The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Friday, October 2, 2015 — 5

‘MSGV’: Old Dogs 
learn new tricks

New open-world 

series entry is clever 

and innovative

By JACOB RICH

Daily Film Editor

Since the dawn of cinema, art 

critics have been arguing about 
the concept of specificity as it 
relates to a medi-
um. If a film has 
cinematographic 
specificity (artis-
tic qualities that 
are unique to cin-
ema), does it have 
inherently more 
value than a film 
that doesn’t?

Now, 
critics 

have begun to 
carry this argu-
ment over to the 
interactive medi-
um. Is a game 
with more player 
agency 
more 

worthwhile, because it excels in 
ways only video games can?

This critical dilemma is the 

heart of the discussion surround-
ing the “Metal Gear Solid” series. 
The popular stealth action fran-
chise’s first four numbered games, 
while all critically acclaimed, 
have received flak from fans and 
critics regarding their cinematic 
influences. Some have argued the 
series relies too much on cutscenes 
and linear narrative. Others have 
argued that “Metal Gear” ’s cin-
ematic influences are extraordi-
narily compelling, and are part of 
what makes the series great.

That’s why it’s so fascinating 

that “Metal Gear Solid V,” the fifth 
numbered entry in this wildly 
popular series, completely aban-
dons the focused narrative struc-
ture of the previous major games. 
Instead, it relies almost entirely on 
open-ended, emergent gameplay, 
favoring a high degree of player 
agency in problem solving over 
scripted sequences. 

The vast majority of “MGSV” 

is a military open-world game 
that takes place in two humon-
gous areas based on real-world 
locations: Afghanistan and the 
Angola-Zaire border region of 
Africa. As a member of military 
NGO “Diamond Dogs,” the player 
is tasked with completing military 
objectives. But, rather than cram-
ming its open world full of side 
activities and collectibles as many 
of its contemporaries like “Assas-
sin’s Creed,” “Grand Theft Auto” 
and “Mad Max” do, the world of 
“MGSV” is mostly empty wilder-
ness, save for numerous guarded 
outposts. 

This lack of extraneous content 

is undoubtedly a positive thing. 
With few distractions, Kojima and 
Konami were able to hone “Metal 
Gear” ’s core gameplay — infiltrat-
ing and exfiltrating guarded areas 
— into the finest stealth action 
gameplay the genre has ever seen. 
This is due to the incredible degree 
of control the player has over his 
or her avatar, the sheer number of 
tactical options the player can use 
in combat, and the flexibility of the 
AI in how it reacts to the player. 

 So, whether you’re focusing 

on efficiently completing a mis-

sion or just dicking around in the 
open world, the joy of “MGSV” 
is discovering the clever, brutal 
and often hilarious ways you can 
interact with enemy soldiers. The 
exhilaration of trying something 
new and having it succeed or fail 
gloriously is the joy of “MGSV.” 
The mission structures are gen-
erally quite engaging and often 
act as a creative spark for encour-
aging experimentation with the 
mechanics. 

Further expanding upon the 

already excellent gameplay is 
the “buddy” system, an entirely 
unique ally mechanic that adds 
yet another layer of options for in/
exfiltration. At any time, the player 
can call upon an eclectic mix of 
helpers — a horse, a dog, a sniper 
and a robot — all with interesting, 
powerful and upgradable abilities. 
The buddies each add a new angle 
of strategy to gameplay, and their 
most interesting uses are so fun to 
discover and play around with that 
they should not be spoiled here. 

When “MGSV” ’s full toy chest 

of weapons, buddies, vehicles and 
abilities are unlocked, there is no 
doubt that it becomes the greatest 
open-world sandbox game ever 
made. 

However, the road to this 

heightened state of emergent 
gameplay is a rocky and somewhat 
unsavory one. “MGSV” employs 
a progression and unlock system 
straight from “Metal Gear Solid: 
Peace Walker,” a game for the 
PSP that, by most accounts, very 
few people played. To unlock new 
weapons and items, the player 
must navigate a complex system 
of recruitment, staff management 
and research & development, none 
of which is particularly compel-
ling, and all of which requires 
grinding. It’s the kind of mediocre 
menu-based gameplay one would 
find in a mobile companion app for 
a game, more “addicting” than fun. 

The most bizarre facets of this 

system are the completely pointless 
countdown timers that make the 
player wait unreasonable amounts 
of time after unlocking weapons to 
be able to use them. These feel like 
remnants of a scummy microtrans-
action system that was scrapped 
late in development. 

