/lit/ - Literature

>>19586515
This game is garbage

If you like Rockstar games in general, their tone is a direct descendant of Elmore Leonard (also a huge influence on Tarantino and wrote Jackie Brown the only QT movie with an adapted screenplay). Try his western stories, fren.

>>19586544
thank you, I will

>>19586515
Literally an Against the Day ripoff lol

>>19586515
i felt so much anxiety with this game because I can't shoot all the people obviously manipulating me and pissing me off, Arthur is a retard or mentally weak but i get it manipulative families are a disease still i felt less anxiety dying 300 times to a dark soul boss

>>19586516
Weak Bait.

>>19586515
Yes bro, the story is fantastic and Arthur Morgan may be the most likeable protagonist ever

>>19586515
All computer games are Robinsonades where you replay 'The life and strange surprizing adventures of Robinson Crusoe' again and again. Read the book and read every computer game you have ever played.

>>19586515
Inexlipably overrated rockstar game with pretentious artistic goals ripped from other mediums #53379

>>19586717
lmao filtered

>>19586614
No, it's not. Rockstar is cash grabbing retarded people like u

>>19586726
nah i can't get filtered by something u haven't played. but i am confident on describing the game since there's no reason to think it differs from rockstar's other output. they're always thematically sloppy and clearly aping something from film or TV, gta is basically south park for example

>>19586753
>something u haven't
*something i haven't

>This game is like an exceptional novel.

ok readlet. this is not the vidya board.

>>19586515
Can you really call that game a piece of art when it so rarely even utilises it’s own medium? RDR2 would work better as a tv series or a novel than a game. I don’t mind rdr2, but to say it’s the peak of games as art is silly, because it’s story could be told just as well, if not better in other mediums.
It is of my opinion that the greatest artistic achievement in video games in an obscure game called The Void released by Russian studio Ice Pick Lodge. Truly, it is a story that could not be told throug any other medium, it expresses itself in ways that no other medium is capable of. The story is not told through exclusively cutscenes and dialogue with gameplay being a simply entertaining bridge between story, the gameplay IS the story. The themes, the philosophy, you experience it, you feel it, because the game understands how to use gameplay to tell its story.

>>19586661
Isn't there something similarly solipsistic about reading a book?

>>19586753
You got filtered so hard you didn't even play it lol

>>19586772
Reflection? Thinking? Are these the concepts you're grasping for?

>>19586782
Reading a book means becoming Robinson. It's not just games. You enter an uninhabited world constructed by a consciousness that is fundamentally absent.

>>19586515

Wouldn't really call it a novel. Finding a novel in video games is, like John Romero once said, finding story in a porno. It's not gonna work.

Sure, a game can have artistic/literary merit to its hearts content, but in the end, all it's worth is how good of a game it is.

RDR2 was too influenced and hammered down by PC-related issues. Granted, there is a story in Arthur accepting himself, Dutch breaking down, Hosea losing his faith, John rebuilding his life, but in the end, all of these are tied down to the narrative of the game, not to the narrative as a story.

Just enjoy games as they are the same way you enjoy books for what they are. There's no point to make a novel out of a game because that's not what people want or are meant to look for when playing.

>>19586807
In the broadest sense perhaps, but your missing the Robinson archetype that every computer follows from. Skill developmemt, looting, resource acquisition, base building, companion mechanics, openworld exploration, free roaming with a gun and shooting things, and so on. Even the shipwreck and escape from slavery openings are often directly borrowed.

>>19586515
Too much ludo-narrative dissonance in RDR2. The story is about Arthur being a good guy and all this crap about remorse and regret but during the gameplay you're mowing down enemies by the hundreds and committing wanton murder and arson. Metro Exodus did the whole "on the run with a gang of misfits" thing better. In the story they are trying to find a new life and to stay good in a world of evil. If you kill people the characters notice and criticize you for it. If you kill enough people you get the bad ending where Artyom dies of radiation poisoning. In the good ending Melnik sacrifices himself so that Artyom may live. This is the message of the game and it meshes with the gameplay.

