transgamerthoughts

[transgamerthoughts]

a night at poe's masquerade

Last night I made a quick tweet about how I think Persona games (particular from Persona 3 onwards) tend to be fundamentally conservative games. In worlds filled with magic powers, shadow selves, and literal gods there's an understanding that many of the most villainous people you can know are folks in positions of social/political power who weaponize their status in order to prey on those beneath them. This is a particular focus of Persona 5 but it extends even back to back to a game like Persona 2 and characters like Tatsuzou Sudou. Although these games acknowledge the social structures that lead to particularly vicious kinds of abuse, there is tendency for our protagonist to then fold themselves into those power structures. In games that focus less on real-life political allegory, there's still pattern of protagonists eventually accepting the societal roles that they're initial chafing against. It's a very common occurrence in the series. clockwork!

Persona 4 is the chief culprit here. Yukiko struggles with the idea that her presumed inheritance of the Amagi Inn is an imposition on her life but makes peace with that fact and eventually prepares herself for that role. Chie confronts Adachi, shocked that anyone who chose to be a police officer would do so for selfish reasons or betray the ideal image she holds of that job. Though confronted with the ways in which the system enabled Adachi's murders, she ultimately decided that she wants to become a police officer. Just as some examples. there's more. it's a fraught game in many ways

(I'm not gonna talk about Naoto. That's a minefield. as a trans critic people ask what I think about Naoto quite often. my answer is I like Naoto quite a bit and while I appreciate the queer read I don't need her story to be actually about transness. my tongue in cheek deep position here is that I think she's the damn coolest thing in the Dancing All Night opening movie. absolute fire!)

Persona fans are totally reasonable human beings. by which I mean that they might be the most electric and fuckin' absurd fandom I've ever encountered. While some people agreed with my read of the series, many others swarmed in. Which is fine enough. That's just what happens when you're visible on Twitter. I don't really have an interest in outlining the series in gross detail although, contrary to many accusations, I have played all the mainline games. One thing that can never be hurled my way is a suggestion that I don't play videos games. This criticism doesn't arise out of nowhere though I admit I didn't exactly expect it to become a trending topic floating in the "For You" tab. I was tweeting before bed.

Lesson learned! this fandom is wild! So it goes!

I've been thinking about people's responses and I want to venture into fraught territory to talk about a particularly bad habit I see from many fans. Which I think can be extended to things like ongoing debates about localization as much as they can apply to this little tempest in a teapot. Which is that I've grown somewhat concerned with he ways in which RPG fans (intentionally or not) exoticize Japan as a means to defend their favorite games from critique. It's kinda bad!

and I'm gonna risk a ramble exploring the topic… and I wonder how tumblr in 2024 will compare in reaction to hellscape of twitter

Something you often encounter in these discussions is an implication (sometimes a direct suggestion) that it is impossible to really engage with Japanese media as a westerner. That there's too many layers of nuance and too many centuries of ingrained tradition for anyone who has not engaged in lengthy study on the topic to penetrate. Often, this is framed as a desire to simply put things in cultural contexts. respect it and give due seriousness! Which is fine. I absolutely think if you wanna talk about something like the portrayal of the Japanese justice system in Judgement, it probably helps to… y'know… know details about the Japanese justice system. If you want to talk about how a game approaches gender, an understanding of certain social mores is important. No one debates this; it's important to understand art as arising from specific material conditions and places.

This is not really the approach people take however. Instead there is an insistence that the cultural difference between Japan and western nations is essentially insurmountable. Which has some bad implications. I think people are well meaning when they're like "hey, you gotta watch this YouTuber talk about Shintoism and JRPG boss fights for over an hour" but it comes at the cost of painting the culture as something of a puzzle to solve. and make no mistake: I'm glad anyone is doing the work but there's a bit of strangeness at play when folks are like "well you're American" and then tell me to watch criticism also made by Americans. especially since I do have a educational background that includes the study of world religions. i've studied plenty of this! and it's not impossible for me to have grasped.

the world is beautiful and nuanced and specific and full of vibrancies. but these things are not so singular that we can't connect with them or come to know them. and those nuances and specifics and vibrances don't create a protective ward around works. if anything, they're invitations to explore something new. if I walk away from Persona with a position that you don't agree with I promise that it's not something that's happened in haste. It used to be my job to think about games. and I've thought about Persona a lot! it's not inaccesible.

When we start to paint a culture as being particularly foreign we inherently exoticize it. We drape a degree of mystery over it which implies there is no universal connections found in art. Of course the concept of "police" is different in Japan to some extent as is the expectations that go into inheriting a family business. yes, the social nuances of a classroom differ. But Japan is not so alien to the western critic that we can't look at popular fiction and spot patterns. I certain don't need a 17 anime consumer to write me an essay on honne and tatemae or whatever in order to understand what's going on in the Midnight Channel. It's an easily observable truth that Persona often identifies issues within Japan society while also (particularly in Persona 5's case) concluding that these problems are not a consequence of specific power structures but rather moral failings of certain bad individuals. That's the text. Even when it wants to suggest otherwise.

Here's a little snippet from Persona 5. On face value, it seems to contradict what I'm saying. "Harper, how can you say that it only cares about individuals when it outright says that society itself needs to be addressed!?" DO YOU EVEN PLAY THESE GAMES YOU BITCH?! The answer is that the game does not have a model or idea of what it means to change society except vaguely to inspire people to more individual action. be nicer. stand up for yourself, speak your truth, do things for your own reasons. which has a radical element to it in the context to be sure but we've spent a huge portion of the game seeing how the abuse of power, particularly power placed in certain positions and social strata

a change of mindset is good but… is that sufficient? I'm not entirely convinced. not if this game want to truly deliver on everything it has explored. (side note, a lot of folks were like "why are you focusing on p5 so much here?" and the answer is that it's recent, representative of the series' values from the last decade or so, and because I'm a tired adult in their 30s who has stuff to do and isn't obligated to make a 300 tweet long thread breaking down multiple scripts. if you want me to do that labor, you better pay me for my time. otherwise I don't care to appease fan who have no plans of truly entertaining what I'd do anyway. no breakdown I do could please them)

but you fight Yaldabaoth Harper! You kill the collective gestalt representative of the status quo!. okay sure but the metaphorical battle falters as the game ultimately imagines many of our heroes (for instance Makoto, who also decides to become a cop even after her sister leaves the profession to become a defense attorney) are content to slide into the power structures as they exist. they've simply become "good apples" in the same basket that held the bad ones What does it matter if you kill the metaphor when you don't carry through elsewhere? It's not simply some vague human desire to be exploited that created the various monstrous villains we face throughout the game. There's real material circumstances, systems and long-held powers that gave them the carte blanche that enabled their abuses! Be they financial, political, or even sexual.

We might layer nuances on top of this of course. Notions of reticence to change or valuing of tradition, attitudes towards elders. But when we do so it's important be careful. When fans imply impenetrabilities in the works by virtue of cultural difference, there's a risk of veering into a kind of Orientalism. One which mystifies the culture and turns it into a kind of "other." Distant, strange. This sometimes comes paired with a kind of infantilization of creators but that's a different though similarly fraught topic that I think is particularly best left in the hands of the creators themselves. I'm not the person to talk about that!

Nevertheless, a frustrating part of the response to my tweet today has been a rush to say "This work functions that makes it necessarily elide your ability to critique it."

I'll be an ass and generalize. It's mostly people with Persona avatars making this suggest. That Persona, as a Japanese work, is imbued with an ineffable quality that magically allows it to side-step what's ultimately a pretty timid conclusion. Many of these folks are younger players, self-identified as such in profiles, who clearly have a deep connection to the series. It means something to them. But I'd rather they simply say "hey, I found this thing particularly moving at an important moment in my life" rather than conjure an impassable ocean between myself (or really anyone) and the work in the event they find flaws.

Otherwise, you just get this:

Stories are not merely about what happens on the journey. The destination does matter. It means something when the king grabs his shining sword and fights off the orc invaders or whatever. A value system is suggested Similarly, it does means something when Chie becomes a cop. (This is just a shorthand example mind you! But you hopefully get the idea!)

I don't think games or any work of art need us to defend them. The trap of fandom is that you often turn to any possible means to justify what you love. For Persona, a series which does have the decency to explore cultural issues, that same cultural specificity is often weaponize by fans (largely western fans even!) to deflect certain problems. This process inadvertently portrays that culture as a mystery, a shrouded thing that we cannot ever criticize. It's one thing to dig into some of those contextual specifics but it's another all-together to imply these specifics provide a mean to abrogate certain analyses. and I think navigating the line between due deference and something deeper and stranger seems to be something many of the fans reacting to me... have not managed. I had a peer talk to me about this situation and their feeling was that the animated members of the fandom that were coming at me, many of whom are self-identified as young and western, were kinda treating Japan like it was a land of elves. which it's not! it is a place on Earth and yes we need to take strides to understand and respect certain specificities... but we can't mystify an entire people. especially if the purpose is to turn those people and their culture into a shield. a means to justify and validate the specialness you see in a franchise.

I call Persona conservative because it cannot imagine a world in any other shape that what we have right now. God dies but nothing actually changes. I don't think it's enough to say "well, they defeated the god! and they needed the collective strength of society to do it! people did change because without that change of heart, the heroes wouldn't have the magical juice to fight the Kabbalah monster!" to toss Makoto's words back at the series: victory against a single god is meaningless if the true enemy is society.

If you can't show me what that grand spiritual change means for society, then I think you've kinda failed. you've certainly failed if the conclusion is that the world after that change is functionally the same and it doesn't really matter to me if "they talk about this in Strikers or whatever" because you can't offload your thematic snarls to side games. if the main stories you tell can't resolve this tension, that's a problem. these are often very beautiful games. they certainly have amazing structure and systems. but I don't think it's controversial to say they often hedge their bets at the end. and there's no impenetrable cultural wall surrounding the games that leaves the criticism off the table.

that's just What Happens. and it's fine for us to acknowledge flaws in even in things that contain beauty or meant something to us

really. it's fine.

#persona #casual game crit #fandom

[transgamerthoughts]

You've Done It Before. You Can Do It Again

In 1997, Aeris died. She was not the first to die in our quests to save the world and she would not be the last. But posterity has dictated that she is the most important. Both Gaming's Messiah and Madonna, her death didn't just save the Planet. It saved the artform.

We'd never felt such a loss! Or so the mythologizing goes. It's all a bit silly really.

Decades later, Kazushige Nojima and Yoshinori Kitase have brought us to this moment once more and dangled a wonderful possibility before us: this time it could be different.

Aerith kneels in prayer at the center of a swirl of franchise detritus and magick'd wills. Cloud wants one thing. Sephiroth wants another. Players want one thing. The writers want another.

What does Aerith want?

Here, in this moment where destiny and culture is made, Rebirth comes to a baffling conclusion. So! Let's talk about ending things…

Aerith is dead. Aerith is alive.

I’m not particularly interested in what this moment means to games culture as a whole (though we must unavoidably discuss that a little bit) and I think that while it isn’t incorrect to look at Rebirth and conclude that it was playing to the audience more often than it was telling a self-contained story, I’m more interested in why Nojima and Kitase reached this moment and decided that it was truly sacrosanct after all. It’s somewhat cynical to boil Rebirth down to a game meant only to string along an audience when it is also art wherein key individuals involved with the original enterprise are navigating their way back through their old work. There's more happening here than AAA product.

I mean… there has to be.

Right? This is the story they wanted to tell. I gotta at least grant them that much. and if you're reading this, I'm gonna assume you've played the game because I don't wanna do a beat for beat breakdown of everything in Rebirth that led to this moment. i'll cover some of it but I'm writing on my own damn personal blog. i have the luxury of being messy.

I’m often accused of thinking the best of people too often but the alternative is assuming the worst. While it is not unfair to say that Rebirth ultimately does focus on the allure of mystery and speculation over more wondrous and original options, it ignores the obvious reality that the game culminates in a battle over whether or not you actually can change something and whether or not certain stories do end up crystalized within culture.

“Can I change this thing which defined me?" Rebirth asks.

It is ultimately a disappointment that, in the swirl of magick and ghosts and souls where all things can happen, Nojima and his cohort conclude that they can’t change. Because I don’t think they care about what this moment means to the fans. It means something to them.

They are clinging to this for their own sake. But why?

Before we start, let's outline the raw mechanics of the plot. They're not as complicated as people want to suggest but for the sake of discussion we might as well be clear.

Throughout Remake, in moments where the story threatens to veer from the 1997 original, strange spirits arrive to place things back on course. These are arbiters of "fate" but we later come to understand that they represent, to one extent or another, the will of the planet.

Cloud and co defeat these spirits at the end of Remake. This creates, in theory, a world that does not need to follow the exact plot of the original game. It can be different this time.

Rebirth shows that all possibilities exists side by side in the Lifestream. Fans tend to calls these "timelines" but I think it's better to just think of them as a big swirl of memories and possibility in the heart of the planet. The planet is a nexus. All things exist within its blood.

It is possible to travel between these parallel potentialities or else sometimes brush up against them. This can happen through dreams, it can happen when interacting directly with the Lifestream. In some cases, intervention at the point of your fated death in one world can send you into these different potentialities. This happens to Zack and Biggs.

Sephiroth wants to unite all these worlds and fuck 'em up. Basically: he wants to do what he did in the original game across all possible worlds. Not more complicated than that.

The party doesn't really know any of this added layer really. They just want to stop Sephiroth from dropping Meteor on the world. Who wouldn't?

Much like in the original, Aerith resolves to stop this by praying at the Forgotten Capital with the White Materia so that Holy can be summoned to save the planet.

She vaguely knows this will lead to her death. Nanaki knows something bad is fated to happen to Aerith.

Cloud has a sense of this too kinda.

There's more to it than that. There's new history behind the Black Materia (I've written about why I'm not a fan of that stuff really) and a dimensional shell game where the White Materia is traveling between potentialities. But the ultimate point of that is that it needs to make it here. To this moment. And yeah, that's a lot of moving parts but basically: she wants to summon Holy. Ya gotta summon the Big Good Magic and in saving one world, you can save 'em all. You've done it before. Do it again.

(And before you say it yes the fact that I needed to make a list of mechanical points it a bit of a strike against the plot but it's really not that tricky to follow.)

Regardless: Aerith's gotta die. The planet's set on it. Literally! There's white colored shadow-whispers trying to make this happen. They attempt to ward Cloud off from reaching Aerith at the capital. Because if Cloud reaches, things could be different this time.

He will save her. Will he save her?

Those whispers are funny thing. In writing about Remake after release, I concluded that the Whispers in that game might be seen as the legions of fans swarming the story with their expectations. Make this exactly like I remember or else! We will bend anything and everything to have the version of the story we want. In slaying those ghosts, Cloud and his friends take the story into their own hands. The story doesn't belong to the fans. It belongs to the characters. Which leaves limitless possibilities on the table. New endings, new fates.

I didn't know what to think when white Whispers showed up in Rebirth, seemingly desperate on making sure Aerith died. They were different than the shadowy fan-coded Whispers from before. They were extensions of Aerith herself. Manifestations of the Planet's desires.

They were the guiding hands of Kitase and Nojima pushing Cloud and the player down a different path. And this time, there is no besting fate. Aerith's gotta die.

Cloud reaches that fateful moment in the Forgotten Capital and when Sephiroth descends to stab Aerith, our hero swings his sword. NO! His blade clashes with the villains and the blow never comes. He has performed a miracle. Except…

The miracle reverts. Blood magically reappears on Sephiroth's blade. Aerith opens her eyes. Everything is happening. Nothing has happened. There is a wild swirl of boss battles. First against Jenova. Because Aerith is dead. Our heroes lash out in their sorrow and fight back.

We are in a focal point of possibility. Zack emerges in the swirl to fight side by side with Cloud. Our heroes fight a version of Bizzaro Sephiroth (here called Sephiroth Reborn) across multiple realms of reality. It's a fight lifted from the end of the original game and here it is at what was once the end of disc 1. And when the villain's transformed super-self falls, Cloud is left alone and face to face with his tormentor. He stares Sephiroth down in the void. but he isn't alone. Because Aerith is alive. She emerges from the edges of time and space, thanks Cloud for swinging the sword that saved her, and they fight Sephiroth.

In the end, the singularity fades. The party sits dejectedly. Because Aerith is dead. But Cloud smiles. Because Aerith is alive. He can see his friend walking among the group. he can talk with her. Nanaki doesn't see her but he can sense her. Yuffie cries. Because Aerith is dead. Cloud smiles. Because Aerith is alive….

Cloud performed a miracle. Aerith overwrote it. the original creators overwrote it. Those two realities, where she was saved and where she died, lay atop each other like blankets layered on a bed. The grander game, where Aerith is flatly saved instead of caught in this in-between state, is not what we get. Instead, there's a messier reality. One where Cloud did the deed but where Aerith decided that, no… we can't have that. She needs to die.

Believe it or not I actually think you could do this ending mostly as it was. It's not really bad until Zack shows up and we have two consecutive Sephiroth fights. I think that Jenova fight is rather good and a suitable emotional climax by itself. I know some people disagree with the bombast but there's ways in which that disagreement feels like it arises from a desire for Rebirth to hew entirely too close to the original game in this moment. Which is to say that I'm fine with the cosmic tug-of-war at the moment Aerith's death even. Let Cloud has his momentum success. And then? Let him fail. Not what I think makes for the most interesting story possibility but you can do a lot with it. Have your big Jenova fight. Ditch those final twisty bits and give time for the party to actually grieve? That's a fair enough ending even if you still want Cloud to see Aerith both alive and dead. Not as bold as simply diverting course down a deeply new path but you can shape it into a polemic about the value of action. There is value in our attempts to do good in and of themselves.

Swing your sword. That enough, if the circumstances are so grand, makes you a hero. Cloud accomplishes a miracle at the end of this game. From a writing perspective, we can say that not letting Aerith live is cowardly but we shouldn't ignore what Cloud manages to do. In that moment, in that hellish swirl among ancient ghosts, after years and years of fans wondering if Cloud even had that strength within himself, we get the answer. He does.

There's something very beautiful in that. It's to Rebirth's detriment that it has no interest in examining that shining (if fleeting) victory. It's certainly not interested in the failure. Aerith's superposition between life and death plays into a repeated trend in Rebirth's writing: it never want to slow down. It never wants to take stock of things.

One of the problems with Rebirth is that it often hits key moments of the game without understanding that the fallout matters too. That people are not built, in all instances, to simply press on even if eventually they will. Dyne's death is followed almost immediately by a big battle and chase with Palmer, Nanaki does not get to really spend time taking in his father's sacrifice before Gi Nattak arrives to whisk the party away, Aerith's death has perhaps two minutes of actual follow up. It is a story where grief is incredibly important.

It also does not give our characters time to grieve.

Remake was a game about 1997's Final Fantasy 7 and Rebirth is ultimately a game about the weight of maintaining a franchise. The multiversial mode it takes incorporates characters and plot points from the wider Compilation of Final Fantasy 7 and pours it all into the Lifestream. You don't need these things to tell the story of "Final Fantasy 7 The Game" and the moment they are added, the reach expands. This is where the matter of mystery boxes rear their head and it seems to me that while Rebirth's plot was structured with mystery and potential for speculation, it also got away from Nojima and Kitase.

I do think this is the story they want to tell. It is important to them than the Lifestream, the heart and soul of the world they created, contain all possible things associated with that world. Final Fantasy 7 has grown into a decades long project and you cannot reckon with only one part of that; you need to explore all aspects. Aerith's death is the clarion call that cuts through the accumulated lore and history that's built up over the years and that might be the biggest reason why it still comes to pass. In reckoning with the weight of a franchise, they ultimately conclude that this is a story partly about death. You can't get rid of it.

