Read on Twitter
seeing some welcome pushback against the "wholesome games" label, and it& #39;s reminding me of this @JFriedhoff essay, which was pushing back against the idea that all personal games have to be glum & melancholy https://medium.com/@jfriedhoff/playing-with-resistance-a483b19d4fe7">https://medium.com/@jfriedho...
my take is that: "positive vibes only!!" people are just as likely to do shitty things as other people, and are often worse because they won& #39;t talk about their shitty behaviour or deal with it. you can draw the parallel to games p easily.
which is not to say that games tagged as wholesome are bad? but it& #39;s just an aesthetic. and as an aesthetic, i quite like it? i& #39;m more of a fan of flat pastels than gritty brown (and it& #39;s easier to make that work on a low budget)
mainly i am glad that there& #39;s a market segment that connects with players that is smaller than all of "indie games". because that was too large to be particularly useful. it& #39;s great marketing, and that& #39;s important because i want people to get paid for making their games.
but of course, like most successful marketing, it& #39;s going to erase a lot of the complexities and interesting tensions within the actual games. probably bad if all you& #39;re trying to do is make a wholesome game? but luckily, most games have higher aspirations than that.
in conclusion: play Dépanneur Nocturne, it& #39;s great https://ko-op.itch.io/dep-nocturne ">https://ko-op.itch.io/dep-noctu...
oh, wait, also: there& #39;s a pretty clear comparison to be drawn to the UK& #39;s embrace of hygge, and the inherent ideology it carries with it https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/nov/22/hygge-conspiracy-denmark-cosiness-trend">https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandst...
if i had seen this thread before, i might& #39;ve just retweeted it rather than writing anything myself: https://twitter.com/hannahnicklin/status/1265428360005668870">https://twitter.com/hannahnic...
