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And then when asked about how they should represent colonialism, which led to the death of millions of Africans, it is hand-waved away with the comment that such critiques are 'anachronistic' and they didn't think like that back then.
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Apr 10, 2013 06:00
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Well you see, they draw the line at having a "Genocide button". Everything up to that, however, is fair game.
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Apr 10, 2013 06:04
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V for Vegas posted:And then when asked about how they should represent colonialism, which led to the death of millions of Africans, it is hand-waved away with the comment that such critiques are 'anachronistic' and they didn't think like that back then. Hmm, I suppose you have a point that saying "don't represent ANY awful things that happened in history like genocide" leaves you with a game where colonialism is just this funny little thing Europeans did to make themselves bigger on the world map, and otherwise didn't harm any Africans ever. I guess leaving it out causes as many problems as leaving it in can.
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Apr 10, 2013 06:26
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I wish they'd just come out and say "sorry we don't want to include any genocides of white people, but africans, browns, native americans are fair game"
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Apr 10, 2013 06:38
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DrProsek posted:I guess leaving it out causes as many problems as leaving it in can.
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Apr 10, 2013 06:41
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The trail of tears is a decision in the vanilla game, so...
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Apr 10, 2013 06:54
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DrSunshine posted:Well you see, they draw the line at having a "Genocide button". Everything up to that, however, is fair game. Except for the "Attack Natives" button in EU3, which is literally a Genocide Button. To be fair to Paradox, given the kind of people we see on their forums a button which you press to "Remove Grk" would really only just encourage them.
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Apr 10, 2013 07:27
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All paradox games need a decision to Remove Kebab.
Baloogan fucked around with this message at 07:33 on Apr 10, 2013 |
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Apr 10, 2013 07:31
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Mister Bates posted:Not sure if you're joking or not, but Paradox has always been adamant about their games never directly mentioning genocide in any way, shape, or form. You could easily mod in a decision like that, if you really wanted to, but in the vanilla game there are never going to be any 'exterminate an entire population' decisions. DrSunshine posted:Well you see, they draw the line at having a "Genocide button". Everything up to that, however, is fair game. I joke, but there is a very worthwhile discussion there: how do you address historical atrocities in non-narrative games like these? Where is the balance between tact and whitewashed revisionism when you cede these events to the agency of the player? How do you even begin this dialogue when your community is full to the brim with immature ultranationalists? I do believe it is possible to address these sorts of topics strictly in terms of the game design and not in some tacked on flavor event or narrative, such is the case with Brenda Brathwaite's board game Train; however, I can't begin to know what the mature handling of sensitive topics would look like in a game where painting the world your color is part of the fun. (I feel awful for phrasing it that way.)
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Apr 10, 2013 07:45
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drat it people, it's not called genocide, it's a population exchange or resettlement.
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Apr 10, 2013 09:20
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Does ordering the HOD Steam code from Paradox's web-store get you the Victoria 1 Complete pre-order bonus as well? I think I'd like to get the latter on Steam for the hell of it.Wolfgang Pauli posted:*edit* Wait, is Trail of Tears a vanilla decision in Vicky 2? I thought they came to their senses about that. I'm 99% sure that Trail of Tears is a PDM/APD event only. VVVV  I stand corrected
gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 10:10 on Apr 10, 2013 |
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Apr 10, 2013 09:59
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gradenko_2000 posted:Does ordering the HOD Steam code from Paradox's web-store get you the Victoria 1 Complete pre-order bonus as well? I think I'd like to get the latter on Steam for the hell of it. It's in vanilla. You can find it in ACW.txt.
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Apr 10, 2013 10:07
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I had a conversation recently with a friend who I think would really, really enjoy Paradox games (particularly EU3). He said he played it for like fifteen minutes and then immediately closed it and uninstalled it, citing it as "the most vile, racist piece of trash he's ever played." Because the game doesn't simulate the rich history of Ethiopia or something. While I didn't deny Paradox has its strange quirks, it's pretty much impossible to make a postmodern historical game and have it be fun or successful. Also y'know, it's called Europa Universalis. Do you honestly expect the game's core gameplay to not be stuck in Europe, later expansions aside?
