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Oh ho, got the Dowland too! Very good. You may wish to keep an eye on that going forward too. But yeah, I was thinking of the Jazz one. It's a "complaint" by the game's animator in the Instructions section. I'm curious what this "research" entailed though; it sounds like some others have made the connection? Nicely done though.

And thanks, I definitely will continue to have stuff like that; not huge exposition dumps but just little hints of "Here's how this character reacts, given who he is and the setting." Glad you enjoyed that.

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I found an OpenForum thread from 2002 that was, from what I can tell, a guessing game about video game quotes. The text is slightly hard to read, coupled with me being dyslexic, but I was still able to find a reference to the quote. I searched up Jazz Jackrabbit screenshots and videos, and one stream recording of the game made the same claim about this quote. I couldn't see it in the credits, but again, that could be due to my dyslexia acting up; I can sometimes skip entire paragraphs, which is why I try to remember to double-check everything I read.

Ah, interesting, so someone was using it as trivia on a quiz. Yeah like I said, not in the credits per-say, it's at the end of the instructions section in the menu. But still, good catch!

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I'm sorry for suddenly jumping back into our conversation, but I had another weird and sort of morbid question. 

I won't specify where it's said, as I don't want to accidentally spoil too much for other players, but there's a piece of dialogue that says Mezz "trimmed down the ranks" of the gangsters. Is Mezz a no-kill kind of hero, and this dialogue implies he simply hurts enemies to the point of being out of commission? Or does he sometimes hit hard enough to kill? Even what amounts to a well-crafted stick can cause catastrophic damage if swung with enough velocity and into the right areas of the body.

I know this sounds extremely morbid, but I always am curious if combatant (especially armed) heroes follow a no-kill rule or not. 

Side note, does Dragon's Breath cause physical damage to hyenas after long-term abuse? I know it's already shown to cause mental disturbance (not even counting suggestibility in other species), but I can't stop thinking about how a drug like that would ruin a person's body over time.

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I've intentionally left it vague. It's mostly video-game logic: you can bring a giant buster sword down on someone and bring their HP down to zero, but they're not dead, just "defeated", whatever that means. Making it explicit that he's murdering every single one of the enemies seemed like the wrong tone, and doesn't quite fit his character. To be clear though, Mezz isn't Spiderman/Batman, he's perfectly fine with killing (though you should probably picture it as a more cartoony killing, rather than him drenched in blood or something). It's just that he's somewhat of a stealth character, so he USUALLY favors knockouts; he sees killing as sloppy and unimpressive, but not off the table. You don't live your whole life in the ruined city and not kill. Even Scratch probably has a few notches (though I'm not definitively specifying there). But Diezel and Khazeem for example are 100% dead in the appropriate endings, and it's at least somewhat Mezz's fault.

Now, does all this mean that that bit of narration about "trimming the ranks" means he ended them all, or just crippled them for a while? Whichever you prefer, though I think my intention was more toward the latter; again, he prefers not to kill because it's sloppy, and doesn't fit as well with the "hero" identity/delusion he's crafted for himself. He is, like all good people, trying to live up to a somewhat unattainable ideal. But he's not unrealistically hard-line about it.

As for Dragon's Breath's potential for physical damage, the answer is that it's never been fully determined. Anyone who's not a hyena either ends up a sex slave (which tends to have a fairly...unimpressive career length) or ends up wandering off before training is complete and dying because their sex obsession and empty-headedness leads to the neglect of basic self-preservation: starving, tumbling off a high ledge, picking fights they shouldn't, etc. Anyone who IS a hyena goes crazy with violence and paranoia, and is murdered by other enterprising entrepreneurs before any physical signs of damage manifest. In the few cases where slaves/"Entertainment" have survived several years in their new roles however, no clear evidence of physical harm from the drug has manifested. But keep in mind that for "fresh meat" the drug is only used as an ensnarement and training tool for conditioning, then discontinued once the new assets are ready, so there's no continual abuse that might lead to further damage. Mahir only uses the clicker in the end.

ALSO: Was thinking over my comments on Mezz's name and realized I'm forgetting my own...lore? Dev lore? Originally I was going for a musical theme in naming for the first game, though I gave up on it pretty quick ("Diezel" is a brand of amplifier for example). "Mezz" is a reference to Mezzo, as in Mezzo Forte. "Medium". Get it? Cause he's short?

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I actually was kind of curious if there were more music references hidden around, as there was the Dowland graffiti, not to mention the title "Serenade." I completely missed the name references for the characters, since I don't really know much about music at all, let alone brands or types of instruments.

I get what you mean about ambiguity on enemies' fates, and I appreciate that it's not just a concrete "kills everybody or nobody" dynamic. Aaaand because I'm deranged, when you said "more cartoony killing," I envisioned Mezz replacing one of Mahir's cigarettes with a stick of dynamite.

