Temple of The Roguelike Forums
Development => Design => Topic started by: Endorya on June 26, 2014, 09:01:41 AM
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I once posted this following subject in some other forum and the reaction to it wasn't that great, and I post it in a forum filled with grownup people. Not that their reaction wasn't that bad but they simply started to view me as someone... crazy. Not to mention the thread was later removed from the forum. It seems it is fine to make movies and write books about these things but as soon as they go inside a game, the whole world collapses. I thought that PEGI 18+ ratings existed for a reason.
I enjoy a lot playing games with endless possibilities, I think that most of you feel the same way, especially if you are a rogue like fan. But Before I get into details, I just want to make sure you know that I take no part in real life of the following features that I'm about mention, in fact I despise every human being who exercise them; I just want to make sure of this, one should always apply extra caution when dealing with possible retards, whose disposition to see the difference between reality and computer games is practically non-existent.
It seems that killing, for the most of us, is just something completely ordinary; I mean taking the life of an in-game character, including animals and children. But the minute you add rapping and torture, it seems you might just be crossing the line. How would you feel about having a game where the option to molest and torturing someone was there? I mean, you, having the possibility to play as the ultimate bad guy. It is not like the game urges you to use those actions upon NPCs, they would simply be there in case you felt like using them and to handle their consequences. These actions would also be viewed as something really bad within the game. Take Fallout as example, if you murdered a child you would be flagged as 'child murderer' making many NPCs to permanently cease interaction with your char: "Stay the fuck away from me you child murdurer!"
What are your thoughts on this subject? I'm extremely curious to see how this forum will handle this topic.
[EDIT]
Before you post please make sure you read my post at page 4 starting with: *** Explanation ***
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It would be interesting to see a game where this had been implemented well. I'm sure it would draw negative attention to it too, which one should keep in mind while writing such a game. And the game should warn about such content in very clear and plain language. Not only because underage people shouldn't be playing it, but also as a warning for people who would not want to encounter such content.
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It seems that killing, for the most of us, is just something completely ordinary; I mean taking the life of an in-game character, including animals and children. But the minute you add rapping and torture, it seems you might just be crossing the line.
It's because how se see killing in the context of killing "bad guys". It's probably the reason why we human race can't get rid of wars. They would end right when killing would be always a bad thing. But in war it's heroic. Torturing is different, it's something terrorists do, so it's bad. Those real life ideas are seen similar way in games. Killing is ok, torturing is not. Then again, it's an interesting idea. Less dramatic idea could be threatening someone to get his stuff or make him do something.
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What is the point of playing a game if you cannot do things that are not allowed/possible in the real world?
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It would be interesting to see a game where this had been implemented well. I'm sure it would draw negative attention to it too, which one should keep in mind while writing such a game. And the game should warn about such content in very clear and plain language. Not only because underage people shouldn't be playing it, but also as a warning for people who would not want to encounter such content.
Totally agreed. That warning would definitely be implemented. But lets think about this for a moment. The game is warning you about content that the player has full total control over it; it is not like the player will be forced to deal with things he doesn't want to be part of. The player is the one who decides what actions to use throughout his whole playing time.
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It's because how se see killing in the context of killing "bad guys". It's probably the reason why we human race can't get rid of wars. They would end right when killing would be always a bad thing. But in war it's heroic. Torturing is different, it's something terrorists do, so it's bad. Those real life ideas are seen similar way in games. Killing is ok, torturing is not. Then again, it's an interesting idea. Less dramatic idea could be threatening someone to get his stuff or make him do something.
I actually meant killing any kind of people, regardless of their alignment. Nowadays most open world RPGs let you do this. Take Skyrim as example, you can just go to town and start slaying its citizens just in the name of fun. People are simply fine with this, but why shouldn't they? It's just a freaking game and you are the one who choose your actions. These type of games have also a built-in moral code that condemn evil actions. It's all fine as long you don't harm innocent people through torture or sexual abuse; killing innocent people is completely approved though.
Bethesda removed the ability of letting children being killed in Skyrim because they feared the game could be banned in certain countries. So it was up to us, the players to create a mod to change this. "Fascinating!" - Spock.
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What is the point of playing a game if you cannot do things that are not allowed/possible in the real world?
Exactly my point. I've talked with family members, friends and co-works and only a handful of all these people fully understood my point of view. For most people, specially those who don't play games, it seems that allowing you committing atrocities in a virtual world is somehow telling those who play these games that they should do the same in the real world. I simply can't fucking understand how can one view the issue like this. I've exhausted my head beyond words trying to view their point of view with some logic, unfortunately with no success whatsoever.
I would understand that having such features could influence a rapist in some way, but for fucks sake, the same thing could be said from rape scenes from movies or books. But the real question is, how having someone with a dangerous fantasy should be someone else's problem? People with mental disorders should simply be locked away and not the other way around. We developers should not feel castrated in our work discarding the possibility of having yellow birds in our games just because there is a fool in china that kills old ladies whenever he plays Flappy Bird.
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Good topic. I think Tome4 recently had a feature removed following players' request because of excessive killing of orc children (?)
Killing in games doesn't offend anyone because it's so present in everyday media. People don't pay attention to it as long as it's not happening in their immediate surrounding. Rape, on the other hand is much more dodgy, you rarely see it in the movies. Myself I would feel really uncomfortable to see it in a game, especially if I was to do it as a character. Similarly, I wouldn't put it in my own game. It's not that I think rape is any worse than murder, it's something else, maybe in the culture.
There are other things too, like slavery and racism. Both have been ever present in our culture. I wonder if there is any game, perhaps trying to be historically accurate, where the white race is dominating another race.
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I guess I agree with your point of view that this kind of gameplay shouldn't be rejected out of hand. When you play a game, you're playing a role. It's very much like acting. Saying it's immoral to write or play a game featuring these kinds of possibilities is along the same lines as saying it's immoral to write or act in a TV series like Game of Thrones (although I suppose this too is mildly controversial).
On the other hand, I still think there are lines that shouldn't be crossed for non-edifying entertainment purposes. I think there's good reason that people balk at the notion of a game allowing the player to molest children. Generally, the boundaries of what's acceptable in video games should be the same as the boundaries for drama. A lot of people confuse themselves on this matter by bringing in notions of agency in video games to try to put distance between games and other more widely understood things, like drama. In fact, the differences are inconsequential from a moral perspective.
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Myself I would feel really uncomfortable to see it in a game, especially if I was to do it as a character.
That's my whole point, you don't have to do it if you don't want to. You are not forced to execute those actions. Alternatively, you could have an option to hide those very actions from your character's action list. I would fully understand that people would be uncomfortable (I know I would) by having games rewarding the player for executing quests with goals like killing innocent animals just in name of cruelty. I hate the game Deer Hunter because I really can't find any joy in hunting animals for sport, not even in a virtual sense. Nonetheless, I'm NOT against its existence as it's just a game for fraks sake. Give me a game where I can kill people just in the name of fun and I will surely play it; I surely enjoyed Carmageddon franchise.
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Yeah, that's funny, I will happily play a game where I kill human(oid)s, but not something like Deer Hunter. Even though in real life I'd kill an animal before a human. I guess that killing human(oid)s has gotten so neutral in the culture that it's treated outside of all other wrongdoings (talking about fiction and the media all the time).
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I guess I agree with your point of view that this kind of gameplay shouldn't be rejected out of hand. When you play a game, you're playing a role. It's very much like acting. Saying it's immoral to write or play a game featuring these kinds of possibilities is along the same lines as saying it's immoral to write or act in a TV series like Game of Thrones (although I suppose this too is mildly controversial).
On the other hand, I still think there are lines that shouldn't be crossed for non-edifying entertainment purposes. I think there's good reason that people balk at the notion of a game allowing the player to molest children. Generally, the boundaries of what's acceptable in video games should be the same as the boundaries for drama. A lot of people confuse themselves on this matter by bringing in notions of agency in video games to try to put distance between games and other more widely understood things, like drama. In fact, the differences are inconsequential from a moral perspective.
Yeah. From their perspective they should be really be concerned with horror movies, nothing can be as shocking as a well made horror movie containing all sorts of gore, guided through a disturbing plot. I keep urging everyone around me to think with their wits instead of their hearts. One thing I've learned is avoiding bringing up this discussion to women, unless you really know they are up to it; their protective instinct as mothers is so incredible that it completely blocks their reasoning.
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Well, controversial features in games is a bit touchier because it becomes role-play rather than passive viewing. If you (as in "one" rather than you of course) want to go around killing, raping and torturing innocents, and you derive your fun from killing, raping and torturing innocents rather than fun gameplay mechanics, then that might say a few things about your character. I think killing has become ok as sometimes it is actually ok (self-defense, intruders, etc). But you never torture to protect your self/loved ones/country, etc. In all the RPG games that I've played, I've seen (and sometimes saved) many torture victims, but I never had to do the torture myself. They let that feature be passive (view/experience) rather than active (role-play).
