The IntroSo, I don't pretend that this is the most... thought provoking forum for discussing trends in popular culture, but I think now is as good a time as any to discuss how various minorities try to fight against the harmful effects of stereotypes. To do this, I'm going to use a couple of classic minorities. Now, I suppose that now is as good a time as any to mention that some slightly... uncomfortable imagery will be brought up in this particular essay. So be warned. For this particular discussion I'm going to use three minorities of note, at least in the United States: Queer Men, Black people and Jews, because I might as well have some ground that isn't completely uncomfortable to tread on. Disclaimer (ass covering) #1When I initially started writing this bad boy, I realized just how increasingly uncomfortable it was to talk aobut the various aspects of both queer and black representation. After all, aside from what I've picked up from years of media consumption, what the frack do I know. Besides, did the world really need another white, straight dude talking about issues that didn't really affect him (aside from the Jewish one). It didn't help that about three quarters of the way through writing it, I realized that I didn't have anything about the "fairer" sex in there, or anything to do with Trans/intersex/gender stuff (although I'll go into why I decided not to a little later.) But then, I came across something interesting in a creative non-fiction piece by Barbara Hurd called "Magnolia." She's discussing how the edge where swamps end and other enviroments begins sort of makes people uncomfortable. And it reminds her of how uneasy writing students can be. "'I don't know where this is going; nothing hangs together," they wail, and I urge them to slow down and stay where they're uncomfortable. I tell them 'being on the edge' is partly what good writing, is all about and I hope they never get used to it. I want them to move out of the places where they're uncomfortable. I tell them 'being on the edge,' is what good writing is all about and I hope they never get used to it. I want them to move outside of the places of where they feel safe and secure, out of the centers of power or knowledge or, out of the centers of an ideology, a class. A little long winded to be sure (although I'll admit to being one to talk), but it reminded me of something that was always there, and yet not, in all of the writing classes I'd taken in college: that if you're going to write, you're going to be uncomfortable at some point, whether it be because you're writing from the perspective of someone who is morally abhorrent to you or because you're discussing things to do with the opposite sex, or because you're writing about something that is deeply, deeply personal. Not only that, but at some point, you're going to offend someone, perhaps even someone who cares for you or vice versa. And so, if I at any point offend you, friends of mine who may read this at some point, I apologize... except kind of not. These are my opinions, and if they offend you, or even put you off, then that is your problem, not mine. If it's any help, I'd like to think that if you dig deep enough into anyone's psyche you'll find something unpallatable or unsavory, and if you catch any of that in here, I'm not sorry. Go ahead, report me to Tumblr, see what I care. But before you do, just make sure that you've read it thoroughly before writing angry comments or confronting me about it in real life. Disclaimer (ass covering) #2Also, if you're wondering why I don't discuss the portrayal of women or intersex individuals in great detail here, it's because these are topics that deserve their own posts. The portrayal of both has a long, storied, infamous in the history in the media of the world, and I'd like to do each justice in it's own time. Also, well, rule of three and all that. With all of that out of the way, let's get this gravy train rolling. I'm sorry, what?I suppose I should back up here and explain my thesis for a bit. Something that's easy to forget when writing is that the reader isn't psychic, something that anyone who's ever read a bad piece of internet writing or even watched the room will tell you. What I'm getting at here, is that I suppose it wouldn't hurt to go in depth a bit into the thesis that I'm basing much of this argument on. You see, I believe that the media we consume effects us in some way. Not in "Doom makes children more likely to commit school shootings," but it does, ever so slightly, effect how we view the other. If you've noticed how people seem to think that being a complete biggot is equal to the freedom of speech, for example, or even if you've noticed how the number of Islamophobes increasing ten-fold since every other terrorist is portrayed as being from a Muslim country these days (as opposed to only some of them). Haven't you ever been watching something and thought to yourself, "yeah, how dare these bad people do these bad things." Or even how no one is 100% certain what an actual Roma person looks like because most media protrayals make them out to be 19th century hipsters. Ask anyone in the alternative scene, and they'll tell you that people tend to be a little scared of them. Apparently this five foot five woman was the terror of a bully who was a good head taller than her. Part of the reason for this is that every mook in most old eighties movies