Zero Punctuation: Killzone 3

[Cronox]

Why do you hate America? I guess you're just a troll who likes the attention.
Also:
Guerrilla Games is a Netherlands based company, you think you would fact check before ranting on like a loon.

Hating America is basically the normal position of non-Americans. I mean, with the dawn of the internet and the increase of international communication, culture's and nations and super egos matter less as we have come to understand each othe rbetter, but until a few years ago most peopel regarded America in general as we regarded the tourists who came over here and acted liek jackasses. Even today, most people, while not actively hating America, don't particularly like it enough to risk the animosity of their peers brought on by expressing a positive viewpoint. So my overall point is, if Yahtzee were trolling for attention, he would say he loves America and wishes to live there.

Really it's not so much teh America as the nationalism itself - he hates the nationalism of England and such as one could infer from a few subtle jabs in his book, though I could just be projecting. Point is, nationalism and patriotism are outmoded ideas which America in particular seems to be holding onto most dearly out of all the countries in the Western world.

Besides, he makes a variety of semi-offensive jokes thrughout his videos, why take the America thing so seriously when being British and misanthropic is kind of Yahtzee's thing?

 

[Cronox]

This doesn't apply to everyone from Europe/Australia.. but I sense an aura of smugness coming from many of you. We have a lot of idiots over here, I get it. Har har. If France or England was the size of the USA, you'd have a lot more idiots, too.

We do stereotype English people as evil, and if not evil we stereotype them as suave, manipulating, good with the ladies, etc. Do you guys not stereotype us? A common thing I hear European's say is some form of "rednecks/American southerners are stupid." Do you really think all American southerners are uneducated? And do you really think they otherwise have no redeemable qualities? Many of them are genuinely nice people, friendly, etc. If "Hollywood" was based in London, how many feature films do you think would show these positive attributes? My guess is, rednecks would more likely be portrayed as ignorant, God loving, incestuous racists.

I think we just all need to recognize that, at the end of the day we're all pretty similar. Our countries are pretty similar, and the people are pretty similar. Is the USA often involved in wars? Yes. Was England not involved in the affairs of lot of foreign nations in the past? Shoot, we were a colony of you at one point.

Sorry, /rant. Just wanted to get that off of my chest.

I agree for the most part, though it is odd to hear an American make teh point of tearing down nationalist preconceptions. And yes, that is a joke, otehrwise I wouldn't be agreeing at all. Really I think the reason that the Europeans poke fun at Americans so often is that we have it in our heads that you need to be humbled. With the dawn of the internet, one can have an instantaneous conversation with people in completely different continents simultaneously - as a result, everyone's culture is breaking down into a singularity. Mark my words, in a few generations, Nationalism will be abolished along with her more sexy sister of Patriotism, and we shall be able to address everyone as individuals without preconceptions. Well okay, I guess I'm too much of a pesimist to really believe that.

The one thing I disagree on is taht you seem to address all non-Americans, and I have to resentthe notion of being addressed on not only my nationality, but my lack of specific nationality. It just seems a bit antithetical to your point. Then again, I am so thoroughly lacking in cultural identity that I'd switch sides in a heartbeat to whoever was winning teh great game of scientific conquest - when Japan officially outdoes the western world I'll default to their side. Not so much China though. I don't like their system of government at all. Wow, we sure did get off topic of a silly internet video reviewing a generic FPS, didn't we?

 

[maninahat]

Without the US we would have lost.
Without the UK we would have lost.
Without the Russians we would have lost.

This. A Million times, this. If any one of these pieces had been missing, the whole lot of us would be speaking German. I get so sick of these "The US/UK/USSR did all the work and the others were non-factors," arguments. If any one of those nations hadn't fought in the war, then they all would have lost.

Uh, bad guys needed an accent. But I guess it wouldn't be a problem if it was an American accent right?

Also, this. If the Brits are allowed to rant against a game where all the antagonists have British accents, are the American's allowed to rant against about 60% of all the other games ever made where the antagonists have American accents?

No, because Americans also play the hero 100% of the time (give or take 0.1%), so it doesn't matter if they have Americans occasionally playing villains because you get a sense that Americans can play more than one role. Saying that, in most games that portray Americans as villains, they are usually corporate boss stereotypes or axe crazy soldiers. If you were a CEO of a company or a Colonel then you might have a reason to complain at being cast as the baddie.

Then again, if you're a rich enough CEO to compare yourself to half the games' villains where a CEO is the main antagonist, then you're probably too well off to give a shit what some 'video game' that the peasants play thinks of you.

Or alternatively, you are so rich, you fund the games that cast you as the villain in the first place. I hope you peasants enjoy your fantasy as much as I enjoy the money you pay to me for it..ha ha ha!

