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NikkolasKing posted:The last Rockstar game I played was GTAIV. Before that...Vice City Stories. I remember SA ending fairly well for the protagonist and his family, but other then that... yeah.
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Apr 6, 2022 11:39
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San Andreas was copping from a different genre of films, what I guess we'd call hood dramas. Those generally end with a happy, moralistic ending - our protagonist generally survives and makes the moral decision at the correct moment, but isn't untouched by the experience. Usually they lose a close friend or loved one, and often will carry the baggage of their experience forward. That's why CJ survives, but having been betrayed by his friend, losing the life he made in Liberty City, and his hometown burning in a riot. Early Mafia movies had a moralistic ending as well, where the criminal behavior is ultimately punished, but since the 80s they took a turn towards tragedy instead. The protagonist is ruined by their flaw, and was doomed to that fate due to the same traits that we admire.
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Apr 6, 2022 14:18
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I haven't played the Red Dead games but Redemption does seem to basically be a thematic mix of Westerns and the crime fiction Rockstar is quite familiar with, probably as a purposeful affectation. While they obviously have their own political affectations (the depiction of Mexico and Mexicans in Westerns is certainly a story in itself. The Magnificent Seven comes to mind as one of the few exceptions, probably) the stories are much more personal. That said, GTA has increasingly had a conflict between its overall presentation and mainline stories, again starting with San Andreas.
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Apr 6, 2022 14:34
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I really haven't played many Rockstar games, but usually they seem to orbit around this kinda generically edgy tone where they're criticizing everything at once, but not really saying anything meaningful in the process. Red Dead Redemption is an exception where they have a pretty sentimental story in the middle of things that it ends with, but to get to that, you still have to wade through edgy stuff like a crazed necrophiliac treasure hunter and a faux-intellectual hopped up on the fancy new drugs of the time. So many of the sidequests end with punchlines like the people involved dying in the end or whoops looks like you made the world a worse place. It's meant to let you feel heroic if you hunt down some outlaws but not feel bad if you rob a bank or tie up a lady and throw her onto the railroad tracks like an old timey villain. That's how Rockstar's sandbox do. The only thing it really makes a coherent statement on is how native americans got a bad deal, but there's really no native characters, they just ended up throwing in with John Marston's crazed father figure in some ridiculous scheme. The tone works best in Bully where the edginess is being communicated through angsty adolescents so the tone fits completely and instead of people getting murdered, it's kids getting wedgies. It feels more playful to cause chaos by throwing stinkbombs instead of killing hookers. I think the edgiest it gets is a mission where it starts trying to make you think that Jimmy is going to be delivering meth, but the twist at the end is that it's hair growth formula for bald men.
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Apr 6, 2022 16:09
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SlothfulCobra posted:The tone works best in Bully where the edginess is being communicated through angsty adolescents so the tone fits completely and instead of people getting murdered, it's kids getting wedgies. It feels more playful to cause chaos by throwing stinkbombs instead of killing hookers. I think the edgiest it gets is a mission where it starts trying to make you think that Jimmy is going to be delivering meth, but the twist at the end is that it's hair growth formula for bald men. Pretty sure there's a mission where you're supposed to take pictures of girls in the shower or something, that's messed up.
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Apr 6, 2022 18:19
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Idunno if this is political, but I had the same disappointment with the Mad Max game that you all are describing with RDR. I really liked the plot, and the last act was absolutely awful. Max spends the whole game spurning human connection because he just wants to get his car back so he can drive off into the wasteland. In the end, everyone else dies horribly and Max drives off into the wasteland. It completely missed the point of Fury Road, where Max's arc is embracing his humanity instead of trying to be this inhuman thing that survives because it's shorn itself of everything beyond survival.
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Apr 6, 2022 18:29
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It's not so much missing the point as it was positioned as lead in into Fury Road so that character growth didn't happen yet. The ending did feel unnecessarily mean spirited and bleak though. The movies generally went for more bittersweet notes.
