Everytime Ubisoft announces a new game, a SJW on Tumblr gets their wings/complains that the protagonist isn't a fat black female gender-queer lesbian furry.
To be fair, I'd also like to see another Saints Row.
Everytime Ubisoft announces a new game, a SJW on Tumblr gets their wings/complains that the protagonist isn't a fat black female gender-queer lesbian furry.
To be fair, I'd also like to see another Saints Row.
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
I guess getting stuck on the "great white savior" thing for Far Cry 3 is for people who miss the part where Jason gets all his magic powers and weapons from the natives and is effectively fucking obliterated by letting the natives lead him around by the dick like an ignorant foreigner?
One ending gets him killed, and the other ending has him as basically a wretched husk of a human being completely detached from friends, family, and basically all emotion besides "ultrakill"; in both cases, he does nothing whatsoever to lead anybody to anything other than more insanity and murder. Kinda tough to be the "great white savior" of anything when the character in question doesn't even really survive the ordeal in any meaningful way and doesn't actually save the people he's supposedly the "savior" of. He's just one more foreign asshole in a long line of foreign assholes who came in and helped tear the region into miserable shreds of nastiness.
Sure, people are welcome to hate the hell out of the story for crappy writing or whatever, but the "great white savior" thing is getting pretty silly. The guy wasn't the savior of anything except local black market profits. Just glad we can skip this bullshit for Far Cry 4 and enjoy the game for crazy mountain-leaping shenanigans and elephant-riding base raids.
Of course Jason gets all his magic powers and weapons from the natives. One of the main "great white savior" tropes is that white dudes are better at literally everything, even the stuff the natives have been doing for generations. The white guy comes along and suddenly he can absorb all the native power and out-native the natives. See: Avatar, Dances With Wolves, Jack London's "The Son of the Wolf," etc.
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited June 2014
Except this "white savior" was too stupid to leave like Vaas did, because even that crazy monster knew the locals were totally batshit insane and to get the hell away from them. Jason just got suckered in by being an ignorant, arrogant moron and it destroys him, his brother, almost his other brother, and almost all of his friends, all of which whom now know he's an insane psychopath (if they even survived the island). And Vaas was going to be what Jason turns into, except he left so he wouldn't end up as a human sacrifice for a nutcase warrior religion.
The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Shitty story? Fine, plenty of fodder there. White racism? People are seeing what they want to see in the game and ignoring the inconvenient parts.
Pity the guy wasn't African or something so we could've skipped all this silliness instead of discussing more about the merits of using wildlife for pest control.
The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited June 2014
The dead horse is not worth beating any more than it ever was. If "white guy + non-white locals" is all it takes to classify a game setting as racism, then people are entirely missing the racist forest for the racist trees. Insert the exact same asshole as Jason into the game as any other skin color suddenly the "white savior" thing would no longer be valid. Why? Because the guy wouldn't be white? So it's only the fact that Jason is white that makes the situation bad? So many things wrong with that that it's hard to believe.
I wouldn't even care, except people drag the issue up every other damn page or so like the argument is something they need to win, even if it means just beating people over the head with it. It's tired, it's boring, it's entirely subjective, it's highly specious, and it just keeps crapping up the thread.
Seriously, fucking combat elephants? Far Cry + coop? Himalayas, awesome visuals, wingsuits, and grappling hooks? And we're back to some people playing the racism harp again? It's not even relevant anymore (everybody already has their stance and has for ages), much less "bring it up every page" relevant.
They do, actually. Watch Dogs has Abstergo employees in it, and Abstergo sent a team to the Rook Islands to investigate it. They're loose connections, but they are there.
Also a point where people are literally playing an AC game in watch dogs.
There are also some Blood Dragon arcade game units in one of the buildings you hack into.
[Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
The dead horse is not worth beating any more than it ever was. If "white guy + non-white locals" is all it takes to classify a game setting as racism, then people are entirely missing the racist forest for the racist trees. Insert the exact same asshole as Jason into the game as any other skin color suddenly the "white savior" thing would no longer be valid. Why? Because the guy wouldn't be white? So it's only the fact that Jason is white that makes the situation bad? So many things wrong with that that it's hard to believe.
I wouldn't even care, except people drag the issue up every other damn page or so like the argument is something they need to win, even if it means just beating people over the head with it. It's tired, it's boring, it's entirely subjective, it's highly specious, and it just keeps crapping up the thread.
I think the problem is at the end of the day these kind of stories pop up so much in games that it reached as point where its hard for people to tell parody from reality.
