Last of Us 2's pupils dilate... Why?!
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00:00 In the past, we here at WhatCulture have covered a lot of video games with details that, for
00:05 lack of better words, are downright pointless.
00:08 They say that the devil is in the detail, and when considering the dark, depressing,
00:11 and downright gross content that we're about to cover today, you have to imagine Satan
00:15 himself rubbing his little paws together at the thought of what's to come.
00:18 So let's not keep the big red waiting as I'm Jules, this is WhatCulture.com, and
00:22 these are 8 Video Game Details That Went Too Far.
00:25 8.
00:26 Horse Testicles React to Weather
00:28 Red Dead Redemption 2
00:30 You knew this was going to be on this list, so let's just get these big swollen meat
00:33 balloons out of the way early doors.
00:35 Yes, for some reason or another, the devs working on Red Dead Redemption 2 thought that
00:39 it would be pertinent to include horse testicles that grow and shrink depending on the weather.
00:44 I know that the player spends a lot of time on horseback throughout the experience, but
00:47 I doubt that any, bar a select few, were spending those journeys gazing at their steeds' bollocks.
00:52 And to be honest, unless you're a vet or an actual ranch owner, then I really don't
00:56 want to hear for your reasons why you were staring either.
00:59 What was quite comical about this whole affair, however, was that some real-world horse owners
01:03 pointed out that this detail was actually incorrect, seeing as the real-world equestrian
01:08 equivalent doesn't 'bounce' as much, meaning that Rockstar was perhaps a little
01:12 too enamoured with those meat marbles.
01:14 7.
01:15 Ice Cubes That Melt in Real Time
01:17 Metal Gear Solid 2
01:19 Of all of the Hideo Kojima moments that exist within the Metal Gear franchise, this is the
01:24 one that keeps me up at night.
01:26 Why?
01:27 Why did the man get somebody to program ice cubes that melt in real time?
01:31 To try and fathom the reasoning behind this would likely send me to a padded cell, but
01:35 one can't argue that it's an impressive, almost fanatical moment of dedication.
01:40 The fact that the player can shoot these individual ice cubes out of a bucket in the first place
01:44 is pretty incredible, especially considering the still-very-apparent limitations of the
01:48 PS2, but to then find out that they melt slowly over the course of several hours is just uncomfortable.
01:55 This is what makes it a detail that goes too far.
01:58 Nobody asked for it, nobody noticed it for years, it does nothing to enhance the plot,
02:02 and all you do is walk away from this situation with a deep concern for the auteur director's
02:07 state of mind.
02:08 6.
02:09 Pupils That Die Late
02:11 The Last of Us Part II
02:12 Now, here's a detail that while being utterly impressive from a technical standpoint, is
02:16 one that arguably wasn't just pointless, but was something that directly contributed
02:20 to a rather nasty aspect of the gaming industry at large.
02:23 I'm speaking of course about crunch culture, no that's not another YouTube channel that
02:27 we're thinking of starting, but actually the often-enforced work ethic that sees developers
02:31 and designers of video games work way past contracted hours under the passive-aggressive
02:36 threat of repercussions should they want to do things like, I dunno, have a life outside
02:40 of work.
02:41 The Last of Us 2, and Naughty Dog as a whole, were hit with reams of allegations about the
02:45 excessive and unfair working conditions of its employees.
02:48 However, Neil Druckmann responded to the situation by stating that the Last of Us team "enjoyed
02:53 crunch culture" as they were "perfectionists".
02:56 Now, while it's all well and good to give your heart and soul to a project if you truly
03:00 believe in it, considering the much less infused workforces of other companies that are forced
03:05 to go through crunch culture, it seems like a little too far to almost begin championing
03:10 it.
03:11 The dilation of the eyes is truly impressive, but one has to ask the question, is crunch
03:15 culture as a whole worth detail like this?
03:18 5.
03:19 The 10-Hour Tutorial - Final Fantasy XIII
03:23 Sometimes it's not the individual detail that goes too far, but the sheer amount of
03:27 them that really yanks at your nostril hair, and such a plucker was how Final Fantasy XIII
03:32 decided to dole out its player tutorials.
03:34 Now, as it stands, Final Fantasy XIII and its weird offshoots are considered to be the
03:39 Sonic 06 moment for Square Enix, where they doubled down on characters that few enjoyed,
03:44 told a story that even less understood or cared for, and took a hand-holding approach
03:48 to its gameplay that left bruises thanks to its vice-like grip.
03:51 It's a game that defenders will say "gets good" after about 10 hours, which is a statement
03:56 that carries as much water as a bloody sieve, but does inform you that Final Fantasy XIII
04:01 has some huge gameplay flow issues.
04:03 The biggest assassin of your fun comes in the form of a protracted 10-hour tutorial
04:08 that will feed you meagre information pieces about the battle system and the world around
04:12 you.
04:13 It's these details that should have been present from the start, as seeing as the level
04:17 design for these opening hours is basically corridor paradise, would have allowed the
04:22 player some flexibility on how these battles play out, or how to build a party.
04:27 We wanted the details, in this case, up front, damn it.
04:31 4.
04:32 Every.
04:33 Single.
04:34 Special Move.
04:35 The Mortal Kombat franchise.
04:36 I mean, how could you not include talking about the worrying amount of detail that the
04:40 Mortal Kombat devs put into their brutal special moves?
04:43 From the moment you witness your first bone breaking in two, or your first eyeball being
04:47 gouged, you might find your phone rising from your pocket to dial your parents and ask if
04:51 they still kept that security blanket you had when you were a kid, and yet, somehow,
04:56 it just keeps getting worse.
