Playlist: Charlotte Olivia Grace

Alternate Title: Dealing with Religious Trauma But Like in a Cute, Fun Way

Featuring: A director’s cut style breakdown of each song choice, and a bonus Campaign Song not found on the original playlist!

Not Gonna Take Me by BAILEN

You took my mother You took my father Oh, but you're not gonna take me!

This is SUCH a fun song and I feel like it sets the tone for the playlist so well! And, truth be told, it was the first song that I knew was going to make the final cut. The energy of the song is so lively and fun, and the chorus -especially the bit I quoted above!- is really just a Cog slam dunk. The toxic, insular culture that her parents had gotten wrapped up in is not going to take her too, and Cog is going to run as far and as fast as she can to make sure it never catches up with her. 

Only the Good Die Young by Billy Joel

Well your mother told you all that I could give you was a reputation Aw she never cared for me But did she ever say a prayer for me?

HEY this is the Ace and Cog song. Thanks for the banger, Billy Joel. Like bro the whole song is about this guy rolling up and talking about whisking this girl who’s grown up wrapped up in religion away from it to a life that -not to brag- kicks serious ass. There’s more for you out in the world! It’s not a scary place, it’s exciting and full of life and people who are going to love you! Come on! Every time I listen to this song on Cog’s playlist, I picture Ace singing and doing a dumb little dance and voices along with it just to make Cog laugh because they’re SO cute. Also, coincidentally, Cog’s mom fucking Hated Ace. Presumably because he “stole and defiled” (her words!) her daughter. You hate to see it 😔 Also, every time I hear the line “I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints” I picture Cog sitting around a fire with Ace and her party members absolutely breathless from laughing which is an incredibly healing mental image that I highly recommend. 

Haven by We Banjo 3

Let me be your haven Let me be your light Sail with me across the ocean deep And find a place for love and joy

One of my dnd characters? Wanting to be a source of light and peace for the people around them, wanting to come up alongside them and bear their burdens with them? It’s SO likely, and it’s true. I think in my head this was originally another Cog and Ace song, where she wanted to repay all the ways he’d helped her by reaching out and trying to offer him a sense of peace in the midsts of everything he has to deal with, but the longer she’s spent with her party the more I think it’s come to apply to them as well. Yes, sometimes you have to fight. Sometimes, you have to make hard, painful decisions. But there’s light and love and joy to be found in the world! And if you can’t find them, it’s worth it to be the source of those things for the people around you! I think Cog would love nothing more than to take all of her friends troubles away from them to just give them a chance to breathe, and this song speaks to that so genuinely.

Hover by Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

The roof peels away And she's left uncovered Then feet leave the ground And she hovers, she hovers, hovers, hovers...

A song about discovering our self-worth, perhaps? About realizing you’re more powerful than the people around you want you to think you are, and then taking a deep breath and deciding to use that power for yourself? That’s self care, baby! This is very much the “I’m looking around, I’m realizing Home isn’t home for me anymore because it isn’t safe, and I’m starting to think that maybe it’s time for me to go” song. You know, that hyper-specific song that every playlist has. Also, it’s just such a pretty song! And right in my range, which doesn’t hurt its odds of making it onto a playlist. 

Cloud’s Song by Brent Walsh

Hey, God, are You listening? Sometimes it feels like I'm not hearing anything back Why does that scare me so much? Hey, God, are You listening?

Y’all ever uh. Y’all ever grow up deeply rooted in your family’s church of choice, only to have a crisis of faith later in life when you’re old enough to think for yourself because you don’t feel the connection to your god that everyone is telling you that you should? No? Just me and Cog? Okay! Cog doesn’t believe in the Old Gods. Mystra is dead, same as all the other gods, killed by whatever force caused the apocalypse and turned the Wasteland into what it is today. Anyone who says otherwise is looking for a way to manipulate people. ...but it’s one thing to say that and convince yourself that it’s true, and another entirely to unravel 18+ years of being told otherwise and come to terms with what a world truly without gods means for you and the people around you. And what if the gods are real, what if Mystra is alive, and she just didn’t care for Cog? If Cog is just fine not hearing from her either way, what should it matter if she’s real or not? Except it does matter, somehow, and Cog doesn’t know what to do with that. Oof.

