Difference between revisions of "Essay:Worst Liberal Video Games"

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-The video game industry is a very liberal market. Here are some of the worst examples of liberalism in video games by developer:
-==Ubisoft==
-Ubisoft claims to be a very diverse company. It seems they aren't very diverse politically as they have some of the most liberal games on market
-• The Assassin's Creed franchise: Anti-Christian, as it claims that Jesus Christ was a fraud<ref>http://assassinscreed.wikia.com/wiki/Jesus_Christ</ref>, with the villains of the series being the Knights Templar. The worst of the franchise is Syndicate, which has you killing capitalists in Victorian age London, working with the evolutionist [[Charles Darwin]] and [[communist]] [[Karl Marx]]. Ubisoft also had a transgender in the game, even though such a person was nonexistent back then. The only slightly conservative game is the third, where the Assassins help the American Revolution by killing the Templar leaders of the British, and Assassin's Creed Unity, which specifically condemned the French Revolution and its adherents. However, a DLC came out for the former game that has you kill all of the [[Founding Fathers]].
-• Watch Dogs 2: While the first game is generally conservative (Pro-family, Anti-big government, Anti-crime), the sequel is one of the most liberal games to date. The main characters are anarchists, and the game has you fighting big corporations. You also have to work with many gays and transgenders. Also, in one mission the player must take down a church and expose it as fake. Even though the church in the game is meant to symbolize the cult of [[Scientology]]<ref>.http://www.mobilenapps.com/articles/20876/20161027/watch-dogs-2-scientology-tom-cruise-side-mission.htm</ref>, there are various Anti-Christian undertones, such as a cross being depicted in an evil light with the words "False Prophets" being put under it. It is in this mission where you must also work with a gender-confused mayor, who is mad with the church for leaking videos of his mutilations onto the internet.
-• Farcry 5: Even though not released yet, there is a lot pointing to the idea that this game will be quite liberal. The main villains of the game will be white, Christian, right-wingers in Montana<ref>https://www.infowars.com/villains-in-upcoming-video-game-are-white-christian-right-wing-extremists-from-montana/</ref>, while the previous game villains were more politically neutral (they include a psychotic pirate and an atheistic dictator).
-==Konami==
-Konami has supported then-FLOTUS Michelle Obama's Let's Move program in 2013 during E3. In addition, they also tend to have very liberal games on market such as:
-* The ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' series by Hideo Kojima blatantly pushes anti-Americanism, post-modernism, nihilism, and also hints at anarchism being preferable to law and order. It also has some praise for May 1968, and Peace Walker infamously has most of the cast hero-worshipping ''[[Che Guevara]]''. Kojima was also shown to be a big Obama supporter, especially in regards to the latter wanting to get rid of nuclear weapons. There was also an anti-Colonial settlement in several of the games, and has also promoted LGBT politics in the form of Dr. Strangelove. Notable examples include:
-** ''Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty'' is notorious for being the first [[Postmodernism|postmodern]] game in the history of gaming. It also is extremely anti-American, with Hideo Kojima in his Grand Game Plan for the game even explicitly stating that America as a culture was meant to represent the biggest evil in the game, with the same source implying that Solid Snake, one of the few characters who was on the good spectrum, acted as a spy for Communist China.<ref>Metal Gear Solid 2: Grand Game Plan (http://www.gamepitches.com/2012/01/kojima-productions-metal-gear-solid-2-sons-of-liberty-design-document/), page 36-37.
