky Route Zero), A Maze of Vines (Carrion), Not Tomorrow (Silent Hill), Level 0 (Tetris CD-I), Toad Highlands (Mario Golf)
Thumbnail by: / hotcyder
Description Credit: Leeches, Philip Hodgins 
Игры
Hello! This is normally where I'd plug my own Patreon, but this video I really want to encourage folks to support Kitty Horrorshow. You'll get access to tons of experiences like the ones I talked about here, and you'll be helping her put more stuff like this into the world. www.patreon.com/kittyhorrorshow
Hey Jacob! I think you'd very much enjoy the game Pagan: Autogeny, and I think you probably own it already, if you ever ended up getting the itch.io bundle for racial equality!
did you make this video just to make sure she makes more games for you to be afraid of?
Yes, check out KittyHorrorshow. Really unique and creepy horror.
The king has enlightened us once again
FOR REAL THO HOW DO YOU OUTDO YOURSELF EVERY VIDEO
I didn’t know about hitting F5 in Tenement, but instead discovered that if you jump off the edge of the world you fall into a labyrinth of sewers, with ladders that go back up and reset the world. So every time I was done exploring an instance of the space, I would stand by the edge, look at the sky, and jump.
I also never reached the end of the game, I didn’t realize it devolved eventually. I just found an instance of the world I liked and thought, yes, I can live with this.
The residents would thank you for that, I think. I suspect the ledge jumping thing must be the 'intended' way to reset the game maybe?
oh my god I never even jumped off the side, I just did it and holy cow
@@JacobGeller And after all your videos about the call of the void! You got too good at resisting it! :P
I think you won the game
@@subprogram32 I wonder how that influences the reading!
Crazy how this woman was born with the lastname "Horrorshow" and then grew up to make horror games huh
I know this is just supposed to be a stupid throwaway joke but I am genuinely in tears, this is so fucking funny to me. Thank you for the laugh.
have you heard of that lovecraft guy? i think he started writing romance or smthing
@@fweged4353 So sad that H.R. Giger died of acute radiation poisoning.
Gold comments all the way xD
@@fweged4353 his most romantic character was Cthulhu 😍 by far my gosh I get shivers thinking of the tension and romanticism of the great dark one 🙈🥰
"I was a teenage giant floating omniscient tick w/ spider eyes and 98 human teeth" my favorite Against Me! song
Thanks for the imagery, I love the sight of a extreme amount of teeth...
By panic at the disco
DOOOOOO YOU REMEMBERERR WHEN YOU WERE YOUNG AND YOU WANTED TO SET THE WORLD ON FIREEEE
Ahh you have taste in music my friend
@@m3gawither7734 Against Me! is a band, also known for their song names. Highly suggest checking them out, the lead singer is awesome.
I’m not saying you would enjoy Pathologic, but i would enjoy you talking about it
👍
Yes
this pls
Yes!!!! His style would perfectly fit the game!
Catboy burakh I wouldn’t wish playing Pathologic on anyone but his Haunted House video reminded me so hard of the atmosphere in that game
Your note about not psychoanalyzing Kitty herself reminds me of The Beginner's Guide, and I feel like that's not accidental here. It would be easy to add our own lampposts to the work we're examining.
Solstice Hannan there's lampposts everywhere, just got to look hard enough
My EXACT thought.
i think its interesting to think about how the artist relates to the art, but its easy for ppl (especially online) to take it beyond simple discussion and start imposing their interpretations onto the actual person
i thought the same thing, he's actually written about the beginner's guide before.
check it out: caneandrinse.com/the-beginners-guide-and-the-falsification-of-memory/
Wait, was The Beginners' Guide a game/short story/faux-documentary about two amateur devs, one who loved playing and "improving on" the other's games while the other dev just wanted to gril- I mean make random Source engine levels?
I have memories of watching a playthrough of it years ago (at least of what I think you're talking about), but could never remember what it was called or who made it.
I'm not even sure if it was an actual game or a well crafted video essay, but it's where I first heard anyone bring up the use of light to guide players in video games and media. Coupled with how light sources (and lampposts in particular) are eventually used in The Beginners' Guide, that idea always stuck with me.
EDIT: YEP, I watched an SBFP playthrough of that "experience." Now to relive that playthrough and then watch Vinny play it.
Oh, the lighthearted stuff i needed for this rainy monday. Sweet.
Karai lek ta chovendo na onde eu to tamem
@@luska_0736 kkkkk onde eu to tbm
I'm from São Paulo and yeah, absolutely !
It also rainy this Monday where I am
i don't even know in what day we are
"there are no more jumpscares in this collection" the angels and foghorns in Lethargy Hill at 15:18 jumpscared the SHIT out of me
Oh god same my heart just stopped
Whether it was an intentional lie or Jacob's desensitized to jumpscares, either way, it really adds to the dread and ambiance.
Even if it made me piss myself a little, since I'm watching this at 6AM. ;;_;;
i thought the video was buffering so i went to check on it and BOOM the loud noises came and i nearly shuddered
my roommate and i both nearly pissed ourselves
I was listening to this video as background to trying to sleep, boy was that a mistake. That part freaked half-asleep me the fuck out
seeing just those black angelic figures in the sky did something to me comparable to a childhood nightmare
You can only see the're shadows. As you cant discern friend from foes
I think it triggers some sort of primal fear that lives in humans. What that fear is of exactly, I have no idea.
At what time are the angels?
It reminds me vaguely of one I had where "the Hand of God" stretched across the sky as a Nazca-style outline whose pinky finger visibly shrank as it tried and failed to stop a monsoon whose arrival was heralded by rising towers of jack-o-lanterns referred to within my dream as glowing skulls. My house was mostly buried in water and I nearly drowned.
Sameee. I had to pause at that and I found this comment.
The “you used us up” message at the end of the tenement is really interesting to me for some reason
"Gotta feed them leeches baby girl" has lived rent free in my brain as well
That, with the addendum "We are angry, come back tomorrow," in addition to being irrationally funny, was very striking to me.
It says to me that you, maybe the creation, used up the creator's creative juices, and now they sit frustrated and drained, blocking themselves and you from doing anything more.
Now in turmoil, they need to rest. You could stop, and maybe you should.
And yet, you're going to come back.
You're going to come back the next day, keep hitting f5, keep jumping into the void, keep digging through those strange muses for inspiration, only to reach the same conclusion.
