everything i make is disgaea

originally posted a large part of this on pillowfort, but i've added more to expand on the idea i was getting at there...

basically, disgaea is the lens i understand everything through. some people have star trek or star wars or whatever, i have the silly anime SRPG with exploding penguins. when they were making it, they knew it could be the last game their company ever got to make, so they decided to do whatever sounded fun at the time. it's set in the netherworld so that they'd have the freedom to make the characters do ridiculous things without a second thought. on the surface it's all jokes, but the story is so sincere! the spirit of disgaea is such a unique and tangible thing to me that i feel like i'm always chasing after it when making my own art.

this quote from a 2015 interview with sohei niikawa has always stuck with me:

[Disgaea] is about nonchalantly doing something completely ridiculous, but, at the same time, being completely serious about doing it.

he's talking about it in a gameplay context here (having the level cap be 9,999 instead of the typical 99 or 100), but it applies to the characters, too. i feel like no one embodies it better than valvatorez, who is one of the strongest guys in the series, but he will stand there and recite sardine facts at you for hours uninterrupted because he genuinely believes eating them will make you stronger. he is ridiculous. but he's also genuinely compelling at the same time! you can do both!!! it's the best!!!

i don't really write my characters around a core gag or anything, but i do like writing stuff where you expected something shallow but then you're crying real tears at the end. like, i don't think anyone went into BAD END THEATER expecting to find a moving love story. because my drawings have this cute and cozy vibe, it's like people just expect to read something fluffy that they'll forget about in a week... but if you've played my games before, you probably know better heheh.

a lot of comments i get are along the lines of "i didn't expect to feel all these emotions!!!" and... that's definitely how i felt when i first played disgaea! there's a reason i loved laharl so much, but the bar to explaining him is so high!!! no one plays disgaea, and d1 these days is kind of a tall ask!!!!!! but laharl etna and flonne remain strong faves among disgaea fans and i really think it's because of the contrast in their silly presentation and the seriousness of their actual stories.

lonely wolf treat is like, maybe you expect it to just be animal-ear girls being cute together, but by the end of chapter 4 you're suddenly heartbroken over trick leaving. i guess i shouldn't speak for everyone, maybe you cared about all the characters way sooner than that, or maybe it took even longer for it to really hit. but the core of it is a group of characters doing their best to navigate the world they're in, who all love each other and want to have a good life together despite their different backgrounds and circumstances. it's characters who look a certain way being seen as a threat for no good reason while the actual aggressors position themselves as having the moral high ground. it's... oops, the same themes from disgaea 1 actually!

SPOILERS BELOW!!!

disgaea isn't about oppressed groups or anything but like the idea that demons are inherently viewed as evil because of the obvious "well they're demons, so they must be!" when actually they're just operating under a different moral framework and are actually quite nice when it comes down to it... like...

disgaea 1 is especially about this, in d1 an archangel is scheming with the humans to take over all three worlds (angels, humans, and demons) by using the humans to attack/weaken the netherworld while posing as the humans' benevolent gods (well they're angels, so they must be!), meanwhile the actual leader of celestia (angel world) is working with the former ruler of the netherworld (who is thought to be dead, this is major spoilers for a game that came out 20+ years ago lol) to try to foster peace and understanding between their worlds which have been separated for so long that they can ONLY see each other as enemies.

the true end of the story is that laharl, the demon prince who had always rejected the idea of love because his human mother sacrificed herself to save him, finally comes to understand WHY she did that and sacrifices his own life in exchange for angel trainee flonne's--except he doesn't have to die for her to come back, she becomes a fallen angel (technically a demon?!), his willingness to sacrifice himself though concretely proves that demons are capable of love (and not just evil!), and flonne goes back to the netherworld with him to teach demons about love and kindness, and laharl as the new ruler of the netherworld makes formal peace with celestia, and his dad's spirit (who had been kept around by the seraph) is put to rest knowing that the netherworld is in good hands and his son is gonna be alright, etc....

LIKE WHAT IF INSTEAD OF VIEWING EACHOTHER AS FLAT STEREOTYPES WE COULD SEE THE NUANCE AND TREAT THE WORLDS WE DON'T UNDERSTAND WITH CURIOSITY AND KINDNESS? WOULDN'T THAT BE NICE?

so that's what i wrote about for lonely wolf treat. and because a lot of my stories take place in the same world, it comes up often, and because i've been prompted to think about it so much, it's just gotten more nuanced over time until we end up with night with timber! in my mind it's thanks to disgaea, but honestly these are common enough themes that come up everywhere so it's not like that was my only inspiration… it's just the one i feel the most deeply, which is why i wanted to ramble about it.

did you know disgaea is really good? please play disgaea! thanks for reading!