Well, I was wrong about E3

A few days ago I made a post about how I didn't really give two shits about E3 2015 and that the magic of the show had kind of been lost.  If there is a God he read that post and then decided to smack me down with some of the best announcements I've heard in gaming for a long long time.

At first I thought I was on the right track when the only thing I had caught wind of was Fallout 4.  I understand there are a lot of people who enjoy those games but I'm not a huge fan of modern Fallout but that's another post for another time.  After that though, it was just heavy hit after heavy hit after HEAVY HIT!

Doom, South Park: Fractured But Whole, Shenmue 3 kickstarter (that has already met the goal), Final Fantasy 7 Remake, The Last Guardian are just a few to name off the top of my head and I'm sure the show will deliver more and more awesomeness soon.  Hell, Shenmue 3 alone was enough excitement to have me bouncing up and down like a 10 year old at Christmas but along side all this other stuff it's almost too much to contain.

This is all news I've had given to me by friends watching the streams and keeping up with the news as it hits while I'm at work so I've not had a chance to start digging through all the stuff yet.  I'm sure that once I start looking through there will be some new IP for me to get excited over too so this weekend is going to be very exciting.

The only way E3 could get more exciting at this point would be if someone announced Half Life 3 or some shit.  Fingers crossed for more gaming greatness.

South Park: The Stick of Truth

This game got a lot of praise and was talked about rather highly upon its release.  This usually makes me far more harsh on a game and it's a bad habit because it can have a habit of ruining a title for me.  However, South Park is one of those games that easily lives up to all its praise and it's absolutely worth playing.

The game revolves around a "new kid" who comes to South Park and he is quickly swept up in some kind of LARP, Dungeons and Dragons type thing being run by the cast of the show.  While all this is going on, some kind of terrible government plot is happening and it is up to you and your friends to stop it.  The story to this game is essentially one big episode of the show converted into a simple RPG game so fans of the show will know what to expect from the game plot wise.

Game play wise, I find Stick of Truth to be a little lacking.  It's an extremely simple RPG with some Mario RPG esque timing things attached to the various attacks to make them hit harder or apply an effect.  I played as a Mage and found all the combat to be stupidly easy to the point where my buddy character was completely pointless.

That said though, while Stick's game play is very simplistic it makes up for by having tons of character and being genuinely funny.  There are many little nods to old episodes of the show while also having a ton of it's own humor.  It has been a long time since I genuinely laughed out loud playing a video game but a few of the moments had me hitting the pause button so I could get my shit together.

There's also a hell of a lot to do in this game.  There are tons of side quests and things to collect.  If you are a perfectionist then you will definitely get quite a significant amount of play time out of this game.  Not to mention that there are 4 playable classes (warrior, mage, thief and Jew) that all have their own unique skill sets.  The animations on some of the attacks alone warrant multiple playthroughs and have a pretty big effect on how you tackle certain situations.

I could talk for fucking ages about how good the game is and why you'd probably love it but I'd be here all day if I did that.  It would be easier to say that if you are a fan of South Park then you absolutely WILL like this game.  If you're not familiar with South Park then this isn't a good place to start but there is enough for a newcomer to enjoy too.  If you don't like South Park or you're looking for a deeper RPG experience, then you're clearly an idiot looking in the wrong place. 

You aren't a Developer OR a Writer, Shut Up

Very recently South Park: Stick of Truth was released and it's being met with an absolutely stunning amount of praise and for once it seems like this praise is well founded.  I've not played it yet but it looks like a really solid game and I can't wait to get my grubby little mits on it.

Now generally speaking, the politically correct crowd have been fairly hush hush about this.  Is it because there's no offensive content in this game? HA HA! NO! There's TONS of offensive content in this game and the stuff that I've seen is only the tip of the ice burg I imagine.  The reason the usual internet whiners have not been getting riled up about Stick of Truth is because attacking Matt Stone and/or Trey Parker is a good way to get their attention so they write an episode about you and expose how much of a fucking moron you are.

However, it finally happened on Polygon with an article written by some tosser and was about how she was upset that she couldn't "pick a female character".  I'm not going to link the article because Polygon is a piece of shit but this writer had very little to say about the game itself, and it was just paragraph after paragraph of her whining that she couldn't be a female.  Luckily when she contacted Ubisoft she was told to fuck off and play the game (in much nicer terms) but we all know for most gaming writers that actually playing the games they are moaning about to the end is way, WAY too hard.

This isn't the first time this shit has happened either.  I saw an equally stupid article and got into a huge Facebook argument myself about the game Deep Down which is coming soon to PS4

For those that don't know, Deep Down is a free to play Roguelike game coming to PS4 at some point.  The article that this person linked was a similar piece complaining that there are no playable female characters.  Now the argument I got into was about if that was sexist or not (it's not) but the reason that was given by the developers was that it was for story reasons, which is fine.

Now I know I've chosen 2 examples of the same issue, but I'm not going to rant about it may or may not be sexist or whatever stupid bullshit.  No, my problem with this is like the title states, you aren't the developer or the writer for these games so shut the fuck up.

If a developer creates something then you are more than welcome to criticise their game or their choices for character and story but crying "misogyny" at something just because it doesn't suit your "needs" or agenda should not fly, ever.  If Matt and Trey don't want you to play as a little girl in Stick of Truth, then that's THEIR creative decision from a story standpoint and you have no right to complain about that.  It's their story, not yours, and if they want an all male cast then they are allowed to write a story based around an all male cast.

The same goes for Deep Down, if the developers don't want any playable females in their game, then that's THEIR decision and who are you to tell them they can't or shouldn't do that?  Why shouldn't they do that?  Just because women exist, doesn't mean that you have to be featured in every single piece of media ever created.

The same thing goes for anything.  If a developer or writer wants to have an all female cast, then I don't have any right to tell them that's wrong because that's the story that THEY want to write.  You can argue about it being a bad story all you want, but telling them they aren't allowed to do that is wrong and stupid. 

Imagine if a game had a cast that was made up entirely of animals, you don't see people complaining about how "humans are underrepresented in this story" or whatever stupid bullshit.  It's their story and while you absolutely have the right to criticise the decisions of the creative team, you have NO right to tell them it's wrong or that they should change it just because it doesn't fit in with your way of thinking.  If games are supposed to be heading towards becoming some kind of art form, then these people just have to realise that not all art is made for them and they just have to deal with that.

So, if you want a game with equal representation of all genders and walks of life, go play a game that does so, and if a game like that doesn't exist, then get off your stupid whiny arse and MAKE ONE.  Don't go around slagging off other peoples work because you have the imagination of a goldfish with brain problems.

So play the game and criticise it by all means, but unless you're going to say something of value then just shut the fuck up.