I guess if you're so itchy to make a rape/torture game, go for it, just try not to anger your player base though :P
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Well, controversial features in games is a bit touchier because it becomes role-play rather than passive viewing. If you (as in "one" rather than you of course) want to go around killing, raping and torturing innocents, and you derive your fun from killing, raping and torturing innocents rather than fun gameplay mechanics, then that might say a few things about your character. I think killing has become ok as sometimes it is actually ok (self-defense, intruders, etc). But you never torture to protect your self/loved ones/country, etc. In all the RPG games that I've played, I've seen (and sometimes saved) many torture victims, but I never had to do the torture myself. They let that feature be passive (view/experience) rather than active (role-play).
I guess if you're so itchy to make a rape/torture game, go for it, just try not to anger your player base though :P
You can role play a rapist character in a movie and you also can role play a rapist when writing a story around him. As I stated previously, you are not forced to use those options nor you are forced to try the game. The active role-playing only happens when you decide likewise; you are the one who has total control over the things you wish to do in the game; you are not forced to do anything you don't feel comfortable with nor the game will acknowledge evil actions as noble deeds.
I have absolutely not desire whatsoever in creating a game around raping and torturing but very interested in creating a game featuring total freedom for both good and evil intentions. Take Fallout as example, you could end up being a good or a bad fellow with irreversible and due consequences triggering around you.
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But the minute you add rapping and torture, it seems you might just be crossing the line.
Personally, I wold love to see a roguelike with rapping. Demoralize your opponents and gather followers with tight rhymes and wicked flow.
Killing in games doesn't offend anyone because it's so present in everyday media. People don't pay attention to it as long as it's not happening in their immediate surrounding. Rape, on the other hand is much more dodgy, you rarely see it in the movies. Myself I would feel really uncomfortable to see it in a game, especially if I was to do it as a character. Similarly, I wouldn't put it in my own game. It's not that I think rape is any worse than murder, it's something else, maybe in the culture.
Really, a large part of that is because rape hits a lot closer to home for more people. There aren't any murder victims playing games (by definition), but there are a lot of victims of rape and sexual assault (I think the statistics are 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men? Which is part of the reason women react more negatively to it, Endorya...it's something that is very likely to happen either to them or someone they're close to, they're not really being unreasonable, don't discount what they're saying just because you disagree with it). Since it's such a traumatic experience, a lot of people have some amount of PTSD about it, so experiencing realistic depictions of it can cause some pretty bad reactions (not just feeling uncomfortable, but panic attacks or flashbacks). On the flip side, treating it too lightly when it's something really really bad that happened to them is probably going to cause people to feel kind of uncomfortable about it at best, offended at worst (and partially that's cultural, rape is not really taken as seriously as it should be by most people considering how prevalent and traumatizing it is).
Now, of course, on the flip side there are people who have been victims of nonsexual violence, who might have PTSD and who might be made uncomfortable by depictions of violence. The difference would be that the types of violence they've experienced are probably not very like the types in games, and there's also a lot of ways to show violence without it being gratuitous or realistic, so that it might not bother even people who have been through it. Also, if they feel that way, they probably know how violent a game is going to be before they get too into it, and the violence is probably going to be an integral part of the game, so it's easy for them to know if they're even interested in it or not. If there's a rape, someone could have no problems with the rest of the game, but that one part could be so upsetting that they stop playing, and for what? What does rape add to the game?
And that's really the question you have to ask yourself: Why do you want to portray rape in a game? What purpose would it serve? Are you trying to make a larger point? If it's just to be "realistic," because, you know, someone could rape someone else, I don't really think that's a good reason. Are you going to include pissing and shitting too?
Is it just because nobody else is doing it? That's not necessarily a reason either. There are reasons nobody else is doing it. Now, I don't think that it's impossible that a game could handle rape well, but I find it pretty unlikely that putting it as an optional feature in a roguelike is going to be handling it well.
With regards to torture, there are some games out there that do feature it, but I think that's really just a "good guys don't use torture" thing. Dungeon Keeper, where you explicitly did play as the bad guy, featured torture chambers, and in Liberal Crime Squad you can kidnap and torture people (mainly psychologically) to brainwash them. Those are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head.
I think torture would be something that would be a little more socially acceptable than rape, especially in a medieval fantasy setting. In a modern day setting where you have to waterboard or electrically shock someone? That'd be a little dodgier, and again I think you'd really have to think about what you're trying to say and why because, again, it's something that's still going on so it hits a little too close to home.
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In general I'd wonder what's wrong with the developer (not the case with you) and why would the developer want to put the possibility of pointless violence or sadism in games. But it's a good thing that those things would not be glorified.
Raping and torture in real life is also worse thing than killing, maybe that's why they are disliked in every form. Maybe also that they inflict more mental pain than outright killing.
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Personally, I wold love to see a roguelike with rapping. Demoralize your opponents and gather followers with tight rhymes and wicked flow.
And you are not the only one.
Endorya...it's something that is very likely to happen either to them or someone they're close to, they're not really being unreasonable, don't discount what they're saying just because you disagree with it)
It is not about agreeing or disagreeing with what they say but listening to their answers based purely on emotion and not logic; there is no point having an argument based on emotion. I've come to realize that one shouldn't condemn others for having different points of view 2 decades ago, probably because there is a fine chance I might just be older than you.
And that's really the question you have to ask yourself: Why do you want to portray rape in a game? What purpose would it serve? Are you trying to make a larger point? If it's just to be "realistic," because, you know, someone could rape someone else, I don't really think that's a good reason. Are you going to include pissing and shitting too?
Do you really believe that I've never ponder about it? Do you think that one day I just woke up and screamed: "WHAT IF?!". I've already stated here that this discussion had already happened in another forum, with family members, with friends of mine and with co-workers. You should ask yourself instead if those questions of yours were really necessary. I might add pissing and shitting and call it the Rickton skill: "You feel very Rickton, it is time to take a dump". Sorry, but stupid questions do require stupid answers. It seems like you just fire a full burst at me without actually aiming. For the most of time, a single aimed shot is more effective than a full magazine fired at the waist.
Is it just because nobody else is doing it? That's not necessarily a reason either. There are reasons nobody else is doing it. Now, I don't think that it's impossible that a game could handle rape well, but I find it pretty unlikely that putting it as an optional feature in a roguelike is going to be handling it well.
I've mentioned the reasons about it a few times now, it is just a matter of you reading everything I've typed so far. But I'll just repeat myself; I want to offer freedom of choice giving the audience a chance of playing with a true good or a true evil character. This is the main reason for me and I don't expect anyone to agree with it, this is the best part of being the author of something, because you get to do what you want the way you wat. And remember: "don't discount what they're saying just because you disagree with it".
For the record, Fallout II actually has a rape scene, it is not exactly explicit but from the dialog available you can choose to rape that female NPC.
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In general I'd wonder what's wrong with the developer (not the case with you) and why would the developer want to put the possibility of pointless violence or sadism in games. But it's a good thing that those things would not be glorified.
Well, if a game would be just about torturing and raping I would wonder that myself. Anyway, bad actions should always bring bad consequences. I'm still deciding what to do about evil characters. What I have so far is having bad actions setting bounties over your character which will, as a consequence, having him being reject by society. You will no longer be able to enter civilized cities and you will have bounty hunters over your ass.
Raping and torture in real life is also worse thing than killing, maybe that's why they are disliked in every form. Maybe also that they inflict more mental pain than outright killing.
I actually believe that torture is the worst, then killing and lastly raping. There are tons of raped victims that manage to recover and still live normal lives; I actually have an example of this in my own family. Taking the life of someone is completely destroying any hope of having that person recovering from anything.
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Endorya...it's something that is very likely to happen either to them or someone they're close to, they're not really being unreasonable, don't discount what they're saying just because you disagree with it)
It is not about agreeing or disagreeing with what they say but listening to their answers based on emotion and not logic; there is no point having an argument based on emotion.
Whether the arguments are "logical" or not, I think that it's saying something if every woman (or most women) you talk to about it has a problem with it.
And I don't think it's a good idea to discount people for their arguments being based on emotion when you're dealing with a very emotionally loaded subject like rape (not to mention it sounds like you're saying women can't be logical because they're too emotional, at least when it comes to this subject if nothing else, which comes across as a little sexist).
I've come to realize that one shouldn't condemn others for having different points of view decades ago, probably because there is a fine chance I might just be older than you.
Maybe you are, maybe you aren't, but what's the point of bringing it up? Even if I am younger than you, does that make what I have to say invalid? (I'm 25, if it matters)
And that's really the question you have to ask yourself: Why do you want to portray rape in a game? What purpose would it serve? Are you trying to make a larger point? If it's just to be "realistic," because, you know, someone could rape someone else, I don't really think that's a good reason. Are you going to include pissing and shitting too?
Do you really believe that I've never ponder about it? Do you think that one day I just woke up and screamed: "WHAT IF?!". I've already stated here that this discussion has already happened in another forum, with family members, with friends of mine and with co-workers.
Sure, I hope you've thought about it. And sure, you've said the discussion has happened before, but none of us were there for that so we don't know what was said in those. So I'm sorry if you've already answered them before, but calling them "stupid questions" is just hostile.
You should ask yourself instead if those questions of yours were really necessary.
