Starker on 24/7/2019 at 03:10
And wider cultural shifts includes popular shows like Game of Thrones.
As for recent AAA games, I haven't played many of the recent ones, but The Witcher 3 certainly had some. Quiet in MSG 5. Dead or Alive 6. I was about to say GTA 5, but then I checked and it conveniently came out just a few months before your cut-off point. I'm sure there are more. But AAA games aiming for a certain rating have less to do with feminists criticising games and more to do with marketing. Console publishers have had policies against nudity and sex for a long time now (making only a few exceptions for games like God of War). If you really think a major studio rushes to make changes to their game days after some feminist talks in a podcast about it, that's conspiracy theory territory right there. And wouldn't be censorship in any case.
Also, feminist critiques have less to do with actual nudity or sex as such, but rather the depiction of female characters and gratuitous nudity.
Edit: hell, even the Thief reboot, a game which is all about nicking valuables from the nobles, just had to include a whorehouse where women walked around with their tits out and a peephole scene.
Starker on 24/7/2019 at 10:52
The entire premise of your argument stands on assumptions at best, if not outright conspiracy theories. You want to make people believe that filthy rich AAA executives (who care so much about profits and numbers that they shamelessly push gambling mechanics in their games to the point of now receiving attention from lawmakers) are cowed by one person writing a critical article or by a few people complaining on a forum somewhere? That the so-called SJWs are able to so effortlessly force big corporations into doing their bidding? Yeah right, you can go tell those stories to your grandma, maybe she'll believe it.
Also, who is it who's waging war against femininity here exactly? Is it feminists arguing for more mature depictions of sex and nudity or is it the right wing reactionaries denigrating sexually active women as thots and roasties and spewing misogynist vitriol towards girls showing too much cleavage on Twitch? Is it the progressives who advocate more inclusivity and diversity in games or is it the regressive gamers who start to make sexist jokes as soon as they hear a female voice in multiplayer?
And what's more, you're saying that "the left" will come for video game violence next? Yeah, who is it again who time and time again brings up violent video games in context of real life shootings? All the examples of people actually trying to ban video games (as opposed to just criticising some aspect of it on a forum) have come from conservatives, while the left, such as the ACLU, have been on the side of defending them.
demagogue on 24/7/2019 at 11:37
I guess I can mention this case.
So I got World Ship Simulator, which as you can see in the OP is "Very Negative". It had a nice sale and the ad hid the poor ratings, but more importantly I was under the temporary illusion that it was the sequel/updated version of Ship Sim 2008, the latter of which was pretty good and I used to like. But it's not. It's a cheap rip & buggy off. So that sucked. It didn't occur to me that there were competing "Ship Simulator" games with such similar names, and to look out for the bad one. Edit: Oh right, I didn't even buy it on Steam either, but from some other outlet. So there weren't even reviews to look at and I wrongly assumed it was the game I was thinking about.
So a little miffed about that, I then got the actual updated version of Ship Sim 2008, which is called Ship Simulator Extremes and which was also on sale. (Incidentally Ship Sim 2008 itself isn't even sold anymore, but I believe it's unplayable on modern OS's anyway.) And while SS Extremes is what I wanted, it turns out it's also permanently disabled on any OS after Windows 7, which makes me wonder how it can even still be legally sold, or anyway not have a big bold warning about that up front somewhere... It didn't occur to me to even look out for that.
So that's two strikes in a row for a game I used to like. The studio itself has been AWOL for several years and not fixing the bugs to make it playable, or even responding to comments, although recently they announced they're going to release a new version for modern OS's ... which I guess I'll keep a wary eye out for. I still like the feeling of walking out onto the catwalks of a massive cargo ship rocking in a torrential storm in the middle of the North Sea, and trying to thread the needle of oncoming ships with something that big, like a slow motion drift over literally a few kilometers. But there's also cruising in speedboats or tugboats or sailboats in different environments. It's still a pretty atmospheric concept.
If there's a punchline, I guess it's that while I like indie studios and want to support their niche games, it's usually these kinds of studios & games that are vulnerable to this kind of unprofessional behavior or cheap ripoffs. Kind of sad the good and the bad should come together like that so often.
WingedKagouti on 24/7/2019 at 11:47
Quote Posted by demagogue
I still like the feeling of walking out onto the catwalks of a massive cargo ship rocking in a torrential storm in the middle of the North Sea, and trying to thread the needle of oncoming ships with something that big, like a slow motion drift over literally a few kilometers.
Sounds like an experience for a VR setup.