Do you think The Witcher series is "mature?"

[endtherapture]

Been lurking on the Dragon Age Bioware forums today and come across an incredible hatred of The Witcher 2:

Also, calling Witcher series "mature" is like calling XBox Live a civilized discussion platform.

A lot of people appear to have this problem with TW series. Are they just Dragon Age fanboys or is it a legitimate argument?

I found the game pretty mature. It dealt with a mature high politics plot as well as a personal one with realistic and complicated romances, friendships and working relationships. This was across a backdrop of a pseudo realistic medieval fantasy storyline, filled with rape, mysogeny, racism etc. It's no less mature than Game of Thrones, which isn't called out as being immature. Sure it has tits but that's no less mature than the characters in Dragon Age having sex in their underwear?

Your opinions?

 

[Vegosiux]

Well, there's this deal, "mature" and "rated M" are not the same thing. As far as Witcher goes, yeah, it's dark, it doesn't sugarcoat stuff, but at times it just seems as if it's trying too hard to be "mature" and comes across as pretentious. Let's just say that considering my taste in gaming, by all criteira, I should have liked the Witcher series, but I just couldn't enjoy the games.

 

[The Madman]

Witcher is mature in the same way Game of Thrones is, which is to say... sorta?

The game clearly loves to show off the occasional naughty bit and has a love of naughty words as well. An almost child-like glee at times, especially in the first game where it hands out cards and all but giggles to itself in glee.

But then so does Game of Thrones. It's pretty entertaining.

The main things that make The Witcher series more 'mature' tend to be its emphasis on adult topic matter and political intrigue. A kid doesn't give a crap that the King of Temeria is fighting a war over his bastard children because he doesn't want them being used as pretenders to his throne by noble families looking for a casus belli to wage war against him, and yet that's the main plot for the beginning of the Witcher 2 and one that continues throughout the game, with the plot turning towards various kingdom fighting for political control over the Pontar valley and later a political summit to resolve the issue and attempted assassination there.

And while Witcher 2's prevalent themes were political in nature, with the first Witcher the prevalent themes were racism. Persecution of minorities (Non humans) and whether that persecution makes it right for those minority to then turn around and commit acts of, as the US would put it, terrorism.

Not really kids stuff. So while the Witcher series can be a bit childish when it comes to omigoshboobies, yeah, I consider it a pretty mature series. Atleast insofar as any video game can be mature.

 

[BrotherRool]

The Witcher isn't mature in terms of sex, women and NPC dialogue. In fact, it's incredibly immature and half the dialogue has been written by a 13 year old. There's a whole gameplay mechanic that would give people who know what a female is migraine's just thinking about the design of it.

'I couldn't sleep last night over the sound of my neighbour beating his wife' as NPC dialoge is something that belongs in Saints Row, it is the purple dildo of maturity and is only fitting in a game which doesn't understand the words it's using.


However I think once you get over the fact the writers have giggling fits whenever they hear the word 'whore', I think the politics and grey morality is fairly mature. Overall there was too much juvenile crud for me, but fantasy is often famously airy fairy and bringing in some grit is a gesture I can understand a lot of people getting behind. And the racism stuff was done pretty well.


So not Planescape: Torment, and pretty darn juvenile in some aspects, but a decent job in others

 

[endtherapture]

The sex and stuff in TW2 never bothered me. It was kinda just there, lurking in the background. No one made a big deal out of it in-game.

It's a probably with the industry being all like "OMG SEXSEXSEX SEX TITS SEX SEX". Obviously it was a bit less mature in TW1, but the second game grew up a lot.

I only had sex once in the game, and that was the very tender and romantic bath scene with Triss.

The rest of it was no worse than the sex scenes in A Song of Ice and Fire, or Gregor Clegane discussing rape scenes in a Tavern.

 

[The-Traveling-Bard]

'I couldn't sleep last night over the sound of my neighbour beating his wife' as NPC dialoge is something that belongs in Saints Row, it is the purple dildo of maturity and is only fitting in a game which doesn't understand the words it's using.

