"It didn't grab me" - Every release this decade outside of Mario Maker, Superhot, & The Witness.
Or Nuclear Throne, or Trackmania, or any of the hundred other games that Jeff likes and has talked at length about liking.
Seriously, this whole "Jeff hates games now, he's so jaded" thing just needs to die already. Other than the obligatory "they're getting paid off by [name of console manufacturer]" type comments this genre of Giantbomb commentary is by far the laziest and dumbest thing that people on this site say.
This site is losing the plot, 1st no Bloodborne in GOTY, now x-com 2 gets a 3/5. I know this is primarily an entertainment site, and that it does well, but you could go back to ACTUALLY video games.
@moonwalksa: I think the problem here is that the distinction between "a creator acknowledging that what they do and make is art, and a creator who is trying to make art" is almost entirely a matter of perception on the viewer of the art, instead of a fundamental difference in the creator themselves. Almost any piece of evidence you could use to paint good ole Jon Blow as a pretentious blowhard can just as easily be used as evidence of the loftiness of his ambitions and his unwillingness to compromise the quality of the thing he is creating. Labeling him as either an up-his-own-ass blowhard or a dedicated singular visionary says more, I think, about the critic than the creator. (Fwiw I'm entirely in the "Jon blow is the smartest man in videogames" camp, so, I dunno what that says about me.)
@president_barackbar: Exactly! And no, you're not a terrible person, but I would say that a "terrible" person would try to make you FEEL terrible or ashamed for accepting these things as art and enjoying them, rather than going around trying to make others feel badly about the things they like, and whether or not they should be offended or "hurt" by them.
I like how you went from "anybody who cares about this is a mental toddler" to "the real problem is those who shame others for how they enjoy games" in three comments.
@scarycrayons You misunderstand my point. It's not that people are intentionally saying or doing these things, it is simply a byproduct of the art they are making. Whether that is good/bad/meaningful is what I'm trying to ask. I'm not accusing Stanley Kubrick of trying to incite a war when he made Full Metal Jacket, I'm trying to ask if making an exciting and thrilling movie about a topic like war is morally justifiable.
(I chose Kubrick for that example btw because of Samuel Fuller's famous reaction to it: "Another damned recruitment film." Also kinda important to my thinking here is Rivette's famous review of Kapo http://www.dvdbeaver.com/rivette/ok/abjection.html
@scarycrayons So, here's my full argument on this subject.
American society has decided as a group that the n-word is unacceptable to say. (This whole issue is of course wayyyyy more complicated than what I'm representing here so bare with me on that.) The reason it is unacceptable is that, even when presented in the most non racist possible context, or when said by even the most non racist possible person, it still ties itself and contributes to the historic dehumanization of African-Americans. So, by "enjoying the tension of a gruesome murder in a mystery novel" are you and I both contributing unwillingly to a culture that celebrates and enjoys violence?
Even when narratively justified things like stereotypical female characters or gory action scenes still tie into the part of a culture that is misogynistic and bloodthirsty. (I'm thinking now about how all war movies say war is hell but still portray the violence as exciting and thrilling.)
Does difference between fiction and non-fiction completely resolve this tension between representing problematic things and supporting them?
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