Patrick Klepek: I Really Like 'God of War,' But Reserve The Right to Change My Mind

[Vimes]

https://waypoint.vice.com/en_us/art...f-war-but-reserve-the-right-to-change-my-mind

With everything else in life, the arguments and viewpoints of others influence my thinking. It's the same with video games, too.

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Despite having played neither GoW or Bioshock Infinite myself, I found the thinking in this piece mirrored my own regarding other games.

I really liked the new God of War. It has problems—pacing is a mess in the second half, the absence of Kratos' wife underscores the game's broader avoidance of a series with a history of violent misogyny—but in broad strokes, I really liked it. It spoke to me as a new father, and as someone who, like Kratos, looks back at their older self in embarrassment, cherishing the growth that comes from getting older. (I have not killed any Greek gods, but it's all relative.)

That said, I reserve the right to change my mind; it is not my settled opinion on this cultural artifact. My personal reading of God of War informed the 2,000-something word review published on Waypoint, but it reflects a fixed moment in time, when I played through a very long game largely in isolation, left only to my own thoughts, impressions, and reactions. I then wrote a lot of words very quickly.

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Though I haven't played it since 2013, I still think about BioShock Infinite a lot.

After finishing BioShock Infinite, I was over the moon. Columbia wasn't Rapture, but it was a sprawling, ambitious science fiction story that checkmarked all the boxes Patrick Klepek looks for. Combat was a wash, and the multiple lighthouses a boring trope, but it pitched itself and felt like a capital s Serious video game. This was a story that had something to say about race, politics, and the messy ways conflict and power corrupt even those with the best intentions. If you wanted video games to be seen as art, we needed more BioShock Infinites, and as someone who was, at the time, trying to transition to more serious criticism, this fit.

When the game came out, everything supported my initial reading. Reviews dropped, and everyone liked the game. Not only was it good, it seemed important.

Then, others weighed in. Specifically, people outside the establishment game reviewing cognoscenti, a small group of individuals who tend to review the "big" games, and thus set the tone for how a game is perceived and talked about. (I'm part of this, and have been for a long time.) As critics like Waypoint's Austin Walker ("I Can See My House From Here: Bioshock Infinite, Nostalgia, and The Uncanny"), Anjin Anhut ("Infinite Privilege"), Gary Alexander ("Columbia: Problematic Racism Theme Park"), Leigh Alexander (" BioShock Infinite: Now Is The Best Time"), and others published essays, my calculus changed. I'd taken so much of BioShock Infinite's at face value, and mistook a game projecting as serious to mean it was also "right."

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This piece definitely compares with stuff I've been thinking about for a while now as I get older. Some time ago, I used to believe in the "totally objective reviews" claptrap, but as I come back to games I thought were unimpeachable, I find some of them hold up and some of them don't

So many things are situational too; I played the whole Metal Gear series with a friend a mere year after completing it alone, and it changed the way I felt about pretty much every entry in the series. MGS2 was a revelation the first time I played it, but the moments didn't hold up as well the second time. What seemed stunningly prescient when I played it in 2015 (my mouth was literally hanging open during the infamous codec call near the end) came off as a bunch of jargon and both-sides-ism given how current events have evolved in the last few years. Meanwhile MGS4's idea of an entire political system run into the ground by a rogue computer algorithm, which seemed utterly ridiculous to me playing for the first time, now seems strangely accurate to the direction things are going. The presence of my friend, who hadn't been exposed to the series before, also changed which moments and themes I reacted to as well. I don't even think my opinion on the games have changed permanently either, and I'm interested to see how my feelings further evolve if I come back to the series yet again.

Spoiler

Ocarina of Time, on the other hand, will be a masterpiece forever.

I like what Klepek is putting down here, and I hope it's a conversation that continues among critics.

 

[NSA]

I think reviews are always going to be flawed in the sense that they're a product of the time. I don't know if it is really possible to see something and 'know' it's going to be a classic for 5-10-20 years.

 

[TailorDKS]

Edit: Kinda missed the topic.

But this doesnt make sense. A Review should review the game as it is and not how it will be years later...

 

[Deleted member 15497]

I mean, yeah.
Reviews are going to be about the first time you play a game.
No one can predict the future.

