Cyberpunk 2077 - Unkillable Children, Story NPCs

I'm pretty sure I know what I meant a little better than you do. ;)

It's pretty sad and pathetic when someone attempts to turn a harmless poke into something more than it was meant to be.
 
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A few games off the top of my head with children (and other NPCs) you cannot kill:

All of the Borderlands games
All of the Rockstar games

I think I can stop there, actually. Borderlands takes an anarchic, gleeful approach to murder and more. As a player, what you 99.9% do is shoot and blow up people. But can you kill Tiny Tina? No. Can you kill Brick or Lilith or any of the other major NPCs? No. And why can't you kill them? Because the game is full of killing, but killing is not THE point. There's narrative structure to the game, and that structure is communicated through those NPCs. Skyrim, of course, is the same way. If you feel like modding in the ability to kill those NPCs, go for it. But in doing so, you will render 90% of the game pointless. It will just be a sandbox to run around in, and nothing else. Expecting the designers themselves to do that is stupid.

Which is why I brought up a game like Rust earlier. There is no plot in Rust. There are no objectives, no characters, no story. That game is solely about building things and killing and being killed. So if that's what you want in a game, that's where you'll find it. You won't find it in Cyberpunk 2077, just like you won't, and haven't, found it in any story driven games.

And NONE of that is the same as saying that killing NPCs can't be a choice, or used for dramatic purposes. There is a huge and extremely obvious difference between killing or allowing the death of NPCs, potentially including children, as part of a scripted quest, and being able to kill anyone at any time, which is what everyone here has been talking about. There is no actual choice involved in the latter, no more than ramming your avatar into a wall over and over is a "choice". It's not a choice the game presents as a useful one. You might just as well get mad at the developers for not allowing you to make the "choice" to give yourself a severe head injury.

It's not fucking censorship, and the fact that you call it that tells me a lot about your critical thinking ability. At this point, if you keep screeching "but my immersion!" without even attempting to acknowledge or understand why there are fundamental issues to allowing you to randomly kill people that has nothing to do with robbing you of your free will, or accusing you of being a closet murderer, you never will.

Couldn't care less about a list of games where you can't kill children, i've never asked for it or argued that all games has killable children. That doesn't mean i think it's good or that it should be the norm.

Of course it's censorship, what else would you call it?

Why would a game modded so that children can die from damage be rendered "90% pointless"? I had killable children in FO3 when i played it the last time, i don't think any kid died though (years ago now, so my memory is vague). I know that i finished it though and it wasn't "90% pointless".. That would have been very perplexing.. "wow i added a mod which made children take damage, now the entire game is pointless!!!"

I've never argued that you should be able to kill anyone at any time, if it's a character which is key to some interesting outcome or quest line (that they really want the player to be a part of) then it's better if the outcome is that they get knocked out, like in e.g Gothic. Story has nothing to do with this, then we could just as well argue that no women or animals, or whatever life form can't be killed because "story!". That doesn't make any sense at all. A child can of course be a NPC that is part of the story or it can be a random nameless NPC that isn't part of anything.
 
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The fault is in putting pixel children in to start with, because you want to add immersion, to them throw it all down the drain by making them immune to the world's hazards., which is pretty idiotic.

Now players' avatars are made a mere world's hazards bit, in these days when vid products are so PC centric a NPC must exist on players' whims.

This war of mine added children by the little ones DLC. Children by design can not scavenge or guard. They are not immune to hunger, sickness, cold, depression, death.

Gameplaywise, if the decision had been made to let them challenge, it had to be balanced in gameplay.
 
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This has nothing to do with cultures. Within each culture you will find people with opposing viewpoints. It's just individual peoples opinions. I thought it was weird you brought up culture and wondered if you had an agenda or bias. fortunately you left no doubt with the following post.


.

No. The concept of culture does not exist out of thin air. It is tied.
Making it a statement about individual opinions requires an attaching point that allows it.

It can not be a matter of individual opinions in a system that aggregates opinions to form a consensus.

In the american system, cultures are aggregated. Telling that somewhere sometime, maybe, guys within a cultural group think otherwise means nothing as long as their opinion does not shape the aggregated outcome.

It is weird stuff to try to sell when the whole machine works that way, for anything, whether it is political, economical or whatever.

At best, it can be stated that there are different cultures and stuff like that.

It is no longer 1776. Time has flown and things are known by now.
 
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This discussion always heats up when words like psychopath are used, when drawing conclusions about the players personality and mental health, conclusions that are merely based on game preferences.

Personality is tied to preferences.

It never was about killing indiscriminately. Therefore the example is not fitting.
Because the game was to run over pedestrians indiscriminatively.

Usually, in so called RPGs, an orientation is given to which NPCS must be killed and which NPCs must not be killed. NPCs are discriminated from the start and by design. Hence by the way breaking the game when killing a discriminated for NPCs.

Applied to children, it means that children must be discriminated for and against, the product must direct toward killing some while sparing others. Or it would be an artificial and moralistic decision or something like that.

