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Hi, I’m An Idiot Who’s Mad About Everything In Video Games Except The Layoffs
BY
MIKE DRUCKER
Who cares about people losing their livelihoods when Assassin's Creed has a black protagonist?
I’m starting to feel like I hate video games. I never thought I’d say those words, but here we are! The hobby I’ve loved my whole life is being ruined by greedy decisions made by selfish people. Whether through evil or stupidity, video games are being destroyed by the very people who claim to make them. As much as I want to stay excited and engaged as a fan, I’m afraid that some of these corporate decisions have made me want to leave gaming entirely. I’m disgusted. I’m upset. I’m offended.
Wait, layoffs? What layoffs? No, I’m sorry. Let me clarify: I’m an idiot who’s mad at everything in video games except the layoffs! For some reason, those don’t bother me at all! And if they do, I’m certainly showing it by focusing all of my time on ever-shifting culture war nonsense.
With thousands of people in the video game industry losing their jobs - including developers who made successful games - I think my energy is best spent elsewhere. Namely, making an endless series of 90-minute-long videos in which I call every new popular piece of media “woke” unless it features Gina Carano looking straight into the camera and saying slurs. And see? That’s a woman, so you can’t even call me sexist because I can name at least one.
Assassin's Creed Did What Now?!
The thing is, what’s ruining games isn’t corporate greed shutting down studios that hit every possible milestone. And it’s definitely not experienced people being forced out of the industry while young talent finds it increasingly hard to make a consistent living. No, I think the biggest problem in games right now - actually, maybe the world? - is that the new Assassin’s Creed game is set in medieval Japan and has a Black character.
That’s right! Your shock is the same as mine! I clutched my pearls so tight they left little circles in my palm. Yes, the character is a well-known historical figure who’s had multiple portrayals in Japanese media. But I’m furious he’s there and it absolutely does not say more about me than it does about those DEI developers. It’s a pure coincidence I chose just this moment to bring up DEI!
And don’t tell me that the other main character in the new Assassin’s Creed game is Japanese. Because she is a non-cybernetic woman, which is almost as bad! I’m sorry, all the feminism and CRT and other buzzwords I get from my favorite podcast hosted by three identical-looking meatheads isn’t going to make me interested in playing as a woman.
That is, unless the developer makes any subtle changes to her design between announcement and release, in which case I was always the biggest fan of her and I will murder the artist who gave her suboptimal vagina bones. The fact I don’t know the names of body parts while being mad about those same body parts gives me absolutely zero pause. If I try to consider concepts in my head, my nose begins bleeding like a psychic pushing their limits.
If anything, I’m the calm one here. I don’t just give Elon Musk eight dollars a month because I’m a sucker who needs a father figure. I pay money because I believe in free speech and I’m going to keep typing before the gerbil in a ball that is my brain accidentally hits upon what I’m saying. It’s the other people on social media who are mean. They accuse me of being racist and being sexist. But let me ask you: does constantly whining about the existence of people of color and women make me racist and sexist? Tell me how that makes sense!
I’m sorry, you want to talk more about Assassin’s Creed? No, I’m already over that. I forgot that game existed five seconds ago when a former game designer pushing 60 told me who to be mad at next. First there was a game journalist I’d never heard of until they wrote a couple articles that someone on Reddit said I wouldn’t like. They’ve done more damage to the industry than any corporate executive ever could! Before that journalist popped into existence fully-formed, games were all Aryan men and robot women with genetically enhanced vagina bones. Now look at games! Do we really need more games like Baldur’s Gate 3?
Hang On, I'm Angry About Warhammer Again.
Let’s stop talking about the journalist because a squirrel ran by my window and I forgot what was making me type so hard. I just asked the guys and they told me we’re now mad at Trench Crusade. I’d never heard of it before yesterday, but hoo boy am I really mad at it now! Trench Crusade is the worst! After learning that Warhammer 40K was going to add women to the Custodes - and Googling what a “Custode” was - I was very upset and hurt. If Games Workshop wants to destroy the lore of a game I only had a passing familiarity with and still don’t understand, that’s on them! I have a rubber stamp on my desk explicitly for the purpose of approving lore changes, and yet it remains dry and un-inked.
