how do you feel about games having killable children?

I understand the concept that a gamer isn't actually killing an actual "child" so it probably shouldn't matter, but I fear that if those types of options were available in video games, players would risk being desensitize, which could affect your humanity, especially if you were to read about a child's death in the real world. Of course, that is just my personal opinion.

It's a videogame. It could be a kidnapping simulator and I'd probably play it.

That's a good point. Everyone is discussing this from the perspective of "well, what if I want to go on a killing spree. Shouldn't I be allowed to kill -everyone-?" as opposed to "Oh my god, look at the unintentional collateral damage caused by the firefight I was just in". I would consider this a vote in favor of being able to kill whoever (at least for me) in a game because it can show the consequence of action, even if the action was thought to be justified and righteous. That seems like a powerful tool for drawing a player into the game as opposed to "hey, look at all the carnage and dead bodies created by the fight I was just in and this indestructible kid taking a nap in the middle of it" which would have pretty much the exact opposite effect.

-Byshop

That's the thing: they were consistent with rape. Yoyu couldn't rape kids, but you couldn't rape adults either. And I don't recall any specoific problems in the game that potentially could have been solved with rape, so the lack of ability to rape anyone isn't jarring. Torture could conceivably have been a solution to problems, but since it's restricted equally across the board it's easier to run with it. The developers don't present torture and rape as solutions to problems, so I can just accept that those actions have no place in the game. That's not really the same way that they treat killing.

Point taken.

Why would you want to kill anyone, then?

That's a dumb ass question.

I hate the story that rely on killing to show something is dangerous or meaningful.

From a game reputation I say that no game should allow you to kill children/

The idea of not killing someone in a game because they are too young is an odd standard to hold. If you kill an innocent man or woman (and many if not all of you have) in a video game, then how is killing a child, whose innocence is inherent, any different? Also, remember, these are video games. If you are concerned about the effect of killing children in video games might have on you, then you should also be concerned to some extent the effect of killing anyone in video games.

doesnt bother me. Its a video game.

The only thing dumb here is your idea that kids and adults are somehow the same thing.

Anyways no i wouldn't want to kill kids since it would be just that meter to long and across the line of what i would feel comfortable with. Which is also why very few games have kids in them, since particular on pc there are always someone sick enough to make a mod where you can kill them in game.

Not sure, how do you feel about a game that lets you kill pregnant women?

Was that in my post?

Just wondering here :

Killing adults - euphoria

Killing kids - sick

Care to explain that?

I wish more games allowed it. I know the UK has explicit laws that ban any games where you can kill children. Thats mainly the reason why a handful of games have children but they can't be killed; they don't want to miss out on the UK market, especially if they have already gone through the trouble of making the game in English. You'd be losing out on several thousand sales for what generally amounts to very little tangible difference in the game's gameplay or story.

Even with that, i wouldn't mind seeing more games with more options.

I find the people who are up in arms about the "children shouldn't be killed in games!" hilarious. No doubt most people are thinking in the context of an FPS, but i just finished playing some Crusader Kings 2, and heres a list of a few things i did over the span of a few generations:

I decided to take a 12 year old girl, the last heiress of a duchy, as my personal ward to educate her. I also had her murdered. The initial plot failed, and she lived, but as her ward she was still under my care and couldn't flee for safety or go into hiding. I plotted again, killed her, and took her duchy title. I needed to do so before she reached the age of 16 and got married to a male and transfer her title over to him since women could not own land if an eligible male existed.

I've killed several of my male heirs, including young children, early in the game because i had gavelkind succession rather than primogeniture. (gavelkind = split titles among all male children; primogeniture = goes to the oldest son). Killing them off ensured a single male heir with good stats/attributes.

I married my blood related cousin to secure an alliance with the French against a muslim Jihad for my lands.

I had children with my cousin, then had her assassinated after she was of child bearing age because she gave me no sons. I could've divorced her, but that require permission from the pope and he didn't like me. Would've cost too much gold to bribe the pope so it was cheaper to just kill her off.

I marry my daughters to nearby old dukes with little or no children, then kill the dukes and their heirs, so that their titles go to my daughter and then i marry those widowed daughters to nephews (it makes an incestuous relationship) so i can press rightful claim on the titles of the former dead duke.

