[quote=John Moose]I find some of the descriptions of Is-Not really touching.
"She will rise from the zee and the ice like dawn. She will be garlanded with red and decked with gold."
"If you burn, you burn like a candle. If you die, you die like dawn."
I think the sharp contrast with the darkness and grittiness of Neath makes it easier to truly appreciate the splendour of Parabola.[/quote]
Dear Lord. I missed those sentences. Now I think they will be forever in my mind: "If you burn, you burn like a candle. If you die, you die like dawn."
The text beyond the Gate is nice, but I especially like the text leading up to the Gate:
The Flukes know your name, but they do not call it…Here is a black glass mountain, shuddering with lights…Your ship cries out to it, and it cries back…Your ship will founder here, and you will stride carelessly from its wreck, snowflakes unmelting on your skin. (Yes. Yes.)
[quote=earthbourn]The text beyond the Gate is nice, but I especially like the text leading up to the Gate:
[snipped by L.L.][/quote]
This is incredible. I’m glad you shared this.
Several people mentioned Seeking finales. I have yet to do any serious Seeking, but this line from Sackmas day 9: At Your Window continues to haunt me.
[quote]A trace of sadness, like the frost which silvers the night […] I was Mr. Candles. I will not be again. [/quote]
It wrenched a little heartbreak out of me. Without my permission! edited by Lamia Lawless on 9/25/2017
Whether this is beautiful may depend, but it has perhaps resonated with me more than anything else in the game as of yet: from the Renown:Bohemians 8-14 action.
And thus with a kiss
It’s harder to romanticise Romeo and Juliet when Romeo has gurgled and foamed to death, and Juliet’s blood has sprayed into the audience.(…)
This truly made the world real for me.
The Neath is a unique place in many, many aspects, one of the most glaring being the inability to permanently die (at least in Fallen London). And, well… of course art would make use of that. Art makes use of everything, it’s what it does, to comment on or add meaning to the world, create something where there was nothing and stir emotion in its audience. Morbid and shocking, yes, but also an opportunity to add more immersion to one’s work.
It’s one of those little details that you’d never think of in passing but makes perfect sense once presented. And it is something I will cherish.
[quote=Magrok]This truly made the world real for me.
The Neath is a unique place in many, many aspects, one of the most glaring being the inability to permanently die (at least in Fallen London). And, well… of course art would make use of that. [/quote]You would LOVE this month’s Exceptional Story, "The Stone Guest". It’s about film-making in the Neath.
I can’t recall any specific lines or phrases, but I loved the way that the theme of childhood vs. adulthood was repeated many times in HOJOTOHO! I don’t want to say anything since I’ll spoil everything by talking too much, but it is easily my favorite ES of the ones I’ve played.
Wordlessly you hand them over, and with two quick paces she places them in the fire. When she returns to sit opposite you her hands are shaking. The two of you talk, honestly. It goes no further than that. There are no confessions of feeling. You are never less than a room apart. But something else connects you: a moment of vulnerability - the firmest currency of the Game - that you cast away. edited by A Dimness on 10/2/2017
From “The Awful Temptation of Money.”
“Trade is the basis of civilisation, from the marbles the urchins swap in their games to the deals that shape an Empire. If only they were all honest. You have a lead on some rare coins.”
[quote=Bitty]I always thought this line from when you’re on a slow boat passing a dark beach on a silent river when you have Nemesis is real chilling
"They must have passed this way, on this boat. You could go on and join them, in the silent houses of the dead. But then how would you avenge them?"[/quote]
Speaking of Nemesis, this line sums up that entire Ambition quite nicely:
"Revenge is important. What you are becoming is not."
"[i]You remember the hollow voice you heard in your dreams. The gnawing hunger in your belly. The way the darkness seemed populated with tiny movements. The sense you had that your bones were outgrowing your skin… perhaps you shouldn’t go back. It’s more peaceful here."
[/i]I think, in general, FL has so many stories about becoming something monstrous and crossing lines you’ll never be able to cross back, that moments of clarity and hesitation in the madness make for some very, very heavy words. My character getting an outsider perspective on their Seeking for a moment really showed me what I was doing to him, and what kind of hellish fever dream his life had become.
I think one of the key Monster-Hunter unique options deserves mention, for all of the wonder that below the waves conjures up. It’s a whole separate world you embrace, the hunter slowly becoming the monster. Much like John here is saying, and other snippets that have been quoted here in the thread.
"Moments in darkness"
False-star light on the water, in the moment before your dive shatters the surface –
The seal, lithe as an otter, harsh-skinned as a shark –
The pounding embrace of threshing waters –
The Movement and the Act, which cannot be performed above the water or in the sight of living men –
The ecstatic roar of the Seal –
The blood, spilling warm into the icy water, so you can draw it into your mouth. The Hunter’s sacrament –
You rise from the water with your harpoon hooked neatly through the Seal’s neck-plates as it follows meekly in your wake. Your bo’sun sees the predator’s secrets in your eyes, and lowers his gaze.
I need to play the Eaten storyline to know why everyone is so enthusiastic about it. It terrifies me there are actually multiple outcomes, with how long in theory it takes to get to those outcomes.