Midsummer



Here's how I rank media:


  • Books.
  • Film and Television. (suffering from the influence of books)
  • Professional Wrestling.
  • Video Games. (suffering from the influence of films)

The list is also ordered by age, from oldest to newest.

The list is also ordered by accessibility with books being the most easily accessible, with a super low barrier to entry.
Film, in its 125 year history has only been getting more and more accessible. Only issue is with archiving with countless films only existing as decaying printed film spools. That's just the viewing side. On the production side, its never been easier to make one, just that there are more institutional and financial hurdles to jump over now with "independent cinema" existing in name only.




 Mainstream wrestling is more or less monopolized and is always taking advantage of the newest technology. However, smaller regional and local promotions still exist with notable wrestlers still touring the indie circuit. Video games have ever increasing hardware requirements but part of it is because of the industry itself. Its a fully digital medium so archiving isn't that much of a problem. Its still young, so we'll see how the medium develops with time.

As you go down the list, the technical requirements increase. More and more moving parts. Lots of elitists look down on pro wrestling but a lot goes into running 3 live shows per week, a large PPV monthly while keeping track of multiple intersecting storylines and characters and trying to keep it refreshing. Video games need whole teams working for multiple years to achieve the end result.

Video games have been getting gayer as time goes on. This is because of the negative influence of film on video games. The worst offender of this is easily the company Naughty Dog. A lot of people have been gaslit by an aggressive marketing campaign into liking the Uncharted and the Last of Us franchises. At their core, the two franchises are a mediocre cover shooter and a subpar stealth game with both offering canned tension and excitement as an on rails, theme park like experience.

At the opposite end of this we have Hideo Kojima games and IO interactive's Hitman franchise (East and West). Both at their core are fantastic on a technical level and offer the player a small, limited set of rules giving you the freedom to experiment and make mistakes. Each player having a unique experience. Story only really matters in books because that's the only thing they have going for them but both video game franchises have fantastic stories.

Its not about having a fantastic, emotionally driven story that you get to play through. That's how you get duds like The Order: 1886 and The Last of Us.
Its about having a fun and interesting game, that is challenging and offers you freedom and just so happens to have an interesting story. That's how you get a Metal Gear Solid 5 or a Talos Principle or a DOOM.