Review: "Never Alone and the Need for American Indian Narratives in Games" by Daniel Starkey, Polygon

Original article here.

This is a particularly difficult article for me, since I'm Alaskan Native. As the author says, it's often up to Natives to prove they are what they claim to be, but suffice it to say I get money from my regional corporation. So, there, I guess that works?

Here's the thing: I get the point of this article. I really do. When I saw Never Alone I sort of felt obligated to buy it as a form of showing support to my heritage or something.

Well, on to the article. After his introduction, which I didn't really see much issue with, he says this:

And that brings us, somewhat laboriously, to Never Alone. I reviewed the game for Eurogamer last year, awarding it a 10/10. This was before that publication dropped scores altogether. At the time, my choice was somewhat controversial. I caught flak on Twitter and other social networks; people thought that it wasn't fair for me to praise a game that had some admitted technical issues so highly.

Okay. If the game has highly publicized flaws and issues with the game, why in God's name would you award it a 10/10? You have a responsibility when reviewing to let your readers/audience know the quality of the game, and clearly this game is good, great even, but hardly perfect. So, let's see how he defends this.

But that choice came from my experiences as someone that constantly struggles to balance the traditional and the new. I've always loved technology and the distractions that they provide. One of my Elders, before she passed away, often chastised me for texting when I should "be still," for spending too much time on the internet, and not enough time "walking the land."

He didn't defend it at all, instead tossing out a Red Herring in the form of his Elder passing away. Why did he award a perfect score to a flawed game? He tries to explain after a long and heart-felt story about his experiences with an elder who passed away.

While I was writing my Never Alone review, I was struggling with my own past. I was grappling with my own loss, and desperately searching for some way forward, some kind of peace that I could hold onto and walk with. Balancing that fatalism, against the optimism that a game like Never Alone demands from its audience, took time for me to internalize and understand.

But still, no explanation. He had issues and it resonated with him, I suppose, but that doesn't excuse giving a very flawed title a perfect score.

I had the opportunity to speak with a few of the folks on the team for a bit in person a couple months ago. They said they were grateful for my review. Not for the high score I gave their game, but for the way in which my words touched and inspired the team. Knowing that they could have such a strong impact on someone else's life gave them their own hope to keep making these sorts of games.

Then give it an 8 or 9 out of 10, but include those wonderful praises. Giving it a high score is worse than buying it out of "obligation" like I felt I had to. I'm not informing my readers that the game is perfect, because it isn't. Instead I'm just playing it on my own and supporting the developers in that way. I get that you want people to play it. That's fine, I do as well. But don't pretend like it doesn't have flaws.

What I took from Never Alone is my own experience. It meant more to me than just about any game I've ever played. Nothing had ever spoken to me like that, or tapped the struggles of modern Native life.

Yeah, I get that. It meant a lot to you to see something similar to your culture expressed on screen. Only it's closer to my culture, but even then not exactly. I can feel an obligation to play it because they're fellow Alaskan Natives, but the Inupiat differ from my own Athabaskan roots. I can feel a connection to them and an obligation to play and purchase their game, but the culture is their own and I'm just an observer. I can share it and share in it, but it doesn't have the same meaning to me as it does them. To them, it's a very personal thing, but to me I can only tell that it's personal.

He speaks to a developer named Renee Nejo about the game, and it's very interesting. If you don't know much about native history, I would check it out. But then he says this:

Never Alone was never intended to be purely an act of preservation, but to give hope to a people in the face of centuries of oppression and colonialism.

Okay. You lost me. Is it stupid that Russians can pass off the land that doesn't belong to them to the United States, who it also doesn't belong to? Sure. But why would you mention colonialism and oppression? Is it to bolster an otherwise meaningless article that had given me no reason to read it until that line? Tommy Wiseau gives readers/audiences more reason to care. Tossing in a reminder to the white readers that they should care because we've had crappy stuff happen to our ancestors does nothing to help your article.

For the most part, the conversation about Never Alone has been dominated by non-Natives that have misinterpreted the game as a sort of digital museum piece, instead of what it is — a clarion call for Natives to stand up and be proud of who they are.

No, that's one interpretation, which is just as valid as mine that it was an attempt to share a culture with people who know nothing about it.

(Oh and to the non-native moron in the comments complaining about the term "Indians"... just stop. It makes you look ignorant. Most natives who count as "American Indians" don't mind the term.)