Zack and Biggs' tumbling travels through potentialities also end tragically. Biggs desperately seeks meaning for his survival but still (at least in the last possible world we view) dies senselessly at the hands of Shinra. Zack once again faces a firing squad of soldiers. He cheats death at their hands again by leaping into the core of the reactor Biggs intended to bomb. But even though he avoided that fate, he is forced to reckon with death again during the final battle. He's moved through time and fate and history to arrive at Cloud's side and help him battle through the singularity of his trauma but although he faces Sephiroth, Zack ends up in a doomed world anyway. Maybe a miracle does happen to you but sometimes the great fate you've been saved for is simply to help someone else achieve their own. You live long enough to say the right thing (thanks Biggs) and that forms a ripple that gives the true hero's sword swing the proper strength in the final battle. So it goes.

Rebirth doesn't explain itself and in some ways it does lose sense of what it wants to say as it adds more and more layers to the mix. In what's probably the game's most defining scene, a leap through countless possible worlds and choices, players are more likely to be focusing on which version of Stamp the Dog is on graffiti'd walls and candy wrappers. Stamp is the way we track what world we're in and in being mysterious and coy, Rebirth suggests that players should be more interested in the raw mechanical stuff rather than the thematic reasons we navigate these worlds. why, through all this noise, we have to reach this point

The story gets lost in these extra layers to the point that players are mostly left to wonder what the end result means in this grander multiversial battle. How does Aerith's death fit into the puzzle? The raw mechanics of the moment become the focus instead of the more significant question of "Why does Aerith feel she needs to die?" It's a very strange case of the writers somehow both understanding the importance of this moment and sidestepping the things that made it powerful to begin with. It's not merely the loss that matters.

It's how we react to the loss.

Perhaps the most important moment during Aerith's death in the original game is the moment where Cloud interrupts Sephiroth's speech after he kills her. Sephiroth begins to pontificate about his plan and the glorious future that awaits once he collects the Lifestream. Don't worry, Cloud. She'll become part of the Lifestream and I'll collect it in my grand singularity. From there, I will begin to-

Shut up. Cloud's text box blots out Sephiroth's.

"The cycle of nature and your stupid plan don't mean a thing. Aeris will no longer laugh, cry, or get angry…. My fingers are tingling, my mouth is dry, my eyes are burning…"

None of the higher level stuff matter. The manipulations of the Lifestream, the ancient war between the Cetra and Jenova. None of it is important when compared to the loss of a friend. There is only the days before the loss and the days after. Who gives a shit about your cosmic motivations and grand designs? Why won't this stop hurting?

Aerith does not get a burial in Rebirth. Cloud emerges from the swirl knowing that while Aerith died, she is also present in the realms that drape over this one. Only he perceives her in full although Nanaki can vaguely sense she is still among the group as well. Within the Lifestream, where worlds can sometimes touch, the Aerith that Cloud did save looks on.

There is something beautiful about that idea and it is one worth exploring but it undercuts whatever Rebirth might want to say about the nature of sacrifice. Aerith dies but there is no true parting. Even in terms of mechanics, the player reunites with her in the game's final battle. I think it's one thing to have her linger in a superposition following Cloud's act perhaps but it's very odd to me that Rebirth decides that Aerith's death is so important without following through on any of the consequeces. We are not parted from her mechanically and our heroes are not shown mourning their friend in any meaningful fashion.

The result within the fandom has been a complete misunderstanding of the moment. Debate rage about if the Aerith that Cloud sees is a coping mechanism. Her presence becomes theory-fodder. Rebirth never dangles those questions. It is pretty clear what is happening. We've had an entire game explaining the mechanics that make her presence possible. But barring the pain of her separation and time given to grief, it feels lacking. Of course it's too clean! Cloud's going crazy! What is EVEN GOING ON MAN?! lmao

let's talk about it in the comments, motherfucker. let's react emote in Twitch chat.

More than anything, that is Rebirth's biggest structural failing. Not that it's "too silly" or "too loud." Those are symptoms signifying the more important issues: Rebirth is disinterested with or perhaps afraid of leaving players in these key moments for too long. When I look at the end of the game, I don't see the cost of too many mystery boxes. Yes, this game is sometimes being playful and coy with audience expectations. But I don't think that's the driving factor behind some of thee decisions rather than some snickering obsession with planting mystery boxes. Something else is happening and it's more honest than I think some people want to accept. There is a mistrust of the modern audience's comfort with the casts' being too vulnerable for too long. I don't know entirely why this is the case when it wasn't so in 1997. That's the frustrating part about writing this. I have no hard answers. Rebirth is frustratingly slippery and it's hard to grasp on to anything solid.

What I do know is that where the original had people weep for Aerith and talk their way through this tragedy, Rebirth speeds the player towards the credits. If this moment is so crucial that it must happen, to the point that Aerith and the writers bend time to ensure it happens in this particular way, I don't understand why we can't explore the immediate emotional consequences. You made me play a tacked-on box smashing game to get gyshal greens in Corel Prison but you don't want to take the time for this? What are you afraid of?

Again, I don't know. I'm not writing because I have an answer that makes all of this easier to swallow. I'm writing because this moment demands a reckoning. it demands exploration

What I can at least lay out is this: Aerith dies largely as a value statement. While Rebirth posits a world of wild difference, it concludes after the benefit of decades of reflection that victory over evil necessarily cannot happen without great loss. Pain is the final ingredient in the magicks that can save the world. This isn't necessarily a novel conclusion but placed into the wider context I do think it's interesting. Even in those nascent days, there was a sort of bargaining period throughout the gaming world when it came to Aerith's death. The school-yard rumors and internet myths gave way to debug menu navigation and GameShark codes that brought her back to life. It's been the dream of players for decades to do exactly what Cloud does here. Block the blade. Save the girl. can't wait to tell folks at recess!

Rebirth's position, which stands frustratingly contrary to the promise of Remake, is that this impulse is a selfish one. It's not one coming from a place of bad faith but the desire to fix this particular pain point, this mythical moment in the cultural consciousness, is arrogant. But Rebirth is never bold enough to point the finger at the player's desire or else give enough time to the cast's pain following Aerith's death. Contrary to Cloud's words in 1997, all we are left to wonder if how this fits into the cycle of nature and Sephiroth's stupid plan.

I think it's fair to look at this and call it cowardly. Aerith's imposition runs counter to the open, free skies promised at the end of Remake. In a game nominally focused on loss and sacrifice, this moment (like almost all wrapped up in those themes) falls short. There's a beauty in the singularity. There is a gorgeous swirl of possibility as Cloud brings his sword to bear. There is something saintly and wonderful about seeing Aerith's spirit in a field of flowers as we speed on to the future. But it's ultimately superficial. Rebirth lacks the strength to imagine a better outcome to this moment but it also fails to argue why this is what needs to happen. In the end, we have taken the long way around to the same point, and what power this moment held before was lost on this second time around.

I've heard some folks say "well, who cares? This is the middle part of a story!" but that's not an excuse for leaving things unsaid. Perhaps the third game pulls everything together. Perhaps we understand the value of the super-positioned lamb, sacrificed and saved, after the cosmic game has been played to its conclusion. But taken as its own thing, Rebirth ultimately ends up confused. It offers everything. It offers nothing.

"This is how it has to be," Rebirth says. It never explains why.

There is sound and fury but it signifies nothing. There's pieces under the surface that we can poke at regarding the necessity of sacrifice but without the pain that comes with those sacrifices, the lesson is incomplete. All we have left to talk about are the stupid plans.

#final fantasy vii remake #final fantasy vii rebirth #casual game crit #spoilers #games criticism #aerith gainsborough

[transgamerthoughts]

Abandon All Delusions Of Control

this is another cross-post. which is funny because I've paid for a domain name redirect to my tumblr since like 2016.. i never know what site is gonna explode these days. less people follow me here than anywhere but this write ups been passed around so...

I've been playing Dragon's Dogma 2 and while I'd love to talk about gameplay or interesting moments, the game's found itself something of a cultural lightning rod. It is a game with many friction points arising in a cultural moment where gamers are, perhaps more than ever, convinced that "consumers" are kings.

Dragon's Dogma 2 is not readily "solvable" and you can't min-max it. You will make mistakes. You will be scraped and bruised and scarred. Pain is sometimes the only bridge that can take us wher ewe need to go. And gaming culture, fed the lie of mastery and player importance, does not understand that scars can be beautiful. I love this game. I think it's a miracle it came out at all.

I also think in spite of the success it's found… that 2024 might be the worst possible year for it to have released.

Let's ramble about it..

It's easy to feel like Hideaki Itsuno and his team miscalculated the amount of friction that players are willing to endure and while I don't think that's true (he didn't miscalculate moreso stick to his particular vision) it certainly appears that we've reached a point in gaming where players, glutted on convenience, don't really know what to do when robbed of it. I've heard folks complain that they can't sprint everywhere or else balk learning that ferrystones required for fast travel cost 10,000 gold as if these shatter DD2 into pieces. I'm vaguely sympathetic to these concerns but at the same time they seem to spring entirely from a lack of understanding of the game's design goals. Much like how folks demanding a traditionally structured RPG narrative from an Octopath game misunderstand what that team is trying to do, players asking to sprint through the world or teleport with ease fundamentally misunderstand what Dragon's Dogma wants. The world is not a wrapper for a story. It is the story. Dragon's Dogma is a story factory whose various textures create unprecedented triumphs and memorable failure.

It is crucial to the experience to allow both of those to occur and live with whatever follows.

I'm always cautious of talking like this because it can come off as smug or superior but I think ultimately that's the truth of the matter here. This was not a well-played franchise before now and even if it's a AAA title, there's a way in which this game is meant to elide most AAA open world trends. You are expected to traverse. If you want relatively cheap and faster travel, you're meant to find an oxcart and pay the (quite modest) fee to move between trade hubs much like you would pay for a silt strider in Morrowind. Even if you do this, you could be ambushed on the road and in the worst case the ox pulling the cart can be killed. Something being "possible" in a game doesn't always mean it is intentional but Dragon's Dogma continually undercuts the player's ability to avoid long treks. Portcrystals, which act as fast travel destinations, are limited and ferry stones (while not prohibitively expensive compared to weapons and armor) are juuust expensive enough that you need to consider if the expense is worthwhile. Once is happenstance. Multiple times is a pattern. And the pattern in Dragon's Dogma is to disincentivize easy travel. It screams of intent.

Something I could not have imagined playing games growing up is the ways in which even a decade (or two) could lead to radically different attitudes on what games should provide. That's an audience issue to an extent but it's also something games have brought upon themselves. The "language" of an open world game has been solidified through years climbable towers, mini-map marked caves, and options to zip around worlds. When a game deviates from that language, the change is more noticeable than ever.

Hell, even Elden Ring (perhaps the closest modern relative to Dragon's Dogma) allows you to warp between bonfires and gives you a steed to ride. But that's also a much larger game! DD2 is not a large game and the story is not long. Yes, you can spend untold hours wandering about into nooks and crannies but a trek from one end of the world to another is still significantly shorter than bounding through most open worlds and a run through the critical path reveals a speedy game. Not as speedy as the first but brisk by genre standards.

exploration is the glue that binds the combat and progression system in place. Upgrading armor and weapons requires seeking out specific materials and fighting certain monsters. Gathering the funds for big purchases in shops mostly comes from selling your excess monster parts. The entire game hinges on the idea of long expeditions where you accrue materials and supplies on the road and then invest that horde one way or another once you return to town. It's not simply a matter of mood and tone for you to trek throughout the world without ease. The gameplay loop is built around it.

There's another complicating factor that I'm less interested in diving into and it's the presence of certain microtransactions at launch. Principally I'm against MTX in single players games, particularly conveniences of which most of DD2's microtransactions are. But I also think there's been a fundamental misunderstanding of what many of these are. Among the biggest things I've heard (repeatedly!) is that you can pay real life money for fast travel but that's not true. You can buy a single portcrystal offering you one more potential location to warp to. It's a one-time purchase and the only travel convenience offered. This has transformed, partly because of people's lack of familiarity with Dragon's Dogma's mechanics, into a claim that you can pay over and over to teleport around. I think that assumption reveals more about the general audience than anything else.

I think it is worth entertaining a question: does the existence of this extra port crystal signify a compromising of the game's goals regarding travel? That's not a discussion that folks seem to be interested in having—instead opting for more emotional and reactionary panicking—but it is the most interesting question. On face the answer is yes and that raises the follow up question of whether or not the developers had knowledge this convenience (though one-off) would be offered to players. If so, did that knowledge affect how they designed the game? Even slightly? It seems rather clear to me that these purchases are a publisher decision; there's nothing in the game's design that suggest the dev team wants players to have access to an extra portcrystal. As we've established it's quite the opposite!

They want you to haul your fucking ass around and get jumped by goblins, buddy.

Which is many words to say that as much as I care about microtransactions from a consumer standpoint, the way in which they undermine Dragon's Dogma 2's goals is a fair reminder of the ways in which they hurt developers. Ultimately, I do think that these purchases are ignorable and in that sense (combined with the misinformation surrounding them) I'm a little burned by the consumer-minded discussion. Doubly so because of the way it feels, at least in part, tied into a certain kind of rhetoric that's been on the rise lately. Instead, I find myself drawn to the question of the damage they do the devs and if more onerous plans actually would force their hands into undercutting portions of their own designs. The shift of many series into live-service chasing suggest so but even as I entertain these thoughts I don't get the sense that Itsuno and his team were forced to reshape their game world to encourage these microtransactions. The world is as they want.

If it wasn't, they wouldn't make it so failing to act quickly in a quest to find a missing kid stolen by wolves could end with you being too late. They wouldn't make it so buying goods from an Elven shop without an interpreter was a hassle. It's present in Every Damn Thing!

More interesting to consider is why this particular game became such a lightning rod of passion when I'm going to assume that most people caught up in the discussion have no particular fealty to the series. The answer is a combination of factors but there's something about the genre that ignites the panic we're seeing as much as the culture moment we're in. When people try to explain that these MTX purchases are not needed, it's confused for approval of their inclusion but that's not something we need to grant. I don't think anyone wants these things here and when they say "you don't need them" they are referring to the more complex thought that the game is better played without them. But this is not heard because the idea that you'd want to opt into friction and discomfort is not something that the general audience is likely to understand. They're wired against it. They crave ease.

not everyone, mind you. DD2's enjoyed a lot of excited reactions (there's tons of folks who like this game as it is and are happily playing it) but it has faced plenty of folks railing against "bad" design choices but the fact remains that those "bad" choices were intentional.

I'm writing about this stuff instead of, say, the wild journey I took solving one of the Sphinx's riddles because the immediately interesting thing about Dragon's Dogma 2 has been what it's become as a cultural object. It is a game suffering from success. Never designed for a general audience or modern standards but thrust into their hands due to Capcom's ongoing renaissance. Dragon's Dogma is a fine game whose cult status is well earned but the reason DD2 garnered this attention (and therefore becomes a hot-topic game) has as much to do with Capcom's ongoing success rate as anything else. In some ways, it actually IS a good time to release a game like Dragon's Dogma 2. There's certainly a curiousity in place. Partly borne of goodwill and also from folks' genuine desire to try something new.

and yet, we're in a odd moment in games. consumer rights lanaguge, having been fundamentally misunderstood and reconfigured by gamers as a rhetoric for justifying their purchase habits (I'm paying the money! why can't the game do exactly as I demand!?) has stifled many people's ability to have imaginative interpretations of gameplay mechanics. they don't ask "what is this thing doing as a storytelling device" (which mechanics are!) and rather default to "what is this thing doing to me and my FUN and my TIME". which are not bad questions but they also misunderstand the possibility space games have to offer. While we can attribute some of the objections that has arisen to players' thoughts about genre itself and the way in which Dragon's Dogma positions friction as a key gameplay pillar, the fact of the matter is that we would not be having such spirited discussion about these things in, say, 2017. not that things were great back then, but I think the audience is worse now in many, many ways. sarcastically? I blame Game Design YouTube.

Even if there were no microtransactions, we'd still be having a degree of Discourse thanks to a key game mechanic: Dragonplague. It is a disease that can afflict your Pawn companions which initially causes them to get mouthy and start to disobey orders. If you notice these signs (alongside ominous glowing eyes) then your Pawn has been infected and you're expected to dismiss them back to the Rift where that infection can spread to another player. The game gives a pop up to the player explaining this the first time they encounter the disease. However, some players have ignored that warning and found a dire consequence: an untreated Pawn can, when the player rests at an inn, go on an overnight rampage that kills the majority of NPCs in whatever settlement they are in. This includes plot-important characters. The reaction's been intense. Reddit always sucks but man… just look…

I understand some of the ire. It's a drastic shift from your pawn being a bit ornery to instantly killing an entire city. On the other hand, the game does warn of potentially dire consequences if a Pawn's sickness is ignored. Players have simply underestimated the scale of that consequence. Surely no major RPG would mass murder important characters and break questlines! We're in post Oblivion/Skyrim world. Important NPCs are essential and cannot be killed, right? Well, wrong and this is another way in which Dragon's Dogma chases after the legacy of a game like Morrowind more than than it adapts current open world trends. This is a world where things can break and the developers have decided that they are okay with it breaking in a very drastic way. It's hard to think of anything comparable in a contemporary game. We don't really do this kind of thing anymore.

The result has been panic and a spread of information both helpful and hopelessly speculative. Is your game ruined? Well, maybe. There is an item you can find which allows for mass resurrection but that's gonna require some questing. But some players also say that you can wait a while and the game will eventually reset back to the pre-murder status quo. What's true? Hard to know. Dragon's Dogma doesn't show all of its cards and won't always explain itself. We know entire cities can be killed. We know that individual characters can be revived in the city morgue or else the settlement restored (mostly) with a special item. Dragonplague is detectable and the worst case scenario is, to some extent or another, something that the player can ameliorate. Those are facts but they don't really matter.

That's because players issue (panick? hysteria?) with dragonplague is as much to do with what it represents as what it does. Players are used to the notion of game worlds being spaces where they get to determine every state of affair. They are, as I've suggested before, eager to play the tyrant. Eager to enact whatever violences or charities that might strike their fancy. They do this with the expectation that they will be rewarded for the latter but face no consequences for the former. Dragonplague argues otherwise. No, it says, this world is also one that belongs to the developers and they are more than fine with heaping dire consequences on players. Before the dragonplague's consequences were known, players were running around the world killing NPCs in cities because it would stabilize the framerate. They're fine with mass murder on their own terms. they love it!

This is made more clear when we look at how Dragon's Dogma handles saving the game. While there are autosaves between battles, players are expected to rest at inns to save their game. This costs some gold, which is a hassle, but the bigger "issue" is that they only have one save slot. Which means that save scumming is not entirely feasible though not impossible with a bit of planning. What it does mean, however, is that the game is saved when a dragonplague attack happens. you have to rest at an inn for this to trigger. which saves the game. They cannot roll back the clock. The tragedy becomes a fact. It's not the only time Dragon's Dogma does this. For instance, players can come into possession of a special arrow that can slay anything. When used, the game saves. Much like how players are given a warning about dragonplague, they're warned before using this arrow: don't miss.

If you do? that's a real shame. The depth of this consequence is uncommon in today's gaming landscape. Games are mostly frivolous and save data is the amber from which players suck crystallized potentialities. Don't like what happened? No worries. Slide into your files and find the frozen world which suits your proclivities. You are God. In Dragon's Dogma, you are not god. The threads of prophecy can be severed and you must persist in the doomed world that's been created. The mere suggestion is an affront. The fact that Dragon's Dogma has the stones to commit to the bit in 2024 is essentially a miracle.

It's easy to boil everything I'm saying down to "Dragon's Dogma is not afraid to be rude to the player" but that doesn't capture the spirit of the design. It invites players to go on a hike. It makes no attempt to hide that the hike is difficult. But that's the extent of it. It offers little guidance on the path, doesn't check if you're a skilled enough hiker. Your decision to go on the hike is taken as proof of your acceptance of the fact that you might fall down.

