E PLOITSISSUE FIFTEEN JUNE 2019 X an UN WINNABLE publication Violet Shulman on WORLD of TOMORROW The METACRITIC PROBLEM • ASTROBALL • HABITUS in GAMES • TUCA & BERTIE • FORZA HORIZON SOUNDTRACKS Editor in Chief | Stu Horvath EXPLOITS A Magazine Dedicated to the Reasons We Love Things Managing Editor | Melissa King Music Editor | Ed Coleman Books Editor | Gavin Craig Movies Editor | Amanda Hudgins Television Editor | Sara Clemens Games Editor | Alyse Stanley Copyright © 2019 by Unwinnable LLC Unwinnable 820 Chestnut Street All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may Kearny, NJ 07032 not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher www.unwinnable.com except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. For more information, email: Unwinnable LLC does not claim copyright of the [email protected] screenshots and promotional imagery herein. Copyright of all screenshots within this publication are owned by Subscribe | Store | Submissions their respective companies This machine kills fascists. THE METACRITIC PROBLEM by Jeremy Signor have a strange relationship with Metacritic. My mind operates algorithmically I most of the time, especially when it comes to what games to play, so I must con- fess I use Metacritic to give my gaming habit focus by letting me prioritize what games to play. I usually start with the New and Notable games section, then work my way down the Games list, going in descending order of Metascore. Sometimes I’ll focus on one game at a time until it’s completed and sometimes I’ll switch when something new or rated higher comes out in order to be part of the zeitgeist. Now, I’m not going to pretend this is a particularly good practice. Review scores are bullshit and publishers use Metascores to deny development studios’ bonuses. Yet there’s something about attaching a number to games that turns on the math- ematical part of my mind. When there’s a consensus on what’s good, it makes discovering those games easier. Metacritic also aids in discoverability of games that might be off the beaten path, but have critical consensus behind them. I was clued into playing Celeste last year, for example, and it ended up being my game of 2018. Though I certainly could have been keyed to the game’s existence through other means, like word of mouth over Twitter, seeing a concrete monument to its good reputation is a strong pull. And yet there remains the elephant in the room that critical consensus under- mines diversity of opinion. The truth is, whether we choose to directly engage with Metacritic or not, it still bleeds through into the general discourse to some degree. Metascores aren’t explicitly discussed, but rather take the temperature for how much a game might be discussed online, or how much post-launch hype it can generate. It’s why you get disproportionate gushing over most AAA game releases like Red Dead Redemption 2, which earned “universal acclaim” despite having major issues that are discussed in post-mortems that aren’t technically reviews or scored. This is true for the overall games discourse happening online, but I’ve learned you can counter-program your own personal timeline of discourse to suit your tastes better. Pathologic 2, a game that never got featured on the front page of Metacritic and currently sits at a middling 70 Metascore, is getting talked up in more alternative games circles simply because it’s such an interesting design. And Metacritic also has a particularly nasty blind spot for artier games or stuff you’d find on itch.io. You’d never find something as daring and experimental as Para- topic widely reviewed enough to even qualify for a Metascore, and indeed, it was only given a score by three games outlets, one short of qualifying. Another thing I’ve observed from watching Metacritic is the differences in how Metascores are applied to other media, particularly music. I rarely see music releases dipping to the dreaded yellow range of scores, and that probably says something about how young games media is, how music appreciation is rightfully treated as subjective with a multitude of definitions of “good”. I certainly wouldn’t apply my Metacritic algorithm to my music listening habits, or else I’d have a bunch of genre statements that I wouldn’t know what to do with because they’re so outside my range of tastes. All of this is just my messy way of saying that we all have our channels for dis- covering what media we like, and what ones we choose to engage with color our overall experiences. Metacritic is a useful tool for me to keep up with what’s cur- rently coming out and let me prioritize so that I don’t leave a bunch of unfinished games in my wake. But that’s beginning to happen anyways with how fast games are coming out, so I suppose now’s as good a time as any to