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Apr 10, 2013 11:29
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V for Vegas posted:And then when asked about how they should represent colonialism, which led to the death of millions of Africans, it is hand-waved away with the comment that such critiques are 'anachronistic' and they didn't think like that back then. Yeah, the games would be a lot more fun if they constantly called you a monster over all the wars you start, state owned sweat-shops you run, and the deaths caused by colonialism. HistoryGames: The only way to win is not to play. Honestly, pretty much any video game involving conflict has the player doing what would be terrible things in real life. Most people, however, are able to recognise that shooting someone in an FPS doesn't actually make you a murderer, and that colonising Africa doesn't make you a neo-colonial racist.
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Apr 10, 2013 11:45
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Drone posted:Because the game doesn't simulate the rich history of Ethiopia or something. While I didn't deny Paradox has its strange quirks, it's pretty much impossible to make a postmodern historical game and have it be fun or successful. Yeah, even if Paradox games are naively Eurocentric in many ways, I still wouldn't want to see a tumblr version of EUIII. 'Colonization successful! Also you are a horrible white imperialist oppressor who should literally die.'
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Apr 10, 2013 12:40
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Yeah people need to take a step back and think about how upset they get about hinted at racism in a video game. I mean I conquered all of France as Spain and whenever I could afford it used the Assimilation Decision. I managed to kill the French culture group over 200ish years, that does not mean I would do that in real life. Its a game. And you know a wizard did it!
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Apr 10, 2013 13:13
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Most of what EU3 simulates isn't really representative of the real reality of the situations, anyway. It's effectively a virtual Risk, especially excellent in the fun department.
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Apr 10, 2013 13:29
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A lot of people were sort of shocked and horrified that kidnapping and raping women looks like it'll make it into The Old Gods and it's similar in that it's A Thing That Happened that probably shouldn't actually be modeled in a video game. Horrifying things happened in history and I don't think it really does much to honor the memory of those who were victims of genocide to meticulously detail that stuff. Glossing over it may not be the best but for a video game it's probably just the better route.
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Apr 10, 2013 13:58
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Put them all in, everything you can do. Let the player deal with the ethical and moral implications. Then show him a list of all people he hurt at the end of the game, then ask him whether if it was all worth it.
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Apr 10, 2013 14:05
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Darkrenown posted:Yeah, the games would be a lot more fun if they constantly called you a monster over all the wars you start, state owned sweat-shops you run, and the deaths caused by colonialism. HistoryGames: The only way to win is not to play. Sit there, never declare war or colonize, improve your economy and pass all reforms. Totes can play viccy2 without being a monster.
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Apr 10, 2013 14:20
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WhitemageofDOOM posted:Sit there, never declare war or colonize, improve your economy and pass all reforms. But unless you actively expand your sphere of influence and meddle in the affairs of other states your economy will eventually be crippled. 
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Apr 10, 2013 14:31
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RagnarokAngel posted:A lot of people were sort of shocked and horrified that kidnapping and raping women looks like it'll make it into The Old Gods and it's similar in that it's A Thing That Happened that probably shouldn't actually be modeled in a video game. I wouldn't have as much of an issue with it, but in general CK2 deprives women of agency even more than the Middle Ages did in real life. They're almost completely reduced to bargaining chips / breeders with no opinion about anything unless they're holding land. I mean, you can - and often do - marry your 16-year-old daughter to a disgusting, fat, drunken and cruel 60-year-old man for political gain, and apparently CK2 women don't mind this at all. It should at least make her hate your guts (and her husband's), maybe add an event where she protests and you lose the "Kind" trait if you go ahead anyway. Flavor stuff, really, much like the game tells you "you're not being a nice person here" if you torture prisoners for fun. I'm not arguing that we should have ahistorical levels of gender equality, but I do think it would be at least more fun if female characters exercised some rudimentary agency. Medieval society put some terrible constraints on women's lives, but it wasn't a stable era and are plenty of examples where these constraints were challenged. If your wife is trapped in an awful loveless marriage, there's tons of stuff she might do to make your life harder - like cheat on you and tell you it's yours (hardly uncommon), try to turn your kids and courtiers against you, participate in plots, or have a sudden onset of extreme piety that emphasizes the virtue of chastity. Hell, the game doesn't even represent nuns at all, whereas a few of them were arguably among the most influential women of the Middle Ages (Catherine of Siena and Bridget of Sweden come to mind). ...Now I really want to make a Soap Opera Mod.
