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Frankly, I'm disappointed that this didn't lead to Pascal joining A2 as a sidekick on the "murder all robots" train. I think that the story could have gotten some real mileage out of him as he dealt with his newfound trauma and drive for revenge. As is, this story beat amounts to "you know those nice characters that we've been playing up as improbably nice? Well they sad-died super sad deaths, aren't you feeling sad now?" What would have been a great launching point for a tragic Pascal arc is just sort of wasted on the non-character that is A2.
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Nov 24, 2017 04:49
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What would make anyone think he was at all liable to seek revenge? Dude seems likely to kill himself if you don’t do it for him (either by wiping his memories and hoping newer Pascal can do better this time, or straight up assissted suicide), and there’s no “try to help him get past his grief at the machine kid suicide bonanza” option.
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Nov 24, 2017 04:59
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Not expecting revenge, really. Just briefly thinking of the possibility of making some...questionable decisions. "I must be beautiful" kinds of questionable.
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Nov 24, 2017 05:06
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Now that I think on it and after finishing the game, erasing his memories does make a bit more sense thematically, I think. It might be effectively killing him, but since cores still seem to have a semblance of soul left in them, you're still keeping a good person alive in this lovely world, and that is still preferable to killing them. Even if Pascal 2.0 were to repeat the original's mistakes, they would not necessarily lead to the same tragic events, unless Pascal's villages are somehow destined to be facing hordes of zombie machine tanks.The Dark Id posted:I felt bad replaying the game just to record doing this. If you actually went with this option, you suck rear end. Go walk into traffic and get hit by a bus you lovely person you. If you’re wondering, Pascal just commits suicide afterwards. Go you... 
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Nov 24, 2017 05:12
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Miacis posted:...unless Pascal's villages are somehow destined to be facing hordes of zombie machine tanks. 
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Nov 24, 2017 05:13
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Miacis posted:Now that I think on it and after finishing the game, erasing his memories does make a bit more sense thematically, I think. It might be effectively killing him, but since cores still seem to have a semblance of soul left in them, you're still keeping a good person alive in this lovely world, and that is still preferable to killing them. Even if Pascal 2.0 were to repeat the original's mistakes, they would not necessarily lead to the same tragic events, unless Pascal's villages are somehow destined to be facing hordes of zombie machine tanks. On the one hand, we have Anemone, who went through amazingly horrible poo poo repeatedly and managed to hold on much better than might be expected. On the other, 9S. ...Yeah, I can see the argument for memory erasure.
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Nov 24, 2017 05:14
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GeneX posted:What would make anyone think he was at all liable to seek revenge? Don't get me wrong, Pascal offing himself in the face of that tragedy is a decent story beat and totally in character for him. I just feel like there's a lot more that could have been done with him. Why might Pascal seek revenge, you ask? Maybe he could decide that he couldn't stand destroying the last memories of his treasured family, and resolve to investigate just why in the hell the machine network is full of such assholes. Maybe he could get a pep talk FROM THE ANDROID STANDING NEXT TO HIM THAT PERSONALLY SURVIVED TO SEEK REVENGE ON ALL MACHINES BECAUSE THEY MURDERED ALL HER FRIENDS. Mostly I just want to see more of our best boy, and am kind of salty that he didn't get a terribly in-depth character arc.
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Nov 24, 2017 05:18
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I knew poo poo was coming. I knew Pascal's Village couldn't possibly last. I had read all of TDI's threads up to this point. I knew Yoko Taro was at maximum power.I knew I was in for heartbreak. I still was not ready. 
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Nov 24, 2017 06:03
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Bufuman posted:I knew poo poo was coming. Look at it this way It can't get any worse
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Nov 24, 2017 06:42
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Killing the kids off and explaining it with a concept not introduced until after the fact felt pretty weak to me. Props for doing something different with the suicide from not being equipped to handle fear thing, I suppose. The Pascal choice and it's effects were much more powerful, so I guess it works as a setup for the choice.
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Nov 24, 2017 06:52
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exploded mummy posted:Look at it this way We both know that phrase is blood in the water for a Taro Yoko game. Whatever happens next is your fault.
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Nov 24, 2017 07:05
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Well, at least Pascal got to do a very cool thing before Yoko Taro drove on by and
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Nov 24, 2017 07:20
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Neddy Seagoon posted:
 Yoko Taro games eventually get to the point where they feel like a long, cruelly drawn out joke about anything you thought was nice in the world....And that's why we love it.
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Nov 24, 2017 07:21
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exploded mummy posted:Look at it this way let's not kid ourselves
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Nov 24, 2017 07:53
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Ixjuvin posted:let's not kid ourselves A2, 9S, their pods, Anemone, Jackass and Emil are all still alive, after all. Let's see how long that lasts.
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Nov 24, 2017 08:00
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exploded mummy posted:Look at it this way Ha.
