Maybe ... but the opposite could also happen. Since the game in question is so direct and so heavy-handed in its portrayal of violence, any Fox News journalist using it as an excuse to scream "Viddyagames are evil ! Think of the children !" would look absolutely stupid, making a fool of him/herself in the process. It is obvious that this game is *not* for kids, and if this whole situation can help some people to finally understand that all video games are not necessarily supposed to be played by 12 years old kids, that's a good thing !
It won't, and likely never will, help change anything in a broader sense because that's not what the media wants; their entire rationale in instances like this is based on "only children play games so all games must be for kids" ("...even violent ones like Hatred", to finish the rationale). That simple 'rule' allows them to say just about anything that would otherwise be completely irrational. And if you are in opposition to the idea-of-the-day... well you must be against keeping children safe from harm. How could you!?. So within a very simple and short framework logical and reasoned argument is felled without so much as a sound.
Ok, I don't want to bring any flame on this thread already in magma mode but I'm talking to those who say that games shoudn't have to limit themselves in terms of violence.
up to now, there is no game on the market on which you can kill CHILDREN!
Why do you think the devs imposed themselves that limit?
Look at most open world games, kids aren't included because of the possiblity of aggression towards them, yet it is still a game...
Do you know understands why games should impose themselves limit?
...up to now, there is no game on the market on which you can kill CHILDREN!....
Because it's actually against the law. To imply, incite or express violence towards minors is pretty much the quickest way to get your game banned and you slapped in the klinker (jail) - in the UK at least.
Oh come on...Even if the esrb allowed it, no sane devs would allow kids npcs in their games...
Shooting a 5 year old in GTA...somehow...feels....so wrong.
did you know that Carmageddon (the first version) had green blooded zombies in europe because the review board didn't want any people being killed. they were red blooded people in other territories.
up to now, there is no game on the market on which you can kill CHILDREN!
Actually I can think of at least a few games that allow you to do that.
Baldur's Gate 1/2
Fallout 1/2 (though I hear it differs between regions)
Bioshock
Dragon's Dogma
Heart of Darkness and Limbo feature brutal deaths for the player characters
Hell, in The Sims of all games you can set your kids on fire. When I was younger, I remember that my parents had issues with me playing GTA, but I don't think I have ever caused more virtual carnage than in The Sims. I'm pretty sure you could find more examples among PC games from late 90's to early 00's.
did you know that Carmageddon (the first version) had green blooded zombies in europe because the review board didn't want any people being killed. they were red blooded people in other territories.
One of my friends had this version. I believe it was made for Germany, but he got it from some shady dealer at a flea market. The German version of Soul Reaver had that too.
I'm sure you can download a bunch of mods for any Fallout or Elder Scrolls made by Bethesda and there is way more grim and weird stuff, someone should do it to open their eyes, quite literally.
I'm sure you can download a bunch of mods for any Fallout or Elder Scrolls made by Bethesda and there is way more grim and weird stuff, someone should do it to open their eyes, quite literally.
The Elder Scrolls community alone most must have produced more weird stuff in the past few years than the whole of the games industry in all of its history. Some of the things I've come across are absolutely insane and fascinating at the same time.
Oh come on...Even if the esrb allowed it, no sane devs would allow kids npcs in their games...
Shooting a 5 year old in GTA...somehow...feels....so wrong.
As many have said, it's been done before but it's mainly an esrb issue.
Killing children happens when you have a game world where you would expect everything to follow the rule. Nowdays it is solved by making children immortal.
Even as a parent, killing children in games does not disturb me any more than killing anyone else. A child or any other thing in the game behaving more realistically and begging for their lives such as in hatred really gets to me though and is equally disturbing.
These games often do make the point of the morality of killing children, or as it was in ultima: they forced you to act by having children attack you. (ultima series was involved in some drama due to this as well)
I guess the irony is when we have characters that are under 18, but because they're not preschoolers they're suddenly not children and they've graduated into being okay to kill.
I showed this gameplay trailer to my gf and asked her for her opinion, and the first thing she said to me was that - comparing to other games i showed her before, this one wasn't has colorfull.
And then i said, oh, ok, what about the killings? And she said, oh i guess that too.
And this is someone who doesn't care for games and stuff.
She didn't freak or anything because it's a game. Whatever.
You guys are still arguing about this meat?