Like the sad fact is to me its kind of obvious that Farcry 3 is that and it purposely tries to be that, but the state of video game narrative is thus that I wouldn't be surprised if the entire thing was played straight either. It is getting better overall, but just because that's the case I don't think it should be immune to criticism.
As for the whole "white savior" thing and race. Well, truth be told the reason its bought up is because in the history of entertainment its a well-documented event. And it isn't just white person + non-white locals, rather it tends to be a combination of race of most of these people writing the stuff, power fantasy, the use of foreign settings/people as backdrops, and the stereotypes therein. Which usually at best plays out as naive admiration and at worst plays out like a piece of white exceptionalist propaganda.
And as to why some may not inherently be offended by an Asian man doing something in a mostly Asian country is because, historically, it simply doesn't have the same negative connotations.
And as to way some may not inherently be offended by an Asian man doing something in a mostly Asian country is because, historically, it simply doesn't have the same negative connotations.
And as to way some may not inherently be offended by an Asian man doing something in a mostly Asian country is because, historically, it simply doesn't have the same negative connotations.
Nanking might disagree.
Yeah. But Nanking was an actual tragedy and is treated as such.
White Savior narratives are usually played pretty straight and sport a complete lack of self-awareness.
And as to way some may not inherently be offended by an Asian man doing something in a mostly Asian country is because, historically, it simply doesn't have the same negative connotations.
Nanking might disagree.
Yeah. But Nanking was an actual tragedy and is treated as such.
White Savior narratives are usually played pretty straight and sport a complete lack of self-awareness.
Name an example of White Savior in videogames.
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
And as to way some may not inherently be offended by an Asian man doing something in a mostly Asian country is because, historically, it simply doesn't have the same negative connotations.
Nanking might disagree.
Yeah. But Nanking was an actual tragedy and is treated as such.
White Savior narratives are usually played pretty straight and sport a complete lack of self-awareness.
Name an example of White Savior in videogames.
Why? I mean if you want to find examples of white saviors I'm sure you can find something. Not about to do your work for you.
The dead horse is not worth beating any more than it ever was. If "white guy + non-white locals" is all it takes to classify a game setting as racism, then people are entirely missing the racist forest for the racist trees. Insert the exact same asshole as Jason into the game as any other skin color suddenly the "white savior" thing would no longer be valid. Why? Because the guy wouldn't be white? So it's only the fact that Jason is white that makes the situation bad? So many things wrong with that that it's hard to believe.
I wouldn't even care, except people drag the issue up every other damn page or so like the argument is something they need to win, even if it means just beating people over the head with it. It's tired, it's boring, it's entirely subjective, it's highly specious, and it just keeps crapping up the thread.
Seriously, fucking combat elephants? Far Cry + coop? Himalayas, awesome visuals, wingsuits, and grappling hooks? And we're back to some people playing the racism harp again? It's not even relevant anymore (everybody already has their stance and has for ages), much less "bring it up every page" relevant.
Historical Context is a thing.
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited June 2014
Though. Thinking on it.
I will give you that for the most part video games themselves usually avoid this. But mainly because most of their settings are fantastical and ethnically homogeneous, so its a side effect more than anything.
So, yeah if I said video games specifically excuse me but entertainment medium as a whole, eh.
The dead horse is not worth beating any more than it ever was. If "white guy + non-white locals" is all it takes to classify a game setting as racism, then people are entirely missing the racist forest for the racist trees. Insert the exact same asshole as Jason into the game as any other skin color suddenly the "white savior" thing would no longer be valid. Why? Because the guy wouldn't be white? So it's only the fact that Jason is white that makes the situation bad? So many things wrong with that that it's hard to believe.
I wouldn't even care, except people drag the issue up every other damn page or so like the argument is something they need to win, even if it means just beating people over the head with it. It's tired, it's boring, it's entirely subjective, it's highly specious, and it just keeps crapping up the thread.
Seriously, fucking combat elephants? Far Cry + coop? Himalayas, awesome visuals, wingsuits, and grappling hooks? And we're back to some people playing the racism harp again? It's not even relevant anymore (everybody already has their stance and has for ages), much less "bring it up every page" relevant.
Historical Context is a thing.
Elaborate on what you mean, because to me Ninja Snarl made a good point. Had Jason Brody been anything but white, these conversations wouldn't be happening. Which, to me, seems a bit more racist than the actual accusations themselves.
Maybe I'm missing something here.