Err what? That doesn't belong in Saints Row at all. Saints Row is all about fun violence, and characters actually enjoying what they're doing instead of all the gritty realistic stuff that is GTA. ( I like GTA by the way.) I would shocked if they said something that serious.

Anyways that line fits very will in Witcher 2 because that's how their world is. That's how they treated their wives, and that's how they treated women. Hell the first part of the game were soldiers were going to burn dozen, or two dozen people alive in building.

I think a lot of people forget that in the Witcher 2 universe that's how they, and act. Since I doubt 95%(I know this is a made up statistic, but in my life all the people I talked to about the Witcher has never read the books) of the people who played the Witcher has read the books therefor should really shut their mouths on what's immature in the game in the terms of sex, and behaviors when they books are the same damn thing.

Not that I am a Witcher fanboy, but I hate it when people don't realize that's what their universe is like, and that's how it was in the books.

 

[DementedSheep]

Too me it?s both mature and incredibly immature at the same time. The political intrigue, general themes, issues with racism and some of the sex scenes are done maturely yes.
But the out of place fan service crap, the obsession with lesbians, the dick jokes, the constant swearing and ignoring the description of characters because red heads in mini dresses are hotter is not. I don?t like their handling of rape either because they just throw it in all the time. How do we make this situation worse? I know lets have some more rape/attempted rape.

 

[endtherapture]

It's not mature in the slightest. It's being dark for the sake of being dark. It has blood and gore just to have an M-rating. That is far from mature.

Why would it want to have an M-rating if by simply taking the blood out would give the game a better chance at selling more sales?

The blood, gore and sex is there to enhance the atmosphere of the setting and help to tell the story. The story just wouldn't work as well if it was told in a PG rated sense.

 

[BrotherRool]

'I couldn't sleep last night over the sound of my neighbour beating his wife' as NPC dialoge is something that belongs in Saints Row, it is the purple dildo of maturity and is only fitting in a game which doesn't understand the words it's using.

Err what? That doesn't belong in Saints Row at all. Saints Row is all about fun violence, and characters actually enjoying what they're doing instead of all the gritty realistic stuff that is GTA. ( I like GTA by the way.) I would shocked if they said something that serious.

Anyways that line fits very will in Witcher 2 because that's how their world is. That's how they treated their wives, and that's how they treated women. Hell the first part of the game were soldiers were going to burn dozen, or two dozen people alive in building.

I think a lot of people forget that in the Witcher 2 universe that's how they, and act. Since I doubt 95%(I know this is a made up statistic, but in my life all the people I talked to about the Witcher has never read the books) of the people who played the Witcher has read the books therefor should really shut their mouths on what's immature in the game in the terms of sex, and behaviors when they books are the same damn thing.

Not that I am a Witcher fanboy, but I hate it when people don't realize that's what their universe is like, and that's how it was in the books.

That line is absolutely absurd and it's hilarious that they put it into NPC mouths without recognising it's absurd. Maybe I'm not conveying the casual tone, or the fact it's just blurted out to a random stranger without any context. It's like someone saying 'I'm sexually inadequate' in the middle of the street. There is no sensible world where people (a woman at that) would talk so casually about an abusive relationship. It could be something that every accepts, something no-one is willing to stop or talk about. But that's the point, people wouldn't talk about it, they'd just keep quiet, or gossip about it to people they knew. It wouldn't be a casual thing and it would take a very very special sort of person to emphasise the fact that they couldn't get a good nights sleep.

Abuse, okay thats a mature subject, and a society where its accepted as a norm, those have existed(ish) and could be explored in an interesting way. But people wouldn't act like this and it only betrays a complete non-understanding of the topic.