It's just raw-meat plain and simple, we need to focus on non-meat, or else the meat will go rotten.
teaandcigarettes
Even the woodland games are doing it? This is no good.
xvampire The difference here is that this game doesn't have the power the other meat does, it's just pixels, people won't flock to it.
this is just a strip of bacon compared to the all you can eat buffet displayed in hatred.
eld
It's not even that, it's the fact that edge-master kids will get lured into this meat game and become megameats later on. NegevPro Seems cool enough, but there seem to be more beauties about than freaks, that's kinda a shame.
At least we still have cool special attacks, environments and music right?
Pedro Amorim It's more so the fact that, more young meats will be created from playing these horrid games.
You guys are still arguing about this meat?
It's just raw-meat plain and simple, we need to focus on non-meat, or else the meat will go rotten.
teaandcigarettes
Even the woodland games are doing it? This is no good.
xvampire The difference here is that this game doesn't have the power the other meat does, it's just pixels, people won't flock to it.
this is just a strip of bacon compared to the all you can eat buffet displayed in hatred.
eld
It's not even that, it's the fact that edge-master kids will get lured into this meat game and become megameats later on. NegevPro Seems cool enough, but there seem to be more beauties about than freaks, that's kinda a shame.
At least we still have cool special attacks, environments and music right?
Pedro Amorim It's more so the fact that, more young meats will be created from playing these horrid games.
are you ever going to realize that terms you just made up to describe things is not the best way to get your point across to people?
i literally have no idea what any of your posts are talking about. it's like if I just started replacing random nouns with the names of Family Guy characters.
are you ever going to realize that terms you just made up to describe things is not the best way to get your point across to people?
i literally have no idea what any of your posts are talking about. it's like if I just started replacing random nouns with the names of Family Guy characters.
Oh come on...Even if the esrb allowed it, no sane devs would allow kids npcs in their games...
Shooting a 5 year old in GTA...somehow...feels....so wrong.
Shooting someone without proper justification should always feel wrong, regardless of age.
I think what you are grappling with is that the justification for killing is much easier when it involves simplified characters that only have a limited number of characteristics, like murderous blood thirsty monsters who can't be reasoned with. Simple enough, kill it or be killed. This is the space that games traditionally operate in but have been venturing outside of, in some capacity for a while.
This game probably won't do much more than push a boundary which means it will more than likely be horrific financial failure. But it will "succeed" in creating space for future games that follow in its foot steps.
The good thing is that the vast majority of people don't fall prey to "the evil devil box's trickery" like they didn't fall prey to slasher flicks in the 80's and 90's. Fully formed humans can separate reality from fiction. Which is reflected in the fall of violent crime over the last 30+ years as games have become a major cultural thing.
The key to getting this right, is in not letting the games develop the person, but let the developed person play the games. so yea, ratings, stick to them.
Well there's a huge detachment between the player and the npc. If I hold a gun upto a child in a video game, it's more like pointing at a doll. I won't feel anything because it doesn't react like a child, I also won't see much of an npc's face most of the time due to camera distance, so no expressions either.
If it reacted, begged, tried to reason with me, or even escape, instill some kind of depth within my perception of it of more than just an empty mindless mobile object, then I would genuinely feel guilty or some kind of remorse. And some games have indeed succeeded with making characters I've felt protective of or sad over their death.
Although this leaves me with a dilemma, would I like a game that emphasizes the real weight that the life of an npc could carry if it were character that has actual depth and was a more representational portrayal of irl; In an effort to teach the value of life or would that just make the whole thing worse by the eventual desensitization of it all.
Altho segwaying slightly off topic I do think that AI is the area we need to focus on more within games as a whole, graphically we've evolved but AI pretty much stays the same year after year. Guh I want every npc to be an Ellie
Sure this a very vulgar trailer but the game looks like a throwaway, bargain bin game. Controversy may sell, but this is not really that controversial, it's generically mindless.
Generally speaking I don't care for the "moral brigade" and all that garbage. As far as I'm concerned if a product sells, then regardless of what YOU feel is moral and right, someone disagrees and was willing to spend their hard earned money on it. Telling me I can't play a video game because it is immoral is the first step to telling me that I'm only allowed to like what you like and do what you do. What makes you so goddamn perfect?
("you" being the moral warriors, not a specific person)
I have no problem with what they're doing precisely because its a video game regardless of narrative motivation of the character. Probably won't play it unless the gameplay is pretty fun.
Obviously they've done a really good job marketing it with the trailer, I wonder why they released the trailer now (I guess because it's near Hallowe'en?) when the game is slatted to release Q2 next year.
eld
It's not even that, it's the fact that edge-master kids will get lured into this meat game and become megameats later on. NegevPro Seems cool enough, but there seem to be more beauties about than freaks, that's kinda a shame.