Maybe it wasn't necessary that I ask them, but I don't know what you've already thought about. I think those questions are questions that you should think about if you want to include rape in a game. If you have thought about them already, then great.
I might add pissing and shitting and call it the Rickton skill: "You feel very Rickton, it is time to take a dump".
Yeah, that's a personal attack, and there's really no reason for that. I think I'm starting to have an idea why your other thread didn't work out so well.
Is it just because nobody else is doing it? That's not necessarily a reason either. There are reasons nobody else is doing it. Now, I don't think that it's impossible that a game could handle rape well, but I find it pretty unlikely that putting it as an optional feature in a roguelike is going to be handling it well.
I've mentioned the reasons about it a few times now, it is just a matter of you reading everything I've typed so far.
I did read what you wrote, but thanks for talking down to me again. I just said "realism" rather than "freedom of choice," which was my bad I guess.
But I'll just repeat myself; I want to offer freedom of choice giving the audience a chance of playing with a true good or a true evil character. This is the main reason for me, but like you said: "don't discount what they're saying just because you disagree with it".
OK, you said that before, but that still doesn't really answer the question. Sure, you want to offer freedom of choice, and that's fine, but no game will ever truly have complete freedom of choice. Some things will be doable, some things won't, just due to limitations of what's programmed in. Why is it so important to specifically have rape in the game, when you know it's likely to cause problems, rather than some other immoral action?
Like I said before, I'm not discounting the inclusion of rape in a game, and none of this is intended as an assault on you or your ideas, so cool it on the hostility a bit (I think you might be getting a little emotional rather than logical ;)). If you want to have a discussion, let's have a discussion, if you just want to be told you're right, that's probably not going to happen, this is roguetemple, for every 5 users there's 6 diametrically opposed opinions.
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w00t? No need to flame Rickton for replying in your thread, Endorya. He raises some questions which are extremely pertinent in my opinion (and I was programming computer games and developing rpg settings before he was born, if that means anything to you ;) I must say I always found the argument that "I'm your elder, so I must be wiser" very rude and frankly counterproductive) – in any case, I can't see what in his post warrants such hostility on your end.
Having said that, I think it's a very interesting topic. May not have time to post a long reply right now, but will try to scratch the surface a bit. First of all, there are no topics that are "off limits" for games, I think. On the contrary, games can provide really interesting ways to handle difficult themes. I do think that controversial topics like those mentioned must be handled with great care: the developer/team needs to do it in a sensitive as well as intelligent way. I was always a bit iffed out by the "scroll of genocide" that shows up in Nethack et al., for instance. Then again, "Smart Kobold" features a take on genocide that I think is intelligent/respectful, while managing to remain in the lighthearted spirit of the genre: After you've defeated the hostile kobolds, there are still some scared kobold children running around in the caves, and the details of your win screen depends on whether or not you exterminate them.
I need to "hang up" now. Will come back with some more feedback soon.
As always,
Minotauros
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There is a fear factor involved, the fear that the media we watch can desensitize us, can erode our barriers, make us jaded. In an interactive media, where we take an active role and are the instigators of objectionable behavior, there is the fear that it lessens the barrier between thought and action in real life as well as virtual.
There is some degree of truth behind the fears, at least with certain personality types. For games I would guess that it somewhat depends on how realistic the virtual environment is. Consider that a history of cruelty to animals is one of the traits that regularly appear in the FBI's records of serial rapists and murderers. At what point does doing so in a virtual environment equate to doing so in the real world? Does this only affect minds that are already unhinged? Quite a few questions here and a subject of serious study.
Personally I'd rather play a more goal oriented game than one where mass killing predominates, but as those are few and far between, I do play games which have mass slaughter. Does this make me more likely to commit mass slaughter in real life? Not really, but that may well be in part because in real life there are rather severe consequences and at least some barriers to obtaining the means.
When I play games where other repugnant (to me) behavioral options exist, I tend not to exercise those options, preferring the good guy/gal role. If those repugnant options are overly rewarded or seem to be the optimal path, I probably won't play the game long.
As a game designer, there are far too many other more interesting and more profitable portions of a game I can spend time on. Adding in the commands, methods, rendering, dialogue, etc for rape or torture is completely unappealing to me. I far prefer to concentrate efforts on making the game fun to play and just don't see morally objectionable behaviors adding to the fun factor, at all.
I will freely admit that I would view a player who spent all their gaming time being a rapist and torturer of small animals as someone to stay far away from. Just in case. I would also tend to place the developer of a game promoting objectionable moral behavior in the same class as a producer of pornography or dealer of illegal drugs. That is, people I choose not to associate with.
However, if I understand the OP correctly, he is not addressing the idea of promoting questionable behaviors but merely making them available. I do not understand why.
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Whether the arguments are "logical" or not, I think that it's saying something if every woman (or most women) you talk to about it has a problem with it.
And I don't think it's a good idea to discount people for their arguments being based on emotion when you're dealing with a very emotionally loaded subject like rape (not to mention it sounds like you're saying women can't be logical because they're too emotional, at least when it comes to this subject if nothing else, which comes across as a little sexist).
A good leader makes rational decisions based on logic and not on emotion. Ask Spock. When I ask something I expect a logical answer, I think that we all do. Something I'm not is a sexist person and you could witness this if you actually knew me. I'm actually quite protective of women but when it comes down to logic they don't have a chance, heck even my wife and most of my female co-workers agree with this. I hope the women discussion is now closed.
Maybe you are, maybe you aren't, but what's the point of bringing it up? Even if I am younger than you, does that make what I have to say invalid? (I'm 25, if it matters)
The fact I'm 11 years older than you, can contribute to the fact that I might have learned that lesson sooner than you. The lesson where people have opinions and that one shouldn't be against those whose point of view differs from yours; this is what I meant and not that I'm wiser.
Sure, I hope you've thought about it. And sure, you've said the discussion has happened before, but none of us were there for that so we don't know what was said in those.
Sorry, I can't simply believe that you think I haven't thought about this issue nor in the consequences it may bear. You should know better of programmers, we live in the future; we code thinking of what will happen from our writings, until we test the code to see it wasn't exactly what we were expecting (now I'm simply messing with you)
Maybe it wasn't necessary that I ask them, but I don't know what you've already thought about. I think those questions are questions that you should think about if you want to include rape in a game. If you have thought about them already, then great.
See my previous typing.
Yeah, that's a personal attack, and there's really no reason for that.
You can't simply ask about pissing and shitting with loads of sarcasm and expect people to react well to it. Some people might ignore it, some may not. It also depends on the mood; my mood today is not that great.
I think I'm starting to have an idea why your other thread didn't work out so well.
Is there a thread of mine that didn't work well? Which one? I'm not being sarcastic or anything, I'm actually being serious about it. Which thread?
I did read what you wrote, but thanks for talking down to me again. I just said "realism" rather than "freedom of choice," which was my bad I guess.
I honestly didn't talk down to you. People sometimes do post directly based on the OP's opening post without reading through all the after comments. I did get the impression you didn't read all my comments because you were asking questions about things that I believed I have answered already.
OK, you said that before, but that still doesn't really answer the question. Sure, you want to offer freedom of choice, and that's fine, but no game will ever truly have complete freedom of choice. Some things will be doable, some things won't, just due to limitations of what's programmed in. Why is it so important to specifically have rape in the game, when you know it's likely to cause problems, rather than some other immoral action?
Ok, I'll try to give you a deeper explanation having into consideration roguelike mechanics. There are games that give you freedom to change your character's alignment throughout their gaming time, allowing you to become a good or an evil character. I think we all have seen what playing good char is all about; good characters can be filled with personal sacrifice, loosing loved ones, performing incredible deeds, wining battles and changing the course of realms affecting thousands of lives, yeah, we have all seen that. But what can you actually do with a playable evil character? Well, for the most of it you can lie, steal and kill, and that's it. I want evil characters to be truly evil. I want the player to feel what being evil is really all about and have him dealing with its consequences accordingly.
If you just want to be told you're right, that's probably not going to happen, this is roguetemple, for every 5 users there's 6 diametrically opposed opinions.
I did this thread to see how everyone would react to it, to see how do you think and how vulnerable you are over sensitive topics because I might bring new ones. I've discussed this subject to exhaustion outside the forum and I truly have nothing left to think about it. Still, I find it a rather nice exercise, once a while. People initially tend to be against it, but as we discuss it they end up changing their minds. I can say that males have a greater success rate over females for the reasons I've mentioned previously, regarding changing their views on this topic. I've also acknowledged that when someone is truly against torture or raping there is nothing you can say to change their way of thinking, no matter how logical your argument might be.
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I don't need people saying that I'm right or wrong because this ends up just being something about personal preferences. Those who enjoyed playing Postal will probably find this good news while those who hated the game will probably ask: "Why?!". Personally, I didn't enjoy Postal, I find it very repetitive and dull. Ok, the pissing feature was funny, for a moment.
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w00t? No need to flame Rickton for replying in your thread, Endorya. He raises some questions which are extremely pertinent in my opinion (and I was programming computer games and developing rpg settings before he was born, if that means anything to you ;) I must say I always found the argument that "I'm your elder, so I must be wiser" very rude and frankly counterproductive) – in any case, I can't see what in his post warrants such hostility on your end.