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Apr 7, 2022 09:12
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I know the game isn't Canon (a fake idea), but were they ever clear about whether it was a prequel or a sequel? Edit: VVV The hallucinatory wedding officiated by a dog was one of the best things I've ever seen in a video game; like they let Refn direct a Mad Max movie. Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 15:21 on Apr 7, 2022 |
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Apr 7, 2022 14:06
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I don't know if developers ever said that outright, but going by what they put in the game it felt like a low key prequel. Main antagonist of the game is Immortan Joe's son and his forces use the same symbol. By the end of the game Max's mental state is essentially the same as at the start of the movie. He frequently hallucinates a little girl (and maybe mother? don't remember) in Fury Road. Connections are so slight you can easily decide game and movie are separate things, but if they are supposed to relate to each other, the game wouldn't make sense as a sequel. As you observed, his character arc wouldn't fit. Another mean thing in the game is that he does decide to try to form a human connection. It happens just before everyone dies 
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Apr 7, 2022 15:18
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The video game was based on another script by Brendan McCarthy that was considered but ultimately passed on for Fury Road instead. So it wasn't intended as a direct sequel, but was existing in the same space with a lot of the same characters.
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Apr 7, 2022 15:39
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Ghost Leviathan posted:Also a big thing to realise that the Space Marines are the least loyal forces of the Imperium statistically. And there's also hints scattered throughout the lore that they were never meant to still be operating anywhere near 10,000 years later, with many having built-in flaws that were supposed to destroy them. The Emperor's grand plan for the galaxy all went horribly wrong in the worst possible ways, and he really wasn't meant to be a literal rotting almost-corpse on life support kept alive by desperate atrocities and worshiped in exactly the way he wanted to avoid. This is only if you ignore some of the more out there bits of the fluff like the Star Child or the Sensei (Call me a Grog if you must). It's completely reasonable for someone within the universe to make the faith claim that this was Just As Planned. Z
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Apr 25, 2022 07:34
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War and Pieces posted:This is only if you ignore some of the more out there bits of the fluff like the Star Child or the Sensei (Call me a Grog if you must). It's completely reasonable for someone within the universe to make the faith claim that this was Just As Planned. Z you fuckin grog you (please ignore me being literally surrounded by shelves of decades old D&D books)
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Apr 25, 2022 07:40
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War and Pieces posted:This is only if you ignore some of the more out there bits of the fluff like the Star Child or the Sensei (Call me a Grog if you must). It's completely reasonable for someone within the universe to make the faith claim that this was Just As Planned. Z Have the sensei appeared at all past The Lost & The Damned?
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Apr 25, 2022 11:28
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Triskelli posted:Have the sensei appeared at all past The Lost & The Damned? I did some quick googling and they were in the Inquisitor War trilogy in 2004, at least as a story told in setting.
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Apr 25, 2022 11:36
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Inquisitor War got a reprint in 2004 but it's actually an Ian Watson Rogue Trader era series.
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Apr 25, 2022 11:54
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Arivia posted:I did some quick googling and they were in the Inquisitor War trilogy in 2004, at least as a story told in setting. Pretty sure they all got genocided off screen after the super secret factions herding them together failed to pull their poo poo together and recorporate the Emperor properly. Granted, what i've seen is the fan canon since they basically disappeared. But it's Warhammer 40K. "______ got genocided into extinction!" was a literal plot trope for multiple species in the story and an entire army type called the Squats. Hell, it's an everyday activity every faction engages in to a casual degree. Honestly, at this point the grimdark genocide stuff has been so overused in Warhammer 40K that it doesn't really raise an eyebrow for me anymore. It's the equivalent of having a character in a TV show get murdered (only writ large) to bring in views through trying to inflict pathos and drama for the viewers. Over time it's desensitizing people (in the game, not real life mind you. Genocide is always evil as hell.) to the lore to a very horrific real life thing via overuse of it as a plot development. Or to put it in possibly a more coherent way: The first time your favorite character in a TV show dies it's a series best show* for many people. The seventh time though is just  to pay attention.*Looking at you, NCIS and other crime procedurals. Archonex fucked around with this message at 12:19 on Apr 25, 2022 |
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Apr 25, 2022 11:58
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Squats are actually back now!
