Kahunaburger said:
Saulkar said:
Kahunaburger said:
Saulkar said:
Torrasque said:
Saulkar said:
I gotta say, I'm pretty curious as to what the hell you're talking about bro
Well essentially I made a forum topic describing how I felt when the game Mass Effect 2 revealed Canada had been annexed by the States. Now while authors and such describe similar events happening to other nations and such all the time, even to Canada. This has never bugged me before, I have played a lot of Fallout and nothing ever good happened to Canada there. For reasons I cannot fathom it
"really" hurt when it came from Mass Effect. I expressed this and I was torn down, ridiculed, and outright insulted en-masses. Now while like anything fictitious I got over it quite easily, it was peoples reactions that still befuddle and hurt me to this day.
What say you?
That's interesting - what about that particular "future history" did you find annoying, vs. say, Fallout? Or is it more a gut reaction type thing?
I guess I am really lying only to myself when I say that I do not know but it seams I cannot formulate a statement explaining why it bugged me so much without invoking severe wrath from anybody I talk to.
Haha, go for it - I don't think any reasonable person would get angry at you for explaining why something rubbed you the wrong way.
Ok, I will give it my best shot. Here are two comments, the first not is mine, and the second is. The one that is not mine actually made a lot of sense to me and added some elements.
Not Mine
In all seriousness, though, I think I understand why you'd feel a bit stung by the implication in ME that Canada was portrayed as largely irrelevant. I don't remember that part in ME2 (is it a Codex entry?), but I'm guessing that it was probably mentioned as a "it was no big deal" type of situation in the game, which would probably raise my blood pressure to SOME extent if I was a Canadian.
I think it's difficult for Americans to understand the attitude, because it's rare for America to be casually written off in a game and for the game to imply that nobody really cared all that much when the country ceased to exist.
Mine
If the whole point of a videogame is to evoke an emotional response and we allow this does this not make us all irrational?;-) Additionally I think it is not so much as Canada was made to seem irrelevant as it was one of Canada's biggest developers pulling that stunt. When it comes from another country it tends to have no impact but when a developer in your own nation does it without purpose or a long term goal, making it a little side note, I guess that is where it hits. Your comment actually added more to more thoughts than I would have thought possible. Thanx for the reply.
To sum it up. The best way I can describe it is that the way it was used and by who were the prime contributing factors.
1. It was done as a simple side note like "Hey lets just out of the blue add that Canada was taken over and it serves little purpose at all and nobody cares." It does indeed comment briefly that this resulted in a civil war but the whole point was simply to give reason as to why the statue of Liberty's head appears in the game. Canada's annexation was made to seem an irrelevant side note.
2. Canada has a booming videogame industry yet there is little love for our country shown in our videogames. Most common reason appears to be to appeal to the market down South. People often ask me what would be the point, I always reply the same reason The States and other nations do it, self acknowledgement. Now while I am not overly butt hurt over this, the fact that Canada's potentially best developer did this, and for seemingly no reason, it does not develop the story further, it does not pander to a demographic, it does nothing and made to seem like nothing coming from a fellow Canadian. I guess that is what made all the difference. Now while this was most likely never the intent. It felt like at the time the developers simply wanted to avoid Canadianising the game out side of a few references by simply getting rid of Canada. Now I will stress this that, that was probably not the intent, that is just how it came off to me.
I hope I was clear enough and was not misunderstood.