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Corporate satire in games isn't funny anymore [PC Gamer]

Lant_War

Lant_War

Classic Anus Game
The Fallen
Jul 14, 2018
23,586
Fallout, but something about Obsidian's latest effort left me cold. I stopped playing way before finishing it, despite it being relatively short for an RPG. That was the case due to various factors, but it wasn't just down to my backlog forcing me into my nightly 9 pm paralysis, which invariably leads to Skyrim.

No, it was its attempts at humour that hindered my curiosity to explore the rich and colourful Halcyon system. I'm not referring to the hilariously 'dumb' character builds you can create, but the parody of evil corporations that characterises this troubled part of the galaxy.
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The late-capitalist hellscapes that The Outer Worlds and Journey to the Savage Planet try to ridicule are not hypothetical situations lurking in the future. They exist today. As a result this satire just bounces harmlessly off its targets; it no longer has bite, and therefore, it isn't funny.

Corporate satire in videogames is missing something: hope. Satire needn't be throwaway slapstick like 2019's not-golf game, and the anti-social goose game. It can be constructive; created with the idea that a better future is possible.
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https://www.pcgamer.com/corporate-s..._source=twitter&utm_campaign=buffer-pcgamertw

I have been feeling the same with corporate satire in games recently. I don't know if it's because it does remind me of a sad reality or because most games like this don't go beyond the surface-deep, repeated to death jokes. As bad as the dialogue might've been, I feel like Death Stranding did a much better job at critizicing corporate culture by focusing on hope and positivity rather than old and tired self-mockery.
 
SNRUB

SNRUB

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,010
New Jersey
The Ratchet & Clank games do a good job at parodying corporate synergy. I'm speaking for the PS2 games, less about the PS3/4 titles.
 
Jroc

Jroc

Banned
Jun 9, 2018
6,145
Give me something new. Give me some benevolent corporations with great leadership.
 
ClivePwned

ClivePwned

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,625
Australia
Eh, I love the writing in Outer Worlds (playing it now). But the evil corporation thing has been done to death in Sci Fi for the last 30+ years. But it's either corporation, opposing empire, alien invaders, mad scientist, religious zealots, meglomaniac, evil wizard, etc. You usually need to have an antagonist, and these days you need to give them a reason to be evil, so greed is easy to write for, especially for younger writers who have no living memory of communism evil empire.

Also, is Outer Worlds 2 happening? It's probably my favourite game from 2019.
 

Deleted member 1003

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
10,638
Totally understandable. GTAV's constant satire through the TV shows, radio commercials rarely made me chuckle.
 

Deleted member 49438

User requested account closure
Banned
Nov 7, 2018
1,473
Thankfully I played this via Game Pass. I made it through to the end, but most of the characters I found more obnoxious than funny. The only thing that kept me going to the end was Parvati. I honestly can't remember laughing once...
 
Araujo

Araujo

Banned
Dec 5, 2017
2,196
That is such a broad stroke that feels almost like clickbait.

How about something more nonsensical like "Satire in games ain't what it used to be" ?

It's ok to talk about how what was new once now has lost a bit of it's bite... but this is quite juvenile thinking. Corporate Satire can still be greatly effective as a medium to tell a narrative. It just has to be done well... guess what? Just like every other type of narrative.
 
astro

astro

Member
Oct 25, 2017
56,979
Araujo said:
That is such a broad stroke that feels almost like clickbait.

How about something more nonsensical like "Satire in games ain't what it used to be" ?

It's ok to talk about how what was new once now has lost a bit of it's bite... but this is quite juvenile thinking. Corporate Satire can still be greatly effective as a medium to tell a narrative. It just has to be done well... guess what? Just like every other type of narrative.
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They're talking about a specific played out type that you see in sci-fi, and I agree with them in that it usually feels worn out as it's been done so often.

The style too, like a 1950s "we're your friends" that bleeds over from other games like Bioshock into Fallout into The Outer Wilds.

All I know is TOW felt like a retread immediately in thay regard.
 
Horned Reaper

Horned Reaper

Member
Nov 7, 2017
1,560
TOW was just too much of a been there done that kind of game. Everything felt undercooked, including Its humor. A well written game could still pull off corporate satire in my opinion.
 
TheRulingRing

TheRulingRing

Banned
Apr 6, 2018
5,713
Tbh I think corporate satire just feels hollow and loses all its bite when it's a big corporation creating the satire lol.

It's like they're just rubbing it in our faces.
 
SkoomaBlade

SkoomaBlade

Chicken Chaser
Member
Oct 30, 2017
1,054
I think the problem is that all lot of times it just really isn't all that clever. I haven't finished it but The Outerworlds but I do feel like much of it's corporate satire was just surface level jokes that have been done a million times before at this point and often done better.
 
Dark Knight

Dark Knight

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
19,323
The fuck? Outer Worlds had plenty of hope alongside all the corporate lambasting. The story itself is about a survivor that a corporation tried to murder, that's from a time when corporations didn't own literally every thought in the galaxy. They strive to remind the inhabitants of Halcyon about the free will that is inherent to sentient existence in a chaotic universe.

This opinion piece is just flat out wrong imo.
 
OP
OP
Lant_War

Lant_War

Classic Anus Game
The Fallen
Jul 14, 2018
23,586
Horned Reaper said:
TOW was just too much of a been there done that kind of game. Everything felt undercooked, including Its humor. A well written game could still pull off corporate satire in my opinion.
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Yeah that's mainly the game I was thinking about. It felt so generic on the few hours I played.
 
