
More games should be honest about death - danso
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2018/12/28/more-games-should-be-truly-honest-about-death/
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b_tterc_p
Serious emotional games are hard to do. Either they’re on point and really
short (cool, but ultimately forgettable) or they’re probably too long to make
their point. Furthermore if a player has no agency to avoid bad outcomes, it
doesn’t really feel like a game. The thing you’re experience is forced. Easy
to not feel accountable.

Fire emblem is a good example of this. It’s a strategy game where you have
about 30 characters who permanently die when killed in any battle. Most
players just restart each battle until deathless runs are achieved- either due
to emotional or practical concerns. So, when someone dies, it’s not sad, it’s
annoying.

You also lose empathy if a character dies due to unforeseeable consequences of
choices or shitty AI performance.

Legacy board games address these problems well. Because the state of the game
is irreversibly driven forward by physical mutation of the game, it forces you
to commit to your fortune and errors. I hope we see more of these games made.
I haven’t seen this model used anywhere, but I could imagine a video game
where you buy the right to do one irreversible play through of a story mode,
cloud saved on their systems so you can’t manage the data yourself.

~~~
dharmab
Some examples you should look into:

\- Diablo 3's hardcore mode, where you have a single life and your gameplay
and saves are on a cloud server

\- Far Cry 2 permadeath journals

\- Roguelike strategy games like Dwarf Fortress and Rimworld

\- One chance, a browser game designed around a single playthrough (although
the saves are hidden in a cookie that can be cleared)

~~~
robertAngst
re Diablo 3 HC-

Just focus on Vitality, pick a low difficulty level, and slowly grind the
game.

Never died, had 1 close call due to Frozen.

~~~
dharmab
The point of Hardcore mode is to play on the ranked seasonal ladders where you
get permanent rewards for high scores, which means raising the difficulty.

"Games aren't hard if you lower the difficulty" is a strange argument to make.

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1123581321
Well-written. I also find these kinds of games to be cathartic experiences.
However, I think that the few games have saturated the market, or over-
saturated, if That Dragon, Cancer’s poor sales are representative[1]. I
suppose that might be because viewing the content of these games is cathartic
enough, but it might also be because unless one is in the industry, playing
one of these games once, or once per personal loss, is enough, and thankfully
sudden losses like the author’s are still rare.

1
[http://www.thatdragoncancer.com/thatdragoncancer/2016/3/24/o...](http://www.thatdragoncancer.com/thatdragoncancer/2016/3/24/on-
lets-plays)

~~~
jdietrich
Trivial entertainment generally sells better than serious explorations of an
important theme, regardless of the medium. Six of the ten top-grossing movies
in 2018 were adaptations of superhero comics; several Oscar-nominated movies
have barely recouped their costs.

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pbalau
I don't think the op actually talks about games, but about interactive
stories. In my mind, a game needs a challenge, the story is almost secondary.
Take the Fallout games, the stories are there, but without battling the
monsters, you don't get anywhere (yes, I know you can not battle the monsters,
there is still a level of skill required to reach the various stages of the
story). If you look at a game like Orwell, there is almost no skill involved
and, in the end, you can't really win. You can't replay the game and get
better at it. Probably this was the reason why Mass Effect 3 didn't have that
many stelar reviews, 'cause in the end, it didn't matter what you did.

There is a place for these interactive stories, but hey are not video games.

~~~
icsllaf
Orwell is different though. It has multiple endings, you can possibly fail to
come at the right conclusions at certain points which change the story
dramatically, and you have to put in time and effort to actually find certain
facts to get a good ending.

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white-flame
Drakengard (the first of the series) was written in response to the flippant
way many games are framed: You usually score higher the more enemies you kill.
Yoko Taro thought that only an insane person would actually think that way.

So he created a game where the main character is literally broken and insane,
killing huge swaths of enemies in a continually escalating apocalypse beyond
his control. Throw in additional party members who are also broken and insane,
and some point of view personalities commenting on how utterly horrible
everything is, and on if the player is as insane as the character is.

It's not a _great_ game and quite dated, but definitely has a message to
explore which makes traversing the horrible contexts worth it. He went on to
make Drakengard 3 and the related NieR games as well.

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projektfu
I started the article hoping it would be about making death and life-
threatening situations more severe in games, both to make them a little more
realistic as well as making them more difficult and requiring more strategy.
I've always thought that there should be an FPS where getting shot once is
likely to kill you. Probably there is, but I don't play a lot of games
anymore.

~~~
gammateam
Ive wanted a FPS bullet sponge game where one of the random enemies getting
killed starts a flashback to everything thats gone wrong in their life to
become a private military contractor after their wife said “its time to be
realistic”

And then watch the memories fade in real time

that happening to a nonsignficant character

~~~
mcguire
How about this: the first hour of gameplay is fighting the terrorists, the
next 100 is learning how to get food from your plate to your mouth again.