Everything: Konphujun(#1458)
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Zilla36021st Century. |She/Her|Trans* Woman In Aviators Firing A Bazooka. ⚛️Registered Userregular
The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Third option, he's not racist, the studio's not racist, but he missed the mark he was aiming for in his story. Accusing him of actually having a prejudiced agenda against a race is a big deal, and one that I don't believe he's guilty of. Biting off more than he could chew? Sure, guilty as charged.
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Dr. ChaosPost nuclear nuisanceRegistered Userregular
Honey Badgers.
Oh shit. Going to have to craft some protective cups.
The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Third option, he's not racist, the studio's not racist, but he missed the mark he was aiming for in his story. Accusing him of actually having a prejudiced agenda against a race is a big deal, and one that I don't believe he's guilty of. Biting off more than he could chew? Sure, guilty as charged.
I didn't ever say he was racist. I said he made a racist game.
The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Third option, he's not racist, the studio's not racist, but he missed the mark he was aiming for in his story. Accusing him of actually having a prejudiced agenda against a race is a big deal, and one that I don't believe he's guilty of. Biting off more than he could chew? Sure, guilty as charged.
I didn't ever say he was racist. I said he made a racist game.
That's not even an argument. So if he has to explain to ONE site that they got it wrong, then the game is racist? So if one person interprets Pacman as being racist because it's a yellow guy eating colored guys then Pacman is racist?
The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Third option, he's not racist, the studio's not racist, but he missed the mark he was aiming for in his story. Accusing him of actually having a prejudiced agenda against a race is a big deal, and one that I don't believe he's guilty of. Biting off more than he could chew? Sure, guilty as charged.
I didn't ever say he was racist. I said he made a racist game.
That's not even an argument. So if he has to explain to ONE site that they got it wrong, then the game is racist? So if one person interprets Pacman as being racist because it's a yellow guy eating colored guys then Pacman is racist?
Yes, you've perfectly captured the thrust of my argument by restating exactly what I'm saying in quite reasonable terms. I realize now my mistake and withdraw everything I've ever said about how obviously racist Far Cry 3 is, and I now agree with everything in this Stormfront thread and disagree with all these people who think it's racist:
Posting links to other people doesn't make your argument more compelling, Tycho. It just makes it seem like you want other people to argue on your behalf.
You think it's racist to have a white guy be the puppet of a group of psychopathic locals engaged in their internal power struggle.
Considering that the white guy is not set up as a hero, but a duped fool probably too drug-addled to rejoin civilized society... I disagree.
Posting links to other people doesn't make your argument more compelling, Tycho. It just makes it seem like you want other people to argue on your behalf.
Their argument is was my argument, though. I don't see why the reasons provided in the links are worse for having come from others rather than me. Surely if an argument it's convincing, it's convincing no matter who wrote it. But, like I said, I'm on the side of both Storms (front and watcher) now, having seen the light and switched over. Praise be to Yohalem for his brilliant satire! It's so brilliant that I and others managed to miss it and think the game was actually racist. Truly he is a master of subtlety. We could all learn a thing or two about obfuscation and clever tomfoolery from this modern day Ambrose Bierce.
Posting links to other people doesn't make your argument more compelling, Tycho. It just makes it seem like you want other people to argue on your behalf.
Their argument is was my argument, though. I don't see why the reasons provided in the links are worse for having come from others rather than me. Surely if an argument it's convincing, it's convincing no matter who wrote it. But, like I said, I'm on the side of both Storms (front and watcher) now, having seen the light and switched over. Praise be to Yohalem for his brilliant satire! It's so brilliant that I and others managed to miss it and think the game was actually racist. Truly he is a master of subtlety. We could all learn a thing or two about obfuscation and clever tomfoolery from this modern day Ambrose Bierce.
There are two sides to this.
On one hand, communication is a subjective field. If you communicate something to someone that you did not originally intend (due to misunderstanding, a language barrier, a really bad analogy, etc), then it is generally not considered the recipient's fault, but the communicator, for failure to properly communicate an idea to the audience.
On the other hand, you have to be willing to understand that people receive things differently than others. A lot of people are of the opinion that there was racist undertone to Far Cry 3. Considering that it has been repeatedly claimed by the studio that this was not its intended message, you have two choices. One is to distrust what the studio says, in which case there's not actually an argument to be made about whether or not the game is racist- the argument is about whether the studio is trustworthy. The second is to trust what the studio says and then come to the understanding that their message was corrupted somewhere along the line. Saying "Far Cry 3 is racist" and "Far Cry 3 was trying to subvert common racist tropes of the heroic white man coming and saving everyone, but didn't hit the mark and just came off racist" are functionally identical, but the first one attaches a lot more stigma and negativity- and since we're talking about a subjective field, you can't just all of a sudden switch to functional speech, you lose accuracy in the conversion.
