OH THEY BETTER HAPPEN!!!
Dramatic movie scenes that didn't happen in Anomaly Diversion. For @oblique-lane
For the first time, I actually used a reference. I went a bit overboard. Whoops. They think they're solving something, good for them.
(This is NOT a tsp blog! Please don't follow for The Stanley Parable!)
Just played tsp for the first time yesterday oh goooddd this is good. No, I mean, I knew it's gonna be good but I didn't think it would be LIKE THAT?? Like, that's more than just breaking the 4th wall, it's getting rid of it at the very beginning and talking to the player DIRECTLY directly. Complete lack of rules. They broke fucking everything that could be broken. There's also yaoi. How better can it be???
That erotic tension between an artist and the urge to delete their works.........
Can I have you for a minute?
The day RED Sniper spared an injured BLU Scout, he noticed that something about this guy was suspiciously off. In fact, he had long ago begun to notice: there was *something* off about everything around here. Or in other words, how does it feel to find out that all this time the people you and your friends fought... Were your clones? Who the REDs and the BLUs actually were? What other horrors were hidden from mere mercenaries? And what was wrong with the 'faces'? Scout and Sniper from the opposing teams secretly bond together to find this out. Welcome to a story of forbidden friendship, conspiracy, and existential dread!
Tags: Gen, Explicit, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death; Themes of Dissociation/Derealization, Suicidal themes, Hurt/Comfort, Slice of life, Spotlight for every character.
[ENG] AO3
[RUS] Ficbook
Вy ObliqueLane
I can't believe Anomi just straight up ripped off Badwatervideos2009 with the living ragdolls and even scout entering the white door smhh couldn't even come up with anything original nyeah. shaking my head.
also THERE'S 70 PEOPLE ON THE DISCORD VC SHUTT THE FUCK UPPP
02/25/2025: Okay uh after the recent Discord finds... This scene feels VERY differently now, holy shit, Eida you sick bastard....
(Skyghost // Umbrella man from INTERLOPER ARG)
This is the biggest thing I am interested in at the moment. So sad that Interloper doesn't have a fandom in the conventional sense... We only have a Discord server for the investigations (a couple thousands of people who as confused at what's going on as I am) but there's... no FANDOM. You know what I mean?
There are many characters in this story who, as people (and not people?), are SO INTERESTING, yet there are barely any fanart or them. All with the biggest potential of telling the most heart-wrenching sad story that would compromise our understanding of "human-ness" as we know it... Come on, people?? I'm crying and climbing walls at the Anomidae//Eidamona parallel and the implications...
PLEASE let's make it a fandom. You, yes, you. GO watch it, all episodes, RIGHT NOW!!!
Thank you SFM, with you I'm able to cheat with everything...
Character analysis (or at least my vision on him, if you believe my reasoning)
What do we know about Spy? He's a disguise mastermind. He can pretend to be anyone in order to infiltrate into the scene to do his job - quite literally, stab people on the back. But when he's not in the battle, what is he to his teammates? A suave Frenchman, a gentleman with taste, somewhat a leader.
At least, that's the persona he prefers to show. But is he really..?
What if I tell you that this person never drops his disguise?
For a man who always wears a mask and who's identity being secret is a sacred part of his role in this job, isn't this persona too much to show if it is real? Frenchman, rich, ladykiller... Wouldn't it be too easy to decipher his identity with so much clues provided? Wouldn't it be dangerous?
While Miss Pauling and the Administrator definitely know Spy's real identity, hiding it is a major thing for whatever reason. One could assume it might be because of Scout (obvious guess) but I doubt he's a sole reason. Spy very much enjoys being the Spy all by himself. Do what's the deal?
Why did Spy join Mann Co. in the first place?
Let's take this assumption as a fact: people come here out of desperation. They are professionals in their field, yet in their past/casual life there is a pattern of them having difficulties that push them into joining this service. I don't see why Spy would be an exception.
The reason for joining is usually money. Some people question why Spy, a wealthy man from higher society, would join Mann Co. if he has it all already.
Well, probably because he really does not.
Have you ever met an aristocrat? Wealthy people don't get so protective about their expensive suits, they can afford cleaning or a new one. Regardless, rich people don't usually get stingy about material goods, especially if they're mass produced.
At least, not those who were born into wealth.
Spy's defensiveness about his "wealthy stuff", his pomp-ness, disgust and arrogance towards "plebs" gives off a man who knows what it means to live in poverty and who doesn't want to be associated with it ever again.
(Not even talking about his own filthy habits such as not washing his mask and pissing on walls? Jesus Christ)
Dare I even guess that he might be not French at all? His French is so broken. (Although, so is Medic's German, but at least he uses his language much more frequently and in more complex sentences, while Spy only uses French to say some basic expressions, occasionally confusing them with other languages). Definitely not a native.
If anything, he's not giving "rich man" at all, he's giving con man. And that fits my picture perfectly.
So, poor upbringing. How old is Spy? If he's Scout's father (and he was young when he was conceived), I'd say he's no less than 20 years older than him. I'd give him a few more years actually. So, approximately Spy is around 50 at the events of the game (1968-1972). Let's assume he was born somewhere in the 1910s.
