Extra Punctuation: What Is the Matter with You People?

[Kelethor]

The reason I'm in favour of child-killing mods can be explained with my experience in New Vegas.

I was roleplaying as a psychotic, bloodthirsty character--not really what usually comes to mind when one says "evil", though, because he kills everyone, including people who contract him to kill others, and doesn't really discriminate by faction or standing or class.

So I came to this one point where I was massacring the Legion forces at the Fort, and I ran into some children. I'd been ruthlessly slaughtering everyone else here, and my character was a psychotic murderer---a cannibal, who'd help someone out and then chainsaw them to pieces while they were thanking him. So it only made sense that I'd murder the kids too, right? But---I didn't feel right about it. I'd gotten some moral twinges before while RP'ing as this guy, but--not like this. I gulped and held down the button to use my Ripper on the child, but---he screamed, ran away, and I didn't chase him. I cringed at his cries for help and hated myself for trying this. I just left the Fort in disgust. This is one of the strongest experiences I've had in gaming.

A week or so later, I wasn't RP'ing or trying to get immersed, just randomly gunning people down 'cause I was bored. I saw one of the kids and, since I hadn't been trying to get in RP-mode, just saw another bunch of pixels to wipe out. I opened fire and the kid ran away. I continued chasing him and firing and firing and firing and firing, but he never went down. It occurred to me that they'd probably made the kids unkillable.

And that ruined the previous experience because as it turns out there was never going to be any consequence for my action. My inability to kill the frightened child, even while absorbed in the role of a bloodthirsty killing machine, meant nothing because I wouldn't have been able to do anything of any significance even if I HAD been able to push myself over that edge.

So it's not so much that I want to kill kids. I want to be able to choose not to.

That was beautiful man. Beautiful.

 

[RedHighwind07]

Wait why does everyone kick up a stink about this? Does killing children actually make the game "better" in most gamer's eyes? See this is why the media and shit were all over gamers and games were getting censored left right and centre. It's because most gamers have these retarded psychotic fantasies where the inability to kill children apparently reduces the gameplay value. I can see where the other side of this argument is coming from- people play games so they can test out the limits of the in-game society, but the need to be able to kill children personally is one that is just plain wrong, even if it is in a game. Also, the whole watching a child dying thing in MW3 was pretty ineffectual. I mean, how many kids in Africa die of diseases every day? How many children were killed in all those recent NATO bombings? To quote Yahtzee from his ZP review of MW2- "it's a rather dim attempt to capture the same shock and awe and that's the thing about shock- once you're doing it every 5 minutes, it stops being special". In fact, the whole killing thing seems a bit weird to me. It baffles me how killing things is such a mandatory part of any game now, and no one seems to have any issue whatsoever (except for the aforementioned media).

This is just my opinion but. Feel free to shout me down and tell me how I'm wrong or whatever.

 

[xXAsherahXx]

I've always found it weird that a child's life is more valuable than any adult. To me, any human is equal to another regardless of race, sexual preference, or age (especially age).

Yahtzee makes a good point about Modern Warfare, but his argument about raping children falls short because killing is killing and rape has certain morals and grades to it. There's statutory rape, molestation, or good ol' fashion rape. On top of that we have the stigma of raping a child being worse than the rape of an adult. I actually agree with that since with the child you are taking innocence away. With an adult, their innocence is most likely already gone.

You could offer the argument that there are multiple levels of manslaughter (involuntary, murder, etc.), but the stigma here is killing is wrong on all levels (with a little leeway on involuntary). At least, that is the understanding I have of the culture in my country. I'm not an Aussie, even if half of my family is from there. In my country's news, an adult being raped gets a reaction like "That's despicable, I hope he goes to jail for a few years!!" whereas murder gets something like "Rot in prison for all eternity!!!"

Modding Skyrim game for the realism of killing a child isn't a good enough reason, but it doesn't really merit a "WTF!!!"

 

[alinos]

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.

See you've hit the nail on the head. We are all really just afraid the little shit's are going to do just that and come and murder us.

While i don't have said mod, my issue is that if for whatever reason i have decided to slaughter every living creature in town. It seems rather stupid that their is one little kid still skipping through the street's.

Maybe if when you killed a child parent's or significant other's he ran off into the forest never to be seen again until 15 year's later when he comes and unleashes a can of whoopass it would make more sense

 

[ckam]

I remember Yahtzee trying to maim children in a review of his. I got it as a joke, but I think he wanted to "spread the love" because someone else did it in that game.

Anyway, I agree with the let's not kill children for no good reason other than a marketing ploy. So, OK then.

 

[nbamaniac]

Oh my Gawd, I'm not immersed because the children can't die!!!! I wanna go to the corner and slit my wrists now!!! /cry IMMERSION HURPDADERP!!!!!