At least we still have cool special attacks, environments and music right?
.
Let me remind you of that time when introduced polycount to the term "meat" and how people at previous workplaces hated your guts for telling them about the meat (But in reality it's a grand conspiracy!!)
Polycount is like a workplace and people will eventually get frustrated.
I never really mentioned meat in irl,
these people I worked with were meats. I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt, but they were just as expected, mean hateful meats.
perfectpencil: i guess im guilty of being a "moral warrior" in this thread, and i regrett a little bit of the preaching. i think artistic freedom and freedom of speech should allow basically all form of expressions.
BUt i still think its valid criticism of a game that it does something morally wrong. and thats is not to tell you that you not allowed to play it. its impossible for me to prevent that, ovbiously. what the point of the criticism is, is landing someone a new perspective on something, like "have you thought about it in this way?". and as always, you are free to ignore that. its up to you.
in this case, it would not be "this game is BAD cuz makes you murder people!", instead it would be "killing innocent civilians without any point seems disturbing to me, what do you guys think?"
i think its important that the critisicm exists beside any artistic expression, beacuse in the end, the only thing it can do, is make things better.
The difference between killing and murder is zero in games. To murder is to kill with premeditation. We just kill "processes" with premeditation, always. Just play games such as dishonored or hitman absolution.
There's a lot to say about this game and the discussion around it, but what you said here is interesting. Mostly because it's not true by the slightest, and it's important that people stop using these directly false claims that is just an individual thought not based on any studies out there, and there's done a lot of them.
Taking Hitman vs Hatred as one example, since you mentioned that game. Hitman puts you in a state of decison making, stealth and completing a task. The kill is a metaphor for a completed puzzle. It's never the action that defines these things, it's the intentions behind the mechanics. Just as in real life. it's not what you do, its WHY you do it thats always important to us. In other words, our intentions. Hatred in comparison to Hitman puts you in a state of killing. Nothing more. These two different states are what is imporant to not mix togehter and call "the same thing", since they are not the same thing. This distinction is very important.
The biggest problem during discussions concerning this topic and this game is in general the lack of knowledge about psychology, human behaviour and nature vs nuture issues. From a psychological point of view ( read the proteus effect for a starter) this game is directly unhealthy for the development of kids. There's actually not even a question about it. Society is already very desensitized, and these game will be played by mostly (not all) those that should not play them. So indirectly Hatred will breeth killers. I'm being harsh because the future holds occulus and more in it's path, and there needs to be a serious discussion about this, there needs to be more education and awareness on what has already been done in studies and such.
I do however agree with what was stated over, that banning is never good, but more serious regulation and education is what we need. And Blaizer, Im actually saying this politly, not meaning to sound harsh even though I notice it might come out that way.
But why are kids even part of the discussion ? Games have ratings, hence parents complaining that their kids played a certain game have no one to blame but themselves. Just like with books and movies, there are different kind of games directed at various audiences, from toddlers to adults ... and that's exactly why Call Of Duty and GTA are *not* sold in the same aisle as Barbie dolls and Legos.
I fully agree with you on education tho - As mentionned earlier I really wish that more people could understand that video games do not always equal kid's toys. Funny how much damage a mere misinterpreted word can do. (Although to be fair, video games as we know them today *did* evolve from tabletop and board games. They just gradually shattered the initial boundaries of the medium...)
The biggest problem during discussions concerning this topic and this game is in general the lack of knowledge about psychology, human behaviour and nature vs nuture issues. From a psychological point of view ( read the proteus effect for a starter) this game is directly unhealthy for the development of kids. There's actually not even a question about it. Society is already very desensitized, and these game will be played by mostly (not all) those that should not play them. So indirectly Hatred will breeth killers. I'm being harsh because the future holds occulus and more in it's path, and there needs to be a serious discussion about this, there needs to be more education and awareness on what has already been done in studies and such.
The proteus effect does not make people murderers.
I do however agree with what was stated over, that banning is never good, but more serious regulation and education is what we need. And Blaizer, Im actually saying this politly, not meaning to sound harsh even though I notice it might come out that way.
Kurt
Education is always good but has to be unbiased, regulation however is a slippery slope.
The proteus effect does not make people murderers.
No, of course not, it's part of the picture that helps us understand the impact of these things. Nothing makes us murderers but our predisposition to become one, but we can heavily influence if that predisposition kicks into gear or not.
