Gross Games about Flesh and Stuff

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Watch this video on Nebula: nebula.app/videos/jacob-gelle...
Perfect Vermin: itsthemaceo.itch.io/perfect-v...
How Fish is Made: store.steampowered.com/app/18...
Videodrome (David Cronenberg, 1983)
Cao Hui, “I Want to Play God:” www.linlingallery.com/eng/arti...
Indiepocalypse Radio interview with Maceo: • Interview with ItsTheT...
Laura Dern on David Lynch: www.rollingstone.com/tv-movie...
Games shown: Perfect Vermin, How Fish is Made
Music used (chronologically): The Massacre Downtown (Perfect Vermin), Silent Heaven (Silent Hill 2), Sleep Paralysis (Ruiner), Path of the Addict (Superhot: Mind Control Delete), Nocturne op.9 No.2 (Chopin), Dies Irae (Giuseppe Verdi), Nocturne in G Minor (Chopin), Tears of… (Silent Hill), You Can Always Come Home (Mike Franklyn)
Additional Music from Epidemic Sound
Thumbnail Credit: / hotcyder
Description Credit: Videodrome

[@JacobGeller]

New Geller merch is HERE. "Fish Fear Me" hats! Haunted house posters! Modern art mugs! Check it out, quantities are limited: store.nebula.app/collections/jacob-geller

[@Godzilla0936]

Give free or else

[@raze_]

Already sold out rip.

[@JackSparrow-re4ql]

Stop fucking my mind! Rape! Raaaaaape!

[@pukeglop]

no

[@Ifgodscouldbleed70times]

Geller’d up

[@pepijnstreng4643]

How Fish is Made reminds me of a story I read in high school by Anton Koolhaas, called "De Trechter" (The Funnel"). It's about a group of turkeys on a farm who have built an entire religion out of the fact they're going to get slaughtered. Turkeys who have been selected to be slaughtered - they know because they're suddenly fed way more and more often - attain the status of king or queen and are honored by the rest of the group. One disgraced queen - passed over for slaughter, instead used as a breeding hen - walks past the shed with the little chicks every morning and shouts "At the end, the knife awaits!" They even have rituals where one older king asks the young ones: "Our head will get shoved into the funnel! By who?" and the answer is "by us!". "Our feet will be bound together, but held up to be bound by who?" "By us!". There is one moment where a turkey flies over the wire that's keeping them contained, and into the outside world, but he has no idea what to do there, so he just flies back. His whole life has been framed so much in the context of this turkey society, that outside of it he has no idea what he would even do. Sometimes he will fly to sit on top of one of the posts, and wonder outside, but then he becomes too fat to even lift himself off the ground and decides that he can see just as much through the wire as he can see over it.

[@VictorDaniel-zc7ly]

👆🏻Congratulations once again you have been selected among the shortlisted winner's for the õngoing Ps5 giveaway, telegram the Name above 👆✅!

[@chriss780]

there's something very fitting and funny about the spam scam comment in response to this comment in particular immediate reminder of our own religion in a way, no?

[@liberpolo5540]

@@chriss780 tell me bout it! 😭

[@julija8472]

that's so insane and interesting! where can i read it?

[@brainzpvz2592]

That kinda reminds me of Chicken Run, which is also a pretty existential movie lol.

[@AoiLucine]

I... that last line about how perfect vermin makes us ask 'why would the news anchor do that, didnt he know he cant take it with him?' And how fish is made answer 'no, he didnt know, and you dont either' sort of smacked me in the face hard about a lot of stuff about my dad's death. He was getting chemo for pancreatic cancer throughout 2019, but by early 2020 he was getting weaker and weaker and he couldn't think as clearly as before. We all wondered why he was doing this, when it was hurting him more... doesn't he know it would be easier for him to just stop? But he didn't know. And i don't really know either, if I'm honest. Maybe to him fighting it to the last was worth all the pain to be around us just a bit longer. Welp didnt expect a video about two gross games to hit me so hard i start crying during work but hey, you never know.

[@briannabergman8381]

I'm so sorry for your loss :( it's the oddest of videos that make us think of our loved one sometimes.

[@catysuewho]

Wow, I experienced almost the same thing with my dad. He passed away from pancreatic cancer the day after my birthday in 2019. In the last few months, my mom really wanted him to go off the chemo. It seemed like the chemo was killing him more than the cancer was. But he wouldn't hear it, wouldn't even consider it. Honestly, I would do the same thing. Even if I knew fighting wasn't helping, was doing nothing but killing me faster, I wouldn't be able to stop. Because what's the alternative? Accepting death? He lived for a little over a year after his diagnosis and I know, logically, he accepted his death. He'd had lots of health problems his whole life, so it wasn't something he was unfamiliar with. He knew he was terminal. I think what you said is true - he did want to be with us as long as possible, even if it meant more pain and a lesser quality of life. But I think there was more to it, too. I think he didn't want to go without a fight. I think he didn't know how to stop fighting, even when he was losing. And like I said - I would do the same. I would keep smashing absolutely everything on the off chance I might get a vermin or too. Maybe just out of spite. Watching a loved one die from cancer is a horrible thing, and I'm so sorry we and countless others have had to experience it. I'm sorry for your loss, and sending you love.

[@hughcaldwell1034]

My wife is fighting. Fighting so hard through the worst shit I've ever seen, long past what I think I'd have the strength for, just for a chance to be with us a bit longer. It's a slightly different case, because her condition is chronic rather than terminal. But all this means is that without proper treatment, she'll have her life stolen without even the relief of death. My heart to anyone who's been through anything even remotely similar.

[@hughcaldwell1034]

@Ping Pong Thanks. The condition is ME-CFS if anyone is wondering. It isn't at all rare, but it's not very well known for various reasons, so research isn't well funded. We're hoping research into long covid will have some beneficial insights, though, since there's a lot of overlap with ME. Sci-Show has a good video if you want to know more.

[@ssjpanda8417]

I can only imagine. My family got "lucky" and it could've been so much worse but I understand the pain.

[@Demyxnocturne123]

Id say another aspect of Perfect Vermin is a desperate, frantic attempt to return to normalcy despite debilitating illness- the newsman wanting to return to his job, live his life and glory even though hes dying. Especially given his anger toward his doctor.

[@bishielurfer]

That's an interesting take, as I did wonder about why the specifically chose to place it in an office. Could also represent how these types of things just destroy your everyday life. But as someone with chronic illnesses that can be absolutely debilitating, I definitely have times where I am just desperate for those moments of normality. They're sometimes the only thing that can keep you grounded.

[@somedragonbastard]

While the fear of terminal illness is something I've blessedly never had to face, *this* is deeply relatable to me. I'm disabled and being pushed to return to "normal" life, to school and exercise I can't do, and on some level I do want that, because I'm still angry about my circumstances and want to be able to go back to before all of this, but I've had to learn to let go, to proverbially put the hammer down and just live with my body as it is. It's hard as hell.

[@wormybobcat3706]

Or maybe his anger isn't towards the doctor, but instead himself, it's clear he feels some form of regret, thinking that his passage on earth was but another gust of wind. Hence why when the opportunity comes, he wants to make sure he goes out with a bang.

[@monke7919]

Some other interesting details that could possibly contribute towards finding the true meaning of this is the as the levels go on every time you see the news anchor not only does he become more exaggeratedly mutated, but the ashtray gradually fills up with more and more cigarettes and ash And as you play through the levels, you will start to notice more and more. No smoking signs and the potted plants will stop looking like a potted plants and will start more closely. Resembling something more akin to the internal systems of a long, which may seem like a stretch. Until you compare the potted plants, I'm referring to And the diagram of what a lung looks like in the doctor's office You can see they are clearly depicted in similar ways as if to draw a clear connection to them.

[@atlas6987]

I think How Fish is Made is actually about life; about how, when inevitably forced to make decisions that we are not equipped to handle, everyone is a “fish out of water”.

[@atlas6864]

nice point also matching username

[@SomeoneYouDontKnowOfficial]

Kind of disappointed that he didn't mention how the news anchor went down the hole that is smoking with the game pretty much screaming it at you with how no smoking signs are everywhere, showing up more and more as the game progresses and his gradual decay is perfectly reflected on the left side of the screen with an ash tray filling up more and more with cigarettes, dying the same way his mother did, from smoking. Besides that I don't think anyone could have went over these games better.

[@kringle7804]

ive only seen one of his vids but it might be that he doesn't want to point out the obvious which seems to have hurt this video because there isnt much pointing other then cancer thing

[@nevinmyers1245]

He has to cut a lot out of his scripts to make them concise. The no smoking signs are interesting for sure, but don't really add much to his analysis, and were probably more trouble than they're worth to try to fit them into the script.

[@aarepelaa1142]

@@kringle7804 he literally pointed out the obvious thing the game is about. So clearly he just missed it.

[@Geostationary0rbit]

Id argue becuase hes useing these games to make a philosophical point. This detail surrounding the games reveal, while interesting, serves no purpose to what he is trying to discuss.