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Apr 10, 2013 15:07
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Tomn posted:But unless you actively expand your sphere of influence and meddle in the affairs of other states your economy will eventually be crippled. Unless you're the US.
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Apr 10, 2013 15:13
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Guildencrantz posted:I wouldn't have as much of an issue with it, but in general CK2 deprives women of agency even more than the Middle Ages did in real life. They're almost completely reduced to bargaining chips / breeders with no opinion about anything unless they're holding land. I mean, you can - and often do - marry your 16-year-old daughter to a disgusting, fat, drunken and cruel 60-year-old man for political gain, and apparently CK2 women don't mind this at all. It should at least make her hate your guts (and her husband's), maybe add an event where she protests and you lose the "Kind" trait if you go ahead anyway.
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Apr 10, 2013 15:21
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You can even mod the game now to allow women to lead armies, so that daughter who ended up as a 30 martial Brilliant Strategist can actually be of some use now.
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Apr 10, 2013 15:36
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RagnarokAngel posted:A lot of people were sort of shocked and horrified that kidnapping and raping women looks like it'll make it into The Old Gods and it's similar in that it's A Thing That Happened that probably shouldn't actually be modeled in a video game. Riso posted:Put them all in, everything you can do. Let the player deal with the ethical and moral implications. Guildencrantz posted:I wouldn't have as much of an issue with it, but in general CK2 deprives women of agency even more than the Middle Ages did in real life. They're almost completely reduced to bargaining chips / breeders with no opinion about anything unless they're holding land. I mean, you can - and often do - marry your 16-year-old daughter to a disgusting, fat, drunken and cruel 60-year-old man for political gain, and apparently CK2 women don't mind this at all. It should at least make her hate your guts (and her husband's), maybe add an event where she protests and you lose the "Kind" trait if you go ahead anyway. Flavor stuff, really, much like the game tells you "you're not being a nice person here" if you torture prisoners for fun. NihilCredo posted:If you took off your LF-shaped glasses for a second you'd see this has jack poo poo to do with gender politics. You can marry your 16-year-old son to a loathsome grandmother (hopefully not his grandmother) and he won't say a word either.
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Apr 10, 2013 15:37
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Guildencrantz posted:I wouldn't have as much of an issue with it, but in general CK2 deprives women of agency even more than the Middle Ages did in real life. They're almost completely reduced to bargaining chips / breeders with no opinion about anything unless they're holding land. I mean, you can - and often do - marry your 16-year-old daughter to a disgusting, fat, drunken and cruel 60-year-old man for political gain, and apparently CK2 women don't mind this at all. It should at least make her hate your guts (and her husband's), maybe add an event where she protests and you lose the "Kind" trait if you go ahead anyway. IS there evidence of this? I'm asking sincerely cause I'm curious. I had always been taught that marriage was seen as a bargaining chip and love didn't factor into it. Not that love didn't exist, people were making songs about love since forever, in all cultures, but it was seen as forsaking your duty first and foremost to your country. I'm sure the occasional person got offended at the notion, but was it actually common? But I'm willing to admit I'm wrong on this. Are there any historical documents that talk about this cause I'd genuinely be interested in reading about them. Wolfgang Pauli posted:I don't think it's meaningful to disregard the conversation, though. This is something we should be talking about, because both cases are true. We realize that this is artificial, but the human mind is more than capable of empathizing with any old thing. The only reason we don't recognize that these are Bad Things is that the interactive medium through which we act is not providing enough distance to make us realize what's going on. The onus is on the artist and designer to control the audience's psychological distance from events, and in the case of games like this the events are, in fact, player controlled. It's about allowing action but still showing consequence. We're living in the model and not necessarily thinking about the correlations to actual events they represent. On some level that's fine, but on another it's something that merits mentioning at the very least. More what I was getting at is when Paradox puts in Bad Thing many people immediatly will jump to the conclusion that Bad Thing is being endorsed. This is common in a lot of media for public consumption. If you put in controversial subjects you risk people mistaking that as endorsement. Sometimes there's a time for controversy and conveying a message and I don't think Paradox games are it. You already mentioned DEFCON as an example of a game that handles that whole "wow youre a hosed up person" concept really well, because it set out to deliver that message to you so it's the focus. Paradox games are first and foremost supposed to be fun, and while I myself am actively involved in social justice issues on a daily basis as a part of the work I'm doing right now, when I sit down with a Paradox game I don't really need to be saddled with a lot of guilt about virtual people. There's just a time and a place for that.
