mari_maciota
841 Reviews liked by mari_maciota
I don't think I'm able to rate this one, in part because I'm eternally torn between the content of the DLC as-is and the numerous statements Joshua Sawyer has made about what went wrong and how much he regrets the final product.
Honest Hearts is a strange DLC. There's simultaneously a lot to chew on and also barely anything. Compared to its immediate predecessor it feels like a brisk walk versus a marathon jog. Normally I'd take it from the top and walk you through it, but... Fuck it let's just go in dry.
HH is more of a metaphorical or ideological tale, not relying on the explicit text so much as the implicit ideas left between the gaps. Contrast Dead Money and it's actually surprising how little there is outside of the chats with Daniel and Joshua.
The core of it is simple: Facing an invasion by the militaristic White Legs tribe, the New Canaanite Mormon missionary Daniel feels that it's prudent to evacuate the Sorrows tribe for Zion National Park. Opposite him is Joshua Graham, the ex-Legate of Caesar's Legion (the Burned Man from NV's various rumours/graffito) and current acting chief of the much more combat-capable Dead Horses tribe. Graham believes that, given the violent nature of the wastes, it's a far more sensible option to have the Sorrows stand and fight - they have, after all, lived in Zion for one hundred years and should defend their home.
It's easy to read this as a white saviour narrative, and I can see why.
It is unfortunately the nature of CRPGs to make the player be the sole determinant in conflicts that arise, which in hindsight explains why so many of them are either milquetoast or involve the player by default. Naturally, to resolve the conflict in HH, you must interface with either Graham or Daniel.
The problem here is threefold: Graham and Daniel are both white men - though Daniel was intended to be an Asian man in development - which gives the setting some surface-level unpleasant implications.
Secondly, they are the only NPCs who have a voice in the story. The two actual tribes are background noise, and while you do get a follower from each they're mostly in their own bubble.
Thirdly, while the developers did take care not to draw influence from real world native cultures, the PS3's god-awful memory limits meant that each of the three tribes had to have the same skin colour, resulting in them being either pale white or very visibly Native American - something Josh Sawyer took responsibility and apologized for.
That all said, I don't necessarily think Honest Hearts is a white savior narrative. Despite accidentally falling into it a few times, I'd say it's definitely making an attempt to deconstruct the trope.
Popular fandom narrative has seen Graham painted as the unreasonable one and Daniel as the reasonable one, which is what the story seems to be doing on the surface, but I've come to disagree.
In the past, Graham paid a single visit to the Dead Horses tribe and inadvertently warped their entire culture. No longer just a tribe, they venerated him as a god and sought to follow in his warmongering ways.
Daniel ostensibly wants to prevent this, but it's also clear if you interrogate him that his actions aren't based entirely in altruism. The player has to antagonize him and finger-wag him for his pacifism, meaning 99% of people probably don't see it, but doing so causes him to flip his lid and reveals more of his motivations. In short, the Sorrows are a vessel for him to seek redemption because he feels he never did enough for the previous parties he attempted to aid.
That last bit, right there, is where I start having issues with Honest Hearts.
The writers for NV are very well-read compared to 3 or 4's, and it shows in the subject matter they bring to the forefront in NV and its DLCs. The problem here, however, is that they're still white Americans. "Write what you know" worked well for them, but with HH they decided to bring Mormonism into the picture. Now, I could go into detail about how that faith is rife with homophobia, sexism and racism, but I'd probably be preaching to the choir.
No, my actual issue is that neither Joshua nor Daniel actually seem Mormon. I don't know if some wires got crossed or what, but the way they're written comes across as distinctly Jewish? You might've seen people over the years reference Daniel's "catholic guilt", but his very specific brand of guilt stemming from his self-perceived inaction in the face of other people's suffering honestly has far more in common with Judaism than Mormonism. Sure, he and Graham talk a lot about righteousness and the Lord, but little attention is given to the idea of the two getting into heaven for their perceived goodness while the idea of cleansing themselves by doing good pops up a ton.
Branching off of that, problems begin to arise due to the tribes themselves lacking any voice in the plot. This following observation is so common that even Youtube Commenters can notice it, but the Sorrows adapt so well to militaristic life that one can't help but answer if they'd been considering it for a long time. This we will never know, because the one major Sorrows NPC is more occupied with her husband than the tribe. While they also adapt well to their new home in the event of evacuation, it's made clear that many of them regret it - but you only find this out in the ending slides.
Conversely, I don't think enough attention is given to the Dead Horses tribe. Sure, the Sorrows are important, whatever, but the narrative doesn't contrast Daniel's interference in their lives with Graham's at all. They're essentially set dressing, and arguably mean less to the plot than individual Sorrows. To even get a smidge of narrative parallel you need to track down the (admittedly excellent) Survivalist's logs
Similarly, the whole framing of the Sorrows potentially 'losing their innocence' for partaking in war has always rubbed me the wrong way. As they lack a voice in the narrative, Daniel pretty much tells you this and you're not really allowed to challenge it in any meaningful way. It comes across as deeply infantilizing, and the tribes themselves frequently using conlang and you-no-take candle speech just makes me raise an eyebrow.
Lastly, while I do so deeply admire the attempt to have a "good vs. good" conflict in a CRPG for once, it runs into a wall because it's phenomenally hard to actually get justifications from Daniel. As I said up above, he only reveals his motives if deliberately antagonized, and said antagonism also requires adopting a pacifistic stance - a ridiculous concept in a game where you kill 50% of all living creatures you see. Otherwise the player is meant to take Daniel's motivations at face value, while Graham is far more upfront about what he wants and why you should do it.
...That all said, however, I ultimately like that Honest Hearts has no unambiguously good endings. The only peace Daniel and Graham can find is if you kill them, and even seemingly 'good' paths lead to them feeling troubled and stricken with regret. My personal favourite is the path where the Sorrows are militarized and Graham is not cautioned on the merits of restraint, for he essentially turns them into another Legion, having come full circle.
I wish I had more to say about Honest Hearts, but coming back to it I'm actually surprised at how little is in it? It took longer to write this review than it did for me to get the Survivalist stuff, do the smidge of sidequests, and beat the main story.
[Wow, I use "that all said" a lot.]
Honest Hearts is a strange DLC. There's simultaneously a lot to chew on and also barely anything. Compared to its immediate predecessor it feels like a brisk walk versus a marathon jog. Normally I'd take it from the top and walk you through it, but... Fuck it let's just go in dry.
HH is more of a metaphorical or ideological tale, not relying on the explicit text so much as the implicit ideas left between the gaps. Contrast Dead Money and it's actually surprising how little there is outside of the chats with Daniel and Joshua.
The core of it is simple: Facing an invasion by the militaristic White Legs tribe, the New Canaanite Mormon missionary Daniel feels that it's prudent to evacuate the Sorrows tribe for Zion National Park. Opposite him is Joshua Graham, the ex-Legate of Caesar's Legion (the Burned Man from NV's various rumours/graffito) and current acting chief of the much more combat-capable Dead Horses tribe. Graham believes that, given the violent nature of the wastes, it's a far more sensible option to have the Sorrows stand and fight - they have, after all, lived in Zion for one hundred years and should defend their home.
It's easy to read this as a white saviour narrative, and I can see why.
It is unfortunately the nature of CRPGs to make the player be the sole determinant in conflicts that arise, which in hindsight explains why so many of them are either milquetoast or involve the player by default. Naturally, to resolve the conflict in HH, you must interface with either Graham or Daniel.
The problem here is threefold: Graham and Daniel are both white men - though Daniel was intended to be an Asian man in development - which gives the setting some surface-level unpleasant implications.
Secondly, they are the only NPCs who have a voice in the story. The two actual tribes are background noise, and while you do get a follower from each they're mostly in their own bubble.
Thirdly, while the developers did take care not to draw influence from real world native cultures, the PS3's god-awful memory limits meant that each of the three tribes had to have the same skin colour, resulting in them being either pale white or very visibly Native American - something Josh Sawyer took responsibility and apologized for.
That all said, I don't necessarily think Honest Hearts is a white savior narrative. Despite accidentally falling into it a few times, I'd say it's definitely making an attempt to deconstruct the trope.
Popular fandom narrative has seen Graham painted as the unreasonable one and Daniel as the reasonable one, which is what the story seems to be doing on the surface, but I've come to disagree.
In the past, Graham paid a single visit to the Dead Horses tribe and inadvertently warped their entire culture. No longer just a tribe, they venerated him as a god and sought to follow in his warmongering ways.
Daniel ostensibly wants to prevent this, but it's also clear if you interrogate him that his actions aren't based entirely in altruism. The player has to antagonize him and finger-wag him for his pacifism, meaning 99% of people probably don't see it, but doing so causes him to flip his lid and reveals more of his motivations. In short, the Sorrows are a vessel for him to seek redemption because he feels he never did enough for the previous parties he attempted to aid.
That last bit, right there, is where I start having issues with Honest Hearts.
The writers for NV are very well-read compared to 3 or 4's, and it shows in the subject matter they bring to the forefront in NV and its DLCs. The problem here, however, is that they're still white Americans. "Write what you know" worked well for them, but with HH they decided to bring Mormonism into the picture. Now, I could go into detail about how that faith is rife with homophobia, sexism and racism, but I'd probably be preaching to the choir.
No, my actual issue is that neither Joshua nor Daniel actually seem Mormon. I don't know if some wires got crossed or what, but the way they're written comes across as distinctly Jewish? You might've seen people over the years reference Daniel's "catholic guilt", but his very specific brand of guilt stemming from his self-perceived inaction in the face of other people's suffering honestly has far more in common with Judaism than Mormonism. Sure, he and Graham talk a lot about righteousness and the Lord, but little attention is given to the idea of the two getting into heaven for their perceived goodness while the idea of cleansing themselves by doing good pops up a ton.
Branching off of that, problems begin to arise due to the tribes themselves lacking any voice in the plot. This following observation is so common that even Youtube Commenters can notice it, but the Sorrows adapt so well to militaristic life that one can't help but answer if they'd been considering it for a long time. This we will never know, because the one major Sorrows NPC is more occupied with her husband than the tribe. While they also adapt well to their new home in the event of evacuation, it's made clear that many of them regret it - but you only find this out in the ending slides.
