User talk:Fish/Damon's Beginning

Notes on Damon's Character

In order to keep Damon's character consistent throughout his story branches, I'm putting all my notes on his personality, friends, and family here. If you develop Damon or Seth in some way not covered by the notes below, be sure to add your own expansions to the character definitions. --Fish 15:42, 22 November 2007 (EST)

Damon

Damon is gay, but he is deeply closeted. He passes for straight by imitating the testosterone-driven behavior of his teammates, and he hides his relationship with Seth. In the real world he does not engage in any public displays of affection, is very private and secretive, protected by an outward veneer of charisma. Damon is a very charming man when he puts his mind to it, but few people ever get beyond that surface charm.

He's insecure about his sexuality, and paranoid that it will be revealed and ruin the life he has. He doesn't see that the life he actually has is narrow, frightened, confined, and built upon the potential he has as a baseball player — in a sense, his desire to achieve for the future has restricted his ability to fully enjoy the present.

Damon is a pitcher for the university's baseball team, and is right-handed.

Damon's Character Choices

Since Damon is secretive, all his story branches should be built on the dichotomy of secrets and lies versus truth and revelation. Therefore, intrigue is the name of the game. Seth abhors Damon's penchant for secrecy and constantly exhorts him to be more honest.

Losing — When Damon's branches result in Game Over, it should be as a result of his secrecy: either he conceals information, and it gets him "killed", or he hides one secret too many and Seth, disgusted, leaves Damon for good.

Winning — Damon's threads can end in a You Win if he finally reveals his true nature and comes out of the closet. Once he has completed his journey to a more open, honest, self-accepting individual, his character story is essentially complete.

Seth

You might see Seth as everything that Damon wishes he could be — irreverent, flirtatious, rule-breaking, rebellious, and open. Seth likes to shock people, likes to be prickly and overly sensitive if it makes others uncomfortable, and to be suave and comfortable when others are feeling out of sorts. He really enjoys pushing the buttons of society, because he sees himself as outside it, and unbound by its rules.

Seth is a guitarist for a local garage-punk band, and is left-handed.

Jacob

Jacob is a meathead, a narrow-minded athlete protective of his own masculinity and anything that might threaten it. He surely would react badly if he knew Damon were gay — and what's more, sharing a locker with Jacob. He has arrived to the Dreams night well-toasted in vodka and accompanied by his girlfriend of the month, Amanda. Jacob is one of those guys who gets thick-witted and stupid when he drinks, and he wasn't exactly an award-winning intellectual to begin with. Essentially is a bully, a rabidly homophobic foil for Damon's secrecy — after all, if Damon wants to come out of the closet and reveal his secret, there must be someone to reveal it to.

Jacob is the team's first baseman. The original Damon sequence doesn't mention his race, but we can presume he's probably white.

Amanda

All we know of Amanda so far is that she's probably a medical student, and that she likes hanging around athletes. She's white, she's into her own appearance, and she's not very good at leading Jacob out of trouble.