Sakura Wars Chapter 17 ~Do you want to build a snowman?~

[ozaline]

The movie which has a narrator rather than relying on title cards, opens up on an old manor house.



Monster-Human's not a fun name! I'm gonna call him... Wolfenstein!





















Back at the theatre, Oogami is scolded by Yoneda.







"But, I could have killed all those people."





I mean it's kinda ironic in a way that a series that presents an idealized version of the Taisho Democracy tends to have villains who are all reactionary, "Make Japan Great Again," types... Since the Taisho Democracy while much freer, and not reaching the horrors of the early Showa years was not exactly blameless. But still I do appreciate the themes that the game presents of global co-operation, and freedom.

--Anyway, later Maria and the others discuss the fact that Iris has gone without a few meals, only drinking water and keeping to herself. Maria states that she thinks simple fear would not have been enough to make Iris lose control like that.





"That past--



Iris comes down and Kanna tries to get her to eat.







Iris asks Oogami if everyone would hate her if she didn't fight, he tells her that if she doesn't want to, she shouldn't, and that no one would look down on her.

The next Day Iris is sitting in the theatre's outdoor court, when she sees a bird fall to the ground.



Iris begins to glow





Just then the alarm sounds... the enemy has attacked.

Comments

[alicemacher]

The ideal time to brief the team on Iris's history would've been "as early as possible." Granted, it's easy to say that from the perspective of present-day psychology.

[ozaline]

In the game it actually doesn't come up for a full two calendar years after this point, it's actually something that comes up in the second game, and in the first game it really is just her being scared. And the conflict between her wanting to be seen as a grown up, and her obviously not being one.

I'm not sure if that backstory was devised before the first game (cause there is a lot of backstory that was hinted at but not exactly spelt out), but in the first OVA it's definitely a thing when their ship arrives in Japan to take Iris to join the X-me... Hana-gumi Ayame knowingly tells her, "she's not alone anymore."

[alicemacher]

So in the games do they not go as much into the characters' backstories as we've seen the manga does?

[ozaline]

Well not in this instance. The manga has the obvious benefit of hindsight. The manga began in 2002 which was the same year the fourth game came out, and by then there had been two OVAs, a movie, a TV series (which is non-canon), a bunch of light novels, a dozen or more live shows... The point is the manga had a lot of material to draw on, the game also had a 3 year production schedule which was quite challenging cause there had not been another game like it, so I'm sure lots of ideas were left on the cutting room floor. The manga can also shift the camera away from Oogami more often, not that the game doesn't but you don't want to take control away from the player too often.

In the first game Maria, Sakura, Sumire, and Kanna all have their pasts explored a bit, but Iris and Kohran don't get as much attention in that department till the second game (which does a lot more character study anyway).