Living in an endless loop of taking, and taking, and taking.
it's like they know that you are bored on that floating rock and sick of hearing the same lines over and over and keep resetting it. they are annoyed of you, of your demands for more entertain
@@Dazork04 sounds like the life of an artist
@@Dazork04 it's like a kid being told off after asking "why?" too much, and being told to go to bed.
i love the "come back tomorrow" message so much bc of it.
I've always loved KittyHorrorShow, she straddles this terrifying line between cosmic and body horror. The idea of a place that is alive, but does not want you there or wants you to become a part of it. Genuinely terrifying stuff.
Have you read Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer? Very similar freaky vibe
@@enderwiggins8248 More love for Annihilation and KittyHorrorShow?! This is perfect!
Kind of reminds me of that old series posted to the creepypasta wiki, the Dogscape. Not for the light of heart for sure, takes some serious inspiration from "I Have No Mouth but I Must Scream"
@@WiggleMeTimber Bruh, you killed me with this comment! 🤣
@@Madhatter1781 honestly some of the more chilling imaginations of a post apocalypse. It kinda makes me think of HellStar Remelia’s cannibal planet
Watching this, what freaked me out more than the jumpscare in Grandma's Garden was the transition to the final stage in Lethargy Hill. Everything is so stark, and the angels in the background... I feels like you should hide from them, or at the least avert your gaze. But you can't. You can't look down, you HAVE to see the figures on the horizon.
The second they appeared I had to pause the video, the “music” was too loud. I agree with you, it does feel like you shouldn’t look at them.
every second of lethargy hill had me frantically looking for some way of control, especially when the angels came, i couldnt even control what i wanted to see
I was waiting for them to start screaming about the glorious Megamycete, or some shit!
That part of Lethargy Hill is the single most oppressive and suffocating moment in Kitty Horrorshow's entire library (and there's some stiff competition there). I remember when I was playing it, I would tense up every time one of the interstitial moments came up, dreading the possibility that the place it went back to would be worse. And the final part, with the distorted, hellish foghorns, the angry red skies populated with looming black angels, and the story just going on, getting more and more tortured... I get chills just from this video, let alone playing it.
After the angels appeared, I couldn’t look away, but I had to. I ended up covering the top half of my screen with my hand after that.
Lethargy hill feels... hurting. moreso than the other games in a way I can't properly describe. You can't do anything about the story, can't stop anything that happens, just watch as everything decomposes further and further and never gets "better" in any sense. The angelic figures, the foghorns, the imagery all make me feel emotions, although I'm not sure what the exact emotions are.
It’s a primal feeling.
Primal, existential dread. The kind that lives in the mind of a lost creature, small and disoriented in an environment that feels incomprehensibly hostile.
@@derek96720 It's a similar feeling - if you've ever been to one - given off by places that hate, like discussed in Anatomy and Hill House. Places that feel incomprehensibly like they want you *out*.
Kitty Horrorshow’s games feel like they’d be good to play when you feel your very flesh is cursed. It’s so visceral that I come back to this video often just to feel as raw as these games make me feel
Gives me the rapture vibes like, a reckoning for ones actions no matter how natural or human the impulses that led you to those actions were.
The woman created life for her own selfish purposes, destroyed life for her own selfish purposes and now has to live with that, unable to escape it or the feeling that led her to that point in the first place.
It gives me a similar vibe to the concept of "x doesnt need punishment, theyll punish themselves forever"
Nothing quite like intimately crafted genre fiction. It can bring about many things. New feelings. Old feelings you forgot you could feel. Dark thought you hope nobody ever finds out about. Thrillingly unique experiences, or painfully familiar ones.
great comment
I think the big takeaway from looking at these games as reflections on creativity is to take a damn break once in a while. The squirming, hungry roots of the system we live under will do anything they can to squeeze you creatively dry until there’s nothing left if you let them.
It’s okay to take some time to let the well refill with water once in a while.
THIS. Resting is part of the creative process.
this is what has been torturing me for years. i cannot stop. stopping feels like i am somehow being unproductive, or that i am losing energy, i am losing time, i am losing motivation, i am losing creativity. stopping work on something feels like i'm stopping everything because i view work as my lifeblood, when really, if i work too hard, it becomes a leech, stealing that blood away from me slowly and painfully. i am being bled dry.
@@spitgorge2021 don't succumb to capitalist pressures of productivity if u can! hope you're in a better place about this
@@spitgorge2021 I feel that too, but lethargy is also a parasite to me. when I take time to focus on myself, it evolves into sitting there and doing nothing for hours and hours. I’m not even engaging. My phone is half on, my eyes half closed, as the sun sets and my body rots in bed. I hate myself for doing it but I just can’t help myself.
@Jacob Geller
I cited this in a report i did for my english teacher. I didn't make the essay as an assignment, but because even though this teacher doesn't play horror games I knew these were topics he would enjoy. Now hes making a "video game analysis" lesson plan and is using MY essay as an example of GOOD
and thank you, kitty, you have made amazing things and i care u
Ayyy, that’s pretty cool.
that rocks
This makes me think of an artist stuck in a shitty day job. What you want to do, what you need, is not what is expected of you. The world drains the life out of you while you desperately try to sustain the momentum required to fulfill those expectations. You try to meet milestones, but there’s nothing there. Nothing that nourishes you.
That, or I am depressed, hate my job, and am projecting real hard.
That’s actually a pretty good observation!
Definitely had that thought while playing Tenement
Tenement reminded me of the feeling of being trapped in the small town I grew up in. I moved to the city and thought I'd escaped it, but I'd really only found myself in another trap. All of the stories from the resident about city life and small town America from different perspectives really hit home with me- nobody is really satisfied either way.
Both?
I was in the depths of depression and exhaustion from my job and lack of proper medication when I saw "FOUR SHORT GAMES ABOUT PAIN" in my suggestions.
I said to myself "YES, I NEED PAIN IN MY LIFE HOW DID RUclips KNOW"
I think it's really understated HOW MUCH care and thought you put on the music in your videos. It's almost an unfair advantage how much better the same stuff can get with the right timing and music holy shit.
I feel like this was the secret to the success of Vsauce in the early 2010s
Of course the music will be good if he takes masterpieces and puts them on the videos, the credit goes to the people who actually made the scores, giving him credit for using SH music doesn't make any sense.