I do however agree on the regulation bit, it is a slipperly slope.
There is a couple of things that hit me now and after I wrote last. That all this is just part of the process. Like an angry child needing to get it out of the system. Someone probably had to make Hatred so we just get it "universally" out of the system.
That campaign from the -60s on marijuana still rings true and came into effect here also. For those not familiar .. they had a campaign against the usuage of marijuana and after the campaign the number of useres increased.
And you are right pior. It's actually the parents responsible. Regulation and resistance to these things only makes them grow. And the fact that we still both embrace and hate these things I guess is only a sign that we as a society still need to mature.
Serbian Film is a film aimed for a certain audience, and i don't recommend you to watch that film if you are very sensitive. And like that film of cult, Hatred is aimed for a very specific audience.
I you google more about Serbian Film you could be shocked. Films are worse than games, actually. I watched Ninja Assassin yesterday, and oh man, that was insane. But well, it's just another gore feast film like 300.
There's a lot to say about this game and the discussion around it, but what you said here is interesting. Mostly because it's not true by the slightest, and it's important that people stop using these directly false claims that is just an individual thought not based on any studies out there, and there's done a lot of them.
Taking Hitman vs Hatred as one example, since you mentioned that game. Hitman puts you in a state of decison making, stealth and completing a task. The kill is a metaphor for a completed puzzle. It's never the action that defines these things, it's the intentions behind the mechanics. Just as in real life. it's not what you do, its WHY you do it thats always important to us. In other words, our intentions. Hatred in comparison to Hitman puts you in a state of killing. Nothing more. These two different states are what is imporant to not mix togehter and call "the same thing", since they are not the same thing. This distinction is very important.
What is true or not, is subjetive at this rate, you can say whatever you want. From a logical point of view, in games we kill with premeditation (it's a fact), we are given the objetive to kill people aka "enemies".
And i don't see distinctions between Hitman Absolution or Hatred. Agent 47 is a fucking psychopath without emotions. Not all missions are stealth and we are forced to kill using very questionable methods. Playing it, i felt the game had a very very bad taste, but i undestand it's not for all audiences nor for all ages.
"Influence of games" is a bad term you should not use, because we are more conditioned by TV News and films. Games are uncanny, and are quite distant from reality so... i don't see the point of attacking games because they are violent.
There is a good regulation right now for games (quite harsh in Germany for example), so parents are responsible. If you let your kid playing games such as Cod, or violent games in general such as hatred, you have all the blame.
The same happens with products aimed for adults, with sexual/bad language content.
We can't kill/censor the freedom of creation, that's not good in a democratic world. Bad things are present all the days in the reality, so why the heck blame a stupid game like this? postal is worse!!
If you feel you have the predisposition to become a murderer, due to the "influence" of a game/film, go to the medic asap. Normal people don't have that issue and scientifics have proven that (a person doesn't become a murderer in one day or two weeks). Just take as example that occidental murderder from the Ottawa success... wonder yourself if we should censor religion instead of games.
But well, i understand perfectly your point of view and i respect it because i feel too much FEAR coming from your words. Are you from the country of fear? USA?
But well, i understand perfectly your point of view and i respect it because i feel too much FEAR coming from your words. Are you from the country of fear? USA?
No, you actually don't understand my perspective. Mine was taken from studies, not a personal point of view, and the discussion for what is right or wrong is still what's the importance with a discussion. I do notice that you didn't understand my point when I spoke about "intention" and "state of mind", so it's slightly difficult to offer any respons to most of what you wrote.
I come from norway. I live by a lake where for days our community were out in boats looking for dead bodies after almost 100 kids got brutally killed some time back. I know what it means when something like this happens near you and it's not based in fear, just reality, and that's why I think its important to look at what studies tells us and keep an open mind and keep digging into studies and broaden our perspectives. I felt your comments were to biased beside that so I leave it at that, but my point is not based in what I think but what studies and knowledge can teach us all. I don't know the answer to any of this, but i do like the art of storytelling and creative freedom.
Has the consensus in regard to these studies been reached yet? From what I've seen lately it still seems like opinions are split. Frankly, I haven't looked at any actual studies lately, but at mainstream sources that summarize the overall state of research, or excerpts. At the moment it seems to be very easy to find studies that either support or disprove correlation between games and the attitudes of the audience towards violence. ESA for instance claims proudly that the links between games and violence are not there: http://www.theesa.com/facts/violence.asp however, given that they are a pro-gaming lobby, they have a vested interest in saying so.
