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Parable - 05 - HD
🕑 Added 2019-09-09 19:28:53 +0000 UTCI wasn't sure about the "boing" sound effect, but my immaturity ultimately won the day.
Commentary
This is why Susan started out short in this storyline. As your character progressed in the Fable games (less so in the third), they underwent physical changes. This included height. Knowing that I wanted to have noticeable height increases, I didn't want Susan to start out as tall as normal.
Comic Vs What's Being Parodied
I was originally going to simplify the physical changes by combining them into a single transformation, but I changed my mind because I felt it improved this moment, and would give more options for later. I did, however, significantly change at least one thing when compared to Fable 2, which one can probably guess without me specifying it.
You had three skill sets: Strength (melee weapons, health), Skill (ranged weapons, speed), and Will (magic). Leveling Strength made you bulkier, and leveling Skill made you taller.
Leveling Will, meanwhile, made blue lines form on you. These would eventually glow, which at least made them look less like veins, but I always hated how the blue lines looked. I sometimes played with very limited magic just to avoid getting them.
Long story short, I'd have no intention of recreating those lines here even if I wasn't terrified of having to draw a tattoo-like pattern on Susan panel to panel.
Why Not So Vertical?
Speculation as to why Susan was short included some wondering what counted as "adulthood" in this fantasy world. I meant it as adulthood from our perspective, but it brings up an interesting topic regarding common height biases, and how varied associations affect our perception of it.
In this case, the association of height with being an adult, and how it affects character design.
My understanding is that girls tend to get as tall as they're going to get around 14-15 years old, and boys more often get as tall as they're going to get around 15-16 years old. While it's not impossible to keep growing after those ages, it's not what normally happens.
People associate adulthood with height, however, and with being 18. It's not uncommon for characters to grow several inches between the ages of 16 and 18. I've even seen characters in their twenties and thirties being noticeably taller than when they were 18.
Basically, even when it doesn't make sense, it's not uncommon for an increase in height to be used as a visual shorthand for "this character has grown older".
People don't seem to think about it much, however, and the impression I get is that this shorthand tends to work without people speaking up and saying "um, excuse me, but why are they taller in their thirties?"
I myself have some firsthand experience with this from when Susan grew taller in the main canon. I presented whether it was a natural growth spurt, or the influence of having awakened her magic power, as a mystery.
Susan was 17 at the time. While it's possibly I've simply forgotten, I don't recall anyone speaking up to say how unrealistic her having a growth spurt at that age would be.
Comments
The Sunroses
gsddjfs nice
ZekeStaright
She's getting her game on so she can go play.
Kevin Wright
I liked that, too. Tickled my funny bone.
Fenrir
Your an All Star
James C
Somehow, I think Susan is mostly objecting to the new hair.
Daryl Sawyer
Better height as a signal of age than boob size. Kind of tired of the anime fan community, where lusting after an underaged female character is fine so long as she has big boobs, but appreciation of any character with small breasts, regardless of age (and I'm not talking 900 year old vampire lolis here) makes you pedophile. :-\
Alien Valkyrie
Dan, did you let Tedd help you writing NP again?
James C
Susan is likely to use every exploit she can to max herself out. And, as a Fallout fan, Dan is very familiar with pushing stats past "maximum" (11 in all SPECIAL, anyone?)
ijuinkun
There's that, plus there may be times when you would want to be inconspicuous rather than drawing everybody's attention.
Foradain
Bianca Lawson was being cast as a seventeen year old for about seventeen years...
Some Ed
Well, the biggest reason I would forgo using illusions to make myself look as good as possible is that illusions require ongoing mental effort to maintain and don't really mean that much in the long run, so I'd prefer to use my magic to make myself be as fit as feasible, rather than just look it. I mean, why would I prefer to look like a buff teenager but die before I'm 50 because I didn't take care of myself?
Some Ed
It's especially easier for TV to convey age based on height rather than other features when they've cast a 30 year old as someone who's 14-15. I think I've seen instances where they went even more overboard on this, but I can't think of any specific examples. TV tropes can probably do a lot better than me on this.
Wild Card
So that's where magic energy is stored! Explains why I have so little of it.
Thisguy
I think you made a comic a while ago mentioning the veins thing... Anyway, this is El Goonish Shive, why would we NOT have a gratuitous transformation sequence with boobage growth. And I do agree that having magic veins would look weird. Why have customisable characters if the game is just going to force them to look like something anyway? As for heights, there is a trope know as ‘teens are short’, which, if you’ve ever seen a 6ft 14 yo, you know not to be true. But people do associate height with age, probably because it is easier for TV to convey age based on height rather than other features, especially in cartoons and the like where you are limited by the art style as to how you can portray age.
Edward Haag
In the lore of The Witcher, basically all sorceresses are ridiculously hot, with the reasoning being that if you’ve got access to magic, why wouldn’t you use some illusions to make yourself look as good as possible?
M.
It's a concept worth exploring. :)
Chordat
This likely surprises no-one, but there is a Skyrim mod that makes a female character's breast size correspond to how much magical power they've got left. It is, of course, called "Mana Tanks." Also, looking forward to Susan's reaction to the highly intelligent general populace.
J. Jenny Jameson
Holy carp. I played that game through three times and that never occurred to me. I guess it was just that visual shorthand Dan was talking about as a kind of generational indicator.
ZekeStaright
Hey Now.
coredumperror
Instantly clicked this email the hardest I've ever clicked. :) Busty Susan is besty Susan!
Copper Hamster
Ah, I see you grew her mana reservoir. Also, it's not usual but you can have normal growth spurts until 20-ish. Usually it only happens to people who don't go through a 'growing like a weed' spurt earlier.
Serith
Yay! Level up! I hope Susan doesn't shy away from magic just because of the side effects. I'd like her to level it all the way myself.
Matt R
I hope we see her levels maxed out
Stephen Gilberg
So, will she keep the detached cuffs? One thing I found strange about "Night in the Woods" was that 20-year-old Mae and her peers were much, much shorter than their parents. Of course, they're not human....
John Trauger
My immaturity has great appreciation for your immaturity, Dan.
Jon
Tedd, for one, would approve of the sound effect!
Alenil
I wonder where is limit for her "magic"