So which is it, do you think Far Cry 3 missed the mark, or do you distrust the PR?
Posting links to other people doesn't make your argument more compelling, Tycho. It just makes it seem like you want other people to argue on your behalf.
Their argument is was my argument, though. I don't see why the reasons provided in the links are worse for having come from others rather than me. Surely if an argument it's convincing, it's convincing no matter who wrote it. But, like I said, I'm on the side of both Storms (front and watcher) now, having seen the light and switched over. Praise be to Yohalem for his brilliant satire! It's so brilliant that I and others managed to miss it and think the game was actually racist. Truly he is a master of subtlety. We could all learn a thing or two about obfuscation and clever tomfoolery from this modern day Ambrose Bierce.
There are two sides to this.
On one hand, communication is a subjective field. If you communicate something to someone that you did not originally intend (due to misunderstanding, a language barrier, a really bad analogy, etc), then it is generally not considered the recipient's fault, but the communicator, for failure to properly communicate an idea to the audience.
Satirizing a defamatory idea or trope is tough because any satire can be tough to distinguish from what it's trying to satirize if it opts for subtlety instead of hitting you over the head with it (and even that doesn't always work). Far Cry 3 saved the closest it had to hitting you over the head with it until the very end when the cult some players may still think are the good guys the white guy is the adopted vanguard for kidnaps the player character's friends with the intent to sacrifice them and essentially putting the character right back where he started with the pirates. Being clever isn't always the way to go in satire unless you're really in it for the art.
This makes the reaction to the cover image for Far Cry 4 even more amusing and face palming at the same time. FC3's depiction tripped because the satire wasn't communicated clearly enough. FC4's cover image generated controversy because many recipients could not recognize a Chinese person as Chinese with modern clothing and hair styling.
On that note, I'm looking forward to seeing what they do with both Pagan Min and the player character. The last time I remember seeing a modern take on a Chinese villain (as opposed to ye olde Yellow Peril pulp types) in a Western made game was Sleeping Dogs, kind of a necessity as that was set in Hong Kong. Min likely won't be as nuanced as the Triad characters there but it's still rare to see a Western work depict an East Asian man in an authoritative or masculine role that doesn't involve being a ninja or master martial artist.
I'm almost certain that this is the first time we have a player character from a Nepalese inspired background. I will be disappointed if we do not get to switch out that knife we saw in previews for a kukri at some point. At the very least at least some of your allies better be the setting's equivalent of a Gurkha.
Posting links to other people doesn't make your argument more compelling, Tycho. It just makes it seem like you want other people to argue on your behalf.
Their argument is was my argument, though. I don't see why the reasons provided in the links are worse for having come from others rather than me. Surely if an argument it's convincing, it's convincing no matter who wrote it. But, like I said, I'm on the side of both Storms (front and watcher) now, having seen the light and switched over. Praise be to Yohalem for his brilliant satire! It's so brilliant that I and others managed to miss it and think the game was actually racist. Truly he is a master of subtlety. We could all learn a thing or two about obfuscation and clever tomfoolery from this modern day Ambrose Bierce.
There are two sides to this.
On one hand, communication is a subjective field. If you communicate something to someone that you did not originally intend (due to misunderstanding, a language barrier, a really bad analogy, etc), then it is generally not considered the recipient's fault, but the communicator, for failure to properly communicate an idea to the audience.
On the other hand, you have to be willing to understand that people receive things differently than others. A lot of people are of the opinion that there was racist undertone to Far Cry 3. Considering that it has been repeatedly claimed by the studio that this was not its intended message, you have two choices. One is to distrust what the studio says, in which case there's not actually an argument to be made about whether or not the game is racist- the argument is about whether the studio is trustworthy. The second is to trust what the studio says and then come to the understanding that their message was corrupted somewhere along the line. Saying "Far Cry 3 is racist" and "Far Cry 3 was trying to subvert common racist tropes of the heroic white man coming and saving everyone, but didn't hit the mark and just came off racist" are functionally identical, but the first one attaches a lot more stigma and negativity- and since we're talking about a subjective field, you can't just all of a sudden switch to functional speech, you lose accuracy in the conversion.
So which is it, do you think Far Cry 3 missed the mark, or do you distrust the PR?
