Katawa Shoujo Forums

Megumeru wrote:
Thing is about today's youth--even in Japan--is how the sense of 'respect' slightly 'waned' towards the more elderly. What's more, however, is the simple fact that maybe Jigoro is just being over-protective. Ever wonder what caused Jigoro to be the single parent of Shizune and Hideaki or where does he get that dismissive attitude towards Hisao? There's a backstory of the family, to which I am speculating that Jigoro's wife died after Hideaki was born (childbirth complications, accidents, etc.)

Here in Britain respect hasn't so much waned as completely dive-bombed in some circles, so when someone demands respect in the way Jigoro does, it can easily be seen as arrogant. I must admit, I'd never given much gravity to the idea that Jigoro's wife dying changed him all that much, until you put this:

Megumeru wrote: what's more, none of the members in the family are capable of communicating with Shizune after figuring out she is a deaf/mute. Now imagine you're in Jigoro's shoes for a moment, struggling to communicate with your daughter who--I believe--to be the last 'spitting image' of your late-wife. One day, your daughter brought home her boyfriend who KNOWS how to communicate with her and is CAPABLE to. You would certainly go to lengths to dismiss him entirely; less chance of him taking your precious

Now that there I'd never even considered. In some ways that shows a vulnerability in Jigoro - an understandable one albeit. Conversely, I'm not sure what the relationship with parents is like in Japan once marriage has taken place, but from a purely western perspective it would be seen as something that he'd eventually have to move on from - it's not like he'd never see her again.

It was interesting to read that from an (I assume naturalised Japanese?) perspective, as it really did give some views I hadn't considered before. Might be worth going through her route again and seeing what I can pick up.

As a side comment before I begin, I will note that, if memory serves, A22 was one of the few Americans in 4LS. I'm fairly certain that Hivemind is American, Suriko and Crud are Australian, and Aura is Finnish (to account for the writers). Assuming the Japanese cultural references were intentional (and I can't imagine why not), it certainly implies that he did his homework (and potentially lends credence to reader interpretations that account for deaf culture as well).

As I've noted before, I didn't like Shizune's route at first. I enjoyed the story, but there were bits and pieces that didn't seem right, and the ending also felt a little off. It was one of the last routes I played, so I had an interesting set of expectations as I approached her route - in the context of the other routes, she's a bit stern and by the book, also very demanding; but she shows hints of surprising kindness and attention toward others.

Shizune's route is also one of the few which I've taken the luxury to re-play (and went over it with a fine-toothed comb). The second time through, a lot of confusing and seemingly inconsistent bits from the first run fell into place, and it struck me as a much more compelling and interesting narrative.

But, overall, I'd say the phenomenon is almost to be expected.

As I stated elsewhere, art is directed to challenge the audience (engage the intellect) or to entertain the audience (engage the emotions). Needless to say, most works of art perform a little of each role.

To expand on the terms "challenge" and "entertain," I'd say the following: The "challenge" presents an idea, concept, worldview, etc., and demands that the reader take hold of the proposition, wrestle with it, and come to a personal decision on what it means, and the truth of the proposition. The "entertain" evokes some sort of emotional response, be it happiness, sadness, anger, laughter, etc. A passive audience can be entertained, but you need an active audience in order to challenge them.

If I were to assign values of 1-5 to the routes' tendency to challenge the audience and to entertain the audience (in rough relation to each other), I'd give the following (respective) ratios:

Shizune - 5:2
Lilly - 1:4
Hanako - 2:5
Emi - 3:3
Rin - 4:4
Kenji - 1:1

This is not intended to slight any particular route, and a truly fair analysis would be better suited to rate these values on a scene-by-scene basis. It will likely also reveal my prejudices, but you can't really eliminate those - it's best to acknowledge them and calibrate your interpretations accordingly.

My biggest criticism of Lilly and Hanako's routes is that they have a tendency to tell you what to think - to conduct the majority of the interpretation for the reader. This allows for a greater focus on cultivating an emotional response. However, as I noted in that previously-referenced post, I subscribe to Maslow's hierarchy of needs as a yardstick to evaluate art. So I consider those routes to be weaker and less meritorious than the other routes.

Emi's route is kind of middle of the road - it isn't exceptionally challenging to see what's going on and to figure out the meaning of things being said and done, but it isn't handed to you on a silver platter, either. Feels are strong in places, and it's pretty consistently entertaining, but there isn't really much of a "huge impact" scene to compare to those of the other routes.

Rin's is described as a rollercoaster, and justifiably so. Very few people claim to truly understand Rin, and those that do have extremely conflicting interpretations. The vast majority of scenes are drenched in confusion, helplessness, and desperation.

And then we have Shizune's route. A few fun bits here and there, some cute scenes, the massive hammer that is the Mishabomb, and then a mountain of implications, subtle "blink and you'll miss them" expressions, cultural references, and to top it all off, a notoriously reclusive author who withholds even the barest hint of how he expects readers to engage it. And, though I have no intention of touching on it in any detail, it is the elephant in the room that, whatever such an artifact may mean, there exists a leaked draft of a dramatically different route.

