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My Top 100 Games of All-Time (100-51)

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Lately, I’ve been seeing people on social media posting Topsters lists of their favourite video games, which has gotten me thinking about the topic. It got to the point where I put together my own quick-and-dirty list on Bluesky, but that didn’t really leave me all that satisfied. You see, for about twenty years now I’ve been using IMDb to track and rate every movie I’ve seen in that time. It’s actually been pretty useful for me, and I can easily look back and get a rough idea of what movies I’ve seen and what my thoughts were on them. This put me on a journey to try to do the same for every video game I’ve ever owned and/or played, which led me to a site called Backloggd. Having spent a couple weeks recounting every game I can remember playing, I’ve now got a big list of nearly four hundred games I’ve played (four hundred!? GOOD GOD). That’s a big enough library that I can legitimately put together a top one hundred games of all time list… so why not do just that?

A few notes before we start: first, I’m not going to include compilations here (so no Master Chief Collection, Tetris & Dr. Mario, Super Mario All-Stars, Metal Gear Solid HD Collection, etc). The upper-echelons of the list would probably be dominated by compilations, and that just doesn’t feel fair to the legacies of the individual games. Secondly, I’m not going to make this “one game per franchise” like I would if this were, say, a top twenty-five. If your franchise is good enough to get multiple entries, then you’ll get that representation (although a sequel that basically invalidates its predecessor’s existence will likely push prior entries off the list entirely). Thirdly, this is wildly subjective and, by its nature, only based on the games that I’ve actually played. As a result, I guarantee you that I have not played some all-time classic that you love. Please tell me how much you hate me for not including it down in the comments below.

Got it? Let’s get onto the list then…

100. Echochrome (2008, PSP)

A fun, quirky, minimalist little puzzle game on PSP where you have to rotate a 3D maze in order to change perspectives and allow a mannequin to reach the exit. Can be a bit finnicky with its controls, but it’s such a unique and striking premise that I can’t help but love it.

99. Theme Hospital (1997, PC)

This business simulation game was a blast back in the day, but what really made it stand out from the crowd was the various wacky ailments your hospital would have to treat.

98. Peter Jackon’s King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie (2005, PS2)

In the annals of licensed video games, King Kong was easily one of the best. 90% of the time it’s a tense, immersive first person shooter where you struggle to survive against the monsters of Skull Island. For a glorious 10% of the time, you turn the tables and become Kong, beating the ever-living crap out of every monster that had been harassing you up to that point. The game was also just legitimately revolutionary, pushing the boundaries of immersion, with no HUD to speak of and direct involvement from Peter Jackson himself.

97. Guacamelee! (2013, PS Vita)

A joyous, lucha libre-themed Metroidvania. I remember trying a demo of the game when I was on a vacation in Atlanta and immediately deciding that I was going to buy this game when I got back.

96. Pokémon Diamond (2006, DS)

The fourth generation of Pokemon is probably my favourite of them all (and I say this as someone who stopped at gen two and came back for gen six, so this isn’t nostalgia speaking). The physical/special split was revolutionary for the gameplay and the difficulty was legitimately challenging. Granted, Diamond makes the list largely because I have not gotten around to playing Pokemon Platinum yet. When that happens, I expect Diamond to drop off and Platinum to move higher up, as it’s generally considered vastly superior to the other two Sinnoh games.

95. Vigilante 8: Second Offense (1999, PS1)

Car combat is one of those genres which are dominated by one big franchise (Twisted Metal), and the rest are a bunch of forgettable rip-offs. Vigilante 8: Second Offense is the closest anyone ever came to stealing the crown, with its significantly better graphics and interesting innovations. Who cares about any of that though: on the Arizona stage, you can cause a meteor to strike the arena, which will send any nearby cars flying and then a giant ant comes out which attacks everyone on sight. Entire evenings were spent in our household on this one level as we blasted each other and this giant, fuck-off ant over and over again.

94. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003, PS2)

Another Peter Jackson licensed game makes my top one hundred! The Return of the King game is a fairly simple hack ‘n slash by modern standards, but it sure is fun and miles better than it had any right being.

93. Assassin’s Creed 2 (2009, PS3)

At the time of its release, Assassin’s Creed 2 was a revolutionary experience, perfecting the half-baked formula of its predecessor, and featuring an interesting narrative with a protagonist who was surprisingly endearing. At the time, I would have easily put Assassin’s Creed 2 much higher on this list. However, only one game later, I was halfway through Brotherhood, when I suddenly found myself completely done with this series’ structure of “travel halfway across the city to your mission, then travel halfway across the city to complete the objective”. I still think Assassin’s Creed 2 is good enough to warrant a spot in the list, but oh how the mighty have fallen.

