So here’s something a bit different.
Three quick things about me:
- I have a slightly unsettling number of YouTube watch hours banked on analytical video essays, particularly of the movie and (most relevantly here) gaming variety;
- I am a huge believer in the power of properly-managed expectations when it comes to the personal enjoyment I find in entertainment media (which, after all, is meant to entertain);
- My enjoyment of videogames is often directly tied to my ability to discuss them with others before, during and after I play them (this one shouldn’t shock anyone). To put it plainly, when I enjoy discussing games with people – whether online or in person – I enjoy those games more.
These points have naturally come together over the course of the last several years to ensure I’ve responded strongly to the following ten analytical YouTube videos. These aren’t the only ten that have ever struck me – not even close – but I felt like shouting out these in particular because each one has either given me a perspective-altering revelation that helped me look at the videogames I play and discuss in a more balanced way, and/or laid out in clear terms something I’d already felt about said games but was unable to properly articulate. These ten may total around three and a half hours watched back-to-back, but they also happen to be on the shorter side of my Favourites playlist, believe it or not, so as much as I really want to put a Kotaku-era Tim Rogers video here, I’ll resist.
Yes, that makes what you’re about to read the equivalent of ten separate way-too-long YouTube comments, but I mainly want to highlight the videos themselves. They may definitely skew towards topics that happen to interest me specifically, but have a watch of a few if you want, maybe listen to them while doing something monotonous, and hopefully you’ll find a view or two worthwhile. You might even pick up a new subscription.
Subjectivity Is Implied
Joseph Anderson, 2018
Main Takeaway: “Objective opinions” don’t exist, and entirely objective analyses are boring.
We start with the most reactionary video of the lot – it’s clear Mr Anderson recorded this rant as a frustrated response to wider media literacy trends – but it has to go first because the point at its centre informs (or should inform) every other analytical video, ever.
Despite its title, the video tackles two sides of the same fallacious coin: the silly idea that publicised takes on videogames should be clarified as subjective opinions repeatedly to eliminate all possible option for devious deception, and the even sillier idea that every videogame take must endeavour to be an “objective opinion”, which as Joe describes, is like “asking for the conversational equivalent of hot frozen ice cream”.
That second part in particular has long been a frustration of mine to explain to people, and this Anderson essay is a fascinating breakdown of the issue that ends up with a remarkably charitable attitude to the potential reasons why people might think they want such an oxymoron, despite the author’s gritted-teeth presentational tone. It’s the video that inspired the idea for this list many years ago, and it’s well worth a watch.
Breath of the Wild’s “Disneyland Problem”
Mother’s Basement, 2017
Main Takeaway: Your job – and exposure to videogames – significantly affects your preferences.
This one has rapidly turned into a bit of an odd time capsule – Geoff Thew doesn’t even do videogame content anymore, having long since made his real YouTube fortune through the popular niche of anime openings, and so none of the hypothetical Breath of the Wild videos he mentions in the beginning actually came to pass. Yet despite this, the video he did make is the most compelling illustration of reviewer-to-fandom dissonance I have ever seen, and it achieves this almost as an accident on the way to mounting a wide-angle defense of one specific game against perceived criticism a mere month into its long life.
By the sheer nostalgic charm of a fired-up attitude in a lo-fi-by-current-standards setup, confident enough to oppose “let’s call them idiots” via hastily-assembled bullet points but relatably self-conscious in his repeated links to other video essays, Thew casts light on the high-pressure environmental context that causes many professional videogame reviewers to value polish, novelty, relative brevity and accessible flow-state over other desirable qualities in games. And he’s bang-on the money.
Not only has this distinction helped me filter what I read or watch the weekend of a new game’s launch while preparing for the often-inevitable counter-opinions to come, it’s also helped me work out why I tend to value the same elements highly as well. After all, I may not be paid to write about games, but after decades surrounding myself with constant new releases and reactions to those new releases, my preferences occasionally shake out shockingly similar. As stupid as it may sound, realising all this has helped me relax and enjoy the discourse a lot more.
While the rest of the video isn’t as interested in directly backing up the well-made press point, and I disagree with a couple of Thew’s BotW defenses (I would’ve loved to see that “best story in a Zelda game” claim expanded on), he does go on to make a second argument dissolving impossible expectations around supposedly “infinite” games with a pretty elegant Disneyland allegory that’s also worth watching – and may or may not foreshadow another video further down this list.
Genwunner | The Problem with Pokemon’s Artstyle
Purple Gaming, 2019
Main Takeaway: Years of widely accepted majority opinions on game franchises can completely miss the point.
Refining this list down to ten entries required some self-imposed rules, and one of them dictated that I probably shouldn’t bring in too many videos focused on just one game or series, unless that singular focus brought out or supported a conclusion with much wider-reaching implications. That rule eliminated literally hundreds of my favourite videos, but I just had to keep this one.
Even though the content of the video essentially boils down to one narrator riffing off a viral reddit post, that post and Purple Gaming’s exploration of its implications absolutely blew my mind the first time I watched. The very concept that the battle lines of an all-time knuckle-dragging fandom fight have been drawn in the wrong place for decades short-circuited something inside of me, and then honestly made me excited to see what other mainstream accepted gaming opinions might be open to some prodding.
For what it’s worth, the second half of Purple Gaming’s video attempts to fold the major art style debate into some of the usual criticisms against the modern Pokemon games’ stubborn resistance to change, but those issues are perhaps handled better in other videos out there. Still, this is a fun watch.
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