I have probably killed several thousands of muslims in the lower half of Spain. Successful sieges of cities and castles will often allow you to imprison the royal families owning those lands. I can either let them go (hah!), ransom them off, or execute them. I've probably executed about 50 or 60 royal muslims of all ages and genders. Sometimes their liege can't pay the ransoms and sometimes i'd rather execute a princess or queen of a muslim emirate to destroy his line of succession.

And i don't feel any remorse about it. Not only is most of this stuff historically accurate, the game encourages you to do so to effectively take over other kingdoms. Being nice means being a dead dynasty.

im fine with it

virtual children havent had the chance to live a full virtual life unlike virtual adults. who are we to virtually end their lives in their virtual prime. hell they could grow up to cure virtual cancer.

also am i the only one who finds the guys profile pick of agent 47 ironic. killing everyone brutally for money is fine, but kids makes you a monster. in real life maybe, but again, its a fucking game

And I also have to take issue with the people saying "of course it's okay, everything's okay in games because it's just a game." Once I go that route, I'm admitting that games DON'T MEAN ANYTHING. I'm not gonna take that stance, because I actually like games. Hell, people could take the same stance with movies or music. But once you downplay its connection to reality enough, you're sort of admitting that it's just pointless superfluous bullshit that we'd be no worse off if the stuff was banned. Yes, they're games and they're fiction, but the content absolutely DOES matter. And when people find that content objectionable, it's counter-productive to take the whole "don't you know it's just fiction" approach.

Anyway, damn near anything is "allowed" in movies. Whether or not the public accepts it depends on how it is handled. The shame should be true of games. In games where killing kids actually works within the context of the game and makes the game better, then I think the developers should be "allowed" to let to let the player kill kids. However, that does NOT eliminate the possibility of some developer making the killing of kids a selling point just to gain publicity from a shock factor. While that should be "allowed" too, that doesn't mean people won't rightfully criticize the game. And that doesn't mean that "it's just a game, it's not real" is a valid defense of the content. Like I previously said with my Fallout 3 example: my problem isn't just that I couldn't kill kids. The biggest problem is that that limitation doesn't work within the context of the game. Let people kill kids or don't let them kill kids, but it has to work for that particular game. Should games allow the player to kill children? Just depends on the game.

I sat and wondered...and recalled Fire Emblem

yes a Nintendo game of all things, technically has the choice of killing children, in rare instances. In these cases, there is the intent children would JOIN your clan, but the option is there to kill them too.

Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon, Prologue IV is a child expected to single-handedly hold the gate. Talk to him with Marth and he'll join or you could just kill him for experience.

@wiifan001: EXP is EXP no questions asked just blood spilled....

@Telekill: LOL

Did you say physiological ?

....-_-

This should stop before it gets out of hand.

@acp_45: Not to offend anyone but i feel like this is a really religious person or just a díckbag who thinks everything needs to be like he wants it to be :p

@dylandr: Or he just didn't think his argument through and when he saw his baseless view he became stubborn and refused to back down even if this goes all the way to the Planes of Oblivion.

Eh, I'd say @Telekill 's hypocritical and baseless views and improper judgments can be chalked up to youth and inexperience. Most people who make idiotic statements without the ability to back them up or argue for themselves properly are just kids that haven't thought things through and don't like to admit to being wrong, so when they are confronted and corrected, they just hide until the subject matter is forgotten about.

@Zen_Light: Actually I'm 33. When it comes to kids there is a line that's drawn in the sand. It's far worse to kill a child than an adult regardless that it's bad to kill at all. That's my opinion. So no, it's not baseless. Also, I don't hide. I just don't see the point in having to explain myself 50 times in a circular argument.

You make irrational statements, and when others make good points and ask for an explanation you just ignore them? That's childish. If it bothers you so much to respond to people here, you shouldn't be typing out comments in the first place.

I, too, would like to know how you justify other actions in games that lead to immorality and the possible harm to children that other posters have suggested, like playing criminals in games and dealing drugs, etc.

Do you simply not play any games that have consequences such as those? Do you consider the affect of every bullet you fire from a gun in the game world? With such strict behavioral judgments in mind, do you realize the hypocrisy of your comments?

Am I wasting my time by trying to engage in dialog with you?