Conversely, I don't think enough attention is given to the Dead Horses tribe. Sure, the Sorrows are important, whatever, but the narrative doesn't contrast Daniel's interference in their lives with Graham's at all. They're essentially set dressing, and arguably mean less to the plot than individual Sorrows. To even get a smidge of narrative parallel you need to track down the (admittedly excellent) Survivalist's logs
Similarly, the whole framing of the Sorrows potentially 'losing their innocence' for partaking in war has always rubbed me the wrong way. As they lack a voice in the narrative, Daniel pretty much tells you this and you're not really allowed to challenge it in any meaningful way. It comes across as deeply infantilizing, and the tribes themselves frequently using conlang and you-no-take candle speech just makes me raise an eyebrow.
Lastly, while I do so deeply admire the attempt to have a "good vs. good" conflict in a CRPG for once, it runs into a wall because it's phenomenally hard to actually get justifications from Daniel. As I said up above, he only reveals his motives if deliberately antagonized, and said antagonism also requires adopting a pacifistic stance - a ridiculous concept in a game where you kill 50% of all living creatures you see. Otherwise the player is meant to take Daniel's motivations at face value, while Graham is far more upfront about what he wants and why you should do it.
...That all said, however, I ultimately like that Honest Hearts has no unambiguously good endings. The only peace Daniel and Graham can find is if you kill them, and even seemingly 'good' paths lead to them feeling troubled and stricken with regret. My personal favourite is the path where the Sorrows are militarized and Graham is not cautioned on the merits of restraint, for he essentially turns them into another Legion, having come full circle.
I wish I had more to say about Honest Hearts, but coming back to it I'm actually surprised at how little is in it? It took longer to write this review than it did for me to get the Survivalist stuff, do the smidge of sidequests, and beat the main story.
[Wow, I use "that all said" a lot.]
Hey did you know that Fallout 3 never came out? No, not the bad one everyone ignores in favour of NV, I mean the original Fallout 3 - Van Buren, the one that barely anybody is even aware of these days.
Van Buren is something of a fascination of mine. In the wake of Fallout 3’s awfulness way back in 2008, I spent ages poring over the design documents and every scrap of information I could find. Stillborn though it was, seemingly most of the game’s documents had leaked online which provided a robust treasure trove of knowledge.
But alas, they who gain knowledge gain sorrow as well. In plumbing the depths of Van Buren, my feelings of discontent towards Fallout only grew. Try as I might, I couldn’t manifest the revival of Van Buren or Good Fallout Games.
I remember the day I saw that first New Vegas teaser. Watching cold and stone-faced, disinterested and bored. Oh, a robot? Another robot? I killed thousands of robots in 3. I’m sick of robots-
And right there, at that very moment in the memory, young me lay eyes on it: The flag of the New California Republic.
“Could it be?” Thought young Mira. “Van Buren… revived?”
The introductory cutscene only increased the hype. NCR out in full force, the Great Khans having returned for a third time running, Caesar’s Legion in all their rancid glory, Hoover Dam… To say nothing of the reveal that many ex-Fallout 1/2/Van Buren were involved, Josh Sawyer among them.
The day New Vegas came into my life was wondrous. I skipped out on everything to go home and play it for 4-5 days straight.
And… It wasn’t what I wanted! I didn’t hate it, but I did come away feeling lost. I did not get it, nor could I, for I was simply too young. Young Mira wanted Van Buren, which she was [forgive me] """promised""" and felt a bit odd, having a game that seemed to be stuck in Van Buren's shadow but wasn't Van Buren.
Dead Money kinda came and went for younger me. Loved the atmosphere and the inclusion of an honest-to-god BAR but I was again far too young to get anything from it. I was one of those preternaturally annoying chucklefucks that thinks getting all the gold out of the vault "defeats the message".
But both NV and Dead Money were 14 years ago, I've had some time to think. About them, the other DLCs, and about Fallout as a whole.
The ghost of Dead Money hangs over NV, lurking in the corners. Father Elijah’s influence is felt as early as stepping into Helios One, to say nothing of how much his old fellows despise him. Whether the player discovers it or not, they’re traipsing on foundations that Elijah helped lay. That the NCR literally wear the carcasses of the Brotherhood troops they killed only adds to his mystique. Posters for Dean Domino are everywhere, visual white noise that most people pay no mind to. Among them, posters and graffiti alluding to the Sierra Madre as a mystical place where people leave their hearts behind. Dig further into the story and you’ll stumble across the Brotherhood, who spend half of their screen time cursing Elijah for digging their grave and not even having the courtesy to lay in it with them.
As it turns out, though, Elijah has his own grave to dig.
Dead Money isn’t very alluring on the surface. It trades a sprawling Wasteland, impressive locations and factions with distinct aesthetics for a muddy poison-soaked hellhole that’s only barely lit up and is near-exclusively populated by homogenous creeps in gas masks. Add in lots of backtracking, skill checks and fakeouts that explicitly punish
Not to mention the framing. A miserable old dick slaps a bomb collar on your neck and tells you to go rescue three “companions” - insofar as potentially dead weight can be a compatriot.
Everything about Dead Money screams Survival Horror. Shooting isn’t an option half the time and even when it is, ammo isn’t quite as plentiful in the Sierra Madre. There’s a fair share of backtracking and oftentimes the best way to resolve fights is to not get into them. New Vegas gets a bit power fantasy towards the middle-end of the game unless one plays on Hardcore Mode with the difficulty bumped up, and Dead Money immediately throws a wrench into this by stripping you of basically everything. Indeed, the Sierra Madre and its surroundings even call to mind some of the CG art made for Resident Evil: Survivor.
Dead Money isn’t what I’d call a ‘fun’ DLC. Even at its most gripping I can see why most people consider it a snoozefest even if I personally don’t. It’s much slower, more introspective and three times as morose as the other story-focused DLC (Lonesome Road), all while being far less overt with its narrative despite the endless repetition of its four key words: Let Go, Begin Again.
It isn’t immediately obvious how these words apply to Dog/God. Elijah is obsessed with the Sierra Madre, Dean is obsessed with fucking over the centuries-dead Frederick Sinclair, and Christine wants revenge on Elijah. The tragic Nightkin is an outlier at first, and in the intervening years since this game came out I’ve seen even fellow Dead Money enjoyers scratch their heads and declare them an outlier.
What struck me about Dog/God on this replay is how they have more in common than they don’t. Much attention is drawn to Dog’s voracious appetite and bottomless hunger, yes, but God’s fanatical need to control at every given moment is the same kind of gluttony in all but name.
But, relevant to the overarching theme, the most striking part about them is that there’s not really “two halves of a whole” within them so much as they are fragments inhabiting one body. Both of them, in their own way, voraciously pursue their desires while also trying to exert control over the other.
What they have to ‘let go’ of is themselves.
Which is, in all sincerity, deeply resonant. An annoying part of getting old and bothering with that self-improvement nonsense is that you’ll almost certainly come across parts of The Self that’ve accrued some crust over the ages. Beliefs you don’t really hold onto, anger that’s long since lost its target, endless little idiosyncrasies that add up into an odd little rusted automaton in the shape of you. Letting go of that is a bothersome process, albeit a necessary one.
The debatably-best ending for Dog/God is convincing them to let go of their respective Selves and simply embrace the end result. Take hold of the idiosyncrasies and accept them not as “two halves of a whole” but as different shades of the whole. Rather surprising to see such a gentle, loving treatment of DID from a game where - 30 minutes prior to starting this DLC - I got Cass’ infamous Long Dick Johnson line.
But you know what? Let’s skip the 4 protagonists of Dead Money and go back to the 5th: Me.
I think, at some point, everyone who’s young and adores a particular piece of art will inevitably conceptualize something perfect: Their perfect sequel, their perfect adaptation, their perfect spinoff, etc etc.
I’m not going to pretend I was any different, and pertinent to the topic at hand I’d long since had an idea in my head of “The Perfect Fallout”. Indeed, my earliest discontent towards New Vegas stemmed from the fact that it wasn’t that ideal. It was a more introspective and debatably experimental title that was still Fallout but not the Fallout I wanted.
Fortunately, I’ve grown out of those behaviours and have become vastly more accepting of flawed works. Indeed, the search for flawless art is at odds with the nature of art as a reflection of humanity - a uniquely flawed species of mammal.
In returning to Dead Money in 2024, in a post-Fallout 4 and post-Fallout TV world, truthfully I don’t even see the text on display.
I see a group of 4 people who’re maniacally obsessed with a perfect ideal to the point of self-ruination. They won’t accept anything less than what their mind’s eye sees, no matter how blind that eye is to the real world in front of them.
I see Fallout fans like my younger self, still clinging to the hopes that one day they’ll get the perfect flawless Fallout title.
And in this, I’ve come to appreciate the ending a lot more.
It may seem trite or overbearing to have your reward for a 4-5 hour puzzle gauntlet be some gold bars that you have to forsake, but on a meta level I appreciate it.
You can’t take all the gold bars with you without exploits or cheats. You have to make a choice: Be content with less, for at least you have something, or leave empty-handed. What was once stupid to younger Mira now feels profound, and for once I felt content to simply leave the gold untouched and settle for my spoils (Namely, the Automatic Rifle) before locking Elijah in the Vault.
I got the perfect ending this time. Told all the companions to just bail and move on with their lives, in much the same way I have to tell people in real life to ditch stupid vendettas/feuds and focus on the things in front of them. It was cathartic this time in a way it hasn’t been before - maybe I have gotten old.
To cap off the metaphor, though: Dead Money lands a lot better now that I’m content with New Vegas and am apathetic to any future Fallout entries. I’ve got my ideal Fallout game, even if it took some time for me to come around to it. Bethesda can turn the series into a playground all it wants; that’s that, and this is this.
Really, the hardest part of being a Fallout fan isn’t liking the games that are, it’s letting go of the games that co- Too on the nose? Sorry, please don’t throw tomatoes. Let me begin again- FUCK.
Van Buren is something of a fascination of mine. In the wake of Fallout 3’s awfulness way back in 2008, I spent ages poring over the design documents and every scrap of information I could find. Stillborn though it was, seemingly most of the game’s documents had leaked online which provided a robust treasure trove of knowledge.
But alas, they who gain knowledge gain sorrow as well. In plumbing the depths of Van Buren, my feelings of discontent towards Fallout only grew. Try as I might, I couldn’t manifest the revival of Van Buren or Good Fallout Games.