>>19586848
*computer game

it's insane how good this game is and how rockstar just went to shit after it

>>19586849

Nah, the real issue with the ludonarrative is how hypocritical it gets and how unrealistic of having a good life is when you have hundreds of body counts to your name. It all adds up to nothing in the end.

Of course, granted, this doesn't mean that the ludo-narrative should be insisted on making the character fill themselves with grief, but the fact that they become so disillusioned with the life they life and the blood on their hands that it sends them spiraling down into madness

Niko Bellic actually did a better job of captivating this mindset, as many Europeans and/or immigrants grow disillusioned with the American Dream mindset and because of their temperament and how they were raised to perceive observations, they might not be able to understand the nature of Capitalism and begin to undermine it at first. This helps build your narrative because it sends an important message to the player on what they're trying to make their character to be played as.

Here, in RDR2 and Metro Exodus, there is no freedom of choice, you're instead implicitly given details about the character's moral compass, but it doesn't help engage you with the character on an interpretative level. It's more of the creator's dissonance and intent to have you think that the character is in deep moral complacency but is in good tidings with their spirit so it makes them look good to you in the end.

>>19586515
>This game is like an exceptional novel.
I liked it but it's not.

>>19586848
Now I get what you mean, it makes sense, but I don't see how it applies to all games. Like in the case of Jump 'n' Runs or Tetris. But yes, it's a common structure. Like the amnesia trope it's about taking something away, establishing an almost blank point of departure where the player/reader has to add or discover the narrative for themselves.

>>19586753
Nah, I’ve been gaming for 25 years and this is the first story that was actually good. It’s possibly the only good story ever told through the medium.

I cried when my horse died. Only game to make me shed a tear.

Try some Larry McMurtry and Louis L'amour

>>19586515
This has to be a joke. The writing was shit.

>>19586981
no u

>>19586849
I agree with this. The gang to me also felt really fake. Like they're supposed to be a gang of outlaws yet the game depicts them super self-righteously.
Which just comes off as ridiculous. I would rather they went with a realistic depiction of outlaws, but they didn't because that would have been more risky.

Video game based on a movie genre come outta Italy? Or is it influenced by Blueberry?

>>>/v/
>>>/tv/
>>>/co/
>>>/int/
This isn’t lit. If you read Louis L’Amour, Zane Grey, Williams or even McCarthy you would be disappointed.

>>19586515
The entire plot:
>Dutch: you just gotta trust me Arthur I HAVE A PLAN
>Arthur: I sho don kno about this one Dutch.
Repeat x10000000000

Since this is the closest thing to a western thread, any thoughts on this?

>>19587008

Blueberry is a comic that was later made into a movie (called Renegade in the US because no one would take a Western called Blueberry seriously (yes, that's literally the reason)). It's a passing influence (or it could be, whatever's the case), but it has no relation to what OP is saying/describing.

>>19586966
uhh

>>19586849
lmao you moron the entire point is how they've all lost the plot

>>19587020
>it's good because it's complicated!!!

I think the game was okay, but the story seemed to be secondary importance to the game's primary objective: creating experiences. Most things people remember from the game is not some kind of commentary on the futility of banditry or the decline of the west (these themes, or any theme at all, are barely explored) but the "badass moments". Like how cool it was when the whole gang strolled up to the Mansion to save Jack, or when you get attacked by that giant crocodile in the river. None of the character's motivations are explored in detail, they all come across as retarded outlaws, especially Dutch. Maybe that was the point all along, but "dutch is a retard with a shoddy ideology" isn't a particularly interesting one.

The overall atmosphere of the game is a departure from the blaring spaghetti western trumpets and stylised Sergio-Leone-esque pause screens to something more serious. Red Dead 2 is hard to take seriously though. The entire world is still a parody. Their stab at racial issues and civil war bitterness is barely delved into, which to be fair is difficult when your game takes place in a parody of Louisiana rather than the real thing.

