History ZeroPunctuation / TropesMToP

** One of his repeat criticisms of Creator/Nintendo is that they repeatedly engage in a form of this, especially whenever their games don't evolve past any of their older titles in terms of story and mechanics and thus render themselves redundant in his eyes. ''VideoGame/NewSuperMarioBrosWii'' got [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech torn apart for this]]:
--->"Even bad games have a place in gaming history, even if it's just to feature in some "how not to do it" guide. ''New Nuper Nario Nothers Nii'' is a rare example of a game that has absolutely ''no'' right to exist. ''VideoGame/SuperMarioWorld was better, ''VideoGame/YoshisIsland'' was better. This is supposed to be the future, ''damn it''! If everyone has to buy digital televisions before 2010, then that means you aren't allowed to suddenly ignore 20 years of gameplay innovation!"

** ColonCancer: Finally lost patience with this in his review of ''Lichdom: battlemage'' and thus began the RunningGag of pronouncing unnecessary colons as dry heaves.

** ItsEasySoItSucks: [[invoked]] Initially {{averted|trope}} when he calls out fans of the NintendoHard ''BionicCommandoRearmed'' for taking this stance, then plays it straight the rest of his career...

** UpdatedRerelease: Especially when Creator/{{Nintendo}} does it - one of his repeat criticisms is whenever their games don't evolve past any of their older titles in terms of story and mechanics, and he praises any title of theirs, such as ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask'', that does anything that breaks the established formula.

* OneHundredPercentCompletion: DefiedTrope, he couldn't care less

** Main/HundredPerCentCompletion: By his own admission, Yahtzee has trouble understanding the completionist mentality and tends to think lowly of games like ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' that bank on it as their selling point. This also extends to games like ''VideoGame/YoshisIsland'' and ''VideoGame/TemboTheBadassElephant'' that emphasize the need to find all the secrets to "properly" complete a level.
** In his ''Videogame/YoshisCraftedWorld'' review, he darkly suspects that introducing HundredPerCentCompletion to video games was the origin of the industry exploiting the obsessive instinct of completionists, which itself indirectly lead to the modern-day proliferation of lootboxes and live service games. Although he admits he might be being "a touch hysterical" about that.

** ContemplateOurNavels: Has called out games such as ''VideoGame/SeaOfSolitude'' and ''VideoGame/{{Gris}}'' for bogging themselves down with unsubtle symbolism in the name of this, using Literature/MobyDick as a comparison.
--->"What I dislike about games like ''[Sea of Solitude]'' and ''GRRRRIS'' is that they're trying to affect the appearance of meaningfulness without actually having any depth. If you look at, say, Moby-Dick, it can be interpreted as a metaphor for a lot of things - man vs. nature, order vs. chaos, [[TheLastofTheseIsNotLikeTheOthers the struggle to clean semen out of the bathroom rug before your mum gets home]] - but on the surface level, it's an adventure story about a white whale and a dude with a narc-on, and if you prefer it that way, then that's all it need be. ''[[RunningGag GRRRRIS]]'' and Sea of Solitude have no surface level; it's all symbolism all the time."

** RealIsBrown

** UpdatedRerelease: Especially when Creator/{{Nintendo}} does it - one of his repeat criticisms is whenever their games don't evolve past any of their older titles in terms of story and mehanics.

** {{Waggle}}: [[invoked]] One of his key issues with Nintendo consoles, because how shoehorned-in it seems.

** OscarBait: Considers games such as ''VideoGame/SeaOfSolitude'' and ''VideoGame/{{Gris}}'' to be poor attempts at this, trying to fast-track their way to critical success via art direction and music without having any actual depth or subtlety and often at the expense of gameplay

* OldShame: Yahtzee has admitted at least twice he used to watch ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'' when he was a kid. While some people might not consider this shameful, he certainly does. [[invoked]]

** Hilariously subverted in his review of ''VideoGame//Spiritfarer'':

* NotSoDifferent: ''VideoGame/TheWitcher2'' review makes this observation of [[UsefulNotes/PCVSConsole console & PC gamers]]. [[HatesEveryoneEqually You both suck equally]]!

* NewlyPopularUpdating: Expect any game he reviews to have a new quote entry at the top of its page by the end of the day, appropriate or otherwise.

* NWordPrivileges: Isn't afraid to spout off a hard "nigger" (albeit only when quoting other people) for a joke, as proven in ''VideoGame/MafiaIII'', his online review of ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV'' and to a lesser extant ''[=PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds=]''.
** Having said that, he felt legitimately put-off about it in ''Mafia III'', particularly the game's liberal use of intense racist slurs immediately following a disclaimer stating that their use was "to preserve historic accuracy, and foregoing it would be denial that it happened". The amount of use of the word (as he described in his joke) ends up coming off as the writers thinking they had free reign to use the word, to the point where it actually hurt the story.

** OscarBait: Considers games such as ''VideoGame/SeaOfSolitude'' and ''VideoGame/{{Gris}}'' to be poor attempts at this, trying to fast-track their way to critical success without having any actual depth or subtlety and often at the expense of pacing or challenge.

** FauxSymbolism: Dislikes the way games such as ''VideoGame/SeaOfSolitude'' and ''VideoGame/{{Gris}}'' seem to bank entirely on cheap and unsubtle symbolism without any actual depth to them, as if they’re intentionally angling for critical success without putting any effort in.

** FauxSymbolism: Heavily dislikes games such as ''VideoGame/SeaOfSolitude'' and ''VideoGame/Gris'' that bank on cheap and unsubtle symbolism without any actual depth to them, as if they’re intentionally angling for awards without putting any effort in.