 

[Inuhanyou]

i dont really get why he's bringng up GOW here. bioshock infinite in itself was a product of hype even as we saw the numerous development issues play out in real time,having to get the main guys of unreal engine into irrational just to complete the game on time, all the content in trailers that just doesnt exist in the game, the padding and filler in place of actual gameplay, the bad characterization between elizabeth and booker which was quickly made irrelevant by TLOU the same year

GOW is a great game..saying its merely a product of hype is like saying BOTW's scores are just a product of zelda hype

 

[Anime_Lamp]

Journalist thoughts should be locked.

I think the original review IGN did of God Hand still holds up.

 

[KORNdog]

Who?

 

[Timeaisis]

When you play through a game in a few sittings and then immediately write about it you are going to naturally veer towards extreme love or extreme hate.

Time is the ultimate test.

 

[Kenzodielocke]

Goat of War though.

 

[Deleted member 9971]

You do you, people should have their own opinions and its fine to change them.

 

[Zekes]

Humanity in 2018.
A lot of people dont think, they let others do the thinking and just accept it as their opinion.

It was the same with Star Wars 7 and a lot of games. When it start screening almost everyone loved it. But someone said, he doesnt liked it and after that, almost no one liked it.
Thats what happens when you follow to many Influencers/ Youtubers and so on...

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I see this with the kids I work with. I took them to see The Last Jedi and they loved it. Now all they do is parrot the opinions of all the YouTube reviews and theory videos they watch. And they do this with literally any piece of media.

It's sad.

 

[brinstar]

Who?

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you could click on his profile on the waypoint site you know

 

[hank_tree]

This is why quoting someone's review 5 years down the line to prove a point is stupid.

Your opinion on any piece of media changes over time.

 

[KORNdog]

you could click on his profile on the waypoint site you know

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I've never even heard of waypoint and tend not to click links to places i've never heard of.

Google search says he's some kotaku guy though.

 

[weekev]

i dont really get why he's bringng up GOW here. bioshock infinite in itself was a product of hype even as we saw the numerous development issues play out in real time,having to get the main guys of unreal engine into irrational just to complete the game on time, all the content in trailers that just doesnt exist in the game, the padding and filler in place of actual gameplay, the bad characterization between elizabeth and booker which was quickly made irrelevant by TLOU the same year

GOW is a great game..saying its merely a product of hype is like saying BOTW's scores are just a product of zelda hype

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However more than a year later people are still holding BOTW as the yardstick for a masterpiece. Will we be saying in a years time "yeah this game is good but is it God of War good?" I'm not actually sure. I reckon the yardstick will still be BOTW.

 

[PshycoNinja]

i dont really get why he's bringng up GOW here. bioshock infinite in itself was a product of hype even as we saw the numerous development issues play out in real time,having to get the main guys of unreal engine into irrational just to complete the game on time, all the content in trailers that just doesnt exist in the game, the padding and filler in place of actual gameplay, the bad characterization between elizabeth and booker which was quickly made irrelevant by TLOU the same year

GOW is a great game..saying its merely a product of hype is like saying BOTW's scores are just a product of zelda hype

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It is weird given there wasn't that much hype or excitement for the game a few weeks before it released. Then a story trailer released and people got a little excited. From what I have seen, it seems to me the large, positive reaction is due to it actually being good.

It was the same with Star Wars 7 and a lot of games. When it start screening almost everyone loved it. But someone said, he doesnt liked it and after that, almost no one liked it.
Thats what happens when you follow to many Influencers/ Youtubers and so on...

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A bit off topic but I do agree with this sentiment.

 

[Dreamboum]

Many reviewers holds up in their writings even around release and some don't. Klepek just doesn't hold up most of the time. It's fine for him to change his opinion after months or years, but at this point I already found someone else who would write something more interesting and insightful right now than reading the umpteenth guy who resonated with God of War because he's a father.

If you already know that there is a chance that you might change your mind on God of War, that maybe there are things in there that could be important to discuss in current or future criticism of the game, there's a point where you're just sitting this one out instead of bringing it to light.

I think it speaks to a much deeper issue than reserving the right to change one's opinion, it's about accepting that you don't have the perspective to treat and criticize a game to the same level of insightfulness as someone else from a different background. This is what needs to be brought up, it goes much beyond a simple change of mind.

