Everybody's Talking At Once

Greg Kasavin stops by to discuss Supergiant's latest, the party-based purgatory-escape-'em-up Pyre. We also find some time to discuss Bastion and Transistor, not to mention the limits of "naked allegory," the largely untapped potential of diegetic Game Over states—and more generally, of game designs that allow for and accommodate failure—and the ballsy magic of filling a game with material that most players will never see.

Ah, and of course, Greg does mention the unique mixture of terror and pride that comes with releasing a game into the swirling masterpiece-maelstrom that is 2017. Quite a year for games, this year of ours.

———

• And here's the Giant Bomb interview that I refer to a few times.

• In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Simone de Beauvoir wrote: "The slave is submissive when one has succeeded in mystifying him in such a way that his situation does not seem to him to be imposed by men, but to be immediately given by nature, by the gods, by the powers against whom revolt has no meaning; thus, he does not accept his condition through a resignation of his freedom since he can not even dream of any other; and in his relationships with his friends, for example, he can live as a free and moral man within this world where his ignorance has enclosed him."

"All The People Say (Season 2)" by Carpe Demon.

Medievalist, archnerd, and outspoken Persona-enjoyer Adam Osborn returns to discuss Persona 5—as well as visual novels, waifus, and Pope Joan, though not always at the same time and not necessarily in that order. Thrill as we trip over each other trying to remark on everything remarkable about this mad JRPG opus.

Persona 5 is an odd beast, even by the series' lofty standards of oddness. It's at once a refined version of existing Persona and Shin Megami Tensei conventions, a savage assessment of Japanese (and global) small-and-large-p politics, and a parable about the indispensable role of punk in everything from education to religion.

If you're new to Persona, and if you've got a few extra hours on your hands, then our previous discussion about 3 and 4 might be a better entry point. And while we have some minor SPOILERS throughout, the really heavy ones start at 01:31:31.

There is also one final boss-related detour from 00:09:05 to 00:10:12.

———

• Shoji Meguro. I can't think of anyone else whose work I like that much whose name I forget that often.

• There's a surprisingly straightforward connection between Persona 5's final boss, by the way, and a certain figure from Gnosticism. (Now, go outside of Gnosticism, and the reference remains relevant but gets a little harder to read).

• Here's a translator's take on the irksome aspects of the English-language script for Persona 5.

• And here's the interview with Katsura Hashino that I mentioned.

• Adam called me out, kindly and succinctly, on my constant use of the word "interesting" as, like, interrogative punctuation.

• Here's that Film Crit Hulk Article again.

• It was indeed Jeremy Bentham who first designed panoptic prisons, and who wrote about the Panopticon as "A new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example: and that, to a degree equally without example, secured by whoever chooses to have it so, against abuse." So that's more than a little relevant to Persona 5's heart-stealing business, not to mention its imagery, I daresay.

• Michel Foucault did then, of course, write extensively about panopticons, most famously in Discipline and Punish. I was weirdly ready to believe that Foucault had somehow been the one to inspire Bentham, not vice-versa, despite Bentham having lived and worked about two hundred years earlier. That's how large Foucault looms (if you've been to grad school, anyway).

• Lastly, but my no means leastly, here's that MonsterTalk episode wherein Robert M. Price talks about Satan, the Devil, and how those two figures became one and the same. A moniker very close to Satanael comes up, even!

"All The People Say (Season 2)" by Carpe Demon.

https://etao.blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/etao-podcast-30.mp3

Medievalist, archnerd, and outspoken Persona-enjoyer Adam Osborn returns to discuss Persona 5—as well as visual novels, waifus, and Pope Joan, though not always at the same time and not necessarily in that order. Thrill as we trip over each other trying to remark on everything remarkable about this mad JRPG opus.

If you’re new to Persona, and if you’ve got a few extra hours on your hands, then our previous discussion about 3 and 4 might be a better entry point. And while we have some minor SPOILERS throughout, the really heavy ones start at 01:31:31.

There is also one final boss-related detour from 00:09:05 to 00:10:12.

