What can video-games tell us about socialism?

I’ve tried to review Far cry about three times now, and have failed on each time. It really says something about a game when one can’t think of anything interesting to say about it. This is the level of detachment from the game required to make myself capable of utterance in it’s regard. So instead i’ll talk about something very similar, city skylines. The joke is that their not similar, bet you never saw that one coming.

It’s never good to explain your jokes, explaining would increase the knowledge pool of your audience or might cause them to consider a situation from a different or novel angle, this goes against the very heart of comedy which is all about savaging those you disagree with and berating people for being different. Speaking of and: And city skylines is a game where you build a city and manage it’s policies and infrastructure. Since communism has never been attempted i felt his was the perfect petri dish with which to experiment.

I started by building a shopping district, not a great star admittedly. So i evened things out by cutting off their water supply, haha take that bourgeoise dogs. Everyone complained because their small businesses had no running water and all the designated drivers who ordered tap water were getting pissed, in both senses of the word. The resulting increase in car traffic collisions sent insurance rates for the locals soaring and forced everyone to reply on a public transport network that i hadn’t yet unlocked.

Feeling this wasn’t quite provocative enough i began a campaign of racial segregation only to find such core features had been scooped out and made into DLC. Disaffect by my unethical treatment at the hands of petty capitalists attempting to increase my spending to drive their machines of economic growth, i decided to double down on my communist utopia. A park was placed in every suburb, at this point however that was only a single suburb and then all the people were mad because i demolished their homes to do so.

Next came another problem with the water supply, some joker had placed the sewage output upstream of the water abstractor. People complained that they came home from working in the flower shops for a shower only to come out lathered in their own excrement. Other complained they couldn’t tell when their coffee had brewed and found its new nutty and full bodied flavour disconcerting. Most people agreed it was shit.

A hallmark of any great leader is their large scale infrastructure projects. The pharos of egypt built the pyramids for tourism, the athenians built the parthenon as a display of the financial solvency and china built the three gorges dam because they dam felt like it. Hence i too would leave my legacy for all to sea. I blocked off the local river and build a large sea wall around the growing town to leaving the town immune the cruel machinations of the waters. Thinking i had avoided a biblical catastrophe i went to go make dinner. When i returned i found, with no where to send their waters to, the rivers had burst their banks and flooded the town. Drainage being minimal due to the sea wall. This was brilliant progress, we were one step closer to the boy band busted’s manifesto of the future put forward in their song ‘year 3000’.

The trajectory of history is not linear however, some fool accidentally deleted part of the sea wall allowing all but the low lying areas to drain. No one lives there however despite my attempts to sell it as a libertarian wonderland. There were no more building projects. The costs of the build and the payout in court to angry locals claiming i was “negligent” left the town bankrupt losing more to interest than they were gaining in taxes.

This was when the plague hit, no one was sure which struck first the deaths or the disease, with no hospitals or graveyards the suburbs turned homeownership into a death sentence. Their homes became their tombs which caused the people living closest to catch and then succumb to dysentery, cholera, yellow fever and a runny nose. If that wasn’t bad enough the trashmen went on strike when i refused to pay them. While i was busy trying to crush their ILLEGAL unionisation the bodies piled up, those damned bin men would do anything to exploit a crisis.

I watched as the city burned with plague, numbers dwindling down to their hundreds at the binmens behest. When the chips were down they stabbed us in the back. Their betrayal will not be forgotten. Vengeance will be clean and swift. Our sovereignty will go unchallenged as claim our mantle, free of binmen, free of impurity a glorious future for all.

This game has no option to use horses instead of cars. That irks me somewhat.

CS:GO: A fountain of dread

Last night was a tortuous affair, in my excitement at the clementless weather precipitating outside my window, I seized on an opportunity for a little R+R. That is Rum and Raisin ice cream. Only, i ate too much, slurped too hard, caressed the spoon with more passion that could be permissible in even the most debauch pornographic scene. I soon became intoxicated with the thrill, a back seat driver in my own consciousness and when the demons take over, hell will follow….

CS:GO is a gambling addiction simulator for kids and probably the second most masochistic game i’ve ever played. Slightly ahead of Dark souls and just behind bum hair fire fountain boogaloo. I once wrote a review of the game for my dear friend, The Sophititicated gamer. Though i could never live up to his standards of sophititicatedieness, I could name drop him in the second paragraph of my review of CS:GO as a meager attempt at gaining the support and adoration of his fanbase. sophititicatedienessismists are still out of my reach, for now it seems.

In a competitive game one team attempts to commit a terrorism in an improtue strike and the other team then tries to thwart the attempt in a sort of... counter strike. Simple enough. How could such a premise give rise to the infamous behemoth of steam we all know and despise. I could blame pretty much anything from the repetitive structure to Gabe’s love of knives. So i will, clearly this is the fault of the NRA, in the game you can buy guns without any background check or limitations from a catalogue that is clearly inspired by your local walmart. (i stole that joke)

Even if you’ve committed offenses before like using an improvised explosive to destroy part of venice you will not be denied sale. Children, yes young innocent children inspired by violence on the news and on their streets take to the game in droves to reenact the violent and sadistic behaviour of their peers and parents. Lawmakers have failed to act to shut down the violence that is spilling over from the real world into the virtual.

In an interview i made up for convenience with myself. i said a number of things that clearly supported my premise and didn’t at all stretch this sensationalism driven piece out into a extended advert for my political views.
Righty ho, now your all boiled up to some Mccarthyism level paranoia. (Melissa McCarthy i’m onto you) we can now discuss the real game in CSGO: this is my guide on how to BM (bad manners). The true path to victory in any sport is the to undermine the psychology of your adversary. In the old analogue days of two player split screen this was simple.
 “How does social contract theory assume our consent when a small minority will always refuse but are not given way to exercise such action and are then not compensated in turn for the subversion of their inalienable rights.”

This would normally cause the other player to leave out of boredom and this victory was yours forevermore. If you made it through the entire sentence without tearing up you are a stronger Yeti than I.

These days, unlike the better day of my nostalgic youth, the kids don’t have the attention span for anything that isn’t racist vitriol or… the current youtube controversy of the day. #futureproof. I can’t condone using either of those to get their attention because i am too busy writing a review where i teach people how to be toxic in a Videogame…

Okay, it’s half an hour later and after starring in the mirror listening to needle in the hay on loop i can conclude the existential angst the prior paragraphs have caused are somewhat protional to the subject matter. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgNgvCLRqWc)

How can i be a true advocate for a medium or subject while being self-critical or even critical of aspects of the subject. The objective truth is i can’t. If you’re not of higher moral virtue than everyone else your views don’t matter or you are in fact an indictment of things you are a proponent of. Chase the approval of other desperately, avoid introspection and conceal any ernest views you have with sarcasm and doublespeak. Avoid direct cries for help at all cost and you continue to churn out sub par content in a oversaturated medium in a fleeting attempt to gain popularity and for God’s sake! make sure when the cracks in your resolve start to show they think that it was all part of some half baked joke you took too far. LOL!

Csgo: Good if you’re drunk.