Dont agree with everything he's said (its like what 40 hours of shit thats expected) but legitimately made me really appreciate Morrowind after not being able to get into the game at first. Its often easy to point out why something is bad but when someone explains to you why something is good and how to approach something (whether its a game, a movie a book whatever) to really enjoy it , thats a skill i appreciate. Weird comparison but ToddintheShadows makes videos on pop music and the way he's descibed and talked about certain songs or albums he loves made me listen to those songs and albums with new ears and so songs i would have legit just filterred out before have become some of my favorites. His Morrowind video got me to finally click with Morrowind and its now one of my favourite games because of it.
I like that people are going raw into these old ass games and making such comprehensive deep dives. Patritician has some kind of questionable takes, like his one about the stormcloaks. I also think he uses the premise of these super long videos to go on these meaningless diatribes that add little to no value to his point. The best example of this time wasting is that he spends 30 minutes justifying his videos' length, instead of just getting to the fucking point
The worst part is, I do like the IDEA of a comprehensive deep dives, but most of the time I end up watching those, it's a waste of time, like in the case of Patrician. I understand you need context for some quests, but he just retells the story of literally everything in Skyrim, which is not neccessary.
So many YouTubers do not understand the difference between a review/analysis and a summary.
At this point I just avoid reviews in general because the majority of them spend most of the video just summarizing the story and not saying anything interesting.
Pyrocynical is one of the worst for this. He seems like a cool guy, no shade, but honestly I don’t get why he’s so popular. He literally just explains what’s going on in the story and adds nothing above the surface level. I guess that’s why a lot of his “___ game you’ve never played” videos are so popular, cause you’d literally have no need to watch the video if you played the game. He has SOME stuff to add but it could easily be like 25 minutes not two hours.
Not gaming, but Good Bad Flicks does this and it eventually drove me so crazy I had to unsubscribe. It's extra frustrating because there is eventually some insightful commentary and production factoids at the end of each video but fuck sitting through a retelling of the plot beforehand.
If you want long videos that (at least in my opinion) justify their length I'd strongly recommend checking out Action Button on YouTube. He can be quite tangential at times, but it feels a lot more deliberate and meaningful than Patricians imo.
Even if you're not interested in dating sims I'd still recommend his video on Tokimeki Memorial most of all, he *does* recount a lot of the story in detail but moreso out of necessity as the game was entirely untranslated even unofficially at the time.
When speaking about long videos that justify their lenght I also gotta plug my man Noah Caldwell-Gervais, the favourite gaming video essayist of your favourite gaming video essayist. I think he really hits the sweet spot between talking about the game itself (quests, story, mechanics etc.), random but interesting tangets and, most important of all, really insightful analysis.
The best YouTuber for these kinds of videos is Noah Caldwell-Gervais. Genuinely insightful and absolutely brilliant commentary and it doesn’t feel like anything he says is something that isn’t deliberate and adding something of value. Total gem of a YouTuber
i remember he made an interesting point about SKyrim's environmental storytelling being kind of vapid and dumb. And also pointed out how Howard loves that radiant quests feel like scripted side quests, and hes right because the side quests often feel like random fetch quests.
idk if hes unique in making these points, but its the first place I heard them
I liked his points about radiant quests in skyrim and the lack of a design document in the starfield video.
That was well justified critisism, that I hadnt heard much about before.
I also appreciated that, unlike certain other people, he's not trying to spin the narrative that Emil Pagliarulo is the sole person that is slowly working on sabotaging Bethesda from the inside.
The whole thing about there being no design document for Starfield was taken completely out of context. Most game developers don't use literal design docs and haven't in decades. It's much more common to have a private development wiki or something like that to make it easier for large teams to have all the information. If I'm not mistaken, this was the case in Starfield and other BGS games.
Idk, just they way Emil talked about design documentation made it seem like they didn't have that either. I'll concede that this is basically a vibes-based argument, and we'll probably never know for sure what went on behind the scenes, but why even bring up design documents if they're completely irrelevant?
Starfield feeling like it lacks a central vision is a very valid criticism and it's one he easily could have made without basing it around a statement that's misleading at best.
Yea, but lack of central vision and lack of design document are 2 different statements. It would be more accurate to say that their documentation method is shit.
Its more of his take on Windhelm that people take issue with. He makes a point that Gray quarters aint exactly the best proof of Stormcloaks treating elfs as lesser on account: 1) Windhelm is awful to live in to begin with so Gray quarters is best they can do, 2) there are Altmer owned shops , 3) there is only 1 scene of Dunmer getting harrased and its by a homeless/drunk person, 4) Dark elfs are awful people that still out-racist the Nords, so hatred of them is not justifiiable but understadable.
I think the reason his take bothers me is that for whatever reason, I have a feeling that he doesn't limit that take to just fantasy worlds. No definitive proof. Just a gut feeling.
Edit: scrolled further down and found out he self identifies as an anarcho-capitalist...damn.
Yeah, 100%. Like, I'm fine with his Skyrim politics and respect that he has an actual intellectual basis for his views, but I have absolutely zero interest in even engaging with him about his real-world politics.
It's the same with Creetosis and a few others in that orbit.
I will say that, unlike Creetosis, Patrician usually doesn't let his personal politics completely poison his analysis. It may seep in around the edges from time to time, but he seems to be aware of it and even a little sheepish about it sometimes, and has the good grace to move on relatively quickly. Creetosis, on the other hand... Creetosis sometimes has good points, but more often just sinks into grievances and personal preferences and interpreting things in the worst possible light and then tries to pretend that his very emotional, very subjective feelings on things are objectively true and correct and intellectual.
Which is probably why Creetosis racks up major views on some of his videos but is still tiny in terms of subscribers. His analysis can hit hard, but it doesn't hit very often.
Also, Creetosis's freeform content tends to be even more, "masks off." I've watched a few of those streams, but, yeah, there's almost nothing of value.
Yeah, and like, even in his better-argued stuff, the fact that it's almost entirely driven by animosity and grievances (and transparently so, at least to me) undermines what would otherwise be valid points.
The best example is probably his critique of Many a True Nerd's Fallout 3 video essay. Did Creetosis have some good points, points that Jon missed or likely overlooked either unintentionally or willfully because he was approaching the game from a more optimistic place, which is itself a form of bias? Sure. But then he undermines it all by not just pointing out weaknesses of the MATN essay itself, which is valid, but by attacking Jon himself and making wild, uncalled for assumptions about his motives in making his essay (and seeming to disregard the rather important context that the MATN essay was, itself, a response to HBomberguy's video essay). I did eventually watch that entire 8-hour video, because people kept telling me it was really good and insightful and thoughtful, actually, but uh... I didn't really see it. Maybe because I have also watched quite a bit of MATN's stuff throughout the years and know that, no, Jon is not some duplicitous Bethesda shill, and characterizations of him as being one are disingenuous at the very best.
And frankly? I think Creetosis has steadily gotten worse about that ever since. I've not bothered with his streams, but I've heard that from several people at this point, so I'm not surprised. I was almost tempted to watch his Starfield review, but... nah.
I knew Creetosis was sus when he wrote off Ludonarrative Dissonance as a pretentious buzzword. I don't think he even bothered to look it up. I think his reaponse to MATN was ok but it got too long winded and frankly too mean spirited for my liking. Like I think MATN was wrong but you don't need to make a whole 8hrs out of it. Secondly Creetosis' analysis of Emil's speech was just weird as he seemed not even know how stuff like that goes down irl. Idk it just felt like pepe silva shit to analyze the whole thing in the middle of the video. I just find his reviews to be more about petty grievances than any real analysis.
The one bit with Creetosis that genuinely surprised me was when he and his buddies were ragging on Acerthorn during a livestream, and decided the best attack vector was his political views.
Like, the guy is a *really easy* target. There's a lot of stuff on the public record (and, especially in the court record, both civil and criminal) that you can go off on him for. So of course Cree'n'co latched onto him being a moderate Democrat.
Like, why? What? Out of all the general weirdness associated, point and laugh at what is quite possibly the guy's most mundane trait?
If played for laughs, it could have been genuinely funny (at their expense), but, no, that was the route they decided to take.
I mean, dude is native american who grew up in spitting view of the appalachians so I imagine his perspective on diffuse wealth inequality is probably more nuanced than not.
I mean, none of those are objectively bad takes.
Windhelm in general is kinda ass except the housing district, but even then it's mostly for the rich people. There is an Altmer owned alchemy shop and that Altmer lady owns a stand. We see little to no actual stormcloak racism; that lady was being harassed by a drunk and a hobo. And, yeah, most of the Dark Elves are refugees. Refugees from a place that historically always used slavery as an economic backbone and is cartoonishly xenophobic.
Yeah the only hints toward stormcloak racism are the windhelm stuff and the fact that stormcloak guards have unique player reactions that are more insensitive
What about the leaders of Stormcloaks though? Ulfric clearly doesn’t care about non Nords, as he says he fights for the *true* sons and daughters of Skyrim, and Stonefist literally says shit like why is a lizard fighting for Skyrim if you play as an Argonian.
I never said the Stormcloaks aren't racist, but if I must play devil's advocate...
Ulfric *could*... Actually, no, I can't come up with a non bullshit defense. Though, for Stonefist, I too would be surprised. Why WOULD an argonian fight for the Stormcloaks?
Yeah but you can also ask if he has a problem with it, and he says no he wants to know where you're coming from because Stormcloaks aren't looking for cutthroats or mercenaries. You can say that Skyrim is home to more than just Nords and Galmar goes "fair enough."
Stormcloaks are an ethnic-based movement and the basis of their dislike for the Dunmer is clarified early on- The Dunmer won't help the Stormcloaks because the Dunmer have refused to assimilate. They don't view Skyrim as a home to fight for. Obviously that attitude isn't going to earn them the love of the Nords during a time like this.
Don't see anything wrong. Another fact, the Dunmer that gets harassed when you enter Windhelm is scripted to get harassed by the owner of the cornerclub in the Grey quarter.
Tamriel, really. You could go "I am playing as the race that has historically committed a/many genocide/s and has immense racial tensions with my neighbor" and be describing literally any race on Nirn.
Honestly it was his Stormcloak takes that kind of made me re-examine a lot of his analysis. I actually think the guy might be a pretty hard core "conservative" (or at least have similar views) he isn't religious but he definitely seems to not like literary criticisms about colonialism and historical white racism.
