Vocabulary for the modern Gamer: Sekiro Edition

As it stands, there are multiple takes on the Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, discussion, and many of them are indeed terrible. The “easy mode” narrative that has been toted around by gaming “journalism” has been nothing short of both frustrating and yet downright comical, but the fact that certain definitions are being misused and misconstrued to push agendas is getting out of hand.

So Let's revisit a previous segment that has been popular on this blog; Vocabulary for the modern gamer is back, ladies and gentlemen! and today we're going to talk about Accessibility and Exploits.



Accessibility.
Adjective

• easy to approach, reach, enter, speak with, or use.
• That can be used, entered, reached, etc.:an accessible road; accessible ruins.
• Obtainable; attainable:accessible evidence.
• Open to the influence of (usually followed by to):accessible to bribery

Right away you can see exactly why people tend to confuse accessibility with being “easy”, but an ease of approach does not particularly mean that. To prove this point, let's look at the most simple things in life like Doors or Stairs.

To the average person those are accessible means of entering a room or a building, because they grant us access. Now, to someone with disabilities it becomes difficult to utilize those things so the accessible option is to add a ramp or wider doorways for wheelchair access, or hand rails in bathrooms and showers for people who have trouble standing. These are things that make performing every day tasks, much like everyone else, obtainable; which is in fact the goal of accessibility.

In gaming, the same desired effect is why we have certain options available.

Color Blind mode, Sound cues, Epilepsy warnings and lighting adjustments special controllers that allow for certain motions and actions to be performed. These are all done for the sake of accessibility, and for gamers who just so happen to have disabilities that prevent them from enjoying the game the same as everyone else. While this doesn't change the difficulty of the game, it does make the game easier to be played so that these folks are able to have the same experiences as everyone else.

Before we go any further let's talk about our second definition.

Exploit
transitive verb

1: to make productive use of : UTILIZE exploiting your talents exploit your opponent's weakness

2: to make use of meanly or unfairly for one's own advantage exploiting migrant farm workers


In gaming, the exploit is a means of utilizing certain elements of a game, that's not normally way the game is originally intended to be played, in order to accomplish something. This can be achieved either through exploiting glitches and bugs in online based games or using fan created tools such as trainers that allow cheat options. There are trainer communities that express explicitly that trainers are not to be used online, but that doesn't stop people from doing so.

It's also interesting to note that tool assisted exploits are more commonly used in speedruns, as a means of helping establish muscle memory, and finding easier paths to lower your clear-time. However, when it comes to casual playing, tool assisted exploits are not a means of accessibility for those with disabilities, as anyone can use cheats if they mean to just go through a game with the least amount of resistance, possible. If that were the case then one could make the argument that the 30-man Konami Code is “handi-capable”. You could probably hear me groan at the use of that word in your head, just now.

True facts

Now here comes the important part of this discussion.

When you have someone making the argument that changing a game at it's core will help the game cater to a demographic of gamers who happen to have disabilities, You are in fact saying that these players need to be treated with “kid gloves” in order to finish a game that everyone else would have no problems finishing if they just put the time and effort into learning the mechanics of that said game!

Full stop!!!

It has nothing to do with helping the disabled, It is definitely not done as an act of kindness, and in fact comes off as a really condescending move that fails to seem charitable at it's very core. Which is it entirely hilarious when this point is used as a “hot take” when people defend articles such as this. 

I'm a journalist and i'm okay I work all night and I work all day....

Now, as far as the article is concerned. It's reads more like a justification for using an exploit, while trying to explain away doing so. Here's a bit from that, because the article itself is spoiler heavy.

An hour or so in, I slow the action down by 50 percent with the intent to study *[the final boss's] moveset. I plan on leaping off the cliff once I get cozy, and then juicing up the speed back to normal. But it feels too good to stop. So I finish the guy off in slow motion, watch a predictably brief From ending (I got the 'good' one too) and let the credits roll. The adrenal high, the sense of accomplishment, the themes and motifs and memories are still flowing through me. Nothing is lost. I love this damn game.

*Editor's Note: The name of the final boss has been altered from the original quote to prevent spoilers

In the case of the article, That's an entirely different discussion, starting with caring whether your credibility and integrity can take a blast of that magnitude, and still have people look to your articles with any sort of respect, afterwards. Sure "it's just a game" and people use cheats in games all the time, but seriously if you're writing about games and looked at as some sort of authority or subject matter expert, it's a whole entirely different ballgame.

Get_on_my_level.jpg

However, when you see an actual quadriplegic, like Reddit's own Limitlessquad defeat bosses like the Corrupted Monk, you really take a step back and have to reassess your own personal skill level and what it means to actually “get gud” . This isn't some journalist who basically complains about the nature of a series of games that have been, for a decade, notorious for their learning curve and difficulty and have influenced games to rediscover challenge and difficulty in an industry that was almost completely engulfed in hand-holding and tutorial heavy mechanics since the early 00's - This is someone who actually wanted to play a game that everyone else was playing and succeed at playing that game given the challenging gameplay and steep learning curve, and actually did so!

Before we end this, Let's sum up the argument for maximum hilarity. 

This is a game about a Shinobi who lost his arm and gained a prosthetic, and has to master his disability, by using that prosthetic, and it's many upgrades in order to be good enough to accomplish his sworn goal. And self proclaimed “journalists” are legitimately making the argument that this game is too hard, and needs either have an easy mode or exploits in the game to cater to gamers with physical disabilities.

LET. THAT. SINK. IN!

Because of course representation matters, right?



- I'll see you next Bossfight!