If you are much older than I'am (36) than there is a high probably than you have learned that: 'we shouldn't discount what others say just because we might disagree with them' before I did. This type of knowledge is something we teach to kids, at least this is what happens from where I come from. I think now you understand why I reacted the way I did. Being called a kid is not exactly a compliment.
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I will freely admit that I would view a player who spent all their gaming time being a rapist and torturer of small animals as someone to stay far away from. Just in case.
My wife's kid played Postal II when he was about 12 years old finishing the game and replaying it a few times. He laughed his ass off killing people and dogs and setting them on fire with gasoline, then he would decapitate the dead bodies with a shovel and play soccer with their heads, exactly the way Postal II dev's team intended it to be played.
Now he is 20 years old. He loves dogs with passion (his favorite animal actually) and he is a truly loving young man with a kind heart, adored by everyone and by his teachers. Never got into fights nor into trouble with anyone.
One shouldn't simply label someone as evil because he might play violent games. It is like saying that metal fans are all a bunch of drug addicts and killers because they all listen to demonic music. The same thing could be said about the producers of the SAW movies, they are all evil and sick bastards.
I hope one everyone will recognize what playing a video game truly means, what role-playing means.
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Wow, just how do you turn this:
I will freely admit that I would view a player who spent all their gaming time being a rapist and torturer of small animals as someone to stay far away from. Just in case.
into this:
One shouldn't simply label someone as evil because he might play violent games. It is like saying that metal fans are all a bunch of drug addicts and killers because they all listen to demonic music. The same thing could be said about the producers of the SAW movies, they are all evil and sick bastards.
I hope one everyone will recognize what playing a video game truly means, what role-playing means.
Seriously?
You submit a single case where a person engaged in a behavior and later exhibited no signs of detrimental effects. I submit a single case where a person engaged in role playing antisocial characteristics and when subsequently exposed to severe stress, acted out those same characteristics in real life. What is proved? Nothing.
If you are truly interested in the subject:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/media-spotlight/201304/can-video-games-cause-violence (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/media-spotlight/201304/can-video-games-cause-violence)
The last paragraph is very interesting:
"As for the question of whether video games are really harmful, the lack of a clear answer after decades of research suggest that the real problem may well lie with our not being able to ask the right questions."
You don't know, I don't know, the experts don't know.
I happen to prefer placing my bets on the safe side.
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Really, a large part of that is because rape hits a lot closer to home for more people. There aren't any murder victims playing games (by definition), but there are a lot of victims of rape and sexual assault (I think the statistics are 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men? Which is part of the reason women react more negatively to it [... ).]
This is pretty lame. I'm not a big fan of the thread in general, as it's pretty obvious why people would be uncomfortable with a game that features child molestation and animal torture, but you just know asking a question like "why shouldn't I include the possibility of being a rapist in my role playing game?" is going to lead to someone posting "hookup culture = rape culture" talking points from their Android device. And there it is.
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What about if those choices were in the plot of the game? Splinter Cell: Double Agent had player to make difficult choices through the game: do I kill the prisoner to gain the trust of terrorists (player is a double agent, as the title implies), do I blow up a passenger ship to maintain my cover. There weren't that big consequences though (maybe you got beaten up some or either organization started to trust you less, but there was always the next choice or other ways to remedy it).
If the actions were part of the plot, then they maybe would not be so gratuitous? But on the other hand, player would be confronted with these things regardless if he wanted or not.
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Take Skyrim as example, you can just go to town and start slaying its citizens just in the name of fun. People are simply fine with this, but why shouldn't they?
The player's actions are justified because he has a goal. Which often is to save the world... from enemies. So it's a lot like war and as we know in war killing is ok.
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there are a lot of victims of rape and sexual assault (I think the statistics are 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men?
That's entirely impossible, unless sexual assault means asking for someone's number when they don't want it.
Back to the topic. Emotional response to such things in games will only happen when the game is immersive and/or descriptive. Imagine a game featuring a big red button which shows the text "You just raped someone. Hurray!" when it's clicked. I doubt anyone would get offended by it.
The opposite of the red button game is DEFCON, which is focused on being immersive. Launching my first nuke, seeing it explode on the world map, hearing a faint sound of distant explosion and seeing "London hit, 5 mln dead" was one of the few disturbing experiences I had in games, because the whole game makes you believe that you're really a part of it and not just a person from outside that interacts with it.
This level of immersion is achievable in roguelikes, but it's entirely up to player. If player puts his imagination to work when playing a roguelike then it's going to be a convincing experience, and the other way around. Of course you can help their imagination with descriptions (procedurally generated rape scenes? now that's something you'd never expect to see).
Overall, I get where your idea comes from and have nothing against it, after all it's just a game.
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You submit a single case where a person engaged in a behavior and later exhibited no signs of detrimental effects. I submit a single case where a person engaged in role playing antisocial characteristics and when subsequently exposed to severe stress, acted out those same characteristics in real life. What is proved? Nothing.
You didn't submit any case, you just mentioned how would you feel about someone spending his free time playing a game based in vile actions; my response was connected to this. Seriously.
If you are truly interested in the subject:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/media-spotlight/201304/can-video-games-cause-violence (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/media-spotlight/201304/can-video-games-cause-violence)
Thanks for the link. I found it really interesting.
The last paragraph is very interesting:
"As for the question of whether video games are really harmful, the lack of a clear answer after decades of research suggest that the real problem may well lie with our not being able to ask the right questions."
It doesn't make any sense in my head whatsoever saying that we might be asking the wrong questions, when these questions are the subject themselves. If the answers are not conclusive, I just think they should remain open until a conclusion is found.
You don't know, I don't know, the experts don't know.
I do know that virtual vile actions doesn't harm me and many others. They might harm someone without a shadow of doubt, that's why viewer discretion is advised and none of us should be forced to endure through stuff we might not be comfortable with.
My opinion on how violent games can affect persons is quite simple, some people are simply more open to suggestion and more influenced than others; some people simply possess a deeper predisposition to execute evil acts while others may prefer to make a stand through peace. Hence these type of studies often resulting in inconclusive results because each one of us experiences life in different ways. You can't simply have the manual: "Human Behavior for Dummies" and expect to understand the whole mankind.
I happen to prefer placing my bets on the safe side.
Which makes total sense.
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(procedurally generated rape scenes? now that's something you'd never expect to see).
LMAO!
Overall, I get where your idea comes from and have nothing against it, after all it's just a game.
Thanks. That was really nice to read.
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The player's actions are justified because he has a goal. Which often is to save the world... from enemies. So it's a lot like war and as we know in war killing is ok.
Those actions are called war crimes, remember Vietnam's incident with the American soldiers? You can't simply kill / harm innocent people with the excuse of being at war. Instead of Skyrim take Fallout as example, I guess Fallout makes way more sense for what I was trying say previously.
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If the actions were part of the plot, then they maybe would not be so gratuitous? But on the other hand, player would be confronted with these things regardless if he wanted or not.
That's the main problem with it, I don't want to force those actions on people, I wouldn't like that myself. I want players to be the ones who tell what happens next.
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I submit a single case where a person engaged in role playing antisocial characteristics and when subsequently exposed to severe stress, acted out those same characteristics in real life.
You didn't submit any case, you just mentioned how would you feel about someone spending his free time playing a game based in vile actions; my response was connected to this. Seriously.
I submitted the case right there in that statement.
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This is pretty lame. I'm not a big fan of the thread in general, as it's pretty obvious why people would be uncomfortable with a game that features child molestation and animal torture, but you just know asking a question like "why shouldn't I include the possibility of being a rapist in my role playing game?" is going to lead to someone posting "hookup culture = rape culture" talking points from their Android device. And there it is.
Funny, I find out to be lame seeing people being against vile options that no one is forced to use and that are not even part of the game's core.
To each one his own, I guess.
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I submit a single case where a person engaged in role playing antisocial characteristics and when subsequently exposed to severe stress, acted out those same characteristics in real life.
You didn't submit any case, you just mentioned how would you feel about someone spending his free time playing a game based in vile actions; my response was connected to this. Seriously.
I submitted the case right there in that statement.
And I still believe my answer is connected to it. I see no point on lying myself about it.
However, if I understand the OP correctly, he is not addressing the idea of promoting questionable behaviors but merely making them available. I do not understand why.
Out of curiosity. You still don't understand why I wish to include those options? I've added more information about it after this post of yours.
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You can't simply kill / harm innocent people with the excuse of being at war.
Of course you can and it happens all the time. Sometimes these war crimes are addressed afterwards, but only if it's possible.
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Of course you can and it happens all the time. Sometimes these war crimes are addressed afterwards, but only if it's possible.
Which will always be an evil action regardless of how you can justify it. My initial discussion was about people being ok with committing crimes in Skyrim. Killing an innocent person or an animal just for fun is an evil act, which people seem to be ok with it.
