Originally posted in response to a post about Arknights names

There are plenty of posts of people going “Wait, Arknights has a character named Pinecone?” or whatever, but I think the actual idea behind it is more interesting. There’s this in-universe culture called the Sarkaz, and they consider it normal to rename yourself when you adopt a new role in life. They have a lot of things like that, like symbolically taking on a dead person’s identity and unfinished business by taking their weapon. The individual is in perpetual flux, while the Sarkaz people are forever enduring.

There’s a lot of little interlocking parts in this game’s worldbuilding. For Sarkaz, it’s different traditions and values relating to collectivism and lack of concern for a “stable” individual identity. Then for another group, their thing can be, say, “casual openness to physical contact.” It’s like fractal worldbuilding, with each culture having its own little world within it, and I really recommend Arknights to anyone who finds that interesting.