# Murder in video games



## Juub (Jul 14, 2014)

Woke up this morning at my friend's house. Wild party last night so I was a bit hungover from the booze. Powered on the PS4 to try it out and there was his brand new copy of Watch_Dogs inside the disk tray. I fired up the game and played a couple of missions. Last mission I played was Backseat Driver. A good 2hrs give or take 15 minutes.

Throughout the whole experience I couldn't help but notice how gratuitous murder has become in video games. You'd be hard-pressed to find a non-sports/sim game without tons of pointless murder. Is it really a bad thing? I wouldn't say so. I do however think it takes away from a lot of the creativity that could be used on objectives that wouldn't involve murder. In my opinion, killing someone shouldn't be something you do often in games. It should be only used as a last resort but in this day and age, it seems violence solves every conflict in video games.

Then again, if it was something uncommon, it would probably attract a lot more attention and be a lot more realistic and meaningful which I don't think we really want. I know there are tons of games out there that don't involve killing everything in sight but in my opinion solving conflicts with violence has become way way too prevalent.

Would you have a different alternative for solving problems in adventure games? Do you think all this violence adds to the experience or takes away from what could be far more creative mechanics/objectives.

Discuss.


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## Aduro (Jul 14, 2014)

I think there should be more options than just killing non-stop in games. In Red Dead Redemption there was often a choice in some quests and plenty that couldn't be resolved through killing which it gave much more variety but didn't take away the fun of the shooting element. I often get bored of 3rd person shooters where its just shoot shoot shoot, repetition can make even the most brutal kills dull. As long as people distance themselves from killing its not a problem to make that the main action of the game though, violence in just escapist fun as long as it isn't too real.


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## Yagami1211 (Jul 15, 2014)

I welcome the presence of non lethal methods of dealing with a possible enemy or just outright ignoring him, like in stealth games in which you are rewarded when no battles happens whatsoever.


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## Juub (Jul 15, 2014)

Yagami1211 said:


> I welcome the presence of non lethal methods of dealing with a possible enemy or just outright ignoring him, like in stealth games in which you are rewarded when no battles happens whatsoever.



So much this. Stealth games which is the genre killing would be the most useful is actually the genre that actually encourages you to avoid it the most. Otherwise most games don't give any other options. I also think it's crazy how 99% of human enemies want you dead.


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## Mael (Jul 15, 2014)

None of this would've happened if you had just stopped.


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## Deathbringerpt (Jul 15, 2014)

Fuck that.

Doom guy needs a shotgun, not a fucking hippie peace argument.


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## Katou (Jul 15, 2014)

They say Games are the future of the Reality 

So . . yup.  No high Authority is going to stop this madness 

[sp] I have no idea what the fuck I'm saying. . Carry on  [/sp]


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## Juub (Jul 15, 2014)

Deathbringerpt said:


> Fuck that.
> 
> Doom guy needs a shotgun, not a fucking hippie peace argument.



Totally different thing. Killing monstrous aliens requires killing. I'm talking about games such as Watch_Dogs or GTA.


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## Buskuv (Jul 15, 2014)

>hard press to find non sports/sim games without gratuitous murder

What are:

Puzzle Games
Platformers
Fighters
Party Games
Adventure Games
Strategy Games (of virtually any kind)
Virtually all Nintendo games

And, of course, this is barring violent games where killing takes place in a believable context and is by no real definition murder--shooters, etc.  

It honestly doesn't take place that much.  Outside of sandbox games like you mentioned, GTA and GTA with hacking, and some of the more specific types of games (Postal, Hitman, Manhunt, etc), it's not actually that common.  Most of the violent games have some sort of context or reason behind the violent mayhem, gratuitous as it can be.


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## Hunted by sister (Jul 15, 2014)

Murder in games is irrelevant. It's not real. Doesn't matter, it doesn't change you as a person. It's just... there.

Sure, non-lethal options in games like Dishonored are welcome, but not because you can avoid killing people, but because it's a choice and expands the gameplay.

Often I just want to grab a shotgun in a bloody FPS and tear people apart. Why? It's fun. However that doesn't mean I enjoy murder. 


Dr. Biscuit Kardashian said:


> >hard press to find non sports/sim games without gratuitous murder
> 
> What are:
> 
> ...


blank
They Bleed Pixels, Super Meat Boy, I Want to be the Guy, etc etc
Mortal Kombat...
blank
I'm pretty sure there are adventure games full of murder. Anna, Fahrenheit, Still Life (not sure never played), Dark Fall Lost Souls
Strategy games often have murder AND genocide
blank.

//HbS


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## Buskuv (Jul 15, 2014)

One example is not the same as 'hard pressed to find ANY,' dude.

How many fighters are there, especially big fighters?  And Mortal Kombat is the only one with murder in it?  'Kay.

Don't even get me started on platformers.

I don't know of very many RTS games with neutral non-combatants that you can kill (there's a few in the original StarCraft, I think). 

But killing =! murder.

So, not feelin' that whole post, bro.


