You must have heard of Braid. It’s an above-average but overpriced puzzle-platformer out for Xbox Live Arcade. Because it’s August and there’s not much about, and because Braid’s story was written by sixth-form philosophy students taking the piss, some people have got a little too excited about it. As a service to you, dear reader, we’re going to spare you from having to plough through the very worst efforts of a couple of reviewers by calling them up right here, right now.
First up, the Unreliable Eurogamer’s 10/10 review by Dan Whitehead:
“Its creative importance reminds me most of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' seminal graphic novel, Watchmen. Both are works of homage and deconstruction, commentaries on the way we interact with their respective media.”
Or maybe it’s just a puzzle-platform game, and has fuck all to do with a graphic novel.
“His mission is to find a princess. She's not a literal princess though, but a metaphor - the romantic cliché of that perfect soul mate as filtered through popular videogame motifs. In the context of Braid's melancholy mood, it becomes a bona fide commentary on the human condition.”
Still on the subject of the story (which really is awful), Whitehead goes on to recite straight from the pages of Things Cunts Say. We’ve italicised the offending portion:
“You can sprint past these sections, should you wish, but to do so means missing the point quite spectacularly. Surrender to the game's reflective intentions and it can be quite profound. I have no problem admitting that I found myself thinking about people and places that I'd not considered for years. Relationships that ended too soon. Some that went on far too long. Memories that no longer seem reliable. Others that are still painfully vivid.”
So see a fucking shrink. And stop fiddling with yourself.
Anyway, the music – it’s quite basic, but fits the style of the game nicely. Or, if you’re a twat:
“Music box nursery rhymes play off against levels that explore the friction between childhood and adult freedoms.”
Brace yourselves now, readers, for you’re about to experience the holy grail of games reviewing. It’s… THE SENTENCE FROM HELL:
“You could argue that by using the doomed romanticism of an introspective male as its core that the game is treading clichéd creative soil but in a medium as emotionally stunted as videogames it still represents an enormous leap towards realising the potential of the form.”
And to round it all off, Whitehead rewards anyone who’s miraculously got to the end of the review without emptying both barrels of a shotgun into their own skull by throwing in one of the cuntiest entries from the Things Cunts Say canon:
“Still wondering if games can be art? Here's your answer.”
According to Whitehead, the answer is “10”. For anyone who isn’t a cunt, the answer is “no”.
Just so the usual crowd of green tea sipping hippies don’t start whinging to us that we’re picking on Whitehead / EG, here’s a cheeky little something from Xbox World 360’s Michael Gapper:
“In a world without Mario and Valve and the Bethesda hit factory Braid is indeed the best game ever made.”
That’s right, Gapper – and if your aunt had a big hairy pair of bollocks swinging between her legs, she’d be your uncle.
We were going to work our way down the list in MetaCritic to bring you more, but we’ve just given in to the compulsion to rip the sound card from our PC and flagellate our own faces with it.
First up, the Unreliable Eurogamer’s 10/10 review by Dan Whitehead:
“Its creative importance reminds me most of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' seminal graphic novel, Watchmen. Both are works of homage and deconstruction, commentaries on the way we interact with their respective media.”
Or maybe it’s just a puzzle-platform game, and has fuck all to do with a graphic novel.
“His mission is to find a princess. She's not a literal princess though, but a metaphor - the romantic cliché of that perfect soul mate as filtered through popular videogame motifs. In the context of Braid's melancholy mood, it becomes a bona fide commentary on the human condition.”
Still on the subject of the story (which really is awful), Whitehead goes on to recite straight from the pages of Things Cunts Say. We’ve italicised the offending portion:
“You can sprint past these sections, should you wish, but to do so means missing the point quite spectacularly. Surrender to the game's reflective intentions and it can be quite profound. I have no problem admitting that I found myself thinking about people and places that I'd not considered for years. Relationships that ended too soon. Some that went on far too long. Memories that no longer seem reliable. Others that are still painfully vivid.”
So see a fucking shrink. And stop fiddling with yourself.
Anyway, the music – it’s quite basic, but fits the style of the game nicely. Or, if you’re a twat:
“Music box nursery rhymes play off against levels that explore the friction between childhood and adult freedoms.”
