Games ruined by creator's politics

Unless those politics are somehow explicitly represented in their work, I don't care.

Same with misconduct. I can enjoy the Cosby Show and Michael Jackson music despite the creators' actual/alleged real world sexual misconduct. I know not everyone can make that separation and that's cool too. Consume the media you choose to consume. As for me, art is art, and people are people.
 
if it was discovered that a game developer despised you for your skin colour or sexuality i would think choosing not to support a person who actively hates you for who you are is pretty justifiable and not necessarily some act of 'smugness'.

I honestly wouldn't care. If someone who hated skinny white silly haired twats like myself made a game, but the game was really good, I'd still play it. If the developer supported Donald Trump, I'd still play it. If they supported Hilary Clinton, I'd still play it. Really. I do not lie when I say I honestly do not give a fuck. I play games for enjoyment. Looking into it any deeper than that is honestly a waste of my time, and I do not have much of that outside of work, my daughter and other commitments.

Where I draw the line is where the artist has literally killed someone or similar. For example, lostprophets (band). As soon as their lead singer was jailed for raping children and babies, I stopped listening to them. Anything less than that? Again, I don't give a shit.

edit: actually, I do make a habit of sometimes avoiding games that push political ideologies onto me. I don't want to know about your politics, whether its in a game, on a forum or in person. Leave me alone and stop trying to force your views onto other people, goddamnit.
 
Generally, no, I am not bothered by nor feel a game is "ruined" by a creative team's political views, simply because all creative works will naturally be influenced by the politics, morality, interests, and ethics of the people creating. Creative expression is really just that, and politics is a part of all art in one way or another.

Dating right back to Doom, a game that relished in counter culture shock through violence. I believe it was Carmack who said that Doom was supposed to disturb, as the ultra violence as a vessel for disturbance was a product of the era. So in that respect, if I feel a video game (any creative work for that matter) disturbs or shocks me, then so be it; that is the creative expression of the author and their intent.

In all honest this is, for me, often a point of curiosity. Experiencing a creative work from a confronting, offensive, and dissonant perspective can be an experience within itself. Not something to agree with or even learn from (and I really want to push that point), but something I still find interesting. To see, hear, and experience the creative expression and creative freedom of even the most repugnant perspective is an experience that for me is branded unique in itself. I might walk away repulsed, but I'm intrigued by creative expression as a window into a creative team's mind. As long as I emotionally resonate in some way, the curiosity was worth following.

If anything, I only find a game (or creative work in general) ruined by a team's politics when the handling of those politics is less about what I agree/disagree with, and instead seems executed with zero nuance, grace, and coherency. As if the creators were so self indulgent in the ego of their message and politics that they struggled to convincingly portray as much through their expression. Like even though I agree that racism is bad, a creative work that fails to explore this perspective and simply beats its own RACISM IS BAD drum, lacking organic coherency with the creative expression itself, is just bad art. It's that kind of eye-rolling shit, and is so common in the bad writing across this medium, where the authors/creators are unable to express themselves in any way other than the most blatant.

I also think it's worth remembering that video games are projects that require a fairly monolithic workload from a multitude of creators, so while one or even several members of a team may have a slanted political ideology, you won't necessarily see that in full force in the project itself, but instead only fragments of it. Unless a game as a whole is made with collective political ideology, with intent, or those with said political ideologies are in senior positions with a lot of sway and power over the project's direction, I think it's silly to judge a game for a single person's political stance. I gurantee everyone here has a favourite game where someone on the team was probably a shitbag with political opinions you'd deeply disagree with. That's just life.

That being said, I'm totally down with people choosing to make their purchasing decisions based on ideologies of a team/person, such as deciding not to buy an otherwise appealing game because of political and/or ethical differences. I can also appreciate that while I have my perspective above, there are bound to be circumstances where a person just can't shake the political views of a creator when they play a game that's otherwise devoid of them. If it's not comfortable for you, so be it.
 
I honestly wouldn't care. If someone made a game that hated skinny white silly haired twats like myself, but the game was really good, I'd still play it.