Frankly, I'm a bit skeptical about any of these conclusions. The issue is enveloped in politics and it involves too many groups that have a vested interest in seeing a particular outcome.
I believe that the state of the economy, providing people with education and making efforts to reduce inequality has a much higher impact on combating crime than moderating violent video games, or other forms of media.
Has the consensus in regard to these studies been reached yet? From what I've seen lately it still seems like opinions are split.
Indeed, it seems split still and it's probably still to early to make any real conlusions on the topic. I do however believe we can derive some conclusions (though temporary and always in motion) from things as the proteus effect, the obedience experiment(milgram), conditioning in general, intention drive actions, pygmalion effect, social learning theory, catharasis and so on. There's a lot of behavioural insight that will to a certain degree by themselves hold true to isolated situations, but as a whole (as in the development of a society) I for sure can't say much what it all mounts up to.
It's a big topic. Good overall summery you had there with some nice references. Gonna have a look at what you dug up.
I believe that the state of the economy, providing people with education and making efforts to reduce inequality has a much higher impact on combating crime than moderating violent video games, or other forms of media.
Very good point. And I believe if a society is "healthy" no violent video game would make much difference, but again that's my personal opinion only and only based on what I know of behavioural studies. But it seems very tied to the state of the whole as long as we have the freedom to make individual choices (thinking Milgram and the marijuana campaign here).
I want to add something to clarify some of what I wrote, and some of what you brought to the surface, teeandcigarettes. In the isolated incident I mentioned earlier, the perpetrator used call of duty to excersise for his kills. Video games was in the case a hot topic, but it was clear consensus among the experts that these games did not create a killer. It was just one of many resources used to go through with an intention drive thought. A psycotic idea born outside the gaming environment.
And this seems actually to be the consensus. That's why I was looking at intention driven gaming and not killing as a symbolic action to finish a goal.
Blazier, your probably right about what you said about the character in Hitman and that is questionable how you need to kill. I think personally I was in a stealth attitude when I played it so I didnt notice it that much.
But this again brings up the idea of free will. Let's take Dayz as an example. Here you as the player choose to either kill any of the other players or your just explore and try to stay clear of zombies. And I do like the idea of games that has this freedom of free will in them. You don't need to go around killing other players even though you can, and through that idea these games can produce individual growth through good actions or devolve through making bad choices.
Plato spoke about our soul and how too see our inner selfs. Get drunk and your true behaviour comes out. Thats loosly paraphrasing, but the idea holds true to games also. Do you behave as a dick in-game, your inner most personal space probably is a dick, even though you behave "correctly" in your day-to-day interactions.
And this is loosly what I am thinking of when Im contemplating the idea of intention driven gaming and how a game like Hatred differes from a goal oriented game.
But again, I really don't know what my view is in all of this, but wanted to get that last bit off my chest. Now Ill butt out
If I lose my right to bear arms over this game I'll be pissed lol. A game made by a foreign developer exploiting American public shooting tragedys doesnt exactly earn my respect.
With that said, the game concept execution and production values seem really solid. Can't fault them there.
Replies
they didn't. the licensing boards they needed to get the game through and under a certain rating imposed those limits.
there is :
in very very literal and creepy way
http://games.adultswim.com/cream-wolf-twitchy-online-game.html
Oh come on...Even if the esrb allowed it, no sane devs would allow kids npcs in their games...
Shooting a 5 year old in GTA...somehow...feels....so wrong.
did you know that Carmageddon (the first version) had green blooded zombies in europe because the review board didn't want any people being killed. they were red blooded people in other territories.
Actually I can think of at least a few games that allow you to do that.
Baldur's Gate 1/2
Fallout 1/2 (though I hear it differs between regions)
Bioshock
Dragon's Dogma
Heart of Darkness and Limbo feature brutal deaths for the player characters
Hell, in The Sims of all games you can set your kids on fire. When I was younger, I remember that my parents had issues with me playing GTA, but I don't think I have ever caused more virtual carnage than in The Sims. I'm pretty sure you could find more examples among PC games from late 90's to early 00's.
One of my friends had this version. I believe it was made for Germany, but he got it from some shady dealer at a flea market. The German version of Soul Reaver had that too.
so... people who worked in studios such as Ion Storm or Black Isle are deranged?
The Elder Scrolls community alone most must have produced more weird stuff in the past few years than the whole of the games industry in all of its history. Some of the things I've come across are absolutely insane and fascinating at the same time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbNPlXgX4Z8&feature=player_detailpage#t=392
As many have said, it's been done before but it's mainly an esrb issue.
