76c96e No.15957146
Have you played a videogame with - what you suspect to be - a deeper meaning or underlying themes laying within the game's pretext/subtext?
Was it substantial, or just a bunch of new-age crap? Did it have substance, or was it just simply referencing the bible like Evangelion did?
In any case, please do expound, as I'd love to hear about it.
f0a710 No.15957152
NIHILISM MAKES GAMES DEEPEST
91d716 No.15957155
>>15957152
But that's just a theory.
9cfd9c No.15957162
Most game devs who want to make "deep" games don't really want to make games at all, they want to make interactive stories. I have no problem with this, but I think it's unfair to both mediums to tie them down to the same definition.
Nier, Pathologic, The Void and Metal Gear are the only actual games I can think of with deeper meanings while still being enjoyable as games
Pic unrelated..
76c96e No.15957168
>>15957162
Is Pathologic truly worth playing? I tried about four hours of it but I got bogged down by the extensive reading, and I was pretty damn lost - reminded me of EYE in that regard. Mind you, I've played text-heavy games before and I love visual novels, but for Pathologic it just felt different.
0efa34 No.15957169
>>15957162
Mega Man is up there with them, but you've have to be on some otherworldly autism shit to piece it all together.
942019 No.15957172
Does Evangelion even mean anything?
0efa34 No.15957175
>>15957172
No. Anno outright said he included the symbolism basically because it was neat. There was no greater point.
9cfd9c No.15957179
>>15957175
Nothing wrong with that in my opinion, interesting visuals are fun regardless if there's actually meaning behind them.
f18f4f No.15957182
>>15957168
It's boring. It's also confusing and figuring out all the bullshit takes too much time for the pathetic endings you get. Pass and let the turbo autists think they play a good game.
0efa34 No.15957183
>>15957179
I agree in general, but I'd have preferred at least some stab at something or other for the amount of effort that went into draping everything in symbols.
dd2743 No.15957202
>>15957172
Taking out the sybolism, Eva is a highly entertaining. I think Anno grabbed a book on Freudian nonsense at a local library while writing it. It also effectively subverts jap media.
1f8113 No.15957237
Persona 3 is secretly a self-help guide for neets
it is the only one in the series that is
the problem, though, is that it was too subtle and probably helped no one because of it
d75415 No.15957243
I think that Prey 2017 was building to a point about identity, like what is a person, can memory wipe and reprogramming people's brains be compared to murder, how would we deal with consciousness copying (like in SOMA), what is the value of an individual as well as the value of THE individual, but I think that most of it got scrapped for time, unfortunately. The plot is still interesting, but I wish it would have delved deeper into those themes.
1f8113 No.15957259
>>15957172
I was just thinking about this today, and I think the best evidence for Evangelion not being metaphorical/allegorical etc. is its own name. Neon Genesis Evangelion doesn't really mean shit.
New Beginning Word of God
Why not simply call it "Another New Testament" or anything like that? Because they wanted to call the giant robots "evas". It's all purely aesthetic, no real meaning behind it
a6d0a2 No.15957264
System Shock 1 revolved around the horrors of technology
System Shock 2 revolved around the horrors of nature
854150 No.15957270
Yume nikki and its fan games.
Really deep stuff
0efa34 No.15957340
>>15957259
The neon is literal. Orange Tang.
8d7c77 No.15957558
Deus Ex clearly had something going for it.
6c93b0 No.15957566
>>15957146
LINK IS DEAD IN MAJORAS MASK AND IT'S ABOUT THE FIVE STAGES OF GRIEF
083328 No.15957577
Invidious embed. Click thumbnail to play.
I assume when you say deep you mean a theme or something that isn't immediately obvious.
It's originally a book so it's kinda cheating but I liked how Metro 2033 was the classic hero's journey but instead of becoming a hero you slowly become more and more murderous all the way up to genocide.
32d2af No.15957610
Maybe it's cliche to name the original walking sims, but both Loom and The Secret of Monkey Island had some deeper things going on.
Loom could've been just about some magic adventure, but it made you learn and grow as a magician (even if the path was 100% linear). Seeing your growth and eventual accomplishment is both rewarding as gameplay and as a story.
The opposite can be said with Monkey Island, which acknowledges your path is linear and simple, and demeans you with a theme park aesthetic and corny jokes. You don't really accomplish anything, if anything your attempts at adventure made things worse. "Don't pay more than 20 bucks for a computer game" as an ending is probably the smartest thing I've seen in any visual media.
>>15957172
>>15957179
>>15957183
>>15957202
Eva has obvious points about puberty, finding a place in the world (as a job), and accepting your faults. It's not much deeper than it appears, though, outside the subversion of common tropes. The series finds that theme later on, definitely feels like it's being made up as it goes along.
MGS2 does that subversion in a much better way, presenting itself as a follow-up yet telling you to kill off Snake, having a fox unit that's completely dysfunctional, and an mc who's never told what's going on. But the game runs with it, and a lot of the story bits (especially the closing monologue) say more about how we carry things on, and remember them. If a sequel is a remembrance of the original, what does it need to carry on? And why can't it be seperated from the original? The game presents a possible solution to the question, as far as I interpret it.
>>15957558
Did it? They quote a lot of theology, and bring up political/social issues, but none really build into a conclusion. It feels like a facade of intelligence, where all they have are the elements of an impressive story, but fail to piece it together.