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This is pretty lame. I'm not a big fan of the thread in general, as it's pretty obvious why people would be uncomfortable with a game that features child molestation and animal torture, but you just know asking a question like "why shouldn't I include the possibility of being a rapist in my role playing game?" is going to lead to someone posting "hookup culture = rape culture" talking points from their Android device. And there it is.
Funny, I find out to be lame seeing people being against vile options that no one is forced to use and that are not even part of the game's core.
To each one his own, I guess.
This thread is so bad. What is the point of discussing this anyway? You take pains to say you're only talking about irrelevant features (you know, the kinds of things people who actually write games don't include), as though this makes an essential difference in the normative question you pose. First, it doesn't. Second, who cares if it does? Who's going to write the value neutral, noncompulsory child rape game?
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This thread is so bad. What is the point of discussing this anyway? You take pains to say you're only talking about irrelevant features (you know, the kinds of things people who actually write games don't include), as though this makes an essential difference in the normative question you pose. First, it doesn't. Second, who cares if it does? Who's going to write the value neutral, noncompulsory child rape game?
I actually care for everyone's opinion because it helps me to better understand mankind, how people work. If you think that this topic is that bad, I really don't understand why you keep reading it and posting in it. I guess you just needed to make sure I knew about the way you feel about it. It is absolutely fine with me if you view these features as pointless, but don't take that argument as everyone's ultimatum.
I actually find this thread quite interesting. I enjoy a lot noticing different point of views even if I totally disagree with them.
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Out of curiosity. You still don't understand why I wish to include those options? I've added more information about it after this post of yours.
Honestly you could add an encyclopedia's worth of information and I still wouldn't understand. I'm rather glad I don't.
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Honestly you could add an encyclopedia's worth of information and I still wouldn't understand. I'm rather glad I don't.
That's cool with me as long you don't blame me for not understand it. I don't understand myself how can someone enjoy Pacific Rim, but this is a problem of mine.
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Gangway!
w00t? No need to flame […] I always found the argument that "I'm your elder, so I must be wiser" very rude and frankly counterproductive)
If you are much older than I am (36) than there is a high probably than you have learned that: 'we shouldn't discount what others say just because we might disagree with them' before I did. This type of knowledge is something we teach to kids, at least this is what happens from where I come from. I think now you understand why I reacted the way I did. Being called a kid is not exactly a compliment.
Then we're about the same age. You're a year older, so I kneel to your superior XP pool ;) What I reacted to, however, was your very hostile reply to a completely sensible post. In your original message, you seemed to be honestly asking what people would think about adding atrocious actions to a RL. Rickton replied with some points that are important to consider before doing something like that, without condemning where you're coming from. Then, you were the one who got overly emotional and accused him of being immature, just because he pointed out that it's not completely unproblematic to add rape into a computer game.
Touching upon this, but hopefully getting on with the discussion, I'm not too fond of the emotional/rational dichotomy you seem to be using. I sincerely think that emotion is an extremely important part of human intelligence; amongst other things, it constitutes some essential justifications for why we have ethics in the first place. Without emotion, there can be no reason, only rationalism.
And so: Coming from the "simulationist" side of things, it's justifiable to claim that the player should be allowed to do evil. I'm all on board here, considering emergent gameplay. In a RL, it makes sense to allow killing the villagers instead of running their petty errands and leaving your hardearned gold in their shops. Now, some game explicitly disallow killing friendly NPCs, others will let people react badly to evil PCs, yet others will just feature NPCs who stand unimpressed by as you hack down their neighbors for no apparent reason. Different solutions work well for different types of games, of course.
Implementing rape and torture (to stay with those examples) takes it a step further, though, and can't solely be justified by saying it's up to the player how the PC acts. The reason is that these are corner cases that need to be explicitly developed and coded. There are other, similarly specific actions, you are going to leave out, whether it be training birds, making paper, sleeping, shitting and pissing (yes, seriously ;)), helping out at the orphanage, whatever. As a designer, you need to justify (to yourself, at least) why you are putting effort into including some of this and excluding other things. For fun? To make a point? And you must acknowledge that you giving the player this particular agency has to do with how the PC is portrayed. I recently read a related discussion, where Red Dead Redemption was mentioned. (I haven't played it myself, so I'm just paraphrasing what others said) The game includes prostitutes with which the PC can interact. He is explicitly prevented from having sex with them, because he's a married man, and this is to say something about his moral fiber. However, he will gladly kill prostitutes by tying them to the railroad tracks and waiting for a train. In an example like that, the "simulationist" argument doesn't really hold water. The designers specifically disallowed one immoral act and allowed another. The only logical conclusion is that the hero of that game is designed to be a misogynistic asshole of the first degree. If the designers would disagree with this reading, it makes them the assholes (or just stupidly inconsiderate), IMHO. As a side note: Don't fall into the trap of believing that it's somehow controversial to allow sadistic murder of prostitutes. This features in many, many mainstream games, and the "value neutral" portrayal of such violence is something we should rather work against as game enthusiasts.
Taking a step back and considering films with controversial content, for instance, there are a whole bunch of movies, eg. splatters, torture porn, and actually most action movies, which portray different kinds of violence for the entertainment value. There are also movies which take on difficult themes and try to treat them in a respectful and serious way. On the subject of child molestation, an example might be Mystic River. I think there's room for both kinds (and various expressions which fall somewhere in the middle, being at once spectacularly gruesome whilst trying to make a point). And, for instance, stories about heroic men exterminating aberrants in the name of good isn't exactly a modern phenomenon. Yet, as an audience and certainly as a creator, I find much more satisfaction in films/games/whatever which treat their mature themes in a mature way. I grew up with Peter Jackson's Bad Taste and all that, so I couldn't care less about the Nth installment of Saw. Stuff like that seems to me more or less a wasted effort, although I guess each generation needs its collection of "shocking" media. Still, I applaud a movie like Pasolini's Salò, which is one of the most stomach-churning movies ever made, and on level that makes stuff like Cannibal Holocaust seem just lame.
Treating a subject matter in a serious way will probably not piss off the people who actually matter. Some prudes might principally scoff at a game which features certain crimes, and many victims of said crimes will want to avoid such games most of the time. But I think, if you want to include rape, for instance, you should do it in such a way that even a rape victim would say: "This game gives a realistic/meaningful portrayal of rape, and whether or not I would want to experience the game myself, I respect the designer for making it." I think victims of particularly violent crimes never stop thinking and talking about their experiences (Primo Levi makes this point about survivors of the Holocaust), although they might feel uncomfortable with rape jokes at a dinner party. Treating the topic of evil isn't only "acceptable", it's actually very necessary to do, for us as a society and as individuals. In other words: If you do feel like there are no issues raised by the addition of rape and torture in your game, it probably means you should just leave it.
So ... in a RL/open world game ... I would love to be allowed to control an evil protagonist, if it made me feel like I went away from the game somehow richer in experience. If it's "just for fun", though, I think that adding something like rape is in bad taste, so much that it might put me off trying the game in the first place. And please note that I'm talking about explicitly implementing sadism here, in which case the argument that "it's the player's choice" really doesn't fly. Sure, every now and then I play ADOM and end up exterminating Dwarf Town just for laughs. But I would not approve if Biskup had added the option to gratuitously molest children in his game.
As always,
Minotauros
PS. 2013's RL of the Year, Noxico is sex-themed, and I think it's even planned to feature procedural rape. To me, that seems pretty "meh" at best, morally repugnant at worst; in any case, of course there's room in this world for a game like that, and I don't believe anyone becomes a bad person from ASCII fantasies about giving rimjobs to centaurs.
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First off: Expecting to engage in an argument without emotions is illogical. If you or anyone else thinks they are the special snowflake that can argue without emotion then you are lying to yourself and others. Its like you are interested in Ballistics Research, so you throw a grenade into your family room and then complain that no one appreciates your wonderful scientific experiment -- after all it was designed with inhuman logic! so wtf! ...
Anyway.. There is a difference between books/films and video-games: audience participation. The former requires passive interaction, the latter requires active interaction. Watching or reading about a rape or a torture is inherently different than participating in one. The degree of interaction correlates with emotional immersion. It is bad enough that we as a people have become desensitized to killing by the unending bombardment on our senses by both active and passive death modelling. Do we really need to turn up the dial on interactive rape and torture? Does it seem like a particularly smart and or necessary idea within the realm of your purportedly inhuman logic?
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Good point. The question isn't really: "Might my violent game directly make someone violent in real life?" but rather how one wants to make one's (tiny) impact in the field of culture as a whole. Handled in a good way, though, I think that player agency can precisely be what makes games an interesting medium to explore atrocity. There are examples of theatrical/cinematic narratives that break the fourth wall and imply the audience as somehow complicit, by force of their voyeurism. Maybe the original example is Brecht's Dreigroschenoper. In film, there are examples like Funny games (shamelessly ripping off Brecht in this regard) and I guess something like Man Bites Dog could be mentioned. The point is, playing a game about violence does remain in the realm of voyeurism, even if it's taken up a notch by letting the player dictate which act of violence should come next. For that very reason, I'm sure a good game about violence could make some interesting points about violence-as-entertainment in itself and maybe even bring some players to introspect a bit, more than a book or a movie.