@@pedroantonio5797 of course the incredible music is attributed totally to people who made it... But how it's used is completely in the hands of the the creator. Whether it's the timing, altering the editing according to it or even changing the way he is speaking. How is it not possible to appreciate the person who made the music and who used it so well as the same time
@@Raymando I understand your point, but putting Prisonic Fairytail in a horror game review as you speak about "how deep and profound the game meaning is" doesn't take much thought, the masterpiece speaks for itself
@@pedroantonio5797 What's your point then? That someone using music that's not made by them should never be praised for the use of the music? I see where you're coming from, but I have no clue where you're trynna go with it?
Something about the last message in Tenament is so funny to me. Like, you've clearly ripped apart reality or whatever, and whoever wrote the message is just like "hey imma have to ask you to come back tomorrow that was pretty rude :("
After playing quite a few of Kitty Horrowshow's games with some friends, one thing that really interests me is the fact that all the different games and worlds feel connected, somehow. One of the people within Tenement mentions watching a movie of a woman speaking words in an odd language, and how he eventually got the message, that she was talking about some sort of tower in the midst of devastation- Which stood out to me as a clear reference to Exclusion Zone.
But there's something else that threads between several of her worlds; that theme of bugs, leeches, ticks, they all tie into an odd religion; The "Holy Book" That appears in Grandmother's Garden appears in other games she's done, most particular Monastery, in which it's revealed exactly what that religion is worshiping: A Goddess named Hate, who rules over hateful stinging winged things. She's depicted as a statue of a woman with red, crystalline wings.
I can't help but feel that these worlds are connected through this odd religion, this Goddess. The bright, angry red crystals of Hate contrast with the green crystals and energy associated with the Sister of Exclusion Zone. Is the Sister connected with Hate? Was Hate the one that cast the Sister out? That Goddess who only wanted to Love and be Loved, and yet was abandoned, who lashed out in her despair...If she stands in contrast with Hate, could she be Love itself? Where did she go?
I have a lot of questions, and I feel that Kitty Horrorshow's games are going to stick with me for a while. Thank you for letting me know that these games exist.
Interesting that you bring that connection up...
Back in 2015 (according to itch.io, at least) she released a Twine story called "Hornets," in which the protagonist invokes the Goddess of Hate and inadvertently causes an apocalypse in which giant hornets kill everyone.
Considering that's one of the earlier works of hers I can find that's publicly available, it seems she's had this sort of underlying mythology on her mind for a while (perhaps not in an "every game is connected, Kitty Horrorshow Cinematic Universe confirmed!" sort of way, but it's neat that she still ties it in every so often)
YESS LITERALLY so many of Kitty Horrorshow's works tie together (the town in Leechbowl being mentioned in Scarlet Bough, for instance) and it's genuinely so fascinating to me.
My instant ramen hot take is that after the sister was cast out and abandoned her Love twisted and she became hate. Hate isnt the opposite of love, its apathy. Hate comes from pain and wanting to inflict that pain outwards. Its "how long does a house sit empty asking what it did wrong before it unlocks its doors and invites someone in?" If a goddesshadnt loved their followers once they wouldn't have a reason to care enough to invest in hatred.
I havent played these games but if there was a throughline i would guess its a loving goddess being abandoned in her citadels wondering why she wasnt enough until she hates the creations she made to love her, the ones that moved on in ways she cant. And the only way to get their attention is through fear. They forgot her love, but theyll never forget her hate.
Love is not the opposite of Hate and they are, in fact, two sides of the same coin.
The opposite of them and all emotion, is Apathy.
You cannot Hate or Love if you do not care about it.
The clipping audio of the foghorn noise paired with being in that huge open space with nowhere to hide is like the worst thing imaginable. That's almost physically painful for me to experience, even in video game form lol. Excellent job.
you almost described thallassophobia without mentioning water even once
@@piscessoedroen Yeah I have a fear of space that's much akin to thalassophobia, so that makes sense lol. I can't think about the vastness of the ocean without feeling it either, so.
@@dannahbanana11235 it's called agoraphobia
Open spaces. Trapped in a place so wide you cannot escape it, so barren you cannot hide in it. You are seen, you are heard, you are here.
Creating art is a weird thing. It’s a compulsion. If there were a law handed down tomorrow that drawing and painting were punishable by death, I guarantee you would find me with a stylus or pencil in my hand before the day was done. My wife refers to my art as “my mistress”-she’s demanding, she’s jealous, and she’s never satisfied with what I produce. But I keep coming back to her anyway. It will hurt, and I know it, but I will be back. I have always felt that was an underlying theme in Kitty Horrorshow’s work.
Anyone who can choose to stop creating is not an artist.
Your comment is very interesting and well-written, but it makes me feel like your relationship with your art maybe isn't very healthy. I'm not judging, I'm genuinely concerned. Please always be kind to yourself.
in order to make your best art, you need to be okay with what youre creating. ironically, perfection exists in the complete lack of perfectionism. take these words to heart and your creativity won't be an abusive mistress, but instead a loving and caring friend.
@@spitgorge2021 It's not abusive. Art isn't actually real, it's a part of you - but unlike most other parts, it _has_ to be expressed. To let something languish is to kill it, and people take pride in their creations. Some of our creations feel almost alive, that to give them up would kill them. But ultimately, it's not mind control or self-harm or anything like that. If there were TRUE danger in the thing itself, then we wouldn't do it, but as it stands right now, art is a thing that forces itself to be created through our hands.
@@ahobimo732 what a pointless exercise in gatekeeping
i think the fog horns in the last game might be a reference to the 7 trumpets in revelation
they are played by angels, and we see angels, and are meant to be deafening, like they are in this game
I thought the same thing. Angels on the bible are often terrifying to humans, not beautiful. These could be that sort of angel, here not in benevolence, but in judgement.
They say “do your best” but to truly do ones best is to expend every internal and external resource available to us. Doing your best hurts, doing your absolute best is damaging, doing your very best is not sustainable. To create the best thing you can it will consume everything until it has grown to its maximum size if you keep feeding yourself to it. Your money, your time, your soul. Use every talent, every moment, every Newton of force you can apply to yourself. The end result is magnificent and something to be immensely proud of. But what are you? You finish and move on to the next but it’s slower, more painful, more difficult now. You have less to give now, parts of you that pushed you forwards have broken. Yet everyone still says “just do your best!”
You described the pain of burning out/"falling from grace" so well. Thank you, this will be one of the quotes i will remember for a long time.
