Killing kids: why and why not?

[Cael]

No. Being an outlaw comes with consequences, and that includes being pilloried in civilised areas. If the quests are based on civilised areas, you lose access to them, and if it is part of the main quest, you're fucked. Sucks to be you.

Consequences, bitches. Learn it.

Shmonsequences, granny. "Civilized" is in the eye of the beholder, and for every NCR and fucking Modoc there is a Great Slave Market and a Raider Meeting Ground. In a world not designed to shoehorn you into being plusgood citizen one way or another, that is.

Equating Fallout with being the avatar in Ultima. LMAO, that's a new one. What are Fallout's virtues you are supposed to follow, hm?

Who said anything about virtues? I addressed the Fallout game: You get an Evil rep, your face end up on Wanted posters in every town and you get runned out of every civilised town you care to name. End of your quest to find a GECK. Cue non-standard game over.

It would still be logical to allow the player to ally with bandit groups in order to get closer to his goals. Bandit groups which do exist in the game but usually appear only as hostiles. They should be okay with accepting an asshole player into their ranks.

You were sort of allowed to in FO2. You could join the slaver faction. The problem is that it basically screws you over because you gained the Slaver tag, and that has consequences.

The thing is, we have people here arguing that there should be no consequences to that kind of action because "everyone is a rapist and murderer in a post-apoc setting", which I find to be complete bullshit.

Nobody is arguing against having consequences. I didn't see anyone doing that here. But I see people arguing for expanding the options you have when you go the path of slaver/raider/whatever bad guy the game allows you to play.

See, the game allows you to play that sort of character, but then it strips away a lot of options from you without giving you any others.

The options don't even have to be equivalent. The bad guy slaver path doesn't have to be as long as the normal guy non-slaver path. But it should offer you some options you don't get as a good guy. That's what adds replay value.

Arcanum did it rather well with allowing you to join the dark elves and giving you a couple unique quests for the evil playthrough. Yeah it's a bit shorter than the good guy path, but it still offers you a couple of unique quests only the bad guys get. Therefore it's a viable and different path, rather than just telling you "well you chose to join the bad guys and now nobody talks to you anymore lol".

When a valid choice locks you out of some content, it should also open up different content.

No one?

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

 

[JarlFrank]

No. Being an outlaw comes with consequences, and that includes being pilloried in civilised areas. If the quests are based on civilised areas, you lose access to them, and if it is part of the main quest, you're fucked. Sucks to be you.

Consequences, bitches. Learn it.

Shmonsequences, granny. "Civilized" is in the eye of the beholder, and for every NCR and fucking Modoc there is a Great Slave Market and a Raider Meeting Ground. In a world not designed to shoehorn you into being plusgood citizen one way or another, that is.

Equating Fallout with being the avatar in Ultima. LMAO, that's a new one. What are Fallout's virtues you are supposed to follow, hm?

Who said anything about virtues? I addressed the Fallout game: You get an Evil rep, your face end up on Wanted posters in every town and you get runned out of every civilised town you care to name. End of your quest to find a GECK. Cue non-standard game over.

It would still be logical to allow the player to ally with bandit groups in order to get closer to his goals. Bandit groups which do exist in the game but usually appear only as hostiles. They should be okay with accepting an asshole player into their ranks.

You were sort of allowed to in FO2. You could join the slaver faction. The problem is that it basically screws you over because you gained the Slaver tag, and that has consequences.

The thing is, we have people here arguing that there should be no consequences to that kind of action because "everyone is a rapist and murderer in a post-apoc setting", which I find to be complete bullshit.

Nobody is arguing against having consequences. I didn't see anyone doing that here. But I see people arguing for expanding the options you have when you go the path of slaver/raider/whatever bad guy the game allows you to play.

See, the game allows you to play that sort of character, but then it strips away a lot of options from you without giving you any others.

The options don't even have to be equivalent. The bad guy slaver path doesn't have to be as long as the normal guy non-slaver path. But it should offer you some options you don't get as a good guy. That's what adds replay value.

Arcanum did it rather well with allowing you to join the dark elves and giving you a couple unique quests for the evil playthrough. Yeah it's a bit shorter than the good guy path, but it still offers you a couple of unique quests only the bad guys get. Therefore it's a viable and different path, rather than just telling you "well you chose to join the bad guys and now nobody talks to you anymore lol".

When a valid choice locks you out of some content, it should also open up different content.

No one?

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

Yes, mondblut was arguing for better options for outlaws rather than just closing off content without offering any new, bad-guy-exclusive content to compensate.

 

[mondblut]

No one?

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

Which part of "Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you"" you didn't get?

 

[Cael]

No one?

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

Which part of "Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you"" you didn't get?

You are as bad as sjws in demanding shit from devs. Play the game or don't, that is up to you. Stop trying to change things to pander to your fetish.

If I were to make a game, I'd make damned sure that if both the sjw and the asshole criminal options result in harsh punishments that will either make it impossible to finish the game or disadvantage you to the point you ragequit. Why? Because you both whined.