The Gardener by Sarah Sparks

God the gardener when the autumn comes I will not seasons fear With the pruning a branch is stronger, I will learn to love the shears

This song is about coming out on the far side of a situation she never should have had to be in, but realizing that she’s stronger because of it. Is it still unfair that she had to grow up in such an unhealthy environment, burdened by expectations she was never going to be able to live up to? No, of course not. There’s no outcome that makes it worth it for her to have suffered through that. But because she survived it, she is infinitely more compassionate, more patient, and more intentional than she likely would have been otherwise. It’s not easy to come to terms with trauma like that, and I definitely don’t think Cog is as close to finding closure as she would like people to think she is. But she’s getting there, and I think this sort of perspective has done a lot to help her on that path.

Shake it Out by Doll Skin

'Cause I am done with my graceless heart So tonight I'm gonna cut it out and then restart 'Cause I like to keep my issues strong It's always darkest before the dawn

So technically this is a cover, but honestly I love the energy on it so much more than the original. It’s about moving on from a past that’s clinging onto you and weighing you down by shaking off that guilt and turning to face a new day. Also, it’s just a fucking banger. It’s unapologetic about shrugging off weight you’re not obligated to carry, and while I don’t think Cog is quite to that point in her journey yet, I hope that by the end of the campaign she will be. Right now she still has a lot of guilt for the way she left her home, even though she knew she needed to go for her own good, but this song is for a Cog who -a few years down the line- has made peace with her decisions and understands that she deserves the same kindness from herself that she gives to everyone else.

Echo by Talisk

This song is an instrumental, but it goes So hard and is so representative of the arc I see for Cog in this game that it honestly makes me emotional every time I hear it. The beginning is quiet and a little slower, then about 30 seconds in the violin comes in and starts ramping things up as Cog begins to look around and realize the life she has been living isn’t the one she wants to continue. At around 1:30 the melody gets more complex and other instruments layer in as she sets out into the world and starts meeting the people she now considers her closest friends, and it continues to build and build and build with this anxious but excited energy of fingers flying across strings, barely keeping up with themselves with how eager they are to get the music to the world. The final variation on the melody from about 4:19 to the end of the song makes me picture Cog just spinning, arms wide, eyes closed with the sun on her face and the world’s biggest smile, and it just fills my heart with so much joy! 

Gold by Rabbit Wilde

All my friends are calling me Wild, like the wind I'm drifting from all I've known And packing up and trying all my best At staying gold

This song is so cute and fun, and high energy in the Exact way I was looking to cultivate for this playlist. This song is about the way Cog has grown and become more self-assured since leaving home and joining her party! Going from being tired and silenced, to having a fire burning from within her! She’s making new friends, she’s wandering and exploring the world, and she’s taking control of her life in a way that’s left her overall a happier and healthier person. And again, at risk of sounding repetitive, it’s just a bop. And bops always make it onto this playlist! 

Hieroglyphics by The Oh Hellos

'Cause you've been too busy thinking ahead Of where we're all going after we're dead To maybe consider our bodies are worth More than the dust that we can return

I am literally Obsessed with this song as a Cog song (and also, as a result of my playlist building, with The Oh Hellos in general). The whole energy of the song is looking at people who view religion as this old, tradition heavy thing its followers are obligated to bear forward and just asking... why? The lyrics I highlighted above are the ones that really sold this song as a Cog song for me, but there’s another line in the second verse with absolutely beautiful imagery about nebulas being beautiful, sacred bodies of dust that goes on to pose the questions; why can’t the same be said for humanity? Is being human completely divorced from being divine? Is there not inherent divinity in being a living, breathing creature with independent thought? For Cog, this is what faith should be. It should be about reveling in being alive and in the beauty of the world you get to live in. If there are gods, she can’t imagine them wanting anything different for the beings they created.

