Behind the Plots of 2015: Part 1: Ghosts and History... Specifially, History Ghosts! Joyce Jr. Plot

The long promised blog has arrived at your doorstep with a behind the scenes look at JRM's three major plots of 2015!

Let us begin with the first one that ended!

JOYCE JR., HIKER ANTHONY, AND THOMAS

I can't say some things about Thomas quite yet as we'll be learning them next year, but let us give some time to the rectangle who sacrificed himself at the end of this plot.

I've waffled on RPing video game characters before and I wanted the first one I picked to be something unique and unusual. I don't think I rejected many characters because they were from video games, and old Reject Characters post show some early temptations, but it was Thomas who earned the right to be my first video game protagonist because of the challenge he'd impose. Also, because I wanted JUMPROPEMAN'S FIRST VIDEO GAME CHARACTER!!! to just be a rectangle. A red rectangle.

Thomas Was Alone is also a platformer with a bit of a place in my heart. I dabbled in the idea of doing Let's Play on Youtube once upon a dream, but since my computer sucks I could only record flash games or very simple games... and Thomas Was Alone's initial Game Jam version was one I picked. It wasn't anything special then, since it had no narrator yet, but it was a cute enough foundation and I made and posted the video. What really set it apart was when the developer was turning his Game Jam prototype into a full game and actually posted his trailer for the game as a video reply to the youtube video back when Youtube Video Replies were a thing. The idea that he saw the video I made of his game made me feel special <3

Anyway, THAT is the true reason that Thomas was picked, with the joke "it's just a rectangle" cementing it. Also, his silent nature lead to the quick introduction of his narrator, although both Thomas and the Narrator spun away from their incarnations in the game as time went on. When you first meet Thomas the Narrator even mentions this is the third time that Thomas felt alone, a reference to the Game Jam prototype and final product game. Thomas was a ficitonal character, the video game character ripped from his game and placed in our world with the Narrator following after him and certain mechanics coming as well. One thing I've never been too much a fan of is when I have a character from something and having it be referenced. "Hey I played your video game!" was one big barrier to using video game characters, and why characters like Hector and Vector have legitimate sounding reasons for being in the few games they were a part of. Thomas, however, was literally from his game!

The Chapters were also a core part of Thomas since before we met him, although their presentation isn't as minimalist as it is in his source game. What the chapters would mean was never set in stone, but near the end the last few were sort of preplanned since the schedule allowed me to do so. I was very fortunate that I got Thomas to put on a good showing on a few plows leading up to the final chapter, as he often felt hard to implement and the Narrator gimmick, while fun, sometimes dragged him down and made it even harder for him to get involved!

I gave Thomas his water weakness from his game, but its lethality lead to an issue that often came up in chatzy. If he had died by water, there were a few plans that bounced around my head. There are checkpoints in Thomas Was Alone, and Thomas might have respawned at his only "checkpoint" in our world: the computer he emerged from... which would probably be in the ZFS scrapheap at this point. Another was that, if people had tried to pursue a resurrection path for Thomas after the very permadeath, if it was really an issue (I did not want to revive Thomas but I did not want to push too hard to keep him dead if people pushed against me constantly) was to meet the Narrator. When he died, we even almost heard a "If you like to provide feedback, contact this address" or something, but ultimately I didn't think anyone would be pushing hard with the finality of it all and the Narrator giving an address instead of a proper epilogue woulda suuuuuucked.

But if he HAD, this is what the Narrator might've looked like...

Although the Narrator is most certainly meant to be British, I wanted to use this pic without telling anyone its origin. Since it don't matter no more: It's from porn! Bikini A-Go-Go is a naughty picture that I saw back when porn was hard to find and all, and for some strange reason, this narrator character here appeared throughout, stopping the action to give it some narrative. ...Not that kind of action, incidentally. I though including a character from a pornographic film who had nothing to do with porn and nobody would recognize as such would be funny, and in a set of stories I wrote elsewhere I made a similar character to this narrator who was fatter but still black and white and stepped in to talk sometimes. I guess things like him really leave an impression!

