Ever notice how strongly violence and videogames was pushed compared to how non-existant the narrative is now? Ever notice that the prevalence of games pushing narratives has gone from nearly non-existant to universal in almost the exact same timeframe?
Before they couldn't control the narrative. There was a medium that exercised critical thinking in kids, priming them to break the conditioning being thrust upon them by TV. Such a medium needed to be destroyed.
Now? They've realized what direction the wind blows, so instead of destroying games, they subverted them.
The violence in games narrative is dead, not because it was bullshit, but because it is no longer useful.
Yeah, that's why the "sexism in games" narrative was shifted to instead. It's the exact same kind of thing, but just change out some words. Conflating things that happen in fictional games with reality.
Yes, once they realized that people might actually play games for the stories, I guess. It's just that stuff like Zork or HTTG wasn't as well-known or sexy as Doom, and LucasArts games had too much moon-logic to them. And Sierra, well.
And yeah, video games weren't exactly known for compelling stories until fairly recently, and it's taken a lot of time-lag for that perception to filter through to non-video-gamers. All those failed movies didn't help, either. Not to mention that, originally, they weren't assumed to really HAVE stories. Here's some aliens, they're attacking. Shoot them. Waugh. Here, play through a scene from Star Wars. Here, shoot some tanks made out of green lines. :P
Now they realized that people like interactive entertainment at least as much as they like to sit and passively suck it up, so they just have to make sure they can hijack the stories.
Want to know all about a group of people? Look at the stories they tell.
Ever notice how strongly violence and videogames was pushed compared to how non-existant the narrative is now? Ever notice that the prevalence of games pushing narratives has gone from nearly non-existant to universal in almost the exact same timeframe?
Before they couldn't control the narrative. There was a medium that exercised critical thinking in kids, priming them to break the conditioning being thrust upon them by TV. Such a medium needed to be destroyed.
Now? They've realized what direction the wind blows, so instead of destroying games, they subverted them.
The violence in games narrative is dead, not because it was bullshit, but because it is no longer useful.
Yeah, that's why the "sexism in games" narrative was shifted to instead. It's the exact same kind of thing, but just change out some words. Conflating things that happen in fictional games with reality.
Yes, once they realized that people might actually play games for the stories, I guess. It's just that stuff like Zork or HTTG wasn't as well-known or sexy as Doom, and LucasArts games had too much moon-logic to them. And Sierra, well.
And yeah, video games weren't exactly known for compelling stories until fairly recently, and it's taken a lot of time-lag for that perception to filter through to non-video-gamers. All those failed movies didn't help, either. Not to mention that, originally, they weren't assumed to really HAVE stories. Here's some aliens, they're attacking. Shoot them. Waugh. Here, play through a scene from Star Wars. Here, shoot some tanks made out of green lines. :P
Now they realized that people like interactive entertainment at least as much as they like to sit and passively suck it up, so they just have to make sure they can hijack the stories.
Want to know all about a group of people? Look at the stories they tell.