beeqlass

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Heart of the hex

pro tip if you cant get the motivation to do studies: Just Turn it into Fanart

Dead Pixel Scene Sound Aanalysis

This is an essay I wrote for my music in film class about the dead pixel scene. Sorry about the recap in the beginning since my professor didn't know the game, I had to explain the plot.

Hope y'all find it interesting with some of the technical terminology from the class!

Word count: 2,237

Scene: 54:04 to 55:39 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mgcm7Er62LY 

Mouthwashing is an indie psychological horror game by Swedish game studio "Wrong Organ," released in September 2024 and published by "Critical Reflex" with a soundtrack by Martin Halldin. The game follows the story of 5 crew members stranded in a Pony Express freighter spaceship named Tulpar after it crashed. The game follows a non-linear narrative, presenting us with events in the modern day and events before the spaceship crashes. In the modern day, we play as Jimmy, the prior Co-Pilot now ascribing himself the role of Captain after the original Captain was injured in the crash leaving him completely maimed, In the flashbacks we see the events through the eyes of Captain Curly before he was injured. The other crew members consist of Anya, Swansea, and Daisuke. From the beginning of the game, the crew members, besides Jimmy, and the viewer are led to believe that Curly had crashed the ship on purpose. But as the game continues, through the flashbacks we learn that Jimmy was the one who crashed the ship. Slowly we are shown how much of a monster Jimmy is and how he has manipulated the people around him. It’s shown towards the end of the game that Jimmy decides to crash the ship because he discovered that Anya, the ship's nurse and only woman on board, was pregnant after he sexually assaulted her. Curly, trying to keep everything running on the ship as well as being a close personal friend of Jimmy's, talks to Jimmy after Anya informs him that she told Jimmy she was pregnant, and claims to Jimmy that they’ll be able to fix this. Jimmy realizing that he will ultimately not be able to escape his actions once they land proposes to Curly that he should just crash the ship and have them all “Die Heros” saying that if they do land and what happened to Anya comes to light Curly would surely be ostracized as well because he is the Captain, he is in charge of making sure everyone on board is safe. At this, Curly hesitates and Jimmy says he’ll “take care of it”, we see him enter the cockpit, override the autopilot, and crash the ship, Curly realizing the mistake in his hesitation runs to the cockpit to try and stop the course ultimately facing the impact head on leaving him in the state he is in today. Throughout the rest of the game we watch as Jimmy ultimately causes the death of those around him as the crew runs out of supplies and Jimmy refuses to take responsibility for his actions. 

The scene at the timestamp 54:04 to 55:39 is the first time in the game Anya seems to talk about specifically the physical assault she faced at the hands of Jimmy. Now it is important to note multiple factors for this scene when analyzing it. One is that this is not the first time Anya has tried to voice her discomfort to Captain Curly about the actions of Jimmy, we see earlier in the game that she expresses to Curly that she is upset that Jimmy doesn’t take her position as nurse seriously, even making crude sexual jokes about their company mascot during the one on one psychological evaluations she conducts with him. This is important to acknowledge because it could explain why she doesn’t outright state in this scene the harm she is undergoing, instead trying to hint to Curly the emotional and physical distress she is facing. She could feel like her concerns were brushed off once before which led to Jimmy doing even more drastic things such as moving from verbally harassing her to physically assaulting her, so she could be hesitant to be vulnerable and mention her feelings again. The second important thing to note when tackling this scene is due to the non-linear narrative and the fact we don’t get to see the events through the eyes of Anya herself there are multiple different interpretations of where she may be mentally in this scene. Although it is clear that Anya certainly has her suspicions of what has happened and is aware of the pregnancy at this point it could be that she is in a stage where she is just now piecing together all the information. Through multiple pieces of dialogue later in the game, Jimmy himself states that he knows how to make a spiked drink using the ingredients they have on board, he even goes as far as to confidently state that the person the drink is used on will “Have no memory when they wake up and will be perfectly fine.” Since we never are explicitly told the nature in which Anya is assaulted many viewers believe that given the nature of the game and every piece of dialogue having a specific purpose, it could be likely that Anya was drugged and then assaulted by Jimmy and this scene is her trying to voice her suspicions to Curly after she discovered her pregnancy. 

