Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp: It's not Animal Crossing

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp is an experience where all the good in Animal Crossing is killed, and in its place is the cold, dark, stone cold comfort of money. It’s an experience that, if nothing else, has given me a new appreciation for what the good and proper games in the series do. Because if you’re looking for your next Animal Crossing, and a nice, relaxing experience, this is not it at all.

Source

Animal Crossing is a game founded on one core idea: living in a town. It’s never about the individual mechanics, or any one character. It’s all about that experience you get just existing there. Wanna spend a while bug catching? Talking to the neighbors? The game lays out many options and a few concrete goals, and then you just have at it and enjoy yourself.

Perhaps one of the most memorable aspects of that was the time element. Animal crossing works on a real time, year round system. Things take a day to make, so come back tomorrow! What’s important to note about this is that it’s remarkably healthy and respectful design. Unless you absolutely must get every collectable in every season, there is never any rush for anything, and the game lets you take as much time as you need. Every request and need for items is seasonal, so you’re always able to get what is required. Animal Crossing aims to coexist with you, not to have you keep up, not to show you what you’re missing, none of that. It’s a game series that greatly cares for and respects the player.

And from that, pocket camp gives us… checklists and timers. Huh.

Let’s start with the checklists. This undermines the entire point of simply existing in the world. Animal Crossing has always had tasks, but they were either very contextual, or very broad. “Go fill up the museum”. “If you’ve got a sea bass, could I have one?” They were always very gentle, never forced, always coexisted with the game proper, and totally optional.

The checklists in Pocket Camp are front, center, in your face, and painfully obvious. When a villager in the other games asks for fruit, you just have to keep that in mind. When a villager in this game asks for fruit, you’ll get a big notification for it, and it’ll say “⅓ ORANGES” and that just feels so, so artificial. It’s in your face, unavoidable, and not friendly to the player. These fun little requests turn into overt demands.

This feeds into my biggest complaint with the game as a whole: this doesn’t feel like a cohesive, complete world. There are checklists, there are levels, there are popups for the Real Money Currency all over the place. The world is a world with artificiality stamped all over it. Menus would appear in other games when it made sense. Looking through your pack, looking at a sign. Here, menus just pop up… because? It really takes away from the sense that this is a world, and adds to the feel that this is a game.

The timers don’t help with this at all. They front and center try to place how long things take in your head. It’s not this natural “oh, I’ll have it done tomorrow” or “wait a week” idea you have in older games. “This item will be finished in exactly 4 and a half hours, and by the way here’s a way to skip it” absolutely demolishes any semblance of a coherent, physical world to exist in.

Look, the point I’m making here isn’t that “microtransactions are bad” or “screw phone games”. The issue is that this game is trying to be a mini Animal Crossing, and failing miserably. Animal Crossing has always been first and foremost about the world, and this game kills any chance of having a world with timers and checklists hovering over everything.

I play Animal Crossing to relax, slightly influence a town, and just do whatever. I boot up Pocket Camp and am told to get 3 oranges and a squid. Pocket Camp is not the worst thing ever. But it is a story about how good game design can so easily die. It wears the clothes, it looks the part. However, Pocket Camp does not have the soul that Animal Crossing should.

Persona 4's Issues with Queerness

Alright. I think it’s time I finally did something on this. These sorts of issues have been near and dear to my heart ever since I figured out more of who I am, and I would be remiss to never bring these issues up. That is to say, I care a great bit about queer issues in media, and it’s why I really do mean it when I say: Persona 4 handles LGBT+ issues in a bad, phobic way. I want to talk about why.

Persona has never been a series that’s historically very good with queer representation. The games I have the most experience with, Persona 3 and 5, basically don’t have any LGBT+ representation. Persona 3 has one off colour joke and one sort of maybe implied relationship, and Persona 5 has one horribly offensive gay couple and one maybe trans woman. So, generally, the Persona series has been pretty, how shall I say, overt, with its issues in these categories. Refusal to acknowledge our existence and bad jokes at our expense is par for the course, and sadly expected.

Persona 4 is a bit different. Ostensibly, Persona 4 has LGBT+ representation, and main party members at that! Kanji’s entire dungeon is basically shouting at you “HE’S GAY”, and Naoto presents as a man and is implied to be transgender at many points. So, uh, yeah, actual, positive representation? Yay?

...Everything I just said is a lie. Kanji is not gay, Naoto is not trans, and Persona 4 is not LGBT+ friendly. At all. Persona 4’s phobic tendencies are more insidious and not obvious on the surface at all, and what seems like positive representation gives way to tone deaf writing and very uncomfortable implications and statements.