92. Freedom Fighters (2003, PS2)

Freedom Fighters is a legitimately revolutionary game for its time. It starts out as a pretty terrible third person shooter due to its wildly inaccurate weapons. However, it soon evolves into something special, as you start being able to command an ever-growing number of squadmates, until you’re eventually commanding a dozen guys into massive battles against tanks and helicopters as you attempt to liberate an occupied USA.

91. The Sims 3 (2009, PC)

I wasted way too many hours in university playing The Sims 3 that I should have been spending on homework and socializing. Oh well, it’s not like I wasn’t enjoying myself.

90. Rise of the Tomb Raider (2015, PS4)

I reviewed the first Tomb Raider reboot game back when it came out and, as much as I enjoyed it, it clearly was a bit rough around the edges. Rise of the Tomb Raider largely smoothed off the rough edges and made for a much more refined and enjoyable experience overall.

89. Bioshock Infinite (2013, PS3)

Another one of those games that probably would have ranked a lot higher at one point, Bioshock Infinite still impresses due to its amazingly-realized world and mind-bending story. Hell, the game spends a lot of time just being a walking simulator and, honestly, that’s when it’s at its best. The shooting gameplay’s pretty rough, which does lower its overall quality somewhat, but Booker and Elizabeth’s adventure remains as unforgettable as ever.

88. James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing (2004, PS2)

Everyone’s got a favourite James Bond video game, but for my money, Everything or Nothing is the GOAT. An early third-person cover shooter, this game was hard as nails back in the day. Its plot was pretty over-the-top, but considering it was coming out after Die Another Day, I guess that was just par for the course for Pierce Brosnan’s Bond. Honestly, the craziest thing about it was probably that Shannon Elizabeth was a Bond girl, but then again, so was Denise Richards during the Brosnan era, so what do I know?

87. Future Cop: LAPD (1998, PS1)

Future Cop‘s single-player gameplay is fun enough – blast away violent criminals, gangs, and cultists from the comfort of your transforming mech. However, what really pushes it over the top is its multiplayer mode, Precinct Assault, which is basically a proto-MOBA: get points for killing enemies and capturing neutral territory, use these points to buy bases, defensive units, and offensive units, which will attempt to enter your opponent’s home base. First side to get an offensive unit inside the enemy’s home base wins. It makes for an endlessly addicting, back-and-forth struggle to come out on top.

86. EarthBound (1994, SNES)

This cult classic is largely memorable for its quirky humour and writing, which does away with the JRPG conventions of the time, instead featuring a bunch of psychic children fighting gangs of weirdos in the 1990s.

85. Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings (1999, PC)

Man, you had to be there back in 1999, chopping down trees, mining stone and iron, and then marching out your massive armies to go obliterate your opponents’ base while the horns of war sound.

84. Total War: Warhammer III (2022, PC)

…and then we have the ultimate evolution of the epic RTS, Total War: Warhammer III. Total War has been producing jaw-dropping battles for decades, but the Warhammer games unshackled that formula from the limits of history and into glorious dark fantasy. Warhammer III gets the placement here by default since it allows you to bring in all previous factions and DLCs into one enormous world map to conquer. It’s a staggering amount of content on offer and makes for an overwhelmingly massive sandbox to play in.

83. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018, Switch)

And speaking of overwhelmingly massive, Smash Ultimate is probably never going to be surpassed in the fighting genre in terms of sheer roster size and content on offer. The core gameplay is as simple and fun as ever, making for a great pick-up and play experience with your friends and enemies.

82. XCOM 2 (2016, PC)

Confession: I kind of hated XCOM 2 on launch. I had loved XCOM: Enemy Unknown, but the guerilla ops of vanilla XCOM 2 just didn’t jive with me and the RNG felt way off. However, after War of the Chosen released, I decided to give it another look, and it sank its hooks into me deep, to the point where I can’t really see myself going back to the original game anymore. The modding scene is also pretty incredible, allowing you to deck out your soldiers as Space Marines, Solid Snake, and even Helena Douglas and Hitomi from Dead or Alive.

81. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (2001, PS2)

I have my issues with Metal Gear Solid 2, but in the eight years since I wrote about it, the game has only managed to become even more relevant. Even if it’s not a game I’d particularly want to go back and play at a moment’s notice, I find myself thinking about it all the time, which is a level of longevity you really can’t say about a lot of media two decades from release.

80. Bully (2006, PS2)

Billed as “Grand Theft Auto in a school” at a time when anti-bullying campaigns and the Grant Theft Auto moral panic were at their height, Bully is nowhere near as controversial as it may sound. In fact, you’re the one bringing down the bullies (although you can wedgie the nerds if you want to be a dick).

79. Death Road to Canada (2016, Switch)

A hilarious and addictive zombie survival roguelike, Death Road to Canada is the definition of a “just one more run” game.

78. Journey (2012, PS3)

One of the early, undeniable examples of “games as art”, Journey is a short, thoughtful, gorgeous experience.