In short, unlike the other routes (with the possible exception of Rin), there's no easy answer. The biggest questions of Lilly, Hanako, and Emi's respective routes can be satisfactorily answered with little more than a paragraph of exposition/interpretation (even if people are capable of going into much greater detail). For Shizune and Rin, you would need, at the very least, an extensive essay to really unpack what's going on in those routes to any degree that would do them justice. And people tend to like Rin's route more than Shizune's because of the significantly greater focus on the entertainment/feels side of the equation. Hell, the conclusion of Rin's route is pretty much "I may not understand [Rin], but that doesn't mean I can't like/love [her]."

Anyway, TL;DR - Lilly is Worst Girl, Misha is Best Girl (but Shizune's near the top).

AaronIsCrunchy wrote: On the cultural part, there is a large part of that to do with Jigoro - he seems to me to want to see a return to the older hierarchy of Japan, and in particular displays samurai ideals.

Interesting thing about that. Jigoro is a consultant. That means that he isn't part of a corporate hierarchy. In samurai terms, that makes him a ronin.

What this means in terms of samurai culture depends a lot on the period. In the later periods when the culture was very rigid, being a ronin was close to being an outlaw. In the earlier periods, being a ronin was respected, a notable example being Musashi himself. Regardless, he's not a samurai aka "servant". It seems like Jigoro isn't following samurai ideals so much as an idealized version of them.

Like everything else in Shizune's route, "Jigoro displays samurai ideals" is complicated and nuanced.

And of course, someone who knows more about Japanese culture than I do is welcome to correct me.

Megumeru wrote:Shizune's route is fine. It's reader-intensive and not a bag of fluff-ball that you cough up in the end of some of the more 'fluff-intensive' route.

Shizune explains early on about how 'actions' matters more than words--if my memory serves me right. If you take her word for granted, you'll miss a lot of plot-points or things she does to show you that she genuinely cares for Hisao. Not to mention it's also culturally-intensive, so unless you're very-VERY familiar with Japanese culture and customs (or has grew up experiencing it) you'd probably will not catch some of the more important/glaring facts of what is going on.


...I think there was a huge argument/debate about something like this a year ago.

If you've got any references to this discussion I'd love to read it. I have no doubt that there is a ton of stuff I'm missing.

Assuming the Japanese cultural references were intentional (and I can't imagine why not), it certainly implies that he did his homework (and potentially lends credence to reader interpretations that account for deaf culture as well).

I dunno. I asked the devs once how much consideration the team spent on Japanese cultural mores in the story and the answer I got was that the team was overal more focussed on telling the story and portraying the characters the way they had them in their mind than to try and emulate a Japanese high school environment as realistically as possible.

I don't know if Jigoro is "your typical asian father", but he's certainly not "your typical asian citizen". The man is loud and rude in a culture that values politeness (and Misha tells Hisao that Jigoro is basically that way to everyone, so it's not just protectiveness of his daughter), he's a consultant (in a business culture where consultants are very uncommon. Businesswise he seems a lone wolf rather than part of Japan's large corporate hierarchy), he carries a katana around in public (Japan has rather strict weapon laws and even if he had a permit for it then the practice of openly carrying a weapon in public would make a LOT of people uncomfortable...in a culture where making other people uncomfortable is a bigger sin than it is in the west) and he's publishing an autobiography before he's even retired. (again, in a culture that values humility)

I'm not completely ruling out the possibility that there's a lot more to Jigoro than meets the eye, but I'm also not ruling out the possibility that whatever subtle cultural references can be found in Jigoro's character may be coincidental after all since he clashes spectacularly with typical Japanese mores in several unsubtle areas.

Guest Poster wrote:I'm not completely ruling out the possibility that there's a lot more to Jigoro than meets the eye, but I'm also not ruling out the possibility that whatever subtle cultural references can be found in Jigoro's character may be coincidental after all since he clashes spectacularly with typical Japanese mores in several unsubtle areas.

I've thought for some time that the best way out is to assume that Jigoro Hakamichi is insane (a wonderfully unspecific term) and then work backwards, asking -why- he is insane. Clearly, everyone who knows him feels it, but makes some sort of allowance for it, probably due to a backstory which we are free to attempt but which we don't have enough evidence to completely reconstruct.

brythain wrote:assume that Jigoro Hakamichi is insane (a wonderfully unspecific term) and then work backwards, asking -why- he is insane.

Now this could be interesting. Nobody just becomes a Hawaiian-shirted samurai wannabe over nothing, after all...

Liminaut wrote:

AaronIsCrunchy wrote: On the cultural part, there is a large part of that to do with Jigoro - he seems to me to want to see a return to the older hierarchy of Japan, and in particular displays samurai ideals.

Interesting thing about that. Jigoro is a consultant. That means that he isn't part of a corporate hierarchy. In samurai terms, that makes him a ronin.

What this means in terms of samurai culture depends a lot on the period. In the later periods when the culture was very rigid, being a ronin was close to being an outlaw. In the earlier periods, being a ronin was respected, a notable example being Musashi himself. Regardless, he's not a samurai aka "servant". It seems like Jigoro isn't following samurai ideals so much as an idealized version of them.

