When you love something a lot, it can sometimes turn into a kind of passion that is overwhelming to other people. When you express that on the internet, it becomes fodder for jokes. Now, one man’s passion for not cheating in video games has become grist for the internet joke mill.
The debate about whether games should have easy modes has been going on for decades, or at least since I personally ate shit at Super Smash Bros. while playing against my older brother and his friends.
Some people feel that easy or assist modes provide greater accessibility to players who are disabled or otherwise wouldn’t be able to enjoy a particular game. Others are less tolerant of that argument, positing that the sheer existence of an “easy” mode would taint a developer’s vision or cheapen the accomplishment of beating a tough game. These two camps tend not to see eye to eye.
The current subject of this round of that debate is the latest game from From Software, Sekiro. From Software specialises in making punishing games that reward you for paying attention and being persistent, but there are players who are physically unable to play the game as intended, or want to know why their friends are all screaming about umbrellas but don’t have the time to devote to learning Sekiro’s complex combat systems.
Debating things on the internet usually does not end with people coming away with a greater empathy for the other side’s position. But this debate has reached a kind of Christmas Truce over a single tweet.
Last week, PC Gamer associate editor James Davenport wrote an article about cheating in Sekiro and not feeling bad about it. “Some might say I missed out on the intended catharsis, sidestepping the ‘artist’s intent.’ So what?” Davenport wrote.
“There’s nothing to preserve for the greater good in Sekiro’s design. I’ll get what I can from it. And I got a lot from Sekiro.” Twitter user Fetusberry took issue with that position, and retweeted the outlet’s tweet with some commentary of his own.
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory.
Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. https://t.co/upkhLSNQNO
— Fetusberry 「Ass Bastard」 Crunch (@Fetusberry) April 6, 2019
Fetusberry clearly feels very strongly about the issue of cheating in video games. Unfortunately for him, there is nothing that the internet at large finds funnier than people’s unvarnished, passionately held opinions expressed in a hyperbolic way.
To wit, internet jokesters have started copying and pasting the text of Fetusberry’s tweet into videos of using minor cheats in games and modifying the text for other social situations.
— The Secret World of Alex Yiik (@sebmal) April 8, 2019
You cheated not only the game but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory.
Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.It’s sad that you don’t know the difference of what true gamers are. pic.twitter.com/wI2ZHsUQlk
— Endgame Hype (@PrinceOfPufftop) April 7, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory. Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.
It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. pic.twitter.com/tBTeHK5f9W
— TodoNintendoS (@TodoNintendoS) April 8, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory. Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.
It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. pic.twitter.com/h8veGCFroE
— TJ #CTRNitroFueled ???? (@tj2gaming) April 8, 2019
Not here too ???? pic.twitter.com/M19r0JlpBC
— ????????️????Lulu????️???????????????? (@luulubuu) April 8, 2019
— Akfamilyhome (@akfamilyhomeak) April 8, 2019
— Sonic the Hedgehog (@sonic_hedgehog) April 9, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory.
Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. pic.twitter.com/8nHKyDwfc5
— SEGA Europe (@europe_sega) April 9, 2019
Link: Hits Ganon once with a boomerang
Ganon: “You cheated not only the game, but yourself-“
— Kelly Turnbull (@Coelasquid) April 10, 2019
Raphael: You cheated not only the game, but yourself. You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve. You took a shortcut and gained nothing. pic.twitter.com/kLuqO6IllT— LittleKuriboh (@yugiohtas) April 7, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourselfpic.twitter.com/ZbpMXhw3yJ
— Chiitan???? (@ogecebel) April 10, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory.
Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. pic.twitter.com/2znIy1EVQu
— rutgerfan106 (@AxeofVirility) April 9, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow. You didn’t improve. You took a shortcut and gained nothing.
You experienced a hollow victory. Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.
It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. pic.twitter.com/aPilBGKTnW
— Casey Eggsplosion ???? (@CaseyExplosion) April 8, 2019
you cheated not only the game, but yourself
you didn’t grow
you didn’t improve
you took a shortcut and gained nothingyou experienced a hollow victory
nothing was risked and nothing was gainedit’s sad that you don’t know the difference pic.twitter.com/thQa3CTajL
— Ming Me to Life (@NateMing) April 8, 2019
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn’t grow.
You didn’t improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.You experienced a hollow victory.
Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.It’s sad that you don’t know the difference. pic.twitter.com/ivvjRFUKpk
— meat ball (@starrygoround) April 6, 2019
While all this is funny, and allows for some levity during a debate where people on either side have dug in their heels hard, you have to wonder what it must be like for the person who kicked it all off, now getting resoundly dunked on across the web.
Fetusberry has since said that they find the jokes hilarious, tweeting, “I feel like there’s no point in getting upset about it, ‘cause what am I gonna do to change anything?” Kotaku reached out for comment, but didn’t get a response in time for publication.
Comments
32 responses to “Hyperbolic Tweet About Game Difficulty Turns Into Wonderful Internet Joke”
Hey I agree with him but this is pretty funny
When your an Old Gamer the from the 8 and 16 bit generation, question is not Nintendo or Sega… the question is were you a GameGenie or GameShark kid?
Did you play Sim City with infinite money?
Do you know the Konami code?
Do you save scum at XCom?
Did you type iddt 4 times in Doom multiplayer?
Ah, the joys of the internet. Rampant bullying under the name ‘it’s a joke lulz’
I honestly thought the Link one was gonna end with an awkward pause before he just walked out.
Meh, as long as it’s not the kind of cheating that affects other players I couldn’t give a flying fart what people do to enjoy their game.
Reminds me of Destiny, the loot cave and the many ways folks cheesed the raids.
We cheesed the crap outta the Vault of Glass and I couldn’t care less what folks thought of that, we could do it as intended but given the small window our team had to play together we simply chose to do it the faster way until it was fixed.
Plus it was really fun pulling off some of the weird and whacky ways of breaking the game to break up the grind every now and then.
Sue me.
Ah good old Vault of Glass cheese… I spent like two hours one night helping another player throw the last boss off the side for a group where people were being cycled through to get a kill on him.
Honestly one of the most enjoyable game for exploits simply because some of them were as complex as the intended way.
As a warlock the VoG cheap was always fun to pull off and hilarious to fail.
These are all in-game cheeses/glitches/shortcuts & that’s fine imo, but if you use external mods to beat a game than in my opinion you din’t really “beat” the game.
Tbh I don’t see much difference between in game cheeses/glitches and external mods. The developers didn’t intend for the cheese/glitches to be there, you’re just exploiting a flaw in the programming to skip the challenge. And an external mod just alters the game a little bit to skip the challenge.
If it’s something the developers intended, that is a different story
The way I personally see it is that by using cheeses/glitches to your advantage is OK because your playing the vanilla game code that was released by the developers, whether intended or not. But by using an external mod created by someone outside development then you are tampering with the original code. That’s just the way I personally see it, but I understand where you’re coming from.
I found the article where some people were trying to drag in disabled and accessibility people into why game such as this needing an easy mode was thoroughly laughable. Whats next making hard horror films into a G rated cut, or having all scenes changed so they can take place in the day, just so everyone can enjoy? At what point does a piece of art defeat its own purpose?
Yes accessibility is good, the more the better, but there will always be a point in trying to cater to everyone, something could end up being compromised.
Sure, Blake. I’ll pass it on to my 16 year old relative, who was an avid gamer (til a car accident took 3 fingers n part of his right hand last year. He still gives it a go, but let’s say he’s permanently playing on hard mode now). I’ll be sure to let him know how hilarious you find his predicament.
Re-read his comment.
He quite clearly said he finds certain game journos laughable for using disabled gamers to virtue signal about an easy mode for games they cant beat.
It’s not clear he said that at all. The original journalist didn’t mention accessibility at all (let alone ‘virtue signalling’), and Gita only mentioned it as a talking point others have raised in the broader debate about hard games.
The hypocrisy of calling out virtue signalling is that you are, yourself, signalling your own virtues by doing so. You’re signalling how much more pragmatic and above such shallow behaviour as ‘virtue signalling’ you think you are, by literally doing the thing you’re complaining about.
You cannot say that since the release of Sekiro, it hasn’t created an overwhelming consistent narrative of gaming news outlets pushing for an easy mode in games that have none, and using the example of disabled gamers as a hard justification for said mode to be introduced.
I haven’t seen any, personally, but it’s a valid argument in any case. There are some fairly trivial ways games like this can be made easier for people that need that, and it takes nothing away from everyone else who can just choose not to play on that setting. Assuming journalists are using disabled people as props to hide their alleged gaming ineptitude is incredibly bad faith.