[@josecarlosmoreno9731]

@@Geostationary0rbit It sort of changes the message a lot, where cancer is often unexpected, doing something that actively harms you and causes cancer is very different and has less to do with the fragility and ephemerality of life and more to do with the stubbornness, irrationality, and self destructiveness of people. KZbinrs make mistakes, they're just people.

[@icantthinkofaname8139]

I’ve seen a streamer play “how fish is made”, he chose up immediately, told everyone else that going up was the best the option, actually lied and said going down was best to some fish who failed the vibe check, when he found the fish under the crusher he said “those are the people who chose down”

[@JeanMarceaux]

Most normal Jerma stream.

[@paranormallettuce7227]

@@JeanMarceaux WHY WAS I ALSO THINKI THIS SOUNDED LIKE JERMA LOL

[@icantthinkofaname8139]

@@JeanMarceaux not Jerma… guess again

[@sirmonster76]

@@icantthinkofaname8139 I want to say sneako but that doesn't sound right.

[@crappyoneshots6410]

@@icantthinkofaname8139 AVNJ? I know he streamed it lmao

[@Lazuli_the_Blue]

Perfect Vermin is a game I knew about before I was diagnosed with cancer. Looking back at the game now, it makes my very uneasy to say the least. What makes it worse is what the news anchor said near the end of the game, when he talked about how he doesn’t want to end up like his (presumably) abusive mother and how Ithe going to die like her. My cancer came from my father’s side of the family, and let’s just say he was also problematic, and at times abusive. He died a few months before my diagnosis… I was 18 when I was diagnosed, and as of writing this I’m turning 20 in almost 2 months. It’s a miracle that I’m alive now since my original due date was only a few months at best (at least that’s what my mother told me). Ever since that day my mind was focused on trying to live and doing the things I love, making art, making stories, making games, and making friends. I want to make a mark on this world, even if it’s a small mark, so I can prove to the world that I existed. I know that sounds dramatic, but that’s what I feel about my whole situation. I’m fine right now, but my future is still uncertain. What is certain is that I have tomorrow, and I guess that is enough.

[@jeb6869]

I hope you and your family well, cancer Is hard and your very gifted to survive

[@balloonman8796]

You've got my best wishes, you're very brave for fighting on to keep on living. You're dedication to making your mark os admirable and an inspiration, best of luck!

[@adamwhybray9300]

Stay strong but please don't beat yourself up for the times you can't.

[@Neon_Henchman]

The sentiment that "you want to make a mark on this world" is one I share wholeheartedly; myself, I want to make video games, with the mentality that you can play them for hours on end and still learn something new, this was how I came up to love Resident Evil's Invisible Mode and Serious Sam 3 and Minecraft's Tech. Ultimately though, I want people to have fun with my games, and to keep playing them for decades or even centuries, kind of like how Super Mario Bros. on NES still isn't dead today, because while I myself may be gone by that time and people may not remember me by name, at least a part of me still lives on through my work.

[@sageof6pandas233]

What profound words, no praise or sympathy could properly express how I feel about this post. Take my like and keep it.

[@kcryrine5056]

9:29 love the line, "its the first time you haven't held a hammer." instantly, it brings to mind an older man who has always solved his problems the same way, sitting in a doctors office feeling powerless.

[@mikehawk8984]

When you're a hammer every problem looks like a nail.

[@someneet145]

"No one will care about my death if I don't prove to them that I lived." -Harold A. Shpitz, Perfect Vermin

[@trajectoryunown]

"If you're not remembered, then you never existed." -Lain Iwakura, Serial Experiments Lain

[@std155]

@@trajectoryunown I LOVE LAIN

[@dallas_boi5415]

@@std155 Lean?

[@kainevittulainen]

@@trajectoryunown Let's all love lain!

[@thy7411]

@@dallas_boi5415 lain is the female main character of serial experiment Lain.

[@Interesting_Failure]

The thing that kind of "closes the loop" in Perfect Vermin is that the ability to only interact with the world via a hammer works well as the nature of cancer treatment; all you can do is destroy things and try to only destroy the right ones. It also kind of highlights the absurdity of the whole process. Like, why would this ever work? You're not fixing anything. You're doing the opposite of fixing things.

[@DeathnoteBB]

Well it works because you can’t do anything else. It’s dangerous but it is the only option sometimes

[@ardensetiawan353]

For the most part of life, the only way for biological construct to "fix" things is by destroying them. When a bacteria get infected by a virus, they don't remove it and survive. They simply die, or they die in a way that help fellow bacteria from getting the virus. It fix the species as a whole, but for that individual bacteria, it might not even matter since it, well, died.

[@WWFanatic0]

One thing that's interesting with that is that, by necessity, you have to destroy things that aren't the problem. Even if you know where all the things to hit are in the game, you still have to break a number of other objects like doors in order to get to them. I think it sells the analogy better because some cancerous cells are out in the open in easy to destroy (like removing surgically) but others are deep and entwined with normal cells and the only way to destroy them is to destroy some healthy cells too.

[@BigMikeMcBastard]

@@WWFanatic0 The issue is that metastatic cancer may shed cancer cells that seed new tumours basically all over the body. Too small to be seen in any way other than microscopically, but you can't examine an entire living body that way. Chemo is designed to be taken up by the metabolically very active cancer cells at a far higher rate than healthy cells. Healthy cells may get sick and die, but tissues and organs will remain essentially intact, while those otherwise tiny little germinating cancer seeds are wiped out en masse. Without chemo your only option is to cut out larger tumours, which isn't always possible, which can kill you on their own, and which always require a bunch of healthy tissue cut out along the margins too. The only time chemo is ambiguous is when the cancer isn't responsive to any of them, or when the prognosis is so poor that it's a choice between making yourself sick for the last 13 months of your life, or mostly feeling well during the last 12 months of your life.

[@WWFanatic0]

@@BigMikeMcBastard I understand very well how cancer treatment works and I think you're misunderstanding my point. There is no cancer treatment that destroys 100% of the cancer cells and 0% of anything else. Regardless of treatment, there is damage to healthy cells and tissue. That may be fully recoverable damage but it still happens. In the game you cannot smash only the targets and nothing else. That there is no "perfect" option where there is no collateral damage makes it more fitting of a cancer analogy in my opinion.

[@rookregent5623]

i wish i had looked at the trigger warnings before playing Perfect Vermin, but at the same time, not doing so made it hit harder. Cancer is a painful thing for me to think about. It killed my brother right before he could turn 18, and even before the game was finished i knew. it felt like......i was finding globs of Wrongness. Growths that kept coming back and *visually* hurting somebody no matter how hard i tried not to smash the true objects(good cells). i felt like chemotherapy. i watched a man wither on screen, rotting from the inside out while i tried desperately to save him, and i really should have stopped playing, because i stopped seeing it as a game. i started playing like i was really trying to save my brother. i just knew instinctively what was going on. the end was predetermined and i still kinda hate myself for "losing". his death was predetermined, the cancer terminal, and i still hate myself for "losing" a fight against a monster i couldnt even hurt. at least the game gave me a hammer.

[@spicymeatballs2thespicening]

The worst part about cancer is that if you think about it evolution wise, your cells are prioritizing their own survival over yours, a successful mutation to help them survive longer to the detriment of you as a whole human. It's like your own body betraying you in a destructive revolt for independence as single celled creatures again, nature truly is cruel. If I had such a horrible condition it would make me want to ignite myself to take my old friend turned enemy, my body, down with me for good

[@u.s.citizen9933]

My condolences for your brother. I will pray for him. I understand you are hurting and rightfully so, but you are also worthy of good times and you will have them as well. I have 1 hope for you, that you can live a life of love to the fullest, and love meaning willing the good of everyone.

[@kendarr]

My condolences for your brother, I don't know him or you, but he would probably want you to live the best of your life, don't let that bring you down, stay strong friend.

[@ghaleon1103]

Wow... Thank you for sharing. I'm sorry for what you had to experience

[@MrDbzguy]

haha nice!

[@dan_dapotato]

While I was playing How Fish is Made, my mom bursted into my room and stood in awe while watching the parasite cutscene and actually enjoyed the whole thing. I could be playing the tamest game but whenever my mom decides to come around its always something unexplainable.

[@hughquigley5337]

LMFAO criminally underrated comment

[@OlTimeyChara]

You and your mom sharing one braincell awesome

[@cwaero]

My usual Jacob Geller viewing experience consists of watching for 30 seconds then running off to play the list of interesting games he’s gonna spoil before I watch the rest of the video

[@a.d.d.j8673]

Man said free to play how can I resist

[@viderevero1338]

Even being fashionably early I'm no match for the supernatural power of Patreon viewers.

[@khartoumist1031]

Just did this for both, and I've just returned

[@remainprofane7732]

Shit forgot to do my homework for this Jacob Geller video.

