-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Concerning Spider-man's pro-NYPD/surveillance state messages
- Thread starter Supermanisdead
- Start date
OHHHHHHHHHHHHH....I've got a history lesson for you.
Bullshit.
You can't have a story with any sort of twist or punch without a political statement. There are DOZENS of political statements in Spiderman.
Like the author of the Deadspin article, I'm not very far into the game, but I got the impression that the towers just facilitated communication among the NYPD. When you hear about a crime on the radio, you often hear dispatch saying something like "there are reports of" such and such crime, implying that the crime has been called in. Also, for the few early game missions I've been on, you hear Yuri say that she needs Spider-Man to get probable cause for the police to be able to investigate certain areas. I guess I can see some concern over the government using Spider-Man to circumvent normal procedure, but Spider-Man does that on his own regardless.
Has there been concern over this in Batman? I don't recall the Arkham games having anything that was exactly like the radio towers, and I know having the public question whether Batman is a good guy or a maniac is a common theme for the franchise, but Batman often teams up with the police commissioner, who also happens to have the Bat Signal. I'm not sure where the difference is in these scenarios.
Has there been concern over this in Batman? I don't recall the Arkham games having anything that was exactly like the radio towers, and I know having the public question whether Batman is a good guy or a maniac is a common theme for the franchise, but Batman often teams up with the police commissioner, who also happens to have the Bat Signal. I'm not sure where the difference is in these scenarios.
Bruh, everything is a political statement because the things that you do, say, and create reflect your values, and values are political.
Man, I should inform Kiran Bedi she's been doing her job wrong.
For real
Officer officer overseer
And again, it's not about individual police, it's about the police institution and who/what they protect and who/what they don't
This right here, they aren't spying on anyone, where did this idea come from. I am at 83% complete and not once has it been hinted at that they are spying on people, just that they are connected to Police scanners and alarms. JJJ mentions it in a podcast because he's paranoid and says that they are listening to him talk to his wife, that's it.
Yup, the fact that he beats up corrupt cops in the first hour and his comments to cops in general that they don't trust him and they try to stop him from doing things shows how much trust he doesn't really have in them. Just because he's going around and stopping crimes doesn't mean he loves everyone on the force. He says things int he game that directly hints he's not a big fan of them.
I don't think there's anything wrong with how the NYPD is presented in Spider-Man. It's NYC, but an alternate version in the world of Marvel where supervillains are constantly causing havoc. The system they have in place makes sense given the context - which doesn't really seem like spying a la the system in that Batman movie; it's just a way to effectively curb crime which happens pretty often in the game.
Jameson is basically Alex Jones. I had to mute him after an hour into the game. Dunno if he tried to pitch water filters or "super male vitality pills" as well.
Jameson is basically Alex Jones. I had to mute him after an hour into the game. Dunno if he tried to pitch water filters or "super male vitality pills" as well.
Batman pushed to the extreme is fucking fascist trying to control everyone's behavior.
It's shown in a lot of material.
Re: Batman, look up Brother Eye. Bruce doesn't know the meaning of civil liberties.
I wish he had played through the whole game to experience the events of the later acts and how Spider-Man fights against them, but ok
I'm sorry you have to read any of this horse shit.
I hope you guys realize that 99% of the audience is just loving every second of this game. Not saying discussions can't be had, but this is just nitpicking to the extreme IMO, and you said, not even remotely correct.
Same goes for that "which web swinging is better?" thread lol.
I mean, she's Indian, so...it's a little different.
Like keep in mind, we're talking about american cops. I sort of don't understand why people would say "not all police" and point to europe and Asia when we're talking about the fictional and nonfictional overreaching of the american police forces. I can't comment on how the police force in India is, I've never and probably will never have any interaction with them.
But american cops? The NYPD especially? I could tell you some stories.
Ok?
Makes it even sweeter that I can use an old tweet of his to summarize his current thoughts.
I don't want to spoil much, but he goes directly against the policed state idea the further you go into the game, yeah this article is nonsense.
It's not about individual corruption. Or individual honor. Portraying police injustice as the result of a few bad actors is misleading and dangerous.
