The Invincible Protagonist

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The Invincible Protagonist

#1 Post by Twoflower »

Here's a writing conundrum I've been pondering lately. Maybe you can relate, maybe you've got some tips. Let's find out.

I've been giving thought to the invincibility of protagonists lately, and how that affects the way players metagame their way through a narrative experience. When you know you can't simply dead-end by picking the "bad" conversation option, it instills a sense in the player that they can do anything, no matter how risky it is to the protagonist character, because the game will always let you continue the story in some way.

A good example of the most extreme end of this is Telltale's Walking Dead games. You can be nice, you can be a douchebag, you can just sit there and say nothing... save someone, kill them, whatever... the game will continue onward. Short of failing a minigame you cannot be stopped and every action you take, no matter how crazy, is perfectly fine despite the character supposedly being in extreme peril. It's difficult to incentivize 'safe' choices when you never really penalize 'unsafe' choices.

There's always the opposite approach, to dead-end the player -- say the wrong thing, BAD END. But I've never liked this because it's easily defeated with a rollback or reload, and thus it feels like a non-option, a trap designed to frustrate the player. If you give someone two options and the second one leads to your doom, then you've really only given them one option.

Even outside of life-or-death stakes, this can be a problem. Let me give you something from the game I'm writing right now...

My story starts with the protag losing his job, and in need of finding a new one. Eventually he ends up working at an arcade... which is patently obvious from the title of my game (Arcade Spirits) so there's really no drama about whether or not he'll take the job, despite it being a risky prospect.

But it's a risk to the character, who has to accept a lower income and less job stability... while the player feels no risk at all since it's the literal title of the game, and they know this is where the plot is going. If I even gave them the option to turn down the job nobody would take it, because they'd assume that was an insta-bad-end, as nobody would write a whole game-sized branch of the plot where you go file paperwork in an office for months instead. As a result they're likely to direct the character to YOLO it and jump in with both feet, no hesitation.

So what happens when later on, there's a story beat where you find out you COULD have had a more stable, higher-paying job, if a trusted ally hadn't lied to you early on? The protag character should probably be upset at this. And yet... I don't think the player would care, since through their metagaming knowledge they know it wouldn't have amounted to anything. If you give them the option to say "Whatever, s'all good" or "You betrayed me!" the player will likely always pick the former, to keep relationships high and because they know it didn't actually matter.

Now, then. How do I make the player feel the same risk and vulnerability the character should be feeling, without beating them over the head with the stick of the Bad End?
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#2 Post by Zelan »

It's a tough question, and I don't think there's one single Right Answer to it - it probably varies from game to game. What I would say, though, is that instead of having bad ends triggered by just one choice, have a multitude of choices lead up to the end instead. That way, it's harder to fix with "just a rollback" as you said.

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#3 Post by Mammon »

There is of course the good and bad end, but that usually doesn't really amount to much. It's more a matter of the last scene changing drastically from one sentence to the next to 'nope, you dead' or 'this character suddenly saves the day and wouldn't have shown up if you hadn't gotten all their relationship points'. A bad end in that case is usually not that impressive.

A halfway bad end is not that much better. If there's a point halfway the story where you just can't continue if you didn't accumulate enough relationship points or whatever, it's more likely to invite '*Sigh* Guess I'll start a new game and autoskip for two minutes to get it.' so it won't amount to much.

The only two real solutions are kinetic gameplay and various routes that actually differ. The former might actually be a better option when the bad end feels slapped on and the choices were predictable. The latter is a lot of writing work and will require your story to be able to go many ways. I like to think that's what I did with P&Y and S&Y, instead of multiple choices that will decide what will happen you instead get just once choice that splits the route in two completely new routes. There are many bad routes in both games, although I have a tendency of making them more uncomfortable than bad.

A possible different solution is to make a not-obvious choice system whose choices might actually intrigue the player, but to do this without making the choices unnecessarily vague is like walking a tightrope.
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#4 Post by SundownKid »

Now, then. How do I make the player feel the same risk and vulnerability the character should be feeling, without beating them over the head with the stick of the Bad End?
If you aren't happy with having an invincible protagonist, then DON'T have an invincible protagonist.

