vanguard333

I think you would love this video then: Interestingly, a damsel in distress that lacks agency is referred to in the trope talks video I just referenced as a classical damsel, and that is a bad thing as it means the character could easily be replaced with a non-sentient plot device without anything being lost. However, there are many other types of damsel in distress that aren't that at all and aren't bad, as the video explains. Would you consider any of those other types that the video mentions to also be damsels in distress?

Nope; from what I've heard, there are no slaves at all. The game also de-synchronizes the player character if they try to attack a civilian during a raid, even though we know full well that that did happen. I suspect that they're omitted because it would be hard for the player to feel great about raiding if it including enslaving people and attacking civilians. Oh, I do. Whenever any these company does something scummy, I am quick to not buy the games that are products of those scummy practices. The one exception was Mario 3D All-Stars, and even there I do regret my purchase to some extent. Besides: This; just "not buying the games" isn't enough; speaking out is also important. Speaking of "callous or incompetent", Hanlon's Razor says never to assume something was done out of malice when it is adequately explained by incompetence, but don't rule out malice as a possibility either. Yeah; it is officially referred to as Celtic Christianity or Insular Christianity or something like that; I just said Catholic because there wasn't any religious divide among Christians in Western Europe, so one may as well just say Catholic. Yes, they had their own nobility systems... in Wales, Cornwall, Ireland, Scotland, and maybe some small pockets of England (I'm not the biggest expert). But as I said, in most of England, they were absorbed into the Anglo-Saxon societies and treated as second-class citizens.

No; I believe a game with a historical setting should try to get its setting as authentic as possible, but I do not expect it and I'm not angered when it gets stuff wrong. What angered me about this is that this inaccurate, stereotypical portrayal comes with a ton of bad implications. Do I really have to further clarify why I would be mad about something like stereotyping?

As I said, I found most of the historical inaccuracies simply laughable rather than irritating; this one got me angry because it wasn't just inaccuracy but was also stereotyping. Does that make sense?

Um... the only sentence where I had the word "bigotry" in it was talking about the treatment of Celtic groups today, as in towards the ones that still exist. My point in that paragraph was about how the same stereotypes used in the game to represent groups that are indeed dead are the exact same stereotypes being used on related groups that are still alive today. Does that make sense?

Yikes. Yeah; I agree that those are definitely also good reasons not to buy any Ubisoft games.

So, Assassin's Creed: Valhalla recently released, set in late 9th-Century England during the Viking invasions, and this game has managed to anger me in a way that I feel I need to get off my chest; hence this rant. I should say right away that I haven't bought the game, as I'm of the opinion that a game with a historical setting should try to make that historical setting as authentic as possible, and all the trailers for the game screamed of what pop-culture thinks of Vikings rather than what Vikings actually were, so I expected nothing in terms of accuracy for this game. And yet this game somehow still managed to anger me. Most of the inaccuracies I heard about or noticed when watching clips of it were laughable rather than irritating, like one recurring Norse architecture in the game being a type of Norse church (in a time period when Vikings were still pagan). But then I heard about and saw how this game portrayed the Celts that were living in England at the time... I enjoy studying Celtic History as I find the cultures that existed very fascinating, and I think it's a real shame that the Celts are rarely looked at in modern media, and when they are, it's usually wrong. So, Celts being portrayed badly is nothing new to me, but this... For context, in this time period, England was dominantly Anglo-Saxon, with the only Celtic region in what is today England being Cornwall (which isn't in the game). There were Celts in the rest of England, but they were a minority that was largely absorbed into the Anglo-Saxon communities, and there's written evidence that shows that they were treated as second-class citizens even during the Viking Invasions. They were also already Christianized; having been Christianized far earlier than even the Anglo-Saxons. So, how does the game portray these Celts? Living in the woods, wearing skulls and antlers on their heads, and practicing spooky fantasy druid pagan ritualistic stuff. What angers me is that, at that point, it's not just inaccurate; it goes beyond that well into the realm of stereotyping by basically being every Celtic stereotype pooled together. For centuries, the surviving Celtic Nations (Ireland, Scotland, Wales, etc.) have been viewed by different nation-states as the backwater of Europe (and let's not even get into how these countries were treated by England specifically), and while there are specific stereotypes associated with each of them (Scotsmen being brave and/or cheap, Irish being leprechauns, Welsh being Wales), all Celtic Nations have been assigned this stereotype: backwards, druidic, etc. Obviously, it's not nearly so bad today, but bigotry is still there, and when a game like this that puts on a veil of history portrays them like this, it's sickening. It isn't helped by other unfortunate implications this game has on top of that: the protagonists (the Vikings) are literally colonizers, and their colonizing is glorified and sensationalized, while a group that was marginalized in that time period is represented entirely by stereotypes that still exist today. How can I not be appalled by that? It gets even worse: they're planning a DLC where the player character gets to invade Ireland and I'm quoting the website: "Explore the haunted wilds and beautiful landscapes of Ireland as you battle a druidic cult known as the Children of Danu" and they've said in trailers that, "the highlight here is really for the players that are more interested in the Celtic, the Druids, and the darker tones that really add to the mysterious feeling of this expansion." What the **** are they talking about?! For one thing, there were no druids! Ireland had already been Catholic for 400 years! One of the most famous illustrated Bibles, the Book of Kells, was published in Ireland over a century before then! And what's all this nonsense about "darker tone" and "mysterious"? Equating "Celtic" to "dark tone and mysterious" just reeks of this stereotyping. What do you guys think? Am I overreacting, or am I right to be concerned about the fact that the game basically represents Celts by a bunch of stereotypes?