So, to start, let’s talk about what Kanji and Naoto’s character arcs actually are. Kanji and Naoto are actually stories about societal roles, and the struggle to fit in and carve out a sense of self and place where others will accept you. Kanji struggles with his need to be a “real man” and be tough, at odds with his love of socially feminine activities like handicraft. Naoto wishes to be a great detective, but feels she cannot be taken seriously as a woman in such a position, and so presents as male to achieve her goals. Both of these characters go through understanding who they want to be, how they limited and misunderstood themselves, and how adhering to these societal expectations will only make them miserable.

Alright. Let’s look at Kanji. A large part of this disconnect between his idea of a “real man” and his interests manifests in insecurity in his sexuality. It’s pretty clear from his dungeon alone, it being a bathhouse, with his shadow being every stereotype of a gay man imaginable.

But, the thing is, he’s not… really… gay. For much of the story, Kanji has a crush on Naoto, who is, mostly, presenting male. But he still holds attraction to her after that is dropped, which, while you could maybe interpret to mean he is bisexual, absolutely reeks of the writers trying to rewrite him as straight, and trying to cast all that implication of him being gay under the rug. Kanji’s sexuality is a tool for the writers. Not a serious idea to explore, not a central character theme, his sexuality is a means to make him confused, and that is all. The fact that the game ever refuses to say the word “gay” is pretty telling. Persona 4 does not actually care about gay issues one bit. Persona 4 cares about making Kanji weird, confused, and othered.

There’s a lot of issues with this idea of just using being gay as a way to be confused. It calls up the ugly phrase many folks have heard from people: “Oh, you’re just confused”. It casts exploring one’s sexuality as an ugly, odd thing that you should ideally never do. Kanji gets more integrated into the group as he “grows out” of this phase thing, which is just, well. I hope I don’t have to explain why that’s a bit of an issue.

There’s the other half of this issue, which is that this is a dirty, dirty tease, and to just say “no he’s not actually gay” is honestly kind of insulting. The writers couldn’t have been blind, c’mon. This is a tease, whether they intend it or not, and to walk back on this is deeply troubling. And in the spirit of “a tease”... Naoto.

Naoto’s whole shtick is that she feels forced into presenting male due to what she wants to do in life. Which would be fine, except, pardon my language, holy shit, what a dirty tease this is. You have gotta know what you’re implying when you write lines about “body modification surgery”, seriously. Everything about her pretty much implies she’s being written as transgender than then, just… no. It’s this ridiculous thing that’s honestly pretty insulting.

To get to the overall point, all this leads up to one central idea: in Persona 4, being LGBT+ makes you the “other”. It makes you the weird social outcast, it makes you unstable inside, it makes you unaccepted. Characters find themselves in this game, but finding yourself means shedding that stuff, because that’s “weird” and “confusing”. Queerness is built up as this plot point, and a negative plot point at that.

Oh, Kanji’s not gay, he just likes feminine activities.

Oh, Naoto isn’t trans, she just looks up to male role models.

I’m sure you’ve probably heard those arguments before if you’re queer, or even if you’re not, you almost certainly know of them. They’re these destabilizing attacks on one’s identity, constantly doubting them. And this is basically exactly what Persona 4 says. To the game, you can have a story about defying society's expectations and being yourself, but for god’s sake, don’t put a gay person in there. That’d be weird.

I hope we can do better than this.

The Drums of Persona Shopping

This is going to be the most ridiculously specific thing I have ever written about.

I write way too much about Persona already. If you couldn’t tell, I do have a certain fondness for the series. A lot of what I love is the small stuff, where you can clearly tell effort and care was placed into even the tiniest of things. So, in the spirit of that, I’m gonna talk about the drum track to one song in Persona 5, specifically, Butterfly Kiss.

So, some background quick; if you haven’t played Persona 5 (how dare you), this is the song that plays when you visit Tae Takemi, the resident doctor and medicine shop of the game. It’s background music for your shopping, basically. So keep that idea of what it’s meant for in mind, and let’s dive right in…

...Into some drum terminology! Hehe. I promise, this’ll be quick and painless.

Hi Hat: The cymbal you see drummers tapping on all the time. I’ll be talking about two kinds of hits here, taps and crashes. Taps are quick and quiet, crashes are longer and louder.

Snare: You know that sharp snap of a drum beat you hear during songs? That’s the snare. You’ll pick up on it quick.

