Forum - View topicThis Week in Games - Tilting at Windmills Instead of Dragons
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432Hz
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Moderator's Note: post content removed. ANN Talkback is not the appropriate venue to pursue petty personal feuds with the writers. –F
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BadNewsBlues
Posts: 6307 |
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We also get that if people like you don’t like the stuff written on ANN because it offends your sensibilities in same way. You and the other random people with less than a 1000 posts are free to take your easily hurt feelings and nonsense theories somewhere else.
Like Gamefaqs. |
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Heishi
 Posts: 1346 |
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I noticed an error in the article. Hero was made a playable DLC character in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, not Brawl.
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benzone
Posts: 35 |
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Pardon me, but we don't need other people to dictate to us what "real problems" are. Also, people who promote social change shouldn't accuse people who oppose those changes of "culture war!" Even if you consider yourself to be on the correct side that will be vindicated by history, that doesn't change the fact that the culture war has two sides and that both are fighting it out with an aggressive "take no prisoners" stance. Both sides are passing laws and pressuring corporations to impose their views on everyone else. Both sides are engaging in "cancel culture." Both sides are getting books that they don't like altered or banned at public school libraries: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn has been so over its racial slurs since the 1970s. Also the Disney film Song of the South has not been legally shown in public or available commercially in the United States since 1986.
So yes, people on each side of the culture war are going to express their views. That is all that is happening. And the people who do the "enough with 'bothsidesism'" stuff ... are just people who claim that their position is right and the other side's position is illegitimate and is not worthy of consideration. Why is this the case? Because they say so. "We are right and people who disagree with me are wrong, and all facts and data that opposes my point of view gets rejected." How convenient. Last edited by benzone on Fri Oct 04, 2024 1:46 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Blanchimont
 Posts: 3564 Location: Finland |
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5? History and the creator themselves seem to disagree;
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YackDe
 Posts: 163 |
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Yes, because Disney moved away from the model of regularly re-releasing movies in theaters to releasing them on VHS and they didn't want any permanent record of the movie's existence. Trying to ascribe that to some insidious culture war keeping a corporate monolith down is completely baseless. |
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LinkTSwordmaster
 Posts: 547 Location: PA / USA |
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I'd give anything for an undub/uncensored release of Xenosaga but realistically, the under-age character moments are probably gonna keep that game buried forever. Xenoblade X really got the short end of the stick on the WiiU as well, and I pray it hits the Switch2 (or PC would be better) with full online co-op. ....and a story expansion, because cliffhangers with no sequels aren't cool.
Speaking of cliffhangers, I talked a bit about it in the F-Zero article's discussion area, but it's a travesty they're giving us Climax finally - but no translation. You can patch it and see Captain Falcon's final adventure in 100% English now, but that also means you'd likely have to play the game twice over, once on a RetroArch device, and then again on your Switch to unlock everything and play online. GP Legend+Climax were specifically notable for their story mode at the time too. The DS run of the Dragon Quest series has generally been pretty solid, though you have to patch in the party talk feature for DQ4 if I recall. DQ7 on 3DS is one of my favorite JRPGs ever made now, and DQ8 on the PS2 is still probably Square's coolest 3D game of the PS2 era. When the video translation issues had popped up and people were talking about them, I went and watched it myself and the subtitles definitely didn't match the tone of what they were verbalising - there's apparently an official video with translation that I'm hearing is supposed to be coming, but I'm not sure when or where. In a game like Dragon Quest, it's kind of benign-but-dumb to be saying "Type A/B" when it's clear the intention is either dude or gal. It makes sense in a game like Phantasy Star: New Genesis where you can literally pick & mix and match shapes and parts to come up with whatever you want, but I do worry that retroactively applying a "Type A/B" sort of removal of gender to DQ3 might additionally remove narrative moments - DQ7 being a good example, as a big part of Maribel's story is that she's a "tomboy" archtype and her lack of liking anything lady-like is driving her parents insane. Then Kiefer as the king's son & heir, is causing worries that his succession to the throne is going to be messed up because he's an "unreliable son". The gender dynamic among the party is key to how the three main characters relate to each other, and also marks how the story expertly shows everyone growing as you progress farther into the game. If VR becomes more