GRcade

mic wrote:Can’t anyone else see how a murder/ rape/ abuse simulator could encourage people to try it irl, or at least harbour such thoughts?

I don’t think it should be possible to carry out such atrocities. Does it so radically destroy immersion to remove the ability to attack npc’s (unless of course it’s integral to the game)?

As games become ever more realistic, I think devs should take responsibility to prevent this kind of thing.

You can't really play the role of a ruthless outlaw in a realistic setting of the wild west if you can't commit ruthless crimes as that wouldn't be immersive at all. I'd rather play the video game equivalent of The Unforgiven than Paint Your Wagon.

There's nothing wrong with R* having made a game where this is a possibility. The issue is the guy who used the game to make a shitty troll video about beating up feminists. It's strawberry floating alt-right noncery, and I'd be glad to see less of it on the Internet in general.

Even so, the real furore is more to do with inconsistencies in Youtube's policies for removal. There are thousands of videos on there which attack groups and individuals for a laugh, and they remain there. There are plenty of videos which encourage violent or dangerous behaviour, and they remain on there.

Youtube are strawberry floating bad at this gooseberry fool, and have been for years, so I don't expect anything to change off the back of this.

Knoyleo wrote:There's nothing wrong with R* having made a game where this is a possibility. The issue is the guy who used the game to make a shitty troll video about beating up feminists. It's strawberry floating alt-right noncery, and I'd be glad to see less of it on the Internet in general.

Agreed. This is the real issue.

Even so, the real furore is more to do with inconsistencies in Youtube's policies for removal. There are thousands of videos on there which attack groups and individuals for a laugh, and they remain there. There are plenty of videos which encourage violent or dangerous behaviour, and they remain on there.

Youtube are strawberry floating bad at this gooseberry fool, and have been for years, so I don't expect anything to change off the back of this.

Again, agreed. And it's not just alt-right garbage that's allowed to stay up. For example, there's this batshit crazy vegan who posts rants, without a shred of irony, demanding that meat eaters be forced to turn vegan or put to death. How the hell is that channel allowed to stay up?

mic wrote:Can’t anyone else see how a murder/ rape/ abuse simulator could encourage people to try it irl, or at least harbour such thoughts?

When people play a videogame, they know they're playing a videogame, just like when people read a book or watch a film. We have decades of experience of people playing violent videogames and not turning into murderers. If someone commits such acts in real life then there is pretty obviously more of an underlying problem than they played videogames.

Of course there are extremes of acceptable content and society has to decide where that line is. We should approach that from an evidence based perspective, and the evidence is that playing videogames doesn't make people more violent.

This video isn't an example of a game influencing someone's beliefs. It's an example of people already holding those beliefs projecting them onto the game.

kerr9000 wrote:

Jazzem wrote:

kerr9000 wrote:The way things are going we are heading down a distopian path to 1984/minority report levels where people can be judged on every little thought eventually before they've even really had it. Some times people try to be so progressive and left that they circle around the political line and become practically right wing fascist in there demands for people to think, feel and act only in the ways they deem acceptable.

Dude, don't have a "progressives are leading us down a dark path through slippery slopes" take in 2018, just don't. It's comically tone deaf.

progress is fine and it is going to lead us in the right direction hopefully.... but I don't think trying to shut down peoples thoughts is helpful. I am generally left wing in my thoughts but I do think if you want people to listen to your ideas you should listen to there's as well as apposed to just saying how right you are, sticking your fingers in your ears and going la la la im not listening. I am not against progress I just think people stamping demanding there way, and demanding everyone think the way they do is not the right way to go.

If you want other people to not be allowed to put out an opinion be it in a speech or in a video etc then that's a weakness in you/your side in that you don't think you can put across your own argument and win support without having to gag the opposition.

The guy hasn't made a video with an opinion he's made a video or videos on how many ways to kill a feminist in RDR2. It's rather different. Again, he hasn't picked women in general but specifically targetted a feminist.

kerr is arguing in favour of reasoned debate and engaging differing beliefs and politics, which is all well and good if both sides want to engage in reasoned debate, but not a great response to people expressing their desire to kill people.

He should take his argument and reapply it to see why youtube would be right to remove this video - the comments are an echo chamber for people who want to literally stop those with opposing beliefs from voicing them by killing them.

Next time I get a chance to play RDR2 I'm going to see if I can find this feminist and confirm once and for all if she's annoying.

and then feed her to a bear

Tafdolphin wrote:

Venom wrote:Games are a medium that is mostly, fictional, killing. Bethesda don’t allow killing of child characters in their games for reasons of taste. But should Rockstar do the same with the feminists? But also, some people are racist - should developers prevent the killing of people of colour?

But this wasn't just a female character. It was a feminist.