It's entirely possible to kill the protagonist and switch to a different protagonist. You run the risk of pissing off the player, but it's your game, and it's definitely an uncommon plot device.

However, it does have precedent. See also: Michigan: Report From Hell. (Technically it's not really the main character that dies, but you can let your reporter die and they get replaced in the next section if you do).

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#5 Post by LateWhiteRabbit »

Twoflower wrote:Here's a writing conundrum I've been pondering lately. Maybe you can relate, maybe you've got some tips. Let's find out.
*SNIP*
Now, then. How do I make the player feel the same risk and vulnerability the character should be feeling, without beating them over the head with the stick of the Bad End?
I've studied a lot on this, and read a lot of books on writing, and even took classes on interactive writing in college. It's really not as complicated a problem as it seems.

First and foremost, you need to make the player EMPATHIZE with the protagonist. They have to care about the character to care anything about your story. It is why silent or faceless protagonist aren't often done anymore - it makes it really hard to connect with the story as a player. Your first priority in writing and starting your story should be to immediately and as quickly as possible build empathy between the player/audience and the protagonist.

To go back to your example of the Walking Dead - think about how Lee is introduced in just the first few minutes of the game:
-He is in the back of a police car, which is an immediate form of danger. Putting the protagonist in danger is a quick way to build empathy from an audience.
-We learn he was a college professor. This contrasts strongly with being in a police car as a criminal. Those two things aren't usually seen together, so the dichotomy builds interest in the character.
-We learn his wife was cheating on him with someone else. Instant empathy. (Interestingly, showing he had/has a wife, i.e. someone that loves/cares about him, gives the audience permission to care about him too.)
-When the car wrecks, he checks on the police officer. I.e. he is shown being compassionate. This would be a perfect escape opportunity for a criminal, but his first thought is to check on the well-being of the person holding him under arrest. This signals the player, in a subtle way, that even though Lee IS a criminal, he is a good person, and again, the dichotomy hooks the audience/player.
-We see Lee rescue a little girl and make himself responsible for her safety. Now he is a hero, a criminal, and has someone depending on him/the player.

All in the first 10 minutes or so of the story. The player is now invested in the CHARACTER, and will follow them into whatever plot happens to them. You mentioned the danger of the player not caring that the protagonist missed a better a job opportunity or not wanting to challenge an NPC to avoid harming the 'relationship'. Hooking the player with EMPATHY towards your protagonist solves this, because if you empathize with a character, it genuinely pisses you off when someone is mean or hurtful or damaging to them.

As for branching choices and storylines - the key is just to match everything you offer to the player SATISFYING in some way. The choice can reveal new narrative information or some other reward otherwise unobtainable. Your player should always be satisfied with the branch or choices they are presented. Maybe if the player refuses the choice to work at the arcade, we are presented with some more short scenes that explore just who the protagonist IS and makes them even more empathetic.

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#6 Post by Twoflower »

LateWhiteRabbit wrote:First and foremost, you need to make the player EMPATHIZE with the protagonist. They have to care about the character to care anything about your story. It is why silent or faceless protagonist aren't often done anymore - it makes it really hard to connect with the story as a player. Your first priority in writing and starting your story should be to immediately and as quickly as possible build empathy between the player/audience and the protagonist.
Agreed. Even though my protag is very user-customizable -- name, gender, race, etc -- the character does have a defined background, having a long string of unsatisfying jobs and a recent firing. I establish right away this cycle of depression and hopelessness, to drive up empathy, and make the player want to help this character succeed and be happy.

The problem I'm facing is that when we later find out a close friend lied and they could've had an arguably "better" job (more pay but less satisfying) I present the player with a number of roleplaying opportunity reactions: to either be upset about this and full of regret, or to accept it and know they're on the right track. And... well, since the empathic investment is currently in "pull this character out of the pits" I'm thinking very few players will choose to have any regrets, because as invincible protagonists who know they're doing the right thing by joining the arcade, they shouldn't have any regrets.