popular & sleeving various avatars onto yourself without concern for gender presentation becomes more mainstream in the future, I can see writing games specifically around a more ambiguous "Type A/B" sort of presentation, but then it's usually used in current (2024) titles as a bare-minimum lazy way for a company to just "look" progressive and call it a day. Actually-adding options or writing the game around it is a lot more impressive a feat. If I write & have a character praise their child with an "Aha! That's my girl!" or a "Son, you have made your father proud" - particularly when the game world establishes gender roles in its society - it's a lot harder to make "Aha! That's my child!" sound as natural or emotionally-connecting without stopping to think for a while about how to change it. Last edited by LinkTSwordmaster on Fri Oct 04, 2024 2:11 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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FinalVentCard
ANN Reviewer
 Posts: 644 |
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As a reminder to folks about to share opinions, please be sure to comply with the rules. Of note:
If you object to integration or representation, think about why that is and maybe reconsider trying to couch your argument in flimsy red herrings. |
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LinkTSwordmaster
Posts: 547 Location: PA / USA |
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It actually puts Xenosaga III on PS2 into a very unique and interesting situation, as Xenogears had originally been intentioned to be "part 5". Xenosaga III in fact sits as covering part 3.5 and 4, because they abbreviated a bunch of stuff with Pied Piper and Missing Year to connect the events of Xenosaga II & III. When you start Xenosaga III with no context, you can clearly grasp the vibe that you're jumping in mid-story & missing some details. Additionally, by the end of the game, it's clear that they were adding in elements of Xenogears and rushing to meet an ending while expecting no further games in the series to come up in the future. It's honestly a shame, I'd have like to see all six Xenosaga titles as intended. As a refresh, Xenoblade I actually does a really good job of mirroring the sort of story that Xenogears was trying to tell on the PS1. There are a bunch of narrative similarities and characters mirroring other characters in reference. Xenoblade X similarly acts as a really good follow-up to Xenosaga III, if only in spirit. I've not played through Xenoblade II and III, but I do know that the second one added in KOS-MOS. It's fascinating how all three separate series, Gears, Saga, and Blade are more or less the same pattern of events cycling again and again, almost like a snake devouring itself.... |
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Top Gun
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I have almost zero interest in fighting games and only know about Max from friends posting clips of him, but that scream has already been memed to hell.
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AiddonValentine
 Posts: 2345 |
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-Xeno stuff: I just look at Monolight Soft and think "Look what you could have had, SqEx." One of the most interesting RPG studios working. Now get working on Xenoblade X port and follow up
-Darkstalkers: Playing Darkstalkers, you can see a lot of where Guilty Gear came from with the more over the top designs juxtaposed with zany humor. I can only imagine what sort of horror icons they could add into the roster nowadays, like a version of Hasshaku-sama -Dragon Quest: Y'know, I think it's indicative of how uncreative the outrage farmers are when they don't get the Female Warrior's additions are clearly meant as plausible deniability to keep the sprite as accurate to the original design as possible. They're basically invisible with how close they are to her skin tone. As a horror fan, these people know NOTHING of what actual censorship is like, what kinds of fights creators have had with ratings boards to get their work out there. Instead of bringing it up with entities like the ESRB or MPAA they whine about vague forces that are both powerful and weak as they've done a milion times before. Like I said, uncreative. Come back to me about "censorship" after brushing up on the Hays Code, the Comics Code Authority, the Red Scare, the Video Nasties, the Parents Music Resource Center ,and the origins of tentacle hentai (seriously, stuff gets weird) And at the end of the day, Horii has made it clear he wants nothing to do with that nonsense as KosoKoso is his show, so that statement might as well be his words. He has rejected having his words twisted and his life's work used as some cudgel instead of just a story he wanted to tell that people could enjoy. You have been denied, good day, people. Speaking of which, check out this interview he had with WIzardry creator and AnimEigo founder Robert Woodhead: https://news.denfaminicogamer.jp/interview/241003w Last edited by AiddonValentine on Fri Oct 04, 2024 3:03 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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FishLion
 Posts: 237 |