*** In his review of ''VideoGame/Inversion'', he compares cover-based shooting to the glue holding a model airplane together, i.e. the bits connecting the interesting parts of a game. The fact that ''Inversion'''s gravity gimmick only serves the cover-based shooting is therefore, to him, akin to [[InsaneTrollLogic grinding up the model airplane to bulk up the glue.]]

** Main/HundredPerCentCompletion: By his own admission, Yahtzee has trouble understanding the completionist mentality and tends to think lowly of games like ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' that bank on it as their selling point. This also extends to games like ''VideoGame/YoshisIsland'' and ''VideoGame/TemboTheBadassElephant'' due to the need to find all the secrets to "properly" complete a level.

** FauxSymbolism: Rags on ''VideoGame/SeaOfSolitude'' and similar games for piling on unsubtle symbolism without any actual depth to them, as if they’re intentionally angling for awards without putting any effort.

*** Elaborated further in his review of ''VideoGame/Inversion'', where he compares cover-based shooting to the glue holding a model airplane together, i.e. the bits connecting the interesting parts of a game. Therefore, the fact that ''Inversion'''s gravity gimmick only serves the cover-based shooting is akin to grinding up the airplane components to bulk up the glue.

** His review of ''VideoGame/MightyNo9'' has a sort of BackHandedCompliment version of this. Despite his complaints, he ends by saying the game wasn't as terrible as the backlash made it seem in his eyes and was more of a victim of the hype surrounding its status as a SpiritualSuccessor to ''Mega Man''. As he puts it:
--->"On its own merit, its only crime is being a mediocre game wearing the bra of a considerably better-endowed one. You can either waste energy throwing its balled-up tissues back in its face or get over it and motorboat some cantaloupes instead."
** He was fully aware of the BileFascination behind people asking him to review ''VideoGame/BalanWonderworld'', and admitted that he felt inclined to be charitable towards the game since everything about it came from a flawed vision and not "standard video game industry terribleness", i.e. lootboxes and live service. Not that he was any kinder towards the game, of course.

** PinballProtagonist: One of his recurring complaints is when a game tries to have a dramatic story but the main character ends up being this. Indeed, this was a lot of why he didn't like the rebooted Lara Croft, as he felt so much of her story was just being forced to do stuff and then doing it.

** RummageSaleReject: He often criticizes [[EasternRPG JRPGs]] for their eccentric costume designs.

** TakeCover: One of his main beefs with current-generation shooters. In his [[http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/1976-Kane-Lynch-2-Dog-Days review]] of ''VideoGame/KaneAndLynch 2: Dog Days'', he observed that he doesn't mind this trope as long as it's not the ''only'' thing the player is expected to care about. In his words, "you can still have it, in all its pop-up shooting gallery tedium, but you've got to have something else!" Such as stealth gameplay for ''Deus Ex: Human Revolution'', BulletTime for ''Max Payne 3'', or an amazing story for ''Spec Ops: the Line''.
** UpdatedRerelease: Especially when Creator/{{Nintendo}} do it.

** Having said that, he felt legitimately put-off about it in Mafia III, particularly how he felt as though the game's liberal use of it immediately following an apology for them using it but feeling they must in order "to preserve historic accuracy and foregoing it would ruin the immersion". The amount of use of the word (as he described in his joke) ends up coming off as the writers thinking they had free reign to use the word and use it so often that it actually hurt the story and turned the South into cartoonish villains.

** HundredPerCentCompletion: By his own admission, Yahtzee has trouble understanding the completionist mentality and tends to think lowly of games like ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' that bank on it as their selling point. This also extends to games like ''VideoGame/{{YoshisIsland}}'' and ''VideoGame/{{TemboTheBadassElephant}}'' due to the need to find all the secrets to "properly" complete a level.

** Yahtzee generally doesn't say whether viewers should or shouldn't buy a game. As such when he goes out of his way to clearly say to ''not'' buy a game, such as with ''VideoGame/MindJack'' and ''VideoGame/Oddworld Soulstorm'', his hatred for the game is obvious.

** Yahtzee generally doesn't say whether viewers should or shouldn't buy a game. As such when he goes out of his way to clearly say to ''not'' buy a game, such as with ''VideoGame/MindJack'' and ''VideoGame/OddworldsoulStorm'', his hatred for the game is obvious.

* MySpeciesDothProtestTooMuch: Despite being a MisanthropeSupreme in general, he seems to have some sympathy for non-whites, particularly those in the developing world. One of his common complaints with the "Spunkgargleweewee" genre is often being forced to kill dark-skinned foreigners for no apparent reason other than America being xenophobic. He also once mocked the idea of being offended by a joke from a race yours once enslaved.

* OnlyTheCreatorDoesItRight: In-universe, he has taken this attitude with regards to several franchises, most notably the ''Franchise/SilentHill'' series, for which he criticized every Western-developed entry in the series for missing the mark or failing to live up to the standard of the original four Japanese games (with ''Silent Hill 2'' in particular being one of his favourite games of all time). This became particularly ironic when he named ''VideoGame/SpecOpsTheLine'' his game of the year for 2012, despite it being an entry in an established franchise which none of the original creators had any involvement in.

** In his Creator/{{Acclaim}} Entertainment 'Hall of Shame' video, he clarifies that Creator/{{Sony}} really did parade a dead goat around at ''VideoGame/GodOfWarIII'''s launch party.