[@coreyd5418]

downloading my games right now so hopefully I'll be able to watch this evening

[@april5054]

I can see the death analogy in How Fish is Made, but honestly most of every part of it, for me at least, feels like it's talking about life. Nobody knows where to go in life, what to do with their life, and you basically just have to make a guess. Many people are paralyzed by the choice, unable to lead fulfilling lives because they can't decide what they want to do so they end up making the worst choice, doing nothing. Nobody knows what the answer is, what it means, or why they have to make it, and nobody knows how to deal with it. That's my opinion on it anyway

[@daedalus_20v]

Kind of a too-long reply here, but I think this is a very solid take. Especially that one fish who watched all the others and kept track of how many fish made which decision, ultimately admitting that simply _knowing_ that data didn't really provide any meaningful answers. That's us. We're the fish. If you've ever been to any Q&A panel for any successful artist, musician, actor, filmmaker, writer, etc. invariably someone will ask (effectively), "how did you do it?" In other words, "how did you achieve this level of success? what's the secret?" Because, of course, the person asking is an _aspiring_ artist, musician, actor, etc. etc. and what they're really asking is "how can _I_ do it?" The famous actor will give some mostly generic-sounding answer about believing in your dreams, working hard, being on time, so on and so forth. They say that because that's what they did, but ALSO because that question is essentially unanswerable in any meaningful way. The actor knows what they did, and they know that it worked... but they don't necessarily know how or why it worked for _them_ when 10,000 other people are doing the same thing and still trying to break in. So much of what happens in our lives is out of our hands (or in someone else's hands). We worry about making decisions when each one _usually_ only amounts to an incremental step in one direction or another, even if it doesn't always feel that way. Furthermore, most black & white decisions in life are actually similar shades of grey... both a little bit right and a little bit wrong. That's why it's hard to choose. But you have to just pick one and _make_ it be the right one.

[@DaxterKing]

That was my immediate read on it as well. Also, I think the fact that there is no swimming ever, you're literally a fish out of water, is an analogy for "modern life". In addition to the human issue of how to live life, there is now a new layer added on. It feels like every day you can find a science article explaining how the way we've constructed our societies isn't ideal or is outright hostile to the health of our minds and bodies. Blue collar workers physically destroying their bodies, the sleep deprivation that comes from many demanding jobs and academia, people under constant stress of how they will afford rent or their next meal, etc. In a lot of ways, we have made it so we are fish out of water, maneuvering through a world even though it is designed by us, not designed for us in many ways.

[@jonathanmoran5707]

I hope that's not what its about. If so, then that means the creator of the game is unable to find purpose in life, and that's sad.

[@Jennicorn]

Ooh, I really like this. Maybe they're the same thing, that choosing how to live is also choosing how to die? Like for a lot of people, we're thinking about where we'll end up, what career we'll have, if we want a family, imagining ourselves at the end of it all. Choosing the way you live your life sometimes IS choosing how we die (even if we don't know it). Because the way you live leads to the way you die. Like how in perfect vermin, the news anchor talks about hating his mother, yet dying like her. No one knows if they're going the right way or if they'll end up with the ending they want, we're all just kind of blundering towards death, not knowing how our life choices are shaping where we'll end up.

[@april5054]

@@jonathanmoran5707 That's not necessarily true. What i'm saying isn't that life doesn't make sense so you can't decide, it's that to make a decision on where you go in life is stumbling in the dark, picking blindly. but you have to choose eventually, even if it's scary. It's a bit hopeful if you think of it that way. "Don't worry, a lot of people are going through the same thing. you're not alone."

[@floofiekun1875]

"No one will care about my death if I don't prove to them that I lived" is the final message from Perfect Vermin, and it just seems to hit me hard.

[@beepot2764]

I've watched 3 loved ones battle cancer. My mom, my dad and my grandma. All handled it so differently that sometimes it feels like whiplash thinking about those years. Mom, fought it fairly conventionally and as doctor recommended with radiation and chemo. She was frantic and so scared up til the end. Dad did what he always did and kept drinking. Only ever voicing his fears when he was trashed. Died mad at me for not knowing when to pull the plug. And grandma told no one, refused treatment, and told us all 2 days before passing because she needed someone to take her to the hospital. Died relatively quickly and in good spirits. All of these experiences have taught me that you can't judge or predict anyone's behavior, you can just be there to see it all happen.

[@emmamlis927]

❤❤❤❤

[@Little_Milk120]

That’s heavy man. I’m sorry for the troubles you have faced in this life. But know that we each face our own version of hell. And if we’re able to cope with it and sleep at night then we’re doing alright. I wish you peace.

[@sunsetman22]

I lost my dad and my grandmother on the same year due to cancer (skin and stomach, respectively). I was on my penultimate year of high school and sadly I wasn't there to accompany them in their last moments (dad died on the hospital late at night while I was asleep, my grandmother at home, same thing). I fear I may suffer the same fate one day, and it haunts me to no end. I hope I can see them again some day. stay strong man

[@bird2509]

22:19 I also think it’s worth mentioning that as the news anchor gets more and more grotesque as the cancer takes over his body, the amount of cigarettes in the ashtray grows

[@Hanagigi]

I took that as the common trope of passage of time. He smokes regularly, therefore the more cig butts are there the more time has passed.

[@humphreyspellingbee1732]

@@Hanagigi I struggle to believe it's that simple. "No Smoking" signs are everywhere in the game (heck, it's the game's icon) and the news anchor is dying from a smoking-related illness. I think it's a visual reference to the fact that the news anchor can't stop destroying his body even as he grows sicker and more deformed.

[@darkness74185]

@@humphreyspellingbee1732 also smoking is very much used to distract from pain and stress for most people. So it can also work as a metaphor as a placebo that is ultimately also contributing to the malfunctioning of his body. Short term pain or long term pain

[@someinternetperson1597]

@@humphreyspellingbee1732 In fact, the doctors office has a diagram of the windpipe and bronchial tubes, adding on to the lung cancer thing.

[@TheShadow7771]

In Perfect Vermin I absolutely adored the fact that you can destroy so many perfectly fine pieces of furniture to find the vermin. Perfect metaphor for cancer treatment.

[@bqonm742]

“the real measure of a game’s longevity isn’t how long it takes to beat, rather how long it sticks with you after beating it” immediately made me think of OneShot, a game I played three times, once for each ending, then immediately uninstalled and refuse to touch until I forget about it

[@newtwoup4293]

I LOVE ONESHOOOOT 💡💡💡💡💡💡💡

[@duckfilms3662]

Also in perfect vermin the "plants" around the office are later shown to be parts of medical diagrams in the doctor's office.

[@amycox5733]

I noticed that one of the pot plants looked super weird!

[@caoilfhionndunbar]

My favorite moment in How fish is Made was when the big fish gave you the numbers. UP the entire game was red. DOWN was blue. he swaps the colors. the game literally just tells you that the choices are interchangable, and meaningless. its also incredible just how much it gets into the twenty odd minutes of gameplay. definitely gonna stick with me for a long time

[@potatotheclown]

After finishing this video I found a kitchen chair in my living room, and let me tell you I felt FEAR.

[@bane2201]

You should see a doctor.

[@EVL_GRN]

@@bane2201 and perhaps pursue a career in newscasting

[@valala2987]

I think the choice in how fish is made is supposed to be a representation of the many different, seemingly important choices we have to make throughout our lives. Do we go to university or do we learn a trade? Do we choose to follow our passions or do we want a job that gives us financial security? Choices like these dictate our entire lives. We take these choices thinking that they will forever change the course of our lives. We get stressed out and some people become paralyzed, endlessly trying to way their options. We all get stressed out by trying to guess the outcome of our choice while fully forgetting that our lives are constantly moving forward and no matter what we chose, in the end, it will always result in death. Also, I think the fish caught in the cogs is supposed to represent people that don't have the privilege of choosing. They are figuratively caught in the cogs of our society and just like the victims of for example sweatshops, they might die because of the choices we take. Nobody thinks about what pain we can cause people by buying the latest phone or some cheap clothing. We are much too busy thinking about our own choices and our own lives. The fish with the parasite I think is supposed to represent people that cannot choose because of oppression. Be it racism, sexism, or whatever. Some people have to follow the rules of the society around them and don't get a voice. Their oppressors speak and decide for them. I think this game is not about the choice itself but about choices in general. It doesn't matter which choices we take, the result is generally the same.

[@neena6394]

THIS !

[@axuwu6939]

The very last line of Perfect Vermin made me feel… a lot, especially with the full context of the game. “No one will care about my death if I don’t prove to them that I lived.” I’m not smart enough to properly type out an analysis for this and the game’s meaning, but I’ll leave it here in case anyone else wants to have a go at it.

[@balister5264]

In How Fish is Made I decided I was going down, the intelligence that the trapped fish in the beginning made me decide “down” was the answer, I was so adamant in the beginning, then as I went on, talking to the other fish made me start to question, I was still going to choose down, then I got to the fish that needed me to tell him what to do, I told him down, I was going to go down, but then I got to the choice, and in a moment of self doubt, I went up

[@NirousPlayers]

Dammnn This game really makes us reflect on life. We can go all our lives being certain we want something, and then slip in a moment of self doubt and (maybe) fuck everything up.