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Culture wars are generally executed by people taking issue with made up problems like rock n roll music. It's kind of hilarious to call companies making the most profitable choice "one side" of a cultural war. People have regressive attitudes that become unpopular and companies decide it was a bad look so they listen to all the neediest parents who don't trust their kids to understand complicated subjects like the history of racial caricatures and make media unavailable to maintain brand image. Then somehow that is all put on the opposite side of a "war" by people being in opposition to choices they dislike. One side of culture wars is always regressive, they want things the way they were and not they way they are, and they usually have a social ill to blame for why things got messed up. The other side of the culture war is mostly people confused why something is being attacked and defending the usually benign choices made in the thing they care about. Even the "rating boards that have become increasingly strict on the content that is deemed appropriate" as someone else mentioned would be the result of parents wanting to impose regressive appropriateness standards on game media. If someone just said "give up the sexy character or I'm not playing" and left it there it wouldn't even be a culture war, it would just be a fan-company interaction. Tying the desire for the way things were into a boogeyman social ill while longing for the standards of the past and trying to argue for bringing back those standards by removing the boogeyman is what makes it a culture war. The only sides I have seen in a culture war are the Regressivists and the surprised fans minding their business, I think we should call them Culture Invasions or Attempted Cultural Regressions. Calling it a war is a term made to imply there are two equals sides in equal exchange and not the tidal wave of vitriol couched in principles that are often excuses for personal taste (see anti-porn advocates admitting to using children as an excuse to restrict porn for everyone as much as possible). |
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Nigel Planter
Posts: 108 Location: London, UK |
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The removal of gendered language is another issue entirely and separate from the Type A/B stuff. When localizations remove lines like "you're a man aren't you? So start acting like one!" or "you should act more ladylike" it's more about the translator's issue with gender roles. The Type A/B stuff is limited to games with character creation and it only applies to the actual creation itself. Characters are not going to start saying Type A and B during actual dialog or the game itself. I side with Horii on asking who gets offended by saying male and female and find it dumb but it seems more like Japanese developers doing the bare minimum to appease the overseas marketing firms and localizers than something that's going to affect any game story going forward. Every instance of Type A/B I've seen in games still refers to the player character as male and female in the game itself so it doesn't really affect anything in the end. I would not be surprised if DQ3 HD still calls you a "brave young hero" or "brave young heroine" depending on whic type you pick and ultimately makes the obufuscation pointless. Regarding one specific example that got brought up in the article. the Japanese version of Animal Crossing on Switch and all non-English language versions ask for the player's gender. It's only the English localization that removed it and did the "style" thing. I might guess the next Animal Crossing might do it globally though since a lot of English localization teams are pushing for that stuff. Kind of like how Rune Factory 5 only added same-sex romance because the American localizers pushed for it so the next game might have it by default. |
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FinalVentCard
ANN Reviewer
Posts: 644 |
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Giving a player character agency over identity doesn't mean other party members have to be neutral, though. If the devs decided that they wanted to let the player design the protagonist, then it's just the protagonist, innit? There's still plenty of room for other characters to have their own stories and identities. I can buy the typing being clumsy, but an earnest clumsy effort still beats out no effort at all. It takes time for stuff to improve! We had to get "Mr. T" Barret Wallace before we got "A good man who serves a great evil is not without sin"-Barret Wallace. Progress isn't about nailing it on the first try, it's about doing better in the name of doing right by others. You can't live life not doing something because you might not "do it right", and it's unfair to not allow folks the chance to do better in the future.
I wanna say "the screaming will continue until the hype subsides", but in the name of Rule Of 3, this'll be the last time I do the "live dood reaction" bit. Still, I think we all identify with Maximilain "Dood" Christensen and his exuberant excitement at what goes on in the fighting game community. Never too late to be excited about stuff! 
Last edited by FinalVentCard on Fri Oct 04, 2024 2:49 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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animaters
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they could just add more options, u know? u wanna select male, sure, female? sure, X gender? sure instead of forcing a backward model of A/B even tho in-game stuff wasn't changed to accomodate it in the first place Also, it seems as if the article is trying to sweep under the rug what the creators said by misattributing the authenticity of the subtitles in that interview to a specific line, and making it seem as if the entirety of it is fabricated by internet grifters which is not the case. dunno, but seems like this was just reflected as trivial bumbo jumbo instead of giving actual genuine thoughts about the implications of such censorship. not trying to shove anything down article writers throat, ofc, just giving my own two cents about it. each to their own cup of tea ig. cheers |
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