How realistic is your cup of tea?

[exodiark]

I really don't want to walk around in the game and explicity see how children are brutally murdered or women are raped, etc. Seeing children screaming for help before they are BRUTALLY slained with blood splashing everywhere and women lying in the street crying while the pervert rapist is banging her...

 

No, that is just too much. While something like this could be in the game, I only want it to be implied - if at all. Having something as explicit as this is sick and perverted. Why would someone like to see that in a game? I don't get it. Do you guys want PE to be the most ****ed up game ever created just so it caters to perverted sickos? My god, please NO.

 

Well, it's one way to evoke strong emotions?

Besides, just because they are there, doesn't mean there are LOTS of them. Maybe just one scene, a turning point for the protagonists. Having one scene doesn't mean this game will cater to psychos.

 

And it doesn't have to be rape/child killing for the dark side of life, there are many shunned but relatively "tamer" topics like child slavery, debt slavery, trafficking, poverty (to the level of scrounging food from trash), domestic abuse, cannibalism, and etc. These topics rarely portrayed seriously in other video games, but it does happen (quite often, except for cannibalism) in real life.

 

 

EDIT:

Imagine if your hero is abused as a child, and you see them explicitly. I'm sure it affects how you will choose his actions. Your hero might be a benevolent man/woman because he/she don't want his childhood happens to other kids. Or, you decided your hero to be a vengeful man/woman because his childhood scarred him forever. Or maybe he/she simply gone mad, whose actions is very unpredictable.

Edited September 19, 2012 by exodiark

[exodiark]

Racism and rape and child killings and cannibalism and god knows what else. Seriously? Are we going for shock value now? I'm not one for censorship, but this demand for "realism" sounds more like a want for a "this game is so hardcore and mature cuz it's gots all these crazy ****."

 

And I'm also willing to bet some people here have been on the receiving end of rape. Just think about what some of you guys are saying.

 

Well, "rape" here is only act as an example. But anyway, hard realism is portraying every possible aspect of social life, whether "good" or "bad", realistically. It does not glorify both good and bad side of it, it just portrays social life.

[Veca]

I would like to see a combination of the first two options.

 

Explicit where it fits, and implied where that fits

[casa]

I'm torn between hard and ESBR. Personally I really don't mind hard, gritty and shocking, but there's a fine line between realism and shock effects. I also don't think certain things like rape should be touched in all detail, simply because it might be (understandably) too much for a large part of the audience.

[ET3D]

I'm voting: "I hope Obsidian sticks to its vision and doesn't listen to what's posted on the forum." Obsidian has done well in the past, IMO, and I don't want it to stray from that path.

[Rinu]

I prefer realistically portrayed characters and their behavior. Not everyone is happy, brute, cartoonish jealous or nice (but some are, of course). If nasty things happen, okay, but be sure to do it right.

 

This poll is kind of deterrent example of when mature or realistic is interpreted as gore, shocking, and teh nakid chicks. It's exactly where Witcher fell flat. Its characters, especially female, felt like empty shells filled just for purposes of story. I hope that Obsidian will strike for first instead of The Sun-like themes. It's simpler to smack an occurence of sexual abuse into the game than to write characters in such way where you can see glimpses of their realistic "taints" naturally woven into the world and how they can affect others on a personal level.

Edited September 19, 2012 by Rinu

[dlux]

I'm torn between hard and ESBR. Personally I really don't mind hard, gritty and shocking, but there's a fine line between realism and shock effects. I also don't think certain things like rape should be touched in all detail, simply because it might be (understandably) too much for a large part of the audience.

That is what some of the "gamers" (I use this term very loosely) here want though. They want to explicitly see women get brutally ganged raped in full view so they can watch...

This thread makes my stomach churn. The mods should step up and lock it! This is not what Obsidian wants anyway.

[exodiark]

I prefer realistically portrayed characters and their behavior. Not everyone is happy, brute, cartoonish jealous or nice (but some are, of course). If nasty things happen, okay, but be sure to do it right.

 

This poll is kind of deterrent example of when mature or realistic is interpreted as gore, shocking, and teh nakid chicks. It's exactly where Witcher fell flat. Its characters, especially female, felt like empty shells filled just for purposes of story. I hope that Obsidian will strike for first instead of The Sun-like themes. It's simpler to smack an occurence of sexual abuse into the game than to write characters in such way where you can see glimpses of their realistic "taints" naturally woven into the world and how they can affect others on a personal level.