Here's the thing though; a fair amount of those "stupid things" aren't necessarily stupid when considered in context; I even looked at some examples of ones you mentioned and explained them in a well-worded, analytical and nuanced way. If you're looking for well-worded, nuanced criticisms, internet comments are rarely the place to look; most people from what I've seen just try to be concise and hope people get what they're meaning. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of dumb stuff said on the internet; the internet is a cesspool after all. But a lot of people are just venting their thoughts on the game, so it's important to interpret what they're saying in the most favourable reasonable light before then going into the criticism.

Here's the thing: I didn't play the demo because I've been busy with two things: 1) University, and 2) finishing Mario 3D All-Stars (I completed 64 and Sunshine while 100% completing the former, so now I'm starting Galaxy). I did hear though about the egg guardian time-travelling in the demo and, if you look back at previous pages of this thread, I did voice my concerns about what it potentially entailed. Why would it have to be a cutscene? Do what Shadow of the Colossus did and have it be a hopeless timed boss fight; that way the character dying is organic story & gameplay integration. In fact, the Warriors gameplay would've been perfect for the second-to-last mission being Link defending Zelda from a bunch of Guardians that just get more numerous and overwhelm him, as well as a final mission of Zelda alone with her sealing powers vs the calamity; compensating for being alone by being able to one-hit KO most enemies by erasing the malice. I more suspect that they either planned a prequel and got cold feet, with someone thinking, "Who wants to play a game where they lose? What if people get mad and demand refunds? (to which I would say anyone buying the game should know going in that they'll lose)", or they thought for some stupid reason that it being a canon prequel would be too limiting, which is utter nonsense. EDIT: I just read up about the game's story and the original characters. I will say that, as much as I'm not a fan of the alternate timeline idea, I do think it could be "salvaged" for me in the sequel with something along the lines of the following idea I came up with: In BOTW2, the Yiga Clan has a new leader, who also goes by Master Kohga, but he is skinny and almost the opposite in personality, and he himself freely admits that "Kohga" is just a name given to each new leader of the clan. When I say different in personality, I mean it: he takes an active role in the story, he's cunning and completely no-nonsense outside of a bit of trolling, his every expression is laced with contempt for Hyrule, and he is wary of Ganondorf and says that Ganondorf is not to be taken lightly despite working for Ganondorf, and he himself says that he's only aligned with Ganon to see his own ambition come about. Said ambition is the complete destruction of Hyrule, as he sees Hyrule as fundamentally flawed and in need of being destroyed, as it's rooted in a perpetual middle ages and cycle of destruction. He is extremely well-learned; possessing (incomplete) knowledge of Ganon's original identity as well as the Curse of Demise and the reincarnation of Hylia and the Hero, and he even uses these as part of his "proof" that Hyrule should be destroyed. He is also extremely competent and pragmatic: not only is he able to use Shiekah tech for teleporting and telekinetically moving spiked balls, but he is also a master swordsman able to dual-wield ancient blades that he keeps hidden in his sleeve. He is also an amputee, with it being revealed that parts of his body have been replaced with Shiekah tech, and here's where the "salvaging" comes in: it is eventually revealed that this Kohga is in fact the original timeline's version of Sooga (the Yiga second-in-command with two swords), with his injuries having been sustained during the Calamity. Basically, picture a mix of these two characters: What do you guys think? Would something like this be potentially neat to see? If there's already a new Yiga Clan antagonist, it would probably take less than a day to program in a reference to Sooga.