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Apr 25, 2022 12:02
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Ghost Leviathan posted:Squats are actually back now! Do they have trikes again? Because gently caress yes if so.  Edit: For those that don't know it, trikes are essentially grimdark kid's tricycles scaled up to their size. Imagine some gnarly as gently caress looking biker bro with a full beard, a bomber jacket, a bandana tied to his forehead, and all the other accoutrements riding an obnoxious as gently caress sounding motorcycle. Then imagine the guy riding the motorcycle is a space dwarf riding the equivalent of a motorized tricycle scaled down to his size. Now add guns as needed and you have the trike. It's one of the more ridiculous things Warhammer 40K has produced. If that isn't commentary on the more obnoxious types of biker bros I don't know what is. Archonex fucked around with this message at 12:15 on Apr 25, 2022 |
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Apr 25, 2022 12:06
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moths posted:Inquisitor War got a reprint in 2004 but it's actually an Ian Watson Rogue Trader era series. Thank you for the correction, that’s very important for this discussion.
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Apr 25, 2022 12:06
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Archonex posted:Do they have trikes again? Because gently caress yes if so. Unknown as of yet, holding out hope for new SKREEEECH templates. Though from what we’ve seen of the squats so far (rebranded as the Leagues of Votann) they’re going to be a glimpse into what people could have been without the Imperium or the Mechanicus. Kinda want to see these guys expose the lie that “oh we HAVE to live in a theocratic fascist hell to survive this galaxy” when you can look over there and see a bunch of short guys getting along fine without it. On the other hand, the squats have secret giant computer Zardozzes they revere, so who knows how progressive they’ll actually be. E: vv It was a double-bluff vv Triskelli fucked around with this message at 14:02 on Apr 25, 2022 |
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Apr 25, 2022 13:54
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I actually thought that teaser was an April fool's joke.
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Apr 25, 2022 13:57
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That's basically a human-descended analogue to the Eldar's Wraithbone stuff.
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Apr 25, 2022 14:27
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Absurd Alhazred posted:And yet endless war is the premise of the game about endless battles for which you should buy and paint miniatures/run various RPG campaigns. I kinda like the idea of Warhammer being a parallel universe where Chaos is actually powered by the games we play in our world, and sent into the dreams of GW employees via the warp. If we all stopped doing battles and instead played games where they hang out, solve mysteries, work through interpersonal conflict, etc., we'd be able to save trillions of souls from eternal punishment. I just sorta like the idea of a bunch of chaos space Marines going to therapy and getting their lives back on track.
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Apr 26, 2022 01:13
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Dr. Arbitrary posted:I kinda like the idea of Warhammer being a parallel universe where Chaos is actually powered by the games we play in our world, and sent into the dreams of GW employees via the warp. It's somewhat hinted at that if you could cure Plague Marines some would probably stop being chaos space marines. The TLDR is that many of them realize how hosed up they are now, how their existence is a joke and that Nurgle's "gifts" are a double edge sword at best but they don't see or have a way out.
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Apr 26, 2022 01:16
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Nothing in 40K makes sense until you get that it's all fascist propaganda. The enemy is both universe destroying powerful and at the time can be easily defeated by belief in the Emperor. Or a basic understanding of any sort of Logistics.
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Apr 26, 2022 02:32
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Comstar posted:Nothing in 40K makes sense until you get that it's all fascist propaganda. The enemy is both universe destroying powerful and at the time can be easily defeated by belief in the Emperor. All their logistics people are busy figuring out how to get enough psychers delivered to the Emperor on a daily basis.
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Apr 26, 2022 02:52
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40k actually has an okay explanation for the logistics weirdness and that everything the Adminstratum touched is hilarious byzantine.
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Apr 26, 2022 03:46
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Dr. Arbitrary posted:All their logistics people are busy figuring out how to get enough psychers delivered to the Emperor on a daily basis. More people die daily to keep Arby's open Telsa Cola posted:40k actually has an okay explanation for the logistics weirdness and that everything the Adminstratum touched is hilarious byzantine. Yeah, the Imperium overall has absolutely no shortage of resources oddly enough, especially manpower, but a massive sprawling ten thousand year old empire is kinda hard to run.