Deus Ex is still a hell of a lot better than any of its prequels, mind.
a3f410 No.15957640
Hitman had a lot of this. At the surface it's just a game about an assassin hired for money, but deep inside hides his existential crisis. First he had to kill his creator, then had regrets for killing all these people and went to church when the Russians kidnapped the priest and he again had to kill. Then in Blood Money it is revealed that the agency itself is corrupt and are out to kill him.
2257f9 No.15957651
>>15957566
to be fair that's just a theory
1b3880 No.15957763
Reminder that lore was the justification for making the final boss of binding of isaac an undertale Yes really ripoff and boss rush.
1b3880 No.15957769
Also Nicalis and/or edmund are faggits and shipped rebirth and afterbirth unfinished
1b3880 No.15957773
8d7c77 No.15957848
>>15957610
>Did it? They quote a lot of theology, and bring up political/social issues, but none really build into a conclusion. It feels like a facade of intelligence, where all they have are the elements of an impressive story, but fail to piece it together.
I would say that Deus Ex tried to throw everything at the player and see what stuck. However I wouldn't say that there wasn't an attempt at concluding these themes by giving the player reign to solve the issues via the three main endings (Return to Preindustrial Era, Globalist AI Utopia, Continuation of the Illuminati). The developers attempting to be impartial to all endings don't really present the player with any conclusive path.
Other than that, the theology becomes analogous to the story pretty well as an attempt to somewhat explain the new technocracy. Pic related
a5249f No.15957867
Unironically, mad max. the game gets heavy at the end with cues how max is sliding into madness again. Instead of rushing to save the woman and the girl, he drives around talking to imaginary people, its like some subcouncous part of him wants them to die so he can keep brooding.
5ae679 No.15957869
>>15957162
Sauce on that robot? Looks interesting.
9cfd9c No.15957871
394d02 No.15957904
TBoI is honestly the best example I can think of
loved it so much I brought it on PC (plus all DLCs), Switch and regrettably iPhone which required a shoddy phone controller
others I can think of that are no where near the same level as TBoI include Dark Souls, Terraria, The End is Nigh (kinda, the games existence also has some emotional shit to do with the dev of TBoI), Hotline Miami and kinda Killing Floor
also come to think of it, you can call me a retard but Hotline Miami 1/2 was one of the few games that made me cry purely because of how fucked and meaningless all the violence became at the end
394d02 No.15957906
>>15957168
a full on remake is currently being made under the name Pathologic 2, there's a steam page for it and apparently it's going to have a lot more voice acting and a few more systems to do with factions or whatever but it's the same story/setting
977f91 No.15957960
I didn't play it, but I heard pic related has you deeply exposed to in-world symbolism and iconography until you "get it what it is all about". It's nothing really useful, but consider that mysticism in general works in similar fashion and interactive entertainment is basically the only medium where you can get an analogous experience.
Also, it's not really a game, more to a walking sim. If you want a game in this fashion stick to Myst titles with the word "Myst" on them.
I don't personally think videogames are a good medium for deeper meaning, the main verbs involved in gameplaying don't involve contemplation, even when it involves some kind of communication it's mainly just a tool to achieve the winning condition. Don't want to start the whole "story vs. gameplay" debate, but consider that when you are interacting with anything story related you are not playing, you stop the game to read a description, a dialog or watch a little movie of sorts, and when people talk about lore, theories, etc. the main sources come mainly from these non-games parts. Nothing wrong with that, I just wanted to point out the obvious, not judge it
0574ea No.15957974
>>15957960
>didn't play it
>not really a game
>here's what it's all about
>walking sim
>zero walking
You're one dumb nigger.
a46f81 No.15957979
>>15957146
are you serious? look at the catalog. all we have are threads about "agenda pushing"
977f91 No.15957987
>>15957168
Are you me? I felt exactly the same, word by word. I'm basically waiting for >>15957906 , hoping that the more fleshed out gameplay and, fuck, even the animations keep me entertained to endure the enigmatic or maybe badly translated text.
>>15957974
>>not really a game
I guess you need to play Gone Home to know it's not game then.
>>here's what it's all about
Nice misquote nigger. Learn to read.
>>walking sim
>>zero walking
>the abstraction of teleporting to hotspots implies you are really teleporting or literally anything else except walking
Fuck off.
>You're one dumb nigger.
You're one dense motherfucker.
0574ea No.15957993
>>15957987
Stop talking about games you've never played released before you were born.
a46f81 No.15957997
>>15957993
ooh watch out he read the faq
89fcbf No.15957998
>>15957987
with the pathologic remake they've shown off that they've revamped the combat system. the updated graphics also adds a lot to the artistic side of the game
321869 No.15958008
The deepest video game i ever played was when I mating pressed your mom
977f91 No.15958010
>>15957993
It didn't, youngfag
>>15957998
Nice, can't wait to play it. I don't get the 2 on the title tho, I wonder if they are going to pull of the "it's a remake, but it's really not" trick
>>15958008
Savage.
f5c197 No.15958032
>>15958008
my mom is a video game?
a46f81 No.15958037
>>15958032
lol that makes you an expansion pack
f5c197 No.15958043
>>15958037
I mean, could be worse, could be a microtransaction.
f8b083 No.15958051
>>15957172
It's just a show about how to deal with depression, nothing more than that really.