looks like they came straight from a Dead Kennedies concert (or a showing of the Rocky Horror Picture Show). There were all these new people with their scary, subversive music, and it was telling that, so movie makers exploited that, making them stand-ins for what gang members look like, because, in spite of what you might think, the difference between someone who's in and isn't in a gang is a little trickier than just seeing what someone wears. What we take in effects us on some level. If media is food, then we are what we eat, especially if we don't have anything to compare it to. The Bad, the Bad, and the HatefulWhen it comes to black people, there is a rich, storied history of racism. When black folks weren't portrayed as stupid, they were portrayed as brutally sexual beings, beasts that we had to keep our women far away. There's one particularly infamous scene in which a guy in black face is approaching a woman and she jumps off a cliff rather than face the wrath of a horny n*gger. The whole scene plays out like how I'd imagine someone being approached by a raving band of reavers would. What doesn't help matters is that back in the day, comedieans weren't allowed to use sexual humor, but were allowed to use racist humor. But yeah, that's something that tends to be a trend racist portrayals. They want our women, and if given the chance will abuse them. After all, the only people allowed to abuse our women are us. And then there's the idea of the greedy Jew. If you've ever been to a holocaust museum or spent too much time on 4-chan, you'll know classic anti-semetic imagery when you see it. The long-nosed, pais having, greedy-eyed sniveling thing that is the very image of usury. These were images that you'd know from heart if you saw them. Jews aren't really people so much as they are social parasites. They're not strong, they're not able. They're fat, greedy things that exist only to pedlde their own agenda. And I can say all of this as tribesman myself. And lastly, we have gay men. Now, while films weren't technically allowed to acknowledge the existence of gay people, that certainly didn't stop them from villifying them. If you've watched any thriller from the fourties, or even just seen a standard issue Peter Laurie flick, you'll know the fellow I'm talking about. The soft spoken, effeminate, pathetic thing that kills. The way we'd know that bad guys were bad guys was by the fact that they inevitably had some effeminate personality trait. Take the dude from Pocahantus. It's telling that we know he's the badguy based on the fabulous ponytail he has. This isn't even getting into the likes of Buffalo Bill in all of his creepy woman-suit making offness. He's made to be scary because he subverts what modern society things is supposed to be feminine. Now, I know what you're thinking, especially if you're white, straight as a board and protestant. "But those are just movies. There's no way simple stories can lead to any negative connotations." Have you ever felt particularly ill-at-ease around someone of Islamic belief in spite of thinking of yourself as a tolerant person? It's okay if you have (well, it isn't, but it isn't totally unjustified). This is what happens when every other movie, airport novel and (especially) video game is filled to the brim with Arabic/Muslim stereotypes. Not to mention that there's a reason why the US government got every other artist this side of Dr. Seuss to Americans with as much Japanophobic imagery they could pump out. It's the reason why Americans foam at the mouth whenever the word socialism is spoken aloud. That's what happens when you make the ruskies the enemy "an enemy to our way of life" in everything from Red Dawn to James Bond. The reason for this is that we humans are naturally lazy, whether we like it or not, and in the end, instead of trying to reaffirm whether a portrayal is true or not, we just say that they wouldn't have printed it unless it were true, right? Fighting fire with waterNow that I've gotten the narsty, ugly part of this discussion out of the way, I think that it's the fact that there are two very, very distinct ways of fighting stereotypes: by rejecting them outright, or, and this is by far the more fun way, embracing them with open arms. In the latter, they say "no, this isn't how we are." In fact, this is the farthest thing from how we are." Let me show you in the greatest detail imageanable how unlike this we are. And with the latter, the sentiment is more to the effect of "yeah, this is how we are. You say this like it's a bad thing." In essence, it's fight fire with fire. Striking the idea down with it's own force. I think, in many ways, the latter is much more palatable for the majority, even if some dislike it a smidge. As for the former, it's kind of boring but not without some very necessary merit. After al, there's only so far playing iwth a stereotype will get you in the realms of acceptance. With African American folks, it's telling that the well-dressed, eloquantly spoken black man has sort of become a stereotype in his own right. You'll know it, if only because it was how Malcalm X presented himself. He was providing a very logical, very real explanation of why the black man should defend himself. And then there’s the very real way that, at least during the sixties, more and more important roles went to Black people. It’s telling that Brock Peters was allowed to