~~~
dharmab
A game about physical therapy sounds interesting. Although I'm not sure how to
adapt spending dozens of hours on the phone with insurances and billing
centers.

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jchw
I find games that try to depict real life suffering to often be too on the
nose for the medium, but I love games that deal with themes like loss, grief,
etc. through good story telling. Some indie games have done a really good job
of this, even when it's not the focus. Celeste for example toes the line of
being too on the nose in my opinion but is a great example of a game taking on
a serious topic (anxiety.) Plenty of other examples out there.

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shaunpersad
Some of the most fun I've had in games were in the situations where killing
was optional. And I wish more games were designed around that concept.

The original Splinter Cell comes to mind. You were supposed to be a stealthy
spy, so killing was often counter-productive to your goal. But if you were
really careful, you could go beyond that and opt to not commit violence at
all, by thinking of the best way to sneak past, trick, and divert your
enemies.

Putting aside the morality of it all, from a challenge/fun perspective, games
make it all too easy to kill, but so much more difficult to avoid it. But some
of the most satisfying experiences can come from thinking about the perfect
strategies to not kill your enemies.

It is curious though, why so many games require killing/violence to be fun,
when there is arguably a lot of untapped fun and new strategies to be had
without those mechanics.

~~~
save_ferris
Completely agree, it's surprising more games don't reward alternative outcomes
to melees.

I've been fascinated by the consumption of violent content in general over the
last few years, but I struggle to find good reading on the topic, and my usual
internet hangouts haven't been super helpful (I suspect some redditors think
I'm an anti-gamer by asking about research into violent content consumption).

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gammateam
I think the name of this medium undermines the discussion.

"Games" instead of the interactive experiences they are

Pretty much any heavy topic has a gamer saying "I think we SHOULD we able to
have [this controversial thing] in games!" and it sounds horrible.

From the gamer's perspective it is as benign and intense as reading a book, or
watching a movie, but calling it a game, VIDEOgame even - something in the
minds of the population as a play thing for children, and coupling it with
adult controversial peril - just won't get the message across.

Of course we aren't for censorship in mediums, which means anything goes.

I think the way this topic is framed - primarily due to the name of the medium
- has slowed this discussion down.

~~~
kiriakasis
But interactive mediums and games are different. It is hard to define a line,
but in my experience you get the best of both world when proper games (those
that are more natural to call games that interactive mediums) have deep
messages.

For me the perfect example was (the particular run I had in) Undertale. Where
if you never watched the trailer you only learn the truth at the very end.

For what I have tried of "interactive mediums" they are harder to build an
emotional connection than books, movies, and games.

~~~
gammateam
I get that the term is going to stick

Debating what videogames should and shouldn't do is always going to undermine
its own message with people that don't really why adults are talking about
videogames

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ekianjo
Games are made to be fun - it's not called electronic entertainment for
nothing. If it's to remind you of the pain of living constantly what's the
point of playing them?

~~~
krapp
Games are made to be entertainment, and like any other genre of entertainment
(literature, movies, television, plays, etc.) they can encompass the entire
range of emotion and experience, not just "fun."

I think it's a sign of the medium maturing - more adults are playing and
demanding more complex experiences than just collision detection and pattern
recognition can provide.

~~~
ekianjo
> more adults are playing and demanding more complex experiences

Where do you see that? The same genres of games are as popular as ever. At
best you can say a niche is forming but that's about it. Nobody is "demanding"
anything.

~~~
krapp
It seems to me that a "niche" doesn't form unless there's a demand for it.
I've seen enough indie games with "adult" themes like That Dragon Cancer and
Papers Please to lead me to believe somebody is looking for games like that.

~~~
ekianjo
I don't think that's a market in the sense that you mean it. It's more akin to
"curiosity". Something stands out of the rest so a certain % of people will
want to try it. And then, come back to normal games afterwards. For example, I
know a bunch of people who played Paper Please (including myself) and enjoyed
it, and then returned to play what they have been playing for x years before.
It did not change their gaming habits.

------
rleigh
Some games do explicitly investigate death, but they are far from the norm.
One I found quite touching was "To The Moon", which is a quirky but
surprisingly emotional story around the death of an old man, and his lifelong
struggles and regrets. It's short, but well worth a look (as is the sequel).

I think this type of narrative-driven investigation of a complex and
uncomfortable topic is something which games can do extremely well. But few
games attempt it. I wish more did; it adds a level of depth and intimacy which
I haven't experienced with other media such as books or film (though some came
close).

~~~
avcdsuia
It's empathy I think, games are extremely capable of that.

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fareesh
Some games have done a great job of conveying complex emotions. Metal Gear
Solid 5 - The Phantom Pain, for all its faults, either inadvertently, or
through genius, managed to deliver the feeling of "Phantom Pain" by launching
an incomplete game. By pitching the installment as the end to a 25 year old
epic saga, the game simply ends with a seemingly unsolvable problem.

