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Forums - Politics Discussion - The sjw review by eurogamer on Kingdom Come: Deliverance

nuckles87 on 21 February 2018

Video games are an art form. As such, video games inherently have political elements in them, whether you like them or not. These political elements aren’t even NEW, and have been in games for as long as games have been advanced enough to have them.

Missile Command was about the futility and hopelessness of nuclear war. In the 80s SEGA produced an arcade game called “I’m Sorry”, which was blatant political commentary on the corruption surrounding Japan’s then-Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka. SEGA’s own mascot starred in a game where he fights to protect the environment from a greedy human (one of Sonic’s early shows even took that environmental message and made it a central theme). And do I even need to bring up the Metal Gear Solid series and its commentary on war, nuclear weapons and private military contractors?

But nevermind the games that have political messages woven into them, ALL games can be viewed in a socio-political context, because all games inherently carry with them the worldview of their creators (or, at the very least, all games with a story/characters). As such, the criticism of games from a political perspective should not only be expected, it’s a GOOD thing, because it brings attention to culturally problematic aspects of video games, and gives the creators a chance to correct or avoid them in the future.

And as with all criticism, just because a critic has a political issue with a game doesn’t mean you should feel bad for liking that game. Heck, plenty of people are able to love video games in SPITE of the issues they may have with a game’s politics. I’m not a big fan of the male gaze framing in the Bayonetta series. But not only did I buy both games AGAIN on the Switch last week, they also rank as my favorite action games, period.

And as with anything, not all criticism is smart. The way this review takes Kingdom Come to task seems like it’s taking a magnifying class to something that, at best, seems only slightly problematic. I’ve only seen a few of Anita Sarkeesian’s videos, but the ones I have seen use examples that are so poor that they undermine the valid points they are trying to make.

If you don’t care about the political aspects of games, then don’t read the reviews that touch on them. But this is an aspect of gaming criticism that there needs to be MORE of, not less, even if that means more silly reviews like this one.



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JWeinCom on 21 February 2018
DonFerrari said:
JWeinCom said:

 

"We know of African kings in Constantinople on pilgrimage to Spain; we know of black Moors in Spain; we know of extensive travel of Jews from the courts of Cordoba and Damascus; we also know of black people in large cities in Germany," the historian, Sean Miller, tells me. Czech cities Olomouc and Prague were on the famous Silk Road which facilitated the trade of goods all over the world. If you plot a line between them, it runs directly through the area recreated in Kingdom Come.

That's the part that was omitted from the OP.  I'm not a historian, so I can't speak to the validity, but the actual argument was much more than "you don't know, it might have been like this?"  Although, the OP cherry picked parts of the review to make it seem like that.

So you want to argue just so you can accuse the OP of something?

Yes.  I wanted to point out that the OP took parts of the quote out of context.  And that's precisely what I did.  



haxxiy on 21 February 2018
SuperNova said:
Out of curiosity, is there a female playable character?

Because 'historically accurate' is not at all a blanket excuse for the mechanics and portrayals you put into your games. While it might me true that most women in the 1400 didn't have combat roles, Joan of Arc being one of the most famous ones and Elise Eskilsdotter who became a pirate to avenge her husbands death perhaps the most badass one, that does not mean that it would be impossible to struckture a game around non-combattive roles either.

Integrating black characters or asian charaters, while staying historically accurate would also not have been impossible. There was a substantial enough black population in Denmark around the time for example that portraits of black noble danes exist, setting the game in Denmark or close to the danish border would have allowed for black characters.
There were also active trade routes into Asia and east Asia. I mean, Marco Polos famous travels took place around 100 years earlier. There was enough contact that the black death was able to spread into europe from Asia, and it is not just likely, but proven that trade delegations from Asian countries came all the way to continental Europe, so if you WANTED to have an asian character in the game while stil staying historically accurate, you could.

The developers evidently didn't want to do any of that, and that's fine, it's their game.
The 'in the name of historic accuracy' excuse however is not sufficient on any of these points. The developers made choices and the game is the result of these choices.

Since you mention Marco Polo, it would have been worth noting he and his relatives were literally the only italians Kublai Khan had ever seen in its entire lifetime; and Yuan China was actually at one end of the silk road, and was a world power on trading, diplomacy etc., unlike Bohemia. So, the chances do not look that great for a 16 square km piece of land somewhere in the middle of Central Europe.