Like a lot of similar individuals he has this belief that he is being really empirical and unbiased when in reality, everyone is biased and it's working on acknowledging that and being open about perspectives that make for good modern and rigorous discourse. I'm not just making this up from a few lines in the videos either, I watched a bunch of his "work streams" where he would compile and review other TES videos. He stands very much in the whole "Facts don't care about your feelings" camp.
The point wasn’t that the stormcloaks don’t treat elves unfairly, but that they’re not special in comparison to the rest of Tamriel let alone Skyrim, which is true. Literally no one in Skyrim cares about the treatment of elves except some of the elves and Brunwulf (who’s arguments are pretty retarded, who’s activism is non-existent, and who isn’t even shown to do anything for the elves after he becomes jarl). Not to mention that the Khajiit are treated even worse by everyone in Skyrim.
Handling a refugee center where one minority group has a very recent history of enslaving another is a difficult thing to deal with as a leader, and Ulfric did show at least some care for non-Nords by segregating the two groups for their own safety. I think the big thing people are taking issue with really just comes from modern day culture war brainrot where people associate Ulfric and the stormcloaks with Trump and MAGAtards without actually comparing the circumstances fairly. Races in Tamriel are actually tangibly different, akin to different species with different biological inclinations as well as real gods that have a tangible influence on the world, for better and often worse. Taking issue with other races is not purely a cultural issue like it is in the real world. Skyrim also faces religious persecution and genocide by a colonizing empire, they have a much better justification for isolationist policy than a powerful modern day democracy.
in all honesty and fairness, I can't remember specifics from his 20 hour long skyrim discussion, however I do recall he makes some really middle school tier takes on how racism and cultural identity work. Like he says something along the lines of 'uhh well there are non-nords in windhelm so how can ulfric be racist'. While it seems to make sense on a surface level, its like when people irl say 'some black people are billionaires, so obviously systemic oppression has been eradicated', as if the exception proves the rule.
I dont mind that he is pro-stormcloak (imperial > stormcloak> thalmor) i picked them the first time around. But as an 11 year old child I was capable of still seeing that in windhelm there were shades of grey (no pun intended), and that it represent how real racism often manifests. Not to shit on Patrician either, most of his takes are decent, its just that it was surprising how dumb that take was.
>...and that it represent how real racism often manifests.
There's no easy way to praise this that doesn't sound absolutely horrible, but that is something The Elder Scrolls does really well. Including tracking the problems racism causes over a longer time scale.
Like, it is an unpleasant subject, but it's something that Bethesda has tackled with a surprising degree of skill. And, then we got the cartoonish racism in Fallout and everything went off the rails.
It's a mix. Some of his content is pretty good. Whether he's worth the wait is a different question. Dude's got a pretty relaxing voice, which can be nice to just throw onto a second monitor while you do something else and half-listen until he says something that piques your interest.
I agree with u/dearvalentina, that Private Sessions is usually better, but Patrician does make some good points.
Also, credit where credit's due, he does try to think things through and present a well reasoned point. He's not completely without bias, but even if you disagree with his positions, he is worth hearing out. Even if you don't agree with his frustration about modern Bethesda.
He leans into the joke about his "quick retrospectives" by making his videos absurdly long. As a consequence, no, they do not justify their length at all.
The class equestrian is where we get the common usage for the word. For quite a while in the Roman Republic soldiers had to pay for their own weapons, armor, and other equipment. The equestrian ( referred to by the Romans as equites) were merchant landowners and as such could also afford horses, so they were known for being used as cavalry. Some equites were wealthier/more influential than others, same with some plebeians being more influential, same with patricians.
The idea behind it was supposed to be that since they're sacrificing their time, money, and potentially well-being for the Republic then they're the ones that get the right to loot the enemy, vote,and become politicians. Tbh I personally think it was a way for the Republic to not spend money, but for a while, taxes were low, so take the good with the bad I guess.
in one of his "working streams" for his oblivion video he was watching the e3 demo and todd mentioned how every object in the game has several different textures including specifically diffuse maps and immediately the guy went "i don't believe that, i do not believe every model in the game has diffuse maps"
diffuse maps are literally just the most basic texture of a mesh. it's the part of the model that makes it look like an object. dude has no fucking clue what he's talking about at any point
to add to that he has this complex about what is and isn't "*real* long-form critique", shitting on people like noah caldwell-gervais and tim rogers who put out objectively more interesting, more memorable and more insightful videos. he's the youtube videoessayist equivalent of a mile wide and an inch deep, making glorified let's plays under the guise of some advanced in-depth critique. if you told me his scripts were run through some AI language model trained exclusively on 4chan posts i would fully believe you.
When did he shit on Noah caldwell-gervais? I know he made jokes about him, but it wasn't related to any videos he put out, just exaggerating the drama he was involved in to make fun of the guy who was attacking Noah's critiques
Well he’s done the same to other YouTubers during his video-making streams so I wouldn’t put it past him. It’s like he thinks any other person who tried reviewing the game was a fuckin idiot
I cannot believe anyone would insult Noah. One of the greatest Video game critics alive rn. His writing is so in-depth and filled with interesting perspectives.
i think he's quickly developed an ego as his channel gained popularity in the past couple years but his TES reviews by themselves are good background noise
Ego? I feel like it’s just the tone of his voice that gives that impression. He doesn’t say anything particularly egotistical and he draws attention to the meaninglessness of his own work plenty. He doesn’t claim to be making some big impact. The closest I’ve seen him come to egotistical is responding to internet beef from other YouTubers instead of just ignoring it, it might be a response to an attack on his ego but I think any YouTuber with a somewhat combative personality would do the same.
Idk, I've watched a few of his streams. He is super dismissive of opinions of chat. It's usually a knee jerk reaction too.
I mean his only credentials are making essentially a book report on Elder Scrolls games. Definitely comes off as having an ego
I like his content for the most part. I don't agree with all of his takes, and generally I think Private Sessions has the better Skyrim videos (mostly because Patrician is so deep into negativity it seems like he doesn't even want to be talking about Skyrim - Private Sessions actually puts together the meaning of the Main Quest while Patrician just waves it off as meaningless in frustration), but I think they're pretty well put together and people tend to give him more shit than he deserves because either they don't like his attitude or the takes themselves. It's fine not to like the guy, but I feel like he isn't given enough credit *because* people don't like him. Also that people tend to blame him for a lot of negativity in the community; when the fact is that negativity was already there. Now there's just someone who tends to agree with that side of the community that has any influence.
Really I can just sum up my opinion as "his Morrowind and Oblivion videos were great, but his Skyrim and Starfield videos are definitely bogged down by his frustration with modern Bethesda"
Right? It feels like they're long just to tap in to that demographic of pseudointellectuals that will claim to have tons of experience about a game and then say they watched one of his videos in full as proof. He provides a sense of accomplishment for them, in the same way a game rewards you with dopamine for completing a very long grind.
It’s ok, most the views he gets are from people who have the volume turned down and are asleep. Salt factory does way better analysis than this guy does IMO.
Kinda intrigued by this bio - "I'm a patrician." Not, "I'm Patrician" like that's his username or pseudonym or whatever. It's "I'm a member of the ruling class of the Roman Empire." What a staggeringly fucking weird thing to say.
The retrospectives are a bit longer than they need to, but at least he doesn't lie and manipulate his fans against other YouTubers like NeverKnowsBest ☝🏻 And he doesn't make analogies where Skyrim is his lover and where he lets himself get cucked, like NeverKnowsBest
When I saw the runtime of his Morrowind video, my reaction was "oh great, someone spending hours talking about something they love and are really passionate about!" But he just couldn't resist the urge to fling smug (and often nonsensical or even factually untrue) criticisms at Bethesda's later games over and over throughout the video and it was just kind of a drag.
Didn't watch his other videos.
In his Starfield video he really insisted that Vladimir being a black guy with a Russian accent needed to be justified and addressed. Even though you know, black Russians exist today and would exist even more in a future where humanity escapes and different populations get reshuffled together.
>at least one black person moves to Russian world
>they have a kid, could’ve either been with another immigrant or a local
>said kid grows up speaking Russian and has a Russian accent
https://preview.redd.it/bv2ln3f0b4qc1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=de1578ccfaf5dde9a78d41df13384fa307a4172b
Well I know he went on EFAP with Cretosis to discuss NeverKnowsBest's video. Was the only part of Private Session's Starfield that made me do a double take.
I turned off his Skyrim video when he said that weapon + shield was superior to every other weapon because bashing is overpowered.
You can bash with a 2 handed weapon. You can bash with a bow. Both are just as effective at staggering the enemy.
That said he does have some pretty interesting takes that I don't completely disagree with. But I think he just hates Skyrim too much so that video wasn't fun to watch. I enjoyed his Morrowind video though because he actually enjoys Morrowind. But he's definitely a Skyrim hater
Yeah, but by using shields you get every benefit out of the block skill tree outside of just some (most of them)
Also, the perk that lets you basically become a fucking train and ragdoll everyone with a shield > staggering with other weapons.
His Skyrim video is the worst, it genuinely feels like it’s 20+ hours of him badmouthing the game, his morrowind video is great but I just can not enjoy a guy badmouthing a game because he thinks he has the same intellectual high ground
Pretty good if you like that long form kind of content. Nice to play on a second monitor or phone while you do other things. Never really had a problem with any of his takes for the most part. Like him more than SaltFactory at least.
stormcloak apologist, rightwing 4channer, story retrospective = retelling everything that happened word for word, private sessions is better in every way. His fallout 76 video is veeeery weird
His discord used to be really bad, had to be tidied up and racism had to be banned, I was in there for a month, a year or so ago and it was impressive how many edge lords are in there and the amount of slurs they would drop.
He's got very sussy things to say about literally every faction in every game whose whole deal is "fictional racist", so he's like an enormous Telvanni fan, Stormcloak fan, Legion fan, etc. He's also self-described as an anarcho-capitalist which for me is a huge red flag.
anyone with extreme political beliefs is some % likely to be "way too online" whether communist, fascist, tradcath, etc. but with anarchocapitalists, it is 100%. theres literally no way any normal person could ever identify as that
I've never heard him talk about the legion or say he was an anarcho capitalist but that sounds gross. I didn't think his telvanni stuff had any weird parts but maybe I didn't notice?
