Kotaku writes hilariously bizarre political rant inside PS5 review
I generally try to refrain from dedicating an entire article to poke fun at other gaming sites. It’s low hanging fruit and a tad tasteless. However, every so often you get one that puts out a take so hilariously bad that I can’t help myself. Enter Kotaku and their truly bizarre review of the PlayStation 5.
Now, when you review a new console, what is it that gamers are looking for? How well it performs, what exclusive games does it have, are those games any good, what new features have been included, how much it costs, is that price worth it. That sort of stuff. Instead, a Kotaku writer, we’ll call him Itchy Willy for legal reasons, decided to go off on a pretentious political rant partway through his review of Sony’s upcoming console.
He starts off, “I’m sitting at my desk, staring at the PlayStation 5 looming over my media stand – “entertainment center” is a little too grandiose for the small piece of target furniture that holds all my gaming stuff – and wondering how the hell I’m going to review this thing.”
Well, easy. I just told you how to review it in the second paragraph of this very article.
“How would my boss, whose various PlayStation 4 reviews I’ve skimmed several times so as to glean some insight into what I should cover, review this thing? How can anyone, at this very moment in time, review this thing?”
Again, I just told you. Well, Itchy Willy does start off with some relevant information. Talking about the launch date, pricing, and size of the console and it’s performance. So good, perhaps this article isn’t quite as pretentious as that opening paragraph seemed to indicate. Then we get this gem.
“This review has spent 3,000 words talking about the PlayStation 5, which is the most I’ve written about anything.”
And it really shows.
“But Id be remiss to ignore all the reasons not to be excited for the PS5.”
From there he launches off on this bizarre rant about the state of the world.
“The world is still reeling under the weight of the COVID-19 pandemic. There are more Americans out of work than at any point in the country’s history.”
The Great Depression would beg to differ.
“Our healthcare system is an inherently evil institution that forces people to ration life-saving medications like insulin and choose suicide over suffering with untreated mental illness.”
Someone’s obviously never been inside Brampton, Ontario’s hospital.
“As I’m writing this, it looks very likely that Joe Biden will be our next president. But it’s clear that the worst people aren’t going away because a new old white man is sitting behind the Resolute desk — well, at least not this old white man. Our government is fundamentally broken in a way that necessitates radical change rather than incremental electorialism.”
Now, for starters I have a four year bachelor of arts in political science, and I’m pretty sure “electorialism” is not actually a word in the English language. We also have another limousine socialist who thinks they are the next Che Guavara. And he couldn’t resist a jab at the alt-right Nazis, who’s basically anyone who doesn’t 100% agree with him.
“The harsh truth is that, for the reasons listed above and more, a lot of people simply won’t be able to buy a PlayStation 5, regardless of supply.”
Yes, and I’m not able to buy myself a Ferrari. Does Itchy Willy not understand that this is a luxury product he’s reviewing? Nobody needs a game console to survive or be happy. As someone who’s actually been to a communist country, you don’t see too many people playing PlayStation. The few gamers that do exist in Cuba are all on old PCs, connecting to Steam through pirate neighbourhood LANs.
“Or if they can, concerns over increasing austerity in the United States and the growing threat of widespread political violence supersede any enthusiasm about the console’s SSD or how ray tracing makes reflections more realistic.”
You mean all the political violence being caused by far left radicals like Antifa, who are occupying their time terrorizing shop keepers and their minimum wage staff members?
“That’s not to say you can’t be excited for those things — I certainly am, on some level — but there’s an irrefutable level of privilege attached to the ability to simply tune out the world as it burns around you.”
Christ, what a Debbie Downer. If this party gets any more lively, a funeral is likely to break out.
Truth is people need to escape from the real world for just a bit. This is what keeps you from going absolutely insane with despair. It’s also why a lot of gamers take exception to politicizing our pass time. Obviously you don’t want to get lost in a fantasy world, but it’s healthy to tune in, turn on, and drop out every now and then.
And yeah, a lot of people can’t afford a PS5 right now. That sucks. During my college years, all I had was a really crappy PC to game on because I didn’t have the money to buy a new system. Same when I lost my job a few years ago and was stuck working the gig economy to survive. I also know the success and security I have right now could get pulled out from under me any minute, without warning. Hell, my company was just subject to threats of a hostile takeover that had us all spooked. That’s life unfortunately. Sometimes you get dealt a bad hand. Some folks get dealt a lot of bad hands. But if you spend every waking hour fretting over it, you’ll only make yourself sick. If you’re really so concerned about these people, donate the review unit to a homeless shelter or inner city youth group. I’m sure they’d appreciate it.
I really have to wonder what Sony must make of this. Kotaku is technically still a mainstream gaming publication, for some reason. So they were most likely provided the console for free as part of their deal to review it. Surely Sony was looking for something favourable about their newest shiny. Not for the writer to go off and tell people not to buy it because the world is supposedly going to hell in a hand basket. I’m sure the marketing department can’t be too please to be drowning under that wet blanket. Especially given the other PR problems they’ve had this year.
But wait, there’s more!
Not to be outdone, the Xbox Series X also got its own bizarre article from Kotaku concerning its… holes. A different writer, we’ll call them Afreida Pocks, says that the ventilation holes on the top of the console are too big, and are triggering her trypophobia, or fear of small, irregular groups of holes.
Now, I wouldn’t want to make fun of someone who has a legitimate medical condition. That would just make me a douche bag. Which I already am, but why exacerbate it? The problem is that trypophobia isn’t actually recognized as a specific mental disorder by the American Psychiatric Association. So yeah, there ya go. You couldn’t make this stuff up if you tried.
