Extra Punctuation: What Is the Matter with You People?

[Versuvius]

For me it's for the hilarity factor. Soul trapping children, using them to forge my magical dragonslaying weapons. Sure i have also collected the souls of various people..i have a black soul gem on my table that contains the still screaming soul of the emperor.

Why are you looking at me like that?

 

[Aprilgold]

Because their so fucking irritating in Bethesda games. Hell, you have a quest about doing something for a kid, and hes still a punk ass. In RPG's it gets annoying being a villain and killing EVERYBODY, only for one to walk away from it all like nothing happened.

 

[Erttheking]

Wait a minute, didn't he complain way back when in his Fable 2 review that he COULDN'T kill children...Yahtzee you're entitled to your opinion but some freaking consistency would be nice.

Also I find it odd that Yahtzee finds it joyful to tie people to the back of a jet in Just Cause 2 and take off but once someone gets too young, ohh suddenly we're going too far. Not to mention modders seem to be less interested in creating an interesting and immersive game and seem more interested in breaking down as many walls as possible and creating as many bizarre creations as possible. Hell, I can't help but wonder why Yahtzee is focusing his energy on them anyway.

Also the ability to go around screwing random people...we don't need to give fox news more ammo thank you very much. They still haven't forgotten Hot Coffee.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Face it invulnerable children suck, it messed up the gameplay and any type of open world feel to it.

 

[Atmos Duality]

1st (facebook) comment, and it points out Yahtzee's hypocrisy.
2nd comment, says we aren't meant to take anything he says seriously.

I disagree with comment #1 since it's a hypocrisy argument, and those are simply fallacies (Mr. Croshaw can change his mind over time. He's not on trial here.)
I agree with comment 2 to a degree, but while "Comedic" applied to his video, it doesn't really fit the tone of *this* article. Barring severe disconnect with intent, I think we can safely assume that Mr. Croshaw is treating the topic of Digital Child Murder and Shock-Deaths with the seriousness it requires.

Anyway...child murder mods. This was a hot-button issue back in Fallout 3, and there, one could argue that the developers were intentionally goading someone to mod that into the game given how incredibly obnoxious they were.

Now it's a topic in Skyrim.
The most frequent defense for the child-murder mods is comparing it morally and boiling things down to the degree of their depravity.

Where one draws the line is based on personal morals and subjectivity. Some of us are offended and disgusted by the murder of digital children. Others are desensitized, callous, or even (secretly, if the halo-effect still works online) eager to kill them.
And that's just keeping this within the contexts of PURE FANTASY. (ignoring that whole "Save the Childrens from Video Games"-movement we put up with in reality)

I get no jollies from murdering digital children, and I frankly don't think it's integral to (nor does it enhance) the experience of any game. However, it's impossible for me to logically argue against someone who gets off on that, because it's still morally-subjective.

And lo'. Controversy is born.

Rather than jump into the vortex of circular logic and argumentation that comes with this sort of controversy, I'm just going to observe.

 

[5ilver]

I can sort of see how the law's line was put right there (it's quite funny, when you think about it-adult deaths are okay to depict but kids' aren't?) as there are hundreds of other outdated, naive and pointless laws out there.

What I can't see is what changed Yahtzee's opinion. Did his morals and consciousness ambush him and keep him at gunpoint while he wrote the article? Did he suddenly become a father? I'm honestly curious since this is the first time I find myself disagreeing with his opinion.

 

[anthony87]

Maybe its because I work around a large number of kids and teens with a criminal record and conduct disorder, but I don't see what the hell is annoying about Skyrim's kids.

I played hide-and-seek with a little girl in Whiterun yesterday. Though she did cheat and counted too fast when I went to hide. But then again...so did I.

Maybe The Escapist just attracts an unusually large number of child haters.

You should have downloaded the child killing mod and killed her for that. Cheating is a crime that should be punished with death.
Seriously though, I agree with you. The Escapist is a community filled with child haters it seems. Whenever someone reads news about a group saying kids shouldn't be allowed in restaurants everyone seems to agree. I have even seen people whining about there being kids at McDonalds.

OT: I also have problem seeing the appeal in games allowing us to kids. When I play Saints Row The Third and shoot the windshield of a plane ending up flying out on the other side of it to dive several miles to catch a person I threw away before I entered the plane I don't see the logic in the complaints about lack of realism.
Or Skyrim for that matter. After killing a dragon using a combo of magic and sword you don't hear anyone whining about realism.
When you're playing GTA do you complain about the realism after the cops stop following you just because you repainted the car?

If you can forgive that a team of S.W.A.T. stops following you because your car changes colour when they saw you enter the paint shop you shouldn't whine about the lack of realism when there's no kids around.

