Why must every game revolve around making my balls feel big?

[Setrus]

I get what you're saying, batman games, quake, Prince of persia and a whole host of games all try to tell me how badass I am. Which would be fine...if it was a bit less extensive of a theme.

I kind of miss games like Dark Messiah, where I couldn't wade through hordes of enemies like the average space marine...

 

[Manji187]

The point I am laboriously trying to make here is that way too many games constitute little more than a juvenile power fantasy. An endless procession of burly, infallible badasses joylessly curb-stomping hundreds of unambiguously evil enemy redshirts. It's really getting old.

I think it's due to a combination of factors.

First is target audience; teenagers/ adolescents, most of whom will be male (ie testosteron driven, to a degree .

Second is the nature of videogames as primarily a

Spoiler: spatial and physics simulation

Third is "laziness"/ cost-evasion on the part of developers. Why employ good writers/ put time and effort in good writing when "blank slates fighting endless mooks" sells really well anyway?

Btw, where do you place games like MGS3 and The Witcher 2? Power fantasies but just not (or less) juvenile?

 

[Broderick]

You know, you might have just inadvertantly nailed on the head the reason why my three favorite games/series are Mirror's Edge, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, and Portal 1+2, and my current favorite TV show is My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. All of these games break the alpha male male power fantasy mould present in so many other titles.

It's also interesting to note, as a poster on the first page alluded that there were a lot of threads on the issue of power fantasy games flooding the library. Which leads me to a logical conclusion that it is a big issue for many people, nt just a small subculture. Which leads me to posit a question, if so many are tired of the predominately male enforced gender identity of Alpha Male escapism, why do I take so much flak for liking a show which breaks that very mould? Hmm, this may require some more testing...

Also.. did I totally just relate a video game thread to My Little Pony? Yes I did.

/sunglasses

Did you just write "deal with it" in futhark runes on a rainbow dash picture? Awesome! As for the topic at hand, I do agree with the OP, although I dont think he/she is seeing the whole picture here. As others have pointed out, there are pleanty of games that do not have that power fantacy, and billions of enemys coming out at you for the slaughter.
Many of these however, would obviously not be in the "action" genre.

I do believe that such cannon fodder enemys are less of a power fantacy in some games, and more of a "means to an end" sort of deal. From a design perspective, how else would the player advance in power(if we are talking action with some rpg elements here) without killing tons of enemys? Skyrim did it pretty well, but not all games can do it in that format. I suppose you could go the "shadow of the colossus" route, but I am unsure if that would work in too many other games.

Personally, I would like to see more "puzzle" based leveling. Where figuring out hard puzzles would increase your power or xp; the problem would be implementing it, and creating hard enough puzzles. I mean actual puzzles too, not skyrim "match the patterns" puzzles or "find this key and bring it to this door" puzzles. Stuff like in some of the old resident evil(no not the key ones mentioned above =P) games, or ratchet and clank.

 

[Vegosiux]

You know, my favorite characters are those who can snark like there's no tomorrow. Every grizzled grunt can hold a gun (sword, dog with bees in its mouth so that when it barks it shoots bees...) and bust up shit, then get lucky through one series of contrived coincidences or another in order to be set apart from the next grizzled grunt. Really, take one coincidence away in the series and suddenly you've got a headscratcher.

But not everyone can engage in snark-to-snark combat.