Biggest theme in the game is change. The industrial revolution is taming the west and outlaws are being clamped down on. Cornwall's monopoly on the oil or whatever isn't supposed to be a profound commentary on capitalist greed or whatever, though. It's a pretence to stage cool missions where you blow shit up. That's all these games are and that's fine, but I get the impression that (sometimes) red dead 2 is aspiring to be more than that and it just doesn't work.

The game is definitely too scatter shot with regards to its themes and its characters for its own good. A single main antagonist or antagonistic force would have helped focus the plot I think. As it is, the gang at various points runs afoul of the government (or the Pinkertons), Leviticus Cornwall, the O'Driscolls, the Braithwaites, Angelo Bronte, the dictator of Guarma and the U.S Army. Then add to that Dutch and Micah. The Pinkertons in and of themselves represent the encroaching modernity just fine, and their relentless pursuit is more than reason enough to justify the gang's degradation, so you can still keep Dutch and Micah as eventual antagonists.

The plot is also hostage to Rockstar's mission formula. There is only so much storytelling you can accomplish in a way that feels natural when said story is delivered in chunks at the beginnings and ends of each mission, and during the rides to and from locations. Arthur's journal was a great inclusion, but it's hardly a testament to the story of a video game when the best part of it could have been conveyed just as well in the written form (as his journal is literally a book.) Game storytelling should ideally be accomplished in ways unique to video games, in my opinion.

>>19587305
blah blah blah

>>19586515
The gameplay is fun but the story is brainbead and the sjw shit turbo cringe

>>19587305
Good post, puts a lot of things I've been thinking into focus. I've been thinking myself that what the game excels at is those bottled "experiences," especially the ones that come from letting people explore naturally rather than through the plot. And especially especially, the ones that maintain suspension of disbelief when interacting with what are clearly scripted mini-narratives, somehow making these seem dynamic despite the fact that they're ultimately on rails. There's a real art to this in game design, I think it's the core of good RPG development, using what are ultimately static experiences to create a FEELING of dynamism. When you discover a creepy cabin or mysterious cave and somehow your mind seamlessly reacts the way it would in real life, and not "I wonder what the devs did here, and what they expect me to do here; is this ultimately a fetch quest or ultimately an instanced fight?"

But instead of playing to this strength, by making the main plot just a plausible enough "spine" for these pseudo-dynamic experiences to exist organically around, you're right, Rockstar gets too big for its britches and tries to make the main plot into an "art game" plot too. That's peculiarly offensive in video games, the thing where they are trying too hard to be movies and still only ending up as mediocre ones.

>literature board
>people still play video games
i didnt realize how many manchildren dwell among us

>>19586602
Holy shit, this. I would've been fine with Arthur not killing a single person blatantly fucking with them if he was written as a morally righteous person or a scared bitch, but he was written as a grizzled badass henchmen that only gives a fuck about Dutch and Hosea. The second he didn't kill Micah when he started shooting up the town my suspense of disbelief was already at it's peak, and when he didn't kill Dutch after he abandoned him in a burning building my suspense of disbelief was already dead and buried in the ground.

>>19587678
pull your head out of your ass

>>19587719
We call that bait in these here parts anon

>>19587684
yeah, you didn't get it

>>19587729
Here's a (you). Wanna try defending the old lady gold bar scene? That was the dumbest fucking scene I've ever seen in any story driven game. Pure liquid diarrhea.

>>19587734
why?

>>19587755
You seem like you enjoy eating semen.

>>19587684
you forget about not killing Strauss I'd have shoot that german jew right after finding out about the disease

>>19587786
Typical dumb goy, blaming us for your mistakes. You take our money, then whinge and cry when its time to pay back. Goys are subhuman.

>>19587796
you can't word your way out with some goys, some will straight up kill you in minecraft and in rdr2 of course

good game. shit as a book tho

>>19586515
Willa Cather

>>19587796
Lending money is not exactly an honorable or useful industry on the whole. It does serve a certain purpose but it easily slides into parasitic usury.

>>19587870
Something that would be shit or just worse as another medium means it used its medium well. Unless your implying its shit as a book meaning its stupid

>>19587779
fantastic arguments