I haven't played the game yet but don't put your hopes into Peter Parker knowing what is good and bad when it comes to government programs. In the comic version of Civil War he is a grown man(we can say he joined Tony because he was a naive kid in the comics) and throws his chips in with the side that wanted every person to give up their secret identities and register with the government. He's not good with privacy issues.
What do they have to do with the american police force?
I dont know the history of all of them, but India's police force was only built to protect colonial interests, and up to modern day have been complete trash in protecting women and religious minorites.
Batman is constantly put under scrutiny, both within fiction and in life, with the comics, movies, and games going to extra lengths to try and not paint him as purely just a billionaire punching and crippling poor people. The Arkham games also have gone to ridiculous lengths to pull civilians almost completely out of the scenario aside from some asylum employees and the stray reporter in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just about every single person running around in the Arkham games is considered a violent criminal, and the game assuming that all of Batman's methods and tools are non-lethal. Hell, running people over with the Batmobile literally "electrocutes" the person the moment before impact so they technically get pushed away.
There aren't any "normal" crimes for Batman to stop in those games.
Man, this game is amazing.
Don't listen to all this bullshit.
Loving the game, great job!
You'd be correct in assuming the towers are merely communication devices. Like big cell towers, but for police broadcasts.
And yes, Batman has had these issues. Maybe no so much in the Arkham games, but in other media. A big point in The Dark Knight was Lucius almost quitting because he didn't want to be a part of Batman monitoring the entire city to find Joker. But in that instance, Batman WAS monitoring civilian cell-phones and cameras. Nothing like that happens in Spider-Man.
I must say, reading this thread made me realice even more how different living conditions in certain countries are. As a german living in a rural place, i didn't ever questions the integrety of our police force. Of course as we are all humans we commit mistakes and the political guidance isn't always ideal, but to live in a place were you cannot trust your civil servants, must be sad.
Honest questions here. Do people believe that hardcore drugs or police forces have cause more harm to the black community in the USA? Is the amount of black people killed by cops anywhere near the amount of deaths caused by drugs or drug related activity? Do you guys think that the only reason drugs are a real problem is because these same police forces target black drug users/dealers and incarcerate them disproportionately compared to whites?
I'm only 52% through the game, but I do think that it's a fair critique, as is critique about Spider-Man's excitement over beating up drug dealers. This isn't to say that the game is bad or that it's unerringly into right-wing fascism; it clearly also critiques those things.
What's interesting about the game is how muddled its messages, both intended and unintended, are. Well, one of the interesting things.
I also read Peter as naive. He has a hard time reading social cues and is optimistic almost to a fault, which probably explains at least some of his lack of resistance to surveillance and almost surely explains his apparent reading of "drug dealer" as "gun-toting terrorist bad guy who pushes drugs onto the community" and not "small-time minority dealer trying to make a living in a racist city," and the goons that he fights do reflect that first reading, at least.
You made a fantastic game, you shouldn't worry about it.
I remember reading reviews and comments from the first game I worked on and some of the comments were awful... over time you get to realise no point in worrying about it... as it doesn't matter what you say, it'll fall on deaf ears.
Ok, will try that out but how does that relate to or answer my question?
Indeed. And while I understand why the game doesn't devote a few hours to showing just how corrupt the NYPD is in that world, you can't just wave it off by saying, "well they got Fisk, and Osborne, and shades of MODOK, so the police will be perfectly fine now". Fisk going away and nothing getting better is a core concept of the game.
I m ean, you might take that as a shitpost, but...you should totally watch the wire for a very good answer to that question.
And then you should see why the real life at the time mayor of Baltimore tried to have it shut down.
Yah for me this is a big part of the spiderman character, and it adds great depth to "with great power comes great responsibility"
A little too late after heros had died but at least he came to his senses. Stark on the other hand..
Stark is still better at not being a weekend villain than Beast is.
Agreed.
This is reductionist, and I don't mean that as an insult to you, so I'm genuinely sorry if that comes off as harsh or judgmental in some way.