We're not going to agree on this. Apart from anything else, I realise that what I say is probably going to sound like a bit of an insult to yourself, because you felt the dialogue was mature and that aggression on my part is going to ruin any chance of coming to a conclusion. But there is no part of me that can accept that this can happen in anything but a completely absurdist Saints Row esque world where they treat important matters with a snickering irony and absurdity. This game had that without realising what it was doing. When I first heard this line, I almost burst out laughing and then I couldn't believe they put it in the game and then I almost stopped playing the game. And all the NPC dialogue is in a similar vein.

Abuse just plain isn't nice, it messes with peoples heads and can make just functioning like a human being in later life, incredibly difficult and there is absolutely no way a functioning human being with close experience of it would talk about it in that manner. I'm sorry we're going to disagree but I absolutely have to stick with my guns on this one.

. I don?t like there handling of rape either because just throw all the time. How do we make this situation worse? I know lets have some more rape/attempted rape.

This is the worst part for me, and why I don't actually feel bad laying into the devs. I like to believe that they've just had no experience of the matter and through it in because it's something that makes a game 'mature' and gritty without any understanding because frankly the alternative would be unpleasant.

In the game it was almost just a dirty word, like throwing in a fuck for emphasis.

 

[The-Traveling-Bard]

'I couldn't sleep last night over the sound of my neighbour beating his wife' as NPC dialoge is something that belongs in Saints Row, it is the purple dildo of maturity and is only fitting in a game which doesn't understand the words it's using.

Err what? That doesn't belong in Saints Row at all. Saints Row is all about fun violence, and characters actually enjoying what they're doing instead of all the gritty realistic stuff that is GTA. ( I like GTA by the way.) I would shocked if they said something that serious.

Anyways that line fits very will in Witcher 2 because that's how their world is. That's how they treated their wives, and that's how they treated women. Hell the first part of the game were soldiers were going to burn dozen, or two dozen people alive in building.

I think a lot of people forget that in the Witcher 2 universe that's how they, and act. Since I doubt 95%(I know this is a made up statistic, but in my life all the people I talked to about the Witcher has never read the books) of the people who played the Witcher has read the books therefor should really shut their mouths on what's immature in the game in the terms of sex, and behaviors when they books are the same damn thing.

Not that I am a Witcher fanboy, but I hate it when people don't realize that's what their universe is like, and that's how it was in the books.

That line is absolutely absurd and it's hilarious that they put it into NPC mouths without recognising it's absurd. Maybe I'm not conveying the casual tone, or the fact it's just blurted out to a random stranger without any context. It's like someone saying 'I'm sexually inadequate' in the middle of the street. There is no sensible world where people (a woman at that) would talk so casually about an abusive relationship. It could be something that every accepts, something no-one is willing to stop or talk about. But that's the point, people wouldn't talk about it, they'd just keep quiet, or gossip about it to people they knew. It wouldn't be a casual thing and it would take a very very special sort of person to emphasise the fact that they couldn't get a good nights sleep.

This is why I call the game immature. Abuse, okay thats a mature subject, and a society where its accepted as a norm, those have existed(ish) and could be explored in an interesting way. But people wouldn't act like this and it only betrays a complete non-understanding of the topic.



We're not going to agree on this. Apart from anything else, I realise that what I say is probably going to sound like a bit of an insult to yourself, because you felt the dialogue was mature and that aggression on my part is going to ruin any chance of coming to a conclusion. But there is no part of me that can accept that this can happen in anything but a completely absurdist Saints Row esque world where they treat important matters with a snickering irony and absurdity. This game had that without realising what it was doing. When I first heard this line, I almost burst out laughing and then I couldn't believe they put it in the game and then I almost stopped playing the game. And all the NPC dialogue is in a similar vein.

I don't have personal experience of abuse, but I have talked to people who have been abused and there is absolutely no way a functioning human being with close experience of it would talk about it in that manner. I'm sorry we're going to disagree but I absolutely have to stick with my guns on this one.

I'm not insulted. You have your opinion. I have mine. That's all.