77. Super Mario Bros. (1985, NES)

The quintessential 2D platformer, Super Mario Bros. is still a great game even today. Hell, its plethora of secrets are so well-ingrained in the collective conscious, that it’s easy to forget how truly mind-blowing all the hidden blocks and warp pipes really are for a forty year old game.

76. Dead or Alive 3 (2001, XB)

Oh hai, Ayane! Dead or Alive 3 is a gorgeous, spectacular, and downright fun fighting game, which really stands out due to its awesome stage designs.

75. Minecraft (2011, PC)

You don’t need me to explain what Minecraft is, right? I actually only started playing it this year as a bonding activity with my son. As cool as it is to see our world get built piece-by-piece, it’s even more exciting getting to see him learn and get to grips with how to play games in the process.

74. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009, PS3)

Very few games reach the level of blockbuster hype that Modern Warfare 2 achieved, and it lived up to that hype and then some. The campaign is explosive and exciting. The notorious “No Russian” mission is still referenced today, fifteen years later. The multiplayer was also a massive evolution, bringing in dual-wielding and even faster gameplay than its predecessor.

73. Star Wars: Rogue Squadron (1998, N64)

Whenever we’d visit my cousins, the first thing we’d do is fire up their N64 and play a few levels of Rogue Squadron. Flying around in various Star Wars vehicles and dogfighting Tie Fighters is a joy, and it’s still just as fun today.

72. Lollipop Chainsaw (2012, PS3)

A perfect example of how gameplay isn’t everything, Lollipop Chainsaw demonstrates the power of leaning into style. The combat is kind of janky and overly-simplistic, and the enemies are downright rude, but when you’re bopping to pop hits while chopping zombies to bits and the entire screen is turning rainbow, it’s hard to not have a great time.

71. Among Us (2018, PC)

It can be easy to forget due to all the memes and merch which have flooded the public conscious, but at its core, Among Us is a fun social deduction game. Seeing how your friends react under pressure is fascinating, and trying to off them as an imposter gets you sweating like no other game can when your friends are trying to figure out who did it.

70. Life Is Strange (2015, PS4)

At a time when the market was saturated with Telltale narrative games, Life Is Strange stood out with its unique time travel powers and bold writing choices.

69. Pokémon Black Version 2 (2012, DS)

I maintain that the fifth generation of Pokémon was a fairly messy one, but they got the balance between fresh experiences and wild ambition far better for Black 2 and White 2. It largely continues the gameplay improvements from gen four, but adds a ridiculous amount of content, while providing a completely remixed map from Black and White and brand new story.

68. Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake (1990, MSX2)

I will never stop banging the drum that Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake is an underrated masterpiece. Many of the things Metal Gear Solid was hailed for were present here in their infancy eight years earlier.

67. Star Wars: Battlefront II (2005, PS2)

Star Wars: Battlefront II was a wild game, especially considering it came out only a year after its predecessor. It adds more maps. It has a progression system to upgrade your weapons. It makes heroes playable, and adds significantly more. It completely overhauls the flight system from the previous game, adding full-on space battles where you can dogfight, blow up critical ship systems, or board the enemy ship and cripple it from the inside. It was just a massive game with a scope and scale beyond many modern games that I sank countless hours into back in the day.

66. Pokémon Crystal (2001, GBC)

Back when I was a kid, gen two was the pinnacle of Pokémon, a massive improvement upon its predecessors and a shockingly expansive game for a tiny little Game Boy cartridge. Of the gen two games, Crystal was easily the definitive version, hence its placement on the list.

65. Left 4 Dead 2 (2009, PC)

Left 4 Dead 2 was controversial prior to launch, due to releasing only a year after its predecessor. However, as soon as it arrived, all complaints were washed away in a sea of undead. Left 4 Dead 2 is a fun co-op action experience, made all the better due to its AI director who makes every playthrough unique and tense.

64. Halo 3 (2007, XB360)

Halo 3 is a damn good time, with the best gunplay of the original trilogy. If not for some personal gripes about the story, I’d probably rank this significantly higher.

63. Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade (2002, GBA)

The last Fire Emblem game to not get an international release, The Binding Blade has some fan translations which are easily accessible and which help make the game playable for English-speakers. Its sequel would be fairly dumbed-down for the western audience who weren’t used to the series’ gameplay, but for those itching for a larger, more challenging experience, The Binding Blade is just what you asked for.

62. Civilization IV (2005, PC)

The last Civilization to retain the series’ “classic” structure, Civilization IV is possibly my favourite single entry in the franchise. However, its successors have taken the overall experience so far that I am not sure if I could ever actually go back to this game. This made it a bit hard to rank for me as a result, but I think that its more classic Civ gameplay gives it a somewhat unique place and its legacy deserves some recognition.