And that would be an unsound product to let stream for free. Because this is one product at least person would pay to watch being streaming. Would be a mine, even better than Rimworld.
I thought science long time ago came to the conclusion that violent games are harmless? (Unless you already have a personality disorder.)
Every single scientific theory has a limited range of validity.
Violence in video product is not random, it is structured against an environment, it is a top to bottom process, the stronger taking on the weaker.
Vid products come with an environment to support that exercize of violence, an environment that is not matched by daily's life environment. Very few players think they will ultimately grow strong enough to take on the military, the police, the gangs. They know their position.

When looking at other environments like war theatres, which are a closer match, the conclusions are way less conclusive.
 
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@JDR13; and @vurt;: end your tête-à-tête or take it to PM. It is diverting from the topic matter.
 
But at least you had the freedom to explore that choice and suffer its consequences if you are so inclined.

Players do not come to vid products to suffer consequences. They come to vid products to be empowered, in which case, preventing them from killing is a limitation put on them and therefore ruining their feeling of empowerment.

Players reject choices and consequences. They want choices over consequences, they want to determine which consequences are associated to their actions. They pick consequences that suit them and cry until those they can not bear are removed.

It is another utterance of power.

Life is not a vid product. Walking away from consequences in life is not as easy as it is from walking away from a vid product. Consequences in life might be imposed in such a way they are not determined by people who suffer them.
Eventually, the best way to escape consequences is to find other people to foot the bill for you, a process the US have grown world and history experts at.

It reminds of M&B 2 beta. The M&B crowd is full of historians and M&B2 introduced female characters. Within days, historians were lining up to beg for an ease on the woman condition, the world was perceived as too hostile. Okay, it is historical that a woman should be put down but do not make it too long, too obvious. An ingame week, not more.

Players opted to play a female character and could not cope with the consequences, they forced a reduction (the dev tried to defend his design) whereas there is a solid historical ground to implement a world where the stigmata of being a woman should follow a PC all the time and that even rising to the Queen status should not alleviate it.

Same as the RPG example: GMs know that players are likely to walk away from the table when facing consequences they can not bear.

It is not choice and consequences. It is choice over consequences. It is another utterance of power, they act and they determine consequences.

In the past, raping women was choice and consequences as so called RPGers sell it.
Nobles could decide to rape women. As a consequence, they used to drop a coin on the raped woman. It was compensation.
A rape did not come without consequences.
 
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Yes, I know Carmeggedon is not exactly your average RPG. The reason I brought it up was that parts of replies in this thread reminded me of the protests and worries about the (effect on) mental health seen at the tme of Carmeggedon.

I understand RPG devs making choices who can be killed and who needs to stay alive, no matter their age.
And I can understand people wanting to be able to screw up their own game by killing a vital NPC, no matter the age.

But expecting that all kids, vital as an NPC or not, need to stay alive is welcomed by all players, or else be judged/labelled as mentally unhealthy is a bridge too far, imo.

To think it is okay to kill lots of people in one game but to condemn players when wanting to kill in an another, just because its design is not about killing…

I have known people wanting to see what happens if you isolate and starve a Sim.
It is their game, they have bought it. They can play it anyway they want. It is entirely up to them.
Other games being more appropriate when in a killing/discovery mood is beside the point. It is a game, it is about having fun.

It would be disturbing though if players can not differentiate between a game and real life, and lose track of having innocent fun - pixel killing is harmless to most of us in The West. Like Chien said earlier and in the post above, it is about having - for a short moment - the illusion of having power.
And thus an escape from reality.
 
Players do not come to vid products to suffer consequences. They come to vid products to be empowered, in which case, preventing them from killing is a limitation put on them and therefore ruining their feeling of empowerment.

Players reject choices and consequences. They want choices over consequences, they want to determine which consequences are associated to their actions. They pick consequences that suit them and cry until those they can not bear are removed.

[…]

I'm not sure why you think you can tell me what I play videogames for, but you're either very young or your views are too narrow and feel with the need to dictate that everyone's views should be like yours.

RPGs have always been about playing a role, making choices and bearing consequences to those choices. The point is that since a videogame (or text book, or board) are nto real, the consequences can be harsh and you suffer no repercussions in real life. That's the fun part. You can get killed, jailed, or suffer all kinds of grief in a character, but none of it matter s the next day when you go to work or school, so it enables you to experience things you wouldn't in your normal life, both good and bad. If you play RPGs to feel like a paladin rescuing the princess form the dragon in a castle in wonderland and happy rainbows shoot from the ass of camels as you ride through double rainbow bridges, good for you. But that's a fairytale, not a RPG.
 
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@Eye;
I didn't play Carmeggedon but I know I would of enjoyed it. I was playing Twisted Metal 2 and you could run over civies in that one too - inbetween firing missles at each other.