I remember the day I saw that first New Vegas teaser. Watching cold and stone-faced, disinterested and bored. Oh, a robot? Another robot? I killed thousands of robots in 3. I’m sick of robots-
And right there, at that very moment in the memory, young me lay eyes on it: The flag of the New California Republic.
“Could it be?” Thought young Mira. “Van Buren… revived?”
The introductory cutscene only increased the hype. NCR out in full force, the Great Khans having returned for a third time running, Caesar’s Legion in all their rancid glory, Hoover Dam… To say nothing of the reveal that many ex-Fallout 1/2/Van Buren were involved, Josh Sawyer among them.
The day New Vegas came into my life was wondrous. I skipped out on everything to go home and play it for 4-5 days straight.
And… It wasn’t what I wanted! I didn’t hate it, but I did come away feeling lost. I did not get it, nor could I, for I was simply too young. Young Mira wanted Van Buren, which she was [forgive me] """promised""" and felt a bit odd, having a game that seemed to be stuck in Van Buren's shadow but wasn't Van Buren.
Dead Money kinda came and went for younger me. Loved the atmosphere and the inclusion of an honest-to-god BAR but I was again far too young to get anything from it. I was one of those preternaturally annoying chucklefucks that thinks getting all the gold out of the vault "defeats the message".
But both NV and Dead Money were 14 years ago, I've had some time to think. About them, the other DLCs, and about Fallout as a whole.
The ghost of Dead Money hangs over NV, lurking in the corners. Father Elijah’s influence is felt as early as stepping into Helios One, to say nothing of how much his old fellows despise him. Whether the player discovers it or not, they’re traipsing on foundations that Elijah helped lay. That the NCR literally wear the carcasses of the Brotherhood troops they killed only adds to his mystique. Posters for Dean Domino are everywhere, visual white noise that most people pay no mind to. Among them, posters and graffiti alluding to the Sierra Madre as a mystical place where people leave their hearts behind. Dig further into the story and you’ll stumble across the Brotherhood, who spend half of their screen time cursing Elijah for digging their grave and not even having the courtesy to lay in it with them.
As it turns out, though, Elijah has his own grave to dig.
Dead Money isn’t very alluring on the surface. It trades a sprawling Wasteland, impressive locations and factions with distinct aesthetics for a muddy poison-soaked hellhole that’s only barely lit up and is near-exclusively populated by homogenous creeps in gas masks. Add in lots of backtracking, skill checks and fakeouts that explicitly punish
Not to mention the framing. A miserable old dick slaps a bomb collar on your neck and tells you to go rescue three “companions” - insofar as potentially dead weight can be a compatriot.
Everything about Dead Money screams Survival Horror. Shooting isn’t an option half the time and even when it is, ammo isn’t quite as plentiful in the Sierra Madre. There’s a fair share of backtracking and oftentimes the best way to resolve fights is to not get into them. New Vegas gets a bit power fantasy towards the middle-end of the game unless one plays on Hardcore Mode with the difficulty bumped up, and Dead Money immediately throws a wrench into this by stripping you of basically everything. Indeed, the Sierra Madre and its surroundings even call to mind some of the CG art made for Resident Evil: Survivor.
Dead Money isn’t what I’d call a ‘fun’ DLC. Even at its most gripping I can see why most people consider it a snoozefest even if I personally don’t. It’s much slower, more introspective and three times as morose as the other story-focused DLC (Lonesome Road), all while being far less overt with its narrative despite the endless repetition of its four key words: Let Go, Begin Again.
It isn’t immediately obvious how these words apply to Dog/God. Elijah is obsessed with the Sierra Madre, Dean is obsessed with fucking over the centuries-dead Frederick Sinclair, and Christine wants revenge on Elijah. The tragic Nightkin is an outlier at first, and in the intervening years since this game came out I’ve seen even fellow Dead Money enjoyers scratch their heads and declare them an outlier.
What struck me about Dog/God on this replay is how they have more in common than they don’t. Much attention is drawn to Dog’s voracious appetite and bottomless hunger, yes, but God’s fanatical need to control at every given moment is the same kind of gluttony in all but name.
But, relevant to the overarching theme, the most striking part about them is that there’s not really “two halves of a whole” within them so much as they are fragments inhabiting one body. Both of them, in their own way, voraciously pursue their desires while also trying to exert control over the other.
What they have to ‘let go’ of is themselves.
Which is, in all sincerity, deeply resonant. An annoying part of getting old and bothering with that self-improvement nonsense is that you’ll almost certainly come across parts of The Self that’ve accrued some crust over the ages. Beliefs you don’t really hold onto, anger that’s long since lost its target, endless little idiosyncrasies that add up into an odd little rusted automaton in the shape of you. Letting go of that is a bothersome process, albeit a necessary one.
The debatably-best ending for Dog/God is convincing them to let go of their respective Selves and simply embrace the end result. Take hold of the idiosyncrasies and accept them not as “two halves of a whole” but as different shades of the whole. Rather surprising to see such a gentle, loving treatment of DID from a game where - 30 minutes prior to starting this DLC - I got Cass’ infamous Long Dick Johnson line.
But you know what? Let’s skip the 4 protagonists of Dead Money and go back to the 5th: Me.
I think, at some point, everyone who’s young and adores a particular piece of art will inevitably conceptualize something perfect: Their perfect sequel, their perfect adaptation, their perfect spinoff, etc etc.
I’m not going to pretend I was any different, and pertinent to the topic at hand I’d long since had an idea in my head of “The Perfect Fallout”. Indeed, my earliest discontent towards New Vegas stemmed from the fact that it wasn’t that ideal. It was a more introspective and debatably experimental title that was still Fallout but not the Fallout I wanted.
Fortunately, I’ve grown out of those behaviours and have become vastly more accepting of flawed works. Indeed, the search for flawless art is at odds with the nature of art as a reflection of humanity - a uniquely flawed species of mammal.
In returning to Dead Money in 2024, in a post-Fallout 4 and post-Fallout TV world, truthfully I don’t even see the text on display.
I see a group of 4 people who’re maniacally obsessed with a perfect ideal to the point of self-ruination. They won’t accept anything less than what their mind’s eye sees, no matter how blind that eye is to the real world in front of them.
I see Fallout fans like my younger self, still clinging to the hopes that one day they’ll get the perfect flawless Fallout title.
And in this, I’ve come to appreciate the ending a lot more.
It may seem trite or overbearing to have your reward for a 4-5 hour puzzle gauntlet be some gold bars that you have to forsake, but on a meta level I appreciate it.
You can’t take all the gold bars with you without exploits or cheats. You have to make a choice: Be content with less, for at least you have something, or leave empty-handed. What was once stupid to younger Mira now feels profound, and for once I felt content to simply leave the gold untouched and settle for my spoils (Namely, the Automatic Rifle) before locking Elijah in the Vault.
I got the perfect ending this time. Told all the companions to just bail and move on with their lives, in much the same way I have to tell people in real life to ditch stupid vendettas/feuds and focus on the things in front of them. It was cathartic this time in a way it hasn’t been before - maybe I have gotten old.
To cap off the metaphor, though: Dead Money lands a lot better now that I’m content with New Vegas and am apathetic to any future Fallout entries. I’ve got my ideal Fallout game, even if it took some time for me to come around to it. Bethesda can turn the series into a playground all it wants; that’s that, and this is this.
Really, the hardest part of being a Fallout fan isn’t liking the games that are, it’s letting go of the games that co- Too on the nose? Sorry, please don’t throw tomatoes. Let me begin again- FUCK.
MultiVersus
2024
1 beta fechada e aberta + 3 anos para isso? monetização MUITO pior (honestamente pior que suicide squad), otimização pior(stutters que não estavam presentes no UE4), UI pior(aquele meme de UI triple A moderna), controles/jogabilidade pior (parece lagado, duro de controlar) e outros.
Honestamente para ser um "Smash Killer" ainda tem que chegar nos pés do Super Smash Bros 64, mas talvez daqui a mais 3 anos consigam?
Honestamente para ser um "Smash Killer" ainda tem que chegar nos pés do Super Smash Bros 64, mas talvez daqui a mais 3 anos consigam?
Tron 2.0
2003
The Tron-fanatics dream!!!!
to me perguntando por que nunca joguei isso antes caras!! pra quem entende inglês, vale muito a pena, todos os jogos são incríveis e já to com saudade de bater na mesa e gritar objection!
no geral mesmo algumas partes sendo meio longas me diverti bastante, é uma visual novel click and point mas tem tanta coisa pra fazer que nem da pra achar chato. senti que voce realmente joga ao invés de só ficar lendo o tempo inteiro. fora que tinha uns personagens que só de aparecerem na tela eu já dava risada.
acho que o terceiro jogo é meu favorito e o último caso cheio de mistérios me prendeu a atenção do início ao fim. um advogado só chora uma vez, e é quando tudo acaba!!
no geral mesmo algumas partes sendo meio longas me diverti bastante, é uma visual novel click and point mas tem tanta coisa pra fazer que nem da pra achar chato. senti que voce realmente joga ao invés de só ficar lendo o tempo inteiro. fora que tinha uns personagens que só de aparecerem na tela eu já dava risada.
acho que o terceiro jogo é meu favorito e o último caso cheio de mistérios me prendeu a atenção do início ao fim. um advogado só chora uma vez, e é quando tudo acaba!!
