notnert427

Eh, it seems like even the duders who don't tend agree with Waypoint's general perspective seem to at least like Austin & Co. as people and respect their opinions, which is how it should be. Honestly, taking extreme left positions on things is arguably kinda Waypoint's whole brand at this point, and it's fair for that not to be for everyone. I find myself often in a similar place to where it sounds like you're coming from of both wanting to hear from them and often thinking they take things a bit too far.

I wish they had someone on staff at least play devil's advocate, or better yet actually fall in the middle or even skew a bit right politically. Except that would likely just be the crew ganging up against that one person all the time, and I'm not sure the gaming community itself even tolerates non-left perspectives at this point. The Waypoint stuff is fairly entrenched now in fighting racism, sexism, et al., which certainly isn't a bad thing, but also frames things to where any comment that doesn't fully jump on board with that is considered pro-racism, pro-sexism, et al., when the actual point may simply be that X thing they're getting irate at might be a stretch.

All in all, I'm glad that both Waypoint exists to do their thing and I'm glad GB mostly stays away from politics. Alex seems like the only GB staffer who's equipped and willing to offer some sharp political commentary anyway. GB is wise to stay in their lane, and I try to do much the same. It's not necessarily that they don't care about this stuff; it's that this is a video game website first and foremost. It's fine for gamers to take a similar perspective of just wanting to play video games as well.

Ah, okay. That makes more sense. I thought BF1 was a terrific game that actually did it right on inclusivity with interesting, historically-sound depictions of the conflict, so glad we agree on that. And yeah, unfortunately some of the gaming community sucks, but that's more an issue with the general shittiness of people (especially anonymously on the internet) than gaming itself.

Huh? The game opens with you playing as the Harlem Hellfighters in a fairly harrowing bit that serves as a emotionally stirring depiction of war itself. Moreover, the game's box art featured an African-American soldier, and it had in-game items featuring their insignia and honoring where they served with nicknames they earned through valor. Personally, I wasn't that familiar with WWI history on the whole, but actually read and learned about the 369th Infantry thanks to the game. I also did the same with the Women's Battalion of Death featured in later DLC. I'm not typically big on defending EA, but they deserve some credit for featuring soldiers and units in Battlefield 1 other than the standard white male fare that most games do.

I'm a white male and am therefore privileged to not really have politics negatively affect my life in ways it unfortunately does others. I recognize that, as well as how it renders my perspective a bit less meaningful in these sorts of discussions. Given this, I can't say I often notice or overly concern myself with political over/undertones and/or what messages can be derived from games. It's not what I play games for, as they're mostly escapism from real-world awfulness. That said, I'm glad outlets like Kotaku and Waypoint do address these things. It's worth considering and discussing.

Frankly, though, sometimes this stuff feels like a real stretch. Everyone's individual lens colors their perspective a bit (myself included), and there have been plenty of times when people have made a concerted effort to try and make something political that wasn't necessarily intended to be so in order to take a stance on it to push their beliefs. I don't necessarily have a problem with that in and of itself because I enjoy hearing perspectives other than my own, but sometimes this stuff gets really insular in not-great ways.

The most notable example of this that comes to mind are all of the recent pieces about working conditions in the gaming industry. While exposing some of that stuff is a good thing that hopefully forces some changes for the better, the fact remains that there was a very preferred narrative of evil corporations keeping the little guy down, and most of the articles about the issue didn't even make an attempt not to be one-sided on that. It all seemed far more focused on being influential than informative, and that's fairly frightening.

I also recall when Far Cry 5 came out and its story (which in fairness Ubi initially painted as if it would be some social commentary on religion and the political right) ended up pulling its punches politically. It was readily apparent that many were hoping to use the game as an opportunity to tee off on groups they disagree with and were somewhat livid that the game didn't really give them as much ammo for that as expected. Granted, the story was dumb/bad, and I actually wish they'd tried to say something instead of nothing, but the backlash to the game for not eviscerating hated groups was petulant and transparently so.

Does the Riot Cop thing bother me? Not really, but my demographic isn't being questionably shot often, either. It's arguably in poor taste, kinda like how Battlefield Hardline was, but where's the line on that stuff? I mean, it's not too hard to get offended at the shooter genre itself if you head down that road, and then get mad at racing games for promoting unsafe driving, etc., etc. I personally take issue with a lot of the weird pervy stuff often needlessly stuffed into games that IMO too many people give games a pass on because there are segments of the gaming community that are "into it", but I don't spend that much time trying to push that agenda.

At a certain point, it's worth considering whether it's just becoming attempts at censorship and what games will become if everything has to be outright designed to not potentially offend. I'm not going to sit here and defend the most deplorably-themed Steamtrash games as if they should definitely exist, though. I guess for me it's a thing where if it's something 99% of us can agree is awful, lambast away. However, if an "issue" is a sort of thing that's dependent on personal politics, it's fine to make that case, but also fine for others to not jump on board with that and just play the game if they want to.

I really enjoyed this movie. It has styyyyyle for days, and was interesting enough throughout to keep up the tension. Jeff Bridges was way more than just the Dude in this, IMO. I won't spoil too much for those who haven't seen it, but there's a lot more than meets the eye to his character and I particularly enjoyed his scenes with Cynthia Erivo, whose voice never gets old. Bad Times at the El Royale felt like a good Tarantino movie to me. Highly recommend.

I liked most of this film a whole lot. The first half to three-quarters of it is a shockingly great WWII film. The cinematography is terrific, it's really intense, and they do a great job building up the spectre of the experimentation. Sadly, it becomes a bit of a letdown when they actually get there and it turns into a fairly ridiculous nazi zombie movie. It cheapened some of the movie's earlier excellence for me, but I still quite liked the movie overall. As an aside, Wyatt Russell needs to be in more things. I've liked him in everything I've seen him in so far.

Things seem headed down the AC path where going forward it's just going to be setting changes from.....From.

Noooooo. His character in Contradiction was incredible. RIP.

Good for Johnny V! This seems like a great fit for both sides, given JV's earnest childlike enthusiasm.

No, I kinda blackballed it because Activision initially bundling what was basically the current Respawn team's work to try and boost sales of whatever new CoD that was was all kinds of shitty towards both the consumer and their former dev team. I have, however, moved to the Battlefield series and have enjoyed both I and V, due in part to being slower-paced like the old MW games were.

And yeah, it feels way different now from the current CoDs. It's why WWII was such a bummer for me, because that fast pace just felt really "off" given both the setting and what I wanted it to be. For CoD fans that have stuck with the series, I'm sure that wasn't an issue and likely a preference since the series has become so much of a twitch shooter in recent years. I get why they don't want to alienate their fanbase to please the few like me who actually prefer the slower pace, but it's also my biggest concern for this reboot.

I imagine they're hoping to pull in some folks like me with some nostalgia for the MW games and simultaneously are planning on keeping the playstyle of current CoDs to please the series regulars, but I'm going to likely want this game to play in ways it won't.

Obligatory shoutout to one of the best GB segments.

Seriously, though, my interest is more piqued than I expected it to be. It doesn't actually look real stupid. I actually could be down for another "gritty" shooter in theory. However, they fooled me with WWII, which I bought and then barely played because the series has gone so far in the hypermobility direction. I'm done with the twitch shooter stuff where everyone zooms around hipfiring SMGs. If this game is just another reskin like that was instead of going back to the actual semi-realistic pace/style of the old MW games, I'm out. I will say it looks awful pretty.