Left my heart at the Sierra Madre and a ghost person ate it

This is not a wiki entry listicle about the Ghost People; check the real wiki for a loredump. This is an essay about how and why a Fallout DLC managed to tap into the core of my being, written mostly for myself.

The Ghost People are hostile characters in the Fallout: New Vegas add-on Dead Money. The add-on is divisive -- it's the most different in mechanics and tone, a hardcore survival horror experience rather than the goofy wasteland tour of the base game. This shift is achieved through many aspects, and the Ghost People are a major one.

My dearest friends & strangers online seem to be batshit terrified of them, to the extent that legends of them glitching to infinite perception were spread across the playerbase.

It fascinates me. I can’t stop thinking about it. It's so opposite to my experience.

I understand people's terror in theory. The Ghost People DO kick your ass, pretty brutally too. Mechanically they're unlike any other npc -- they're the only ones who break the “bonks you but harder/faster/adds status effect” formula by requiring dismemberment to be killed. They ask you to change your entire approach to combat, one which you've developed over many levels of play, maybe even your entire weapon specialty if you're a guns main. And they move weird! They're slow when idle (and very visibly disabled, though let's not open the monstrosity=disability can of worms rn), and in combat they're lunging & bouncing in directions you can hardly predict. They make spooky noises, you never see their faces, and eyes glow the evil™ shade of green. If that wasn't enough, you're trapped in a tiny, decrepit, toxic gas filled area with a bomb around your neck and all of your equipment is gone. The combination of the unknown and disempowerment is very effective at creating dread, and thus, horror.

Now let's address why all of it failed to work on me.

1. My first time playing I was way too OP and an unarmed+survival build. Bear trap fists chomp limbs very effectively! The fear of novelty? Voided.
2. I find comfort in Dead Money's brand of spooky. Ghost people's designs are very friend shaped, their sounds make me feel all fuzzy, and their leaps remind me of catching grasshoppers as a child. Also seeing Al-Andalus written all over the Villa's design was magnificent.
3. The environmental factors didn't work either! I'm claustrophillic, I get lost all the time anyway, and the bomb collar made me feel seen rather than terrified. Like, yeah, this is exactly how it feels to have sensory issues around pitches/textures of sound. Getting to hurl javelins at shitty speakers is autistic wish fulfilment for me, thank you!
4. Lastly, I was much more focused on being upset about the worker exploitation lore.

Overall, an excellent experience, cute awesome mega, 15/10. Would go back and vibe.

And then I went back, and I haven't been the same since.

My 2nd visit to the Sierra Madre a couple months later was one massive flood of sorrow. Every encounter with a ghost person was wracked with pain and guilt and regret. I was not vibing with the ghosties, I was killing them.

After blowing up Elijah's head like he had threatened to do with mine, I found myself staring at the exit gates. I hesitated. I did not want to leave.

I did not want to leave my kin, my siblings, my family.

I need you to know that I have yet to feel this way about my actual family. I need you to understand that I have felt at home & heartbroken about leaving two times in my life, and this was the first one.

I was shaken and distraught for days and it terrified me. I could not get over it. I brought it up in therapy with little to no success (she didn't get it (or me in general (unrelated))). Over the months I've tried putting what happened to words & pictures multiple times. This is a distillation of what I've been able to come up with, hopefully to be expanded in the future.

If you ignore the intensity of the feelings, me getting a little too excited about the Ghost People is not at all unexpected. I have a tendency to attach myself to fictional outcast groups, especially if they're dehumanised by other characters. Hell, it's not even unique within FNV. My comet and I have an extensive story about the Fiends, and I was certainly going “that's me!!!!” @ Old World Blues' Lobotomites in between sobbing about the Cuckoo's Nest. Culture is a big thing for me, seeing how people live helps me connect, even if the implications wreck me.

The strange thing is that there is very little discussion of what a day in the life of a Ghost Person would look like. We're told a lot about the injustice of their origins, we're told there are a lot of them and that they make their own weapons, but beyond that? Not much. Even the hologram worship was left unused in the final game :( I suppose it contributed to my affection -- I scoured the web for any traces of info and filled in the gaps myself before the 2nd playthrough, perhaps it strengthened the bond. But again, that's true for Fiends and the Lobotomites too, and they had so much more concept art to work with, so... why ghosties?

My now-former therapist said “It's because you can see their pain and it reminds you of your own :)”. She went on a completely bonkers & off-base elaboration in the next sentence, but the sentiment is right, I think.

I came into the 2nd playthrough already aware of every crumb of lore. The 1st time you play and encounter a ghost person it's like “oh what a kooky creature!”. Your 2nd time the first living thing you see is a person trapped in a form that's been forced onto them but also kept them safe, and they're subjected to excruciating pain trying to keep themselves intact, but also they've been doing it so long that the line between them and the mask has literally collapsed, so damaging the mask might as well obliterate them, and--

I think we've just located the core of my siblings, my family.

Seeing it over and over again, instead of it being revealed gradually, really hammered in that they're just like me fr. My hypervigilant night-paranoid high-masking identity-loss-experiencing self suddenly didn't feel alone. No wonder having to kill them felt like being gutpunched.

What also sets ghosties apart for me is how they are talked about by the other characters. The Fiends are vermin. The Lobotomites aren't even acknowledged beyond “there were more attempts”. The Ghost People, meanwhile, are inhabitants. Dean Domino refers to them almost warmly as locals while calling you a tourist, he chooses to leave them be and advises you to do the same. He does it for survival, sure, but the idea is clear -- the Ghost People, even with their odd behaviours & appearance, aren't in your way, they're just a part of the world. That, THAT pangs something in my heart.

The Sierra Madre's Villa promised me a place where my weirdness & my pain would not be a burden to anyone. Where I could be surrounded by people who understand completely, where there'd be a community of other (very gender) weirdos. Where there could finally be peace, even if it's among nameless polygons to shoot.

I have a save file at the Villa. Occasionally I go back with AI player detection off. You know, for a family reunion. Because I cannot let go.