38bb0c No.15958071
YouTube embed. Click thumbnail to play.
>>15957172
The first 26 episodes are about overcoming your angst. What do all the pilots have in common? They hide from their own problems and everyone around them by building up a "shell". A false self if you will. Shinji seems autistic even though he's an overemotional pussy. Asuka seems like a bitch, but she's only afraid of letting people get close to her and Rei is a "clone" in the way that she's not herself, but she's just like her mother since that is what everyone expects from her. The angels aren't evil. They represent confrontation and are only there to destroy the fake world, the "shell" all the kids have created around them.
There's even a short scene showing a parallel universe where they aren't acting like this and it looks just like a generic SoL highschool anime.
38bb0c No.15958089
>>15957598
>Evangelion is the Undertale of anime
The Dark Souls of shitposts.
243912 No.15958228
>Tfw Majoras Mask legitimately is about the 5 stages of grief but that shitter matpat has made it unable to ever discuss because contrarian culture.
Fuck him and fuck you.
29f14a No.15958293
>>15958010
it's because it's developed by weird Russians
initially it was Pathologic Remastered or some shit but there's already Pathologic HD which is the English remake with widescreen and whatnot.
so essentially they confusingly renamed the game to avoid confusion.
4b871f No.15958334
Story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important.
0ab7a6 No.15958338
>>15958043
Your dick is micro transaction.
6dd4aa No.15958379
The moral of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance and The World Ends With You was "go the fuck outside and maybe you'll stop being such a bitch."
dbe277 No.15958398
I was playing Max Payne and then I realized the main character, Max Payne's name, is actually a reference to how much PAIN(it rhymes with Payne, which is the main character's name) he is going through.
977f91 No.15958405
>>15958398
The perfect bait, learn this newfags.
1d9aa0 No.15958433
40fa84 No.15958462
>>15958334
you are the cancer
dbe58c No.15958483
>>15957172
Anno was depressed and spent 4 years in his bedroom. When he finally accepted the world around him for what it was he made evangelion with the message of doing the same. The rebuilds are a big fuck you because 15 years after his message of building relationships and avoiding seclusion, people are hiding in their rooms obsessing about his show. The religious symbolism is just there because he thought it looked cool.
6dd4aa No.15958491
>>15957610
>The Secret of Monkey Island
No More Heroes did a similar thing, hinting at how utterly pointless everything you're doing is.
I'm sure there's something else in there with how Travis seems "cool" to Americans. The East/West cultural divide is a pretty big theme in most Grasshopper Manufacturer's games.
On that note Liberation Maiden was straight up Japanese nationalistic propaganda with some heavy handed anti-American imperialism themes. I'm actually surprised that it was released as is.
Killer7 is about how international politics is a tremendous shitshow on damn near every level. Highlights include
>illegal missile strike allowed to happen because the only thing that could stop it is another illegal missile and no one wants to reveal that ability to the common people
>Japanese political party has the guidebook to polotics and gains massive power out of nowhere. U.S. Gov releases a few pages into the wilds of Texas and watches as a postal worker transforms his town into a utopia. They then kill him because it's effectively a cult.
>Glow in the dark CIA nigger has a breakdown after the MK Ultra conditioning breaks, starts World War III.
>comic book heroes used in a video game whose true purpose is to train potential government agents/child soldiers
>women are all the same
18883a No.15958547
db7cfc No.15958548
>>15958491
Don't forget the part where they have black market organ trading that was conducted through the immigration office.
babd08 No.15958564
>>15957146
Remember when The Binding of Isaac openly shits on Christianity in the opening, but is made by jews? I wonder why.
babd08 No.15958574
>>15957974
>the myst games are walking sim
You millennials never cease to amaze with your absolute idiocy. They're simply the best puzzle games in history, and a retard like you wouldn't make it off the first island.
babd08 No.15958582
>>15958567
Tell me the deepest thing you noticed in metal gear solid 1-2-3. Come on kid, let's have a laugh when everything you know is shitty little memes.
39be18 No.15958585
>>15958582
Literally nothing. Everything in Metal Gear is like a shitty soap opera except with poop and piss jokes.
973393 No.15958608
>>15958582
Well, MGS2 told us the "obvious" about Internet flodding garbage, "mind control", and how you are supossed to get life meaning, I know this sounds the usual meta talk in every medium, but for me MGS2 makes it special and creepy.
And I like the arsenal Gear part in general, short history.
Also, tell me something deep about any game you played, pseudo-intelectual-anonymus user…
>Opinion discarded 'cause of an anime girl.
2b784b No.15958613
>>15958608
The anime girl didn't discard your opinion but the fact that you're a phoneposter does.
973393 No.15958669
>>15958613
>Being this autistic over a filename that I imported from my phone.
I get it I get it, you really don`t have anything to say…
420222 No.15958684
Enderal (a total conversion for Skyrim) plays with this a lot. The entire game takes the old "You are THE CHOSEN ONE" narrative, runs with it for about 70% of the playtime, and then starts to give you one resounding slap to the face after another for falling for it.
The entire plot is built around the motif of "Letting go".