Really. I do not lie when I say I honestly do not give a fuck. I play games for enjoyment. Looking into it any deeper than that is honestly a waste of my time, and I do not have much of that outside of work, my daughter and other comittments.
i know, i'm not saying i'd be completely the same either

i'm just saying that dismissing people not wanting to support a developer for their hateful views as doing it out of some kind of act of self-satisfaction is silly. out of all the reasons to not buy a game i'd argue that if you were part of a minority group that was looked down on by a developer, not wanting to support their work would be justifiable (especially when we post on a forum where there are several people who won't buy games if it doesn't hit a certain framerate).
 
i know, i'm not saying i'd be completely the same either

i'm just saying that dismissing people not wanting to support a developer for their hateful views as doing it out of some kind of act of self-satisfaction is silly. out of all the reasons to not buy a game i'd argue that if you were part of a minority group and it was discovered that a developer thought less of you as a result, not wanting to support their work would be justifiable (especially when we post on a forum where there are several people who won't buy games if it doesn't hit a certain framerate).

I'm not dismissing anyone - people can do what they want. I'm talking purely about myself and the way of writing my post might have made that unclear.
 
You're doing the same thing. You're right, we have a smoking gun but no corpse. Just a bunch of people whistling and saying their contracts bar them from speaking about a corpse. The only thing we know is that there are license agreements, between Barrett and ActiB at least, and that EA was cosy enough to advertise manufacturers on their website. You're categorical statement that the money only flows in one direction is as much based on imagination as saying it is a two way street. Unless you were privy to these deals of course. So either we keep it at their cozying up doesn't sit well with me, but I have no idea what has been decided, or we're free to 'use our imagination'.

Then let's examine why they would want the actual weapons inside their games, and not do a PP7 like in Goldeneye. For movies the deals are clear. It's cheaper to license existing guns than make a lot of fake ones. For games, the guns have to be modeled anyway so they might as well create fake ones. Yet, they purposely go into territories which make them eligible to pay licensing fees, and not use something generic like M21 Carbine. Why?

Authenticity you might say. Maybe gun culture in the US has advanced to the point where children would pick Battlefield over CoD because it has the real licensed names of machine guns, like FIFA and Gran Turismo. It could be, I'm not well versed on US culture in this regard. I hope it's not. And if it is, I'm still appalled by the politics, because then the developers make this gun culture stronger.

For me, the motive is stronger the other way around. Game developers don't really need the authenticity if it comes at extra cost, like you said yourself, they are already popular enough. But gun manufacturers do have incentive to get their guns into popular franchises. Product placement makes more sense than licensing when it comes to real world guns in games.

It makes a heck of a lot more sense for Activision to give special thanks to Barrett if money also flowed into the pockets of Activision. You don't see them extending special thanks to all the guys at Havok for licensing out their tech. They actually paid for that.
I actually do have some first hand knowledge in this regard, but that's neither here nor there. The actual larger issue is that you are ignoring information that you yourself brought to the table in order to try and create this narrative that has no actual evidence to support it. You say we have no information on these licensing agreements, but in the article from Eurogamer that you posted it says:

Eurogamer said:
Today licensed weapons are commonplace in video games, but the deals between game makers and gun-manufacturer are shrouded. Not one of the publishers contacted for this article was willing to discuss the practice....However, the gun makers are more forthcoming. "[It's] absolutely the same as with cars in games," says Barrett's Vaughn. "We must be paid a royalty fee - either a one-time payment or a percentage of sales, all negotiable. Typically, a licensee pays between 5 per cent to 10 per cent retail price for the agreement. But we could negotiate on that."

FPS developers like to put in real guns for the same reason racing developers put in real cars: they like the realism, and feel that some part of the consumer base does too.

As for your comments about special thanks...really? I have seen special thanks given to pets, children, fictional characters. I have seen them given to pizza parlors, and I can assure you in those cases the developers still paid for their dinner. Special thanks could be for something as simple as a media rep at a gun manufacturer answering a question perticularly fast, or it even be a requirement of a licensing agreement. But it in no way has the significance you ascribe to it.