———

• Shoji Meguro. I can’t think of anyone else whose work I like that much whose name I forget that often.

• There’s a surprisingly straightforward connection between Persona 5’s final boss, by the way, and a certain figure from Gnosticism. (Now, go outside of Gnosticism, and the reference remains relevant but gets a little harder to read).

• Here’s a translator’s take on the irksome aspects of the English-language script for Persona 5.

• And here’s the interview with Katsura Hashino that I mentioned.

• Adam called me out, kindly and succinctly, on my constant use of the word “interesting” as, like, interrogative punctuation.

• Here’s that Film Crit Hulk Article again.

• It was indeed Jeremy Bentham who first designed panoptic prisons, and who wrote about the Panopticon as “A new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example: and that, to a degree equally without example, secured by whoever chooses to have it so, against abuse.” So that’s more than a little relevant to Persona 5’s heart-stealing business, not to mention its imagery, I daresay.

• Michel Foucault did then, of course, write extensively about panopticons, most famously in Discipline and Punish. I was weirdly ready to believe that Foucault had somehow been the one to inspire Bentham, not vice-versa, despite Bentham having lived and worked about two hundred years earlier. That’s how large Foucault looms (if you’ve been to grad school, anyway).

• Lastly, but my no means leastly, here’s that MonsterTalk episode wherein Robert M. Price talks about Satan, the Devil, and how those two figures became one and the same. A moniker very close to Satanael comes up, even!

“All The People Say (Season 2)” by Carpe Demon.

We’re on iTunes. We’re also on Stitcher and Podbay and Google Play.

Left click to play. Right-click to download.

Drew's good buddy Adam Osborn, PhD-pursuer and self-described archnerd, stops by the discuss the Persona games in anticipation of Persona 5 finally coming out next week (but no, really for real this time).

Starting at the 01:08:24 mark, I should mention, this one does get a TRIGGER WARNING for suicide ideation, because there's no way to do Persona 3's imagery justice without going there. And once it comes up, it does keep right on coming up.

Less importantly (but still not unimportantly, I know, nerds), heavy SPOILERS for Persona 3 and beyond begin at 00:47:00.

From Revelations: Persona, through Personas 2 (not a type-o), on through the series' breakout moment with Persona 3 and 4 and their numerous spin-offs, Adam walks us through the legacy of these literate, resonant, bizarre, and not-even-slightly-subtle creations. We read the latter-day Personas as psychologically rich coming-of-age tales, commentaries on JRPG and anime conventions, devastating simulations of social anxiety, and plenty else.

If you've never played a Persona game (and especially if you're considering making Persona 5 your first), then consider this a primer. If you have, then consider this a retrospective—a bit like what Drew and Lucio recently did with the Dark Souls games—with, yes, some sketchy Jungian analysis thrown into the bargain.

———

• Joseph Campbell is often called a "mythologist," which is about as badass a job title as one could ask for.

• Here's that primer on Aleister Crowley by way of David Bowie.

• And here's that excellent Persona 3 Let's Play by one Monsieur Schildkrote.

"All The People Say (Season 2)" by Carpe Demon.

https://etao.blog/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/etao-podcast-29.mp3

Drew’s good buddy Adam Osborn, PhD-pursuer and self-described archnerd, stops by the discuss the Persona games in anticipation of Persona 5 finally coming out next week (but no, really for real this time).

Starting at the 01:08:24 mark, I should mention, this one does get a TRIGGER WARNING for suicide ideation, because there’s no way to do Persona 3’s imagery justice without going there. And once it comes up, it does keep right on coming up.

Less importantly (but still not unimportantly, I know, nerds), heavy SPOILERS for Persona 3 and beyond begin at 00:47:00.

If you’ve never played a Persona game (and especially if you’re considering making Persona 5 your first), then consider this a primer. If you have, then consider this a retrospective—a bit like what Drew and Lucio recently did with the Dark Souls games—with, yes, some sketchy Jungian analysis thrown into the bargain.

———

• Joseph Campbell is often called a “mythologist,” which is about as badass a job title as one could ask for.