Thank you for articulating this so beautifully and accurately. I'll be saving it and referring back to it in conversations where the topic comes up
Please don't take this wrong but you've described my experience in education horrifically well. They say 'Do your best' with every assignment until the 'best' becomes a new normal and hurts more than anything. Suddenly doing less than your best is a crime and going further beyond is the expectation even when there's nothing left to give.
this comment really resonates a lot
One wonders if anyone who has ever said "do your best" has ever done it themselves. How often we demand of athletes, artists, actors, public servants, our own children. Not even getting into Capitalism, which demands we give everything to our work, while the corporate masters spend their days drinking with other executives, golfing, etc.
We're expected to grind ourselves down to nothing, in the name of The Work. A process that chiefly benefits others, while we suffer. And every step of the way, conditioned to expect that from ourselves.
Lethargy hill was legitimately terrifying to look at, made me flat out revert to a scared child who was stuck in that scene, the blaring foghorn and the near cosmic size and shape of the angels silhouettes made me feel as if they were staring down at me, not with emotion or intent but just watching me and mixing that with the deep shades of red and black flashes makes me feel like I can't avert their gaze, they'll always watch me no matter where I am and I would be struck with some sort of childish terror where I want to scream and cry for them to stop staring and to be silent, but knowing they couldn't hear me or leave me. I imagine it does have something to do with the story but even if it was completely textless and just had that scene, it would still instil nothing but primal fear.
I had a dream which was exactly the scene with the angels…before I watched this video…
That’s why I like horror. I feel like it is a unique art, it takes a lot of creativity to make a good horror story and there are literally no limits for your imaginations.
Great video.
"The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."
I don't know, randomly remembered this line, probably from all the tvs tuned to dead channels, but feel like maybe it captures the essence here beyond that simple connection in that all encompassing constructed world that subsumes life itself in some way. Or something.
That’s from the novel Neuromancer! I love that book.
My favorite thing about that line is that it hasn't grown obsolete, but has completely changed. At the time of the original writing, it probably meant that analog static gray...
But now that analog tv is gone, to a modern reader, that line might imply a lurid, pure BLUE so bright it almost glows, or a similarly vivid black. Both completely valid imagery for a futuristic sky, but entirely disconnected from the likely intent of Gibson.
"I actually composed that first image with black and white video static of my childhood in mind, sodium silvery and almost painful, a whopping anachronism right at the very start of my career,in the imaginary future, but an invisible one, interestingly. One that revels a particular grace shared by all imaginary futures as they make their way up the timeline and into the real future where we all must go. The reader never stopped to think that I must have been thinking, however unconsciously, of the texture and color of a signal free channel on a wooden cabinet Motorola with fabric covered speakers. Readers compensated for me shouldering an additional share of the imaginative burden and imagined whatever they assumed was the color of static to take on a melancholy of the phrase dead channel." -Gibson
And of course, there's one reply proudly bragging about how they know that line is from Neuromancer, and another comment pseudointellectually doing the "that used to mean gray, now it means blue" routine that pops up every single fucking time someone mentions that line.
@@DeadAndAliveCat and there’s that comment painting it like it’s a bad thing that people like a line from a book and how the line is still applicable today 😎
"this is painful. art as blood."
didnt you mention house of leaves in an earlier video? it has a quote about this, something like:
"passion is not the euphoria of creating something, but the persistence in doing so despite a lack of inspiration" or something, idk and i dont want to google it bc im tired but its near the end of the navidson house bit
this is honestly how most stuff gets made. "flow" is rare, procrastination is constantly present. things i have made i seemingly have managed to do in spite of myself. KH is trying to show the audience what the artist often experiences but cant express for whatever reason.
"Passion has little to do with euphoria and everything to do with patience. It is not about feeling good. It is about endurance. Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati. It does not mean to flow with exuberance. It means to suffer."
@@primrose9693 thanks very much
Thats so true for me. Anytime I do anything well, I'm like damn the stars just aligned right because I don't think I can ever do that again. Then I dread doing it again but the cycle repeats
Which video was that?
If Jacob was a pirat, they'd call him Vantablackbeard.
hehehehe
babe, wake up. new jacob geller video
No joke, as I started playing this I was yelling to the other room "babe! Jacob Geller just dropped one!"
Yes honey
wake up babe new bladee
nah
This also reads like a very feminine experience of pain to me. The organic pulsing bloody body parts taking over your life, the fear of something parasitic growing inside you, your creation sucking the life out of you even when it's born (or just hating it). It just reads like the inner workings of a terrified potential mother to me. That's just a superficial observation, there's enough material here for a whole different video.
yes yes yes yes. female-centered horror is amazing and cathartic and comforting as a woman in this crazy world.
Kitty horrorshow is a trans woman, so she wouldn’t really know about the anatomical female experience (periods, motherhood, etc). However I think a lot of her writing has to do with her experience as a trans woman and feeling pain about her own body (surgery, hormones, etc).
@@headphonic8 that's really good to know! It does go to show you how visceral her work is that it resonated with so many different experiences.
This was literally all i could think about while watching this, thank you for putting it into words!
@@MetaKnight964 please leave, that kind of thing is not wanted here.
Well this was distressing. I’m gonna go hug my cat.
"When you're done with your creations when you've given all you've got to give and it feels like they're alive and you're just a husk."
Fuck, why did you have to dig into me like that. I've literally felt that you have no idea. These characters are more alive and well fleshed out than I am.
I have dug so much out of myself to make my characters that there is no longer a distinction between us. I am riding the line between fiction and reality just as they are because they are as much me as I am them. This is unhealthy.
this feeling is so familiar to me .. i think these games will live in my head rent free
Relatable
Yes, like they are more human than I ever will be.
I am an amateur and recreational writer and text-based roleplayer, and I feel this intimately. In a similar sense, I tend to inhabit the characters I am writing to the point I feel their emotional pain and discomfort and it has real-world physical and emotional reactions and effects from and on me. Sometimes I am simply nothing more than an arbiter of my creations and muses, a shell of my usual self living a life I can never have that takes place only within my synapses. The wish fulfillment of certain experiences and the cathartic release of emotions I do not or can not have on a day-to-day basis does... something... to me and it keeps me coming back over and over again. It's addicting. Yet, when I come back to the real world and let myself properly process what I experienced I learn more and more about myself that maybe I wouldn't have otherwise because the things I do in writing do not have real-world consequences. There are no relationships ruined or built up aside from those with my fellow writers. I have no physical injuries or amputations. Everything I experience is purely emotional, yet in the moment I feel as if I truly experienced those things. This doesn't even account for what I learn about my writing style or other lessons I take away from each session. In my opinion, it's all utterly fascinating when I think about it.
tl;dr: roleplaying for me is more about writing and learning about myself than anything else, but at times I can't help but feel those things belong not to me, but to my characters.