Bonus Track!  Tough Kids by Coyote Kid

I don't trust anyone more than I trust me and mine It's a dog eat dog world, but this pack runs till the end of the line

Campaign Song! Party song!! It’s just a banger!! If this campaign had a theme song, this would be it! I can fully picture the animated opening that would play before the start of the game, and it SLAPS. The first thirty seconds is this western style instrumental with the camera racing across the barren wasteland, with the first swell of the trumpet triggering the camera to pan up toward the sun setting on the horizon as the title card fades in. From there the camera takes off again and loops to each party member spread out across the Wasteland before they’re brought together. It swoops over the caravan Sunny and Wol are escorting, and they shield their eyes against the sun to look up at it as it passes. We see Nilos silhouetted against the outline of Scorch, steeling himself to enter the Bandit town with little more than the ratty suit on his back and the gun hefted over his shoulder. We see Maelo wandering out of his ramshackle house with his pack full and on his back, sparing one sad look at a swath of hazy green trees in the distance behind him before putting his back to it and setting out for the Crossroads. We see Cog! Bored to tears in a New Alexandrian classroom until she catches a glimpse of Ace beckoning to her from the doorway, and she grins and waits until her professor’s back is turned before grabbing her books and darting out of the room. We see Adiane in a dark alley somewhere, minding her business until she hears something that piques her interest! She looks up, rolls her shoulders, and we catch the flash of a dagger in one hand before she disappears into the night. And finally we see Clay, sitting against the back wall of what’s clearly a prison cell with his head resting on his knees, and we hear the rattle of a metal door being opened and Clay looks up as light from outside his cell falls on his face for the first time in god knows how long.  And then the chorus! We cut between various notable fights the party has been in to showcase their thematic skills! Sunny gives a mocking salute before hauling back to punch some bad guy in the face! Wol ducks an attack completely accidentally as he flips frantically through an enormous book, and when he looks up to cast his spell his eyes are a void dotted with silver stars. Nilos blasts some poor bastard point blank with a shotgun shot, then whirls around to slam the butt of the gun against someone else’s head! Cog’s casting gloves glow white hot as she flings a hand toward the sky to call for aid, and her robes whip around her as she sends a shockwave of magic out with herself at the epicenter! Maelo looks up, pulls a very obvious ‘oh shit!’ face, then taps the end of his staff against the ground and causes impossibly dense vegetation to grow instantaneously and send the people charging toward him toppling to the ground. Adiane whirls out from behind him as he finishes casting, tucks and rolls into a crouched shooting stance, then fires off three precise shots that drop three different targets. And Clay catches an attack on his shield, laughs and shouts something we can’t hear over the swell of the music, then summons his pact weapon mid-swing to catch his attacker unawares and send them toppling to the ground. And the second verse? OH boy. The cadence of the line “it’s a dog eat dog world” lends itself so naturally to having the antagonist of each arc surge up onto the screen one after the other, with a grinning Valentine bringing up the rear with his arms spread wide. And then! The bridge? We cut between the party’s npc friends living their lives and kicking ass. Ace and Sunny’s dads! Nathan and Sierra! King Alistair! Wol’s family! Penny and I’den! Also!! Not only can you physically not lose your shit listening to the repeated “we’re gonna make it or die trying” it’s also PRIME real estate for a flash montage of important moments of the campaign. Bombing the first bunker with a Meteor Storm scroll! Sunny putting her fist through the shadow demon in Lafaroh! Cog tackling Nilos to Dimension Door them into open air eight hundred feet off the ground! Watching the Bandits shoot down the Emperion airship over the Crossroads! Staring down the elf queen in her own courtroom and telling her she’s wrong! Finding the Godkiller! Sauntering into Scorch to clean up in the Murderbowl! God we do so much cool shit in this game!!  The final rendition of the chorus just shows the party working together as a team, having each other’s backs and covering weak spots without a second thought because they know how to work well together. The song fades out on an overhead shot of the party sprawled out around their campsite at the end of a long, exhausting day, eating and talking and laughing and just generally, blatantly, comfortable with one another. The camera swings up one final time to show the beautiful night sky overhead, with swaths of stars that wink out slowly one by one as the song comes to an end. 

