By John Walker on October 27th, 2009 at 2:52 pm.
Griefing in a single player game may seem slightly self-defeating, but in a game like Red Faction: Guerilla it’s just so incredibly tempting. A game that makes everything but the ground itself destructible and then gives you a giant hammer is asking for trouble – when you realise you can smash up your own bases, including their inhabitants, it becomes a battle with your own consciousness not to constantly destroy it, ally moral be damned. This is something that clearly couldn’t be resisted by Idle Thumbs who have created a superb song about the exploits of a Space Asshole. You can watch it below.
Red Faction: Guerilla is ranking highly in my ill-formed list of 2009′s best games, and watching this makes me want to go back and break more stuff. Kieron discussed it in detail here. Oh, and of course America seems to have a problem with the word “asshole”, so if you’re one of them you might not want to play it too loudly in your grandmother’s nursing home. And now, enjoy the song:
27/10/2009 at 15:00 Freudian Trip says:
Both beautiful and wanton. Lovely.
27/10/2009 at 15:18 Yargh says:
most enjoyable
27/10/2009 at 15:19 Stense says:
It is very catchy.
27/10/2009 at 15:19 Tei says:
Fun fact: The graphics for “money” on the game are gears and mechanical pieces. but on my spanish localized version after the middle of the game the characters in-game change is mind and call it “money”. As in “We need more money for the nanothingie”
27/10/2009 at 15:20 c-Row says:
Beautiful.
27/10/2009 at 15:22 Bhazor says:
The villain of this song seemed hugely unimaginative.
I was a bigger asshole in the original, sticking explosive to the bad guys helmets and watching them panic, creating a deep pit just to screw with AI path finding, letting my allies get beat to death in front of me and then stealing their stuff etc.
That said the ending was nicely sadistic against a poor unnamed grunt so that was good.
27/10/2009 at 15:24 Dave says:
Ha!
I sort of accidentally drove a truck into a bridge support at one of the safehouses once, and a dude started shooting at me until somebody else yelled at him to chill out. It almost made me want to start blowing up Red Faction stuff on purpose to see what they’d do, but it seems I still have the same conscience that stopped me from drowning little kids in The Sims…
27/10/2009 at 15:26 Joe Martin says:
Only one word to describe this:
WIZARD
27/10/2009 at 15:26 Idle Threats and Bad Poetry says:
Idle Thumbs, you say?
27/10/2009 at 15:28 Clovis says:
In Saints Row 2 you could happily beat the crap out of your “homies” with no penalty. Why? Because it’s fun. I don’t see how killing miners making them sad actually adds to the game. Now every time I want to goof around blowing up my own faction’s stuff I have to save my game and reload. It would make no sense for the miners to merrily have their stuff (and heads) broken, but it also doesn’t make sense that a sledgehammer can blow a concrete wall to pieces in one swing.
Doesn’t matter much though; I’m really enjoying RFG.
Heh, make sure to catch the last 30 seconds of the video.
27/10/2009 at 15:42 Arathain says:
The last 30 seconds was my favourite bit.
27/10/2009 at 15:54 airtekh says:
Love it. :D
27/10/2009 at 16:24 Baris says:
I was very pleasantly surprised to hear this during the podcast. Never understood why people kept pressuring him to make another song until I heard this.
27/10/2009 at 17:01 h4plo says:
Wonderful treatment of a wonderful game.
27/10/2009 at 17:54 JonFitt says:
The song was good, but apart from the last 30 seconds it was poor machinima.
Lots of shots of the guy chasing people and missing them with the hammer. It needed some more coordination with more elaborate setups and destruction to match the song.
27/10/2009 at 18:11 army of none says:
Excellent song :D
27/10/2009 at 18:26 Risingson says:
Can I have a taste of your icecream?
Can I lick the crumbs from your table?
27/10/2009 at 20:19 Erlend M says:
Can I interfere in your crisis?
28/10/2009 at 04:20 JimmyJames says:
No! Mind your own business.
27/10/2009 at 19:34 tocob says:
Video: Jake Rodkin
Video Games: Nick Breckon
27/10/2009 at 19:52 Tyshalle says:
Americans have a problem with the word asshole?
This is news to me, though I suppose we have a problem with most things, don’t we?
27/10/2009 at 20:57 Aisi says:
“Take pride in your appearance!”
….
:-D
Brilliant find!! Space asshole.. to the rescue!?
27/10/2009 at 21:33 Gabbo says:
Video Games = Jake
John Q. Videogame = Nick
This being posted might just make Remo all giddy, given his love of the site.
27/10/2009 at 21:47 Dominic White says:
Agreeing with those saying that the assholery on the video was awkward and pedestrian, aside from that final stretch. No ramming civililans off the edges of cliffs? Breaking bridges as they’re about to cross them? Sticking demolition charges to random civillians heads?
There’s a million ways to be a Space Asshole in RFG, and he seems to have found one – hitting people with the hammer.
27/10/2009 at 21:59 Muzman says:
Man, I am bummed I missed the sale. (the mining colony inhabitants are some of the most passive I’ve ever seen, passing up reasons to down tools and punch one another with disturbing regularity. Maybe it’s the oxygen mix on the planet.)
Anyway, and now this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqz5dbs5zmo
27/10/2009 at 22:31 Vincent Avatar says:
I say, is that Tenacious D singing?
27/10/2009 at 22:38 Psychopomp says:
Singing’s not loud enough to be Jack Black.
28/10/2009 at 03:06 Hypocee says:
I wasn’t aware we had a problem with ‘asshole’ – if anyone, that’s you guys since it’s missing an R, right? Are you maybe referring to ‘jackass’ when it’s used by certain Communist Antichrists with the wrong colour skin?
29/10/2009 at 07:57 DMJ says:
Damn you RPS! It’s just not acceptable for me to start singing “Space Assho-o-o-o-ole!” at work but it’s too catchy…
29/10/2009 at 11:30 Mythrilfan says:
This made me so, so happy. Just in general.