Killing is Too Easy
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
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Not only that, how about not spoiling the game, and if you (you as in Yahtzee, not you Lovely M) are, how about a little context?Lovely Mixture said:
No spoiler warning as this section was already spoiled by Yahtzee...
Take the killing of Robert. Tess pipes Robert in the leg and eventually shoots him in the head. If you played that section of the game without any context, Tess and Joel would seem like monsters. But here's where Yahtzee's gripe with ND games falls apart. He never gives you any context, on the end result...and Lol...wait till they show their intentions? Please.
So with context.....The first time you meet Tess, she's been beaten up and escaped death. Robert and his men didn't simply steal a few guns and leave. He almost killed Tess as well and who knows what other bad things he tried with her in a screwed up world like tLoU. She didn't beat up herself.
So why did Yahtzee ignore that part? Because this soapbox would look like another I hate Naughty Dog games rant? Of course...
And the Last of Us is a poor example as you can skip almost all combat with humans..
I'd like to bring up Alpha Protocol. It isn't the perfect game but something special about it is that you can finish the game without killing anybody. Choosing to not kill your enemies opens a whole other game and some of my favourite moments hinge on the fact I chose non-lethal force to meet my goals. As much as writers often rely on wanton violence to make something feel badass and mature, being the bigger man can be just as fulfilling.
I also agree with Yahtzee's point about killing, but I still think The Last of Us was great.Zhukov said:
Also, to add to that last bit of your post; One of the things William Shakespeare's plays had to compete with for an audience were events were they had bears killing dogs. Which is why Shakespeare's plays often used literally buckets of blood.
So our liking of violence is a lot older than some would think, and has really kept up with us through the ages in our entertainment. As you said, at least it isn't real now(normally).
If I had to guess what started it, it would probably be that those that liked to hunt and kill animals probably got better at it, and had a better chance of living than those that didn't. It's just in our nature.
That all said, I think another problem with the criticisms to The Last of Us(at least from my experience with the game) is that the killing isn't really fun(especially on harder modes). I didn't clear out a space and go "Wow! xD Man that was FUN! Lets do that again!", it was more of a "Wow.
Thank God that's over. Now I can just listen to Joel and Ellie while I have a look around".Don't get me wrong, it was satisfying at points to kill your way through some of the harder enemies (the bloaters), but afterwards I felt more relieved that it was over, and I could just relax than anything else. The Last of Us is a violent game with lots of killing, but I wouldn't call it "fun" killing.
That story reminded me of this one.Rossmallo said:
Okay. So the story goes, that there is this Knight who takes an oath of celibacy, and goes around saying that he will never break his oath, no matter what.
Well this powerful King(or lord or something) hears about this, and thinks it's stupid to say you won't ever break such an oath, "no matter what". So, he asks the Knight up to the top of this tall tower. There he introduces him to a bunch of very beautiful women. The Lord says to the Knight: "If you don't have sex with at least one of these women, then one by one, I will have them jump out of the tower to there deaths."
The Knight thought long about what to do. Should he stick to his oath, or should he break it to save the lives of the women?
In the end, the Knight chose to not break his oath, meaning all the women died. His logic was that by sticking to his oath, he was doing nothing wrong, and that the deaths of the women were on the lord's soul, as he was the one who made the challenge in the first place.
Well this powerful King(or lord or something) hears about this, and thinks it's stupid to say you won't ever break such an oath, "no matter what". So, he asks the Knight up to the top of this tall tower. There he introduces him to a bunch of very beautiful women. The Lord says to the Knight: "If you don't have sex with at least one of these women, then one by one, I will have them jump out of the tower to there deaths."
The Knight thought long about what to do. Should he stick to his oath, or should he break it to save the lives of the women?
In the end, the Knight chose to not break his oath, meaning all the women died. His logic was that by sticking to his oath, he was doing nothing wrong, and that the deaths of the women were on the lord's soul, as he was the one who made the challenge in the first place.