 

[Raven117]

I mean, he is free to do what he wants. But wow. Have some convictions in what you write. If a game hits you in all the right places, give it a good review. You can let others discuss the game's social commentary as they see fit if you did not see it yourself. Reserving your rights to change your mind if someone else finds something objectionable is being an intellectual coward with no actual analytical skill.

Moreover, if a professional game reviewer didnt' pick up on some things, then likely, its just not that huge a deal that other gamers will notice.

There is no shame in letting people trained to look for this stuff, write about that.

 

[Deleted member 176]

However more than a year later people are still holding BOTW as the yardstick for a masterpiece. Will we be saying in a years time "yeah this game is good but is it God of War good?" I'm not actually sure. I reckon the yardstick will still be BOTW.

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I'm not so sure. Even when Breath of the Wild first came out you could see all of the people upset about shortcomings like the lack of dungeons. Does God of War have anything like that? An easy complaint to point to? Maybe the pacing?

I could see Breath of the Wild being blown away by a revised BotW2, I'm not so sure about God of War 2.

 

[Deleted member 3017]

However more than a year later people are still holding BOTW as the yardstick for a masterpiece. Will we be saying in a years time "yeah this game is good but is it God of War good?" I'm not actually sure. I reckon the yardstick will still be BOTW.

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It will depend on the user. BotW and GoW satisfy different audiences in many ways. I steer more towards BotW, but there are going to be plenty who hold GoW to the same standard I do with Zelda.

 

[Kasey]

I think reviews are always going to be flawed in the sense that they're a product of the time. I don't know if it is really possible to see something and 'know' it's going to be a classic for 5-10-20 years.

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It's not really a flaw per se, unless the goal is "objectivity" which no reviewer should strive for.

 

[Deleted member 8196]

" If you wanted video games to be seen as art, we needed more BioShock Infinites,"

lol we don't Bioshock Infinite, Bioshock maybe, but Infinite? Nope.

 

[Nya]

I don't feel this is something that requires such significant highlighting. The potential for devalued merit of critical opinion in any field can almost always occur given enough time passed. Several seasoned journalists curl up into a ball at what they wrote a mere 5 years ago, let alone 10, or 20, but standing by your words in the zeitgeist is necessary. This need to pre-disassociate yourself from them reduces their value greatly.

 

[TinTuba47]

I enjoyed GOW more than BOW, personally

 

[AkuMifune]

I think he's overthinking the whole thing. But I reserve the right to change my mind later.

 

[enkaisu]

I dunno, I think MGS2 still holds up quite a bit, especially these days.

But yeah, it happens. Reviewers are still people just like everyone else. Jeff Gerstmann of Giant Bomb loved Horizon Zero Dawn when it first came out, and then by the end of the year he had cooled on it quite a bit.

 

[Deleted member 13364]

I mean, he is free to do what he wants. But wow. Have some convictions in what you write. If a game hits you in all the right places, give it a good review. You can let others discuss the game's social commentary as they see fit if you did not see it yourself. Reserving your rights to change your mind if someone else finds something objectionable is being an intellectual coward with no actual analytical skill.

Moreover, if a professional game reviewer didnt' pick up on some things, then likely, its just not that huge a deal that other gamers will notice.

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Have you never changed your thoughts on a film, album, TV show or game after some time has passed after your initial exposure to it? I'd find it very hard to believe that you haven't.

 

[Filament Star]

Is this basically saying "I reserve the right to find this game offensive later if someone else decides that it is?" Because that would be ridiculous and I could never take his reviews or writing seriously again.

 

[Dreamboum]

Moreover, if a professional game reviewer didnt' pick up on some things, then likely, its just not that huge a deal that other gamers will notice.

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At the same time, the reviewer maybe chose that it's not a big deal. If he's making the call for the players, then he should explain why. That's it, if they didn't utterly fail to see it, but that speaks way more about your ability as a reviewer than an innocent mishap.

Not that reviewers aren't allowed to make mistakes, but it's not exactly mistakes we're talking about on here.

 

[Deleted member 176]

" If you wanted video games to be seen as art, we needed more BioShock Infinites,"

lol we don't Bioshock Infinite, Bioshock maybe, but Infinite? Nope.