And the Black Death was transmitted from the turkic / mongolic peoples through the Eastern Roman Empire and the Pontic Steppe, by means of invasion (some even outright mention biological warfare, such as throwing infected dead bodies over walls on sieges) and only then to the rest of Europe, not direct cultural contact, which was basically closed to Europe ever since the arabs dominated most of the Mediterranean.

On heart, though, this whole thing is not a debate over historical accuracy, but trying to impose a poltical statement even against overwhelming odds it is something factual. People's feelings are involved as well, since it was OK not to be minorities among the rural Spain RE4 zombies, but those absolutely had to exist instead on RE5 on a similar context, transposed to Sub-Saharian Africa.



 

 

 

 

 

SuperNova on 21 February 2018
haxxiy said:
SuperNova said:
Out of curiosity, is there a female playable character?

Because 'historically accurate' is not at all a blanket excuse for the mechanics and portrayals you put into your games. While it might me true that most women in the 1400 didn't have combat roles, Joan of Arc being one of the most famous ones and Elise Eskilsdotter who became a pirate to avenge her husbands death perhaps the most badass one, that does not mean that it would be impossible to struckture a game around non-combattive roles either.

Integrating black characters or asian charaters, while staying historically accurate would also not have been impossible. There was a substantial enough black population in Denmark around the time for example that portraits of black noble danes exist, setting the game in Denmark or close to the danish border would have allowed for black characters.
There were also active trade routes into Asia and east Asia. I mean, Marco Polos famous travels took place around 100 years earlier. There was enough contact that the black death was able to spread into europe from Asia, and it is not just likely, but proven that trade delegations from Asian countries came all the way to continental Europe, so if you WANTED to have an asian character in the game while stil staying historically accurate, you could.

The developers evidently didn't want to do any of that, and that's fine, it's their game.
The 'in the name of historic accuracy' excuse however is not sufficient on any of these points. The developers made choices and the game is the result of these choices.

Since you mention Marco Polo, it would have been worth noting he and his relatives were literally the only italians Kublai Khan had ever seen in its entire lifetime; and Yuan China was actually at one end of the silk road, and was a world power on trading, diplomacy etc., unlike Bohemia. So, the chances do not look that great for a 16 square km piece of land somewhere in the middle of Central Europe.

And the Black Death was transmitted from the turkic / mongolic peoples through the Eastern Roman Empire and the Pontic Steppe, by means of invasion (some even outright mention biological warfare, such as throwing infected dead bodies over walls on sieges) and only then to the rest of Europe, not direct cultural contact, which was basically closed to Europe ever since the arabs dominated most of the Mediterranean.

On heart, though, this whole thing is not a debate over historical accuracy, but trying to impose a poltical statement even against overwhelming odds it is something factual. People's feelings are involved as well, since it was OK not to be minorities among the rural Spain RE4 zombies, but those absolutely had to exist instead on RE5 on a similar context, transposed to Sub-Saharian Africa.

Yes?

What I'm saying is they clearly didn't want to make diversity a priority, or they would have chosen a diffrent 16 square km piece of european land. And AGAIN it's fine that they didn't.

If they wanted to tell a diverse historically accurate story, the options are there. They didin't take these options, because it didin't fit with what they wanted to do. That's ok. It has however all to do with design decisions and very little with historical accuracy.

So we are in agreement in so far as I also don't think this debate is about historical accuracy. I'm also not trying to impose anything. The only thing I am saying is that instead of using an excuse of historical accuracy 'We didn't want to' should be sufficient enough explanation.

 

One aside about the black death point: European cultural contact and trade with Arabs was well established by the time and it was by no means only indirect and by invasion. Heck there was a sizable enough Arab population in Spain that the Spanish King (who was technically austrian) had to establish diplomatic relationships with them, since they were the former ruling class.



DonFerrari on 21 February 2018
nuckles87 said:
Video games are an art form. As such, video games inherently have political elements in them, whether you like them or not. These political elements aren’t even NEW, and have been in games for as long as games have been advanced enough to have them.

Missile Command was about the futility and hopelessness of nuclear war. In the 80s SEGA produced an arcade game called “I’m Sorry”, which was blatant political commentary on the corruption surrounding Japan’s then-Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka. SEGA’s own mascot starred in a game where he fights to protect the environment from a greedy human (one of Sonic’s early shows even took that environmental message and made it a central theme). And do I even need to bring up the Metal Gear Solid series and its commentary on war, nuclear weapons and private military contractors?

