Of Phil Fish and Indie Entitlement | |
Of Phil Fish and Indie Entitlement Hello, Escapist readers! As part of our partnership with curation website Critical Distance, we'll be bringing you a weekly digest of the coolest games criticism, analysis and commentary from around the web. Let's hit it! Not too long ago, Anita Sarkeesian's Tropes vs Women in Games series tackled the narrative device of "fridging," whereby important figures in a character's life (usually women) are killed off to catalyze the character's development. At Ontological Geek, Bill Coberly grabs hold of the concept and takes a particular look at fridging in the context of Baldur's Gate 2, where it treats the death of two characters, one man and one woman, very differently. From Baldur's Gate to a more contemporary series, Stephen Beirne takes to the Dark Souls series again, this time borrowing from German philosopher Nietzsche to describe the game's "optimistic" nihilism:
Let's move on to discussions of internet fame, shall we? In this widely circulated video (at right), Ian Danskin advances the argument that the highly visible negativity directed at Fez developer Phil Fish stems largely from a system of internet celebrity, in which Fish's public statements are only part of the equation. Problem Attic developer Liz Ryerson directly responds to Danskin's video as being too charitable toward the primary actors involved, instead asserting that there is a pervasive background noise of masculine entitlement which undergirds the behavior of love-to-hate-them indies like Fish or Jonathan Blow -- and it is part and parcel with the increased commercialization of the indie scene:
Want more? Be sure to swing over to Critical Distance to have your fill! | |