application — karteria

[thecameraguy]

IC INFORMATION
Name: Lyle
Canon: Look Outside
Age: Adult
Gender: Male
Species: formerly human, now one of the Cursed, as a witness of the Visitor
Appearance: not good
Canon point: Roughly day four of the game's events. Since Look Outside can be played in so many different ways (and 2.0 came out only in the beginning of October), Lyle has...

Met with Sam

Kissed Sam??? (important 2 him)

Is in the process of developing a photograph for Sam of the Visitor

History: Hm. I am going to bullet point this one.

Lyle had a fairly normal upbringing in Montreal, Canada. Lived with a comfortable family. Was given a camera as a gift for Christmas one year, which encourages him towards learning old school film photography.

Little is known about his childhood; easiest thing to do in this case is to say it's immensely average. Did okay in school; wasn't really popular with his peers. Enjoyed Look Outside's version of Dungeons & Dragons, called Mazes & Wizards. Maybe went to some community college; made some friends there, enough to have at least made an attempt to run a campaign that never got past its second meeting.

Lyle eventually gets a job at a convenience store. Aiming high....... At this job, he meets Sam. They probably don't interact much, if at all. Sam eventually loses this job.

... But in the meantime, Lyle's developed something of an obsession with Sam, for some reason. Perhaps it's because of how average he is? How nondescript? How unemployed?? Something about Sam is fascinating to Lyle, who uses his camera for evil: Lyle begins to stalk Sam. Whether he originally lived in the same apartment as him is unknown, but Lyle ends up living just a floor down from Sam. He steals his spare key out of a planter; he infiltrates his apartment without Sam's knowing.

Lyle turns one of his rooms into a darkroom for his seedy hobby of: taking candid photos of Sam. He develops them in this room and hangs them there, a shrine to Sam's apparently-alluring visage. This interest in Sam goes on for who-knows-how-long.

Lyle takes pictures of other things sometimes! Like: the sky, during a strange, apocalyptic phenomenon! Lyle photographs the sky at an inopportune moment, as the Visitor, a cosmic entity that distorts everything that beholds it as a method of "communicating" and/or "assimilating" with others. In beholding the Visitor, Lyle... changes. This happens a day before anyone else begins to change. He holes himself up in his apartment, where the entire mutation must have taken place over the span of 24 hours.

Lyle's disturbing transformation completely disfigures him. He's no longer recognizable as human, and has fused with the camera he used to look at the Visitor. It's undoubtedly gorey and awful, in-keeping with the nature of the game.

The next day, news is spreading like wildfire: do not look outside. Stay indoors. Those who look outside face the same fate as Lyle, though many of these people lose their sanity. Lyle was far more fortunate in that regard.

Sam manages to avoid looking outside, and begins on a trek to understand what's going on in the apartment. He visits Lyle, who trades him a kiss for some photo paper. Lyle... takes a photo of Sam mid-kiss, though it's hard to say whether it was really accidental or not.

Sam eventually returns to Lyle with exposed photo paper in tow, and asks him to develop it. Tasked with his crush's photo, Lyle gleefully retreats to his darkroom to develop it! ...And ends up in Karteria instead. Booooo

Personality answers:
"What does your character think about physical appearances? Are they the sort to meticulously primp themselves, or could they not care less?"

On a more shallow level, Lyle considers himself as "taking up space." He is aware of it when inviting himself into Sam's apartment, nervous about the amount he takes up, and asks if it's okay. It's reasonable to believe Lyle is very aware of himself as an existing person who occupies room, and he is uncomfortable with this face. He's nervous; he would prefer to be small, to take up little room and be unseen.

But his feelings about his physical appearance are further exhibited by the curtain he wears over his massive body, and the overwhelming response he has if Sam chooses to take a peek while giving him a kiss. Lyle gets so distraught that he's been seen in this newly monstrous body that he retreats into his darkroom, for Sam's kneejerk reaction to seeing his body is horror, regardless of what the player thinks. Sam sees him as scary, and this breaks Lyle's heart. He won't emerge from the darkroom for the rest of the game.

Lyle cares what people think about him more than he cares about what he thinks of himself. The thoughts of others, particularly those who he wants to like him, matter far more. To be seen in this newly terrifying body isn't something he's comfortable with, and likely won't be, for a long time. But if characters don't respond with revulsion... it'll probably make him feel better, at least.

"What would it take to truly upset your character, enough that they would act upon their feelings? Are they the sort to forgive?"

Lyle... shows us that he's willing to forgive Sam even as Sam attacks him. As long as he has something of him (a polaroid with his soul in it), he doesn't attack, continues to wait Sam out. Lyle begins to attack back when Sam destroys the grasp he has on that which he loves: his obsession with Sam, and threatens his life with it. Threatening to undermine what Lyle loves most, what sates his appetite, upsets Lyle. And he will retaliate if this is truly threatened.

On a more sad-upset level, judgement makes Lyle upset. He forgives readily for being judged, however, and mostly becomes a wet paper bag about it. Sorry, he won't do that anymore, don't be mad at Lyle... He'll be good, promise. But Lyle doesn't forgive Sam if Sam looks at his body without his permission: having a promise broken, particularly an important promise, makes Lyle deeply upset. He'll not forgive, but he won't attack over it, anyway. He'll just go cry. I think that with time it would be possible for him to forgive having a promise broken, but it would take more than a measly 15 days that the game offers, apparently.

