Has a game ever made you feel bad for playing them?

[blind2d]

I felt bad for playing an Elmo game on the N64 when I was ten or so. 'Cuz, y'know, Elmo's for babies... As for relating with the character you play as... who does that? Maybe in a skateboarding game, but that's it! And the worst thing you can do to somebody else in those games is startle them! (The good ones I play, at least.)

[UndeadChicken]

I don't understand what some of you guys have against gamers relating to their characters. Games are not all about shooting lasers at spaceships and ninjas kicking the crap out of each other anymore, a lot of games these days have a story to tell that's just as good as any book or movie. I personally enjoy games more for the stories and the characters then I do the actual gameplay.

[SymphonicX]

I don't understand what some of you guys have against gamers relating to their characters. Games are not all about shooting lasers at spaceships and ninjas kicking the crap out of each other anymore, a lot of games these days have a story to tell that's just as good as any book or movie. I personally enjoy games more for the stories and the characters then I do the actual gameplay. You know a year or so ago I might have agreed with you....but now I don't think the stories in these games are up to much at all. With the exception of "The Darkness" which was adapted from a graphic novel, most games seem to be written by people that have only seen movies. I refer you to any of the GTA games as a starting point - but I'll go even further - Halo series is thin on the ground except for a wealth of characters which were by and large either ripped out from Aliens or Star Wars. Red Dead Redemption? I guess I can't comment after giving up on it - but from what I did play (all the way up til Mexico), it was very much a classic "true grit" style western, but I dunno really.... Then you've got the war shooters - who, let's face it, don't give a fuck about story. I refer you to BFBC2 sp mode - "story" being in inverted commas. Something about a silly noisy weapon. Even Gears of War 2 - which had one of the most harrowing and sad moments in a game, let's face it - its just a standard action sci fi movie. Other than The Darkness - I genuinely can't remember the last time I felt attached whatsoever to a linear game's character....RPGs like Fallout and Oblivion tend to fare better simply due to the choices that can be made in game - but as a result of it's sandbox nature, it doesn't go to the same realms as GOW2 or whatever in it's story.

[Tricky]

If you want to play a war shooter where you do care about your characters, Arma 2 is up there, its quite heavy on the sim stuff for those who only like mindless blasting, but you do genuinely try to look after your squad, and enemy AI gives the impression that you're fighting real humans that make tactical decisions rather than the heavily scripted enemies that you get in most games, and they can kill you with a single round from miles away. Plus with the mission editor you can build whatever story you like, or play other peoples...

[UndeadChicken]

You know a year or so ago I might have agreed with you....but now I don't think the stories in these games are up to much at all. With the exception of "The Darkness" which was adapted from a graphic novel, most games seem to be written by people that have only seen movies. I refer you to any of the GTA games as a starting point - but I'll go even further - Halo series is thin on the ground except for a wealth of characters which were by and large either ripped out from Aliens or Star Wars. Red Dead Redemption? I guess I can't comment after giving up on it - but from what I did play (all the way up til Mexico), it was very much a classic "true grit" style western, but I dunno really.... Then you've got the war shooters - who, let's face it, don't give a fuck about story. I refer you to BFBC2 sp mode - "story" being in inverted commas. Something about a silly noisy weapon. Even Gears of War 2 - which had one of the most harrowing and sad moments in a game, let's face it - its just a standard action sci fi movie. Other than The Darkness - I genuinely can't remember the last time I felt attached whatsoever to a linear game's character....RPGs like Fallout and Oblivion tend to fare better simply due to the choices that can be made in game - but as a result of it's sandbox nature, it doesn't go to the same realms as GOW2 or whatever in it's story. Well most of those games you listed, with the exception of Oblivion and Fallout 3, are games that I don't even bother to play. I like to play games that do have a story and character development, and while it may be true that there's not as many of them now as there used to be, they do still exist. But you know I guess I may be the only one here who still enjoys those kinds of game, so I guess it's pointless for me to argue about it.

[Mitchified]

You know a year or so ago I might have agreed with you....but now I don't think the stories in these games are up to much at all. With the exception of "The Darkness" which was adapted from a graphic novel, most games seem to be written by people that have only seen movies. I refer you to any of the GTA games as a starting point - but I'll go even further - Halo series is thin on the ground except for a wealth of characters which were by and large either ripped out from Aliens or Star Wars. Red Dead Redemption? I guess I can't comment after giving up on it - but from what I did play (all the way up til Mexico), it was very much a classic "true grit" style western, but I dunno really.... Then you've got the war shooters - who, let's face it, don't give a fuck about story. I refer you to BFBC2 sp mode - "story" being in inverted commas. Something about a silly noisy weapon. Even Gears of War 2 - which had one of the most harrowing and sad moments in a game, let's face it - its just a standard action sci fi movie. Other than The Darkness - I genuinely can't remember the last time I felt attached whatsoever to a linear game's character....RPGs like Fallout and Oblivion tend to fare better simply due to the choices that can be made in game - but as a result of it's sandbox nature, it doesn't go to the same realms as GOW2 or whatever in it's story. If we're going back to The Darkness, you have to consider games like BioShock, inFamous, and Portal 2. These three games have fantastic stories that make you care about the characters in them (although ironically in Portal 2, you don't actually care about yourself, just the other characters in the game). BioShock is the big one in that group. One of the best storylines in the history of video games; it's right up there with a novel in terms of overall complexity and setting.

[SymphonicX]

I dunno about that personally...! Its a good story...the plot twist is straight out of a M Night Shyamalan movie, and it essentially revolves around searching for someone's lost wife....