61. Battlefield 3 (2011, PS3)

While there’s a palpable sense that Battlefield 3 was taking a bit too much influence from Call of Duty, this game was an incredible experience back in the day. This was also the last time that DICE prioritized my favourite game mode, rush, and some of the rush maps here were incredible.

60. Dead Space: Extraction (2009, Wii)

Extraction is leagues better than it has any right to be. A rail shooter spin-off for the Wii of all things, Extraction tells an entertaining and surprisingly well-paced story about the fall of Aegis VII and the Ishimura.

59. Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey (2019, PS4)

Whenever I bring up memorable video games, I always go back to Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey. To some degree, this game is kind of crappy… there’s basically no explanation of its mechanics, extremely repetitive gameplay, and very simple combat. You will struggle to make it more than a few hundred meters from your home without your ape having a panic attack (oh hey, just like real life!). You will be killed by predators out of nowhere and you will miss multiple jumps and fall to your death. These deaths are permanent, mean one less ape in your colony, which is already teetering on the edge of extinction.

However, you will eventually begin to get to grips with the mechanics. You’ll learn how to move around so as to avoid danger. You’ll learn how to make tools to make things easier for yourself and to fight back against the predators. You’ll start trekking out further and further from your home. You’ll learn to communicate with your troupe and start forming armed, roving gangs for safety. Soon, this massive jungle you’ve been exploring won’t seem so massive.

What really cemented the game for me was when I decided to climb the father tree, the largest tree in the jungle. I was carefully making my way up this massive trunk, climbing into the clouds, giving myself literal vertigo due to the sheer height. I reached the top and the entire world stretched out before me. There were so many more places left to explore, and I’d barely scratched the surface of it all…

…oh, and then I had to figure out how to climb back down. Truly an unforgettable game, far more than the sum of its parts, even if it takes a lot of patience to find the gold within.

58. Battlefield 4 (2013, PS4)

While the first six months were unacceptably bad, Battlefield 4 is now arguably the best Battlefield game on the market. Packed with tons of weapons and maps to engage in large-scale war on, I poured hundreds of hours into this game at the peak of my obsession with online shooters.

57. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time (1991, SNES)

Turtles in Time is a great beat ’em up, but it’s one of those games that cements its legacy with one simple mechanic: you can grab enemy Foot soldiers and throw them at the camera. This would be cool enough as-is, but the cherry on top is that this is how you have to damage multiple bosses. Fuck yeah.

56. Fallout 3 (2008, PS3)

Fallout 3 came out at the perfect time, back when the open world game was still special, and when the Fallout universe hadn’t been explored in a decade. It made for a really evocative and unique experience that can’t really be recaptured now that everyone knows what Fallout looks and sounds like.

55. Twisted Metal 2 (1996, PS1)

In terms of pure gameplay, Twisted Metal 2 may just be the pinnacle of the series, with some iconic maps, lots of fun characters to play, and entertaining weapons to blast your friends to smithereens.

54. Resident Evil 7: Biohazard (2017, PS4)

I really love RE7. I love how it mixes the long-forgotten, classic Resident Evil gameplay with modern horror conventions to create a truly fresh, terrifying experience. This is easily the scariest Resident Evil has ever been.

53. Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow (2004, PS2)

Pandora Tomorrow was my first Splinter Cell game and it immediately cemented my love for this franchise and stealth games in general. Shooting out lights, hiding in shadows, using gadgets, and generally just fucking around with your enemies is as fun as ever.

52. Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell (2002, PS2)

Oh hey, remember how I said we’d get multiple games from the same franchises on this list? Well, I had a really hard time picking between Splinter Cell and Pandora Tomorrow, but I had to give the original game the slight edge, due to preferring its story campaign just a tad more (sadly, I never got to play the multiplayer in Pandora Tomorrow, so I can’t comment on that).

51. Hitman 2 (2018, PS4)

IO Interactive’s modern Hitman trilogy is a stunning accomplishment. Create a vibrant, expansive, multi-level open sandbox, throw at least two targets into it, then set you loose to figure out how to kill them in a manner that suits you best. The sheer level of freedom is jaw-dropping and the ways that the world will react to your actions is remarkable to see. I’ve only played the first two of these games, but Hitman 2 gets the edge for me due to its more creative scenarios.

And that’s it for part one. If you’re reading this the day it came out, then part two will be up tomorrow!

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Review Misuse

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

Critical reviews are an endless source of discussion in popular culture. On the one hand, they offer a useful tool to sort through content and get a general idea of whether the product will appeal to you. On the other hand though, people often bristle at review scores and find themselves in a sharp divide between critical opinion and public perception. TotalBiscuit recently put out a pretty good video highlighting the disconnect between reviewers and the general public after the latest debacle regarding review scores of the Mad Max video game. In case you don’t feel like watching/listening to a 40 minute video, TotalBiscuit basically says that reviewers and the public have differing opinions on what constitutes value, that the public tends to value familiarity over innovation and that the public puts too much stock into review scores rather than the content of reviews themselves. While I liked the video, I think that TotalBiscuit waffled a little too much and didn’t really dig hard enough into the issues at hand for my tastes.

