It’s been a few months since I published Friendless Fire, a video game where you play as a robot trying to save the internet from a powerful virus. Before this game, I didn’t put much effort into my games’ stories. They were just simple excuse plots. Friendless Fire’s story has a bit more going on. I’d like to share it with you today. Disclamer: this will spoil the ending. If you want to play the game and you care about the story, stop reading this post.
For the rest of you, this is the opening cutscene:
I showed the opening cutscene and the first level to my friends and family. Some of them asked me, “Why are you fighting Compalmate? He’s cute.” If I had a nickel for every time I made a pink antagonist that people white knighted for, I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice.
Anyway, TX2 proceeds with his mission. He fights Compalmate’s clones and talks to Wanda inbetween the levels. I’m not showing the conversations because this post is already long enough. Play the game if you’re curious. If you don’t want the ending spoiled, this is your last chance.
Eventually, TX2 takes out all the clones except one.
Enraged, Compalmate builds scary-looking armor (at least from his perspective). I call it “Antfoenent”. As you might have guessed, it’s several synonyms for “enemy” mashed together. Compalmate’s design is based on Kirby, so Antfoenent’s design is based on Dark Matter and Void Termina; final bosses of Kirby games.
Speaking of final bosses, TX2 defeats his.
Back when I was still making the game, one of the comments predicted that TX2 would teach Compalmate about consent, boundaries and personal space. I’ve lost a lot of readers recently, but if you’re still here, you were right.
This cutscene is followed by a list of enemies and their names. After that, the story ends:
And that’s how the story end. Compalmate learns to love humanity without being possessive. This story is canon; the virus turned helper will show up in future comics.
Now that I wrapped this up, I should talk a bit about the incident that happened two weeks ago. After I said I wouldn’t share AI generated fanart anymore, I got a lot of backlash; 68 comments and they were all negative. According to the analytics, people are still visiting my website, but almost nobody is commenting on my posts. I miss interacting with the fans.
I’m not sure how to proceed. Do I stick to my guns? Do I cave under pressure and share fanart, no matter how it was created? Is there some kind of compromise? Is it too late for one? These are uncertain times for my site.