Your video game hot take(s) thread

[Old_Hunter_77]

> All the more ironic as these critics talk about how gamers are supposed to be more inclusive and accepting, yet they'll turn the blind eye to something or be insecure about their taste, because it's not super serious or dour 24/7. Trying to impress people who don't play gaming or look down on gaming.

Ok I'm gonna parlay this into another take:

Some of the effusive praise for Read Dead Redemption 2, Death Stranding, The Last of Us 2 and maybe Telltale games is based on some of the self-hatred anti-gaming gaming vibe that @BrawlMan is talking about (assuming I'm understanding where you're coming from, you'll correct me if I'm wrong my man).

I stress... some. Folks that genuinely enjoy playing these games, cool (I genuinely really enjoyed Last of Us 2. I did not play Death Stranding, it looks miserable, but it's fair to call me out for judging it harshly without playing it).

I love narrative story games but they gotta have gameplay. Mature themes and voice acting are great but if I'm just holding x to walk and get exposition at me, what the hell, no thanks. Yeah, RDR2 is the primary culprit, here for me.
But even to some degree the Disco Elysium types- choices, story, characters- again, I love that stuff. But when these games dominate critics list as "must-plays" I get suspicious at game critics who may be bored with.. you know, games.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

And yeah, I'm not like shitting on people with different tastes, just funny how my brain and interests in such a different direction, you know? Part of it I wonder is that I had a break in gaming, I didn't follow it through. I basically skipped over the Ocarina of Time, N-64 era of gaming completely (similarly, Half-Life and Halo and FF7). So when I come back to it as an adult and I'm seeing Assassins Creed and Dark Souls and Uncharted and God of War and I'm like holy shit, awesome, meanwhile Mario is still saving Peach and I'm scratching my head.

This is a weird argument to have, considering that all video games are for children, and adults who play them are just developmentally stunted because they should be sitting in a bar downing pints and shouting at sports events on TV.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

Ok this next take is going to be the coldest take on a gaming-centric forum but it is hot when I say it IRL...

The best most impressive composers are working in video games.

Music is my top entertainment, I care and think more about bands and jazz and tunes than games. And it's like every game and trailer has awesome music. Maybe it's all just computer algorithmed at this point, I dunno, but I'm constantly wowed by how great game music is and how it fits with what's going on. I just notice music a lot.

And just anecdotally, it's cool that games are using scores while so much mainstream TV and movies have become overly dependent on slow/soft covers of classic rock songs, so lame.

As I said in another thread I'm playing Dandara, a tiny little indy game that runs on my laptop, and there is this super-chill beat and ambient music the whole time. Freaking Stardew Valley tunes still pop into my head randomly. And that's just the little indy stuff- even the over-done sandbox open-world crap has exhilarating swelling orchestral crescendos when I scale the otherwise lazy viewpoints.

So, yeah, I''m sure you're like "duh, I know." But I don't talk to gamers outside of the internet, and I recently had a conversation where someone was like "hey you've always been into music, where is all the talent and originality now you think?" and we were talking about pop culture mainstream of course not obscure scenester stuff- and I thought about for sec and realized it's in games.

Try out Far: Lone Sails. Also a small indie game with a relaxing and beautiful soundtrack.

 

[Gyrobot]

> All the more ironic as these critics talk about how gamers are supposed to be more inclusive and accepting, yet they'll turn the blind eye to something or be insecure about their taste, because it's not super serious or dour 24/7. Trying to impress people who don't play gaming or look down on gaming.

Ok I'm gonna parlay this into another take:

Some of the effusive praise for Read Dead Redemption 2, Death Stranding, The Last of Us 2 and maybe Telltale games is based on some of the self-hatred anti-gaming gaming vibe that @BrawlMan is talking about (assuming I'm understanding where you're coming from, you'll correct me if I'm wrong my man).

I stress... some. Folks that genuinely enjoy playing these games, cool (I genuinely really enjoyed Last of Us 2. I did not play Death Stranding, it looks miserable, but it's fair to call me out for judging it harshly without playing it).

I love narrative story games but they gotta have gameplay. Mature themes and voice acting are great but if I'm just holding x to walk and get exposition at me, what the hell, no thanks. Yeah, RDR2 is the primary culprit, here for me.
But even to some degree the Disco Elysium types- choices, story, characters- again, I love that stuff. But when these games dominate critics list as "must-plays" I get suspicious at game critics who may be bored with.. you know, games.

Looking at our millennial generation I can see why, during 2008 which people considered a low point for gaming since it was sexist, exploitation media built to keep a population docile with cheap trashy entertainment that relied on some swimsuits/sports magazine model on top celebrity actors combined with the rise of dudebro shooters like CODMW and Gears of War. There was no room for narrative based game, just annual spunkgsrgleweewees and Nintendo games. All while JRPGs which were the standard for narratively driven games got called out at last for how morally childish they are barring SMT.

