Let’s see how the hard core right wing and religious people handle this latest trend in videogames. First they complained that games were too violent and were bad influences on kids. Now that’s no longer an issue. Now in Fable you can have gay marriages and get bawdy with women. In games like Nocturne and Digital Tuner(among others), characters are often aligned with the demon world. And in Shadow Hearts, the whole entire Catholic church is the bad guy. As much as I consider myself a good Christian, it would be interesting to see the extremists squirm.
I’m not sure if I’d say gustier so much as more visible. The Megami Tensei series (of which Nocturne is a part of and Digital Devil Saga: Avatar Tuner shares the same creators as) has had the ability to play a character of dubious morality since the NES days. It’s just 1) the series was isolated to Japan and 2) the graphics were so cruddy that even if a parent casually noticed that a child was playing a game with colorful creatures in it, he/she probably wouldn’t know that the player could be siding with the forces of evil–not without asking a bunch of questions.
It might be worth noting that Persona, also a part of the Megami Tensei series, came to the English-language audience towards the start of the PS1-era. While the players were not specifically evil, the protagonists could summon their inner demons in battle, talk with opposing demons to get resources, or slaughter angels with a machine gun. (Angels are generic monsters just like any other “demon.”) The ESRB rating of this eight-year-old game? KA. Or in today’s parlance, E for Everyone.
And computer games have had brothels and such long before Fable came about (and it’s not like you’re going to see anything graphic on camera anyway). Arcanum had the ability to select a prostitute of the same gender–or even a sheep if that’s what really turned your character on.
So it’s nothing new really. It’s just that games now have the ability to show those same things in greater detail than before.
[quote=“Rune Lai”]Arcanum had the ability to select a prostitute of the same gender–or even a sheep if that’s what really turned your character on.
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There’s supposed to be a homosexual romance in The Temple of Elemental Evil, too. Is Troika trying to make a point?
I wouldn’t say gutsier, it’s accepted and to a degree expected.
All the issues like gay marraige, violence in games, the violence in the world itself have been drilled to death in media around the globe. Now when someone sees something in a game they don’t think it’s something totally new or inflicting. Now people to a degree expect it in some games that are announced. For example when an realistic action game is announced it is expected to see what spin than put on it, rather it be extreme violence, you are the terrorist or what not. You get the picture.
I guess what i’m trying to say is that the industry has gotten more mature.
Hmmm… as far as Christian groups go, they don’t give the games ratings or have a say in the devs content. So it’s really up to the classifiers of games to decide whether a same-sex liason in the game constitutes a moral dilema, but I do think Chrisitian groups would still criticise it nonetheless, maybe not make a big fuss about it, but would give a reply if asked. Such as in reviews of games they do on christiananswers.net/spotlight/games/home.html:
tbh, same sex marriages in some rpg is not that much of a serious issue, I think the issue is the growing trend for games like Playboy Mansion and The Guy Game (Real [not CG] cutscenes of women flashing their beasts):
So what? I’ve seen NC-17 and unrated (but would be NC-17) non-porno movies before.
I think the problem is that games like BMX-XXX and Postal 2 are aimed at twelve year olds instead of actual mature gamers.