Hey Jacob, right now I'm studying something called Literary and Cultural Analysis in Amsterdam (where I'm from). To be honest, I think you are a great inspiration to me in that regard. This program is constantly looking for new and innovative ways to analyze cultural objects, and for original objects to analyze. You sir, are a master of analysis and interpretation. The way you construct your video essay's, how you make the connections and interpretations, original objects to choose (not the same old Rembrandts and Picasso's (although I love those as well)) and how you get in just the right amount of personal. My hat's off to you, this stuff is quality!
Anyways, continue doing what you love, you've earned my support!
Love from Amsterdam!
Loool. I'm in the third year of the same programme in Amsterdam, and have been following this channel for the same reasons! Cheers, Jacob!
That's so cool Tinus! My girlfriend is studying the same subject in Amsterdam as well. I often find that horror as a genre and games as a medium are underutilized and underappreciated as objects for academic analysis. That's probably why I keep sending her video's of Jacob's and others, lol
@@c.9108 Hahahaha that is pretty fucking cool! I'm still in the first year! Well, maybe when the universities open up again, we can meet up!
@@shanebergvik9487 Freaking cool! In which year is she?
I mean this in the nicest way possible, but it always takes me a long time to click on your videos because of all of the psychological preparation I have to do to be ready to feel the things I do when I watch your videos.
I don't know how you manage to do it every single time, but you have a special ability to reach directly into my heart and mind, and I hope you are responsible with your power.
See you next time!
Me too. It takes a lot of energy to process, since there's a lot of depth to it.
what a flattering comment :)
I dont wanna watchit cause i dont wanna run out of his videos
Stare at the camera and be slightly breathy. Vary the volume of your voice.
I feel like this is the vibe of all my fav youtubers- like "hoo boy x dropped a new video time to explore my psyche"
But they are so damn good.
this video had no right to hit as hard as it did, especially the ending. “All the objects, all the creations just heightened the pain and loneliness she was feeling” “what are you left with when you give all your blood, all you have, to the things you’re trying to nurture, and its not enough? what’s the result of putting so much of yourself into the things you make that ultimately it feels like they’re whats truly alive, and you’re just a husk?” i honestly can’t describe with words why this video and these quotes mean so much to me, but thank you for saying them and putting them out into the world.
8 months later.. but HOW DO I DEAL WITH THIS??? It's so relatable but what to do with this information now that it's put down in words...
@@socracle2774 HOLY SHIT EIGHT MONTHS??? also FR when you put so much of your heart into something and in the end it just ends up in ridicule. shit dude.
tenement sounds like dark absurdist comedy tbh
"we are angry, come back tomorrow"
Well heck, this was an excellent and fascinating set of games, and by assosiation the video too! As a ah, massive cowardly custard and delicate flower, I would very much not mind if you decided to create videos on the other Haunted Cities volumes or KH games in general, because I'd love to hear more about them and am simultainously too scared of them to play myself. XD
I especially liked the breakdown of each individual game and the highlighted aspects of each, before the thematic ties summary at the end. I find it interesting that Exclusion Zone was the one talked about at the start and the end of the video - almost like the discussion of the games themselves are walled off by its grey, long-dead calmness, sealing away all the blood and noise sandwiched between. Dunno if that was in any way intended but a very cool metastructure for the video even if unintended!
Finally, as someone who literally just finished one of her weekly creative writing projects earlier today, that whole sequence about Lethargy Hill, of tearing pieces of yourself off more and more to create little drones to make you happy - and I just look at my 15 or so dnd characters in varying stages of growth and development and go 'Is that you? Are you all my drones? I mean technically I guess, though I prefer to think of you all as my children, though is that making the same mistake as the woman in the story-" and so on like that. Though at least, I am glad I have no reached any big realisation about hating all my creations or anything like that yet. I sure hope that doesn't happen! XD
In any case, one of my favourite videos of yours yet, in case you couldn't tell by the excessively long comment. Looking forward to another year of your videos, fantastic work!
For what it’s worth, I tend to be really skittish with horror games. I played SOMA in safe mode, can only watch let’s plays of more popular horror games, and I can’t even play Bioshock without freaking out. But I adore playing everything that Kitty HorrorShow has made. I think a big part of it is that she plays with dread and unease more than fear and surprise in her games. If you are one of those people who enjoys reading about horror things (like the summaries of horror movies on Wikipedia, or watching a 30 minute RUclips analysis of horror media), but engaging directly is often too much, Kitty HorrorShow’s games may be the type games you would enjoy playing.
@@PhantamSam I have tried to play one of her games before (Dust City), but I entered the first building and was like nooooooooope. I can also tell you from these games above that the only one I likely wouldn't have noped out of before the end is Exclusion Zone, and I would have been especially not happy about hitting the Grandma's Garden jumpscare.
You are right, I am one of those people who prefers to read about horror things then engage directly - buuuut that just makes me want to read/watch videos about Kitty's games too. :P
I definitely agree with you in wanting to see him do more videos on other games she's made. Two I'd definitely love to see him cover, even just a little bit, are Chyrza and Hornets. Those were always the ones that impacted me the most.
@@PhantamSam This is so fascinating to me. I'm someone who has played too many horror games and is generally unshaken by them at this point, but Kitty Horrorshow's work is a consistent exception and usually scares the pants off me. I wonder what we're each responding to that makes us react so differently to these games.
I'm currently going through a crisis from my muse being spent and the project I dedicated 10 years to ending in disappointment. 36 years old and time is slipping through my boney fingers, the act of creating feels like pulling my teeth out, all things around me dragging my precious precious energy for themselves to play with and leaving none to heal myself with. It's hell, absolute hell. Kitty Horrorshow gets it. Thank you for introducing me.
2 months later--Hope you're doing well. It's so, so important to rest and refresh. Time away from creating is what gives us the ability to create more, and there's plenty to enjoy in both. Rest and recovery is never a waste of time if you let yourself relax and enjoy it.
Thirty three, haven't made anything in months, every project I start dies. I want so badly to create but feel like I've lost the ability.