This is not unique to Dragon's Dogma. In fact, this is part of the appeal (philosophically) of a game like Elden Ring. The difference being that even FromSofts much-lauded gamer gauntlets (excepting perhaps Sekiro, conincidentally their best work) offer more ways to adjust and fix the world state to the player's liking. Even the darling of difficulty will offering you a hand when you fall. Dragon's Dogma is not so eager to do so. In a decade where convenience is king for video games, that represents both a keen understanding of its lineages and a shocking affront to accepted norms and expectations.

The core of Dragon's Dogma, the very defining characteristics that earned it cult status, are the same things that have caused these modern tensions. It is both a franchise utterly consistent in its design priorities and entirely out of touch with the modern audience. Dragon's Dogma 2 has come into prominence during a time where imaginative interpretation of mechanics is at an all time low and calls for "consumer" gratification are taken as truisms. It is a game entirely at odds with the YouTube ecosystem and the very things that give it allure are the tools that have turned it into a debated object.

This flashpoint of discussion is proof of Dragon Dogma 2's design potency. It's also a sign of the damage that modern design trends have done to games as whole and the ongoing fallout that's come from gamers learning design concepts without really understanding what designing a game entails. And, uh… I dunno respond to that or how to end this. That's both very cool but it also bums me out. Dragon's Dogma 2 is a remarkably confident game but games are long beyond the point of admiring a thing for being honest.

#dragon's dogma 2 #games criticism

[transgamerthoughts]

If I Should Die Here On This Field

I'm a big tactics game fan. Which is a little different than being a simulation or strategy game fan. The joy of a more simulation-heavy game comes from intense granularity over equipment and the wider appeal of high-level military strategy. Maps pull back wide, sometimes to the galactic scale if the setting demands, and there's a grand stage upon which your puppets dance. Tactics games, on the other hand, often spring joy from a very specific mix of sweeping sensibilities and smallter moment to moment perils. They allow access both to the gallantry of soldiers (particularly when it's knights and horsemen) while never shying from the ways in which battlefields grind that idealist interpretation into so much powder. In the best moments they dive into matters that many games often ignore.

Unicorn Overlord succeeds more with the gallantry than the politicking. It chases after numerous inspirations and while it never matches their moral or political complexity, the moment to moment decision making—not to mention a surprising addictive overworld exploration element—will be more than enough to please more players. The tactics are good! The grandeur is there! Sometimes that's all you need. I've been playing throughout my weeknights and a majority of the weekend. And while the game may yet surprise me with last moment twists (as is Vanillaware's habit) that's more than enough to get the gist.

So! Let's talk!

Unicorn Overlord tells the tale of the exiled prince Alain and his quest to retake the kingdom of Cornia (and really the entire conquered world) from the clutches of the evil Emperor Galarius. In some ways, that's all you need to know. You'll travel from nation to nation, each of which wears convenient hats like "the one with the elves" or "the one with the beastmen," and gather a host of lionhearted heroes to lead in battle. You know how it is.

I'll circle back to plot and presentation later because the core of Unicorn Overlord really is the gameplay itself. When you enter a battle and begin deploying troops, it plays like a simplified RTS; you will move units in real time and occasionally make use of war machines (ballista, catapaults, etc) to hinder approaching forces while sometimes building up points to use on more specialized abilities. Mages might place gravity wells that slow down enemies, Eleven troops conjure rain to heal allies over time or douse fires. You'll capture outposts and other defensive positions that confer various bonuses and protections. It's what you'd expect from the genre and the game does a good job offering a mix of map sizes and scenarios on this front. You might play a large defense mission based around placing traps and barricades in the way of an approaching force or face a necromancer type with a knack for hurling waves of troops you way.

This is contrasted with the smaller battles you'll face while liberating towns on the overworld map. You see, there's a pretty sizable map here with lots of secrets to find as well as towns and forts interspersed throughout. To liberate these towns (gaining access to shops and recruitment posts) you'll pay bite-sized battles on much smaller maps. These function a minor combat puzzles. How exactly do you capture a fort with two shaman and their gladiator bodyguards? Figure it out! Whereas story battles tend to throw complications when it comes to moving your troops or dealing with unique victory requires, these liberations missions focus on tactical knowledge and unit building.

Because Unicorn Overlord is an Ogre Battle clone. It's not Fire Emblem or even Tactic Ogre, where the battles involve moving each an every soldier and choosing their actions. Instead, you assemble a mash of soldiers into a unit that then automatically battles the enemy when the time for combat comes. It's about understanding synergies that lead to robust units as much as a matter of understanding "hey, your archers are good at shooting down gyphon knights." It's not quite my preferred tactics gameplay but it's also much more rare to have battles like this in your games these days. I've fond memories of Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber and while I'm sure there were games like this dancing at the margins of the genre, I really do appreciate that it's come back in a higher profile game.

The notion of troops automatically battling might cause certain players to chafe but Unicorn Overlord's not a game of random battles where you hope your digital soldiers perform as you imagined. You actually have a Final Fantasy XII esque Gambit System for determining how each character will act in battle. This is one of many examples of Unicorn Overlord chasing after Yasumi Matsuno's legacy and it's by far the best. You might not need this level of control in the early game but as you unlock advanced classes and face trickier enemies, there is a push to min-max performance. I don't think Unicorn Overlord is a hard game on default difficulty or even the more advanced "Tactical" option but the highest peak does ramp up combat to a point where micro-management is crucial. (As a tangent: the Story difficulty mostly seems to bypass the map navigation phase as it grants more stamina to perform actions without needed to pause troops moments to replenish resource.)

These conditional statements are where most of the depth rests. Unicorn Overlord doesn't have stat growths like Fire Emblem. It has dispositions that affect stat spread. For example, you can have someone who is both a "Hardy" type with high HP and a "Precise" type who enjoys greater accuracy. Recruitable units are not particularly different than your story characters; if you use an item to change a named characters dispositions to the same as a generic soldier, they will have identical states so long as they are the same class. My Alain will be, statistically speaking, the same as your Alain at the endgame presuming neither of us adjust his growth types. Which means that key differences in character performance will come down to what customizations we give our characters in the gambit system and the units we assemble. This might disappoint players looking to manipulate characters into the best of all possible arrangements but the upside is that all you really need to worry about is navigating the gambit system and assembling effective tactics.

Unicorn Overlord works best when you are solving those individual combat puzzles. Even the smallest tweak to your conditional statements can mean the difference between victory of defeat. There's an in game Coliseum with both NPC battles and the choice to fight other players' pre-assembled parties. Not only are the rewards great but it's maybe the best showcase of Unicorn Overlord's combat appeal. Dialed down to one single fight (where the goal is simply to come out numerically on top as opposed to wiping out the enemy entirely) the game shines brightly. There's some limitations here but the overall appeal is undeniable. The gambit system probably should have offered three conditional statements per line and lacks certain nuances such as the ability target a specific character in your party instead of specific classes but those are nitpicks. Gambits kicked ass in 2006 and they continue to kick ass in 2024. For roleplaying and tactics? It hardly gets better than this.

This is a lot of words to say that Unicorn Overlord plays far beyond the batting average of the story beats. This is a game whose yearning to emulate Matsuno is baked into every decision and that includes the plot. Which often tries gestures towards interesting character motivations and politcs without really following through. Some of that's baked into the "Unicorn" part of the title. It refers to Alain's signet ring which we learn (about in the first thirty minutes) has the ability to dispel the magickal brainwashing that allowed Galarius to perform the sudden coup against Queen Ilenia at the start of the game. There's some twists regarding the true nature of this magic but the result is often that many opposing characters are not motivated by important material and personal concerns. They're just evil and brainwashed. This immediately mars the storytelling potential and places it more on par with a game like Fire Emblem Awakening than Tactics Ogre. Which! Awakening is a very good game with a great sense of heroism. I wanna be clear about that. But Unicorn Overlord clearly wants to be in the latter category. It hasn't managed it so far.

I played Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together for the first time last year. I've actually been dying to write about it but my ability to write promptly has suffered over the last few years for a variety of reasons. I'll say: Tactics Ogre is the best game I have ever played. Part of that rests in the plot, which tosses all kinds of tough decisions at the protagonist and features a variety of characters from different factions fighting for different reasons. Matsuno is an astounding writer when it comes to understanding how his settings function and the material realities that can push even the best individuals down dark roads. Yes, some characters are irredeemably evil but many shift allegiances in the face of dramatic revelations or simply for selfish reasons. Tactics Ogre's script (and frankly its narrative design) displays a most astounding craftsmanship. I am constantly learning about characters I missed recruiting or paths I chose not to walk. It's an incredibly rich game.

I don't think Unicorn Overlord's quite as rich and that's entirely tied to the way in which is flattens its conflicts. It often talks about a grand history that is far more interesting than the status quo our characters are in. On the one hand, I get it. You want a story that allows the player to bop and weave around the map and readily justifies the sheer volume of combat challenges. On the other hand, while the setting has politic tensions woven into the fabric, they're very thin. This is mostly a game about the good knights fighting the bad knights.

Often is the case that you'll fight a lord hoarding food from his people only to find he was actually preparing for a famine. Yes, you fought that strange guy who was experimenting on people but don't you feel conflict killing him now that you know he was looking for a cure to the plague? Compare this to the agonizing choice players face at the end on Tactic Ogre's first chapter where they need to decide whether to help facilitate the slaughter of an entire town so that it might be presented as a false flag operation in the hope of uniting disparate resistance cells fighting against the apartheid state. That lone choice leads to two entirely different story paths, leaving ripples that affect the protagonist and the world. It poses a question of realpolitik versus nobility. Can you fight this war as an idealist or not? "There is blood on my hands," a title card declares. How long till it lies on my heart?"

Tactics Ogre is full of difficult choices like that and side stories that add richness to the character. Unicorn Overlord doesn't really have this. Or at least what it does have very often feels like a video game trick rather than something meanginful. There's little complication to the story and while there's time given to some character's individual motivations it is not a game concerned with tough questions even if I wants to convince you that it is.

It does, however, have pretty good moment to moment writing. Everything flows well and there's enough heart poured into the mix that while things are pretty superficial once you pull back your gaze, the story still proceeds with a lot of energy. Recently, gamer assholes went on a bender regarding Unicorn Overlord's localization after an amateur on Twitter created an extensive thread of differences between the English and Japanese scripts. There's been a string of anti-localization sentiment among certain gamers and in anime circles from folks who want things to adhere to the original language with strictness.

This, of course, shows a misunderstanding for what localization even is but rather than unpacking all that drama I'll just say: this localization is fine. It's fine! It's trying to emulate the approach of folks like Alex O. Smith and Joe Reeder. Which means there's a certain degree of purple to the prose but it's nothing you can cut through. Most localization flourishes aren't even that archaic; they simply toss in figures of speech.

A metaphor here. A fancy word there. It's well done!

I'm not gonna beat around the bush and maybe some assholes will find this and damn me for it since it's gonna sound haughty but I think you can boil pretty much all of the controversy down to the fact that a lot of gamers kinda suck at reading.

That's a complicated topic to unravel here. Over the last decade or so, there's been changes to how grammar and reading are taught in education systems that have radically inhibited some folks' ability to understand texts. I don't mean "understand the metaphor" or "understand the vocabulary" but rather understand the raw facts of what's happening. Combine this with a lot of culture problems and I don't think it's a surprise that localization has become a sticking point for a certain kind of cretin. And it also doesn't surprise me that this tempest in a teapot came side by side with similarly manufactured controversies.

I sometimes talk about the death of criticism in games spaces but we also just have… worse readers. Not just in terms of their imagination but in their raw comprehension. Unicorn Overlord's localization is not impenetrable and I don't get the sense that it's radically shifting the core action or characterizations at the center of the game. I don't think it particularly matches the games it is chasing after (shockingly many of these are localizations of Matsuno's games) but it's got enough flair that it gives the plot some spice.

That's a good way to sum up Unicorn Overlord. When you look at the ingredients, it's Meat and Potatoes tactics but there's a little bit of spice dusted on top which brings everything together. Be it the Gambit System pulling combat together or turns of phrase bringing the story to life. You're mostly gonna be bounding around the map in a very satisfying loop of battles and town upgrading before some larger tests in the main story. Not the height of the genre but still eminently enjoyable.

And let's be honest. For some of you? All I really needed to say was that it was "Ogre Battle."

#unicorn overlord #ogre battle #tactics ogre #casual game crit #vanillaware

[transgamerthoughts]

a vast methodical fragment

(this is a cross post from cohost. pretty much all my stuff ends up there first. that said! writing here is what initially led to me getting a job as professional critic so some stuff will still end up here)

i am playing Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth. no spoilers in this post! don't panic! though I have seen the ending and will eventually write on What This Remake Business Is Even About Now I'm taking a slower recircling back through the world and doing side content. because this is a good world. that's maybe the biggest strength of the entire game! there's a remarkable sense that the world has been as well-considered as the characters. part of what makes the remake trilogy feel more solid than something like final fantasy 16 is the ways in the texture added into every location. final fantasy 16 had a lot of maps and lore and codex entries that were meant to create a sense of "realness" to Valisthea but the sum total of that falters compared to even some of Rebirth's smallest moments. no timeline, however meticulous, can compare to watching protesters in lower Junon wave signs outside of the Shinra-controlled entrance to the city or seeing how bars are themed in the Gold Saucer.

when I wrote about the end of Final Fantasy 16I made comparisons to Triangle Strategy. both games tackled similar matters on paper but in practice, I felt that the latter succeeded because it had an understanding of its settings material realities. In their podcast on ff16, the folk at Abnormal Mapping (I think specifically Austin as the guest third chair) noted that while the game had aspirations about tackling slavery, it only ever really showed Bearers being used for servant work. they aired out laundry or lit fireplaces. it belied a certain lack of consideration for the world and its needs why is someone airing out laundry with magick when they could be cultivating a field? yes, Titan is a great summon useful in war but would his existence not affect the Dhalmekian Republic's infrastructure and architecture?

Rebirth doesn't have this issue. Walking in any town or exploring the outlying regions starts readily reveals locations that have a great deal of consideration and consistency. I know where the food come from, I can stumble in on teachers reading stories to classes or else telling them some local folklore. there are popular songs, i run into veterans of old wars and stumble on abandoned forts that still have old ammo boxes in them, local superstitions and phrases. the pieces fit together.

I've quibbles with Rebirth in the sense that I think it's a bit distracted as a story. there are times when the larger sound and fury threaten to signify nothing and I don't think that's simply to do with the fact that it's adapting a fairly freewheeling portion of the 1997 original. but that's a very particular complaint targeted at the meta-narrative. What Is This All About?

for the moment, i'm content putting that question on hold. the contrast to ff16 is perhaps what's ringing most loudly in my mind. this is a world with wave-race dolphin riding, combat simulators where an android named Chadley digitizes local gods into pocket-sized summon materia. it's a place where your ninja friend accidentally creates countless copies of a joke-character and they all team up to renovate a seaside inn. but I take it more seriously.

a jaded person might say that it had that grace built in because of my nostalgia but the truth it that earned this consideration through the care built into the world. it didn't make demands of me. the developers looked at the world, asked how it would work and wove that into everything. i know the latest gimmick popsicle flavors for crying out loud!

the difference between a heap of lore and a properly built world can be thin and arbitrary but if there's one thing I really appreciate from this ongoing Remake project, it's the how much the player understands How It Got The Way It Is.

#final fantasy vii remake #final fantasy vii rebirth #ffvii rebirth #ffvii remake #casual game crit #worldbuilding

[transgamerthoughts]

City In The Mist

I had a goal this year of publishing at least one update per month to my ongoing Skies of Arcadia novelization 'To The Horizon.' I already have failed! January threw a happy curveball at me as I traveled to the Chicago area for my first major fighting game tournament. It was fun but took a lot of my focus. Writing stories on airplanes and in hotel rooms lacks appeal . Which means that our first new chapter of the year hits in February. But it's here!

Vyse and his heroic crew have been in Ixa'taka for a while now. It's not quite "Guts stuck on the boat to Elfhelm" territory but my fic hit the Green Moon Arc in June 2022. That's a long time and it's provided interesting challenges as a writer. How do you take an RPG from the early 2000s and modernize it just enough? Skies of Arcadia is a very broad and swashbuckling game but it does tangle with tough topics when our heroes reach the "new" lands under the Green Moon. The game is fundamentally a celebration of cultures and the vibrancy around the world but ya can't deny there's something weird about the heroic crew swooping into and saving the natives. Something's gotta give.

Part of the solution, which expanded the time spent here compared to the Red Moon Arc in Nasr, was to expand on the Ixa'takan perspective and give side characters like Merida and Tika'tika more role in driving off the evil empire. A "modern" take on Skies of Arcadia, while not diminishing the sweeping heroics of the main party, necessarily needs to expand who is allowed to be a hero within the main narrative. That's even more important than expanding the lore.

I dropped a fresh chapter dropped last night, which means we're nearing the end of our time in Ixa'taka . As our heroes dive into the lost city of Rixis to confront a variety of magickal secrets and surprising revelations, the board's set for a grand finale. I'd love to get that follow up chapter done before the end of the month for a lovely two 'fer round but that might be tricky. Still! While this chapter was quite big, the next will be a very focused. Ship battles, ancient giants, things of that nature. If it doesn't come in the next week, it'll still be soon.

I've medical matters to deal with this year but there will be less travel. The fic should have an explosion of chapters in the next few months. For the curious, here's an excerpt of the latest. Keep reading for a brief look at the magick'd mists of Rixis, the Old World capital that time forgot.

Rixis was not a city of gold but the reality was as good as anything Vyse might’ve imagined. A cityscape as dense as Riqueza covered every inch of the plateau’s surface but where the Valuan sprawl was marked by electric lamps and smokestacks, Rixis was completely entwined with the natural world. Whereas the Upper City might’ve had a glittering spire touched with yellow moonstone lights, the various dwellings throughout Rixis were interrupted by trees brimming with impossible vigor. There was no axe that would penetrate their bark and no deficiency that could sap the color of their leaves.

Vyse thought he understood the word “green” until this moment but had clearly been wrong. Likewise for concepts like “red” or “yellow” or really any color one could name. The foliage was a rainbow delight that draped over a majority of the dwellings. The buildings bore the same odd snake-skin sheen as the gatehouse which allowed them to paradoxically stick out like nothing he’d ever seen while also camouflaging them away. Even if they could sail high enough, they might’ve missed spotting Rixis.

Not everything was immaculate. Throughout portions of the city, large craters created unsightly blemishes that took away some of the wonder. Burnt moonstone husks rest in some of their centers, the stones robbed of whatever energies they once held. Had time drained them or had they fallen with so much heat as to exhaust themselves? Either way, he knew exactly what they were.

“They had no protection from the Rains of Destruction,” Vyse noted sadly as he stepped off the dias and into the city grounds.

Fina wandered to his side. “Veridian mages were peerless healers,” she said. “But they didn’t weave wards with the same strength as the Silvites or Ardites. There is protection here however.”

It took a moment to realize what Fina meant but as Vyse looked closer, he started to notice a strange mist hanging upon the air holding the barest hints of beryl heaviness. It wasn’t clouds or fog although they were certainly high enough. The haze occasionally shuddered with movements that he couldn’t quite apprehend. It felt like seeing stray movement in the corner of a mirror except it was playing out entirely before his eyes. Motions that progressed with disjointed skip and shapes that never quite formed into anything knowable behind the wavy green. He took a few steps further into the mist and found that, contrary to his expectation, it held a friendly warmth like a friend’s embrace.

“Is this gloom?” he asked. "From the moonstones?"