They are both fake people that exist only in a game! - The significance of a character, or lack thereof, comes from the person viewing it. I think this perfectly illustrates why hurt feelings by a minority should not be a barometer of what is acceptable content in computer and video games.

With your quoted comment what you are essentially saying is that you think it's okay in Red Dead Redemption 2 for players to kill an in-game female NPC character, however you object if the female NPC character is a suffragette?!

And fictional GRcader Peter Patel from the forum may feel that killing women NPCs in Red Dead Redemption 2 is acceptable but that it's unacceptable to kill black NPCs as he sees that as a racists.

And Fox News have said it is wrong to kill prostitutes in GTA.

And PETA have said it is wrong to kill whales in Assassin's Creed IV.

Everyone has different politics, feelings, thoughts etc, so it is ridiculous to try and say that MY play experience in a game, should be dictated or restrained by the arbitrary whims and feelings of some random strangers. That's the whole point of game, player agency, player choice. If you buy Red Dead Redemption 2 and start playing it. Then some random person from the internet tells you what you should and shouldn't do in it, don't listen to them, it's your game, you play by your rules.

Venom wrote:

Tafdolphin wrote:

Venom wrote:Games are a medium that is mostly, fictional, killing. Bethesda don’t allow killing of child characters in their games for reasons of taste. But should Rockstar do the same with the feminists? But also, some people are racist - should developers prevent the killing of people of colour?

But this wasn't just a female character. It was a feminist.

They are both fake people that exist only in a game! - The significance of a character, or lack thereof, comes from the person viewing it. I think this perfectly illustrates why hurt feelings by a minority should not be a barometer of what is acceptable content in computer and video games.

With your quoted comment what you are essentially saying is that you think it's okay in Red Dead Redemption 2 for players to kill an in-game female NPC character, however you object if the female NPC character is a suffragette?!

And fictional GRcader Peter Patel from the forum may feel that killing women NPCs in Red Dead Redemption 2 is acceptable but that it's unacceptable to kill black NPCs as he sees that as a racists.

And Fox News have said it is wrong to kill prostitutes in GTA.

And PETA have said it is wrong to kill whales in Assassin's Creed IV.

Everyone has different politics, feelings, thoughts etc, so it is ridiculous to try and say that MY play experience in a game, should be dictated or restrained by the arbitrary whims and feelings of some random strangers. That's the whole point of game, player agency, player choice. If you buy Red Dead Redemption 2 and start playing it. Then some random person from the internet tells you what you should and shouldn't do in it, don't listen to them, it's your game, you play by your rules.

His play style wasn't restricted, what was and should be restricted is making a personal choice to go out of your way to kill a specific person because of their political views and then upload it to youtube where you have 100's or 1000's or more people screaming about how they would love to do the same in real life.

Edit: It's not even killing a specific person, but killing them repeatedly and making a series of videos about it.

Venom wrote:Everyone has different politics, feelings, thoughts etc, so it is ridiculous to try and say that MY play experience in a game, should be dictated or restrained by the arbitrary whims and feelings of some random strangers. That's the whole point of game, player agency, player choice. If you buy Red Dead Redemption 2 and start playing it. Then some random person from the internet tells you what you should and shouldn't do in it, don't listen to them, it's your game, you play by your rules.

I know you're responding to Taf who is coming at this from a "this shouldn't be possible in the game" perspective, which I don't agree with, but in general isn't this news story more about the reaction the video achieves? To quote the OP

Many of the comments underneath the video supported the actions. “Rockstar, making dreams a reality,” wrote one. “Why can’t we do this in real life?” wrote another.

If the effect of the video is to bring people with these beliefs together and to reinforce those beliefs, isn't that a problem? It's completely aside from what is in the game itself.

Brerlappin wrote:No one is trying to restrict how you play your games. If you want to sit in your dingy hovel, cheeto dusted fingers clutching your xbox controller as you beat the gooseberry fool out of the RDR2 feminist in the privacy of your own home, i cant stop you (not you directly, venom, just "you" in general).

You paint such a grim picture, juxtaposition my name and say you don't mean me. Just be honest about it!

Quit going to bat for these alt-right, muh freedumb of speech banana splits, Venom. It's not a good look.

Saint of Killers wrote:Quit going to bat for these alt-right, muh freedumb of speech banana splits, Venom. It's not a good look.

Free speech is worth fighting for - but point taken! I think I've only got so engaged to escape my 'homework.' People arguing in forums on the internet, it's about as productive as two fleas arguing over who's steering the dog.

The guy was a dick, and YouTube are inept, but this IS also about the game itself too, and even video games generally.

A few have said that you want to be bad guys and do naughty things, which is fine within the context of a storyline. But to allow such things as this to occur through emergent gameplay, or without the developer’s intent, is sloppy and irresponsible. For example, a vampire game can be immersive without giving gamers the option to build a mutilated baby shrine.