As always,
Minotauros
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Then we're about the same age. You're a year older, so I kneel to your superior XP pool ;) What I reacted to, however, was your very hostile reply to a completely sensible post. In your original message, you seemed to be honestly asking what people would think about adding atrocious actions to a RL. Rickton replied with some points that are important to consider before doing something like that, without condemning where you're coming from. Then, you were the one who got overly emotional and accused him of being immature, just because he pointed out that it's not completely unproblematic to add rape into a computer game.
My problem with Rickton's post was related with two things: The explanation of the obvious regarding "respecting the opinion of others" (come on) and the pissing and shitting suggestion filled with pure sarcasm. It had nothing to do with how he views the rape / torture features. Think about it, I had this discussion dozens of times before, his statements didn't exactly come as a surprise to me.
Touching upon this, but hopefully getting on with the discussion, I'm not too fond of the emotional/rational dichotomy you seem to be using. I sincerely think that emotion is an extremely important part of human intelligence; amongst other things, it constitutes some essential justifications for why we have ethics in the first place. Without emotion, there can be no reason, only rationalism.
I could say this to be quite subjective. You don't need emotions to realize that saving 1000 people is better than saving 10 (logic at play), however you could choose saving those 10 persons because one of them is your beloved one (emotions at play). When I say logic, I mean having it controlling a huge chunk over the decisive factor. We are not robots we do need the emotional side, unfortunately if the emotional side takes control over a decision, it will cloud our sense to accurately judge a situation. A court of law acts upon logic to make logical decisions.
As a designer, you need to justify (to yourself, at least) why you are putting effort into including some of this and excluding other things. For fun? To make a point?
I never mentioned anything about things I might be excluding by implementing those infamous features. I didn't exclude anything to include those options as a matter of fact.
And please note that I'm talking about explicitly implementing sadism here, in which case the argument that "it's the player's choice" really doesn't fly.
Oh but it does fly right trough it, the same way you are the one that decides if you character will be a good or a bad fellow. It is exactly the same thing. They are called options exactly because you get to decide which ones to take. They require player input to be triggered. Having the torture option is exactly the same thing as having the option to drop an item whenever you feel like doing it, mechanics wise. Emotionally it is different story, which the player can still control in the end, so why the fuss? You can disable those options through the option menu, meaning they will not be present in the game's action list. It simply doesn't make any sense to me being against gaming features that are not forced upon you; something that only triggers with your own will.
For all these years I've been discussing this topic, none of those who are against it managed to make perfect sense to me. It must definitely be my fault. Maybe giving priority to logic is a problem for many people, in which case I do thank myself for being in such way. Every time I let emotions getting in the way I end up doing things I regret.
I don't believe anyone becomes a bad person from ASCII fantasies about giving rimjobs to centaurs.
Unfortunately there are people who believe that.
Anyway, thanks for the time and effort you put in elaborating your whole post. I did enjoy reading it and it did touch some important aspects regarding this issue.
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Do we really need to turn up the dial on interactive rape and torture?
That is something that you, the player, will decide. You are not forced to play or download anything you don't want. Horror movies affect you that much? Don't watch them.
Does it seem like a particularly smart and or necessary idea within the realm of your purportedly inhuman logic?
Does it seem particularly smart developing some many war games? Oh yeah, killing is nowadays something acceptable in video games, because it got trivial. Basically, now killing is just cool 8) and don't forget to add all sorts of agonizing screams to the victims in video games, with bones being broken, loads of blood and gore, just in name of immersion and because it is just cool.
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This thread is so bad. What is the point of discussing this anyway? You take pains to say you're only talking about irrelevant features (you know, the kinds of things people who actually write games don't include), as though this makes an essential difference in the normative question you pose. First, it doesn't. Second, who cares if it does? Who's going to write the value neutral, noncompulsory child rape game?
I actually care for everyone's opinion because it helps me to better understand mankind, how people work. If you think that this topic is that bad, I really don't understand why you keep reading it and posting in it. I guess you just needed to make sure I knew about the way you feel about it. It is absolutely fine with me if you view these features as pointless, but don't take that argument as everyone's ultimatum.
I actually find this thread quite interesting. I enjoy a lot noticing different point of views even if I totally disagree with them.
I would be interested in hearing different points of view on something with some technical substance relevant to roguelike games, but this is, with few exceptions, just a slow motion freshman English bullshit session hosted on web 1.0.
AgingMinotaur lays it out pretty well above. Aside from that, I don't think we're likely to learn anything new about a subject that's been flogged to death since the mid-90s and the fact that you have an internet connection suggests to me that you haven't been living in the sort of isolation for the last 20 years that would result in an unfamiliarity with the stale talking points being bandied about in this thread. (Although given that you took the unusual step of discussing the implementation of horserape with your coworkers, I doubt any of this will close the matter for you...)
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I would be interested in hearing different points of view on something with some technical substance relevant to roguelike games, but this is, with few exceptions, just a slow motion freshman English bullshit session hosted on web 1.0.
AgingMinotaur lays it out pretty well above. Aside from that, I don't think we're likely to learn anything new about a subject that's been flogged to death since the mid-90s and the fact that you have an internet connection suggests to me that you haven't been living in the sort of isolation for the last 20 years that would result in an unfamiliarity with the stale talking points being bandied about in this thread. (Although given that you took the unusual step of discussing the implementation of horserape with your coworkers, I doubt any of this will close the matter for you...)
Sorry if my English is not that great, as you said and quite well, I'm just an English speaking freshman. It is funny though, how your last 3 posts filled with impeccable English failed to add anything useful towards this topic. Well, you did whine about it though, which is a classic procedure for things we feel uncomfortable with. Chill out dude, here, have another mushroom, this time with no patches on it.
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I failed to see the logic behind: unusual + horserape + co-workers. I guess the problem must be related to my freshman English.
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Sorry guys, I'll have to break connection for now. I'll probably just come here again tomorrow morning.
Hang on here Mushroom Patch, I mean muchroom patch as in a common noun - you should revise that. Nah, I'm just messing with you. :P
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This thread is so bad. What is the point of discussing this anyway?
I think we are getting into something interesting which is the concept of enemy. It's always the others: other tribe, other country, other creatures... I think when we kill creatures in games it's more than just a game, you know. Killing others is good, right? It gives us more resources and better chance to survive. Of course it doesn't help that other creatures try to kill us, too. But in real life wars and conflicts come from the concept of enemy, because without it we would see everyone as friends or at least not enemies.
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This thread is so bad. What is the point of discussing this anyway?
I think we are getting into something interesting which is the concept of enemy. It's always the others: other tribe, other country, other creatures... I think when we kill creatures in games it's more than just a game, you know. Killing others is good, right? It gives us more resources and better chance to survive. Of course it doesn't help that other creatures try to kill us, too. But in real life wars and conflicts come from the concept of enemy, because without it we would see everyone as friends or at least not enemies.
This has been another penetrating reflection on humanity by Krice, roguelike philosopher.
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OK, I thought I was done, but I'm going to give myself one last chance to try and clarify what I'm trying to say (plus give some suggestions of other evil actions) without the "freshman English bullshit" (I think? I don't really know what that even means).
I never mentioned anything about things I might be excluding by implementing those infamous features. I didn't exclude anything to include those options as a matter of fact.
You're not necessarily excluding things by implementing other things, but there will be things that you can't do in the game, just by the fact that you won't have programmed them in. Maybe they weren't explicitly excluded, but they won't have been included when rape was.
There are tons of evil things you can do (for varying degrees of "evil") that aren't rape, and would probably be more interesting from a gameplay perspective. For example:
- Kidnapping people and ransoming them back to their families for massive amounts of money
- Selling kidnapped people into slavery, or enslaving them yourself to have them build a giant gold statue of you, fight for your amusement, join your army, etc.
- Cooking your dead enemies into meat pies and selling them to the unsuspecting populace
- Deposing the king, taking over, and imposing draconian laws to imprison and execute all who oppose you
- Bribing the doctor in town to steal people's organs and give to you to sell on the black market/make potions out of
- Buying up all the houses in town and renting them at extortionate rates and never doing any repairs
- Burning down the homeless shelter
- Burning the farmer's fields so the people have no food to eat, then selling them imported food for massively inflated rates (or just letting them starve)
- Sneaking into people's homes and poisoning their food
- Putting addictive drugs in candy and giving it away
And please note that I'm talking about explicitly implementing sadism here, in which case the argument that "it's the player's choice" really doesn't fly.
Oh but it does fly right trough it, the same way you are the one that decides if you character will be a good or a bad fellow. It is exactly the same thing. They are called options exactly because you get to decide which ones to take. They require player input to be triggered. Having the torture option is exactly the same thing as having the option to drop an item whenever you feel like doing it, mechanics wise. Emotionally it is different story, which the player can still control in the end, so why the fuss? You can disable those options through the option menu, meaning they will not be present in the game's action list. It simply doesn't make any sense to me being against gaming features that are not forced upon you; something that only triggers with your own will.
You can't just absolve yourself of all responsibility by saying "It's the player's choice!" Sure, you're not forcing anyone to chose the bad options, but you're putting them in where most games don't.