First off, I will agree 100% that people (particularly video gamers in my experience) put way too much emphasis into review scores. This is generally where the most ridiculous controversies spring from, such as the numerous occasions where reviewers have received death threats for giving games a glowing 9/10 review. This is due in part to some members of the gaming media’s really poorly skewed scoring system, which has messed with gamers’ expectations of what score a game should receive. I can’t be the only one who has noticed that many video game reviewers tend to score games very “softly”, giving almost every major release an 8 or a 9, with one or two huge releases typically getting 10s. For many gamers, this has created the expectation that games scoring lower than a 8 are unacceptable, even though the scale itself has been incredibly devalued and uninformative (and even then, they have a hard time accepting an 8 for a hyped, triple-A release).

In spite of its problems, I actually rather like the 10-point review scale (or its various gradients, such as the 100-point scale). As a bit of a stats geek, I like the idea of being able to quantify my feelings towards a piece of media through a simple system like this. This is the whole reason that I signed up for an IMDb account more than a decade ago and have been tracking every movie I’ve seen ever since. Obviously it’s still not perfect – “so bad they’re good” movies such as Troll 2 get a low rating for quality but I find them endlessly enjoyable. Other movies just may be super generic or very flawed, but I like them quite a bit anyway (such as Howling V).

That said, I don’t find websites like Metacritic to be very helpful*. Metacritic prioritizes review scores over the content of the reviews themselves, effectively making anything but that final score worthless. This also becomes problematic when different reviewers use differing review scales – since many game reviewers are “soft” these days, the few that actually do use the full spectrum of the 10-point scale can knock a game’s Metacritic score down and cause an uproar. This becomes even more distressing though, because publishers have been known to hand out bonuses to developers for hitting score-thresholds on Metacritic. How about this publishers: if you want the game to hit a score-threshold on Metacritic, then maybe give your developers more time to polish the game and don’t hold them to a hard-and-fast release deadline? Or worse, what are the odds that the desire for high review scores and sales stifles creativity by stifling innovation?

Another element that I thought that TotalBiscuit missed the mark on was the disconnect between critics and the public. He was acting like he thought critics were on a totally different wavelength from the rest of us. Personally, I think this stems from a misunderstanding of the purpose of critics. In essence, a critic is someone who has studied, and consumes, a lot of media and therefore has an informed opinion on whether individual media is worth consuming, which they pass on to the public as a form of service. Having seen a wider variety of good and bad content than most consumers, a critic tends to be better able to judge the quality of a piece of art. That said, it must always be remembered that a critic is just a professional giver of opinions – even the best critic will find themselves at odds with other critics and/or the public at times and it isn’t unheard of for peoples’ opinions to change over time. The critic’s own preferences can also affect the review process – it’s pretty common for horror movies to get mixed to negative reviews, even if they’re well-regarded amongst fans of the genre.

The disconnect comes from a couple elements of the differences between critics and consumers. Many consumers will have a very limited scope of the media – they may only watch summer blockbusters, or only play first person shooters, or not have a lot of interest in the finer points of a genre outside of whether they enjoyed it or not. As a result, reviews might not even be that big a factor in their purchase, but rather a badge of pride that something they like is considered “good”. These will often be the consumers most vocally hostile towards critics as, from their perspective, critics are held in high regard but do not line up with their understanding of media. This is related to arguably my favourite post on this blog, Translating Ideology, where I explored the gulfs that form between people with different world views. It’s a strange dichotomy – they may personally dislike critics for disagreeing with their perspectives, but still hold their opinions as authoritative and somehow able to diminish their media. Consumers in this mindset need to keep into perspective that, in the end, critics are just putting out their opinions.

Perhaps this prods at a deeper area of resentment though – the old hatred of “snobby intellectuals” versus the uneducated “everyman” who knows what is actually good and what isn’t (this is what Conservapedia would refer to as “the best of the public”, and you know it has to be great if Conservapedia endorses it…). I wouldn’t be surprised if there is an element of this in complaints about snobby critics, where the consumer is literally too unlearned on the subject to understand the critic’s perspective. Bear in mind that this isn’t to say that the consumer is wrong to enjoy whatever media they want to, but it is worth understanding that the divergence between critics and consumers comes down to a wide variety of personal experiences, not simply because “critics like innovation, consumers like what’s familiar” as TotalBiscuit boils it down to.

