Chinese Video/Computer Games

tankphobia said:

No, we need another 10 pages about how hot the female characters are. I think a good game can stand on its own merit without eye candy. Good looking characters is simply a bonus, not the reason I play video games.

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Good looking characters can extend beyond the "hot ladies" stereotype though.
Before the game was even released, the design of Sun Wukong was compelling enough, receiving a lot of positive comments.

I had not even heard of the Concord game or seen the post by @Index when I did a quick google search and one of the major complaints was "Ugly character design". After seeing the post, I can see why.
They either look like first-time ComiCon cosplayers, trying fill a "woke-agenda stereotype" bingo card, or plain ugly aliens.

Taking women (and even faces) out of the equation, something like Master Chief from Halo, or Ghost from Call of Duty are iconic. Even something like 8-bit Mega Man looks cooler.

Character design is a complex thing. An argument can be made, do we fall in love with the character designs because of the game? Possible.

However, ugly design definitely affects our attachment. Look at what happened with "Ugly Sonic" from the Sonic movie. He was so poorly received that they re-did the entire movie with a new model. Probably for the best as they have a third movie on the way.

There were the Final Fantasy V and VI remakes with art design so despised that they were consigned to the dustbin of history, replaced by “Pixel Remasters”, and no demand for their return.

Tam said:

The Journey West has made Xuanzhang look effeminate and weak. Needs constant protection and always riding on an animal.

The historical and real life Xuanzhang is the total opposite and a total chad of a monk to travel from Xian to Xinjiang, then Afghanistan and Pakistan, down to India on foot and back again, with a rigged bamboo backpack.

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Real life Xuanzhang was also chased by Tang dynasty borders as he travelled. Travelled a bit later and he might be taking an internal trip lol? He actually have to sneak pass Tang custom station cause you are not allowed to pass the border without the right paper with you.

siegecrossbow said:

Three Kingdoms is literally done to death. I want Game Science to do an adaptation of Hark Tsui’s movie version of the Proud, Smiling Wanderer as a giant FU to Sweet Baby Inc and their fellow cucks. Why you may ask?

Imagine if the primary strong transgender antagonist looks like this than a literal mound with feet.

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Come to think of it, JinYong's longer novels might be perfect to be turned into games like Wukong.

It would be a damn shame if Bandai Namco really go the way of its Western peers; one thing i liked about Elden Ring was how refreshingly otherworldly delicate and beautiful the characters were and yet they were also very capable and complex eg Malenia, Lydia, Millicent, Ranni. Even the theme of transgenderism with Radagon and Marika were touched on in a tasteful way, but if i have to play a soulsborne game and put up with fugly karens that i encounter in the anglosphere, at work and in the pub, then what even is the point of purchasing anything from Bandai Namco?

Beauty uplifts and inspires; the fuglification of western games tends to be naked self inserts of below average fugly female developers who have somehow acquired the keys of the kingdom of formerly great games and studios.

Chevalier said:

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It would be a damn shame if Bandai Namco really go the way of its Western peers; one thing i liked about Elden Ring was how refreshingly otherworldly delicate and beautiful the characters were and yet they were also very capable and complex eg Malenia, Lydia, Millicent, Ranni. Even the theme of transgenderism with Radagon and Marika were touched on in a tasteful way, but if i have to play a soulsborne game and put up with fugly karens that i encounter in the anglosphere, at work and in the pub, then what even is the point of purchasing anything from Bandai Namco?

Beauty uplifts and inspires; the fuglification of western games tends to be naked self inserts of below average fugly female developers who have somehow acquired the keys of the kingdom of formerly great games and studios.

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As the old American proverb goes, the customer is always right, in matters of taste.

Chinese studios have not and should not lose sight of that. You should never spite your customers because of your own ego. That's how you get flops like Outlaws, Concord etc.

Ugly or pretty characters don't even matter that much into it. For some reason, western studios have become arrogant and anti consumer. When the customer says that they don't like something, instead of taking their feedback as valuable advice for the next time, western studios take it as an attack on their ego and double down on the genre to "prove the customer wrong".

Blitzo said:

Personally among the other AAA efforts I think Phantom Blade 0 and Where Winds Meet looks a little bit more focused from a Wuxia perspective, though I'm not sure about the monetization model of the latter.

Also I have to say those kind of trailers where it's people in the studio talking too much about the development of a project (while it is still being actively developed) being a part of marketing always seemed a bit self congratulatory to me.


One thing about Game Science which I respect is their marketing for BM:W overwhelmingly was just showing gameplay trailers and one or two cinematic trailers without too much actual "this is how we're developing it" marketing.

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To be fair, Game Science also had at least one video of their director and staffs talking about the game development of BM:W years ago. For example that video about them talking about using motion capture on cats.

That is why I have mentioned we should control our expectations about the Chinese game industry. BM:W have raised our expectations, but the industry is still very new. The Wuchang developers looks suspiciously like a "Me Too". Who knows. They talk about their game using motion capture, and environmental scanning, like what Game Science did. They also happened to release their promo video days after BM:W came out. Or maybe they are a real deal. We won't know until their game is released. Even if it disappoints, it wouldn't surprise me, because great AAA games are not gonna be common. It's the same thing that happens in any other game industry.