My current plan is to allow three options: To truthfully be happy with the situation, to be uncertain about the situation, or to lie to people and claim you're happy while quietly wondering what could have been. So in all three, you are stuck with the decision your character made / was railroaded into (joining the arcade, because the TITLE of the game is "Arcade Spirits" and that's what you do) but hopefully the player will be curious to see how the story changes if they choose regret and worry.
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#7 Post by LateWhiteRabbit »

Twoflower wrote: Even though my protag is very user-customizable -- name, gender, race, etc -- the character does have a defined background, having a long string of unsatisfying jobs and a recent firing. I establish right away this cycle of depression and hopelessness, to drive up empathy, and make the player want to help this character succeed and be happy.
I've got to ask why you are making the protagonist customizable - it seems at odds with your goal and doesn't really work. Customizable protagonists are really just a form of faceless protagonist, and should be used only when the protagonist is supposed to be a player surrogate. This interferes with the protagonist having a defined background - how is the player supposed to empathize with a character that had no predefined characteristics before the player chose them? Again, it is encouraging the player to view the protagonist as a stand-in, an avatar, and NOT a unique individual human being. It doesn't matter if the circumstances of the character stay the same - the customization is telling the player that this person is interchangeable with any other with a similar background.

It is about really focusing on your goals for the game - if the protagonist is supposed to be the PLAYER, then yeah, go crazy with customization. If not, you are actually damaging your attempts to build empathy with a character and create a stronger story.

And be careful about using the pity-party route for creating sympathy for a character. You have to do some very specific things in addition to that, or you can cause the audience to reject the character. Principally, you've got to make sure that the circumstances the character finds themselves in are not any fault of their own, or you need to pile on a lot of other empathizing factors besides. And if you go the failure route, you need to establish almost immediately that the character is very talented in some other area. No one (the audience) likes a loser - they like underdogs.

Basically, the pitfall you face is that if it is possible that the firing is the fault of the character in some way (and not an injustice thrust upon them) the audience will feel the character deserved it, and any pity-party behavior will create annoyance and antagonism towards the character, rather than empathy. In fact, go easy on the "oh, woe is me" stuff anyway, because a character that complains or moans a lot isn't likeable - no matter how justified their complaints are.

And I don't know the specifics of your story, but you need to be careful that your protagonist is not passive. The protagonist needs to be active in order to gain support from the audience, and if the protagonist has just been drifting along with no purpose or dreams or goals from one unsatisfying job to the next, you aren't giving us much to support.

But do give a lot of thought as to WHY you are trying to include customization - because it is expected? Because it sounds like it is going against everything you are trying to do with the story.

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#8 Post by Twoflower »

I'm going with something of a hybrid approach -- a protag with a history, but customization to better suit the player's desires. In the same way you can pick your personality-based emotional responses to events around you rather than simply picking branches now and then, it's for roleplaying purposes. It felt weird or wrong to tell people "no, you must be this specific white guy because narrative" or anything like that when including customization is a very low cost way to allow representation, should the player want the character to represent their race or sexuality.

As for the 'pity party / loser' aspect, the firing is NOT the protag's fault. Definitely aiming for underdog, here. It's just the latest in a series of bad luck situations outside their control, which has them feeling depressed but they're certainly not whiny about it. And while initially the protag just sort of goes with the flow, that's a major character angle -- the arcade is the protag's chance to STOP being passive, and the player can choose to embrace it wholeheartedly and become an active person with hopes and dreams. You're joining the story at the turning point, bringing the protag around from despair to triumph.

To bring this back around, basically what I was trying to figure out is how to remind the player that while embracing the protag's dreams feels great, they're also vulnerable for taking the risk of doing so. I've been working on this for the last day and I think I've just about got it in the writing.