Especially considering said journalists had to finish the game, without any guidance or any tips they could Google, on the default difficulty. And there’s also been other editorials going into the machinations of what a mode would look like that makes sense for the game, rather than the blunt “yay/nay” discussion that keeps getting thrown around in comments.
This summarizes most people’s thoughts on the situation against changing design decisions, although you can potentially put an easy mode in the game, it goes against the games design of no hand holding.
Although I’m not against fully of an addition of an easy mode, but it has to come from the developers freely, not a mob demanding it. I would liken it to a patron demanding Vegan alternatives at a steakhouse, we shouldn’t expect that to fly, why should expect the same idea in games?
And they’re not allowed to enjoy this game? Just so you know, I admittedly find this game difficult but fair. For me. For my cousin? It sucks how much it bums him out. That’s not an excuse, that’s fact. Just consider yourself fortunate it isn’t a problem you must cope with, but why shut out those that this IS an issue for?
Oh I read it just fine. Again just to be sure. He said dragging the concept of using disabled folks into the “argument” was laughable, not that journo’s who can’t play games were using it as an excuse. That’s you fleshing out his sentence with an assumption of what he meant, good sir. But asking for an easier difficulty or re-mapable controls for those who do have physical limitations is not funny, nor a bad idea. How many times have I myself on this site said a dev should make the game they want to? What’s-his-face, the head honcho of From Software (sorry, I have the flu n my brain is mush), said himself that it’s a tragedy that not everyone can play their games on From’s preferred difficulty. I accept that it is what it is fully, but raising a valid topic on behalf of those who would gain some joy out of an alternative mode shouldn’t be deemed “laughable”, then having it justified by one of the most ridonculous metaphors I’ve heard in a while, it just smacked of looking down his nose and gatekeeping. I’m not getting into that whole journo excuse debate, I just got a little peeved at someone appearing galled by the thought of adding an alt setting (that Mr Avon and other like minded folk never have to go near) which less fortunate folk could use to get some of the same pleasure us more dexterous folk get from this awesome game. Hope I clarified my point and also how his came off (without others having to shore up his words, you gotta admit it sounds pretty arrogant). Have a good day, Mr Bear!
creating an easy mode for the human brain that allows it to distinguish between things without drawing bloody stupid conclusions.
Why did he use cheats on the final boss? That is like using a “date drug” to get laid.
No….no it’s not…*face palm*
Enlighten me?
Because cheating in a video game will never be comparable to rape, you neanderthal.
I know that 100%, I guess my comparison was in poor taste as I merely wanted to use the similarities of difficult things in life, some people choose the easy way out even if it isn’t the right way. PS I am pretty sure Homo Neanderthalensis have been extinct for about 40,000 years.
Yeah that’s fair, I guess my approach was little left of field for what I was trying to get at. First comparable thing that came to mind.
You’re comparing it to committing sexual assault! lol…don’t think so
Honestly who cares how someone chooses to enjoy an entertainment product they have purchased. Given it’s difficult to get a refund these days for change of mind, it could feel like a waste of money to some that can’t complete the game for whatever reason. It doesn’t take away anyone’s personal sense of achievement by completely something on hard difficulty if there is the presence of an easy option.
Gamers are a diverse group of people in general with wildly varying abilities, time etc. I think it’s naive of a developer to think all their potential audience would be happy to play the game at a single extremely punishing difficulty that only appeals to masochists. Otherwise we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
Back in the IDDQD days this wouldn’t have been a conversation, it’s only now that cheats have become something that either don’t exist or are sold as microtransactions that people care. Cheats used to be fun, half the fun of playing games in those days was whacking on a bunch of crazy cheats and just tearing through the game. Who, in games like Goldeneye, didn’t chuck on Invicibility, Slow Animations and Infinite Ammo and just waltz through the game like a God. Who didn’t put on extra gibs in Rise of the Triad or just generally screw around in any old FPS with God Mode.
Another difficult game comes out, another round of boastful gatekeepers using it for self-validation.
Didn’t grow?
Didn’t grow what? Better at playing a game such as sekiro? Learning a certain boss fight in one particular game?
Cheating in these single player games only ever affects the one doing it. He’ll sometimes it’s even fun.look at GTA3 or breath of the wild. Even in dank souls there exists some truly cheesy methods of winning.
People take their video games WAAAAAY to seriously.