Annoyed Gamer Ep. 6 – Hypocrisy and Piracy

Alright, Erik vs. Marcus once again.

1) Achievements: Achievements, I think can be fun. I’m a little nostalgic, so I find that achievements have taken away a lot of those extra goodies that you use to get for completing hard tasks, instead of just getting something that is comparably worthless. Personally, I don’t mind achievements, but I do mind some of the culture surrounding it, elitist gamers will never cease to tick me off.

2) Alex Hutchinson’s “racist” remarks: So to respond to that first part because that is very interesting. The reason I always hear from developers or insiders for yearly releases is that sequels are good. It means your game is doing well and the reason why new IP doesn’t just come out all the time is because people would rather buy into a trusted franchise, rather than a new IP. Same goes with new ideas. I don’t like it, but it’s how the business runs.

One thing that has increasingly bothered me about Marcus’ views is that they kind of come off as hypocritical. In this case, saying that there is a bias in gaming journalism and then brilliantly showing it off himself. What I think of both Marcus’ and Hutchinson’s views is this: it might be possible that people have different opinions than you. Seriously, when you have to amend your pretty definite statement with “in my opinion” and that opinion is a way to claim that someone else is just being bias and fanboyism, then you really need to rethink how you argue. I thought Skyward Sword was a perfectly fine choice for having a bunch of nominations, I have enjoyed it more than most games I played last year (or ever really). See my opinion and Marcus’ opinion cancel each out rendering them both pretty useless in trying to determine if the general populace just gives Japanese developers a free hand out.

Then how he ends it *facedesk*. Marcus comes off as pretty bias himself when he says “I don’t like Japanese games anymore”. If you can’t objectively defend your claim, don’t make a claim. I know this is just opinion, but I watch these videos in the slight chance I might learn something, not just listen to some guy rant non-nonsensically (which given the nature of this show, kind of seems kind of counter-intuitive).

3) Piracy: Well not the most articulate way of putting it, I definitely agree. In the comments, people were saying that “urhg, piracy is not theft because it’s not a loss of something herp derp” but seriously, Marcus is right on this. When money doesn’t move, people lose their jobs over this kind of stuff. Now I know how hard it is to resist free stuff over paying for stuff. I probably have some songs that I shouldn’t have on my Itunes playlist, but one of the greatest comments I’ve ever read from a pirate read like this:

“If you pirate, don’t try and hide behind some technical talk or moral validation. Just man up and have the balls to say ‘yes, I do steal these games because I don’t want to pay for them’.”