This makes me think of a question. Are these two "moral extremes" both kind of bad?
(Kill anyone who gets in your way, and never kill anyone, ever.)
Yes, the killing people one is without question worse, but is the never kill anyone thing really something one should stick to, "no matter what"?
I just think that people shouldn't deal in absolutes. Even the "good" ones can end up causing trouble.
That said, I am all for games that let you solve problems by doing more than just killing people.
I've never really saw the death penalty as "punitive revenge". A life sentence is punitive revenge, any arbitrarily long prison sentence or imprisonment where rehabilitation is not a serious consideration is punitive revenge. Death is not revenge, or perhaps not for anyone beyond the victims of whatever crime or their family.
Rather, death is simply the removal of a problem. Taking individuals that are a threat to the society they live in and removing them from it. A life sentence works just as well, but I can't seriously believe that anyone who can be rehabilited by prison would take 20 years to do so, suggesting that rehabilitation is not the goal of a life sentence. And without that, I fail to see the point of wasting resources on keeping them around.
It is an interesting point about how facing a death penalty encourages those facing it to be even more violent, but frankly I'm not sure promising them life in cell instead is going to encourage them to come along quietly either.
Rather, death is simply the removal of a problem. Taking individuals that are a threat to the society they live in and removing them from it. A life sentence works just as well, but I can't seriously believe that anyone who can be rehabilited by prison would take 20 years to do so, suggesting that rehabilitation is not the goal of a life sentence. And without that, I fail to see the point of wasting resources on keeping them around.
It is an interesting point about how facing a death penalty encourages those facing it to be even more violent, but frankly I'm not sure promising them life in cell instead is going to encourage them to come along quietly either.
I don't think you read my post? And I never said Joel was a hero. In fact every single rebuttal on this thread is arguing that Joel is not a hero. So just read them.mike1921 said:
As you brought up Greedo's imminent threat I compared it to Frank's (was that his name) threat - the guy sent people to kill Tess so he was a threat.
Weather an unarmed 'villain' is a threat or not is a matter of perspective. Tess pulled the trigger because the hitmen were sent after her. He screwed them on a deal and betrayed them again...he sounds like a consistent threat to me
AND again you are totally missing the point of those earlier scenes and explanations setting the tone and rules of TLOU setting. It's a dog eat dog world now, human's are forced to do some messed up things for survival.
Joel even says he used to be bandit, his brother says to Joel he would rather of died then do those sick things. To actually think that the game/story wants you to perceive Joel as a hero is insane.
So just like Scarface, Joel is not portrayed like a hero throughout. Scarface did some messed up stuff but he refused to kill the children b'cos he has certain rules and compassion, joel did some messed up stuff but he is still capable of love/good etc.
So I have come to the conclusion you are basing your view on cherry picked information on TLOU without playing the game or something is wrong with you.
well the vibe I've been getting from Joel so far is that the events during the first outbreak left him damaged in the head, bitter as fuck and not caring about any lives including his own.
Yeah, I didn't get very far in The Last of Us but Joel definitely isn't your typical protagonist - and definitely not the kind you're supposed to sympathise with. That's why Ellie is such an important character.
Yeah, I didn't get very far in The Last of Us but Joel definitely isn't your typical protagonist - and definitely not the kind you're supposed to sympathise with. That's why Ellie is such an important character.
I haven't played The Last of Us, but I had the exact same problem Yahtzee had with the thematically similar, paternalistic/redemptive themed, Bioshock Infinite. "Oh boohoo, I killed native Americans at Wounded Knee, I feel so bad about it. Luckily I have no problem massacring hundreds of people my horrific spinning blade claw arm."
Writers create stories about people who can so casually murder so many others, yet still expect us to feel empathy when someone near and dear to them is mistreated. It feels so insincere. It is possible to make a serious, cerebral story with unpleasant yet sympathetic people, but there is a knack to it: even Al Swearingen or Michael Corleone have an emotional response to them killing someone.
