![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
progI've been enjoying the heck out of Bully: Scholarship Edition, the recent re-release of the 2006 Rockstar game for Wii and XBox. (I got the XBox one.) I picked it up after it dropped in price to $30, which I assume is a reaction to GTA IV's existence. Bully is basically a total conversion of the Grand Theft Auto engine, with a "high-school hijinx" theme applied.
It's fun to play a tightly scripted sandbox game where the PC isn't a murderous psychopath (he's still a jerk, but at least a jerk-with-a-code). You can still attack random strangers, but it takes significantly more effort than in GTA, and there's less reward. So it feels natural to just leave all the bystanders alone and concentrate on completing missions - which are a blast. (I've completed over 50 missions, according to the stat screen.) It seems to be that the designers achieved a significant tonal shift with a very subtle rules tuning, and I like this.
"Of course", it wouldn't be a Rockstar game without being wincingly misogynistic in ways not worth describing or defending. (It also treats all men as either (a) assholes or (b) gay, but this is not a valid defense.)![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
chocorisu is correct in calling Rockstar games gamer porn, and as such, the optimal way to enjoy it is to skip past the bits you don't like, and focus on the rest of it. (Yeah, I know. Sorry.) And if someone tells you that the game is pretty horrible, all you can do is shrug and agree, really.
It's fun to play a tightly scripted sandbox game where the PC isn't a murderous psychopath (he's still a jerk, but at least a jerk-with-a-code). You can still attack random strangers, but it takes significantly more effort than in GTA, and there's less reward. So it feels natural to just leave all the bystanders alone and concentrate on completing missions - which are a blast. (I've completed over 50 missions, according to the stat screen.) It seems to be that the designers achieved a significant tonal shift with a very subtle rules tuning, and I like this.
"Of course", it wouldn't be a Rockstar game without being wincingly misogynistic in ways not worth describing or defending. (It also treats all men as either (a) assholes or (b) gay, but this is not a valid defense.)
chocorisu is correct in calling Rockstar games gamer porn, and as such, the optimal way to enjoy it is to skip past the bits you don't like, and focus on the rest of it. (Yeah, I know. Sorry.) And if someone tells you that the game is pretty horrible, all you can do is shrug and agree, really.![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-07-22 10:44 pm (UTC)I wouldn't say it gets exactly nuanced later in the plot but it did redeem itself, at least for me.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-22 11:08 pm (UTC)