The long version: I of course agree that the studio didn't intend to make a racist game. Almost nobody is ever racist on purpose. Even some Stormfront people probably don't think of themselves as racist. That doesn't change the fact that certain things are racist despite the intent of the people saying the stuff.
If two things are "functionally identical" I don't think I lose accuracy in the conversion. Here's what I think is going on: people desperately want some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist even though it is, so they mince their words and say it "came off racist," as if that's somehow better. But it's not. It's literally the same thing. If I "come off racist" then I've said something racist. That's just how it works.
You can't just look to intent to find out if something is racist. Read the first few chapters of The Autobiography of Malcolm X and make a list of all the people who intended to be racist and all the people who you think actually were (super duper extremely undeniably unequivocally and obviously) racist. I guarantee the second list is going to be longer than the first.
The long version: I of course agree that the studio didn't intend to make a racist game. Almost nobody is ever racist on purpose. Even some Stormfront people probably don't think of themselves as racist. That doesn't change the fact that certain things are racist despite the intent of the people saying the stuff.
If two things are "functionally identical" I don't think I lose accuracy in the conversion. Here's what I think is going on: people desperately want some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist even though it is, so they mince their words and say it "came off racist," as if that's somehow better. But it's not. It's literally the same thing. If I "come off racist" then I've said something racist. That's just how it works.
You can't just look to intent to find out if something is racist. Read the first few chapters of The Autobiography of Malcolm X and make a list of all the people who intended to be racist and all the people who you think actually were (super duper extremely undeniably unequivocally and obviously) racist. I guarantee the second list is going to be longer than the first.
You linked that wiki article before, but it is controversial whether it was racist at all or not. Lots of people think it was, lots of people didn't really get that impression. I personally didn't. So you can quote death of the author, but it doesn't actually help your argument because it's irrelevant. I'm not saying it's not racist because they didn't intend it to be, I'm saying it's not racist at all, and I'm citing their intent as evidence of my personal opinion. Sure invoking death of the author makes that evidence worth less or entirely worthless, but it doesn't invalidate the argument entirely, and the important part of the argument is the analysis itself, not the studio's claims.
Second of all, you absolutely do lose accuracy when you use objective language to describe subjective things. Functionally identical is an objective statement, but two functionally identical things can have different subjective meanings. You lose subjective accuracy when you switch from subjective to objective, and you lose objective accuracy when you switch in the other direction. It's intellectually dishonest to take a subjective opinion and talk about it in objective terms- this is an emotional argument, and doing so truncates emotion from the conclusion.
In either case, I'm not trying to argue with your opinion. What I am saying is that you cannot honestly claim "Far Cry 3 is racist" because you're speaking objectively about a subjective matter. That claim cannot be considered because it does not match the context.
You can say "Far Cry 3 feels racist," "It missed its mark and just came off racist," or any number of subjective claims and now all of a sudden your opinion (key word there: opinion) is honest and must be considered. But you're speaking in binaries, and that is not appropriate for this particular argument.
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
You know...I don't mind these talks.
But once it gets to the point that you're arguing the definition of objectivity and subjectivity I think these things have ran their course.
But seriously dude...what kind of shit is that to say?
Really poorly explained shit?
I'm not invested in Far Cry 3 not being racist; I played it and had fun. I also played and had fun with GTA:SA, which I think included racist and misogynistic characters.
The long version: I of course agree that the studio didn't intend to make a racist game. Almost nobody is ever racist on purpose. Even some Stormfront people probably don't think of themselves as racist. That doesn't change the fact that certain things are racist despite the intent of the people saying the stuff.
If two things are "functionally identical" I don't think I lose accuracy in the conversion. Here's what I think is going on: people desperately want some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist even though it is, so they mince their words and say it "came off racist," as if that's somehow better. But it's not. It's literally the same thing. If I "come off racist" then I've said something racist. That's just how it works.
You can't just look to intent to find out if something is racist. Read the first few chapters of The Autobiography of Malcolm X and make a list of all the people who intended to be racist and all the people who you think actually were (super duper extremely undeniably unequivocally and obviously) racist. I guarantee the second list is going to be longer than the first.
You linked that wiki article before, but it is controversial whether it was racist at all or not. Lots of people think it was, lots of people didn't really get that impression. I personally didn't. So you can quote death of the author, but it doesn't actually help your argument because it's irrelevant. I'm not saying it's not racist because they didn't intend it to be, I'm saying it's not racist at all, and I'm citing their intent as evidence of my personal opinion. Sure invoking death of the author makes that evidence worth less or entirely worthless, but it doesn't invalidate the argument entirely, and the important part of the argument is the analysis itself, not the studio's claims.
