[Mari]

Arguments for or against? Post below!

[Mari]

This game suffers from the same problem as Shaq Fu. It stars real people and would probably be very disruptive to the theme of the site.

[Deleted]

Barkley Shut Up And Jam is a regular-ass basketball game where real basketball players play basketball with each other. It obviously shouldn't be legal.

Barkley Shut Up And Jam Gaiden - or, as the upcoming Barkley 2 solidifies its proper franchise name as, the Hoopz Barkley SaGa - is functionally an entirely distinct series. It's currently not even up for discussion because there's no plans to bring it to any Nintendo systems, but when that time comes the fact that one of the games' names is based on a SNES basketball game's name shouldn't be taken into account.

[Mari]

--To note because, apparently, this series is just a mess of nonsense. This thread shall henceforth be discussing Barkley GAIDEN.

[Maverick Hunter Zero]

Once again... SatAM Sonic Eggman says this to make it as simplistic as possible...

NO!

That is all...

[PolarStarQuote]

Nnnope. Barkley Shut up and Jam Gaiden is, as far as i can see, Looking at it from every angle, a meme game made as a joke without any care or basis for taking itself seriously. I mean...







Just look at the thing.

Asides from the It totally includes and features Charles Barkley as the main character all OVER the place, Including the main character 'Hoopz Barkley' being literally Charles Barkley's son-- The whole thing is a joke, The Developers are clearly too far in on the joke to have an actual real meaningful story here. It can say it has plot and character, but its entirely wrapped in the thought of "basketball is funny."

Would we really have anything to gain from what original Non-meme content the game has anyway?? What on earth could we get from Cyberdwarf or the world that the supposed 'Original game that has nothing to do with the others'?

The Game would destroy the site's Tone, Without doubt, and i believe that you should vote No for all good reasoning. I can not, in any way, Imagine my characters interacting with a robot man made out of basketball skin talking about how "Dribbling is the beat of the universe" or something dumb like that. Its a game about Jokes, And nothing else. Its a Meme Game. And we cant allow it to be a blot on the site. Absolutely. Not. 

My vote is No.

[Deleted]

Barkley Shut Up And Jam Gaiden has no presence on Nintendo systems, aside from the technicality of sharing a name with a SNES game as a joke.

That said, if Barkley 2 gets a Switch release, I think it should be legal. Though it's a "meme game" in some sense, the tone of the game deliberately refuses to acknowledge how ridiculous the setting is, and treats it as an entirely serious fantasy/cyberpunk story. It's really hard to explain without just saying "go play it" (though you should), but most of the "jokes" are just basic assumptions of the setting. Basketball is magic, furries live in the sewers like Morlocks, and Charles Barkley's shadow self transforms into a T-rex, but the tone of the game takes all of this deadly seriously, in such a way that a character from this setting would fit in alongside the rest of the cast without too much issue if they aren't constantly namedropping real world things (which wouldn't be in line with the source material anyway). Additionally, the series has a lot of entirely original worldbuilding, though the meme/reference parts are the most immediately noticable at a glance. Though none of the real people should be legal under the logic that bans Kingdom Hearts versions of Disney characters, the original characters like Hoopz Barkley, Balthios James, the Cyberdwarf, and X114JAM9 could work easily.

Edit: Also, Barkley 2 has a legal team to allow them to actually sell it, so it's doubtful most of the obviously-ridiculous meme stuff like Ghost Dad up there will make it over. It'll still be kind of silly, but it'll likely be less difficult to take seriously at first glance - though we won't know until it actually comes out.

[PolarStarQuote]

Characters not reacting to crazyiness doesnt make it any more tone-deaf, as the game seems to be. I mean-- You literally said Basketball is magic and Furries live in the sewer and Charles Barkley is a Dinosaur. Thats Meme Jokes that the game is advertising itself on. It doesn't matter how dead serious the characters take the story to be, That kind of ludicrousness has NO place on Li, whatsoever.


To approve something like this would just make the entire site a Joke, the very second a post saying the words "My dear Friend Charles Barkley" are typed.I legitimately think that, allowing a single character from this series to be acknowledged in Canon on site is Dangerous, would destroy our entire credibility as a serious site, and ruin any legitimate reason for us to have any stake in the plot.

Why would i, A serious roleplayer here to enjoy a serious, legitimate roleplay, have a single reason to care about a story where a Charles Barkley-saurus is known to exist in the plains, With a Ghost Dad somewhere around by, and the Cyberdwarf talks about how "Basketball is Magic, We must vanquish the furries in the sewer!"

I wouldnt. I Couldnt.

[Therider]

I mean, we literally roleplay on a site with an Italian man as our leader, who grows when he eats Mushrooms, shoots fire out of his hands with help from a flower, and turns invincible when he touches a Star. Alongside him are people who can use magic, a man who literally hunts vampires with a whip that houses the soul of his ancestor's fiance, a caveman riding a dragon, a little girl who houses two souls in her, and not to mention animals who range from fire-breathing lizards to magic fairy keys who steal other keys to improve their collection. Or should I mention the man who throws milk at people and then heals himself when he beats them up?

I, as a serious legitimate roleplayer, who play all serious characters, including a band of adventurers who killed a God, and said vampire hunter, would have no problem dealing with basketball skinned men and dinosaurs with the head of a famous basketball player. We're mashing together video game worlds, it's honestly OK to me to have these things, and to be honest, I think we need more goofiness. I think we could deal with more absurd and freaky things that make the site unique. Is Moonside too risque for the site? Maybe we should ban Earthbound for having Moonside as a place and reference.