Get Up Close (and a Little Too Personal) in Senran Kagura Reflexions

Senran Kagura has never been shy about its more titillating aspects--in fact, one might argue they’re the only reason for its existence. While individual entries in the series range from side-scrolling beat-em-ups to third-person shooters and rhythm cooking games, they all revolve around a group of generously-proportioned girls who go to ninja school and get their clothes torn up a lot. If the Senran Kagura franchise had to be boiled down to its most common motif, it would be a static image of a reluctant schoolgirl having some kind of elongated object shoved between her breasts. It lives and dies by its euphemisms, making every situation as sexual as possible while toeing the line of what can and can’t be shown in a marketable product. I doubt anyone expected that to ever change, but nevertheless I have unfortunate news for those who might've.

Senran Kagura Reflexions is the latest entry in the aforementioned Senran Kagura series courtesy of Marvelous Entertainment and Honey ∞ Parade Games. In Reflexions, players are summoned to a dimly lit classroom by series heroine Asuka to help her sort through some inexplicable feelings. To do so, she requires a gentle massage from the player. Of course, by “gentle massage” I mean groping, poking, fondling, and spraying down every single inch of her body as she either moans or bemoans your complete invasion of personal space.

Upon turning on the game and entering the main menu, players will be met with a handful of modes: Reflexology, Dress-Up, Mini-Reflexology, and Diorama. Reflexology is the game’s story mode. An animated 3D model of Asuka greets the player and asks for their help sorting through her feelings. She offers her hands and the player enters Standard Reflexology mode wherein they massage her hands. Depending on where you choose to rub (there are 6 different areas on each hand), Asuka and the player will enter into one of seven different dreams. These dreams depict alternate universe relationships between the player and Asuka, such as student/tutor, producer/idol, and big brother/little sister. Upon entering the dream, Asuka will find some half-baked reason to implore you for a massage, and you will always oblige.

Again you will enter into Standard Reflexology mode, only this time you’re able to massage anywhere on her body from the knee up. With the Joy-Cons you can squeeze, touch, caress, or shoot her with a water gun. One of five different colors will flash on screen depending on how and where you touch her, and once a hidden satisfaction meter fills for one of the colors, players can choose to enter Glorious Reflexology mode, wherein they must give Asuka an even more intimate massage than before. In the beginning, this means playing bongos with the Joy-Cons on her thighs with enough rhythm to fill a pleasure meter within a 60-second time limit. Progressing in the game unlocks other techniques for Glorious Reflexology, such as brushing her arm and actually using a certain brand of vibrating wand for its intended purpose. After that, a gem will appear on the screen and partially fill itself in with the color of the area you massaged the most. From there you and Asuka are booted back into the classroom to repeat the process. Once the gem is completely filled, you will get one of five endings determined by the color you filled most of the gem with.

All that explanation makes it sound like there’s a lot to this mode, but that sadly isn’t the case. Massaging Asuka’s hands was as dull as blindly moving the stick around and holding down a button to trigger a dream. After the first playthrough, a feature unlocks in this mode that shows what dream will trigger once you start massaging an area, which is incredibly handy for unlocking the other dreams, but it also makes the whole process pretty arbitrary. I didn’t enjoy massaging her hands at all, and found myself just wishing I could select the dream I wanted to go through next instead of checking every area on her hand for its specific trigger. Reflexions attempts to provide feedback for these massages by simulating the feeling of her heartbeat via rumble, but it doesn’t quite deliver. She also repeats a handful of canned lines in this (and every) mode that get old extremely quickly.

This lack of feedback extends even further to the full-body massage mode. The only parts of her body that react at all to your touch are (predictably) her chest and her thighs. While her thighs jiggle ever so slightly, her breasts can be groped, slapped, and pulled every which way. I soon developed a habit of pulling them as far apart as possible each time I entered a dream. It was less a ritual of enjoyment and more an act of self-flaggellation to remind myself of what I’d chosen to do with my time. Massages in this mode ultimately became a repetitive process of poking and grabbing different parts of the body until I was met with the color I was seeking an ending for, and spamming that action over and over until the game decided it was time to let me slap her thighs around some more. Motion control in this mode is limited to swinging the Joy-Cons to slap and poke at Asuka while tilting them squeezes her body. This mode could’ve felt more interactive by controlling the hands on screen with motion control instead of relegating them to analog stick movement only, but the motion control that already exists is so finicky that it’s best to simply stick to button inputs.