But please let me preach what I can't practice: there is no muse. There's only tinder and spark. Tinder is easy to find, and sparks are small. If you keep combining them, eventually you get fire. You want to create, so you'll keep trying. I'll keep trying too. Energy is so hard to come by sometimes, but we won't stop, because we can't. Our souls won't allow us.
Stay aloft, kindred spirit. We'll fly, the both of us
@@kitty_horrorshow and @Amalgamous Goat Thank you A year later and after one last massive hangover and a following day of isolation I finally reached some kind of clarity. I don't know what happened but it's like something broke and I can create again. It's nowhere near the explosive self-expression I had before the 2 1/2 year breakdown but I'm just happy to have something.
You're right - there IS no muse, only spark and tinder. BTW Exclusion Zone made me cry and Lethargy Hill was the kind of under-the-skin dread I love. I couldn't play Tenement Hill, couldn't even open it. Much too personal much too soon.
So here's one thing I took from the line "That's what I need. Someone I don't know. Someone I didn't make"
It gives us this look at self hatred taken to its logical extreme. Someone who is so sick of this world they made, so tired of their own self that when the people whose lives they are a part of begin to reflect any part of them, their ideals, their slang, their mannerisms can become more like yours and then even seeing those people is like seeing yourself.
My friends and family mean the world to me, to have their company poisoned by my own hand sounds truly, horrific.
I had a weird experience a few years back when I revisited Second Life out of curiosity, having played it a lot in the early 2000's. While there are still places in modern SL with people in them, I had a folder full of bookmarks that could take you places from way back when.
Not a word of a lie that 9/10ths of these places had been turned into empty lots. Just grass where there used to be something. That was sad, but what was worse were the places that were still standing that I remembered being alive and full of people. All this thought and creativity, standing alone in its virtual world, likely to never be visited again. It was just virtual property, sure, but at least real buildings rot and decay. These ones would just be... there, functional, waiting for visitors that would never come.
Also there were a lot of foxes with big penises in some of them so I guess those were okay
I... know the feeling.
Oh!This channel has a really good video about this,it's called "Artificial Loneliness".
I adore obscure indie games like these. It's art at it's purest form, a divine manifestation of imagination, conveying a sense of truth to a select few so that they may share it with the world.
kitty horrorshow seems to actually understand the “haunted ps1” aesthetic so many other indie developers have been trying to capitalize on
HOW CAN ONE MAN'S BEARD BE SO THICK I DON'T UNDERSTAND
2B 😍
Anatomy seems very similar to Tenement - both having cycles of resetting in which the reset inflicts pain and anguish upon the characters.
Watching Jacob watch a video in fast forward..."wow, Jacobs got really pretty eyelashes when he blinks!" Did I learn the right thing?
Yes
I thought about it some. Tenement really vibed with me, because I can kind of relate. I feel drained by the world, but I can't really push it away. I'm not sure if I'd want to.
After too many resets, the residents lock you away... but still invite you back tomorrow. And they continue on as if nothing happened the day before. It's a vicious, abusive cycle and... Man, I get that. My, uh, love of urban areas and animal skulls kind of helped the connection form even a bit more. It's weird, like looking into a sort of abstract mirror. Today, I opened the game and just... left it open. Talked to the residents, enjoyed the music. Avoided resetting. I know how it feels to be drained, bled of mental energy. Being forced into this feeling of inadequacy.
Thank you.
You have literally the fullest beard I’ve literally ever seen. It’s like you’d need to shave parts out of it to make it look natural. What impressive genes.
The final atmosphere change in Lethargy Hill covered my entire body in goosebumps, and all my hairs stood on end. What a great horror experience.
quite fun to follow-up a video about infinity with a video about entropy
good stuff
I've been enthralled with her work as of late. the poetic storylines. her use of horror in intangible ways. she's doing something other indie developers cannot. she's an artist. it's amazing.
that in-game writing feels like the flesh interface series.
Mother horse-eyes? Or something like that?
@@bee5440 yeah, it's reminding me of that.
I should not have watched this in lunch.
Why??! Should i watch this in night rn?!:0
me, from the sticks of missisippi, very well acquianted with ticks and leeches
video; opens about ticks and leechs
me:aight thats it im out
Ticks and leeches SUUUUUCCCCKKK
@@Generic_Gaming_Channel was that a fckn pun
@@roadkillrabiez it is now that you mentioned it
Bloodsuckers and squirmy things really are the worst
I popped a blood blister while watching this. It was magical.
diagnosed with ptsd a year ago. as someone who was a productive layout designer and artist, i really appreciate discussing pain necessary in making art. i havent made art since my own incident, because i wouldnt be able to manage the pain i have now with the additional pain i would have to bear in making art
tldr: thanks, i feel seen
So, uh, my cat jumped onto me right about the time of the "howling miasma of blood" and "please stop it hurts" so uh. Frightening! Thank you!
ngl the "jumpscare" in Grandmother's Garden came off as funny to me lmao
"This is art as blood, sucked from an open wound". I will never forget the way your phrased that. I don't even like horror games but I came here because I love your channel. Amazing analysis.
I've always felt like the truth behind all horror is infinite sadness. When we stop running, all that's left is weeping.
If anybody else is reading this comment, I'd love to hear how *you* relate to Kitty's incredible work here. For me, personally, it really struck me hard as somebody who is self-isolating by nature, and feels the need to create so as to distract myself from the scariness of the outside world and even my own family (Tenement & Lethargy Hill especially hit close to home on this note). I love how Kitty's creative works can vibe with people like myself and others because of how open-ended and raw it is. I don't think I've ever related to a media so strongly before.
Also, these games feel very traumacore, and as somebody with CPTSD, there's something oddly comforting about how similar in the feeling of bizarreness and dread they have to my own traumatic episodes. It's like someone else understands the confusion, the horror, the inability to escape until it all stops as quickly as it came.
I feel like kitty has produced these games in the same way one would get blood out of a stone with their bare hands
Shes bad ass
I've watched this video several times, but I just rewatched it again and... I think I just understood something about Exclusion Zone that I never got before. "They wanted to love her but they didn't know how." That line always struck me, and I just realized that it's because it sounds exactly like parents with a troubled child-- like my own mom when I was younger and didn't yet have the words to describe to them what I was going through, WHY I acted the way I did, why I was lashing out in pain despite how hard they tried to make me feel loved. My parents, or at least my mom, wanted to love me, but they just didn't know how, and I didn't know how to tell them, so I just... hurt, and I lashed out, and I hurt them, and myself, and others, too.
