So, blizzard seems to decide what to write on how “Metal” it would be. I have grown to hate Metal writing. Now one thing i think we need to establish is the fact Metal Writing and Rule of Cool are different things. Rule of Cool is the idea that you do something because you think it would be cool, not because it makes the most narrative sense, and tbh, that is OK. Warhammer 40k is a RoC setting, and while it 100% is not perfect, it still is capable of telling engaging stories and having a setting that feels whole. As long as you write around it and don’t let it break canon for its own sake. Rule of Cool leads to badass moments, but they still form a cohesive story, it’s just written around the Cool.
Now for Metal Writing, Metal writing is what an edgelord thinks writing around RoC is. There is no attempts to make the darker elements fit in properly, no care for what, if any, actual cultures they insult or piss off. Lazyness is abound with the idea of metal writing, unlike Rule of Cool were effort is put into the story to make the cool moments feel earnt, metal writing is simply surface fluff. In WoW this is best exemplified by the failure to properly capitalize on Metzans vision of a morally grey setting where typically monsterous and evil races would be more ambiguous, namely with BfA and WoD, the making it so Trolls (A Warcraft race heavily based on Mesoamerican and Caribbean cultures) exist solely to be raided, the poor representation of First Nationers in the Tauren, making the “good” members of horde races hate their nations, etc, etc. Metal Writing often offends people unintentionally, because the Authors didn’t care about actually writing something compelling.
I wanted to add an entire post about another game that shows why Metal writing is bad, but it was taking up to much space, if any of you guys want to hear me rant about an obscure game let me know!
it’s why ultimately why we have to just start ignoring it, even though this is the story forum. its just funner to make up your own stuff and find a way to have fun if you continue to play it.
The Rule of Cool works great when you embrace it fully. As you said, Warhammer 40K pretty much thrives off it but can still tell engaging and even morally complex stories using it.
Blizzard’s issue is that they want to have their cake and eat it too.
They want their big Teldrassil moments and their rock star style use of the void to make their void elves look cooler. They want to have these big moments that scream “WAR IS GLORIOUS” on the top of their lungs and shriek into the heavens how epic this all is.
But they also want to teach moral lessons about why war is bad. They want Anduin to be a role model for young boys to learn “non-toxic masculinity” and they want to really push home their “War is Hell” philosophy by playing up the pathos of certain events and making sure anyone who engages in war either:
Is pure evil with no redeeming qualities at all.
Realizes the error of their ways and seek to make peace in spite of the “cycle of hatred”.
This creates a massive tonal whiplash that actively seeks to punish players for having fun with the war story Blizzard is giving us.
Sometimes I think alot of these complaints are just over my head… and then I think I am glad for it.
I do not know if “metal” or “rule of cool” are even close to the determining factors of the Story woes often lamented here.
Is Sylvanas tearing apart the Lich King’s crown “rule of cool” or “metal” or “sjw” or “fem fatalism”? People often throw so many labels around for things they find distasteful…
Are the story guys that talked about metal and rule of cool even around anymore?
Also, someone help me out here, I remember hearing that the Burning of Teldrassil came from outside of the story department and they had to write around it but I cannot for the life of me remember where I heard that or if I’m completely wrong about it.
The whole attempt to build some theoretical framework that can just algorithmically determine whether a story is good or not based on its tropes or themes or structure is misguided.
Like, TVTropes holds a lot of interesting data about common story elements…but none of those elements are inherently good or bad. Likewise, Robert McKee has interesting things to say about story structure…but not all stories follow his analysis nor do they need to. I HATE attempts to use sources like that as like Bibles of writing rules or something
WoW writing is bad because of a lot of complicated and very specific issues, not Just because the writers have a bad philosophy about writing.
Anyway, I totally agree Happy. After whoever it is became president of Games Workshop, their reading material has burst through the roof with good content – not that they didn’t have some good books before.
Helsreach Part 1.
Youtube search it, dear reader.
You can thank me later.
oh so its ok when one of there many franchises is good. just screw everything else right
Stuff I like being good :praise company
stuff I dont care about being bad : lol i dont care 40k is good lol
why you dont play it, I am not gonna go and tell you why deleting the whole setting and starting over is bad.
and you havent told me why 40k is good, going around like your opinion is fact, is also a fallacy