Hatred steam page is up, they kept the AO rating, first steam game to be sold with such rating

NuclearKangaroo

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http://store.steampowered.com/app/341940/

you know, i said hatred COULD be one of those games that changes the industry, but i didnt really believe it would do it

this is big, it could be the begining of the mainstream acceptance of the AO rating, afterall steam is the biggest digital distribution store around


PS: an isometric shooter requiring 8 GBs of ram and a 64 bit OS? ridiculous
 

Johnny Novgorod

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Rated AO for "Intense Violence, Blood and Gore and Strong Language". That doesn't sound much different from a lot of M games. You'd think they would've put a little more effort in justifying the AO rating.
 

Fappy

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Johnny Novgorod said:
Rated AO for "intense Violence, blood and gore and strong Language". That doesn't sound much different from a lot of M games. You'd think they would've put a little more effort in justifying the AO rating.
I imagine they rated it based on context more than anything else. They should have added "disturbing themes" or something like that.
 

scotth266

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Johnny Novgorod said:
Rated AO for "intense Violence, blood and gore and strong Language". That doesn't sound much different from a lot of M games. You'd think they would've put a little more effort in justifying the AO rating.
For example, Evolve has the tags Blood, Strong Language, and Violence. Apparently all it takes to get AO is to have "intense" violence and gore, but that seems really odd given that other games feature the same content: GTA5's torture scene comes to mind, as does the ridiculous levels of dismemberment and disembowelment in the God of War franchise.
 

RJ 17

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Edit: Removed correction after noticing "first steam game" in topic title. :p

scotth266 said:
Johnny Novgorod said:
Rated AO for "intense Violence, blood and gore and strong Language". That doesn't sound much different from a lot of M games. You'd think they would've put a little more effort in justifying the AO rating.
For example, Evolve has the tags Blood, Strong Language, and Violence. Apparently all it takes to get AO is to have "intense" violence and gore, but that seems really odd given that other games feature the same content: GTA5's torture scene comes to mind, as does the ridiculous levels of dismemberment and disembowelment in the God of War franchise.
Johnny Novgorod said:
Rated AO for "Intense Violence, Blood and Gore and Strong Language". That doesn't sound much different from a lot of M games. You'd think they would've put a little more effort in justifying the AO rating.
As for the reason, it's more about the context within the current state of society. Random acts of violence - i.e. school shootings - are occurring quite frequently these days. On top of that, when one such mass murder does take place, videogames are one of the first things that gets the blame.

To put it into perspective: can you imagine what the societal backlash against the gaming industry/community would be if they didn't give an AO rating to a game where you essentially play as a mass murderer with the single goal of slaughtering as many innocent, terrified people as possible? I'm all for artistic freedom, but that doesn't mean that art is above societal criticism.

In short, it's not the violence that a lot of people would find offensive, it's the very premise of the game.

Just for the record: I really don't care. Make whatever game you want. I think it's an incredibly stupid idea for a game, but they're free to make it.
 

Mutant1988

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Good.

Just because it is AO doesn't mean that it should not be possible to sell. If parents are so afraid of their kids purchasing and playing "bad" games then it's their responsibility to ensure that their child's account is set to the right age.

If it's the parents account (Likely, kids don't have credit cards), they should instruct their child that this game is not intended for them. If they have taught the kid any kind of respect they will listen. If they do not, then yes, that's them failing to teach the child respect.

If they cannot verbalize how this game isn't for their child, then maybe they should re-examine their own reasons for why they dislike it.

If not, then it's not Valve's fault because Valve clearly put the AO rating right there.



As for the game itself, it looks like garbage made for juvenile dip****s that get off on controversy. I think I'll pass buying this one.

In comparison here, and this is just my opinion; Postal is satire, as garbage at it is, because it's actively ridiculing the notion of video game violence (among other things).

GTA is also satire, as it portray many real attitudes in society (Liberal and conservative US politics in particular), taken to their logical conclusions.

This might be news to some people but prostitutes are treated like shit in real life as well and were treated like shit before GTA was even a thing.

Maybe the satire of Hatred is that it's played completely straight, with no hint of irony, as a mass murder wish fulfilment fantasy?

Maybe. It still looks like a bad game.

Fappy said:
Johnny Novgorod said:
Rated AO for "intense Violence, blood and gore and strong Language". That doesn't sound much different from a lot of M games. You'd think they would've put a little more effort in justifying the AO rating.
I imagine they rated it based on context more than anything else. They should have added "disturbing themes" or something like that.
Indeed. Context matters a lot. Most controversies stem from people ignoring context. Or try to evade taking any responsibility themselves.

*Cough* GTA *Cough*

As for the rating itself, I don't think ESBR is a very legitimate organization to begin with. It's a completely independent organization that has taken upon themselves to tell everyone else what is or isn't worthy of a specific rating.

Take what they say with a grain of salt, at all times.
 

CommanderZx2

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I hope that many of the VN games will get themselves rated and then be able to be sold uncensored with an AO rating on Steam.
 

