Notes on The Beginner’s Guide

I started taking notes after the end of the notes game. How ironic.

Coda’s games get directly impacted by Davy’s meddling and existance - he has an observer so how he makes his games changes. They become dialectic in nature.

They meet during the notes game.

The prison game is a mess, but it has the same type of vibe as the notes game, because Davie liked the first one. It’s about your relationship with yourself and talking to yourself. But Davie doesnt like this one, because it is ultimately an ugly part of Coda.

The next one is the cleaning game. That exists to fuck with Davie’s insistance on meaning and consistency and details, it’s a happy rebellion.

Then is the lecture game. It’s even more directly about how Davy makes Coda into a god while entirely missing everything, all the little flags.

And then is the theatre game. IT took months for Coda to make it. And it’s about shutting yourself down. Again, it’s tongue and cheek about Davy. He is being extremely overt about Davy being the annoying presence of a person who doesn’t understand you.

And then is the spacing crashing. Open your eyes, its impossible to solve otherwise. Yes Davie. It is impossible if you dont open your eyes. It’s stopped being an outlet because you’re making it harder.

That’s ultimately their tragedy - neither can be honest. One can only see on the surface, while the other digs too deep. And in the end the only one who lives on is Davie. Their story is told implicitly, through the games, what Davie thought about them at the time and how it clearly affected coda.

Then is the sky islands game - the break from their relationship gives temporary peace, through calm reflection. But then he has to answer Davie’s expectations. The puzzle is other people. You cant talk yourself out of loneliness. And Davie, you can’t talk him out of it either. YOURE THE ONE DOING IT TO HIM, YOU ARE TRAPPING HIM. YOU DIDNT CARE ABOUT HIM, YOU CARED ABOUT HIS GAMES.

So. It reflects my own issues. Or maybe I’m making it reflect them. I fought with mom today, over a triviality as it happens. And I really wanted to fix the situation. But I didn’t know how to do so.

The machine. The machine is the trauma its the inner intrinsic self that just needs whatever it wants it needs the validation. And Coda is trying to fight against it, like I tried to fight against myself. But its impossible, you need to live with it and you need other people to keep you going when it all backfires. Davie is not that person. The machine is both the part that hurts and the part that is creative. Neither choice is a good one. Killing it is bad, making it live and strugglying because of it is bad. That’s the dichotomy of creation. You want people to see you but you dont want them to see YOU. And Davie’s solution of giving him more people to watch him struggle is wrong. All he wants is just you to watch. Coda is the same as you. But with a slight nuance.

As I’m writing these notes, I’m watching my friend play the game in voice chat.

Why do I need to think about math. It feels the same. And this is a tragedy, with no solution. The best Davie Wreden came up with is screaming it out into the void himself. The only band aid the game has is prevention, thats it.

And then, we come to the tower. It’s painful to watch. The only way to get through Davie’s thick skull is to just say it outright, which will inevitably entirely kill Coda’s heart, or whatever is left of it anyway. But Davie keeps going, because it’s his broken instinct based on the wrong assumptions all the way from the start of the game.

But the only way Coda know’s how to communicate in a way that can get through Davie is destructive. He doesn’t want to say this, I wouldn’t want to say this. But you have to, for them to stop. Coda grew up and it killed his dream. And when you finally get what I mean, don’t say anything. But Davie did. He never learned his lesson. Because he’s fundamentally broken. But I get it. I fucking get it.

Because I’m broken too.

Epilogue

This game is about torturing yourself, or a version of yourself with the same trauma and malfunctioning mentality, of being driven entirely by validation.

It’s a tragedy, a lesson to not repeat it, but it gives no resolution of how to fix it.

Not being driven by external validation is unthinkable. It’s inconceivable. What now. I need to go too Davie. I’m sorry too. But we just have to live with ourselves for a bit.

And maybe then we can see what Coda really wanted.

And maybe then we can escape from our prison.

oh.

but I’m doing the same thing as Davie by showing the game to my friend. I want to get validation even through the smallest actions of sharing the games I like, because I feel like I’ve done something. In that sense this whole blog is extremely messed up. Let’s go me.