Yes, it's fine for a bit of coincidence to happen in a story; you're right about that. What is an issue, however, is a story that depends on contrivances, and that's usually what people mean when they say a story is contrived. A story ideally should be driven by its characters and the actions they make based on their circumstances and who they are. It's okay for contrivances to create the circumstances, but it's not okay for a contrivance to be abruptly inserted to move the plot in a specific direction without character involvement. For just one example of what I mean in popular media in general, the beginning of a story is not just there to introduce us to the setting and world; its main job is to introduce us to the main characters and show us who they are. It's okay for a coincidence cause the inciting event near the beginning of the story, so long as that coincidence immediately prompts a character decision, and that character decision is what truly drives the plot forward. Here are some examples of what I mean: The problem with relying on contrivances to move the plot forward is that stories are ultimately an exploration of their characters and their journeys (even in something like a dystopian novel, as the setting effectively is a character), and relying on coincidences rather than character actions & consequences to move the plot forward are ultimately less meaningful and satisfying, and they hinder the story's immersive potential as they can provoke one particular thought: "...yeah, sure... that could plausibly happen, but we all know all the real reason why that happened." Fates has this storytelling problem: it's plot depends too heavily on contrivances to move forward, and not enough on character, which ties in to another problem Fates has, ultimately one of the biggest problems a story with a large cast of characters can have: This; huge portions of the main cast lack depth or make inconsistent decisions that leave the audience less clear about who they are (and I don't mean their identity when I say "who they are"). Whenever I see someone say something's "too anime" it's usually basically shorthand for something like, "It has too many of the anime tropes that I dislike", which is certainly a valid criticism if one that's on the subjective side of things.

That's really disappointing. I won't; mainly because the prequel premise is the only thing that made me excited for the game at all, but also because I don't want to support deceptive tactics like this. Is it just me, or does this decision the developers and marketers have made just makes no sense at all? If they thought that an actual prequel with all the tragedy and everything wouldn't sell, then why lie? Why not say from the get-go that it's a reimagining of events or something like that? The fact that they marketed this game on being a prequel shows they knew that's what would interest a lot of people, so why didn't they just make a prequel?! It would've been easier to do and would've taken less time, they still could've been creative about it, and it wouldn't disappoint fans! From both a developer's perspective and a business perspective, the decision makes no sense to me.

I don't understand what this is supposed to mean. I realize in retrospect that I could've been clearer in what I meant; I meant that if you have to go outside a game's story to learn something that helps understand that game's story, then that game's story has failed on some level, but if this is supposed to be some sarcastic retort that I wasn't judging the game as a game or something like that (I seriously can't tell because of how it's worded), then that's still a little uncalled for.

Barring the first three Paper Mario games and the Mario & Luigi games, Mario games aren't exactly story-driven (just the opposite). They're platformers, and platformers don't need much story. That said, there actually is some clever worldbuilding in some of the 3D Mario games (hear me out). In 64 for example, each level didn't need to make sense as a cohesive world because they were magic-made worlds from paintings in a castle that is cohesive. The castle makes sense, and the levels are contextualized as painting worlds, so there's no loss in immersion. A game needs as much worldbuilding as that which enables it to make sense for immersion. For platformers, not much is needed. For something like an RPG, however, a fair bit is needed. Thanks. If you have to go outside the game to find that piece of info though, then the game has failed on some level. If you have to go outside a story to find a piece of info that helps understand said story, then the story has failed on that level.

Please do not jump to accuse me of strawmanning; I do not take such accusations lightly. I was responding directly to your statement: you argued that saying that, "Fates doesn't have good world building therefore the writing is bad" and thinking that every story needs to have amazing worldbuilding is a reductive argument, and that the game's story doesn't need good worldbuilding to still be good. I then replied by saying that I agree that the worldbuilding doesn't have to be amazing for the story to be good, but my issue (and I suspect that it's also the more popular issue) with the worldbuilding is that there are cases in the game's narrative of the poor worldbuilding hindering the story. So, yeah; don't jump to accuse me of strawmanning; I read through people's arguments carefully, interpret them in the best possible light that I can, and then respond. I do not strawman. You don't need to know the complete history, no. I agree that all one needs is the information that's relevant to the plot. Here's the thing: there are moments where relevant information is either missing from the story or scattered in such a way that it does hinder the story and raise questions that pose problems for the plot. For one example, the stated reason Nohr is declaring war with Hoshido is that it's land is barren to the point where it needs to conquer more fertile lands to survive. That's pretty important, as it is the driving motivation for many to take part in an aggressive war against a non-hostile nation. When do we learn about this? Late into Birthright, and only late into Birthright. It never comes up in Conquest despite Corrin siding with Nohr in that version. That is a piece of worldbuilding with a large amount of plot implications, and it goes completely unmentioned in Conquest. And this is a common criticism that I see brought up a lot. For another example, Azura's necklace & magic song slowly killing her the more she uses it is brought up only in Birthright. It is never even foreshadowed in Conquest. So, in Birthright, it's a fairly sad moment where Azura gives everything to suppress Garon's power and dies in the process. The equivalent with her suppressing Takumi at the end of Conquest just raises a whole lot of questions at it seems to appear out of nowhere. This is admittedly more a problem with bad exposition than bad worldbuilding, but I'll include it. I would list more examples, but I need to eat supper.