[@balister5264]

@@NirousPlayers it has been a moment since I played it, and I have a horrible memory, so I may have gotten the directions mixed up, but the way my journey went on was the same. But yeah, for a game with such a bizarre concept, it is a great commentary for certain things in life, like you may go your whole life set one path, your whole life is based around this one thing, you may have ruined friendships, relationships, etc, but at the very end on your death bed, you may have a moment of self doubt, the “what if I’m wrong” could make you change your mind in the end, meaning that all of those relationships and friendships ended, were ended over nothing. It’s a game with a beautifully deep meaning, just set over a fish processing factory, where the fish can decide what they want their life to become

[@njdotson]

I immediately chose up and stuck with it because the fish was falling down at the start so I thought I should logically want to go up

[@barettam9577]

@@NirousPlayers Humans are the most argumentative of beings

[@throughcolouredglasses9300]

@@njdotson yessss exactly my thoughts!!

[@NootalieWalf]

*Super fun fact about Videodrome!* The scene toward the end where the television explodes and guts fly everywhere has an absolutely brutal production story. They had acquired some actual animal entrails (conflicting statements about if they were from a sheep or a pig) to shoot the scene, and they stored them in garbage bags. Unfortunately for everyone’s noses, they ended up not shooting the scene until several days later… and they had NOT refrigerated the guts. Apparently the smell was absolutely horrible when they opened those bags up, and it was toward the end of a very long day of filming. The first time they fired the air cannon to explode the tv and guts, it didn’t work as planned, like, at all. Only a small portion of the entrails flew out of the tv and the rest just kind of oozed out, so they had to reset the whole shot (multiple hours of prep) with the rotting, smelly insides again after the already long day. The crew wasn’t exactly stoked about that, but they set up, loaded the guts into the air cannon and cranked the valves of that bitch wide open. It worked. If that ain’t the most metal production story of all time, please for god’s sake tell me about it. I *love* this shit.

[@heavystalin2419]

Not the newest flesh, eh?

[@Roberith]

as a metal addict, I can confirm, videodrome has some of the most metal production so far. Love that shit too.

[@NootalieWalf]

@@Roberith hell yeah 🤘🏻

[@abonny]

Something similar happened with the original Day of the Dead. The Zombies eating all the flesh of the dead had real meat to grab and chew on. Apparently, the freezers broke down and it all got spoiled. They still had to shoot some of the scenes with the spoiled, stinking meat.

[@the_Fisher_King]

Long live the new flesh!!!!!!!!

[@whatthehelliot]

after i was rediagnosed with cancer a little while ago, i played perfect vermin every day at least once without fail. it was kinda cathartic, smashing the shit out of an office building. pretty often it was the only thing id do in a day besides sleep. i cant touch it now but i appreciate the role it played in my life, and im glad theres some recognition for it here :)

[@odditycat2716]

I'm glad the game was able to help you. It's wonderful that art and fiction can do that for us. How are you doing now? Whatever the answer is, keep hanging in there, mate

[@whatthehelliot]

@@odditycat2716 I'm doing good, thanks for asking! I've been in remission since November. hopefully it lasts this time lol

[@dbk-red-son]

@@whatthehelliot hoping the best of luck and hope it's remained till today

[@johnmhuizar]

Love the essay. Side note: I don't know that one can engage honestly with Cao Hui's art without also addressing his veganism. The upholstered chairs and couches, leather gloves and handbags and jackets etc all being pink and fresh and stuffed with viscera---it's pretty straightforward. "Even an object as benign as a sofa" misses that it was already made of flesh and never benign in the first place in his eyes.

[@Kimbie]

How in the world did I not notice that all the objects (except for the marble statues I suppose, which are also far more tame) are all made of animal products? It's not subtext, it's supertext lol i feel dumb

[@stm7810]

didn't know this about him but as a vegan had the same thought, what sort of freak makes clothes and furnature out of skin?

[@gamemeister27]

​@@stm7810Think about it. Skin is the evolved coating for many animals. Why wouldn't it be a good material to making coating/coverings out of?

[@stm7810]

@@gamemeister27 Because it's evil, murder is wrong. Animals like having their skin and flesh, they don't like being tortured, raped or imprisoned. there's plants and synthetic materials. as a paraphile and schizophrenic I know desire and basic reason aren't enough you need to think about consiquences and be anarchist about stuff.

[@pemanilnoob]

@@stm7810I mean, if you’re gonna slaughter an animal for food anyways, why waste the rest and throw it away when you could use it for stuff? Idk tho, I’m no meat expert

[@TenebraeUbr]

Interesting thing about the fish with the statistics is that he switches the colors for Up and Down. Throughout the game Up is red and Down is blue but when Stat Fish says the stats, the colors are switched. I think this is meant to clue the player that he is lying, perhaps for no reason. By making his information... mysterious, maybe even dangerous, he is priming those he talks to better believe what he says. The choice may not matter, but clearly this fish likes the idea of controlling someone else's choice.

[@usedhalfcart]

but he willingly tells you what he feels when he goes through with the choice you give him. i didnt do down, but when he went up he says it feels soft, before not saying anything else.

[@Ociosus1]

In manlybadasshero's channel the developers implied in a comment on his playthrough that they just messed up the colors.

[@FoddyFogHorn]

@@usedhalfcart he says the same thing going down

[@usedhalfcart]

@@FoddyFogHorn interesting. thanks for telling me!

[@nelumboandrews6762]

@@Ociosus1 hpnestly that makes everything better

[@dynawesome]

I really don’t think there’s a single video essayist on KZbin that makes videos as good as Jacob Geller’s. He just never fails to hit the mark and hit it hard.

[@GLA69]

Donkey does a good job with irony in video games and besides the obvious point that Jacob has a different style to do this, I really like both

[@breadman32398]

Makes me want to make an interesting game, just to see how he might talk about it.

[@MrNateM]

Sometimes when I meet new people, we talk a little about KZbin, and try to find some common interests. If they say Jacob Geller, it's gonna be a fun conversation.

[@arrowtotheknees7416]

You should check out Super Eyepatch Wolf! He's great and makes similar videos. I love them both ✨

[@kaptenrotskjeg]

@@GLA69 Dunkey? Youre comparing dunkey tot his? Wow

[@fluoresensitive3519]

I write horror, and I promise you, nothing puts me more in the mood to write some Clive Barker-esque, gut-churning, 'get real familiar with your intestines' type shit than a Jacob Geller video 😊

[@ZizZap4]

Great video, and cool way to tie the two together! Side-note, I feel like "How Fish is Made" is about the act of being eaten in addition to life and death. The fact that you start out falling and have the option of "going down" or "coming (back) up makes me think of being swallowed and the subsequent digestion vs vomit. Digestion also comes to mind between the press room and the "fish in cogs" room -- food being ground down for nutrients in someone's stomach. The body is a machine, but also fleshy. And adding on to all of this, the parasite, and the message of twitching meat being fresh, again relates to digestion and perhaps vomiting -- if not from sickness/content, then perhaps merely subject matter. The title, "How Fish is Made," may therefore be referring to how fish, the dish, is made/prepared, and the manner of that preparation.

[@aquabluerose7734]

Oh that's definitely an interesting take. Fish get eaten all the time, by humans, by other fish, by all sorts of other creatures, and fish often do swallow each other whole. This reminds me of a video I saw where someone catches a fish, then kills and guts it to eat it, only for there to be a still-living small fish in the big fish's stomach that they toss back into the water!

[@kaamn1829]

I also call to mind, when thinking of this, the whole "when you have a hammer, every problem looks like a nail" and the way it fits obviously and more subtly into the context of the games, medicine, and our societal views on life and death itself.

[@JayBea]

When the parasite uses the word "friend-o" it immediately made me think of Anton Chigurh from No Country For Old Men, who says "Call it, friend-o" when asking a person to call a coin flip. The result of the coin flip will determine whether or not Chigurh kills the person, who has no way of knowing either the outcome or the stakes of the binary choice in front of them. That's gotta be a deliberate reference, right?

[@binterwinterboyii1095]

You might actually have a point No Country is all about how life is cyclical and how ultimately no one is immune to fate The parasite is a lot like Chigurh in that they’re very self absorbed in the idea that they are above fate and the problems normal people (or fish) are facing and both stories tell you that they are very much not, Chigurh gets heavily wounded in a car crash and the parasite is still attached to a fish who can still choose to go up or down It’s interesting in that a force of nature and a parasite die the same as everyone, in the end nothing escapes death

[@connor48880]

He only says “friend-o” because the gas station guy said it. And that’s from the trailer. In the movie, he simply says, “call it.” However, I do see the connection, and since the general interpretation of Chigurh is that he is some personification of Death, that makes sense that he would be a parasite. Now I wanna see the parasite with his dumb haircut.

[@angelsfallfirst7348]

I just re-read NCfOM last week and was noticing the same thing

[@driphearts8035]

I'm writing a story called Neubiotic about this type of premise: a world where everyday objects can become infected and remade as flesh. I hope I can finish it someday, and I'm so happy that there are other games like Perfect Vermin and Golden Light exist, as it proves there are others like me who love something so niche and strange.

[@donpollo3154]

Update on the story? Curious about how it goes

[@TheStanishStudios]

So like The Thing meets Prop Hunt?

[@random_access_memory]

Id totally buy and read something with that premise

[@driphearts8035]

@TheStanishStudios pretty much. They recreate human organs but like- not fully. When they make eyes, they don't have eyelids. Instead, they use lips as eyelids

[@IvanLenderman]

This reminds me of a short story written by Harlan Ellison and Robert Shekley "I See a Man Sitting on a Chair, and the Chair is Biting His Leg". Probably worth checking for ispiration!