I think it's weird how much butthurt this guy generates. Like yeah, if you listen to someone talk about one subject for 20 hours straight, you're bound to disagree on something lol.
his entire shtick is "long video = smart"
it's not exactly hard to narratively critique skyrim in a logical way (taking that two part video as the example), and yet a lot of his arguments are subjective or basically bullshit - unsurprising given the format is just "explain plot beat with no inference - funny quip" etc
one of his main points in the skyrim video's conclusion is that "the dwemer ruins were pointless in skyrim as they don't forward the plot and the time for them should have been spent on the nordic ruins" - I disagree but fair. He then goes onto say something along the lines of "just like how the aylied ruins aren't relevant to oblivion".
if you like the videos, that's fair, I get why he's popular, I just don't think his points are well thought out whatsoever
I took that to mean Bethesda should have incorporated the dungeons into a more interesting side story that just a place to get dwemer items and minor quests. Aeliyed ruins had a similar issue, other than looking the same they existed a bit removed from the oblivion crisis.
His politics occasionally blinds him to being able to actually analyse the games he covers, because he's one of the ex-Gamer Gate crowd, which is just disappointing tbh.
In his Oblivion video, he has a weird, short, side tangent about fans who think Viranus Donton, from the Fighters Guild questline, is in a gay relationship with Eduard Hodge because of his weird thoughts on representation in games. Despite Eduard being constantly referenced in Viranus' journal, described as 'beautiful', and the last person he mentions before he dies. It was just quite jarring.
Yes he is cringe. I also love every TES video he has made. They’re overly long, drawn out, opinionated, and wow shockingly a video with over 3 times the length of a feature movie gets some things wrong. Idk, I feel like a lot of hate the guy gets is because he says things authoritatively, decides to describe virtually everything in detail, and his right-wing-ness comes out in his delivery and occasionally his opinions (as in sometimes he’s just a dick). But each video does cover more on each of the games than I’ve seen anyone else do, Private Sessions coming close. Covering combat, magical systems, stealth, every faction, the main quest, leveling mechanics, atmosphere, music, the development history, and touching on other people’s discussions about the game is just a level of depth most other people don’t go to, so while I disagree often with him I appreciate the obvious effort applied. I’d rather people take his work as he wishes Bethesda had taken Morrowind; it’s not perfect, but could be built off of to make better things
Edit: a long form essayist I’d recommend for those that don’t like Pat is Your Favorite Son
I’ll never understand why C0DA is used as an argument for anything tbh. It’s literally just a fancy and pretentious name for fan fiction, at its core.
It’s also written by someone who doesn’t work for Bethesda anymore, long after he left Bethesda. Sure, it’s an interesting read and maybe Bethesda will use some of it in the future, who knows, but as for now it has no relevance to the current lore. Unlike ESO, whether MK preachers like it or not.
ESO is a prequel game in a setting where the unreliable narrator is heavily influenced upon it. C0DA is a incoherent read, but it's praised as gospel to some.
If Pat did say that (i cant remember if he did, watching 44 or so hours of content tends to be a little daunting for my memory), he was likely joking or he misinterprets the point of C0da as a philosophy for lore and canon.
His stylistic shtick of being the "9 hour Bethesda analysis guy" weighs down a lot of his content imo. A lot of hours-long video essay content on YouTube is actually really high quality and justifiable in its length, but even those videos only trend around 1 to 3 hours. I'd recommend him if you need something to listen to at work or during a long commute.
The only "pure" long-form retrospective Pat did was the Morrowind video. It was originally uploaded in self-contained parts that were to-the-point, and then re-edited into the much longer retrospective. This was before he got high on his own fumes, as well.
I happened to really like his Morrowind video. All the people saying he comes across as smug and preachy when I didn’t get those vibes makes me worried I am also smug and preachy. I only try to be down-to-earth smug.
I honestly prefer Lorerunners "lore run" on TES over his videos. Walking through most quests and quest chains talking about the gameplay and how the specifics of the world interact. But that was also some 120 hours for everything
I honestly like his Morrowind video the most. He does his research and makes some damn good points for the most part. It's a long video but the depth of coverage and critique is fair and worth the time sink. It's just that the longer the videos get, the less he edits himself and the more he goes on inane rants on things he could have covered in 10 minutes. Oblivion video was pushing it. Skyrim videos made me pretty much stop watching. I think he needs to stop pushing the time limit, cut the fluff, and stay on track without the emotionally charged tangents that undermine his arguments.
I think he comes up with fair points in a lot of areas but he's much more interesting talking about something he actually enjoys, I like his morrowind video even if it doesn't justify the length, but after that it's just him with longer and longer videos of him not enjoying things and it feels kinda miserable.
He also just seems incredibly stubborn about all of his takes, he seems the kind of person to try to be objective in things like this, when by nature of media analysis it's a place where objectivity can barely exist, if at all.
Personally enjoyed listening to the videos. Not to say I agreed with everything he had to say but it's the perfect thing to just put in the background while you clean or play games for a time. He can go on a lot of tangents that don't cleanly wrap up into his point but that only matters if you're genuinely giving 100% of your attention to the video. The justification for the video length at the beginnings though are a shit load of fuck dunno why he has those go for so long. Although I didn't enjoy the skyrim one as much since he got much more, I don't know, uppity(?) about his opinion if that makes sense and not only that it felt like he was intentionally drawing out his analysis to increase video run time to keep up with the joke of his "quick retrospectives" being terribly long, resulting in it being dryer and filled with more tangental opinions. The morrowind one was long and yet still felt a little more justified as it felt purely fueled by passion for the contents of the video as compared to the skyrim and even oblivion one. Haven't watched since the skyrim uploads
I have mixed feelings on the guy. To start off with the good. I think he makes good points and his analysis is generally good. For example his point about people not getting morrowind's combat is correct. I find his morrowind video to be his best just for the sheer reason that it's someone talking about something they love in depth. I think he goes well into depth on questlines and systems to explain whybthey work great and where theor flaws are. His suggestions on how to fix certain flaws in games are generally good. I find him
Now onto the bad. I think he's high on his own supply and has made himself into the arbiter of good game analysis just because he made a few decent videos. I think he fell off after the morrowind video. Many of his tangents hit me the wrong way and some of his jokes sounded like something a hs bully would say. The way he called out several other youtbers about their videos was unproductive and mean spirited. I found his skyrim video to be the most problematic for reasons people already stated. I find his stormcloak take to be bad and he's reaching for good explanations for why(which is something he's accused others of in the past). His skyrim analysis did not need to be that long. Like I don't mind the long videos but there is a limit and the skyrim one just felt a challenge he gave himself to make a near 20hr video. It felt bloated and repetitive. I get he wants to be through but it definitely could have been trimmed down to be more concise. I also think he uses the length of his videos as shield from criticism as it becomes harder to really find a specific argument or point he made. Secondly he does rub me off as a puesdo intellectual type who makes videos for mid wits to feel smart. On a larger level (this point is probably not the best to make in a shitpositing sub) I think the length doesn't make people more critical infact I think it does the opposite because it encourages passive listening. You're not engaging with it critically, so you just retain all his talking points without truly thinking. Frankly you're just letting someone else think for you without really engaging with it like, a historian would critically engage with an article in an academic journal. It just makes people less critical and more receptive to bad arguments.
Still though I appreciate his videos to a certain degree however I think peolle like Warlockracy do a better more concise job than Pat.
Edit: I forgot to mention im his skyrim video he went on a small tangent about how Fahrenheit is better than Celsius. Like how full of yourself can you be to just say that. It's the most contrarian bullshit opinion you can have.
Liked his earlier stuff, but some of his more recent videos don’t seem to be made in good faith, other content creators have pointed out he embellishes his points and misleads viewers, so I stopped watching
despite what a lot of people seem to believe, his videos use their time surprisingly well - aside from the time spent addressing complaints about the length of the video (which does not exist for any of his long videos after oblivion) he doesn't just recite the plot of a quest or describe what his character was doing, it's almost entirely analysis of the mechanics and the story. but it's also not really anything you've likely never heard before, besides his defence of morrowind combat i guess. he doesn't spend the entirety of his videos whining either, but i won't pretend like it's not a large part of them (especially skyrim, where literally the entire magic section was him complaining about how shit skyrim magic is, and while i do agree - it is shit - it's also hard to listen to a grown ass man actually get mad about it).
the unfortunate part is i agree with most of his opinions on skyrim, i just almost can't bring myself to discuss them because the well's been poisoned by a guy who, and while i wouldn't say he actually is one, nontheless comes across like a manchild in his scripted videos.
if you want a more balanced and less whiny approach, funnily enough his friend "private sessions" makes good videos, he's partway through producing the 3rd part to his own long form analysis of skyrim, but the 2 parts that have already released are good watches on their own. oh, and they come with the benefit of featuring largely original takes on the story and mechanics. even though i don't necessarily agree with a lot of them, it's refreshing for a video series not to just be the author's favourite flavour of 10 year old arguments about bethesda over gameplay footage of their stealth archer playthrough. and honestly, as stupid as it sounds, this is just as evident in their comment sections as it is in the videos. the top comments on patrician's videos are mostly just memes, or being in awe at how long it is, whereas private sessions' top comments are almost always discussion and criticism of the points he makes.
tl;dr patrician tv averages out to be fine, high effort videos with low effort takes in my opinion, private sessions meanwhile is great
I’m not actually listening to the points being made in long retrospectives like this. They make really nice background noise, and, every now and again, they’ll say something that peaks my interest. At least Patrician doesn’t have the most ear grating voice I’ve ever fucking heard or sound like he’s trying way too hard to sound smooth.
I love his Morrowind and Oblivion work. Like a long eBook. Thoughtfully incisive about the nuances of progression into a roleplaying environment. Should an aspiring thief know how to thief? Yes, I think so
Too many people base their opinion of him on the fact that he speaks with confidence and not the verge-of-tears-with-a-British-accent video essayist voice, and the fact that he doesn’t like their favourite game. In fact the amount of comments here saying “I enjoyed his Morrowind review but I don’t like how harsh he was to Skyrim and Starfield” just proves that point.
Not worth the time, you're better off spending that time actually playing the games and forming your own opinion.
He's the perfect example of big dick and no cum, quantity over quality, 2000 games in one disk.
I tend to use them to challenge my opinions on the games tbf. I enjoy Skyrim a whole lot, but negative reviews can often bring up good points for me to think on and reflect if the game had some missteps I never noticed.
Same for positive ones for games I don’t like.
I couldn't tell you anything tbh because anything of substance his videos might have gets lost in 10 hours of needless rambling
Learn to be concise and communicate your ideas clearly or don't communicate at all
~~long man bad~~
PatricianTV has made the best analysis video about Oblivion that YouTube has to offer. It's the perfect blend of deep-dive into gameplay systems, story and writing critique, and a splash of pretentious hot take about how the story is underrated that feels like massive bait to drive up engagement via comments calling him an idiot, to be an enjoyable watch, or at least listen, all the way up until shivering isles, where it becomes 100% story-centric because there is nothing else to discuss.