But Mr. Narrator would have told us about Thomas being fictional and this guy providing voice work on the game and be surprised that the Kobbers story about Thomas existed at all. It probably would've ended with us seeing Thomas in Thomas Was Alone, the happy rectangle we knew just in the game world being Thomas... although our Thomas was a lot more naive then the one from the game in the end, and our Narrator more sarcastic and irritable.

Thomas was always slated to have a final chapter and sacrifice himself... but the means to do so came later in his lifespan.

Joyce Jr.'s plot was only beginning to stir in my head back in August of 2014, when I went off to the Texas/New Mexico border for my friend/roommate's wedding where I was groomsman. On the car ride there, my dad played some books on tape that I listened to when not sleeping, and one mentioned the peculiar Revolutionary War figure of Joyce Jr. A brief history lesson: Joyce Jr. was a figure used in Colonial America during parades/ceremonies, where he'd lead the festivities. A man dressed to parody whoever the colonists despised, he would cart around effigies of the pope or whoever the hate was directed at until grumblings upgraded into revolutionary fervor. Joyce Jr. stopped solely being this figure of celebration and started performing acts of Tarring and Feathering against people who were deemed unfair... by him mostly. What was once a character anyone could dress up as like Santa Claus became a single man with a mission, and he even objected to some tarrings and featherings done either in his name or with his presumed blessing, posting notices around town to say as much.

The blog post introducing him and his quote on his profiles were direct quotes from Joyce Jr.'s real equivalent. And yes, Joyce Jr. was insistent on the Jr. because of him being a spiritual son to a figure of great revolution, George Joyce, who seized King Charles I in the English Civil War and was given an elevated role in myths surrounding him, right down to the belief he executed Charles himself. Either way, this curious character caught my imagination and I wanted to put him in RP! Historical Fiction has always been a joy of mine, but porting a real man from a couple centuries back was too cumbersome, so he became a spirit! Not a Jumpropeman type Spirit, but a spirit powered by the thoughts of men almost how North Dakota came to life thanks to the minds of the people on her. Take that sentence out of context and try to make sense of it!

Anyway, so Joyce Jr. was given his spectral form, and one of the few pics online associated with him seemed to fit, so next came the plot. Pretty simple: Kobbers were getting more and more fans and adoration, something briefly touched on by the Church of Unity but I felt poorly explored. Joyce Jr. would use all that to try and win some converts to an idea of revolution, for his was a Spirit of Revolution, and it was all he could do! However, he could not do so alone, so much like I dug up Doeg the Edomite from the Bible for Kalisha, I grabbed the talking ass from Balaam. Balaam's ass had no name, but to keep the recognizability, I gave her the name of her famous rider, which lead to an early point of contention in Joyce Jr's and Balaam's relationship. Balaam was originally a sounding board for Joyce Jr. so he could do his musing and all, and since he helped from the shadows the first few times we saw him it kept him from being completely silent.

His powers were a mix on just influencing tractors, as he could supposedly "inspire" people, but I evolved it to be more interesting and to incorporate his role involving Tarring and Feathering... a practice I openly condemned in 2011 when Rain's buddies did it to a guy. I was hoping the fact he had no issue tarring and feathering peeps would be a first clue to his more extreme nature. I think I've worn out the ally-turn-antagonist formula so I'll be holding back now, but Joyce Jr. did actually want the Kobber to succeed! they just needed to start a war to do so!

Some scrapped things involved Joyce Jr. turning unruly citizens on Kobbers in a mob as his method of fighting since Anthony wasn't always planned as so strong a pawn, and before I gave him the limitation of never going indoors, I considered him being starstruck by entering the bar, calling it a hallowed ground he wasn't worthy of being in and still leading to his time spent away from the bar. Mostly, he was meant to make the Kobbers think, both about their celebrity and what they could be doing to better the world rather than punching bad guys in the face. He speaks for himself in his talk with Widow Maker, so no need to dawdle.

On other matters, the final confrontation with Joyce Jr. was slowly born. It evolved from possibly no fight to the mob fight to just fighting him to eventually incorporating late-addition Anthony. The nuke itself was late to the party too, and had I known missiles would be the in thing this year I might have found some other way for him to be threatening, but the nuke came together with Thomas's needed ending and that's how those two came together. Also: Thomas's orb was almost left just in the bar instead of with Tupai, since Tupai was a late add to Thomas's plot but helped it grow a few extra chapters and leave an emotional spot even if for some reason everyone hated Thomas. At least you could feel bad for Tupai instead if that were true, right?