I'm replying to all of what you said; I'm just cutting it for space. I agree with a lot of what you're saying. The game does seem to go out of its way to essentially harm its own narrative just to include different mechanics. I am of the opinion that story and gameplay ideally should inform each other, so when I see them either separated from each other or outright in opposition with each other, it is weird. That said, I think it's less that it's an easy target for criticism, and in fact less with the game itself, and more what the game is emblematic of: this game was made at something of a boiling point of division among FE fans in the wake of Awakening's unexpected huge success bringing in a whole bunch of new fans to the series, and it shows in the game itself. Looking at the game pre-release and when playing through the finished product, I always got the sense that the game was made to try to cater to everyone. The developers outright said that Birthright was designed to be like Awakening and Conquest was designed to be like the older games. But more than that, the gameplay and all its many features, a lot of which seem to more simply be there than be their in service of other aspects of the game (like the 2nd gen units) seemed to me at least to largely have just been thrown in, like they were throwing in everything they could think of to see what fans would like and what fans would not like. But, when you try to cater to everyone, the result is often directionless and mush. You mentioned the Blood Pacts from Radiant Dawn and other writing issues in other games, and the way I see it is that those writing issues are often seen as blemishes on otherwise at-least decent stories. With Fates, a lot of its storytelling problems are widely pervasive; they are not individual components, but widespread issues that have a pattern behind them and why they're there. just genuinely wondering (so please don't infer anything harsh from this as that's not the intent): are you familiar with the Strawman Fallacy? In critical thinking, one is supposed to interpret an argument in the most favourable light that's reasonable, and then criticize it in the least favourable light that's reasonable. Skipping that interpretation step leads to a strawman fallacy: where an argument is misinterpreted as weaker or less structured than it is, often in order to make it easier to criticize. I ask because I feel that, whenever I see people complaining about complaints, the strawman fallacy is often a concern of mine. Anyway, that out of the way, now to discuss what you're saying here: I don't think that anyone would argue that the game needs to have the same level of worldbuilding as Genealogy to have a good story. Story and worldbuilding are interrelated, but ultimately separate issues. That said, worldbuilding is important to storytelling in something like an RPG, as one of the biggest components of an RPG is immersion, and worldbuilding is integral to immersion. Worldbuilding sets the stakes, establishes potential motivations, etc. The problem with Fates' poor worldbuilding is that it does have an obvious negative impact on its story. It's not "worldbuilding bad, therefore story bad", it's "one of the things hindering the story is the poor worldbuilding in its foundation".

Drat; I didn't notice that Divine Beast. Now my concerns have returned and are elevated tenfold. If this game really is an alternate scenario and not an actual prologue to Breath of the Wild, then I'm not getting it. Don't interpret that as me being petty, because I say this not out of frustration or disappointment (though I'm certainly feeling those emotions), but out of disinterest. I'm not normally interested in Warriors gameplay; what drew me to this game was the idea of experiencing the Calamity; experiencing a prologue to BOTW, with all the story elements that were only alluded to in ruins, journal entries and flashbacks. This is Star Trek: Enterprise and a bunch of other early-to-mid 2000s TV shows all over again: I didn't want time-travel nonsense reimagining of a story for which I never got to see the original version; I want to see the original version.

Can deuteragonists (secondary protagonists, like Elincia in Path of Radiance) count? If so, then here's my list: NES & SNES Era: Marth Caeda Alm Celica GameCube & Wii Era: Ike Micaiah Elincia Sothe DS & 3DS Era: Robin Lucina Corrin Azura Switch Era (DLC or Sequel): Byleth Edelgard Dimitri Claude Rhea Bear in mind that this is just who I would like to see; I didn't include anyone from the GBA era because I never played those games and don't have any opinion on the characters in them; it's the same reason there's no Genealogy or Thracia characters either.

Am I supposed to watch one or both? I'll just watch the second video. Like a 21st Century Don Quixote/10

Hey, there's a new launch trailer: 0:51 Well, there's goes my theory of the hooded character being Twinrova. I have to say, this has alleviated some of my concerns, as it looks like the Calamity will be playing out as intended after all. However, if that's the case, then why have the guardian be a time-traveler in the first place? Is it just because it didn't appear in the memories in BOTW?