So imagine our excitement when we found a similar tabletop war game with overtly Catholic themes in Trench Crusade! Wow! Violence and Catholicism? Finally: dinner is served! So further imagine our disappointment when their community also didn’t want me and my closest friends teleporting in to start screaming at everyone who’d been there all along. It makes no sense to me! I want to be a part of so many gaming communities, but they kick me out whenever I lose my mind and scream at everyone. Who is more intolerant in that situation? It’s certainly not me, the person who’s instantly moving on to a new gaming hobby before leaving behind that one too.
If anything, the layoffs in the gaming industry are the fault of the woke pronoun police. Most game designers and game journalists may not make a lot of money, but I have decided they have far more power than corporate executives do. And I promise you - I would step over my family’s charred bodies to defend those executives to the death. If a corporate executive has appeared on stage and talked about graphics, he is not woke. Also, the word ‘he’ is very important there.
Wait, No, It Was Stellar Blade Wasn't It?
Meanwhile, if a video game designer complains about working conditions or randomly getting laid off, why are they talking and not busy making more space guns in the types of games I like? That’s why these companies are failing. It’s not greed. It’s not incompetence. It’s the deep personal grievances I’ve had since finding out I’m not humanity’s protagonist.
What’s the saying? “Go woke and go broke.” The podcast dads who tell me which snake oil pills are the best for big strong muscles also give me phrases that alliterate and rhyme to help me remember what I do like and what I do not like. I may accuse others of lacking critical thinking skills, but I fear doing it myself like someone with rabies fears water. I don’t have the energy to both be furious that Starfield let players choose pronouns and also consider what it means that I’m this furious Starfield let players choose pronouns! I don’t know what to do with the fact that I said people would be mad at Stellar Blade and nobody was. I’m just going to scream “new thing” and then tell lonely children and adults who should be investigated to subscribe to my channel.
In all honesty, I’m the person who’s protecting gaming. I’m the one true video game player as designated by God. Anyone who started after me doesn’t have the life experience that I bring to my knowledge and appreciation of interactive entertainment. Anyone who started before me is old and out of touch with reality. In my brain that’s shriveled like a raisin in the sun, the only people who actually enjoy games and aren’t pretending are players who look like me, act like me, and talk about the Roman Empire like it was a sexy theme park with a segregated pool.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go burn down the internet because a developer said that two men in a game can kiss like my mom and her new boyfriend.
Archive
Hi, I’m An Idiot Who’s Mad About Everything In Video Games Except The Layoffs
BY
MIKE DRUCKER
Who cares about people losing their livelihoods when Assassin's Creed has a black protagonist?
I’m starting to feel like I hate video games. I never thought I’d say those words, but here we are! The hobby I’ve loved my whole life is being ruined by greedy decisions made by selfish people. Whether through evil or stupidity, video games are being destroyed by the very people who claim to make them. As much as I want to stay excited and engaged as a fan, I’m afraid that some of these corporate decisions have made me want to leave gaming entirely. I’m disgusted. I’m upset. I’m offended.
Wait, layoffs? What layoffs? No, I’m sorry. Let me clarify: I’m an idiot who’s mad at everything in video games except the layoffs! For some reason, those don’t bother me at all! And if they do, I’m certainly showing it by focusing all of my time on ever-shifting culture war nonsense.
With thousands of people in the video game industry losing their jobs - including developers who made successful games - I think my energy is best spent elsewhere. Namely, making an endless series of 90-minute-long videos in which I call every new popular piece of media “woke” unless it features Gina Carano looking straight into the camera and saying slurs. And see? That’s a woman, so you can’t even call me sexist because I can name at least one.
Assassin's Creed Did What Now?!
The thing is, what’s ruining games isn’t corporate greed shutting down studios that hit every possible milestone. And it’s definitely not experienced people being forced out of the industry while young talent finds it increasingly hard to make a consistent living. No, I think the biggest problem in games right now - actually, maybe the world? - is that the new Assassin’s Creed game is set in medieval Japan and has a Black character.
That’s right! Your shock is the same as mine! I clutched my pearls so tight they left little circles in my palm. Yes, the character is a well-known historical figure who’s had multiple portrayals in Japanese media. But I’m furious he’s there and it absolutely does not say more about me than it does about those DEI developers. It’s a pure coincidence I chose just this moment to bring up DEI!
And don’t tell me that the other main character in the new Assassin’s Creed game is Japanese. Because she is a non-cybernetic woman, which is almost as bad! I’m sorry, all the feminism and CRT and other buzzwords I get from my favorite podcast hosted by three identical-looking meatheads isn’t going to make me interested in playing as a woman.