play the role Tom Robinson as straight as he was when only a few decades earlier, black face wouldn’t seem out of place in a movie theater. And who could forget Sidney Poirtier as Dr. John Wayde Prentice Jr. (don’t answer that). Fast forwarding a little, we have The color Purple, along with any number of Spike Lee pictures (back when he was good at his job anyway). Getting back on track, it's telling that the black nerd is a trope within itself. In fact, I’d argue that that’s something that’s great about so-called “genre” fiction. You can take refuge in it to push the envelope and really make people question. Another great example would, of course, have to be Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhuru, who wasn’t some maid or something, but the communications officer, an important member of the crew who had a vital role in the show. It’s telling that MLK himself told Nichols not to quit the show, due to how inspirational she was. Of course, most folks weren’t paying attention to that shit when James T. Kirk was off kicking a dude in a terrible costume’s ass or romancing some woman who looked like the 60’s version of Lady Gaga. As for Jews, well anyone who knows anything about either Boxing or even has just seen or read Exodus will know what I'm talking about when I bring up the Athletic Jew. This was especially the case with Exodus, and many of the other works of Leon Uris. Jews aren't these sniveling weaklings, but we're strong, and just as badd as the so-called aryans who oppressed us. This was especially true now that we’d survived an onslaught of people attacking us on all sides. In fact, if you look up the stereotypical image of what israeli’s looked like back during the fifties and sixties, you’ll notice that there’s a definite Aryan feel to the way israeli’s are portrayed. It didn’t hurt that we Jews were still reeling from one the most horrifying attempts at genocide in recorded history. To say that the creation of the state of Israel wasn’t a major moral booster would be an understatement. As for queer folks, well, I think that it took a bit longer than these other two, especially considering the fact that that it was only around the mid-70s that people stopped considering homosexuality . Keep in mind that even positive portrayals of queer folks, stereotypical or otherwise was a nono until the hayes code was finally abolished in the 70s. It was around this period that the famous “Dog Day Afternoon” came about. In it, Al Pacino plays a man who’s pushed to the edge, a man with two wives, one a transwoman. Although, yeah, that wasn’t really a thing back then, so for him it was just a man who wore women’s clothing. This was a massive step in the right direction, most gay cahracters were coded gay villains. That being said, while there were definitely fringe pieces of entertainment, there wasn’t anything that showed gay folks as anything other than stereotypically flamboyant and such. I think it was really in the early 2000s when things started getting a little better. Everything from Queer as Folk to the Wire helped create a much more accepting environment. I mean, think about a character like Omar Little. This was a smart, tough mother fucker who just so happened to like to be gay. Could you even fathom something like that back then. Fighting fire with FireAnd then there’s option B. We’re gonna take everything negative you said about us and use it in our favor. Now believe it or not, but this is a viable strategy, and not just viable, but optimal, if not prone to easily becoming outdated. Where do you think Blacksploitation came from? While black men were primarily portrayed as musclebound, brainless, sexually aggressive monsters, keep in mind that this was in the post-victorian era America, an era that wasn’t exactly known for… looking upon overt sexuality favorably. But characters like Shaft and Sweet Sweetback? These bad mothers came out in a post sexual revolution, post Black Panther America. Comebining the Black Power message of the civil rights era with the James Bond, James T. Kirk idea of a sexually liberated men and women doing with comes naturally created these bad mothers. No longer was being a strong, sexually active black man something to fear. Now, it was something to be envious of. Why woulnd’t you be envious of fuckers like Black Belt Jones? They can kick your ass, look out for the little man and can get more women than you in an afternoon than your white ass can in a lifetime. It didn’t hurt that the tables are turned in these depictions. Keep in mind that Birth of a Nation romanticized a lynching. In stuff like Sweet Back, it was one black man against a whole army of white Policemen who seemed to hunt him down like it was their hobby (which, some would argue, it was and still is). And then you have the likes of Woody Allan and Mel Brooks. Both of whom had lived through the horror that was the holocaust, and the latter had fought for his country during that time. In the case of the former, he’s taking this idea that the Jews are emasculated nothings and running with it. His characters seem to say, we’re losers, so what? Most of them end up getting the girl in the end in spite of being the farthest thing from the so-called masculine archetype (although there may be a bit of wish fulfillment in there). As for the latter, keep in mind that this man has most likely seen the worst the Nazis had to ridicule