 

[l33tabix]

Killzone 3 is quite possibly the best FPS out at the moment. correction to Yahtzee though. the ONLY controls you can change are L2 and R3. R3 is a much better aim and from the point on the controls are exactly the same as 1 and 2. Sometimes I do wonder about these reviews.

 

[The Ruiner]

Yahtzee seriously man WTF? We in the states had f**k all to do with making KZ3. Sony is a Japanese company, and Guerrilla Games is European. I appreciate all the entertainment your provide with the reviews you make but that is a pretty thick mistake.

 

[Jordo141]

Yahtzee seemed to miss the fact that this game was made by a company based in Amsterdam.

And you could switch the crouch/aim buttons. It's called the "Alternate" control scheme.

Exactly; when I discovered it the controls were much more fluid and easier to use.

 

[zygia]

It's weird that so many people bash the Move controller. I mean I might not be objective since I bought it for the sole purpose to play Killzone 3 BUT...

After about 5 hours in game I honestly stopped caring about cover because my aiming was so much superior to that of the regular controller that I could easily pop any Helghast's (or whatever you spell it) head the moment it appeared and I was playing on Veteran difficulty. So don't let Yahtzee discourage you from at least trying it, and I do mean try because it will take some time to switch from normal controls.

Otherwise great review, the plot could not be summarized better.

 

[GeneticallyModifiedDucks]

For some reason I have the feeling that he knew that the game was made by the Dutch and managed by SCEE. He just wanted to take another crack at Americans, and hoped people wouldn't notice.

Also R1 is best for shooting on the PS3 because that is where the curvature of the controller naturally positions your index finger. The "trigger" buttons aren't triggers. They just have more range on them and a badly placed pivot. Forcing the player to use R2 to shoot is reason enough to sell the game without finishing it.

Thankfully I can't remember any game that forced you to use R2 for shooting on the PS3.

Bioshock did. There isn't any way to change it. Also Mafia II. And I think GTA IV didn't let you switch to L1/R1. Could be wrong on that last one. Several other games have it mapped to R2, but thankfully let you switch. There are people who like it better that way, apparently.

 

[Dr.Cereal1]

I'd say on the ps3 r1 is quite a bit better than r2 for firing.

 

[mikespoff]

"Fuck modern technology right in its cutting edge - OWW!"

I actually lol'ed at that one. Great episode!

 

[mikespoff]

Does Yahtzee hate the original Star Wars trillogy because all the bad guys have English accents too?

Wait? You mean the storm troopers with the British accents? I mean I know Vader aka Anakin had a british accent, but wasn't noticeable until you the new trilogy. And the Emperor. meh

Either way I think I see your point.

Umm... Vader doesn't have a British accent. His accent in the suit is pretty vague, and as Anakin in the prequel trilogy he's distinctly American. The emperor, sure. But the storm troopers all sound American.

I don't think that accents are really indicative of any affiliation in StarWars. The most prominent British accent in all 6 films is Obi Wan, and he's as good as they come.

The one possible exception is that all the Kiwis are bounty hunters...

*EDIT - damn, I just remembered that the clones all speak with the same accent as Jango Fett. So scratch that - accents are pretty meaningless.

 

[bart56912]

a comment

 

[bart56912]

299

 

[bart56912]

300 comments yay

 

[Arppis]

Didn't care for KZ2 much. I had the exactly same issue with button confiq. And in KZ2 there wasn't even toggle for crouch(yes there is one in multiplayer, but doesn't help much in singleplayer) WTF?!

Game Developers should just decide one universal button confiq and stick with it. Halo got the button placements right at the first time, it bugged me that CoD screwed with perfectly working system and decided it was good idea to move the crouch and sprint buttons to really odd places. I got used to that in time, but I just can't get used to the clunky feeling of Killzone and really crazy button confiq. There isn't any proper reason for that either. For CoD I could argue that the "stop breathing" button for snipers is easier to press this way...

Seems like they haven't got any smarter from KZ2. Sad to see that.

 

[Lord-Ling]

I like how a game made by a studio in the Netherlands and published by the Japanese is somehow gets railed for being too American. Come on, it only took me 5 seconds on wikipedia to know that the Dutch made this and not Americans.

But it does show "maybe-America" in a good light, since the Dutch are willing to make them super heroic. Or maybe Yahtzee's paranoid pettiness against the USA is making it seem like they are everywhere (like how fundies see demons in everything like pokemon)

 

[StopWastingMyTime]

I like most of your reviews and the hate comedy on them but if america is so fucking stupid and gay then why do more people move from their countries to ours? The only reason why its hard to get a green card is because we want productive people who can actually help other people in this country and because so many people are flooding toward us faster then a Tsunami in Japan.

No-one has corrected you for a year or so so i have to inform you that the United States is outside the Top 30 countries of the world for immigration per capita and so is very much average, perhaps it is this attitude that he is mocking and you have proved his point for him.