04:57 Intestines are pulled from opponents through their mouths, bodies are contorted and twisted,
05:02 forcing bones to break through the skin, and muscles are ripped and blasted apart with
05:06 rather shocking detail.
05:08 It is not rainbow rhythms, is what I'm getting at.
05:11 While it would be wrong of me to chastise the franchise for the success of violence
05:14 and gore - because, spoiler alert, I love the MK franchise - things are approaching
05:19 a worryingly fanatical approach to detail that it makes my stomach churn.
05:23 Because what else are the devs going to subject us to down the line?
05:26 At what point will the line be so crossed that we lose sight of it?
05:30 Only the person programming Scorpion sucking the bone marrow out of his victims truly knows
05:34 the answer.
05:35 3.
05:36 You Never Actually Get The Crown.
05:38 Fall Guys.
05:39 So as we all know, Fall Guys is a game for absolute sadists, that is dressed up in a
05:44 manner that makes it look like a 90s Saturday morning cartoon.
05:46 It's a game that will make you coo with awe before then crying out "Aww, f*ck this
05:52 bullsh*t" as it swings wildly between being so cute that butter wouldn't melt, to roasting
05:56 your very soul as your friends betray you at the final hurdle.
06:00 Compounding all of this frustration, however, is a small detail that admittedly breaks my
06:04 heart every single time I see it, and that's that even when winning the elusive crown by
06:08 persevering through drunken bean hell, your little fella over here never, ever gets to
06:13 have the crown, either losing it or failing to grasp it before it floats away again.
06:18 It's a scenario that seems like the cruelest moment in the cruelest of games, a shattering
06:23 of glass that reveals that you're locked inside a gameplay loop of chasing a crown
06:27 that you'll never actually win.
06:29 Woof.
06:30 2.
06:31 Some of the Enemies Are Forced Conscripts.
06:33 Call of Duty World at War.
06:35 The Call of Duty games are well known for their rather bombastic approach to warfare,
06:39 often resembling a Michael Bay venture with the excess of explosions and patriotism that
06:43 oozes out of every orifice.
06:44 However, there are key moments when COD decides to get shockingly real, and for some, it's
06:49 a little too much like the real thing for comfort.
06:52 Take for example the shocking revelation that in Call of Duty World at War's sixth mission,
06:56 Burn 'Em All, you're not just fighting against the Imperial Japanese Army, but also
07:00 conscripts that were forced to serve the Japanese Army after being captured.
07:05 This rather grim detail was found by fans who analysed the speech of some of the soldiers
07:09 that you're roasting alive, as it was revealed that not all of them were speaking Japanese.
07:14 Some it turns out were speaking Indonesian, and thus leading many to believe that these
07:18 soldiers are forced conscripts who really don't want to be fighting either way.
07:22 We've witnessed nuclear devastation and multiple player deaths in the first person
07:26 in these games, but somehow this is the moment that feels like things were most real, and
07:31 most painfully traumatic.
07:33 1.
07:34 Burning a Man Alive to Open a Door - God of War
07:37 When you're a seething mass of muscles and might, and might as well have 'I love revenge'
07:42 tattooed on your head, you'd likely expect a lot of people to out and out just try everything
07:46 in their power to never have your shadow darken their doorstep.
07:50 This is likely why very few people have Kratos on their Christmas cards list, as this God
07:54 of War will truly stop at nothing to get vengeance, meaning that he's murdered more than his
07:58 fair share of innocents along the way.
08:00 Take for example the absolutely shocking scenario within the Temple of Pandora, where Kratos
08:05 finds that the way is blocked.
08:07 Now the devs at this point could've easily just had the God of War find a key or bust
08:10 down the door using his brute strength, but for some reason they decided that this particular
08:15 door could only be opened with a human sacrifice.
08:18 So Kratos drops back from the gate and lowers down a soldier who's trapped in a cage,
08:22 who at first is relieved that he's being saved from a rather terrible fate.
08:26 Except the fate that's actually in store for him is much worse, something the soldier
08:30 realises as he's dragged at an agonisingly slow pace up to the entrance.
08:34 He pleads with Kratos, asking what he's doing, that they could just return to Athens
08:38 together, but it appears he's just yelling into the void, as Kratos then burns the man
08:42 alive in order to proceed.
08:44 It's a detail that's dragged out, feels unnecessarily cruel, and doesn't even further
08:49 our relationship with Kratos as a character, making the whole affair feel like excess for
08:53 excess' sake.
08:54 And there we go my friends, those were 8 video game details that went too far.
08:58 I hope that you enjoyed that, and please let me know what you thought about it down in
09:01 the comments section below.
09:02 As always I've been Jules and you can go follow me over on Twitter @RetroJ but the
09:06 O is a zero, or you can swing by Liv and Let's Dice where I do all of my streaming outside
09:10 of work and it'd be great to see you over there.
09:12 But before I go, I just want to say one thing.
09:15 Consider this to be a detail that I don't think gets pushed far enough, and that is
09:19 that you my friend listening to this video should be kind to yourself, both physically
09:23 and mentally, because you deserve all of the best things in life alright?
09:26 I know I say this a lot but I truly believe it.
09:29 You are a massive ledge, and I just want the best for you.
09:31 So please go out there with love in your hearts, try to build bridges instead of burning them,
09:35 and remember, above all else, that you deserve all the good things alright?
09:39 As always I've been Jules, you have been awesome, never forget that, and I'll speak
09:42 to you soon.