 

I don't really interpret "realistic" as a gore fest/ orgy street/ game of thrones, those horrible things only act as an example.

My take on "realistic" is, quoting myself, "There are wonderful things out there, but there are no sugar-coating the ugly truths either. Just like IRL."

[casa]

I'm torn between hard and ESBR. Personally I really don't mind hard, gritty and shocking, but there's a fine line between realism and shock effects. I also don't think certain things like rape should be touched in all detail, simply because it might be (understandably) too much for a large part of the audience.

That is what some of the "gamers" (I use this term very loosely) here want though. They want to explicitly see women get brutally ganged raped in full view so they can watch...

This thread makes my stomach churn. The mods should step up and lock it! This is not what Obsidian wants anyway.

 

I'm pretty sure we won't ever see that in this game, not even a hint of that, so just ignore those vibes.

[exodiark]

I'm torn between hard and ESBR. Personally I really don't mind hard, gritty and shocking, but there's a fine line between realism and shock effects. I also don't think certain things like rape should be touched in all detail, simply because it might be (understandably) too much for a large part of the audience.

That is what some of the "gamers" (I use this term very loosely) here want though. They want to explicitly see women get brutally ganged raped in full view so they can watch...

This thread makes my stomach churn. The mods should step up and lock it! This is not what Obsidian wants anyway.

 

I'm pretty sure we won't ever see that in this game, not even a hint of that, so just ignore those vibes.

 

Yes. They are going to market this game after all, of course there won't be extremely shocking materials.

 

But this poll also tests how much shocking materials people are willing to take.

Judging from the poll result, Obsidian has no need to worry about creating slightly controversial contents for people here.

[honkytonk]

I don't have anything against graphical violence or violence against children, so they don't have to shy away from anything for me, BUT I don't want it to be like been hit with a sledge hammer in the manipulative ME3 way.

The whole opening sequence of that game with the child was one of the worst things I've ever seen in any game.

I didn't see a scene and was forced to think for myself or feel an emotional impact because of prior decisions or relationship to certain people. I saw a child dying and was supposed to feel sad, because said child died. This child was 2 minutes earlier introduced with 20 seconds of dialog.... why should I care?

In my eyes it was just handled poorly and that's what I don't want to see with this game.

 

Don't show gore or violence because you want to show gore or violence and for the love of <insert name of your deity here> don't try to force a emotion onto us.

The brutal slaughter of a npc you learned to know over the course of a portion of game will have an impact regardless of the music you play, it doesn't have to be the sad sad music that tries to make you weep. If the character was well written I either grew to like or to hate him and different people tend to have a different perception of characters, so some will say it was sad and others will be pretty happy, but the player should have to make up his own mind about that.

 

What I'm trying to say: no hand holding in the emotions department please.

[exodiark]

I don't have anything against graphical violence or violence against children, so they don't have to shy away from anything for me, BUT I don't want it to be like been hit with a sledge hammer in the manipulative ME3 way.

The whole opening sequence of that game with the child was one of the worst things I've ever seen in any game.

I didn't see a scene and was forced to think for myself or feel an emotional impact because of prior decisions or relationship to certain people. I saw a child dying and was supposed to feel sad, because said child died. This child was 2 minutes earlier introduced with 20 seconds of dialog.... why should I care?

In my eyes it was just handled poorly and that's what I don't want to see with this game.

 

Don't show gore or violence because you want to show gore or violence and for the love of <insert name of your deity here> don't try to force a emotion onto us.

The brutal slaughter of a npc you learned to know over the course of a portion of game will have an impact regardless of the music you play, it doesn't have to be the sad sad music that tries to make you weep. If the character was well written I either grew to like or to hate him and different people tend to have a different perception of characters, so some will say it was sad and others will be pretty happy, but the player should have to make up his own mind about that.

 

What I'm trying to say: no hand holding in the emotions department please.

 

Yes, that opening kid was ugly and tacky XD

Shepard killed lots and lots of people, and now he feels bad about some random kid he barely knows?

[Moonlight Butterfly]

I'm torn between hard and ESBR. Personally I really don't mind hard, gritty and shocking, but there's a fine line between realism and shock effects. I also don't think certain things like rape should be touched in all detail, simply because it might be (understandably) too much for a large part of the audience.