Before we move on: Tupai was a growing idea turned spur of the moment character, and one he was actually placed in that trash can, I suddenly came up with all the ideas for his relationship with Thomas. He broke down the wall of Thomas being useless in combat just in time for it not to matter! Tupai was also born in a similar way to Thomas, in that he was the "I'M FINALLY RPING A TOUHOU" to the "FINALLY RPING A VIDEO GAME CHARACTER" that was Thomas. The strange technical truth kind of a fakeout! The sounds he made were the only quirk about writing him though, as I tried to flex my abnormal simile chops to describe sounds that technically don't exist since chupacabras aren't real.

And our last player in this plot: Hiker Anthony. Originally brought in from the Future folder to fill a very important role: DYING! Unfortunately, he didn't die. As I was doing my quick catch-up on blogs before the season, I grew fatigued, and the idea of the untouchable hero who just kills the bad guys no problem really rubbed me the wrong way. Hypercabale heroes aren't fun to read, the moment you realize they won't face adversity in their battle it's just reading bad guys dying. Anthony was meant to twist your expectations in the Six Months... blog he was part of. Look! A new character! A backstory for him, he's got these Pokemon too, look at this stuff I've thought up for him! ...that made him hard to kill in the end. But although Anthony was certainly not hypercapable in his battle with the then-unknown Blajboa, he lost. He was dying. The hero we were told to watch failed.

Hiker Anthony himself was picked because of him sticking hard in the minds of me and my brother. "Don't you mean my brother and I, JRM?" No, I read a whole book about the evolution of grammar recently and it's only "wrong" in the same way that it used to be wrong to say "all the time" when you meant always or to even use the word "standpoint" in conversation! Anyway, the Hiker who kept calling looking for a battle in Pokemon Gold and Silver made an impression, with his basic team, easy access for Pokemon training, and constant calls, and the Hiker class was my first exposure really to "GWAHAHA"s of hearty JRPG men. So, this NPC was lifted and dressed up to die, but attachment and an idea for him to be the person who could enter the bar for Joyce Jr. came up, so he got saved in the end. The town he defends and lives in, Blue Diamond, is a real location! Although when the Kobbers arrive, the building they enter to the missile silo is based on a strange one I saw in Corpus Christi near the Selena Museum that stuck out in its strange lifelessness amidst decorated buildings.

Anthony's Pokemon were slowly picked and I'm happy with the ones we got in the end, but here are the ones who didn't make the cut!

Golem and Machamp didn't make the cut because I felt Anthony never would have traded... even though he owned both Golem and Machamp in his source games. Graveler and Machoke were shoo-ins because they were owned by him in Pokemon and were the furthest forms of his two mainstays, although I did not give him the duplicates he used in Gold and Silver to keep things fresh and interesting. Nosepass and Throh were considered and scrapped as my biases took over instead of potentially appropriate/useful Pokemon, and I'm sure I considered a member of the Timburr line as well. There might have been others considered too, but we got Dunsparce (because Anthony is the one who calls to tell you about their swarm, plus, Dunsparce is great), Crustle (a quick favorite of mine in Gen V), Bibarel (not a Bidoof, but equally doofy and still adorably dumb), and Shuckle (who I like because its a worm in a rock and a goofy Pokemon). I tried to give each Pokemon a distinct personality, with Dunsparce, Bibarel, and Crustle getting soft character arcs as well as they developed insecurities.

There were some small facts about Anthony that didn't gel with the general RP Pokemon stuff: Anthony only had six Pokemon because in Johto I decided it was against the law to carry more as a way of controlling power, a la gun control but with Pokemon. Also, Anthony had no luck finding an Pokemon in America and that's what lead to his almost-retirement to Blue Diamond, although no one else had that problem later.