There is no "smoking gun" here.
 
For me...The Last of Us: Left Behind.

I was definitely left behind, because I am not intrigued by homosexuality nor exploring same sex relations.

Oh no, you have to explore the life of someone unlike you! That thing every minority has had to do in every other game! How torturous!
 
I'm not a social justice warrior who scours the earth looking for offense in every part of society. If Hitler released a good video game, I'd buy it.
 
Oh no, you have to explore the life of someone unlike you! That thing every minority has had to do in every other game! How torturous!

To be fair, if they aren't interested, they have the choice and right to not be interested in homosexual relations. It's their loss.
 
The Rolling Stones reporter who interviewed Ken Levine summed up that twist perfectly:


I get where he's coming from with the "oppression breeds oppression" angle, but the game did not do the work to get from A to B.

That's hardly a perfect summary, it's just trying to make it sound more topical (which is kind of pushing it since Trump was still just a reality star birther when BioShock Infinite came out). It actually sounds deeply ignorant of history, which the game is beating you over the head with. Although Columbia is isolationist, immigration isn't the central conflict, it's slavery/indentured servitude justified through racism. Comstock is modeled after a specific form of historical American racism, Christianity, and nationalism, to the point where you can pick out actual, famous presidents to better compare him to. If you wanted to throw a critical jab against him, it makes much more sense to say he makes the resistance against slavery look just as bad as the institution of it (which is what you may get across when you depict a brutal slave riot, especially when the rebellion is antagonistic to the protagonist).

I agree that it doesn't really lay the groundwork between the Vox Populi as victims vs. combatants, and, on top of this, there's only so much that can be done when the narrative wants to go into another direction. It's worth noting that the change in tone coincides a literally jump ahead that puts you in another world, one where Booker died fighting for the Vox Populi. So you more or less skip any sort of turning point one would expect and are left with an imperfect history to understand the turn of events. They actually want to kill you because they think you are a fake Booker, seems like something that could be fixed over a conversation.


If the core of the argument of not wanting to play certain games is based on not wanting to give money to those who you think may cause harm with it, is there any problem in playing those same games if they are free?
 
citation needed on your part there.

the change was made before any esrb submissions were put through.

That's actually not the case. The change was first noticed after SFV received its T rating. Before then it was always Rating Pending. ESRB's official rating was posted on their site on November 4th and the footage of Mika was released on November 7th. Aside from that, here's Capcom's satement

"We work very closely with the ESRB to make sure we're a Teen rated franchise, and that's the primary, driving factor," Capcom said in response to Street Fighter 5's changes.

http://www.polygon.com/2016/3/28/11321138/overwatch-tracer-pose-removal
 
Lots of talented artists are pretty shitty people. You need to separate them from their creations and try not to think about it.

You don't "need" to do such a thing, and as a general, crucially important fact of life, if at any point anyone suggests you "try not to think" about something, deafening red alerts should start blaring in your mind.
 
I'm not dismissing anyone - people can do what they want. I'm talking purely about myself and the way of writing my post might have made that unclear.
ah okay, sorry about that!

i haven't personally chosen to not buy a game due to a developer's comments/politics either but i wouldn't blame anyone who chose to, especially if those views are inherently hateful and damaging.
 
I'm not a social justice warrior who scours the earth looking for offense in every part of society. If Hitler released a good video game, I'd buy it.

That seems like a sensible use of your money, extermination camps don't build themselves.
This may be the first time I've seen someone use Godwin's law against themselves

In general I can't help but laugh my ass of at those people that think they are so mature and above the issue because they're not going to let something trivial like funding hate speech (or worse) get in the way of them playing their videogames.
 
Agreed. I don't think the concept of the character of Fitzroy is inherently terrible, but it feels like she changes purely because they needed to quickly make a point rather than any kind of tragic fall from grace. It gets extra muddled when we're supposed to think Daisy and her crew have gone too far, yet by this point in the game Booker and Elizabeth have shot their way through like a million dudes. and squeezed their heads until they exploded. and set them on fire. and

There's nothing wrong with the tragic "good idea but bad methods/oppressed figure pushed too far" character, it's just supremely bungled in Infinite in this case. I dunno if that's really to do with Levine's political beliefs, I think it's more just a wonky marriage of political beliefs poorly manifested in writing and game mechanics that don't really fit the message.