Drachma cautiously approached the edge of the haze and ran his hand through it. “S’not quite,” he noticed as his face turned downward into a scowl. “More like’n what Rhaknam carries ‘round him.”

Vyse understood the comparison. The arcwhale carried a veil of frigid demise wherever he traveled in some odd mixture of magick and natural defense mechanism. Vyse recalled the strange mustiness that accompanied Rhaknam’s presence in the sky. As if a portion of the world was being pulled into mist. This was similar although far more inviting. He wondered if the mist was as dangerous.

As if to put the party at ease, Fina walked further into the cloudy city. Cupil slid off her wrist and bobbed at her side, giving a comfortable meeeep as his hue changed from silver to green. His master gave a playful twirl like an angel dancing on stardust.

“It’s visible glimmer,” she explained. “A magick was cast with such potency that it burned hot enough to leave traces centuries later. I can’t imagine what it was…”

Drachma stomped towards a crumpled heap of stone where a house’s wall had fallen in. “Ye ken fix t’call me daft if y’like but I seen this rock ‘fore. Travelin’ merchant were selling chunks.”

Aika gave an exasperated sigh. “Does it matter? There’s no gold! Merida said the streets were jam pack’d with gold and silver but there’s only crummy rocks.”

“It’s verdite,” Fina noted as she ran her hand over a nearby wall. It rippled at her touch like the surface of a pond grazed by the wind. “Naturally receptive to magicks though not as strong as moonstone.”

“How’d some merchant get a hand on it?” Vyse wondered. Drachma shrugged.

“Mebbe some Valuan runaway what were posted ‘ere,” he mused. “Iff’n we’re far enough what Ixa’taka’s below Valua then might’ve been a fool drifted in from North Ocean.”

Aika took her place next to Fina and touched the verdite stone. A smaller ripple cascaded along the surface. “I don’t care if it’s magickal,” she moped. “This was all supposed to be gold!”

“Green magicks pull from the world around the user,” Fina said with a gesture at the verdite-clad city. “In a city built with a stone that conducts energy? Even a fleeting spell would be formidable.”

Drachma frowned. “Ain’tcha suppose to feel that kind ‘o magicks in yer bones? I gots nothin’ in me body right now 'cept me usual aches.”

“Not everyone’s as connected to that sort of thing.” Fina sounded sorry for the old man. "I can certainly feel it."

Vyse tilted his head. “When you were teaching me red magick on the journey, I was pulling on power inside my body. Green magick is different?”

Fina nodded. “Every school has quirks,” she offered. “Red magick pulls from our own energy, green draws from the world around us and is then modified by our emotions.”

Aika giggled and brought up her hand. Her purple moonstone rested in the pal and with a teasing whistle, she chilled the air around above it. Hints of frost flaked upwards. “What about purple?”

“It’s powered by belief,” Fina replied. “The more you believe in the spell, the more real it becomes.”

Drachma rolled his eye. “Talk’n hogwash.”

The cold in Aika’s hand swirled with more energy. “I mean… it’s cold. It is! Freakin’ cold!”

“I can feel it from here,” Vyse agreed. “Nice and chilly.”

“Purple magick is a matter of trickery," Fina explained. "We rearrange the world in a way that it isn’t: a burst of cold, an illusion. And the more we all agree it is… it becomes. This is true of all magicks but particularly for purple spells.”

Aika shrugged and the cold in her hand faded. “Dunno if I really get it. I just think about makin’ something cold and it starts to happen.”

The lesson concluded as Drachma took heavy steps deeper into the city, foot falls hanging on the glimmer-filled air. “Ain’t meant t’cut yer brain-fest short but ye ain’t noticed?”

“Noticed what?” Aika asked. She looked around the city as if expecting to find something obvious.

Vyse took a moment and cast his glance about as well. Rixis was pristine save for the scant moonstones slammed into the ground. Scars of a calamity that shattered the world. Then he realized.

“There’s no bodies,” he pointed out. “No signs that anyone ever lived here.”

“Wouldn’t expect a dead Valuan noble like we found in Pyrynn but yeah! There’s nothing! The temple had all sorts of stuff. Even had coffins for those weird kings.”

“Might’ve fled before the Rains,” Vyse posited. Fina shook her head.

“They didn’t,” she said with surprising surety. “No one knew the Rains were coming and the shift from the falling moonstones drove their Gigas out of control. After that I’m not sure.”

The absence of information gnawed at the back of Fina’s mind. There was only so much information available about the world immediately after the Rains of Destruction, much of which came from the Elders’ magicks. It was part scientific monitoring—climate data, seismograph readings, glimmer particle recordings, argenti scout reports—and part arcane scrying. Piercing the veil of chaos that draped over the skies following the calamity was a difficult task but it wasn't impossible. Fina had an intimate recollection of this data, having studied it for years in preparation for her journey.

But there was something bothering her which she could not explain. Beneath that tangle of encyclopedic trivia was a vague feeling that threatened to become knowable. Something important that could provide a deeper context to the riddle of Rixis. It was like how the start of a dream could only be vaguely recollected. If she could only dig deeper into the ocean of herself, she knew she’d find something.

Because there was something there. Something she had forgotten.

Vyse’s voice brought her back to reality. “No animals either,” he noticed. “Time’s left the city completely untouched.”

Drachma shrugged. “Kenne say I wanted t’stumble on some den ‘o fiends anyhow.”

The old man looked around the city again and suppressed his sense of adventure. What was he doing here? How was it that he was across the damned South Ocean and it had nothing to do with Rhaknam? The whole situation felt preposterous. Here he was kicking about some Old World metropolis, nearly choking on glimmer and gloom, while the thing he wanted most was on the other end of the world.

There had been a moment in the mines where it felt right to be here under the Green Moon fighting the Valuans but he changed his mind. The Old World! Buncha arcane blather that he wanted nothing to do with! An old bastard like him was never meant to wander such magick’d grounds. If only he could…

A scream cut through his thoughts and diffused through the fog with such fear that he wondered if the earth had cracked open and birthed a horrible beast. It took a moment before he realized that it was Aika. The scream was so far removed from her normal tone that the old man had confused it to the screechings of a cornered monster. He cast a glance around and found that she had disappeared from sight save for a quaking shadow deeper in the haze. Vyse was already running towards her, with Fina in tow. With a burst of speed that gave false impression to his age, Drachma scrambled towards the young pirate. He fully expected a fight but froze when the scene drew into view.

There were figures in the mist. Hundreds of them. Shades of translucent thinness that trudged about without leaving any footfalls on the ground. A tall warrior much like the ones back at Horteka marched through the center of the city on business lost to time. A partner at his side, cat-eyed and bearing the smallest hint of fangs, patrolled with equal purpose. One woman, resplendent in garb and shimmering soft green, had portions of her body that gave way to feathers. Her face was covered with enough ruffling plumes to imply great importance or at the very least a bold adventurousness. Two young children twirled around her with arms more like wings than anything belonging to man as Drachma understood. With enough speed, he suspected the pair might lift their feet off the ground and sail right into the sky. This marvelous cavalcade of those untouched by body-magicks and those displaying their changes spread out until the city seemed populated once again.

He was looking at ghosts.

#skies of arcadia #to the horizon #fan fic #sega dreamcast

[transgamerthoughts]

Bring Me That Horizon

I'm writing again! Okay, well… I never quite stopped and even did some games criticism stuff in the last few months. My Tears of the Kingdom piece was linked on Polygon and that was both very flattering and brought back some memories of the old gig. I guess I'm still a "critic" these days. Cool! Still… I kinda fell off the radar for a while. Oops! But now…

The last few years have been dominated by one project: my ongoing novelization of Skies of Arcadia. I've really tried to expand that world and capture what I love about the characters. Alas, while I used to write articles on the daily I'm not someone who sprints through writing anymore. That's good and bad and led to a bit of a reputation for long gaps between chapters. We had a pretty long stretch this time around but that was mostly to do with life events: moving to California, getting an extremely bad case of Covid, etc…

We're back at it with our latest chapter. Wherein our heroes take stock after helping the Ixa'takans strike back at the evil Valuan Empire and chart a course to the ancient city of Rixis. This has been a chance to really build out on both the lore of the Old World and do something that I wish the game was better about: giving the Ixa'takan people a more active role in their liberation. Our current arc under the Green Moon has been much lengthier than what happened in Nasr (where Vyse and the others retrieved their first moon crystal!) but I'm glad for it. That said: I'm also quite glad to be heading towards a conclusion here.

In the next few weeks, we'll have a sprint of new chapters that will contain ghosts in misty cities, giants smashing against mighty fleets, and revelations about the ever-salty Captain Drachma. Then we'll get introduced to some of my favorite characters and hit what I'll charitably call the halfway point. I'm energized and excited.

If this sounds like nonsense to you all I can ask is that you consider checking out the story so far. It's a breezy and high-spirited tale of adventure that I think you'd enjoy even if you're not a Dreamcast nerd like myself. There's 26 lengthy chapters of adventure and it'd definitely bring a bit of brisk excitement to your weekly reading. It's a weird time right now and while we should never hide away from the real world and nestle ourselves in stories, I do think there's value to exploring high adventure and heroic tales in spite of things.

If we can't make time in our hearts for these kinds of stories and the do-goodery within, how can we ever imagine smashing the face of injustice in our real lives? Perhaps that sounds naive or overly romantic but I believe in that sort of sentiment quite deeply; these stories are not frivolous. The dare us to do better!

Regardless, it is good to be back. For those who have read along so far, I'm grateful for your support. For those who might join us now: welcome!

#skies of arcadia #Eternal Arcadia #Dreamcast #fan fic #To The Horizon #sega

[transgamerthoughts]

Her Only Weapons Were Her Tears

Tears of the Kingdom's main objective, spelled out in the player's quest log right from the start is simple: find princess Zelda. Whether you explore every dungeon and follow the plot, complete a smattering before accidentally diving into Ganondorf’s lair, or rush with a speedrunner's fury into the final battle hardly matters.

All road's seek the same princess. All roads seek a shining sword. 

Let's chat about ending things and whether princess are saved and the horizons are clear. Should they be?

It's simple really! You have one job, Link! Find the princess!

Normally, that's a long process that takes players through a massive world as well as the skies about and depths below. In seeking the princess, players chart a massive path from shrine to shrine, side quest to side quest, and dungeon to dungeon. They seek power, gain heart pieces and increase their stamina, and acquire sagely spirits to aid them along the way. I'm not going to pick apart the paths players can take. Link can arrive in the Imprisoning Chamber beneath Hyrule Castle with a full arsenal of diamond tipped arrows and swords fused with monster bones. He can arrive completely naked.

He will arrive. He will slay the evil Demon King Ganondorf. He always finds his princess.

Zelda has changed. Flung into the far past at the start of the game, the princess meets King Rauru and Queen Sonia, the founders of the Kingdom of Hyrule. Zelda has arrived at a turning point in history; as Link prepares to fight Ganondorf in the future, she is already fighting that battle in the past. Growing close to the king and queen, Zelda joins with them and a cadre of sages to fight Ganondorf as he lays waste to the world. The "end" starts when Sonia is killed in an act of duplicity that grants Ganondorf access to one of the Zonai "secret stone," relics of immense power held by the royal family and sages. They grant access to near-limitless magical energy and can even gift individuals with immortality.

There's a catch to that final part. In order to use a secret stone to gain immortality, the stone must be consumed. This process changes the individual into an ageless dragon. It also robs the individual of all sapience. Time cannot touch you but it comes at the cost of individuality. You have no thinking mind, all is endless sleep and instinct. You sleep.

As Ganondof uses his stolen stone to raise armies of monsters, Rauru and the sages (including Zelda as a nascent sage of time) battle Ganondorf.. Zelda survives and is left with Rauru’s stone after using his strength to seal the Demon King away. It is a temporary reprieve Recalling how, in the present, the Ganon shatters Link’s sword—the legendary evil-sealing Master Sword—a long term gambit is crafted. The sword itself is unknowingly sent back in time to Zelda where she consumes Rauru’s stone and transforms into a mighty dragon. The blade rests upon her head where it will regain power over untold ages until Link can recover it. Zelda has given Link everything he needs. And in doing so, she gives all of herself.

I’m not interested in a discussion focusing on if Zelda’s sacrifice plays into gender tropes. That’s an easy yes but I also think “the princess should save herself” is a boring way to look at the series or games more broadly. The story is as we have it. Zelda soars the skies with the Master Sword, she has shed all vestiges of her thinking mind, and only Link will be able to change that. But how much should it change? What kind of story are we telling?

I’ve spent most of my experience with Tears of the Kingdom sharing progress with friends in a private Discord. Our notes and discoveries were highly redacted and covered in spoiler warnings throughout everyone’s progress but more and more people have completed the game. It’s led to a discussion of the ending—which untangles much of the tragedy of Zelda’s sacrifice—and if something more melancholy is more fitting than the utter triumph our heroes know when the credits roll.

Let’s break it down: one way or another Link will obtain the Master Sword. If the player follows the story, they are invariably guided towards the Light Dragon that roams the world map. Many side paths also drive them this way. Seek the dragon, oh valiant knight, and you will claim the blessed sword. If you’re simply curious and climb on the soaring dragon’s back, you might even find it by chance.

If you don’t bother with any of this, you receive the sword in the final battle anyway. Ganondorf consumes his own stone after failing to best Link in combat. He transforms into a twisted dragon spewing corrosive gloom. The final boss fight takes place high in the sky where Link finds himself on the Light Dragon’s back. If the player hasn’t recovered the Master Sword, there it rests upon the dragon’s back. All roads converge.

Depending on the path a player takes, they might reach the Light Dragon after collecting the various dragon’s tears present at the ground zero sites of many ancient geoglyphs. The tears contain visions of the past; they weave Zelda’s story with Link’s modern day wanderings. Collect enough and the Light Dragon soars to the sky, weeping a final tear that explains all.

Zelda has been crying for centuries.

Link soars upon the dragon's back—a footing gained only by Zelda’s sacrifice—and plunges the sword into Ganon’s draconic form. He receives a parting gift: the spirits of Sonia and Rauru release Zelda from her timeless prison. The princess falls and falls…

Link dives…

The princess falls… She falls…… He dives… He reaches out…. She is falling but so close…

He grabs her hand. They fall. Together, they land within a lake. The sun shines and she wakes. There are tears in her eyes

Objective complete. You have found princess Zelda.

The question stirring amongst my friends is whether or not all is too well. Is the resolution of the story, although beautiful and carved within our memories, perhaps a bit too clean?

Ah, well…

There is a time and place, even now, for stories of hope and complete victory over the darkness eating away at the world. My favorite story is one of these; the pirates sail against the evil empire and save the world from foes both modern and ancient before sailing off to the horizon. These stories speak to us because they allow us to believe in heroes. The tale cries out: “it is never too late!”

It is never too late to save the world. It might be too late for a clean and perfectly happy ending.

Tears of the Kingdom’s ending is immaculate in presentation. From the player’s initial dive into the depths beneath Hyrule Castle all the way until the last dive to catch Princess Zelda, the entire sequence soars. I’ve been playing Zelda games since 1998 and this was the first time I burst into tears playing a Zelda game. The music swelled, Link dived down, and he did what he failed to do at the start of the game when Zelda first fell further into the depths and backwards in time. It is the perfect capstone to nearly-perfect game.

There’s the argument for a happy ending in a nutshell. I measure the success in tears. I shed them years ago for my favorite game and I shed them here and now. There is a glorious release found within the water, a wonderful affirmation of the fairy tale. In dark times, these tales hold immense power.

These are dark times and Tears of the Kingdom is a wonderful fairy tale. In spite of this, and even allowing for the fantasy setting, it’s fair to ask: is this a story for our current times or a beautiful dream?

The story which matches our times does not have a clean ending. Zelda does not magically heal from her sacrifice. In this version, she continues to sail the skies and though she may not weep, the princess will never be found. Not as she was. There has been a change wrought through blood and tears and no matter how sweet the victory, the world does not revert to a status quo. Objective complete. But…

The possibility of this ending has stirred plenty of discussion amongst my friends and peers. There is a general consensus that perhaps it would be best that Zelda remain shackled in her draconic form. Not because that is the “mature” thing to do but rather because such an ending is more honest and of our times. We’ve seen how power responds to those who act against it. The response is violent and swift. It is measured in blood and tears.

There will be a day when the demons and their kings are cast down but the scars of the rule will remain etched upon the land and found most painfully in the absence of those who made sacrifices along the way. The sorrow transforms victory but time does not turn back and no miracle is coming to rewind things until the blood is back in our veins and the tears flow back from where they came.

Which is better? The story when the princess awakens safely amongst the grass and flowers or where she sails forever upon the winds? There is a Hyrule where the Light Dragon sails eternally as a monument to the costs of fighting the Demon King. Of what was lost.

There is a Hyrule with an undying Zelda.

That’s probably the more “honest” version of the story even if it’s not the most magical or player-pleasing. Practically, there’s a version of Zelda where her sacrifice is lasting and true; one where a status quo is fundamentally shifted. Where stories and games further along this point always contain a dragon in the sky. There was a bold card to play with Tears of the Kingdom even if the ending as it stands is beautiful. Hell, even if the goddess blessed another brave woman who unites with a loyal warrior to fight the forces of evil… there might still be a dragon in the sky. A Zelda-eternal hovering above all as a reminder of what it takes to be brave. As sure and solid as Death Mountain itself. Always watching. Sometimes crying.

It doesn’t matter if the tears are for joy or sorrow. They’d fall on the world below and the waters would bloom flowers with light and love. Because those are her weapons.

And, you know... magic swords gotta get their magic from somewhere.

#tears of the kingdom #tears of the kindom spoilers #games criticism

[transgamerthoughts]

"Heard, Chef."

If you know a millenial who has social media, you may have heard about The Bear. Hell, I'm sure many of you have watched it. The harrowing story of Carmen Berzatto's attempt to save his deceased brother's restaurant has met with astoundingly positive critical response.

Season Two focuses on Carmy and Sydney's attempt to turn The Original Beef sandwhich shop into a Michelin star worthy restaurant. In working towards that goal, many characters find joy in honing their craft while others unhealthily lose themselves in the work.

There's plenty of stories to tell but I wanna focus on the personal journey of resident asshole "cousin" Ritchie. I wanna talk about forks, bleeding for your work, and the ways we sometimes close ourselves off from others.

Ritchie Jerimovich (played by Ebon Moss-Bachrach) is a fucking asshole. Close friends with Carmy's deceased brother Michael, he's constantly positioned himself as the one motherfucker on the planet who knows how to run the restaurant. In Season One, he continually fights against any changes to the menu or the sloppy way the Original Beef was run. He's called "cousin" but he's not even Carmy's cousin by blood; he has wedged himself into the Berzatto family's life. And as season two drives closer and closer toward the restaurant's rebranding and grand opening, Ritchie has continued to push back on others.

Ritchie, again, is a fucking asshole. He swears and yells at others, he tosses out slurs liberally. In season one, he nearly kills a drunk patron in a fist fight during a bachelor party the restaurant is hosting. His mistakes mount up and it is only through chance moments of luck and fleeting self-reflection does he start to change.

The change is not complete at the start of season two. It comes with a scant few episodes left.

In the episode "Forks," Carmy sends him to stage in the high-class and award winning restaurant helped earn Three Michelin stars. As Ritchie works, mostly forced to fold forks into napkins, he reckons with the restaurant's high standard but eventually finds comfort in the work. He is learning to serve others, to be aware of people's needs, and how to listen to those around him. It transforms into into someone more open and receptive. He cleans up, wearing the restaurant's required suit for when he is observing the work in the dining room. He muses that it feels like armor.

Ritchie returns to The Bear ahead of opening and continues to wear a suit. Many people remark about the change but most note that it suits him. And in the lead up to a family and friends night soft-launch, he apologizes to others and helps them rise to high standards.

