The Massacre

Content Warning: Brief descriptions of extreme violence

Another new game, another flashy science-fiction show, another action film. The same tropes get repeated—the suit gets destroyed, the dragon is slain, and the robot blows up, putting a nice dent in the VFX department’s budget.

It was always a feeling, nagging at me, playing through Remedy Entertaiment’s 2019 release Control. Despite considering it one of the greatest games I’ve ever played, the feeling never stopped. The combat encounters felt like a massacre of, frankly, my own kind, at my own pushes of buttons and joysticks on an increasingly crappy controller. ( 8bitdo, I love you, but, please sort your D-Pads out. The mushy nightmare of a D-Pad is the one thing killing a good experience with the controller I own.)

"A compilation of images of various screenshots of science-fiction armor seen in Quantum Break and Control."

Various screenshots gathered from concept art for Remedy Entertainment’s Control and Quantum Break.

I’m not really sure where this started, but the feelings took over one day, and rapidly. There was a solace I stuck to within these designs, these enemies, and the prospects of their existence. Kevlar, metal, and rubber, all existing to protect… something; usually a human wearer, if the media ever focuses on the humanisation of the wearer in the first place. They were given a purpose to protect. This was a great purpose. like the AI on a spaceship whose sole purpose is to open and close doors.

My job is to protect the human. My job is very important.

In the same vein of people getting second-hand embarrassment from watching game-shows, or that episode of The Office, I can only feel second-hand… maybe not anger, but something of the like. It’s like watching a mirror of yourself getting killed. One time, burned alive. A gun pierces an oxygen tank. Another, a rifle to the face. The next, telekinetic powers throw them against a brick wall.

I don’t know. It’s exhausting.