"What would be your character's lowest, darkest moment they've lived through? How did they respond to their troubles and face their demons?"

So listen, I'm going to pick a moment that involves some explanation that is beyond Lyle's current canonpoint, into LO's 2.0 update. Why? Because Lyle's lowest, darkest moment has been going on for years, even prior to the events of the game. Lyle has succumbed to a vice that is wretched, creepy, and something he has to guard because it should not be known publicly: he is stalking his upstairs neighbor, Sam.

What may have started out as a fascination with the other man has evolved into breaking-and-entering, following him around, and learning too much about Sam without him even knowing much of Lyle's existence. The game itself states about Lyle, "photography had always been a means to indulge his darker impulses." His hyperfixation on Sam, and the lengths Lyle goes to to sate his desire for slivers of Sam's life, is his overall lowest moment. And at the point of being apped... there is no resolution. There's no reckoning with these demons, other than accidentally becoming an ambulatory camera that would have an even greater chance of catching Sam—and is even capable of storing Sam's soul in a photograph, just in case "something bad happened" to Sam.

Lyle's real moment of facing his demons comes in a Promise ending, where he has the chance to get an epilogue that gives some kind of resolution. If he plays a full campaign of Mazes & Wizards, he gets the chance to funnel some of his moral dilemmas through the main antagonist, Zalmoxis. Having become integrated with Sam and co., perhaps it's after having interacted with the gang enough that Lyle "sets photography aside" and quits his candid stalking of Sam. However, he apparently remains obsessed with him, with the epilogue cheerily stating "Change is one step at a time!" Very true, epilogue. You can do it, Lyle!

"What is your character most afraid of?"

Lyle is afraid of many things. He shrinks at denial; he startles at loud sounds. He titters and hides himself under a curtain, afraid of being seen or known. Lyle is most afraid of rejection and judgement. The most obvious example is that reaction Sam can have to seeing his body if he decides to peek: that is judgement and rejection tangled in one, and Lyle becomes utterly hysterical about it.

Another example of his feelings on rejection and judgement come when Sam inquires about Mazes & Wizards. As Lyle explains the idea of tabletop roleplay and inquires about what Sam thinks, the player has the option to snark, "Hah! NO! They're for losers!" Doing this causes Lyle to exaggeratedly tear apart his Mazes & Wizards book, wearing "an almost pained expression." "See? Who cares! Hah! S-so stupid! Let's never speak of that silly game again!" ...Lyle loves M&W. He wants to be agreeable, and fears judgement and rejection. He's a doormat who does what is favored by those who he surrounds himself with, lest they judge him for his own interests.

Inventory:

• Photo of Sam
  
• Photo of Sam
  
• Photo of Sam
  
• The collection of miscellaneous photos that he keeps on his body. They... they all have souls in them. I just think it would be funny if Aves-types had to see that. They're random people Lyle presumably tested his new powers on, who he now regards as "friends."

Powers/Abilities:

• Big Chomp
  Bite with an enormous crushing mouth! Grows stronger by level. This power also drains victims of their life force, funneling it back to Lyle like a vampire drinking blood.


• Development Fluid
  Spew highly acidic development fluid. May cause acid burns. Grows stronger by level. Lyle produces his own developer from his own body, and likely produces other darkroom fluids, like fixer (gross) and stop-bath.


• Blinding Flash
  Emit a blinding flash! May blind all enemies. It's a camera flash. It's bright.


• Lyle Kicks
  Kick with many sharp legs! Hits four times on random enemies, and may make them bleed. He has legs and they're sharp.


• Film Bind
  Target is bound with film - unable to move and more vulnerable to fire. Lyle, with his strange new anatomy, is capable of producing film the way a spider produces silk, and it's just as sticky and binding. He can cocoon enemies with it. Great.


• Soul Taker
  Steal someone's soul with a photograph. May instantly kill some enemies, and slowly drain the life of others. I DON'T KNOW IF THIS SHOULD BE PERMITTED IN KARTERIA. He might be able to drain stamina from doing this, but maybe no developing-polaroids-and-stealing-souls via them.

Lyle is also skilled with photography, and has novice-level skills as a GM for shit like D&D. Amazing.

Additionally, as a Cursed... contact with Lyle's fluids may be occasionally contagious. For the ease of playing in a game already formed around body horror, I am going to request that this be nerfed, especially because Lyle never does this himself in LO. It seems to be a trait that potentially happens besides, but not always (for example, Rosie (Baby Teeth) infects her non-witness parents by biting them, but Sam does not get infected if bitten).

Samples: Here & Here
Player Goals: Lyle is a minor character in Look Outside who has already undergone the body horrors, so enduring more body horrors this time isn't necessarily the aim. On the other hand, I am just interested in seeing him separated from his canon! I'd LOVE castmates... but trying to see him navigate a world as he is now, separate from his vices? I'm curious to see if it causes him to crash out and deteriorate, or if he manages to 'heal' from his bad habits (of stalking people).
Soul Choice: Randomize me baby For posterity's sake, Lyle was randomized Carnivora.