There is a system that includes law enforcement being racist to black and brown people PLUS those same people being locked out of educational opportunities, employment opportunities, freedom of movement both economically and physically, etc. that causes the harm, and drug issues and law enforcement are just two small parts of that system and intertwined together rather than two things to be separated and compared in this way.
I mean, real talk, ya'll made game of the year.
The fact that people are willing to discuss minor elements of your game this much is a testament to how well you did. Don't get discouraged by the occasional hot take.
Yeah dude, deepthroat that end act where the not-IDF show up who are super different from the police
Except not they're pretty much the exact same with more funding and the cops wont just be that in a few years
Except not they're pretty much the exact same with more funding and the cops wont just be that in a few years
Because the game doesn't challenge Spider-man's own internalized fantasy about policing. He's concerned that cops might blame him for something and start firing at him - not that there are systemic issues with the police that makes them plenty untrustworthy on their own. The only "bad cops" are considered to be on Kingpin's payroll, and that's the only reason that they're bad.
Only we won't get anyone nearly as "charismatic" as Silver Sable to be their face.
Exactly. Spiderman can afford to have a secular mindset about how to treat the police because he has superpowers and a secret identity. Peter Parker, however, or on a much different but similarly appropriate level, Miles Morales, cannot do that. They are beholden to the law and the corruption therewithin. Spiderman can step beyond it, doing what they can't or won't. That's why he's a super hero that most people like, but in universe, most people are torn on.
I mean, it sucks, but at the end of the day we're basically always consuming copaganda. Lots of classic movies about cops that heroically don't follow procedure, lots of loveable FBI agents in media, detective, cops in general. Lots of Marvel movies push strange, nearly jingoistic or otherwise reactionary messages, Black Panther even being full of some of the worst offenses (what if the bad guy was like... A black lives matters guy but twisted... And black Panthers best friend is a cia agent). Call of Duty has been massively popular for years and I can't avoid trailers for a TV show on Amazon about Jim from the Office, the CIA badass.
What makes Spiderman feel different seems like it could be a couple of things. For one, the game just came out and has a really fun image. The realities of a surveillance state, doing drug busts and palling it up with the NYPD aren't something a lot of people think of as "fun," and this exposes uncomfortable contradictions in the world of superheroes. And all these issues rest towards the front of our collective consciousness, and have for a while. Surveillance state stuff in particular is a worry shared by a lot of people, and not just those on the left. We don't live in a time where this kind of propaganda can go unquestioned by everyone.
At the end of the day this isn't much worse than what we've been playing or watching or reading for decades now. It's just harder to ignore.
What makes Spiderman feel different seems like it could be a couple of things. For one, the game just came out and has a really fun image. The realities of a surveillance state, doing drug busts and palling it up with the NYPD aren't something a lot of people think of as "fun," and this exposes uncomfortable contradictions in the world of superheroes. And all these issues rest towards the front of our collective consciousness, and have for a while. Surveillance state stuff in particular is a worry shared by a lot of people, and not just those on the left. We don't live in a time where this kind of propaganda can go unquestioned by everyone.
At the end of the day this isn't much worse than what we've been playing or watching or reading for decades now. It's just harder to ignore.
He's not opposed to the surveillance because it's not being used for surveillance. He knows this because he literally hears what they do. If it comes up in a future game sure, but as of now why would he be mad about large Police scanners?
That's kind of disingenuous and an indictment on the police forces that we would ever think of asking the question that way.
It's basically saying "what was worse for a patient : malaria or this medication supposed to cure malaria?".
Like one is literally here to exploit the community and extract as much liquidity as it can and the other is supposed to protect the very population it is oppressing.
Like how bad the system is failing that we have to ask this question?
e:
and then there's this of course
I get that, but how do you take such a complex social issue and put it into a superhero game? Like we can't properly handle this issue in real life, how is a spiderman game suppose to address it if we can't even in real life.
The harm is in portraying the American police as a benign organization. The problem is in portraying the bad part of our police as a few dirty cops and not all the pricks who circle the wagons every time an unarmed black man gets shot in the back or with his hands up.