25448a No.15958789
>>15957172
It does have a message. It has a few messages actually, but it's all very simple and people tend to read too deeply into the narrative. People think it's about some huge existential view on life or whatever, but no, it's simple messages about humans and relationships dressed up with a bunch of fancy bullshit.
>First is the message Yui outright states in the movie: "Anywhere can be paradise, as long as you have the will to keep on living."
This is simple and just means that you can find your happiness as long as you don't give up on trying to find it.
>Secondly, that sometimes people hurt each other, but other times they love and care for each other. This makes life worth living.
This is what Shinji learns in the end. He wants to be close to people but was worried about getting hurt. He ultimately makes the decision that instead of being unfeeling orange tang, he'd rather run the risk of being hurt if it means the possibility of being loved by someone. Which is sentiment I am fully behind.
>Love yourself
Self-loathing is prominent throughout the series and is what usually leads to characters hurting each other especially Shinji and his father when it's revealed as Gendo is dying that he didn't think he could be a good father to Shinji. So he didn't even try, this makes Yui angry and she kills him. But when Shinji is part of the weird collective conscious orange tang, the people in his life help him realize that he can't be loved by others if he doesn't love himself first. He decides in the end to try and learn to be able to love himself so that he can be loved by others.
There you go. That's all the messages explained in one paragraph each.
a8cd3b No.15958909
Shadow of The Colosuss. As Wander kills more and more of the Colossi, you start to transform into an increasinly demonic and evil creature. It's ironic how Malus is the most human looking of all of the Colossi, yet he's the final boss. By that point, Wander is fully corrupted from Dormin's power.
4b871f No.15958958
>>15958462
Stories in games are usually there to compensate for poor gameplay and are often written by movie industry rejects who care little for the medium they present their story in. There are very little games out there that manage a perfect balance between story and gameplay and often one has to come at the expense of the other. I know I'd rather have DKC2s than Gone Homes.
050325 No.15958961
>>15958585
>get challenged
>runs away like a weasel
Gotcha! You will always lose in life, kid: out there, over here, inside your head. Because you don't have balls, and balls affect all dimensions of existence.
1a8dc4 No.15958965
>>15957146
Boy, do I have the perfect game for you
050325 No.15959073
>>15958958
>Stories in games are usually there to compensate for poor gameplay and are often written by movie industry
Not the whole world is as bad as baste murica
4b871f No.15959132
>>15959073
>Not the whole world is as bad as baste murica
Maybe, but they're still trying.
a46f81 No.15959133
>>15959073
reading comprehension is shit on /v/ lately
a3f410 No.15959177
>>15958958
>Stories in games are usually there to compensate for poor gameplay
That's bullshit. In fact it's the opposite - stories enhance gameplay.
>I know I'd rather have DKC2s than Gone Homes.
Yeah and there is nothing in between…How about Thief 1 or RTCW?
97c8e3 No.15959234
>>15959177
>stories enhance gameplay
No they do not,whether a story is good or shit has zero impact on how the game itself plays.
gameplay =/= story
977f91 No.15959269
>>15957237
Motherfucker, explain this shit.
0ffb4c No.15959313
Devil may cry, but the issue is that people play these games to style on demons and never pay attention to the plot or dante as a character.
43147a No.15959371
>>15957169
>I'd like to take a moment to celebrate my inauguration as leader of Neo Arcadia today to mourn the death of X, the legendary hero of yore, before we set forth operation Omega and Ragnarok. With the power of Omega, we'll make sure that those dirty Reploid goyim will stop plaguing society with their "free-form code" and put a smile on their face FOR GOOD, like the good ol' days of 9/11! After that, Neo Arcadia will dominate as the safest haven for humankind!*
>What do you mean Zero has a point to establish the Resistance? That's a Chinese bootleg programmed by a Reploid supremacist little girl!…how do I know that? Well they just killed our last leader in cold blood, like another shoah! Accept no substitutes…or you're going straight to the judges for libel.
Sigma, Wily, and Elpizo did nothing wrong. Dr. Light foresaw this and wanted to be the last cyber ghost standing.
977f91 No.15959604
It's also fun to analyze games that are completely meaningless but just push emotional buttons to keep the journey motion in spite of any coherence.
Good guys vs. bad guys in a war
>why they are at war?
The game never explains it, if you look up for lore the good guys helped the bad guys conquer lots of planet and as prize the bad guys gave the planet to the good guys as a gift, some years later, their changed their mind and wanted their planet back.
>why did they want the planet back?
Who knows. They didn't even throw a macguffin natural resource there to justify the onslaught.
>why are the bad guys bad?
Because they exploit resources to build weapons to conquer planets to exploit more resources until they didn't have anything else to conquer, then nobody knows what they do really except waging war for no reason with the good guys. One of the funniest things in the game is there's this part when you enter a city-sized house factory that constructs hundreds of homes in hours, it's there to show off how artificial and inhuman the bad guys are, but you can't stop thinking how cheap housing got in these worlds, they were fabricating houses at the same speed factories fabricates cans of soda, if anything homelessness must be extinct in the bad guys' civilization, how wicked. Also, they are authoritarian for reasons.
>why are the good guys good?
Because their planet is a fucking natural eden and they want to defend it from the bad guys that want to bring pollution and death, notice they didn't care about that when working for the bad guys in the first place. Initially the good guys are fucked because the bad guys obviously have better technology than they do.