"
I don't have personal experience of abuse, but I have talked to people who have been abused and there is absolutely no way a functioning human being with close experience of it would talk about it in that manner. I'm sorry we're going to disagree but I absolutely have to stick with my guns on this one."

Here's the thing.. don't think of it in the terms of our world. Think of it in terms of *their world*. In their world it's okay (Not that I agree with this by the way.) for them to do things, and talk about it. That's how it is in their world. Besides during medieval times man would beat their wives, and the King would have sex with other women besides his Queen. That's just how it was. Even a King hit his Queen.. but that's usually frowned upon by the people but if a normal man beat his wife. Nobody would do anything about it. That's just how it was.

Remember things may be accepted in that world, because that's the norm in that world.
When I play video games, and RPGS. I don't think about the real world when it comes to behaviors. We're playing in alternative world.

Did you play up to that scene when you had a choice to kill the Prince because people thought he poison The Dragon Slayer? Do you really think that a Witcher could pass such a judgement on a Noble let alone a Prince? Not in the real world, but in their world it happens.

ALTHOUGH! I will agree with you that the whole thing of just blurting out random things like that is a bit immature without any real reason to do so, but think of it like this. Maybe they were holding a conversation before you walked up to them, or next to them? There's your reason why the NPC said it.

That's how I see it though.

I'm not trying to argue, but just have a discussion.

 

[BrotherRool]

I'm not insulted. You have your opinion. I have mine. That's all.

"
I don't have personal experience of abuse, but I have talked to people who have been abused and there is absolutely no way a functioning human being with close experience of it would talk about it in that manner. I'm sorry we're going to disagree but I absolutely have to stick with my guns on this one."

Here's the thing.. don't think of it in the terms of our world. Think of it in terms of *their world*. In their world it's okay (Not that I agree with this by the way.) for them to do things, and talk about it. That's how it is in their world. Besides during medieval times man would beat their wives, and the King would have sex with other women besides his Queen. That's just how it was. Even a King hit his Queen.. but that's usually frowned upon by the people but if a normal man beat his wife. Nobody would do anything about it. That's just how it was.

Remember things may be accepted in that world, because that's the norm in that world.
When I play video games, and RPGS. I don't think about the real world when it comes to behaviors. We're playing in alternative world.

Did you play up to that scene when you had a choice to kill the Prince because people thought he poison The Dragon Slayer? Do you really think that a Witcher could pass such a judgement on a Noble let alone a Prince? Not in the real world, but in their world it happens.

ALTHOUGH! I will agree with you that the whole thing of just blurting out random things like that is a bit immature without any real reason to do so, but think of it like this. Maybe they were holding a conversation before you walked up to them, or next to them? There's your reason why the NPC said it.

That's how I see it though.

I'm not trying to argue, but just have a discussion.

Thanks for the pleasantness of the response. To me a world where abuse is that light-hearted (although I could accept it being that common and that accepted, just not so light-hearted that people would be more worried about their sleep than it going on) is so strange that it would lose it's meaning to me not inhabiting that world. It#s sort of why I compared it to Saints Row, because it creates that feeling of unreality. And because of the other bits (as far as Witcher 1 goes, from your account and some other comments in this thread, it sounds like Witcher 2 tackles this better) I'm not really certain that the developers had the skill or the want to address the issue in a meaningful way.

Maybe if, like you said, this came up in a conversation and it was part of a larger theme, I think that might have been a fairly mature way to handle it as part of the setting.

I'm afraid I didn't get up to that part of the game, there was an option with the witch at the end of Chapter 1 that I'm particularly sensitive to and I just didn't want to play a game with that in it. Some of the political stuff and the nature of Witchers that people talked about coming later up sounded pretty interesting, but I decided I wasn't prepared to play the game when it had this certain thing in it

 

[BloatedGuppy]

More "mature" than most in terms of the subject matter. I.E., the medieval era politics that drive the plot. It's fairly dense, wordy stuff that assumes a high level of familiarity with the world and a reasonable level of intelligence from the audience. There's very little painful exposition or hand holding.