With that established and the heavy nuances of the scene explained the sound design of the scene can be more accurately summarized and analyzed. This scene is only 95 seconds long and although it doesn’t implement as complex of sound design as some other scenes in this game everything is still done with a purpose. At 54:04 the screen fades from Jimmy getting chased by an axe-wielding Swansea to show a much calmer scene of Anya sitting on the couch in front of the screen in the common area of the ship, showing a night sky. Text appears on the screen with an intimidating dramatic noise expressing that the current scene takes place 2 days before the crash. There is no music at this point, the sound consists of an ambient silence and the typewriter-esque noise that is used when each of the characters speaks since the game is not voice acted. The ambient silence continues as Anya and Curly, whose perspective we are now in, discuss how they both have trouble sleeping at night. At 54:26 music begins to fade in as Anya says she enjoys the nighttime window screen and turns her head to face it. It’s interesting to note that in the soundtrack this song is named “What’s New On The Radio” which could be a subtle nod to Anya and Swansea’s playlist being one of the only things that survive the crash later in the game and is the only thing that is ever playing on the radio in the lounge. 

At 54:29 the perspective changes to just seeing the night sky, with slight tearing in the screen showing that it’s only an illusion put on for the crew members to have a semblance of time of day. The music is quite calm and melodic having a relaxing feeling to it as Anya speaks about how she sometimes goes to the common room during the night just to stare at the screen. The song's melody stays in an upturning positive sound as the notes ascend and Anya points out to Curly that there is a dead pixel in the corner of the nighttime screen. Curly says that he can’t see it and at 54:46 the perspective cuts back to Anya as she states that the dead pixel is always in the back of her mind, the music continues its repetitive loop and feels almost slightly uncanny for a second before it changes to a different note when Curly speaks. Curly speaks about how he must not see it because he’s used to seeing the bigger picture and that the single dead pixel doesn’t ruin the illusion. It’s interesting to note that the music’s melody which had been in an ascending pattern since the beginning of the conversation begins to now go lower when Curly says “But maybe I’m just used to seeing the bigger picture.” The music now takes on a much more solemn feeling as Anya asks Curly how many days of transit they still have left and he informs her it is just under 8 months. Anya then asks Curly why he thinks that Pony Express would put locks on the medical bay but not the bedrooms. To this Curly ponders before at 55:30 saying he assumes it is the same reason why they put locks on the cockpit door “Safety”. At 55:32 when Curly says safety the music abruptly stops and the word safety pops up on the screen momentarily with a sudden noise, written in bold white text over and over on a black background while having a glitchy analog TV effect. After the pop-up goes away we are left with the same ambient noise that was in the beginning and Anya’s solemn expression as the scene fades away. 

At the beginning of this scene, outside of the sound effect that plays when the time before the crash is displayed, we are shown the diegetic sound, the ambient noise at 54:04 to 54:25 can be assumed to be what the characters are hearing as it's just a natural droning sound similar to that of an air vent. Once the music enters at 54:26 given its gradual fade in and the lack of acknowledgment from the characters on screen we as the viewer can tell that the song is non-diegetic and being used to give the scene stronger emotional value. When the perspective changes to solely the night sky at 54:29 the song seems quite relaxing and hopeful as Anya and Curly continue their conversation. It seems like a typical conversation as Anya talks about the dead pixel but once the screen cuts back to her at 54:46 she says that the dead pixel “Is always in the back of her mind.” this is when the viewer is being hinted to that she isn’t just talking about a pixel on the screen. In this scene, the dead pixel is a stand-in for Jimmy, no matter what she does even if she tries to ignore it like she has been in the past she can’t ignore what Jimmy has done to her now. Knowing this combined with the repetitiveness of the song until Curly speaks gives an unsettling feeling, much like how Anya must feel being stuck in a spaceship with her abuser. 

