Is this the weirdest bug or a feature I somehow accidentally activated? The face was live and working. It went back to normal after I launched an app.
It's imessage.
If android phones showed up in imessage as red bubbles or purple bubbles but everything still worked OR if Apple released iMessage for Android very few would actually care about the type of phone used .
Long past time for Apple to add this capability. Android has had it for ages. Samsung with Good Lock can even have app-specific audio settings.