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Apr 10, 2013 15:49
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ThatBasqueGuy posted:Unless you Your spelling looked weird so I fixed it for you. (in all seriousness a pacifist/good guy playthrough of V2 sounds like it could be awesome)
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Apr 10, 2013 16:03
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Have you guys not actually loaded up Zulu before?quote:attack_the_laagers = { It's a decision to kill 60% of the Boers in Durban, in case you can't parse that.
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Apr 10, 2013 16:19
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Patter Song posted:Have you guys not actually loaded up Zulu before? AND gives you 5 prestige!  Also is that in vanilla V2? I never noticed that before but then I've kinda sworn off playing uncivs until a mod or HoD manages to make the early years fun.
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Apr 10, 2013 16:25
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DrProsek posted:AND gives you 5 prestige! I pulled that right out of the BoerWar folder in the Decision folder of AHD. I only bring it up (and the Trail of Tears decision US has, for that matter) to show that there are historical atrocities you can actively commit in V2.
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Apr 10, 2013 16:27
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Patter Song posted:I pulled that right out of the BoerWar folder in the Decision folder of AHD. I only bring it up (and the Trail of Tears decision US has, for that matter) to show that there are historical atrocities you can actively commit in V2. Ah, no idea why I didn't at least remember the ToT. I suppose the game already has genocides in it so adding in a second decision like the one the Zulus have isn't unprecedented. E: Actually, on the note of the Native Americans, are there any mods to add in more Native American nations? There's the Metis Confederation, the Cherokee, and Yucatan, but what about the other groups, like the Cree or Dakota? burnishedfume fucked around with this message at 16:37 on Apr 10, 2013 |
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Apr 10, 2013 16:35
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Riso posted:Put them all in, everything you can do. Let the player deal with the ethical and moral implications. Pretty borders justify the means  .
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Apr 10, 2013 16:54
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Darkrenown posted:Yeah, the games would be a lot more fun if they constantly called you a monster over all the wars you start, state owned sweat-shops you run, and the deaths caused by colonialism. HistoryGames: The only way to win is not to play.
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Apr 10, 2013 17:17
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NihilCredo posted:If you took off your LF-shaped glasses for a second you'd see this has jack poo poo to do with gender politics. You can marry your 16-year-old son to a loathsome grandmother (hopefully not his grandmother) and he won't say a word either. Jeez, why the hostility? You're completely right in that last bit, of course - and it would be cool to change that as well. I mean, family is huge in this game, but family life and interpersonal relations need fleshing out to add more character. And it isn't so much a gender politics thing as it is a game design thing: landed rulers/vassals do interesting things by well, ruling, councillors by participating in plots and factions, male family members plot and scheme for claims or demand landed titles, women sit around and pop out babies / passively add some stats. When you have a daughter in the game, you don't really give a poo poo what education she gets and so on, she's currency and, unlike your sons, definitely won't become a memorable character you post screenshots about. I'm not demanding feminism from a Middle Ages game, but that's just boring. RagnarokAngel posted:IS there evidence of this? I'm asking sincerely cause I'm curious. I had always been taught that marriage was seen as a bargaining chip and love didn't factor into it. Not that love didn't exist, people were making songs about love since forever, in all cultures, but it was seen as forsaking your duty first and foremost to your country. I'm sure the occasional person got offended at the notion, but was it actually common? Oh yeah, love definitely didn't factor into marriage - or at least it was considered something that would develop after the fact. Still, people were pretty realistic about this poo poo, and loveless marriages with massive age differences were considered politically suspect. For this reason, looks and age mattered in making political decisions about marriage - beautiful women were in high demand, and conversely, a rebellious wife was a liability. Examples: - The third wife of the Polish King Wladyslaw Jagiello, Anna of Cilli, was several decades younger than him. Because of this, the whole court and nobility knew she was unhappy and they couldn't stand each other, so some nobles to accuse her of loving around and undermine the legitimacy of her daughter. They failed, but it was more of a political thing and we have no idea if she wasn't, in fact, cheating on the ugly old man. - On a similar note, his third wife Sophia (also really young) was a major power player in the kingdom after Jagiello died, and allegedly poisoned the aforementioned daughter to make sure her children ascend to the throne, CK2-style. - Joan of Kent, mother of Richard II of England, had a pretty complex marriage history, but - to make it brief - she essentially managed to go against the wishes of her family and choose her own husband, twice. All chroniclers insist she was apparently crazy hot, so that probably factored into it. - The story of Heloise and Abelard is the original one about a woman Breaking The Rules For Love. And the scandal clearly spoke very strongly to the sensibilities of their contemporaries for a reason. I've got a couple more, but I can't remember the relevant names, I'll have to do a little research. In any case, obviously this kind of thing was, by far, the exception rather than the rule, and most of the time, women were in fact little more than chattel. A few were able to use the central place of the family in society to stir up some drama to their own benefit. But it's the exception that makes for a cool story and that's what CK2 is all about!
