As previously requested, we're trying out a regular, automated discussion thread! Use this space to talk about things that don't fit the ordinary subject matter of the space, or for discussions that don't necessitate a full post! All rules besides the relevancy rule still apply!

For these first ones, please let us know what you think about it! Personally, I'm not sure how popular this practice will be, so I don't really know about the frequency at which they should be generated, so we're just gonna feel it out and figure it out, together. Any suggestions about how to run it, moving forward, are welcome!

Rockstar’s been involved in union busting and severe crunch of employees. Also, worsening the circumstances for costumers. Paywalling content and a fucking paywall of their trailer (technically paying to see an add).
I think that piracy should be the only way any of us should play this title, cuz I know I don’t wanna throw my money at no union busting evil corpo mfs.

I have just started a playthrough of KCD1 and after spending about 10 hours of henry i decided to play through a womans lot.
Wow, what a story. I loved it, gameplay wise it was okay but the story is such an excellent example of games as a medium for storytelling, you really feel for Theresa and her role as a woman in medieval society; it sucks!
She does the most of the chores around the house, she is forcefully married off, all her friends are equally as boy obsessed, and all this girl wants is for someone to actually listen to her and see what she wants.
Henry is representative of that, there is the obvious “She likes him” but i think it goes much deeper than that: She wants to be Henry. I think its inferred pretty heavily throughout that Theresa doesnt want to stay in the village and wants to adventure but unlike henry who is held down by his morality and duty to his parents by CHOICE, Theresa is FORCED to stay. A dove with her wings clipped, and what happens when Skalitz is attacked? She is nearly raped, and only is saved by a man who represents the adventurous ideals of what she wants to live by. To be more meta in terms of themes, her role as a woman is a role she doesnt want and when she is about to suffer a uniquely violent and awful crime against her, she is saved by a man that represents her ideals of freedom and adventure.
Only after does she finally break the rules, she starts attacking, she starts fighting back against the invaders.
The story goes on. But my point of all this is:
This shit woke as fuck.
Even when you’re playing as Henry, talking to Sir Divish’s wife she talks about being married off and being attached to a man, the games realistic interpretation of a medieval society means it is showing just how misogynistic and awful it was for women (and anyone of the lower classes).
And whilst I havent played it, the second game features both a black character and a very well fleshed out gay romance?
It seems to me that the writers and creators are highly interested in showing the beauty and the horrors of living in this medieval world, the good and the very very bad.
So, why is it that the creative director is a pro ai, gamergate loser who bitches about feminism and forced diversity on twitter? Not to mention following pro trump shit (Like Trump Jr)
How? How can the creative director be someone who is bigoted yet be the creator of something so clearly anti bigotry?
Is it a broken clock situation? Or is is that maybe the creator isnt as right wing as he thinks he is? Or is it that the team of writers put these in and he’s more of a figurehead?

I haven’t played the first one, but I have 200 hours in KCD2, and this game seemed woke as shit. So forgive me if i’m a little confused by the fact that the lead writer is an anti woke guy who participated in gamergate. What the fuck? I loved this game and a lot of other lefties do too and now i’m just disappointed😞 Does anybody know more about this subject then me and can tell me i’m completely wrong? Does he not have as much influence on the story as i thought he did? Was the writers room filled with normal people who snuck acceptance under his nose?

Dear all,

I recently stumbled across gameplay trailers for The Defiant and Fourteen Years of Flames, upcoming Chinese games about the Second Sino-Japanese war. It got me ruminating on communist/socialist games and looks set to scratch that COD itch without the glorified imperialism.

It also got me thinking that, outside a few low-fi RPGs like Disco Elysium, Esoteric Ebb, and Citizen Sleeper, I haven’t played many Marxist games (or games that allow you to be Marxist). What are your favourite communist/socialist games? Preference for those that run on steam deck.

Solidarity,
Lou

I know that a woman directed Dragon Age 2, but what else?

I'd especially love to hear about a woman being the lead for something well liked and well respected

Game: Dragon Quest 7 Reimagined

Hi, I'm Hass, and this is my first post here.

See, I'm making a lot of world building for both bots and my tabletop game. And I have a faction that I need help with.

Quick explanation, the lore of the world I'm making is a German victory in WWII leading to a nuclear war, and the far aftermath of it.

There's this faction, the "North Cult", that is a mix of Soviet and Canadian culture. My question is, how could I mix their religious beliefs in nature, ice and winter with socialist ideals?

