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Naoko Raidon; A villain
Topic Started: Nov 11 2009, 02:25 AM (648 Views)
Grim Wolf
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Name: Naoko Raidon (surname given first)
Gender: Male
Age: 17
Grade: 12
School: Bayview Secondary School
Hobbies and Interests: Good Grades, Intelligence, Debate, Chess, Battered Women's Shelter, SotF (psychological)

Appearance: Naoko Raidon stands at a small-ish five feet, eight inches and weighs in at only 135 lbs. He is slender and not very well-muscled. He is extremely good-looking: his features are perfectly proportioned to his face and his default expression is a gentle smile, though admittedly one which doesn't quite reach his eyes. His eyes are dark and smoky and their shape (along with his skin color) is typically Japanese. His nose, ears, eyes, and facial structure all lend themselves to the handsome, even if he leans a bit to the weak side. His flowing black hair only emphasizes his features.

He favors khaki pants, nice shirts with the top button undone, and his favorite jacket--a long blue school uniform affair with a seven-pointed star sewn into the back. The jacket is the only memento of his dead brother, Naoko Ichiro. Beneath his clothing, Raidon has a half-complete tattoo of incredible intricacy: his father began to do this to him between the ages of 12 and 14, both in honor of their yakuza heritage and, after heating the needles, as another method of inflicting pain.

Biography: Naoko Raidon is a troubled, troubled individual.

Which isn't too say he's a murderous psychopath--not by any means. While certainly troubled, Raidon is actually fairly balanced: he is well in control of himself, he suppresses no great hatred of anyone at his school. His ambition can be a bit overbearing, true--he has made himself few friends in his drive to be valedictorian of his high school--but other than this quirk he offers no outward sign of his internal turbulence.

Of which there is quite a bit.

Naoko Raidon was born to parents Naoko Hayashida and Naoko Noriko. He had one older sibling, Naoko Ichiro, his senior by six years. Noriko would die when Raidon was four. She had stomach cancer which metastasized to almost all parts of her body with incredible speed: her immune system had basically shut down at some point, and the cancer spread along her body rapidly. Hayashida would later say that Noriko had simply 'lost her will to live' and so her body had responded to her wish.

This was because Naoko Hayashida ranks among one of the more twisted men to pervert the face of the earth.

Before her death Noriko's gynecologist found severe damage of the kind usually associated with violent rape. An earlier medical examination found her body pockmarked with burns and bruises, including a poorly healed break in her fingers and two bruised ribs. The signals of frequent abuse make the ensuing breakdown of her immune system a tragic, but hardly surprising, event.

The Naoko family, an old branch of the Yakuza, commanded considerably prestige in Japan. Hayashida was a particularly successful head: his affluence and power kept police from becoming too involved in his affairs, and his tyrannical rule of the Naoko household ensured that his abuses were kept quiet. Therefore there was no obligation for the police to involve themselves in what would be politically and criminally dangerous territory.

In a particularly bizarre twist, the Naoko family seems to have followed an Ottoman-style of succession for the head of their family: whichever child remained alive and in power became the family's head. This did not preclude siblings surviving--many would step down or cede power to a more capable (or at least more ruthless) sibling in order to maintain the line. Not so Hayashida: originally the youngest of seven siblings, four of Hayashida's siblings died 'accidental' deaths, one committed suicide, and one, Naoko Shinji, went missing. Thus Hayashida rose to prominence; thus the influence that allowed him to torment his wife and children.

Yet Hayashida's power only went so far. His power in Japan collapsed in a two-pronged event: first, one of his lieutenants realized (and reported) that Hayashida had been embezzling enormous sums of money, and after neither boy had shown up at school for three days authorities had called upon the Naoko house and discovered that he had them locked in a room for three days. Unfortunately for the boys, Hayashida was nothing if not clever: he'd already made enormous investment in American enterprise and was able to arrange for his escape from Japan before the yakuza could wreak its revenge and before police could seize him. He moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, because it was one of the places in the U.S. in which the yakuza had no influence.

When Raidon was ten years old, his brother locked the both of them in the garage and then slit his wrists, taking his own life. Raidon has never talked about this with anyone, though the psychological ramifications are potentially devastating. Worse still was Hayashida's reaction to the event: he would not pay for the boy's grave or funeral, claiming him to be too 'weak-willed' to be worthy of any expense. Because of his politically and monetarily secure situation, and the fact he severely reduced his physical abuse upon coming to North America, Hayashida was never expatriated to the eager elements back in Japan. He refused too, to submit Raidon for psychological treatment, perhaps afraid the magnitude of his abuses would be discovered and certainly disdainful of psychology as a 'refuge for the weak'.