Nintendo would never allow it!

OrangeRKN wrote:

Venom wrote:Everyone has different politics, feelings, thoughts etc, so it is ridiculous to try and say that MY play experience in a game, should be dictated or restrained by the arbitrary whims and feelings of some random strangers. That's the whole point of game, player agency, player choice. If you buy Red Dead Redemption 2 and start playing it. Then some random person from the internet tells you what you should and shouldn't do in it, don't listen to them, it's your game, you play by your rules.

I know you're responding to Taf who is coming at this from a "this shouldn't be possible in the game" perspective, which I don't agree with,

Like I say, I'm not committed to that really. Personally I don't think it should be allowed per se, but I can see the arguement for it.

Venom wrote:
Everyone has different politics, feelings, thoughts etc, so it is ridiculous to try and say that MY play experience in a game, should be dictated or restrained by the arbitrary whims and feelings of some random strangers.

But you can see how there are some red lines here, some objective statements that a game should not be making/allow to be made? Player agency is one thing, but if your commitment to that includes discriminatory content, perhaps consider the importance of agency versus the voice you're giving to bigotted viewpoints.

EDIT; this has gotten really off topic, sorry everyone.

Cal wrote:

Venom wrote:But why should killing in games be okay, and this not?

Isn't that biggest question here? So many obvious contradictions that one hardly knows where to begin.

Unfortunately, out here in the GRcade Re-Educational Correctional Facility For Problematic Opinion Holders (I was exiled to this gulag some years ago), we are absolutely not allowed to voice our opinions on such matters, but I look forward to reading through the doubtless fair and even-handed discussion here.

Oh Cal.

You were banned for being a knob in debates over and over and over again during which time you were allowed to post your opinions without really any serious recourse for several years because others afforded you that level of patience and respect for you and your views. Unfortunately you reached a point where individuals could no longer be bothered investing hours upon hours of their private time dealing with your literal incapacity to respect and/or address other's views on a discussion forum. It really is that simple.

I think in this case, a large and public media force does have a responsibility to moderate the breeding of hate, and nobody has a right to express it in a private forum. From a private capital point of view, it's not in their best interests to provide a magnet for hatred either.

As someone else said could be more realistically emulated in a video game, they can run the streets yelling about how they hate XYZ, and they can enjoy people wandering up to them to challenge them, completely ignoring them, or punching them in the face, or worse, depending on whatever environment they find themselves in. That would also be wrong, but whatevs, make your own bed.

It's from that environment that actual harm towards others originates, so society does have some responsibility to try and prevent it. That does not (and cannot) prevent people from hating certain things, which they are free to do and remain arseholes until they day they die of loneliness. They do not have a right to be acknowledged, heard or listened to. Freedom of speech isn't the same as freedom to preach and amass hatred for your own puerile amusement, because of some pathetic victim complex that barely exists, if it does.

Regarding the ability to do this kind of thing in videogames, what did people think about the inclusion of a town in Fallout (3 or 4, I can't remember,) that was run by children, who, in order to get the game rated and released, could not be harmed by the player.

Obviously, in a game where you can kill pretty much any NPC, it was a pretty jarring change in mechanics. But was it the right thing to do? Would you have preferred to be able to harm these children, even if you weren't going to? Did you download the killable children mod?

Let's be honest what this latest sweep of anti-censorship is really about. A minority claim that a majority wants to prevent them from acting out their fantasies of destroying individuals they do not agree with, when really they are simply sad and hurt that they do not have more people around them and fistbumping them because they also want to simulate and/or beat the living gooseberry fool out of someone with different organs and different ideas, because they lack empathy of any kind. So they corral around on the Internet with other digital incantations of other "suppressed" individuals. The sad thing is the same groups do actually hook up and murder and gang rape the subject of their hatred because they cannot imagine any other way dealing with it. It is a fact that it is less likely they will be bludgeoned, cut, batoned firmly up the buttocks until their holes bleed because they are the dominant sex.

Somebody call the waambulance. Bunch of cretins the lot of them.

Knoyleo wrote:Regarding the ability to do this kind of thing in videogames, what did people think about the inclusion of a town in Fallout (3 or 4, I can't remember,) that was run by children, who, in order to get the game rated and released, could not be harmed by the player.

Obviously, in a game where you can kill pretty much any NPC, it was a pretty jarring change in mechanics. But was it the right thing to do? Would you have preferred to be able to harm these children, even if you weren't going to? Did you download the killable children mod?

While I prefer games dealing with realistic settings to reflect that in the gameplay, I do also think that perhaps there should be a line drawn when it comes to certain actions a player can and cannot do. Question is where do you draw that line?

What's people's thoughts on being able to set off the nuke in Megaton in Fallout 3 thus killing everyone there, including children?