Tron 2.0
2003
eu decidi que era fã de Tron desde o momento que eu joguei o mundo dele em Kingdom Hearts II. amo a fase, fui atrás do o filme e amei, e agora eu amo Tron 2.0 também. a estética neon do filme é reproduzida lindamente aqui! eu adoro como a linguagem de computação é aplicada para tornar sistemas comuns de RPGs em elementos diegéticos, como o seu nível ser um número de versão de software que você vai aumentando conforme avança na história e coleta itens bônus (eu terminei o jogo em v9.8.1, por exemplo), os upgrades do seu personagem são sub-rotinas com versões "Alfa" "Beta" e "Gold" e que muitas vezes devem ser desfragmentados/portados/descorrompidos para poderem ser usados.
esse jogo é tão dedicado em usar terminologia de computador que o menu de ajuda passa mais tempo contextualizando o que os termos representam dentro do jogo do que qualquer outro tutorial presente, o que eu acho muito engraçado. realmente fizeram o jogo para aquela pessoa que sabe mexer em um terminal unix e que constantemente tem que ajudar os amigos que não sabem abrir uma planilha no excel sem acidentalmente instalar um ransomware. fun fact: eu sei relativamente pouco sobre computadores ao ponto de ter perguntado para minha namorada quase formada em Análise e Desenvolvimento de Sistemas pra ver se eu não usei um termo errado nesse texto, mas eu sou mais alfabetizada em como fazer coisas no computador do que um cara que meu pai conhecia que literalmente enfiou um ransomware no PC depois de jogar um "Ad0be Ph0t0sh0p 2022 cr4ck baix4r grátis" no Google. eu tô falando sério (censurei por via das dúvidas lol).
acima de tudo, Tron 2.0 aplica a mesma filosofia de design de mapas que incentivam exploração atenciosa presentes em CRPGs como Deus Ex e Arx Fatalis mas com a vantagem desse ser um mundo explicitamente virtual, com um realismo mais baseado na ideia de "videogames" dos anos 80, ao contrário dos jogos mencionados que se passam em realidades mais similares à nossa. enquanto jogava uma das fases, eu percebi um bloco flutuante que parava em um ponto bem alto do mapa, que parecia estar lá só como um "enfeite" para a atmosfera. na curiosidade, eu subi nele e fui levada à um lugar secreto, com um upgrade novo e uns emails extras que dão um contexto a mais para os eventos que aconteceram entre o filme original e o jogo. e honestamente? o uso de emails como uma ferramenta de narrativa em Tron 2.0 é bem mais elegante aqui do que em muitos jogos pós-System Shock 1 e 2 que tentam preencher detalhes da história com logs encontrados no mapa (acho até melhor que os dos Fallouts 3D, INCLUINDO New Vegas).
mas o que incomodou MESMO foram as corridas de Light Cycle (as famosas corridas de moto de Tron). elas são conceitualmente muito empolgantes, mas a câmera insiste em manter um ângulo que não ajuda muito e a inteligência artificial dos adversários é avançada demais. em vários momentos eles fazem múltiplas curvas extremamente precisas em um piscar de olhos enquanto você com o seu cérebro primata não consegue nem reagir à primeira delas e morre. a sorte é que os momentos que a corrida é obrigatória possuem checkpoints frequentes, mas ainda é bem frustrante a forma que todo o ritmo e a história dão de cara com a parede para essas seções acontecerem. infelizmente esse jogo também se inspira no confronto final de System Shock 1. no sentido de ser um tanto ruim e uma maneira meio desapontante de terminar algo que eu estava gostando de coração. o encerramento em geral tem uma sensação de ser um pouco apressado demais, até mesmo na narrativa. o clímax é estranhamente fraco considerando que o resto da história possui beats intrigantes e confrontos legais.
mas eu amo ele de toda forma. eu adoro essa época onde videogames servindo como sequências de filmes eram lançados. infelizmente assim como "Os Incríveis 2" tornou o jogo "The Incredibles: Rise of the Underminer" não-canônico, Tron 2.0 sofreu o mesmo destino após o lançamento de "Tron: Legacy". o que tudo bem, afinal quem disse que o poder de decidir o que é canônico ou não está nas mãos de grande corporações? olha o meu cânone de Tron: Tron (1982) - Tron 2.0 (2003) - Kingdom Hearts II (2005).
olha o meu cânone da Turma da Mônica: Turma da Mônica (1970 - ) - Mônica no Castelo do Dragão (1991) - Fallout New Vegas (2010).
esse jogo é tão dedicado em usar terminologia de computador que o menu de ajuda passa mais tempo contextualizando o que os termos representam dentro do jogo do que qualquer outro tutorial presente, o que eu acho muito engraçado. realmente fizeram o jogo para aquela pessoa que sabe mexer em um terminal unix e que constantemente tem que ajudar os amigos que não sabem abrir uma planilha no excel sem acidentalmente instalar um ransomware. fun fact: eu sei relativamente pouco sobre computadores ao ponto de ter perguntado para minha namorada quase formada em Análise e Desenvolvimento de Sistemas pra ver se eu não usei um termo errado nesse texto, mas eu sou mais alfabetizada em como fazer coisas no computador do que um cara que meu pai conhecia que literalmente enfiou um ransomware no PC depois de jogar um "Ad0be Ph0t0sh0p 2022 cr4ck baix4r grátis" no Google. eu tô falando sério (censurei por via das dúvidas lol).
acima de tudo, Tron 2.0 aplica a mesma filosofia de design de mapas que incentivam exploração atenciosa presentes em CRPGs como Deus Ex e Arx Fatalis mas com a vantagem desse ser um mundo explicitamente virtual, com um realismo mais baseado na ideia de "videogames" dos anos 80, ao contrário dos jogos mencionados que se passam em realidades mais similares à nossa. enquanto jogava uma das fases, eu percebi um bloco flutuante que parava em um ponto bem alto do mapa, que parecia estar lá só como um "enfeite" para a atmosfera. na curiosidade, eu subi nele e fui levada à um lugar secreto, com um upgrade novo e uns emails extras que dão um contexto a mais para os eventos que aconteceram entre o filme original e o jogo. e honestamente? o uso de emails como uma ferramenta de narrativa em Tron 2.0 é bem mais elegante aqui do que em muitos jogos pós-System Shock 1 e 2 que tentam preencher detalhes da história com logs encontrados no mapa (acho até melhor que os dos Fallouts 3D, INCLUINDO New Vegas).
mas o que incomodou MESMO foram as corridas de Light Cycle (as famosas corridas de moto de Tron). elas são conceitualmente muito empolgantes, mas a câmera insiste em manter um ângulo que não ajuda muito e a inteligência artificial dos adversários é avançada demais. em vários momentos eles fazem múltiplas curvas extremamente precisas em um piscar de olhos enquanto você com o seu cérebro primata não consegue nem reagir à primeira delas e morre. a sorte é que os momentos que a corrida é obrigatória possuem checkpoints frequentes, mas ainda é bem frustrante a forma que todo o ritmo e a história dão de cara com a parede para essas seções acontecerem. infelizmente esse jogo também se inspira no confronto final de System Shock 1. no sentido de ser um tanto ruim e uma maneira meio desapontante de terminar algo que eu estava gostando de coração. o encerramento em geral tem uma sensação de ser um pouco apressado demais, até mesmo na narrativa. o clímax é estranhamente fraco considerando que o resto da história possui beats intrigantes e confrontos legais.
mas eu amo ele de toda forma. eu adoro essa época onde videogames servindo como sequências de filmes eram lançados. infelizmente assim como "Os Incríveis 2" tornou o jogo "The Incredibles: Rise of the Underminer" não-canônico, Tron 2.0 sofreu o mesmo destino após o lançamento de "Tron: Legacy". o que tudo bem, afinal quem disse que o poder de decidir o que é canônico ou não está nas mãos de grande corporações? olha o meu cânone de Tron: Tron (1982) - Tron 2.0 (2003) - Kingdom Hearts II (2005).
olha o meu cânone da Turma da Mônica: Turma da Mônica (1970 - ) - Mônica no Castelo do Dragão (1991) - Fallout New Vegas (2010).
Alan Wake II
2023
(desde já peço desculpas pela review grande.)
Eu não consigo nem descrever o que foi esse jogo, de verdade. Não sei que porra o Sam Lake tava usando quando foi fazer esse jogo mas eu quero um pouco também.
Alan Wake 2 é facilmente um dos melhores jogos que eu já joguei, absolutamente tudo nele é melhor do que o primeiro jogo (o que não é muito díficil), e me deixa até triste saber que esse jogão ainda não se pagou, se eu fosse milionária eu dava todo meu dinheiro pra Remedy continuar fazendo jogo.
Gostei de tudo nesse jogo, mas as atuações aqui são um absurdo, acho que nunca vi um jogo ser tão bem dirigido quanto esse, a visão artística que eles tiveram, a estrutura narrativa desse jogo é um absurdo de tão boa, sem contar a atuação do Ilkka Villi, que consegue alternar tão bem entre Scratch, Thomas Zane e o próprio Alan, as cenas gravadas com os atores são absurdas de tão boas.
Trabalho brilhante dos diretores de arte, principalmente nas partes do Alan com os ecos do Alex Casey, e tudo naquela cidade, no Hotel é tão encantador visualmente, e você poder mudar de cenários praticamente em tempo real é algo que ainda não entrou na minha cabeça, nunca vi isso em algum outro jogo pra compara mas ainda assim acho que Alan Wake 2 fez isso perfeitamente, principalmente na parte da Saga quando você vai pro quadro de casos dela. Falando no quadro de casos, foi uma das minhas partes favoritas do jogo! Entendo que muita gente possa ter achado chato, mas acho que deu uma profundidade muito legal pro jogo, além de ser diferente, um diferente bom.
O combate ainda segue a mesma premissa do mesmo jogo, você anda, corre e mata bicho, mas aqui foi absurdamente melhorado, ao ponto de até ser divertido. Não é a melhor coisa do jogo, mas as boss fights com a Saga e certas partes com o Alan você se diverte muito jogando, principalmente na parte do Dark Ocean Summoning, uma das minhas partes favoritas do jogo, só não supera a Herald of Darkness, o @jaqueta tá de prova do quanto eu fiquei feliz jogando aquilo, acho que nunca sorri e me diverti tanto quanto naquela parte.
Enfim, Alan Wake 2 tá pra mim um dos melhores jogos que eu já joguei até hoje, os segmentos de investigação, os cenários mais abertos e diferentes, a narrativa, direção de arte criativa e complexa, e a história que, mesmo confusa, continua coesa, fazem desse jogo pra mim uma das melhores experiências que já tive com um jogo.
Ainda tô muito triste que acabou...
Eu não consigo nem descrever o que foi esse jogo, de verdade. Não sei que porra o Sam Lake tava usando quando foi fazer esse jogo mas eu quero um pouco também.
Alan Wake 2 é facilmente um dos melhores jogos que eu já joguei, absolutamente tudo nele é melhor do que o primeiro jogo (o que não é muito díficil), e me deixa até triste saber que esse jogão ainda não se pagou, se eu fosse milionária eu dava todo meu dinheiro pra Remedy continuar fazendo jogo.
Gostei de tudo nesse jogo, mas as atuações aqui são um absurdo, acho que nunca vi um jogo ser tão bem dirigido quanto esse, a visão artística que eles tiveram, a estrutura narrativa desse jogo é um absurdo de tão boa, sem contar a atuação do Ilkka Villi, que consegue alternar tão bem entre Scratch, Thomas Zane e o próprio Alan, as cenas gravadas com os atores são absurdas de tão boas.