That is what some of the "gamers" (I use this term very loosely) here want though. They want to explicitly see women get brutally ganged raped in full view so they can watch...

This thread makes my stomach churn. The mods should step up and lock it! This is not what Obsidian wants anyway.

 

I don't know, maybe they should do it so they know how serious that is and how it effects the victim.

 

See how they like that... (but yeah I agree with you it's disturbing)

[Nivenus]

I'm a fan of games like The Witcher as well as George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice & Fire, so it'd be the top option for me.

 

However, I'm willing to live with the second option as well.

[Canova]

well i hope they wont go for GRRM level of bleak and depressing. im all for more realistic portrayal of medieval society and i know medieval europe was full of messed up stuff. but video games are suposed to be form of escapism, our own modern wold is depressing enough

Edited September 19, 2012 by Canova

[l3loodangel]

1. Oh there is. There are many literature with characters undergo great character developments after those characters witnessed or experienced a terrible horror, including rape.

 

This doesn't mean you have to rape or something, you might be a newcomer in a VERY chaotic town, and seeing people raped in back alley might set the intended mood of the city. 2. Or it might give you a powerful reason to be a hero and kill every crime lords in the town, or anything really, it depends on your interpretation.

 

1. Men get raped too, especially in prisons. I think we would all love to see your "character development" after that.

2. I am against that my character would be able to march into town and kill everyone or anyone he wants.

Edited September 19, 2012 by l3loodangel

[Stevenaap]

I prefer realistically portrayed characters and their behavior. Not everyone is happy, brute, cartoonish jealous or nice (but some are, of course). If nasty things happen, okay, but be sure to do it right.

 

This poll is kind of deterrent example of when mature or realistic is interpreted as gore, shocking, and teh nakid chicks. It's exactly where Witcher fell flat. Its characters, especially female, felt like empty shells filled just for purposes of story. I hope that Obsidian will strike for first instead of The Sun-like themes. It's simpler to smack an occurence of sexual abuse into the game than to write characters in such way where you can see glimpses of their realistic "taints" naturally woven into the world and how they can affect others on a personal level.

Hear, hear. I'm kind of confused, why are people expecting these ultra violent "themes", if you can call 'em that, all of a sudden? Is it because of the witcher? I don't think the titles any of the members of the dev. team worked on in the past featured that kind of explicit violence. Well I mean sure you could hit a child in the nuts with a sledgehammer, but otherwise I think fallout played it rather coy and so did all of the other titles.

Which also brings me to the next point: PS:T which was generally lauded for it's mature themes wasn't dark and gritty, it got it's appeal from the complexity of the themes and its imaginative world-building. What reason would you have to expect or want the level of grittiness described in this thread for this game?

[Pangur]

I chose 'tamed reality'. I want to see deep political and social problems there, but I definitely don't want horrifying things and explicit violence in this game.

[exodiark]

1. Oh there is. There are many literature with characters undergo great character developments after those characters witnessed or experienced a terrible horror, including rape.

 

This doesn't mean you have to rape or something, you might be a newcomer in a VERY chaotic town, and seeing people raped in back alley might set the intended mood of the city. 2. Or it might give you a powerful reason to be a hero and kill every crime lords in the town, or anything really, it depends on your interpretation.

 

1. Men get raped too, especially in prisons. I think we would all love to see your "character development" after that.

2. I am against that my character would be able to march into town and kill everyone or anyone he wants.

 

My sarcasm responding machine is not working well, but I'll reply anyway.

 

1. Yes, I did say "people," it's gender-ambiguous. And I think you all will be disappointed, I am not a writer so my character development might suck. But in the hands of Obsidian...

 

2. I didn't say anything about killing everyone, and I didn't say that he/she will kill those crime lords with ease. He/she might need help, he/she might need to rally the townsfolk. He/she might succeed, or fail, horribly. Or, you can just join the crime lords, it depends on your choices.

 

And it doesn't have to be rape, there are many other social problems like domestic violence, debt slavery, etc that seldom explicitly show up in video games. They might be "tamer," but they are also realistic and interesting as well.

Edited September 19, 2012 by exodiark

[exodiark]

I prefer realistically portrayed characters and their behavior. Not everyone is happy, brute, cartoonish jealous or nice (but some are, of course). If nasty things happen, okay, but be sure to do it right.

