trivard676True story here. It was only a few short months ago when I had first visited fanfiction.net. I knew what it was, but had never actually been there. I kind of wish I never went. A friend of mine had written a story and posted it there and they figured that being a prolific reader and writer, I should give it a read and critique. Well, I did a lot of reading that night and I learned a lot of things. Specifically that a lot of people really ‘really’ like to write about people shacking up in their favourite franchises.**
Seriously…?
Of course I clicked on the link…And there are categories for each and every thing that you could think of, including some of our favourite series here at RoH, with a boat-load of stories to boot. Rule 34.
…seriously.
So my little learning experience got me thinking. Sure, it’s only fantasy – sometimes some really explicit, one-shot fantasy, but…knowing anyone from the world of survival horror in real life would have to suck. Sure, they’d be handy in a Zombie Apocalypse, but ask them to help you move and it’s all “biohazard this,” and “I’m searching for my dead wife,” that.
#5 – Everything is a Weapon, and Weapons are Everywhere
Have you ever gone searching for something in a junk drawer and end up finding something else? Sometimes it’s a game or some other gadget you forgot you had. If you’re extremely lucky, it’s a stash of money that your parents/significant other have been keeping from you and probably forgot was even there. Or in the case of our survival-horror buddies: stockpiles of weapons and caches of ammo.
Interesting. We’re out of sugar…AGAIN
You wouldn’t want to let your kids anywhere near these people, either, lest you want them to learn all of the intricacies of that RPG just hanging out in the corner of Chris & Jill Redfield’s basement (cuz they’re married/engaged/dating in pretty much all Fantasy Lands, see?) at an extremely young age. Or, just end up picking up their bad habits, like using these weapons without any formal training or even a basic understanding of how they work. With all of that improper storage, we wouldn’t be surprised if they even work.
Simple point and click interface. What else is there to know, really?
Oh, and the stuff that they do need? Well it’s never as simple as going to the place where it’s generally stored and going and getting it. Oh no, there might be a little bit of sugar here, in the kitchen, but the rest of it is in the livingroom. There’s some in the basement and in there’s a nice little stash in the garage, too. Y’know, in case you run out, you don’t want to have to schlep all the way back to the kitchen.
#4 – They Hate Your Pets/Plants/Kids
So maybe you invite old Jill and Chris over for supper. They ring the bell and your dog Barky is just so excited that he guns it for the door when you open. Just in time to get a round-house kick to the teeth by…Milla Jovovich? Wait, what?
Anyway, if your dog looked like one of those loveable mutts from RE2, this kind of behaviour might be acceptable. But in all other cases it’s generally frowned upon to kick your host’s pet in the face upon your arrival at their home. But they’re just being cautious, right? Still…Barky would never hurt anybody…
Your dog doesn’t look like this, either.
Things might not have gotten off on the right foot here, especially right after Regina tranquilized your bearded dragon with an oversized dart she concocted from the first-aid kit in your bathroom. So you invite them in to the backyard patio to cool things over. You run inside to grab a couple of beers and come back to the three of them in the centre of your yard dispensing copious amounts of herbicide and fire on your prized garden. Need a babysitter? It’s pretty much been determined that Ethan Mars (a surival horror? Ehh…whatever) sucks at watching kids, and you wouldn’t want to let your kids anywhere near Isaac Clarke…
#3 – So This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things…Only Incredibly Complicated Things
Jeez, you just lost your keys. They’ve got to be around here somewhere, right? Let’s look around. Well maybe you left them in your pants pocket, or they fell between the couch cushions? Or perhaps they’re in this priceless painting on the wall? Or maybe they’re in this antique heirloom? Well whether they are or not, there’s only one way to find out.
That belonged to my grandmother. Dick.
Or maybe your significant other doesn’t like to use keys? Keys are old fashioned and need to be carved into ornate card faces. What you really need for your home is a different crest to get into every important room, or a series of key-cards with corresponding lock puzzles that need to be decoded properly with odd word-based puzzles to open various doors. The keys and the unlocking device will always be hidden in various valuable vases or jewelry boxes throughout your home. See, that’s what any security expert will tell you.
When you’re visiting James Sunderland in his lonely old water-logged hotel room (assuming you played your cards right previously…) it’s important to arrange the music box pieces in just the right so you can gain access the bathroom. But don’t look at the plunger too often, or the toilet won’t flush.