For me it's just that it's more immersion breaking than anything. I was playing Skyrim last night and while I'm working at the forge in Riverwood a battalion of Stormcloak soldiers show up and just start straight up murdering the shit out of everyone. Needless to say this pissed me off because they also killed my supplier of Iron Ingots while they were at it. While all this is going on a Blood Dragon and a Frost Dragon show up and start attacking. So I pull out my bow while the epic music starts slowly building up in the background and get to work poisoning my arrows, finding a decent sniping spot and keeping an eye out for any potential cover. Needless to say, it felt like quite a kickass moment.

So after this battle involving a battalion of soldiers, innocent townspeople and two dragons is over I take a moment to survey the damage. This little village that I frequented quite often is now deserted. Empty. They even killed the dog! I think about how just a moment ago I was shopping, forging weapons and helping people out...and know they're all dea-

"I'm not afraid of you..even if you are my elder"

FUCKING KIDS!!!! Did you not see the shit I just pulled! Two dragons! Loads of soldiers! Dead by my hands! And you wanna talk like that to me you little punk?

My way of thinking about the whole thing is to either make them obey the rules of the game world like every other NPC or just don't include them at all. They barely add anything to the game save a quest or two out of hundreds of quests.

 

[BrionJames]

I haven't played through MW3's campaign yet, but I doubt I'll be as shocked when someone explodes in front of me. Probably because I'm playing a game where 90 percent of the time I'm shooting people. Sure most of them are faceless with their gas masks and balaclava's, but it still doesn't take away the fact your killing people, simulated people. I admit playing Skyrim and having kids mouth off to me constantly does make me want to punch them, not kill them...maybe...depending on my characters alignment. Making a moment, or a freedom, in any game to be shocking strictly for the sake of it, is kind of asinine.

 

[weirdee]

It is interesting to see how people make the distinction between killing children and killing adults, especially when you are made to go after hundreds of people over the course of the game, not all of which are entirely evil people.

That actually raises an interesting point. Technically within the context of Skyrim's reality as is kids can technically fuck my shit up if they wanted to. They might not be as strong as me but, as anyone who's used an invincibility cheat can prove, not being able to deal as much damage as an enemy doesn't mean anything when the enemy physically can't kill you no matter how much they try. In Skyrim's reality why do we need the dragonborn? Just give all the kids swords and send them to kill dragons. They don't even need armour so you'd save on iron.

See? That's the solution to the Draugr problem in today's Critical Miss. Oh, sure, they look all big and scary now, but just wait until they're crying for Mommy while fleeing from pre-schoolers.

Failing that, buy a child harness and wear the children as armor.

Top that, mithril!

Thank you for the single greatest mental image now. "Christ he's using one as a mace now! We're doomed!"

Perk: Kinderguard

When wielding a child, you have an additional 10% chance to stun your opponent when you hit them.

 

[reachforthesky]

Alright Escapist, when did you kill off Yahtzee and replace him with one of your EscapeBots? You've made a serious logical error this time, in his review of Fable 2 Yahtzee complained about his inability to not kill children, and in that case he didn't even have a real reason besides boredom! In Skyrim, the kids are quite often annoying fuck. Even a snarky 300-year-old vampire is unkillable just because she looks like a kid. This preposterous Yahtzeebot has forgotten the most important reason for killing children in games; we fucking want to. They aren't real, and they're pissing me off, so there's no reason I shouldn't be able to kill them. I don't wouldn't want to fuck them (or any NPC because that's weird h-game shit, but I guess we're making "perverted" a given characteristic of our hero) It's been said before, if someone is willing to kill at all, there's a very good chance they won't care about the size of his victims, but I would hope that a vast majority of those who want to have sex with someone aren't automatically child-rapists. The real Yahtzee would have never relied on such an obvious apples-to-oranges fallacy. No I do not want to kill children. I don't want to kill anyone, in real life. But this is a video game and who gives a shit? Besides myself of course, because these shit-eating brats are filling up what should be a perfectly empty graveyard of a town with their stupid banter (along with the ten-trillion NPCs the game has infuriatingly decided are too important to let you kill.)

 

[Yopaz]

Maybe its because I work around a large number of kids and teens with a criminal record and conduct disorder, but I don't see what the hell is annoying about Skyrim's kids.

I played hide-and-seek with a little girl in Whiterun yesterday. Though she did cheat and counted too fast when I went to hide. But then again...so did I.

Maybe The Escapist just attracts an unusually large number of child haters.

You should have downloaded the child killing mod and killed her for that. Cheating is a crime that should be punished with death.
Seriously though, I agree with you. The Escapist is a community filled with child haters it seems. Whenever someone reads news about a group saying kids shouldn't be allowed in restaurants everyone seems to agree. I have even seen people whining about there being kids at McDonalds.