Is Never Alone a good game? If you don't mind slow pacing and a somewhat empty environment. But this isn't my review of the game, this is my review of the article. All in all, Starkey doesn't do a bad job at Polygon, but he never fully explains the reason for the perfect score. It seems like he gave Never Alone a 10/10 because he's a native and it's a native game. If that's the case it's an injustice to Eurogamer's readership. But, I suspect it was more innocent than that. I suspect he gave it a perfect score because he genuinely liked the game, and if that's the case it should be fine.

I may have been a bit hard on him. I think it's because his article touched a nerve with me, and it's that my kin hardly ever get recognized outside of Alaska (where many a redneck treats natives like crap). The culture is unique and something so interesting. Maybe I just get jealous that so many other Americans seem to love Japanese culture and foods, but pays no attention to the natives in their own land? I'm not sure.

The Problem with the Metroid Prime: Federation Force Petition

A petition on Change.Org is nearing towards 20,000 signatures, as of this writing.

I don't normally review petitions, instead sticking to the premise of this blog (game journalism), but in this case I'll make an exception. This story is going around and the news sources are painting games as entitled, whiney children petulantly seeking their own self-worth. I think that's not fair. So, let's look at this petition in detail, and see what the problem is:

Metroid Prime: Federation Force was announced at the Nintendo digital event on June 16, 2015. For almost a decade, long time Nintendo fans have been waiting for a true Metroid game. Metroid is one of Nintendo's most beloved and respected franchises spanning almost 30 years of legacy. The foundations of isolation, atmosphere and exploration in unknown planets are what made Metroid great. With the release of the Wii U and its greater technological capabilities thousands of fans were expecting a new and improved Metroid game. 

So the opening paragraph sets up what the author's argument is, in two parts: (1) Metroid has historically been dark, a game of isolation (except maybe Hunters?), and (2) players were expecting a new actual Metroid game. Fair enough, let's go on.

What we got however is a disgrace of a game with the name "Metroid" slapped on the title. It has no elements at all of what Metroid is about and its a disrespectful manner to old and new fans of the series of showing them that the Metroid franchise is not dead afterall. This is not the Metroid we asked Nintendo to make.

And here's the realization of the two arguments in the first section. This new game is not about isolation, because it's a multiplayer game. It's not dark, it's colorful. It's hardly got any elements of what makes a Metroid game a Metroid game.

Or does it? The argument fails to address that the controls and the look of the game match closely with the Metroid Prime series. While it is a multiplayer game, it still has the look of the series, and while not matching with the Metroid series as a whole, it is in the same universe as that series.

I think Nintendo is able to do this well, and the game is probably going to be fun (not so sure about Blast Ball, but whatever).

We should let Nintendo know what we really think of the game and make them actually LISTEN to their fans for once. Help us stop this atrocity of a game from bearing the beloved Metroid franchise name and make Nintendo halt production on it.

I was on board with you for most of this petition. I think this isn't the Metroid game fans of the series wanted, and it's a universe multiplayer game fans didn't want to be involved in. So who was this game made for? Obviously, it's a gap-filler. What I mean is it's like Link's Crossbow Training, where it's in the universe (kind of) but not really a game in the series. It fills a gap because Nintendo isn't currently developing a title in that series, so they just use the assets they have to make something fun and cheap.

The problem I have with this petition was that is asks Nintendo to "halt production on it". No, this isn't fair. I may dislike the game and think it's a crappy replacement for a good game, but I'm not going to ask Nintendo to halt production of it. I'll just vote with my wallet like a normal gamer.

Just Nintendo gamers hanging out in a creepy white room.

Do I think the petition's creator and signers are entitled? Absolutely not. They're justifiably angry at Nintendo for seemingly cutting corners. I don't see a problem with that anger other than their demanding Nintendo halt production on something they've already showed off at E3.

So, these are my problems with the petition. I'm not sure it really addresses what the game is, and why Nintendo's making it. I would hope the petition creator would remove the language demanding Nintendo halt production of a game that's already mostly complete. It just seems petty.

Review: "Over 12,000 sign petition to cancel Metroid Prime: Federation Force" by Dan Pearson, GameIndustry.biz

Original article here.