I always attributed Fitzroy's decent to savagery on the influence of that realities Booker on her. One of the first things you see upon entering that version of the world is a board pinned with the scalps of the ruling/working class which was is a reference to Booker's atrocities at Wounded Knee and just about all of the dialogue you have with her is about the Booker that helped her lead the revolution. I don't think it's poorly manifested in the writing or the game's mechanics, both of which revolve around Booker being a terribly violent man who utterly corrupts any group he becomes involved with, however it does undermine the complexity of massive, tragic social events in order to serve that narrative. Violent revolution's featured as a way to show home much of a shit a character is, it's not featured to offer any insight into violent revolution. Much like the racism in the game merely serves to show Booker's ability to manipulate the prejudice/exploitation of others to allow himself to commit grievous acts of violence/social control.
 
The privilege of "if", indeed.

The privilege of not giving a shit, yes. Why should I care about some dude's beliefs?

I find it absurd how every single thing needs to have a political stance nowadays and how everyone seems to be "WELL YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!!!". Even the gaming side of gaf is full of it now, and it's the worst it's been in years. It's gone from a gaming forum into a political debate lounge! Can't escape the talk of politics and representation in nearly any thread now, and it's absolutely infuriating. I just want to play games and talk about games! Nothing else! What on earth is so wrong about that?!
 
The privilege of not giving a shit, yes. Why should I care about some dude's beliefs?

I find it absurd how every single thing needs to have a political stance nowadays and how everyone seems to be "WELL YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!!!". Even the gaming side of gaf is full of it now, and it's the worst it's been in years. It's gone from a gaming forum into a political debate lounge! Can't escape the talk of politics and representation in nearly any thread now, and it's absolutely infuriating. I just want to play games and talk about games! Nothing else! What on earth is so wrong about that?!

Because things like representation are important to a lot of people, really.

But I agree with a lot of what you're saying. If it doesn't affect the game, and it doesnt feel like the game is preaching to me,( which I don't think happens in any game published on console, anyway. Maybe some weird PC indie game?) I can ignore it.

At the same time, I kinda just don't like supporting assholes. But I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a threshold for even that doesn't matter. I don't support anything by Doug TenNapel, despite enjoying earthworm jim a lot as a kid. But if it were Castlevania or something really dear to me, I'd still play it. Kinda only affects game's I'd probably buy cheap - I see Armikrog on sale for like 10 bucks and think nah, fuck that guy.
 
I was definitely left behind, because I am not intrigued by homosexuality nor exploring same sex relations.
Thanks for contributing to an atmosphere that shows such revulsion and discomfort at the existence of gay people in any media that has helped keep LGBT people feeling invisible and alone for decades. Heaven forbid you feel uncomfortable by the existence of people slightly different frm yourself. What a burden that must be to endure.

That's funny, because for gay people, straight relations and straight politics are all they're given in most of the media they consume, and they don't react in the same way you have.

Heaven forbid a straight person have to "endure" homosexuality in ONE game (hell, not even a game - a short DLC), while gay people have to "endure" heterosexuality everywhere, every day, all the time.
Preach
 
The privilege of not giving a shit, yes. Why should I care about some dude's beliefs?

I find it absurd how every single thing needs to have a political stance nowadays and how everyone seems to be "WELL YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!!!". Even the gaming side of gaf is full of it now, and it's the worst it's been in years. It's gone from a gaming forum into a political debate lounge! Can't escape the talk of politics and representation in nearly any thread now, and it's absolutely infuriating. I just want to play games and talk about games! Nothing else! What on earth is so wrong about that?!

And yet you continue to enter these specific threads, when no one is forcing you to read or participate in them.

