Extra Credits: No Redeeming Value

[Atmos Duality]

The whole reason I didn't bother with finishing the series boiled down to 8 minutes. Bravo Extra Credits.

I've played better spectacle combat games (that don't rely so extensively on those fucking worthless QTEs) and shit better stories out on Word Perfect when I was in grade school.

Violence for the sake of violence justifies many a character's actions, but that will in no way add depth to a story.
If developers are ever going to improve, they need to learn that in order to tell a GOOD COMPELLING STORY, they need to stop relying so heavily on the action movie cliche's and one-liners.

The ending for God of War 3 sounds like it was trying to pin the blame for Kratos's psychotic killing spree squarely on the players, but I could be reading too deeply into that.

EDIT: Forget one important word, take the heat.
Don't my mistake kids, pre-read your posts before posting them!

 

[Flac00]

Good video man, keep it up. Your arguments seem much more levelheaded and thought out then most. Still gotta compete with the "Fatantisocialguy" or whatever he is called on Youtube. That guy has some prowess. Though Video games wont become art until maybe 2020, if not later. Too early to be counted as it then. All mediums had to go through the stage of standing up and yelling "WE ARE TO BE TAKEN SERIOSLY". Good video.

 

[Blackpapa]

The first game was supposed to be great, the second two were follow-ups that were supposed to sell good.

Games are a unique media because they combine so many aspects of other media in one. A book would pretty obviously fail without a decent story, but a game has redeeming value in gameplay, graphics and other aspects. In addition, let's be honest, publishers consider gamers to be full-out retards. The people who read ancient drama are DEFINITELY NOT the same people who play god of war.

Sure, YOU may appreciate the skillful analogy and a well-crafted story, but for (partly wild guess, partly research) 80% of the players the shortcomings of the storyline don't matter if there's a lot of splattery gore and fun gameplay.

Also, it's not a surprise publishers want to milk the franchise as much as they can. When they get to make the decisions, they NEVER, EVER, ABSOLUTELY NEVER stress that the game has to have a rich, intelligent and well-written storyline. It's simply not a selling point. You can't show off your philosophical bastard and nietzsche wannabe character, however well written, on a magazine ad. The fact that the story is hard to market and can only be appreciated AFTER buying the game contributes to the current situation of retard-friendly games.

In addition, storylines are very subjective things. You can give a coder a checklist and, even if he hates the job so much he'd rather experience prison rape for the duration of his work day, he will still create code that does indeed do those features. On the other hand a writer has to WANT to create a good storyline. If he creates a sub-standard piece of poo like most games have, he won't get paid less or more than if he'd write a magnificent, book-worthy script that would put Planescape Torment to shame. In fact, if he'd do the ambitious option he'd probably spend less time with the kids at home. Why bother, gamers being retards?

 

[Blackpapa]

<double post. blame my browser>

 

[Aisaku]

"No Redeeming Value"

For a moment I thought the video's title "No Redeeming Value" referred to the lack of continuity, payoff between sequels in a franchise. Like how Resident Evil 4-5 have been basically 'flavor of the week' with no real relevance to the story's overarching plot save for the characters. Then again RE is another franchise in which storytelling isn't its selling point.

On God of War:

I know full well I'm not in the demographic for GoW 3 but really, the time I picked it up at at a demo station in a store, I couldn't help feel queasy at the amount of unmitigated violence it delivers. Mind you, I'd see a gory movie just fine. But doing it myself... ewww.

 

[squid5580]

Wow...people actually play God of War for the storytelling...Seriously?

Every game I play I play for the story. Every single one.

That is just sooo wrong. Every game should be just start it up and let the slaughter begin until you hit the 10 hour mark and then it is over. How could that not be fun?

Try going on a rampage in GTA for 10 hours. No missions just start killing civilians and cops and running around the map killing people for 10 hours. It will get boring long before the ten hour mark

Or just play Crackdown 2 offline for 10 hours lol.

 

[KO4U]

Still feels like you're preaching to the choir, but your argument is cool headed and thoughtful-just what is lacking from most who promote games as art.

 

[DamienHell]

Best series on the escapist.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

It's the curse of Popularity though. Happens in most art-forms.
(Yes, Gaming is an Art, shush)
Alien - Alien 4 shows it, as does most sequels.

Even, and it's rare you'll get to hear me say this, but Doctor Who does it.

The Weeping Angels in Blink were so Greek, even resembling the Furies that they HAD TO RETURN. PEOPLE DEMANDED IT.

Not realising that by bringing them back, they were automatically setting them up for a fall.

See, The Time of Angels couldn't have been scarier than {i]Blink[/i] any more than Species 8472 could be scarier than the Borg. In fact Trek is one of the worst at this with each series turning the old series bad guys into pussies.

Did Shakespear ever write Romeo and Juliet 2? Dickens write The Ballad of Fagin?

Stories/Games/Pictures are self-contained works of art. You can't just revisit them.

Unless you change both them and the original. Wicked and Return To Oz work because it's just another view away from Dorothy. American Mcgee's Alice works because it reverses the innocence of Alice.

With GoW ending as it did, one of the only way it could have successfully returned would have been through Kratos's son, who ultimately would have killed Kratos.

But that's not "Test Audience Friendly".

And Test Audience's generally don't know anything because they're specifically brought in not to know anything.

So...

Be original. And please, for God (of war)'s sake, stop pillaging our shrines to nostalgia. Because all you end up doing is desecrating them.

 

[teebeeohh]

you could have mentioned chains of olympus where kratos gives up all his powers only to realize he is a total dick and has to keep killing. He then slaughters inocents in paradise to get his powers back

 

[Atmos Duality]

The ending for God of War 3 sounds like it was trying to pin the blame for Kratos's psychotic killing spree squarely on the players, but I could be reading too deeply into that.

I actually played the god of war series (and you should too, or else you really shouldn't make such flame bait claims about how poor it is) and I didn't get that impression from the ending.

The day I let someone else dictate my opinion is the day I let them live my life.
Nevermind that it's totally possible to draw different conclusions from different people based on the same material.

Another conclusion to draw from the ending: Kratos is mad beyond reason, and there is no hope for redemption. We see this from his perspective to demonstrate what the game has been saying all along.
See? Two different conclusions, both speculative in nature (arguably) not because the story is "deep" in any sense, but because it isn't completely clear what they were trying to accomplish (or I'm too thick to realize that, take your pick).

As for not playing the series, well, I'm the unfortunate owner of God of War: Chains of Olympus, and GoW2. I do admit I never finished God of War 3 (because I don't own a PS3, and my friend only rented the game), but I never once saw a scene or spectacle that showed any form of narrative depth in all three of these titles.

It felt like I was playing the same damn thing over and over again, like the developers didn't have time to recreate the conditions for what made the original so great (allegedly, from my point of view, I haven't played it) so they just tacked on the others to wring more money out of an established franchise.

It is rather sad that a genuine opinion is so easily interpreted as "flame-baiting" today, but I suppose I did come off as hostile.
Well. Whatever. I don't like the God of War series primarily because it does the amazing by boring me.

 

[Silverel]

Easily the most intelligent series I've seen on gaming. Great work. Don't stop doing these!

 

[TraumaHound]

I just wanted to add that I really liked Alison's art in this week's ep. The Kratos pics were great, easily identifiable even with the minimalistic cartoon-art style.

 

[Kuro Kaze]

Thank you. I loved one and two I felt was lacking. Three though the game play was fun I felt was a giant bag of story failure. I am glad someone in the spotlight has the balls to point this out. So again I say thank you.