Dark Knight

Dark Knight

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
19,323
Corporate ownership of all aspects of life in Outer Worlds is sort of the end game for the trope/genre so I'm honestly glad they went ALL THE WAY with it.

While I was playing it, and in retrospect, it felt witty and on point enough to appreciate that dedication to the message.

To be fair I was getting bored of the game in the last 1/3, but it honestly had nothing to do with the world building, story, and lore, and involved more glaring gameplay issues.
 
Meatfist

Meatfist

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,292
The only game I can think of that did corporate satire right was Portal 2, and that was because it really leaned into the absurd rather than just "haha people are disposable"
 
riverfr0zen

riverfr0zen

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,165
Manhattan, New York
It's because the points being made by the satirical narrative never evolve. It's always the same sophomoric criticism of corporations; the banality, how humans are disposable to them, etc. etc. These things were interesting the first time we encountered them in games, but it's not exactly cutting edge commentary anymore. Just tired stories and humor, depressing as an episode of Dateline at 2am in morning.
 
Tuco Benedicto Pacifico

Tuco Benedicto Pacifico

Banned
Oct 31, 2017
8,466
The problem with TOW is that the humor (and more in general the social commentary) about corporate culture is absolutely hamfisted, not to mention entirely front-loaded from the very first minutes of the game.
At no point you are even faced with conflicting ideologies worth any consideration. It's "Corporations are evil, am I right guys?" from the character creation until the credits roll.
 
80s Old School

80s Old School

Banned
Oct 28, 2019
442
From what i read in the OP this article is too broad. It feels more like a stealth diss to Outer Words than any true statement on satire in games. Again and I will keep preaching it, just because you have an interpretation on the themes of a game does not mean you can carry it over to objective fact. How often does corporate greed come up in games and is explored in any detail? What are we comparing? Do two or three games represent the entire gaming spectrum? Because the title is ..."satire in games"" not how I feel about 2 or 3 games.
Also let the salt go and stop comparing a game where writing is literally the central focus of the game to a game where the writing is one of the many elements and also done on a budget for that style of game. Yes Disco has better writing than OW but if Disco's writing was bad the game would be a failure. OW debatable fine writing does it's job and people overlook it's strengths like characterization.
 
Suicide King

Suicide King

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,018
I agree somewhat. Instead of having faceless corporate villains, there should be more liberal-leaning funny enterpreneurs who are into high-fiving minorities but still want poor people to fuck themselves. And more middle class bootlickers that end up being nothing more than mindless fodder.

The broad satires are indeed becoming too common and generic.
 
Ubik

Ubik

Member
Nov 13, 2018
2,496
Canada
There are plenty of worse trends in video games than over the top on the nose corporate dystopias. The writing in TOW was fine. The negative hyperbolic opinions on this game are way more tiresome and generic than the game was.
 
gblues

gblues

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,482
Tigard, OR
TOW isn't satirical. Instead it takes corporate loyalties to their logical conclusion, as the basis for tribes to form around. It's 100% earnest. There is zero anti-capitalist subtext. Which is what disappointed me the most. The character writing carries the entire game.
 
texhnolyze

texhnolyze

Member
Oct 25, 2017
23,184
Indonesia
The Outer Worlds simply has bad writing, which is disappointing coming from Obsidian. Not only the lore and story, the characters are also mostly bland.
 
Fisty

Fisty

Member
Oct 25, 2017
20,232
I was pretty much over it by the time I played Borderlands 2. There have been some funny moments here and there, but it's a bit overdone and a cheap way to get chuckles that dont really have substance
 
Jonathan Lanza

Jonathan Lanza

"I've made a Gigantic mistake"
Member
Feb 8, 2019
6,820
I think it's harder to laugh at when the jokes are coming from companies that have so transparently encompassed everything that "they" are "mocking". It ends up coming off as light jabs at most.
 
Haze

Haze

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,785
Detroit, MI
Calibro said:
TOW and JttSP are just too blunt about it. You gotta be subtle and sharp at the same time.
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Facts. TOW's satire is so painfully on the nose and cartoonish that it's hard to take seriously or get invested in. And I HATE capitalism and I'm invested in the industry. TOW was a match made in heaven but even thematically it misses the mark.
 
Ailanthium

Ailanthium

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,275
You know, I would like to see more games with characters like Ted Faro; multi-faceted corporate heads who legitimately think they're helping the world, but are too narcissistic and self-righteous to realize they are more than a small part of the problem. Give me Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos, not another Martin Shkreli. Those who wear the mask of benevolence are left dangerously unchallenged, and are far more worthy of scrutiny and satire.
 
Teamocil

Teamocil

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,134
Claven said:
This. Ripping into capitalism in Disco Elysium was hilarious, because that game is well written, unlike Outer Worlds.
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Disco was too smart at times. I played a good chunk around some friends and they often had no clue what they were reading. Sometimes I'd be like "wtf does this mean"

admittedly I'm a dumbass so I imagine the general public would have a harder time dissecting it too.
 
riq

riq

Member
Feb 21, 2019
1,688
I mean, I'd more than welcome replacing corporate satire with corporate hate but I don't think AAA devs have that as a priority.
 
DragonKeeper

DragonKeeper

Member
Nov 14, 2017
1,588
It feels false because here in reality, we aren't suffering from "an evil corporation" or a "corrupt millionare". It's the whole capitalist system that's evil.
 
Famassu

Famassu

Member
Oct 27, 2017
9,186
It's not funny because some devs in their infinite "we didn't want to do anything (too) political" wisdom don't go far enough with it. It's toothless because they go for the absolute longest hanging fruits.
 
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