>how they work that out
Emulating their technology, specifically the titan technology
>how they manage to fight head-to-head with an army powered by planets filled with industries dedicated to make war machinery when they themselves don't want to lose the natural unpolluted beauty of their planet?
Who the fuck knows. This is so unclear that lorefags could literally theorize that the impression that the good guys have of their own planet is an illusion, the only time you see anything related to the good guys home planet is in a virtual simulation, who knows if it is really like that, they could be quite plausibly being manipulated by a third force interested in crippling the bad guys' political power, maybe the good guys are the real invasors, you never fight in their home planet, you spend the whole game in bad guys' territory.
One could argue that is a parallel for US independence, some massive empire gets a territory reward some people with resources there they form a community and start to prosper than the massive empire comes back and demand taxes and the people go apeshit. That would be quite fair, the good guys, in fact, prosper, but the bad guys don't even make a demand, they just get by killing and conquering everyone just because.
I really don't mind retarded stories, if anything, it shows the devs are focusing in what really matters.
977f91 No.15959619
>>15959604
Post-scriptum note: it's not a planet, it's some planets that the good guys have and when the game starts they already lost some.
76c96e No.15960759
>>15958483
If that's true, then he did a terrible job at it. Everyone around Shinji is a psycho so I'm not surprised Shinji acted how he did. I actually kinda like his character. But that's it. Everyone else is an asshole or deranged.
f65291 No.15960775
Attack on titan is about the 200 year old matrix. They live in a classed wall society and are scared into never leaving by false flags using Nephilim giants.
Other than that its rare in a game to have any sort of deeper meaning without being pretentious drivel
dbe58c No.15960809
>>15960759
Everyone else has similar problems and you see how they deal with it poorly
455559 No.15960813
>>15957175
The religious symbolism isn't the core of the show. The character drama is. As for what all of the religious imagery means, I think the idea is just that the things referenced in religious texts throughout history are actually these same alien beings that are attacking the Earth now.
e0e7c6 No.15962077
>>15958965
To be fair, cuckolding is the thinking man's fetish
470c47 No.15964447
>>15957598
>Evangelion is the Undertale of anime
Evangelion isn't made for furfags
aa8faf No.15964529
This is literally the only game where I feel as though the message is directly tied to the gameplay mechanics.
Only at the very end, when everything is finished and you're clinging to anything you can to avoid the inevitable do you realize the lesson: You have to let go.
316f80 No.15964716
>>15957152
nihilism needs to die
0166e6 No.15964788
e05e7a No.15964792
>>15958789
>he'd rather run the risk of being hurt if it means the possibility of being loved by someone.
very poor choice
f7af4c No.15964884
>>15958608
>Not red version
Faggot.
cdf091 No.15965085
YouTube embed. Click thumbnail to play.
>>15957146
Not exactly a deeper meaning but the so-called Quintet trilogy, Actraiser and Terranigma in particular, are the only games that make you feel like a force of CREATION for the sake of advancing CIVILIZATION itself, instead of DESTROYING like in many other games.
And it's not like a city building game where the goal is usually making a profit, there is a very powerful mystical significance behind your actions. Terranigma drives the point home in how selfless the hero's actions are (even though he himself may not be).
5fff6e No.15965145
>>15957960
>Myst as walking sim
That's a sideways interpretation if ever I heard one, the Myst games require one to actually pay attention to the world and think to progress, walking sims ain't like that. There's very few easy rides to be had in them and they're so much the better for it.
Also, play them, Myst is janky now but sets the stage for Riven and Exile which are both worth it for how unusual they are, the last 2 are ok just not as intriguing.
977f91 No.15965517
>>15965145
Riven is the walking sim, not Myst.
>Also, it's not really a game, more to a walking sim. If you want a game in this fashion stick to Myst titles with the word "Myst" on them.
977f91 No.15965526
>>15965145
Also, I did beat Myst, I kinda just postponing Riven because backlog laziness.
03a9a3 No.15965615
>>15957152
but nihilism is inherently shallow, that's the problem of nihilism and why nihilist are emo faggots who kill themselves because they can't find meaning or purpose in life.
03c287 No.15965628
>>15958608
>>Opinion discarded 'cause of an anime girl.
Yes
c296b7 No.15965638
Alpha Centauri has a pretty good deconstruction of progressive ideals.
It sells Deirdre is a peacenik treehugger, then she enslaves the ravenous flesh-hungry native life to annihilate all other factions even the ones with which she is ostensibly on good diplomatic terms. Zakharov, the fedora-tipping rationalist who values knowledge over all, has a laboratory in his basement where he invents new deadly viruses just because he can.
Meanwhile, the research hospital quote shows Morgan really cares about humanity's survival. The Spartans just wanted to be left alone. Miriam was the only person who thought it was wrong to use technology to do horrible things to people in the name of techno-industrial progress. She is presented as a wack job but is the only decent person among the various factions.
713c4f No.15965974
>>15957168
I fucking loved Pathologic, personally. There's a lot of reading, and the typical Russian jank, but I thought it was 10/10 on delivering the feeling of helplessness and dread.
I felt really fucking stupid and frustrated the first three times I failed it, but once things 'clicked' for me, and I saw into the patterns and made sense of the overall story, it turned into GOTYAY for me.