The thread title literally has the word "politics" in it. If these kinds of discussions infuriate you so much, you have only yourself to blame for clicking on it. No one is forcing you to take part.
 
I think for everyone there is a context where the knowledge of something shitty associated with the creator of a game can negatively affect your time with it, to a degree you're not comfortable with.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance feels like it's going to be one of those times for me. I would refund it if I could, but it's about two years too late now.

I'd separate the creator from the game when the creator doesn't benefit from my patronage. But I don't perfectly abide by that principle. This is more about feelings than 100% consistent rationale. If it turns out Yu Suzuki is a massive racist, I'd probably still play Shenmue III. Just it'd be kind of like when I rewatched Firefly after I learned Adam Baldwin is a nutty asshole.
 
I'm not a social justice warrior who scours the earth looking for offense in every part of society. If Hitler released a good video game, I'd buy it.

How brave of you.

Fuck those bleeding heart liberals who wouldn't want to support the work of a mass murderer, right?

The privilege of not giving a shit, yes. Why should I care about some dude's beliefs?

I find it absurd how every single thing needs to have a political stance nowadays and how everyone seems to be "WELL YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!!!". Even the gaming side of gaf is full of it now, and it's the worst it's been in years. It's gone from a gaming forum into a political debate lounge! Can't escape the talk of politics and representation in nearly any thread now, and it's absolutely infuriating. I just want to play games and talk about games! Nothing else! What on earth is so wrong about that?!

Because it doesn't stop at beliefs. Homophobes like Orson Scott Card use their money to fund Anti-LGBT groups, and those groups do real damage to LGBT people's lives.

And regarding your little tantrum at the end, I'm so sorry that us uppity minorities have spoiled your little boy's club, but I'm afraid we're not going away. Representation in mass media is a crucial part of changing the views of wider society, so we're going to ram ourselves down your throats until you like it, or at least get tired of fighting it.

Everything is political, I suggest you get used to it.
 
I think Tomonobu Itagaki has some... questionable... views about women, and there was a few sexual harassment lawsuits lobbed his way. While they were tossed out, considering the report in Japan that nearly 1/3rd of women in the workplace face sexual harassment, I'm inclined to believe the woman who spoke up about it.

Ninja Gaiden is still a great action game, but I'll always cringe and roll my eyes every time underage Ayane or thong-leather Rachel jiggles their way on-screen. It's not that the fanservice is any better or worse than some games, but I personally think its designer took it out of the realm of fantasy and got away with it.
 
Muv-Luv and Muv-Luv Alternative.
What a load of right wing. Good VN, but no.

I can separate Polanski's film and the rape, but that's probably because his films are too good. Muv-Luv and Muv-Luv Alternative are not that good.
I'm trying to find info on this, but I'm coming up with nothing. What are you talking about?
 
Sometimes, you do just have to remember that the final product doesn't necessarily represent or reflect the creator's personal beliefs or stop it from being a fantastic product.

It can be hard to separate them, especially if they're very public or it's something that affects you deeply on a person level.

I know for a fact some of the movies, games, music and books I own were made by people who were probably massive pricks and I would be very surprised if they all held the same view as me.

Like, I don't think it's ever affect me in a game (I don't really pay a lot of attention to the politics of the creators) but Morrissey is someone I disagree with politically on a number of levels and I just find him to be a massive prick the rest of the time, doesn't mean the Smiths aren't absolutely amazing, though.
 
Unless those politics are somehow explicitly represented in their work, I don't care.

Same with misconduct. I can enjoy the Cosby Show and Michael Jackson music despite the creators' actual/alleged real world sexual misconduct. I know not everyone can make that separation and that's cool too. Consume the media you choose to consume. As for me, art is art, and people are people.

Same, I started thinking about adopting that mindset but once I realized that several of dozens/hundreds of people worked on TV Shows, video games, albums, movies, etc that I like that I'm sure I've already supported bigots in the past and that doesn't bother me because it's not shown in their work.
 
Because it doesn't stop at beliefs. Homophobes like Orson Scott card use their money to fund Anti-LGBT groups, and those groups do real damage to LGBT people's lives.