Come 2018 and the dudebro shooter identity is dead, weebshit and Sony has ended their long running relationship and we get hits like Disco Elysium and proper narrative games being released and the titans of misogyny like Activision started to crumble from their actions. We are living in an era of gaming that has survived the toxic dudebro devs that tried to stifle us thanks to governments offering arts grants so you dontbhave to grovel before a soulless publisher for money

Meanwhile the manbabies who cry about how woke games are now and how their titty game franchises are dead or out of their reach after years of gorging on their titles? Abandoned and without the means to make a game suiting their problematic tastes

And besides, the kids born in 2008 will never be able to smoke due to new laws that prohibits them from buying tobacco, we may as well owe it to make sure they don't suffer the same excesses of trashy games to rot their brains and instead enlighten them with something insightful.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

This is a weird argument to have, considering that all video games are for children, and adults who play them are just developmentally stunted because they should be sitting in a bar downing pints and shouting at sports events on TV.

haha.. my wife and mom have entered the chat

 

[BrawlMan]

Some of the effusive praise for Read Dead Redemption 2, Death Stranding, The Last of Us 2 and maybe Telltale games is based on some of the self-hatred anti-gaming gaming vibe that @BrawlMan is talking about (assuming I'm understanding where you're coming from, you'll correct me if I'm wrong my man).

You are correct.

 

[BrawlMan]

@Old_Hunter_77
For extra irony, these same, insecure twats praised DmC (2013) for having a "interesting and mature story". A game with a "lovable protagonist". The story sucks and is not good, and the main character is an unfunny douche. The villains, aside from one, sucks and are uninteresting. The female characters are treated worse in this game, than any of the actual Devil May Cry games. Almost none of the intentional jokes land. The game looks even more silly for its try hard, "edgy", story and themes. It's a game stuck in the time period it released and has continue to age worst. Yet, Devil May Cry 5 and any game from the original continuity is "mindless and fun trash". BTW, DmC has a few forced walking sections that break up the pacing the wrong way. Also, some of those same critics are butt-hurt and bewildered over DmC not getting a sequel. No, shit you dumb asses. What the fuck were you all expecting?!

Stupid site won't let me quote now for some reason!

 

[09philj]

Each successive Shovel Knight campaign declined in quality and King of Cards was just straight up not fun.

Looking at our millennial generation I can see why, during 2008 which people considered a low point for gaming since it was sexist, exploitation media built to keep a population docile with cheap trashy entertainment that relied on some swimsuits/sports magazine model on top celebrity actors combined with the rise of dudebro shooters like CODMW and Gears of War. There was no room for narrative based game, just annual spunkgsrgleweewees and Nintendo games. All while JRPGs which were the standard for narratively driven games got called out at last for how morally childish they are barring SMT.

Come 2018 and the dudebro shooter identity is dead, weebshit and Sony has ended their long running relationship and we get hits like Disco Elysium and proper narrative games being released and the titans of misogyny like Activision started to crumble from their actions. We are living in an era of gaming that has survived the toxic dudebro devs that tried to stifle us thanks to governments offering arts grants so you dontbhave to grovel before a soulless publisher for money

Meanwhile the manbabies who cry about how woke games are now and how their titty game franchises are dead or out of their reach after years of gorging on their titles? Abandoned and without the means to make a game suiting their problematic tastes

And besides, the kids born in 2008 will never be able to smoke due to new laws that prohibits them from buying tobacco, we may as well owe it to make sure they don't suffer the same excesses of trashy games to rot their brains and instead enlighten them with something insightful.

Look, Disco Elysium is a great game. It's one of my two favourite CRPGs. You know what my other favourite CRPG is? It's Fallout: New Vegas. If I had to pick only one, it'd probably be New Vegas. Sure it's buggy and it looks like shit but on the other hand out of all the CRPGs I've played New Vegas is the one that balances being an interesting, complex RPG with being a videogame you can pick up and play. Disco Elysium is fantastic but it also strips the RPG experience below the bare essentials. This does make it easy entertainment that doesn't need much thought, but also makes it very idiosyncratic and somewhat lacking in, you know, gameplay. Obsidian's own latter day entry to the genre is Pillars of Eternity, which is *staggeringly* ambitious and a real RPG fan's RPG, but also harsh and unforgiving and mentally taxing. Then there's New Vegas, which has all the things that are great about Pillars but puts them in a package where you can also disintegrate people with a laser gun. Sure it's ugly and buggy, but there really, really is very little else like it. It came out in 2010, the same year as CoD: Black Ops and the series bastardising Splinter Cell: Conviction.