Pathologic feels different because it's just a very weird game overall, but it's super subjective. Some people might find it boring, dated, or just too autistic. It's something that hooked me from start to finish, because the whole game felt like a detective game where time is truly your biggest enemy, and the case grows colder and leads disappear with each passing day.
It requires a certain frame of mind to fully go into though, where extensive reading is required, and a fuckload of patience. I thought of that game like chipping away at a giant slab of marble, piece by piece. That game probably took me about 50 hours overall to complete, and I don't think everything really 'clicked' for me until about 30 hours in.
76c96e No.15966189
>>15965974
But were the 30 hours of confusion truly worth it?
05dae2 No.15967485
>>15957960
>Also, it's not really a game, more to a walking sim
e915d8 No.15967532
>>15957146
in case there are not enough anons already slobering over ice-pick's cock, I'll say The Void. It was sublime.
7ef7f9 No.15967605
>>15965974
I found out yesterday through the Pathologic 2 steam page that you can try out some of the alpha content for free.
I had a brief look at it and they've definitely enhanced the visuals a lot.
currently the alpha only lets you play as the Haruspex, I'm not sure how many days you're able to play in it but the combat is better and you can still roam the whole town.
6a3a90 No.15967643
>>15966189
There's only one way to find out Anon.
76c96e No.15967762
>>15967643
yeah, I guess you're right.
ac188f No.15980822
>>15959269
>>15958433
I guess you could say that the theme of finding meaning in life in spite of death making our actions seem futile would be helpful to neets. Also the fact that the MC goes from an apathetic loner to a caring leader to his friends and an active member of the community.
a93c0b No.15980899
>>15958909
Shadow of the Colossus is an allegory for the Jews subverting European power for their interests.
Wander or Wanderer is a strange name for a main character. It's a major hint that he personifies the "Wandering Jew" (the name given to the Jewish diaspora for centuries). His goal is to revive a woman named Mono (which I take for the "monotheism" of Judaism). This dead woman personifies Israel (also note that Jewish lineage is traced matrilineally), ie. Wander is a Zionist seeking to recapture the Holy Land.
Dormin, a spirit residing inside a massive central tower says to revive Mono Wander must defeat the Colossi. As earlier theories have pointed out Dormin is Nimrod spelled backwards. Nimrod being the biblical character behind the tower of Babel. (Note: EU parliament building resembles the classic painting of tower of Babel.)
Colossi represent European nations. Wander travels to each one where he locates & strategically attacks its weak points (much like Jews subverting a nation to their will through usury & political maneuvering). For such a small group like the diaspora Jews to accomplish this successfully repeatedly throughout history the metaphor of a single man taking down a towering colossus is quite fitting, wouldn't you agree?
The game was published in 2005 & contains 16 Colossi. When the game was in development, the EU contained 16 nations states.
Now, I hear some people saying, "But Europe consists of 50 sovereign states and territories!" Well, originally the game was supposed to contain 48 Colossi, so pretty close to that. That number proved too large & was reduced to 24 (by 2004 the EU had 25 nations) but these extras were scrapped. (It makes you wonder if the addition of 9 new states to the EU in 2004 was too much work for the staff to add mid-production, when they had worked on the assumption of 16?)
Like nations the Colossi are varied. Some destroy themselves & their surroundings trying to fight Wander, just as Jews have survived the rise and fall of empires. The final Colossus is incomplete & shackled at the waist. I take it to represent the Third Reich, an incomplete but terrifyingly powerful nation if the Nazis had won WW2. As Wander conquers them, he usurps their power (power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely), eventually transforming him into Dormin itself, a horned bull-like demon (shades of biblical sacrificial god Moloch).
Wander's trusty companion Agro (the horse) represents the shabbos goyim. Agro = Anglo, and Jews liken non-Jewish souls to cattle / beasts. Agro is seriously injured helping Wander, like the British Empire which collapsed after WW2. Without Agro's help, Wander would have failed. Without British intervention in Palestine (Balfour Declaration), Jews would not have Israel. And though Wander dies, he ultimately succeeds. (Just as the Jews succeeded in taking back Israel, despite the holocaust.)
Previous theories touched on Dormin / Nimrod but not the Jewish aspect (which is surprising given the biblical references). As such, if this theory is correct then SotC is a typically Japanese critique of the EU, a multicultural project doomed to failure, and a deeply subversive work. Could this be why its creator, Fumita Ueda, has had such difficulties following its release?
8a91cc No.15980929
>>15957259
Neon Genesis Evangelion means "First book of the New Gospel"
The meaning behind the show likely isn't even intended and definitely not religious.
It's more about loss of ego boundaries and what it does to someone, EoE is what theoretically happens when everyone experiences a loss of ego boundaries at the same time
I'd guess the inspirations are either shrooms - which were legal in japan until 2002 - or crippling depression rather than religion which was also influenced by psychedelics and depressive states
c7f439 No.15980968
/v/ doesn't even understand what deeper meaning is, how could they possibly be able to tell you what games encompass it?
3e3c74 No.15980995
>>15980951
He just wanted to fit in…
c6e6e8 No.15981038
>>15980929
unintentional meaning does not exist anon, that is new age bullshit
8ec25a No.15981095
Nu-Prey is unironically and explicitly about turning a much stronger and more capable alien species into race-traitors by amplifying their empathy skills. It might've been a bit of a cheap move at the end, but it amplifies subsequent playthroughs to see how the testing was being done. Not particularly deep, but I thought it was cool.