Earlier installments also killed off characters (The Boss, Big Boss) in tragic
fashion.

The Last of Us & Final Fantasy VII also had some good plot points that dealt
with tragic deaths.

~~~
Etheryte
A friend of mine who's a lifelong fan of MGS says he always gets phantom pain
when someone brings Phantom Pain up. A tragedy to see the series wrap up like
this.

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golemotron
Not to make light of this but we could say that more romances should be honest
about love too.

Fiction (and games are a form of fiction) separate parts of life from their
context so that we can experience them by themselves. It's always going to
have appeal.

~~~
joshschreuder
I think Florence (mobile game) did the depiction of real life romance pretty
well.

[https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/florence/id1297430468?mt=8](https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/florence/id1297430468?mt=8)

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mountains....](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mountains.feathertop&hl=en)

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nailer
Direct link to game (doesn't work on mobile as you can't click 'I understand')

[https://danhett.itch.io/c-ya-laterrrr](https://danhett.itch.io/c-ya-laterrrr)

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spullara
I love hardcore modes of video games. I once made it to The End in Minecraft
on hardcode mode and as I materialized on the platform near the island the
Ender dragon swooped over, knocked me off and that was it. Quite hilarious!
But I also play full loot PvP games that are just basically unloved by the
mainstream video game player. It is too much loss for most.

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mistrial9
I distinctly recall speaking at length to a Buddhist monk about the "dharma"
potential of games, in the early 90s. This monk was quite literate in
religious teachings, and also a good desktop publisher with his Mac. Guess
what - lots of "death" in Buddhism !

~~~
dharmab
I wonder if there's any Buddhist metaphors to a game like Devil Daggers.
You're caught in an infinite cycle of life, chaos, suffering and death, and
the only way to end the cycle is to cease your "desire" to play.

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microcolonel
They obviously shouldn't. Games should feel worth playing. If your video games
confront you with little other than heavy-handed suffering porn, any random
real life activity will surely beat them. "death" is abstract in video games
just as it is in chess. The purpose of this is to encourage exploration of
_danger_ without its very real drawbacks.

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lazyjones
It doesn't make much sense to expect this from games. They're not "honest"
about anything else, like the skills and effort required to accomplish
something and getting many/infinite tries for everything. Games are pure
escapism and suppression and shouldn't be expected to address real life issues
in any constructive way.

~~~
kiriakasis
Almost nothing is pure escapism. Most games that have little plot or content
have a deep social nature (fortnite, LoL, online Call of Duty).

Also being "honest" or "constructive" does not mean being "heavy". The best
stories almost always leave lasting life lessons, in this regards games are
not different from any other popular medium in the history of humanity.

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_mrmnmly
One great example of emotional game can be a Hyper Light Drifter - especially
if you know about its author's illness.

------
Haga
Gaming is about preparation for life not death. Source every playing animal
ever.

~~~
fjsolwmv
Death is a large part of life.

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pnw_hazor
It seems like there are plenty of games that try to be honest about death.

I don't play them. I play games for fun.

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wetpaws
I am surprised no one mentioned Nier Automata yet

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agumonkey
Games should be games, they should be fun.

~~~
shurcooL
Fun can be different things for different people. Games can provide different
experiences that some people seek.

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__m
Why though?

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INTPenis
I'm sorry but I play games to forget my troubles, not to take on yours.

~~~
dragontamer
This is exceptionally callous way of looking at things. Video games are
certainly a medium for discussion: "Papers Please" is a discussion point on
legal immigration for example. (Its not true across the board: "Prison
Architect", is NOT a discussion point on prisons).

I'm not one to play "political" games, but IMO, they are no different than
political or personal movies, poems, or letters. Video games are just one more
medium of which society can use to connect and communicate with other people.

Have you played the "This is fine" flash game? Its actually a deeply personal
+ political discussion point as well.

[https://namsang.itch.io/thisisfine](https://namsang.itch.io/thisisfine)

These games aren't necessarily designed for maximum enjoyment, they're
optimized for maximum discussion and community connections.

~~~
reificator
> _(Its not true across the board: "Prison Architect", is NOT a discussion
> point on prisons)._

I mean... to a degree it is. Certainly not to the same degree as Papers
Please, but that's a high bar.

Or maybe I just read my own assumptions into the game...

~~~
kiriakasis
It is a discussion just by its setting. Into it you can read clues on how the
author or the community perceive some stuff. But it is not meant in any
specific way to communicate a point, or to be a critique or prisons, or even
to just make you think.

It does not make you feel bad when you slaughter inmates, it does not try to
portray them as people; not even as dehumanized people, this kind of analysis
is just not in the game.

(Disclaimer: I played it a while back, maybe it changed from the last time I
saw it)

~~~
reificator
> _it does not try to portray them as people; not even as dehumanized people_

It was an explicit goal of theirs to do that, including giving every prisoner
a backstory.

Whether they accomplished their goal of portraying them as people is a
different story, but they did try.

