AI Summary
5 min readThe Western Gaming Crash Is Real
"I do actually think that we're having a Western gaming crash." Asmongold opens with a claim that sounds extreme but he argues is demonstrably true—and the evidence he marshals is not about culture war grievances alone. He estimates that identity politics and "woke" content account for maybe 10-20% of the problem. The rest is simpler: "games are so safe and so boring now. People just don't care about playing them."
The Consumer Has Always Had the Power
The immediate trigger for the discussion is a viral article from Indie 100 about a "woke detector" spreadsheet that has rated over 1,500 games, with more than half marked "not recommended." Asmongold finds the spreadsheet both silly and revealing. The problem with these lists, he argues, is that they treat wokeness as binary rather than a spectrum. "You might think that Baldur's Gate 3 is woke, that's fine, but everybody knows it's not as woke as Dragon Age." Some entries on the list are reasonable—people simply not wanting to buy "very shoehorned fake corporate DEI slop." Others are too extreme, like calling Elden Ring woke because it uses "body type A and B" instead of male and female.
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:04) **The Western Gaming Crash Thesis** - Asmongold states his core argument: a real crash is happening in Western gaming, driven not just by identity politics but by games being "safe and boring."
- 2 (00:32) **Xbox's "Greatest Age" Tweet as Exhibit A** - Reacts to an Xbox ad claiming gamers are living in a golden age, using a "Dragon Age" timeline meme.
- 3 (01:41) **Consumer Power and the "Woke Detector" Spreadsheet** - Discusses a spreadsheet rating 1500+ games on "wokeness," with over 800 not recommended.
- 4 (03:58) **The Problem with Binary "Woke" Lists** - Critiques the lack of nuance in "woke detector" spreadsheets, which fail to distinguish between degrees of inclusion.
- 5 (05:24) **The "Biggest Games of the Year" Pattern** - Lists top games of the year by developer origin, revealing a stark pattern: Asian developers dominate, Western developers struggle.
- 6 (08:13) **Global Internet vs. Local Sensitivities** - Defends the "woke detector" list by noting the internet is global, and many cultures have laws or norms against transgender identity.
- 7 (10:17) **Hogwarts Legacy and the Serona Ryan Controversy** - Corrects the narrative: it was the boycotters, not the anti-woke crowd, who were upset about the trans character.
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Show Notes
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