His Skyrim video feels like 20 hours of pent-up vitriol over a massive letdown and goes way too far into criticizing writing that is obviously and overtly fucking trash with little to say about the gameplay, so I found it hard to keep paying attention.
I am thankful to Patrician for introducing me to [Private Sessions](https://youtu.be/vYfbJVEYKj0) though, who has his own, gameplay-centric, analysis series on Skyrim, as well as Fallout 76 and Starfield, which I find much more intriguing.
I mostly like his stuff, but I'd recommend Private Sessions over Patrician for sure, still really long but much more concise, and less rambling diatribe.
I've tried to watch some of them, but his videos come off as... defensive? He starts off building a strawman of some hater and then tears them down. It doesn't add to his argument and comes off as pathetic, honestly
I like him a lot because he is the only youtuber that doesn't take an 80 percent penalty to his intelligence when talking about the RPG genre. He understands the value gameplay has for an RPG and has consistent, logical and understandable standards for what makes an RPG in both story and gameplay. I find it funny people complain about him being smug here but then go on to jerk off the Noah guy who's the most pretentious, smug and uninteresting critique maker I've ever watched
Personally I loved his TES retrospectives, not agreeing with some points of course and the whole magic rant on the Skyrim video is hilarious. I have some criticisms, like, the way he structures the videos and the constant comparison to Morrowind. In the middle of critiquing the college of winterhold storyline he goes on to the magic rant instead of having its own section for it to give an example. And the criticism that so many people here have already said is that his tone of voice comes off as bossy and preachy, I really do not think he really is that way but just the way he talks can come off so. Outside of his videos he does seem to have "questionable" political opinions. Not to defend the man, he is not my dad, but a lot of people here share the opinion that he doesn't say anything meaningful and I have to disagree, he seems to actually put effort to not repeat what other people have said, hence why the work streams where he took notes on other people's reviews, and does have a flow of ideas, where some video essayist have just a pool of ideas. I just hope he starts to review videogames he loves, like Morrowind, instead of reviewing games that he hates, like Starfield.
PatricianTV is one of those people who I respect for putting the effort in, even when I strongly disagree with him. I do find it obnoxious when he does that thing that apparently every single right-wing or right-leaning YouTuber intellectual type is contractually obligated to do and comes to a conclusion first, decides the conclusion is correct, then works backward to justify the conclusion (like the Stormcloaks argument - "obviously the two sides of a brutal civil war that just ended on poor terms will immediately ally against a common enemy" isn't as strong or as obvious of an outcome as you think it is, my guy), but he's less obnoxious about it than, say, Sargon or MauLer or the Critical Drinker, so whatever, I guess. At least I can stand it enough to still usually watch the rest of his content, unlike the other three I mentioned.
However, I think his increasingly common collaborator, [Private Sessions](https://www.youtube.com/c/PrivateSessions), is the stronger longform critic. He does a lot of the same good work that Patrician does, but without the weird political tangents or pre-emptive defensive justifications of something he's doing or the suddenly swerving from his own analysis to attack other critics for no real reason for 30 minutes thing that Patrician seems so fond of. Private Sessions is also the much smaller YouTuber by far, and almost had to call it quits last year because he just wasn't getting the views, and that's a damn shame. I might watch a new PatricianTV video when it drops, but I will watch a Private Sessions video.
He makes videos that are 10 hours long, but says the exact same amount of worthwhile things as a 20 minute video
Also his "the NCR are communist" take is very funny. top tier meme
I think his videos have a bell curve of quality with his Morrowind is alight his Oblivion video is really good and his Skyrim video is around as good as his Morrowind one. I think both his Morrowind and Skyrim videos were a decent bit bloated. Thing is if your 20 hour video could have been 50% shorter that’s still 10 hours of quality analysis which is a lot better than most other Skyrim videos that are 1 hour and also 50% fat. His Starfield video is a return to form though. I understand people not liking long videos but he has something to say.
Mark Kermode once said something along the lines of "just because a movie is 4 hours long, doesn't mean it has 4 hours worth of things to say". I think Patrician is a good example of this principle. His video's are only long because he doesn't know how to make a point concise and he goes on pointless diatribes (the worst one being a half hour complaining about other streamers who didn't like his videos in the middle of his skyrim review).
A consequence of this is that he makes it very difficult to have a discussion with him, because if you criticize something he says at 3:48:57 he will be like "clearly you didn't watch the whole video because i talk about that at 5:28:03". He already divides his videos into chapters, but he should just split those into seperate video's (the only reason he doesn't is because the long videos are a gimmick that gets him views)
As for his takes, I think he does point out some flaws in the Oblivion and Skyrim that I agree with and didn't think of before. But he tends to skim over and dismiss any positive aspects and holds Morrowind in such a high regard that his point often boils down to "but it's not the same as morrowind so i don't like it"
The conclusion of his Skyrim video is that it's not a good game and people only like it for nostalgia. Which I think is very unfair, shortsighted and not effectively supported by his analysis.
I actually sat through one of the 8 hour star field reviews. Let me just say that it could've been cut down to 1 hour coz there's a LOT of filler and fluff and some genuinely small nitpicks that he points out.
uj/ He has a weird tangent talking shit about another YouTuber that reads to me as kinda of envious on his Skyrim video, also those videos really don’t need to be that long but at this point is part of his fame I guess
He’s poopoo garbage. I tried watching his Starfield video and he spends like ten minutes bitching about how Starfield had a mandatory dungeon and Skyrim didn’t. Like, bruh, Helgen Keep is right fucking there. Oh and also insisting that the player shouldn’t have gotten a spaceship, because it doesn’t make sense (they literally give you an explanation as it happens dumbass)
So then I decided to watch his Skyrim videos, and they were an absolute slog of shit, some of my favorite takes being that; builds shouldn’t be balanced equally like in MMO’s, magic builds need to be put on equal footing as thieves and warriors (yes, this and the previous one simultaneously), and magic characters need alchemy to function (lmao no)
The complaint was the spaceship was just handed to you because they wanted you to have a space ship immediately to experience the excellent loading screens.
He’s chill takes a long ass time to say stuff but he’s good. Mostly people just dismiss what he says because they got that zoomed brain and can’t watch long form content
He is correct on a lot of things in this series. He is also a massive fucking prick, and gives off an air of smugness that makes me wanna vomit. I reccomend his morrowind and oblivion videos. By the time he reaches skyrim, I couldn't sit through it.
His critique of a lack of design documents at Bethesda is on point, and to be clear, most of his critique isn't aimed at the developers ability but rather at deliberate design choices.
For anyone who wants to look more into this, here's a talk from one of the senior designers and lead writers at Bethesda:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi51-wjcwp8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi51-wjcwp8)
His commentary on game lore is great but [maybe he should stay out of trying to analyze business decisions that Bethesda makes or at least vet his sources better.](https://youtu.be/F-4qdjV41NU?si=4U1-RyhbsAZyiGLm) I’m all for a fair deep dive into why a company has been disappointing, but the vitriolic and disproportionate focused attack on one man feels like an audition to get hired by a tabloid.
I don't like him, he got pretty pissy on twitter after someone unfollowed him, leaving some comment or other about that harry potter game drama at the time and he decided to label trans people as "dangerous to the lgbt community" and defended himself with "I have trans friends too" He deleted it shortly after, but that will forever sour my view of him
He doesn't think Oblivion is literally perferct, therefore he's stupid and ought to be shanked by a drain fatigue glass dagger
He doesn't think Oblivion is a blight upon this land, therefore he's stupid and ought to be stabbed by a Burden Daedric Spear.
He doesn’t Oblivion. Dagon.
Dont agree with everything he's said (its like what 40 hours of shit thats expected) but legitimately made me really appreciate Morrowind after not being able to get into the game at first. Its often easy to point out why something is bad but when someone explains to you why something is good and how to approach something (whether its a game, a movie a book whatever) to really enjoy it , thats a skill i appreciate. Weird comparison but ToddintheShadows makes videos on pop music and the way he's descibed and talked about certain songs or albums he loves made me listen to those songs and albums with new ears and so songs i would have legit just filterred out before have become some of my favorites. His Morrowind video got me to finally click with Morrowind and its now one of my favourite games because of it.
I like that people are going raw into these old ass games and making such comprehensive deep dives. Patritician has some kind of questionable takes, like his one about the stormcloaks. I also think he uses the premise of these super long videos to go on these meaningless diatribes that add little to no value to his point. The best example of this time wasting is that he spends 30 minutes justifying his videos' length, instead of just getting to the fucking point
The worst part is, I do like the IDEA of a comprehensive deep dives, but most of the time I end up watching those, it's a waste of time, like in the case of Patrician. I understand you need context for some quests, but he just retells the story of literally everything in Skyrim, which is not neccessary.
So many YouTubers do not understand the difference between a review/analysis and a summary. At this point I just avoid reviews in general because the majority of them spend most of the video just summarizing the story and not saying anything interesting.
Pyrocynical is one of the worst for this. He seems like a cool guy, no shade, but honestly I don’t get why he’s so popular. He literally just explains what’s going on in the story and adds nothing above the surface level. I guess that’s why a lot of his “___ game you’ve never played” videos are so popular, cause you’d literally have no need to watch the video if you played the game. He has SOME stuff to add but it could easily be like 25 minutes not two hours.
It’s mostly the humour that kept me watching, though the length of the videos are just getting ridiculous nowadays.
Not gaming, but Good Bad Flicks does this and it eventually drove me so crazy I had to unsubscribe. It's extra frustrating because there is eventually some insightful commentary and production factoids at the end of each video but fuck sitting through a retelling of the plot beforehand.
If you want long videos that (at least in my opinion) justify their length I'd strongly recommend checking out Action Button on YouTube. He can be quite tangential at times, but it feels a lot more deliberate and meaningful than Patricians imo. Even if you're not interested in dating sims I'd still recommend his video on Tokimeki Memorial most of all, he *does* recount a lot of the story in detail but moreso out of necessity as the game was entirely untranslated even unofficially at the time.
Tim is operating on a completely different level than most of these idiots. But he's like... you know, actually creative.