OT: I also have problem seeing the appeal in games allowing us to kids. When I play Saints Row The Third and shoot the windshield of a plane ending up flying out on the other side of it to dive several miles to catch a person I threw away before I entered the plane I don't see the logic in the complaints about lack of realism.
Or Skyrim for that matter. After killing a dragon using a combo of magic and sword you don't hear anyone whining about realism.
When you're playing GTA do you complain about the realism after the cops stop following you just because you repainted the car?

If you can forgive that a team of S.W.A.T. stops following you because your car changes colour when they saw you enter the paint shop you shouldn't whine about the lack of realism when there's no kids around.

For me it's just that it's more immersion breaking than anything. I was playing Skyrim last night and while I'm working at the forge in Riverwood a battalion of Stormcloak soldiers show up and just start straight up murdering the shit out of everyone. Needless to say this pissed me off because they also killed my supplier of Iron Ingots while they were at it. While all this is going on a Blood Dragon and a Frost Dragon show up and start attacking. So I pull out my bow while the epic music starts slowly building up in the background and get to work poisoning my arrows, finding a decent sniping spot and keeping an eye out for any potential cover. Needless to say, it felt like quite a kickass moment.

So after this battle involving a battalion of soldiers, innocent townspeople and two dragons is over I take a moment to survey the damage. This little village that I frequented quite often is now deserted. Empty. They even killed the dog! I think about how just a moment ago I was shopping, forging weapons and helping people out...and know they're all dea-

"I'm not afraid of you..even if you are my elder"

FUCKING KIDS!!!!

My way of thinking about the whole thing is to either makes the obey the rules of the game world like ever other NPC or just don't include them at all. They barely add anything to the game save a quest or two out of hundreds of quests.

I can relate to that. If a village gets massacred it seems odd to leave the kids alive. What I don't get is the desire to kill kids.

 

[Master_of_Oldskool]

Hold on, did Yahtzee "every healthy womb in the world should float into the sky like greasy etc. etc." Croshaw actually just chastise people for wanting to kill children? I think I need to have a lie down.

All sarcasm aside, I can't really see the point of going to all that trouble, either. If a game gives me the option to kill children, then I may do so, if I find it's the most convenient thing for me. If not, then what am I losing? Since the game was designed without child-murdering in mind, I clearly do not need to murder children to get the maximum possible enjoyment from the game. What's the big deal?

 

[Jonluw]

Sorry. Yahtzee's articles are normally enough to convince me on an issue, but when it comes to child-killing. Nope.
To explain in terms of Yahtzee's "Not all roles can be available to you"-argument: When one of the roles available to you is "horrible indiscriminate murderer of innocent men, women, beggars and wildlife", it creates a dissonance when there is something you can't kill.
Even if those things aren't normally morally acceptable to ki- Hold on a fucking moment there. Since when did it become morally acceptable to kill defenseless adults?
This game lets you decapitate innocent people and carry their heads with you to store in your home where your thane is honour-bound to stay with the faces of their dead friends and relatives watching them from the walls to which you have crudely nailed their heads with arrows, but when you complain that there being immortal characters in the game feels odd and artificial the answer is "You can't have the option to kill children. That's just disturbing."
Fuck off, I'm not buying it.

I don't think the love-making mechanic simile holds up either. You don't necessarily hurt people by having sex with them, so if the game included a mechanic to sex npcs up, I would not expect it to include a mechanic that would let me sex the children.
If the game included a rape-mechanic, however, I would expect it to also be possible to rape children, yes.

The only argument I accept is "kids in fantasy don't die because they have to grow up to be heroes".

In fact, I'd be okay with not being able to kill children if you were only allowed to hit them into that 'damaged' state that quest-essential characters enter when they should have been killed.

 

[Maldeus]

What, Yahtzee, you spend so much time ranting about how much you hate children and now you're sad to find out other people share the opinion? You rant about how irritating and stupid they are, you theorize that the reason you don't like sex so much might be because of how repulsive the concept of having one might be, you fantasize about all the wombs of the world being sucked out, inflated, and floating off into the sunset like ninety-nine red balloons, and now you're going to pretend you don't understand the concept of shutting the little buggers up with an axe between the eyes? Hell, you explicitly criticized Fable 2 for not allowing you to kill the children.

What's wrong, Yahtzee? You got what you wanted.

 

[Arppis]

I don't really want to kill kids in any game. But I wouldn't mind killing off some NPC characters if I choose so. Skyrim did imo the stupid mistake of relying too much on the NPC's for the advancement of the main quest.

Or atleast... make the unkillable NPC's getting knocked out for few days and you can rob them blind. I'd settle for that!

 

[Coldster]

Well would you look at that. An undeniable case against the modders and (some) users of Skyrim and put together very, very well to come to a logical conclusion. Outstanding work Yahtzee. I look forward to seeing more Extra Punctuation like this. This is the material that I really like to see.