I was not trying to show that it was racist. I was responding to the point that if an author didn't intend to it be racist, then it wasn't racist, and the opinion of an author has nothing to do with it because authors don't get to decide what their work means. In fact, if you read one of the links I posted, you'll see an argument that I agree with about what Yohalem is said is only more damning. He basically admits the game is racist.
Second of all, you absolutely do lose accuracy when you use objective language to describe subjective things. Functionally identical is an objective statement, but two functionally identical things can have different subjective meanings. You lose subjective accuracy when you switch from subjective to objective, and you lose objective accuracy when you switch in the other direction. It's intellectually dishonest to take a subjective opinion and talk about it in objective terms- this is an emotional argument, and doing so truncates emotion from the conclusion.
But once it gets to the point that you're arguing the definition of objectivity and subjectivity I think these things have ran their course.
As someone who literally does philosophy for a living I'm not really sure your use of "subjective" and "objective" here is very helpful or is getting at anything relevant to the discussion.
...people desperately want some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist...
Why do you think we (sorry, people) desperately want some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist?
If you're not one of the people who desperately wants some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist then I wouldn't assume that I'm talking about you in that post. For instance, if I said "people love to eat jelly beans!" and you said "Tycho I don't like jelly beans" I think you've sort of missed the point - I didn't mean literally everyone loves to eat jelly beans. I was referring to a certain subset of people. Meanwhile when I talked about the people who fall over themselves to say that (for instance) something "comes off" racist but isn't actually racist, if you're not one of those people, then I just wasn't referring to you.
I don't give a shit if it's racist. GTA:SA is racist as fuck, and I still think that game was a ton of fun.
Obviously being racist doesn't make a game less fun, except for people who are bothered enough by racism that it ruins their enjoyment of the game. I don't recall ever saying that a racist game is less fun or that Far Cry 3 is less fun because it's racist. I only ever said it's racist.
Seriously. This topic has been done to the death now and everyone here is just reiterating previous things said already. Now about those Honey Badgers...
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
But seriously dude...what kind of shit is that to say?
Really poorly explained shit?
I'm not invested in Far Cry 3 not being racist; I played it and had fun. I also played and had fun with GTA:SA, which I think included racist and misogynistic characters.
Yeah. But my issue is this...
Okay, if games are fun, let them be fun. No problem with games that are just fun. I play quite a few.
But if games are going to have big boy themes and issues in them, then they are going to face big boy critiques. I feel it is that simple.
There isn't just an on/off switch for when video games should and shouldn't face artistic review. And I dislike people falling back on this idea of "fun" whenever criticism is brought to the medium.
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One ending gets him killed, and the other ending has him as basically a wretched husk of a human being completely detached from friends, family, and basically all emotion besides "ultrakill"; in both cases, he does nothing whatsoever to lead anybody to anything other than more insanity and murder. Kinda tough to be the "great white savior" of anything when the character in question doesn't even really survive the ordeal in any meaningful way and doesn't actually save the people he's supposedly the "savior" of. He's just one more foreign asshole in a long line of foreign assholes who came in and helped tear the region into miserable shreds of nastiness.
Sure, people are welcome to hate the hell out of the story for crappy writing or whatever, but the "great white savior" thing is getting pretty silly. The guy wasn't the savior of anything except local black market profits. Just glad we can skip this bullshit for Far Cry 4 and enjoy the game for crazy mountain-leaping shenanigans and elephant-riding base raids.
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The game's own lead writer came out and said that the "white savior" thing here is intentionally Jason being a blundering idiot and getting completely destroyed for it. The notion can be thrown about until we get Far Cry 15, but regardless of whether or not the writer did a solid job of getting the idea across, that's the message. Period. Far Cry 3's story can be said to a poorly-conveyed message about Western arrogance, but it's absolutely not the racist white-uplifting thing people keep trying to twist it into.
Shitty story? Fine, plenty of fodder there. White racism? People are seeing what they want to see in the game and ignoring the inconvenient parts.
Pity the guy wasn't African or something so we could've skipped all this silliness instead of discussing more about the merits of using wildlife for pest control.
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I wouldn't even care, except people drag the issue up every other damn page or so like the argument is something they need to win, even if it means just beating people over the head with it. It's tired, it's boring, it's entirely subjective, it's highly specious, and it just keeps crapping up the thread.