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Back in 2013 or whatever that was a pretty common sentiment. It was a year or two before everyone recognized that Infinite was bad.

 

[MattyG]

I used to take reviews as gospel, but lately the idea of being maleable with opinions is so much more appealing. He's totally right, it is hugely detrimental to both our own critical growth and the discussions we can have about games (or any work of art) if we just make an opinion and entrench ourselves in it with no room for change. It's funny that he uses Bioshock Infinite as an example, because that's the game that taught me to look at others' opinions and not be afraid to adjust my own when I found I'd misread or misjudged.

Who?

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I've never even heard of waypoint and tend not to click links to places i've never heard of.

Google search says he's some kotaku guy though.

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What is the purpose of this? They're pretty well known. Just... read the article or don't, doesn't matter if you know who he is.

 

[Vimes]

I think it speaks to a much deeper issue than reserving the right to change one's opinion, it's about accepting that you don't have the perspective to treat and criticize a game to the same level of insightfulness as someone else from a different background. This is what needs to be brought up, it goes much beyond a simple change of mind.

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Yeah I think Klepek touched on that with the articles linked regarding Bioshock Infinite, but I do wish he'd spent a little more time on this subject. Someone with the right perspective has the potential to change your mind on a piece of media pretty drastically if you're open-minded.

 

[Anya7890]

I get where klepek is coming from, I remember when the last of us first came out I thought it was a 10/10. Then after sitting on it longer and looking at it more closely, I felt it was more of a 9.7 if anything... I feel that whenever a new tame is released, we sometimes get caught up in the hype of it's released and don't noticed the flaws until that "hype" where's out.

 

[CRIMSON-XIII]

Reviewing a game at the moment and how it resonates with you still years down the line are different things.

You can enjoy a game very much atm, like how i enjoyed Horizon Zero Dawn last year or Zelda BOTW, but whether they stick with you in your mind is a different matter.

I'd argue that a game like Journey, or personally, the Socom games, resonated with me over the years and were extremely memorable . i think of them as special because of how i felt during them years ago and the thoughts i have regarding them now. Horizon is a masterpiece but I dont consider it too memorable

it just depends on the game and the player.

 

[TheInfinityGauntlet]

but it reflects a fixed moment in time,

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Yes? No shit? All reviews are reviewing a product at that current moment in time for both the product and the world.

However more than a year later people are still holding BOTW as the yardstick for a masterpiece. Will we be saying in a years time "yeah this game is good but is it God of War good?" I'm not actually sure. I reckon the yardstick will still be BOTW.

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Hope not that's a short stick

 

[Memento]

Talk about an useless article. It is basically stating the obvious. Opinions can change as the times passes. Ok?

 

[Fireblend]

Who?

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Does his identity discredit his opinion or something? Why should who he is matter for the purpose of this thread?

 

[Imran]

I agree a lot with the example of Bioshock Infinite.

That was a game that was number one with a bullet on my GOTY list that year and then I spent a lot of time thinking about it, analyzing it, and wondering if the game's ambition to be something was as good as actually being it. It finished at #10 for that year.

 

[CHC]

I know I shouldn't but I find Waypoint so annoying. It goes without saying that anyone can change their mind at any time, for any reason at all. The entire piece is filled with so much needless self reflection, over-consideration and rhetorical questioning, to the point that it just comes across as hand-wringingly neurotic. I mean, I get what he's laying the groundwork for, but this reads like a parody of a progressive viewpoint, where the only thing he actually winds up saying is "I feel like I like this thing but I'm not sure I want to commit to liking it."

 

[benzopil]

This doesn't make any sense. If vocal minority 5 years later thinks that Infinite is bad, who cares. You reviewed it 5 years ago and had a lot of fun, like most of it's buyers.

 

[Derrick01]

If you feel later on like your initial impressions were driven by hype or "the moment" or whatever then I don't have a problem with correcting your mistake. I've done it before with Skyrim and to a lesser extent GTA 5 (I still like it more than hate it but it's not nearly as good as I initially thought). Granted I don't review things professionally so I can make those mistakes without consequence but I feel like other than that you should stick by what you write. Feelings and opinions can change over many years but they shouldn't change so fast that you have a different opinion on a game a mere 6 months later or something.