-;Absolute evil in MGS2
-Evil in Hollywood films has always changed depending on the time in which the film’s story takes place. Inthe American market, where audiences like to see good triumph over evil, the absolute enemy – be it a race,country or setting – has always changed with the values of the times. MGS2 will be developed with mainlythe American market in mind, though it will also consider countries in the European market, such as Germany, France, Britain and Italy. Therefore, the particulars of its ‘evil’ must be handled carefully. It should be noted that we face no such problem with Japan.<br />
-Westerns -> Native Americans<br />
-Post-WWII war films -> Germany, Japan<br />
-Cold War-era spy films -> Russia<br />
-Post-Cold War films -> China<br />
-Following the signing of the friendship treaty between the US and China -> Japanese businesses(the collapse of the bubble economy)<br />
-s -> Terrorism<br />
-;MGS2’s evil
-The evil in MGS2 is the American government. However, this does not refer to Americans in general, nor to any particular persons, but to the festering discharge that has built-up within the democratic state of America over the years. The intention is not to defame any race, state or ethnicity, but rather to look at the ‘monster’ that the country’s political structure has created. It is an intangible entity yet at the same time a massive menace to the world, about on the same level as the evil in The X-Files. It could be called a throwback to the somewhat classic type of evil. It is this hidden hand of the American government, the Patriots, that has both created madmen like Solidus and the members of Dead Cell and has also used them for its own ends.<br />
-;Absolute evil
-The Patriots -> the shadowy organization that controls the American government<br />
-People used by them:
-Solidus -> current President of the United States of America<br />
-Colonel Gurlukovich -> a Russian who wishes to see his country rebuilt<br />
-People they must be careful of:<br />
-Vamp -> ex-Stasi<br />
-Old Boy -> former Nazi army colonel<br />
-Snake -> a spy for China?</ref> The same source also implies that it intended to push a feminist agenda.<ref>http://www.gamepitches.com/2012/01/kojima-productions-metal-gear-solid-2-sons-of-liberty-design-document/
-Page 6<br />
-"'''Story'''<br />
-Having an iconic female character (Fortune), like in the previous game, as well as an ordinary woman involved with the main character, will add both a realistic and romantic element to the game.<br />
-‘The 21st century will be the age of women, when women will protect men’"</ref> Both main villains, who espoused American values (to the extent that they were even named Sons of Liberty and Patriots) and were fighting each other, were shown or heavily implied to be complicit in terrorist acts, and several of the characters, both good and bad, were shown to do very amoral things, including constantly betraying each other. Solid Snake in the ending later gave a message on how there was never such a thing as "absolute reality" and how "reality" was just "cleverly disguised fiction", meaning he was essentially pushing nihilism. In addition, some of the main villains, the Gurlukovich Mercenaries, who were strongly implied to be Communists, were depicted in a more sympathetic light compared to the other villains.
-** ''Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots'' has the player aiding implied Muslim terrorists and Communist insurgents in the first two acts. In addition, there was a brief promotion of the crackpot Global Warming ideology at the beginning of Act 4. It also depicts the main antagonist Liquid Ocelot's desire for the destruction of the Patriots and the creation of pure anarchy in a positive light nearing the end. It also juxtapositions the United States and the Soviet Union symbolism during Big Mama's speech, implying that they were little different from each other. It also glosses over the complications posed by Sunny "keeping the brain cell intact", and also heavily implies a more unrealistic view of government control similar to more left-wing views on how things work when all the characters are acting as though if Liquid Ocelot either took control of the Patriots directly or otherwise just wiped them out altogether, the human essentials of water, air, electricity, food, medicine, communications and transportations would be negatively affected to catastrophic levels, many times forgetting that most if not all of those would either not have been impacted at all by the Patriots shutdown (due to existing well before the Patriots or the Philosophers before them were even an idea) or otherwise being a minor inconvenience at worst.
-** ''Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker'' was very left-wing in its outlook, even by ''Metal Gear'' series standards. One of the more infamous aspects of the game had the various main characters, including the co-protagonists Big Boss and Kazuhira Miller, giving a very fawning account on the Marxist terrorist Che Guevara, completely ignoring his role in nearly causing the Cuban Missile Crisis to become a full on nuclear war despite two of the main villains doing exactly that, not to mention Big Boss trying to put a stop to two attempts at launching a nuke twice, one at Cuba and another at America. In the case of Big Boss and Miller, it also conflicts completely with their histories, which had them, respectively, feeling guilt for killing The Boss (as well as implying at one point that the Cuban Missile Crisis was ultimately responsible for the aforementioned action) and growing up in Japan during that time with the adults explicitly panicking respectively. Aside from Che, Miller and Big Boss also proceeded to briefly mention Mao Zedong once via his book ''On Protracted War'' while implying they similarly held him in high regard as well. The various characters also gave very anti-American views, including condemning the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, the firebombing of Tokyo, the post-war period of Japan, and also repeating the usual condemnations towards American involvement in South and Central America, many times completely ignoring or at most glossing