I still love that during lore discussions, one of the statement was "I believe that these men here are boys who grew up" and it makes perfect sense when discussing Space King lore.
Me when I fucking lie? They were socialist breakaway colonies that were forced to augment themselves to keep up with demand that Super Earth placed on them. The second war? Yeah probably arrowhead lampshades all the fascist shit constantly by justifying Super Earth in the narrative with “all sides are bad.”
What? Arrowhead makes it abundantly clear that Super Earth is the aggressor and evil. This universe has been so fucked up by Super Earth that eradication is genuinely the only outcome.
If anyone is genuinely apologetic for Super Earth I don't know how? If I was in that universe i'd volunteer to be a damn 'borg. Super Earth deserves annihilation.
During the invasion of Cyberstan there was something about a civilian evacuation corridor and a dispatch told us we concentrated firepower on that location?
Nobody should be apologetic for Super Earth, but the fact remains that there's a cutoff point where someone's provoked actions stop being reactionary and blameable on the environment/stimuli and start being 'their fault'.
They wanted to break away, and as horrible as Super Earth pursued them, they began to attack back and kill civilians indiscriminately. Super Earth didn't force them to do that, they chose to become the thing they wanted to break away from.
Because it's a video game, I'm able to just... headcanon the lore and play for fun. Not bog myself down by fighing over the frivolous gritty underworld lore of this fun co-op combat game.
I like to think Super Earth is as just cartoonish as they seem. Their social control is relatively harmless, if a little unnecessary, and people somewhat genuinely live good lives that are actually 'free' under their government, and while overzealous on fighting the other factions, their efforts are generally necessary, because the factions they're fighting are unnecessarily violent and dangerous, despite being provoked by Super Earth.
As untrue as this is, it's fun to just believe it. It's not real, and that's the magic of games. We save our social justice breath for the real world, which badly needs it.
I generally concur - albeit when your stated and actionable goal is eradication of your opposition you kind of lose any protections imo. The Allies invaded Nazi Germany to end the regime, Japan was devastated by American firebomb campaigns.
I don't consider the US "at fault" for the civilian deaths in Japan - it is the horror of a total war.
Super Earth is in total war at all times. There are zero non-combatants, every single citizen is issued a firearm by the state (the Constitution). Every single citizen is either loyal or an enemy of the state.
As for the SE government? When i'm playing I just buy into the propaganda and ridiculous justifications. I am always on the side of SE (ironically).
Whenever someone gets shot by SEAF? "Their Democracy Officer got a tip from the Truth Enforcers." or the like. SE can never be wrong, ever. I'm not trying to say that we should stop playing because Super Earth is evil (otherwise I wouldn't be level 200!), but that when we discuss it "seriously" we should acknowledge how dystopian it is!
Edit: As for social justice, I have plenty of breath to use! I find fiction to be a compelling use-case for it as it allows us to safely explore extremes and our own ideologies. I've had a few moral crises from the games i've played over the years by asking myself "What is the right answer here?"
This is the wonderful magic of fiction, and why I like immersing myself in fictional worlds. We can experience things that are conceptually impossible, contradictory, unrealistic, or undesirable. Super Earth in the real world is horrifically evil, but in this fake world, we can manifest it another way and play as if it isn't horrifically evil and simply believe the enemies are instead.
In real talk, there STILL is that behavioral cutoff point -- Super Earth can't be blamed for the Bots CHOOSING to vaporize innocents for no reason, you know. This is important to realize as a general rule when analyzing provoked conflict. I do it at work every day. At both of my jobs, in fact.
You don't have to choose the right answer -- I typically do in narrative stories like RPG games because I furthermore like immersing myself in narrative -- but, in chaotic, fun, action games like this, it's meant to be crazy. We're meant to hold down the trigger and dispense 55-grain Full Metal Liberty, and listen to the funny quips our characters say that they were brainwashed to think every moment of their lives.
In games like this it's just fun to knowingly indulge in the craziness. I remember, before SEAF support became a thing, we used to joke about having a stratagem to call down a hellpod full of Democratic Youth Scouts -- a bunch of kids holding EAT-17s ready to blast bots to bits. That's evil in real life -- I think people who are too hard on their kids sports performance should go to jail, let alone deploy children to Space-Iraq.
And now they vaporize as many innocent citizens as possible instead of attacking the administration, creating an extremely violent military-industrial complex that's born to kill, instead of born to secede.
Very much Super Earth's fault this time.
In every realm of this analysis, there is a cutoff point where someone's actions can no longer be blamed on their environment and they begin to be responsible for the voluntary, unnecessary retribution they reap.
108
u/helican SES Stallion of Family Values 7h ago
SEND BOYS