Seriously, fucking combat elephants? Far Cry + coop? Himalayas, awesome visuals, wingsuits, and grappling hooks? And we're back to some people playing the racism harp again? It's not even relevant anymore (everybody already has their stance and has for ages), much less "bring it up every page" relevant.
There are also some Blood Dragon arcade game units in one of the buildings you hack into.
I think the problem is at the end of the day these kind of stories pop up so much in games that it reached as point where its hard for people to tell parody from reality.
Like the sad fact is to me its kind of obvious that Farcry 3 is that and it purposely tries to be that, but the state of video game narrative is thus that I wouldn't be surprised if the entire thing was played straight either. It is getting better overall, but just because that's the case I don't think it should be immune to criticism.
As for the whole "white savior" thing and race. Well, truth be told the reason its bought up is because in the history of entertainment its a well-documented event. And it isn't just white person + non-white locals, rather it tends to be a combination of race of most of these people writing the stuff, power fantasy, the use of foreign settings/people as backdrops, and the stereotypes therein. Which usually at best plays out as naive admiration and at worst plays out like a piece of white exceptionalist propaganda.
And as to why some may not inherently be offended by an Asian man doing something in a mostly Asian country is because, historically, it simply doesn't have the same negative connotations.
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Yeah. But Nanking was an actual tragedy and is treated as such.
White Savior narratives are usually played pretty straight and sport a complete lack of self-awareness.
Name an example of White Savior in videogames.
Why? I mean if you want to find examples of white saviors I'm sure you can find something. Not about to do your work for you.
Historical Context is a thing.
I will give you that for the most part video games themselves usually avoid this. But mainly because most of their settings are fantastical and ethnically homogeneous, so its a side effect more than anything.
So, yeah if I said video games specifically excuse me but entertainment medium as a whole, eh.
Elaborate on what you mean, because to me Ninja Snarl made a good point. Had Jason Brody been anything but white, these conversations wouldn't be happening. Which, to me, seems a bit more racist than the actual accusations themselves.
Maybe I'm missing something here.
Third option, he's not racist, the studio's not racist, but he missed the mark he was aiming for in his story. Accusing him of actually having a prejudiced agenda against a race is a big deal, and one that I don't believe he's guilty of. Biting off more than he could chew? Sure, guilty as charged.
Oh shit. Going to have to craft some protective cups.
That's not even an argument. So if he has to explain to ONE site that they got it wrong, then the game is racist? So if one person interprets Pacman as being racist because it's a yellow guy eating colored guys then Pacman is racist?
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/columns/criticalintel/10211-Far-Cry-3s-Citra-Is-Straight-From-the-Freakshow
http://genrenonspecific.blogspot.com/2012/12/far-cry-3-racism-story-and-claims-of.html
http://iam.benabraham.net/2012/12/comparative-feelpinions-about-far-cry-3/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidthier/2012/12/10/racism-in-far-cry-3/
http://www.ign.com/blogs/songseven/2013/04/05/far-cry-3
http://www.destructoid.com/review-far-cry-3-239454.phtml
You think it's racist to have a white guy be the puppet of a group of psychopathic locals engaged in their internal power struggle.
Considering that the white guy is not set up as a hero, but a duped fool probably too drug-addled to rejoin civilized society... I disagree.
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There are two sides to this.
On one hand, communication is a subjective field. If you communicate something to someone that you did not originally intend (due to misunderstanding, a language barrier, a really bad analogy, etc), then it is generally not considered the recipient's fault, but the communicator, for failure to properly communicate an idea to the audience.
On the other hand, you have to be willing to understand that people receive things differently than others. A lot of people are of the opinion that there was racist undertone to Far Cry 3. Considering that it has been repeatedly claimed by the studio that this was not its intended message, you have two choices. One is to distrust what the studio says, in which case there's not actually an argument to be made about whether or not the game is racist- the argument is about whether the studio is trustworthy. The second is to trust what the studio says and then come to the understanding that their message was corrupted somewhere along the line. Saying "Far Cry 3 is racist" and "Far Cry 3 was trying to subvert common racist tropes of the heroic white man coming and saving everyone, but didn't hit the mark and just came off racist" are functionally identical, but the first one attaches a lot more stigma and negativity- and since we're talking about a subjective field, you can't just all of a sudden switch to functional speech, you lose accuracy in the conversion.
So which is it, do you think Far Cry 3 missed the mark, or do you distrust the PR?