When Raidon was fourteen years old, his father was killed by Naoko Shinji, Raidon's uncle. Shinji had been the last sibling of Hayashida's to vanish: when Noriko was pregnant with Ichiro (Hayashida, 23: Shinji, 25), the two, who had always had a stronger bond then the rest of their siblings, went out for a walk. Shinji was knocked unconscious, weighed down, and dropped into a river, where the rushing current quite fortunately washed him up on a sand bar. With his brother in control of numerous resouces, Shinji managed to come under the Japanese witness protection program in exchange for his testimony in some crucial yakuza cases. Eventually Shinji went to the Sates, tracked Hayashida down, and took his time killing him. He was arrested by the United States and expatriated to Japan. Naoko Raidon was home at the time: when police were called in response to gunshots heard from the Naoko house, and Raidon was found unconscious. He claims to remember nothing of the encounter with his uncle, and his psychologist was unable to retrieve the memory by putting Raidon under hypnosis.

Raidon, not wishing to be moved to any sort of foster home, sued Minnesota for emancipation. The state had few laws governing the process of emancipation, and anyways the case was unusual: Raidon had no family outside of Japan, and given the brutal death (and probably gang-related) murder of his father there was an actual reason not to send him off. Moreover, his grades were superb and he had literally no disciplinary infractions, either at school or on his record. The court granted him a probationary period, seeing as his inheritance left him with more than enough money to work off of: he had to maintain a 3.0 g.p.a and be approved after six months of therapy by his psychologist. Raidon maintained a perfect g.p.a. The psychologist, after a few month's of investigation, pronounced him in good health, informing the court that while he obviously suffered from some issues (mainly, the psychologist noted, related to his brother's death), they did not pose a danger either to himself or to others.

As a result of his father's constant pushing, his demands (harsh and unreasonable) for excellence from his sons, Raidon has little give to him. He obtains the best grades he can: he spends hours studying, pushing himself to his limits. Perhaps as a result of the physical abuse he experience and Hayashida's attempts to force him fight and Ichiro to fight, Raidon abhors violence in any form: his physical weakness is a result of this, as he dislikes even athletics. He values logic and intellect above all else: hence he strives always to keep his mind flexible through war games, logic games, riddles, anything that makes his mind work in an unusual way. He is good at face-to-face chess (though terrible at computer chess), and is one of the best Lincoln-Douglass debater competing for Bayview Secondary School. In his time there he has been to NFL Nationals twice, and during his senior year made it to quarter-finals.

Classmates are aware of the fact that Raidon lives alone, and many know that it is because his father was murdered. Only those relatively close to Raidon, Simon among them, know that it was his uncle who committed the murder, and he only learned that after taking him to see Saw II.

Death--at least, the violent kind--haunts Raidon. He cannot see a scary movie without being troubled by the various murders. When Simon Grey (who recruited him into the Battered Women's Shelter and remains his best friend) took him to see Saw II, Raidon did not sleep for two days--not because the idea frightened him too much, but simply because he could not stop thinking about it. This may further explain Raidon's obsession with SotF: he has viewed all released footage, several director's cuts, and many of the 'character highlights'--reels released by Danya with focus on particular characters, usually the winners or fan favorites.

Advantages: Raidon is flexibly intelligent, terrible strategic, and uncannily tough. Because of his father's abuse Raidon will not be easily fazed by pain or by adverse circumstances: moreover, his cool logic and strong reasoning skills will enable him to keep his head while others panic, giving him a potentially devastating intelligent. His long familiarity with SotF may also, when combined with his natural talents, prevent him from making any thoughtless mistakes.

Disadvantages: While his mind is a powerful weapon, Raidon possesses one of the weaker bodies entering this year's game--including many of the girls. He is not well-liked or well-trusted by almost any of the students, as he is usually perceived a polite but aloof. Moreover, his psychological issues are likely to be of any use to him in the game: he abhors violence in most forms and is haunted by images of violent death, however tame they may be.
Edited by Grim Wolf, Nov 18 2009, 07:49 PM.
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MurderWeasel
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Hi Grim Wolf! I'll be handling Naoko's critique.

