Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin - Objective Video Game Reviews
Aired: 2015-03-19
Duration: 05:34


=== Why Objectivity Matters (04:56) ===

[00:00:00]  Hello, are you an aspiring game journalist or are you already a game journalist?
[00:00:04]  You probably don't look like this.
[00:00:06]  You probably look like this and you've probably heard those pesky kids asking for something you've heard called objective game reviews.
[00:00:14]  Now, I know what you're thinking.
[00:00:15]  Objectivity, I just, I don't know how that works.
[00:00:19]  Yes, you can apparently still call yourself a journalist and still be opposed to the concept of objectivity.
[00:00:27]  That is how magical games journalism is.
[00:00:30]  Now, I know what you're thinking again.
[00:00:32]  Hey, I went to Anita Sarkesian's latest teleseminar.
[00:00:36]  And after taking that teleseminar a lot more seriously than she did, I've decided I hate my audience.
[00:00:43]  In fact, I think that games enthusiasts are actually the problem with gaming.
[00:00:49]  I hate my audience so much.
[00:00:50]  I have actually written a manifesto, a guide to ending gamers, if you will.
[00:00:56]  I, as a game journalist, will recommend that people do things other than playing games.
[00:01:02]  Because if I've got to be honest, having fun isn't really very high on my list of priorities.
[00:01:07]  You know, for my video games.
[00:01:10]  In fact, if video game developers could oblige me by making shorter games so I didn't have to spend so long playing them, that would be wonderful.
[00:01:19]  And that's even assuming if I can even be bothered to give this video game their time of fucking day.
[00:01:26]  I do get kind of bored dealing with them all day every day.
[00:01:30]  This is why I spend so much money supporting those critics who are demanding death to video games.
[00:01:35]  Hell, I even bought the t-shirt.
[00:01:38]  You know, we've been doing this so long that we're wondering, have we already killed video games?
[00:01:44]  Because let's be fair, if there was one medium that deserved it, it was video games, wasn't it?
[00:01:49]  I mean, they were just awful.
[00:01:51]  Absolutely awful.
[00:01:53]  So naturally, you as a video game journalist really can't understand it when the plebs are getting their pitchforks and rallying for ethics in their industry and objective standards for their reviews.
[00:02:04]  You just, you can't understand it.
[00:02:07]  And I understand why.
[00:02:08]  You lack this little thing called empathy.
[00:02:11]  And empathy for your audience is fundamental when trying to give an objective review.
[00:02:16]  Let me demonstrate.
[00:02:18]  You have you.
[00:02:19]  You deride objectivity.
[00:02:20]  You hate gaming enthusiasts.
[00:02:23]  You want to play less games and you probably want video games to go away altogether.
[00:02:29]  Now, let's compare you to everyone else in the video game industry.
[00:02:34]  Both your audience and the developers who are making games for the people who love them.
[00:02:39]  They praise objectivity.
[00:02:41]  They are gaming enthusiasts.
[00:02:44]  They want to play more games.
[00:02:46]  And they probably want video games to continue to exist.
[00:02:49]  Honestly, I think now is about the time that we should explain to you that maybe the video game industry isn't the place for you.
[00:02:58]  But again, I know what you're thinking.
[00:03:00]  You're thinking, ha, I have an in.
[00:03:03]  I can absolutely justify my presence in the video game industry, even though I hate the video game industry.
[00:03:11]  And no, I don't just mean because you have friends in the video game industry who are going to give you money for participating.
[00:03:18]  I know that you're going to say things like, you can't judge a game objectively on how fun it is because fun is a subjective measure by definition.
[00:03:27]  And yes, you're right.
[00:03:28]  You're absolutely right.
[00:03:30]  It is.
[00:03:31]  Now, if we go back to, say, our list, you can see why we don't want people like you trying to tell us whether a game is fun or not.
[00:03:42]  Frankly, we don't think that you people are best qualified to do that.
[00:03:47]  You seem to have really pressing ideological concerns that you can't get past.
[00:03:52]  This is why we wanted you to be objective.
[00:03:55]  So when you sit down to write your review after playing more of the game than you're really comfortable with, please bear the following in mind.
[00:04:03]  Your audience isn't really all that bothered about your opinion, because your opinion isn't very much like the opinion of your audience.
[00:04:13]  They want to know about the objective merits of the game.
[00:04:17]  Tell us about merits like graphical quality or maybe aesthetic consistency.
[00:04:22]  How good are the controls?
[00:04:24]  What's the multiplayer like?
[00:04:26]  Does the game have a detailed and involving world?
[00:04:29]  Does it have an epic storyline?
[00:04:31]  Is there a lot of content?
[00:04:33]  Is there lots of replayability?
[00:04:35]  By giving us this information and not focusing on information that you subjectively care about, we can make the decision for ourselves if we are going to find it subjectively fun.

=== Kiss Baby Fucker (00:52) ===

[00:04:49]  Then you will have written a useful, objective game review and people won't wish you would fuck off.
[00:05:25]  A chair in the saddle, yeah, the kiss baby fucker.
[00:05:28]  I met it, who targeted so data.
[00:05:31]  You don't have fun, there's no words for the holder.