metta
2921
No. You don’t find it curious, you just want to fight. Unless you’re honestly telling me you don’t see why someone would find Special Forces to be anachronistic in this context?
I didn’t realize I needed to have played the whole 40 or 50 hours for my opinion to be valid. That’s going to be bad news for this forum, 90% of which is people making truth statements about things they haven’t fully experienced.
I’m an hour in, and that example was just the first thing that made me hoot with laughter. I’ll be sure and report back when I’m finished and you can tell me then why I’m wrong. If I finish…
I’ve only played the first Witcher’s Act 1 and a little bit of Act 2, but I don’t really understand why using the term Special Forces would feel all that out of place in that universe. Is it because the term is used in contemporary times? Why can’t fantasy universes co-opt modern military terms for their own use?
Jazar
2923
The only reason people have ever compared this game to Dark/Demon Souls is that the combat demands more careful attention then just run and …stab. You need to watch your opponents, wait for their attacks, strike quickly, and pull back.
That is the beginning and the end of the comparison.
Razgon
2924
wow - whats up with the attitude? I don’t want to fight, I’ll leave that for others. I’m genuinely curious as to why you find the games writing to be poor. I explained myself and my stance in the following paragraphs and no, while the word special forces is far from typical, I don’t see any issues with using non-standard-fare in writing in games. I actually applaud it!
I look forward to hearing what you think though when you are further in, unless of course you still think I just want to fight - In that case, nevermind.
metta
2925
Special Forces has a very specific meaning associated with it, and when I heard it that meaning was activated in my head. I found it off-putting, and funny, and lazy writing, and the fact that you didn’t has no bearing on my experience. Your experience does not negate mine; it does not render mine wrong; it does not cancel out my experience; your experience is not the default; your experience is not normative; your experience does not define every moment for everyone else.
/linguist mode on
Words are not neutral. Words get coded in very particular ways; specific meanings become attached and are activated in our mind when we hear the phrase. Some phrases are coded for gender, like Nurse, which culturally is coded female. We know this because our society has produced the phrase Male Nurse.
/linguist mode off
Then you probably don’t want to listen to Triss’s ramblings about genetics, mutation and evolution in the first chapter.
Giaddon
2927
JUST LOOK AT THE BOOBS, DON’T LOOK AWAY
Did anyone else read metta’s post with the image of a little kid with his fingers in his ears going “lalalalala I can’t hear you”?
No matter what he says, that’s what I thought when I read his post, and nothing he says can change that experience for me.
I also found the use of The term Special Forces somewhat jarring but this a game set in a fantasy universe (so anything goes really) and it does tie-in pretty well with the rest of the story and world.
Using this one example as a reason to dismiss the entire game seems petty and indicative of a very strong bias.
Reemul
2931
Childish did spring to mind, still it definitely pisses him off regardless of what any of us say and i’m sure some of us feel the same regardless of what he says.
Ha, good call. Doesn’t she also talk about cancer and typhoid later in the game? I don’t think the Witcher universe is concerned with anachronisms any more than it’s concerned with whether dragons actually exist.
-Tom
It’s less anachronisms and more… kind of steampunk science thing? They are more advanced in certain areas than in our medieval times.
Special Forces I think is perfectly fine in terms of keeping with the style of the books. Sapkowski used these modern terms without shame.
The anachronistic language sticks out pretty badly, but I can ignore it for the sake of the rest of the game.
I read the translated Blood of Elves. I thought it was just a clumsy translation, but I then I read elsewhere that it was actually a good effort and that the weird anachronisms were in the original text. That made me conclude that reading further would not be a good idea.
Yeah, you’re not interested in that at all, you’re just saying ridiculously halfwitted things in yet another thread in a trollish way and getting churlish when called out on the inanity of your own remarks.
Unless you’re honestly telling me you don’t see why someone would find Special Forces to be anachronistic in this context?
It’s a fantasy world, goofball. They can call them what they want.
I didn’t realize I needed to have played the whole 40 or 50 hours for my opinion to be valid. That’s going to be bad news for this forum, 90% of which is people making truth statements about things they haven’t fully experienced.
You saying unfounded things about a game you haven’t played much regarding a universe you’re unfamiliar with–to folks who are familiar with both–is going to get you called out. That’s going to happen in any thread on this forum where folks are interested and passionate in a subject matter. Not sure why you think you could carry on like that and then get offended when people call you out on your own hokum.
I’m an hour in, and that example was just the first thing that made me hoot with laughter. I’ll be sure and report back when I’m finished and you can tell me then why I’m wrong. If I finish…
Your big mistake is thinking this is about you in the first place.
No one cares whether you finish or not.
They also use the word “Fuck”, which my good friend, college roommate, and professional word etymologist (really, he is!) Grant traces back to approximately the 17th century as coming into something like its current usage, and the mid-19th century for its widespread usage.
The horror of that anachronism.
Giaddon
2938
Heh, that reminds me of Geralt’s “abso-fucking-lutley” in The Witcher 1. I’m pretty sure that happened.
It did.
My monocle popped out and I turned my computer off in disgust.
Lynxara
2940
Yeah, inserting anachronistic things into his fantasy world-- either for story purposes or just whimsically-- is considered one of the hallmarks of Sapkowski’s writing style. I also generally hear from folks who’ve read all the Witcher stuff in some other language that the short stories are Sapkowski’s best work, and the novels usually considered a bit questionable. I know I found The Last Wish, the short story collection available in English, much better reading than Blood of Elves. There’s more short stories that are yet to be translated, but it looks like the UK publisher doing the English translations wants to focus on the novels. If they ever manage to release the next one, anyway.