I just think that BM:W had opened a gold rush on the Chinese Mythology and Wuxia genres. There will be pros and cons for that. I won't be surprised that even Japanese and Western developers might wanna have a shot at those genres too. As long as they stay respectful to the genre and Chinese culture, they could be welcomed.

Sardaukar20 said:

To be fair, Game Science also had at least one video of their director and staffs talking about the game development of BM:W years ago. For example that video about them talking about using motion capture on cats.

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That video was done as a joke a couple of years ago. Overall their marketing has been very much focused on gameplay.

Sardaukar20 said:

That is why I have mentioned we should control our expectations about the Chinese game industry. BM:W have raised our expectations, but the industry is still very new. The Wuchang developers looks suspiciously like a "Me Too". Who knows. They talk about their game using motion capture, and environmental scanning, like what Game Science did. They also happened to release their promo video days after BM:W came out. Or maybe they are a real deal. We won't know until their game is released. Even if it disappoints, it wouldn't surprise me, because great AAA games are not gonna be common. It's the same thing that happens in any other game industry.

I just think that BM:W had opened a gold rush on the Chinese Mythology and Wuxia genres. There will be pros and cons for that. I won't be surprised that even Japanese and Western developers might wanna have a shot at those genres too. As long as they stay respectful to the genre and Chinese culture, they could be welcomed.

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I don't see how any of this is different to what I've been writing.

If anything I've been going a couple of steps further, saying people shouldn't be lionizing Black Myth too much either just because it's been successful, because it's the ability of multiple studios developing high quality products which is more important.

The problem with Western "woke" consultants and game developers is they're still Western with the same arrogance that they know better than anyone else. When I was a kid in a non-white neighborhood, people literally believed that white people and black people are the mother and father races of everyone else. Like I've said before... take all white and all black people and add them together and they still don't come anywhere close to making the majority of the world. When you see what these Western "woke" minded people see as diverse, it's white and black, women, and gays... the only recognized victims of the big bad world according to them. That's not representative of the real world and yet they want only their vision of it forced down everyone else's throat. The Chinese have the oldest continuing civilization in the world and yet whites and blacks in the US think the Chinese are carpetbaggers in the world like they've been around a lot longer.

Now you see these "woke" developers using the same logic of racist whites to turn people against Black Myth Wukong. They're saying how the popularity is because of Chinese buying the game not because it's really popular. They're saying Chinese people don't count. For people who believe in diversity, they already eliminated the largest ethnicity in the world without a thought. So you know that they don't really care about diversity. It's a front for something more typical of Westerners... control and power over everything by dictating to everyone else who's who and what's what. Hiding behind diversity is about covering up their true motivations, You know what "official" victims in the West's victim culture all do? They want to make themselves out to be the only victims because they want all the attention for themselves. The victim culture has been around since the beginnings of the Cold War. They make it where treating victims is like triage in a hospital. Important cases first while everyone else has to wait their turn. And since the Cold War they're still helping only the first and second victims they recognized. Notice how the West likes to label who's the worst evil oppressor in the world in history? They'll say Mao. But notice how the greatest victims of the world are not the Chinese. It's never in the same place as the greatest oppressor of the world. Who are the greatest victims of the world? The Jews and then blacks. Two groups where white people were their oppressors. How convenient!

Blitzo said:

That video was done as a joke a couple of years ago. Overall their marketing has been very much focused on gameplay.

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Its still a video to generate publicity. If Black Myth Wukong had not been successful, people would be mocking that video all the same. Western developers have also done plenty of marketing videos focused on gameplay. Cyberpunk 2077 was heavily marketed based on gameplay footages. So we should not rush our judgement based on what marketing footage that has been put out. This analysis should also include other variables. Such as development schedule, source of funding, outside interference, and in some cases, political messaging.

Blitzo said:

I don't see how any of this is different to what I've been writing.

If anything I've been going a couple of steps further, saying people shouldn't be lionizing Black Myth too much either just because it's been successful, because it's the ability of multiple studios developing high quality products which is more important.

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What I'm reading is that you want to caution against excessive over-hyping of Black Myth: Wukong to the point of Chinese chauvinism. I honestly haven't see that happening yet. Nobody is saying that this game triumphs against the best AAA games of our time. Nobody is making comparisons between Chinese and Western mythologies. Nobody is saying that the Chinese gaming industry is gonna takeover the world.

If anything, this "excessive" excitement we are talking about is mostly a result of pent-up frustrations about how Chinese works and culture have been terribly depicted by Hollywood. We have had the displeasure of watching Shang Chi, live action Mulan, and Netflix's Three Body Problem. Then when the Western culture mafias wanted to dictate to Game Science about how to make their game, this has gone to the boiling point. BM:W is actually one of those rare instances of a Chinese media being unapologetically Chinese, that has been able to reach a vast international audience with acclaim. This is what people like me are celebrating.

About the rest of the Chinese game industry, you and I agree that expectations have to be controlled. BM:W doesn't necessarily mean that China have been elevated among ranks the elite game makers of the West and Japan. There is much work to be done. There are still many more genres to explore like Horror-Survival, Modern Combat, Sci-fi, Strategy, City-builder, etc.

siegecrossbow said:

Black Myth themed erotic manhua came out before Concord sold 5000 copies.

Spoiler: Inappropriate content

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Elder Jinchi’s self love video came out before Concord hit 5000 sales on steam.