As for the sexuality, the violence, and the language...I don't know if I consider it mature or immature, and I'm not really sure why it's always the primary focus whenever this game comes up in conversation. They've clearly gone for a "grit turned up to 11" feel, and it can definitely feel forced at times, but I won't say the game feels "immature" because of it.

Dragon Age feels very much like a young adult novel, in the same vein as those woeful Forgotten Realms novels, or perhaps a Shannara book if you're feeling charitable. Very basic, archetypal factions. Goody goods, and blackest evil. Very broad and simple political affiliations. Very simple, timeworn plot elements. In many ways it reads like an AD&D module. It's approach to sexuality is particularly PG-13 and faintly embarrassing, but fundamentally harmless.

Witcher 2 feels very much like a lower rent Scott Lynch novel. Lots of profanity, extensive shades of grey, and everyone is a shithead of one stripe or another. There's no holding back with sexuality or violence, and the game can occasionally seem rather indulgent as a result. The plotting is dense, occasionally at the expense of pacing, and there is no heroic resolution. The primary characters move from point A to point B and are arguably worse off for the journey.

Thanks for the pleasantness of the response. To me a world where abuse is that light-hearted (although I could accept it being that common and that accepted, just not so light-hearted that people would be more worried about their sleep than it going on) is so strange that it would lose it's meaning to me not inhabiting that world. It's sort of why I compared it to Saints Row, because it creates that feeling of unreality.

Like ASoIaF, and the generation of "gritty" fantasy novels that were spawned in its wake, The Witcher cribs heavily from Medieval Europe for its setting and feel. Life amongst the peasantry wasn't exactly quaint or pleasant. They're not attempting to simulate 21st century North America. Saint's Row is, which is why it comes off as by far less concerned with "reality". Which is ironic, given The Witcher is technically a fantasy game.

Would people approach strangers to discuss their bitter existence at length? Probably not, but people don't stand around with exclamation marks over their head waiting for travelers to come through and clean the orcs out of their cellar either. It's a game play mechanic. A little suspension of disbelief is required.

I think a far more pressing concern than the omnipresent specter of rape/abuse in the dark fantasy environs of The Witcher is all the monsters boiling around settlements in every CRPG ever made. You want to talk about people being worried about their sleep? You can't walk 5 feet out of town without being molested by a fantastical menagerie.

 

[The-Traveling-Bard]

I'm not insulted. You have your opinion. I have mine. That's all.

"
I don't have personal experience of abuse, but I have talked to people who have been abused and there is absolutely no way a functioning human being with close experience of it would talk about it in that manner. I'm sorry we're going to disagree but I absolutely have to stick with my guns on this one."

Here's the thing.. don't think of it in the terms of our world. Think of it in terms of *their world*. In their world it's okay (Not that I agree with this by the way.) for them to do things, and talk about it. That's how it is in their world. Besides during medieval times man would beat their wives, and the King would have sex with other women besides his Queen. That's just how it was. Even a King hit his Queen.. but that's usually frowned upon by the people but if a normal man beat his wife. Nobody would do anything about it. That's just how it was.

Remember things may be accepted in that world, because that's the norm in that world.
When I play video games, and RPGS. I don't think about the real world when it comes to behaviors. We're playing in alternative world.

Did you play up to that scene when you had a choice to kill the Prince because people thought he poison The Dragon Slayer? Do you really think that a Witcher could pass such a judgement on a Noble let alone a Prince? Not in the real world, but in their world it happens.

ALTHOUGH! I will agree with you that the whole thing of just blurting out random things like that is a bit immature without any real reason to do so, but think of it like this. Maybe they were holding a conversation before you walked up to them, or next to them? There's your reason why the NPC said it.

That's how I see it though.

I'm not trying to argue, but just have a discussion.