@Zen_Light: Here's my train of thought.

If you want children included in games as being killable, then you must have some want to kill children. If you want to kill children then you have problems. It's an assumption based on a clear line if thinking with one step coming after the next.

Children don't need to be killable in games.

That's the only effort I'm going to put into explaining it.

You're not 33, you're 3. You are so against the "fictional" killing of children because you are a child yourself, and you don't want to die from being killed in a video game.

I have more of a problem killing animals.

you mean thats the only effort you CAN put into explaining it

also i have no "want" to kill actual children so your full of shit

So long as rape and torture are involved, then yes.

Mwa hahaha! Funniest thread in a while.

So you want to kill adults.

I always asked that question to myself too, they are common NPCs like any other in the game, so if you can kill adult npc why not child npc? I mean I don't fancy to kill children npc but it kinda bitches me off though

If they are trying to kill me first then I'll kill them.

Good luck getting an intelligible response.

He seems the kind that thinks it's fine to hurt others as long as it's indirectly as opposed to direct. Like poisoning someone is ok but shooting them in the face is not. He thinks selling kids drugs in games is perfectly fine, but shooting them in games is not. He thinks shooting mercenaries is fine, once you check their IDs first to make sure they're over the age of 18. He thinks shooting pixels 18 and up is fine and healthy fun, but under 18 means you want to kill them in the real world and have mental problems.

bananas...

actually he probably wont respond at all cause he cant think of anything intelligible to say

Hmm... I could have sworn I posted in this.

I basically want to touch on the topic of immunity for killing children because they're innocent. So are a lot of by standards in games like Grand Theft Auto. I'm sure we've killed enough innocents in those games to send us to virtual hell.

Ultimately, however, it only matters when the game provides a serious and proper context for it. If it makes sense to do it in the game, I will.

Not necessarily. You would be desensitized then for killing adults in games, as you wouldn't be shocked by hearing anyone die in the real world.

I play some extremely violent games, yet it still saddens me every time I hear of a mass shooting or a drunk driving accident, etc.

@i-rock-socks: I made a topic like this in the Giant Bomb forum about being able to kill the NPC children in Skyrim. Everyone jumped/bashed me and called me an idiot basically.

But yes, I totally agree, If you put them in a game like Fallout/Elder Scrolls, make them killable. That "unconsious" text after beating the shit out of them doesn't justify the voilence anyway.

@hxce: It is funny in fallout you hit them with a mini nuke and they stand up and walk away... but it breaks immersion so thats bad...

its a game so doesnt matter

If i remember correctly weren't you able to kill babies in Dante's inferno?

@so_hai: Well on the plus side it does make Vergil seem like someone you'd love to hate.

We need a game where you play as a serial killer and murder all the kids, and even if a cop or anyone catches you in the act, they don't care and just say "Good day"

@Telekill: let me gues you're super religious?

It does break immersion when I just want to punch something in a game like Skyrim and the kids just run away (yeah, I know you can mod that)...

It's kinda similar to the whole Hatred thing. People seem to be completely fine with violence, except when it comes to children.

I mean, I understand that that children are generally more "innocent", but it's still kinda hypocritical.

@Celldrax: the most annoying thing is when you hit them with a dragon hip and they don't give a damn!

I see games as a medium where you should be able to express anything. Like a movie, a painting, a show etc. a game can be anything the creator wants it to, so I have no problem with killable children in games.

There are however, tasteless games just like anything else. Any subject matter can be covered as long as it's done in the proper regard.

Ehhhh kind of an unwritten rule where you shouldn't. Kind of a rocky road. A game that involves children that are killed/died because of Narrative? That's okay. A game like Skyrim/fallout where you can run around and massacre children? Not really necessary. Just in bad taste.

Question: if it's bad taste to be able to massacre children like that, doesn't that sort of indicate that it's in bad taste regardless of the kids? If we look at the game and determine that we shouldn't be able to do those things to a kid, doesn't that indicate that it's highly likely that it's in incredibly bad taste to be doing those things to adults as well? Or let's put it this way...saying that the behavior shouldn't be done to kids already paints the behavior as inappropriate. So what makes it appropriate when the person you're doing it to happens to be an adult?

Never played a game where children can be killed and i don't really care but suggest me a few except for fallout 1 & 2.