Option 4: They're a mixed bag that I'm torn on. In fact, @Jotari can you please add torn/mixed as a fourth option in the poll? On the one hand, a chapter where the player has fight what basically amounts to the medieval fantasy equivalent of an artillery division is an inherently interesting premise with a ton of potential, and I do think that the chapter lived up to at least some of that potential. I do think it of all chapters probably best embodied the lesson of guiding your units carefully. I like that it makes you have to be especially careful with flying units and want to rely more on your infantry and cavalry. It's definitely an idea I would like to see return in a future FE game. That said, the chapter can be a bit of a slog to get through. It's not difficult; it's just that it can take quite a while to get through. There are certainly gaps, but most of the time, if your units are in a spot where they can attack 1 ballistician, they are in range of 2 more.

I didn't mean it like that; I simply meant that she got the most focus: the game's theme song is about her, she probably appears more often (and more prominently) in the trailers than Byleth does, etc. Does that make sense? I suppose, though there is a fair bit of implication, and Link's Awakening is possibly the only (or at least the first) early Zelda game to make a romantic tone very overt, so I figured that she'd count. Also, thanks, both for answering my questions and for what you said about my moveset suggestion for Marin.

Since my questions weren't answered but people who replied after me mentioned Marin and love-interests of DLC fighters, I may as well list which ones I would add: 1. Edelgard: I still maintain that it would've been better if she had been chosen than Byleth, since she's not only a more unique fighter but also the real mascot of Three Houses. She would be a small and heavy unit (thus very difficult to send flying), and she would be armed with axes, dark magic and possibly battalions either for a specific special move or for her final smash. 2. Marin: She would be a fragile speedster. She uses various items from Link's Awakening that are not part of any Link's arsenal, including: the magical rod, magic powder, pegasus boots, and the shovel. She can also sing the three songs from Link's Awakening, each with a different effect: Manbo's Mambo allows her to teleport, similarly to Farore's Wind Frog's Song of Soul summons the Flying Rooster for an attack The Ballad of the Wind Fish awakens the Wind Fish for her final smash She can also use Bow-Wow for her smash attacks, and her grab is the Trendy Game Crane. 3. Tifa: This one is mainly for the obvious moveset potential.

Interesting. Now I finally understand the perspective of those who decried Wind Waker and Majora's Mask and wanted another Twilight Princess. I honestly didn't care at all about Wind Waker or Majora's Mask being different; probably because my first Zelda experience was the collector's edition on the GameCube (which had the first game, Adventure of Link, Ocarina, Majora's Mask, and a 20-minute demo of Wind Waker), so I experienced all three games at once. I even thought Four Swords Adventures was a neat idea as I have two siblings and it would allow us to play a Zelda game at the same time (imagine how ripped off we felt when we realized that the multiplayer required those Gameboy Advance cords that we didn't have). I never saw the E3 announcement for Twilight Princess, but I did see all the other trailers and ads for it. It never struck me as "another Ocarina of Time"; it struck me as a new Zelda game that, where Majora's Mask was an endless gloomy race against time and Wind Waker was an adventure in the open sea, would instead be a grand fantasy epic and battle of light vs darkness, good vs evil almost akin to something like Lord of the Rings or... I can't actually think of another grand fantasy epic like that off the top of my head. I thought Link now being essentially a werewolf was a great idea with tons of potential. So, yeah; I was just as hyped as everyone else, but I wanted another experimental game while standing alone in a sea of people wanting an Ocarina of Time re-release, and I did not understand why everyone else in that sea wanted what they did. So, yeah; one can see why I eventually ended up in the crowd of coming down hard on the game for being another Ocarina of Time. Don't get me wrong; Twilight Princess is a good game, and there were definitely moments that felt really epic. I just wish the climate at the time wasn't full of fans that were angry at anything that wasn't Ocarina; perhaps then Twilight Princess could've been something even more. Perhaps Wolf Link wouldn't have been really underutilized as a gameplay mechanic, and perhaps the game could've been even better tailored towards being that grand epic. Apparently, both Eiji Aonuma and Shigeru Miyamoto have expressed regrets regarding Twilight Princess; Eiji regrets that he didn't make the game as grand or epic as he intended and the team focused too much on the size of the world and not enough on fully utilizing that space, while Miyamoto feels, looking back, that the game is missing something.

What about Marin? Why is she not on the list? Also, would the love-interest of a DLC Fighter count?

Definitely an anime opening song.