Hi Jeremy
I do have to say as I think someone else has pointed out, if a child is old
enough to be allowed on a computer unsupervised to download and view what
they choose then there are a lot more worrying things online than a
violent audio game. Just on uTube alone there is I'm sure more graphic and
inappropriate content which is just a click or 2 away from anyone accessing
a pc. I think this is the responsibility of a parent to teach their
children what they are allowed to view online, I think the fact that the
game warns people is amble to warn anyone of what is to be expected and
people can choose to either download or not and if people choose to ignore
the warning that is their choice and if it's a child too young to be exposed
to this kind of game I question whether they should be allowed to freely
view the web unsupervised as mentioned previously there is a lot more not
only inappropriate but dangerous content accessible online. also with grand
theft auto that to can be brought online through ps online or the xbox
store either as the game or as a free demo and although I haven't checked
I'm pretty sure there will only be a warning there
Regards
Paul
-----Original Message-----
From: Gamers [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Jeremy Brown
Sent: Thursday, April 30, 2015 11:50 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] physical cd's and paypal accounts
In response to the points about physical CD's versus download and/or paypal
accounts.
I was not necessarily suggesting that a physical CD be involved, merely a
code key that would have to be mailed separately. However, as I also said
in the original post, I don't expect VGStorm to do either. It is extra cost
that would have to be passed on to consumers, and for a small company like
VGStorm that's an unacceptable cost. I fully understand both the reality of
the new gaming environment, and the position of Aaron's company; there's a
fine balance between how you deliver games, how much they cost, and what
precautions you have to take to avoid cracking, in this case improper
download by minors, etc. I offered two suggestions. Neither is a super
practical one. However, that said, I do not think that as game developers
we have to say everyone else markets graphically violent games, therefore as
long as I have a warning, I've done my bit. With a physical game, such as
Grand Theft Auto which several people have brought up, in most places, a kid
can't just walk in and buy the game.
They're usually behind a counter, in a locked case, etc. That's not to say
that kids do not play them without parental supervision, but I, like Thomas,
monitor what my kids do, and I like it when companies at least produce an
illusion of controlling who their products go to.
As to Paypal, honestly, it's been years since I set up a Paypal account, and
my memory of it is hazy. However, I know a lot of kids have bank accounts.
Just as with anything else, it could be finagled.
However, I think you're missing my essential point here. Once someone buys
the game, they've gone through some effort either in getting a credit card
by hook or by crook, or by accomplishing the goal some other way. My issue,
isn't so much with the purchase as with the fact that this game is extremely
violent, starts off with a extremely anti-social incident as the motivation
for the entire rest of the game, and not only can anyone who downloads it
play that sequence, but they are forced to to play the rest of the game.
I'm not worried about the 10 year old kid who plays this game after buying
it because they dupe their parents. I'm pointing out that any 10 year old
can download and play the game. I feel that any developer, myself included,
needs to consider these sorts of things when developing a game. If the game
is free to download in either a demo mode or a full version, and it contains
graphic content, no matter yur definition of minor or adult, you have to
realize that people are downloading it. A warning message probably
exacerbates this more than it stops people.
It would have for me when I was younger. A friend of mine and I cracked
Leisure Suit Larry back in the eighties precisely because we weren't
supposed to.
If the first sequence were modified or removed, this game would still bother
me for the violence, but it would have set off my warning sensors a lot
less. Thanks for listening yet again:) Take care,
Jeremy
On 4/29/15, [email protected] <[email protected]> wrote:
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: psycho strike help (Aaron Baker)
2. Re: psycho strike some observations (Thomas Ward)
3. Re: psycho strike some observations (Thomas Ward)
4. Psycho strike help part 2 (michael maslo)
5. Re: psycho strike some observations and other related topics
bundled together (Desiree Oudinot)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2015 22:44:58 -0400
From: Aaron Baker <[email protected]>
To: Gamers Discussion list <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] psycho strike help
Message-ID:
<cag+yvalglqg9vqt_ixy-c5c66wq9hfpimvjyc6s6wrt_nyz...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Hello,
Under manage characters, select your character and hit give person's
name food.
You have to kill the weapon shop owner. You won't be able to shoot him
unless you have a gun, so you will have to hit them with the knife.
On 4/29/15, michael maslo <[email protected]> wrote:
Hi list:
I bought the game and I have to admit I love the game! I have a few
questions please.
1. It says I have 117 food in my place. I hit f at the main menu once
I have loaded my character. My question is though it says I have 117
food when I hit N while on a mission it says I have 0 rations.
How do i get the food as a ration before I starve to death?
Also in the weapon store is there a way to buy a weapon or is there a
way to shoot the guy who keeps shooting me.
This game is so awesome!
---
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------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2015 23:02:51 -0400
From: Thomas Ward <[email protected]>
To: Gamers Discussion list <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] psycho strike some observations
Message-ID:
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Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Hello Jeremy,
You aren't alone. I do agree with a lot of what you had to say below,
and it is a major reason why I in all likelihood won't be buying the
game.