While the narrative of “MGSV” 

is far, far less central than in the 
other games, it still maintains 
something of a presence. The nar-
rative in this game is kind of like 
Ethan Hawke’s divorced dad char-

acter in “Boyhood.” He shows up 
once in a while with a few cheap 
presents under his arm, and it’s 
usually pretty fun and interesting 
when he does, but you never know 
when he’s going to ring your door-
bell. Him, and it, have consistency 
issues. 

It’s worth noting that the 

cutscenes in this game are shame-
lessly catered to the heterosexual 
male gaze. The way the camera 
zooms in and lingers on female 
body parts will elicit at best eye-
rolls and at worst legitimate dis-
gust from many players. It’s a huge 
bummer the direction isn’t more 
inclusive.

But hey, at least its chauvin-

ism runs at a great framerate. On 
PS4, this game runs at a rock-solid 
1080p 60FPS, a visual standard 
that few games on the console have 
met, but more should. 

The voice acting in this game 

is 
strange. 
Kiefer 
Sutherland 

(Fox’s “24”) is excellent as pro-
tagonist Snake, but the character 
is mostly silent throughout the 
game. There are several scenes 
that almost require Snake to talk, 
but he stands there, mute. Snake’s 
comrades do the vast majority of 
the talking, suggesting that there 
may have been contract or budget 
issues with Sutherland picking up 
the part.

One more nitpick: the back third 

of the mission menu in this game 
is rife, confusingly, with optional 
“extreme” versions of earlier mis-
sions. While fun, these should have 
been confined to a separate menu. 

While “MGSV” has its share 

of problems, it’s still the boldest 
and most original game the open-
world genre has seen in many 
years. Swinging from one extreme 
end of the “linear vs. open-ended” 
spectrum to the other is no small 
task, and the late Kojima Produc-
tions pulled it off swimmingly. It 
will be fascinating to see whether 
this game attains “classic” status 
among fans as its PlayStation pre-
decessors have, because upsets in 
structure this huge rarely do well 
by internet fandoms. Until then, 
“MGSV” is a fascinating beast 
that demands to be experienced 
by the curious and worshipped by 
the established open-world gamer. 
Few games are as risky, beautiful 
and brilliant. Savor this one.

“Metal Gear Solid V: The Phan-

tom Pain” was reviewed using a 
post-release digital copy provided 
by Konami. 

KOJIMA PRODUCTIONS

Let’s just hope he doesn’t pull a Fetty Wap.

A-

Metal 
Gear Solid 
V: The 
Phantom 
Pain

Kojima 
Productions

PS4 (Reviewed), 

PS3, Xbox One, 

Xbox 360, PC

By KENNETH SELANDER

Daily Arts Writer

In light of the recent Jew-

ish holidays of Rosh Hashanah 
and Yom Kippur, I think it’s the 
right time to express my dis-
taste for Lil Dicky as a person of 
the Jewish faith. I do not con-
sider myself highly religious, 
but I am proud of my heritage 
and identity as a Jew. 

The history of the Jewish 

people has been one of eter-
nal struggle. Over thousands of 
years, the Jewish people have 
been enslaved and harshly dis-
criminated against and, between 
1939 and 1945, six million of my 
people were systematically mur-
dered in the Holocaust. Things 
have been rough.

I’ve been far luckier in my 

own life. I haven’t had to face 
the multitude or intensity of the 
struggles my ancestors have had 
to embrace in the quest for social 
and religious freedom. I grew 
up in an unusually Jewish area, 
where two massive temples are 
just a short drive from my house. 
And the University provides 
many resources for Jewish stu-
dents, such as Hillel, the Jewish 
American Resource Center and 
even a Chabad house just down 
the street from me. Despite these 
welcoming environments, I’ve 
still had to deal with negative 
Jewish stereotypes on countless 
occasions in my life. 

I have been aware of Lil 

Dicky’s music for some time 
now, and he has acquired broad 
mainstream attention with his 
debut album Professional Rapper. 
His recent music video for “$ave 
Dat Money” is getting plenty of 
coverage, too. I wouldn’t write 
this article had he not achieved 
some level of success — and to 
my great surprise. According 
to Billboard he had the number 
one Rap Album in America in 
early August around the album’s 
release on July 31. 

Lil Dicky is exploiting his 

Jewish 
heritage 
for 
satire. 

