Sometimes when I play video games, I think about other video games. As Metal Gear and Tomb Raider are the only video games I ever care to talk about, quite often I think about one in the light of the other. So like, you know, Solid Snake and Lara Croft. What if they banged?
Felix Kjellberg once again has said something racist. In a livestream last week he used a racist slur. Noted buffoon Ian Miles Cheong chose to mischaracterise this as understandable; as Kjellberg, also known as PewDiePie, let loose the term whilst in a “heated gaming moment”–angry because he was momentarily losing at a game–Cheong suggested that both the phrase and its use were meaningless. In fact, of course, what a person has allowed themselves to become comfortable proclaiming (internally or externally) is what will come out of their mouth when they are excited and cross. If Kjellberg is comfortable with racist language, that is what he will say. And he did. This is why people call him “racist.” It’s very simple mathematics.
I don’t like playing Metal Gear. I love experiencing Metal Gear. I love Solid Snake. Because I love him because there is enough in the game to make me love him, enough character interaction and gameplay opportunity to ask me to love him and exhibit why I might stick around, and because I stick around I learn. Loving is learning, and learning lets you know how to love. One of the things I learnt about (sideways, through a prism) was the Cold War. That’s kind of a joke, calling it “one” of the “things.” Metal Gear pretty much teaches you that war is everywhere, all the time, and “cold” warfare just means it’s hot somewhere else. There’s a character named Hot Coldman. (more…)
Do you ever look at things you like and realise that they’re all the same thing, every one of them? Just varied details on an essential appeal. Me, for example, I’ve been re-reading X-Men archives for the past two months and paying close attention to which details make me like the whole so much. And here’s what it is: straightforwardness. I like people who march straight to the point. Like Wolverine: you can make a joke about a point (or three of them), but you can’t put up much of an argument for how he’s long-winded in getting to one (or three). He’s not. Gambit, he’s all, “I’m sexy, you’re sexy, let’s dance”–straightforward, full throttle, no detours. And Rogue, who I’ve always called my “favourite character” in the widest sense of the question; she’s so straightforward that if a circumstance is untenable, she’ll give a yell of frustration and leave through a wall. Or six walls. She does not allow the world to stay in her way. (more…)
Hi. My name is Claire. I’m big on Ghostbusters. (more…)
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