Meanwhile, Carmy descends into self-loathing even as other's require his attention. Sydney needs him to focus as a partner, the staff need him to teach them and lead. But Carmy can't step up. He can't even decide if Claire, the old flame he's reconnected with, is his girlfriend.

Even as he works to open his dream restaurant, he is in pain. He tortures himself with worry, rarely gives himself time away from things even if his ability to coordinate and communicate with Sydney deteriorates . He forms a confusing armor around himself and doesn't respond to the needs of those around him. He is bleeding for his work.

Ritchie doesn't bleed. Ritchie has discovered something else.

I remember, vaguely, a meeting we had at Kotaku around 2018. It's funny to say I remember because the context of the meeting is lost; my actual memory is terrible but I always remember embarrassments. I said that "you gotta bleed for you work." It was an offhand comment in response to how many reviews some folks, including myself, were taking on. I was a fast worker, so I took on a excessive amount of assignments.

There was a palpable discomfort in the room when I said what I did.

I was embarrassed and I always remember embarrassment.

The pace of journalism is one part dopamine and another part full on dry heaving. I had given myself in to the former because I love writing. It is my oxygen. It's part of why I'm writing this. I can't stop myself. back then i didn't notice how much dry-heaving I was doing to myself. how much I was physically destroying myself.

You can love too much and capitalism too keen to take advantage of that. This is known but it worth saying anyway. I ground myself into powder as a journalist. That's not bragging. It's a warning. i can happen to you and it can happen with any job. but you should not bleed for your work. You can bleed for others—workers should certainly bleed for each other if it means securing better treatment—but you can't bleed for the work.

To his credit, some time later, Stephen Totilo took me aside and said I should take vacation. Which I had never done because, well, news does not stop and there is always another game. I was bleeding and even my boss could see that I was running out of blood. Yes, there was incentive to asking me to take a break; there was risk I would produce poor work. So go take a vacation, right? That way you can return and be a Better Employee.

I could be cynical and see his half-order as a boss managing a worker so they could be more efficient but I choose to belief, against all realities of late-capitalist life, that it was it was a person looking out for a person. Contrary to the idea that age instills distrust I have found that it impresses the need to have faith in those around you.

I have faith.

I took staycation in New York visiting as many highly regarded pizzarias as I could. I arrived two hours early and waited in the snow so I could get a table at Lucali. In spite of taking time to love all the amazing cuisine New York offered and in spite of my own love of home cooking, I would go on to lose over thirty pounds while working at Kotaku. Maybe I didn't learn the right lesson; maybe the forces of capital are that strong. Either way: I make myself bleed again and it's only with the benefit of hindsight that I see how fucked I was. I had a problem.

sometimes, I still do. sometimes it comes back to me and I work on everything I can kinda of like why I'm writing right now and I do it because I have these moments where I can't stop and then I crash for months. sometimes I still make myself bleed.

Near the end of "Forks," Ritchie walks into the kitchen to find head chef/owner Terry (played by Olivia Colman!) peeling mushrooms for a lamb dish. There is no particular culinary purpose; it will not change the taste of the mushrooms. She is there early in the morning and peeling mushrooms because "it's a fun little detail" that lets diners know someone spent time with their dish. Strictly speaking, it is extra work but there's a difference between this gesture and (for example) the way I burnt myself out. It's generosity. It's truly done for others. It is service given willingly and while it does benefit the restaurant it's mostly done because she feels like it and finds comfort in giving a portion of herself to others.

You shouldn't ever bleed for the job. If there is any blood, let it be a donation. In spite of what faith I have, the universe has not seen fit to reveal any truth to us when it comes to the mechanisms that keep it spinning. The reflex is to find absurdity in our ignorance and in our fundamental smallness. Purpose cannot exist in any extant manner because the universe is indifferent to our works. Perhaps this is true and if so it stands to reason that all we have is each other and the having is a fleeting thing.

Knowing this, service takes on a fresh significance although this is perhaps not the more revelatory things to notice. Service is the means by which we insist against all odds that we are here. It is one of the most beautiful ways we reach out and touch someone and say "yes, we are here and we need not be here alone." And service can never be mistaken for work.

Ritchie puts on this suit and dons his armor so that he doesn't bleed for the work. His fellow worker Garret explains that before he worked at Terry's place, he had a drinking problem but he sobers up and learned "acts of service" and it gave him purpose.

he says there's a reason hospitality and hospital share the same root word.

One time I passed out on the new york subways because I couldn't breath. there were times throughout the day that stood up and nearly passed out. my doctor thought I was anemic.

sometimes work becomes like armor. you pour yourself into it because you think it's the only way you can reach people. sometimes, I still believe that. maybe the words are all I have

We all certainly have armor although it's sometimes hard to identify what it is. There's two kinds of armor though and I think one is probably better than the other. There is the armor we put on to protect us from others. There is the armor that we put on the protect us from ourselves.

The first is borne out of suspicion; the second comes with experience. The first is easy to forge and hard to take off. The second is more difficult to build but slips off and on easily as needed. For one and a half seasons, Ritchie has warded other off with bards and rudeness. He's lacked empathy, discarded it entirely. But when we watch him talk with his coworkers in this episode, it's clear that empathy can come easily for him if he allows it. He's a natural with people and it comes into focus the moment he starts shedding the old armor.

I have a propensity to overshare in my work and in my thoughts about other's work. I firmly believe we should be able to be honest with people perhaps to the point of being radically honest but I find it can be difficult to know where lines are. I often wonder if there are ways in which my own honesty has driven people away. if it's simply become angry bluntness.

it is hard to know if it has become an armor I've donned for that very purpose without knowing it. Maybe I pushed folks away because I somehow thought I didn't deserve their friendship. I'm not sure. what i know is that i certainly feel lonely and hardly feel comfortable in any group. i'm suspicious of every and unable to tell what is sarcastic or not.

I fear all I've done is wedge myself into different families.

Watching Ritchie shed his abrasiveness shook me more than anything else this season and this is a string of episode with perhaps the most nightmarish Christmas ever shown in anything I've watched. Ritchie's shortcomings are obvious and loud; his transformation is nothing short of astounding and a testament to The Bear's writers.

It has also left me wondering about my own shortcomings or if I might be able to perceive and understand other people's armor. so I can better empathize with them and their needs. so I can understand how I could better serve them. What are the moments where they are wearing their own armor? What are the moments where my own ill-forge set has driven people away? Hard to know!

Season Two ends with Carmy locked in the walk-in freezer during The Bear's friends and family night. it's the teams first night running the restaurant; this is their first shot to see if they can really work together. to see if everyone fits into place and is not wedged.

Throughout many episodes, Carmy's been reminded to call someone to fix the walk-in's door handle. He's failed to listen and failed to reach out. It might be self-sabotage but it is also a reminder of happens when we bleed for our work. We pour ourselves into something until we are locked away. we fail to act as we should. Carmy simmers in his thoughts while he is locked in the freezer. Eventually, he wonders if he's allowed to be happy and if he's allowed to allow Claire to love him. He wonders if she's just a distraction.

He craves the work, he wants to bleed.

And in the end, as Claire listens through the door, his words drive her away. His relationship crumbles. The work has killed one of the only good things he has taken a chance on. Trapped behind a literal wall and locked in a prison caused of his own neglect, he's not even able to help everyone in the kitchen. He's not there to lead and not there to share in their victory as the night end and they deliver outstanding service. Ritchie is there.

The episode ends in an argument between the two. It starts because Ritchie, empathetically, wants to know what Carmy said to hurt Claire. But Carmy can't open up and continues to lash out. As they yelled, Ritchie declares that he love Carmen. Even as he argues and they swear viciously at each other, he hasn't put on his old armor. And if Carmen could open the door, maybe he'd find someone there who would listen to him and be radically honest.

One of Carmy's biggest regrets is that he wasn't able to work. There is a dash of empathy there—he knows he has failed the staff—but there's still, the audience might fear, a need to hide in the work and bleed. Perhaps he'll discover the difference between work and service. Perhaps he'll end up peeling mushrooms in order to share a human touch with guests.

But for now? The door is stuck.

#the bear #labor #media criticism

[transgamerthoughts]

Returning To The (Tumbling) Skies

Twitter’s exploding! That’s okay! Between this and my space at cohost, it looks like we’re gonna be back in action with light game crit and sharing my Skies of Arcadia novelization. How nice! What’s that last part? Glad you asked, Hypothetical Tumblr user! Since 2020, I’ve been writing a full novelization of the fantastic (and for me life-changing) Dreamcast game Skies of Arcadia! You can read it here. And I guess since it’s been a while since I posted here: if you’re catching this post and don’t know me: my name is Harper and I’m the community manager at Double Fine Productions we make games like Psychonauts 2 and Brütal Legend. I started writing here in 2015 or so, which led to a job as a journalist/games critic, and then to Double Fine. (Gosh, I look at old posts here and it’s... a totally different me back then!) I think I’ll be posting here more often. You can expect a migration of some of my cohost posts here in the next week or so. So hey: good to (re?) meet you.

#reintroduction #double fine #games criticism #skies of arcadia #fanfic

[transgamerthoughts]

What I Found In The Leaves

Last August, as the lease to my apartment was about to end, the roof began to smolder until the place I lived was full of smoke. When all was settled and done, my apartment had no roof. My room was spared and most of my things were okay—this part of the story being set in late capitalism, I am required to assure you that the things I purchased were okay too—and I decided to leave New York City to return to New England with my family. One of the first things I did when I arrived was look at the sky and imagine I was up there. Falling or sailing or flying. It didn’t really matter. I wanted to touch a cloud, to feel the whipping wind.

I promise… this is leading to something. In the months since, in spite of comfort and proximity to my family… in spite of the arrival of my nephew into this world—a child I would climb a mountain and punch God for if I needed to—and in spite of a happy job… I have spiraled into depression. My solution was work and writing. To throw myself into my job and to, somewhat foolishly, take on the task of novelizing my favorite game: Skies of Arcadia. Because if you’ve read my work long enough, it always comes back to Arcadia. I am proud of that project but it sparked a yearning in me. To truly connect to the world I was writing. It lit a fire. Before we proceed, let me be clear that by depression I don’t mean the woes of pandemic living or some disaffection with the reality of entering my 30s. I mean a deep and painful darkness with all the implications therein. Regardless to say, my efforts to combat it drained me. To the point that I burnt myself out and with some prodding from my boss, took a vacation. Which I am currently on. This is not the first time this series of events has played out. I made a promise to myself when I started vacation: no writing. I am breaking it because I have found, yet again, a moment where I must desperately drain the wonder in my heart and attempt to explain to you that I think there are magical things in the world, and that I believe there is some type of magic in art—in that strange alchemic or shamanistic way—that transfers to us. This will be my second attempt to explain it, and to explain what it has to do with video games. (Forgive the indulgence of this introduction by the way; an editor would surely have cut it all but I need you to understand two things: I am in pain and there's a part of that pain which I think points to something important.) This is a story of ritual and tea. Of how my senses and imagination came together to send me on a journey around a fictional world, in search of heroes who both do and do not exist. As part of my love for Skies of Arcadia, I’ve become something of a paraphernalia collector. I bought an old light novel from ebay, I used my rudimentary Japanese skills to set up a warehouse dropbox so that two fan magazines could be sent there and then subsequently shipped to America, and I have drank tea based off the game. At the time, I wanted to collect the little tins the tea came in; they seemed excellent collector’s items. What I found with my first round of tea was art unto itself; balances of flavor and spice and blends that symbolized characters and connected me to them. These were crafted by a dedicated fan and fellow writer. I don’t have the time to sit and research all the ways in which tea is used in ritual. Because I am tired and older and depressed and writing a blog post that perhaps thirty people will read. Regardless, to my delight I found that the tea-maker had created blends based off the various moons that dot Arcadia’s skies. For those who do not know the game, which I assume is many of you: each nation of the world rests under a magical moon. There are six, with one—a Black Moon—theorized to have gone missing. Here was my opportunity for a journey.

I bought teas based on each moon, and one based on the world itself. I will post a separate collection of all my individual tastings and reviews later. The important thing is this: I had been given an amazing gift. With these teas, I had something of that digital world which was actual. When we play games, we hear them and see them. Perhaps with certain haptics we can feel them. But we do not smell them or taste them or literally consume them. Eight teas, eight chances to smell and taste that wonderful world. To touch the clouds. Quem quaeritis? This is a famous question asked by an angel to the three Marys visiting Christ's tomb: his mother the Virgin Mary, Mary Magdalene, and Mary, who is the sister of Lazarus—the man Christ brought back to life after his death. It means: “whom to do you seek?” I was journeying, one tea cup at a time, around Arcadia. From continent to continent, I tasted their spices and experienced hints of their values, their cultures as expressed through the tea. The question played in my mind: Quem quaeritis? Whom was I seeking? The answer is complicated. First, I was seeking something of myself. The part of me that understood magic and wonder. The part of me that believes in the soul and believes that art, in allowing the complex interaction of creators and characters with players, performs some type of soul-magic. It impresses upon us, real and actual changes. I was seeking that piece of me; that part of me that understood that each cup was a ritual that brought about a communion with a distant world. I was searching for the younger part of me that believed in wonderful things. 

I drank the teas in the order our heroes travel the world, and in doing so I was performing a sort of perseveration of their journey. I communed with some place distant and followed in their footsteps. Which answers another half of the question. Whom did I seek? I sought my heroes. I sought the adventurous Vyse and his dogged determinism, I sought the firecracker Aika and her swift rushes to action, and I sought Fina. The woman I wish I could be: feminine, slight, beautiful, kind, brave. Quem quaeritis? All of this sounds like nonsense and when I try to explain the nonsense, I feel a deep embarrassment. To care in the 21th century, particularly in America, is to be weak. To be publicly vulnerable is to make yourself a target. You must be hard and solid as a rock. You cannot believe in magic or else you are doomed. But here I was, chasing myself and my heroes one cup at a time. And I need you to know that it hurt to do that. 

I went to the corner store today to buy some energy drinks. When I got back home, my father asked: “did you find what you were looking for?” I told him “That’s a very complicated question.”

Let me explain. Let me do the thing that I feel I cannot do well anymore; let me do some game criticism. In the world of games, the entities we control exist as two things. They are actors; manipulatable bodies, guided by code and controller inputs, that we guide around as we see fit. In this way, players have extraordinary power. In some ways, it is a… fraught power. We can, as Soulja Boy did, leave Braid’s protagonist in a perpetual flux state: jumping and rewinding. Back and forth, forth and back. Eternal puppets for our amusement, avatars for our power fantasies. Sometimes, as in the case of a game like Skyrim, our controllable actors are little more than flesh suits But actors are, more than anything, just… avatars. Video game actors are also characters. Within their worlds, which are fictional, they have motivations and wants and desires and dreams. They want to live and grow and succeed. Cloud Strife wants to defeat Sephiroth and uncover the truth about himself, Joel wants to protect Ellie and survive in a cruel world. Arthur Morgan wants to find a calmer life and redemption for his sins. They are, as characters, people. But since they are also actors, we can deny them their hopes and dreams whenever we want. We can have Cloud while away his days gambling at the Gold Saucer and, if we want, we can force Arthur Morgan to murder to population of an entire town. The core truth of a player's relationship to the character is this: we decide if their dreams are fulfilled. I find that troubling and I will try to explain why. But first let’s be clear: I do not think the character in games are sentient entities. I outlined this relationship of players and characters in a GDC talk a few years ago, using highly rhetorical terms and my reward was the ridicule of countless gamers who questioned my sanity. Some made videos about my presentation. It was hell. To be a woman, perhaps especially a progressively minded trans-woman, in games is to know a very real hell. To this day, I cannot go a week without some type of horrid experience on the internet. Some judgment of my worth, some assumption about my competency, or in the worst cases some proclamation about my right to live. No doubt this is part of why I needed my vacation. But here is why I find the player/character/actor relationship troubling. It is not merely the abstract notion, the thought experiment that elicits fun but meaningless philosophical natter. The reason I find that relationship troubling or at least complicated is because for all of their fiction, the characters in games can give us real things. They can, through some type of power—a deep power found in the act of story-telling itself—impart aspects of themselves on us. For instance, they can teach us lessons which we then carry into the rest of our lives. My father, for reasons I can’t recall, once told me: “the meaning of life is to serve others.” Though he does not know it, that truism has been etched into my soul. It is a “thing” that my father has given me. But my father is not the only person who has etched something into my soul. Vyse, that dashing pirate, has etched many things into my soul. For instance: “impossible is just a word people use to make themselves feel better when they quit.” That is etched on my soul too. Just as much as anything my father has taught. So we come to the heart of it: what does it mean that Vyse can so alter my being and values, and that he can do it with the same strength and “realness” of my father? What does it mean for a character, who is also often an actor that I guide, to give me such a powerful gift? Because let us be clear: values are “real” things. When I tried to explain that I believe that certain things are actually true, for instance that looking at landscapes does mean that we are looking at something real…. I spent an afternoon with former Jeopardy! contestant Arthur Chu and a cohort of Twitteristas attacking my philosophical surety. So, again, fuck the internet… I digress.. Let’s explore: I believe in the realness of things because of the depth of the emotions those things make me feel, and I refuse to believe that life is just endorphins, hormones, and instinct. That music or games or anything else can make us weep for joy is proof-positive to me of the existence of a soul; of an ineffable thing that is “us.” Not necessarily all enduring but certainly extant. And if this thing exists, it can be acted upon. I know this because my father, with his truism, changed my soul. Changed the core of me. I know this because Vyse and the others did so as well.

I’ve written that games criticism is a kindness; that it seeks the good in art and attacks the banal explicitly because art is beautiful. I write today to suggest this: art is magical. It alters us, not metaphorically, but in the ways it can affect our souls. Which brings us back to character and actors. I control Vyse since he is an actor and I am a player; but he is a character with dreams and hopes and personality. And values. Wonderful values which he shared with me. So what does it mean now that I can send actors to their doom? What does it mean that I can control them utterly when I know for a fact that they can affect and change me? I do not have clean answers for this. Perhaps there are none. Perhaps all I have written is silliness, even as I beg you to please understand. Please. 

Understand the power of stories, understand it in the way that Tolkein did when he said: “Creative fantasy, because it is mainly trying to do something else … may open your hoard and let all the locked things fly away like cage-birds.” Understand that I am telling you that the locked thing is your heart and soul, and that just as a lover or parent or mentor can open that thing… so can the people we meet in our fictional journeys. Vyse is not just the captain of a ship. He is my captain. That means something. Art is ritual and play is ritual. In creation, we place something of ourselves in another thing. In play, we allow ourselves to be transmuted and changed. This is magic, of a sort. I am left wanting however. I followed the path of my heroes in as literal a way as I could, pulling on new senses to understand the world they live in and touch their skies for a fleeting moment. But I cannot reach them; I am Tantalus in the mire. Ever reaching, ever chasing. For that moment I can be the person that my heroes trusted me to become. Note by musical note, word for written word, tea cup by tea cup, I am chasing my captain. When I went back to my apartment the day after the fire, I looked up at the spot where the roof used to be. All I could see was blue sky and I thought I might fall into it. Perhaps in superficial ways I have shared something with my heroes; I have tasted something they have, even though the tea is not actually from Arcadia. It was merely a conduit to my imagination, to the transformed parts of my souls. Yet, I did not find him and I could not find myself. Which is why it hurts, in spite of how wonderful it was. Quem quaeritis? He is not here. So I will keep sailing after him.

#skies of arcadia #games criticism #tea #dreams

[transgamerthoughts]

Guerrilla Radio

I look at Rodney Mullen and I see a kindred spirit. To hear Mullen speak is to go for a ride, the cadence of his voice rising and falling in unpredictable ways. Sometimes, he speaks at a hushed whisper. A low and pained utterance indicating a reverence and yearning that polite society eschews—if there’s one thing folks feel weird about it’s excess displays of passion. When he’s not quiet, Mullen is truly loud. His laugh is a barking chortle. Painful whisperings, awkward celebration. Mullen is a man of infectious extremes.