Kinokohatake

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As much as I can see this doing good for the industries fear of AO, this game is just so stupid and juvenile looking. The trailer sounded like some pissed of 15 year olds facebook whine session.
 

Bombiz

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NuclearKangaroo said:
PS: an isometric shooter requiring 8 GBs of ram and a 64 bit OS? ridiculous
hope you like those destructible environments. it's the only thing that I can think of that would require that much ram. also if thst is tru then I won't be getting this game. that literally all of my ram.
 

mad825

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NuclearKangaroo said:
PS: an isometric shooter requiring 8 GBs of ram and a 64 bit OS? ridiculous
According to the developer on SPUD, they are not the official *offical* specs as they are estimates so it's likely it's going to change as it gets closer to gold.
 

Fox12

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Thomas Guy said:
As much as I can see this doing good for the industries fear of AO, this game is just so stupid and juvenile looking. The trailer sounded like some pissed of 15 year olds facebook whine session.
Eh, I think a game would have to be good before it could drive change. At best, it will be ignored. At worst it will make things worse by reinforcing negative stereotypes in the publics mind. I'm pretty sure other AO titles have received steam releases, to little fanfare.
 

Staskala

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The only reason it's on Steam is that some overzealous Steam employee pulled it way ahead of time, which caused that whole shitstorm over censorship and whatnot. After just revoking that decision Steam now can't do yet another 180 and pull it again. That guy must really be kicking himself right now, if he waited longer the game would have been pulled on legitimate reasons, but now it's going to stay despite its AO rating.
 

Lono Shrugged

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Looking forward to the inevitable moaning over Steam not selling porn games. If the game was a bit less up it's own hole I might have liked it.
 

Ihateregistering1

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I actually thought the game looked like it could have potential, thanks to the clear amount of environmental destructibility and surprisingly good graphics for an iso-shooter...if its setting was anything different than the one we got.

But as someone said, the whole thing comes across as a disturbed 14 year old's fantasy, where he decides that he's going to murder everyone because Sally wouldn't go with him to the school dance or because no one understands him. Christ, the lead character looks like the love-child of Nathan Explosion and Rob Zombie, and dresses like basically every socially awkward kid I knew in high school.
 

veloper

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Good. Steam customers can decide for themselves whether they want to buy a game or not.
 

Haerthan

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While I applaud your optimism, it won't change shit in North America. Fox News will get its hands on it, call it another murder simulator, and sell another bunch of copies based on that alone. Just remind me when it comes out again.
 

Lieju

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Fox12 said:
Thomas Guy said:
As much as I can see this doing good for the industries fear of AO, this game is just so stupid and juvenile looking. The trailer sounded like some pissed of 15 year olds facebook whine session.
Eh, I think a game would have to be good before it could drive change. At best, it will be ignored. At worst it will make things worse by reinforcing negative stereotypes in the publics mind. I'm pretty sure other AO titles have received steam releases, to little fanfare.
Such as? Since I can't find info on other AO games on Steam.

Really, if this game is going to have any actual impact it is going to be rating-wise. As far as I understand, Steam hasn't allowed AO-rated games to be sold on their distribution platform, so far anyway.
So this is going to either be a special case (which is questionable, what makes this special then?) or they'll have to remove that limitation.
 

FFHAuthor

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So, basically it's a very well made game about what EVERYONE does in a GTA game when you hit a rough mission and stop caring about the the story campaign?

Meh. If this is going to be the first AO game made, then it's just a waste of the historic moment. Not something with subtlety and mature overtones, not something dealing with adult ideas or concepts. Just taking the GTA time filler and ratcheting it up.
 

AT God

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I might as well complete my collection of games rated AO without sex in them, already got Manhunt 2. I think the ESRB really dropped the ball by not releasing a content description with this game. Lots of people jumped to assume that the various news-outlets criticisms of Hatred lead to the AO rating and while I hold my tongue on the matter because I don't want to indulge in that hearsay, it does look sort of bad. If ESRB had said anything as to what makes this game so special it would have looked better. I know the Manhunt 2 controversy started over one of the executions, which supposedly implied you castrated an enemy. Having played the AO version with the "filter" disabled, the only thing close to that sort of thing is one execution involves hooking someone between the legs with a sickle and yanking it back. I guess it implies you are cutting up into their torso but the game has the same graphics as GTA3 so there is no real physical damage shown.

I can think of a few things that might warrant an AO rating for a game based on violence because of their novelty, such as harming children (something I really hope isn't included in Hatred personally). I personally hope the game is at least mildly fun and doesn't do anything extremely stupid (such as take any of the advice that is being posted on Steam). If it is just what the trailers seem to show, basically a modern version of the original Postal game I will probably get it, assuming it improves on Postal 1's awful controls.
 

WindKnight

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Thomas Guy said:
As much as I can see this doing good for the industries fear of AO, this game is just so stupid and juvenile looking. The trailer sounded like some pissed of 15 year olds facebook whine session.
Best thing to do with this game for me by far is the fanartist who decided to recast the 'other girls and me' meme with Duke Nukem as 'other guys' and Hatred guy as 'me'... and then followed it up with the whole shipping angle that meme went through.