Killing children happens when you have a game world where you would expect everything to follow the rule. Nowdays it is solved by making children immortal.
Even as a parent, killing children in games does not disturb me any more than killing anyone else. A child or any other thing in the game behaving more realistically and begging for their lives such as in hatred really gets to me though and is equally disturbing.
These games often do make the point of the morality of killing children, or as it was in ultima: they forced you to act by having children attack you. (ultima series was involved in some drama due to this as well)
I guess the irony is when we have characters that are under 18, but because they're not preschoolers they're suddenly not children and they've graduated into being okay to kill.
I showed this gameplay trailer to my gf and asked her for her opinion, and the first thing she said to me was that - comparing to other games i showed her before, this one wasn't has colorfull.
And then i said, oh, ok, what about the killings? And she said, oh i guess that too.
And this is someone who doesn't care for games and stuff.
She didn't freak or anything because it's a game. Whatever.
It's just raw-meat plain and simple, we need to focus on non-meat, or else the meat will go rotten.
teaandcigarettes
Even the woodland games are doing it? This is no good.
xvampire
The difference here is that this game doesn't have the power the other meat does, it's just pixels, people won't flock to it.
this is just a strip of bacon compared to the all you can eat buffet displayed in hatred.
eld
It's not even that, it's the fact that edge-master kids will get lured into this meat game and become megameats later on. NegevPro
Seems cool enough, but there seem to be more beauties about than freaks, that's kinda a shame.
At least we still have cool special attacks, environments and music right?
Pedro Amorim
It's more so the fact that, more young meats will be created from playing these horrid games.
are you ever going to realize that terms you just made up to describe things is not the best way to get your point across to people?
i literally have no idea what any of your posts are talking about. it's like if I just started replacing random nouns with the names of Family Guy characters.
SSJ3VegetoSSJ is right.
I think what you are grappling with is that the justification for killing is much easier when it involves simplified characters that only have a limited number of characteristics, like murderous blood thirsty monsters who can't be reasoned with. Simple enough, kill it or be killed. This is the space that games traditionally operate in but have been venturing outside of, in some capacity for a while.
This game probably won't do much more than push a boundary which means it will more than likely be horrific financial failure. But it will "succeed" in creating space for future games that follow in its foot steps.
It's a steady march toward more violence and more ambiguity. Take this article on NPR about movie violence,
http://www.npr.org/2014/10/20/357628388/study-says-parents-media-exposure-trickles-down-to-children
The more violent content that people consume the less sensitive they are to it, the more they allow their kids to consume it. The same cycle happens with the next generation and so on.
The good thing is that the vast majority of people don't fall prey to "the evil devil box's trickery" like they didn't fall prey to slasher flicks in the 80's and 90's. Fully formed humans can separate reality from fiction. Which is reflected in the fall of violent crime over the last 30+ years as games have become a major cultural thing.
The key to getting this right, is in not letting the games develop the person, but let the developed person play the games. so yea, ratings, stick to them.
If it reacted, begged, tried to reason with me, or even escape, instill some kind of depth within my perception of it of more than just an empty mindless mobile object, then I would genuinely feel guilty or some kind of remorse. And some games have indeed succeeded with making characters I've felt protective of or sad over their death.
Although this leaves me with a dilemma, would I like a game that emphasizes the real weight that the life of an npc could carry if it were character that has actual depth and was a more representational portrayal of irl; In an effort to teach the value of life or would that just make the whole thing worse by the eventual desensitization of it all.
Altho segwaying slightly off topic I do think that AI is the area we need to focus on more within games as a whole, graphically we've evolved but AI pretty much stays the same year after year. Guh I want every npc to be an Ellie
Sure this a very vulgar trailer but the game looks like a throwaway, bargain bin game. Controversy may sell, but this is not really that controversial, it's generically mindless.
("you" being the moral warriors, not a specific person)
Obviously they've done a really good job marketing it with the trailer, I wonder why they released the trailer now (I guess because it's near Hallowe'en?) when the game is slatted to release Q2 next year.
completely related:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z6hNXsldMU&hd=1
Let me remind you of that time when introduced polycount to the term "meat" and how people at previous workplaces hated your guts for telling them about the meat (But in reality it's a grand conspiracy!!)
