BREAKDOWN: Game of the Year Lists are Garbage (Patreon)

Hello, everyone. This is the breakdown of my production process for this video about game of the year lists.

There are several types of video projects for me. With video essays, either a topic is something I’ve been reflecting on for a long time, or it’s something that just occurred to me in a dream and I had to exorcise it, like a demon. This was one of the latter. Despite this, the script  went through a lot of revision and fine-tuning. Obviously, obsessive attention to wording and sentence-structure isn't out of the blue for me, but this one went through at least one radical change that caused me to basically rewrite the whole script from scratch (as always, the unedited script is available to $5 patrons).

You'll remember that the first half of the vid is a frustrated rebuke of unethical practices in the games industry, particularly in the case of Rockstar Games and the development of Red Dead Redemption 2. Yes, I'm calling it by name this time instead of euphemistically referring to it as an open-world western-adjacent video game sequel. Let's talk about that, shall we?

RDR2 was, at one point, a game I was excited for. Just like Valve back when they deigned to make video games, Rockstar always seemed to reliably turn out top-tier content. For a long time, I considered the original RDR among the best games ever made. I wasn't a fan of GTAV, but I figured a return to the old west would be very much to my liking.

Then, of course, reports of rampant labor exploitation at Rockstar made its way to the public eye. You can find a list of these pieces at the sources page for the video itself.

Crunch is a depressingly common norm in the games industry, such that the only way to be consistent with my morals would be to never purchase another AAA game again without verified reports of sustainable business practices (and even then, without unions such practices will inevitably be rolled back when we stop paying attention). This isn't really something I'm ready to do -although who knows, my tune might change if whistle blowers get vocal enough. 

Regardless, when there are explicit reports of exploitation, you don't want to support that company. So I decided against getting RDR2 without a second thought.

Then a close friend of mine got it for me for Christmas.

I was not happy about this, but... he meant well. So I decided to pop it in and give it a shot. I made it about four hours in before turning the game off, uninstalling it, selling it to a local used games store, and picking up a used copy of Shadow of the Colossus instead.

I won't go too much into my criticisms here, as that's not what this post is about. The short version is, RDR2 nakedly disrespects the player's time with a gameplay loop built around maintaining superfluous meters, all in service of a "realism" that breaks down as soon as you hit the gunplay that defines Rockstar's tepid imagining of the cowboy-outlaw lifestyle. All its flourishes were gorgeously rendered, but they are just so much gilding on the surface of a machine that only wants to trick you into thinking it is an Important Artistic Video Game. It is the Oscar-bait of video games.

Knowing that people's marriages were wrecked in service of that, knowing that people developed substance abuse problems in service of that, knowing that some folks quit the industry they worked so hard to get into in service of that? I'm not exaggerating when I say it made me sick.

And then, seeing how many outlets were uncritically giving RDR2 10/10, putting it at the top of their end of the year lists? The anger and frustration that made me feel was the catalyst for this video.

Initially, the script was a wider-ranging criticism of how games conceptualize themselves in the media. I spent a while on a tear about The Game Awards being a less-important E3. But a big chunk was devoted to my issues with RDR2, and how frustrating it was to me that virtually no one seemed interested in talking about them. Thankfully, there are a few youtube videos to this effect- but it would be nice to see more mainstream game outlets doing the same.

To be clear, I like my arguments about RDR2. I think they are solid and would make for a decent video. But I knew from the start that I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight smaller game devs and make a point about how it's not enough to oppose the AAA sector, you also have to support  the indies. And I realized at a certain point that my video was, despite my best intentions, just contributing to the problem. I spent 30 minutes talking about RDR2, and then a few minutes talking about other games and singing a meek tune of "give them your money instead!"

Talking about RDR2 at all was just free advertising. My criticisms of it would just become another facet of the zeitgeist labeling RDR2 an Important Artistic Video Game that is worthy of discourse. I was using this video as an excuse to complain about a game that I didn't like, and in so doing just further burying the indie games I wanted to support (because, statistically, most viewers would never get that far). 

I decided to excise all discussion of RDR2 that wasn't directly related to the issue of labor exploitation in the games industry, and I resolved never refer to it by name. Hence the euphemism.

If the final video feels, to some extent, matter-of-fact in its presentation of the issues, that's because it is. I wanted to say my peace about labor exploitation, and then cut to the chase to celebrate good indie/alt games. 

To what extent does this approach avoid further propagandizing for RDR2 and Rockstar? I have no idea. I think it is unavoidable that even obliquely referring to the game functions as a type of advertising. No ethical journalism under capitalism, maybe? Hmm.

OTHER THOUGHTS.

This video was very intentionally a departure from A Video About Transitioning. That was a monumental undertaking of logistics and experimentation that took a long time to finish. The GOTY Lists vid was like... a joke. It's basically just a bunch of jokes i did for fun. It covers a serious topic, but it's meant to be a very direct statement that I simply cannot consistently maintain the level of quality seriousness demanded of my more ambitious videos. I need to break things up and play around more.

A couple of fun results of this video: I'm now twitter mutuals with Heather Flowers, the developer of Extreme Meatpunks Forever. I also wound up getting in with a bunch of the Hiveswap crew, which led to me getting on the Perfectly Generic Podcast. The lesson: share your love of cool things that aren't super popular, it's a great way to make friends!