“$ave Dat Money” is a direct 
appeal to the stereotype of Jews 
being cheap and petty about 
money. I’ll give him some credit 
— it was a wise career decision 
to get Fetty Wap and Yo Gotti 
on the track. The concept of 
making a rap music video for as 
little as possible is comical, too, 
but the fact that this endeavor 
is qualified as a product of his 
Jewishness is what ticks me off. 
The soliloquy where he makes a 
fuss about being double charged 
for a refill of coffee is unimagi-
native and insulting. 

In “$ave Dat Money,” he 

drops the line “I’mma get on 
Yelp in a minute and review / 
This piece of shit place like only 
a Kike know how.” The reck-
lessness with which Lil Dicky 
plays up Jewish stereotypes 
isn’t a one time deal. In “All K” 
he proclaims “I’m a K-I-K-E.”

“It’s OK because he’s Jew-

ish,” fans (aptly known as 
“Dickheads”) might claim, or 
“It’s satire, you just don’t get it.”

I’m sure some readers think 

I’m making a big deal out of 
nothing, or am being too sen-
sitive, but whenever I hear Lil 
Dicky’s music I’m brought back 
to my own personal experi-
ences with Jewish stereotypes. 

I cringe at Lil Dicky’s music 
because of the connections 
between the stereotypes he 
laughs about and the prejudice 
I’ve experienced in my own life.

At one of my soccer buddies’ 

catechism 
celebrations 
back 

in the day, one of the family 
friends in attendance started 
ranting about Jews. The one 
particular topic I remember 
was how “Jews aren’t good at 
sports,” because they’re weak 
and unathletic. He continued 
on with other wild accusations 
of Jewish people and Israel that 
he sincerely believed. I would 
estimate this guy’s age at 55 
years — a full grown adult with 
plenty of grey hairs. I was 12 or 
13. I proudly identified myself 
as a Jew and defended myself, 
leaving shortly after in extreme 
discomfort. My friends’ parents 
simply brushed his remarks off 
as not a big deal. This would not 
be the last time I had such an 
experience.

While this event is particu-

larly salient in my mind as 
one of my earlier experiences 
with outright anti-Semitism, 
all throughout my life I have 
encountered 
people 
making 

remarks based on negative ste-
reotypes of Jews that aren’t 
necessarily rooted in an out-
right hatred like that guy. I can 
laugh at myself or jokes about 
someone’s overbearing Jewish 
grandmother and use of half-
assed Yiddish, but sometimes 
it’s different. 

Playing travel soccer in high 

school, I recall on a couple occa-
sions an opponent muttering 
about us being “spoiled Jewish 
kids.”

My first week at college, I met 

some kid on my hall. I intro-
duced myself and told him my 
hometown.

“Oh, so you’re a spoiled Jew.”
I 
nervously 
laughed, 
“I 

wouldn’t say ‘spoiled.’”

I didn’t appreciate his tone or 

diction. I would never see that 
kid again, anyway.

Other times in my life I have 

experienced even more moder-
ate occurrences in everyday life 
situations.

“You still owe me $10, I’d 

appreciate it if you paid me 
back.”

“You’re such a Jew, haha.”
I’m not one to always take 

such comments lightly, as much 
as others might not like to make 
a fuss. Sometimes I angrily 
respond to such comments, typ-
ically surprising or upsetting 

the person. They too are quick 
to excuse it and brush it aside.

“It’s not a big deal.” 
“It’s just a joke, relax.” 
Other times I’m simply too 

tired to say much more than a 
half-hearted “F*** you.” 

I’d like to reiterate the fact 

that I have always gone through 
life with a strong Jewish minor-
ity around me in my commu-
nities, or, very infrequently, a 
majority. I can imagine it would 
only be worse being one of three 
Jewish students at a school of 
2,000, like some of friends at 
my temple in high school, or liv-
ing in parts of the U.S. where 
people my age have never met a 
Jewish person prior to college. 

I think Lil Dicky’s self-depre-

cating shtick gets old, but that’s 
not what I’m here to discuss. I 
can appreciate his goofy antics 
to some extent, but not how Lil 
Dicky uses negative Jewish ste-
reotypes to carve out his come-
dic persona as a rapper.

And it isn’t a challenge for 

him to achieve this image. He 
has Sephardic physical attri-
butes that listeners likely asso-
ciate with Jewishness — curly 
black hair, a black beard, etc.