And regarding your little tantrum at the end, I'm so sorry that us uppity minorities have spoiled your little boys club, but I'm afraid we're not going away. Representation in mass media is a crucial part of changing the views of wider society, so we're going to ram ourselves down your throats until you like it, or at least get tired of fighting it.

Everything is political, I suggest you get used to it.

Thank you, well said.
 
Muv-Luv and Muv-Luv Alternative.
What a load of right wing. Good VN, but no.

I can separate Polanski's film and the rape, but that's probably because his films are too good. Muv-Luv and Muv-Luv Alternative are not that good.

I'm trying to find info on this, but I'm coming up with nothing. What are you talking about?

Having recently started this, I'd be interested in knowing what you're referring to.
 
Generally, no, I am not bothered by nor feel a game is "ruined" by a creative team's political views, simply because all creative works will naturally be influenced by the politics, morality, interests, and ethics of the people creating. Creative expression is really just that, and politics is a part of all art in one way or another.

Dating right back to Doom, a game that relished in counter culture shock through violence. I believe it was Carmack who said that Doom was supposed to disturb, as the ultra violence as a vessel for disturbance was a product of the era. So in that respect, if I feel a video game (any creative work for that matter) disturbs or shocks me, then so be it; that is the creative expression of the author and their intent.

In all honest this is, for me, often a point of curiosity. Experiencing a creative work from a confronting, offensive, and dissonant perspective can be an experience within itself. Not something to agree with or even learn from (and I really want to push that point), but something I still find interesting. To see, hear, and experience the creative expression and creative freedom of even the most repugnant perspective is an experience that for me is branded unique in itself. I might walk away repulsed, but I'm intrigued by creative expression as a window into a creative team's mind. As long as I emotionally resonate in some way, the curiosity was worth following.

If anything, I only find a game (or creative work in general) ruined by a team's politics when the handling of those politics is less about what I agree/disagree with, and instead seems executed with zero nuance, grace, and coherency. As if the creators were so self indulgent in the ego of their message and politics that they struggled to convincingly portray as much through their expression. Like even though I agree that racism is bad, a creative work that fails to explore this perspective and simply beats its own RACISM IS BAD drum, lacking organic coherency with the creative expression itself, is just bad art. It's that kind of eye-rolling shit, and is so common in the bad writing across this medium, where the authors/creators are unable to express themselves in any way other than the most blatant.

I also think it's worth remembering that video games are projects that require a fairly monolithic workload from a multitude of creators, so while one or even several members of a team may have a slanted political ideology, you won't necessarily see that in full force in the project itself, but instead only fragments of it. Unless a game as a whole is made with collective political ideology, with intent, or those with said political ideologies are in senior positions with a lot of sway and power over the project's direction, I think it's silly to judge a game for a single person's political stance. I gurantee everyone here has a favourite game where someone on the team was probably a shitbag with political opinions you'd deeply disagree with. That's just life.

That being said, I'm totally down with people choosing to make their purchasing decisions based on ideologies of a team/person, such as deciding not to buy an otherwise appealing game because of political and/or ethical differences. I can also appreciate that while I have my perspective above, there are bound to be circumstances where a person just can't shake the political views of a creator when they play a game that's otherwise devoid of them. If it's not comfortable for you, so be it.

It's a well-written post that I too various degrees agree with, but the problem is not simply an ideological one - it is also material in the sense that you are forking over money and providing capital to a person who contributes to the detriment of other people or who do harm out there in the world.

By giving money to a white supremacist (Daniel Vavra), a homophobe (Orson Scott Card), or an exploitative bully (Brendan McNamara), it is not just ideological disagreements that enter the judgment, but also their financial capacity to affect the world and convey their harmful ideology.
 
The privilege of not giving a shit, yes. Why should I care about some dude's beliefs?

