nuclearspaceheater:

nostalgebraist:

I don’t intrinsically care about the GameFAQs poll at all but it does seem kind of weird to me when Undertale fans describe Undertale sweeping the poll using … negative terms from Undertale

Like describing it as a “No Mercy run” or editing videos so that Flowey is killing the other competing games

(Good job, Undertale fandom, you made the numbers big.  Your numbers are bigger than any of the other guys’ numbers)

If you put it that way it sounds like they’re completely self-aware about what they’re doing.

Yeah, I guess it just strikes me as the kind of thing where self-awareness would tend to lead to not doing the thing at all?  I’m probably taking it too seriously though

(via nuclearspaceheater)

I don’t intrinsically care about the GameFAQs poll at all but it does seem kind of weird to me when Undertale fans describe Undertale sweeping the poll using … negative terms from Undertale

Like describing it as a “No Mercy run” or editing videos so that Flowey is killing the other competing games

(Good job, Undertale fandom, you made the numbers big.  Your numbers are bigger than any of the other guys’ numbers)

Re: the long conversation about Undertale between @cyborgbutterflies and @freezeflare, which I would reblog except it’s long and we can’t snip posts anymore.

cyborgbutterflies expressed a lot of the things that bother me emotionally about the game.  But I think there’s another aspect to it as well, which may well not apply to anyone but me.  But it does apply to me, and it was almost eerie how on-the-nose the game was about it.

I was talking to someone yesterday about the fact that in the past I seem to have spent a remarkable amount of time interacting with people who (on some level) dislike or don’t respect me, and doing so of my own free will.  Of course in my moments of lower self-esteem I figure that this is just because I am an person who virtually anyone would dislike or disrepect, but I don’t really believe that’s true.

I went on to say that I think the actual reason is that when a person is hostile toward me (and I’m including casual disrespect and other kinds of “low-grade hostility” here), my natural response is not to back away, but to lean in.  Specifically, I think: “I have a hard time simply living with the fact that this person dislikes/disrespects me.  (Low self-esteem or vulnerability, again.)  But think about the possibilities here.  Maybe they are right, and I really am doing something wrong, in which case I should ask them to tell me more about it, and try to change.  Or maybe it’s all a big misunderstanding, and we can fix it and have a good and equal relationship.  Or maybe it’s not quite either of those, but they have some sort of ‘backstory’ that’s making them act like this, and dammit, I’m curious about that backstory.“

So I start interacting with them more rather than less, and trying a variety of “dialogue choices” to prod at the issue: what exactly is the shape of my error?  Are you actually trying to help me, and I just don’t realize it?  Do I resemble people who have hurt you in the past?  Should I accept that the way you are behaving is just a common human thing and grow a thicker skin toward it?  Etc.  (Obviously I don’t ask these questions in these literal forms, but I investigate them in more natural and tactful ways.)

Then, in the conversation about this, I said: “You know, it’s like Undertale.  Actually, wait … it’s exactly like Undertale.”

I’m treating the other person’s hostility as a puzzle, and hoping that I can find the correct things to say to “resolve” the hostility.  This “resolution” (as in Undertale) doesn’t tend to involve the other person realizing they were doing a bad thing by harming me – it usually reveals it as “actually” justified or blameless or otherwise somehow “okay.”  If I can’t do this, I feel like I’ve failed.  If I respond to hostility with hostility, I feel like I’ve really failed, on an ethical level.  The ultimate goal is an imagined idyllic harmony with the person despite the initial hostility (cf. the “friendships” in Undertale).

One thing to note about this is that it simply doesn’t work very well.  When people dislike or disrespect you, there’s often a reason for it, often an interesting reason or even a “good” one, but you still won’t generally be able to work your way towards a satisfying friendship or relationship.  Surprise surprise: when someone finds you distasteful, they’re probably going to continue finding you distasteful, even if you’re “talked over it” ad nauseam.  A deeply moving lecture on the cultural history of a cuisine you simply don’t like will not make you any more relish a bite of it.