[@GoodmansGhost]

I feel that in Perfect Vermin the grossness was a way to tell the story, while in How Fish Is Made the grossness was the point and the story was fitted around it.

[@greenmovie13]

i played perfect vermin a few days ago. the first door smash made me laugh, and throughout I became less and less energetic about the game because I was realizing the symbolism. the last line of the game is chilling, and while I could empathize since I lost my mother to cancer, it was so much more than just something about death and legacy after one passes away: “no one will care about my death if I don’t prove to them i lived.”

[@ThePhantomSafetyPin]

That hits so hard for me too. It's what I tell myself about my own works of art. "I want to be remembered and won't be if I don't make a mark." I mean it more as a positive "if not now when" thing, but only now am I seeing how that can be made toxic.

[@awllypollyas8292]

@@ThePhantomSafetyPin that's been me for too long, and I don't know how to stop it. Other than stop completely and see how it goes

[@Star-pl1xs]

@The Phantom Safety Pin@@awllypollyas8292 as someone who's given the latter a shot, & who realized not too long ago myself that my internalized emphasis on things like Legacy was poisoning my perception of self & others, i can't recommend it enough. it's not easy & it's not even a cure, frankly; what it is is room to breathe, which is a nice start

[@awllypollyas8292]

@@Star-pl1xs it's this thing where I look up how to not want to be famous only because other famous people didn't really want to be famous, and I feel like following famous people's footsteps will lead me to fame. I'm screwed, I think I'm just gonna stop trying, cause I just don't want to care anymore

[@Star-pl1xs]

@@awllypollyas8292 that's exactly right! letting go of caring is v hard when all u know how to do is care abt something, but it'll begin to fade once u stop placing weight on it at all

[@Brother-man24]

Playing perfect vermin having just beaten cancer is extremely uh, relaxing? I wish I had heard of it while I was doing chemo, would have been therapeutic in a cathartic sort of way.

[@deadset15-hrvavik17]

Congrats on beating it, make sure to live out your life better then ever now, i can only imagine the pain of chemo

[@bishielurfer]

I can definitely see how that can be cathartic. Glad you beat it, and hope you have a long, happy life.

[@Star-pl1xs]

very, very happy for u

[@thisisilalang]

Big congratulations to you, man! I think I'm going to play it. Maybe it'll help me cope with the fact that I was just diagnosed with a rare type of stroke at the age of 22.

[@slaqualquercoisamemo5117]

@UC9F0Lzn-_3jtkPTRZ4kwEhA that's tough

[@GetOffUrPhone]

I played perfect vermin back when it was released. A couple weeks later on an acid trip every time I closed my eyes I found myself in a tunnel of flesh that was absolutely covered with eyeballs and teeth. Dunno if it was related but that definitely wasn't a fun trip

[@TaliabobMair]

The tunnel used to contain eyes and teeth pre-release so maybe you were onto something.

[@howtoknight]

@@TaliabobMair Some Cancer tumors can also contain/grow eyes and teeth in rare cases, look up teratomas

[@kexard]

3:47 honestly, I interpreted this as self-acknowledgment in the nature of “creating for the sake of creating”. It’s why some people make fanart, fan fiction, and other works for free. It’s an act where they can “play god” in a world they are both familiar with and have the wherewithal to alter in any way. Which also fits my experience, recently having my inspirational spark for ever using art as a source for a living being stripped from me.

[@pedrovallefin8406]

Thats an interesting thought. The very nature of fanfiction has always been rather strange to me. Even though theres certainly some truth to what you said, fans wanting to play god in a way by taking a world they were facinated by and making it their own, i question the idea of "creating for the sake of creating". Sure, theres not profit in mind when making such stories so theyre diferent from what theyre based on for that alone, but does creation equals attention? Must the creation be recognized to exist? I think theres some need for validation there, for others to see what you made of that world you took over, reciving some sort of feedback. To be seem by your peers if not by critics, for your peers become your critics since youre not just gonna receive aproval. Which is what i find rather odd. It may be irrational of my part, but taking the work of another and making it yours always felt illegitimate to put it one way. Somehow it seems more real to take direct inspiration from the story, telling the same thing but modifying it to the extent it feels like something new, than just spinning known elements around. I get that, being that world what inspired you in the first place, you wouldnt want to make it totally unregconizble. But i feel that inspiratiojn can only take one so far before trully making that story trully yours. How much can you be considered to be playing god with a world you only borrowed? Sorry for the not entirely coherent ramblings, just wanted to get that of my chest. Also, what do you mean by the "spark being stripped from you"? Care to elavorate? You got me curious.

[@kexard]

@@pedrovallefin8406 creation for the sake of creating is making something to prove you can still do it. If one never shares it, never intends to share it, then it’s comply made to become proof of the existence of one’s existence of creation. Fanfiction, when seen as a borrowed medium, minimizes it’s true potential. Much of it is made for wish fulfillment, this is true, but there exist examples of fan fictions taking a life of their own, beginning as fan fiction and eventually spawning their own world. And as for my spark being stripped from me I’ll say this: giving up on one’s dream is not a one-and-done event: It’s a process. It forces one to reevaluate the purpose of one’s life, and decide on whether or not that purpose is even worthwhile. It’s even worse when nothing truly changes. Then one questions whether or not their dream was ever truly a worthwhile pursuit. I have seen what people do when they don’t like something. To put anything you created with love and care into that situation is irresponsible and self-destructive.

[@iamnoimpact]

Man, what an absolute journey of all that can decay. Thanks for sharing these games! Really loved that you shared the work of Cao Hui, an artist I've never heard of before. Thanks for always sharing something worth learning. The absolute best.

[@masterzoroark6664]

I personally got to know both thanks to ABG (Alpha Beta Gamer) and ManlyBadassHero. Both are quite good creators and both do act naturally durring their videos (no screeching and overreacting, unlike most other horror centric channels)

[@envirovore]

I quite enjoyed How Fish is Made. It's dark, it's funny, and more importantly it really made you stop and think on a far deeper level than you'd expect from a 20 minute game with 2 minute wtf musical in the middle of it would.

[@asterixs_4031]

i watched someone play perfect vermin right after, within about a month or so, my dad died from cancer. tongue cancer, from smoking specifically. it was weird, seeing a game that was so perfectly parallel to what he went through. seeing the decay that gripped him through the years as the cancer took him, as he slowly rotted until it physically showed. it was almost cathartic in a way to watch the cancerous objects get smashed but still result in the same ending. in the end he got what was coming to him, his death was the consequences of his own actions.

[@raulrus9026]

so in a way u did in the game what antibiotics did in his body. Do you think his actions of smoking represented his way going up or down?

[@dalellll]

The fact that you ONLY have a hammer and that it is the ONLY way you interact with the world is a perfect, perfect metaphor for the despairing state of cancer treatment. I think it made the cancer reveal even more a gut punch. I think I've even heard the same metaphor used in real life. There's an essay by Richard Lewontin were he mentions the way that medicine has the trappings of being a super-advanced science, but that basically treatments for most cancers most of the time are "cut it out or poison it". We want them to point a tricorder at it and fix it, but they only have a sledgehammer.

[@wayawuffin]

really tested my resolve to eat lunch while watching this, i’ll say that (also made me think of the meatball at the end of Inside! game developers really love their lumps of flesh huh)

[@JacobGeller]

And we all love the meatball

[@nbtwall7287]

my mans did an any% challenge run of a Geller video

[@juanjuri6127]

That's one spicy-a meatball!! (the spice is children)

[@micheller3251]

same... the texture of oatmeal as never been more disturbing

[@Your_Native_Mothman]

Yeah this is the first time where I needed to close my eyes while I was eating

[@amergingiles]

I saw Perfect Vermin and Jacob Geller and just squeed internally. Maceo is a fucking wonderful developer. His games are so perfectly paced it's hard to think he hasn't been doing this for his whole life.

[@NoReplyAsset]

Vermin's concept made me think of how cancer cells are just cells that refuse to die when it's their time.

[@howtoknight]

That is quite a heavy, partially chilling.. Observation to say the least...

[@henlynch]

i love the visual of cao hui's artwork partially-obscured by the hammer in your right hand, like you could just as easily smash hui's work to bits as you could the game. it's a cool editing touch.

[@spimbles]

body horror is probably my favorite form of horror when done correctly. and thats because its not direct horror, as the word describes, its moreso just incredibly disturbing and unsettling, rather than inherently scary. it also kinda doubles as cosmic horror in some cases, which makes it even more interesting. once again, Jacob Geller posts yet another W

[@Kniveschowyas]

Same here, attack on Titan, Akira & neon genesis Evangelion… just something about watching viscera expressed artistically, it’s so uncomfortable but I can’t look away.

[@dunderbread]

the idea that the newsman has a form of cancer just makes the increasing cigarettes in his ashtray all the more fitting and morbid

[@sageywagey6668]

this is still one of my favorite of your videos. It’s almost comedic how increasingly it reflects my life with time. it introduced me to the “i want to play god” which inspired me enough to recreate one of his chairs on paper my senior year. Then it got closer. a year later, my mother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and then died mere months later. i also like how fish is made.

