Respecting The Player

Care and Empowerment in Magical Diary

[Text by Autumn Nicole Bradley [www.lifeinneon.com]. This article was funded through Patreon under the ZEAL project. ZEAL aims to provide high quality criticism of rarely discussed games, and showcase the talents of exciting new writers and artists. For details and information on how to donate, please check out patreon.com/mammonmachine!]

Respecting the Player

Magical Diary is a life sim by Hanako Games where you play as a young woman attending Iris Academy to learn to control your latent magical talents. You learn spells which you use to pass your dungeon exams, manage the stress of being a teenager trying to learn, hit the mall for wizarding accessories (my favorite are the faerie wings), possibly fall in love, and just try and make it through your first year. Using your weekly planner, you choose which classes to take each day, or whether to skip class to study or sleep. Right off the bat you choose your appearance including skin color and body size.

The game features character relationships that deal maturely, forthrightly, but also compassionately with queer romance, straight romance, asexual romance, casual romance, interpersonal and relationship violence, and even an unlikely May-December romance. Most admirably, in each case (but especially the last two), the power dynamics at play are dealt with candidly, never swept aside, and character’s agency and player choice is paramount at all times. Of course, you can also skip the romance altogether!

If you’ve played Hanako Games’ more recent life sim, Long Live the Queen, you’ll find Magical Diary to be far more forgiving. (Actually, you’ll find almost every game to be more forgiving, except maybe Nethack.) The naïve way of looking at Magical Diary is that barring a pattern of painfully obvious poor decisions, your choices don’t matter; personally, I had to try to fail. But that’s where the genius lies. You learn over the course of one playthrough that failure of any given task isn’t catastrophic, but merely results in a missed opportunity, which can be far more painful. That entire paradigm lowers the stakes, and encourages the kind of experimental and explorational learning that respects students as people.

Then there is Professor Petunia Potsdam.

Seeing Children and Adolescents as Full Persons

Prof. Potsdam is the school’s headmistress and teaches class for three of the magic colors. But more importantly, she is a window into a world where adults regard kids as full persons with agency, who have their own understanding of the world and make their own decisions about personal boundaries. This is already present in the nature of the class schedules, testing, and disciplinary system: you choose which classes to take, which of multiple ways to complete exams (some options are very creative), and if you haven’t been expeled, you’re not failing.

This isn’t readily apparent in a single playthrough. Seen through the lens of only one set of choices, it may seem that you, the player, have stumbled upon a combination of decisions that result in her approval of your actions. However, over the course of repeated playthroughs, you see that your decisions merit very different responses while still meeting with her approval and encouragement. Her character emerges as someone who uses her authority as headmistress to support your choices, even and perhaps especially when they’re unconventional, rather than trying to mold you into a miniature version of her.

You see this aspect of her early on, during freshman initiation. This was a plot arc that cut right to the core for me. I was bullied relentlessly as a kid, and that’s something that has left some very particular scars, especially when it comes to harassment being excused as “all in good fun”. A key aspect of my bullying was that school administrators turned a blind eye to it, or punished me for fighting back. My hazing sense wasn’t tingling; it was blaring, and I knew that I, as a player, wouldn’t be able to go through initiation if it involved what I thought it did. This is a game and no real person would know what I chose, and yet it stillbrought up old anxieties about being bullied harder for not participating. I will be honest, playing through it the first time, the choice of whether to stay or leave was almost too hard to make and I very nearly quit there.

But I decided to refuse to participate.

That was when I ran into Prof. Potsdam. Her first reaction was concern that I had been hurt, but when I explained that the entire affair was hazing, she reminded me:

I cried. This space is insufficient for explaining the amount of relief I felt to read an authority figure saying this to a student. If there were to be consequences for skipping initiation, they would not come from her. During my first playthrough, I saw no negative consequences. It was only in a later playthrough that I gritted my teeth and went through with initiation. I learned that initiation is only necessary for Damien’s romance.* I also found that each of the unfair things that occur is ultimately and swiftly redressed. As someone whose experience with school was one of unfair treatment by authority figures and being punished for resisting being bullied, I have to express my deep gratitude for this.

Prof. Potsdam also prioritizes an understanding of risk and consequence over futile gestures toward safety, but she never hesitates to step in the instances when the character is actually over her head. In so doing, she presents an image of adult mentorship built on candor and respect, which comes out in everything from discussions of the aforementioned gender neutral pronouns, the dangers of the Otherworld, to even a frank discussion of sex and pregnancy. Shortly before Valentine’s Day, she offers up this little reminder (which I quote at length rather than post 8 screencaps):

“This is the traditional season for young romance, and we don’t want to clip your wings. There are no school rules against love in any form. As long as you and the other person — or people — that you are with are enthusiastic about whatever you’re doing, we will not intervene. But keep any naughty business out of areas where those who have not consented might accidentally see you. And try not to get too distracted from your schoolwork. Know what you want and be sure everyone else does too. If anyone isn’t enthusiastic, whether it’s a kiss or a dance or something else, stop and wait.”