Even if he's not French, I still agree that he's probably European. Hmm, what was happening in Europe at the time Spy was a kid?
Oh yeah. The Great Depression.
See my picture: imagine, a child from a lower class family during the Great Depression, his parents were most likely to not take good care about him (both because of the economical situation AND as an echo to Spy's struggles with his own fatherhood). He has to run away from home early and start to make money. Any way possible.
Unavoidably, it leads to crime.
Petty theft, blackmail, scams. Changing identities. Selling low quality products and services. Changing identities again. When older, seducing rich women to stay at their homes overnight, be fed and supported. Running away from the police. Walking into a trap of the mafia, and then joining them as their goon.
In this nightmare of a life he just had to keep pretending to be someone else, someone better and stronger, in order to his ego to not completely shutter. He had to imagine he was an invincible mastermind trickster of some sort, not just a poor boo-hoo victim of poverty who has never knew normal life and care.
And if you pretend for long enough, you become your role eventually... Right?
His true self was long lost forgotten under many layers of new identities. Worse, his true self was never known. And he didn't want it to be known in its ugly and disgusting vulnerability. Narcissism became his lifeline.
It's so much better to be Spy. To be rich and elegant and respected. His ego rebuilt.
Today I will be talking about Sniper's personality because I often see people portraying him DRASTICALLY different abd I wanted to understand what's going on and why all of the interpretations are correct (in my opinion)
Let's name the most prominent thesises:
Sniper is shy and introverted.
Sniper is unhinged and bloodlusty and is annoyed by people.
Why do i think that these aren't exactly contradictory?
I think at this point it's safe to assume Sniper is autistic (I mean lol this is easier to prove than to disprove). As an autistic person myself, I can see why he could be perceived like that.
Sniper doesn't talk to people and mostly observes them and the situation. Very in tune with his profession. That, however, might be perceived as being shy or very introverted or both. People love talking and expect others to share information, yet Sniper never says half of the things he's thinking about.
But let me tell you, it's NOT because he's shy. If he was shy, it would show in his body language as being stiff and rigid. He's not. His body is pretty relaxed and takes enough space. Still crosses his arms, but in a "don't bother me" way, not a "please don't judge me" way.
He's just disinterested.
I relate to it a lot in real life! People at my job think I'm too shy to talk to them, but no, I just DON'T WANT TO. I'm not scared of any if you, there's just nothing to talk about. I don't know your business, you don't know mine, our interests don't collide. If I talked to you about my interests you wouldn't listen anyway. Small talk? Ew, are y kidding me?
However, I like to listen. I'm an extrovert personally (unexpected huh) so I love being around people, but it doesn't mean I have to takk to them. I'll just sponge the information they are babbling about so I know my community better. When I meet new group of people where everyone knows eachother but me, I'm not going to feel awkward, it's perfectly fine to observe.
Sniper seems to fit into this kind of behaviour too. So he's not shy in a social anxiety sense".
NOW LET'S TALK ABOUT THE BLOODLUST!!
Yeah you all know his in-game voicelines. You feel either horny or assaulted after he rolls these sadistic words on his tongue. Yes I said sadistic, are you gonna argue?
"We professionals don't give speeches we just take a shot" he says in the comics. OH YEAH? IS THAT WHY YOU HAVE THE MOST FUCKING VOICELINES OF ALL OF THEM??
Have you ever noticed how much attention he puts into saying how 'professional' he is? Like, yeah no shit, they all kinda are. But why, unlike other mercs, he insists on calling himself a professional with standards and morals, detached from emotions and feelings, so much???
There's literally no reason to be ashamed of being a killer and to admit that you enjoy killing people, you were hired to Mann Co. for that specifically!!!
My assumption: it's a personal disgust towards himself and his anger issues. I've said it before already and I will again.
His so called 'shadow side' that he suppresses so much. It loves to cause people pain, it loves releasing the inner anger, it is being feral and impulsive in nature. Sniper cannot let himself be like that for whatever reason. He's already built a clear picture of what he is in his head and he doesn't want to destroy that.
The only time he allows himself to be a monster is in the battle because it comes naturally. However, when it's not a situation of adrenaline rush, when people want to talk about his persona face to face, he starts to defend himself and bury his face under the lies he believes in.
And THIS is anxiety. To be scared to be truly perceived. Not like many people tried, but I assume he wouldn't like it.
Bro really thinks he doesn't have feelings lmaoooo imagine being so emotionally immature the only way to process your emotions is to shot a human dead.
So, is Sniper anxious? Yes. Is this social anxiety? No, he's not shy. Is he an unhinged murderer? Yes. Does he identify as one? No. It's really a little bit more complicated than the two thesises from the beginning.
He's a person. Obviously not mentally healthy. High dimensional. Can be potentially broken or healed in terms of a good character study.
I might be very wrong though and most of the assumptions are simply guessing by grasping the patterns, but usually when I analyze someone like thus, it turns out mostly right. But correct me if you feel like it.