I relate insanely to Lethargy Hill. I used to love to draw. I did it every day and scribbled down whatever I wanted. Then I started to want to get good. It was fun at first. I improved and improved, and I still drew a lot and considered myself an artist. Then I got obsessed with getting better. I hated everything I made and lost more and more of my motivation, until I got where I am now. People say I’m good at art but I just can’t believe them. I draw maybe once every two weeks. I never finish anything and if I do it takes a week. I used to love to create, but now the only thing I feel is burning, passionate hatred for myself and my creations. Why am I so bad? I suck. I don’t deserve to draw. Everyone is so much better than I am. I don’t know how they’re so good and it feels like that impossible level of amazingness is the standard nowadays because I’m on social media a lot and it seems like every little kid can pick up a pen and do a real technical achievement nowadays except me. It hurts a lot because I can’t call myself an artist anymore because I feel like I don’t deserve it. I can’t say I like drawing anymore because I hate it. Those same feelings shown in lethargy hill come out in my art. “There should be more here”. “Had so many plans for this place”. I still want to be an artist, despite it all, but I just don’t have the strength in me to get good at doing it, which is bad because I feel like I NEED to be good at it. And I just cant.
Lmao sorry for the big serious rant I just really related to that game haha
It's okay. I'm also an artist, though I'm primarily a writer. You hit the nail on the head with that comment. I empathise heavily, to the point where the ending of the video makes me tear up every time.
So, you're fine. It's just the way it is. Good luck.
@@exsanguinatedd thanks man, I appreciate it
@@paranormeow what do you think the ending of the game symbolizes with them being destroyed and then the world itself turning against her, while she begs for "company"
@@spicymeatballs2thespicening probably quitting and regretting it. idk
god I felt that. Also its okay bro the rant was fine. Im someone who draws and loves to create things but I always hate that I cant be”better” or something ya know?
Theres no other channel that gets me this excited when i see a new upload
Same
Jim can't Swim
@@RussellMC or JCS - Criminal psychology
You, Leadhead, and Tom Scott uploaded in the same hour.
Do you _want_ me to procrastinate lol, love your videos
Reads title:
Ah yes... Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy.
I’d honestly love to hear Jacob’s take on that game (It’s one of my favorites)
Wait, stop the boat.
On the third game, you DID try to come back tomorrow, right?
Does anything happen?
@@scintillantflea4698 No, the city returns to the usual state and the ghosts tell their usual stories again. It doesn't lie though, there is an actual timer forcing you to wait 24 hours before they let you out of the cage.
That “not tomorrow” in the end was just.... thx for the video
Poor Lisa : (
Your writing is as always delightful. Thank you for another gem.
Trans rights
Love these replies
trans sylveon
Ah yes, the game of having a trans flag pfp and waiting for people who have known you for years to notice
God dammnit
The themes that really dug into my brain with Tenement and, to a lesser degree, Grandmother's Garden was the normalization, and sometimes inspiration and aw found in the classically horrifying. 'Course I always tend to read those themes in a lot of horror, considering the parallels to how oppressed classes are seen in 'polite society' as broken, horrible things.
"Prepare for qurantine." When did this game come out again?
HAHA WOW FUNNY AN OLD WORK VAGUELY MENTIONED DISEASE WOW FUNNY
shut up 😩🙏 please shut up 😩🙏
@@danny8284 I haven't said anything for two months
Thank you for making this video, I really really needed it. I started crying really hard right before you made the curiosity stream joke, and you just converted the tears into laughter. Instantly. That's the work of a great artist, and I apply that to you and Horrorshow. Again, thank you
This hits so much harder now that I’ve immersed myself in my own creative and ongoing projects. I watched it originally before I fully transitioned into making content and sharing it, and I understand this so much more on the back end of the creative experience
How come, can you elaborate more on why it's relatable
oh boy. you know the video is going to be a trip when it starts with "kittyhorrorshow writes about ticks in what feels like every game she makes" and you have a massive phobia of ticks.
Geez, my emotions were all over the place on this one. Thanks for the quick save near the end, had me laughing and crying from that. I love Kitty Horrorshow’s work, and your thoughts on them really hit the mark in my opinion. As usual thanks for all the hard work on ur vids 👍
"Life is pain I hate"
- Jeremy of the 985
These games remind me of an Italian book, "Dall'inferno" (From hell) by Giorgio Manganelli. I learnt about the book on the Untraslated blog, check it out.
I think that this video helped me to understand the significance of the book. Thank you Jacob!
I imagine these games must have hurt to make, but it was a good pain, and I'd rather feel that kind of pain, than the pain of not making anything at all.
I'm never not impressed when I click on one of his videos. They really are a form of art
Hey Jacob! Nearly two years ago, I saw this video and was entranced by it. Not only just the games shown, but the way you went about describing them with passion and reverence. This was the first time I have ever been exposed to this side of games- the side that looks and feels like the developer really got their hands on it and didn’t let go. I’ve been making games of my own since February 2021, and I don’t want to stop. This video is what inspired me - thank you.
ngl the dissection of insects alone makes me wanna sign up with curiosity stream
I want to thank you for giving us serious, sincere videos about... things. All kinds of things. This one, the video about Depths, the Shadow of the Colossus one, the ones touching on violence and political narratives etc etc etc. There’s a lot of creators who would feel the need to take the piss out of their more serious content to keep things light, but I appreciate the weight you allow things to have. There’s something to be said for believing your audience to be able to grapple with the severity of things.
Not really sure where I’m going with this, just - thank you for your videos. Particularly this one. It’s wonderful to be allowed to deal with subjects that are dark and painful and beautiful in their breadth of humanity without the creator trying to babytalk us through it. Keep on keeping on.
The raw melancholy that filled me hearing you describe the futility of creation over Lisa’s Theme, and then the perfect release of the sponsor read - as masterfully timed as ever. You’ve struck home again, bud.
How? Literally every video you make is incredible. One of the best indie developers covered yet again by one of the best essayists on the platform.
As an art-maker myself, i appreciate the attitude that art is sometimes a compulsion to put one’s self through pain, again and again. To give my life force to something that may outlast me but will never be alive.
In tennant, I'm pretty sure you arent supposed to restart, by jumping off the map you get placed in some red sewage tunnels in which you can escape from and change the town
i DO want to hear more about insect dissection...
these games r about 4 types of soup, there's miso soup tomato soup chicken leek soup and then the last one that there is is onion soup i think
This was a wonderful video. I love horror.. conceptually, I think. I love seeing people talk about it. I love seeing others play through it. I love hearing analysis of it.
