Gethsemani said:
The problem with the Kill Screen review of the Division is not that it focuses on the ideological markers in the Division. The problem is that it is a very selective reading of said markers and everything that doesn't fit the reviewers narrative is simply not mentioned. From the fact that the big bad is another Division agent and that his Dragon is a PMC to the way the game consistently addresses the Division's unsupervised power by presenting both positive and negative opinions of it from NPCs and collectibles. The reviewer simply doesn't address these things, because doing so would render the reviewers position invalid. It is a bad review not because it addresses politics and ideology, but because it does so in a dishonest and highly biased way.
I read the article and those things jumped at me as extremely glaring oversights in the article as well.
The writer seemed to view the Division purely with the eye of how things are in the normal world, not through the world that the game was creating, like he just skipped over the entirety of the background explanations and narrative that were created to give context to the entire situation. The Division doesn't exist in a world that we would recognize or even comprehend, the agency's entire purpose is viewed in the game as being a desperate last step to not maintain law and order, but to enforce the Social Contract the most basic concept of civlization.
A distinction that most people tend to not understand. The game itself could be characterized into two main parts, the first part is fighting the Rioters, the Cleaners, and the Rikers, factions who are brutalizing the people and making it an impossibility for society to even function on any level. They've all stepped outside the basic concepts of the Social Contract or the 'shared agreement of civilization' they're killing people and brutalizing people, to in the end take their things...but the motivations to stop them are not to protect things. You're not fighting them to protect an electronics store or protect some rich person's brownstone, Midtown Manhattan has gone far beyond that. You're fighting them because they're killing people and stopping the government from helping it's citizens.
The Rioters aren't just taking things we put financial value on, they're seizing hospitals and food shipments. The Cleaners aren't just blue collared sanitation workers, they're murdering people in the streets because they think that they're sick with a horrible disease, and there is no way for them to be sure, so they just kill them all. The Rikers aren't just the oppressed and misunderstood criminals, they're determinedly attacking the JTF to torture and murder them. You're not fighting these people because they're stealing TVs, burning buildings, or escaped from prison, you're fighting them because they're trying to destroy the only things helping people.
I also disagreed with the writer's view of the people. If you're speed running through and don't take the time to examine the world, then you'll probably only focus on the mechanics and the 'I need something' notice that will show up. Walking the streets, looking at their behavior, examining cell phone recordings, Echos and even walking through your base and overhearing their conversations...that characterizes them MUCH better than just going 'Oh, you need a soda'.
The Second phase of the game revolves around fighting the LMB, who've gone the dark route of power. That's something that the reviewer completely ignored. They have the guns, they have the power, and they're asserting control those are the same things that the JTF are trying to do. But the JTF is doing it to try and keep people safe and restore order for the sake of the citizens of New York. The LMB is doing what it's doing for the sake of power and control. It's actually a very interesting narrative choice that's shown well in the comments and suspicions shown by characters towards you. They are the side of the coin that you could quite easily have become.
It might have been an excellent option for a later faction focus in the game, have two factions you could have joined in the late game, the JTF as the 'good guys' and the LMB as the 'bad guys' both with their own late game campaigns, both with the same goals (restore order), but with different intents behind them (give the people back stability, force the people under their control). JTF is for the people and doing everything they can so that normalcy can return, the LMB is asserting heavy handed control over people because they view them as savages who need a firm hand. But then that would have been an excellent design decision for the late game that is completely at odds with how Ubisoft made the game.
I don't think that it proves gaming has an anti-intellectual streak (that's a hideously broad brush to be painting gaming culture with), but I think the review shows that some gaming journalists have pretenses to intellectualism that fall flat in the face of deeper examination.