• Here’s that primer on Aleister Crowley by way of David Bowie.

• And here’s that excellent Persona 3 Let’s Play by one Monsieur Schildkrote.

“All The People Say (Season 2)” by Carpe Demon.

We’re on iTunes. We’re also on Stitcher and Podbay and Google Play.

Left click to play. Right-click to download.

Last week, Richard Terrell outlined his framework for taxonomizing and evaluating game criticism, and we spent some time using that framework to disagree vociferously about whether Arin Hanson is any damn good at talking about Zelda.

This week we get into the weeds about the Zeldas themselves, and here's the crux of the issue: Richard feels about Dark Souls the way that I feel about Skyward Sword, and vice-versa. Where he sees rawness and jank in the Souls games, I see a certain stark, boneheaded elegance (as well as jank). Where I feel patronized and slowed to a crawl by the last few Zeldas, he feels nourished by them: "I accept that that stuff is good for me," he says, meaning the descriptive text and careful tutorializing and all.

That might be an unbridgeable gap of taste. But is taste what we're talking about here, or is there something more objective at play? (It will not shock you to learn that Richard thinks there is, and that I disagree).

———

• Here again is Richard's Design Over Time series.

• And Richard was also good enough to share his notes for this conversation, including the ones on Egoraptor.

• When researchers talk about people overestimating their own competence, they usually discuss it in terms of Dunning-Kruger effect.

• Unthinkingly and in the heat of the moment, I used the word gamer. Icky.

• I'm honestly not sure whether the hey-player-here's-what-a-bomb-is-again thing in Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword is a bug or a feature. Richard remembers hearing that it was a bug in an Iwata Asks, but neither of us can find the quote (or one that says the opposite, for that matter). Interestingly enough, if it is a bug, then I suppose Richard would say it's a useful bug—accidentally prodiving the player with helpful refreshers, kind of like how the slowdown in the first Zelda accidentally makes hectic rooms a shade more approachable.

• David Hellman wrote the seminal piece on fussy long-windedness in Zelda games.

• Innuendo Studios did a fantastic piece about semiotics in games and game criticism, using The Beginner's Guide as a jumping off point.

• And here's Cogwatch.

• Richard did a Design Over Time about Bloodborne, in direct response to a video by one Monsieur HBomberguy. He was still working on his video at the time of our conversation, which is why we didn't discuss his critique of Bloodborne (and/or of the Souls fandom) in more specific terms.

"All The People Say (Season 2)" by Carpe Demon.

https://etao.blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/etao-podcast-28.mp3

That might be an unbridgeable gap of taste. But is taste what we’re talking about here, or is there something more objective at play? (It will not shock you to learn that Richard thinks there is, and that I disagree).

———

• Here again is Richard’s Design Over Time series.

• And Richard was also good enough to share his notes for this conversation, including the ones on Egoraptor.

• When researchers talk about people overestimating their own competence, they usually discuss it in terms of Dunning–Kruger effect.

• Unthinkingly and in the heat of the moment, I used the word gamer. Icky.

• I’m honestly not sure whether the hey-player-here’s-what-a-bomb-is-again thing in Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword is a bug or a feature. Richard remembers hearing that it was a bug in an Iwata Asks, but neither of us can find the quote (or one that says the opposite, for that matter). Interestingly enough, if it is a bug, then I suppose Richard would say it’s a useful bug—accidentally prodiving the player with helpful refreshers, kind of like how the slowdown in the first Zelda accidentally makes hectic rooms a shade more approachable.

• David Hellman wrote the seminal piece on fussy long-windedness in Zelda games.

• Innuendo Studios did a fantastic piece about semiotics in games and game criticism, using The Beginner’s Guide as a jumping off point.

• And here’s Cogwatch.

• Richard did a Design Over Time about Bloodborne, in direct response to a video by one Monsieur HBomberguy. He was still working on his video at the time of our conversation, which is why we didn’t discuss his critique of Bloodborne (and/or of the Souls fandom) in more specific terms.

