We all know you watched a number of movies this 12 months, however did you watch a number of Polygon movies this 12 months? To have a good time one other 12 months within the can, the Polygon video group gave every producer the possibility (…and task) to shout out their favourite work from 2024 to offer you an concept of the place to dive in.
The Nice Sport: The Making of Spycraft
This video is extra like my favourite of the final three years, as a result of my colleague Simone de Rochefort and I labored on it at the least that lengthy. The Nice Sport: The Making of Spycraft is a feature-length documentary concerning the titular online game Spycraft: The Nice Sport. That big-budget, full-motion 1996 online game featured each a former KGB main common, Oleg Kalugin, and a former CIA director, William Colby. The parallel tales of two titans of Chilly Struggle espionage, and the making of a technology-pushing sport, turned too fascinating to disregard.
Engaged on this video was in contrast to the rest I’ve accomplished at Polygon. After I threw out the thought to have Jamelle Bouie — of New York Occasions op-ed, TikTok, Unclear and Current Hazard podcast fame — narrate the documentary, I by no means dreamed it’d really occur. We additionally had outdoors assist for narration, graphics, and all of the difficult manufacturing points that full-length documentary creation entails, and it’s a testomony to the entire group that it turned out pretty much as good because it did. If you happen to spend the time to observe, I deeply admire it!
‘Man talks About Starship Troopers for 25 minutes NOt clickbait’
I’m a giant fan of Starship Troopers. Not solely is it my favourite of Paul Verhoeven’s movies, it’s considered one of my Letterboxd 4, and if my buddies are any indication, it’s an R-rated characteristic our era was uncovered to at a really not R-rated age. Years later I realized and appreciated that it was a biting satire, maybe the most biting in a long time if the variety of dissenting critics it fooled in 1997 is any indication. That’s a degree that Pat’s video exquisitely illustrates. His video is definitely loads about Starship Troopers, each the film and the guide, in addition to considered one of my favourite video games of the 12 months, Helldivers 2.
However that’s not why I feel it’s necessary. After all, I feel all of our movies are necessary, however I feel this video is necessary in a extra… pressing means. As a result of… you already know. (I’m gesturing round at the whole lot. I notice now that that is a lot more durable to convey in writing than in video.)
Whereas Starship Troopers and Helldivers 2 take middle stage, what the video is admittedly about is that it’s necessary to assume critically about satirical media in a world the place “Get it? It’s fascist” isn’t a joke. That even incisive, penetrating satires like Starship Troopers and Helldivers 2 aren’t with out their flaws and limitations. That generally it helps to dive deeper not simply into the commentaries filmmakers make, or the books that encourage motion pictures like Starship Troopers (nicely, particularly not that one), but in addition the historical past that evokes a director to make a film about how warfare makes fascists of us all (sure, even that warfare).
Christina ‘XTINA GG’ Gayton
‘Delicate nerd clothes suggestions’
My favourite video I did this 12 months is that this TikTok on delicate nerd clothes. It’s a sartorial curiosity I’ve had for some time and I’m glad so many individuals might relate to it. The video is about how geek attire used to all the time be very daring and in-your-face, like Scorching Subject T-shirts with the emblem and title of the sport on the entrance of a shirt in large, colourful lettering. Nowadays you’ll find a myriad of clothes to specific your pursuits in additional delicate ways in which would solely be recognizable to different followers of the IP, such because the Unown pants from Atsuko (that I feel is likely to be out of inventory now??).
‘Sonic the Hedgehog Interview 3: Into the Shadow Realm’
My favourite video from considered one of my co-workers is the Sonic the Hedgehog 3 interview Pat did with Ben Schwartz. I used to be impressed by their improvisational chemistry. I feel it’s a testomony to the inventive risk for interviews and the way they are often enjoyable and fascinating. It felt like watching two buddies relatively than knowledgeable interview. Additionally, I LOVED Sonic the Hedgehog 3. It was so good.
