A quick question to my fellow gamers

On 05/20/2013 at 05:48 AM by jcal94

Hey everyone, sorry I haven't been around lately. I know I said I'd get another blog out about my future game, and haven't, and I know I haven't really commented on many blogs. Life is crazy around 18 with juggling school, trying to get a job, helping around the house, keeping healthy relationships, and relaxing with the bit of time I can get. I'm hopefully going to be around more frequently now that it's summer time, depending on how a possible job goes for me and how much time it would take up!

Now, onto what I'm here to ask everyone. Quick background: I have a very dark and twisted psyche. I'd be a pretty freaking terrible person without my religion, family, and loved ones to keep me from doing stuff I would otherwise probably not regret, so I don't know how most people would take this. In a game that deals with a lot of psychological, emotional, and just pure mentality issues around good/evil and what makes them, do you all feel it is crossing a line having a non-main character protagonist kill some very young children (like, between 6 months to 2 years) in a twisted sense of showing how broken down this character really is, despite them appearing normal most of the time and being the main love interest? She justifies her actions to the player character by stating doing that gave them 100% immunity from having any experiments or body/mind-altering procedures done on them, but the player character points out they could have easily taken them back to safety.

Is something like that crossing a line? I feel it is justified in showing that underneath this apparently regular girl, there's just one more issue that is of grave concern. But, alas, being only 18 and not completely world-wise and everything, I am reaching out to all of you to give me your opinion on it, and, at least in an M game, what do you feel is "crossing the line" of what's acceptable? And I don't mean in things like language, or sex, I mean in dark/grim subject matter. I know you all are real gamers, and want an opinion from the type of people I aim for as an audience.

Thanks, and hopefully I'll be around more here soon!

leeradical42

05/20/2013 at 08:00 AM

Well as you put it crossing the line isnt so much about ethical as it is received you have to ask yourself how it will be receceived theres alot of gamers that wont like it then again if its part of the story and really needs to be told there may not be a choice depending on the story, but look at Rockstar and how much scrutiny they get and ask yourself is it worth the hassle,anyway i have a 17 year old so i know how busy your lives can be but it sounds like your being a very responsible young man by school and a job and putting that as priorities is ok so we will excuse u this time for not being on here lol hope this helps a little.

Matt Snee Staff Writer

05/20/2013 at 11:35 AM

killing children is pretty bad, and reserved for only the most heinous villains/protagonists. People don't tend to forgive people who do that. Same thing with doing harm to innocent animals like dogs or cats. Maybe if you want to demonstrate this person's psyche, have them kill an adult, but one who was totally innocent. People are a lot more forgiving of killing innocent adults than children.

jcal94

05/20/2013 at 07:15 PM

Thanks for your comments sneen and lee. As you say, it is considered a pretty evil thing, but one thing I want to emphasize is grey and gray morality. There are good people who do bad things because they feel it is for the greater good, and evil people who do good things but only to advance their evil intentions. In this instance, it would be shown that at the moment, with her own past flashing before her eyes, she feels that it would be easier on them to be dead as she wished she was when she was just an experiment, but once Ray, the main character, yells at her asking her why when she could have just taken them with her, she breaks down realizing she made a huge mistake, and gets conflicted with two parts of her own psyche.

To pull it off in the way it needs to affect the player, I will need to refine it again and again to get it just right, but i hope once I get it to that exact point, that it will enrage, sadden, and make the player wonder exactly how broken this girl is, all at the same time. It's a thin line to tread on between just enraging the player, and make them think it was just thrown in for shock value. It'll probably be one of the hardest parts for me to write out of the whole story, but I hope I can pull it off and give these mixed emotions.

ThatKidOverThere

05/20/2013 at 08:22 PM

The whole plot point of the character killing children is pretty cool, but what will make the story stand out is how the other characters react to it. Will the other characters trust the killer enough to agree with the justification of her actions? How does the killing affect the relationship between the player and the love intrest? Does this side of the character remain omniprescent after the incident and affect other characters actions towards her? As I said, the plot point is pretty cool, but to craft a good story, the dark side of the character can't just be plopped in the middle; it must be interwoven into the story and the characters actions.

BTW, when are you gonna give us an update about the game? How far is it in development, i'm itching to hear the details!

05/20/2013 at 09:21 PM

Thanks! It's going to depend largely on player choice on how the main character reacts to her, but all the others will slowly become more and more uneasy around her when this stuff happens. This is not just one instance of showing she has an evil within her, as there are different spots all throughout the story where stuff like this comes out, but it is spaced out enough at the same time that you can still like the character and she can still retain a title of a protaganist.

And I hate to say this to someone interested in it, but it is mostly still in my head. I'm just 18 now, 19 in a month, and am starting classes this fall on game design. I know there's other methods I could use such as RPG maker, etc, but it's a large project once put to paper, and it will actually end up spanning genres, so I need to know how to make games from the ground up for it to function properly. But I'll probably be slowly working on it throughout my classes, too!

brighat

05/20/2013 at 08:45 PM

Something like that sounds too controversial and politically incorrect at this time for a video game. If they wanted to do it, it would have to be stylized, I guess. The closest I've seen was in Dante's Inferno. Until we see an actual game where the main character does such a thing, it's difficult to tell if I would want to play a game with a main character who commited said crime. I have to know what this video game is and what the plot is.

Sounds perfect for Infinity Ward, who have a history with controversial cutscenes.

PixlBit