[@Foede]

"the real measure of a game's longevity isn't how long it takes to beat, but how long it sticks with you after you've beaten it" That's a really nice quote.

[@Scooby_tft]

damn. I had to stop after a while just to think about perfect Vernin's ending

[@randomtree7295]

@@Scooby_tft o

[@parrata]

That musical number triggered most of my phobias at once, so it felt like a sick, sadistic joke poking fun at my own suffering. 10/10, so good I will never forget it.

[@archiefarrer6983]

I'm genuinely so glad you mentioned the trypophbia warning. I instinctively shut my eyes and even the description made my skin start itching like crazy. I have trypophobia and severe eczema so it's kind of a genuine medical concern.

[@nicholasc6208]

Halfway through this I got a series of two ads relating to fish, one advertising a new fish meal and one on how terrible fish tastes. They will stop at nothing to construct a truth to validate the self.

[@fionacheng7868]

For anyone interested, Talia (the dev of Perfect Vermin) also worked on the games Swallow the Sea and Pit of Babel. She also released a roguelike last year, Brutal Orchestra, which is a lot less "blood and guts" but much more themed around body horror and psychological stuff. Check it out.

[@NirousPlayers]

Holy shit i need to start learning people's names. I know both games (Swallow the Sea and Pit of Babel), and i didn't knew it was made by the same guy that made Perfect Vermin, lmao. Yeah, his games rocks hard.

[@Scourgething]

Amusingly, it has fish in purgatory.

[@fuumiku]

"I really wonder to what extent these self-deceptions and constructed truths can strike a nerve in the knowing onlooker." I don’t have cancer, but I’ve had an undiagnosed chronic & grave illness for a few years & only got a diagnosis for it last month. I think for most watching this, yeah Perfect Vermin being "just" a metaphor for cancer might feel bland or anticlimactic or too on the nose, but honestly? There’s that intensely unique kind of pain, dysmorphia and dissociation when the state of your body is beyond control and you can feel it deterioratingbut there’s nothing you can do. There’s that type of self-harm that feels like survival, or like there isn’t any other possible way to react or cope with the other pain you have no say over. There’s a type of debilitating smearing of your self-image when your body becomes your tomb, and it just, consumes all the areas of your life, it consumes yourself. You don’t know what’s happening, you don’t know how to stop it, you just know you have to endure it, and you know it’s degenerative. The future is limited, and a significant portion of it is going to be spent being u controllably distressed and in pain. What symptom will happen next as your whole body system is shutting down, slowly but surely? Is your body mocking you at every step, or desperately pleading alongside you as it tears apart as the seams? You don’t know. You don’t know the meaning of life, what the correct way to go on is. You just know you want to live and be at peace. For that, I’ve often fantasized of ripping my whole skin off or crushing my organs, thinking that then at last, I could be free. Of course, though a cathartic thought, that is both impossible and would just worsen everything lol. All that to say, this specific experience with illness is very... Very difficult, and gruesome, and intrinsically existential and ideology-testing and violent and intense. Body horror isn’t the aesthetic, it’s the lifestyle. It’s hard to *ignore*, *not* to think about it. Perfect Vermin doesn’t feel as if it’s trying too hard, or like, purposefully being as gross and shocking as possible, it feels just like a power/coping fantasy I’ve had many times calling itself out. It’s comfort, that even as you think of it and cry and know how twisted and horrible it is and helps nothing, it makes you feel a little less powerless in your pain and even if you indulge in it or don’t, nothing will come from it anyways. You know it’s a lost fight, your hope is a self-deluding and resigned one.

[@fuumiku]

Usually though, art wise, as a vent-comfort thing I enjoy flowergore and songs like Fruiting Bodies by R.I.P more, I’ve never really looked into gore of this sort but #felt lol maybe I should. The game’s images do disturb me and make me uncomfy tho tbh, like I’m not *not* affected by them and did get some light nausea watching this vid, but in the end, especially knowing what it all was meant to communicate, I def feel like, a connection to it & to the gore. I don’t think i’ll be playing these kinda games myself anytime soon, so yeah just, I really really enjoyed this video. Thanks.

[@micarocks101]

I really connect with this from my own experience with chronic fatigue. While the game is explicitly discussing cancer, but the analysis through the perspective of chronic illnesses and those of us living with them, the cathartic fantasies of escaping your own body by eviscerating it is a strange thing to explain, and the game conveys that emotion well.

[@setheus]

God, exactly. All the time I think "surely it can't be that bad/ I'm getting better," then the second I put a little more effort into something mundane, like stretching, something crackles and threatens to come apart. The progression of the Anchor, the futility of it, is exactly what it feels like when folks- even doctors- say "it's manageable with a healthy lifestyle!" Like... yeah, that's the problem, I am unhealthy and it has created a feedback loop. How am I supposed to run or lift weights when my legs can barely keep me standing? I remember playing Perfect Vermin years ago, and man, it was both incredibly dreadful and incredibly cathartic

[@sepiasmith5065]

Very well said, and I'm sorry to hear what you're going through. I hope you get as much peace as possible. And on your second comment, if I'm interpreting it correctly, you could also check out things called "guro" or "pastel gore" for that cathartic, artistic gore.

[@zacheryeckard3051]

I know that feel, bro. Here's to doing what we can to slow the descent. Here's to finding the joy along the ride. Here's to the people who make carrying on worthwhile.

[@belindaluna2067]

....I can't believe I didn't realize this about Perfect Vermin until now. All you have is a hammer. When all you have is a hammer....which works for both what the player does and what the Newsman does. Keep going, keep hitting things. Because that's all we've got.

[@JmonsterNEO]

Your character in Perfect Vermin is meant to be a direct analogy to Chemotherapy treatments if I’ve read the game correctly.

[@gremlinman9724]

what i find interesting about cao hui's stuff is, the colors are dull. everything is matte. just like real organs, preserved in formaldehyde. guts aren't bright red and shiny with moisture, they look like oddly shaped lunch meat. i honestly wouldnt be surprised if some of his statues were made with real meat.

[@mattb.7079]

Yeah, in some way it almost "blends" in with the furniture. It kinda gives a somewhat mundane sentiment

[@knack8284]

Cringe af

[@mattb.7079]

@@knack8284 that's some great self-awareness

[@knack8284]

@@mattb.7079 damn that was a real zinger bubba go tell that one to pops

[@mattb.7079]

@@knack8284 kinda cringe ngl

[@davinpaz1871]

I'm not saying you would enjoy pathologic, but what i am saying is that I'd really enjoy you talking about it

[@fatal_pastry1176]

No one enjoys pathologic. I loved that game, but I did not enjoy it, and I think that's quite intentional.

[@reyntime5697]

Yes! Me too!

[@visceralrat]

Yes! Another pathologic fan out in the wild! Honestly, once you get deep into it, it kind of becomes fun. In a way.

[@WhiteKnuckleRide512]

There is not a single one of my worldly possessions I would not feel confident betting on the fact that Jacob knows what Pathologic is.

[@actuallyasriel]

I played Perfect Vermin on my laptop while I was homeless, and my takeaway from it was basically your conclusion by throwing How Fish Is Made into the mix. He refused to accept his own death, paralyzed by its inevitability and locked into the only answer he thought he knew to be correct. I, too, paralyzed by inevitable horror, had locked myself down, and couldn't take my eyes off an inevitable conclusion that wasn't going to come, which is a bit too much information already so you'll forgive me for not elaborating. I'm OK now, housed and on disability support that's granted me a sort of stability, and revisiting Perfect Vermin in this video with you also feels perfectly timed, as said stability threatens to wane. Sometimes you can't know what choice you *should* make, just that you *have* to make one. Thanks for being consistently one of the most engaging people on this platform. :)

[@riverman9040]

I am an extremely queasy person and I watched this video as a kind of exposure therapy, but I ended up nearly crying at the end. That shows how powerful these games are.

[@rashkavar]

One thing you didn't mention that I picked up on just watching the video: all the "vermin," at least in the footage you showed, seemed to be in places where you tend to suddenly find people. --Open a door, person is there. --Walk into a bathroom, someone suddenly emerges from one of the stalls. --Leave your cubicle, your supervisor's standing there. Or that one guy from the next cubicle who just talks all day. --Enter the break room, someone's sitting there on break. I can think of contexts where any of those 4 things can be unpleasant or startling. Solid doors can swing open suddenly if people don't consider the need to be careful about it. People emerging from bathrooms remind you that you're going to the bathroom in public, something a lot of people with anxiety find uncomfortable. Supervisors standing outside your cubicle probably have yet more work that needs to be done 5 minutes ago to lay on your shoulders, while the chatty coworker is why you're behind on your deadlines in the first place. The first person in the lunch room might be the jerk who doesn't bring their own lunch and just grabs whatever looks tastiest from the fridge. Indeed, the choice of what object they are could tell you what they represent. The supervisor is the desk lurking just outside the cubicle, presenting more work. The person dangerously opening doors is represented by a door. The person representing bathroom anxiety is a toilet. The coworkers who sit around chatting are chairs. The lunch stealer in the break room is a fridge. It's a completely different read, and one that might only be supported by the experience of watching your excerpts, but it seemed interesting that it's a read that didn't even get a mention.