Is it really that hard to ignore? >.< How about using your imagination when "immersion" fails you?

 

[Callate]

In Fallout 2, many children would try to pick your pockets as you went by; lacking any other means of response to the act, I would sometimes kill them. Barring something like that, Yahtzee's right: there isn't really any good reason to allow the player to kill children.

If you're going to get all up in arms about it, you might want to grind your axe on the unkillable "storyline important" NPCs, first. But if you have to advocate for child murder, please know that I am 100% not behind you on that one.

 

[Frozengale]

To all those bringing up Yahtzee's statement about killing kids in Fable 2, the child killing wasn't the point. The point was that Fable is a series that touts itself on Choice and Freedom and that in games there will always be a limit to what you can do in any given game. It's not that he is for the killing of children in game, it's that the game has several restrictions and the things you can do are fairly pointless.

In that context it wasn't about child killing, it was about pointing out the flaws of the Fable series Choice and Freedom. He was just using extreme situations.

 

[Techno Destructo]

"Everyone knows children never die in fantasy stories"
*Points to Star Wars: Episode 3, where Anikin kills younglins*

 

[nbamaniac]

"Everyone knows children never die in fantasy stories"
*Points to Star Wars: Episode 3, where Anikin kills younglins*

Technically, it's sci-fi.

 

[Techno Destructo]

"Everyone knows children never die in fantasy stories"
*Points to Star Wars: Episode 3, where Anikin kills younglins*

Technically, it's sci-fi.

Oh, my mistake, I guess that justifies those murders then. Who cares about Sci/fi children getting killed anyways?

 

[samaugsch]

I admit, I got that Skyrim mod myself =/

I'm roleplaying a Good/kind Nord Warrior, who doesn't steal or murder innocent, and he will go out of his way most of the time to help others. But he's also a werewolf, and he will uncontrollably transform into the beast every now and then (I have actually dediced beforehand that it will be every 6th or 8th night xD )and when he transforms, he will go completely berserk and just hunt everything and everyone in sight. And when I realized that the children got out completely unscathed, it weakened the roleplay aspect for me.

In Fallout 3, I was annoyed by children in Little Lamplight. My character was a complete asshole, who didn't give a fuck about the children, they didn't let him pass, so he used force. But noticed that they were invulnerable.

It isn't really about the child killing for me, it just annoys me that when these games are about killing, why are these children an exception? I don't think your pedophile- example is a correct one here, since these games mechanisms don't revolve around sex, they revolve around killing things. And it just doesn't sit well with me that the children are invulnerable.
Yes, I am ready to kill pixel children for the sake of my roleplaying. And that is my choice.

That's exactly how I feel, though it wouldn't be a bad idea to make your karma take a bigger dive if you murdered children since people generally react more negatively to you murdering kids than adults.

 

[nbamaniac]

Oh, my mistake, I guess that justifies those murders then. Who cares about Sci/fi children getting killed anyways?

Don't mind.. I just nitpick every single little thing I see.

 

[Vault101]

haha I can imagine with that scene in Modern warfare...theres s "be disturbed" prompt..Nostalga critic stylw (you know, his reveiw of the cell)

 

[Right Hook]

So it's not so much that I want to kill kids. I want to be able to choose not to.

Exactly! Very good.

 

[McNinja]

I wouldn't want to kill kids if they didn't talk at me every time they moved within 2 feet of me.

Listen, kid, I really don't care what you have to say. I just roflstomped a dragon. Please GTFO.

Edit; actually, this applies to every single person in Skyrim. As much as I like talking to people, I really don't like it when they try to tell me... well, anything I don't specifically ask them for.

 

[DanDeFool]

You know, this makes me wonder if child-killing is disabled by default because of the media as well as to maintain the tone. After all, if Fox News came down on Mass Effect for a barely-visible twenty-second consensual sex scene, imagine what they'd do about an open-world game where you can go around butchering children? Talk about bad press.

Not that we should let those Fox News curmudgeons dictate game design philosophy, mind. I just think they have enough people on their side already without us giving them more ammunition.

 

[AngleWyrm]

I'de like a mod that makes kids age quickly.
You could zap em with an "old enough" spell, and then bash their nasty little heads in.

Because it's ok now that they're all grown up.

 

[hooksashands]

I wonder how far we could go with violence and psychotic behavior before someone finally said "Okay, we're banning your game in every country until it stops supporting the fetusblender.exe file."

 

[Shjade]

I don't remember if it was Morrowind or Oblivion, but one of them let you kill anyone. If they were quest related, you just failed the quest. If they were main quest related, you just got a message saying 'And then the world lost it's only hope. Do you wish to continue playing in the doomed world you've created or reload a save?'

I didn't play much of Oblivion, but you could do this in Morrowind.

Who could've guessed killing Vivec would have repercussions?