In relation to Lil Dicky feed-

ing off of stereotypes, there’s 
something to be said of Black 
rappers using the N-word and 
perpetuating negative stereo-
types, but I don’t believe it’s 
my place to say much because, 
as a white person, I don’t know 
what it’s like to experience that 
discrimination. I do know that 
in “All K” Lil Dicky claims that 
if Black people can “say the N 
word / I sure as fuck can say 
Kike / Do something about it, 
pussy.” I suppose socially speak-
ing this may be true, but that 
doesn’t mean you should. As 
Dave Chappelle reflected on 
his time with “The Chappelle 
Show,” his sketches were “funny, 
but socially irresponsible.”

Lil Dicky is purposefully uti-

lizing hyper-exaggerated Jew-
ish stereotypes as one of the 
primary pillars of his career. 
And there doesn’t appear to be 
a silver lining — he’s not using 
these 
stereotypes 
ironically 

to break them down. Listen-
ers might be laughing, but as 
Dave Chappelle realized before 
deciding to cancel “The Chap-
pelle Show,” there’s a certain 
way a group may be laughing at 
a joke that makes it not so funny 
or satirical. There’s a difference 
between people laughing with 
you and people laughing at you.

Lil Dicky exploits 
Jewish stereotypes

MUSIC NOTEBOOK

LIL DICKY

Nice Ray Bans, dick.

VIDEO GAME REVIEW

From the first look, we knew 

Miuccia Prada was mixing busi-
ness with pleasure for SS16. 
Though the death of her aunt pre-
vented her from seeing the show 
in its live grandeur, we can only 
imagine the insight behind her sar-
torial articulation of the modern 
woman. It’s clear she designed for 
a woman of conflict — potentially 
one for a socialite who’s facing an 
identity crisis — Well, yes, power 
lunch at 12:30, but what about the 
ladies, are we lunching? The for-
mer version of the modern woman 
could easily be seen donning any 
of the collection’s precisely tailed 
power suits, while her alter ego 
outshines the #squad in the wispy 
emerald number topped with 
the oversize statement trench.

Modernized pencil skirts of 

the transparent, patchwork and 
asymmetric 
varieties 
radiated 

cheekiness 
typically 
exclusive 

to the brand’s little sister line, 
Miu Miu. Still, pantsuits reigned, 
proving the label’s everlasting 
contingency to the intellectual 
vibe of Dr. Prada herself. Accents 
of otherworldly adornments like 
colossal ear baubles and slashes 
of gold lipstick contrasted any 
seriousness of structured silhou-
ettes. If this is the norm in cor-
porate Prada cubicles, I want in.

The 
collection’s 
whimsical 

overtones appeared throughout 
the show, ranging from trench-
es accented by vertical, gilded 
pinstripes and models donning 
multi-colored pumps to all those 

go-go’s. Accessories played a key 
role in the coquettish, yet bookish 
vibes, as the line traded in iconic 
Willy Wonka-esque sunglasses 
for pastel-rimmed spectacles. An 
overarching ’70s color palate of 
oranges, tan and muted greens 
and browns taught us that the 

era’s trends are now cemented. 
However, I’m still trying to figure 
out those fishnet necklaces, or are 
they meant to be scarves? Dickeys, 
perhaps? Alas, Miuccia continu-
ally throws us for a sartorial loop.

- CAROLINE FILIPS

PRADA

MILAN FASHION WEEK

Max Mara provided a fresh 

set of cool classics to lure in 
all ages. Creative Director Ian 
Griffiths settled on a nauti-
cal line for spring/summer, 
yet nothing feels boring or 
routine about this collection. 
The fabulous basics are there 
— stripes, sailor trousers, pea 
coats — fixed among a sea 
of edgy star knits, maritime 
prints on silk and modern jack-
ets. The pacing of the show 
was excellent — one moment 
red summer stripes and the 
next a tasseled skirt paired 
with a nude starry knit. The 
fact that the show could move 
effortlessly 
from 
a 
classic 

striped jacket and pant combo 
to summer whites onto an 

edgy black power outfit can be 
attributed to a perfected Max 
Mara trademark of simultane-
ous dependability and novelty.

Every 
look 
that 
came 

down the runway had amaz-
ing craftsmanship, luxurious 
fabrics and beautiful move-
ment. The classic cuts syn-
onymous 
with 
Max 
Mara 

paired perfectly with this 
season’s trends (primary col-
ors, stars and stripes). This 
look of striped yellow sail-
or pants and cropped star 
knit with edgy round shades 
and killer flats shows how 
in touch Griffiths is with 
the modern woman’s needs. 

- MARA MACLEAN

PRADA
MAX MARA

