Guest article by Super Bad Advice

When Destiny 2 came out, I offered to review it for Herr Biffo as what with all the excellent Found Footage stuff going on, as well as his secret training for a promotional appearance on Strictly Come Dancing dressed as a giant swan goujon doing the tango, his time hasn’t been available in binloads. Goujons have, but not time.
 
However, despite the busyness we hit on both doing a piece as we knew we were probably going to approach the game from 2 very different angles. You’ve probably already read Biffo’s review, so here’s mine – which, in somewhat of an achievement for a site that reviews games, is also not a review as such. Sorry.
 
You can go to any old gaming page and be told about how D2 looks great, plays beautifully, has tons more to do than the original, has more solid plans mapped out for future play and events, it’s easier than ever to hook up with other players to tackle the shared world content and so on.
 
To do another review like that would be retreading old ground, and wouldn’t tell you much more than you could get from press quotes off of adverts.
 
So instead, here’s what Destiny 2 is to me, and why. With further apologies as it all gets a bit personal (but don’t worry: not THAT personal – you won’t need wet wipes afterwards or anything).

I wouldn't say I've been putting off playing Destiny 2, but I've been daunted by it. I've not been shy in stating that I didn't exactly get along with its predecessor. I played it a lot - admittedly, before all the DLC started dropping, and the game reportedly got good - and I just couldn't get into it no matter how hard I tried.

I mean, I love first-person shooters. It confused me that anybody would make a first-person shooter which seemed designed to undermine all the things I enjoy about the genre. I'm all for breaking moulds, but I couldn't fathom how players were feeling rewarded by its relentless slog.

Most frustratingly of all, I looked on - helpless - as Destiny grew into a bona-fide phenomenon. The people who loved it really loved it, and I felt like I was on the outside, looking through the window as everyone enjoyed a party.

It's the same feeling I get when it comes to Dark Souls; desperately wanting to be part of something, while a sense creeps up on me that - whisper it - this is not designed for me. It's hard not to feel shunned, or like I've been told I'm not worthy enough.

"It's fine. You stick to your little kiddy games, love..."

And yet, that message had failed to go in entirely, because I bought Destiny 2 - and I set out last weekend to play it. This time it was going to click with me, I'd decided. I would put in the work. I'd find a team. I'd do the raids, and suffer the grind, and build my character. I'd play it properly, and I would love it, and it would be my reward for a hard year's worth of work. 

​But first... there were other things which needed doing.

I went to a rainforest once. Years ago, as some of you may recall, I was part of an expedition to Guyana, to look for monsters with a bunch of cryptozoologists. What's weird, looking back, is how much of what we got up to could've come straight out of a video game. 

We climbed mountains and raided tombs. We drove around in jeeps that felt as if they were going to fall apart at any second. We descended into bat caves, met a shape-shifting shaman, and caught a caiman for dinner with a bow and arrow. Our guide - an Amerindian chieftain - told us how he was descended from an eagle, and I got bitten by hundreds of tiny, razor-toothed, fish while taking a bath in a river.

There were also a bunch of things I did which wouldn't make for particularly gripping gameplay; like, using an entire packet of moist toilet wipes to have a nice wash one night after being bitten by hundreds of tiny, razor-toothed, fish. Being forced to wear a pair of ridiculously oversized comedy shorts, because I was too hot in my special jungle trousers. Having a conversation with the aforementioned Amerindian chieftain about the Ronnie Corbett-starring BBC sitcom Sorry...

I wish I could do something like that again - the memories will last my entire lifetime - but the reality is I don't think my ageing feet would be up to the task. Fortunately, I can have much the same experience  thanks to Naughty Dog's Uncharted series.

In this latest instalment, there's even a mini game where your character has a wash with moist toilet wipes! Except: no there isn't.

Well, that was all a bit intense wasn't it? The pieces are moving into place, but still... there are many, many questions which must be answered.

I won't be answering any of them in this article, but shall instead offer some behind-the-scenes trivia for your delight. 

If you wish to discuss the episodes, I suggest you head over to Facebook, where the Brannigan's Vortex group share their theories as to the greater conspiracy. Or post a comment below. I like hearing what you thought.

SPOILER WARNING: Do not read on unless you have watched Whimsy Rodgers!

I read a great piece this morning, on PCGamesN, by Kirk McKeand. It discusses the depiction of Nazis in video games, from a Jewish perspective. It's well worth a read in its entirety, but it ends on this note:

"We have to keep including Nazis as villains - in fact, we have to do so more - but only in their horrible and disturbing entirety.”

It reminded me of a similar discussion I read in a newspaper many, many years ago, regarding 'Allo 'Allo, of all things, where the conclusion was that the best way to undermine Nazis was to make them look like buffoons.