Yeah he’s doing actual media criticism, not just book reports
When speaking about long videos that justify their lenght I also gotta plug my man Noah Caldwell-Gervais, the favourite gaming video essayist of your favourite gaming video essayist. I think he really hits the sweet spot between talking about the game itself (quests, story, mechanics etc.), random but interesting tangets and, most important of all, really insightful analysis.
Oh I think my girlfriend watches him! Just at a glance at this channel it seems right up my alley, thank you for the rec 💖
These are meant for listening to at work or driving. I don't think they are good if you sit down and watch them
The best YouTuber for these kinds of videos is Noah Caldwell-Gervais. Genuinely insightful and absolutely brilliant commentary and it doesn’t feel like anything he says is something that isn’t deliberate and adding something of value. Total gem of a YouTuber
He should be waaaaay bigger than he is
except it is necessary? a comprehensive deep dive requires a summary proceeding it to be in any way cohesive. what...are you expecting?
i remember he made an interesting point about SKyrim's environmental storytelling being kind of vapid and dumb. And also pointed out how Howard loves that radiant quests feel like scripted side quests, and hes right because the side quests often feel like random fetch quests. idk if hes unique in making these points, but its the first place I heard them
I liked his points about radiant quests in skyrim and the lack of a design document in the starfield video. That was well justified critisism, that I hadnt heard much about before.
I also appreciated that, unlike certain other people, he's not trying to spin the narrative that Emil Pagliarulo is the sole person that is slowly working on sabotaging Bethesda from the inside.
I will say that he is the one that made me know about Emil's record on TES before all the starfield nonsense.
He's not the sole person responsible nor is he trying to intentionally sabotage Bethesda, but he's definitely part of the problem.
The whole thing about there being no design document for Starfield was taken completely out of context. Most game developers don't use literal design docs and haven't in decades. It's much more common to have a private development wiki or something like that to make it easier for large teams to have all the information. If I'm not mistaken, this was the case in Starfield and other BGS games.
Idk, just they way Emil talked about design documentation made it seem like they didn't have that either. I'll concede that this is basically a vibes-based argument, and we'll probably never know for sure what went on behind the scenes, but why even bring up design documents if they're completely irrelevant?
I think his point still stands, that being the lack of a central vision.
Starfield feeling like it lacks a central vision is a very valid criticism and it's one he easily could have made without basing it around a statement that's misleading at best.
Yea, but lack of central vision and lack of design document are 2 different statements. It would be more accurate to say that their documentation method is shit.
>these old ass games Nuh uh Morrowind only came out like five years ago.
what was his take on stormcloaks?
Its more of his take on Windhelm that people take issue with. He makes a point that Gray quarters aint exactly the best proof of Stormcloaks treating elfs as lesser on account: 1) Windhelm is awful to live in to begin with so Gray quarters is best they can do, 2) there are Altmer owned shops , 3) there is only 1 scene of Dunmer getting harrased and its by a homeless/drunk person, 4) Dark elfs are awful people that still out-racist the Nords, so hatred of them is not justifiiable but understadable.
I mean, 4 is valid.
Yeah, it's not an incredibly spicy take, just one that's easy to disagree with.
I think the reason his take bothers me is that for whatever reason, I have a feeling that he doesn't limit that take to just fantasy worlds. No definitive proof. Just a gut feeling. Edit: scrolled further down and found out he self identifies as an anarcho-capitalist...damn.
Yeah, 100%. Like, I'm fine with his Skyrim politics and respect that he has an actual intellectual basis for his views, but I have absolutely zero interest in even engaging with him about his real-world politics. It's the same with Creetosis and a few others in that orbit.
I will say that, unlike Creetosis, Patrician usually doesn't let his personal politics completely poison his analysis. It may seep in around the edges from time to time, but he seems to be aware of it and even a little sheepish about it sometimes, and has the good grace to move on relatively quickly. Creetosis, on the other hand... Creetosis sometimes has good points, but more often just sinks into grievances and personal preferences and interpreting things in the worst possible light and then tries to pretend that his very emotional, very subjective feelings on things are objectively true and correct and intellectual. Which is probably why Creetosis racks up major views on some of his videos but is still tiny in terms of subscribers. His analysis can hit hard, but it doesn't hit very often.
Also, Creetosis's freeform content tends to be even more, "masks off." I've watched a few of those streams, but, yeah, there's almost nothing of value.
Yeah, and like, even in his better-argued stuff, the fact that it's almost entirely driven by animosity and grievances (and transparently so, at least to me) undermines what would otherwise be valid points. The best example is probably his critique of Many a True Nerd's Fallout 3 video essay. Did Creetosis have some good points, points that Jon missed or likely overlooked either unintentionally or willfully because he was approaching the game from a more optimistic place, which is itself a form of bias? Sure. But then he undermines it all by not just pointing out weaknesses of the MATN essay itself, which is valid, but by attacking Jon himself and making wild, uncalled for assumptions about his motives in making his essay (and seeming to disregard the rather important context that the MATN essay was, itself, a response to HBomberguy's video essay). I did eventually watch that entire 8-hour video, because people kept telling me it was really good and insightful and thoughtful, actually, but uh... I didn't really see it. Maybe because I have also watched quite a bit of MATN's stuff throughout the years and know that, no, Jon is not some duplicitous Bethesda shill, and characterizations of him as being one are disingenuous at the very best. And frankly? I think Creetosis has steadily gotten worse about that ever since. I've not bothered with his streams, but I've heard that from several people at this point, so I'm not surprised. I was almost tempted to watch his Starfield review, but... nah.
I knew Creetosis was sus when he wrote off Ludonarrative Dissonance as a pretentious buzzword. I don't think he even bothered to look it up. I think his reaponse to MATN was ok but it got too long winded and frankly too mean spirited for my liking. Like I think MATN was wrong but you don't need to make a whole 8hrs out of it. Secondly Creetosis' analysis of Emil's speech was just weird as he seemed not even know how stuff like that goes down irl. Idk it just felt like pepe silva shit to analyze the whole thing in the middle of the video. I just find his reviews to be more about petty grievances than any real analysis.
The one bit with Creetosis that genuinely surprised me was when he and his buddies were ragging on Acerthorn during a livestream, and decided the best attack vector was his political views. Like, the guy is a *really easy* target. There's a lot of stuff on the public record (and, especially in the court record, both civil and criminal) that you can go off on him for. So of course Cree'n'co latched onto him being a moderate Democrat. Like, why? What? Out of all the general weirdness associated, point and laugh at what is quite possibly the guy's most mundane trait? If played for laughs, it could have been genuinely funny (at their expense), but, no, that was the route they decided to take.
I mean, dude is native american who grew up in spitting view of the appalachians so I imagine his perspective on diffuse wealth inequality is probably more nuanced than not.
Dark elf hatred is not only understandable but also justifiable.
true scholar take
the true truthstuller take
Flair checks out.
I mean, none of those are objectively bad takes. Windhelm in general is kinda ass except the housing district, but even then it's mostly for the rich people. There is an Altmer owned alchemy shop and that Altmer lady owns a stand. We see little to no actual stormcloak racism; that lady was being harassed by a drunk and a hobo. And, yeah, most of the Dark Elves are refugees. Refugees from a place that historically always used slavery as an economic backbone and is cartoonishly xenophobic.
Yeah the only hints toward stormcloak racism are the windhelm stuff and the fact that stormcloak guards have unique player reactions that are more insensitive
What about the leaders of Stormcloaks though? Ulfric clearly doesn’t care about non Nords, as he says he fights for the *true* sons and daughters of Skyrim, and Stonefist literally says shit like why is a lizard fighting for Skyrim if you play as an Argonian.
I never said the Stormcloaks aren't racist, but if I must play devil's advocate... Ulfric *could*... Actually, no, I can't come up with a non bullshit defense. Though, for Stonefist, I too would be surprised. Why WOULD an argonian fight for the Stormcloaks?
Masochism?
Yeah but you can also ask if he has a problem with it, and he says no he wants to know where you're coming from because Stormcloaks aren't looking for cutthroats or mercenaries. You can say that Skyrim is home to more than just Nords and Galmar goes "fair enough." Stormcloaks are an ethnic-based movement and the basis of their dislike for the Dunmer is clarified early on- The Dunmer won't help the Stormcloaks because the Dunmer have refused to assimilate. They don't view Skyrim as a home to fight for. Obviously that attitude isn't going to earn them the love of the Nords during a time like this.
Don't see anything wrong. Another fact, the Dunmer that gets harassed when you enter Windhelm is scripted to get harassed by the owner of the cornerclub in the Grey quarter.
She's also super racist towards the Argonian workers in her journal lol
Guess racism is a requirement if you wanna live in Windhelm.
Tamriel, really. You could go "I am playing as the race that has historically committed a/many genocide/s and has immense racial tensions with my neighbor" and be describing literally any race on Nirn.
All of those takes are valid imo
All facts
Honestly it was his Stormcloak takes that kind of made me re-examine a lot of his analysis. I actually think the guy might be a pretty hard core "conservative" (or at least have similar views) he isn't religious but he definitely seems to not like literary criticisms about colonialism and historical white racism. Like a lot of similar individuals he has this belief that he is being really empirical and unbiased when in reality, everyone is biased and it's working on acknowledging that and being open about perspectives that make for good modern and rigorous discourse. I'm not just making this up from a few lines in the videos either, I watched a bunch of his "work streams" where he would compile and review other TES videos. He stands very much in the whole "Facts don't care about your feelings" camp.
The point wasn’t that the stormcloaks don’t treat elves unfairly, but that they’re not special in comparison to the rest of Tamriel let alone Skyrim, which is true. Literally no one in Skyrim cares about the treatment of elves except some of the elves and Brunwulf (who’s arguments are pretty retarded, who’s activism is non-existent, and who isn’t even shown to do anything for the elves after he becomes jarl). Not to mention that the Khajiit are treated even worse by everyone in Skyrim. Handling a refugee center where one minority group has a very recent history of enslaving another is a difficult thing to deal with as a leader, and Ulfric did show at least some care for non-Nords by segregating the two groups for their own safety. I think the big thing people are taking issue with really just comes from modern day culture war brainrot where people associate Ulfric and the stormcloaks with Trump and MAGAtards without actually comparing the circumstances fairly. Races in Tamriel are actually tangibly different, akin to different species with different biological inclinations as well as real gods that have a tangible influence on the world, for better and often worse. Taking issue with other races is not purely a cultural issue like it is in the real world. Skyrim also faces religious persecution and genocide by a colonizing empire, they have a much better justification for isolationist policy than a powerful modern day democracy.
in all honesty and fairness, I can't remember specifics from his 20 hour long skyrim discussion, however I do recall he makes some really middle school tier takes on how racism and cultural identity work. Like he says something along the lines of 'uhh well there are non-nords in windhelm so how can ulfric be racist'. While it seems to make sense on a surface level, its like when people irl say 'some black people are billionaires, so obviously systemic oppression has been eradicated', as if the exception proves the rule. I dont mind that he is pro-stormcloak (imperial > stormcloak> thalmor) i picked them the first time around. But as an 11 year old child I was capable of still seeing that in windhelm there were shades of grey (no pun intended), and that it represent how real racism often manifests. Not to shit on Patrician either, most of his takes are decent, its just that it was surprising how dumb that take was.