the Jews with, so he decided that he would do to the Nazis did to the Jews: he did everything in his power to make them ridiculous. This, in it’s own way is a viable strategy. After all, being scared dickless of something is a sort of power in and of itself. Keep in mind that in the “Harry Potter” franchise, Voldemort and the Death-eaters did everything in their power to make it so that people knew his name but knew not to use it. By embracing things that are frowned upon, Brooks attempted to strip them of their power, or their power, which was the entire point of the Producers. It was meant to dredge up all of the things that people didn’t like to talk about in high society. The two main characters were blatent Jewish stereotypes, one mewling and pathetic, the other greedy and manipulative. We also have even less subtle examples like random Jewish characters showing up in blazing Sattles and History of the World. This, of course, brings us to drag culture. Now while I’m well aware of the fact that drag culture probably goes back as far as there have been women’s clothing (anyone who's ever seen Taboo will know what I'm talking about), it gained a bit of a resurgence in recent years. My impression, though, is that it really kicked back off around the seventies, in a post stonewall world. While the works of John Waters and the Rocky Horror picture Show didn’t exactly do much to portray “alternative lifestyles” in a positive way, they didn’t demonize them. Yeah, Frank N Furter was a manipulative, cannibalistic, murdering bastard, but unlike Buffalo Bill, this had nothing to do with the fact that he wore women’s clothing. Bill was played more to creep the audience out, whereas Furter relished in it. And while things were rather quiet during the 80s (thank you, Reagan), things kicked back up in the 90s with the likes of the Bird Cage, which embraced gay stereotypes, but also said that just because you’re a drag queen, doesn’t mean you can’t make a good father/mother. This, of course, brings us to Rupaul’s Drag Race. Now, I’ve never been one to really watch reality television (particularly that sort of elimination style b.s.) but I can appreciate a show that helps provide a palatable place for those who think of something as unfamiliar and therefore bad. I’d even argue that it was this silly little show that really helped provide all the greater appreciation for queer individuals. Fighting fire with Rubbing AlcoholAnd then you have the more popular method of fighting stereotypes: the oscar Movie. You'll know them when you see them. They usually deal with the past the usually talk about how the past was terrible except when it wasn't. Chances are you won't have heard of them until after the Oscar nominations come out. They tend to be wanna-be artsy fartsy films. They tend to be biographies based on "real stories". And while it's possible that the lead character will die in the end, there's also a real chance that Needless to say, there's plenty of these bad boys floating around, especially with regards to the other, and you'll know they're oscar movies, because they always have that one, old white guy who's supposed to be the relatable one, especially in civil rights era films. You'll see this in the likes of The Help, the Blind Side, and Hidden Figures, and 42. Because heaven forebid that the audience of old, psudo-liberal assholes identify with actual black people. And then we have several thousand portrayals of the holocaust, thanks to the double whammer that was Schindler's List and Wiesel's Night. Now, I;m not saying that there is anything wrong with setting a film during the holocuast, it's just that we, the audience tend to become dulled to the horribleness of that era. I swear, there was even a quarter of the money donated to Holocaust survivors that was used to make all of the holocuast movies this year, there'd be enough caush left over that germany wouldn't have to pay them anymore. This particularly grating becuase, one: the holocaust was just the tip of the iceburg when it comes to anti-semitism in history, and two very few of these movies, save for the occasional "Defiance," ever do anything to remind people that yes the jews did fight back. We did try to resist. Stop showing us how horrible life in Nazi occupied Germany was and show us the Ghetto uprisings already. Or would that mean that gentile's couldn't be the hero proper. And make no mistake, Jews fought against Nazi occupation, both metaphorically and literally. Poeple would often teach children or write newspapers, or in some cases outright smuggle in weapons. Even in the camps, people would do little things like give eachother little bits of food or making combs out of barbed wire. Why don't we see that kind of shit? Oh yeah, because then we couldn't endulge in some good, old fashioned Catholic style self-flagelation. And then we have the queer community, who the oscars haven't been afraid to deal bullshit hands to either. Now, while Milk was certainly ahead of it's time, you do get the feeling that it was made for, well, oscar movie goers, who don't like being challenged too much. This has lead to such wonderful, history erasing pictures such as "Stonewall," which did not have that much diversity in the trailers, and which ignores the inclusive nature of the riots. I mean, the riots were started by a black trans-woman, and when your trailer stars a primarily white