over Soviet involvement in the region as well. One character, a French woman named Cecile Cosima Caminades, also was implied to be very sexually loose, and also gives a glowing account of the horrendous events of May 1968 in France and also was a fangirl of notorious Existentialist philosopher Jean Paul Sartre (her fangirlism to him was made more explicit in the Japanese version, where she actually squeals in excitement when Big Boss mentions that he was the same guy who infamously referred to Che Guevara as "the most complete man of the century."). It also has some implied LGBT agenda pushing in the form of Dr. Strangelove, who is strongly implied to be a lesbian. The CIA was also depicted in a very negative light, being the main antagonistic force in the game, and the initial main villain Hot Coldman, a station chief in Central America and an implied former Director for the CIA, was depicted as a madman. It also paints the FSLN in a sympathetic light and, in a clear breach with real-life history, depicts them actually revolting against the KGB late in the game, as well as largely glossing over their crimes (in an even more egregrious note, the Sandinista Comandante Amanda was implied in dialogue to be a Christian despite the fact that the FSLN, being a Communist organization, was explicitly Atheistic in its outlook). When covering the game at Tokyo Game Show 2009, Hideo Kojima heavily implied that deterrence was bad, as was holding any form of military at all.<ref>https://www.gamespot.com/articles/kojima-talks-peace-walker/1100-6230488/<br />"There's the philosophy of nuclear deterrence," Kojima continued. "America and Russia just kept piling up on their nuclear weapons. And when you have an army, it deters enemies from invading. That's yet another theory of deterrence. Why can't we get rid of nuclear arms and soldiers from the world? I'm sure that everyone's thought about it. And then there's the reality, which I hope players will think about as they're playing Peace Walker. Back then, it was a time when these theories were actually thought to be effective. And now, we're paying the price. We've still got tons of nuclear weapons scattered all over the world."</ref> In addition, it also had Kojima during development reporting glowingly on Barack Obama's Prague Speech on a World without Nukes.<ref>http://ameblo.jp/kp-blogcast/entry-10361111977.html<br />『核なき世界』をプラハで宣言したオバマ大統領がノーベル平和賞を受賞した。 ようやく時代が動き出したのか。 ピースウォーカー計画始動？そうなる事を願いたい。 『平和は歩いては来ない』 『お互い歩み寄るしかないのだ』 Gymにて。 ("President Obama, who talked about a "world without nuclear weapons" in Prague, has won the Nobel Peace Prize. Has history finally made its move? Could this be the beginning of the Peace Walker Project? I hope so. "Peace won't come to us." "We have to meet it halfway" At the gym."?)</ref> There's also a slight joke where the characters refer to Hideo Kojima as "god." Paz also at one point channels anti-Colonial sentiments regarding outside markets.
-**''Metal Gear Solid V'': Like with ''Peace Walker'', it depicts several anti-American references throughout both games. In the first part of the game, ''Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes'', it depicts a black site in Cuba that was all but stated to be Guantanamo Bay in what was clearly intended to be a condemnation towards its existence, including implying that the terrorists placed there had just been abducted in the dead of night and didn't actually do anything wrong. It also showcased some extremely brutal torture, including them forcing a kid to rape a girl, as well as stuffing a bomb down said girl's vagina. It also depicts the Marines in a very negative light. One of the side missions for the game also has the player infiltrating the base with the explicit mission of assassinating members of a Marine Sniper-Spotter team who had previously been deployed to Laos due to their being successful in killing several high-ranking members of the NVA and other Communist organizations in the region, with the person giving the mission being KGB, while another mission has the player sabotaging anti-air guns as well as doing a helicopter raid on the base. Kojima, in an interview with the Guardian, also makes it perfectly clear that up to that point, he intended for his games to question America's role in the world, and implied he wanted to show it in a negative light.<ref>http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jul/18/hideo-kojima-interview-metal-gear-solid-phantom-pain
-"With Ground Zeroes he [Hideo Kojima] escalated the stakes by taking aim at North America’s contemporary policies towards terror suspects. “In the past the US was the centre of the world, where everything was happening,” he says. “I think my stories have always sought to question this, maybe even criticise it. But the situation is changing. America is not seen as the centre of the world any more. So the focus of my stories is shifting alongside with that change in the real world.”
-"It’s a diplomatic answer, but Ground Zeroes is not an especially diplomatic video game. Its incarcerated terror suspects kneel in wire cages, bound at the hands and feet with blinding sacks over their heads. As you hoist them on to Snake’s shoulder and sprint to the evacuation helicopter, some break down in tears either through fear or relief. It’s grimly political. “[Guantanamo] was definitely something that I made decision to address in the game,” Kojima says. “Hollywood continues to present the US army as being the good guys, always defeating the aliens or foreigners. I am trying to shift that focus. These movies might not be the only way to view current affairs. I am trying to present an alternate view in these games.”" </ref> In the second half, ''Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain'', there were several anti-American references, such as having a character named Code Talker refer negatively to the American Indian Boarding School as well as developing genocidal views on the English language and his being portrayed sympathetically for this, as well as Miller making a reference to the pejorative "American Empire." Ronald Reagan was also mentioned as well as his Evil Empire speech, with a more sarcastic element to it. In addition, although the protagonists do fight against the USSR, their missions in Africa have them aiding the Communist backed MPLA, and also make several anti-Colonial references such as Western Powers being "parasitic" towards their natural resources. Like before, it mentions the FSLN in a glowing manner, even explicitly founding a socialist state as well as being backed by the USSR. In addition, writer Kenji Yano also implied that Big Boss being Ishmael instead of Huey Emmerich was because they wanted to avoid a pro-American bias regarding morality.<ref>http://www.metalgearinformer.com/?p=25955