When you find out that your best friend actually had a job offer with good pay that they didn't tell you about, you get to choose how the protag reacts...

1. You can honestly say "It's fine" and decide you made the right choice anyway, even if you're worried about making rent or even having enough money to eat a decent meal. So there's a lingering edge of worry due to the vulnerability, but you choose confidence and hope.

2. You can DIShonestly say "It's fine" to spare your friend's feelings, while quietly freaking out over whether you made the right decision or not. Obviously the game doesn't let you NOT join the arcade, so it's not really like that was an option, but from a roleplaying perspective I'm hoping some players will find this push-pull of anxiety and hope interesting.

3. You can get upset at your friend and have it out right there. There's a brief argument where your friend points out that you'd have hated that job whereas you love the arcade, so what's the problem? Leaving you with that anxiety and worry, and a bit of drama.

My hope is that while most people will pick option 1 for the power fantasy of being super confident and in control and active, adding the edge of "...but I'm eating toast for lunch" will keep it from feeling entirely like the super good amazing happy option. And the second two options will hopefully appeal to people looking to push aside the "safe" invincible protagonist route in favor of something with more depth.
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#9 Post by LateWhiteRabbit »

Twoflower wrote:I'm going with something of a hybrid approach -- a protag with a history, but customization to better suit the player's desires. In the same way you can pick your personality-based emotional responses to events around you rather than simply picking branches now and then, it's for roleplaying purposes. It felt weird or wrong to tell people "no, you must be this specific white guy because narrative" or anything like that when including customization is a very low cost way to allow representation, should the player want the character to represent their race or sexuality.
Sounds like you do want the protagonist to be a player surrogate, and that's fine, you just need to realize that does have narrative consequences. I personally find it weird if people can't relate to someone of a different race or gender - if they can't, it means the writer did a horrible job of creating empathy. I'm not a Polynesian teenage girl, or a black man, for instance, but I had no problems relating to Moana in Moana or Lee in The Walking Dead. In fact, there where a couple of choices in the Walking Dead where I felt the game taught me something about myself through my choices.
Twoflower wrote: When you find out that your best friend actually had a job offer with good pay that they didn't tell you about, you get to choose how the protag reacts...
Since you are going with a player surrogate, you aren't going to be as successful investing player's in the anxiety and hardships of the protagonist in a narrative manner. The protagonist is the player's avatar in this case, and the player isn't going to worry about their avatar not making rent, or being forced to eat toast. You'll need to make it more about the betrayal of the friend, because the player can still acutely feel the anger of betrayal from an ally. Alternatively, you could incorporate the rent and food into some kind of rewarding gameplay mechanic for the player, so they feel that this friend denied them extra rewards through their actions.

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#10 Post by Kuiper »

Twoflower wrote:So what happens when later on, there's a story beat where you find out you COULD have had a more stable, higher-paying job, if a trusted ally hadn't lied to you early on? The protag character should probably be upset at this. And yet... I don't think the player would care, since through their metagaming knowledge they know it wouldn't have amounted to anything.
I don't agree with the premise that players only care about things that matter from a "metagaming" perspective. Oftentimes, players care about things because characters care about things. Just because something has no direct consequence on me as a player (or a player character) doesn't mean that it's irrelevant. For example, a lot of BioWare games have relationship threads that involve listening to your party members talk about their childhood. We hear about how they were bullied by other children growing up, or how they became an orphan when their village was attacked by invaders, or what their favorite hobbies were when they were an adolescent. From a single-minded "metagaming" perspective, none of this matters, because regardless of what kind of childhood that character had, they still grew up to be a fighter who joined our party. Everything apart from their ability contribute to my mission is "irrelevant," if I'm taking that single-minded approach. But we still care about these characters' backgrounds, because those things are part of what make those characters what they are, and we care about those characters because...well, why else would you start playing a BioWare game?
Twoflower wrote:If you give them the option to say "Whatever, s'all good" or "You betrayed me!" the player will likely always pick the former, to keep relationships high and because they know it didn't actually matter.
Players have lots of reasons for making a decision, and not all of them are rational. There's a choice near the middle of Telltale's Game of Thrones (season 1) where your group captures one of the members of a rival house and holds him in captivity. You're left with the choice of simply holding him for negotiating purposes, or you can rough him up a bit to "get even" for some of the misdeeds that this character committed earlier. Obviously, if your ultimate goal is to parley peace between the two houses, beating the guy up is totally antithetical to your objectives. The rational thing to do would be to simply hold him, keep him clothed and fed, and use him as a "bargaining chip" that you can exchange for some of your own prisoners. And yet according to Telltale's player statistics, over 65% decided to beat the guy up. Why would people ignore the choice that was obviously "rational" from a metagaming perspective to keep their relationships high? Because that guy was a jerk! He spends the first half of the game being a thoroughly cruel person. When I had the chance, you can bet I inflicted as much pain as I could, because I wanted justice. Oh, I also wanted peace between houses. But in a moment of impulse, when I had the chance, I had to give that guy what was coming to him, and that superseded everything else.