Trabalho brilhante dos diretores de arte, principalmente nas partes do Alan com os ecos do Alex Casey, e tudo naquela cidade, no Hotel é tão encantador visualmente, e você poder mudar de cenários praticamente em tempo real é algo que ainda não entrou na minha cabeça, nunca vi isso em algum outro jogo pra compara mas ainda assim acho que Alan Wake 2 fez isso perfeitamente, principalmente na parte da Saga quando você vai pro quadro de casos dela. Falando no quadro de casos, foi uma das minhas partes favoritas do jogo! Entendo que muita gente possa ter achado chato, mas acho que deu uma profundidade muito legal pro jogo, além de ser diferente, um diferente bom.
O combate ainda segue a mesma premissa do mesmo jogo, você anda, corre e mata bicho, mas aqui foi absurdamente melhorado, ao ponto de até ser divertido. Não é a melhor coisa do jogo, mas as boss fights com a Saga e certas partes com o Alan você se diverte muito jogando, principalmente na parte do Dark Ocean Summoning, uma das minhas partes favoritas do jogo, só não supera a Herald of Darkness, o @jaqueta tá de prova do quanto eu fiquei feliz jogando aquilo, acho que nunca sorri e me diverti tanto quanto naquela parte.
Enfim, Alan Wake 2 tá pra mim um dos melhores jogos que eu já joguei até hoje, os segmentos de investigação, os cenários mais abertos e diferentes, a narrativa, direção de arte criativa e complexa, e a história que, mesmo confusa, continua coesa, fazem desse jogo pra mim uma das melhores experiências que já tive com um jogo.
Ainda tô muito triste que acabou...
lebkuchen i dont know how to pronounce ur name but id die for you
é mais ou menos como a DLC anterior, mas com menos setpieces interessantes de combate e com talvez um pouquinho mais de história? eu gosto de como a narrativa faz o máximo para amplificar as ambiguidades, mas acaba sendo só mais um gancho para um Alan Wake II, que na época parecia que nunca iria ocorrer. o chefe final é bem bobo. muito bobo.
Spiritfarer
2020
Spiritfarer foi meio decepcionante por não ser o meu tipo de jogo. Há tantos jogos indies notáveis hoje em dia, que não chega a ser incomum encontrar jogos que desviam dos padrões da indústria, e um que me chamou a atenção foi Spiritfarer. O jogo se trata sobre Stella, que agora é a nova caronte, após ele ter se aposentado e é a vez dela de guiar os espíritos para os pós-vida. O jogo tem belos visuais 2D desenhados à mão, e mesmo controlando que nem um jogo de plataforma, é na verdade um simulador de gerenciamento. Eu não costumo jogar jogo de gerenciamento, mas eu tava esperando que fosse um pouco mais tranquilo pra mim e que mesmo se a história não me tocasse, a minha recepção fosse um pouco mais positiva, mas esse não foi o caso. Se você gostar do esquema de gameplay, seja craftar itens, cozinhar, cuidar das plantações, bichos e passageiros, vai ser tudo bem calmo e relaxante e servir bem de veículo para acompanhar a história, e se esse não for o seu caso, a sua experiência vai ser mais próxima da minha, achando os negócios cansativos e desmotivadores. Spiritfarer se vende pela sua história tocante sobre a relação da vida, morte e pós-vida, mas nem nessa parte eu consegui me importar, pois a maioria das interações com os espíritos se baseia em fetch quests e momentos breves demais pra causar impacto, o que tornou a minha experiência um tanto impessoal. A minha falta de motivação pra continuá-lo foi tanta, que recentemente desinstalei o jogo. Apesar do que falei aqui, o jogo não é ruim, e se você tiver interesse, há chances que ele possa ser pra você o que não foi pra mim. No fim das contas, Spiritfarer não é pra mim, e acho que tá tudo bem nisso aí.
Crow Country
2024
''Staring into the flames... I feel something. It's a mixture of dread and hope.. Maybe everything will be okay. Or maybe it won't.''
This game came out on my birthday (May 9!!) and my goodness, what a gift this was. One of those games that ever since I played the demo it felt like something that was tailor made for me.
I did like 3 playthroughs of this since the weekend as I honestly fell in love with it, I just wanted to experience everything there was of it. This game perfectly captures the PS1 horror experience, calling back to things like Resident Evil 1 (specifically the original) and Silent Hill 1. A mixture of eerieness, moody atmosphere, body horror and it all clashes quite interestingly with the cute cylindrical character designs.
The gameplay and map design are pretty top tier, too. There is backtracking but it's well done and rewarding, it helps that the map is just small enough so it never feels like a waste of time to go back to areas you've been before.
While the controls are quite nice and somewhat ''modern'' compared to some of it's comtemporaries, I would still highly recommend playing this with a gamepad. It's playable with keyboard but it is somewhat awkward (there's no mouse support). It can be quite dynamic since you can avoid combat entirely 75% of time and save a ton of resources by causing enviromental damage towards the enemies or just baiting them into traps. Made me think of Resident Evil 3 in this regard, which I really appreciate.
The story is surprisingly nice, too! The characters are all very charming and I really liked reading all the lore behind the theme park. There are some pretty dark implications about the origin of the virus later in the game, which makes me wonder if there is any potential for a sequel of sorts someday.
If there are any flaws in it... Honestly? I can't think of much. I heard people say it was a bit easy compared to other survival horror games out there but I don't consider that an issue tbh, it feels perfectly designed as it is. And if that is a problem for you then you can just start the game on the hard difficulty (Murder of Crows). My third playthrough was on that difficulty and it is very tough indeed, more in line with what you expect from older games of this genre.
I honestly could go on and on about how much I loved this game but I think i'll leave it at that for now. I wholeheartdly recommend this to anyone from fans of old-school survival horror fans to even potential newcomers. 💜
This game came out on my birthday (May 9!!) and my goodness, what a gift this was. One of those games that ever since I played the demo it felt like something that was tailor made for me.
I did like 3 playthroughs of this since the weekend as I honestly fell in love with it, I just wanted to experience everything there was of it. This game perfectly captures the PS1 horror experience, calling back to things like Resident Evil 1 (specifically the original) and Silent Hill 1. A mixture of eerieness, moody atmosphere, body horror and it all clashes quite interestingly with the cute cylindrical character designs.
The gameplay and map design are pretty top tier, too. There is backtracking but it's well done and rewarding, it helps that the map is just small enough so it never feels like a waste of time to go back to areas you've been before.
While the controls are quite nice and somewhat ''modern'' compared to some of it's comtemporaries, I would still highly recommend playing this with a gamepad. It's playable with keyboard but it is somewhat awkward (there's no mouse support). It can be quite dynamic since you can avoid combat entirely 75% of time and save a ton of resources by causing enviromental damage towards the enemies or just baiting them into traps. Made me think of Resident Evil 3 in this regard, which I really appreciate.
The story is surprisingly nice, too! The characters are all very charming and I really liked reading all the lore behind the theme park. There are some pretty dark implications about the origin of the virus later in the game, which makes me wonder if there is any potential for a sequel of sorts someday.
If there are any flaws in it... Honestly? I can't think of much. I heard people say it was a bit easy compared to other survival horror games out there but I don't consider that an issue tbh, it feels perfectly designed as it is. And if that is a problem for you then you can just start the game on the hard difficulty (Murder of Crows). My third playthrough was on that difficulty and it is very tough indeed, more in line with what you expect from older games of this genre.
I honestly could go on and on about how much I loved this game but I think i'll leave it at that for now. I wholeheartdly recommend this to anyone from fans of old-school survival horror fans to even potential newcomers. 💜
Tails' Skypatrol
1995
Veredito: É bem bacaninha e fora da curva, eu inclusive jogaria feliz uma continuação.
Quando pesquisei Tails' Skypatrol, logo de cara achei que seria um jogo de navinha. Tipo, olha essa capa. Procura qualquer foto do jogo. Joga no Youtube. O que me levaria a crer que ele não seja um jogo de navinha?
Bom, ele é um jogo de plataforma. Um autorrunner, aliás. Cada fase é uma pista de obstáculos: você precisa chegar vivo no final passando por todas as armadilhas e inimigos pelo caminho, usando suas habilidades de movimento pra isso. Ou seja... um jogo de plataforma. Com a diferença que você está sempre voando.
E pra ser sincero, ele é bem bom. É curto, rápido, direto. São 4 fases só, cada uma leva poucos minutos. E o mais estranho para um jogo de 1995: ele é difícil pra cacete sem NUNCA apelar para mortes baratas. Não tem level design bosta, inimigos apelões, nada. Quando você perde, a culpa é 100% única e exclusivamente sua. O visual é bonito, os controles são redondinhos, as músicas são boas, e os chefes são interessantes.
O que mais eu poderia pedir de um spinoff no Game Gear para um personagem secundário da franquia?
Quando pesquisei Tails' Skypatrol, logo de cara achei que seria um jogo de navinha. Tipo, olha essa capa. Procura qualquer foto do jogo. Joga no Youtube. O que me levaria a crer que ele não seja um jogo de navinha?
Bom, ele é um jogo de plataforma. Um autorrunner, aliás. Cada fase é uma pista de obstáculos: você precisa chegar vivo no final passando por todas as armadilhas e inimigos pelo caminho, usando suas habilidades de movimento pra isso. Ou seja... um jogo de plataforma. Com a diferença que você está sempre voando.
E pra ser sincero, ele é bem bom. É curto, rápido, direto. São 4 fases só, cada uma leva poucos minutos. E o mais estranho para um jogo de 1995: ele é difícil pra cacete sem NUNCA apelar para mortes baratas. Não tem level design bosta, inimigos apelões, nada. Quando você perde, a culpa é 100% única e exclusivamente sua. O visual é bonito, os controles são redondinhos, as músicas são boas, e os chefes são interessantes.
O que mais eu poderia pedir de um spinoff no Game Gear para um personagem secundário da franquia?
Rumble Roses
2004
Just like Fear Effect and Dead or Alive: Extreme Beach Volleyball, Rumble Roses is a game I remember more for its marketing than any discussion around it. It's one of those games, where the jiggle physics is cranked all the way up, and any opportunity to sneak in a fanservice shot is seized upon with such ferocity you'd think some poor animator had on a collar rigged to blow if they don't fit in as much TNA as possible, like some pervert's version of Speed. Every print ad for games like this was carefully framed to tantalize the teenaged male demographic, with characters pressed together or caught in some compromising pose with "Mario Bros. doesn't have... BOOBS!" written in big blocky letters. Everyone who fell for one of those has a YouTube channel now.