refine my discourse intake. U MUSIC THE MUSIC of FORZA HORIZON – Racing fight with every other car on the road,Hori - games often have good soundtracks; this state- zon instead went with a balance of music that ment of fact seems weird at first, but when was energetic enough to make you want to you test it across games such as Gran Turismo go fast, such as “The Power” by DJ Fresh, but and Need for Speed, it holds up. As it should, relaxed enough to take things easy and just since like all other titles, racing games depend enjoy driving around Colorado, like Encore’s on good music to create tone, flesh out their “Digitalism.” This tone is perfectly encapsu- setting, and perhaps more than any other lated in the first song you hear when you start game genre, music is vital to making a player the game up: Porter Robinson’s “Language”. feel like they’re in a race. When you’re going The first Horizon has aged gracefully because over a hundred miles an hour against a field its music wants to do just one thing: make you of machines, you want a sound so energetic feel happy. that it keeps your head in the game. And few Forza Horizon 2, on the other hand, didn’t other racing games have collections of great keep the same tone going. While I wouldn’t licensed music on par with the soundtracks call it outright bad, Horizon 2’s soundtrack found in the Forza Horizon series. somehow ended up being too relaxed and, The original Forza Horizon from 2012 is a along with other gameplay and design detrac- time capsule of a racing game because of its tors, the game hasn’t aged as well as its prede- weird tone – it’s a remarkably unaggressive cessor. Replaying it a month ago, I just wasn’t racing game. Rather than actively fighting “feeling it.” There’s good music in there like cops or other racing drivers on a closed cir- Jungle’s “Busy Earnin,” but Horizon 2 overall cuit, the first Horizon wants you to enjoy the just has too many songs with a slower tempo scenery and its titular music festival; this tone and production that sounds anemic at times, extends to its actual music. While Horizon’s which is alright if you’re leisurely cruising contemporaries had soundtracks that usually along, but it isn’t the kind of music you want had an attitude that made you want to start a to hear when you’re racing. However, it isn’t MUSIC a complete loss. Replaying the first showcase PLAYLIST event, the game finally felt like it came alive, “Run for Cover,” by The Killers thanks entirely to “Astral” by Pyramid. A Fer- “Boys,” by Lizzo rari vs. fighter jet time trial demanded some- “Hurry On Home,” by Sleater-Kinney thing heavy and quick, and this song was exactly that. This didn’t change the course for “Satellite,” by The Get Up Kids the rest of the experience, but this event did “Red Side of the Moon,” by Trixie Mattel prove that even the feel of a single race can “Path,” by Club Night be decided on something as minor as what’s “Need You Tonight,” by INXS playing on the radio. “A Woman in Love (It’s Not Me),” by Tom Petty and Forza Horizon 3 and 4 have kept things on the Heartbreakers track, with both games carving out distinct “Our Love,” by Rhett Miller identities for themselves: Horizon 3 has an “stereo future,” by BiSH entire radio station dedicated to Australian “Jose & Mark,” by The Unauthorized Bash Brothers musical groups (Future Classic radio, which Experience, The Lonely Island includes my personal favorite “Sleepless,” by “Just Like Ringing a Bell,” by Titus Andronicus Flume), and Horizon 4 has an entire original “Old Town Road - Diplo Remix,” by Lil Nas X, Billy soundtrack created just for one of its radio Ray Cyrus, Diplo stations (Hospital Records radio, which is “ME,” by CLC highlighted by Fred V & Grafix’s “Sunrise”). “Nothing for Free,” by Paul McCartney Like a good grand touring car, Forza Hori- “Whales” by Hail Mary Mallon zon’s soundtracks are energetic enough to keep you focused, but not so hardcore that “Black Heksen Rise,” by Integrity you get tired; rather, they’re soundtracks you “Citadel,” by Inter Arma want to keep playing for mile after mile. “Now the Screaming Starts,” by Bloody Hammers – Evan Dennis “Templo do Caos,” by Deafkids “Shotta,” by Young Nudy, Pi’erre Bourne, Megan Thee Stallion “Creative Industries,” by USA Nails “Hello, Anxiety,” by Phum Viphurit “Coasting,” by Darren Korb “Freesm,” by Hashtag “RHODONITE AND GRIEF,” by La Dispute “Willow Weep For Me,” by Frank Sinatra “Norman And Norma,” by The Divine Comedy “Existing Closer or Deeper in Space,” by Earthen Sea Listen now on Spotify BOOKS ASTROBALL – There are two big issues worth tackling after reading Ben Reiter’sAstro - ball (and ostensibly after reading Michael Lewis’s Moneyball, the book to which Astro- ball frames itself as spiritual successor, even though it really isn’t).