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Apr 10, 2013 17:28
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Guildencrantz posted:In any case, obviously this kind of thing was, by far, the exception rather than the rule, and most of the time, women were in fact little more than chattel. A few were able to use the central place of the family in society to stir up some drama to their own benefit. But it's the exception that makes for a cool story and that's what CK2 is all about! I've had a bunch of these "exceptions" where my only son dies, or all my sons are retarded while my firstborn daughter is a genius of epic proportions(Which leads me to kill all my sons  ). This leads to a female ruler marrying matrininally and I remember most of them and barely any of my male rulers. It also means I pay a lot of attention to all my children. Unless I've got 7 or 8 sons, my eldest daughter is always tutored by my ruler, just like the oldest son. Compared to how things actually were back then, I'd say that's a significant improvement. Hell, if you're in iberia, you can make daughters inherit on the same grounds as sons. All in all, I'm not seeing the problem. Males have an advantage in the power game of a medieval setting? Color me shocked.
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Apr 10, 2013 17:38
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Qwo posted:Just because FPS games don't address the sometimes vileness of their murder simulation, doesn't mean that they wouldn't benefit from such an approach. The same is true of any genre, including historical strategy. There are particular differences in making a grand-strategy game that make it incredibly difficult to attach some kind of meaningful narrative that the player is supposed to identify with, though. I mean, if you wanted Hearts of Iron to properly grapple with the vileness of being a murder simulation then the way to do it would be to implement a Holocaust mechanic for the Germans to pump IC into, with them gaining VP as you achieve Hitler's goal of exterminating his racial enemies. Such a game would be utterly horrific and completely unsellable, for obvious reasons.
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Apr 10, 2013 17:39
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Guildencrantz posted:Jeez, why the hostility? I don't know about how your games go, but in my games, mothers are CONSTANTLY planning to kill SOMEBODY to get their kids on the throne. That said, it sometimes feel like they do so because it's literally the only thing they can do.
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Apr 10, 2013 17:46
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Really, I think the game just needs more character/interpersonal interactions to flesh individuals out. As it stands, I don't even bother to remember any names aside from my character, his wife, the eldest child of each gender, and one or two of my greatest rivals, because no one else really matters in any real way. Like, sure, your spymaster's important, but you can just plop him down in your capitol with orders to Scheme and not worry about him until you need someone assassinated. More interpersonal stuff, where you have events with family, vassals, etc, with the two character's traits and stats determining what kind of interactions those are would go a long way to flesh everyone out, and then everybody, including the women, would feel less like chess pieces and more like characters. For example, just to make something up, maybe your eldest daughter, who is Wroth and Cruel, confronts you and demands you go to war to press a claim or that you imprison a vassal that she feels insulted her. Or maybe you and your brother both have the Crusader trait so you get an event where the two of you swap war stories, getting a relationship boost and an extra martial point. Just something like that, to humanize everyone and let you get a feel of who everyone is. The vendettas in The Republic were a good example of this, I thought. Tomn posted:I don't know about how your games go, but in my games, mothers are CONSTANTLY planning to kill SOMEBODY to get their kids on the throne. Not to mention if you're playing as a Muslim and all your wives are constantly trying to murder the other wives' kids. I swear, it's like a Mexican standoff spontaneously erupts around the breakfast table every morning.
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Apr 10, 2013 18:04
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Tomn posted:I don't know about how your games go, but in my games, mothers are CONSTANTLY planning to kill SOMEBODY to get their kids on the throne. Everything I've learned about Roman women tells me that mothers constantly plotting to get their kids on the throne has a long and proud history 
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Apr 10, 2013 18:10
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