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## Byakkö (Jul 15, 2014)

Sounds like OP needs to broaden his selection of games. There's plenty to choose from today if you look for it. The WiiU isn't selling that well but there's a decent selection of creative non-violent games, and in the near future there will definitely be more on the console. 

Non-violent games such as platformers or puzzle games aren't always the bestsellers or the games you'll see advertised on TV, but they're available.


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## Hunted by sister (Jul 15, 2014)

Dr. Biscuit Kardashian said:


> One example is not the same as 'hard pressed to find ANY,' dude.
> 
> How many fighters are there, especially big fighters?  And Mortal Kombat is the only one with murder in it?  'Kay.
> 
> ...


The part before quoting you was the main part. Anyway, the second part, a lazy point, was that these genres are not free of murder. So your rather sarcastic post didn't quite hit the mark it was trying to hit

//HbS


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## Raidou Kuzunoha (Jul 15, 2014)

Peaceful solutions doesn't exactly stop a rampaging dinosaur like in Dino Crisis or save the world from mad men or some super being from another dimension.

We need more bloooood.


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## Juub (Jul 15, 2014)

Dr. Biscuit Kardashian said:


> >hard press to find non sports/sim games without gratuitous murder
> 
> What are:
> 
> ...



Most adventure games involve a lot of murder. Puzzle games typyically don't involve interractions with other NPC's and the objective is rather simple; solve the puzzle. Strategy games like Age of Empires and Civilization often have war in them which involves a lot of killing.

Anyway, maybe I should have been more specific. I was mainly talking about games that can fall under the ''adventure'' term. Halo for example is an FPS but it is still an adventure. Tetris isn't an adventure.


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## Deathbringerpt (Jul 16, 2014)

Juub said:


> Most adventure games involve a lot of murder.



And yet most of the time, it's not the playable character who's directly involved with the murder and it's still really easy to find adventure games without it. 

Assuming that Dr. Biscuit Kardashian is talking about Point and Click Adventure games. Shame on him for not including Dating simulators as well .



Juub said:


> Puzzle games typyically don't involve interractions with other NPC's and the objective is rather simple; solve the puzzle.



Even if we don't take the fact that you're just dismissing puzzles games because "reasons", plenty of puzzles games series of late have had more emphasis on story/plot and characters like Phoenix Wright or Professor Layton or Ghost Trick which are all about resolving conflict with non-violent means. 



Juub said:


> Strategy games like Age of Empires and Civilization often have war in them which involves a lot of killing.



Yes, war strategy games involve playing in war scenarios. Not much of a shock there. He wasn't talking about city building strategy games that focus on actual building or anything.



Juub said:


> Anyway, maybe I should have been more specific. I was mainly talking about games that can fall under the ''adventure'' term. Halo for example is an FPS but it is still an adventure. Tetris isn't an adventure.



Considering the thread name is "Murder *in videogames*" you should have been more specific from the very beginning. You're trying really hard to give this idea that we're merely stuck with violence and killing in videogames when wide generalizations like that are simply untrue. We're way past Jack Thompson's bullshit, dude.


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## Juub (Jul 16, 2014)

Deathbringerpt said:


> And yet most of the time, it's not the playable character who's directly involved with the murder and it's still really easy to find adventure games without it.
> 
> Assuming that Dr. Biscuit Kardashian is talking about Point and Click Adventure games. Shame on him for not including Dating simulators as well .
> 
> ...


I would say it is true for most adventure games as mentioned before. At first I wanted to include puzzle, SIM and RTS games in the OP but I simply thought they weren't popular enough of a genre to mention.

Mostly I'm talking about games where you actually interact with human characters. Most of them could somewhat fall under the ''adventure'' category which is a broad term. Platformers don't involve much interaction with other human characters. It's mostly between you and the environment with an NPC sprinkled here and there.

Take games like ARMA, Torchlight, Skyrim, Watch_Dogs, Halo, COD, Dark Souls, Hotline Miami, Mark of the Ninja, Metal Gear, Splinter Cell hell even Thief. I could draw a long long list of those and even a game like Mark of the Ninja doesn't involve much interractions with NPC's. All the games mentioned are also completely different in terms of gameplay/style.

I guess the message I'm trying to convey is that whenever there is a possible interaction with other characters(beyond the basic push button to talk) it seems games will make it possible to just kill people.

Of course puzzle games and RTS most likely won't fall under that category. They don't even put you in a situation where killing someone else would be possible.

Edit: Also, in the OP I did mention ''adventure games'' and that it seems murder solves a lot of issues. I should have been clearer with it I guess.

Edit 2: Just to get my point across. I'm currently looking for an adventure game where I interact with people/characters that isn't a SIM and doesn't involve any killing. Could you list me some games released in the past year or so? I'm also dead serious. I'm really looking for such a game.


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## Yagami1211 (Jul 16, 2014)

Define adventure game.

Like Broken Sword ?

or like the Yakuza franchise ( Happens in a world of Yakuza with surprising low death count. )

or the Batman games, he break bones but doesn't kill.


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