I miss the mess around games that we used to get. I still remember Black and White and training my lion avatar or whatever to throw my enemies into the sea. Great fun! Discipline was funny too, of course he would sulk for a little while but that just made it more amusing.

People need to play more god games I think.
 
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But expecting that all kids, vital as an NPC or not, need to stay alive is welcomed by all players, or else be judged/labelled as mentally unhealthy is a bridge too far, imo.

Never was the point.

In so called RPGs, especially those story driven things, and contrary to Carmaggeddon, adult NPCs are discriminated: there are those who are destined to be killed, those who are not destined to be killed.

Kids must not be treated differently, by virtue of storytelling, there must be large numbers of killed kids. Just as it is for adults. Missing that would seem artificial and moralistic.

It is not about not killing kids, it is about killing kids. A significant share of NPC kids must be allocated to killed material. Just as adult NPCs are.

At the end of a socalled RPG, it is known there will be a certain body count of adult NPCs. Usually a large one. Same for kids.
 
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I think this debate is quite disgusting in general. One side trying to bait the conversation into "Oh my, what kind of sick person needs to kill kids in a game?!" and people from the other side falling into it and feeling as if they have to make excuses for having a questionable morality, when they are being offended rather than being the offenders.

Either way I'm done with this thread. If anyone can't understand how anything that makes a RPG artificial and rigged is bad and subtracts from the "RPG" term itself (at least for some of us), I'm sorry. I can't help you anymore.
 
I think this debate is quite disgusting in general. One side trying to bait the conversation into "Oh my, what kind of sick person needs to kill kids in a game?!" and people from the other side falling into it and feeling as if they have to make excuses for having a questionable morality, when they are being offended rather than being the offenders.

Either way I'm done with this thread. If anyone can't understand how anything that makes a RPG artificial and rigged is bad and subtracts from the "RPG" term itself (at least for some of us), I'm sorry. I can't help you anymore.

The topic is not "disgusting" unless you are a disgusting person driven by bad morals and the only thing that keeps you from killing kids is that the devs turned on "god mode" for them. Such people is not a majority i believe.

Why is kids taking damage (from enemies, you, environmental hazards) having "questionable morality"? Again, you make no sense. It's obviously you who have a very questionable morality if all you can think of is you/the player killing the children.

How is kids taking damage and being killable (like everyone else) artificial? It's the exact opposite of that.
 
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I'm not sure why you think you can tell me what I play videogames for, but you're either very young or your views are too narrow and feel with the need to dictate that everyone's views should be like yours.
And now this, golden thread, golden thread. The result of two centuries of institutionalized double standard.

Kings could have a lot of interest in women. Usually, they had a servant, a noble of low birth quite often, to review women before they were introduced to the king.
Kings were known to accept one point: the guy knew what kind of women the king wanted. It was expected from him. He had to know.


These days, as people keep surrendering their privacy, keep supporting stuff like Steam that makes a business of collecting data to resell them to devs so that customers are better served, still guys coming out to tell they are the only ones who know what they want.

Incredible stuff. Those guys, if one day microchipped, would still claim that they are the only ones who know what they think.
RPGs have always been about playing a role, making choices and bearing consequences to those choices. The point is that since a videogame (or text book, or board) are nto real, the consequences can be harsh and you suffer no repercussions in real life.

What a sane, non contrarian point of view.

It is a video product, it is not real, consequences can be harsh.
It is a video product, it is not real, consequences can be harsh.

This is when one must acknowledge that people are not born equal, that there are superior minded people. Because it takes a superior mind to achieve that observation.

For simple minded people, harsh consequences can not be applied in a video product without players consenting them. If they feel the consequences are too harsh, they will walk away. You can walk away from video products, you can not that easily in life.

Quite a lot of historians in vid products, the type TW3 is based on historical Poland.

Yet not so many to demand that their hallowed avatar should be treated in historical ways.
A swordfight could leave people crippled, a sword swing could sever both legs right at knee joints.
People were maimed as punishments: they could lose an eye, a hand for stealing. They could be scarified to ensure infamity.

Those were harsh consequences that people did not have the luxury to walk away from. For them, it was not as simple as screaming the customer is king, you must listen to customers, obey and serve.

Consequences were imposed on them with little say in it. They had no a GM in front of them who try to tailor out consequences they could bear without throwing a tantrum.

That's the fun part. You can get killed, jailed, or suffer all kinds of grief in a character, but none of it matter s the next day when you go to work or school, so it enables you to experience things you wouldn't in your normal life, both good and bad. If you play RPGs to feel like a paladin rescuing the princess form the dragon in a castle in wonderland and happy rainbows shoot from the ass of camels as you ride through double rainbow bridges, good for you. But that's a fairytale, not a RPG.[/QUOTE]
 
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I think this debate is quite disgusting in general. One side trying to bait the conversation into "Oh my, what kind of sick person needs to kill kids in a game?!"

Strange thing to say. The psychopath thing was introduced in the thread in a certain post. People are responsible for their own words.

Sick person and stuff like that is unneeded.
 
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