 

[Gyrobot]

Of course new Vegas will always be the game that could have cure every disease by playing it but for me TLOU2 and Disco Elysium was always something else. They are games that defied marketing expectations in their time much like how Vegas did in 2010 but TLOU2 and DE was more successful in that regard

 

[BrawlMan]

They are games that defied marketing expectations in their time much like how Vegas did in 2010 but TLOU2 and DE was more successful in that regard

That's a load of shit. I'll give Disco credit where its due, but LOU2 didn't defy any market expectations. It's part of the standard AAA hype machine and marketing. Before you ramble on about how the game "defied" racists, sexist, "weaboo/anime loving assholes", they're not a strong factor in this situation. All they did was give the game extra marketing. The standard "No Such Thing as Bad Publicity". LOU2 is nothing special to me. It's another zombie apocalypse game where people are miserable and monstrous to each other for little reason.With the standard "revenge is bad" like the game is saying something new. It's a 2013 game stuck in the 7th generation with a new coat paint on 8th generation hardware. Dark for the sake of dark; not that interesting. And even if it "defied marketing expectations", the ends don't justify the means. Not the crunch and stress on developers for the sake of "ART!". Not the manipulative, up your own ass marketing from Sony and Naughty Dog. The game is a success obviously and made its money, but most people won't go back to it. Japan hates Part II because of the over saturation of darkness. Sad, because they genuinely love the first game. Max Dood and the crew are right: LOU2 is nothing more than glorified torture porn in game form.

If anything, most games from the indie circle are the ones that defy marketing expectations. They're proof you don't need bombastic budgets, bad dlc and microtransX, over hyped marketing, nor all of these licensed song and high profile Hollywood actors to make a game sell. Nor some NFT promoting corporate punk ass biatch that like the smell of their own farts to sell a good game.

 

[Gyrobot]

That's a load of shit. I'll give Disco credit where its due, but LOU2 didn't defy any market expectations. It's part of the standard AAA hype machine and marketing. Before you ramble on about how the game "defied" racists, sexist, "weaboo/anime loving assholes", they're not a strong factor in this situation. All they did was give the game extra marketing to the game. The standard "No Such Thing as Bad Publicity".

If it that was the motto, Gematsu won't have to disable comments whenever the game is mentioned, even for something as mundane as a HD update. The appropriate response to 2020 would have been mindless escapism, not misery porn, but here we are.

Bad Publicity can absolutely kill the hype for something like the TLOU2 and other games like it.

 

[BrawlMan]

If it that was the motto, Gematsu won't have to disable comments whenever the game is mentioned, even for something as mundane as a HD update.

So what? It's Gematsu. I don't blame them, but that really does not mean much. They might as well shut the comments section down for Forbidden West now, since that's the new target hate for no reason.

Bad Publicity can absolutely kill the hype for something like the TLOU2 and other games like it.

Exactly. The money was made, but the hype did not take long to dry or vanish. Most sensible people moved on to more important things. Bad publicity peters out or won't always keep you profiting in the long run. Controversy does not always equal cash.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Cooking mechanics need to be excised from gaming. It's just not fun to grind multiples of 50 unique ingredients and then randomly mix them in hopes of coming up with one of 100 recipes while watching a 15 second animation play every time and it never will be. There's nothing fun about it, it's just filling out a spreadsheet very slowly.

Each successive Shovel Knight campaign declined in quality and King of Cards was just straight up not fun.

I honestly liked the Plague Knight and Specter Knight campaigns more than the Shovel Knight one. I haven't played the King one yet, but I'm going to have to.

 

[Dalisclock]

XBOX consoles have a horribly inconsistent naming scheme. XBOX, XBOX 360, XBOX ONE, XBOX SERIES X. And then you have stuff like the Series S and such. Guys, just pick a naming scheme and stick with it. Sony, for all it's faults, at least picked a practical(if Boring) scheme of PSX+1 for each generation.

Nintendo kind of has this problem but nintendo feels like it's not as bad because each console does something different or has a gimmick, as opposed to "more powerful then the last one". While I think the Wii is a stupid name, I remember it because its the one that was based around motion controls. The Switch is a combo handheld/motion controls/console. The GameCube looked like a purple cube. The virtual boy we don't talk about. But in their case the wierd naming scheme kinda matches with the fact their consoles are a bit weird sometimes and it's easier for me to remember the Wii U vs the Switch then the Xbox One vs the Xbox Series X. Maybe that's just me though.

 

[Casual Shinji]

The game is a success obviously and made its money, but most people won't go back to it. Japan hates Part II because of the over saturation of darkness. Sad, because they genuinely love the first game. Max Dood and the crew are right: LOU2 is nothing more than glorified torture porn in game form.

Max and the crew felt the same about TLoU1 though, and that game DID make a huge (positive) impact.

And I mean, Japan is... Japan. I'm sure a show in a similar vein as BoJack Horseman wouldn't do good in Japan either. Apparently Japan doesn't like Aggretsuko, while in the West it's pretty popular. And the reason for this seems to be that it's too depression for the average japanese viewer, while western audiences can take much more joy in the insignificant struggle that is life. Not that I'm saying that's what TLoU2 was disliked for.