Ultimately, beating up the bad guy "didn't matter." In fact, that decision might ultimately come back to bite me in the next season. But it wasn't the kind of decision I made with the anticipation of some future reward. No, beating him up and getting a cathartic moment of justice was its own reward, and even if I had full knowledge that I'd "punished" for that choice, I'd still do the same thing, just so I could spend those few minutes watching the bad guy getting beat up.

People play games because they want to have fun. They want to experience awesome moments. And they're willing to make sacrifices to experience those awesome moments. Sure, forgiving someone for their betrayal might be the "beneficial" thing to do if all I care about is my stats, but what good are stats if I miss out on things that I really want to do, like watching the main character deliver a speech telling the betrayer that they're a terrible person instead of overlooking the betrayal and immediately forgiving them? I think there are plenty of people who would rather experience that cathartic speech than simply see a "+2 relationship" notification. Of course, the extent to which readers will desire that catharsis is going to depend largely on how much they empathize with the main character and understand the feeling of betrayal, which ultimately comes down to how well you're able to execute the story as a writer.
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#11 Post by YonYonYon »

I'm just sneaking in to say, if any character betrayed my trust I'll beat them up as much as the game allows, all relationship points be damned. I don't want any relationship with someone who can betray me
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#12 Post by Zelan »

I'm seconding some of the things that Kuiper and YonYonYon have said; although I generally try to get every ending of a visual novel, my first playthrough is basically my "blind" playthrough, where I just go with my gut for all of the answers. Sure, sometimes this leads to a less-than-desirable ending for me, but it's the ending that I get for roleplaying my character the way that I want to, and I like seeing the consequences of that.

(Kuiper, you need to quit linking TVTropes. cx I click your links every dang time and I don't have six hours to kill.)

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#13 Post by Twoflower »

Okay, here's my proposed changes for making this work according to VN community standards, while maintaining what I'm trying to achieve with the game.

1. The character generation at the start is proceeded by a quick prologue which (vaguely and mysteriously) indicates you have a troubled and difficult past, before prompting you to accept the default character or customize your appearance. This way, you know you have some backstory, some context, rather than being a pure blank slate. By presenting the option to go "Default" or "Custom" players who prefer a fully established character from the get-go can take the default, and those who would like to customize still can.

2. When the moment comes where your friend notes she actually had a better-paying but boring job opportunity available, your choices are:

"I made my choice and I'm okay with it"
"I'm nervous and anxious but I won't take it out on her"
"I'm angry at her and will get into an arguement about it"

If you take the last one, you have the opportunity to (if you choose to do so) quit your job on the spot and go find something safe and boring, which leads to the Bad End / easter egg where you have a dull but okay life and die comfortably numb.

I'm still guessing most players will take "I made my choice and I'm okay with it" but I can live with that, even if I'd hope some would take Zelan's option and do a roleplaying-based playthrough rather than metagaming it. And even if your character's okay with it, they still have to deal with the reprocussions of that decision... trouble making rent payments, crap food for lunch, the arcade being a bit unstable in general. ...which you address by deciding later on to working to improve the arcade business so you CAN be stable, in the end.