Beats: Count “1 2 3 4” over and over to yourself to the beat of the song. Congrats, you now have the skeleton of how drum beats are counted.

And that’s about it! Here’s the song, and let’s get going:

So, to establish the beat of the song that lasts until about 40 seconds in, let’s get our bearings. This beat can be quite chaotic at first, so to steady yourself, focus on the loud snare hit every few seconds. That snare hits on the “4” of the “1 2 3 4” beat mentioned above. To make it simpler: the beat loops after every snare hit. Now, in that timeframe is where we’re gonna focus.

The progression of beats (this isn’t tied to the 1 2 3 4, just fits in the time from 1-4) overall goes:

Crash - Tap Tap Tap - Crash - Snare - Crash - Tap Tap Tap - Crash - Snare

This beat almost breaths as it goes. It goes from the quiet taps, to the louder crash, to the loud BANG on the snare, then back to the crash, then the taps, and on and on it goes. It’s got this up and down rhythm to it that makes the song feel like it’s never standing still, even at the lowest, most calm moments. It’s really good beat variance, and most importantly, it never feels like it’s jumping around or being sudden, as a more casual, shopping theme should. It’s just good work all around.

Of course, the song can’t stay like this forever, and when shifting to the next bit (0:40), we’re going into steady triplets on the hi-hat. You’ll hear the snare every 6 taps, and 2 hits on the bass drum in between. Basically, the point of this part is meant to be a climax to the song of sorts, going smooth, steady, and high intensity, while keeping it not overwhelming by never throwing in any odd, off beat hits.

As the song comes off this height, it doesn’t quite go back into the beat from before right away. A variation of the earlier beat plays right after the high point (1:10). This version has the hi hat constantly going in the background at a much louder volume. As well, the snare hits much earlier and much more suddenly in this section compared to the first one. This is a sort of cool down period, taking a half step from the more intense part so it doesn’t jump up and down, keeping the smooth feeling of the song going.

And that’s basically all the differences in the drum beat throughout the song! These beats aim to create interesting, constantly changing beats while also trying to keep it from jumping around. To achieve this, the song keeps the individual, low energy beats breathing up and down smoothly, while relying on the high energy segments to carry it by themselves. In between these beats, it takes careful pains to make the transitions as smooth as possible. It’s a beat and song that never feels like it’s standing still, always feeling like it’s moving in a unique and interesting way. It’s just another feather in Persona 5’s impressive musical cap.

Doki Doki Literature Club - It's really good

If you haven’t played this game yet, please stop reading and go play it. It’s on Steam, it will only take you a few hours, and it’s free. I’m going to be talking openly about everything this game does and why it’s an amazing, realized experience, so spoilers all over the place here. Trust me. Go in blind.

Doki Doki Literature Club is what you make of it. I went into this game expecting some shock value horror (off of the warning at the start), a small little project in a developer’s spare time that they gave to the world for fun. What I got was a smart, thoughtful horror game that truly taps into “horror” beyond scary monsters and spooky environments. This game gets horror, this game gets metafiction, this game just knows how to do what it sets out to do.

On the most basic level, the horror, or rather the progression of such, is smooth and really well executed. From the simple, cutesy opening, you then get some poems that are maybe a bit at odds with it. Easy enough to shrug off as artsy. Then as you go on, you’ll start getting hints and nudges that there’s some pretty ugly things going on under the surface. Natsuki may be the victim of child abuse, Yuri harms herself, and Sayori, well, Sayori is the focal point of the transition from act 1 to 2.

The transition to a seemingly more serious tone and subject matter, feels like a light shift, which is the important part here. Everything still feels in control, like things are still going ok. You even get a choice, giving the feeling and illusion of a dating simulator even still. You’re still doing ok. This is just character depth. Things will be alright.

Then everything goes to shit.

Sayori’s suicide is effective for two reasons: the illusion of an “end”, and the shock. You, minutes earlier, were given a choice as to how to respond to her. Of course, it didn’t matter, and she will go through with it no matter which one you choose, but the game tells you “the end, that’s it, no do overs, she’s dead.” You think you messed up, but you never had a single choice in the matter.

The other reason is, well, the sheer shock. I’m not usually a fan of shock value. It’s cheap and easy, with no lasting value.This, however, is good shock. It serves as a transition into act 2 in tone, and most importantly, it doesn’t shy away, showing every little detail of her lifeless body. It’s shock that leaves an impact, because minutes earlier, everything told you that you were still in control. And then BAM. All a lie, and you have to see every little bit of what has happened. Your entire perception of the game is shattered in this one moment. It’s shock to do something, not just shock to shock.