 

[Thaius]

I generally agree with what Yahtzee is saying here. Also, he's right about Modern Warfare: No Russian was not a useless shock scene. The child death in MW3 is.

I do understand one argument, and one argument alone; when a dragon destroys an entire village, no one should be alive. I can understand why people would be annoyed at a village getting completely torched and a few random kids standing around. But the only acceptable thing to do about that is make a mod where children can be killed, but you can't kill them. I'm sorry, bu there is no excuse for wanting to murder children in the game. At all. I can understand wanting them to be moral for the purpose of realism, but making it so you can kill them is pointless, stupid, and sick.

 

[AlternatePFG]

I don't want to kill kids at all (Don't really have the intention to download it) but it doesn't help that Bethesda goes out of their way to make them total dicks.

When I played through Little Lamplight in Fallout 3 my first thought wasn't "I just want to shoot these kids already", it was "Why make these kids so annoying if you are forced to work with them?"

 

[Twad]

Anyway, everyone knows children never die in fantasy stories, even if everyone else in the village does. 'Cos then the child is expected to go off and train for fifteen years until they're built like a bullock barbecue and can take revenge on the dark lord who orchestrated it all. It's pretty much the law.

This reminds me, im still waiting for a story that takes this basic premise and completely turns it around and inside out...

An idea would be to play as the evil overlord, 15 years later, facing a large group of rag-tag "heroes" out for revenge... wich happen to be the kids you left alive after you were bored an burned the town to the ground.

Then you kill them all, since they are all level 1 and you are the closest thing to a living god on the planet... and since you are the player you wont make the mistake of letting them go so they can level up, only to come back later when its really inconvenient for your world domination plans..

Unless when the first battle start, control switch from your godly self to one of the young, lvl 1 heroes. Good luck.

 

[anthony87]

Maybe its because I work around a large number of kids and teens with a criminal record and conduct disorder, but I don't see what the hell is annoying about Skyrim's kids.

I played hide-and-seek with a little girl in Whiterun yesterday. Though she did cheat and counted too fast when I went to hide. But then again...so did I.

Maybe The Escapist just attracts an unusually large number of child haters.

You should have downloaded the child killing mod and killed her for that. Cheating is a crime that should be punished with death.
Seriously though, I agree with you. The Escapist is a community filled with child haters it seems. Whenever someone reads news about a group saying kids shouldn't be allowed in restaurants everyone seems to agree. I have even seen people whining about there being kids at McDonalds.

OT: I also have problem seeing the appeal in games allowing us to kids. When I play Saints Row The Third and shoot the windshield of a plane ending up flying out on the other side of it to dive several miles to catch a person I threw away before I entered the plane I don't see the logic in the complaints about lack of realism.
Or Skyrim for that matter. After killing a dragon using a combo of magic and sword you don't hear anyone whining about realism.
When you're playing GTA do you complain about the realism after the cops stop following you just because you repainted the car?

If you can forgive that a team of S.W.A.T. stops following you because your car changes colour when they saw you enter the paint shop you shouldn't whine about the lack of realism when there's no kids around.

For me it's just that it's more immersion breaking than anything. I was playing Skyrim last night and while I'm working at the forge in Riverwood a battalion of Stormcloak soldiers show up and just start straight up murdering the shit out of everyone. Needless to say this pissed me off because they also killed my supplier of Iron Ingots while they were at it. While all this is going on a Blood Dragon and a Frost Dragon show up and start attacking. So I pull out my bow while the epic music starts slowly building up in the background and get to work poisoning my arrows, finding a decent sniping spot and keeping an eye out for any potential cover. Needless to say, it felt like quite a kickass moment.

So after this battle involving a battalion of soldiers, innocent townspeople and two dragons is over I take a moment to survey the damage. This little village that I frequented quite often is now deserted. Empty. They even killed the dog! I think about how just a moment ago I was shopping, forging weapons and helping people out...and know they're all dea-

"I'm not afraid of you..even if you are my elder"

FUCKING KIDS!!!!

My way of thinking about the whole thing is to either makes the obey the rules of the game world like ever other NPC or just don't include them at all. They barely add anything to the game save a quest or two out of hundreds of quests.

I can relate to that. If a village gets massacred it seems odd to leave the kids alive. What I don't get is the desire to kill kids.

It's not a desire to kill kids. It's a desire for the rules presented in the game world to be consistant. See....well, see my post that you quoted actually. Nowhere in the post do I mention a desire or anything close to that. We just want to be immersed and children that are immune to everything from Swords to Arrows to Fireballs to Bear maulings to Dragons prevents that not unlike a brick wall stopping any forward momentum.