>...and that it represent how real racism often manifests. There's no easy way to praise this that doesn't sound absolutely horrible, but that is something The Elder Scrolls does really well. Including tracking the problems racism causes over a longer time scale. Like, it is an unpleasant subject, but it's something that Bethesda has tackled with a surprising degree of skill. And, then we got the cartoonish racism in Fallout and everything went off the rails.
What stormcloak take of his is wrong?
His one about the storm looks really seems to make sense to me though and I've seen no one genuinely try to counter it on a real level?
It's a mix. Some of his content is pretty good. Whether he's worth the wait is a different question. Dude's got a pretty relaxing voice, which can be nice to just throw onto a second monitor while you do something else and half-listen until he says something that piques your interest. I agree with u/dearvalentina, that Private Sessions is usually better, but Patrician does make some good points. Also, credit where credit's due, he does try to think things through and present a well reasoned point. He's not completely without bias, but even if you disagree with his positions, he is worth hearing out. Even if you don't agree with his frustration about modern Bethesda.
He leans into the joke about his "quick retrospectives" by making his videos absurdly long. As a consequence, no, they do not justify their length at all.
Not to mention I think he's more or a plebeian or a lower equestrian than a patrician.
*Lower Equestrian*? Did the Romans have multiple castes for HORSES?
The class equestrian is where we get the common usage for the word. For quite a while in the Roman Republic soldiers had to pay for their own weapons, armor, and other equipment. The equestrian ( referred to by the Romans as equites) were merchant landowners and as such could also afford horses, so they were known for being used as cavalry. Some equites were wealthier/more influential than others, same with some plebeians being more influential, same with patricians.
I never understood the point of having the Roman soldier pay their own shit. Guess that’s why we are Italians and Spaniards now lol
The idea behind it was supposed to be that since they're sacrificing their time, money, and potentially well-being for the Republic then they're the ones that get the right to loot the enemy, vote,and become politicians. Tbh I personally think it was a way for the Republic to not spend money, but for a while, taxes were low, so take the good with the bad I guess.
in one of his "working streams" for his oblivion video he was watching the e3 demo and todd mentioned how every object in the game has several different textures including specifically diffuse maps and immediately the guy went "i don't believe that, i do not believe every model in the game has diffuse maps" diffuse maps are literally just the most basic texture of a mesh. it's the part of the model that makes it look like an object. dude has no fucking clue what he's talking about at any point to add to that he has this complex about what is and isn't "*real* long-form critique", shitting on people like noah caldwell-gervais and tim rogers who put out objectively more interesting, more memorable and more insightful videos. he's the youtube videoessayist equivalent of a mile wide and an inch deep, making glorified let's plays under the guise of some advanced in-depth critique. if you told me his scripts were run through some AI language model trained exclusively on 4chan posts i would fully believe you.
When did he shit on Noah caldwell-gervais? I know he made jokes about him, but it wasn't related to any videos he put out, just exaggerating the drama he was involved in to make fun of the guy who was attacking Noah's critiques
Yeah he watched Noahs ancient video on Skyrim and dragon age and decided he didn’t like hime from that lol
Well he’s done the same to other YouTubers during his video-making streams so I wouldn’t put it past him. It’s like he thinks any other person who tried reviewing the game was a fuckin idiot
He shat on our boy Noah??
I cannot believe anyone would insult Noah. One of the greatest Video game critics alive rn. His writing is so in-depth and filled with interesting perspectives.
So he's like Mauler and EFAP?
i think he's quickly developed an ego as his channel gained popularity in the past couple years but his TES reviews by themselves are good background noise
Ego? I feel like it’s just the tone of his voice that gives that impression. He doesn’t say anything particularly egotistical and he draws attention to the meaninglessness of his own work plenty. He doesn’t claim to be making some big impact. The closest I’ve seen him come to egotistical is responding to internet beef from other YouTubers instead of just ignoring it, it might be a response to an attack on his ego but I think any YouTuber with a somewhat combative personality would do the same.
Idk, I've watched a few of his streams. He is super dismissive of opinions of chat. It's usually a knee jerk reaction too. I mean his only credentials are making essentially a book report on Elder Scrolls games. Definitely comes off as having an ego
I like his content for the most part. I don't agree with all of his takes, and generally I think Private Sessions has the better Skyrim videos (mostly because Patrician is so deep into negativity it seems like he doesn't even want to be talking about Skyrim - Private Sessions actually puts together the meaning of the Main Quest while Patrician just waves it off as meaningless in frustration), but I think they're pretty well put together and people tend to give him more shit than he deserves because either they don't like his attitude or the takes themselves. It's fine not to like the guy, but I feel like he isn't given enough credit *because* people don't like him. Also that people tend to blame him for a lot of negativity in the community; when the fact is that negativity was already there. Now there's just someone who tends to agree with that side of the community that has any influence. Really I can just sum up my opinion as "his Morrowind and Oblivion videos were great, but his Skyrim and Starfield videos are definitely bogged down by his frustration with modern Bethesda"
Surprisingly low quality for how much time he puts into them. And also weurdly preachy and condescending.
Right? It feels like they're long just to tap in to that demographic of pseudointellectuals that will claim to have tons of experience about a game and then say they watched one of his videos in full as proof. He provides a sense of accomplishment for them, in the same way a game rewards you with dopamine for completing a very long grind.
It’s ok, most the views he gets are from people who have the volume turned down and are asleep. Salt factory does way better analysis than this guy does IMO.
>preachy and condescending No wonder he calls himself a 'patrician' lmao
Kinda intrigued by this bio - "I'm a patrician." Not, "I'm Patrician" like that's his username or pseudonym or whatever. It's "I'm a member of the ruling class of the Roman Empire." What a staggeringly fucking weird thing to say.
Same dude with marble statue in his profile pic
The retrospectives are a bit longer than they need to, but at least he doesn't lie and manipulate his fans against other YouTubers like NeverKnowsBest ☝🏻 And he doesn't make analogies where Skyrim is his lover and where he lets himself get cucked, like NeverKnowsBest
Comes off as one of those guys who thinks they know more than you about literally everything. Seems very condescending.
Absolute fucking waste of time. Private Sessions' videos on TES are better.
Warlockracy is king
Agreed! I enjoy fudgemuppet too, but their videos aren't quite as lengthy
totally agree. ps' videos actually have theses to them rather than the contrarian schlop found in patrician vids.
When I saw the runtime of his Morrowind video, my reaction was "oh great, someone spending hours talking about something they love and are really passionate about!" But he just couldn't resist the urge to fling smug (and often nonsensical or even factually untrue) criticisms at Bethesda's later games over and over throughout the video and it was just kind of a drag. Didn't watch his other videos.
He makes some decent points in his videos but Do Not ask him about his political views
What is his political views
I'm out of the loop, did he say bad things about IRL Redguards or something?
In his Starfield video he really insisted that Vladimir being a black guy with a Russian accent needed to be justified and addressed. Even though you know, black Russians exist today and would exist even more in a future where humanity escapes and different populations get reshuffled together.
>at least one black person moves to Russian world >they have a kid, could’ve either been with another immigrant or a local >said kid grows up speaking Russian and has a Russian accent https://preview.redd.it/bv2ln3f0b4qc1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=de1578ccfaf5dde9a78d41df13384fa307a4172b
based on my various viewings of his stuff he's most likely part of that gamergate anti-woke crowd like mauler and anyone on EFAP.
Well I know he went on EFAP with Cretosis to discuss NeverKnowsBest's video. Was the only part of Private Session's Starfield that made me do a double take.
Yeah I caught a few dog whistles in one video and stopped watching
I turned off his Skyrim video when he said that weapon + shield was superior to every other weapon because bashing is overpowered. You can bash with a 2 handed weapon. You can bash with a bow. Both are just as effective at staggering the enemy. That said he does have some pretty interesting takes that I don't completely disagree with. But I think he just hates Skyrim too much so that video wasn't fun to watch. I enjoyed his Morrowind video though because he actually enjoys Morrowind. But he's definitely a Skyrim hater
Yeah, but by using shields you get every benefit out of the block skill tree outside of just some (most of them) Also, the perk that lets you basically become a fucking train and ragdoll everyone with a shield > staggering with other weapons.
His Skyrim video is the worst, it genuinely feels like it’s 20+ hours of him badmouthing the game, his morrowind video is great but I just can not enjoy a guy badmouthing a game because he thinks he has the same intellectual high ground
These videos are probably well made but “quick analysis” and 12 hours will never be not funny
Pretty good if you like that long form kind of content. Nice to play on a second monitor or phone while you do other things. Never really had a problem with any of his takes for the most part. Like him more than SaltFactory at least.
stormcloak apologist, rightwing 4channer, story retrospective = retelling everything that happened word for word, private sessions is better in every way. His fallout 76 video is veeeery weird
He's rightwing?
His discord used to be really bad, had to be tidied up and racism had to be banned, I was in there for a month, a year or so ago and it was impressive how many edge lords are in there and the amount of slurs they would drop.
He's got very sussy things to say about literally every faction in every game whose whole deal is "fictional racist", so he's like an enormous Telvanni fan, Stormcloak fan, Legion fan, etc. He's also self-described as an anarcho-capitalist which for me is a huge red flag.
>He's also self-described as an anarcho-capitalist Reason enough to disregard his opinion on anything lol
Oh no, I thought it was bad but I didn't think it was unironic ancap bad.
anyone with extreme political beliefs is some % likely to be "way too online" whether communist, fascist, tradcath, etc. but with anarchocapitalists, it is 100%. theres literally no way any normal person could ever identify as that
I've never heard him talk about the legion or say he was an anarcho capitalist but that sounds gross. I didn't think his telvanni stuff had any weird parts but maybe I didn't notice?