I cannot do it, myself. I cannot handle playing horror games. I cannot handle experiencing them first-hand.
But this feels like the next best thing.
When he said lethargy hill feels so barebones its “like a custom doom map” I immediately felt the hours of analysis for My House.WAD coming back to me. I don’t expect him to cover it (I feel other creators have already covered the subject the best) But I wish he came back to cool small indie powerhouses like kitty horror show. I would love Jacob Geller to talk about Yames and discover my body or water womb world. Especially a video on Signalis. I am not one to ask for regression but this video has persisted in my memory long after his recent videos become a year old.
The radiation geiger noise that sounds like a dying man's rattle reminds of certain Japanese horror movie I watched many years ago. I don't remember the details but I think there's a haunted home where this noise is constantly playing in the background. It implies something's gonna happen but just doesn't. It drove me crazy and is the single most horrible thing I remember from any horror movies.
holy shit angry static noises lethargy hill scared the shit out of me
Burst out laughing when I heard, “...the Karen’s on the beach holding a strange energy,” at 03:59. I know he actually said “cairns,” but once my mind made that jump I couldn’t un-hear it and I am still chuckling at the mental images that generated! Such is the nature of the human brain, turning erudite discussion into base puns since the dawn of complex language, I suppose. Or maybe, I am just “that guy.”
same, its how I also learned that karens is how you pronounce cairns
I’ve watched this video a few times, both because it’s about very interesting horror games and because it’s just good for re-watching, something I’ve found to be common among many of your videos. The previous times, I was interested by all of the horror and the rich atmosphere of the games. This time though, within a month of graduating art school, I was brought to tears.
The part near end about putting so much effort into something that it is more alive than you hit so unbelievably close to home. This school year, I started truly holding my art to my personal standards instead of getting maybe two thirds of the way there. This has resulted in me creating the best illustrations I have ever created, with so much care and time put into them, with more life than ever before. Once it gets late enough that I need to stop working, I close my laptop and iPad, look around, and find a bedroom in shambles. There are bags from countless doordash orders strewn everywhere since I can’t bring myself to make my own meals anymore and dirty laundry on the floor. I also find that it’s now 4 am, I’ll only be getting 4 hours of sleep and I’m too tired to brush my teeth for the 7th night in a row. The only reason I’m now taking showers more than once a week is because I recently cut my hair short enough that I can’t simply tie it back to cover up the grease without it looking so bad I can’t justify going out like that. Days where I don’t work help, but with the amount of work I’m being assigned, I can only afford two non-working days which isn’t enough for me, a neurodivergent person with chronic fatigue and joint pain.
All of this came rushing forward at that point in the video. Thankfully, as mentioned before, I’m less than a month away from graduating, at which point I’ll go home and do absolutely nothing for a significant period of time to recover. For now, I’ll continue trying to pull through.
I've been listening to the silent hill soundtrack too much, I instantly recognized Not Tomorrow
i was literally drawing while watching this and i literally paused when you were talking about putting blood into something while we stay husks bc i was CALLED O U T.
They COULD be about creation. But some of them feel like they could also be about toxic relationships. About how much work and time and effort you put in or are expected to put in, and how little you get back. How terrifying and suffocating and painful they can be. In Tenement YOU are the toxic family member, the abusive partner, the narcissist. Over and over again, the game tries to teach you, "You can't keep doing this to people. You can't keep asking for more." By the end, you're shut out, and told that the people you were talking to have been "used up," by your selfishness. They're angry. They need a break. They tried to let you be a part of their lives, but you just wouldn't listen to their needs. You hurt them, in a way that cannot easily be repaired.
In Exclusion Zone, it's the Goddess. She was hurt by her sisters and left her home, but I find myself with a complete lack of empathy for her. She chose to wallow in her sorrow, to bring waste and death and radiation to a place that _tried_ to love her, but she didn't appreciate the kind of love it gave her, and so she destroyed it with her negativity. Echoing what often happens to a relationship when one person is consumed by self-victimization and -pity, refuses to take responsibility for their part in the relationship, and their partner ends up feeling trapped trying to give this person what they need, both unaware that what they need is some fucking therapy.
In Grandmother's Garden, it's the forest. It feeds off of your work and effort, demands more and more with each pass, and gives back less and less of what you really need. What you get is rarely enough, but it's better than the Nothing that you know is on it's way. You know that when the forest stops giving you what you need, you'll still go out there. You'll still dig holes in the garden and give the earth your blood. And the earth will roil and consume everything you give it, and you'll be left there with nothing but the wind. Or you'll be wholly consumed, as the little girl was, trapped in a tiny space not even big enough to move in, in the darkness and surrounded by that which both hates you and needs you, and the opportunity to put yourself first has long since passed.
In Lethargy Hill, it's the mother. She brings these people she "loves" into her life, giving them use within the house, but she defines these uses in terms of vitriol and misery -- The father "shambles, sobbing"; the sister "shrieks, filling rooms with jealous looks"; the daughter and son "fill the house with noise" and constant fighting. And for a time, she _thinks_ she's discovered her version of happiness, in a pit of darkness and suffering, but that call comes back, the call that I believe all abusers hear, the call towards what they believe is perfection. Abusers are unhappy, they feel incomplete and lost, as most people do. But instead of finding fulfillment in themselves and their interests, they try to fill the void superficially, with a "perfect" husband, and a "perfect" family, everything they "want" or should want. It's a farce. In the end, their true desire for attention creates chaos and dejection where there doesn't have to be, because they just can't seem to understand that fulfillment doesn't come from these places. It comes from within.
I love your interpretations, too, but these hit closer to home for me personally, and I adore that the games can be interpreted in more than one way.
I felt the same way, except about Exclusion Zone.
To me it makes me think of the sorrow of friends/family of someone in an abusive relationship; "trying to love her but not knowing how" while the Goddess is slowly dying, and all the life being drained from around her. Coming along afterwards, learning the truth of the situation, and yet a determination being made: "nothing significant discovered, return from that wasteland", knowing the pain she felt and yet giving up on that person b/c "they did it to themselves, nothing we can do about it, they chose to be that way".
"This video was sponsored by CuriosityStream!"
"Insect dissections is what came up..."
Now _that's_ how you do a transition! What a legend!