Yes, while the sounds, voice acting, etc are all fine as it is I just
found the senseless violence, murder, and mayhem not to my liking.
While fighting and killing in a combat situation usually doesn't
bother me I found the idea of just walking into a party and killing 10
people for no reason sick and immoral. Same goes with the farm
mission. I love animals, and the sound of killing goats for no reason
really bothered me. Bothered me so much I uninstalled the game shortly
there after because I just couldn't play the game after that.
That is not to say I think the game is a bad game. I just personally
dislike the degree of violence and senseless killing involved in the
game. It bothered me in away few games do. It is one thing to be
killing zombies in a game like Swamp since they aren't real people or
can justifiably be called monsters. It is a total and morally
different issue to walk into a party, mall, jail, or somewhere and
just start killing people at random for little reason.
Cheers!
On 4/29/15, Jeremy Brown <[email protected]> wrote:
So, I read the documentation, and I've played one game. Admittedly,
that's a small data sample, but I want to make the following
observations:
1. The game sound design and the game play are very nice. The hot
keys are for the most part very intuitive, and the movement and menu
systems all work as expected. Breaking the game into distinct zones
that you get to from a menu and then sidescroll through made a lot of
sense and avoided some obvious navigational issues. Some auditory
cues could have been perhaps a little more pronounced for my taste,
but overall, I got it.
2. I found the character motivation very flimsy. First off, just
deciding to homicidally kill everyone at a party as my first action in
a criminal career in which I want to amass a gang and get money and
better weapons didn't click for me. Good crime bosses avoid
entanglements with the police and such situations. Further, mass
murderers of the type depicted in the first sequence aren't your buddy
film types imo.
3. On a moral ground, I have severe issues with the character
motivation, the game scoring, and the presentation of violence.
The character motivation as character motivation was discussed above,
but giving a player a choice of either body count or cash as a means
of keeping score struck me as sort of sick. Further, I have a hard
time justifying the developer's decision to release a game with this
sort of content that can be downloaded directly and played at least as
a demo, with no blocks in place to keep minors from playing it. All
such blocks have issues, there's no good way to police such issues,
but given that the first sequence is the murder of ten defenseless
people for no better reason than you decided to strikes me a socially
irresponsible.
The game play is awesome, the game design has a lot of good points,
but minus several million for good taste and well-thought out
character motivations. This game could have been improved immensely
merely by introducing more motivation. You're a poor caterer who's
about to lose their job, be turned out on the streets and a mysterious
man drives up to you, he offers to set you up in comfort if you kill a
certain man at the party. Unfortunatley, he does not have any way of
identifying the man. While still morally reprehensible, this at least
gives the player some reason to be doing this. Further, if more
patrons have some means of fighting back other than police, then it
might be less objectionable to me. I play violent games: every rpg,
mud, etc is essentially no different in terms of raw violence.
However, basing a game on killing people who are screaming don't hurt
me strikes me, as I said before, as completely irresponsible.
Take care,
Jeremy
--
In the fight between you and the world--back the world! Frank Zapa
---
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------------------------------
Message: 3
Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2015 23:08:59 -0400
From: Thomas Ward <[email protected]>
To: Gamers Discussion list <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] psycho strike some observations
Message-ID:
<caafbg10x3odrvv10nquy8_vw296oys1krzn2dy_z8fcd6pj...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Hi Ron,
Who is to say people don't take issues with their kids playing games
like grand Theft Auto?
Truth is I am one of them. Even though my son might want games like
that I don't buy them for him. I tend to buy age appropriate games,
and those I feel do not compromise my moral inclinations. I always
find out what the game is about before buying it, and also check what
age it was designed for etc. While I know some parentsjust don't care
I'm not one of them.
On 4/29/15, Ron hopkins <[email protected]> wrote:
Hello. This is Ron. So I'm reading through these mails. Well, I'd
like to know, how come people don't take issues with 10 year old kids
playing games like grand theft auto, a game that has very graphic
violents from what I've been told, where you have sex with women and
then kill them by running them over, among other things. I think we
need more games like this for the blind, What happened to society
putting limits on what there kids watch and play. I personally love
the sounds. We all know what is depicted in this game is very wrong,
but after its basically roll playing. How many muds and other text
games do people play where your a rogue and steal? Thats wrong too.
Just an observation. I hope to be buying this game soon.
---
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------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2015 22:09:11 -0500
From: "michael maslo" <[email protected]>
To: "'Gamers Discussion list'" <[email protected]>
Subject: [Audyssey] Psycho strike help part 2
Message-ID: <000001d082f3$085e0e70$191a2b50$@com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Hi again list:
I read over the manual again and I do not understand how to get a prison
out
of the jail.
I only have a pistol knife and long knife with my fist too. I thought I
read
here that you need something to break the door down but no matter how much
I
hit the door it does not break. It sounds like I am hitting a metal door
so
I do not know where the wood door is.
Any help would be appreciated.
