I don't buy into the belief that everything in pop culture and history would go the exact same way, no matter what, if something was changed or removed. It just seems pointlessly fatalistic.
i tend to be of the opinion that culture is almost always downstream of politics/current events. in the early 2000s, there was clearly a market for jingoistic entertainment everywhere in america, look at 24 in tv for example. i don't think everything would be exactly the same, that is of course impossible to say, but i also think that the developers of cod were reacting to the world around them more than they were making the world around them. popular first person shooters about americans in wwii existed before cod and if cod never existed that genre still would have probably become popular because of the combination of current events and increases in technological capabilities (multiplayer, better graphics and setpieces etc).
I've argued before on Hexbear that while culture is generally downstream of politics and current events, I believe it is dogmatic to ignore the possibility and potential for culture to flow back as well. That particular argument went very :wall-talk: so I'd rather not repeat it again except to mention that one particular cultural moment that caused a massed reactionary response that snowballed all the way into the 2016 elections (GamerGate) may have tipped the scales in getting enough apathetic and indifferent people involved and participating in the political process. Most of the ruling class and the political donor class were actually surprised (as was :trump-anguish: ) at the outcome of that election, and many "Her Turn" donors had to scramble to kiss the ring in a hurry afterward. I'm not saying :hillary-disgust: would have been that much better but I do give that as an example of culture splashing back into politics and causing a lasting change. After all, capital-G G*mer culture is still more reactionary and fascist-sympathetic now than it was before that incident.
Historians often say that some events could only have gone one way, and others are just freak chance. World War 1 is usually given as the example of something that was inevitable. Some pivotal battle or another for the freak chance.
I could buy that jingoistic shooter games were inevitable in post 9/11 USA. Or at least that multiple studios would've had to have had freak accidents and lost their games just before launch, to change it.
I don't buy into the belief that everything in pop culture and history would go the exact same way, no matter what, if something was changed or removed. It just seems pointlessly fatalistic.
i tend to be of the opinion that culture is almost always downstream of politics/current events. in the early 2000s, there was clearly a market for jingoistic entertainment everywhere in america, look at 24 in tv for example. i don't think everything would be exactly the same, that is of course impossible to say, but i also think that the developers of cod were reacting to the world around them more than they were making the world around them. popular first person shooters about americans in wwii existed before cod and if cod never existed that genre still would have probably become popular because of the combination of current events and increases in technological capabilities (multiplayer, better graphics and setpieces etc).
I've argued before on Hexbear that while culture is generally downstream of politics and current events, I believe it is dogmatic to ignore the possibility and potential for culture to flow back as well. That particular argument went very :wall-talk: so I'd rather not repeat it again except to mention that one particular cultural moment that caused a massed reactionary response that snowballed all the way into the 2016 elections (GamerGate) may have tipped the scales in getting enough apathetic and indifferent people involved and participating in the political process. Most of the ruling class and the political donor class were actually surprised (as was :trump-anguish: ) at the outcome of that election, and many "Her Turn" donors had to scramble to kiss the ring in a hurry afterward. I'm not saying :hillary-disgust: would have been that much better but I do give that as an example of culture splashing back into politics and causing a lasting change. After all, capital-G G*mer culture is still more reactionary and fascist-sympathetic now than it was before that incident.
Historians often say that some events could only have gone one way, and others are just freak chance. World War 1 is usually given as the example of something that was inevitable. Some pivotal battle or another for the freak chance.
I could buy that jingoistic shooter games were inevitable in post 9/11 USA. Or at least that multiple studios would've had to have had freak accidents and lost their games just before launch, to change it.
That's a fair argument to me.
I could at least settle for some delay to the flaghumping acceleration.