I am an avid reader of GameIndustry.biz. I like reading more about the industry of games than the political coverage or enthusiast press coverage of games. Typically, GameIndustry.biz tries to remain impartial as to the arguments of gamers and the game journalists (read: the Mass Effect 3 fiasco and GamerGate). Though to be honest, their coverage as of late has mimicked the coverage one might expect on Kotaku. This article is no different.

It starts out promising, as coverage on a simple petition about games should:

Incensed 'fans' call forthcoming 3DS game an "atrocity"

A petition seeking to halt the development of Nintendo's Metroid Prime: Federation Force, a 3DS title which was announced during the firm's E3 Digital event, has passed 12,000 signatures in just 2 days, rapidly approaching its goal of 15,000.

This is factual and simply explaining the situation. However, the subtitle putting quotes around "fans" is confusing to me. Is the author suggesting these people petitioning Nintendo due to their deep-seated respect for the Metroid Prime series aren't fans?

Then the author does something that should be avoided in most cases when reporting on a controversy:

Currently, it's slated for a 2016 release. Frankly, it doesn't look like a classic, but The Internet is furious.

He invokes the internet. No, Pearson, the internet is not furious. The internet is either a collection of networks for computers to interact on or a group of people. If you mean the group of people, a small number of them know what Metroid Prime: Federation Force is and an even smaller number actually care one way or the other.

After he quotes from people on the petition (fans who are angry that the game they waited for is being sidelined for a multiplayer party game), he gives his opinion on the matter. I will say it's perfectly acceptable for him to do this. He's presented the petition's argument, so now he's going to present his own and contrast them.

Maybe there's some justification for frustration, given that many feel Nintendo put on a relatively weak E3 performance overall. Given that it's been five years since the last full Metroid release, perhaps fans do have a right to be upset that a not-brilliant looking spin-off on 3DS, rather than a full-scale Wii U game, is being put out under the Metroid masthead. You could argue that, finally, people have lost patience with the endless reworking of old IP - even that they have a right to be disappointed after the wonderful Splatoon reminded them of what the company can do when it finds its inspiration. But really, atrocity?

Unfortunately it starts from a poor place. Complaining about the language and not the argument is a problem. If he had left that little bit out this might have been a good paragraph, but it gets much worse:

So entitlement, particularly amongst fans, is nothing new. One of the consequences of the democratisation of mass media is that there are more messages to be heard, that previously relatively isolated opinions become movements - sometimes for good, sometimes for ill. Is there a lesson to be learned by Nintendo here? A warning to heed? Perhaps.

Yes, "entitlement". I'm getting flashbacks to IGN's (at the time) Colin Moriarty openly crapping on Mass Effect fans who hated the ending to the third game. These "movements" as he puts them, are connected to entitlement. He doesn't explain the connection, he just makes it. I really really don't like this. It removes any blame from Nintendo that he might have given in previous paragraphs and puts it directly on the fans of the series.

He ends with this:

But there's definitely a very clear snapshot of the power of consumer feeback [sic] which increasingly surrounds the industry - and the need to find a way to either appease or mollify it. Generally, it behoves the companies involved to do their best not to acknowledge the anger of what is almost always the minority of its audience, but Nintendo might not currently have that luxury. Whether it's a reflection of the sentiment of the wider fanbase is debatable, but the firm's reaction could be pivotal to the perception of its position.

Which is better. It is true the angry fans in one of these controversies are typically the minority. But minority of what? Fans? I suspect most Mass Effect 3 fans were upset at the ending of the game, but only the ones willing to pour their time into that anger took to social media to demand BioWare do something about it. Saying these people are the minority does them an injustice, because it marginalizes their concerns. The real number of people pissed about Nintendo's decision could easily be the majority of people who wanted a new Metroid Prime game and not a robot soccer game. There's honestly no way of telling, but I would say that a huge number of angry people willing to take time out of their day to complain about anything on the internet proves that there is an even larger group angry and unwilling to engage with you.

So ultimately Pearson does a good job. I don't give numerical ratings for these journalist/blogger pieces, but he did well. I may complain about the use of "entitled" and the marginalization of fan concerns, but he didn't do as bad as some of the clickbait sites.

First Post

Welcome to Game Journalism Review! This is a blog where I, Frank Gamer, can review articles and reviews of games and keep the game journalists honest.

I hope you'll join me on this mission!