That is, unless the developer makes any subtle changes to her design between announcement and release, in which case I was always the biggest fan of her and I will murder the artist who gave her suboptimal vagina bones. The fact I don’t know the names of body parts while being mad about those same body parts gives me absolutely zero pause. If I try to consider concepts in my head, my nose begins bleeding like a psychic pushing their limits.
If anything, I’m the calm one here. I don’t just give Elon Musk eight dollars a month because I’m a sucker who needs a father figure. I pay money because I believe in free speech and I’m going to keep typing before the gerbil in a ball that is my brain accidentally hits upon what I’m saying. It’s the other people on social media who are mean. They accuse me of being racist and being sexist. But let me ask you: does constantly whining about the existence of people of color and women make me racist and sexist? Tell me how that makes sense!
I’m sorry, you want to talk more about Assassin’s Creed? No, I’m already over that. I forgot that game existed five seconds ago when a former game designer pushing 60 told me who to be mad at next. First there was a game journalist I’d never heard of until they wrote a couple articles that someone on Reddit said I wouldn’t like. They’ve done more damage to the industry than any corporate executive ever could! Before that journalist popped into existence fully-formed, games were all Aryan men and robot women with genetically enhanced vagina bones. Now look at games! Do we really need more games like Baldur’s Gate 3?
Hang On, I'm Angry About Warhammer Again.
Let’s stop talking about the journalist because a squirrel ran by my window and I forgot what was making me type so hard. I just asked the guys and they told me we’re now mad at Trench Crusade. I’d never heard of it before yesterday, but hoo boy am I really mad at it now! Trench Crusade is the worst! After learning that Warhammer 40K was going to add women to the Custodes - and Googling what a “Custode” was - I was very upset and hurt. If Games Workshop wants to destroy the lore of a game I only had a passing familiarity with and still don’t understand, that’s on them! I have a rubber stamp on my desk explicitly for the purpose of approving lore changes, and yet it remains dry and un-inked.
So imagine our excitement when we found a similar tabletop war game with overtly Catholic themes in Trench Crusade! Wow! Violence and Catholicism? Finally: dinner is served! So further imagine our disappointment when their community also didn’t want me and my closest friends teleporting in to start screaming at everyone who’d been there all along. It makes no sense to me! I want to be a part of so many gaming communities, but they kick me out whenever I lose my mind and scream at everyone. Who is more intolerant in that situation? It’s certainly not me, the person who’s instantly moving on to a new gaming hobby before leaving behind that one too.
If anything, the layoffs in the gaming industry are the fault of the woke pronoun police. Most game designers and game journalists may not make a lot of money, but I have decided they have far more power than corporate executives do. And I promise you - I would step over my family’s charred bodies to defend those executives to the death. If a corporate executive has appeared on stage and talked about graphics, he is not woke. Also, the word ‘he’ is very important there.
Wait, No, It Was Stellar Blade Wasn't It?
Meanwhile, if a video game designer complains about working conditions or randomly getting laid off, why are they talking and not busy making more space guns in the types of games I like? That’s why these companies are failing. It’s not greed. It’s not incompetence. It’s the deep personal grievances I’ve had since finding out I’m not humanity’s protagonist.
What’s the saying? “Go woke and go broke.” The podcast dads who tell me which snake oil pills are the best for big strong muscles also give me phrases that alliterate and rhyme to help me remember what I do like and what I do not like. I may accuse others of lacking critical thinking skills, but I fear doing it myself like someone with rabies fears water. I don’t have the energy to both be furious that Starfield let players choose pronouns and also consider what it means that I’m this furious Starfield let players choose pronouns! I don’t know what to do with the fact that I said people would be mad at Stellar Blade and nobody was. I’m just going to scream “new thing” and then tell lonely children and adults who should be investigated to subscribe to my channel.
In all honesty, I’m the person who’s protecting gaming. I’m the one true video game player as designated by God. Anyone who started after me doesn’t have the life experience that I bring to my knowledge and appreciation of interactive entertainment. Anyone who started before me is old and out of touch with reality. In my brain that’s shriveled like a raisin in the sun, the only people who actually enjoy games and aren’t pretending are players who look like me, act like me, and talk about the Roman Empire like it was a sexy theme park with a segregated pool.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go burn down the internet because a developer said that two men in a game can kiss like my mom and her new boyfriend.
I heckin love science, bros.