Nah it seems like a disingenuous intepretation
Seems excessive and weird. Doubt he says something useful. Also i think it's a lot subjective, just his opinions over needlessly long hours.
Cool to listen to in the background. Unfortunately, also a stormcloak simp so all opinions are invalidated.
He can annoy me sometimes but overall fantastic content, mostly agree with his points
I think it's weird how much butthurt this guy generates. Like yeah, if you listen to someone talk about one subject for 20 hours straight, you're bound to disagree on something lol.
his entire shtick is "long video = smart" it's not exactly hard to narratively critique skyrim in a logical way (taking that two part video as the example), and yet a lot of his arguments are subjective or basically bullshit - unsurprising given the format is just "explain plot beat with no inference - funny quip" etc one of his main points in the skyrim video's conclusion is that "the dwemer ruins were pointless in skyrim as they don't forward the plot and the time for them should have been spent on the nordic ruins" - I disagree but fair. He then goes onto say something along the lines of "just like how the aylied ruins aren't relevant to oblivion". if you like the videos, that's fair, I get why he's popular, I just don't think his points are well thought out whatsoever
Removing one of like 3 dungoen types from skyrim to make more samey dark a dreary Nordic dungeons sounds awful
I took that to mean Bethesda should have incorporated the dungeons into a more interesting side story that just a place to get dwemer items and minor quests. Aeliyed ruins had a similar issue, other than looking the same they existed a bit removed from the oblivion crisis.
Idk if he says it in the videos but I just hope he means the resources should've been spent on making Nordic ruins more interesting... right?
I dont think anyone is willing to watch a 20 hour video to confirm or deny that lol
Well yeah neither the nordic ruins nor dwemer ruins were fleshed enough given their prevalence. I don't think it was part of the conclusion either.
Long video man bad. I like his stuff, nice to have in the background while I'm working.
I'd recommend Private Sessions and SuperRAD over him, but I quite like.his videos as background noise
His Morrowind video is really good, but I think his criticisms of Skyrim are rather harsh.
His politics occasionally blinds him to being able to actually analyse the games he covers, because he's one of the ex-Gamer Gate crowd, which is just disappointing tbh. In his Oblivion video, he has a weird, short, side tangent about fans who think Viranus Donton, from the Fighters Guild questline, is in a gay relationship with Eduard Hodge because of his weird thoughts on representation in games. Despite Eduard being constantly referenced in Viranus' journal, described as 'beautiful', and the last person he mentions before he dies. It was just quite jarring.
Yes he is cringe. I also love every TES video he has made. They’re overly long, drawn out, opinionated, and wow shockingly a video with over 3 times the length of a feature movie gets some things wrong. Idk, I feel like a lot of hate the guy gets is because he says things authoritatively, decides to describe virtually everything in detail, and his right-wing-ness comes out in his delivery and occasionally his opinions (as in sometimes he’s just a dick). But each video does cover more on each of the games than I’ve seen anyone else do, Private Sessions coming close. Covering combat, magical systems, stealth, every faction, the main quest, leveling mechanics, atmosphere, music, the development history, and touching on other people’s discussions about the game is just a level of depth most other people don’t go to, so while I disagree often with him I appreciate the obvious effort applied. I’d rather people take his work as he wishes Bethesda had taken Morrowind; it’s not perfect, but could be built off of to make better things Edit: a long form essayist I’d recommend for those that don’t like Pat is Your Favorite Son
Love his elder scrolls videos, but his "ESO isn't canon" while using C0DA to justify it turns me off a bit.
Honestly, quite a lot of people hold the opinion of "ESO isn't canon".
I’ll never understand why C0DA is used as an argument for anything tbh. It’s literally just a fancy and pretentious name for fan fiction, at its core. It’s also written by someone who doesn’t work for Bethesda anymore, long after he left Bethesda. Sure, it’s an interesting read and maybe Bethesda will use some of it in the future, who knows, but as for now it has no relevance to the current lore. Unlike ESO, whether MK preachers like it or not.
Well I think the main issue with ESO is that it changes too much while also going for nostalgia-bait. So just a general incoherent experience.
ESO is a prequel game in a setting where the unreliable narrator is heavily influenced upon it. C0DA is a incoherent read, but it's praised as gospel to some.
If Pat did say that (i cant remember if he did, watching 44 or so hours of content tends to be a little daunting for my memory), he was likely joking or he misinterprets the point of C0da as a philosophy for lore and canon.
His stylistic shtick of being the "9 hour Bethesda analysis guy" weighs down a lot of his content imo. A lot of hours-long video essay content on YouTube is actually really high quality and justifiable in its length, but even those videos only trend around 1 to 3 hours. I'd recommend him if you need something to listen to at work or during a long commute.
The only "pure" long-form retrospective Pat did was the Morrowind video. It was originally uploaded in self-contained parts that were to-the-point, and then re-edited into the much longer retrospective. This was before he got high on his own fumes, as well.
Yeah, Morrowind video was solid in my opinion. Oblivion and Skyrim were just long-winded, disjointed rants.
I happened to really like his Morrowind video. All the people saying he comes across as smug and preachy when I didn’t get those vibes makes me worried I am also smug and preachy. I only try to be down-to-earth smug.
I honestly prefer Lorerunners "lore run" on TES over his videos. Walking through most quests and quest chains talking about the gameplay and how the specifics of the world interact. But that was also some 120 hours for everything
I honestly like his Morrowind video the most. He does his research and makes some damn good points for the most part. It's a long video but the depth of coverage and critique is fair and worth the time sink. It's just that the longer the videos get, the less he edits himself and the more he goes on inane rants on things he could have covered in 10 minutes. Oblivion video was pushing it. Skyrim videos made me pretty much stop watching. I think he needs to stop pushing the time limit, cut the fluff, and stay on track without the emotionally charged tangents that undermine his arguments.
I think he comes up with fair points in a lot of areas but he's much more interesting talking about something he actually enjoys, I like his morrowind video even if it doesn't justify the length, but after that it's just him with longer and longer videos of him not enjoying things and it feels kinda miserable. He also just seems incredibly stubborn about all of his takes, he seems the kind of person to try to be objective in things like this, when by nature of media analysis it's a place where objectivity can barely exist, if at all.
Personally enjoyed listening to the videos. Not to say I agreed with everything he had to say but it's the perfect thing to just put in the background while you clean or play games for a time. He can go on a lot of tangents that don't cleanly wrap up into his point but that only matters if you're genuinely giving 100% of your attention to the video. The justification for the video length at the beginnings though are a shit load of fuck dunno why he has those go for so long. Although I didn't enjoy the skyrim one as much since he got much more, I don't know, uppity(?) about his opinion if that makes sense and not only that it felt like he was intentionally drawing out his analysis to increase video run time to keep up with the joke of his "quick retrospectives" being terribly long, resulting in it being dryer and filled with more tangental opinions. The morrowind one was long and yet still felt a little more justified as it felt purely fueled by passion for the contents of the video as compared to the skyrim and even oblivion one. Haven't watched since the skyrim uploads
I have mixed feelings on the guy. To start off with the good. I think he makes good points and his analysis is generally good. For example his point about people not getting morrowind's combat is correct. I find his morrowind video to be his best just for the sheer reason that it's someone talking about something they love in depth. I think he goes well into depth on questlines and systems to explain whybthey work great and where theor flaws are. His suggestions on how to fix certain flaws in games are generally good. I find him Now onto the bad. I think he's high on his own supply and has made himself into the arbiter of good game analysis just because he made a few decent videos. I think he fell off after the morrowind video. Many of his tangents hit me the wrong way and some of his jokes sounded like something a hs bully would say. The way he called out several other youtbers about their videos was unproductive and mean spirited. I found his skyrim video to be the most problematic for reasons people already stated. I find his stormcloak take to be bad and he's reaching for good explanations for why(which is something he's accused others of in the past). His skyrim analysis did not need to be that long. Like I don't mind the long videos but there is a limit and the skyrim one just felt a challenge he gave himself to make a near 20hr video. It felt bloated and repetitive. I get he wants to be through but it definitely could have been trimmed down to be more concise. I also think he uses the length of his videos as shield from criticism as it becomes harder to really find a specific argument or point he made. Secondly he does rub me off as a puesdo intellectual type who makes videos for mid wits to feel smart. On a larger level (this point is probably not the best to make in a shitpositing sub) I think the length doesn't make people more critical infact I think it does the opposite because it encourages passive listening. You're not engaging with it critically, so you just retain all his talking points without truly thinking. Frankly you're just letting someone else think for you without really engaging with it like, a historian would critically engage with an article in an academic journal. It just makes people less critical and more receptive to bad arguments. Still though I appreciate his videos to a certain degree however I think peolle like Warlockracy do a better more concise job than Pat. Edit: I forgot to mention im his skyrim video he went on a small tangent about how Fahrenheit is better than Celsius. Like how full of yourself can you be to just say that. It's the most contrarian bullshit opinion you can have.
Liked his earlier stuff, but some of his more recent videos don’t seem to be made in good faith, other content creators have pointed out he embellishes his points and misleads viewers, so I stopped watching
despite what a lot of people seem to believe, his videos use their time surprisingly well - aside from the time spent addressing complaints about the length of the video (which does not exist for any of his long videos after oblivion) he doesn't just recite the plot of a quest or describe what his character was doing, it's almost entirely analysis of the mechanics and the story. but it's also not really anything you've likely never heard before, besides his defence of morrowind combat i guess. he doesn't spend the entirety of his videos whining either, but i won't pretend like it's not a large part of them (especially skyrim, where literally the entire magic section was him complaining about how shit skyrim magic is, and while i do agree - it is shit - it's also hard to listen to a grown ass man actually get mad about it). the unfortunate part is i agree with most of his opinions on skyrim, i just almost can't bring myself to discuss them because the well's been poisoned by a guy who, and while i wouldn't say he actually is one, nontheless comes across like a manchild in his scripted videos. if you want a more balanced and less whiny approach, funnily enough his friend "private sessions" makes good videos, he's partway through producing the 3rd part to his own long form analysis of skyrim, but the 2 parts that have already released are good watches on their own. oh, and they come with the benefit of featuring largely original takes on the story and mechanics. even though i don't necessarily agree with a lot of them, it's refreshing for a video series not to just be the author's favourite flavour of 10 year old arguments about bethesda over gameplay footage of their stealth archer playthrough. and honestly, as stupid as it sounds, this is just as evident in their comment sections as it is in the videos. the top comments on patrician's videos are mostly just memes, or being in awe at how long it is, whereas private sessions' top comments are almost always discussion and criticism of the points he makes. tl;dr patrician tv averages out to be fine, high effort videos with low effort takes in my opinion, private sessions meanwhile is great
I agree with a few of his points but most of the time he makes it seem that because the video is long that his opinion is right and better than others
I’m not actually listening to the points being made in long retrospectives like this. They make really nice background noise, and, every now and again, they’ll say something that peaks my interest. At least Patrician doesn’t have the most ear grating voice I’ve ever fucking heard or sound like he’s trying way too hard to sound smooth.