[MinionZombie]

I dunno about that personally...! Its a good story...the plot twist is straight out of a M Night Shyamalan movie, and it essentially revolves around searching for someone's lost wife.... That's not exactly a positive thing to say these days.

[SymphonicX]

That's not exactly a positive thing to say these days. Yep, exactly my point! hehehehe

[Trin]

Oh, yes, a computer game has made me feel just awful. Like when I euthanised my companion cube. Although the enrichment center assured me that I was absolved of any moral complications by an independent panel of ethicists, and the companion cube would not want to be a burden to me... I still felt bad placing it in the Aperture Science Emergency Intelligence Incinerator. I especially felt bad upon learning that I euthanised my companion cube faster than any other test subject.

[blind2d]

Yeah, me too, Trin... Me too... I heard somebody once played Nintendogs. And then I cried. Does that count?

[AcesandEights]

Oh, yes, a computer game has made me feel just awful. Like when I euthanised my companion cube. Although the enrichment center assured me that I was absolved of any moral complications by an independent panel of ethicists, and the companion cube would not want to be a burden to me... I still felt bad placing it in the Aperture Science Emergency Intelligence Incinerator. I especially felt bad upon learning that I euthanised my companion cube faster than any other test subject. If I could, I would bronze this post and hang it over the mantle.

[Danny]

Okay, dredging this up because of something new. I finally, against the overwhelming bad press got dragon age 2. needless to say i played it and it is indeed terrible. but one thing bugged me in relation to this thread. At one point a party member destroyed the chantry, like blew it the fuck up. if you aint played it its the dragon age version of the vatican. this starts a civil war. you are asked: join the mages and wipe out all the templars, or join the templars and wipe out all the mages. the third option is something like 'this is madness, ill join niether'. naturally this was the one i picked. Having no desire for my rpg hero to take part in some vile pogrom for a political agenda. what happened? It said 'no you must make a choice'. Which is patently bullshit. 1:why offer the illusion of any choice other than that to begin with? 2:so my 'heros' only choice is which group he wants to commit a total massacre of? that was absolutely stupid. It was an rpg where my moral choices did not matter- literally in the end since it only had one mediocre ending.

[SymphonicX]

Okay, dredging this up because of something new. I finally, against the overwhelming bad press got dragon age 2. needless to say i played it and it is indeed terrible. but one thing bugged me in relation to this thread. At one point a party member destroyed the chantry, like blew it the fuck up. if you aint played it its the dragon age version of the vatican. this starts a civil war. you are asked: join the mages and wipe out all the templars, or join the templars and wipe out all the games. the third option is something like 'this is madness, ill join niether'. naturally this was the one i picked. Having no desire for my rpg hero to take part in some vile pogrom for a political agenda. what happened? It said 'no you must make a choice'. Which is patently bullshit. 1:why offer the illusion of any choice other than that to begin with? 2:so my 'heros' only choice is which group he wants to commit a total massacre of one group? that was absolutely stupid. It was an rpg where my moral choices did not matter- literally in the end since it only had one mediocre ending. That's game-breaking ridiculousness!!! I'm glad I stayed away from this title completely - I too would have chosen the path you were denied, so that would have made me turn off the game entirely, and start something else. Re-reading my posts earlier about stories in games, I'd like to put forward two conflicting titles to the fold... The first is Bulletstorm....the most contrived, horribly cliched, immature storyline i've ever entertained on a game, this one follows all the classic cliches from start to finish and manages to tire out the entire selection of annoying cliches within the first 10 minutes of the game....truly awful! "Bulletstorm takes place in a futuristic setting where a futuristic confederation is being protected by an elite band of mercenaries known as Dead Echo. When Dead Echo members Grayson Hunt and Ishi Sato discover that they had been working on the wrong side, they betray their squad commander and end up being exiled to the edges of the galaxy. Players take the role of Grayson Hunt a few years after his exile, who had since become a drunken space pirate. He ends up getting involved on an interstellar crash landing, where he meets his old comrade Sato. The two of them discover that they are surrounded by hordes of mutants and flesh eating gangs in an abandoned paradise. The two of them decide to work together once again to get off the planet alive and take revenge on the man who sent them there. " From wiki..... Then on the OTHER hand!!! The Witcher 2.... One of the deepest, most involving, complicated, awesomely fleshed out storylines ever to appear in a game. An adaptation of a Polish author's fantasy series (assuming of the same name), this is like Game of Thrones, in a game - plenty of backstabbing, political misgivings, loyalty, and racism all mixed in with a fantastic game mechanic and awesome selection of powers. The obvious nature of being able to choose your path means the plot can't exactly be discussed as each playthrough can yield very different results - but the bottom line is, you're a Witcher accused of murdering a King - but it's not long before you prove your innocence and start weighing up all the incentives other characters have to kill the king - and how and why they are planning to kill the next king. It's all about region destablisation, underlying racial tensions and the classic form of rebellion against an oppressive empire. Phenomenal storyline!!!!

[MinionZombie]

Go with the Mages, because as Assassin's Creed tells us every year: Templars are dicks. More seriously, and more on-topic, I recently gave Homefront a second play-through, and there are some moments in that game that are quite out-there. The one that always wigs me out (at the start of the game) is:   You are sat in a prison bus driving past a series of daily atrocities by the occupying Koreans against the Americans, such as executions ... but the one that is quite stunning is two soldiers executing a man and a woman as their small child watches. The child - weeping and screaming - runs to their dead bodies and tries to get them to wake up. It may be a videogame, it's just pixels, but that's quite a scene in itself.