personal dump ahead, feel free to skip this one ^_~
cw: vague game typical mentions of suicide and self harm, minor mention of gender dysphoria, minor spoilers

“No one really likes what I make, but I think that’s OK.
To create is my only smile, regardless.” ▷

i find as more time passes it becomes increasingly difficult to create a respectful, nongratuitous or exaggerated mental illness narrative in gaming. i don’t find the way my own brain speaks to me as very respectful either though. this little renpy title was released only around a year prior to this review, and i felt momo’s searing monologue and pleas were dangerously familiar during a particularly rough chapter of my mid to late 20s.

quite a lot is bad right now! i’m stuck presenting as a gender i don’t associate with in a meager retail assistant role, suffering customers who look at me like i’m a bug they’ve stepped on. i endure chronic muscular pain and poor circulation which leaves me barely recovered enough for my next shift. i bite back an intense anger that doesn’t feel like me, having to physically restrain myself from striking out against a wall. i’m creatively starved and have shamefully not drawn even a single sketch for weeks, contributing to my already passive guilt. “just draw for fun! just do it!” yeah, right.

it’s alright though, i guess. i’m medicated again on a comfortable dose, speaking with a therapist fortnightly, and trying to do what i love in the simplest way possible, like playing these games and writing these silly reviews!! like momo, there are people who love me, but my (her) brain doesn't take much effort to forget these wonderful things, of course.

it’s easy enough to say i saw myself in this cute doll, far from the first person to i’m sure. To echo Archagent’s sentiment from her own wonderful review you should totally check out, there’s something idealised about being a mentally ill doll, wearing a cute little dress with bright anime eyes and thin ball joint arms and legs. this allure is heightened in eve’s dreamlike vignette digital photography she (assumed pronoun, please feel free to correct!) posts to her twitter. plastic arms manipulated into a cheer, to brandish an item, or perhaps legs bent to sit upon something soft in introspection. these limbs are not my responsibility. nothing is.

12 years ago i almost fell just like momo did. i relapse, grow frustrated at those who care about me simply because they do, and overindulge in the worst in me. but i’d like to believe there’s joy and light out there, and that none of this pain was for nothing.

thanks for reading my diary! you should read momo’s too☆