Speaking of YouTubers, my friend and current Xenosaga hype machine, TransWitchSammy, is the only person I've met in my entire life that has actually played Rumble Roses as a proper video game. I still wasn't very interested until she put me in a mandible claw hold and forced my compliance. I had to look up names of wrestling holds for that joke, by the way. I don't know anything about the sport, I just remember seeing Dean Ambrose bring a Coney Island hot dog cart he stole to a match once, and besides that it's periodic updates from Appreciations about what Cum Punk is up to post-WWE.
I am likewise just as uninitiated with wrestling games, but as I understand it, most of them are total garbage. I can't say how Rumble Roses stacks up against its contemporaries or even modern wrestling games, but in isolation, it's got more going on than I initially thought while still not having enough to sustain me beyond clearing 40% of the roster in story mode.
Much like fighting games, which I often describe in how "responsive" they are and how good the impact of landing a hit feels, I'm so much of a philistine here that I can't articulate the more technical aspects of how this game works. I'm no expert on frame timing, I can't count let alone perceive input delay, I navigate these games the same way I would a real fight, all elbows and open-hand slaps (see: button mashing.) But the specials in this game are ridiculous and bombastic in the way real wrestling techniques are, and they look just as likely to cause real, severe, long-lasting damage when executed by a non-professional, so I'd say Rumble Roses ticks the right boxes.
The story is also appropriately bonkers, and I've made several attempts already to describe it as a mashup of wrestling storylines and fighting game narratives but scrapped all that after realizing they're basically the same thing. Dr. Cutter is doing a whole sexy nurse gimmick, but she's also like, brainwashing wrestlers and turning them into heels in an effort to harvest them for her cyborg, and that's something that feels as ripped from the WWE as it does Tekken.
It's just a shame then that Rumble Roses does so little with the heel/face alternate scenarios for each wrestler. Though this does double the size of the roster, each character's second scenario is truncated, with fewer fights and threadbare narratives that amount to an opening and closing cutscene to establish and bookend their gimmicks. Reiko - a certifiable babyface and the lead character - joins a biker gang, and she is completely unconvincing in the role, like a child wanting to be taken seriously. It's really endearing and silly, but you get so little of it. Likewise, there's a real drought of interesting costumes, with each character getting a normal outfit and swimsuit and a single pallet swap of each. Maybe I'm spoiled on Dead or Alive, but I feel like this misses some of the pageantry of wrestling. I just... I wanna dress up the pretty ladies......... .
There are also only three rings to fight in, one of which being a mud pit, and several wrestlers share moves with one another, which resulted in the game feeling a bit long in the tooth after only a few hours of play. The "glass half full" way of looking at this is that my biggest complaint about Rumble Roses is there isn't more of it. This is apparently something Rumble Roses XX addresses, but I've also heard more divisive things about that one... I'd love to say that since I'm buying Xbox 360 games up already that I'd just grab a copy and find out myself, but that thing is 70 damn dollars on average. I like Rumble Roses but not that much.
Anyway, 3/5. Would let Dr. Cutter perform unethical surgery on me.
Speaking of YouTubers, my friend and current Xenosaga hype machine, TransWitchSammy, is the only person I've met in my entire life that has actually played Rumble Roses as a proper video game. I still wasn't very interested until she put me in a mandible claw hold and forced my compliance. I had to look up names of wrestling holds for that joke, by the way. I don't know anything about the sport, I just remember seeing Dean Ambrose bring a Coney Island hot dog cart he stole to a match once, and besides that it's periodic updates from Appreciations about what Cum Punk is up to post-WWE.
I am likewise just as uninitiated with wrestling games, but as I understand it, most of them are total garbage. I can't say how Rumble Roses stacks up against its contemporaries or even modern wrestling games, but in isolation, it's got more going on than I initially thought while still not having enough to sustain me beyond clearing 40% of the roster in story mode.
Much like fighting games, which I often describe in how "responsive" they are and how good the impact of landing a hit feels, I'm so much of a philistine here that I can't articulate the more technical aspects of how this game works. I'm no expert on frame timing, I can't count let alone perceive input delay, I navigate these games the same way I would a real fight, all elbows and open-hand slaps (see: button mashing.) But the specials in this game are ridiculous and bombastic in the way real wrestling techniques are, and they look just as likely to cause real, severe, long-lasting damage when executed by a non-professional, so I'd say Rumble Roses ticks the right boxes.
The story is also appropriately bonkers, and I've made several attempts already to describe it as a mashup of wrestling storylines and fighting game narratives but scrapped all that after realizing they're basically the same thing. Dr. Cutter is doing a whole sexy nurse gimmick, but she's also like, brainwashing wrestlers and turning them into heels in an effort to harvest them for her cyborg, and that's something that feels as ripped from the WWE as it does Tekken.
It's just a shame then that Rumble Roses does so little with the heel/face alternate scenarios for each wrestler. Though this does double the size of the roster, each character's second scenario is truncated, with fewer fights and threadbare narratives that amount to an opening and closing cutscene to establish and bookend their gimmicks. Reiko - a certifiable babyface and the lead character - joins a biker gang, and she is completely unconvincing in the role, like a child wanting to be taken seriously. It's really endearing and silly, but you get so little of it. Likewise, there's a real drought of interesting costumes, with each character getting a normal outfit and swimsuit and a single pallet swap of each. Maybe I'm spoiled on Dead or Alive, but I feel like this misses some of the pageantry of wrestling. I just... I wanna dress up the pretty ladies......... .
There are also only three rings to fight in, one of which being a mud pit, and several wrestlers share moves with one another, which resulted in the game feeling a bit long in the tooth after only a few hours of play. The "glass half full" way of looking at this is that my biggest complaint about Rumble Roses is there isn't more of it. This is apparently something Rumble Roses XX addresses, but I've also heard more divisive things about that one... I'd love to say that since I'm buying Xbox 360 games up already that I'd just grab a copy and find out myself, but that thing is 70 damn dollars on average. I like Rumble Roses but not that much.
Anyway, 3/5. Would let Dr. Cutter perform unethical surgery on me.
Postal
1997
Christian Salyer's soundtrack elevates this from a pretty decent twin stick shooter with not very interesting attempts at transgression to making it feel like I'm committing a crime by continuing to play it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS1sYig7MQo
BioShock Infinite
2013
what if… racism was bad? but what if… hating racism too much… was also bad? wish roger ebert was here to see this… he’d understand just how Important this game is
…I guess, on that point, it’s always interesting to me what games get put on a pedestal — what, according to Gamers, ‘proves’ that games can be art. Every few years it always seems like something comes out that’s immediately lauded for pushing the medium forward, for being more than just something where you press the buttons to run and jump, for really showing just what gaming can be… and they’re usually all triple-A western franchise titles, exorbitantly priced, and being touted as such by more mainstream publications — the ones that don’t generally cover games that don’t have a marketing budget or pre-existing hype behind them. No judgment towards any of those games, of course, I’ve yet to play any of them, but it seems as if the argument is more as to whether mainstream games can be art — whether or not we can make Roger Ebert a Gamer. There’s so many cool games out there that, to some extent have already proved what this medium is capable of, but to some extent, it's always been a measure of self-validation more than it’s ever been a desire to broaden one’s horizons. It’s kind of like those weird Gaylor Swift conspiracy theorists: why listen to an actual LGBT artist when I can instead pretend my favourite white woman actually stands for something? Why leave my comfort zone when I already have the validation I want?
What personally bugs me is that a lot of what gets pushed forward as 'prestige,' I feel, doesn’t truly take advantage of what the medium truly offers, or, as is often the case, are actively scared of letting you actually play the game. There are so many cool things you can do, so many ways you could use game mechanics or ludonarrative to illustrate or underline a thematic point, but so many of these Elevated games instead feel like they’re going for things that movies can already do, and I feel like that’s leaning in the wrong direction as to what can, honestly, feel profound. Just as an off-the-cuff example, the final choice of Ace Attorney: Justice For All asks whether you, as the defense, plead your client as guilty or innocent. Do you believe in protecting your client, or protecting the innocent? Do you exact (relative) mercy on somebody who’s wronged you? Or do you subject them to the monkey’s paw-esque fate they've more than had coming? Which of those is truly just? It’s not a choice that matters — the scene plays out the same regardless of what you pick — but in this sense the option you choose exposes something of you, the player: what you value, and what you, personally, have taken out of everything that’s just happened. You have to choose — the scene doesn’t move forward until you do — and in that sense, it's something that could only be done within an interactive medium: you are directly made to engage with the text, you are directly made to provide your own interpretation of its thematic content. BioShock Infinite does something similar within its first hour, and the question asked is just as profound: are you racist? Or are you not racist?
…I don’t think it’s really going to be possible to talk about BioShock Infinite without talking about… all that, huh?
sigh
I have to begin this with a disclaimer, I guess: I’m white, I don’t think I’m entirely equipped to be talking about this, but the guy who wrote this is also white so maybe, actually, I’m just as qualified to at least try. This game thinks it's making this grand, profound statement about how racism is bad — and how the ‘good old days’ of the U.S, as is the visual aesthetic of Columbia, was built on the abuse and discrimination of the non-whites and immigrants — yet fails to back that up at every turn. For as loudly as it says it, it doesn’t feel like it has much to actually say, with most of its observations feeling so so, surface level. What does the game define ‘racism’ as, anyway? Is it the mere act of an individual discriminating against another on the basis of their race, or is it the systemic act of providing opportunities and benefits to one group over others? Is this society meant to be based off of the pre-emancipation era of the United States, the ‘separate but equal’ segregation that preceded the civil rights movement, or one of the periods in-between? Is there anything that can be said about how white supremacy movements are still prevalent today? Is there anything worth mentioning in how almost all the enemies during the first half of the game are cops? I wouldn’t know: the game doesn’t seem particularly interested in actually going in-depth on the topic, feeling like it’s merely taking a brave stance of ‘racism was bad’ and expecting that to be enough.