dude, you're going to have some controversy, or at the very least ignore certain aspects of history. It doesn't help that Emmerich himself said that "Stonewall was a white event." What in the flying clit does that even mean? That... just... sounds... no. I know that the name of this section was fighting fire with rubbing alcohol, but dude. Making a condescending, racist statement like that isn't exactly going to help your case against being racist. It's not a good sign when a better statement would've been "well my best friend's black." Fighting Fire with Freeze RaysAnd lastly, but certainly not leastly, we have what is arguably the best way to add inclusion into the world: subtle additions to science fiction and fantasy. You see, the thing about science fiction and fantasy is that they're in this sort of middle ground between what is fantastical and what is grounded in reality, something that took ages for most people catch onto. Take Star Wars, for example. Much of the empire's aesthetic borrows heavily from the third reich, Tattooine is rather starkly similar to the middle east, Darth Vader looks uncannily like a typical shogun samurai. On the fantasy side, we have Avatarverse. Each of the four nations, Earth, fire, water, and wind each bear striking resemblence to either a first nation or Asian culture. The air nation resemble classical tibetan monks, the fire nation Imperial Japan, the Earth nation ancient china, and the Water benders Inuits.
What I'm getting at here is that the thing about both science fiction and fantasy is that that they're each removed enough from reality that we don't get too affronted by somehting that might make us unconfortable, unconscious or otherwise. Take Duane Jones as Ben in “Night of the Living Dead.” While it could definitely be argued that “Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" was primarily meant to inspire controversy in the audacity of it’s premise based, Ben’s character being cast as an African American took refuge. Due to opinions at the time, drama was taken a lot more seriously than a Horror Film. For this reason, the issue of casting a Black guy in a budget filmed, violent (for the time) picture about the dead coming back wasn’t really that big of a thing. While it may have stuck out in people’s minds, what really stuck out was the daughter killing her mother with a fucking spade or the zombies appearing to actually eat someone, actual guts (not human, don't worry) and all. It became the sort of detail that ended up sticking in the back of the head just enough to make a difference. Another great example would, of course, have to be Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhuru, who wasn’t some maid or something, but the communications officer, an important member of the crew who had a vital role in the show. She was just as, if not more important than many of the male characters that would regularly come up. It’s telling that MLK himself told Nichols not to quit the show, due to how inspirational she was. Of course, most folks weren’t paying attention to that shit when James T. Kirk was off kicking a dude in a terrible costume’s ass or romancing some woman who looked like the 60’s version of Lady Gaga. Just as African Americans got decent representation thanks to the refuge of science fiction, so too do queer individuals these days. Take for example, Captain Jack Harkness, who whovians know as the man who will attempt to seduce anything with a pulse, men included. Playing for both teams was made to be an endearing aspect of his personality as opposed to a reviled one, like whatshisface in blue Velvet (don't you fuckin look at me!). In fact, in spite of con man start, he becomes increasingly noble as the show goes on. A few years later, we'd get would have to be everyone’s favorite eccentric radio host, Cecil Palmer. Cecil lives in a town where the unpredictable is practically mundane. There’s a glowing cloud that rains dead animals down upoin the ground and five headed dragons that fights for the position of being mayor with a secret old woman who lives in your homes. There’s also a scientist by the name of Carlos, who Cecil describes as perfect, and who’s getting a hair cut is of equal import as the angels that may or may not exist. Yeah, that’s one of the noteable things about Cecil. He has a deep love for Carlos, but h also just so happens to doubt the existence of mountains. Once again, the impact of the Cecil liking men tends to be diminished by the horror that is street cleaning day, or the fact that the coach of the local varsity team happens to be a ghost. It’s not qquite like Glee, American Horror Story, or even Penny Dreadful where they’re like “we have gay characters! Look at us!” What makes it all the more important is that Cecil is literally the voice of nightvale, and meaning that it is primarly through him that we experience the weird, beautiful world of Nightvale and the madness within. It's also telling that Who would continue the trend of adding equality to it's show with a new companion (person who follows the Doctor arround and who is his foil) who just so happened to be a gay woman of color.
