For instance, the Civ games are basically Whig History: The Game, presenting liberal capitalism as the ideal end point for all societies. It even includes uncivilized "barbarian tribes" whose sole purpose is to be exterminated so you can take their land for the glory of capitalism.
However (spoilers for a 20 year old video game)
spoiler
Kreia is revealed near the end of the game to actually be a Sith Lord in disguise, Darth Traya, and is the final boss of the game. I wouldn’t say she’s portrayed positively.
This feels like a very relevant point
spoiler
Eh, sympathetically at least, I'd argue
Her goal to kill the force is mentioned ingame to be omnicidal tho. And the fact that she is constantly grabbing boss characters from off screen to throw at you later doesn't do her favours from a player perspective. I mean, she's basically female :unlimited-power:
True, but I think the big difference is that she's a player character herself. We get to see her philosphy from her perspective, as opposed to Palpatine who's basically just your classic one-dimensional evil wizard.
It then becomes an issue of how would you even make a character this manipulative and competent and powerful a protagonist without them just making themselves "right". But nobody actually listens to Kriea, except to gain power which reinforces her in game ideology, which makes Randians right, but the fact that your making a deal with the devil is obvious... Is the problem that they made her too well? Lmao
~~I don't understand the criticism. I never claimed Kreia was poorly written or characterized, only that ~~
the authors portrayed her pretty vile philosphy in a sympathetic light. I'd guess as a way to "both sides" the light/dark dichotomy that defines the whole Star Wars universe.
Edit: sorry, I'm sleep deprived and misread your comment. Yeah, they definitely made her have a lot of depth compared to Palpatine, which I think betrays that at least some of the writers probably lowkey agreed with some of what she says.
Palps is a great character because he is just a one-dimensional evil wizard with no complexity. He's exactly like real-life billionaires; He just wants power and has no morals what so ever.
Kotor 2 had a rushed release, a lot of the stuff proving her wrong and making her problematic throughout the game was cut. The real issue is that the main quest is made purposefully self defeating for somewhat dumb but understandable reasons, mainly to one up kotor 1’s original twist. I prefer the head canon that the game only makes sense if the bad ending from kotor 1 was canon and the remnants of the Jedi are as broken as the infighting sith. Btw I reject the mmo.
All MMOs should be rejected on principle, I think.
I just think mmo came out after I became too old to be a fucking nerd. I don’t like how Star Wars loves both sides-ism partly because white people don’t understand ying and yang but really because it’s an excuse to sell space nazi merchandise to children.
Star Wars' whole spirituality is all over the place. Sometimes it's Christian, sometimes it's Taoist, sometimes it'a Buddhist, sometimes it's fucking Zoroastrian.
Which is frankly ok so how long as you pick and choose wisely and consistently. The middle path in Buddhism isn’t doing left hand path stuff every other Tuesday.