And it’s frustrating because it often feels like the game is on the cusp of saying something actually potent… right before it veers away without fully committing to it. You start the game in a church, it becomes clear that Columbia is very much a fundamentalist state. You could maybe lean into how most fundamentalists will misquote or selectively take from the Bible to justify their bigotry, or maybe even go into how the church was often used to subjugate and control colonized peoples… or you could simply treat this the same way the racism is treated in general: very surface level, religious fundamentalism is bad because religious fundamentalism is bad and because using religious words like 'our prophet' and 'messiah' to surround your bad guy is subversive and creepy. Early on, after rescuing Elizabeth, you’re sent to a beach area, you get to mingle, and you learn that the segregation discriminates against the Irish, as well. You could use this to maybe go into the historical mistreatment of Ireland, maybe show how these fascist systems will keep moving the goalposts until those at the very top of their hierarchy remain… or you could just, like, never really bring it up again. That works too. Later on, you go into a museum, you find out that the justification for this discrimination is that the founder/prophet of Columbia lost his wife because the labor underclass rose up and killed her and this could be so fascinating and a window of the paradox in how fascist systems treat women: both as one of the defacto ‘inferiors’ to be subjugated… yet at the same time the madonna figure, whose innocence must be protected, and who through this comes the justification to commit atrocities against the other inferiors. The game is on the cusp of realizing this with Elizabeth — being locked up in a gilded cage, being forbidden from interacting with the outside world, yet also being a literal symbol, both the justification and continuation of this totalitarian system — and then this is all just thrown to the wayside because the story wants her to be Cute and Quirky. Every time this story stumbles on something it could actually say it decides it doesn’t feel like doing so. It wants credit for taking the stance it does but never actually wants to get its feet in the muck. And here I thought art was meant to alienate. Silly me.
(also… I feel like if you’re at least trying to condemn racism I don’t think it’s a great idea to have the only defined asian characters be speaking in broken English? again, white guy over here, I don’t want to make assumptions on things I don’t know well about, but, like, maybe not the time and place?)
I mean, I guess it’s trying to be anti-racist. I think that’s what it’s trying to be. I mean I’m not as confident as I was initially because holy shit does the game fucking swerve on its message right at the halfway point. See, by opposing the forces of Columbia, you eventually come into contact with a cabal of rebels seeking to overthrow this fascist system. You help them out (but… only because you’re forced to, Booker is rather ‘yeah whatever’ about basically everything other than Elizabeth), and by changing the timeline to give them GUNS you give them the means to meaningfully act out and rise up against their oppressors… to which the game immediately goes “oh no… this protest… is too violent… are these people really all that different from the slave owners?” And then suddenly the rebel leader goes “oh, by the way, something something you’re not the real you, you must die,” the game decides to show she’s actually The Bad Guy by having her try and murder a child, Elizabeth is made to kill her, and Booker’s response, verbatim, is “the only difference between [a racist, totalitarian system] and [trying to overthrow said racist, totalitarian system] is how you spell the name.” Maybe the Vox Populi should’ve just protested peacefully, ala MLK and Ghandi. Maybe we should’ve just voted out Hitler. And- and honestly what’s most wild for me is that this is how the game just fucking forgets that it’s about fascism and racism right after this. You watch Elizabeth shootthe only named black character in the game the rebel leader and the fallout of the scene is pressing F to reassure her that everything’s okay. The rest of the plot that follows is almost exclusively about time travel and alternate dimensions as opposed to anything regarding the rather delicate subject matter the game was attempting to handle earlier. The slavery of this one white woman is more important than the slavery of Columbia’s entire underclass. You shoot down rebel soldiers almost exclusively past this point and neither you nor the narrative bats an eye.
(addendum here: a friend pointed me towards BioShock Infinite’s Wikipedia page and I really just have to share this paragraph here because, like, what the fuck do you mean “the good and bad sides of racism”? what the fuck do you mean you weren’t trying to make a point and were merely trying to be 'accurate for the time'? I’m going to selectively apply death of the author here so that I don’t have to edit everything I just said because, like, jesus dude, I don't think a game has ever made me lose respect for its writer like this)
One last thing before I move on past the story: I’m notttttttt an Elizabeth fan, sorry. She never quite felt real or consistent as a character; more like a manic pixie dream girl, malleable to be whatever is required to facilitate the plot. The moment you meet her is the moment you free her from the gilded cage she’s been trapped in her whole life, and it was the same moment my suspension of belief broke. It feels like Elizabeth has barely any reaction to any of this, no horror at realizing just how large the world around her actually is, no transitional period to actually being outside for the first time in her life, she’s just immediately exuberant, so wide-eyed at everything, unable to stop herself from dancingwith racists as soon as she hears fiddle music. And it comes off like like it’s trying to make her so Cute and Quirky and Lovable and to me it never really worked. Especially when the game pulls absolutely all the narrative beats you’d expect it to. The Liar Revealed bit leading into the Second Act Breakup — where once you get back together and she still doesn’t trust you the game can’t even fucking commit and have her not help you as much during combat because then maybe that’d at least be a fun way this attempt at art could actually remember what medium it’s in. You’ll have an argument that’ll open a (metaphorical) rift between the two of you and then you’ll point at a locked door and she’ll be like “I’ll get that open for you Mr. Booker : ) “ So much of her dialogue — especially once the game decides it wants to be about alternate dimensions and time travel — is so flowery and… honestly, I’d say a bit pretentious in execution, feeling like it’s actively trying to position itself (and a lot of the plot elements here) as complex and smart, thinking that by making it just barely intelligible whoever’s playing it will be like “wow… this is so complicated… and beyond me… this game is so intelligent…” By the way I just love how the game says, verbatim, “[y]ou don’t need to protect Elizabeth in combat[,] she can take care of herself” like it’s some girl power, progressive thing… then all she actually does in combat is throw you items, open doors you can't, let you tear rifts in time to give you things that’ll help you, teleport right near you when you’re not looking like that one Sherlock Holmes game. She’s basically all the things an escort NPC does except I guess making you actually have to escort her would be a point of division among the Gamers. And it very much falls into that trope where a female character primarily exists to bolster their male counterpart, except here they try and dress it up as if it's subversive and feminist. Between that and some of the quips, you could’ve made me think Joss Whedon wrote this.
So, uh, yeah. I’m not particularly into what this game has going narrative-wise. It wants to act as if it’s tackling these huge themes, it thinks it’s profound by doing so, yet at every turn it feels so unwilling to divide, or challenge, or properly stand for something that it veers away from anything interesting it could actually say — let alone how little it does anything with the medium it’s actually in. And- and Jesus I’m still so thrown by how it can’t commit to even going just ‘racism’ is bad, it has to both sides it, it has to please everybody, it’s so scared of alienating that it alienates itself. If this is art, then maybe that speaks to having to go back to art class.
...At least the gameplay’s loosely fun?
Which reveals my position in the debate, I guess. For all I’ve talked about what makes art — and why I feel like sometimes what gets touted as prestige doesn’t quite meet the metric — I don’t really have much of a horse in this race. I’ll be happy to do my best to discuss themes, and I’ll always look at these things as more than just product, but as a writer, as someone who looks at things from that lens, I’ve always personally been more interested in looking at things from a technical lens: the craft, how it’s refined, what works, what could use improvement. And from that lens, BioShock Infinite is… cromulent. I like shooting things. I like the way the game only giving you two guns basically encourages you to vary with what you carry with you — building an impromptu armory from whatever you can scrounge up around you. I’m fond of the ‘vigors’/phasmids/magic spells you can use, how they all help out in different ways. I especially like how this combines with the gear system in a way that lets the player create legit builds: on my end, I eventually ended up with this playstyle where I’d use a vigor to fling myself directly towards an enemy, whereupon I’d create a giant AOE explosion and wipe out whatever cluster of enemies surrounds my target. I also like the way the game… both hews close and veers away from BioShock the series. It has all the hallmarks, all the defining characteristics that made the series what it was, yet it alters or recontextualizes them in a way that makes them feel fresh. Chief among these is the setting — which, while visually rather breathtaking on its own, really works as a companion piece to Rapture, a city in the sky rather than a city in the sea — but there are other things too: the anachronistic covers of 60s-80s songs mirror BioShock 1/2‘s usage of period-accurate music while also working to set up the timey-wimey aspects of the plot. The combat feels exactly like the previous two games, yet the use of more open areas, in addition to mechanics like the skywires and the rifts make it feel much more fluid, much more arcadey than the claustrophobic meat grinder of Rapture. I’m not entirely sure whether it’s a step forward or a step back, necessarily, but it’s certainly an iteration: things have been looked at, tweaked to become brand new… while not losing the same feel they used to have. It’s neat to see in action.
But man, while I’m not somebody who usually likes judging a work for being an adaptation, a sequel, whatever, it is just… rather tragic that a lot of the wrong lessons seem to have been learned from it. The original BioShock, to me, is genuinely so cool in showing just what videogames: silly moral choice system aside, there’s so much going on with ludonarrative, and diegesis, and it feels like every little videogame-logic thing has something going on behind it in a way that contributes to the overall picture. To go from that, to something that has virtually nothing going on mechanically is such a disappointment. And, in turn, when what’s there instead is something that feels like it’s convinced itself of its ascension, that takes real-world sensitive subject matter for the sake of set design and abandons it once it's no longer needed, that mistakes being complicated for being smart, man am I not impressed. It’s funny, honestly, how this loosely ushered the whole era we’re in of prestige, ‘artsy’ games that at the same time seem so afraid of being video games, because it’s BioShock Infinite’s gameplay that makes me hesitate to call it outright bad. It thinks it’s some profound work, some real watershed moment, something that’s really pushing the medium of gaming forward. In reality, it feels much more like Oscar bait. 4/10.
…I guess, on that point, it’s always interesting to me what games get put on a pedestal — what, according to Gamers, ‘proves’ that games can be art. Every few years it always seems like something comes out that’s immediately lauded for pushing the medium forward, for being more than just something where you press the buttons to run and jump, for really showing just what gaming can be… and they’re usually all triple-A western franchise titles, exorbitantly priced, and being touted as such by more mainstream publications — the ones that don’t generally cover games that don’t have a marketing budget or pre-existing hype behind them. No judgment towards any of those games, of course, I’ve yet to play any of them, but it seems as if the argument is more as to whether mainstream games can be art — whether or not we can make Roger Ebert a Gamer. There’s so many cool games out there that, to some extent have already proved what this medium is capable of, but to some extent, it's always been a measure of self-validation more than it’s ever been a desire to broaden one’s horizons. It’s kind of like those weird Gaylor Swift conspiracy theorists: why listen to an actual LGBT artist when I can instead pretend my favourite white woman actually stands for something? Why leave my comfort zone when I already have the validation I want?