Polycount is like a workplace and people will eventually get frustrated.
these people I worked with were meats. I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt, but they were just as expected, mean hateful meats.
hatersgonahate.gif
perfectpencil: i guess im guilty of being a "moral warrior" in this thread, and i regrett a little bit of the preaching. i think artistic freedom and freedom of speech should allow basically all form of expressions.
BUt i still think its valid criticism of a game that it does something morally wrong. and thats is not to tell you that you not allowed to play it. its impossible for me to prevent that, ovbiously. what the point of the criticism is, is landing someone a new perspective on something, like "have you thought about it in this way?". and as always, you are free to ignore that. its up to you.
in this case, it would not be "this game is BAD cuz makes you murder people!", instead it would be "killing innocent civilians without any point seems disturbing to me, what do you guys think?"
i think its important that the critisicm exists beside any artistic expression, beacuse in the end, the only thing it can do, is make things better.
There's a lot to say about this game and the discussion around it, but what you said here is interesting. Mostly because it's not true by the slightest, and it's important that people stop using these directly false claims that is just an individual thought not based on any studies out there, and there's done a lot of them.
Taking Hitman vs Hatred as one example, since you mentioned that game. Hitman puts you in a state of decison making, stealth and completing a task. The kill is a metaphor for a completed puzzle. It's never the action that defines these things, it's the intentions behind the mechanics. Just as in real life. it's not what you do, its WHY you do it thats always important to us. In other words, our intentions. Hatred in comparison to Hitman puts you in a state of killing. Nothing more. These two different states are what is imporant to not mix togehter and call "the same thing", since they are not the same thing. This distinction is very important.
The biggest problem during discussions concerning this topic and this game is in general the lack of knowledge about psychology, human behaviour and nature vs nuture issues. From a psychological point of view ( read the proteus effect for a starter) this game is directly unhealthy for the development of kids. There's actually not even a question about it. Society is already very desensitized, and these game will be played by mostly (not all) those that should not play them. So indirectly Hatred will breeth killers. I'm being harsh because the future holds occulus and more in it's path, and there needs to be a serious discussion about this, there needs to be more education and awareness on what has already been done in studies and such.
I do however agree with what was stated over, that banning is never good, but more serious regulation and education is what we need. And Blaizer, Im actually saying this politly, not meaning to sound harsh even though I notice it might come out that way.
Kurt
I fully agree with you on education tho - As mentionned earlier I really wish that more people could understand that video games do not always equal kid's toys. Funny how much damage a mere misinterpreted word can do. (Although to be fair, video games as we know them today *did* evolve from tabletop and board games. They just gradually shattered the initial boundaries of the medium...)
The proteus effect does not make people murderers.
Education is always good but has to be unbiased, regulation however is a slippery slope.
No, of course not, it's part of the picture that helps us understand the impact of these things. Nothing makes us murderers but our predisposition to become one, but we can heavily influence if that predisposition kicks into gear or not.
I do however agree on the regulation bit, it is a slipperly slope.
There is a couple of things that hit me now and after I wrote last. That all this is just part of the process. Like an angry child needing to get it out of the system. Someone probably had to make Hatred so we just get it "universally" out of the system.
That campaign from the -60s on marijuana still rings true and came into effect here also. For those not familiar .. they had a campaign against the usuage of marijuana and after the campaign the number of useres increased.
And you are right pior. It's actually the parents responsible. Regulation and resistance to these things only makes them grow. And the fact that we still both embrace and hate these things I guess is only a sign that we as a society still need to mature.
Serbian Film is a film aimed for a certain audience, and i don't recommend you to watch that film if you are very sensitive. And like that film of cult, Hatred is aimed for a very specific audience.
I you google more about Serbian Film you could be shocked. Films are worse than games, actually. I watched Ninja Assassin yesterday, and oh man, that was insane. But well, it's just another gore feast film like 300.
What is true or not, is subjetive at this rate, you can say whatever you want. From a logical point of view, in games we kill with premeditation (it's a fact), we are given the objetive to kill people aka "enemies".
And i don't see distinctions between Hitman Absolution or Hatred. Agent 47 is a fucking psychopath without emotions. Not all missions are stealth and we are forced to kill using very questionable methods. Playing it, i felt the game had a very very bad taste, but i undestand it's not for all audiences nor for all ages.
"Influence of games" is a bad term you should not use, because we are more conditioned by TV News and films. Games are uncanny, and are quite distant from reality so... i don't see the point of attacking games because they are violent.
There is a good regulation right now for games (quite harsh in Germany for example), so parents are responsible. If you let your kid playing games such as Cod, or violent games in general such as hatred, you have all the blame.