Well hey, he IS a bunny after all. 

*Mahir blinks, covered in soot.* Aint I a stinker? *Chews carrot, then immediately spits it out once the take is over.*

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My headcanon is that despite plant life being hard to come by, Mezz keeps a secret garden of carrots just in case he needs to go full Looney Tunes on whatever villain he's facing. 

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Considering how many bars and clubs we come across, feel like there's some plants in indoor grow houses or hydroponic farms for making alcohol. Need some source of sugar for fermenting, herbs and spices for infusions, etc. Probably not high quality considering how Mezz reacts to it but enough to get the job done. 

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I can see your point, although I imagine there would be cases of simply scrounging up pre-bottled booze from old buildings and such, which feels like the purview of Junkers mentioned in Scratch's computer. I bet this would also apply to other commodities, like pre-rolled tobacco products, canned or sealed foods, soda, even bottled water.

Again, Bitshift obviously decides what is canon. I'm simply speculating based on my own understanding of how these types of worlds tend to work in relation to resources.

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Sorry for randomly jumping back in here, but I didn't want to make a new post when I can keep it relatively consolidated here.

I was finishing my assignment, when a perfectly normal thought for any college student entered my mind. "Does a cartoon fuckbunny have romantic relations with a hacker mouse?" I know you hinted at Mezz and Scratch getting up to some stuff, but I am curious if it will be strictly sexual, or if there will be a romantic element to it. I honestly wondered if it was already romantic, as Scratch's disappointment when Mezz left the safehouse seemed less like he couldn't work up the courage, and more, "He never makes time for me." Or I could be completely wrong, I never was good at understanding social context. On a similar note, which one of them is larger? In stature, I mean... Yeah, let's go with that.

Ha, no you're good! As of where we are in the story currently, no, it's strictly a friendship, though there's definitely indications Scratch wants it to be something more. As to where that will end up, you'll have to keep tuning in to find out! Same bunny time, same bunny channel. As for height, Mezz is definitely taller, by a good  three to four inches. As to "height," again, mysteries may be revealed at a later date.

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So, Scratch really is tiny, then. I know by realistic standards, he would be colossal for a mouse, but I imagine keeping the height 100% realistic would make some really odd visuals. If you were trying to go for a micro/macro kink, I wouldn't be judging for it, but I have a distinct feeling that's not your goal. In general, furry characters tend to be rather unrealistic, but that usually comes with the territory of being... you know... humanoid animals (not real); rabbits don't have paw pads, but there are far worse inaccuracies out there, not to mention people should do what they want when it comes to fantasy.

So, I imagine the antagonists aren't really that big, just bigger than the protagonist?

On a note related to Mezz and Scratch, the idea of them getting romantic is particularly sweet, as I have a soft spot for cute characters kissing and snuggling. I know that sounds absolutely vanilla, but that is the way I am. I am looking forward to what you do with them, but I do understand that some fucked up stuff will happen first; it is "Cruel," after all.

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Dean Dodrill said that?  The guy who later made Dust an Elysian Tale?

...Well job well Done cause Jazz is one of my earliest crushes.  Especially those 3D levels where if you hit a wall he flips back and you have a screen full of bunny ass with legs spread open.

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Ho boy, getting into esoteric Jazz lore a moment here: No actually, not Dean Dodrill. He did the excellent opening animation on Jazz 2, which still gives me chills to this day, but like the music (where the new tracks on 2 were done by the amazing Alexander Brandon, later to be of Unreal and Deus Ex tracker fame, but the first game's score was by Robert A. Allen), animation and styling for the characters in general was done by Nick Stadler on Jazz 1. Kind of a sad story: he went to school for animation, hoping to work on big movies and shows, and took the gig with Epic as a stepping stone, a quick stop to gain experience on his resume. Finished up, they offered to let keep him on, but he was set on going on to "real" work in entertainment. Aaaand then Toy Story happened, and suddenly no one would hire new animators if they couldn't do this new 3d thing. As a side bar, that MIGHT also be why so many games, especially edutainment titles in the late 90s had such lush 2d animation: There was a whole crop of traditionally trained animators that couldn't get jobs in the industry anymore, but the gaming world was thrilled to have them, as multimedia and CD ROM was just becoming a thing, and it would be eons before PCs could do decent real-time 3d.

He ended up doing illustration work for an LGBT magazine for a while (I believe he was gay himself) and then just kinda faded from public view. In hindsight, ouch, should have stuck with Epic, though I'm sure that would have had its own issues.

Heh, but yeah, lot of fun stuff in that game. Very jank in places, but beautiful art and music.

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that second to last paragraph made me hope somewhere out there is official lgbt art of Jazz.  You know those turtles would want to do something with him.  Though yeah, bad timing.

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Hey, anything's possible. He's probably not as big a perv as us though. Just hope things worked out alright for him in the end.