What personally bugs me is that a lot of what gets pushed forward as 'prestige,' I feel, doesn’t truly take advantage of what the medium truly offers, or, as is often the case, are actively scared of letting you actually play the game. There are so many cool things you can do, so many ways you could use game mechanics or ludonarrative to illustrate or underline a thematic point, but so many of these Elevated games instead feel like they’re going for things that movies can already do, and I feel like that’s leaning in the wrong direction as to what can, honestly, feel profound. Just as an off-the-cuff example, the final choice of Ace Attorney: Justice For All asks whether you, as the defense, plead your client as guilty or innocent. Do you believe in protecting your client, or protecting the innocent? Do you exact (relative) mercy on somebody who’s wronged you? Or do you subject them to the monkey’s paw-esque fate they've more than had coming? Which of those is truly just? It’s not a choice that matters — the scene plays out the same regardless of what you pick — but in this sense the option you choose exposes something of you, the player: what you value, and what you, personally, have taken out of everything that’s just happened. You have to choose — the scene doesn’t move forward until you do — and in that sense, it's something that could only be done within an interactive medium: you are directly made to engage with the text, you are directly made to provide your own interpretation of its thematic content. BioShock Infinite does something similar within its first hour, and the question asked is just as profound: are you racist? Or are you not racist?
…I don’t think it’s really going to be possible to talk about BioShock Infinite without talking about… all that, huh?
sigh
I have to begin this with a disclaimer, I guess: I’m white, I don’t think I’m entirely equipped to be talking about this, but the guy who wrote this is also white so maybe, actually, I’m just as qualified to at least try. This game thinks it's making this grand, profound statement about how racism is bad — and how the ‘good old days’ of the U.S, as is the visual aesthetic of Columbia, was built on the abuse and discrimination of the non-whites and immigrants — yet fails to back that up at every turn. For as loudly as it says it, it doesn’t feel like it has much to actually say, with most of its observations feeling so so, surface level. What does the game define ‘racism’ as, anyway? Is it the mere act of an individual discriminating against another on the basis of their race, or is it the systemic act of providing opportunities and benefits to one group over others? Is this society meant to be based off of the pre-emancipation era of the United States, the ‘separate but equal’ segregation that preceded the civil rights movement, or one of the periods in-between? Is there anything that can be said about how white supremacy movements are still prevalent today? Is there anything worth mentioning in how almost all the enemies during the first half of the game are cops? I wouldn’t know: the game doesn’t seem particularly interested in actually going in-depth on the topic, feeling like it’s merely taking a brave stance of ‘racism was bad’ and expecting that to be enough.
And it’s frustrating because it often feels like the game is on the cusp of saying something actually potent… right before it veers away without fully committing to it. You start the game in a church, it becomes clear that Columbia is very much a fundamentalist state. You could maybe lean into how most fundamentalists will misquote or selectively take from the Bible to justify their bigotry, or maybe even go into how the church was often used to subjugate and control colonized peoples… or you could simply treat this the same way the racism is treated in general: very surface level, religious fundamentalism is bad because religious fundamentalism is bad and because using religious words like 'our prophet' and 'messiah' to surround your bad guy is subversive and creepy. Early on, after rescuing Elizabeth, you’re sent to a beach area, you get to mingle, and you learn that the segregation discriminates against the Irish, as well. You could use this to maybe go into the historical mistreatment of Ireland, maybe show how these fascist systems will keep moving the goalposts until those at the very top of their hierarchy remain… or you could just, like, never really bring it up again. That works too. Later on, you go into a museum, you find out that the justification for this discrimination is that the founder/prophet of Columbia lost his wife because the labor underclass rose up and killed her and this could be so fascinating and a window of the paradox in how fascist systems treat women: both as one of the defacto ‘inferiors’ to be subjugated… yet at the same time the madonna figure, whose innocence must be protected, and who through this comes the justification to commit atrocities against the other inferiors. The game is on the cusp of realizing this with Elizabeth — being locked up in a gilded cage, being forbidden from interacting with the outside world, yet also being a literal symbol, both the justification and continuation of this totalitarian system — and then this is all just thrown to the wayside because the story wants her to be Cute and Quirky. Every time this story stumbles on something it could actually say it decides it doesn’t feel like doing so. It wants credit for taking the stance it does but never actually wants to get its feet in the muck. And here I thought art was meant to alienate. Silly me.
(also… I feel like if you’re at least trying to condemn racism I don’t think it’s a great idea to have the only defined asian characters be speaking in broken English? again, white guy over here, I don’t want to make assumptions on things I don’t know well about, but, like, maybe not the time and place?)
I mean, I guess it’s trying to be anti-racist. I think that’s what it’s trying to be. I mean I’m not as confident as I was initially because holy shit does the game fucking swerve on its message right at the halfway point. See, by opposing the forces of Columbia, you eventually come into contact with a cabal of rebels seeking to overthrow this fascist system. You help them out (but… only because you’re forced to, Booker is rather ‘yeah whatever’ about basically everything other than Elizabeth), and by changing the timeline to give them GUNS you give them the means to meaningfully act out and rise up against their oppressors… to which the game immediately goes “oh no… this protest… is too violent… are these people really all that different from the slave owners?” And then suddenly the rebel leader goes “oh, by the way, something something you’re not the real you, you must die,” the game decides to show she’s actually The Bad Guy by having her try and murder a child, Elizabeth is made to kill her, and Booker’s response, verbatim, is “the only difference between [a racist, totalitarian system] and [trying to overthrow said racist, totalitarian system] is how you spell the name.” Maybe the Vox Populi should’ve just protested peacefully, ala MLK and Ghandi. Maybe we should’ve just voted out Hitler. And- and honestly what’s most wild for me is that this is how the game just fucking forgets that it’s about fascism and racism right after this. You watch Elizabeth shoot
(addendum here: a friend pointed me towards BioShock Infinite’s Wikipedia page and I really just have to share this paragraph here because, like, what the fuck do you mean “the good and bad sides of racism”? what the fuck do you mean you weren’t trying to make a point and were merely trying to be 'accurate for the time'? I’m going to selectively apply death of the author here so that I don’t have to edit everything I just said because, like, jesus dude, I don't think a game has ever made me lose respect for its writer like this)
One last thing before I move on past the story: I’m notttttttt an Elizabeth fan, sorry. She never quite felt real or consistent as a character; more like a manic pixie dream girl, malleable to be whatever is required to facilitate the plot. The moment you meet her is the moment you free her from the gilded cage she’s been trapped in her whole life, and it was the same moment my suspension of belief broke. It feels like Elizabeth has barely any reaction to any of this, no horror at realizing just how large the world around her actually is, no transitional period to actually being outside for the first time in her life, she’s just immediately exuberant, so wide-eyed at everything, unable to stop herself from dancing
So, uh, yeah. I’m not particularly into what this game has going narrative-wise. It wants to act as if it’s tackling these huge themes, it thinks it’s profound by doing so, yet at every turn it feels so unwilling to divide, or challenge, or properly stand for something that it veers away from anything interesting it could actually say — let alone how little it does anything with the medium it’s actually in. And- and Jesus I’m still so thrown by how it can’t commit to even going just ‘racism’ is bad, it has to both sides it, it has to please everybody, it’s so scared of alienating that it alienates itself. If this is art, then maybe that speaks to having to go back to art class.
...At least the gameplay’s loosely fun?
Which reveals my position in the debate, I guess. For all I’ve talked about what makes art — and why I feel like sometimes what gets touted as prestige doesn’t quite meet the metric — I don’t really have much of a horse in this race. I’ll be happy to do my best to discuss themes, and I’ll always look at these things as more than just product, but as a writer, as someone who looks at things from that lens, I’ve always personally been more interested in looking at things from a technical lens: the craft, how it’s refined, what works, what could use improvement. And from that lens, BioShock Infinite is… cromulent. I like shooting things. I like the way the game only giving you two guns basically encourages you to vary with what you carry with you — building an impromptu armory from whatever you can scrounge up around you. I’m fond of the ‘vigors’/phasmids/magic spells you can use, how they all help out in different ways. I especially like how this combines with the gear system in a way that lets the player create legit builds: on my end, I eventually ended up with this playstyle where I’d use a vigor to fling myself directly towards an enemy, whereupon I’d create a giant AOE explosion and wipe out whatever cluster of enemies surrounds my target. I also like the way the game… both hews close and veers away from BioShock the series. It has all the hallmarks, all the defining characteristics that made the series what it was, yet it alters or recontextualizes them in a way that makes them feel fresh. Chief among these is the setting — which, while visually rather breathtaking on its own, really works as a companion piece to Rapture, a city in the sky rather than a city in the sea — but there are other things too: the anachronistic covers of 60s-80s songs mirror BioShock 1/2‘s usage of period-accurate music while also working to set up the timey-wimey aspects of the plot. The combat feels exactly like the previous two games, yet the use of more open areas, in addition to mechanics like the skywires and the rifts make it feel much more fluid, much more arcadey than the claustrophobic meat grinder of Rapture. I’m not entirely sure whether it’s a step forward or a step back, necessarily, but it’s certainly an iteration: things have been looked at, tweaked to become brand new… while not losing the same feel they used to have. It’s neat to see in action.
But man, while I’m not somebody who usually likes judging a work for being an adaptation, a sequel, whatever, it is just… rather tragic that a lot of the wrong lessons seem to have been learned from it. The original BioShock, to me, is genuinely so cool in showing just what videogames: silly moral choice system aside, there’s so much going on with ludonarrative, and diegesis, and it feels like every little videogame-logic thing has something going on behind it in a way that contributes to the overall picture. To go from that, to something that has virtually nothing going on mechanically is such a disappointment. And, in turn, when what’s there instead is something that feels like it’s convinced itself of its ascension, that takes real-world sensitive subject matter for the sake of set design and abandons it once it's no longer needed, that mistakes being complicated for being smart, man am I not impressed. It’s funny, honestly, how this loosely ushered the whole era we’re in of prestige, ‘artsy’ games that at the same time seem so afraid of being video games, because it’s BioShock Infinite’s gameplay that makes me hesitate to call it outright bad. It thinks it’s some profound work, some real watershed moment, something that’s really pushing the medium of gaming forward. In reality, it feels much more like Oscar bait. 4/10.