 

[JarlFrank]

No one?

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

Which part of "Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you"" you didn't get?

You are as bad as sjws in demanding shit from devs. Play the game or don't, that is up to you. Stop trying to change things to pander to your fetish.

- the game offers you to join the slaver faction
- therefore the slaver faction is presented as a valid gameplay path to follow
- following that gameplay path, presented as a valid choice by the game, closes off a bunch of content
- it doesn't open up alternative new content

Demanding options that are offered as valid by the game to actually offer some content is entirely justified.

 

[Sacred82]

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

the fully fledged outlaw/ slaver experience might just be that you end up hanging from a tree.

Consequences =/= feelgood consequences, gg

 

[mondblut]

the fully fledged outlaw/ slaver experience might just be that you end up hanging from a tree.

Oh, they are welcome to try, lol.

Or you gonna go "bawww, rocks fall everyone dies!1111111" route like a little bitch of a DM whose players refuse to follow the one proper way to play his game?

 

[Sacred82]

the fully fledged outlaw/ slaver experience might just be that you end up hanging from a tree.

Oh, they are welcome to try, lol.

Or you gonna go "bawww, rocks fall everyone dies!1111111" route like a little bitch?

two options here: Either your slaver-y ways attract eventually attract the attention of someone you can't deal with (they aren't called pesky adventurers for nothing)

or

You settle down into your leisurely existence as a slaver. I mean, slaver is a profession, not a faith. Why would you risk that complacent existence in favour of still rescuing the world from some Evul (Evul probably needs some slaves once it rises to power, no?)? A lot of story hooks just wouldn't work anymore. The idea of achieving some greater goal in favour of a complacent (corrupt) existence is supposedly what differentiated the PC's from the normies to begin with.

 

[Cael]

No one?

"You awful human being, we'll let you do that doubleplusungood thing, but we'll punish you by cutting lots of content and generally making the game as unpleasant as possible". Nice try, but pearlclutching by any other name is still pearlclutching. Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you", or shut up with this "muh consequences" moralizing.

Which part of "Give us fully fledged alternate outlaw or slaver gameplay experience instead of "things closed to you"" you didn't get?

You are as bad as sjws in demanding shit from devs. Play the game or don't, that is up to you. Stop trying to change things to pander to your fetish.

- the game offers you to join the slaver faction
- therefore the slaver faction is presented as a valid gameplay path to follow
- following that gameplay path, presented as a valid choice by the game, closes off a bunch of content
- it doesn't open up alternative new content

Demanding options that are offered as valid by the game to actually offer some content is entirely justified.

You get to go on "slaving raids". What more do you want? Isn't that the whole point of you joining the slavers? Go play with your slaver friends. You are no longer a part of the "find the GECK and save the village" narrative.

 

[laclongquan]

And next thing he complain would be not raping their captives on slave hunts.

 

[luj1]

Anyway

Kids have been killed and women have been raped in books, movies, comics, why should games be different?

 

[Neanderthal]

Anyway

Kids have been killed and women have been raped in books, movies, comics, why should games be different?

Because brave blue haired land whales might be offended?

There is the argument that games are interactive and so involve the player more, but considering the effect books of philosophy, doctrine, politics and ideology have had on humanity we can hardly say that escapist stress relief is more dangerous or even approaching the level of the famous books.

Its a new media, people are scared of change and panicking as has happened with the printed word, novels, various types of music, films, video nasties etc.

 

[luj1]

Its a new media, people are scared of change and panicking as has happened with the printed word, novels, various types of music, films, video nasties etc
.

No

Its the ever progressing weakness of man and the inability to entertain a notion without accepting it

 

[Haba]

Children are not very interesting.

Wait till you have some. Interesting the might not be, but sure can make your life "interesting".

Also, all for killing those horrible creatures (in games). Would play King Herod:RPG

My son is highly entertaining (for me), but he'd make for a really shitty NPC. No interesting conversation to be had, no XP and shit loot.

Children in RPGs are just a wasted effort. In other kinds of games they might make more sense. Like in a shooter.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

... women have been raped in books, movies, comics, why should games be different?

There's no point in rape being included in games. In the sense of the PC being able to do it, as there's nothing wrong with it being included as part of the game world for world building and story reasons.
It's a stupid waste of time to implement a mechanic that in no way enhances the gameplay and has no function other than being edgy for the sake of controversy. And of course to get money from the few autists that like LARP to those sorts of shit.

 

[Thal]

This thread reminds me of the time I was playing Fallout 2 and found myself unable to get to the Oil Rig, as I had somehow misplaced the McGuffin that was necessary to get the tanker moving or something. It was very odd since I had it in my inventory before and was absolutely certain that I hadn't dropped it. Well turns out that the street urchins outside that early game watering hole had pickpocketed it from me. Apparently you're supposed to be able to buy your stuff back, but for some reason I was playing a censored version so I could do fuck all. I knew the kids were still in the game, only invisible, since the dialogue bits were hovering above where the little shits were standing. I couldn't interact them directly, but I came up with a perfect solution: I blew up the children with high explosives and resolved to loot the corpses.