It also reveals that the "unethical experiments" the main character conducted in the name of furthering alien research were, in fact, completely justified, and are the only reason humanity hasn't gone completely extinct yet. Ends really do justify the means, especially when extinction is on the line; I don't see this sentiment in most sci-fi games or games in general, and I think nu-Prey handled it in a good way.
72f51f No.15981123
>DEEP
>"woah, it has like, bible quotes and shit, bro"
>MULTIPLE LAYERS OF SUBTLETY
>"you're just stupid if you don't get it!"
>ALLEGORIES
Pretentious writers for fucking video games who would love to pass themselves as philosophers and hordes of retards who refuse to read a book while simultaneously yearning for an interesting work is all we have.
It doesn't help that the academia (which started this nonsense) is filled to the brim with people who need to release multiple theses or whatever a year in order to prolong their scientific career and stay on the board so they scavenge the library for obscure texts and then attach "DEEP MEANING" to them so the other dumbasses can eat it all up and then jerk each other off.
Ultimately, any story can be as deep or shallow as you want it to be because you can see whatever you want to in it.
The truly profound works don't have denuvo-tier obfuscation, are usually relatively simple and the people who read them will generally come to similar conclusions.
78aa7c No.15981128
Rick Dangerous.
He is Trans.
2e6fad No.15981296
>>15959604
They aren't building houses in that factory to be used as actual housing. They're basically just sets for target practice and training. Which is even more fucked up.
603662 No.15981455
>>15957172
its about how hard is to choose a waifu
76c96e No.15981510
>>15981455
The best girl is that cute schoolgirl who makes lunches for that one boy she is smitten with. Unironically.
1e44e9 No.15981591
>>15981123
Imagine getting buff flustered this hard that someone put a bible reference in a game.
603662 No.15982597
>>15981510
well, can't argue with that
0f2a15 No.15982599
>>15957237
It legitimately helped me. It just so happened that at the time I decided to play it, I was 18-19 living in my parents basement with crippling depression. Not that meme shit either. I had more than one doctor tell me I wouldnt be able to function a few years down the line without some serious treatment. Anywho, I had dropped out of high school a couple years ago because of massive panic attacks, and had just been working a job for those years I wasnt in school. I did well in that job and got to a supervisor position by age 17 which was fulfilling in it's own right. But after doing that for a year I became disillusioned with it and left. Couple months after I left, I noticed the copy of P3 I had bought awhile back and gave it a shot. At that point my day to day life was pretty much wake up -> fuck around on youtube or jack off or whatever -> spend an hour trying to reconcile an existential crisis -> play a game maybe -> sleep. The existential shit was really rough because it pretty much meant I could have a full blown panic attack any time, any where. I had cut off contact with friends for the most part, since I didnt want to burden them with my shit, and I knew my parents didnt really understand what the fuck was going on in my head despite their best efforts to help, so I didnt really have anyone to talk to. Persona 3 did something i didnt exoect it too by forcing me to face my existential fears. The whole thing is about developing these characters and then watching how they react to directly facing their own deaths. I had to fight anxiety attacks while I was playing it because of some of the shit they say. But it really changed how I think by the end of it all. It's hard to really express what it was about the game that flicked a switch in me, but after I finished it I made the choice to return to High School and now I've done that and am well into completing a computer science degree from a good university.
TL;DR - You're right
c296b7 No.15983126
>>15981591
I you haven't already I strongly recommend you join some clubs at university. Once you hit the job scene there are few ways to make friends and, especially in this industry, meet women.
t. no life wizard tech worker
4dd6d0 No.15984407
>>15983126
Er, I'm just gonna assume you were replying to me and not the anon you tagged. Anyways yeah I've been trying to find a good club and have some I wanna check out. I'm majoring in Computer Science with a minor in East Asian Language Studies (Nipponese) and am going to try and get into a group exchange program which, beyond being a fun trip to Japan, would be another great way to meet some people. I'm still a lonely cunt right now, but despite being a recluse outside of uni, I'm pretty good at making friendly acquaintances. It's the getting close to people part that I'm really fucking terrible at. We'll see what the future holds though. For now I just need to stay afloat with my chunky fuck off course load.
c296b7 No.15985145
>>15984407
fuck how did that happen
b29f62 No.15991766
>>15957169
Mega Man is a good example. Sonic is better. I like when games have stories, but the story isn't the entire point. When it's something you can ignore if you want, and the game is still good. But if you actually pay attention and piece it together, it ends up a lot more complex than most people notice.
Sonic is about the nature of Chaos and Order. The most basic level of this is something that is immediately obvious even to casuals, which is that Eggman turns the wildlife into robots. The symbolism of this is obvious, though many people see it as being about environmentalism. However, looking into further games makes it less about environmentalism and more about chaos, order, and how freedom and life fits into those concepts.