Like everything else in Shizune's route, "Jigoro displays samurai ideals" is complicated and nuanced.

And of course, someone who knows more about Japanese culture than I do is welcome to correct me.

Hoho not quite.

A consultant works under a company in Japan and is responsible of helping other major companies succeed in its management (or wtv it is they ask about, be it interraction between companies, etc.) This does not make him a so-called 'ronin'

Not to mention, the whole samurai-system had all vanished since the crowning of emperor Meiji and the restoration era--that was in 1867. Also, Jigoro lacked the top-knot hairstyle which defines the status most prominently, which us far from 'samurai ideals'.

More or less I'm seeing an over-protective father who is pretty much against anyone who comes close to Shizune. It's even more interesting to know that here, if you introduce your partner to your family, you're stating a long-long term relationship (or a very serious one).

This also applies to Emi's route, which is pretty interesting.

More or less I'm seeing an over-protective father who is pretty much against anyone who comes close to Shizune.

Sorry. Not seeing it. He seemed just as brash and rude to Misha, Hideaki, and Shizune herself as he did to Hisao.

Shame we never got a scene with him, Lilly, and Akira.

Oddball wrote:

More or less I'm seeing an over-protective father who is pretty much against anyone who comes close to Shizune.

Sorry. Not seeing it.

You're western, so no surprise there. Cultural differences and all, pretty simple.

It's the same concept as how I see Lilly's 'H.A.S' as her being 'cheap/loose'. If she does something like that to Hisao, I am not surprised she'll do the same to someone else in the far future if their relationship ends.

Cultural upbringing/different perspective

Megumeru wrote:

Oddball wrote:

More or less I'm seeing an over-protective father who is pretty much against anyone who comes close to Shizune.

Sorry. Not seeing it.

You're western, so no surprise there. Cultural differences and all, pretty simple.

It's the same concept as how I see Lilly's 'H.A.S' as her being 'cheap/loose'. If she does something like that to Hisao, I am not surprised she'll do the same to someone else in the far future if their relationship ends.

Cultural upbringing/different perspective

I too see Lilly's use of 'HAS' as being 'loose' in a more traditional Asian context. However, it's more the statement of it that seems so; the private behaviour of individuals even in traditional contexts has always covered the entire range. She's also conflicted, being in two worlds at once; I would not be surprised if she finds herself being more conservative in Scotland. Moving from culture to culture sometimes also forces a shift in perspective that affects behavioural norms.

That's why it's especially interesting to watch Shizune at home vs Shizune in school.

You know, Megs, sometimes I get the feeling that you want to start fights around here.

Gah, I just read some of Jigoro's quotes and I already want to bash the guy for being so mean to Shizune. No wonder he makes the experience frustrating.

Oddball wrote:You know, Megs, sometimes I get the feeling that you want to start fights around here.

I'm just replying with my own opinion in kind.

So is it me, or is it you?

You're western, so no surprise there. Cultural differences and all, pretty simple.

It's the same concept as how I see Lilly's 'H.A.S' as her being 'cheap/loose'. If she does something like that to Hisao, I am not surprised she'll do the same to someone else in the far future if their relationship ends.

Cultural upbringing/different perspective

In what way is Lilly cheap/loose? Doing it in a place where someone might walk in on them? Sorry, Shizune does the same. Initiating the sex? Shizune does the same both times. Doing it twice within a 24-hour time span? Hisao does the same with Emi. Also, as brythain mentions, the typical Japanese lack of a sex life that's partially responsible for the declining birth rate has a lot to do with the lack of privacy and personal space that's part of life in Japan and it would make sense for Lilly and Hisao to do it more than once during a time where they're far away from civilization and actually do have more privacy than usual. What people do when they do have privacy covers the entire range. At least Lilly picks a spot and time where only Hanako could walk in on them. Shizune's picks spots and places where her younger brother, her katana-wielding father or even a random student, teacher or cleaning lady could walk in on them.

Really, the main difference between Lilly and Shizune seems to be the fact that Lilly acknowledges that the sex happened afterwards and the fact that Shizune doesn't may have more to do with her compartmentalized thinking.

Also, cheap/loose would imply sleeping around, being promiscious or putting out with every boy who showed an interest in her. Lilly does neither. She got plenty of opportunity as she mentions having turned down several confessions both at Yamaku and during middle school.

Finally, I don't think Lilly's upbringing was any less Japanese than that of the other girls. Maybe even more so, seeing that she's the most clear-cut Yamato Nadeshiko in the cast. Shizune acts more like a westerner than Lilly. In fact, Lilly's traditionally Japanese behavior is what ends up contributing to the central conflict in her route.

Gah, I just read some of Jigoro's quotes and I already want to bash the guy for being so mean to Shizune. No wonder he makes the experience frustrating.

Yaknow, you really oughta start reading the other routes sometimes. If for no other reason to be able to come up with your own impression rather than having to rely on quotes so much.