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It's a funny thing. I remember trying to watch the original Twin Peaks back at the beginning of college. I'd picked up a DVD collection of the series from the school library and was getting ready to watch. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it certainly wasn't what I got. It was only after a good five years of college, three seasons of Hannibal, five seasons of Breaking Bad, four seasons of Batman: the Animated Series, five seasons of Battlestar Galactica, 37 episodes of Death Note, two seasons of Arrow (make of that what you will), a season of Daredevil, three seasons of the Strain, and five seasons of the Wire on that I came to properly appreciate just what Twin Peaks was. I suppose what I'm getting at is that, during a 20 something more accustomed to watching spongebob than proper television, I wasn't quite ready for that sort of thing Twin Peaks was going for. That, and I was expecting the Log Lady right out of the gate. In essence, I hadn't QUITE trained myself to watch television. Or at the very least, television that was the sort of slow burn that Twin Peaks could definitely be. Well, that and I wasn't expecting the original first episode to be a good hour and a half. Lord knows how I made it through half a season of Star Trek. When I was finished with Twin Peaks all those years later, I couldn't help but appreciate just what Lynch had done all of those years ago. It was strange, but oddly charming. To put it honestly, I'd fallen in love not only with the quirky town of Twin Peaks, as well as the mad, quirky citizenry of . It was a strange, melancholic, ridiculous journey that was just subtly off enough to be noticeable. ONe of things I liked about it, in retrospect, was the way that many characters gave off weird first impressions, but when you got to know them a little more, you came to appreciate them. It didn't hurt that every character stood out, some a bit more than others(see Chief Gordon Cole and the aforementioned Log Lady). But I'm not here to talk about everyone's favorite confusing, convoluted masterpiece of television. I'm here to talk about the videogame version of it: the confusing, convoluted masterpiece that is Deadly Premonition. Just as an aside, I remember watching x-play and them mentioning that if someone combined Alan Wake and Deadly Premonition, then you get the perfect game. To be honest, Alan Wake was more Stephan King than David Lynch, a distinction which is definitely worth noting. And to be honest, while Wake is certainly more polished, I kind of like Premonition more. For one thing, it definitely *feels* like a proper homage to the quirky interesting world of Lynch. Everything's a little off kilter, and you're not entirely sure what's played for laughs and what isn't. Take for example, our main protagonist FBI Special Agent Francis York Morgan. Instead of speaking into a tape recorder, Agent York just speaks to his imaginary friend, Zack, who may not be a second personality residing in his subconscious altogether. But yeah, the story is, kinda sorta, like the story of Twin Peaks, in the same way that Transmorphers is kinda, sorta like Transformers, except the former are actually good. The game begins with young Anna Grahme (yes, that's her name--subtle, developers, real subtle) being murdered. And that’s where York comes in. To investigate the murder of our Laura Palmer stand in and get to the bottom of it, all the while talking to Zach, collecting trading cards, doing side missions, and fighting shambling, otherworldly beings. Now, before I go any further, I’d like to say that I do genuinely enjoy this game. It’s got a strange, interesting cast of characters, York, himself is an interesting guy, and the town of Greenvale feels almost like a character in and of itself (like any decent open world does). The little monologues York has with himself whenever he drives, not to mention the quirky, wacky dialogue he has with the various wackos he finds throughout town. Whether it be York discussing in depth his love of Richard Donnar (I've been meaning to watch Lady Hawk ever since he got to that particular bit of dialogue) or his time going to a Ramones show, to York finding several keys with different squirrels on them, and Deputy Harry explaining the difference between them, the dialogue is always guarenteed to be memorable. And you know… there’s just something endearing about the game that even the most polished and perfected of games doesn’t have. It’s like one of those foreign rip-offs of American action movies, but that’s all the more fun because of just how different and clever it is. Maybe it’s the quirky characters you do side-quests for, maybe it’s the fact that the iffyness of the controls makes it feel more like a challenge to find the various collectables and fight the various baddies (except whenever mini/boss fights come along, but that'll be a nitpick for another time) instead of a hassle. Maybe it’s York himself. While it could be argued that Cooper himself characterizes his own show—quirky, reserved, and appreciative of the little things in life—York himself is almost a personification of the game he’s a character. A bit rough around the edges, but funny, quirky, and, in the end, good at what he does. Maybe it's that the soundtrack, that, while hit or miss, has some of the best damned elevator music you'll ever find, as well as some other great tracks. I say all of this because I make no secret that there are things about this game that are horrible. And while aftercare usually comes after the beatings in S and M, I just thought that I’d put all of this out there. Okay, so because