And honestly, it's not like anime doesn't have a history of obnoxiously dark, edgelord material. Whether it's popular I don't know, but considering the amount there's definitely an audience in Japan that likes to indulge in real grim shit.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Max and the crew felt the same about TLoU1 though, and that game DID make a huge (positive) impact.

And I mean, Japan is... Japan. I'm sure a show in a similar vein as BoJack Horseman wouldn't do good in Japan either. Apparently Japan doesn't like Aggretsuko, while in the West it's pretty popular. And the reason for this seems to be that it's too depression for the average japanese viewer, while western audiences can take much more joy in the insignificant struggle that is life. Not that I'm saying that's what TLoU2 was disliked for.

And honestly, it's not like anime doesn't have a history of obnoxiously dark, edgelord material. Whether it's popular I don't know, but considering the amount there's definitely an audience in Japan that likes to indulge in real grim shit.

Japan is still culturally more nationalistic and old school to overlook or be as accepting of the reasons for most of TLoU2’s criticisms regarding Abby’s look and the girl/girl stuff. The realities of their social conditions are also generally different from the States. If anything they’d probably identify more with the crunch issues at Naughty Dog and have an immediate distaste for the game based on their own chronic workplace bs.

 

[BrawlMan]

Max and the crew felt the same about TLoU1 though, and that game DID make a huge (positive) impact.

But I disagree with them and they were partially wrong. The violence actually had a bit more restraint in comparison to the sequel. I didn't care much of the first game either, but at least it dialed back on the darkness a little.

Apparently Japan doesn't like Aggretsuko, while in the West it's pretty popular.

The same thing happened to Cowboy Bebop and Panty & Stocking. They both didn't do well originally in Japan, but once they came over here in the West, both anime saw success. Then all of a sudden, the Japanese want to take a second look when they realize what they missed out on. Similar situation happened with Outlaw Star, but it's kind of the reverse effect. It's still popular over in the United States and UK, but only the really old hardcore otaku remember Outlaw Star in Japan. Even the original creator barely remembers what he did on the show. He straight up said "You Westerners know more about my show than I do.".

And honestly, it's not like anime doesn't have a history of obnoxiously dark, edgelord material. Whether it's popular I don't know, but considering the amount there's definitely an audience in Japan that likes to indulge in real grim shit.

Yet, they'll engage with it and enjoy the darkness when it's on their own terms, or if it's coming from one of their own, and not a foreign country (most of the time). Assuming it's considered good in the first place.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Not sure how much of a hot take it is but I’ll add reasoning to help prove the point-

Numerical/graded review scores are mostly toxic clickbait to generate headlines, and are designed to excuse most people from taking the time to read actual thoughts or the why behind it. Then they spend more time than ever arguing back and forth pointlessly about why or why not a score was wrong or right anyways.

Insanity.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

Each successive Shovel Knight campaign declined in quality and King of Cards was just straight up not fun.


Look, Disco Elysium is a great game. It's one of my two favourite CRPGs. You know what my other favourite CRPG is? It's Fallout: New Vegas. If I had to pick only one, it'd probably be New Vegas. Sure it's buggy and it looks like shit but on the other hand out of all the CRPGs I've played New Vegas is the one that balances being an interesting, complex RPG with being a videogame you can pick up and play. Disco Elysium is fantastic but it also strips the RPG experience below the bare essentials. This does make it easy entertainment that doesn't need much thought, but also makes it very idiosyncratic and somewhat lacking in, you know, gameplay. Obsidian's own latter day entry to the genre is Pillars of Eternity, which is *staggeringly* ambitious and a real RPG fan's RPG, but also harsh and unforgiving and mentally taxing. Then there's New Vegas, which has all the things that are great about Pillars but puts them in a package where you can also disintegrate people with a laser gun. Sure it's ugly and buggy, but there really, really is very little else like it. It came out in 2010, the same year as CoD: Black Ops and the series bastardising Splinter Cell: Conviction.

I disagree. I think Plague Knights campaign was clearly inferior to King Knights and Specter Knights from a gameplay perspective. It was just a retooling of the base games levels while the subsequent campaigns were all new levels.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Japan is still culturally more nationalistic and old school to overlook or be as accepting of the reasons for most of TLoU2’s criticisms regarding Abby’s look and the girl/girl stuff.

That's possible. They have all the yuri/yaoi stuff, but it's either fetishized or seen as "something you grow out of".

The realities of their social conditions are also generally different from the States. If anything they’d probably identify more with the crunch issues at Naughty Dog and have an immediate distaste for the game based on their own chronic workplace bs.

That seems unlikely considering most popular anime is made under similar conditions.