I play as Mullen whenever I boot up Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1+2, the recently released remaster of earlier games. There’s an option to create a customized, idealized version of myself and I could always play as the Birdman. I think they expect you to play as Tony for a long time; his toolkit is strong and stats are spread nicely. Those things matter less and less as you play. It’s easy to upgrade any character’s stats and customize their special tricks but Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1+2 hardly explains itself outside of an optional tutorial. It is a game superbly confident in the fact that the player will play every portion of it including the menus. That’s a wise impulse; Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1+2 is terrifyingly intuitive and always has been. How else could many of us fully complete it in our childhoods? Still, even though I could play as myself, I play as Mullen because I’ve never felt so magnetically pulled to an individual in my life. To hear Rodney Mullen talk about skateboarding is to hear myself attempt to talk about games criticism. There is a core of a person that we might call “Rodney Mullen” and a layer of societal artifice built around it. There is a soul and a sort of clay surrounding it. It’s easy to understand that his soul is fragile. It requires a clear and powerful nourishment. For Mullen, that’s skating. Every quiver in his voice when he talks about a trick, every pause before he mentions his domineering father expresses the singular freedom he finds on a skateboard. I immediately recognize it as the freedom I feel on a page. I see footage of an impossible flip and synthetically equate it to a good metaphor. I see freestyle groundtricks flow into each other like tributaries into a large river, and I imagine a comma-laden ramble of a sentence. I feel something ineffable. When I watch footage of Mullen or other contemporaries like Daewon Song, something falls over me like a spectral blanket. What they find through ollies, grinds, and reverts, I chase every time I write.

Before I played Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1+2, I was already watching documentaries on my favorite skaters and looking at old tapes. I’m back with my family for a time in quarantine, and my father found my old skateboard. It’s an old Geoff Rowley Flip board. I was always a clumsy person; skating was liberating but I could never have found the expression that someone like Mullen or Rowley have. But I did find it in games, and in writing. That sounds indulgent and quixotic but it’s true. I can’t explain how completely necessary writing is to me. Perhaps it would be easier to say that I’ve reached a point professionally where I never really need to write criticism again if I don’t want to. I survived the daily news grind, produced some things I liked, put up with some bullshit that I didn’t, and emerged on the other side in a new field. War’s over. Except it’s never over. I need to write.

Playing Tony Hawk, I see the process. Every level is a crash course in finding intense purpose in our surroundings. While the action of Tony Hawk occurs at a scale detached from reality, one where tricks flow into intense sequences and it’s commonplace to leap large rooftop gaps, the process of achieving a high score points towards a truth that any skateboarder can attest to: the world is different when you perceive it from atop a skateboard. Your streets become so much more than pavement. You observe what is before you with a keen eye and find a meaning and intentionality that isn’t immediately obvious.

Until Mullen debuted the flatground ollie in 1982—itself inspired by Alan Gefland’s technique for freehand aerial vert tricks—the street was less explored than parks and vertical ramps. Flat ground competitions were “freestyle” competitions full of pogo tricks and manuals. The ability to leap into the air meant there were new tricks that could be developed. Mullen pioneered further tricks like the kickflip and the impossible entirely because of the new freedom the ollie offered. But the ollie wasn’t just a foundation for new tricks; it opened up the streets to exploration. Skating could move out of the parks. This proved an essential step to keeping the sport alive.

This widening freedom constitutes the core of Tony Hawk’s gameplay. Although there are plenty of vert tricks and Hawk himself is classified in game as a vert skater, the majority of each level’s gameplay is devoted to exploration. Finding hidden video tapes, jumping over parked cars, wall-riding to destroy schoolyard bells. These objectives are about navigating real spaces albeit ones that are somewhat exaggerated. It is contingent on the player to observe the world through the eyes of a skater. Tony Hawk doesn’t capture the realistic mechanics of skating but it does capture the creative sentiment. In order to complete objectives and also achieve high scores, they need to think like a skater.

To hear Mullen talk about developing tricks and the ways in which skating expanded in the 80s, you’d think little revolutionary was happening. For Mullen, tricks were about expression. These various flips and techniques weren’t about pushing the boundaries of skating. They were, first and foremost, the ways in which a shy kid from a strict Gainesville home expressed himself to the world. They were about asserting his value as an individual and expressing the ineffable parts of himself that he could not express any other way. That individual desire fed into a larger ecosystem where his tricks could be adapted and integrated into an ever-evolving language. The personal became conversational. The conversational became foundational. 

I think about these processes and apply them to my own field, although I wonder if I can even call criticism my home anymore. I didn’t write about games because I thought there could be a career in it. I didn’t write about games because I saw starting my blog as a pathway to outlets or studios. I wrote and still write because it is the only way I have as a still-lonely kid from New Hampshire to express something fundamental about myself. I write because it is the only way I’ve ever felt like I’ve been heard. Let me be clear: this is the comparison I’ll make between myself and Mullen. I’m not implying that I’ve done anything so important as he has. When I see Mullen, I see someone who can’t stop. Because stopping means moving back into a silent space. 

That space is painful. I do not make friends easily and struggle to keep them. I am awkward and have, in my life, only found a handful of people who I believe have ever seen the person I truly am. Writing, then, is a way to shed layers and layers of confusion and performance in favor of something authentic.

When I navigate a Tony Hawk level or watch a tape of my favorite skaters, I see the writing process spread before me. To engage in criticism is to find yourself in a new space every time you play a game. There are a variety of potential objectives and angles that you can seek out and achieve. In order to do those in a sensible fashion, you need to explore and familiarize yourself with the space and then perceive the spaces where you can move, combo-like, from one point to another. In-between, you add flourishes and tricks that express something not only about the space you are in but the person you are. Done well, you show that the metaphorical school-yard is far more than a school-yard. It is a playground, it is a battlefield, it is an unexplored land fit for mapping. A writer, like a skater, perceives certain spaces differently. A Metal Gear military installation becomes a metaphor for self-delusion. The world of Dark Souls, whether in the meanderings of the first entry or the broken spaces of the second, expresses something fundamental about the nature of memory. The violence of The Last of Us Part II (and who chiefly suffers in that world) speaks to the biases of the writers.

There’s a catch though. A difference between what Mullen is talking about and the current reality of games criticism. Where Mullen speaks of his individual expression flowing into a communal effort where skaters are engaged in a wider conversation, games criticism has rarely felt so cohesive. It is a balkanized space where writers are often separated from each other. Mainstream writers hardly read the important fringe spaces, academics ignore anyone without their pedigree. There is a lack of institutional or history knowledge because there’s no real tradition of mentorship or places where that history is documented satisfactorily. In journalistic spaces, writers burn out in the face of institutional failures that have led to shoddy reportage and a lack of protection against a reactionary games culture. There is also no pathway for fresh faces to slot into the leadership spaces that could actually address structural issues. Critically, while there’s hundreds of YouTubers and other content creators bringing criticism to the masses, there’s few times where critical terms or concepts carry over into the broader culture. We do not have the same degree of literacy amongst players as, say, films do among film-goers. This is not to say these things are completely absent. I’ve seen moments where the isolated spaces of games writing interact. When academic writers like Frank Lantz and Ian Bogost wrote about narrative in 2015, a cadre of alt-space writers directly engaged with their work in a debate that helped to solidify understandings of ludology and narratology even further that what had been expressed by writers like Gonzolo Frasca. Writers like Stephen Beirne and Durante Pierpaoli coined the terms ludo-fundamentalism and ludo-centrism to better codify schools of thought that dismissed holistic criticism in favor of games systems analysis. Yet, this is not something widely remembered either by academics or players. And while it’s tempting to self-critique and say that I’m overplaying the importance of that moment because of my proximity to it, I think it’s illustrative of the critical sphere’s major failures. 

Conversations come and go in flashes, very little is integrated into the whole, and we largely forget everything that’s come before in favor of repetitious debates and torturous re-litigations. Beyond this, there’s very little discussion between writers. There’s less letter series and response pieces and very little sense that any real conversations are taking place. Writing might be the realm of individual expression that that expression hardly feeds into a larger pool where concepts can be iterated on. This is, more than anything else, the biggest failure of games writing.  I have found deep personal expression in my writing and yes, there is a community. But what about our processes are communal? Perhaps nothing at all.

In addition to Tony Hawk, my current gameplay indulgence is Pathologic. The two could not be more different. One is accommodating and celebratory. It gives the player ample ability to navigate a level and express themselves. The other is oppressive and continually stymies all attempts at progress. Yet, as I play Pathologic I pause. My character, the surgeon Artemy Burakh is approached by the Kin, the tribesmen and women who occupy the steppe outside his home-town. Artemy is a “menkhu,” a group of surgeons and steppe-folk who perform vivisections. They are architects of the flesh. It is said that they are “Those Who Know The Lines.” 

I load up Tony Hawk and play a competition map at a skate-park in Chicago. In order to succeed and get the gold medal, I also search for the lines. I’ve always been searching. With every game, with every word I search for the lines. Mullen needs to skate.  Artemy needs to heal the sick. I need to write. 

#tony hawk #tony hawk's pro skater #pathologic

[transgamerthoughts]

Idle Thoughts On Games During Pandemic Times

I’m in an interesting position as I write this. Since I’ve written here I have moved out of journalism and towards the dev side of games. Good news! I’m happier! Bad news! It can feel weird to have public opinions.  That said, I miss writing and I’ve had some thoughts about games I’ve played (mostly major titles) that I want to share. I’m keeping them loose and I hope folks will allow me the indulgence. Here we are!

Ghost of Tsushima 

I’ve been surprised by how playable Ghost of Tsushima is. Which is to say that the world is very enjoyable to explore. There’s something about ambling between marker to marker, or stumbling upon a few hidden items, that fundamentally works. I’ve seen some folks imply that this is simply the result of overproduced open-world design philosophies. A sort of focus-tested gaming drug-world that it’s easy to slide into. There’s probably some truth to that, and there’s a discussion to be had about the dangers of pastoralism, but I think that the open-world itself is designed well. Sure, there’s collectables and outposts to conquer and all the things you would expect but those are not the appeal. In fact, in many cases, engaging with those things feels worse than wandering. In the early game particularly, combat is not enjoyable. But there’s a sensibility to the world, a sort of stubborn antiquatedness that calls back to an open-world structure—one where space existed for its own sake—that we don’t see in as many games now. That’s curious to me because Tsushima has been criticized for feeling old-fashioned but I think this approach to world design isn’t so far removed from Breath of the Wild. It is certain littered with more *stuff* that you can stumble on but despite the fact that I can set markers or unlock bonuses that make these things easier to find, I don’t feel an overwhelming push to engage with them.

That good because combat is a decidedly mixed affair. I’m not eager to slide into difficulty discussions but if Tsushima’s closest cousin is Assassin’s Creed, it’s no surprise that I’ve instantly found the game more playable at a lower difficulty setting. If the goal is to emulate film—and there can be discussion about how well that’s actually done; black and white filters don’t suffice to make something comparable to Kurosawa—then Tsushima’s normally cluttered and gamey combat rubs against that impulse. It’s a game with sub-weapons, ninja-like tools, multiple stances for breaking the guards of certain enemies, and a wealth of skill trees. The beauty of the action (which you can frame at the push of a button thanks to a respectable photo mode) can get lost in the shuffle.  Lowering the difficulty has led to speedier and more dramatic encounters where a few sword strokes can slay a handful of men. It’s a curious thing, as I tend to play games on higher difficulties, but this is one of the few times where I felt it might have served a game better to streamline combat down to the most basic of interactions. Tsushima’s combat can get very busy and I did not enjoy tackling challenges or outpost conquest until I progressed to unlock more abilities while also lowering the difficulty. Even then, those are the moments I care for the least.

I feel unable to comment on critical discussions about Tsushima’s story and politics but as an observer to the input of Japanese-American writers and Japanese devs/players, one thing that’s struck me is how the broader gamer culture has reacted to the dialogue. There have been moments where gamers have minimized the voices of some critics with the exultations of certain Japanese writers, which eliminates valid concerns from people who have every right to look close at a game connected to their heritage. The lens through which Tsushima was made was at the end of the day a Western one and that’s worth discussing. I am grateful for the writing of critics like Kazuma Hashimoto at Polygon that dig into these tensions.  I will say that I feel like Tsushima sometimes wants to do the proper thematic thing where it will say that entrenched nobility and cultural notions of honor can be inherently damaging but because that’s mostly expressed, at least in the main plot, as “the outside invaders are besting us because of our traditions” it falls flat. Tsushima works best in side quests where the stakes are smaller. It’s thematic aspirations are best when things are personal and on a more humble scale. I like the version of Tsushima I get to play in those moments more than I like the grand gestures towards honor or combat challenges. Which is to say I mostly want Way of the Samurai with multiple zones and a more connective tissue. Tsushima teases that possibility without ever really getting there. In those teasing moment, the game makes a lot more sense to me.

I’ve enjoyed myself and intend to finish soon. That enjoyment comes with a lingering question: what other game could this have been? It’s inspired an image in my mind of a different sort of open-world ronin game where there is a smatter of villages with sub-stories and perhaps the smallest A-plot. A game with Mongol invaders, dramatic family conflict, or shogunate decrees.  Tsushima has capture my attention but I do wonder more about what might have been that what is right in front of my eyes.

The Last of Us: Part II

I have struggled with this game in ways I did not know were possible. When I play it, I find myself taken in by the raw skill of the actors. There’s a mood and tone I enjoy, a somber twinge to the infected escapades that lingers from the first game. I like The Last of Us. I think there’s small moments of character interaction that express core things about the cast’s shifting relationships. James Howell embarked on a video essay series about this very thing and while it will remain unfinished perhaps forever, I suggest engaging with it. Suffice it to say, the changing language of Joel and Ellie’s mechanical interactions does a lot to underscore the narrative. I think players often think of the The Last of Us in terms of pure narrative but these smaller considerations reveal a game with a very natural approach to story telling. The Last of Us 2 has these moments and often hides them within combat. When multiple factions of humans and infected interact, their clash and the behavior of the AI tells something fundamental about the game world. 

The Last of Us: Part II is a cynical game with an unflattering view of humanity, a view that (in spite of Joel’s selfishness in the first game’s climax) feels somewhat at odds with what came before. It is, in fact, possibly the most cynical game I’ve ever played. That’s hard to talk about but it’s best expressed in the various dying barks of enemies or moments where the player is forced into violent, dehumanizing slaughter. In the former case, it feels like a magic trick. The first time you hear someone cry out their dog’s name, it can be tragic. The next five times you hear it, it feels forced. Like any trick, it’s never as powerful as the first time. You might argue that’s the point: that as you follow Ellie’s journey, the player also stripes enemies of their humanity and agency but the player’s culpability is secondary to the writer’s in some ways.

Players did not contrive to have Ellie rob Nora, one of the game’s major black characters, of her fundamental dignity before murdering her. Nor are players the ones who shove a knife into Mel’s pregnant stomach. Those are scenarios crafted by designers and writers, and much like how retroactively guilting the player for killing a doctor in the first game (An unavoidable action, mind you! Joel will do this regardless of what the player wants.) feels manipulative, calling a player’s culpability into question as Ellie fails to act like any sort of reasonable human being also rings hollow. There is a perpetual push and pull between players and controllable actors, best expressed in the verbs that we are allowed to perform. It is telling the more often than not, Ellie’s most egregious acts of violence happen outside of the player’s control. 

And yet there are moments where I buy deeply into the story. Notably, it happens when Abby is on screen more than Ellie. (Tangent: Abby has more interesting gameplay scenarios that lean closer to horror game vibes like what you’d find in The Evil Within. TLOU is way more interesting working in that mode than HUMAN vs. HUMAN drama.) Abby is also allowed more growth and agency than the script ever gives Ellie. At the core of this is Abby’s relationship with Lev. It is here that I’ve had my largest struggle with the game. 

Discussion about Lev has often bowled over transgender commentators.  For many people, Lev resonates regardless of anything the plot says about his gender. Lev captures people’s attention because Lev is eminently likable. That’s a testament to Naughty Dog’s writing. Still, there is a sense that Lev’s wider resonance has left some folks (particularly queer folks) without as much space to talk among themselves and hash out sentiments without the discussion getting overpowered. This is complicated by an environment where creators seem more empowered to directly speak to criticisms.

Which is to say that as a trans critic (perhaps ex-critic) watching from the sidelines, I was very hurt and dismayed to watch people who do not share in the transgender experience comment quickly about Lev. And while the discussions about Lev are varied—the trans community, like any community, is not a monolith—it’s sometimes felt like trans voices were made the quietest when talking about this character.

Many things are true about art at the same time. Lev can act, as is the case for some players, as a token figure whose struggles are appropriated and turned into spice adding flavor to the apocalypse.  Spice that allows us to be seen as we are usually seen: in pain and defined by that pain, and which displays that pain voyueristically for cis players. Lev can also be a kind-hearted and respectable hero, and ray of light within a dark story. Neither feeling is in competition. Some will find strength and inspiration in the character, others will see the machinations of corporate powers and award-chasing writers. Both can be true.

Enthusiastic fans and players are quick—not in a malicious sense; merely in their excitement—to defend the things they enjoy. If they found a thing good it stands to reason the thing must be good. They empathized and that is taken as proof that a thing is good irrespective of other concerns. This is a kind impulse but one that robs people of their concerns, or at the very least close off conversations quickly. I cannot properly diagnose this except to suggest that there’s a growing force of cultural positivism that’s encircled games of a certain scale. One which shuts down a lot of valuable engagement. The bigness of the moment, of the object, demands the moment be the Best Possible Moment For Games regardless of the qualities of the object itself. That’s worrisome to me.

The Last of Us: Part II has become nearly impossible to talk about even now because we are dealing with an object so large as to have a gravity that weighs everything down. A game with sublime moments that intoxicate deeply but one where voices of critique or caution are buried away largely because of the potency of that intoxication. I deeply wish that wasn’t the case because the breadth of discussions that might’ve happened would have been really valuable.

Aim Lab

I’ve gotten really into Valorant. It’s scratched an itch for a type of multiplayer shooter that I haven’t had scratched in a long time. My experience with the game itself has been good but the surrounding experience has been decidedly mixed. Suffice it to say I’m mostly living the solo-queue life and it’s a miserable existence even with the occasional highs. Yet, there’s a mechanical crunchiness to Valorant that deeply compels me and I’ve enough competitive drive that (in spite of the fact that the most of beloved social aspects of the game seem generally out of reach for me) I’ve really devoted myself to improving as player. Enter Aim Lab. It’s a totally free aim trainer that anyone can download off Steam. It has a variety of drills and exercises that can be used to improve a variety of first-person shooter skills. In one case, you might be flicking from target to target with the express goal of training your aiming speed. In another you might need to look at a group of colored balls, which will then disappear with one of them changed. You’ll then need to shoot at the different one as quickly as possible. You earn a score for each drill, which is tracked and compared to global records and folded into a ranking system. I’ve placed in the “Ruby” range for my rank, which is mostly in the middle of the road. (It’s a weird rank above gold but I think before Plat?) Mechanically sound with sloppy spots. I’m able to identify these thanks to Aim Labs. For instance, I know that I am fast and relatively accurate but that tracking moving targets is a difficulty for me. I know that I am quicker at things on the right side of my screen but also that I’m thankfully able to read changes in the environment quickly. This might sounds like a dry and rote way to approach video games but Aim Labs’ suite of repeatable and trackable challenges means that it is very easy to trace gradual improvements.