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Nov 24, 2017 08:09
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Miacis posted:Now that I think on it and after finishing the game, erasing his memories does make a bit more sense thematically, I think. It might be effectively killing him, but since cores still seem to have a semblance of soul left in them, you're still keeping a good person alive in this lovely world, and that is still preferable to killing them. It also makes the most sense thematically because wiping someone's memories, especially a little cinnamon roll like Pascal, is like creating a child. And what is a child in this world but more grist for the mill? This decision is such a good part of the game and really brings to a point a lot of the things the game has been saying over and over to you about how wiping memories creates a new person, and making it absolutely clear that the cycle of violence and tragedy will continue forever. Not just because machines don't learn and it's been thousands of years of this poo poo (and that's not just a random number, it's a random HUGE number), but because it's such a low point in the story too. It's not easy to punt to blind hope and optimism. Sindai posted:And people thought a world of machines and androids would stop Yoko Taro from finding children to murder. I settled on this as the best explanation for why YorRHa dresses the way they do. It's a giant neon sign reading CHILDREN, that's pointing at A2 and 9S in the player's face the whole game. I wrote it off as gross anime stuff, which it partially is, but once it sunk in that this was a Yoko Taro game it eventually clicked.
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Nov 24, 2017 10:36
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Bufuman posted:I knew Yoko Taro was at maximum How do you know this? I've seen this episode of Dragon Ball Z. He's still powering up. exploded mummy posted:It can't get any worse And now Namek is going to explode in 5 minutes, thanks a lot.
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Nov 24, 2017 11:57
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FeyerbrandX posted:And now Namek is going to explode in 5 minutes, thanks a lot. Oh, good. We still have plenty of time.
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Nov 24, 2017 12:01
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FeyerbrandX posted:And now Namek is going to explode in 5 minutes, thanks a lot. It was already going to do that, all because the guy who knew the secret to keeping Namek from exploding mouthed off to We're just learning about the planet exploding now is all, and we won't learn why it exploded until 5 minutes after it goes off. Tune in next time for more Taro-Ball Z! Edit: Pascal edited their personalities without knowing what he was doing and caused a kernal panic. \/\/\/\/
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Nov 24, 2017 12:20
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So I may have misread things but did they children kill themselves out of terror of the advancing robot hoard, or from seeing their uncle, teacher, and leader abandon his principals and transform into a hulking murder godzilla?
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Nov 24, 2017 12:20
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I went for mindwipe. It struck me as basically the same thing that happened to 9S after the tutorial; he'll boot up, be basically the same person, but with no memories of anything that happened since he broke off from the network. He won't be "our" Pascal, but he'll be Pascal all the same, and he can try again. Current Pascal doesn't have the strength to try again. Dead Pascal can't try again. It was the only option that could conceivably lead to a peaceful machine village full of happy white flag-waving children again.
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Nov 24, 2017 12:24
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Ixjuvin posted:let's not kid ourselves
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Nov 24, 2017 12:45
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Since there's no option to comfort Pascal, the game has essentially distilled this down to a binary choice: harm Pascal or do not harm Pascal. Murdering Pascal and wiping Pascal's memories are the options for harming him and walking away is the option for not harming him. Thus walking away is the only morally justifiable choice. If you think otherwise, then you don't actually see the machines as people; you see them as things that act like people. If someone you knew had their entire family killed, would you murder them if they asked you to? Or wipe their memories? I highly doubt it. Wiping his memory is the truly morally reprehensible choice for a number of reasons. Wiping someone's memories is no different from killing them. We are our memories. When our memories are gone, so are we. You're creating a completely new person in place of the old. And if Pascal doesn't remember the villagers, it's almost like they never existed in the first place. Someone who cared for them needs to be around to remember them. Furthermore, if Pascal's memories are wiped, then he won't have learned from the multiple mistakes he made that had a part in leading up to this point. So he's likely to repeat history by building another village of peaceful machines that will also get slaughtered horribly. In fact, if he asks this readily for his memories to be wiped... has this happened before? How many times? Is this a cycle for him? How many previous villages has he created only to have them brutally wiped out and then had someone wipe his memory. You are a terrible person if you wipe his memory. 
