172: The Gods Must Be Crazy

[Michel Fiallo-Perez]

The Gods Must Be Crazy

"In most genres of gaming players can get their kicks from tormenting the poor virtual creatures weaker than them. Known as 'videogame cruelty potential,' this popular activity is a source of hours of cathartic release for many gamers. But one genre in particular excels at promoting user-driven comedy: god games. They give players the chance to be inventive while dishing out the pain on a broader scale and in greater detail than most other genres."


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[xitel]

There are a lot of flash games out there that enable you to indulge your schadenfreude cravings, like Interactive Buddy and Defend your Castle. I will admit to trapping my sims in impossible fence mazes once or twice, but then, who hasn't?

 

[L.B. Jeffries]

The Sims always crossed too much into the Uncanny Valley for me. Torturing them was funny for a bit and then it just felt disturbing.

Now Lemmings? I started every single level of that game by nuking the little critters and seeing how much terrain they could blow up. Or driving them off a cliff. Or trapping them under water. Or...oh, I could just go on and on.

 

[arrr_matey]

I had the opposite reaction to Darwinia. The screams each Darwinian yelled out upon dying haunted me to no end, making me try even harder to keep them alive. There was something infant-like about them or something.

 

[Nimbus]

I'd just like to point out that Darwinia isn't a shareware game just because it was made by an indie company, or has a demo. It's a fully commercial game.

 

[miawallace]

I had a demo of Zoo Tycoon, and would have endless fun building the zoo properly until the point where a lot of punters would come in, then demolish the fences around the lion enclosure.

 

[Dommyboy]

I loved the Sims: Bustin' Out because you could just be an utter bastard to your sims with many weird objects. Enclosed them in a maze and gave them 1 fridge and lots of dangerous objects. Eventually I felt like a sick individual but I loved forcing a Sim to fix a light, even though it had a 90% chance of electrocuting them and killing them.

 

[PureChaos]

Now Lemmings? I started every single level of that game by nuking the little critters and seeing how much terrain they could blow up. Or driving them off a cliff. Or trapping them under water. Or...oh, I could just go on and on.

same here. i always liked the way the would go 'oh no' cover their faces and pop. most people are mean to game characters because its not real, its just a load of pixels. we all hack up random NPCs just because we they were there. id much rather people did that then go out and do it for real, especially if that person was my neighbor!

 

[Skeleon]

Uhm, Darwinia was a good game despite not seeing your guys die in agony.
Maybe I'm just a whiny little pussy but I don't need to see virtual pain to enjoy a game.
Virtual torture doesn't disturb me too much but saying that god games are only funny if you are able to torture the innocent is a kinda weird statement.

 

[Torian_Kel]

In Left 4 Dead, I was pissed at the Director AI so I shotgunned my team mates (Was playing offline) until they were incapped while still in the safe room, then tossed in a Molotov and closed the door and watched them burn.

Satisfying until the tank came down the stairs...damn Director AI

 

[Flight]

Whenever I got annoyed at Mayu while playing Fatal Frame II, I'd run ahead of her and enjoy her whining. A pretty tame example, I know, but still. Theme Hospital sounds pretty funny, though.

Also, I'm not sure if this is off-topic or not, but the picture surrounding the article made me think of Monty Python.