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So this online friend starts talking to me about Warhammer 40K
...and whenever he gets into the setting I just want to punch him the face.
Every word about this setting seems to be worst kind of juvenile tripe possible. It the kind of speaking of the 'horrors' of war from the perspective of people who only know about war from Apocalypse Now. I also hate it when sci-fi stuff like this purports about the horrors of war all the while having these totally super badass ten-foot-tall people in giant armor suits that slice space orcs in half.
The thing about the setting is that you're creating a detailed backstory and reasoning for what amounts to a bunch of soulless statistics for a game. How can I identify with these people when my only context for them is violence? Do these people do nothing else but slay for the Emporer? Do they not have free time where they play basketball, listen to music, or chat about their waifus on 4chan? It's this weird imbalance where I feel bad for saying I feel any emotional connection to pieces of plastic and the feeling that I'm supposed to feel their struggles matter, despite the fact that they're trapped in an eternal stasis so you can be sold more figurines.
And of course there are people who call it 'realistic'. I mean, I've lived in reality all my life and I've never fought psychic orcs with the most messy and impractical melee weapon ever imagined. Am I doing it wrong?
Really, it's the worst kind of dark there is. Dark for purely aesthetic purposes that ultimately clash with its other aesthetic: being badass and cool. No Country For Old Men was dark. Death of a Salesman was dark. This is just an obsession with maturity that ends up looking more childish.
No wonder it's influenced gaming so much.
Every word about this setting seems to be worst kind of juvenile tripe possible. It the kind of speaking of the 'horrors' of war from the perspective of people who only know about war from Apocalypse Now. I also hate it when sci-fi stuff like this purports about the horrors of war all the while having these totally super badass ten-foot-tall people in giant armor suits that slice space orcs in half.
The thing about the setting is that you're creating a detailed backstory and reasoning for what amounts to a bunch of soulless statistics for a game. How can I identify with these people when my only context for them is violence? Do these people do nothing else but slay for the Emporer? Do they not have free time where they play basketball, listen to music, or chat about their waifus on 4chan? It's this weird imbalance where I feel bad for saying I feel any emotional connection to pieces of plastic and the feeling that I'm supposed to feel their struggles matter, despite the fact that they're trapped in an eternal stasis so you can be sold more figurines.
And of course there are people who call it 'realistic'. I mean, I've lived in reality all my life and I've never fought psychic orcs with the most messy and impractical melee weapon ever imagined. Am I doing it wrong?
Really, it's the worst kind of dark there is. Dark for purely aesthetic purposes that ultimately clash with its other aesthetic: being badass and cool. No Country For Old Men was dark. Death of a Salesman was dark. This is just an obsession with maturity that ends up looking more childish.
No wonder it's influenced gaming so much.
Comments
>How can I identify with these people when my only context for them is
violence? Do these people do nothing else but slay for the Emporer? Do
they not have free time where they play basketball, listen to music, or
chat about their waifus on 4chan?
That's the issue with Space Marines in particular though. They've been bred from the inside-out to humanity's greatest defenders, and because of that they ironically lose the human aspect that makes them relatable. That's why they're at their best when they're portrayed as fallible just like everyone else, rather than mysterious, god-like, giants or Mary Sues (*CoughMATTWARDCough*).
This is also why the best Warhammer novels usually star either the Imperial Guard or the Inquisition (see Gaunts Ghosts or Eisenhorn). They're about (relatively) more normal people fighting for their lives and sanity in a galaxy gone mad.
>And of course there are people who call it 'realistic'. I mean, I've
lived in reality all my life and I've never fought psychic orcs with the
most messy and impractical melee weapon ever imagined. Am I doing it
wrong?
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Anyone who thinks Warhammer is realistic is kidding themselves.
I mean, it has soccer hooligan orks with stuff that goes faster if you paint it red and chainsaw swords. That doesn't exactly scream taking itself seriously.
And if the entire point of the Space Marines is that they lost their humanity, they can't be genuine characters for much the same reason a Cyberman or a borg can't be a character, because there's nothing about him to recognize or empathize with. A character whose prime function is violence can only be an antagonist.
And you laugh, but there are LOTS of people who take Warhammer completely seriously at face value.
I also feel the dark grim war landscape just doesn't fit with the super badass awesome fighting killing machines. You can't really have masculine power fantasy and dystopic war horror in the same room. They've never gotten along since they've had to work together on all those WW2 movies.
Also, this is a complete personal thing, but the art aesthetic makes me want to gag.
Do they not have free time where they play basketball, listen to music, or chat about their waifus on 4chan?
Depends who you're talking about. The Space Marines don't. The Imperial Guard do. The Inquisition soooorta...
Alright, I'll give you a brief explanation of the setting.
Warhammer 40,000 is about a neorenaissance future where humanity is beset on all sides by powerful enemies. The most important human factions are:
The Space Marines, who are like Crusade-era knights with power armour. They're equal parts elite marksmen and swordsmen, the numbers selected during youth. Those youths are then subjected to extensive training and genetic manipulation to the point that most don't survive the process. The end result, however, is the finest soldier known to mankind; unwavering and expert in battle. While they don't have much in the way of personal lives, they're bound by the limitations of a chivalric order. It's this context which gives them the potential to be interesting characters. Not all of them deal with their duties and position the same way.