Ever since the war declaration got called off the amount of people that we got was far beyond what I expected, with us becoming the 2nd most populous nation(if we’re only counting discord members). With the new influx of people we are looking for soldiers to defend ourselves, redstone engineers, and civil engineers. Furthermore, we are looking to bolster the international communist unitok we’re apart of called the S.U.S(Socialists United Society). The other 2 nations being Smoothiestan(left) and our brother nation the Socialist Crimson Republic(middle). If you’d like to join I’ll have the discord in the comments.

We did a rebranding and now wreckers have been removed. Guild is wargaming in general now, not just related to Tacticus. If you want to join our discord then we play a variety of other games besides Tacticus.

The fired Rockstar devs themselves you know the ones suing the company for union busting have said not to boycott GTA 6.Their whole message is to win justice for the people who helped make it and to not punish the people who made it by tanking sales.

If you actually want to help the devs instead of virtue signaling like a neo liberal playing the “let’s vote with our wallet” then the leverage isnt the act of not buying a game it’s to support their unions.

If you really wanted to help the devs you should’ve bought a tshirt from the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain and posted about it way sooner (you know since pre orders are closed now for the t shirts) because the proceeds went straight to the fired workers legal fund. Thats REAL material support instead of a symbolic gesture that costs Rockstar nothing and you just do to make yourself feel good and try to signal that you’re somehow a better socialist.

Edit: I would also like to mention that being a wokescold is hardly productive and just enforces the stereotype that leftists are people who hate fun

Hi. I started playing Helldivers recently, but I’m finding the game unfulfilling without anyone to play with. Does anyone here have a discord server I could join, where we could play Helldivers together?

Hi this is a follow up to my previous post. I have just made a discord server for playing Helldivers. Comment below and I can send an invite to the server

I used to be a huge Naughty Dog fan until TLOU II. It was weird having such a negative reaction to that game and finding the only criticisms were coming out of unhinged cesspools (literally insert any -phobia). It felt like people had to give it 10/10 to distinguish themselves politically from the mob, which made reviews feel inauthentic.

I actually enjoyed the gameplay mechanics and Abby. But that game felt so soulless and made with such an anemic worldview. I was also extra put off by Druckmann & Gross shielding their egos from criticism in a manner that felt really exploitative of racial/gender minorities.

I don’t care to split hairs about whether or not TLOU contains literal allegories for Israel/Palestine. Both Neil Druckmann and Halley Gross still follow the IDF and various Zi0nist accounts. The word performative gets overused but it’s what keeps coming to mind whenever I hear about their social/political commentary in gaming. The work culture set by their studio is a whole other topic altogether.

Intergalactic will be the first ND game I won’t buy because I feel frankly disgusted at this point. It’s just exhausting trying to find criticisms that are not tied to antisemitism or screeds about the Black, masc-presenting female protagonist. Am I just looking in the wrong places?

Lfg Leftist LGBTQ friendly casual looking for some like minded individuals to help me navigate Grounded 1.

Discord: https://discord.gg/5N3zgeV2

I've seen multiple comments on Instagram, Reddit, and YouTube where people have been actively disregarding any criticism for this game, and justifying an absurd price tag for a digital only game. Rockstar is blatantly price controlling this game so that people won't be able to buy cheaper second hand options. They released two trailers (basically teasers), no gameplay at all before allowing gamers to pre-order, with any other game this would be ridiculous, but Rockstar are Rockstar after all, Rockstar wouldn't ever release a bad game. I think it's clear that Rockstar are using their past good will to make as much money as humanly possible from a game. Rockstar are a union busting company, who practice crunch on their employees, and dismisses equal pay. I don't understand how people can ignore this just because "GTA looks pretty", it's so fucking infuriating.

They acted like it was the employees fault for the bad games that have come out as of late. Even though they’re literally just following orders. it’s insane how these same people are quick to call any game they don’t like "cooperate slop" yet will be the first to lick cooperations when they lay off a butch of people. The fact these people went straight to insulting the protesters appearances and ideology shows the lack of class solidarity in gaming spaces. Which isn’t some stunning revelation for me but you‘d expect people who claim to care about "the quality of video games" not to cheer for people losing there jobs. but apparently "leftism ruined video games" so it’s okay. Despite the fact they’ll be even more shitty video games because of this.