Gay Marriage, Child Molestors, Torture, Abortion & Nihilism

[Emiscary]

What do these things have in common? No game (that I've ever heard of anyway) has ever made a serious attempt at addressing any of them. And I find that weird, considering how much discussion they tend to inspire among modern folk.

I'm not saying I wanna see a game that features all of them in equal volume (that would probably be one hell of a depressing & oddly campy game), but why the hell shouldn't game devs take a crack at dealing with "controversial" subject matter? Have they just not got the stones or what? Considering how cynical people are there's gotta be a market for heavier subject matter in games.

 

[Aircross]

Well...I think the media would jump on them and denounce gaming even more if these subject matters were introduced.

 

[hazabaza1]

Swat 4 had that one level with the bloke who killed kids. I think it was implied that he molested them as well.
MGS has the torture scenes too.

But yeah, they're touchy subjects. Big companies don't want to risk the bad press because they might sell less, and it's even worse for little companies who could get shut down if their game has some bad shit in it.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

What do these things have in common? No game (that I've ever heard of anyway) has ever made a serious attempt at addressing any of them. And I find that weird, considering how much discussion they tend to inspire among modern folk.

I'm not saying I wanna see a game that features all of them in equal volume (that would probably be one hell of a depressing & oddly campy game), but why the hell shouldn't game devs take a crack at dealing with "controversial" subject matter? Have they just not got the stones or what? Considering how cynical people are there's gotta be a market for heavier subject matter in games.

Ultima V had a pretty grisly torture sequence if you get captured by Blackthorn.

 

[Emiscary]

But yeah, they're touchy subjects. Big companies don't want to risk the bad press because they might sell less, and it's even worse for little companies who could get shut down if their game has some bad shit in it.

A) Addressing touchy subjects is not the same thing as approving of them/endorsing them. Most especially in a game, because how the subject matter is handled would (in theory) be largely up to the player.

B) Controversy has only ever moved product historically, I can't imagine being the first dev with the balls to release a game with overtly nihilistic themes or a child molester antagonist would result in your company being ruined- but then I've been wrong before.

 

[hazabaza1]

But yeah, they're touchy subjects. Big companies don't want to risk the bad press because they might sell less, and it's even worse for little companies who could get shut down if their game has some bad shit in it.

A) Addressing touchy subjects is not the same thing as approving of them/endorsing them. Most especially in a game, because how the subject matter is handled would (in theory) be largely up to the player.

B) Controversy has only ever moved product historically, I can't imagine being the first dev with the balls to release a game with overtly nihilistic themes or a child molester antagonist would result in your company being ruined- but then I've been wrong before.

I'm not saying companies shouldn't try, but lots of modern media still seems to have something against videogames (Faux news) so chances are some bad shit will go down. Remember the Mass Effect issue?

But yeah, I think something could be done well with these topics. It'd just need to be classy or else it'll probably end up coming off really offensively.

 

[Emiscary]

Well natch. Of course it'd have to be done well the first time around. There's precedents to be set and whatnot.

 

[370999]

Doesn't Nihilism always pop up as a general motivation for villains in JRPGS,

 

[Emiscary]

Doesn't Nihilism always pop up as a general motivation for villains in JRPGS?

Yeah, there's a lot of http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NietzscheWannabe in the land of the rising sun. Wouldn't say any of them did a good job of representing the idea though, beyond being really emo and pissy.

 

[Limecake]

I don't know about you guys but I personally believe the 'abortion' theory for the end of earthbound:

http://superfani.com/2009/04/15/grasping-the-true-form-of-giygass-attack/

Seriously once you see the end bosses 'true form' it can't be unseen. I guess there are spoilers for those people who are still waiting to play a SNES RPG. The game is amazing all the way through and I'm still upset I'm never going to get a proper Mother 3 release.

To me this is how video games should approach these subjects, look at Catherine. The whole game is about cheating, it handles it in a mature way without beating you over the head with the meaning.

 

[DoPo]

Gay Marriage - how many games address marriage at all? I can think of...less than five, and one of them is Fable which allows it.

Child Molestors - a difficult subject . Games try to stray away from depiction of kids especially ones where they are hurt, because they fear the media outcry.

Torture - what would you want to see addressed? Because more than a few games featured torture (offscreen or fade to black) with the clear implication that it's not nice. I would say games feature close to the same amount of torture (maybe a bit less) as other media. Torture isn't really popular anywhere.

Abortion - it's a bit outside the scope of games again. Very rarely do they deal with pregnancy and/or birth.

Nihilism - plenty of games feature their take on villains who want to destroy all because nothing has a meaning (to paraphrase). Arcanum does it really good, too. Again, what do you want addressed in particular?

 

[Emiscary]

Gay Marriage - how many games address marriage at all? I can think of...less than five, and one of them is Fable which allows it.

Child Molestors - touchy subject. Games try to stray away from depiction of kids especially ones where they are hurt, because they fear the media outcry.

Torture - what would you want to see addressed? Because more than a few games featured torture (offscreen or fade to black) with the clear implication that it's not nice. I would say games feature close to the same amount of torture (maybe a bit less) as other media. Torture isn't really popular anywhere.

Abortion - it's a bit outside the scope of games again. Very rarely do they deal with pregnancy and/or birth.

Nihilism - plenty of games feature their take on villains who want to destroy all because nothing has a meaning (to paraphrase). Arcanum does it really good, too. Again, what do you want addressed in particular?

Birth/marriage are kind of joint issues that games need to start acknowledging at some point if the medium is ever gonna mature.

And child immortality is a joke. It cheapens gaming, and it cheapens morality. "Kids are automatically innocent and good! We can't let anything happen to them! Send for plot armor!"

As for torture, I wanna see it represented in a non disney fashion. It's only ever *implied* to happen, it doesn't actually happen. If there was a more visceral representation of the act you'd get a much much stronger reaction to it. (Also: Saw, Hostel & The Human Centipede. I win.)

And I know there are nihilistic *characters*, I wanna see a nihilistic *game*. One where hopelessness, self deception and oblivion are central themes.

 

[Erttheking]

If someone were to include child molsters in a game, they would be dismissed as badly written because they were over the top.

 

[one_brain]

I guess gay marriage could be included in a Harvest Moon game? That'd be interesting perhaps.

 

[Saladfork]

And I know there are nihilistic *characters*, I wanna see a nihilistic *game*. One where hopelessness, self deception and oblivion are central themes.

The "Mass Effect 3's ending was not that bad" game?

Speaking as a moral and existential nihilist, I agree that there are very few games (or movies, or novels that I'm aware of) that attempt to portray the same. As a matter of fact, as I recall, whenever nihilism has been presented in any of the above art forms, it's been presented as an inexplicably bad thing, which I really do not understand.

 

[Emiscary]

Dungeon Keeper has torture chambers including dark mistresses who torture themselves to get off, also to convert heroes to your ranks.

Meaning you can add some kinky looking furniture/critters to your medieval basement.

That does not constitute a serious look at the subject of torture.

Also I'll concede that trying to justify ME3's ending is an exercise in despair. But it's a fan made game, so it doesn't count.

 

[endtherapture]

I'd rather not play an incredibly depressing game when I sit down to relax and have my evening's fun. I get enough for that when I read the news.