-Yano says that Kojima explained the structure of MGSV to him as early as 2011, and all the different elements were already in place: from the themes (such as phantom pain and retaliation) to the motif of Moby Dick. “However, at that point Ishmael was actually Huey. Snake was Ahab, and Diamond Dogs’ enemy was America. It was set up so that the story, being told by Huey (Ishmael) as an American citizen, would be biased toward the American perspective, showing America as being right the whole time.” According to Yano, the Moby Dick connection is also meant as an allegory for the powers that drive the world, as whales used to be more than just a source of food. “Of course their oil was prized, but also other parts such as the bones and baleen played an important role in people’s lifestyles. […] World maps are thought to have come about thanks to the whaling trade. In short, whaling was inseparable from people’s lives at the time. You could even say it had “infiltrated” their lives.” With MGSV, Kojima brought this theme to a new century: “What’s important is that Kojima-san didn’t just transplant the motif from Moby-Dick. I think it’s more a case of these two creators, Melville and Kojima, relentlessly thinking through the way that the world works, and arriving at the same answer.” This connects to the setting of the game: “if we look at the game from the energy perspective, it’s obvious that Afghanistan and Africa would be the settings for the events in MGSV. Each produces oil, and each is a source of rare metals and other mined resources.” Of course, both Moby Dick and MGSV share the theme of revenge. “As Skull Face stated in MGSV, the world is an endless loop of action and reaction. It’s always an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. […] Like Moby-Dick, MGSV is also a tale of revenge.” Why was Ishmael changed from Huey to Big Boss? Yano believes the answer to that lies in what Ahab represents: “Although Ahab has only his personal revenge, when the character is superimposed onto American righteousness, he serves as an analogy for how justification for revenge based on instinctive national memory is converted into a just cause.” He continues: “But in MGSV, it’s actually America that’s the overarching Moby Dick. Big Boss is Ahab in the sense that he’s been maimed by America in the past. Big Boss turns his yearning for revenge into bonds that bind him together with comrades who share his wish to retaliate against America (or its self-righteous justifications). However, from America’s point of view it’s Big Boss that’s Moby Dick. So what we can see in MGSV is actually an attempt to depict battle between Ahab and Ahab, or perhaps Moby Dick and Moby Dick.” This, according to Yano, explains why Kojima chose to switch the role of Ahab from Huey to Big Boss. “To be more precise, the aim is to reveal that the system the world runs on defines Big Boss’s existence as “evil.” That’s why MGSV tells you distinctly that Ahab is you, the player. It says, now you have to experience first-hand the absurdity of being branded a villain by the manipulating ways of the global status quo. […] For that message to be put across, it can’t be Huey telling it, since he’s on the American side. It has to be Big Boss himself that delivers the message.”</ref> In addition, there was an ending for disarming all nukes on a server that implied that all nukes had been gotten rid of, which also featured a quotation by Barack Obama as part of the credits.
-==Rockstar North==
-* [[Grand Theft Auto]] series: This whole series promotes alcohol, drugs, tobacco, crime, pornography, and a bunch of other gobbledygook. [[Grand Theft Auto V]] was probably the worst as it did everything it could to demonize wealthy businessmen, FBI agents, country people, and lawyers. [[Grand Theft Auto IV]] was probably the second worst as it was pro-illegal immigration.
-* Midnight Club series: Same basic premise as Grand Theft Auto, only you're playing as a street racer instead of a car thief.
-==Illusion Softworks==
-* Mafia series: Glorifies every aspect of the Italian mafia.
-==HudsonSoft==
-* ''Cho Aniki'' series: Blatantly of the LGBT agenda.
-==Debatable whether liberal==
-===Indie/Small Developers===
-• Undertale: On one hand, it teaches the importance of core Christian values such as mercy and compassion by discouraging killing characters, and instead solving conflicts non-violently. On the other hand, it involves homosexual and bisexual relationships, some of which may involve the player character (who is 12 years of age) depending on what dialogue choices the player makes.
-===Capcom===
-*Resident Evil series: The games generally have a subtle anti-capitalist and anti-American agenda. However, it also has a condemnation against social Darwinism and eugenics, as most of the main villains in the franchise tended to promote some form of eugenics as well as social Darwinism as their motives. In addition, one of the protagonists, Barry Burton, was implied in the English localization to be a member of the [[National Rifle Association]], and the games also to some extent featured pro-family messaging, as Barry Burton was shown to be very loyal to his family, and the character Claire Redfield is depicted as being loyal to her brother Chris, spending Resident Evil 2 trying to find him and in Code Veronica refuses to allow Albert Wesker to harm him.
-==See also==
-*[[Greatest Conservative Video Games]]
-==References==
-{{reflist}}

Difference between revisions of "Essay:Worst Liberal Video Games"

Revision as of 21:26, June 1, 2017

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