I mean no disrespect at all; I understand some people are less comfortable with weird than I am. There are fair and valid reasons not to have this game be legal, which is why I voted no for now. But to claim that legitimate roleplayers are too high and mighty to dare lower themselves to talk to cyber dwarves who claim that basketball is a way of life, and yet roleplay as other absurd characters, it just doesn't sit right with me. In my history of professional acting and improvising, an improviser works with any scene they get, not just the ones they deem worthy.

[Mari]

I wouldn't equate the fantasy elements of say Mario with the memes of Barkley. One is simply weird and fantastical, and the other has contempt for its own premise. These types of series are incredibly irritating to serious writers, not because they are unrealistic or weird, but because when a story has contempt for its own premise in favor of making jokes, it becomes impossible for it to rise above being a joke. This is also the primary reason 4th wall humor can be so divisive, and why we had to ask people not to get carried away with 4th wall humor in our rules. Some people like it because it's funny, but for others it just... destroys their muse and ruins their time. I'd like to keep those others in mind when considering this game.

On an unrelated note, we actually have a location here on Li based on Moonside. You should check it out sometime! It's pretty neat, though as its creator I might be a bit biased. >.o

[PolarStarQuote]

I should reiterate my point, since it seems alot of people seem to misunderstand me. Basically, What Mari said is the point, There's a clean cut difference between the zaniness of your average Mario Game and Barkley just being Jokes that would absolutely irritate your average serious writer. But,what Mari said is on point, so ill leave it at that.

[Deleted]

I've thought about what to say here for a few days now. An element of the Mother comparison I think is worth mentioning is that those screenshots posted before are, well, not representative of the full depth of the game. It would be like judging Mother based on a few screenshots of the most ridiculous enemies and lines. I'm not going to claim BSUaJG is anywhere near the level of Mother in terms of quality, and the forms the game's absurdity takes is completely different, but it's not just jokes. There's absolutely meat to the game, and characters who work separate from the jokes involved (similarly, I would probably recommend including a similar rule to KH where the real basketball players and companies and such can't be mentioned).

Here's the thing: play the game. It's freeware. If your computer was bought within the last decade you can probably run it. It can be knocked out in a weekend if you really dedicate yourself to it, and takes like a week to finish max. If you decide after playing it that the game's sense of humor and tone aren't a good fit for the site, so be it. But please don't make this decision based purely on extrapolating from a handful of out of context screenshots.

[Maverick Hunter Zero]

Still saying no because it still won't fit the rp as a whole.

[Mari]

My biggest distinction between Mother and Barkley would once again be that Mother doesn't have contempt for its own premise. Whereas, by your own admission Barkley's premise is a joke to the developers. Mario and Pokemon don't have contempt for their own premises, but a lot of the edgy joke videos poking fun at them DO and that's why they do all those silly things we'd never expect to see in a real Mario or Pokemon game. Do you see why we don't view these series the same way? Barkley feels a lot more like those mean spirited fan videos.

Ideally, what we'd like to see from you are examples of the things you're claiming. If Barkley isn't just basketball gags and self-contempt based humor, where is all this meat we're not seeing? You've mentioned Cyberdwarf before, ...but Cyberdwarf has a basketball for a head and skin made out of basketballs. And one of his primary driving characteristics... is trying to regain the basketball powers he lost. I can't think of a single character from Mario, let alone Mother, with that much contempt for its own premise. I just don't see a genuine attempt at telling a story here. I see an ironic attempt at telling a story, but not a genuine one.

And without examples, you're kinda putting us in an unfair spot where we have to... binge play a game in a short period of time. We've tried to do our research, but even sites that review this game positively do so because of its humor, not because of any merit to its story or world. TVTropes describes it as a parody, which is especially damning. A parody, as in a game that exists to make fun of other games, rather than standing on its own as part of the genre. It also says that it deliberately imitates bad translations. The game is literally imitating a badly written game as a joke. Aspergers is literally a status effect you can catch in this game. You must understand that I am doing my research here, and all the facts suggest that this is in fact just a gag game. Which is fine if that's what gets a laugh out of you, but imho I would find it extremely unpleasant to interact with these characters as they're portrayed in the game. I feel like the gag would overstay its welcome very easily.

[Deleted]

"And one of his primary driving characteristics... is trying to regain the basketball powers he lost."

Not... correct? Unless there's some minor mention of it somewhere I've forgotten. It's definitely not a primary motivation. And even if it were... it's magic. He wants to regain his magic powers. The setting treats basketball as magic, which is backed up by many characters having magic attacks involving basketball. This is an assumption of the setting, and not really significantly more absurd than the assumptions of any other fantasy setting, especially your average video game setting.

That's really the core of it... very little in the game is treated as a joke by the developers. Parts might seem like jokes at a glance, but the game takes it seriously, and builds a serious, non-jokey story around it. The Cyberdwarf's actual motivation? He wants to stop the evil organization B.L.O.O.D.M.O.S.E.S. from using the Ultimate B-Ball to unleash the devastating power of the Chaos Dunk. This technique destroyed New York in the game's backstory, and it's implied its use on the Cyberdwarf's homeworld is what caused him to flee to Earth. And most of the plot is... like this. Though some of the proper nouns might seem, out of context, like jokes, the story takes itself seriously. The characters take it seriously. By the end of the game, you're taking it all seriously. The joke is, for the most part, just seeing those proper nouns for the first time, but past that it's all honest fantasy storytelling (and the actual, straight-up jokes in the writing).

Edit: Read this section of this Let's Play, if nothing else, covering the Spalding Factory. It extends through the beginning of Part 19, and I think it encapsulates the game's tone fairly well.