Thanks for the pleasantness of the response. To me a world where abuse is that light-hearted (although I could accept it being that common and that accepted, just not so light-hearted that people would be more worried about their sleep than it going on) is so strange that it would lose it's meaning to me not inhabiting that world. It#s sort of why I compared it to Saints Row, because it creates that feeling of unreality. And because of the other bits (as far as Witcher 1 goes, from your account and some other comments in this thread, it sounds like Witcher 2 tackles this better) I'm not really certain that the developers had the skill or the want to address the issue in a meaningful way.

Maybe if, like you said, this came up in a conversation and it was part of a larger theme, I think that might have been a fairly mature way to handle it as part of the setting.

I'm afraid I didn't get up to that part of the game, there was an option with the witch at the end of Chapter 1 that I'm particularly sensitive to and I just didn't want to play a game with that in it. Some of the political stuff and the nature of Witchers that people talked about coming later up sounded pretty interesting, but I decided I wasn't prepared to play the game when it had this certain thing in it

Aye. Some games will tackle mature themes like beating a wife/rape/killing differently, because they don't live in our world. They live in their world. They don't follow the same rules as us. Just look about all the rape talk in the Witcher in general.. They don't do it to be gritty, hard, immature, mature, etc. They do it because that's just how things work in that universe. I was shocked at first to when they first brought up a rape in discussion and I was like.

"HOLY CRAP! They talk about like it part of day to day life." Which it is.. in their world.

Witcher 1 for example and all the sex scenes. Here's the thing.. in books Geralt is describe pretty much like this. Every single women would claw her eyes out to be with him. He had tons of partners in the book, and they wanted to bring it across in the game. Did they did it in the best way possible? I don't think so. I think the sex cards were going a little too far, but they wanted to get the point across although they did it in the wrong way.

People forget when you play a game it doesn't mean they have to follow our laws, our society, our ways. They make an entire world up, or did we forget that when Dragons were flying in the sky?

 

[DementedSheep]

. I don?t like their handling of rape either because they just throw it in all the time. How do we make this situation worse? I know lets have some more rape/attempted rape.

This is the worst part for me, and why I don't actually feel bad laying into the devs. I like to believe that they've just had no experience of the matter and through it in because it's something that makes a game 'mature' and gritty without any understanding because frankly the alternative would be unpleasant.

In the game it was almost just a dirty word, like throwing in a fuck for emphasis.

Yeah. I know the setting is ridiculously grim and rape would happens a lot but it feel like its a near constant thing and they really don't need to keep bring it up all the damn time, especially not so casually. One of the first conversation you likely to have in the game and it's "hey Geralt, remember that time we threatened to rape the love of you life? No? well then, can you help us with something real quick?" I know why the Crinfrid Reavers were put in the game since the short story they are referencing is relevant but that conversion was just...odd.
The one that really get me though is with Ves

Spoiler

since they use a rape plot on her 3 times (her backstory, Loredo and Henselt). It feels like her role in story is as a lazy way to make you hate other characters by getting raped.

 

[BrotherRool]

Aye. Some games will tackle mature themes like beating a wife/rape/killing differently, because they don't live in our world. They live in their world. They don't follow the same rules as us. Just look about all the rape talk in the Witcher in general.. They don't do it to be gritty, hard, immature, mature, etc. They do it because that's just how things work in that universe. I was shocked at first to when they first brought up a rape in discussion and I was like.

"HOLY CRAP! They talk about like it part of day to day life." Which it is.. in their world.

Witcher 1 for example and all the sex scenes. Here's the thing.. in books Geralt is describe pretty much like this. Every single women would claw her eyes out to be with him. He had tons of partners in the book, and they wanted to bring it across in the game. Did they did it in the best way possible? I don't think so. I think the sex cards were going a little too far, but they wanted to get the point across although they did it in the wrong way.