[@lilylohmann614]

That’s a really good point, and I feel like maybe it ties into the whole story about the massacre. All we know is that it “happened downtown” There’s the implication that there’s a mirror between it, your actions, and the way we attempt to drive out cancer, but… I’m honestly not sure where it goes from there, but what you said did recontextualize that for me

[@sprzedamsanki]

I had similar observation when watching. These "out of place objects" would have been completely "in place" for people in the office, but my interpretation is much more blunt. What if these are actually people and you're just murdering them, but can't comprehend it for some twisted reason? Especially that the Newsman first encourages you to "murder" them and then makes you walk back to the elevator at the end of each level, which immediatly brought me back to the walking back through the carnage you caused in the Hotline Miami game (greatly narrated by Jacob too). An OFC the background news narrating some kind of massacre downtown strongly point to this kind of interpretation too. Brilliant how many ideas can one fit into one hour long vague video game.

[@shinobicyrus]

Gotta say, the beginning of "Perfect Vermin" - at least the part where you're just hunting down flesh-monsters disguised as furniture, reminded me a bit of the Nino Cipri novella "Defekt", which is about an IKEA-adjacent megastore whose process of cheaply making products (and their own workers) sometimes produces mimic-like "defektive" home goods that need to be secretly hunted down and exterminated by the night crew before they get accidentally purchased by customers. No spoilers, it veers off a completely different direction than "Perfect Vermin" does - but both texts' including this fascistic drive to hunt down and "purify" these vermin that hide as innocuous objects makes the comparison inevitable in my head.

[@devinward461]

Prop Hunt but scary

[@pennyforyourthots]

That sounds wild. I should read that.

[@njdotson]

@@devinward461 I thought the exact thing while playing the gane

[@blondeandbothered]

This video essay pulled me from disassociation youtube binging- the writing and topic are both enthralling. Thank you❤

[@Eainai]

I played Perfect Vermin like a year after it came out, while my entire family was sick with covid and my grandmother was in the ER about to die from cancer. It hit hard. I played it again as I watched this video, abd it's almost cathartic to go through that part of my life again. Thank you.

[@zdl5665]

I feel like Jacob is going through a phase right now. Or maybe a period of art. Like this is his “Body Horror Period”

[@pennyforyourthots]

Picasso had his "blue period", Jacob has his "red streak".

[@nebs6888]

So much this.

[@aliG2500]

Perfect Vermin is genuinely one of the most disturbing games to me ever since it takes one of the most plausible threats to your health in existence (cancer) and takes away it’s mundanity and makes it existentially horrifying instead.

[@FissionMetroid101]

Perfect Vermin really stuck with me after I saw it played through. It absolutely nailed the initial subtle symbolism and gradual reveal of its meaning

[@markittystuff]

That ending with just the "How fish is made" gameplay and no commentary was more unsettling than I'd like to admit. I rather wasn't fond of flopping sounds being that eerie to me before. This was such a great video Mister Geller!

[@captainsawbones]

personally from the how fish is made dance scene, i got the implication that the parasite was using the whole dance as a misdirection so you wouldnt notice it just infected *you* with one of its offspring.

[@keybrush4896]

I have to say, the "What do you want from me?!" moment was a much-appreciated grounding line. I was 100% ready to accept the statement preceding it was just not going to be elaborated on, and we were moving on to the next thing, and then Jacob just interrupted himself to say "I'm not going to try explaining it like I know, because I /can't/." And then he STILL went on to describe that moment and its context and influence with as much effort as he could. It honestly made me laugh more than the moment in the game itself.

[@grooorglaserdeth8823]

I stumbled upon this channel almost two years ago. I think it was your Fear of Dark video. My initial thought was "oh, this is gonna explain why evolution made us afraid of the dark". But it was so much more. You have a way with words that just hit home every time. Hell, every one of these videos gives me half an existential crisis. They move something within me that I can't name. I once watched two videos back to back (because again, these are immaculately crafted!!!), and when the attending nurse in the psychiatric day clinic I was in at the time asked me how I was doing the next morning, I told her that I wasn't feeling too hot because of these videos. "So why do you watch them then?" I didn't have a good answer. I still don't. Maybe it's because they evoke feelings in me that I otherwise try to suppress. It's ok to feel sad and overwhelmed at times. It's just a part of being human. And everyone else is also going through it. Keep making these absolute masterpieces!

[@selkieskins]

You are the best video essayist on KZbin. It doesn't matter if I'm otherwise interested in the topic of the video; watching your essays always gears me up to think deeply about the things I'm reading/playing/watching/etc. I genuinely think your video essays enhance my life the way nothing else on KZbin - maybe the whole internet - does

[@spinyjustspiny3289]

I love Cao Hui's statement on his series because it also puts into perspective another major quality of it if we roll with the idea that art generally represents the artist's ideals and ambitions; Looking inside yourself isn't pretty. Most people aren't going to like what they find. But in order to figure out how anything works, including yourself, you NEED to do that. Unlike a lot of the pieces in "I Want to Play God", we don't come with instruction manuals or assembly instructions.

[@turkicnomad5632]

I caught this on nebula and I couldn’t wait to see it pop up on KZbin to see how everyone responded. I don’t have anything particularly spectacular to add, but that last section in How Fish is Made reminded me of a scene in the Matrix. Neo asks The Oracle how he could possibly make a choice, and she responds that he’s already made the choice. He now must understand it. I’m not smart enough to disseminate whether there’s really that much overlap in meaning between these scenes, but it felt poignant. Do the choices we make matter more than the reasons we make them?

[@alessandromorelli5866]

Me too, Nebula is in dire need of a comment or social section.

[@darkness74185]

@@alessandromorelli5866 I would say the last thing Nebula needs is a comment section of any kind. There's already so many ways to share our opinions nowadays I feel like just...... Having access of the content itself is a good enough alternative (not like you can't discuss on Twitter anyways, there's enough voids to shout into already)

[@ThePondermatic]

I'll throw in my hat here. My interpretation of The Matrix is that when The Oracle tells Neo, "You've already made your choice," she's not being completely honest with him. She has her own agenda. She does indeed want to see humanity saved, but she wants it to happen on her terms, one that isn't disruptive to her own way of life as a machine who isn't rebelling as much as hoping for incremental change. She is, in short, a metaphor for the kind of White Moderate that MLK lambasted, or the modern-day "centrist" democrat that the LGBTQ movement is losing patience with. And so her advice and her agenda aren't exactly getting in Neo's way, per say, but he ultimately ends up making decisions for himself instead of treating The Oracle's goals as sacrosanct. In other words, the subtext behind, "You've already made your decision," is, "I believe change is already happening fast enough, and this is why I'm right. You're not going to be uncivil, are you?" I came to this reading after listening to and mulling over this fantastic analysis of Matrix Reloaded and Revelations, which argues very effectively that the trilogy is best understood as a metaphor for the trans experience when the movies came out in the 90's, too soon to be out of the closet and accepted by wide audiences or producers. kzbin.info/www/bejne/g2G5n4yZgq2oesU Aside from the arguments in that video, my take on Reloaded is that for as many characters who straight-up tell Neo what to believe about the Matrix, from The Oracle to Smith to The Architect, it's pretty dang clear they all have their own agenda. So instead of interpreting anything anyone says at face-value, the best way to understand the film is to ask what each character's agenda is and what they're trying to convince or outright manipulate Neo into doing. So, with all that said, I don't think there's any relationship between the lines in The Matrix and How Fish Are Made. One is mocking you for how difficult it is to make a simple yes-or-no decision (edit: as a way to comment on how difficult it is to truly face death with confidence), while the other is a caricature and critique of people in positions of privilege who are sympathetic of the challenges facing minorities but not willing to let their own privilege be challenged in any significant way to help them. Simply different thematic points using the same language in different contexts.

[@Valenet94]

@@ThePondermatic And that is all well and good, but what about Neo? Isn't he just a guy, facing a difficult yes or no choice? Is that not just as important as the Oracle's agenda, and what parallels it may have in real life? A movie, or a scene does not have to be just about one thing, I think. I also don't think How Fish Is Made mocks you for how hard a simple choice can be. If anything, it mocks people who think that a simple choice is necessarily easy.

[@Bane_Amesta]

@@Valenet94 That last part, how many people actually mock others with the usual "is just yes or no, why are you making so much fuss about it? Just decide!" Sometimes is just not THAT easy to make a simple decision.

[@YarraYora]

the first time i listened to your narration of cao hui's artist statement i was immediately inspired after Months of ruminating i ended up making an animatic using your audio. i love the themes you bring up and how everytime you speak it's like you're talking in poetry

[@LokiMartin]

"And then the tongue eater shows up and shakes its ass at us". I don't think I have laughed harder at a line in a video essay in so long. That musical sequence was so unnerving, so absurd and yet also so humorous, I didn't know how to react at first. Thank you for gifting me with this moment.