It's something I've been thinking about a fair bit recently, because I've been watching the TV show Preacher, on Amazon. In that, Adolf Hitler appears as a character - albeit one doomed to spend eternity in Hell - but his portrayal is one that is weirdly sympathetic... and sort of pathetic.

I've not reached the end of the series yet - so maybe it's going to show that his gentle demeanour was all an act - but it's a brave move to make in the current social climate. Of course, two of the people responsible for putting Preacher on TV are Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg - who aren't exactly not-Jewish - so... fair enough. The anti-semitism they've no doubt encountered over their lives has earned them that right.

Inevitably, Kirk's piece got a lot of backlash from - well - those who think we should stop bringing up the Nazis, because the past is the past, and politics have no place in video games, and video games are escapism, and blah-blah-blah.

I probably - hopefully - don't need to point out why these perspectives are wholly wrong-headed in this day and age, why video game creators have every right to put political discussion into their games, and why anyone saying that Nazis should be left in the past are completely on the money, but also deluded if they're not aware that the Nazis themselves haven't exactly left the whole "being a Nazi" thing in the past.

Do you know what I've realised about the Nintendo Switch? It's a games console for middle-aged people. People with jobs. People with kids. With chores. With commitments. Relationships. It's a console for lapsed gamers, and gamers who have been around a bit. It's a console for people who want to remember that feeling they used to get when playing games.

Certainly, that isn't the audience Nintendo was aiming at when it released its first Switch lifestyle ad - full of young, beautiful souls... the sort who would rather go to parties than have a night in recovering from a working week spent juggling bills and making the kids' packed lunches and bowing to the whims of someone who you've realised only got to a management position because they were desperate enough to do so.

People without stretchmarks, or hair in places they don't want hair, and bald bits in places where they do want hair. People with energy and an immunity to hangovers.

You know: people who don't need to spend two days in bed, just because they did something the day before. People without responsibility to anything other than their own, shallow, lives. The sort who are significantly more employable than the rest of us because they've yet to realise that nothing they ever do actually matters. People whose days seem inexplicably longer than everyone else's, whose lives are an endless stream of perfect Instagram moments. I don't even know how to use Instagram. 

I'm talking about people with loads of time on their hands, even if I did rather lose my way a bit there.

This is what the Switch is: a console for people whose time is limited. I mean, I've been lucky over the years. I've - mostly - always been able to find time for gaming. These past couple of months, however, I've been too busy to even think about firing up the PS4 or Xbox One. 

The only console I've touched in that time is the Switch.

Arcades, eh. Not what they were are they? Back in the day, before home video games became better looking than anything the arcades could offer, arcades were magical caves full of noisy wonders. They were to video games what cinema was to TV, what a mountain is to a molehill, what S-Club 7 Juniors were to S-Club 7.

Now the only arcades are full of machines that disgorge tickets, which can be redeemed in return for a Minion pencil topper, or crane grabbers full of Compare The Market meerkats. 

It's why this list of my ten favourite arcade games - barring Star Wars, which I've written about enough for one lifetime, quite frankly - doesn't feature anything post-1992. Please, Father Fruity, enjoy my selections.

Well now. Here's the second instalment of the full series of Mr Biffo's Found Footage. I think it's better than the first one - closer to what I had in my head for the show, more its own thing, more confident and complete.

The benefit of the weekly release schedule is that it's giving me time to sort of work on the show in real time, and react to what people are liking or not liking. Hopefully, this'll mean that it gets better as it goes along. Your feedback is very much welcome.

If you're enjoying... please share the video, tell your mates, like it on YouTube, and subscribe to the channel. It's even more important with this episode, which - not having had the benefit of being the series premiere - needs all the boosts it can get. All of that is going to help ensure we do more in a similar vein. Anything you can do to help will be warmly received.

But anyhow. Time for some behind-the-scenes trivia. 

SPOILER WARNING: Do not read on unless you have watched Advanced Strangulation!

The past is a different country. When I was growing up, nobody thought anything of a creepy middle-aged male entertainer dressed in a silver Bacofoil suit surrounding himself with children. Of course, revelations in recent years have demonstrated that nothing from the 70s, 80s and 90s is to be trusted.

It's hard to look at anything from that era without reading a little too much into it. Take this gallery of foreign computing magazines for example...

Destiny 2 can wait, because today I am obviously going to be writing about Mr Biffo's Found Footage instead. I mean, I've been working on the ruddy thing for almost a year, so you can indulge me on this. 

​Here's a breakdown of Episode 1: Dream Drawings, full of trivia from the making of the episode.

We're going to have a special Found Footage Friday Letters Page this week. Please send your thoughts on the ep, your questions, and theories to: digitiser2000@gmail.com

WARNING: Do not read unless you've watched Mr Biffo's Found Footage - Dream Drawings.