Annotated 46-4
The title here doesn’t appear to invoke any video games I can find.
It might’ve been a slight twist on the writing advice “Kill your darlings,” which would have been on my mind a lot as we headed toward the finale and tried to keep things lean. It has some resonance for that reason, since the point of the advice is you have to let go of a lot to let the work become its best self.
Still, we could’ve gone with “FINAL BOSS FIGHT.”
The closest I can think of shortly is “No More Heroes”. Not sure if it thematically plays, I’m only loosely aware of the plot; the main character desires to have the title of “World’s Greatest Assassin” (or something similar), which involves… killing your way up the ranks if I understand it correctly. In a sense, they may be his heroes and he must surpass them in a brutal and violent way. Or the game’s name might just be a reference to his status being closer to that of an anti-hero in a world where things are less black and white, and more shades of… red.
Alt-text didn’t make it.
I love the paint job on that airship. Pretty sure that was also Goblaurence’ idea.
It seems like a play on “never meet your heroes” to me.
It definitely evokes “Kill your darlings” for me.
Perhaps not a video game, but I feel there’s undeniably a little bit of our heroes reflected in the music video for AWOLNATION’s song of the same title as this chapter.