People forget when you play a game it doesn't mean they have to follow our laws, our society, our ways. They make an entire world up, or did we forget that when Dragons were flying in the sky?

I think this is going to be a good place to leave it, I'm still not onboard with the Witcher being mature in regard to sexual stuff, but I appreciate your point of view and it does make it a little better.

But on the subject of rape I would like to just add a reason why using it lightly like this isn't such a good idea.

Rape is such a violent and torturous act that it can leave it#s victims with scars for years to come as a normal response to something so abnormal and cruel. In particular, for some people, it being mentioned in media like this, or portrayed or described in particular circumstances or lights can trigger a flashback. So whenever you include rape in a fictional work, there's always going to be a chance that it#s going to cause someone playing your game/watching your film/reading your book to reexperience the feeling of being raped.

I'm not saying it should be avoided, there are numerous everyday things that can serve as triggers from person to person, we shouldn't necessarily censor media and there are legitimate reasons to confront and deal with such a serious issue and it's impacts, but I think writers should be aware of the risks involved in that and decide if personally if they want to go ahead or not


EDIT: Changed a few lines around to soften what I was saying a little bit

 

[The-Traveling-Bard]

Aye. Some games will tackle mature themes like beating a wife/rape/killing differently, because they don't live in our world. They live in their world. They don't follow the same rules as us. Just look about all the rape talk in the Witcher in general.. They don't do it to be gritty, hard, immature, mature, etc. They do it because that's just how things work in that universe. I was shocked at first to when they first brought up a rape in discussion and I was like.

"HOLY CRAP! They talk about like it part of day to day life." Which it is.. in their world.

Witcher 1 for example and all the sex scenes. Here's the thing.. in books Geralt is describe pretty much like this. Every single women would claw her eyes out to be with him. He had tons of partners in the book, and they wanted to bring it across in the game. Did they did it in the best way possible? I don't think so. I think the sex cards were going a little too far, but they wanted to get the point across although they did it in the wrong way.

People forget when you play a game it doesn't mean they have to follow our laws, our society, our ways. They make an entire world up, or did we forget that when Dragons were flying in the sky?

I think this is going to be a good place to leave it, I'm still not onboard with the Witcher being mature in regard to sexual stuff, but I appreciate your point of view and it does make it a little better.

But on the subject of rape I would like to just add a reason why using it lightly like this isn't such a good idea.

Rape is such a violent and torturous act that it can leave it#s victims with scars for years to come. In particular, for some people, it being mentioned in media like this, or portrayed or described in particular circumstances or lights can trigger a flashback. So whenever you include rape in a fictional work, there's always going to be a chance that it#s going to cause someone playing your game/watching your film/reading your book to reexperience the feeling of being raped.

I'm not saying it should be avoided, we shouldn't necessarily censor media and there are legitimate reasons to confront and deal with such a serious issue and it's impacts, but I think writers should be aware of the risks involved in that and decide if personally if they want to go ahead or not

I get what you're saying but I still defend my argument with. They don't live in our world. They don't need to handle sensitive topics the same way we do.

As for the flash back things... Then don't play the game/read the book/ watch the movie. It's as a simple as that. I'm not trying to sound like an asshole but if you don't like something or it gives you bad memories then don't play/watch it. I also know I just put this in most blunt/rudest way possible, but I don't feel like sugar coating it for all those PC believers right now.

You're welcome though. I'm glad I made it a little bit better, and it's okay. If you don't like then don't like it. That's your opinion. I respect that, and thanks for the healthy discussion.

 

[Xarathox]

The content within The Witcher games certainly is not "mature". It's actually quite immature and mysoginic.

 

[BrotherRool]

I get what you're saying but I still defend my argument with. They don't live in our world. They don't need to handle sensitive topics the same way we do.

As for the flash back things... Then don't play the game/read the book/ watch the movie. It's as a simple as that. I'm not trying to sound like an asshole but if you don't like something or it gives you bad memories then don't play/watch it. I also know I just put this in most blunt/rudest way possible, but I don't feel like sugar coating it for all those PC believers right now.