But nevermind the games that have political messages woven into them, ALL games can be viewed in a socio-political context, because all games inherently carry with them the worldview of their creators (or, at the very least, all games with a story/characters). As such, the criticism of games from a political perspective should not only be expected, it’s a GOOD thing, because it brings attention to culturally problematic aspects of video games, and gives the creators a chance to correct or avoid them in the future.

And as with all criticism, just because a critic has a political issue with a game doesn’t mean you should feel bad for liking that game. Heck, plenty of people are able to love video games in SPITE of the issues they may have with a game’s politics. I’m not a big fan of the male gaze framing in the Bayonetta series. But not only did I buy both games AGAIN on the Switch last week, they also rank as my favorite action games, period.

And as with anything, not all criticism is smart. The way this review takes Kingdom Come to task seems like it’s taking a magnifying class to something that, at best, seems only slightly problematic. I’ve only seen a few of Anita Sarkeesian’s videos, but the ones I have seen use examples that are so poor that they undermine the valid points they are trying to make.

If you don’t care about the political aspects of games, then don’t read the reviews that touch on them. But this is an aspect of gaming criticism that there needs to be MORE of, not less, even if that means more silly reviews like this one.

One can't be sure if the review will make silly remarks or problematization.

But I do agree with you that any review can look at political or social aspects of the game or gamemaking, as long as they make sense.

JWeinCom said:
DonFerrari said:

So you want to argue just so you can accuse the OP of something?

Yes.  I wanted to point out that the OP took parts of the quote out of context.  And that's precisely what I did.  

not out of context, the context of the OP is the same from the review.

And even the full quote makes nothing... it just say that there were some places and events in europe that had participation of black people and that "perhaps in that specific area there may have been one that stayed overnight". The justification is total bullocks.

SuperNova said:
haxxiy said:

Since you mention Marco Polo, it would have been worth noting he and his relatives were literally the only italians Kublai Khan had ever seen in its entire lifetime; and Yuan China was actually at one end of the silk road, and was a world power on trading, diplomacy etc., unlike Bohemia. So, the chances do not look that great for a 16 square km piece of land somewhere in the middle of Central Europe.

And the Black Death was transmitted from the turkic / mongolic peoples through the Eastern Roman Empire and the Pontic Steppe, by means of invasion (some even outright mention biological warfare, such as throwing infected dead bodies over walls on sieges) and only then to the rest of Europe, not direct cultural contact, which was basically closed to Europe ever since the arabs dominated most of the Mediterranean.

On heart, though, this whole thing is not a debate over historical accuracy, but trying to impose a poltical statement even against overwhelming odds it is something factual. People's feelings are involved as well, since it was OK not to be minorities among the rural Spain RE4 zombies, but those absolutely had to exist instead on RE5 on a similar context, transposed to Sub-Saharian Africa.

Yes?

What I'm saying is they clearly didn't want to make diversity a priority, or they would have chosen a diffrent 16 square km piece of european land. And AGAIN it's fine that they didn't.

If they wanted to tell a diverse historically accurate story, the options are there. They didin't take these options, because it didin't fit with what they wanted to do. That's ok. It has however all to do with design decisions and very little with historical accuracy.

So we are in agreement in so far as I also don't think this debate is about historical accuracy. I'm also not trying to impose anything. The only thing I am saying is that instead of using an excuse of historical accuracy 'We didn't want to' should be sufficient enough explanation.

One aside about the black death point: European cultural contact and trade with Arabs was well established by the time and it was by no means only indirect and by invasion. Heck there was a sizable enough Arab population in Spain that the Spanish King (who was technically austrian) had to establish diplomatic relationships with them, since they were the former ruling class.

Nope, again. The way it is (since it would be a very very very specific scenario for it to be historically right, but still have a female protagonist or black NPC) is that they would have to force a situation where that would be accurate... but if someone wants to tell a story using black people it would be more practical to use something from Africa history books.

You fail to see it isn't an excuse, it was a decision to portray a period.



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Pemalite on 21 February 2018
Aeolus451 said:

I didn't like it so I pointed that dumb shit so others can see it. Ignoring sjws acting crazy is what allowed their cancer to spread. 

