Ten years after the adoption of marriage for all, mentalities have evolved on the subject. However, in the field of video games, a minority of gamers still and always continue to devalue games in the name of a homosexual love story. This practice is called “review bombing” and consists, in most cases, of assigning a bad rating to a title for reasons that have nothing to do with its quality.
Just released, the expansion of the game Forbidden Horizon West you already pay the price, says Numerama. Starting April 19, players can continue to explore the world depicted in the saga. Horizon thanks to burning shores. As already happened with the first installment of the adventure game series, the downloadable content gives access to a new area that offers a main story, but also side quests.
A case far from isolated
It is one of these side quests that has drawn the ire of some of the players. One scene shows the heroine Aloy kissing another woman. A kiss that caused some to downgrade the game on the Metacritic rating platform. The expansion burning shores shows a score of 82 (out of 100) when combining all reviews by the media. But for the public part, rated out of 10, the game only gets a 3.2.
Under a pseudonym, critics merge. According to some, Aloy’s kiss destroys the portrayal of the character. Others see it as a submission to the culture of awakening. If the plots sometimes differ, it is for the vast majority the romance of the heroine that is in the crosshairs of bad grades.
Unfortunately, the phenomenon is far from being an isolated case. As of 2014 and the release of the extension. Left behind of the first work of The last of us, a kiss between two women had sparked controversy. Here, young Ellie hugs her friend Riley. The second episode of the series had also paid the price for the heroine’s sexuality. Especially since in this sequel, there is a real sex scene between Ellie and her partner Dina.
However, perfectly integrated into the story, Ellie’s homosexuality had been a source of criticism towards The Last of Us Part II. Naturally, these complaints spilled over into the serial adaptation of the video game. Especially since the series made another same-sex relationship explicit between two supporting characters from the source material. An entire episode is dedicated to the touching love story between Bill and Franck. Once again, the “review blitz” had struck.
Source: BFM TV