[@ElectronGames]

Orange World is so good! It (and this video) also reminds me of Gutshot by Amelia Gray, which is a short story/microfiction collection that includes stories named things like "House Heart," "On A Pleasant Afternoon, Every Battle Is Recalled," and "Viscera." Pure Geller-core if there ever was any.

[@JacobGeller]

Oooh I'll have to check that out

[@historyelemental7800]

Geller-core is my favorite aesthetic

[@soul-candy-music]

lmao love this quote from a review of the collection - "a book that has been waiting forever to get itself written and, lucky for us, has finally fetched up stickingly on the page." Sounds interesting!

[@noobish]

perfect vermin felt like an anti smoking game, if it is god damn they've done a better job than truth's game

[@DoctorBones1]

i didnt think anyone noticed this, but in perfect vermin the amount of cigarattes on the table goes up as the news anchor gets more and more grotesque, hinting at the fact that cigaratte is one of the biggest causes for cancer

[@justiceeatstrees]

YES KAREN RUSSELL! I love Orange World- every story in it kicks absolute ass. I think my favorite is Bog Girl, which also contains maybe the most casually funny line Karen has ever written. Also this is a great video about nasty games- thank you for making this and having consistently solid taste in literature!

[@FrizzlenillCAN]

As a devout lover of Videodrome, I think you've done it justice, not just in the analysis but also in the concluding admission that it, and the other works in this video, can't simply be examined one way. Videodrome is just as much a McLuhan-ized literalization of puritanical fears of media violence at its time, as it is a reflection on how we try to drown out and distance ourselves from death but in doing so place layers between ourselves and reality, as it is a war allegory for the cultural imperialism of American corporate superpowers against the media identity of Canada as a culture in the age of home video (see "Videodrome's Format War", a great piece on this angle). It is all of these disparate, unrelated things and more, as are many works of art, and as are the games shown in this video. I really loved this video, most of all its statement (as in many of your videos) that an artwork's refusal to openly state its intent and meaning is itself a valuable thing, a way for the piece to ask multiple independent and unrelated questions at once while somehow making them connected and resonant, like the individual frequencies in a musical chord. And as well, I'm glad to see the contemplation of the grotesque being acknowledged as an effective way to accomplish this challenging, intensive asking of questions.

[@thebigbadbeanman]

Jacob may be my favorite content creator on this entire website, theres literally not a single video of his that I haven’t watched at least a few times and I enjoy them every single time I watch them.

[@lizardofthestars]

Why is this my comfort video

[@EllpaFox47]

Also The newsman having cancer When he says he’s “even dying like his mother” His mother died of cancer He hated his mother so much He tried not to do anything that was like his mother All of the treatment for the cancer And yet He perished in the same manner as her

[@hj-ct2qi]

god, geller's scripts are written so perfectly. he tells us both possible endings for "how fish is made," but...doesn't indicate which one is "up" and which one is "down."

[@Glory2Snowstar]

Blame it on Bogleech or messed-up Pokédex entries but I’ve long-loved creating gross fleshy worlds and characters. It kinda started out as a fear for anything relating to biology before it became my… entire aesthetic. I think games like these that hold nothing back when it comes to fleshy horrors help immunize us to fearing it, in a way. That is, until something even MORE screwed-up appears. It’s like the arms race between our immune systems and bacteria, but with fears and curiosity. I’ve been having lots of fun bringing my ideas of living worlds to life during my college semesters, and kinda making them more funky that visceral. I dunno, if the mutated denizens of a stomach acid ocean look happy with their lives, it makes the viewer feel happier too, y’know? I mean, it’s kinda like how we all have mites in our eyebrows. They’re not doing us any harm, and it’s nice to know that we’re never truly isolated from life. I think a far scarier setting would be something truly sterilized: oceans of soap and bleach, metals devoid of dirt and skies of a single hue. It would just feel so… dead. I’m always at my comfiest when I find a little spider in a corner, or something. Makes the place feel healthy and alive. Our fear of mangled flesh comes from a respect for living creatures, after all, so it’s just nice to see the concept become far more widespread. Also I highly recommend a little game called Anatomy.

[@fearanger1]

Just wanna say that out of all those well-put thoughts, "Our fear of mangled flesh comes from a respect for living creatures, after all" really called out to me. I wish you luck on your viscerally creative endeavours!

[@scylloid]

the venn diagram between bogleech fans and anatomy enjoyers is a circle.

[@falconstudios146]

I do love me some Bogleech. I've got a Painchild plushie beside me as we speak.

[@myujmes]

Jacob Geller has a video about anatomy already

[@olserknam]

In the latest years I see more and more people pop up on the internet with a particular dread/fascination for human anatomy and all things visceral. I wonder why there isn't a name for this phobia (?) yet. I've had it for all my life since childhood (although the fear aspect was much stronger back then) but only in the recent years I've been seeing people who had something similar. For most of my life, I though this was an exclusively me anomaly. I'd also say a truly sterilized setting is not as scary as one burtsting with unconscious organic life out to get you. Sure, it's dead and lifeless, but there's a certain trainquility in that. Although probably a hell lot of horror as well after you've spent enough time in such a setting, but I think I'd still prefer it to being surrounded by unintelligent living mass that is alive, yet devoid of any thought and simply cynically obeys its primal instinct to live, to survive at any cost, including potentially attacking you and taking your life. There's something inherently disgusting to me about this dumb, brainless desire to live for the sake of it, no matter how many others you have to harm to continue existing. Which is ironic, considering this is pretty much the drive for all existence.

[@alexbrown7708]

I think my one of my favorite details in Perfect Vermin is how the trachea in the doctors office is a potted plant in the "office"

[@LocalBread]

I just noticed this, but if you look to the left in the news anchors sets, you can see that a bowl on the left is filling up with cigarettes as his condition gets worse.

[@JuiceBaxJams]

i watched one of my fav streamers play How Fish is Made earlier this year, and the phrase "here's to motherfuckers" has been burned into my brain since. weird indie games like these do so much to your brain with so few resources, it's amazing

[@zuresei]

Indie developers 🤝 Sci-Fi authors v --- v doing as little as possible to plant a concept or phrase into your mind which will never leave

[@Generic_Gaming_Channel]

HERE'S TO MOTHERFUCKERS

[@Star-pl1xs]

@@zuresei i have no mouth

[@TylerJMacDonald]

This is so good! Has Jacob covered Darkwood yet? Seems potentially right up his alley.

[@generalludwig1637]

23 hours ago wtf

[@CarrierOfChaos617]

@@generalludwig1637 premier maybe?

[@Natalie-101]

@@generalludwig1637 patreon

[@SmokeyChipOatley]

@@generalludwig1637 if you watch Jacob Geller videos while stoned it sends you back in time, mannn. Either that or it was some patreon thing

[@thesauce179]

Finally, another darkwood enjoyer

[@pixelrunner2775]

I love how among the list of content warnings is literally just fish

[@seangallagher9435]

A cool thing I think you may have forgotten, is that when the fish at the end tells you how many fish have gone up or down, he gets the colors mixed up. The up is blue and the red is down in his text box, when throughout the game up has been red, and down has been blue. You might not even know which one was more popular, which makes his advice even less helpful

[@elizabethkasner5799]

This was such a good video that I was not expecting to enjoy as much as I did because I just do not have a very strong stomach, and so this video passing by in such a blur was simply a delight, I love your works that explore morality

[@JacobGeller]

Thank you so much!

[@turkicnomad5632]

It really helps that as far as gore goes, the imagery is distinct enough from reality to view more easily.

[@Maurrokh]

Objects with meaty insides are far up the list of things that really unsettle me. Sometimes they're just small details in a videogame, but they really upset me. Like certain tombstones in Bloodborne that split apart to reveal their fleshy insides. Or that puppet boss from one of the Silent Hills that has flesh and bone under its porcelain skin. Also it's really fun to imagine that all the walls of the room you're in are just filled with living meat. Good choice in music, Sidewalks and Skeletons was a perfect fit.

[@AstromarineCorpse]

Cao Hui must feel like he makes those things just for you then, huh :D

[@theonlycatonice]

Damn thanks for this was certain I recognized it from somewhere. Sleep Paralysis!

[@Orpheus6428]

Scarlet, from Silent Hill Homecoming.

[@miskatonic_alumni]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/Z6SZdKijqr5jeKs

[@chinchin2980]

The last fish that tells you 199 fish have gone up and 474 have gone down has the colors for up and down switched around basically telling the player that he also doesn't have an idea

[@EllpaFox47]

I feel like the question of up or down and how every fish has a different opinion is an homage to the question of what happens when we die Some say we ascend into the stars (The mackerel) Some say nothing happens but slow decomposition (The fish that’s trapped) Some say we suffer torment for our actions And the fact that we can change our answer with no consequences seems to suggest we are deciding where we stand on that Also the fact that the setting is some kind of purgatory

[@EllpaFox47]

I think the parasite is on the side of nothing after death And that it doesn’t matter What matters is what we do in life Which is why he does the funny musical number

[@braynjohnson4302]

@@EllpaFox47 I see the parasite as the devil. His fate is sealed. All he can do now is corrupt and destroy those who still have a choice. He can devour them and as long they stay there with him he can continue to devour them. So why not promote a message of nothing matters?