You are all as bad as each other. It's just a big giant whinge fest.

estebxx said:

Oh dont worry i normally dont give a shit about this guys (in fact i just laugh at their insanity and move on), but it turns out that after all this years of listening to their crap i cant even take out 2 minutes of my time to leave my opinion on the matter for once, because apparently that makes me as bad as the lunatics who have gone as far as to get people fired from their jobs, because they said or did something they didnt like.

And yet. They aren't going to go away, regardless of what you think or say. - So you are just wasting your time.
Don't get me wrong, I don't support them. But I also don't support their opponents.

At the end of the day... This Progressive vs Conservative war is just bullshit, people need to debate the points that are presented, not their political alignment.



--::{PC Gaming Master Race}::--

sundin13 on 21 February 2018

Well, that sounds pretty.....fair?

I've complained about similar things before, but it was largely in the context of two things: One is a tone which too broadly attacks the game for some subjective elements, and two is score. This review doesn't really do either.

It made sure that its comments on race were well contextualized and makes it clear that they aren't accusing the game of racism. They make sure to highlight that these elements largely lie in the absence of representation, not a racist representation itself.

Then, the comments on the "love" mechanics are valuable information for a review. Reviews are consumer-centric, not "art" centric. What that means is that they serve as a buyer's guide, not some deep critique of a game's themes and mechanics. As such, it is entirely within the scope of a review to speak about elements which may turn off some buyers. Personally, I like romance elements in games when they are done well, but this mechanic doesn't really sound like it is up my alley. I'm glad the reviewer included such information to allow me, as the consumer, to make a more educated decision.

And at the end of the review, there is no score. Score has always been the problem with this form of "it may bother some people" criticism. Without it, it is only information. It is up to the reader to make determinations of what that information means to them.

If you choose that it doesn't matter to you, well, that is fine, but it doesn't mean that this information should not have been included in the review.



estebxx on 21 February 2018
Pemalite said:

And yet. They aren't going to go away, regardless of what you think or say. - So you are just wasting your time.
Don't get me wrong, I don't support them. But I also don't support their opponents.

At the end of the day... This Progressive vs Conservative war is just bullshit, people need to debate the points that are presented, not their political alignment.

Oh ffs... yeah i wasted a whole 2 minutes typing that comment, what a waste... except its not because i just wanted to get it out of my chest, (thats literally all i wanted to do nothing else) and it felt pretty great, (especially since this is the first time ive ever said anything about the subject), and why for the love of god do you think that i am in any sort of way pretending that they will go away just because of my comment, what kind of logic is that? do you believe i am THAT naive and or stupid as to pretend that they will go away because of my comment? that is so ridiculous its actually kind of amazing.

You wanna know what is a real waste of time? this back and forth between you and me, at least i got some relief from finally expressing my opinion on the subject,  this however got me nothing other than wasting my time.

Last edited by estebxx - on 21 February 2018

JWeinCom on 21 February 2018
DonFerrari said:

JWeinCom said:

Yes.  I wanted to point out that the OP took parts of the quote out of context.  And that's precisely what I did.  

not out of context, the context of the OP is the same from the review.

And even the full quote makes nothing... it just say that there were some places and events in europe that had participation of black people and that "perhaps in that specific area there may have been one that stayed overnight". The justification is total bullocks.

 

Yes, it is taken out of context. Because, the first part of the historian's quote explains why specifically in that area there may have been different ethnic groups.  The first half explains that because the town was located on a popular trade route, it is reasonable that there may have been people from other cultures and locales staying there.  

You may still find that not very compelling, and that's fine.  To be honest, I don't think it was an especially great argument.  But, the way it was presented was deliberately misleading.  It goes straight from " a historian I spoke to, who specialises (sic) in the area, disagrees" into the second half of the historian's quote.This gives the impression that this is the entirety of what the historian said, and it simply was not.   The part that was omitted was entirely relevant to the point and it wasn't especially long to the point where it needed to be cut for length.  Moreover, of the paragraphs quoted, the others were cut and pasted in their entirety.  This paragraph, which is probably the most relevant to the argument the review was making, was the only one to be chopped up like that.  There is literally no reason, other than to intentionally mislead, to cut the article like that.   



granturismo238 on 21 February 2018

Ahhh yes. This was bound to happen. I heard several reviews are complaining about this. They want to revise history to pretend females and blacks were always treated with respect in every part of the world at any point in time.

It is agenda pushing and wrong. Reviewers should not be complaining about this stuff.