I’ve been meaning to say it this entire review, I think the best way to describe Deadly Premonition would be to imagine what would happen if Twin Peaks, Shenmue and Resident Evil 4 got really, really baked together. I’m talking barely able to stand or think clearly. And this is especially in the gameplay. For one thing, whereas the combat in RE 4 felt smooth, here it feels like you’re moving through a fucking bog, feeling dense yet somewhat slippery at the same time. Thankfully, however, the developers must have realized how mediocre the shooting was because they added a lock on mechanic as well, which saves you the hassle of trying to maneuver your reticule onto a shambling… fucked if I know what the hell the enemies in this game are supposed to be. The zombified townfolk? Yorks demons literally taken form. The game never does specify this (although I’m sure that it’s all there in the manual, as they say on TV tropes). That being said, the shooting wouldn’t be so bad if not for those fuckers that crawl on the walls like the ripoffs of Tamara from the ring they undoubtedly are. You can’t lock onto them because God is cruel and you can only kill them when directly in light, and unlike Alan Wake, you're not told when light hits them. This means that you’ve gotta wait for them to stop for a fraction of a second so you can get a bead on them. Like most of the mooks in this game, they take more bullets than the average Frank Miller character, but due to the fact that they're more slippery than an uncooked hotdog, fighting them even when you’re not getting your ass handed to you feels about as tedious as doing taxes. And while a point could definitely be made that this was done to heighten the scares, a counterpoint could be made that there’s a thin line between nerve-wracking tension, and waiting for the fucking game to get on with itself. This is kind of a theme throughout the game. It’s especially glaring during the Raincoat Killer sections. Like many horror games, the Raincoat Killer--the big bad and mysterious killer--acts as a nemesis who cannot be killed and who must run and hide from, like the Alien from Alien: Isolation or most of the baddies from Unlike most games like this, when you hide from him after wiggling the thumb pad like you’re playing Mario Party, you’ve got to hid in a corner of some random room while he inspects it. Unlike most games like this, control is taken away from you and you’re forced to press the left trigger when prompted and wait for him to have a hissy fit and storm off. The problem with these sections is that the wait for Rainy to find you is just long and tedious enough that you’ll get bored quickly, yet the prompt is sudden enough that if you decide to do something more interesting like watch paint dry, York will end up with an axe wedged in his frontal lobe. And then there are the unholy driving. You know, I don’t think I ever truly missed fast travel as much as I did while driving around scenically grey and green Greenvale (pun not totally unintended). The cars seem to go at a maximum of about 20 miles per hour. This wouldn’t be too much of an issue if 1. York didn’t run out of shit to talk aobut after the third in depth description of Invasion of the Killer Tomatoes, 2. The map was as unintuitive as fuck. To put it lightly, I think I’d prefer to drive around with an actual map instead of the stupid map we’re given in this unholy abomination. While important landmarks are pointed out, the map you’re given doesn’t zoom out enough to help you make a connection. You inevitably start winding your way around the map until you finally find what you’re looking for, but by that point you’ve lost where you are on the fucking map. Compounding all of this is the fact that the same goddamned music is playing on a loop, which gets tiring after York’s run out of things to talk about, and it isn't even the aforementioned awesome . That being said, I do like that certain songs are looped in certain cars. It’s just a shame you’ve gotta spend ingame currency to get them, money that could be spent on food, med kits and ammo. And getting random bits of info from the greaser who runs the Gas station (yes, there’s gas in this game) but that’s another story. Oh, and one more little nitpick, around the third act, we get a pair of more traditional boss fights, that feel really out of place. While most of the game was this slow burn of a thing, with York getting hints here and there slowly but surely—feeling more or less like a proper videogame equivalent of Twin Peaks—these two SOBs come in out of the blue, like they were summoned from some shonen Anime. It’s jarring, to put it lightly. In spite of all of this, I’d still recommend at least giving the game a try. Flawed, certainly, but undeniably unique. It’s the sort of game that you don’t get very often, that feels weird and off kilter and fun. It’s a memorable experience in world where games are just a little polished for their own good. These days, it's nice and cheap. And while I may have primarily played the 360 version, I hear that the PS3 version is much more complete experience. |
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AuthorHello all and Welcome to Jacob's Latter. Here I will be giving my opinions on everything from movies, video games and books to my general outlook on the world. Archives
January 2018
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