Wrapping things up, I think that we need to keep a few things about reviews in mind in the future. First of all, don’t put all your faith in review scores, but be sure to read the full reviews to see if you agree with their analysis. Secondly, understand that a “low” review score can still be great – I really enjoyed Lollipop Chainsaw and Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge, both relatively low-scoring games which I feel deserved their lower score for technical/design reasons, but which were still well worth playing. I myself gave Alien Isolation a 6/10 on this blog, but enjoyed it for the most part and would recommend trying it. Lastly, keep in mind that the opinion of a critic is just that – an opinion. If you have different experiences than they do, then you may disagree and that’s totally fine. Don’t let it diminish your own feelings towards a piece of media.

*That said, I actually quite like Rotten Tomatoes’ system. Instead of just averaging the differing scales of a handful of critics, Rotten Tomatoes measures from the number of critics who “liked” and “disliked” the movie and then gives it a “fresh” rating if more than 60% of critics liked it. It’s a much better aggregate system in my opinion and tends to be my personal source for information on a movie’s reception.

Deliberate Inequality

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

So I was recently reading this article on Polygon about unequal racial representations in gaming, and it got my mind jogging. Oftentimes, when someone calls out a system or representation for being racist/sexist/homophobic/whatever, people less versed in the subject are quick to come out and ask what the big deal is, that the person is looking too far into things, claim that it’s a part of the “creative vision” or that SJWs are trying to censor art (that they agree with, of course), etc. In any case, I believe that some of these responses stem from a misunderstanding of some of the basics of social justice analysis.

I think that many people believe that racism et al are only actually worthy of being pointed out if examples of them were done deliberately with malicious intent. For example, my father complains about how the media seems to always be complaining about racism in regards to police activity or their representation in Hollywood, and yet would quite likely stand up for someone if somebody was slinging racial slurs at them in public and discriminating against them in an obvious manner. People like him probably find these “smaller issue” social justice concerns to be extremely frivilous, get burnt out from hearing them all the time and definitely do not consider themselves racist. Unfortunately, due to a lack of interest or education on the subject, they are missing the underlying, unconscious issues in society which are contributing to the lingering of racism/sexism/etc. This often means that people concerned with social equality need to be concerned not so much with the less-common and clearly unacceptable examples of deliberate racism, but moreso with the unintentional examples.

Honestly, I find that deliberate examples of inequality are potentially less offensive than the unintentional, ingrained ones where people don’t even realize that they’re being potentially offensive. To link back to the start of the article, think about how big budget video games and movies rarely feature a hero who is a white, a male and a power fantasy of some sort. Think of how Assassin’s Creed: Unity ditched the option to play as a female assassin, claiming that they didn’t have the development time or budget to do it (which was promptly revealed to be a bullshit excuse, they just didn’t prioritize the female audience). Another good example is in Warhammer 40,000. Every couple months, someone comes onto the Dakka Dakka forums and asks where all the non-whites are in 40k. The simple answer is that there ARE other races in the Warhammer universe, and there are a handful of examples of them in 40k art, but it has literally not even occurred to the painters to paint any of their soldiers non-white. Honestly, I fell into the same trap with my 40k armies. When I was growing up, it never even occurred to me to paint any of my Space Wolves anything other than white. When I started an Imperial Guard army years later, I still didn’t think to paint them anything other than white for quite some time, until one of those Dakka Dakka topics pointed out the issue. We all have our own blind spots where we don’t even realize that we’re missing out on a chance at equality, or at least to make a conscious artistic decision one way or the other.

This is why the Bechdel test is so crazy – women rarely speak to one another about something other than a man because of the way that the screenplay is written. When 2 women speak, they have to advance the plot in some way by the very nature of the narrative. However, the fact that most movies fail the Bechdel test really shows how marginalized women are in movies, and that they aren’t generally the ones who the movie really cares for. It shows that women are not prioritized in the scripts, nor are they generally the focus, and generally serve as little more than plot convenience, especially when they speak to one another (because rarely do they bother to have 2 real women characters with any agency). My friend and I were watching the 1998 Godzilla, which isn’t an overtly sexist film by any means. However, we were commenting on it the whole time, when halfway through I was suddenly struck by the realization that the film had bombed the Bechdel test. There were only a couple scenes in the whole movie which featured two women talking to one another, and they spent all of them talking about a guy as the focal point to set up the love story subplot. It really illustrates where the film’s real focus is, and the fact that it’s so common is distressing (and let’s not even mention the 2014 Godzilla, which doesn’t even feature a single scene with more than one woman in it with a speaking role… this is a frighteningly common reality in movies).