As a result, what might have been dull work becomes something akin to going to the gym. I can feel the ways in which my control over a mouse have changed. I understand which muscles need more flexing. Importantly, for all my weakness I also know strengths. Playing Aim Labs—and yes, this is play—becomes a semi-automatic and meditative experience like swinging at a batting cage. 

As a player (again, I hesitate to use the word critic anymore) who tends to engage with games on thematic levels even when it comes to mechanics, it’s been surprisingly gratifying. Part personal ritual, part labor. Bubblegum for the brain. Chew chew chew. Shoot shoot shoot. Take some notes and chew some more. Not much more to say except Aim Labs has surprised me with how enjoyable and relaxing it can be.

Necrobarista

Necrobarista was not what I expected. That’s because I started playing it with what felt like a safe-assumption: it would be comparable to some of my favorite indie “drink” games like Va-11 Hall-A or Coffee Talk. It’s hard for me to break down those games and how their structure—insightful conversations punctuated by drink-mixing and the occasional memory puzzle or story choice—works for me. I know folks who have played those games and bounced off for entirely understandable reasons but I love them. They call to mind some of the personal experience I had as both someone who worked at a bar and coffee shop. In spite of their fantasy settings, they evoke a highly specific and idiosyncratic part of my brain. Necrobarista doesn’t quite do that because it is strictly a visual novel. Repetitive work such as drink making is entirely absence. As a result, I initially found Necrobarista harder to engage with. It lacked the percussive but comfortable rhythm I was craving in quarantine. 

That highly specific preferential quirk/personal need might place the game lower on my list then the other two (the game’s certainly in conversation with them to a degree; it’s got plenty of shout-outs and references that make it clear the designers know the ballpark they’re playing in) but it doesn’t mean it is a “lesser” game in terms of the world it is presenting or the character you’re watching. Necrobarista has, if nothing else, some of the most naturally flowing dialog I’ve experienced in a while. That is partly because I’ve been sampling so much AAA stuff, where the writing tends to eschew the evocative for clean, crisp (and corporate!) staccato, but even in comparison to other VNs or drink games, it finds some more integrated and interesting ways to handle lore dumps. That’s helped by the core conceit. The lead character Maddy Xiāo runs a coffee shop alongside her wise former boss Chay that just so happens to serve drinks to the recent deceased. That makes it really easy to introduce a character, as the plot soon does, fresh off the mortal coil and eager to learn about life after death. It’s a common writer’s trick to place a clueless character in a plot so world-building can happen but because the stakes are high—the freshly-deceased have only 24 hours before they pass into the afterlife—there’s an urgency in the explanations that feels warranted. I could probably spend a lot of time breaking down the ways in which Necrobarista successful builds the world around the player. From a well-framed scenario and properly placed characters (an inquisitive child-genius, for instance) to the ability to click highlighted words for snarky but never crass footnotes, you never want for necessary knowledge but also never feel like your hand is being held. You’re not digging for meaning or piecing together arcane lore concepts. You know what you need to know, it feels fun to learn it, and the characters all make sense. They’re also incredibly likable. Necrobarista’s largest strength isn’t that the details are handled well; it’s that the core cast is deeply relatable. That’s important because the story moves from coffee to magic and death within a clipped 4 hour playtime. Relationships are clear, motivations clearer, and while some of the standout story-telling pieces are in optionally readable side-chapters, the main story lifted up by how eminently fun it is to eavesdrop of these character’s lives. The only glaring exception is a Greek chorus of robots that seem out of place and overly-chatty. Necrobarista sometimes feels eager to impress structurally, and that’s no more clearer than when these fellas are on screen. The difficult thing about Necrobarista’s literary approach is that the pandemic’s completely shot my attention span. It took my two weeks of on and off play to finish what is a very short game. That said, given the enormity of some world events I found it edifying and cathartic to engage with a piece of media explicitly concerned with death and dying. It wasn’t what I thought and I kinda wish it had a bit more happening mechanically but I’m really happy for the time I spent with this one.

Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers

Shadowbringers and Final Fantasy XIV in general is a difficult thing talk about. Not because of the accumulated history of a long-running game and storyline but because my feelings are ultimately swayed by a host of personal and specific emotions. I am a social player on a social server. I’ve spent just as much time coming up with roleplaying plotline and casually taking in taverns as I have tackling difficult bosses. I have made dear friends through FFXIV and even more than that. Those relationships, their energy and gravity, mixed into everything like an errand paint drop. You can hardly see it in the mixture but it’s unavoidably there. For many, this is a game of heroes and anime plots. For me, it has been a doorway to some of the most fruitful, edifying, and occasional painful experiences of my life.  I say this because I want it understood that in spite of this sentiment, Final Fantasy XIV is a good game and Shadowbringers is easily one of the most confident pieces of video-game storytelling that I’ve ever experienced. Which isn’t to say it’s not sometimes trite or predictable. It’s not to suggest there is something groundbreaking here. For all of the craftsmanship, Shadowbringers often succeeds by embracing the conventional. It sticks to more well-worn plot structures, it simplified job gameplay and streamlined a variety of features whose strange and un-sanded bumps brought charm to the game. Yet, in the streamlining comes something more refined. Like running a soup through a fine mesh sieve to create something creamier and more rich. When you look at Shadowbringers high level plot: travel to the corners of the world to fight monsters, all while unraveling cosmic secrets.. it’s familiar. Even as the patches following the launch experience did, as all FFXIV patches do, focus on the fallout of the main story’s event, it kept to a strict content release pattern. If you’re digging for a revolutionary experience, Shadowbringers cannot offer it by virtue of structure. But what has been releases is foundational. The writing is of such quality and battle scenarios increasingly playful that everyone should be taking notes. A core component of Shadowbringers success is how deeply the story is concerned with genuinely exploring the richness of the scenario. It would be easy to craft a story about evil mages destroying the world. FFXIV’s done the more straightforward version of that at launch and it proved stiff. Instead, Shadowbringers’ has a deep concern with motivations and takes unprecedented time to explore the interior of the cast. This allows old characters to grow into bright new versions of themselves, and it has (two for two now!) turned villains into more than just monsters. The writing exhibits a delicious empathy for the world, and it takes time to give everyone a perspective. In MMOs, this is not always afforded. Characters act as quest-barkers and clumsy plot chess pieces. Shadowbringers strength rests in avoiding this in favor of clear stakes both personal and cosmic.  There’s plenty to be said for other aspects. Masayoshi Soken’s music remains an incredibly powerful trump card, and the latest patch (which concludes the Shadowbringers story and sets up for next expansion) shows an increased willingness to employ fight mechanics that trick and test players in new ways. The content is challenging and full of tiny subversive moments that actually rob players of power they’ve taken for granted over the course of hundreds of hours. In finding its stride, Final Fantasy XIV doesn’t just craft sweeping narrative moments, it better integrates those stakes into individual boss encounters. There’s a cohesiveness, an interlocking of parts where each piece (music, narrative, gameplay, et all) are in clear conversation with the other and often in conversation with not only other expansions but other games within the franchise. 

Recently, a piece dropped on Polygon with the title “Games need to return to black-and-white morality.” It was, if I can be honest, a poor title for the article and one which left a freelancer unduly exposed to harsh feedback. But there is a core kernel to the article. To quote the writer: “Watching our heroes stick to their convictions, even against insurmountable odds, ratchets up drama, rather than destroying it. The concept that good can ultimately triumph over evil is a timeless one, and stories that rally around this trope — around unadulterated hope — can help guide us through the year’s ceaseless onslaught of calamities.“ Shadowbringers’s conclusion brought this piece of writing to mind. I’m ironing pretty much all of that piece’s argumentation but the notion that games about heroes have great efficacy in times of uncertainty shouldn’t be a controversial one. The crux of my favorite game, Skies of Arcadia, is that heroism is hardly a choice at all. It is a compulsion, it is a duty that we all must accept when the moment comes. Shadowbringers is not quite as simple but it is ultimately a story about hero defeating the baddies, and I would be lying deeply to say that there wasn’t something incredibly, nearly word-defyingly beautiful about the feeling of hope I felt in its concluding moments. The sweeping power of epic fantasy and heroism holds true and, like a genuine panacea, held a curative power for my soul that was not just enjoyable once consumed but frankly necessary for my well-being.  I’ve no clean conclusion here (and I don’t have to! ha!) other than to say that Shadowbringers has consistently proven a delight in a sea of rocky games media. It is affirming, exciting, and empathetic in ways that I was not expecting. That, along with the friendships I’ve made while playing, have secured its place as one of my favorite video game experiences ever. From start to finish, it really was a delight. 

------------------ And that’s that! I was gonna write about Blaseball but I need to let my Blaseball feelings settle before even trying that. Anyway, if you read this.. uh thanks!

#FFXIV #Final Fantasy XIV #Shadowbringers #The Last of Us Part II #Necrobarista #Ghost of Tsushima #aim lab

[transgamerthoughts]

Final Fantasy 7 Remake: Thoughts and Ramblings

Surprised to dust this off but I want to collect my thoughts quickly now that credits are rolling on Remake:

In general, I enjoyed it quite a lot. As one of many players with a unique relationship to the original (I first “played” it watching a childhood friend over the course of several sleepovers before playing on my own and occasionally returning to it) I was skeptical. I’ve express some of that skepticism at Kotaku , a website I write at. Remakes and remasters sometimes fall short or deviate in strange ways. Remake forges its own path and I’m grateful for it.

SPOILERS AHEAD KIDDOS

So! Here’s some scattered thoughts. Maybe they end up on Kotaku, maybe not. And while I’m loathe to immediately rush to create content on a Sunday night, this game has my mind spinning. Here we go.

The characterizations in this game are very strong, perhaps stronger than the original’s Midgar section. Some of that is owed to a very bad localization in ‘97 (you can get insight into that from my former colleague Tim Rogers’ series here) but Remake takes a lot of effort to allow the cast to breathe. That can come from the ways in which Cloud alters his way of taking with Tifa, and it can come in the moment where Barrett is more explicitly an ideologue. It’s quite good even if the script has a flaw that we’ll talk about in a second. 

That flaw is, frankly, that if you’ve not played the original then Remake is going to end up impenetrable in the final hours. This is particularly true once characters like Zack are brought into the fold and the visuals begin to mirror the original. (See: the hard cuts before Sephiroth and Clouds final duel mirroring the Omnislash moment from ‘97.) I don’t think that diminishes the character work here but I think that the more interesting meta-narrative stuff *so* damn crucial to this game that I can’t imagine what a newcomer will think. 

Connected to this, I’ve seen folks disappointed that this is not a perfect remake but in this instance, I think that sentiment is misplaced. Valid, but shortsighted? You can’t make Final Fantasy VII today. Not in the way it existed in ‘97. Which isn’t to say the visuals or script but the context cannot be reproduced. New hardware, FMVs taking a forefront, an advertising campaign that positioned the game in competition with movies, and a cultural splash that the series hasn’t ever quite replicated. Because the weight of expectation hovers over Remake—folks have been obsessed with a new version since the PS3 tech demo stirred imagination at E3 2020—the game *needs* to be about that. To be a game about this moment, the moment gamers have waited decades for, Remake needs to be about itself in a very explicit way.

I can’t not see the Whispers and Arbiters of Fate as anything other than stand-ins for gamers, fans, and the culture as a whole. That’s an obvious reading but an undeniable one. The core question of Remake doesn’t really have much to do with the fictional stakes. It’s this: who owns Final Fantasy VII, and who owns the Remake? Is it the story tellers or the players? I have a cheat answer: it belongs to the characters. In unbinding themselves from player expectation, they claim ownership over the narrative now. 

Aeris just flat out knows she’s in a sequel/alt-timeline thing. Her final line is about missing the surety of something as presumably ever present at the metal sky of Midgar’s plates. 

I like the combat here more than FFXV, which isn’t saying a lot but worth saying. There’s more participation from the player. That’s it. I don’t think *more* active choice inherently makes a combat system better but it is the key reason this works better than XV.

Character swapping breaks things somewhat since enemy aggro is (save for using the provoke materia) focused on the player. Wish the combat design took this into consideration a bit more. It’s the one glaring flaw in the system.

Tifa is the most fun to play as in this game. It’s not even a contest. Starshower is overpowered as hell and Chi Trap rules. Love using her to increase the potency of the stagger meter when the time comes.

Fights do get occasionally Too Busy. Airbuster is a big culprit here. Too many phases for what was essentially a jobber of a boss in the original game.

Train Graveyard section is an atrocious pace killer as well. Again: “too many notes.”

I never found the Nail Bat and that was a bit of a bummer.

I tweeted out a quote from Barrett this weekend and it made the rounds. In general, for this game, Barrett works best in this revolutionary mode even if certain scenes (Shinra middle manager for instance) deploy visual language that’s dated. Of any character, he has the highest highs and lowest lows. Not surprising.

re: that tweet some folks kinda lost their shit about it(?) but I think the quote still holds. Remake does a good job of showing *individuals* within Shinra but Barrett does rightly note they are complicit to an extent in Shinra’s crimes. You can disagree with what Barrett does about it but that’s 100% true. Sorry, not sorry. (The discourse today was just a hassle frankly. Multiple things can be true at once, but I don’t think Twitter is a place where that’s ever acknowledged.) Whatever eventual regrets he might feel about methodology in ‘97′s script, he’s not wrong on this individual point. I’m interested to see where he goes as a character when it comes to all this.

Kinda related to the above, Remake arguably does a better job than ‘97 showing the alternative to Shinra. It’s the communal nature of the individual sectors. It’s the Neighborhood Watch and local leaders in Sector 7, the trio in Wall Market. Remake rejects Shinra’s autocracy and favors the various slums communes. This is made ever more clear by how little of Reeve we see in this script. Who are the leaders shaping life into a passable experience in Midgar? It’s not the Urban Planning guy with the cat robot. 

Also: hey, is that Cait Sith in the plate drop cutscene? Yep! Hope you played the original or there’s just this sad cat that shows up for 4 four seconds.

Is he a Chad? Well, he’s Chad-ley...

Not sure what to think of the Wutai stuff being more explicit but it feels right for 2020 for a variety of reasons. I’ve never been too interested in FF7′s realpolitik tho. It’s not really much of an expansion so much as a background element but one that’s deployed a bit lazily. 

Roche owns in a way I was not expecting. He’s a balls to the wall anime motherfucker and I kinda love him? I’m really, really surprised that (as far as I could tell) he didn’t even come back for the final bike sequence tho.

I don’t really have the energy to litigate or talk about Wall Market much. I think it’s better than the original but pandering in the sense that it’s a very safe and commodified version of queerness. I appreciate that Nomura and folks looked at the original and were like “well, we can’t do *that*” but it doesn’t quite land for me.

That said: “yes, I know, nailed it,” is a fantastic line with a fantastic read from Cloud’s English VA.

Hell House announcers rule. Hell House fight? Kinda terrible actually.

Nice shout out to Kunsel in Shinra Tower. Crisis Core is a messy game but I like Tabata’s work a lot. Even the messy stuff, which is most of it. That game’s story is bonkers but I like Zack and I actually like the idea of the Digital Mind Wave as a mechanic. If nothing else, Squeenix lost a pretty exciting designer when he left.

Less nice? This game’s tendency to pad out dungeons. The whole approach to the Sector 5 reactor comes to mind. Train fight then tunnels then sun lamps then reactor. It’s a lot. Also: all of the extra Hojo stuff. I know we’re padding out like 5 hours but some of the sections could have been abbreviated. Probably would have made the game better.

Even less nice? Zack’s English voice actor. Maybe the only voice actor I didn’t like. Really miss Rick Gomez on this one. 

 Conversely, Red XIII? They nailed it. 11/10. Nanaki, I love you so much.

 Counterstance is an amazing move and I can’t want to carry that over into Hard Mode. 

The Jenova fight fuckin’ ripped. I was a bit huffy when I learned through leaks that there was a Jenova fight (since the first fight in the original is on the boat to Costa Del Sol) but this was a great set piece. One of the moments where everything worked.

Also good: Rufus fight. Bad: losing Rufus’ speech to the party.

Not a ton more thoughts right now? Sephiroth fight was good although for all his presence in the story I think we suffer without the full Nibelheim flashback to round things out. In all really liked it. Want to play again pretty much immediately. Will write something more cogent for the site I guess? Got a few ideas. But yeah! entered as skeptic and left mostly a believer on this one. 

#final fantasy vii remake #spoilers

[transgamerthoughts]

Final Fantasy XV: Thoughts and Ramblings

I’ve just finished a more detailed playthrough of Final Fantasy XV. There’s plenty to talk about but today is strange and my mind is scattered so I thought it best to keep things loose. It worked for Infinite Warfare. My general takeaway is that I like Final Fantasy XV more than I should. It is a broken, shattered game but one that managed to win me over in spite of itself.

THERE ARE SPOILERS IN THIS POST

1. Let’s start positive here. FFXV has one of my favorite game worlds and settings in a long time. This is impressive given how surprisingly little of it we really explore in detail. There’s essentially two major cities in this game, with a handful of minor locations. Whereas other Final Fantasy games are globe trotting affairs, FFXV remains relatively local until the latter end of the game. 

By this point, you’re no longer dealing with an open world design however. For all intents and purposes, FFXV’s largest gameplay chuck takes place within the nation of Lucis and its various regions. The map isn’t dense with things to do but strong art direction and environment design gives ever location an air of believability that most games do not manage. It isn’t on the same level as The Witcher 3 but FF XV is chasing after the great Western open worlds and does so admirably. The world is fun to be in and feels steeped in a larger history and lore that feels suitably epic and magical.

2. The core cast of characters are enjoyable and memorable as well. The four party members banter and have clearly developing relationships. It adds a lot to the experience. There are weak links in the chain; Gladio tends to be far less personable than we are meant to believe and Ignis’ traits remain fairly static until a major bit of action in the plot physically handicaps him. These are minor complaints considering how well the group dynamics flow. By the end of the game, the four protagonists feel like true brothers.

The secondary cast is pretty fun as well. Iris is a charming and likable character who honestly should have accompanied the party longer than she did. Aranea makes for a memorable rival turned frenemy, and while we don’t get to spend too much time with Cor Leonis, his gravitas served the initial parts of the game very well. 

On top of this, we have one of the most memorable antagonists in the series history. Ardyn is charismatic, intelligent, watchable, and when the times demand it, he can become truly sinister. There are the subtle hints of true depth for this character; he feels complicated and worn. The plot fails to investigate his highly interesting history but he still manages to make an impression. I’ve not had this fun with a Final Fantasy villain in a long time.

3. A lot of these characters draw strength from strong vocal performances and animations. Ray Chase gives a shockingly good turn as Noctis, a character who starts petty and fairly unlikable grows into a commanding presence. Darin De Paul gives an outstanding turn as Ardyn, oozing charm while slipping into more sinister vocal ranges when needed. 

One of the best performances in the game actually comes from Robbie Daymond as Prompto. He brings a wonderful energy to the chipper gunslinger but also imbues him with a raw sense of vulnerability. The voce work merges well with quality animations. In particular, there’s a moment where Luna tells Ardyn that redemption is in his reach if he were to choose it and the facial animation manages to communicate an astounding range of thoughts and emotions within around five seconds. It’s great and shows how important the interplay between multiple disciplines are when creating digital performances.

4. Combat can be frustrating but I found that there’s a nice sense of push and pull to the entire affair. It’s not as technique heavy as Episode Duscae implied. Instead, the challenge is finding times to maintain your offensive actions and your defensive dodging stance. With larger groups of enemies, you will get tossed around from time to time and it can be frustrating. But after a while, you’ll find yourself slipping through guards to deliver big hits, performing strong combination attacks with your bros, and warping around the battlefield to perform deadly, magical acrobatics.

