the word "wholesome" is so poisonous to me at this point that I saw an upcoming game I'm excited for by a developer that I like a lot being promoted under steam's "wholesome games" banner and my knee jerk reaction was "hey fuck off!!! don't call it that!!!" cozy, wholesome, comfy, all that shit. get it away from me. I'm an adult with a job
I think wholesome is one of those words that's fallen into several different colloquial buckets depending on who you ask, some of which I think suck and are harmful (the implication of religious good, the implication that it's the opposite of anything dealing with sexuality), but it's also interesting to see the implication here that adulthood/maturity is somehow antithetical to comfort or coziness. Maybe this is a holdover from the Twitter "tenderqueer wars" but it seems like "relaxing" is acceptable but "comfy" implies something detestable to a lot of folks.
(apologies in advance for this post being rambly as hell. hopefully it's coherent)
to me, it all just feels very infantilizing and a big part of it is the way that marketing has latched onto it. there was a brief moment where "wholesome" stuff (wholesome memes, wholesome games, etc.) felt like it all existed in contrast to the modern online nihilism and irony poisoning, but it's hard for me not to be very cynical about it these days. it's all swirling around in that miserable soup of shit like Dog Rates, just a new genre of hustle bros making money off Trends, but the trends happen to be cutesy and twee. I'm not against content that is pleasant, comforting, chill, sincere, or any of that. but I am against 30 year old streamers talking to 30 year old me like they're hosting a playhouse disney show and they're asking me to take my shoes and socks off before I sit criss cross applesauce on the floor to watch them play a video game, made to look like it's for 6 year olds, published by a billion dollar corporation
I guess another thing is, we all unwind in different ways, you know? sometimes I have a stressful day and I chill out afterwards by playing crusader kings 3. there's something about the implications of what is considered "wholesome" where it's so much about, say, farming. fishing. cottagecore. it's all a little uncomfortably "reject modernity, embrace tradition" for my tastes. juuuust teetering on the edge of fashy trad shit depending on who you ask. not that I'm accusing any specific developers or players of anything. I have 100+ hours in stardew valley