 

This poll is kind of deterrent example of when mature or realistic is interpreted as gore, shocking, and teh nakid chicks. It's exactly where Witcher fell flat. Its characters, especially female, felt like empty shells filled just for purposes of story. I hope that Obsidian will strike for first instead of The Sun-like themes. It's simpler to smack an occurence of sexual abuse into the game than to write characters in such way where you can see glimpses of their realistic "taints" naturally woven into the world and how they can affect others on a personal level.

Hear, hear. I'm kind of confused, why are people expecting these ultra violent "themes", if you can call 'em that, all of a sudden? Is it because of the witcher? I don't think the titles any of the members of the dev. team worked on in the past featured that kind of explicit violence. Well I mean sure you could hit a child in the nuts with a sledgehammer, but otherwise I think fallout played it rather coy and so did all of the other titles.

Which also brings me to the next point: PS:T which was generally lauded for it's mature themes wasn't dark and gritty, it got it's appeal from the complexity of the themes and its imaginative world-building. What reason would you have to expect or want the level of grittiness described in this thread for this game?

 

For me, the closer an art to reality, the more complex and difficult that art is. I appreciate the hard work behind them.

 

For example, which one of these are easier to make?

A simple abstract smiley or hyper-realistic painting of a smiling woman?

In my observation, hyper-realistic paintings take WAY much more time and work, so I appreciate hyper-realistic paintings more. But that's just my preferences and that doesn't mean a smiley is less "artsy" compared to hyper-realistic painting.

[Stevenaap]

For me, the closer an art to reality, the more complex and difficult that art is. I appreciate the hard work behind them.

 

For example, which one of these are easier to make?

A simple abstract smiley or hyper-realistic painting of a smiling woman?

In my observation, hyper-realistic paintings take WAY much more time and work, so I appreciate hyper-realistic paintings more. But that's just my preferences and that doesn't mean a smiley is less "artsy" compared to hyper-realistic painting.

 

I think something can be said for both, but that's not really the point. of course "EXPLICIT racism, rape, child killings, sociopathic disorder, cannibalism in poor areas, and many other taboos" exist in reality, but I don't think adding a sprinkling of misery to the fictional world of PE would make it more realistic per se. Actually I think it's more important for a world to be BELIEVABLE than realistic and that's all up to good world building. There's very few if any RPGs that I would call realistic, but the best once are believable because they are consistent and a lot of effort went into the details, regardless of the setting.

Edited September 19, 2012 by Stevenaap

[dan107]

I say, if it comes up, go for it. Don't force anything in for shock effect, but don't sugarcoat anything that seems appropriate to a character or a situation either.

[l3loodangel]

 

My sarcasm responding machine is not working well, but I'll reply anyway.

 

1. Yes, I did say "people," it's gender-ambiguous. And I think you all will be disappointed, I am not a writer so my character development might suck. But in the hands of Obsidian...

 

2. I didn't say anything about killing everyone, and I didn't say that he/she will kill those crime lords with ease. He/she might need help, he/she might need to rally the townsfolk. He/she might succeed, or fail, horribly. Or, you can just join the crime lords, it depends on your choices.

 

And it doesn't have to be rape, there are many other social problems like domestic violence, debt slavery, etc that seldom explicitly show up in video games. They might be "tamer," but they are also realistic and interesting as well.

 

[Perception success] We are talking about RAPE and not about slavery, racial violence, cannibalism or violent crimes! Pedophilia or child molestation is also a problem of society, but it doest mean I want to see them in the game.

[Crosmando]

Speaking of "realism", I wonder if the game might use the concept of food and hunger.

 

I'm not big of little micro features, but the early Ultima games did this concept well. Just have a party supply of food which drains when you're outside an inn.

[aluminiumtrioxid]

[Perception success] We are talking about RAPE and not about slavery, racial violence, cannibalism or violent crimes! Pedophilia or child molestation is also a problem of society, but it doest mean I want to see them in the game.

 

[Perception success] There is no "we". Only *you* (and a small minority of posters) seem to be fixating on rape exclusively. OP just wants some general grim & gritty stuff going on, and argues that it's a powerful tool. (I think it is, but it's also unnecessary - the developers have proven repeatedly that they are more than capable of delivering strong emotional impact without resorting to such inelegant plot devices. I, however, voted for full realism - if they do decide to present such themes, they shouldn't be held back.)

Edited September 19, 2012 by aluminiumtrioxid