Sound good?
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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#14 Post by LateWhiteRabbit »

Twoflower wrote: 2. When the moment comes where your friend notes she actually had a better-paying but boring job opportunity available, your choices are:

"I made my choice and I'm okay with it"
"I'm nervous and anxious but I won't take it out on her"
"I'm angry at her and will get into an arguement about it"

If you take the last one, you have the opportunity to (if you choose to do so) quit your job on the spot and go find something safe and boring, which leads to the Bad End / easter egg where you have a dull but okay life and die comfortably numb.

I'm still guessing most players will take "I made my choice and I'm okay with it" but I can live with that, even if I'd hope some would take Zelan's option and do a roleplaying-based playthrough rather than metagaming it. And even if your character's okay with it, they still have to deal with the reprocussions of that decision... trouble making rent payments, crap food for lunch, the arcade being a bit unstable in general. ...which you address by deciding later on to working to improve the arcade business so you CAN be stable, in the end.

Sound good?
Why would choosing to be angry with your friend cause you to quit your job? I'd be pretty annoyed at a game that did that to me based off a choice that had that text attached to it. I mean, the choice is asking me if I want to give my 'friend' a piece of my mind, not "I'm angry at her and will now sabotage my life just to spite her."

Likewise, I'd be pretty annoyed if I wasn't given an option to get angry with the friend without quitting my job. As others have said, sometimes you just want to punish an NPC for treating you badly or against your wishes. Like in Telltale's Guardians of the Galaxy game there is an option to 'kick' an NPC that caused you trouble. And keep kicking them if you so wish. It's pointless, it's childish, but it's SATISFYING. As a player, I don't necessarily want to change the outcome of events - I just want to make a character pay for their betrayal and not let it pass unmentioned or unpunished.

And I have to say, the scenario you've described? I'd personally, in real life, consider ending a friendship over such a thing. That's someone making a decision FOR YOU. Without consultation. Without discussion. Because they felt they knew what was best for you. And holy crap! What if you didn't get the arcade job? "I know you stress out over having rent money, and you often have to stretch your food budget to avoid going hungry, but I decided that was better for you than working somewhere boring. I mean, how unhappy would you be with being bored 8 hours a day in exchange for stress-free living?"
....
"We are not friends anymore."

The friend's motivation seems so ... immature and teenage-ish.

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Re: The Invincible Protagonist

#15 Post by Twoflower »

LateWhiteRabbit wrote:Why would choosing to be angry with your friend cause you to quit your job? I'd be pretty annoyed at a game that did that to me based off a choice that had that text attached to it.
No no, you have the you have the OPPORTUNITY to quit there and then IF you choose to do so, like I said. (I probably didn't emphasize it correctly.) You can get mad at her and still stay at the arcade. Choice one is "Mad at her or not?" and choice two is "If mad, do you want to quit or not?".
And I have to say, the scenario you've described? I'd personally, in real life, consider ending a friendship over such a thing. That's someone making a decision FOR YOU. Without consultation. Without discussion. Because they felt they knew what was best for you. And holy crap! What if you didn't get the arcade job? "I know you stress out over having rent money, and you often have to stretch your food budget to avoid going hungry, but I decided that was better for you than working somewhere boring. I mean, how unhappy would you be with being bored 8 hours a day in exchange for stress-free living?"
Part of the overall theme of the story is following your dreams, not just taking whatever you can safely get and grinding your way through life joylessly. It's a story about hope and optimism rather than concrete pragmatism. That's why the bad end is "I got a nice, safe, boring job I hate, the end." So in that regard she's trying to help you, since by this point you've had three jobs you hate and a fourth wouldn't help your state of mind.

But yes, you have the option to get super mad about it, and I'm pondering whether or not you break up with this friend then and there. Although that'll cause a lot of complex branching.
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