Watching HIGH FIDELITY because:

-I 🖤 Gen X

-I 🖤 Music

-I 🖤 Indie record STORES

Feeling nostalgic about the early 90s record store video arcade college radio live shows at The Library and hanging out on Chimes Street general mischief

THOSE WERE THE DAYS
ONLY WE DIDN'T KNOW IT AT THE TIME

- 🖤🖤🖤

#90sCulture #Indie #GenX #Music #Movies #HighFidelity

Has anyone else noticed a bit of a trope in early computer games WRT mocking unions/activism? I was wondering where this might come from. Specifically I'm citing Discworld 2 and the OG Simon the Sorcerer, as I played them both recently but I'm sure there's more.

Quite often it's presented as a bit silly/ineffectual - in Simon the bridge troll unionises as the Gilly goats gruff have contractually bound him to always be thrown into the river and never eat. He's presented as stupid/silly and eventually is thrown into the river anyway by some mercenary muscle (recruited by simon). In discworld 2 there's a joke about the ants from HEX going on strike that is just played as very silly. There's also a female jester suffragette (suffrajester), who's attempts at protesting sexist jester's guild policy is presented as very silly.

I'm not trying to suggest that these are bad games for having these jokes, though I have to admit that as an adult they don't land especially well. But it's interesting considering unionisation in game studios is becoming quite a big thing today. And worker exploitation in the industry as a result of crunch, let alone a whole plethora of other issues, has started to become quite a known thing today.

Any thoughts on why this might be? I can imagine maybe Thatcherism and the semi-recent legacy of the anti war movement may have had an impact but I'm wondering if there's more context I'm missing? It's definitely an aspect of these games that I've felt hasn't aged that well.

#RetroGames #Unionisation #90sCulture #AdventureGames