raycevick

Anti-Climatic

Added 2021-04-30 13:00:06 +0000 UTC

It’s been a month since Subverse released, the latest production from monster cock connoisseurs, StudioFow. It received two million dollars in Kickstarter funding, generated heaps of contentious but notable coverage, and topped the steam charts upon release…

And I already forgot this all happened.

It’s not surprising to me, but it did catch my eye for a game’s build up to release be more eventful than the release itself.

Thing is, it doesn’t need to continue dominating the headlines. It was released, consumed, and completed by its purchasers. There’s no launch controversy, patch drop, or data leak.

At the end of the day, it’s just another video-game in a world with thousands of video-games.

And I guess that’s why I’m puzzled by the reaction the most controversial games generate.

Remember Hatred?

That was six years ago.

Its developer has released four complete games since then. Yet the internet was plastered for days on end with headlines spewing the game’s potential to spawn real-life spree killers (as if America’s lacking them).

Yet all that happened was Hatred came to Steam, sold decently, and hasn’t been brought up since. Why would it? There’s no hidden details, big updates, or successors in the works.

Once again, it’s just another video-game.

It’s witnessing this time and time again that has me not particularly concerned about Six Days in Fallujah.

There’s plenty of things about the game I don’t care. From technical things like the overtly stiff animations, to thematic underpinnings such as presenting the game as a documentary, while pairing it with randomly generated environments.

With what’s been currently shown, I see it as a game missing a great opportunity.

There’s plenty of good questions people have raised in regards to the game, and I’m in the camp of skepticism.

But when I start reading that it’s going to spawn a new wave of islamophobia and spree-killers… I’m reminded of countless games that received the same panic that amounted to nothing.

There are so many video games in the world that to pin so much pressure on one, whether it’s out of hype or disgust, is silly.

It really is just another video-game.