Also this game is so hard. I keep getting caught or killed laughing
------------------------------
Message: 5
Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2015 23:21:36 -0400
From: Desiree Oudinot <[email protected]>
To: Gamers Discussion list <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] psycho strike some observations and other
related topics bundled together
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252; format=flowed
If a CD of the game was available, the price would rise exponentially.
Then people would be complaining about the high price.
This would also exclude those in countries who would pay much more for
shipping than is reasonable.
Even if there was a choice, physical medium or digital download, how
many people would actually pick a physical medium today? Disks don't
usually stand the test of time. What happens if, 5 years down the road,
someone wants to reinstall the game, but can't because they don't have
their game disk anymore? What if, God forbid, by that point VG Storm is
no longer in existance? We would have another Bavisoft fiasco all over
again, and you know as well as I do the backlash they would receive for
using an antiquated system.
Finally, is it really that easy to create a Paypal account if you're
under 18? I honestly don't know, which is why I'm asking, but it doesn't
seem like an easy task depending on the age of the child and his or her
knowledge of finances. You would still need either a credit card or a
bank account to make the transaction.
On 4/29/2015 8:20 PM, Jeremy Brown wrote:
First, to all of you that have responded thus far, thanks for actually
responding.
I'm going to address the issues in one mail to try and save time and
space.
As to Charles' comments that criminals are by definition anti-social
and the name of the game basically implies what to expect, agreed on
both counts. However, choosing to make a psychopathic killer the hero
or main character of a game is a game developer decision. My choice
as a consumer is to vote for the game or not by either buying it or
not. Gangsters don't interest me as a gamer, so I doubt that this
particular concept would have intrigued me even if the handling had
been different.
In response to some of Dark's points:
RE: minors and their definition
Besides, what is exactly a miner seems pretty debatable, hay I was
watching the alien filmes and nightmare on elm street when i was 10 years
old, not to mention playing games like mortal combat and moonstone, and I
was quite fine with the idea that these were games and the difference
between playing a game where I slice someone up with a big nasty blade
and
doing the same in reality, likewise violence in and of itself never did,
or
indeed never does bother me for just being bloody or graphic.
Back to Jeremy:
I was six when I saw the first Alien film. I don't think it
psychologically scarred me for life; that said, I don't think it was
responsible of my older brother who had charge of me at the time to
allow it. One does not negate the other. Just because minor is
somewhat fluid, saying well people see this all the time does not
relieve the social responsibility of the producer.
RE: warning message
In the game's description on the Vgstorm website there is the message:
Back to Jeremy:
Agreed, and I applaud the developers for including this warning.
Further, I agree that there's no good system for keeping minors from
buying such a game, however, there are a couple of systems that would
be more effective than the current one. Making the game only
purchasable with a credit card for instance will exclude many many
minors. Itm ight exclude legitimate customers with bad credit as
well, but this is the sort of decision one must make.
Many games in the past have used a dual system of printed material
that is mailed to a consumer in addition to the game disk or download.
Such a mailing might get the attention of parents.
Neither of these options is a perfect solution, and I don't expect
VGStorm to use either. I'm merely pointing out that ignoring the
problem completely and going with a warning label and good intentions
is not the only way to handle such problems.
RE: Violence and motivation (This one responds to Dark and Desree)
Jeremy's comments here:
I frankly have to just disagree with you on this one Dark. I just
can't see a psychopathic criminal who kills people at a party to start
their career as a person who would form a gang. First off, for that
person to be at that party they have to have been invited. This
implies a certain amount of familiarity or intimacy with at least one
party goer. Further, as we both agreed, avoiding criminal
entanglement with authorities is the best way to be a successful
criminal.
As to the way the violence is presented, I did not get any bafoon
comedy violence vibe. Further, it doesn't strike me as a screw you to
society politically correct or not. It strikes me as an excuse to
glorify anti-social behavior in the name of providing the blind
community with this style of game.
Now, first off, I am not opposed to graphic violence as such.
However, I think that the underlying story and motivations for this
game needed a severe rethink. It doesn't work for me on a hey, this
gives me an excuse level, nor on the I have to do this to accomplish
this goal level.
That said, I'm glad to see developers trying games that are not mere
board games nor polite society games. However, this game could have
involved the criminal element without being anywhere as graphic nor
conflicted in a story sense.
Finally, these observations are, my own opinion. I am fairly
obviously in the minority here. But, as a reasonably sensitive human
being, and a parent, I find the approach to releasing the game in
terms of just releasing it without any brakes and the chosen content
objectionable. However, I wish VGStorm the greatest of luck with its
other titles, and I hope to see other examples of their games using
these mechanics but with a more well-thought out character motivator
and a less offensive way of tracking character success. I downloaded
both Psycho Strike and Paladin of the Sky when I decided to test the
former, and I intend to give it a few more plays to see if my initial
response was merely a kneejerk reaction. I also intend on fooling
with POS and seeing if it lives up to the traffic I've seen on list.
However, I suspect that my initial observations as recorded here will
probably stand for me.
Take care,
Jeremy
------------------------------
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End of Gamers Digest, Vol 110, Issue 79
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