168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Ghost of Tsushima is a great game. It’s one I probably enjoyed more than most, preferring it to the robotic dinosaurs of 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Horizon Zero Dawn and the redneck apocalypse of 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Days Gone. It was a relatively generic open world experience, but executed with such visual sty꧙le and mechanical grace that I was enaﷺmoured enough to chase down its Platinum Trophy.
Sucker Punch Productions built upon the foundations it established with the Infamous franchise and created something greater, a new IP that capitalised on our love for iconic samurai films and a weirdly inaccurate glimpse into Japanese history. It was also cultural tourism to the most egregious extent, mixing up eras (katanas, haiku, and hwachas did not exist when the game was set), and labelling its black and white visual filter ‘Kurosawa Mode’, despite the fact some of Kurosawa’s best work, like Ran, is famous for its use of colour. It also didn’t offer Japanese lip sync 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:un♊til charg♌ing for it months after launch.
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It’s clear the studio was more than willing to take a few liberties for the sake of fun. There’s nothing wrong with bending the truth in this way, especially in games where mechanics and immersion often take precedence over common sense, but that becomes a problem when you’re an outsider creating a game that revolves entirely around another country’s culture, and you🦩 plan to weaponize that to guarantee mainstream success. Tsushima sold millions, so the majority clearly don’t care.
The whole situation is messy, and not one I have the authority to properly comment on, but it ꦅis a stigma that will carry over to the inevitable film adaptation. Earlier this week saw the upcoming movie gain its writer. will be producing the screenplay, having previously worked on sci-fi romance Only, which starred Leslie Odom, Jnr. and Freida Pinto, while his most recent screenplay Blue is currently being adapted by AGBO and MGM. His debut film, Still, is also available on Hulu if you want to see what he’s capable of ahead of Tsushima. He’s clearly a talented writer, and perhaps one with a cultural perspective that can alleviate some of the game’s more deliberate ignorance towards Japan’s history.
Ghost of Tsushima is a game that operates on the tenets of classic cinema. The majority of battles are framed in a way that pay homage to legendary Japanese directors, mostly the aforementio🍰ned Akira Kurosawa, with landscape shots and character portraits taking ample time to establish a sense of drama before throwing you into battle. It’s self-indulgent wankery, an approach that is defined by the Kurosawa Mode filter that seems to fundamentally misunderstand the director’s work. Nothing about the experience itself changes, it merely decides that the colour gradient is what made this director’s filmography so iconic in the first place. That’s disingenuous, since so muc🐷h love has clearly gone into Tsushima’s world and characters, but when this excellence is defined by such an evident cultural pastiche you can’t help but pull it apart.
This extends to the narrative, which is a fairly simple revenge story that explores the definition of honour and the shortcomings attached to the samurai code. Jin Sakai was raised to always do the honourable thing🍒 regardless of the consequences, and Tsushima seeks to detach him from that worldview and show that when the surrounding society is crumbling, dishonourable bloodshed is often the only way forward. Sucker Punch could have explored this so effectively, but it only comes into its own in the closing hours when Jin can choose to abandon the cod🍃e he was raised by, deeming it as something that must be left in the past as he moves forward and becomes a better man no longer defined by his own history.
The Iki Island expansion is easily the strongest storytelling in the entire game, following Jin as he learns the bitter tr🎐uth about his father’s death and hoไw the man he once idolised was a warmonger to be compared to those he calls his enemy. The code he holds so close to his heart is one used to kill innocents and hoard power, its honour little more than a smokescreen to sit upon a throne that will inevitably crumble away to nothing.
Theꩵse moments shine, but I can’t help but feel that quieter instances of storytelling won’t be the focus of the film adaptation,♔ especially with John Wick director Chad Stahelski attached and far less time to develop characters with ideologies fit to be deconstructed. The focus will be on action while the few characters worth caring about from the game will be forgotten in favour of a cliched revenge story without the intelligence to subvert itself or create something that can stand apart from the game.
Perhaps I’m being too uncharitable, as Doscher appears more than capable of taking a predictable story like this and turning it into a poignant exploration of the period that doesn’t play fast and loose with history for the sake of blockbuster thrills. We’ll have to wait and see, but much like 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Uncharted, it feels like Ghost of Tsus෴hima is fated to be a passable adventure that will see Sony Productions make an expected return and not much else.
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