The same happens with products aimed for adults, with sexual/bad language content.
We can't kill/censor the freedom of creation, that's not good in a democratic world. Bad things are present all the days in the reality, so why the heck blame a stupid game like this? postal is worse!!
If you feel you have the predisposition to become a murderer, due to the "influence" of a game/film, go to the medic asap. Normal people don't have that issue and scientifics have proven that (a person doesn't become a murderer in one day or two weeks). Just take as example that occidental murderder from the Ottawa success... wonder yourself if we should censor religion instead of games.
But well, i understand perfectly your point of view and i respect it because i feel too much FEAR coming from your words. Are you from the country of fear? USA?
No, you actually don't understand my perspective. Mine was taken from studies, not a personal point of view, and the discussion for what is right or wrong is still what's the importance with a discussion. I do notice that you didn't understand my point when I spoke about "intention" and "state of mind", so it's slightly difficult to offer any respons to most of what you wrote.
I come from norway. I live by a lake where for days our community were out in boats looking for dead bodies after almost 100 kids got brutally killed some time back. I know what it means when something like this happens near you and it's not based in fear, just reality, and that's why I think its important to look at what studies tells us and keep an open mind and keep digging into studies and broaden our perspectives. I felt your comments were to biased beside that so I leave it at that, but my point is not based in what I think but what studies and knowledge can teach us all. I don't know the answer to any of this, but i do like the art of storytelling and creative freedom.
There are roundups that show more mixed results: http://journalistsresource.org/studies/government/criminal-justice/value-violent-video-games-research-roundup#
Then there are sources that seem to lean more on the argument that violent games do have a clear negative effect, such as this summary:http://psp.sagepub.com/content/40/5/578.abstract
or mainstream articles that purport the same: http://time.com/34075/how-violent-video-games-change-kids-attitudes-about-aggression/
Frankly, I'm a bit skeptical about any of these conclusions. The issue is enveloped in politics and it involves too many groups that have a vested interest in seeing a particular outcome.
Personally, although I do find this topic interesting I do not think that solving it is critical to our society. Regardless of whether media causes people to behave more aggressively, violent crime is in steady decline in both US and Europe: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Violent_Crime_in_the_United_States.png
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/File:Offences_recorded_by_the_police,_EU-28,_2007%E2%80%9312_(1)_(2007_%3D_100)_YB14.png
I believe that the state of the economy, providing people with education and making efforts to reduce inequality has a much higher impact on combating crime than moderating violent video games, or other forms of media.
Indeed, it seems split still and it's probably still to early to make any real conlusions on the topic. I do however believe we can derive some conclusions (though temporary and always in motion) from things as the proteus effect, the obedience experiment(milgram), conditioning in general, intention drive actions, pygmalion effect, social learning theory, catharasis and so on. There's a lot of behavioural insight that will to a certain degree by themselves hold true to isolated situations, but as a whole (as in the development of a society) I for sure can't say much what it all mounts up to.
It's a big topic. Good overall summery you had there with some nice references. Gonna have a look at what you dug up.
Very good point. And I believe if a society is "healthy" no violent video game would make much difference, but again that's my personal opinion only and only based on what I know of behavioural studies. But it seems very tied to the state of the whole as long as we have the freedom to make individual choices (thinking Milgram and the marijuana campaign here).
And this seems actually to be the consensus. That's why I was looking at intention driven gaming and not killing as a symbolic action to finish a goal.
Blazier, your probably right about what you said about the character in Hitman and that is questionable how you need to kill. I think personally I was in a stealth attitude when I played it so I didnt notice it that much.
But this again brings up the idea of free will. Let's take Dayz as an example. Here you as the player choose to either kill any of the other players or your just explore and try to stay clear of zombies. And I do like the idea of games that has this freedom of free will in them. You don't need to go around killing other players even though you can, and through that idea these games can produce individual growth through good actions or devolve through making bad choices.
Plato spoke about our soul and how too see our inner selfs. Get drunk and your true behaviour comes out. Thats loosly paraphrasing, but the idea holds true to games also. Do you behave as a dick in-game, your inner most personal space probably is a dick, even though you behave "correctly" in your day-to-day interactions.
And this is loosly what I am thinking of when Im contemplating the idea of intention driven gaming and how a game like Hatred differes from a goal oriented game.
But again, I really don't know what my view is in all of this, but wanted to get that last bit off my chest. Now Ill butt out
With that said, the game concept execution and production values seem really solid. Can't fault them there.