I find it absurd how every single thing needs to have a political stance nowadays and how everyone seems to be "WELL YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!!!". Even the gaming side of gaf is full of it now, and it's the worst it's been in years. It's gone from a gaming forum into a political debate lounge! Can't escape the talk of politics and representation in nearly any thread now, and it's absolutely infuriating. I just want to play games and talk about games! Nothing else! What on earth is so wrong about that?!
No one made you post in this thread. The topic is specifically games which you won't play for political reasons. If that doesn't apply to you, or it doesn't interest you, you shouldn't be posting here. And if you want to control the discussion around you, I suggest you start your own forum, because the next time I see you in a thread whining about what other people are discussing, you're not going to have a choice about posting here.
 
I always attributed Fitzroy's decent to savagery on the influence of that realities Booker on her. One of the first things you see upon entering that version of the world is a board pinned with the scalps of the ruling/working class which was is a reference to Booker's atrocities at Wounded Knee and just about all of the dialogue you have with her is about the Booker that helped her lead the revolution. I don't think it's poorly manifested in the writing or the game's mechanics, both of which revolve around Booker being a terribly violent man who utterly corrupts any group he becomes involved with, however it does undermine the complexity of massive, tragic social events in order to serve that narrative. Violent revolution's featured as a way to show home much of a shit a character is, it's not featured to offer any insight into violent revolution. Much like the racism in the game merely serves to show Booker's ability to manipulate the prejudice/exploitation of others to allow himself to commit grievous acts of violence/social control.

You literally go to another reality. You have no idea what else has changed, besides the Vox gaining the upper hand. People are asking for hours of additional exposition for a side character, distracting from the main arc of the game. It's not a "tragic fall from grace" because we don't know enough about her character beforehand—our introduction to her is purely a business arrangement, although she couches it in righteous rhetoric. And before that? It's all anti-Vox propaganda.

The "nuance" arguments sound a lot like the "well this gay character seemed forced in" comments, in that it mostly seems like "it has to deal with this topic the way I like." Some things aren't nuanced.

I don't recall that. That might indeed be slavery, though contractual trading of labour was very common from the early modern period through the 19th century in at least the UK and France.

Either way that should have been your evidence for slavery, not population movement.

Again though I stand by my point that if he meant for them to be a stand in for slavery then he needed to be more direct. One simply cannot be coy when talking about American Slavery. It becomes extra complicated because the whole issue would be a mixed metaphor. Columbia is clearly supposed to be a 1880-1910's America, and Fink is clearly supposed to be a Capitalist. That doesn't fit well with slavery.

It doesn't really matter. Levine's point is that the oppressed can become the oppressors if they aren't careful, and that's a broad section of history to back it up, not just slave uprisings. But the game makes it pretty plain that a lot of their situation is slavery in but name. As mentioned, many of them were convicts (and thus not really given a choice to move to Columbia.) Fink's ultra-capitalist world of bidding for menial labor is basically wage slavery. Those sympathetic to the plight of the marginalized blacks and Irish explicitly use abolitionist rhetoric and even imagery directly lifted from the movement.

latest


Yeah, the movement has a lot of direct parallels to the Soviets as well, especially when they start cloaking everything in red and tying up the wealthy, but that's the point—it's broadly drawn for universality's sake, and probably to avoid the usual shit of "the real-world analogues to these guys weren't like this! Horrible!" Again, I don't get the "you have to be hyper-on-point about drawing parallels to slavery!" like slavery is some sacred cow different from the great and terrible litany of horrible acts humans have visited upon each other.

Agreed. I don't think the concept of the character of Fitzroy is inherently terrible, but it feels like she changes purely because they needed to quickly make a point rather than any kind of tragic fall from grace. It gets extra muddled when we're supposed to think Daisy and her crew have gone too far, yet by this point in the game Booker and Elizabeth have shot their way through like a million dudes. and squeezed their heads until they exploded. and set them on fire.

Aside from the first-person fatalities (which someone clearly intended to have as something "cool"), I don't really see how that's at odds with the rest of the game. Booker doesn't shoot until he's going to be summarily executed. To make the comparison to the gold standard of arguments about this sort of stuff, he's not Nathan Drake. This is purely about survival. It also directly speaks to the violent part of Booker's past and how it weighs on him. He's not throwing out quippy one-liners after he dispatches foes, he's pleading with Slade to stop sending men to their deaths.
 