As seen in Sonic & Tails' version of Hidden Palace Zone in Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic is the chosen one, destined to use the power of the Chaos Emeralds to defeat the Master Emerald wielding Eggman. The Master Emerald of course can nullify the power of the Chaos Emeralds, it can contain Chaos. As seen again when we find out it has literally contained Chaos, the God of Destruction who is powered by the Chaos Emeralds. However, at the end of Sonic Adventure, we see that Sonic can use the Chaos Emeralds at the same time as Chaos because Chaos only used the negative energy of the emeralds, and Sonic still has access to the positive energy. Chaos is the physical embodiment of the negative aspects of the concept of Chaos, he is literally the God of Destruction, but Sonic, who remember is also a destined mythical being, is the physical embodiment of the positive aspects of the concept of chaos, meaning life and freedom. This duality is some of the only story given in the original manual for Sonic 1, which explains that the Chaos Emeralds give life to all living things, but can also bring great destruction.
Note that Sonic has no particular use for the Master Emerald, he just uses the Chaos Emeralds to stop Eggman from misusing the Master Emerald. The Master Emerald of course representing Order, containing Chaos, just like Eggman's robotics represent Order, as they also contain Chaos, that is the Chaos Energy that gives life to the animals inside the robots. This is further seen in Sonic Adventure 2, where GUN has robots that work very similarly to Eggman's, but instead of being powered by animals, they are powered by Chaos Drives, vials full of Chaos Energy extracted from some source. The source isn't made explicit, but Chaos Drives function identically to the small animals in Eggman's robots.
Also, the game never makes this explicit, but Chaos is obviously a Chao who just got really strong and absorbed the power of the Chaos Emeralds. The Chao are clearly supposed to be made of water, like Chaos, but were rendered opaque probably for technical reasons. Of course the whole point of the Chao is that they absorb energy from animals, and we've already established that life energy comes from the Chaos Emeralds, it is chaos. Of course in Sonic Adventure 2, Chao do directly absorb small doses of Chaos from Chaos Drives, exactly the same way they absorb energy from small animals. Chaos is not any more special than Sonic or even Eggman. If anything he's less special, since we don't know that Chaos was the subject of a prophecy beforehand.
Also note that Eggman doesn't just try to use the Master Emerald, which controls both the Chaos Emeralds and Chaos the God, but he also directly tries to control Chaos the God in Sonic Adventure. Of course he fails in every game, but that just shows that you ultimately cannot contain Chaos.
Knuckles Chaotix explains that the elders of the Echidna Tribe, whose leader, Pachacmac, would be seen in Sonic Adventure, used a device called a Dark Ring to siphon the power of the Chaos Emeralds into Chaos Rings, but they used these Chaos Rings for war. So again this is the negative aspect of Chaos, meaning Destruction.
b29f62 No.15991767
The Rings of Order were also going to be a thing in the cancelled Saturn game, Sonic X-Treme, but of course that's not canon since it wasn't made. Many aspects of it morphed into things in Sonic Adventure, but the Rings of Order were never mentioned again.
Sonic Shuffle introduces us to Void and Lumina, both aspects of Illumina, the goddess of imagination and emotion, aka the essence of life, AKA chaos. What is life without imagination and emotion? These are the things Eggman contains when he puts animals in robots, as seen with E-102 Gamma. These characters exist in Maginaryworld, the world of dreams, thoughts, and the world is held together by the Perfect Precioustone, which also only exists in Maginaryworld. Void represents the negative aspects of IIllumina, and Lumina represents the positive aspects, but they are both pieces of the whole. Void attempts to destroy the Precioustone, while Lumina seeks to rebuild it. Of course in the game immediately preceding this, Chaos became possessed by the negative energy of the emeralds and became destructive, and Sonic then used the positive energy to preserve life. Chaos was essentially possessed by Void, and Sonic by Lumina. Seeing how Void represents destruction and Lumina represents life is also quite obvious, even with their names.
Gerald Robotnik mistook the mural in Hidden Palace Zone as being himself instead of Eggman, and his future creation, Shadow, instead of Sonic. He then created Shadow with the goal of preserving life (the good aspect of Chaos), by creating an immortal creature which could then be researched to cure diseases, and also to collect the Chaos Emeralds and save the world from the Black Arms. He thought Shadow was the fulfillment of the prophecy of what he called the Ultimate Life Form. Of course he was not the fulfillment of that prophecy, Sonic was the real Ultimate Life Form, and Shadow was just that, a shadow, a pale imitation of the real thing. Gerald had also previously attempted to harness the Chaos when he created the Artificial Chaos, powered by Chaos Drives, based on other echidna murals, such as the one seen in Lost World in Sonic Adventure. One could also interpret the Biolizard as being based on this, and the Biolizard is of course also powered by the Chaos Emeralds. Emerl is also clearly a copy of Chaos 0, again made to harness the power of the Chaos Emeralds, like Chaos. Both Sonic Battle and Shadow the Hedgehog are about Emerl and Shadow trying to find out if they will represent the positive aspect of Chaos, life, or the negative aspect of Chaos, destruction.
>tl;dr: Sonic is the God of Life. Chaos (the character) is the God of Destruction, destruction being the negative aspect of Chaos. Sonic is the chosen one, destined to embody the positive aspect of Chaos, life. Since the very first game, the Chaos Emeralds were explained to both be the source of life and also destruction.
>Eggman then is the god of Order, the opposite of Chaos, represented both by his turning animals into robots and his attempts to control both the Master Emerald and Chaos, the God of Destruction.
>Emerl, the Artificial Chaos, the Biolizard, and Shadow, are all failed attempts at creating artificial gods.