Naoko is temporarily DENIED, and he'll take a good deal of work before he's acceptable.

To start with, I need more info on his appearance. At the bare minimum, I'd like eye and hair color.

Next, Naoko's biography has some major problems. The biggest of these is that it is obvious from the start (heck, from the profile subtitle) that he's going to be played as a villain. The big point of SOTF isn't to have the most villainous villain or the highest body count. It's to see how normal, average high school students react to an insane and extreme situation.

Now, on to specifics. I'd like a better description of Noriko's death. Right now, the actual cause is quite unclear. People don't actually simply lose the will to live.

Naoko's father also needs some serious changes. For one thing, The Program (of BR fame) is not something that necessarily exists in the SOTF universe. It's status is slightly unclear, but for profiles, assume that it does not/did not exist.

His abuse of Naoko requires more explanation. How did he manage to hide it from authorities? Why did no one try to intervene?

I also need to know how he died. If the intent is for Naoko to have killed him, that has to be changed. No character's in V4 should have killed before the game begins.

The piece about Naoko living on his own will also have to be adjusted. In Minnesota, the laws on emancipated minors are fairly strict. There is no way Naoko could live on his own before age 16. If he was 16, though, he could probably get by, as long as he had a source of income, kept good grades, kept clear of the law, etc.

I'm also worried about Naoko's interest with SOTF, reading people, and chess. It all adds up to further the idea that he's going to be a major killer. You should also leave ambiguities ("Perhaps", "no one knows", etc.) out of profiles. While this may be the case in universe, the info should be in his profile.

I'm also worried about Naoko's advantages and disadvantages. Quite simply, they seem a touch unbalanced. He knows a lot about SOTF, has somehow gleaned weapon skills from this, and is incredibly smart and determined. On the other hand, he's not that strong and may be distrusted. I'm not really counting his lack of practical weapons experience, as that isn't such an issue when most characters will lack it. Right now, Naoko seems destined to dominate the game, and that's something we shouldn't be able to tell from the profile.

Finally, you have some slight formality issues. All profiles should read as if written from an objective perspective. This is mostly tied to the ambiguities I mentioned above.
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Grim Wolf
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Actually, though I considered having Raidon kill his father, I'd actually decided he wasn't going to. That seemed too...easy, somehow.

Also, I was unaware of the status of the Japanese Program. I'll alter that.

...Mmm, I s'pose those are all valid points. I kind of assumed you'd reject him: since I built him to be a villain, and I know you frown on it. I'm going to make a lot of changes--I actually left the ambiguous phrases in there because I thought they made it feel more like an SotF report, my bad, but I'm going to make some edits followed by a few requests.

I'd like to allow him to continue to be a character with clearly delineated villainous qualities.

I don't think any of my other characters lend themselves to anything more than an ambiguous performance: none of them are especially manipulative, what complexes they have are few and readable and unlikely to alter their personalities. Raidon is clearly built to be a villain--I made no pretensions to the contrary. What I'd like is for him to be a complex villain: for it to be Hayashida's doing. I want each kill he makes to be character study for him. So I'd like to leave the Chess, Logic, and SotF points in, while substantially altering his history to make it...well, better.

Not a 'madman' villain, nor even a 'coldly logical' villain. Just a villain. A player out of necessity. I understand the problems with having a pre-built player, but he doesn't have any combat experience to make him substantially better than others. He's just a bit more strategic, a bit more logical, and bit more predisposed to play.
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Grim Wolf
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Toned it down in the right places, I think. Not, I will concede you, a normal character by any means: perhaps a bit too fantastic for your standards. If so, I understand: I have an affinity for characters like this, so I bear no grudge if you need to tell me 'bitch, please'. ^_^

Some things I checked into, however: 1) Assuming the Naoko Family is a real long-time member of the Yamaguchi-gumi (which it is not, but I think that's acceptable fiction), the influence ascribed to Hayashida is completely feasible; 2) their are no standardized emancipation laws in Minnesota, making the bit about his emancipation at 14 far more feasible (11 was too early, I apologize). Given that he skipped a grade, I figured he was closer to the border where it would be conceivable for him to receive emancipation; 3) Removed the bit about weapons, sorry, I originally wrote that at 3 a.m and I was dead tired.

Actually, thanks for denying it. If I'd had to stick to my original history I don't think he'd have as much potential to become a good (from an RP standpoint, anyways) player.