What about deliberate examples of inequality though? The Witcher 3 is getting taken to task for apparent sexism in the game (although I’ll admit, Feminist Frequency does not have the best track record of picking good, clear examples). I haven’t played The Witcher 3 unfortunately, so I can’t comment, but one complaint that sounds valid is that the game features a lot of gendered insults when you play as a female character (or when they’re around at least… again, haven’t played it). Moral judgments about it aside, can we at least agree that having such marked differences in the insults directed at male and female characters is sexist? How odd would it be if enemies taunted your male game hero by saying they were weak, had a small dick, couldn’t pleasure their partner, or threatened to sexually assault them if they fail? Unfortunately, this is a strangely common trope for women in video games: quite a long time ago I wrote about Lollipop Chainsaw, a game I actually rather enjoyed, but lamented how the enemies will frequently call the protagonist a “bitch”, “slut” and threaten to violently sexually assault her. This also apparently happens all the time when you play as Catwoman in Batman: Arkham City – there’s a 6 minute video on Youtube of nothing but the instances where enemies hurl gendered insults at her, which is kind of insane. On the more positive end of the scale, I recently replayed the Tomb Raider reboot on PS4 and, despite the island being inhabited by violent, insane, foul-mouthed sailors, I didn’t find the game any less “realistic” for not having them sling gendered insults at Lara all the time. Rather, they simply act as if she was any other badass running around kicking their asses, and shout out her actions (“she’s flanking us!”) rather than taunts.

While gendered insults are undeniably sexist just by definition (male characters get generic taunts, female characters are taunted based on their gender), that isn’t to say that this is something that needs to be eliminated necessarily. I’m wondering if the point that Sarkseesan is trying to make (and the one she tries to make whenever she picks a really questionable example) is simply pointing this out to bring awareness to this potential issue in gaming, rather than saying “This is bad and needs to be eliminated from gaming RIGHT NOW.” If anything, it is more likely stopping devs from taking this sort of thing for granted and trying to get them to be more deliberate when they utilize gendered insults and female characters – is being beaten down and shamed for their gender key to the experience that the devs want to give the player when playing as a female character?

One common mistake that inexperienced writers make is when they try to make their story “mature”, they tend to overcompensate and just saturate it in misery, rape and constant violence. This causes the plot to be completely forgotten or overshadowed, and the acts themselves to feel meaningless. The fix, of course, is for the writer to be more deliberate with the use of mature themes, so that they have the impact that they SHOULD have. Rape, sexism and the like can be used in fiction effectively, but artists should be very deliberate when doing so and do it with the expectation of some potential backlash.

Like, in Season 6 can we finally get to a storyline other than “Who is going to try to rape Sansa this year?”

For example, I hardly want to call myself a great writer, but this deliberate inequality is something I have tried to take into account with my own sci-fi novel I have been working on. It takes place around a thousand years after humanity undergoes a biological revolution and colonizes the galaxy. Racism and sexism aren’t totally dead, but they are significantly diminished because the fearful have turned their attention towards bio-engineered organisms. As a result, women and men (of various races) hold equally prominent positions within the civilian and military structures without people having to comment on it. Homo/trans-phobia is also considered a non-issue in the universe of the story. One major character is bisexual and hated by basically everyone, but no one even thinks to belittle him for his “queerness”. When deliberate inequality is brought up, it is done to show characterization, not just because I decreed that this story featuring six foot spiders and space magic has to be “realistic”. This is not pressuring me to conform to diversity, this is making my story far more interesting and opening up more avenues for creativity than if I stuck to my own narrow “vision”.

People seem to assume that criticism is an attempt at censorship (a misunderstanding which helped kickstart the whole GamerGate movement…). They claim that criticizing media for just fitting with the status quo and featuring “realistic” examples of sexism/racism/etc is an attack on the creative rights of the artist. However, I think that criticism should be seen more as an attempt at artistic improvement. By pointing out examples of inequality, critics are effectively saying “this art would be improved if the female characters weren’t such a flat plot device, consider making them more interesting in the future, because it will enrich the narrative”, or “I would enjoy this more if they weren’t calling the female protagonist a ‘slut’ or ‘whore’ all the time, this is grating for me because I hear these sorts of insults get hurled at my sex all the time”. The artist is free to accept or dismiss that criticism however they wish, but if they dismiss it then they shouldn’t expect not to be criticized for it.

Feminism in Media

~ Barloq ~ Leave a comment

In modern North American society, feminists have about as bad a rep as a man goosestepping down the street with a Swastika on his shoulder. That’s not to say that everyone necessarily thinks that women should get back into the kitchen and collectively make us a sandwich. Rather, it would seem to me that both men and women are sick of feminists shoving their agenda down the public’s throat. I’m sure there’s a good deal of failed communication which is at the root of this problem (this is a huge generalization but from my observations, feminists don’t bother to explain their views to the uninitiated and get really angry when anyone goes against them). There’s also the issue that many people think that feminism is beating a dead horse – after all, aren’t women equal to men in society now more or less? I’m not exactly versed in women’s studies so I’ll leave that particular question to someone else to handle.

