Writer, TF Finatic, Recohoster, and Game dev. Wasnt able to post here as much as I liked, but I'll miss it and all of yall. Till we meet again, friends!
you can disagree with the artistic intent, but the artistic intent is literally spelled out by the text: if you didn't want to do this and you don't want to be criticized for doing this, then why didn't you just stop?
the game goes extremely out of its way to make its main point as explicit as possible because it knows people playing it are not used to analyzing media -- it's extremely approachable as your first "there's something to this media literacy thing" work -- but there are still gamers out there who will not be able to look beyond the simple sensorial and mechanical aspect of entertainment
it's really good stuff
Yeah you literally have one of your team YELL the point of the scene at you before it happens
People think that the author, in an interview, saying that the only option is Not To Play The Game, are very stupid people who think the author is the only valid form of interpretation... and then they go out of their way to not actually read into the meaning of that metaphor.
I hate it so much, and I hate gamers for believing him only in a literal, concrete-minded sense, instead of viewing the game for what it is: Yet another Vietnam-style story illustrating the pointlessness of war and the evil within obedience to an empire's hero myths.
Wow why does this game BLATANTLY REFERENCE Apocolypse Now and other media like that, wow it must be about how video game bad.
yeah, it's trying to make the same points as Apocalypse Now but with the subtlety of If I Had a Rocket Launcher and somehow people still don't get it
People always fixate on the author interview and it's infuriating. They surrender their own mind to a bad description.
far from the only time an author or director didn't give a great interview but that one sure sticks around
It is annoying because that fucking interview is repeated over and over again by dimwits and it ends conversation about the broader story in the game.
God is real, and he is a shithead moron.
You have to completely ignore Walker insisting that he didn't have a choice every time someone asks him what the fuck he was thinking to go with that interpretation too, it's just not really a game about player choice to me at all but a lot of coverage of the game talked about it. which brings me back to "did they actually play the game or just hear about it?"
Gamers have a huge issue with being told a story, and it derails into the meta about what game-story-structure "should be" and it's part of why Spec Ops discourse is so aggravating.
They refuse to engage with the story "but isnt that a failure of the game then?" and they keep refusing to talk about the story because they havent played it enough to talk about that aspect.
It's all deflection from hearsay.
Like, people who I considered smart take the dumbguy interpretation and run with it so smugly it fucking sucks and I do not sympathize with them on that at all. It's just stupid.