“All The People Say (Season 2)” by Carpe Demon.

We’re on iTunes. We’re also on Stitcher and Podbay and Google Play.

Left click to play. Right-click to download.

Richard Terrell returns to talk about Design Oriented, his attempt to categorize, catalog, and (here's where things get interesting) rate game critique. What's being measured there, and how is he measuring it, and to what end?

Last time, we talked about what games are, what art is, and why he considers those questions so different (whereas I really don't). This time we discuss the purpose of critique, and indeed whether critique even has a singular purpose or an ideal shape. (It won't shock you to learn that Richard thinks it does, and that I disagree).

This discussion got big, so this will be a two-parter. This time, we take Egoraptor's video about the Legend of Zelda series as an example of criticism that I find useful, but that rates poorly (to put it mildly) on Richard's metrics. Where's the disconnect, above and beyond my obviously terrible taste?

———

• Here's the Design Over Time series, which contains some of my favorite stuff Richard's ever done.

• The Ian Bogost book in question is Play Anything: The Pleasure of Limits, the Uses of Boredom, and the Secret of Games.

• Here are those GEICO Raccoons.

• And here's Robert Yang on The Beginner's Guide.

• Richard did indeed share his notes on the Egoraptor Zelda video.

• That magical mirror in A Link to the Past is called "The Magic Mirror." Yup.

"All The People Say (Season 2)" by Carpe Demon.

https://etao.blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/etao-podcast-27.mp3

This discussion got big, so this will be a two-parter. This time, we take Egoraptor’s video about the Legend of Zelda series as an example of criticism that I find useful, but that rates poorly (to put it mildly) on Richard’s metrics. Where’s the disconnect, above and beyond my obviously terrible taste?

———

• Here’s the Design Over Time series, which contains some of my favorite stuff Richard’s ever done.

• The Ian Bogost book in question is Play Anything: The Pleasure of Limits, the Uses of Boredom, and the Secret of Games.

• Here are those GEICO Raccoons.

• And here’s Robert Yang on The Beginner’s Guide.

• Richard did indeed share his notes on the Egoraptor Zelda video.

• That magical mirror in A Link to the Past is called “The Magic Mirror.” Yup.

“All The People Say (Season 2)” by Carpe Demon.

We’re on iTunes. We’re also on Stitcher and Podbay and Google Play.

Left click to play. Right-click to download.

Following on our bummer of a conversation about the most joyful show on television, this week we have an exuberant and hopeful conversation about a series of games focused on violence, failure, and ends of days. Go figure.

Yes, it's time to discuss Dark Souls, and the fandoms attendant thereto.

This week's episode unfortunately comes with a TRIGGER WARNING for sexual assault, since we follow up on the whole Devin Feraci situation, and more broadly, on the complications that arise when an episode sits in cold storage for a few weeks, the world ticking on without our acknowledgement. If you want to skip past that and get right to the Souls talk, then you can jump to 00:03:43.

I'll also mention that SPOILERS ABOUND ONCE AGAIN, in case you care about that kind of thing. (If you find yourself caring more about spoiler warnings than about trigger warnings, do consider taking a quick look in the mirror, though).

• Ocarina of Time did come out in 1998.

• There are definitely some games embracing the low-plygon, low-res texture style, but I've still encountered far fewer of those than games based built around pixels and voxels. If you feel that I'm missing out on some exemplary and/or beautiful example(s), then by all means, let me know!

• I said that Rab Florence made the Fail Forward series, which is not true at all. Rab Florence made Memory System Aging.

• It is in fact Marsh Davies who has blessed us with Fail Forward, including the entirely excellent episode on Dark Souls and Dark Souls 2.

• And here's Super Bunnyhop on what the first Dark Souls has to say about mortality.

• VaatiVidya's work is singularly detailed and fascinating, especially the "lore" and Prepare to Cry stuff.

• Here's what the hell it means to say that "Dark Souls creates its own precursors."

• And here's "The Journey To Kill Everyone In Dark Souls. Yes, Everyone."

"All The People Say (Season 2)" by Carpe Demon.