Satirizing a defamatory idea or trope is tough because any satire can be tough to distinguish from what it's trying to satirize if it opts for subtlety instead of hitting you over the head with it (and even that doesn't always work). Far Cry 3 saved the closest it had to hitting you over the head with it until the very end when the cult some players may still think are the good guys the white guy is the adopted vanguard for kidnaps the player character's friends with the intent to sacrifice them and essentially putting the character right back where he started with the pirates. Being clever isn't always the way to go in satire unless you're really in it for the art.
This makes the reaction to the cover image for Far Cry 4 even more amusing and face palming at the same time. FC3's depiction tripped because the satire wasn't communicated clearly enough. FC4's cover image generated controversy because many recipients could not recognize a Chinese person as Chinese with modern clothing and hair styling.
On that note, I'm looking forward to seeing what they do with both Pagan Min and the player character. The last time I remember seeing a modern take on a Chinese villain (as opposed to ye olde Yellow Peril pulp types) in a Western made game was Sleeping Dogs, kind of a necessity as that was set in Hong Kong. Min likely won't be as nuanced as the Triad characters there but it's still rare to see a Western work depict an East Asian man in an authoritative or masculine role that doesn't involve being a ninja or master martial artist.
I'm almost certain that this is the first time we have a player character from a Nepalese inspired background. I will be disappointed if we do not get to switch out that knife we saw in previews for a kukri at some point. At the very least at least some of your allies better be the setting's equivalent of a Gurkha.
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The long version: I of course agree that the studio didn't intend to make a racist game. Almost nobody is ever racist on purpose. Even some Stormfront people probably don't think of themselves as racist. That doesn't change the fact that certain things are racist despite the intent of the people saying the stuff.
If two things are "functionally identical" I don't think I lose accuracy in the conversion. Here's what I think is going on: people desperately want some way to say Far Cry 3 isn't racist even though it is, so they mince their words and say it "came off racist," as if that's somehow better. But it's not. It's literally the same thing. If I "come off racist" then I've said something racist. That's just how it works.
You can't just look to intent to find out if something is racist. Read the first few chapters of The Autobiography of Malcolm X and make a list of all the people who intended to be racist and all the people who you think actually were (super duper extremely undeniably unequivocally and obviously) racist. I guarantee the second list is going to be longer than the first.
You linked that wiki article before, but it is controversial whether it was racist at all or not. Lots of people think it was, lots of people didn't really get that impression. I personally didn't. So you can quote death of the author, but it doesn't actually help your argument because it's irrelevant. I'm not saying it's not racist because they didn't intend it to be, I'm saying it's not racist at all, and I'm citing their intent as evidence of my personal opinion. Sure invoking death of the author makes that evidence worth less or entirely worthless, but it doesn't invalidate the argument entirely, and the important part of the argument is the analysis itself, not the studio's claims.
Second of all, you absolutely do lose accuracy when you use objective language to describe subjective things. Functionally identical is an objective statement, but two functionally identical things can have different subjective meanings. You lose subjective accuracy when you switch from subjective to objective, and you lose objective accuracy when you switch in the other direction. It's intellectually dishonest to take a subjective opinion and talk about it in objective terms- this is an emotional argument, and doing so truncates emotion from the conclusion.
You can say "Far Cry 3 feels racist," "It missed its mark and just came off racist," or any number of subjective claims and now all of a sudden your opinion (key word there: opinion) is honest and must be considered. But you're speaking in binaries, and that is not appropriate for this particular argument.
But once it gets to the point that you're arguing the definition of objectivity and subjectivity I think these things have ran their course.
I don't give a shit if it's racist. GTA:SA is racist as fuck, and I still think that game was a ton of fun.
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Well...I give a shit if its racist.
Because quite frankly the depiction of minorities in media is usually pretty bad and informs the opinions of the uninformed.
Like...umm...I don't think FC3 is racist.
But seriously dude...what kind of shit is that to say?
I'm not invested in Far Cry 3 not being racist; I played it and had fun. I also played and had fun with GTA:SA, which I think included racist and misogynistic characters.
Penny Arcade Rockstar Social Club / This is why I despise cyclists
Seriously. This topic has been done to the death now and everyone here is just reiterating previous things said already. Now about those Honey Badgers...
Yeah. But my issue is this...
Okay, if games are fun, let them be fun. No problem with games that are just fun. I play quite a few.
But if games are going to have big boy themes and issues in them, then they are going to face big boy critiques. I feel it is that simple.
There isn't just an on/off switch for when video games should and shouldn't face artistic review. And I dislike people falling back on this idea of "fun" whenever criticism is brought to the medium.