The Imperial Guard. These are the normal human beings of the setting, and the diversity of tactics within the Imperium means that some are employed in WWII-era Russian wave tactics, others are elite tactical squads and others are somewhere in-between. They also make the most frequent use of armoured vehicles. While they're generally expendable and individually outclassed by everything in the game and setting, their combination of economy, efficiency and support options makes them powerful in battle nontheless.
The Inquisition are exactly what they sound like. Their role is to root out heresy, daemonic presence and alien influences within the Imperium. Inquisitors, the highest-ranking members of the various Ordos, are comparable to Space Marines in skill and equipment, but lack the genetic tampering. On the other hand, these individuals have massive social and economic power, authorised to destroy whole planets from orbit or requisition just about any Imperial force. Different sects of the Inquisition tend to call on particular forces to support their causes. For example, the Ordo Hereticus favour the Sisters of Battle, power-armoured combat nuns, to undo heresy with fire and steel.
The Adeptus Mechanicus are equal parts holy priests and technical engineers. The Imperium sees technology as sacred, and overextensive experimentation is generally heretical when not overseen by a powerful authority. With this is mind, the Adeptus Mechanicus maintain and reproduce what gear and vehicles they can, reciting prayers as they go about the holy task of mechanical upkeep. The greatest strongholds of this organisation are the Forge Worlds, planets entirely devoted to the industrial production of weapons, armour, vehicles and even the gigantic Titan combat units. To defend these places, the Adeptus Mechanicus create Skitarii warriors, human soldiers mechanically augmented and armed with a deep respect and understanding of the technology they protect.
What most 40k fans fail to point out is that the depth in the setting comes partly from commentary and partly from satire. It began as a sort of parody of sci-fi in general combined with the Warhammer Fantasy setting and a side-dish of "hey, this'd be cool". Since then, the fanbase has grown to take it far too seriously. I take it seriously enough to get invested in some of the narrative, but not seriously enough that I can't appreciate ridiculous macho violence for what it is. Think ridiculous action on the level of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann with a technological European Renaissance backdrop and bad guys shamelessly stolen from every other sci-fi out there and you're on the right track.
^ The subtext is all there if you know where to look. Mind you, GW don't always hire the best writers for their publications. The source material is also extremely vast and metafictional, since everything comes from a perspective within the setting. Two sources could contradict one-another over something and neither would be "canon" because either or both could be extremely biased.
>Think ridiculous action on the level of Tengen Toppen Gurren Lagann with
a technological European Renaissance backdrop and bad guys shamelessly
stolen from every other sci-fi out there and you're on the right track.
Or this, pretty much.
Especially since nothing can change because it amounts to a statistics game.
I'm going to ignore the Bleach example because... seriously, it's bleach.
As for the Terminator, he has way more than simply violence defining him. He's made a surrogate father by John, and the Terminator does in an odd way seem to actually care about John. Not to mention his obliviousness is played for comedy.
"Waaagh" is a corruption of "war". Say it like an English soccer hooligan.
^ Despite all those things, none of the things you mention are true limitations and actually serve to make the setting more diverse. Remember, Warhammer 40k exists so players can implant their own stories into it if they so choose. That means it can be as silly or serious as they like. In the literature, at least the good literature, the grimdark serves to make heartwarming moments a fair bit more heartwarming. Just because.
Likewise, the grimdark makes ridiculous moments even more humourous.
Warhammer 40k, like is fantasy counterpart, has very few hard-and-fast rules when it coms to tone and expression.
Anyways, I used to love it, but nowadays... The writers forgot that it was supposed to be satire and excised anything that could be seen as "not dark enough", the fans become misanthropic dickheads who use cries of "HERESY" to hide their thinly vieled prejudices and racism (trust me, I've seen this far more times that I'd ever like to), and gradually anything fun or interesting about the setting was drained out in favour of "MORE DARKNESS!" which ended up turning it into something so bleak, horrifying and disgusting that without the satire and dark sense of humour it once had, it became incredibly difficult to stomach. Thanks for that, Games Workshop! Thanks for slowly killing a part of my childhood!
...Fantasy's still cool, though. They never lost that satirical edge, for one thing. Also, it has Skaven, and Skaven are cool beans.
Wait, is he the big guy who hangs out with the pink-haired girl? because if so, then yes, there's at least one thing more to him than violence.
^^Dark cannot be awesome, or at least not unrealistically awesome. That's what makes it dark. A sense of oppression and despair. You can't do that while shoving a chainsword into someone's gut.
Rail Tracer, anyone?
We can blame 40k's failings on Matt Ward.
^ Not really. There isn't much more to go on. It's still a big mystery in-universe, like a lot of other things. What we know is that when an Ork dies, it releases spores which grow into more Orks over time. Aaaand you can see where that gets us.
And if not, and if that's all there is to his character like you say then he's a shitty character and I was right to dismiss him in the first place.
Like I said, Warhammer is variable. In it's quality, setting, level of darkness, and more.
I'm sure the game itself is perfectly solid, but that setting is just dumb.