Wednesday 6 April 2016

Baldurs Gate Controversy

Oh boy!  Can't go a fucking week nowadays without a given release kicking off some kind of huge controversy.  This time, a new expansion for Baldurs Gate Enhanced Edition called Siege of Dragonspear has managed to piss a number of people off and of course games media are trying to spin it as some kind of indication of how horrible gamers are.

So here's the story that first drew my attention to it.  The new expansion gets released and all other complaints aside for the time being the thing that is apparently getting people all mad is the inclusion of an NPC who talks openly about being transexual or something.  She says something along the lines of how she thought she was a boy but decided to be a girl and gave herself a name from a single letter of every language or some shit like that.  Looking a bit deeper into it shes a nothing NPC who sells you shit or something so of course when I hear about THIS being the reason people are upset, I start raising eyebrows.

Just for the record, I have not played Siege of Dragonspear yet, I'll be waiting for that shit to sink in price during a steam sale or something but everything I'm going to write is based on things I've read from users and reports from friends who have already purchased the title.  It might also be worth mentioning that Baldurs Gate is a game that was original released in 1998.  There are people with fond memories of this game, it's world and lore so right off the bat a developer is already setting themselves up for heavy criticism when dealing with this kind of content.

So, how far is the inclusion of a trans NPC really pissing people off?  Well from what I can tell, not much at all, games media has just latched onto this one aspect of the game in order to push their story.  What is really pissing people off is the shitty writing, the broken multiplayer, mods being killed, shitty interface, corruption of save files and many more things.  From what I'm hearing is sounds like people aren't happy because the game is made like shit and isn't running properly.  Considering that I can go into my GoG account, fire up BG1 on my modern computer system and run it with very few noticeable problems it's sad that a fucking expansion for the update runs so shitty.

The writing is a particularly interesting point because if you believe games media then you'll be told its due to the inclusive nature of the script.  The truth is, all the "inclusions" that they have made are poorly written and feel out of place.  Not only this but they have also gone in and started changing some of the characters personalities.  You can google what these changes were because explaining them in detail would take another post on its own but it shows that the person writing these characters cared more about pushing agendas rather than building upon the previous story and are doing original fans a huge disservice by changing things.

At the end of the day, when we play games like Baldurs Gate it's because we want to jump into a fantasy world, live out an epic adventure and maybe shove a sword in a dragons face while exploring a dungeon along the way.  We do NOT want to hear about people changing genders or how "terrible" attitudes to women are UNLESS they are written in a compelling way that fits the story.  Just shoving that shit for the sake of shoving it in is not only lazy, creatively bankrupt writing but including it into a long established game like Baldurs Gate is, dare I say, offensive.

If you want to make games with shit writing and agenda pushing narratives then sure, do it, maybe some tasteless fuck will play it.  Do NOT come waltzing into games that people have known and loved since before the turn of the millennium, games that some folks fucking grew up with, and start changing shit to suit your warped view of the world.  People are mad not because you are talking about it but because you're shoving it down their throats.

Go and make your own shitty games inside your own little safe space or whatever.  Let us have our fun


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