You're welcome though. I'm glad I made it a little bit better, and it's okay. If you don't like then don't like it. That's your opinion. I respect that, and thanks for the healthy discussion.

It#s not always possible, there are a lot of films that just throw in a random sexual violation. I think the Witcher gives enough clues to drive anyone off whose on the lookout, so its okay. Still I don't think this is particularly PC, it's something that actually psychologically happens to some people and is pretty horrific and knowing the general weight of what you do is important. Calling a black person 'coloured' or whatever doesn't cause anyone to reexperience serious trauma. If people know and choose to include it anyway thats still cool, but if you#re obliviously causing people pain, I just mentioned it, because I figure that the more people who're aware the more people can at least choose with proper knowledge. It's easy to not know without

 

[Trollhoffer]

The Witcher is staggeringly mature. Not for the violence and sex but for it handles morality and the way it presents players with choices. Usually our choices fall between one of two extremes and help build some kind of bar that defines our character along two extremes, but The Witcher games don't attach their narrative choices to mechanics, allowing our choices to play out entirely freely. Without any kind of mechanical reward for the choices we're making, but all the same having to make those choices, we're compelled to choose what we think is best.

That's the kind of maturity that's been missing from games for so long. Certainly the sex cards in the first game were immature and both games like to indulge in themselves at points, but when it comes to the factors that are actually important -- such as choice, characterisation, politics and whatnot -- they really excel.

 

[Anachronism]

Well, there's this deal, "mature" and "rated M" are not the same thing. As far as Witcher goes, yeah, it's dark, it doesn't sugarcoat stuff, but at times it just seems as if it's trying too hard to be "mature" and comes across as pretentious. Let's just say that considering my taste in gaming, by all criteira, I should have liked the Witcher series, but I just couldn't enjoy the games.

I'm inclined to agree with this. It's trying very hard to be mature by making everything dark and gritty, but the problem is that it's so dark and gritty that it ends up coming full circle and coming across as a joke. The emphasis on politics and racism are definite points for its attempt to present a mature, believable world, but much of it is a 13-year-old's idea of maturity, especially the sex cards in the first game. They were basically too keen to make a fantasy RPG which was gritty and "realistic"; absolute 100% grimdark all the time is not maturity, it's an adolescent boy's D&D power fantasy. For me, the best moment of the game was the resolution of Carmen and Vincent's quest.

Spoiler

It turns out that true love can cure a werewolf, which the characters openly said was corny and silly prior to trying it. The fact that the game was willing to take something so potentially trite and out of place in this world as true love and play it completely straight ironically was one of the most mature moments, precisely because it wasn't the extreme grimdark of the rest of the game. Acknowledging the importance of true love as opposed to the shallow sex of the rest of the story was genuinely mature, and I wish the rest of the game was more like that.

Incidentally, I also feel like I should have enjoyed the Witcher much more than I did.

The Witcher is staggeringly mature. Not for the violence and sex but for it handles morality and the way it presents players with choices. Usually our choices fall between one of two extremes and help build some kind of bar that defines our character along two extremes, but The Witcher games don't attach their narrative choices to mechanics, allowing our choices to play out entirely freely. Without any kind of mechanical reward for the choices we're making, but all the same having to make those choices, we're compelled to choose what we think is best.

That's the kind of maturity that's been missing from games for so long. Certainly the sex cards in the first game were immature and both games like to indulge in themselves at points, but when it comes to the factors that are actually important -- such as choice, characterisation, politics and whatnot -- they really excel.

Despite the rest of my post, you definitely have a point here. They grey morality was one of the few things I genuinely enjoyed about the Witcher, and it's an area where it absolutely succeeds in presenting a believable, mature world. The fact that there's no clear right or wrong and that your choices have far-reaching, often unintended consequences was a huge step up from the way choice is handled in most RPGs.