Finally started Kaveh’s hangout (finally, seriously) and completed one of the three main branches.
This was the one about working with his suspicious but ultimately idealistic client to build a library out in Aaru Village.
Overall, not much to say about this one. It’s mid personified, not terrible, not great, just a thing that exists now.
The only real commentary I have is regarding how hilariously off the fic portrayals of Kaveh are, compared to how he actually turns out to be. He basically tells his client to fuck off once there’s too many revisions requested and too many dumb layman comments. He’s hilariously focused on maintaining a good and nice image when telling off clients, but not really concerned about the telling off itself. He’s indeed kind of gullible and stupid about things, but he’s not unaware of scammers and such. He just doesn’t think things through. He’s also, interestingly, very aware of his own (past, potentially?) guilt issues and talks about them very directly and calmly. He even pays his own and your bill at the tavern.
Anyway, some screenshots:
I just like this one.
Kaveh bitching about Alhaitham. It’s a very interesting question how accurate is Kaveh’s perspective on Alhaitham, since he often says things that seem to be quite different from what we see, like saying Alhaitham has a temper. Where did he get that idea?
But on the other hand, Kaveh’s first thought after getting back post archon quest is to accuse Alhaitham of trying to seize power in the Akademiya which… is so far off from Alhaitham’s actual personality that it makes Kaveh look outright delusional.
Kaveh isn’t actually cheap to work with, and he only takes high-end projects on the whole. He outright tells a client when he feels they’re being ridiculous about hiring someone of his caliber.
This is part of a mention toward what is art and what is artistic vision, which doesn’t really go further in this particular branch.
However, I have to say, like so much of Genshin writing, this particular section has a bizarre swerve into “is it inspiration from the gods.” Like, bro, why did that suddenly come in.
Also, this section read like the writers bitching about getting their glorious vision meddled with, and it made me roll my eyes.
Similar to Heizou’s hangout, this one gives more follow up to the internal tensions of the nation that couldn’t be addressed in the archon quest. And the solution is the same: the correct and rightful archon is in charge now, so everything is going swimmingly.
But I do admit they at least tried to bring up some points about how it’s not a simple process (though more as an excuse for why this story can even happen).
I wonder if this is the story of what Kaveh got up to during the archon quest? It’s pretty dumb: He noticed a guy whose house looked like it was going to collapse, so he offered to help build a new one. The guy said he had no money, so Kaveh lent him some. The guy gambled it all away… and Kaveh lent him some two more times. And in the end, the guy tried to have mercenaries kill Kaveh in his own house.
I don’t even know what to say.
This is a minor point, but I am eternally disappointed how everyone in modern day Genshin can’t do anything except graverob when they need to build a cool thing.
All of you are losers who are unworthy of the truly great creators of the distant past. Make your own dang mechanical cores??
The entire section of one of the endings just reads like that joke about getting a good grade in therapy.
For someone who completely flipped out at Alhaitham for just mentioning his guilt issues, Kaveh is awfully calm discussing them in detail with a near stranger. He just goes on for like a dozen dialogue boxes analyzing himself and it’s like… I’d prefer if we had a bit more showing, you know? Something actually happening? That would be nice.
On the whole, I guess I would characterize this writing as being kind of amateur? The writer is aware of like, characterization, and tries to weave it into the dialogue, but their attempts at being casual about it just come across as contrived and a bit weird.