Writers create stories about people who can so casually murder so many others, yet still expect us to feel empathy when someone near and dear to them is mistreated. It feels so insincere. It is possible to make a serious, cerebral story with unpleasant yet sympathetic people, but there is a knack to it: even Al Swearingen or Michael Corleone have an emotional response to them killing someone.
It's quite surprising. Yahtzee really did twist the context of that scene to support his argument.Mr_Terrific said:
There is plenty of criticism you can level at TLOU. You may find that the way they justified killing was weak or cliché or too quick...but to pretend they didn't even try is misleading.
I really don't know, either his intentionally twisting stuff out of context or all that obvious stuff somehow went over his head.
Than fucking say he's not a hero to begin with instead of giving off explanations that might as well be jokes about what he did being alright. I read other people saying that he's intentionally not supposed to be a hero, not you though, you're just justifying it as if he's just fighting off bandits in fallout and like the only difference is that one's in gameplay and one's not.IronMit said:
Umm...no an unarmed villain begging for mercy isn't a threat. That's just laughable. He lost, you don't need to do that particular fucked up thing for survival.
I would say that killing is just that, too easy. It has become the quick and simple problem solver. To use his stealth example most of the time stealth is simply used as a way to silently murder someone rather than avoid them. That's one reason I think games like Amnesia the dark decent was so popular, you could not fight or kill any of the monsters, you had to hide in the shadows or just plain run like your ass was on fire. And that is far more engaging and interesting than waiting for the monsters to turn around so you can effortlessly shiv them in the back and be done with it. Or take most shooters, where you rack up a body count on par with a small nation by the end.
I don't define protagonists as hero or anti-hero. I go in with a blank slate and experience it as it is presented to me. I had no idea you would be operating under the assumption that I thought Joel is a hero because I didn't state otherwise.mike1921 said:
please explain to me the difference between this scene and TLOU. Is this immediately a bad movie because the bad guy was disarmed and begging?
or how about this scene
I won't do what these guys do ever...it doesn't mean I don;t find what leads them to do this stuff interesting.
How about Interview with the vampire? I can't even do that if I wanted to.
Stories set the scene, motivation and personality of their protagonists and what they do makes sense in that context. In the context of the Last of Us, people die left right and centre in this horrible world, and are driven to kill to survive..the authorities had executed someone moments earlier in public. Tess was angry, Tess had a reason to kill someone that had just tried to kill her.
No, what the fuck is wrong with you?gjkbgt said:
Is there some reason you want these people alive and imprisoned instead? Am I supposed to be in favour of keeping them around?
The determining factors regarding which crimes and circumstances merit such consideration is certainly up for debate, as is the standard of evidence required, and that's all fine for a different discussion that quite frankly, I don't know where I'd draw the line on.
But for or this one, I'll make it easy, let's say serial killers, or let's go all out and say we've got a racially motivated serial child rapist/muderer (let's say, crazy white southern redneck sterotype who rapes and murders black children - no, handicapped black children, maybe gay, gotta max out the hate motivated crime factor) . How are people guilty of such a thing in any way worth keeping around?
They're a blight on society in a way few would debate. A cancer cell in the organism that is society that is best cut out, a rapid dog that needs to be put down.
I've said this for years. This is the reason I only play stealth games I can ghost through, tend to avoid violent games in general, and all my violent games are violent for reasons beyond "because I don't know how else to make it fun". (Saints Row III gets a pass, for instance, because it merely revels in allowing the player to do things, rather than saying "you must kill everything between you and the exit"... most of the time, and it has the context of "you're a gang leader".)
It's also the reason I put down Bioshock half way through the Medical Pavilion.
But everyone I talked about it with told me to STFU until ludonarrative dissonance became a thing.
It's also the reason I put down Bioshock half way through the Medical Pavilion.
But everyone I talked about it with told me to STFU until ludonarrative dissonance became a thing.