In any case, despite the stigma which is attached to feminists, I do have to say that I have really noticed considerable sexism and misogyny recently in the media I have been viewing. Three 2013 releases have gotten me thinking about the state of feminism in film today: World War Z, Gangster Squad and (to a much lesser extent) Machete Kills. World War Z is what really kick-started this entire article for me. If you saw the movie, then you probably know what I’m talking about – the entire first half hour of the film features Brad Pitt protecting his useless wife and equally useless daughters who seem to be doing their damnedest to get them all killed. I can guarantee that no one walked out of that film thinking “wow, I really liked Gerry’s wife and kids, they were great characters!” Now I’m not saying that the women should have suddenly picked up machine guns and blown away the zombies while making an obtuse point that women are as good as then men (a la 80s action films). Rather, it would have been nice if they had done… I dunno, anything. Sure, Karen can try to keep her children safe, but she can do that by trying to fight off the zombies sometimes. Or maybe she can not call her husband in the middle of an important life-threatening mission (and subsequently getting a lot of people killed). Oh and when Karen and the kids are holed up on the aircraft carrier, maybe they could try to help out? Hell, read up on the original ending of the film – it was supposed to be even more misogynistic than it ended up being.

Clearly the writers only threw the female characters into World War Z to be plot devices. In a movie like World War Z which feels like it was written and directed by committee, it’s clear that the studio didn’t give a damn about how the women were portrayed in the film or that casual misogyny would affect their bottom-line. In fact, I’m surprised by how well it did and was received in spite of this glaring issue. In a lot of ways it reminds me of Chinua Achebe’s essay “An Image of Africa”, where Achebe decries Joseph Conrad for reducing Africans and the continent of Africa in Heart of Darkness to nothing more than a plot device. While I don’t entirely agree with Achebe on his criticisms, he does make a good point, that reducing people and places to plot devices strips their history and identity away, making them little more than a reflection of the male protagonist.

If World War Z kicked off this article, then Gangster Squad sealed the deal that I was going to have to write about it. I was actually very surprised by how Gangster Squad handled women, although considering that it was a rip-off of The Untouchables I probably shouldn’t have been. I’m not really referring to Emma Stone’s character either, the generic femme fatale love interest (and plot device to add some tension for good measure). Instead, I’m referring to basically the only other female character in the film, O’Mara’s wife, Connie. Like World War Z, the women in the film are reduced to plot devices who the male characters don’t seem to actually be all that invested in. The film tries to be uber-macho, with the protagonist O’Mara dealing with organized crime the only way he knows how – by shooting it in the face. Of course, Connie whines to him that he shouldn’t be risking himself because she can’t live without him. Obviously, the point this puts forth is that violence is a man’s realm and passivity is for women… and according to the film and it’s hilariously hamfisted finale, violence is the only thing that gets results. Of course, the whole movie’s a complete fabrication, although you might have figured that out when you saw some of the over the top action in play. Regardless though, it seems that the whole “action gets results” message the film tries to get across is total bunk, making the entire film even stupider in retrospect. That said, I will acknowledge that Connie does get one surprisingly interesting scene where she actually helps O’Mara pick out his “gangster squad”.

Which brings me to Machete Kills. I actually don’t have a huge beef against it in regards to sexism or feminism or anything like that – it’s a tongue-in-cheek exploitation film and therefore it gets a lot more leeway than a mega-blockbuster like World War Z or “historical” film like Gangster Squad. However, it did remind me of a Cracked article in which the authour stated that women rarely get shot in the head on-screen in American cinema. To sum it up, the article states that “the reason that we so rarely see women getting their brains splattered? Masculine violation of, and domination over, a woman occurs on her body and not her head”. Machete Kills actually seems to subvert this idea, since in the opening minutes a female character is shot graphically in the head, on-screen. However, near the ending a pair of women fight and the more physically domineering of the pair shoots the other in the head, but this is left off-screen. The implications there are interesting, since that character’s actions seem to make her androgynous (not that she’s really overtly feminine anyway). I don’t really have any real profound conclusions to give in regards to that, but it’s certainly an interesting observation that’s worth keeping in mind and mulling over.

Before I close, I’d like to mention another example in a video game I played recently, called Lollipop Chainsaw. Again, it’s a tongue-in-cheek exploitation venture so it gets more leeway, not to mention that video games in general have a pretty big sexism issue. However, while I found the game to be quite fun, there was one annoying aspect which I found very grating and more sexist/misogynist than any of the objectification in the game. This aspect was that the enemy dialogue almost always consisted of gendered insults – seriously, nearly every time an enemy yells at you they call the heroine a “slut” or “whore” and, on one particularly colourful occasion, a zombie declares he’s going to “fist his ass with her face”. Ahem. Maybe if it had happened once it would have been shockingly funny, but when the game barrages you with that sort of dialogue over and over it just becomes annoying (at best).

Anyway, hopefully this little write-up has shown that as much as we love to hate them, feminists do have a purpose in society. Equality is still a work in progress, and media still has a way to go before it is truly adequate. Besides, equality doesn’t have to equal hamfisted morals, it can be an epic and subtle action romp like Dredd (seriously, buy the damn movie already!!!).