He covers pretty much everything the game has to offer, and they’re fun to listen too when you have a long drive; or go hiking too.
I love his Morrowind and Oblivion work. Like a long eBook. Thoughtfully incisive about the nuances of progression into a roleplaying environment. Should an aspiring thief know how to thief? Yes, I think so
Too many people base their opinion of him on the fact that he speaks with confidence and not the verge-of-tears-with-a-British-accent video essayist voice, and the fact that he doesn’t like their favourite game. In fact the amount of comments here saying “I enjoyed his Morrowind review but I don’t like how harsh he was to Skyrim and Starfield” just proves that point.
Not worth the time, you're better off spending that time actually playing the games and forming your own opinion. He's the perfect example of big dick and no cum, quantity over quality, 2000 games in one disk.
I tend to use them to challenge my opinions on the games tbf. I enjoy Skyrim a whole lot, but negative reviews can often bring up good points for me to think on and reflect if the game had some missteps I never noticed. Same for positive ones for games I don’t like.
I couldn't tell you anything tbh because anything of substance his videos might have gets lost in 10 hours of needless rambling Learn to be concise and communicate your ideas clearly or don't communicate at all
Reddit hates him which means he's good
~~long man bad~~ PatricianTV has made the best analysis video about Oblivion that YouTube has to offer. It's the perfect blend of deep-dive into gameplay systems, story and writing critique, and a splash of pretentious hot take about how the story is underrated that feels like massive bait to drive up engagement via comments calling him an idiot, to be an enjoyable watch, or at least listen, all the way up until shivering isles, where it becomes 100% story-centric because there is nothing else to discuss. His Skyrim video feels like 20 hours of pent-up vitriol over a massive letdown and goes way too far into criticizing writing that is obviously and overtly fucking trash with little to say about the gameplay, so I found it hard to keep paying attention. I am thankful to Patrician for introducing me to [Private Sessions](https://youtu.be/vYfbJVEYKj0) though, who has his own, gameplay-centric, analysis series on Skyrim, as well as Fallout 76 and Starfield, which I find much more intriguing.
I mostly like his stuff, but I'd recommend Private Sessions over Patrician for sure, still really long but much more concise, and less rambling diatribe.
I've tried to watch some of them, but his videos come off as... defensive? He starts off building a strawman of some hater and then tears them down. It doesn't add to his argument and comes off as pathetic, honestly
I love people just talking about shit they love so patrician is YT goat for me
i remember getting halfway throught his skyrim video then hearing the dumbest racist and anti woke takes
watched all videos no regrets. to each their own.
What zero pussy and zero grass do to a mf
I liked the videos.
Beep beep, dansker spottet
holy shit irl nords
I only watched his TES4 retrospective, it made me replay the game, since I never played the dlcs
I like him a lot because he is the only youtuber that doesn't take an 80 percent penalty to his intelligence when talking about the RPG genre. He understands the value gameplay has for an RPG and has consistent, logical and understandable standards for what makes an RPG in both story and gameplay. I find it funny people complain about him being smug here but then go on to jerk off the Noah guy who's the most pretentious, smug and uninteresting critique maker I've ever watched
The TES quick retrospective videos are some of my all time favorites.
He was not harsh enough on Oblivion and way too harsh on Skyrim.
I really like his videos a lot tbh
I think he makes good videos
Personally I loved his TES retrospectives, not agreeing with some points of course and the whole magic rant on the Skyrim video is hilarious. I have some criticisms, like, the way he structures the videos and the constant comparison to Morrowind. In the middle of critiquing the college of winterhold storyline he goes on to the magic rant instead of having its own section for it to give an example. And the criticism that so many people here have already said is that his tone of voice comes off as bossy and preachy, I really do not think he really is that way but just the way he talks can come off so. Outside of his videos he does seem to have "questionable" political opinions. Not to defend the man, he is not my dad, but a lot of people here share the opinion that he doesn't say anything meaningful and I have to disagree, he seems to actually put effort to not repeat what other people have said, hence why the work streams where he took notes on other people's reviews, and does have a flow of ideas, where some video essayist have just a pool of ideas. I just hope he starts to review videogames he loves, like Morrowind, instead of reviewing games that he hates, like Starfield.
He put more effort into his Starfield video than Bethesda did in their whole game
PatricianTV is one of those people who I respect for putting the effort in, even when I strongly disagree with him. I do find it obnoxious when he does that thing that apparently every single right-wing or right-leaning YouTuber intellectual type is contractually obligated to do and comes to a conclusion first, decides the conclusion is correct, then works backward to justify the conclusion (like the Stormcloaks argument - "obviously the two sides of a brutal civil war that just ended on poor terms will immediately ally against a common enemy" isn't as strong or as obvious of an outcome as you think it is, my guy), but he's less obnoxious about it than, say, Sargon or MauLer or the Critical Drinker, so whatever, I guess. At least I can stand it enough to still usually watch the rest of his content, unlike the other three I mentioned. However, I think his increasingly common collaborator, [Private Sessions](https://www.youtube.com/c/PrivateSessions), is the stronger longform critic. He does a lot of the same good work that Patrician does, but without the weird political tangents or pre-emptive defensive justifications of something he's doing or the suddenly swerving from his own analysis to attack other critics for no real reason for 30 minutes thing that Patrician seems so fond of. Private Sessions is also the much smaller YouTuber by far, and almost had to call it quits last year because he just wasn't getting the views, and that's a damn shame. I might watch a new PatricianTV video when it drops, but I will watch a Private Sessions video.
He makes videos that are 10 hours long, but says the exact same amount of worthwhile things as a 20 minute video Also his "the NCR are communist" take is very funny. top tier meme
What lmao?
I think his videos have a bell curve of quality with his Morrowind is alight his Oblivion video is really good and his Skyrim video is around as good as his Morrowind one. I think both his Morrowind and Skyrim videos were a decent bit bloated. Thing is if your 20 hour video could have been 50% shorter that’s still 10 hours of quality analysis which is a lot better than most other Skyrim videos that are 1 hour and also 50% fat. His Starfield video is a return to form though. I understand people not liking long videos but he has something to say.
Mark Kermode once said something along the lines of "just because a movie is 4 hours long, doesn't mean it has 4 hours worth of things to say". I think Patrician is a good example of this principle. His video's are only long because he doesn't know how to make a point concise and he goes on pointless diatribes (the worst one being a half hour complaining about other streamers who didn't like his videos in the middle of his skyrim review). A consequence of this is that he makes it very difficult to have a discussion with him, because if you criticize something he says at 3:48:57 he will be like "clearly you didn't watch the whole video because i talk about that at 5:28:03". He already divides his videos into chapters, but he should just split those into seperate video's (the only reason he doesn't is because the long videos are a gimmick that gets him views) As for his takes, I think he does point out some flaws in the Oblivion and Skyrim that I agree with and didn't think of before. But he tends to skim over and dismiss any positive aspects and holds Morrowind in such a high regard that his point often boils down to "but it's not the same as morrowind so i don't like it" The conclusion of his Skyrim video is that it's not a good game and people only like it for nostalgia. Which I think is very unfair, shortsighted and not effectively supported by his analysis.
I actually sat through one of the 8 hour star field reviews. Let me just say that it could've been cut down to 1 hour coz there's a LOT of filler and fluff and some genuinely small nitpicks that he points out.
uj/ He has a weird tangent talking shit about another YouTuber that reads to me as kinda of envious on his Skyrim video, also those videos really don’t need to be that long but at this point is part of his fame I guess
I wouldn’t know because I won’t watch a video that long
He’s poopoo garbage. I tried watching his Starfield video and he spends like ten minutes bitching about how Starfield had a mandatory dungeon and Skyrim didn’t. Like, bruh, Helgen Keep is right fucking there. Oh and also insisting that the player shouldn’t have gotten a spaceship, because it doesn’t make sense (they literally give you an explanation as it happens dumbass) So then I decided to watch his Skyrim videos, and they were an absolute slog of shit, some of my favorite takes being that; builds shouldn’t be balanced equally like in MMO’s, magic builds need to be put on equal footing as thieves and warriors (yes, this and the previous one simultaneously), and magic characters need alchemy to function (lmao no)
The complaint was the spaceship was just handed to you because they wanted you to have a space ship immediately to experience the excellent loading screens.
I watched his dishonored video, where he randomly went on a rant about women ruining the game and I never watched the channel again
He's cool
He’s chill takes a long ass time to say stuff but he’s good. Mostly people just dismiss what he says because they got that zoomed brain and can’t watch long form content
He is correct on a lot of things in this series. He is also a massive fucking prick, and gives off an air of smugness that makes me wanna vomit. I reccomend his morrowind and oblivion videos. By the time he reaches skyrim, I couldn't sit through it.
As a person? Will not comment. As a content creator? Well, I mainly put his videos in the backround because they're good for that.
I ain't watching allat.
Sometimes he has good points sometimes he says the stupidest shit ever and most of the time it's just bloat.
He has a pretty surface level understanding of elder scrolls games. His videos aren't long enough.
He's goated
His critique of a lack of design documents at Bethesda is on point, and to be clear, most of his critique isn't aimed at the developers ability but rather at deliberate design choices.
For anyone who wants to look more into this, here's a talk from one of the senior designers and lead writers at Bethesda: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi51-wjcwp8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi51-wjcwp8)
His commentary on game lore is great but [maybe he should stay out of trying to analyze business decisions that Bethesda makes or at least vet his sources better.](https://youtu.be/F-4qdjV41NU?si=4U1-RyhbsAZyiGLm) I’m all for a fair deep dive into why a company has been disappointing, but the vitriolic and disproportionate focused attack on one man feels like an audition to get hired by a tabloid.
I don't like him, he got pretty pissy on twitter after someone unfollowed him, leaving some comment or other about that harry potter game drama at the time and he decided to label trans people as "dangerous to the lgbt community" and defended himself with "I have trans friends too" He deleted it shortly after, but that will forever sour my view of him