When Curly begins to talk about how he thinks the single pixel doesn’t take away the beauty of the display, at 55:02 when he says “But maybe I'm used to seeing the bigger picture.” to Anya, the music begins to go in a descending note pattern taking on a more sad tone from here on out. Curly’s response to Anya at this moment shows his naivety to Anya’s turmoil, as Captain he’s willing to overlook one issue for the sake of keeping the ship running much like he has with Jimmy’s behavior up to this point, not even realizing that Anya has been trying to get Curly to stop Jimmy’s harassment. The music keeps its solemn tone not changing much as their conversation continues, likely mirroring how Anya is feeling. Anya asking how much time they have left on the ship reveals to the viewer the grim reality that because they still have 8 more months she will either have to give birth on board while being the only medical professional present and potentially have to deal with violent outbursts from Jimmy, or she would have to perform a potentially life-threatening unsafe abortion on herself. Anya doesn’t respond to realizing it's 8 months and instead forwards the question to Curly, “Why do you think Pony Express put locks on the medical room door but not in the sleeping quarters?” At 55:32 when Curly finally answers “Safety” a sudden sound effect and visuals flash on the screen immediately ripping the viewer out of the calmer atmosphere the music gave us. We are immediately put back into the cold reality of the droning ambient noise of the ship while we just stare at Anya who does not respond before the scene transitions to the next. The moment Curly says safety was purposely made very dramatic for a reason. Curly once again shows his obliviousness to the situation not even realizing the irony in his statement. To him he doesn’t see why not having a lock on the sleep quarters could be a risk, especially for Anya who is the only woman on the ship surrounded by 4 men. The sudden stop in music and the flash of the word safety all over the screen feels like a slap in the face, much like how it probably felt to Anya knowing that because of the lack of locks, she was left vulnerable and unsafe, and Curly doesn’t even acknowledge that. 

In mouthwashing, sound design is used beautifully both in cinematic scenes like this one and in free-roam gameplay scenes. This scene shows how intricate even the smaller, less complicated audio scenes still have a lot of thought put into how the audio relates to the plot. We’re shown a scene that at face value some people may not even realize what’s being discussed but once you look deeper into it you see the tragic story of a woman desperately fighting for her safety in an environment that often disregards her. 

TIL, the residents of Cheran, Mexico armed themselves and kicked out the ruling cartel as well as every politician and policeman. It now functions as a legal self-governing indigenous community with a crime rate near 0%

via reddit.com

moments right before daisuke saves the day and gets all the love and praise he deserves and rescue comes just in time and everyone lives forever the end

DAY 9 - SWING cumulonimbus clouds have me in a chokehold

WOLFY!! YOU HAVE GIVEN ME LIFE IN THE FORM OF:

CAN YOU EXPAND ON THIS AU?

Haha that was a sir gawain and the green knight au. Diomedes is Gawain and Odysseus and Penelope are Lord and Lady Bertilak

I was cooking on twitter today

sorry *draws this guy for the hundredth time*

Character design club! Redesigning our partners childhood ocs

timelapse of my latest piece (irl time approx. 4 hours)

Been re-watching gravity falls for the summer

belly of the beast

god, why is HE third-wheeling on our cryptid hunt…

some type of deja-vú….

Echolalia, ASL i love you, and group hug emojis

im at a payphoneee trying to call home

lil 10 min flutter doodle

I CAN'T STOP THINKING OF THIS STUPID FUCKING DELETED SCENE

THIS ONE

i love sibling dynamic sm makes me sick

lineart bc i think its cute

Putting this here in TikTok form to see if it does any better but here’s me making one of the “Tri Angels” from the Book of Bill!

Edit: since some people have asked, I used FIMO professional oven bake clay to create this! :)

👁️👏👏👏

tomorrow……… is august„„„„,?????

its augu…….st?? tomorrW???????????

8th monTH???????? 4 ,more mont hs of 2013?????????????

what??????????????????????????????………………………..

Justin posted the 1956 house he and his wife bought in Jasper, Indiana. It is a complete time capsule. Absolutely NOTHING has been updated or touched.  

Everything is still here- look at the appliances. All original. This is not like the classy expensive updated mid century homes we’ve seen before. 

The furniture has to be the original pieces and sets the previous owners bought. 

The wall hangings are aged.

This is an interesting piece, this bar. 

Look at the bathroom- pink fixtures.

Those lamps!

The master bath has a yellow tub and fixtures.

A 2nd bdm. Even the bedding is vintage.

And, this bath has blue Fixtures. Wow, I would definitely keep them.

More cool lamps and original furniture in the knotty pine family room. 

Wow, look at the built-ins in the office.

The lower floor.

The basement is cool- look at that floor! And, the TV. The bar is classic. I wonder if they were leaving any of this.

Off the rec room is a 2nd kitchen. A pink fridge!

And, there’s this room, too. Look at the stone wall.

for the love of old houses

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