 

[Hero of the Wild]

I really loved god of war! Then I heard what people who didn't like it had to say so I changed my mind. I did like it when I played it, but I don't like the idea of liking it now so I changed my mind.

 

[darkwing]

nice, I guess game reviews will be like currency, with inflation rates lol

 

[quotethis]

i dont really get why he's bringng up GOW here. bioshock infinite in itself was a product of hype even as we saw the numerous development issues play out in real time,having to get the main guys of unreal engine into irrational just to complete the game on time, all the content in trailers that just doesnt exist in the game, the padding and filler in place of actual gameplay, the bad characterization between elizabeth and booker which was quickly made irrelevant by TLOU the same year

GOW is a great game..saying its merely a product of hype is like saying BOTW's scores are just a product of zelda hype

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What you just said about GoW and Zelda apply to Bioshock Infinite as well. It too is a great game. A lot of people view it as such, and critics loved it as well.

Your post screams of bias, especially on the Sony side of things.

To the actual topic, I've changed my mind on games over the years as well. What was once great or even bad, has become bad and great. Some games just don't hold up, where others you see shine because you realize they were ahead of their time in many respects.

 

[Nymphae]

Talk about an useless article. It is basically stating the obvious. Opinions can change as the times passes. Ok?

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[cowboyblobemoji]

this just reads as "I like it until someone tells me I shouldn't" to me.

like the literal "I like it now but that could change" isn't really worth saying because it's common sense, so it's hard to read any other way

 

[daninthemix]

I'm not sure I understand his point about Bioshock Infinite. Is he saying he enjoyed it, until he read the opinions of other writers he respects saying he shouldn't have enjoyed it?

 

[Lunar15]

Patrick has some weird headlines sometimes. But there's a valid point in here.

It's someone who doesn't write a ton of reviews, struggling with the concept of reviews. Reviews are almost always dumb - trying to play something once and declaring a "definitive" opinion on it. Reviewers often play things before anyone else, hide themselves from differing opinions, and then offer what appears, at least to the reader, to be an objective statement on the game's strengths and flaws. So many reviews sound like the reviewer is delivering this incredible experience to us, like they're part of the cycle. It's something we all do, but not all of us take all those words and write them up on a website meant for the masses.

That said, this article is weird and sounds kind of obvious to anyone who isn't a reviewer. It's also just a weak statement. He's getting *at* something important, that the way we view things changes over time and games should be ongoing discussions, but we already know that and disassociating yourself from your review right after you wrote it is just kind of lame. It's not something I'd write an article about at least.

I'm not sure I understand his point about Bioshock Infinite. Is he saying he enjoyed it, until he read the opinions of other writers he respects saying he shouldn't have enjoyed it?

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Yes, that's exactly what he's talking about. It's something a lot of people did. And I don't think there's a single person here that hasn't done the same for a game or movie sometime. You initially loved it and praised it, only to walk that back as you listened to other viewpoints or gave it another go-around.

 

[ghostcrew]

I've never even heard of waypoint and tend not to click links to places i've never heard of.

Google search says he's some kotaku guy though.

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He's written for Giant Bomb, Kotaku and now Waypoint. He's the guy that broke the Infinity Wars/Activision upset story and the news that MS were reversing the DRM stuff. He's a fantastic journalist in a sea of gaming critics.

I can't believe you haven't heard of Waypoint. It's a huge gaming site.

 

[treasureyez]

i dont really get why he's bringng up GOW here. bioshock infinite in itself was a product of hype even as we saw the numerous development issues play out in real time,having to get the main guys of unreal engine into irrational just to complete the game on time, all the content in trailers that just doesnt exist in the game, the padding and filler in place of actual gameplay, the bad characterization between elizabeth and booker which was quickly made irrelevant by TLOU the same year

GOW is a great game..saying its merely a product of hype is like saying BOTW's scores are just a product of zelda hype

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Did you read the piece? It has nothing to do with "hype", and he doesn't say anything to imply that the excitement around God of War is "merely a product of hype."

More and more I see that threads for articles by gaming publications are dominated by snarky replies questioning the premise of the article rather than actually engaging with its content and arguments.