Games are always limited by what actions are possible in the game world. In most games, you can't rape people. The game doesn't make it a bad thing, it makes it downright impossible, the rules of the universe won't allow you to do it.
If you put the option to rape someone in the game, then regardless of how it's handled in the game, regardless of how bad the consequences are and how much the game makes clear that it's an evil action, it becomes something that you are allowed to do by the game. And you can wave your hands and say "it's the player's choice!" all you want, but you're the one giving them that choice, and pretending you had nothing to do with it is completely dishonest.
Like I said before, having true "choice" in a game is impossible, there are always things you can't choose to do, and so by putting rape in the game, you are putting priority on rape as one of the choices possible to make vs an infinite number of other choices that could be made instead (and, while the other immoral choices might offend some people, would probably be much less controversial). And that's the "why" I keep asking about. I know you want to offer a wide range of player choice, but why is rape specifically a "choice" that you want to give priority to, despite evidence it might not be the best idea?*
(*And I just want to make clear, I'm not trying to imply it's some kind of subconscious rape fantasy on your part or anything, there are plenty of reasons: Shock value, stubbornness, want to make some kind of statement about something, because nobody else is doing it, historical accuracy, it's the most evil action you can think of and so it needs to be in a moral choice game, etc.)
EDIT:
OK, one last point, and this is from a game design perspective. If you did decide to implement rape in the game, one of the things to look out for is how it's implemented. And obviously, I have no idea how it is/would be, but here's a potential pitfall I can see:
Depending on how the morality system of the game would work, I would imagine that raping someone would be a very evil action, get you a lot of "evil points" or area notoriety, or however it works. The problem you would have to worry about is, not making it the quickest and "easiest" way to be evil. Because then you might run into the problem of people playing the game who want to be evil, who pick the rape option just because it "makes" them evil the fastest...it would still technically be their "choice," but one which the gameplay implicitly encourages because it's faster and easier to be evil that way vs stealing money from the temple or whatever. And that, I think, would be even worse than making it a mandatory part of the plot, because it would completely trivialize it.
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OK, I thought I was done, but I'm going to give myself one last chance to try and clarify what I'm trying to say (plus give some suggestions of other evil actions) without the "freshman English bullshit" (I think? I don't really know what that even means).
Yeah.. sometimes I simply skip his comments in many other threads because most of the time I need to read and re-read what he posts to make sense out of it. I'm not saying with this that the problem is his.
You're not necessarily excluding things by implementing other things, but there will be things that you can't do in the game, just by the fact that you won't have programmed them in. Maybe they weren't explicitly excluded, but they won't have been included when rape was.
There are tons of evil things you can do (for varying degrees of "evil") that aren't rape, and would probably be more interesting from a gameplay perspective. For example:
Excluding is removing something from somewhere. I can't exclude something that didn't exist in first place. Yes, we can go philosophical and state then when you devote time to something, something else could be done instead but that doesn't apply specifically to raping or torture; It doesn't exactly states that incorporating a certain set of options will result in having less options in another category, it just tells that the game will take longer to be developed because there is a higher number of options to implement.
- Kidnapping people and ransoming them back to their families for massive amounts of money
- Selling kidnapped people into slavery, or enslaving them yourself to have them build a giant gold statue of you, fight for your amusement, join your army, etc.
- Cooking your dead enemies into meat pies and selling them to the unsuspecting populace
- Deposing the king, taking over, and imposing draconian laws to imprison and execute all who oppose you
- Bribing the doctor in town to steal people's organs and give to you to sell on the black market/make potions out of
- Buying up all the houses in town and renting them at extortionate rates and never doing any repairs
- Burning down the homeless shelter
- Burning the farmer's fields so the people have no food to eat, then selling them imported food for massively inflated rates (or just letting them starve)
- Sneaking into people's homes and poisoning their food
- Putting addictive drugs in candy and giving it away
Those are options that could coexist easily with both torturing and raping, in fact kidnapping and ransoming is already including in my list as well as cannibalism. I can continuously add options to my game until I die. I do thank you for mentioning them!
You can't just absolve yourself of all responsibility by saying "It's the player's choice!".
True, you need something like a EULA instead, informing the player that the author is not responsible for any harm that might occur by using his game and that he will use that software at his own risk. The user will not be able to play / install the game until he complies with that agreement. Of course the message will be much longer and in more detail, supervised under my lawyer's knowledge. No worries.
And that's the "why" I keep asking about. I know you want to offer a wide range of player choice, but why is rape specifically a "choice" that you want to give priority to, despite evidence it might not be the best idea?*
I never said anything about giving priority to any of those fiendish options nor I classify them as special; that's how people who are against those tend to view them, not me. These options will actually be the last ones I will implement because there are many other importing things I need to take care of. The torture and raping are just 2 extra options available, if you remove them you still have a shit load of things you can do in the game. If my fast calculations are correct, raping and torture cover only about 0.5% of the game's total features. Just the game's crafting system may provide about 40% of the things you will be able to do in it, this includes, crafting every single item the game has, (I'm talking about creating items with dozens of thousands of possible combinations), including building shelters, houses and even castles.
(*And I just want to make clear, I'm not trying to imply it's some kind of subconscious rape fantasy on your part or anything, there are plenty of reasons: Shock value, stubbornness, want to make some kind of statement about something, because nobody else is doing it, historical accuracy, it's the most evil action you can think of and so it needs to be in a moral choice game, etc.)
In short, I'll just go with freedom and reality, for whatever people might think this actually means. I know what this means and that is enough for me.
Catch you tomorrow.
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I don't understand the point of this discussion. Is this supposed to be a thought experiment? Depictions of rape or torture are inherently more disturbing and taboo than depictions of murder because history and because culture. Killing an orc is not killing an orc, it is being awesome. Killing the guy who sees you commit the crime is not killing the guy, it is being James Bond. These things are admittedly masturbatory little micro-fantasies, but they do no harm because they are entirely concentered in the self. Rape is specifically about the other - having power over the other, and abusing it. That is not a neutral, exploratory element to introduce into a happy little pretend video game. Stuff like that has a way of bleeding out into the world.
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I don't understand the point of this discussion. Is this supposed to be a thought experiment? Depictions of rape or torture are inherently more disturbing and taboo than depictions of murder because history and because culture. Killing an orc is not killing an orc, it is being awesome. Killing the guy who sees you commit the crime is not killing the guy, it is being James Bond. These things are admittedly masturbatory little micro-fantasies, but they do no harm because they are entirely concentered in the self. Rape is specifically about the other - having power over the other, and abusing it. That is not a neutral, exploratory element to introduce into a happy little pretend video game. Stuff like that has a way of bleeding out into the world.
It is definitely a thought exercise. I was very curious to see how roguelike players would handle this issue; I was in fact expecting mixed feelings about it and I think my hunch was right. During all these years that I've been discussing this topic I've also learned that there are persons who are not bothered at all with this issue but that simply feel too uncomfortable of admitting it publicly.
Killing an orc is not killing an orc, it is being awesome.
For you, it might be awesome, for some people it might not be that great, specially if it is an innocent orc, like an infant orc.
Killing the guy who sees you commit the crime is not killing the guy, it is being James Bond.
If you kill a guy who committed a crime, you become a murderer yourself by our own society's moral code and established rules of conduct. It is fine with me that you think that you are James Bond, some people will simply disagree with that ending up recriminating you, even if we are talking about video games.
What I'm seeing here Jim is you attempting to explain the motives of some actions based only on your own character's principles. I, me and myself, can't simply put out an argument towards a public audience, explaining them that torturing in a virtual setting or whatever you want, is this much worst or that much good when I can't be everyone.
Everything has a way of bleeding into the world because we are all different with different degrees of acceptance against everything we come in contact with. For some people Metal music shouldn't be allowed, abortion shouldn't be allowed, gay marriage shouldn't be allowed, violent movies shouldn't be allowed, eating cows shouldn't be allowed, man wearing long hair shouldn't be allowed, piercings shouldn't be allowed and I'm not even going to mention racial subjects. Other people may be perfectly fine with accepting all that I just described, including having torture and raping features in virtual setting, I'm one of those persons.
Rape is specifically about the other - having power over the other, and abusing it. That is not a neutral, exploratory element to introduce into a happy little pretend video game. Stuff like that has a way of bleeding out into the world.
Me having a gun pointed at you forcing my will upon yourself will turn out to be exactly the same thing; It might not be about torture or sexual abuse, but I sure can abuse you mentally and force you to do things against your own moral code. For example, I can force you killing that child next to you by threatening killing your whole family in case you fail to do so. This is me having complete power over you.
PS: It is not a little pretend game, it is a massive pretending little game.
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In more immersive games, a dopamine hot-wiring of the brain smashes up against existing cultural tropes. Therefore, pressing buttons = I am not in my mother's basement; I am a good and worthy person; I could have been a hero in a different time. Self-contained and relatively harmless, maybe even beneficial if it gives a person who feels stymied a way to feel good about themselves and/or some kind of exploratory outlet. It can be a completed circuit in and of itself. This goes for killing orcs and putting red gems in a row in order to get a bonus score.
