FromSoftware proves that we just may be a bunch of Snowflakes after all…

As the gaming industry grows, we see a ton of new gamers joining the ranks. Most, in my opinion are formed from two large groups.

The first is young gamers, who are growing up and are able to invest more time and money into the industry. The second is casual gamers, who are starting to invest more time into gaming, as it becomes a more socially accepted hobby (or in some cases, career). With the growth, however, comes some new arguments that we have to face in light of these new comers not having been exposed to certain “rites of passage”.

The first rite of passage that pops to mind is, “ALL YOU HAD TO DO WAS FOLLOW THE DAMN TRAIN CJ!”

If this sentence is not forever burned into your mind, you may form part of one of the aforementioned groups – sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

These groups would, more than likely have never been exposed to gaming without the internet either. The days when cheats were handing your dad or older sibling the controller and when walkthroughs were tall tales told by your friends on the playground. (I unfortunately had neither older siblings or friends on the playground, so you could say that I am kind of a platinum veteran – look who’s laughing now, social anxiety).

Finally, these gamers were not broken down and built back up by poor quality peripherals. Most of us remember the small (barely color) box TV’s that needed a few slaps to get in focus. Our controllers had short cables (how many times did you pull your Playstation 1 off of whatever surface it was resting on, in a moment of body jolting excitement). The buttons would stick and gaming chairs were the floor. These conditions made us hard. So hard in fact that when TV’s got bigger, quality of the screens got better, controllers became wireless and we got the gaming chairs we deserved, we were conditioned to play better than any other generation (fact).

This still doesn’t address the clickbaity headline though. So buckle up kiddo’s, we’re going to nose dive down this rabbit hole and there’s no turning back.

There’s been a lot of going back and fourth on the interweb about “Sekiro, Shadows Die Twice”. The debate goes like this:

“OMFG can the dickheads that made Sekiro add a freaking difficulty setting”

This is generally followed by:

“Lol git gud scrub”

The discourse that occurs after that won’t be on the post, because I’m a greedy piece of garbage and I don’t want to ruin my chance of monetizing this blog one day. At any rate, the division is clear and both sides seem to be pretty adamant that they’re right. So, here’s the tie-in to the headline.

Snowflakes can be defined as whiny adult-children that are generally found complaining about things that aren’t handed to them. While I think that the word is far less generational and far more a small sample of people who had shitty parents who gave them whatever they wanted (irrespective of their current age), I can’t help but feel an inclination to call those complaining about Sekiro (or any Soulsborne difficulty level game) a “Snowflake”.

You see, I believe in maintaining the integrity of certain institutions. You wouldn’t ask Quentin Tarantino to make a Romcom version of Reservoir Dogs, would you? (If you would, I hope that you can let me know what the Seventh Ring of Hell is like when you get there, because Tarantino is a genius and should be left to live his genius life).

FromSoftware have been making dark, hardcore games since the beginning of their game-making careers (see some of their first titles, such as “Kings Field” circa 1994 and “Shadow Tower” circa 1998). The intensity of these games is their voice.

The cover of FromSoftware's Shadow Tower on Playstation 1

A quick side note - FromSoftware was not actually set up as a video game development company, but rather a business software firm and in my opinion, this fact only further proves that their voice/ style was formed after saying something along the lines of, “F**k you, we’ll do what we want and our games will be as hard as we say they’ll f**king be” but in a Japanese accent of course.

Games with the intensity of something like Dark Souls are few and far between these days and cater to an audience that want to be tested and have their perseverance strained and their concept of sanity shattered. Games like the one’s that FromSoftware make are not there to be lessened in difficulty. Finishing the game is a prized head that should be hung from your wall, after you face the toughest of beasts and stand atop its lifeless corpse at the end of a bloody, tiresome fight and glower down at all those who did not finish the fight, a glint of superiority in your eye and pride pulsating through your veins.

That is what these games are made for. They’re not made to be easy. They don’t hand you a gold medal for casually strolling through the story mode. They spit in your face and tell you to stop playing the entire way through. If this isn’t something you are looking for, the new Paw Patrol game should be dropping soon.

I’m not trying to offend anyone here, but I do think that it should be said that these types of games exist for a very specific audience. You may not be part of that audience and that is 100% fine. No one will judge you if you don’t like it (OK, maybe people will judge you a little). This said, we also can’t expect an entire audience to give up a genre of game that they love, or lessen their experience in that genre, so that you can play it too. We shouldn’t force a developer with a voice that works, to change their voice.

So, if I’ve offended you, I do apologize. If you agree with what I say, drop a like. Either way, I want to hear your thoughts in the comments – maybe I’m way off and you can set me straight. In any case, it’ll be pretty cool to get some discourse going on the subject.

Shot a lot!

Gray (Editor)

GT (PS): n2ut14

IG: graybland14