Fan Art

Another of my Bloodstained fanart. This one was done when Sword or Whip first appeared. As soon as my eyes gazed upon those graphics I thought "Damn son, these sprites could use a make over." I DID get a bit lazy with the background, but eh. The hype didn't let me work properly xD

Dracula Approves!

^ Even more quality fan-art.

Once again, I'm glad to be a member of this official site (formerly a fan-site).

for me this one will always be the best

Has anyone seen this lovely piece of fan-art, yet?

(Whoever drew this seems to be making romantic implications.  I'm not sure that will be the case in Bloodstained...but Gebel DID originally build his Castle all for Miriam, if I recall correctly.)

18 and 30 isn't creepy to me. I met my wife when she was 18 and I'm 13 years older. People don't give us a hard time about it. We are a very happy and healthy couple. In the 1800s, I don't know how much of a stretch it was for age differences or how common they were.

People are so PC now days, but if a young woman wants to be a housewife to an older man it's creepy? If she's not going to college and contributing income she's somehow less of a person? Women have the right to decide what they want to do with their lives, and for those who judge them for more traditional roles in modern society I say you have no right to discredit their agency. They have a capacity for individualized choice and action. That includes the choices of their husbands, careers and education. If they don't fit what you're used to or the choices you would make, don't insult them for it.

Let be perfectly clear, I'm not critiquing particular individuals but rather general patterns and circumstances. I obviously don't know every couple in which this age discrepancy exists and it wasn't my intention to imply that something of the sort could never work out. If you feel at all slighted that wasn't my intention and I apologize.

Now, let me elaborate on why I said what I said. The reason I, and a lot of people really, tend to be suspect about those sorts of relationships is due to the discrepancy in life experience, maturity, power dynamics, where each person is in their life, etc. An 18 year old is on their way to college/vocational school and often still has no clue what they want to do in their life. They may have little to no experience separated from home. Many of their political and lifestyle stances are in serious flux. Biologically, their brains and bodies are still developing. This is in contrast to a 30 year old who usually has started or is about to start their career in earnest, has lived away from home for an extended period of time and has some degree of financial independence and has most of their political & lifestyle stances solidified (though these are of course open to change moving forward). Biologically, both their brains and bodies have completed all the growth they will ever do. Given all those differences, there is often  very little overlap between these groups and in relationships, the 30 year old is often at a serious advantage (this is what I mean by power dynamics). Note here that it isn't the age difference that is weird so much as the actual ages. A 18 & 30 year old becoming a couple is not the same thing as say a 28 and 40 year old becoming a couple. Anyway, those reasons is why such relationships are often rare and oft-putting to outsiders. Again, this doesn't mean these relationships can never work but its the reason they sometimes raise eye-brows. As someone who is 30 themselves, I really can't imagine myself romantically attracted to any 18 year old. It would just come off as "why?" to me.

Speaking a little further about my life experiences, I'm actually friends with someone who at one point dated someone significantly younger than himself. I think she was 15-16 and he was 24-25 when they started. They relationship lasted for a few years and then they broke up amicably. To my understanding they still keep in touch. She was certainly very mature woman for her age. I never gave my friend any direct grief about it but I sure did find it weird that the two of them would even become romantically involved. I wasn't alone in this feeling either and it was certainly a contentious subject among our circle of friends. In fact it was such a spot of turmoil that some of my friends had a falling out. Fists flew. Friendships broke (though they have mostly mended now). I wouldn't attribute the falling out all to that relationship (there was other stuff going on in the background) but it was absolutely the spark that set things off.

When you add this all together and combine it with the fact that romances in video games just tend not to be well written in general, I'd rather not see Bloodstained pursue a romantic relationship between Miriam & Gebel. I feel it would have bad optics. Of course IGA is free to do as he chooses. I'm only expressing my opinion.

In summation, my opinion is a function of

• Sorry if I offended you, that wasn't my intention
• I have no idea where you are going with the housewife/career-choice discussion. That seems unrelated to my points.
  
• Relationships of this nature can obviously work but there are enough factors at play to make me skeptical of those sorts of relationships unless I get to know the individuals real well.
  
• I've never been in such a relationship myself but I personally am likely to find one very unappealing and the one sort of relationship of this nature I was aware of had some very awkward repercussions for nearby people.
  
• Relationship writing in video games often sucks. I feel if you want to intentionally tackle such a potentially tricky relationship, you want a very adept pen/writer.
• The story set-up we have is of a Gebel who seems to be slowly losing his mind and a Miriam who has partial memory loss and when she last met Gebel wasn't really in a position to develop feelings for him. I don't think that is a good basis upon which to build a romantic relationship.
  

So.....about that fan-art and how good it is

Now, I know this next post counts as double-posting, but I feel I just have to post this next piece of fan-art I found right on Deviant-Art!

How do you like this for PS4 box-art of the game?  (Technically the image on the casing is official art, of course)



Source: Qualbert - Bloodstained Box Art