Anyway, Anthony's involvement in RP was never meant to go beyond Joyce Jr.'s plot either. Initially, he was going to agree with Joyce Jr.'s position and he'd die defending it. Blue Diamond was getting harassed by Kobber-like and Kobber-opposed weirdos due to its proximity to Vegas and Anthony was not happy holding them off. If the Kobbers were forced to prominence, they'd have to hold them back as they were now accountable, but this later evolved into a respect for the Kobbers and a belief they should be in charge for better reasons. In the end, Anthony became too nice to do so, but Tom's plot killing Anthony gave me a great way to preserve the intended end for the plot where Anthony, who had replaced the mob and other means of fighting Joyce Jr. as the real battle. Now, Joyce Jr. had a martyr and a puppet to fight Kobbers with, although it was regrettably only one of two times we got a real Pokemon battle with Anthony. If not for Anthony dying there, who knows what I would have done!

I also tried to have Anthony be more down-to-Earth than most Kobbers, but freaking out at their weirdness was a role transferred to Marina. Anthony was meant to get a last run against the Magpies but schedules ruined that possibility. Instead, he kind of fell of the map near the end, much like Blajboa and the Professors!

Now then, because I forgot earlier: Joyce Jr.'s fate and Balaam betrayal. Joyce Jr. is immortal since he's the spirit of an idea, but I wanted to give that satisfying ending so that Thomas dying wasn't for nothing. So, as Balaam became even more of a counterpoint to Joyce Jr., the idea of her turning on him after the battle and sentencing him to some fate began to grow. Balaam's zone she step through became the way to do it, and the idea of outdated ideas came to mind... and so did one way to make it a humiliating fate. I read about Whipping Tom at some point in the past, a man who just ran around smacking bottoms and yelling "SPANKO!" as he did so. There were at least two Whipping Toms in history, so this seemed to be some sort of common idea amongst men, anonymous bum smacking that is. This spirit would be Joyce Jr.'s eternal punishment then, an eternity in an empty void with nothing but a man constantly slapping his cheeks.

A brief throw back to Balaam: you may remember a scrapped talking donkey character from my Rejects blogpost. Surprisingly, she was not a revival of that idea. I apparently really just wanted to RP a talking ass.

I'm not sure how much I wanted Joyce Jr. being an antagonist to be a secret, although I certainly didn't want to come out and say it and keep up the ruse a while. Gooper was right not to trust him! I mentioned once how I wanted Tom Bombadil to be my "join plots late" character, but Joyce Jr. took his place in many ways before the almost improptu scheduling of his finale. I also think I was too conservative in how his tractor helped (or hurt) the Kobbers, and next year's character Ingrid will be providing set boosts in a purely benevolent role.

In the end: I'm glad Thomas got to have one single dramatic death instead of scrambling to make poor justifications that weakened its impact. I prefer the faceless Narrator over the image I chose, as it was almost purely picked out of the novelty of a porn character in RP and the nostalgia his image inspires. I don't feel Joyce Jr. was handled well do to a mix of not much interaction with Kobbers and a standard "fight this guy" ending, and Anthony probably did more than he was ever meant to but still missed out on the Pokemon Battles I wanted. I almost organized a Pokemon tournament to try and get him them but when people mentioned entering a trainer with a single Pokemon or something in it seemed less in the spirit of the event and I felt it not worth doing ultimately. And Balaam... I think I was pretty satisfied with her use! RIP Talking ass.

As for Anthony's Pokemon, I wish Bibarel and Anthony bonding was shown clearer and it might have happened if Viola hadn't used Cleffa in their battle, but that instead allowed me to wrap up Dunsparce feeling useless in battle. Crustle quite clearly had an epiphany in Fite Club and Graveler, Machoke, and Shuckle never had any problem to overcome, although Graveler did become slightly more humble and Machoke more affectionate to Anthony. Shuckle stayed Shuckle, as it should be.

And I believe... that's all I can think of to say about this plot! I at first dreamed of doing these all in one post, but it is time-consuming and I want to do other stuff tonight than genuflect on my old RP.

Did that bother you? Me using genuflect incorrectly instead of reflect? Now THAT you can call me out on!

Anyway, if you have any questions about THIS plot (not the other two), feel free to ask them! Or you can ask them about the characters involved in this plot. Next blogpost will be on JRM's plot and its related cast, and we'll end with the Alruthines, as well as touching on the Professors in that blogpost unless I feel I can stretch them more and maybe make a blogpost about "the rest of the 2015 cats". Until then!