I can't think of any specific instances, although I regret buying the Vanishing of Ethan Carter with what I learned in this thread. I don't go out seeking personal views of artists but if I learn someone is shitty I will avoid their products.

I've done a pretty good job of avoiding businesses that have shitty practices (not perfect but definitely a huge reduction). I think I can do the same with video games, although it can certainly be hard to know sometimes. I guess the most important thing is if I know the money I spend will be used to find something that could hurt someone, or if buying someone's product might be considered an endorsement of said person/business's politics.
 
I lost all respect for Marty O'Donnell once I started following him on Twitter and seeing him blast his political views and very directly bash younger generations as stupid and lazy.
 
The privilege of not giving a shit, yes. Why should I care about some dude's beliefs?

I find it absurd how every single thing needs to have a political stance nowadays and how everyone seems to be "WELL YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!!!". Even the gaming side of gaf is full of it now, and it's the worst it's been in years. It's gone from a gaming forum into a political debate lounge! Can't escape the talk of politics and representation in nearly any thread now, and it's absolutely infuriating. I just want to play games and talk about games! Nothing else! What on earth is so wrong about that?!

If you really wanted to "escape" political content, you would not have entered a thread with "politics" in the title. You want the world to know about your stance of not giving a shit, which is a political stance.

Beyond that, you are free not to care about anything and anyone but yourself, just as I'm free to think that's the position of an egotistical manchild. You can keep the former to yourself, or you're also free to state it, but then I'm free to state the latter.
 
It's a well-written post that I too various degrees agree with, but the problem is not simply an ideological one - it is also material in the sense that you are forking over money and providing capital to a person who contributes to the detriment of other people or who do harm out there in the world.

By giving money to a white supremacist (Daniel Vavra), a homophobe (Orson Scott Card), or an exploitative bully (Brendan McNamara), it is not just ideological disagreements that enter the judgment, but also their financial capacity to affect the world and convey their harmful ideology.

That's what I was trying to get at with the last paragraph or two, that I can totally respect (and even do so myself) making a conscious choice to deny the materialistic aspect of financial support to authors/creators who require said support to continue spreading (or potentially spreading) harmful ideology. I agree with you 100% in that respect, if that choice is made.

I guess I'm more skirting around the logistical price to experience creative work and the reality of other means to experience said work that don't require as such. My perspective on creator vs expression vs ideology and a person experiencing that is without consideration for these factors (as real as they are), and more just as-is. Money and support is absolutely a factor though and yeah, that's something to consider.
 
Whoah, what's the story with that?!

Matsuno is a creator that was used to smaller scale projects and having total control over the creative process of his games. FFXII however was the biggest project he ever worked on and it was a very different type of development process than he was used to. He reportedly compared FF development to a "democracy" whereas he described his previous projects as "dictatorship" with him as the dictator.

Development for FFXII didn't go well and there were huge delays, Matsuno had stress problems and was literally going to temples to pray for the game... Eventually he had to quit for health reasons, leaving the other director of the game, Hiroyuki Ito, to finish the project without him.

In the end the development team went as far as including a metaphor of Matsuno as an optional superboss in the game (Yiazmat) as both a homage to him and a mockery of him.
 
(1) He's a Gamergater who (2) coincidentally is making an all-white game (for whatever ad-hoc reason).

Why anyone can stand to work with the guy I have no idea.

Oh, come on. He's just making a game set in the history of his home country.
 
I absolutely love Dragon Quest, and just picked up VII on the 3DS.

A few weeks ago I read about Sugiyama's drive to spread denial of Japan's war atrocities. What a fucking horrible man.

Now I just can't get it out of my head when listening to his music. I try to blank it out, but the music in DQ is so catchy and encompassing. It is almost half of the experience of playing the game.

All I can think about when hearing it now is what an absolute shit stain the creator of it is.

It really sucks.

Move out of your homeland because I guarantee your people have done way worse.
 
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