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Apr 26, 2022 03:59
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Telsa Cola posted:40k actually has an okay explanation for the logistics weirdness and that everything the Adminstratum touched is hilarious byzantine. Anyone for a Paranoia/Warham mashup campaign....
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Apr 26, 2022 04:56
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I know you're joking because there is absolutely no shortage of people for this kind of play.
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Apr 26, 2022 05:03
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40K logistics people perform miracles every second of every day, even with some big freebies thrown their way. Sure, they lose a planet occasionally, but it's the unit in a continent-wide desert getting an orbital drop of inflatable boats that you hear about, not the 999,999 that get the right resupply.
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Apr 26, 2022 05:23
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90s Cringe Rock posted:40K logistics people perform miracles every second of every day, even with some big freebies thrown their way. Sure, they lose a planet occasionally, but it's the unit in a continent-wide desert getting an orbital drop of inflatable boats that you hear about, not the 999,999 that get the right resupply. The PARANOIA intensifies.
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Apr 26, 2022 05:25
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Only War iirc has a Logistics roll to see if you actually get the equipment you expect.
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Apr 26, 2022 05:29
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And occasionally an ogryn unit somewhere gets some lovely dress uniforms that fit perfectly. It confuses the hell out of the commanding officers as they were asking for more explosives, but it turns out that ogryns can substitute for those in a pinch.
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Apr 26, 2022 05:32
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Apparently one of the major contributing factors to the heresy has become the fact that some of the crusading armies that conquered the galaxy submitted shoddy paperwork (or often no paperwork) which led the government on Earth to overestimate all the resources and place undue tax burdens on most planets.
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Apr 26, 2022 10:00
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Triskelli posted:Apparently one of the major contributing factors to the heresy has become the fact that some of the crusading armies that conquered the galaxy submitted shoddy paperwork (or often no paperwork) which led the government on Earth to overestimate all the resources and place undue tax burdens on most planets. Successfully navigate Terran bureaucracy, including completing swathes of paperwork, often contradictory - fall to Tzeentch. Unable to navigate Terran bureaucracy, meeting obfuscation and delays at every turn, unable to even find relevant paperwork - fall to Tzeentch.
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Apr 26, 2022 10:21
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I'm very much in agreement with Night10194 when it comes to the Imperium, in that it is the main character of the setting and despite all the cries of "satire" or "it's inefficient" the imperium is still correct about what it does and what it is trying to do. It explicitly likes the idea that facism is the approach that works in that universe. I just wish that they had kept the Tau as an honest alternative to it instead of deep diving in "uhh no they will also be fascists but different because [static noises]". That and the chaos gods are loving dull. Chaos as an enemy lacks the ability to do villains well because they are always the biggest bad and they are always dumb as rocks and get to win because" just as planned". Tzeentch is the worst for this as everything about them is dumb as hell.
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Apr 26, 2022 10:45
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In a shittier parallel universe, Warhammer kept going on the parody route and is a beloved niche game that people love to reference as a wonderful way to understand totalitarianism. Meanwhile Paranoia fans took it away too seriously, not understanding that it's supposed to be a joke and their publisher keeps making new content that treats Friend Computer and his loyal troubleshooters as sincere heroic figures against a very real communist menace. The computer games are really fun and good even if they miss the point.
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Apr 26, 2022 11:46
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Unfortunately Paranoia's last new edition iirc was total garbage, tried to trade out 'communists' for 'terrorists' and otherwise missed the point.
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Apr 26, 2022 11:52
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Dr. Arbitrary posted:In a shittier parallel universe, Warhammer kept going on the parody route and is a beloved niche game that people love to reference as a wonderful way to understand totalitarianism. Meanwhile Paranoia fans took it away too seriously, not understanding that it's supposed to be a joke and their publisher keeps making new content that treats Friend Computer and his loyal troubleshooters as sincere heroic figures against a very real communist menace. The computer games are really fun and good even if they miss the point. The thing is that in 40K it isn't really satire. I don't think it has been for much of my adult life. If the "point" was that it was satirical then it missed the boat sometimes form the mid 90's onwards. Warhammer on the other hand is great.
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Apr 26, 2022 12:14
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