5. The game starts with an amazingly interesting core conceit that I think gets squandered. The road trip angle is given a new weight when Cor makes it clear that for Noctis to succeed against the empire, he needs to reclaim the power of the past kings of Lucis. Awesome. That sounds like a neat quest set up. But the game only has Noctis recover a few of these relics during the plot, sometimes without intending to. This then gives way to communion with the various gods around the world.

It would have been a perfectly acceptable and desirable plot to have Noctis seek out the power of kings and gods with the Empire hounding him along the way only for Ardyn to betray everyone near the latter half. In fact, that structure seems fundamentally etched into the structure of the game as an open world experience. And yet, the game abandons the quest for the king’s power, makes it unclear why Noctis is even seeking the gods (or rather, if they are seeking him), and the game totally abandons the Empire. 

The best example of this is Ravus. He’s the commander of Imperial forces, a skill swordsman, Luna’s brother, someone with a personal (if misplaced) grudge on the kingdom of Lucis, and all around bad dude. He was even in Kingsglaive. In FF XV, you encounter him once before he is blamed for the disastrous events in Altissia, turned into a daemon offscreen by Ardyn, and killed in one of the game’s most lack luster bossfights. This is frankly unacceptable from a series that managed to make me give a shit about villains as minor Scarlet and fuckin’ Heidegger but Ravus is basically Beatrix by way of Char Aznable and he’s completely misused. It’s downright sinful.

Similarly, the Emperor has a single scene. If the game took time to build him up, we might have had a betrayal as memorable as Kefka’s when Ardyn usurps power and tosses the realms into chaos. No such luck here. We also only see Minister Verstael for a single cutscene but this is the dude who runs the empire’s weapons program and manufactures MTs using knowledge gained from Ardyn. He’s also, technically, Prompto’s father. There’s loads of potential here that is also wasted because the game hits ludicrous speed after Altissia and never slows the fuck down. As the result, I feel like I’m missing a significant portion of the game.

6. In keeping with the botched story elements, we have the biggest missed opportunity when Ardyn basically creates and eternal night that lasts ten whole years. The world is plunged into chaos, daemons reign supreme, humanity is hiding in a few final bastions of resistance against the hordes. And yet, when we awake into the World of Ruin, we’re not given a new variation of the game map to explore. Instead, we get an expositional dump by Talcott before easily reuniting with out companions.

Yet, in the intervening ten years, a lot of stuff has happened. Ignis has become a badass blind warrior, Aranea has gone from Imperial mercenary to champion of the people with an entire army at her command, Iris, working alongside Cor, has become so awesome that she’s known as “Iris the Demonslayer,” and Talcott, the young boy we knew from years before, has become a veteran hunter in his own right.

Why do I not see the characters again? Imagine if I woke in the World of Ruin with only Gladio to greet me, ever faithful for years as guardian of the Crystal. Talcott joins us as a temporary guest character as we journey from settlement to settlement, helping restore order while also reuniting with our friends. We could help Cindy in a brief story sequence that reunites us with Prompto, we could encounter Aranea and Ignis as they search ancient ruins for information of how to defeat Ardyn, we could reinforce Cor and Iris at Gladio’s request in a battle against daemons attacking Lestallum.

 The set up is right there in the background but instead, we get an exposition dump, no satisfying reunion scene with the gang, and we’re able to immediately head to Insomnia to fight Ardyn. If the first half of the game is missing the Empire, the latter half of the game is missing basically everything.

8. In spite of these obvious oversights and missteps, the ending made me cry. It’s well done. I even think it could have been more dramatic. As it stands, Noctis gives up his life for the people of the world and the fates of his best bros feel ambiguous. I think they should have doubled down even harder on the heartbreak here and showed their last stand. If this is a game about gradually assuming responsibility, that needs to extend to the other protagonists in order to be thematically complete. 

I also think that while Ardyn should have died, there was no need to have the strange moment with him in the spirit realm. If we had someone gotten to understand Arydn’s past in more detail, perhaps during the time Noctis spends in the crystal, it would have been enough to land the final blow on him and wish him peace in the next life. The ending is good but I can’t help thinking it ought to have been great.

9. I can’t believe I’m saying this but I think this game needed a codex. The world is full of amazingly interesting history that I’d gladly read about. Imagine walking into a dungeon and walking away with ancient lore you discovered on old tablets or spending time in Altissia with some type of tour guide and getting a beefier codex for it. As stated, the world is amazingly interesting. Lestallum is a city run by women, Titan is holding up a perpetually falling comet in the middle of Duscae, the Empire and Lucis had major wars, the tombs of old kings litter the land. This is interesting stuff I want to know more about

Say what you will about how FF XIII made the codex necessary to understanding I actually know the religion in that world and the cosmology. In FF XV, I still don’t quite understand what an Oracle is and that’s literally the profession of one of the (ostensibly) most important characters in the game.

10. Speaking of Luna, she suffers from the same issue as her brother; we don’t get to spend time with her. Occasionally, we see flashes to her life and her side journey but this is a powerful character. Instead, she is relegated largely to the sidelines until Altissia, where we reunite with her just long enough for Ardyn to kill her.  

Luna is a  prophet, mage, and priestess who can stare down literal gods and heal magical blight. FF XV could have easily given us moments where we play as here or structured itself such that we actually get worthwhile perspective cuts to what she was doing for much of the story. It would have made her death actually mean something.

11. This game has one of the best soundtracks of the series. It is a powerhouse and Yoko Shimomura nails just about every track. Shimomura has always done very well with strings and piano. Here, that strength aptly bridges the gap between the more realistic aspects of the setting with the fantasy. I don’t have an in depth analysis here. It’s just very good. 

In general, the biggest issue with FFXV is that is is fractured. The open world is great, if lacking in variety. But I forgive that because of how enrapturing it is. The characters are wonderful but the plot misuses them or ignores them constantly. I genuinely like this game but I know that a better scenario designer could have gotten something much more coherent. That’s the biggest problem; this game just falls apart by the end and even if it manages to hit a strong emotional climax, you’re let with the overwhelming feeling that while it was a good time, it could have been genuinely great. 

#Final Fantasy #final fantasy xv

[transgamerthoughts]

Infinite Warfare: Thoughts And Ramblings

Yesterday, I streamed the entirety of Infinite Warfare’s campaign and while I found it compelling enough to press onwards towards the end, I think my overall impression of the game are negative. Make no mistake, this is still one of the better Call of Duty games but that’s not necessarily a difficult achievement with the bar set so low. Series like Black Ops and standalone titles Ghosts are mediocre titles while games like Modern Warfare 3 and World at War are flat out awful. There’s plenty to talk about here and I think it is worth the rambles. Let’s get started.

THERE ARE SPOILERS IN THIS POST

1. Infinite Warfare cannot deliver on the ambitions of its gameplay. It wants to be a fast shooter full of wall running, gun akimbo, variable tactics, and explosions. There are two major issues at play. The first is that the game is an absolute chore to control. Perhaps I have been spoiled by Titanfall 2′s controls but Infinite Warfare is far too plodding to achieve the transcendent gunplay it clearly wants to offer. 

Everything is off by half. Wall running is only partially automatic; if you release the control stick, you unceremoniously snap off the wall. Sliding is counter intuitive. What should be a simple combination of running and pressing the crouch button is made clumsy by requiring players to hold down the the button. You will run and plan to slide past an enemy only to take a knee for them and get blasted in the face. Additionally, sprinting is limited. You get fatigued if you sprint too long but the encounter design seems built for continuous movement. What might have been a game dominated by swift movement has a considerable amount of pauses.

The game offers plenty of tactical options: you have a wrist mounted ballistic shield, autonomous drones, the ability to hack enemy robots, and a variety of grenades. You will not use these very often. The game can be played like any other title in the franchise. In the rare cases you pull from your bag of tricks, it is a fleeting affair. A hack here, a quick shield there as you move from cover to cover. None of these options feel completely integrated into the gameplay. The exist in an ether, pulling out occasionally like a party trick before being shelved. The end result is a game that wants to do seemingly everything but achieves virtually nothing of note. 

The game is ambitious but merely ends up competent. 

2. The major exception to this are the space combat sequences. They are a furious affair full of missile locks, flares, cannon fire, dogfights, and blinding speed. In these sequences, Infinite Warfare becomes a dazzling and genuinely awesome science fiction bombshell.  They are Wing Commander. They are Strike Vector. In any other franchise these battles would be the basis of an entire game. And while these affairs are somewhat over produced, they are integrated well into the main campaign and never outstay their welcome.

3. The move to a future setting held a lot of potential. Infinite Warfare squanders this with an incredibly reductive top level narrative. This is UC Gundam without any of the potential ambiguities. The villains (the Settlement Defense Force) are space separatists with no clear motivation except wanton destruction. Why are they rebelling? Do they have significant cause? We never know. It’s “Ultranationalists” all over again. There’s no nuance here and no context. They are evil because the story needs a villain. No more, no less.

Infinite Warfare’s villains lack any semiotic importance. They point towards nothing. Kit Harrington’s Admiral Salen Kotch is a non entity, spouting Social Darwinist rhetoric but never achieving menace. Say what we will about Modern Warfare 2′s implausible campaign but the main antagonists represented very real anxieties. General Shepard was the military-industrial complex at its worst, a manifestation of a machine and system that could not let go of conflict. Makarov was the looming specter of highly competent domestic terrorism; the modern fear that you might stand at an airport and be gunned down by men with nebulous agendas. 

Modern Warfare’s Zakaev and Al-Asad lacked any real story presence but this only highlighted the confusion of modern conflicts. You will die on a distant battlefield fighting villains you never see, hiding behind armies and militiamen. They were ghosts of the past, created through failed interventionism and given extreme power through the unchecked proliferation of weapons.

Advanced Warfare’s Jonathan Irons represented a different fear. The rising power of private military forces and the sinister plotting of the corporate elite. War turned into domestic business. Elon Musk with guns, smiles and rhetoric.

I am wary of giving those games too much credit but at a bare minimum, I will point out that these antagonists are in touch with their respective zeitgeist. Infinite Warfare settles for Saturday morning level of sophistication. You might as well be fighting Commander Cobra here.

4. Infinite Warfare is a game written by writers, goddammit it. There’s very clear bookmarks, a trite but underlying theme, and plenty of attempts at emotion. I say attempts because while they elicit plenty of reaction from the protagonist, Reyes, they never manage to affect the the player. 

At its core, the game wants to be a parable about sacrifice and the burdens of command. You are outgunned and will get increasingly desperate to defeat the enemy. You will lose nearly everything in service to your people and you will only will be accepting the fact that these sacrifices are necessary. By the end of the game, one major character survives. The majority of Reyes’ crew are dead, including Reyes himself. I watched over and over as soldiers did heroic things, dying in the process. I barely got to know any of these people. They were names, not characters. Bodies to be thrown away in service of the narrative. 

It is to Brian Bloom’s credit that he manages to imbue Reyes with a surprising degree of humanity. I liked Reyes in spite of the narrative and while I never felt the same burdens he did, they were aptly communicated by his actor.  Yet, for all of the emotion on screen there was never a moment that communicated or captured these feelings in game. One sacrifice near the ends comes close, as you watch a valued ally die through their perspective but there has already been so much loss at that point to devalue the moment’s weight.

 This is a game that wants you to feel a chill down your spine with every sacrifice. It plays recordings from all the fallen over its credits. Sons reaching out to distant fathers, mothers assuring their children that they died for a good cause, robots finding their humanity, and stern career soldiers letting their guard down in private moments. You are meant to mourn. To ponder the nature of service and bravery. Battlefield 1 veers into the maudlin from time to time but never becomes half as desperate for your emotional approval as Infinite Warfare. It craves your sentiment but never manages to earn it.

5. Infinite Warfare does hold one mission of true excellence. It is an extended stealth mission that contains a slow, quiet journey through an asteroid field. All Ghillied Up by way of Mass Effect. Bounding through zero gravity, you ponderously make your way towards an enemy cruiser, sniping patrols and slipping behind tumbling rocks. Boarding the ship, you dart from shadow to shadow, slipping behind enemies for stealth kills as you find the right position to open fire and launch your assault in earnest. It culminates in a dizzying space battle. It is brilliantly paced and captivating throughout. 

It is also a side mission that many players will skip right over. The game is partitioned such that you can select to attack various targets of opportunity or move on to the next story mission. Some of the best missions are push off the side, essentially divorced from the main campaign. The ability to choose your next objective might underscore the player’s role as a ship commander but I’m honestly shocked by the amount of well crafted gameplay is completely skippable. 

6. This series has ever escaped the shadow of September 11th. It still finds itself enamored with images of property destruction, civilian death, blood in the streets, and the utter devastation of the domestic. It never reaches the lunacy of Modern Warfare 2′s suburban combat but the game still falls back to evoking 9/11 in order to impress the severity of the conflict to the player. 

In many ways, this series has been an ongoing attempt to allow players to find some modicum of control in an increasingly muddled world. It is a distinctly America game series, anxious of attacks on the home and disruptions to blissful domesticity. The enemies shift from game to game but the tone remains the same: we are at war and will always be at war. Even in the far distance future, barbarians will be knocking on the gates of Rome. Deadly vipers lay in the shadows, ready to destroy our way of life. Take up a gun and shoot the monsters. Find reassurance in your dominance of the enemy. And there will always be enemies. 

If there is a single reason why this franchise feels tired, it is because it never has found the right panacea for this anxiety. The panic attack has lasted nearly a decade.

7. If there is one thing that this game manages to successfully pull from science fiction, it’s found in how diverse the game’s cast is. Your crew contains prominent women and people of color. Various nationalities are represented and there is at least one gay character. There’s also a very likable robot, for whatever that is worth.

8. I feel a slight hypocrisy here criticizing the game’s vapid depiction of war while also taking time to talk about the guns but I do want to note that the game’s weapons feel far more like something out of Perfect Dark than a modern military shooter. There’s still a lot of focus on the tech of war, that same romanticizing of weapons. But there’s also a strangely playful attitude as well. 

I’m unsure what to make of this. If there’s been one other problem with the series, it is how much it really loves the tools of war. People are always eager to point out how subversive Death From Above is. But whatever critique exists in that mission is fundamentally undercut by the fact that the game seems genuinely enamored with the gunship’s power. Infinite Warfare is no exception. These guns are designed to be cool and it is difficult to take the game’s vague lamentations of war seriously when it also wants me to sit in awe of the very weapons and mechanisms by which war are perpetuated. 

That’s all I got for now. This game tries very hard but cannot escape the DNA of what it was built upon. It is clumsy on all fronts. In gameplay, in narrative, in themes, and in tone. It wants to be so much but ends up feeling like nothing. 

#call of duty #infinite warfare #video game analysis

[transgamerthoughts]

Uprooting, The City, and Progress

I have been told I apologize too much and my favorite critical writer once told me to avoid starting with an apology but I must ask your indulgences as I write. My mind is swirling with no particular direction and a public sieving of thoughts seems a productive way of engaging with them. I always find that the challenge of writing and communicating with others often allows me to consider my thoughts more intimately than I might manage otherwise. 

(I’ve also been told I am too verbose. I think the above sentences has confirmed that assessment soundly. As will the rest of this post)

Yesterday, I moved into Brooklyn. I drove with my family down from New Hampshire. They helped me move in, we walked the neighborhood, and we parted ways. If this seems quaint, all I can say is that you’d be correct to call it such. In some ways, my adult development has been severely arrested by anxiety, personal traumas, and my own ambiguous place on the spectrum. Plainly put, I have a hard time with practicalities. I feel far more than I ever think, which is unfortunate because the real world is built by the thinkers. Taxes, paperwork, protocols, routines, and other unspoken societal rules daunt me. It’s always been a bit like this. Which means I fall back on my family a lot. And I’ve been fortunate that they’ve supported me unconditionally in my endeavors. 

I mention this because I have traded a quieter, suburban life for something more active. It has been jarring. (It’s also been beautiful in a short time. I will get to that in a bit.) I’ve long since learned that the paralysis I often feel is not foisted upon me by outside systems or agents. It is the paralysis of freedom. Of knowing that I can leave my apartment, choose a direction, and walk. What freezes me in place is not knowing with direction to face or if I should walk at all. Here I am, able to walk where I might if I want to yet woefully unprepared to any path. Literally and metaphorically.

No one prepares you to get older. No one takes you aside and gives sage advice. The currents of time and other invisible forces push you. You either adapt or you drown in those tides. But no one teaches you to swim in them. I’ve had to learn to swim very fast and I mostly dog paddle in the rapids. Make no mistake: I do not begrudge my successes. I count myself as deeply fortunate and aim to work hard.

But there is no denying the difficult of leaving home. There is a pace to the city that I have not learned. How could I have yet? It’s been a day. Still, you can see it and feel it. People walk different; they have a drive to their step that is filled with confidence. The pace is faster. There is more noise. My eyes wander and always find something worth noticing. Each street corner is a country. Or so it seems. I feel small.

I take care to check myself in moments like these. It would be easy to read too much exoticism into the city around me; such a thing would disrespect this community. Yet, I cannot deny a true magnetism. I already have an affection for my neighborhood, as little of it as I’ve truly explored. Scared as I am, I watch the confident people walk about and believe that I, too, could learn to walk like them.

I’m thinking a lot about why I’m here. I’m here to work. Now that I’m here, I’m starting to think of what that means. What the fuck does that even mean? I have no good answer. Not yet. The reality is there there’s a divide between where I was before and what I do now. Things are different. There are new responsibilities and challenges. I worked a day job when freelancing, which allowed me a certain freedom to write critically on choice things.

That’s still part of my reality but it’s mixed in with obligations to responsibly cover topics of interest to readers or even to cover developing stories. These things shift daily, to an extent. Topicality is always king but when your work becomes more than just criticism and edges to reporting, it is even heavier on the scales. 

I think about how we make progress in this sphere. Not professionally but culturally. How do we talk about games as art? How can we popularize criticism? For some, this is a distasteful question. Criticism need not be popular! If that is true, it must at least become more egalitarian. Not common in quality but certainly less baroque. We cannot rely solely on academics nor can we hope that the loose coteries of critics might pen a grand manifesto that will reach enthusiasts broadly. It cannot come from any one vector.

Yet, all of this is balanced by the fact that, like it or not, readers view our work as a cold and logical service. To report, to catalog. To inform. This is true no matter where we are writing. And often, that desire seems incompatible with more emotive or esoteric writing. There is an undeniable tension at play. It is romantic to think that there is one big critical piece hiding in someone’s mind that will mark a paradigm shift. Sadly, the truth is that change will be slow. Sometimes, you have to wait a bit because Sony’s having a press conference. It’s a hustle. A waiting game. Finding the moments and letting them add up.

I think that’s the job. And I think that it is is a climb; the culture of technologies, the strange tribalisms of gamers, and the rigidity of corporations turns it into a climb. You get closer by matters of inches. To some extent, you have to make peace with the fact that we’re dealing with progress by inches. And perhaps there will be maverick writers; we have amazing voices that are pretty far up the hill. But I think a large part of the job is existing and waiting.

Existing is the hard part, be it in the sphere or the city. I only speak for myself certainly but now that I’m here, each moment feels a bit like playing hide and seek. I’m more keenly aware of my gender performance. Everyone has their own fight and I guess that’s mine. But I feel it keenly any time I shave or make a phone call. More than I did before.

As you can see, this has been a mess of random thoughts and pontifications. All I know is that we’re climbing, all of us. And I think we’re making progress. I think there’s been no better time yet for games writing. On all fronts. But we just need to keep keenly aware that it is, without a doubt a climb. 

And yeah, I’m scared right now. But you keep going. You continue. And I think no one tells you that’s how it is because you have to learn it and live it. 

For me, right now in this moment? I gonna go out, eat some soup, head back to my apartment, sleep, and wake up tomorrow. I’m gonna go to work. I’m gonna continue and if I’m lucky, I’ll learn to walk confidently.