Well they had no bodies either, so my game was fucked up for good. I'm not sure whether I had an earlier save or had to give up that playthrough.

Anyway, you should be able to kill them, if you can also kill the adult next to them. However, I sort of understand why you can't anymore. If you had the option in Skyrim for example, Youtube would be flooded with gratuitous massacre videos by edgy little shits from RL. It would be a PR nightmare, so better for the company to just make them unkillable. So the audience is partly to blame. But I don't even particularly mind the restriction as the above example is the only time I can ever recall trying to kill children in a game, despite all the evil playthroughs I've ever done. Even if your PC is evil, you can design the game in such a way that there is no reason to kill them. Give them something else to do. In this sense, Bethesda failed miserably with FO3. That kids' town was really jarring experience. It's almost like they wanted to rub it into your face. Scrap the town however, and divert your resources to somewhere else, and the problem becomes a very minor one.

 

[Cael]

This thread reminds me of the time I was playing Fallout 2 and found myself unable to get to the Oil Rig, as I had somehow misplaced the McGuffin that was necessary to get the tanker moving or something. It was very odd since I had it in my inventory before and was absolutely certain that I hadn't dropped it. Well turns out that the street urchins outside that early game watering hole had pickpocketed it from me. Apparently you're supposed to be able to buy your stuff back, but for some reason I was playing a censored version so I could do fuck all. I knew the kids were still in the game, only invisible, since the dialogue bits were hovering above where the little shits were standing. I couldn't interact them directly, but I came up with a perfect solution: I blew up the children with high explosives and resolved to loot the corpses.

Well they had no bodies either, so my game was fucked up for good. I'm not sure whether I had an earlier save or had to give up that playthrough.

Anyway, you should be able to kill them, if you can also kill the adult next to them. However, I sort of understand why you can't anymore. If you had the option in Skyrim for example, Youtube would be flooded with gratuitous massacre videos by edgy little shits from RL. It would be a PR nightmare, so better for the company to just make them unkillable. So the audience is partly to blame. But I don't even particularly mind the restriction as the above example is the only time I can ever recall trying to kill children in a game, despite all the evil playthroughs I've ever done. Even if your PC is evil, you can design the game in such a way that there is no reason to kill them. Give them something else to do. In this sense, Bethesda failed miserably with FO3. That kids' town was really jarring experience. It's almost like they wanted to rub it into your face. Scrap the town however, and divert your resources to somewhere else, and the problem becomes a very minor one.

Blame the eurotard censors. That was only in the eurotard version of the game. Everywhere else had the kids showing up, and you can steal it right back from them.

 

[mondblut]

There's no point in rape being included in games.

It gives you experience. It may also be used as a means to recharge mana, collect souls to power up artifacts... the sky is the limit!

 

[Poseidon00]

Incinerating a group of snot-nosed brats in Baldurs Gate with a fireball is my reason for playing the game and you can't take that away from me

 

[JarlFrank]

There's no point in rape being included in games.

It gives you experience. It may also be used as a means to recharge mana, collect souls to power up artifacts... the sky is the limit!

"I'm a wizard."

"Cool. What spell school are you specializing on? Elemental magic? Summoning magic? Spiritual magic? Telekinetic magic?"

"Rape magic."

 

[illuknisaa]

All I want is internal consistency. If you make an fps with kids in it I want to be able to shoot kids. If npcs talk about their dramatic rape incident I wanna rape them too.

If there is no kids or raping I don't need to rape kids.

 

[Okagron]

Killing kids is usually linked with paedophilic urges & desires. It's a no from me.

I sure as fuck didn't want to kill those kids in Camp Littlelight because of "paedophillic urges". I want to kill them because besides being possibly the most retarded location in Fallout 3, and that's saying a lot given that Fallout 3 is nothing but retarded bullshit, those kids are easily some of the worst written characters ever made in fiction.

If you are not gonna allow me to kill absolutely everything, then remove everything that can't be killed. It's restrictive as shit to be able kill only a certain number of people, while the others are invincible. It's counter-intuitive.

 

[mondblut]

Killing kids is usually linked with paedophilic urges & desires. It's a no from me.

Paedophiles love kids, you idiot. And we, we hate their guts (the kids' guts, that is).

 

[mondblut]

There's no point in rape being included in games.

It gives you experience. It may also be used as a means to recharge mana, collect souls to power up artifacts... the sky is the limit!

"I'm a wizard."

"Cool. What spell school are you specializing on? Elemental magic? Summoning magic? Spiritual magic? Telekinetic magic?"

"Rape magic."

Hey, it's current year and sex under "Charm person" is literally raep. And that spell is the single most important reason driving people to wizardry.

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

Paedophiles love kids, you idiot.

"Love" isn't the word I'd use to describe their feelings