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Nov 24, 2017 13:46
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If you favor pacifism in the middle of Yoko Taro hellscape you'd better be dead, got it.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:05
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jyrque posted:If you favor pacifism in the middle of Yoko Taro hellscape you'd better be dead, got it. Everything that lives is designed to end. We are perpetually trapped in a never-ending spiral of life and death. Is this a curse? Or some kind of punishment? I often think about the god who blessed us with this cryptic puzzle...and wonder if we'll ever get the chance to kill him.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:18
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Probably what it boils down to, at least for me, is what remains after the choice. 1) a mind wiped Pascal. We actually don't know much about Pascal from his being in the network. Possibly he was intrinsically a good person-bot, or maybe something kickstarted that development after his disconnect. Some stimuli that he'd miss this time around. But I'd think he'd try to be helpful, even if it was doomed to failure. And in my book, "OK person who kind of sort of looks like Pascal" is preferable to just killing him and getting nothing. But you're still effectively killing the original. And that's pretty lovely to do to a friend. 2) Dead Pascal. Well, at least he wouldn't have to deal with the grief. And he did ask for that. Still, you're killing a good person. As opposed to those hordes of faceless murderbots, possessed allies, and ambiguously-gay sort of brothers. Still pretty awful. 3) Grief Machine. Best case scenario, we get some Pheonix-style "rebirth from the ashes" stuff. More likely, he breaks. Hurts other people because he doesn't understand why the world continues to hurt. Kills himself because he just cannot deal with ANY of this, let alone all of it. Taking this option and leaving him to his own devices (heh) is possibly going to hurt him the worst, and might churn out another mini boss, who would probably hurt others before you (or someone) kill him anyway. This being a video game, 4) Talk to Pascal is not among the choices. You can't be a supportive person for this guy. You can't make The Pascal Center For Bots Who Can't Pacifism Good. You can't just wait, like a week, let him mourn everything he has known and loved, so that it at least takes the edge off. And let's be honest, A2 isn't exactly a therapist. I'm not even sure that profession exists in Taropia. So we just have the three options. None of the options are good, at least to Pascal. At least with mind wiped Pascal, you'd (maybe) have an extra someone who might rebuild. That's what I'd pick. But it's still awful.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:24
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I wonder if there's a multiplayer game where you get pitted against some horrible poo poo, and you can't really win, just lose the least? That might be "fun".
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Nov 24, 2017 14:27
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jonsicoli posted:I wonder if there's a multiplayer game where you get pitted against some horrible poo poo, and you can't really win, just lose the least? That might be "fun". WoW, GW 2 or any other MMORPG? No matter how many times you kill the goblins terrorizing the countryside, the dragon razing surrounding cities or demon lord trying to destroy the world, they are back at it days, hours or in some cases literally minutes later. "Perpetually trapped in a never-ending spiral of life and death" is a good way to describe the world of most MMORPGs.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:37
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Remember the good old days where all we were doing was collecting stickers at the theme park while watching Romeos and Juliets, chatting about T-Shirts and not having to deal with how to end a perfect boy's misery in the most ethical manner? Good times... excluding the whole fighting the 14th World War and having to kill deserters without explanation bit.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:51
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This entire conversation about the moral ramifications of how to handle Pascal's request is one of the reasons why Yoko Taro's games are so drat special. They really take advantage of the medium and force you to confront things in a way no other medium is really capable of.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:52
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...! posted:Wiping someone's memories is no different from killing them. We are our memories. When our memories are gone, so are we. That is total bullshit. Memories are an important component of personhood but by no means the be all and end all. Ever spent much time around a person with dementia? Thought not.
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Nov 24, 2017 14:55
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Wiping a robot's memories back to a completely clean slate and having dementia aren't really comparable, nor is it something I think Taro would ever consider writing as an analogue to it. Dementia's a hosed up illness that only takes parts of your memories away, it'd probably be better if it were something that took absolutely everything. poo poo's cruel as gently caress. Flicking a switch to wipe a robot's memory banks isn't even close to the same league.
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Nov 24, 2017 15:02
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...! posted:Since there's no option to comfort Pascal, the game has essentially distilled this down to a binary choice: harm Pascal or do not harm Pascal. You haven't distilled enough: This is a choice about how you're going to harm Pascal. There is no option to not harm Pascal. Abandoning someone begging for death is an option that also causes harm.
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Nov 24, 2017 15:28
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jonsicoli posted:I wonder if there's a multiplayer game where you get pitted against some horrible poo poo, and you can't really win, just lose the least? That might be "fun". The Secret World/Secret World Legends mentions pretty much constantly in various cutscenes and dialogue that all your actions are pretty much for naught and that humanity is pretty much hosed anyway.
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Nov 24, 2017 15:36
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jonsicoli posted:I wonder if there's a multiplayer game where you get pitted against some horrible poo poo, and you can't really win, just lose the least? That might be "fun". Closest thing to that is called Missile Command for the Atari. It's singleplayer tho, so again, 'closest'.
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Nov 24, 2017 16:43
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jonsicoli posted:I wonder if there's a multiplayer game where you get pitted against some horrible poo poo, and you can't really win, just lose the least? That might be "fun". Any Mario Party prior to 9 
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Nov 24, 2017 16:46
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RareAcumen posted:Closest thing to that is called Missile Command for the Atari. It's singleplayer tho, so again, 'closest'. Yeah Missile Command, Robotron, Space Invaders all those old classics.
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Nov 24, 2017 16:56
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jonsicoli posted:I wonder if there's a multiplayer game where you get pitted against some horrible poo poo, and you can't really win, just lose the least? That might be "fun". DEFCON. Nuclear annihilation is inevitable, diplomacy is guaranteed to break down, and the game even uses the phrase "you just have to make sure you lose the least" in the marketing blurb.
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Nov 24, 2017 17:01
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| # ? May 9, 2024 23:41 |
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Sonic Shuffle
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Nov 24, 2017 17:45
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