She goes on to explain carrying children isn’t allowed, and invites students to speak to her after class if they have questions or “if you don’t think your Green magic is up to the task.”

What just happened here? In just a few sentences she 1) treats the adolescent students as simply younger versions of adults by acknowledging they have and may act on their romantic and sexual desires, 2) demonstrates that queer, poly, (and given the setting) interspecies romance are all acceptable, 3) makes explicit that she’s available for questions (with the clear understanding evident from #1 that students will be treated with respect), and 4) sets a clear expectation that consent is paramount and mandatory for physical contact. This is unlearning heterosexism, monogamy, adultism, and the “silence is consent” cultural script in one fell swoop.

Patience, Support, and Compassion in Messy Situations

(Spoilers between here and the next heading)

(CW: Damien’s and Grabiner’s relationship paths contain instances of relationship violence)

There will be hard decisions at times. Because the game deals forthrightly with adolescence, it means sometimes there are moments where fate has left only bad options for you to choose from, but choose you must. When your romantic partner attacks you in one of the paths, forgiveness or rejection is in your hands no matter what your friends and roommates think. When you accidentally end up oathbound to marry someone more than twice your age, it’s up to you, one choice at a time, whether that leads to romance or mere tolerance of the arrangement in name only.

You’re never alone, though. Prof. Potsdam is there for you at every turn.

When the Misunderstood Bad Boy, Damien, turns out to be the Actual Bad Boy soul-sucking demon everyone warned you he was, it’s up to you whether to forgive him when he apologizes. Your friends try to intervene, eventually culminating in an ultimatum: us or him. Worse, they spring it on you during your final exam.

Anyone who has been in an abusive relationship or who has witnessed a friend in an abusive relationship will recognize this scenario. For friends, it might even feel like such an ultimatum is necessary; it is painful to watch someone you love being hurt by someone they love. But it’s important to remember that people in abusive relationships may have their agency (or their sense of it) severely compromised, or even view their partner’s conduct as within their tolerance. Why someone stays with a partner that others feel is abusive may not be clear to outsiders.

If you decide Damien is still worth a second chance, your friends make good on their ultimatum and forfeit the final exam on behalf of all three of you. At first, Prof. Potsdam cautions you that cultivating relationships with friends is just as important as learning magic. At this point the game teeters on the edge of becoming a moralizing parable. But then a curious thing happens. She recognizes that it wasn’t your failing entirely, and by her actions takes responsibility for the school’s part by offering to switch you to a different dormitory hall—one with students more likely to understand you—the following year:

But one can’t forget that Damien did, in fact, attack you. So at the end of the year dance, she offers this sage advice:

Finally, she signs your yearbook, “Remember that I am always here for advice if you need it.”

In the end, Prof. Potsdam doesn’t judge you for staying with someone who hurt you or question your motives. What’s most important to her is that you have the tools and wherewithal to match wits with someone proven to be a wily manipulator, and the support of friends who truly understand you. Her priority is your safety and flourishing, all while maintaining an uncompromising respect for your autonomy.

Respect, Even for Failure

Lastly, and perhaps most admirably, Prof. Potsdam is a woman who stands by her students even through failure. It is hard to get expelled from Iris Academy, but there are a few scenarios in which it may occur. The simplest is to sleep the entire first week of class, and again the following week. True to form, she doesn’t view this as laziness. Let me repeat that:

When you skip class for six days straight she does not jump to the conclusion that you are lazy.

Why on earth would an educator not see it that way? Surely we all had or know teachers (or some of you may in fact be teachers) who presume students are inherently lazy, looking for any excuse to get out of doing work. For those with that worldview, Prof. Potsdam’s conclusion is bafflingly alien. But allow me to quote at length again from her speech when she expels you:

“We all have talents. We all have many possible futures within our grasp. But just because we can do something doesn’t always mean we should… . Magic does not call to your heart. You feel no drive to improve for improvement’s sake.It’s not your fault. You are a flower planted in the wrong soil, and withering.”

(Bold emphasis mine)

With a few simple words Prof. Potsdam says, in her own way, something truly profound: people are knowledge sponges, and when students are in the right environment their own curiosity will compel them to absorb all the knowledge they can. And it is not the student’s failing when the learning environment wrong.

Through it all, Prof. Potsdam is there to offer unwavering, unconditional support as you learn the biggest lesson of adolescence: how to make your own choices and live with the consequences.

* Semi-spoiler: If you want to be treasurer, you need to have 0 demerits by election time. Participating in initiation is the easiest way to get back to 0 in time (you lose 10 right at the start from an ornery and fickle professor) but if you’re like me and would rather skip it, you can still do it. Your first exam is an opportunity to get 10 merits by getting your blue magic to 30 (caution, you need at least 1 point in each magic school before the last day of September). This takes some luck and planning but it’s a way to bypass the initiation and not lose out.