Maybe you don’t care about the gameplay, though. Maybe you’ve sought this game out solely on the merit of its story and place in the vast Senran Kagura canon. In that case, well, this game is still a letdown. The “story” in Reflexions can be summed up in one sentence: Asuka asks you for a massage and realizes she likes you. That’s it. This game has five different endings, but they’re only different in the sense that she finds five different ways to word the phrase “I love you.” Each dream has a couple different reasons why that version of Asuka would ask you to massage her that it cycles through, and each color has its own handful of sentences where Asuka reacts to your massage. She also has her own set of quips she cycles through during the massages in every dream. That’s about as varied as the dialogue and narrative ever get.

Advancing through the Reflexology mode will unlock various items in the other game modes, such as music for the main menu, backgrounds for the Diorama mode, and cosmetics for Dress-Up mode. In Dress-Up mode, players can customize Asuka’s hair, outfit, and accessories for the rest of the game. The only items that will carry over into Reflexology are equipped accessories, but all of the changes made in Dress-Up will show in Mini-Reflexology, which is an endless body massage mode in the classroom. While I did appreciate being able to dress up Asuka in my game, I felt like my choices were pretty limited. Clothing customization was limited to preset outfits with not much variety beyond the few she already wears elsewhere in the game. There were a fair few accessories, but I didn’t find any of them appealing beyond a simple pair of red-rimmed glasses. I liked the hairstyle selection, but the color options for hair and clothes were lacking in both quantity and quality. In the end, the only customizable feature that actually had a good spread of options was Asuka’s lingerie, which sports a grand total of 45 different patterns to choose from. Don’t get me wrong here, I know that having cute underwear is important, but come on. Why'd they have to make THAT the priority?

Before I sat down to write this review I made a list of the things I liked and disliked about this game. In the end it turned most of the things I really liked about this game were because they made it easier to get through the things I didn't. I liked that I could set the main menu music because it meant I could only hear the one song I liked from the game’s serviceable at best soundtrack (“Love Therapist”). I liked being able to see which endings for dreams and routes I hadn’t unlocked yet because it made seeing everything the game had to offer for reviewing purposes easier. I liked that I unlocked the ability to just skip Glorious Reflexology altogether (for obvious reasons). Beyond that, there’s so much left that I just didn’t like at all. Camera control in the Diorama mode is mostly relegated to sliders controlling angle and position, so it feels awkward and confusing to control.  Playing Reflexions in handheld mode causes a fair bit of slowdown where there isn’t any in docked mode. Asuka’s character model clips through itself constantly to accompany the ridiculous boob physics. It’s also clearly not meant to be viewed as closely as it is in the massages, because there are some pretty low-poly textures on her clothes. Not only does it lack depth both narratively and gameplay-wise - it lacks polish as well.

Most importantly, this game is creepy. It’s just straight-up creepy. I’ve been tiptoeing around that for most of this review so far, but it bears mention more than anything else I’ve thought to address: I felt uncomfortable every step of the way with Senran Kagura Reflexions. Yes, the routes lacked variety. Yes, massaging Asuka was repetitive. Yes, there weren’t enough customization options. Technically, it’s not a good game. However, even if all of those things had been fixed, it would not change the fact that this is a creepy game with a creepy premise meant to enact out creepy fantasies that creeped me out. This game can't be saved, and it certainly can't be ignored. No amount of ironic detachment, desensitization, or additional DLC content will ever be able to change that.

REVIEW ROUNDUP

+/- Customizable menu music, but the soundtrack is forgettable

+/- Some cute customization items for Asuka, but options are limited

- Clunky camera control in Diorama Mode

- No variation in endings

- Useless motion control

- Framerate issues in handheld mode

- Massaging Asuka is repetitive and lacks satisfying feedback

- Everything about it is extremely creepy

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Danni Wilmoth is a Features and Social Videos writer for Crunchyroll and also co-hosts the video game podcast Indiecent. You can find more words from her on Twitter @NanamisEgg.

By: [email protected]