Fantasized rape/sadism is neither self-contained nor masturbatory. It can't be. Guess what pedophiles have? Child porn on their computer. This is not an arbitrary correlation. It is stoking the fires that lead up to the final, horrible act. You mention that rape/sadism is portrayed elsewhere, and is this is true, but there is a HUGE difference. It is almost always portrayed with the goal of creating empathy for the victim. A game where you are potentially the rapist creates the opposite effect. Even the movie Funny Games creates empathy, perhaps even more so --- we are being held hostage ourselves as the sadists display increasing powers of luck and eventual omnipotence. We feel powerless. We are the victims.
Look, if I bought wholesale into the soccer mom mentality of "If they see it, they'll do it" hysteria, I would not be playing video games. But psychologically, there is a subtle but extremely important difference between imagined acts of (anti)heroic impersonal violence and imagined acts of personal, hateful violence like rape or torture. The first is a raging wolf-cry against the vast and terrifying universe, and the second is that wolf-cry gone rabid and spiteful - the transformation of some kind of existential anxiety into the desire to hold the power of the universe over another human being, to make them feel worse than you feel, to become their vengeful god on the mountain. The latter is something that cannot be satisfied within a fantasy world.
Me having a gun pointed at you forcing my will upon yourself will turn out to be exactly the same thing; It might not be about torture or sexual abuse, but I sure can abuse you mentally and force you to do things against your own moral code. For example, I can force you killing that child next to you by threatening killing your whole family in case you fail to do so. This is me having complete power over you.
If that's what you're talking about as far as content for a game goes, then I don't see a problem and in fact am intrigued. The player isn't an empowered psychopath in this situation. It is teaching empathy with the individual plight of the desperate and the powerless (Somali pirates, starving rebels, blah blah blah), which is sorely lacking in most mass-produced entertainment and in fact most first-world countries. I would actually like to see more hard choices in games rather than the usual "help the old lady across the street" or "kick her and steal her purse" idiocy.
But if you are contriving a given situation and suggesting "this is an example of X, rape/sadism is another example of X, therefore they have the same effect when portrayed" then I think I know why you are having such a difficult time reaching a common point of agreement with most people that you've talked to about this. You have mentioned logic several times in this thread. Maybe you need to think about this in a wider scope. I do not know whether you are neurotypical and frankly it is none of my business, but for the 98% of humanity that is NT (including a few outliers like Einstein) it is undisputed that real world situations cannot be distilled into logical expressions to any particular illumination. The world is simply too complicated, with too many subtle associations between the elements in play, to take a real issue "solve it" logically. This ain't A = B, therefore A + C = B + C ... surely you are not approaching the issue from this stance?
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Fantasized rape/sadism is neither self-contained nor masturbatory. It can't be. Guess what pedophiles have? Child porn on their computer. This is not an arbitrary correlation. It is stoking the fires that lead up to the final, horrible act. You mention that rape/sadism is portrayed elsewhere, and is this is true, but there is a HUGE difference. It is almost always portrayed with the goal of creating empathy for the victim. A game where you are potentially the rapist creates the opposite effect. Even the movie Funny Games creates empathy, perhaps even more so --- we are being held hostage ourselves as the sadists display increasing powers of luck and eventual omnipotence. We feel powerless. We are the victims.
Guess what rapists have in their computers, rape video clips from movies. When a rapist watches a movie about raping he will surely view and compare himself with the rapist; he will not feel for the victim being raped; those rape scenes will definitely empowered him making you idea of "we are the victims" truly subjective and remember they also are part of the 'ourselves' you mention.
Look, if I bought wholesale into the soccer mom mentality of "If they see it, they'll do it" hysteria, I would not be playing video games. But psychologically, there is a subtle but extremely important difference between imagined acts of (anti)heroic impersonal violence and imagined acts of personal, hateful violence like rape or torture.
"hateful violence like rape and torture" - what about murdering?. Oh yeah, I keep forgetting, killing nowadays is cool. These are great days for all serial killers out there who get sexually aroused just by killing innocent people, because nowadays their fantasies can be easily simulated through all the virtual and legal violence available. Well maybe this is a good thing, maybe these games where you can kill innocent people 'just-because' will stimulate those lunatics to a point they will not feel compelled performing those crazy ideas in the real world.
But if you are contriving a given situation and suggesting "this is an example of X, rape/sadism is another example of X, therefore they have the same effect when portrayed" then I think I know why you are having such a difficult time reaching a common point of agreement with most people that you've talked to about this.
What I meant was pretty clear. The results of your criteria were easily mimicked by using other variables. Everyone has a hard time accepting everything they do not agree with, regardless of the amount of concisive logic behind 'the' explanation.
You have mentioned logic several times in this thread. Maybe you need to think about this in a wider scope. I do not know whether you are neurotypical and frankly it is none of my business, but for the 98% of humanity that is NT (including a few outliers like Einstein) it is undisputed that real world situations cannot be distilled into logical expressions to any particular illumination. The world is simply too complicated, with too many subtle associations between the elements in play, to take a real issue "solve it" logically. This ain't A = B, therefore A + C = B + C ... surely you are not approaching the issue from this stance?
As I stated before, you can't have a book talking about people and expect to understand the whole mankind. I sure do agree with you the world being too complex but even within such complexity, simplicity still exists. Some things that are simple for ones can be complex for others and vice verse. So how can we both come down to an agreement? We can't, some opinions simply can't come down to an agreement, like religion and science.
My ultimatum is quite simple. Don't like it don't eat it and don't worry about it because no one will force it upon anyone. How can one disagree with this beats me but thankfully I'm no longer trying to understand it.
Nonetheless I enjoyed your writing, I did had to think about it for a moment. From everyone who posted against those options you and AgingMonitaur got me the best writings.
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Ok, my final post is already written but I'll post it only when this thread gets a full day without a single post. Just because. :P
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*** Explanation ***
Ok guys, enough with the charade lol.
You all have just been submitted to an exercise based on an old topic of mine that once was in fact my objective, I mean, including those infamous options in one of my early versions of the project I'm currently implementing. I did discarded their inclusion because once I realized that some harm could be done through them, I really didn't want my game and my name to be part of it. The problem is not the options themselves but the dangerous minds wielding them. The world is simply not ready for them and I doubt it will ever be.
I did brought this discussion to some other forum. However, the forum's admin didn't want his forum to be related to such discussions since the forum was connected to commercial products, namely table RPG books, so the discussion was locked and soon after deleted; the discussion got a little hot too (go figure).
The whole point of doing this was just to see if you would handle the discussion better than those at the other forum and I might say you did handled it quite well. I was also expecting more people not being against these controversial features in comparison which with the other forum and it did happened!
I was extremely surprised by the soothing dialog existing in the first page of this thread, so I thought that some degree of rudeness could change that lol. My wife says I don't react too well to sarcasm, so I took advantage of Rickton's first post having some sarcasm to make the whole discussion a little bit more... alive, just to see if people would change their behavior and opinion. Well, it did work for some, namely for Mushroom Patch.
The funny thing about Rickton's post was that his 'shitting' and 'pissing' suggestion was in fact quite similar to some post that some guy made at the other forum. I actually laugh like a mad when I read Rickton's 'shitting' and 'pissing' argument. Anyway, Rickton I'm really sorry if I got hostile with you ;) but I really needed to do that. I kind of immediately regretted getting "rude" at that moment because I think it was too soon, I should have waited until the thread got about 2 pages, but oh well, I was too excited about it.
Then I just got a little bit of fun with Mushroom Patch, I really wanted to see if he would go hostile if I kept pressing him or if he would simply leave the discussion. Sorry mate if I said something less fortunate but at least I got to know you think I have a terrible english lol! It's all cool!
For the most of my posts it was just me trying to be someone who still believed that raping and torturing were fine options to explore. Damn! God knows how hard it was for me to find arguments hard against AgingMinotaur's and Jim's posts. Well freaking done mates!
I just hope no one will be upset for having me creating a charade thread where you devoted your personal time and effort against something you believe it was really happening; I did mention a few times throughout the whole discussion that I was just curious about your opinions :)
I thank you for your unconscious participation.
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^ ... henceforth known as Lord Douchebag
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yeah, I only ironically made that thread about virtual rape and child molesting. No big deal.
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As tempting as it is to pile on, I suggest we all make a mental note of what has transpired in this thread, then comment on other more worthy topics.
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^ ... henceforth known as Lord Douchebag
I guess your insult is justifiable; I wouldn't say Lord because that would imply you don't know what a true douchbag is, unless you believe that being the ultimate douchbag is someone that creates a charade thread discussing game features like torture and raping, something like April's fool. Anyway, it's cool.
yeah, I only ironically made that thread about virtual rape and child molesting. No big deal.
I guess that doing it ironically would be less worrying than creating it as a fact, at least this is what I think. I just hope this didn't traumatized anyone. If it did, well, my humble apologies, yet again.
As tempting as it is to pile on, I suggest we all make a mental note of what has transpired in this thread, then comment on other more worthy topics.
You just suggested the inevitable.