Brace yourselves now, readers, for you’re about to experience the holy grail of games reviewing. It’s… THE SENTENCE FROM HELL:
“You could argue that by using the doomed romanticism of an introspective male as its core that the game is treading clichéd creative soil but in a medium as emotionally stunted as videogames it still represents an enormous leap towards realising the potential of the form.”
And to round it all off, Whitehead rewards anyone who’s miraculously got to the end of the review without emptying both barrels of a shotgun into their own skull by throwing in one of the cuntiest entries from the Things Cunts Say canon:
“Still wondering if games can be art? Here's your answer.”
According to Whitehead, the answer is “10”. For anyone who isn’t a cunt, the answer is “no”.
Just so the usual crowd of green tea sipping hippies don’t start whinging to us that we’re picking on Whitehead / EG, here’s a cheeky little something from Xbox World 360’s Michael Gapper:
“In a world without Mario and Valve and the Bethesda hit factory Braid is indeed the best game ever made.”
That’s right, Gapper – and if your aunt had a big hairy pair of bollocks swinging between her legs, she’d be your uncle.
We were going to work our way down the list in MetaCritic to bring you more, but we’ve just given in to the compulsion to rip the sound card from our PC and flagellate our own faces with it.
O.O
ReplyDeleteI was sure you were making those up until i looked. Stirling work, Rammy.
And that is why I read this blog. Good effort and so true. My mate almost wet himself with joy when he read that eurogamer review, but I thought it was just wanky nonsense.
ReplyDeleteMy favourite line from the Eurogamer review:
ReplyDelete"Braid has filled my head with so many ideas, so many opinions, so many emotions that wrestling them all into a coherent critique is like trying to strangle a swan made of jelly."
And you failed most spectacularly, sir!
Holy fuck. Holy blue fuck. Holy blue words of fuck from the brain of a cunt. How much of a ten-fold cunt must you have to be to write shit like that, and gladly have your name attributed to it? Fucking amazing work.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteIt's one of the saddest cases of attempting to sound clever, swallowing whole any intention of getting across a point, that I have ever, ever seen. Good find, Rammy.
ReplyDeleteI'm not entirely sure where this guy needs to re-apply for work. Maybe he could writer 'The Critics' for Viz? Or perhaps instead be sent into the jungle to reason with cannibals? Yeah, that'd be good.
"It's almost as if your will to masticate upon my flesh, or indeed imbibe of my bodily solutions is somehow analogous with your aspirations for I to become one with your clan and gain knowledge of your ethnic traditions. Indeed, your pointed animosity, reflected metaphorically when juxtapositioned alongside the blades of your spears could be compared to the early works of Orson Welles. That rather than... ugh... what? What are you doing? NOT MY CHEEEEKS! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!"
What a cunt.
DX
Some critical insight on the overrated Braid would have been more interesting than this Whitehead clusterfuck. You're calling him a cunt for his flowery, pretentious prose but there's actually nothing more worthwhile in your own blog post here.
ReplyDeleteI've often rolled my eyes condescendingly at RAM Raider's literacy-provoked bile in the past, but not this time. Cringeworthy stuff.
ReplyDeleteThis is the first post of yours I've ever agreed with, Rammy.
ReplyDeleteYou're still a vile, poisonous cunt though.
I agree with the above comment. You are a sad, deluded, misunderstood individual, Dan. However, this last post was geniunely funny and made me smile (a bit). Well done. Now get help.
ReplyDeleteAdam
Don't really understand the extreme reactions to this review. I would've though there's more to complain about when reviewers simply spill out the press release - Whitehead's at least made an attempt to explain why the game worked for him so much. Is that such a bad thing? Isn't it actually kind of, like, professional?
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, what do you think a well-written review should look like, just for future reference? There seem to be a lot of people over at EG who really liked this one - and they're not that easy to please.
Like the links to RNLI and Cancer Research, by the way. Does it make you feel like less of a bastard after laying into people for no good reason?
Shut up Dan. Stop pretending to be not you.
ReplyDeleteAdd "clusterfuck" to the list of things cunts say, please.
ReplyDelete