‘Tekken remains to be bizarre and that’s what makes it nice’
I beloved making this video as a result of I bought to dip into all of my little pursuits and tie them collectively: combating video games, animation, martial arts movies, and bizarre wrestling historical past. However on a extra private degree, I needed to eulogize the spirit of martial naïveté.
Rising up in a pre-MMA world with restricted web entry, it was completely attainable for youths like me to go to our strip-mall karate courses and apply throwing chambered punches from our deep horse stances, believing we had been studying easy methods to struggle. After I noticed schoolyard scraps devolve into clumsy, red-faced grappling, I might inform myself it was as a result of neither considered one of them knew easy methods to execute a well-targeted palm strike.
My sensei’s phrase was regulation, and my sensei stated if an opponent grabbed my lapel like this, I might counter with a wrist lock like this. It was a comforting dream. Anyhoo! It is a video about how combating impacts fantasy and the way fantasy impacts combating. I’ve much more to say on the subject and possibly, in the future, I’ll!
‘Cease mendacity about Murderer’s Creed Unity’s Notre Dame’
Boy, do I like to see a delusion busted. Take that, you silly delusion!
Typically, you hear one thing, and also you consider it. Possibly you repeat it to another person — maybe as a result of it confirms how you consider the world, or as a result of it makes you mad, as a result of it’s simply good to consider. Do you know Rutger Hauer improvised that complete Blade Runner monologue on set? Wow!
It’s particularly straightforward to do that on the web, the place I can overlay some textual content on an image of Keanu Reeves and persuade a not-insignificant variety of those that he holds opinions on the subject of “faux buddies.”
I adore it when somebody places the effort and time into totally correcting the document. However as soon as is rarely sufficient. Simone has made this video a number of occasions now in completely different kinds. Misinformation will be genuinely dangerous, or simply severely annoying, however it’s all the time arduous to kill.
It comforts me to know that every time this explicit delusion swells up from the roiling bogs of discourse, Simone can be there to struggle the great struggle.
‘I performed Elden Ring flawed for 2 years’
That is possibly not my most substantial work, however I like when I’m impressed to make one thing as a result of shit is simply occurring to me. The anecdote on the core of this video is that I spent two years brute-forcing and cheesing my means by way of Elden Ring, just for my boyfriend to have a look at my construct and go “your shit’s fucked.”
But additionally: It’s about how I used to be having enjoyable anyway.
But additionally: The response to the video has been my favourite half. I used to be understandably a bit apprehensive about placing out a video mainly saying “lol I’m dangerous at video video games.” However there’s a ton of individuals within the feedback being encouraging, or sharing their tales of sucking at Elden Ring, and it made me actually completely satisfied! For me, having enjoyable isn’t synonymous with being good at one thing, and it seems to be like I’m not alone!
‘Elden Ring does this higher than anybody else’
The factor about this video is that I used to be going to make it. I like making movies about how sport mechanics work, and the thought was to do one about how material is modeled. I turned to Gwen Frey, who I had interviewed concerning the Bread Boy in BioShock Infinite, as a result of she had labored on online game material design earlier than. We had an incredible interview, after which I sat down to put in writing the video, and it simply… didn’t work.
Individually, Pat had pitched a video about Elden Ring’s costuming and the way it communicated character design. This additionally didn’t find yourself going anyplace.
Pat wanted an concept for his subsequent video, and I wanted to cease mendacity to my boss about how I used to be making a video about material. The answer was clear: Pat was going to make a video about material.
And he knocked it out of the park. The wonderful thing about Pat is that he’s extremely expert at observing and explaining tiny particulars in video games. And there are such a lot of tiny particulars in Elden Ring. He takes an enormous matter (ALL OF THE CLOTH IN ELDEN RING???), and makes it humorous and digestible and academic. He did a significantly better job with this than I might have, and I adore it as a result of he succeeded the place I failed. And that’s why it’s so nice to work on a group as proficient as this one.
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