I’ll stop there, because we’d be here for hours if I just broke down the actual story at play. Suffice to say, the rest of the game totally upholds the quality in this first act throughout, and is great at keeping things smart, shocking, and horrifying.

However, that’s just one half of the game’s story. The other half gets into this metafictional edge, with Monika’s full awareness that she is in a fictional game, and trying to get with *the player* specifically, as in you, the one playing the game.

The game does metafiction well, too. It’s not content to simply say “oooooooo we broke the 4th wall” and move on, no, it goes all in. Menus are bent to Monika’s will. The game will pull from your windows username to try to namedrop you and freak you out. You have to delve into the game’s files themselves in order to fix what’s wrong. It makes you intensely aware of the artificiality of it all, and it knows and understands how to craft a “game” world.

And finally, the metafiction plays into the horror. Everything in DDLC is super tightly woven and interesting, and more than anything, the game knows and understands how to keep it consistent. The metafiction and horror don’t coexist side by side, they feed into each other.

I’ve already gone on for far too long, but as a quick example of what I mean: just look at Monika’s position. She’s aware that she’s in a game, and she also really wants to love the player. BUT, the game also draws attention to how horrifying this is, how aware she is of the fakeness of her world. She has no control, no agency, and her attempts to gain such destroy everything. It’s the horror of a fake reality that is the metafiction.

That is to say, DDLC isn’t some groundbreaking plot that changed my view on the world or anything. At the end of the day, it just is what it is and doesn’t try to do more. But it is a brilliantly, expertly done story that doesn’t ever slack or leave anything hanging. It sets out what it wants to do, answers everything it needs for a satisfying story, and then lets the ideas it sets out hang for you to muse on. That is how you write a story, and DDLC is a shining example of it.

The Villain Issue in Overwatch

There’s been much hullabaloo over the newest Overwatch character revealed, Moira. Specifically in the circles I frequent, there’s been even more hullabaloo about the fact that there is a more than slim chance that she’s a trans woman. Her body type fits, her last name is traditionally assigned to men, she has a David Bowie skin for god’s sake. It’s all speculation at the time of writing, but it’s nonetheless an exciting prospect.

...Well, except for one thing.

Overwatch has a villain issue.

Source

In the past I’ve praised the cast of Overwatch for being diverse, well at least compared to most media. While I don’t hold Blizzard’s writing in the highest regard, all the characters felt realized to a certain level and it never felt like they resorted to any overt stereotypes. Except… well, Talon.

Talon is an explicit terrorist organization in the Overwatch universe, for those uninitiated. They’re the de facto villains, regardless of like what you think of them morally. They play the part of villains and are written like villains. And if the fans are on track (and even if they’re not), they’re mostly minorities.

This is a pretty loaded topic, I’m well aware, so, to preface why I think this is an issue, we need to be thinking in terms of how we “other” people and groups. There’s a very well documented record about how we as a species will take those in a group we want to demonize and make them as some other group, not the same as us. Look at the way we talked about non-white people. How both sides in a war characterized the other as brutish, less than human. It’s a thing that happens, overtly and subconsciously. It makes us look at people as different, and we fear difference. That in mind, most of the villains being part of a minority in our culture is… a problem.

To go down the list quickly:

• Doomfist is African.
• Sombra is Mexican.
• Reaper is American, but his skin is not white.
• Widowmaker is white, but she was essentially brainwashed into loyalty.
• And there is a damn good chance Moira is transgender.

There is a long and sordid history of minorities (from a North American perspective) being the villains in our media, being the “other”. Think of the dastardly Mexican villain in old westerns. The crazy “Indians”. The tribes of Africa being portrayed as brutish and less than the white man. The demonization of LGBT+ peoples as being pedophiles, and strange deviants to show how weird and evil they are. So uh, maybe we should stop filling up our fictional terrorist organizations with minorities?

I’m not trying to argue for no minority villains, nor do I think that individually any of the Talon group are bad characters wholly. I’m saying that collectively, I’m seeing some dangerous biases and worldviews take hold in the Overwatch universe, where minorities are more likely to be the villains… just because? That’s not very accurate, and is, in my opinion, pretty thoughtless and just flat out isn’t a good thing.

We need to be more thoughtful about this spread. It’s not “just a game”, because media in all forms impacts the people who interact with it. I don’t want to see anyone who’s not white, straight, and cis constantly shuffled off into villain roles. Villains are not bad. Making us all villains is bad. We can do better.