Remember the How I Met Your Mother series finale backlash? Fans who had watched the show for 9 seasons felt betrayed by the ending. To them, it felt like the creators and writers had been stringing them along, completely invalidating the original premise of the show.
And who can blame them? The writers were building to something for 9 seasons, just to throw it under the bus in the literal final moments of the final episode of the series. To the fans, it wasn’t a “fun” twist. It was a betrayal to the time they had invested in watching a show with a certain premise.
Now, technically, the writers did deliver on the premise of the show, but for many it wasn’t in the spirit of what the premise was. Fans were left asking, “If you (the show’s creators and writers) wanted a certain ending to the show, why did you use this original premise to begin with?”
You see, the How I Met Your Mother writers weren’t interested in crafting an ending that kept to the spirit of the premise. In their minds, they “fulfilled” the premise on a technicality, and then finished the story in the way they wanted.
The premise of how Ted met his kids’ mom was of no importance to the writers. Ted telling his children about how he met their mother was simply a unique narrative device to have a television show about Ted’s life. Robin not being the kids’ mom after that memorable first date was the hook in the pilot episode to get the viewer interested in the story.
The problem is that the story the writers wanted to tell (Ted and Robin’s on and off again relationship and finally ending up together) ended up being in direct conflict with the established premise of the show.
And this is the writers’ fault. They are the ones who used the hook of Robin not being the kids’ mom in the pilot episode. They wrote themselves into a corner. And they didn’t have the guts to commit to this writing decision. Instead of honoring the premise of the show being about the kids’ mom, the writers tried to write themselves around the Robin conundrum on a sheer technicality.
And many of their viewers didn’t buy it.
I say all this, because after my third playthrough, and I’ve figured something out: this is the problem with Winter’s Wish: Spirits of Edo.
The writers created a premise that centered around heroes with no emotions. The emotionless heroes are the “hook.” It is something to make the game stand out and be different. Yet, for the writers, this hook must of become a hindrance to the story, making the routes messy and inconsistent. Because the emotionless heroes hook doesn’t work with the characters the writers created or the stories the writers decided to tell.
So. I’m left asking the Winter’s Wish writers, “If you wanted to write certain stories and create certain characters, why did you use this original “hook” of emotionless heroes to begin with?”
Because the results of this game are an absolute mess.
As always, character and plot analysis and spoilers after the cut! There will also be spoilers for Kunitaka and Kuga’s routes and Riku’s route from Lover Pretend, as well.
Continue reading “Winter’s Wish: Spirits of Edo – Yoichi ~ Plot & Character Analysis”
Otomes as Novels 