Well. How's v.2 look?
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MurderWeasel
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Thanks for toning things down. Naoko looks a lot better. I would like you to tone things down a little more, though.

Particularly, I think some of the abuse is a bit over-the-top, and I'd like some of the yakuza details toned down a bit. Particularly, the bit about him being shot seems unneeded (especially as it would probably bring serious police attention onto his situation, which would lead to large amounts of counseling and so forth).

Basically, I'd just like you to bring him a bit closer to normal. If you cut some of the really horrifying aspects, and bring him a bit closer to normal, that would be great.

The one other specific detail I'd like you to change is his debate team record. I don't mind him being good (even great) at debate, but I'd rather he not be declared the best team member ever without consulting the other people with characters on debate team.

Let me know once you've made some changes, and I'll give him another look.
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Grim Wolf
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Mmm, fair points. Let me consult.

...

Alright, on the Debate front: I specified "LD" debater because I didn't want to step on anyone's toes. Here's what I have to offer--Markham has no specifics to debate, Abigail is the captain, Cyrille...is just on the debate team, nothing given, Roy is apparently good at Debate without any degree of specificity, Illario is only in debate to please his father...mmm, this has taken some time. I'll post a message asking if anyone has any objections on that score, then: it doesn't preclude anyone from being better, it just makes him very good at a certain event.

Oh, they're, um...they're supposed to know. About Shinji and all. The problem is that most of Hayashida's money, like the money of the Yakuza itself, was obtained through mostly legal means. I'll add something to that effect, though.

Erm...which parts should I remove, then? Never mind, I'll have a go at it and get your approval/disapproval once I've finished.

And...let's go!
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MurderWeasel
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Alright! Just post when you've got it all set, and I'll give him another look. One other thing I'd like to see, that I forgot to mention last time: I'd like to see Naoko have some sort of serious counseling for all the stuff he's been through, specifically the yakuza-related bits and his brother's suicide. I'd also like to know exactly how much of his history is known by his classmates and such.

Post when you've got things taken care of. Thanks!
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Grim Wolf
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Alright.

I removed the gunshot wound, toned down some of the abuse, and wasn't quite so specific about the Yamaguchi-gumi (I think I removed all reference to them, incidentally). I made the abuse of Raidon and Ichiro a lot more vague (and added some more realistic details to Noriko), and played back some of the Debate stuff.

Hope that's a bit better.
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MurderWeasel
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There are just a couple more things I'd like fixed. First off, I just can't see any court letting Raidon off without psychological counseling after his brother's suicide. I can see him being too scared to say anything that would incriminate his father, though.

Also, it's best if you remove any "unknown" elements from Raidon's bio. Either say he had a brief encounter with his uncle and don't elaborate, or tell us what happened, but do a little something with it. Noting that the outcome was unknown gives the biography an incomplete feel.

Finally, I may just be missing some debate terminology, but what does NFL refer to? I thought it was football.

Finally, and this is something I should have caught before, there's a little contradiction in his hatred of violent movies and his interest in SOTF. I'd just like that fleshed out a little more. Also, It'd be great if you changed the SOTF stuff he's viewed to "all available material", as the and unedited stuff is probably not available (and also likely boring; each island has hundreds or thousands of cameras rolling nonstop for days).

Post when you've got it taken care of and I'll give Raidon another look!
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Grim Wolf
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I don't think the court can mandate psychological treatment if Hayashida refused it, is the thing. Could say it was a part of their probationary period requirements, if ya like.

NFL is the National Forensic League. They're the national debate group, basically: winning in their ranks is the hardest (trust me).

Gah, sorry, meant to take care of that unknown reference. Forgot about it. >_>

I thought most of the stuff was available? Isn't there a Danya conversation where he talks about releasing the 'unedited' footage for general viewing? Also, the violent stuff doesn't stop Raidon from functioning: it just starts him...

Hm. Alright, editing.
Edited by Grim Wolf, Nov 17 2009, 05:53 PM.
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MurderWeasel
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Alright! Please don't post until you've completed the edits, as it makes it hard to tell if another critique is required or not. Thanks!
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Grim Wolf
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Yes sah! Added, sah!
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MurderWeasel
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Alright. Looks pretty good. Thanks for bearing with me on the changes. Just be sure to portray Raidon realistically and things should work out well.

Raidon is APPROVED for pregame.
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