Assuming you can hold it that long…
#2 – They’re Kind of Asses…
Perhaps it’s just something that you only have to have been their to understand, but that…will never be us. We’ll never understand the horrors that they’ve faced in their lifetime. Horrors which for whatever reason, these people have sought ‘not’ to seek counselling for. Their counselling is constantly working. To live in a world without fear is all the counselling they’ll ever need and they’ll work until they see it through, even if that means ‘more’ terror-inducing nightmares and kicking your dog in the face every time they come over.
Take a look at Alan Wake. The dude is a prick, and do you really think that a couple of nights in Limbo are going to change that? The only real friend that he has is Barry, and we’re pretty sure that Barry sticks around because Alan pays him (sure, he’s his “agent,” right…). Seeing as how Alice is his photographer, the only people in this man’s life are there because he pays them. He lets Clay Steward catch a hatchet in back, and almost lets Pat Maine take a bullet for him, and despite having the time, never calls old Pat back to ask if he’s alright.
No wonder neither one of them want anything to do with him in this photo…
Many of us actually know people who have witnessed horrific things who repeatedly tell you how horrible they were. We want to be good, compassionate friends, so we’ll listen to them and try to help them, but we’ll just never understand.
And any of our troubles pale in comparison, too.
Can’t stand your boss? You’ll get no sympathy from Barry, whose boss made him a pretty indecent proposal. And he’ll never pass up a moment to remind you how difficult it was to accept. So difficult in fact that it’s brought up whenever you seem to have a problem. Followed by “Ya know.” And we always thought he seemed to be the most normal one…
“As soon as this is over, I’m moving to Canada.” –the words of a normal man.
1 – They Have the Worst PTSD
For the uninitiated, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder that generally occurs after a person has witnessed a particularly traumatic event. PTSD is a real thing that happens to people, and it’s a living nightmare.
An estimated 1 in 8 soldiers return from conflict with PTSD.
Take a look at some of the symptoms and tell us how fun it would be to live with. Hang with us, there are a lot…
- Flashbacks of the event
- Recurrent memories of the event
- Repeated dreams of the event
- Physical reactions to situations that remind you of the event
- Emotional numbing – as if you don’t care about anything
- Feelings of detachment
- Inability to remember important aspects of the trauma
- Lack of interest in normal activities
- Avoiding places people or objects that remind you of the event
- Sense of having no future
- Difficulty concentrating
- Exaggerated response to things that startle you
- Hypervigilance
- Irritability or outbursts of anger
- Sleeping difficulties
- Survivor’s Guilt
- General anxiety disorder symptoms (agitation, dizziness, fainting, heart palpitations, fever, headache, paleness…)
So you get the idea – not a fun kind of thing to have. When it goes unchecked, it can lead to drug and alcohol dependency, depression and/or suicide. However with counselling, sufferers can be medicated or taught methods of coping with their traumas. And our beloved game heroes are the posterchildren for the disorder. The media, especially television and movies like to romanticize the disorder, making the sufferers the ‘silent, sensitive type’ with a dark past that teenage girls seem to adore. However, anyone who personally has PTSD or knows someone who does, they can attest to the nightmare that it is, and the vise-like grip it has on your life. And there’s nothing glamourous about that.
The ad campaign for RE5 played off of this
It does sound like kind of an asinine thing to say, that you wouldn’t want to be around people who are genuinely sick. The disorder itself is a nightmare, and by association, it’s not much fun either. Living your life on eggshells is not really living, either. Be careful not to mention your recent tour of Alcatraz to your friend Murphy or Torque and going camping with Alan Wake is a bit of a downer when the sun goes down.
Not to mention that PTSD puts a great strain on personal relationships. It’s hard to be intimate with someone who has unwarranted outbursts of anger, can’t sleep and never cares about anything. Zoey might have a hard time looking at Francis without remembering the time that they fought off all of those Infected together, and by association when her parents/everyone she ever loved turned into a monster. Jill and Chris can never sleep and yell at each other all the time. Isaac has to go into accounting just to get away from all the plasma tools he’s so used to using in ways not indicated by the user manual. Not to mention the panic attacks, too.
In Silent Hill 2, a bit of PTSD is factored into the story, whether intentionally or not.
<<SPOILER ALERT>> James Sunderland is looking for his wife – the same wife wrote him a letter saying that she was in their special place, in Silent Hill. And this would be the same wife that’s been dead for 3 years. He seems to believe an unknown disease killed her. He repressed the memory so far into his psyche that he forgot about it, until it was brought back to the surface in Room 312.
“And that’s why I have the string tied around my finger.”
**We’re sure a lot of hard work goes into making fanfics and it’s a lot of fun. No offense intended 🙂