A better way to have satisfying interactions is instead to find people with whom you don’t start out on the wrong foot.  These people exist.  People with low opinions of themselves may believe that this is false, that they will start out on the wrong foot with everyone and that “rescuing” these relationships is the best they can hope for.  I believe this is almost always false.

In Undertale, it is more or less true.  The vast majority of the interactions in the game involve “rescuing relationships from hostility.”  The majority of the major characters attack you at some point, although you can become friends with them later.  The idea that this sort of interaction is the norm is captured metaphorically through the fact that the game’s characters are called “monsters,” i.e. the sort of beings who attack you randomly in other games.  The game clarifies that in the real world there are “a lot of Floweys,” i.e. people who are somehow so bad that you can’t even “rescue” your relationships with them.  But relationships that don’t have to be rescued are both rare and not a part of the game’s moral or emotional focus.

In Undertale, you can Flee (metaphorically, backing away from a hostile interaction), but although morally permitted, this is boring: you’re missing a lot of gameplay, as well as a lot of money.  You can also attack and then Spare; I’m not sure how to parse this metaphorically, but whatever it is, it’s not something I’d like to constitute a majority of my human interactions.  What you cannot do, not in any nontrivial way, is engage in “dialogue choices” with someone who is not attacking you.  Want to find friends who don’t start off trying to hurt you?  Ha, good luck.  Don’t you remember that everyone’s natural reaction to you is to try to hurt you?

This is a depiction of the world I used to think I lived it.  It was not a good world, and it was also not the real world.

actually, you know what

cyborgbutterflies:

freezeflare:

I suppose what I’m trying to say here is that most people aren’t assholes. Most people aren’t powergamers, minmaxers, etc. Given the option to have mercy, to spare an enemy who makes an emotional plea, most people will take it, I think…

it’s just that most games don’t offer that option.

(AKA: oh god, video game strawmanning discourse, this is the wooooooooooooooooorst. Spoiler-free.)

---

Part of the talk around Undertale* is that it exposes people’s “underlying cruelty” by revealing how barbaric the killing of monsters/the mechanic of grinding on mobs is. I think that’s not true. I think the fact that people kill waves of mobs in games is not due to inherent cruelty in the person or player, and I think that given the option to (meaningfully) spare, most people will take it.

(*Actually it’s not “part of the talk around Undertale”, it’s literally something I thought to myself and will proceed two hours debating against simply because I think I make some meaningful points, regardless of whether or not you agree with them.) 

I think the reason most people don’t do pacifism is because most games don’t readily offer meaningful pacifism. Let’s define “meaningful pacifism” for a moment–I think these are the two most common pitfalls of RPGs and pacifism, and why most people don’t take a pacifist route:

1) pacifism is inaccessible. simply because the the pacifist option isn’t there; or, pacifist gameplay is much more difficult than the alternative. I think with most JRPGs, it would be impossible to deal with the final boss without killing all the monsters, due to your own low stats; if it’s possible, it’s due to some extremely difficult and hard-to-pull off strategies.

2) pacifism is meaningless. pacifism is possible. but, the game doesn’t treat monsters as anything but robots; they are a mechanic, something that’s there to be killed for you, rather than something that has its own life and means something. in doing so it doesn’t treat pacifism like a truly meaningful option. (whether the game offers an intrinsic reward doesn’t matter, but what does matter is how the player feels–whether they conquered a more difficult challenge, or whether they actually felt like they were a better person for sparing all those lives.)

let’s take Bastion, for example. I think that’s a game that’s really good at making you question your own violence, and whether that truly is the best option–being violent and resetting the world, or offering mercy and ending the circle of violence, trying to make something new post-calamity. It makes the lives of monsters (and everyone in the world) meaningful, and it offers intrinsic rewards for your mercy (commenting on it, commenting on your violence), thus fulfilling the second clause (making pacifism meaningful). However, because the pacifist option isn’t readily accessible (it’s way more difficult than neutral gameplay), most people don’t take it. (and even then, it doesn’t do too much to disapprove/discourage violence.)

and there are too many examples of games where pacifism is accessible, but meaningless.

now let’s examine the core argument. “Undertale exposes the cruelty of players in video games”. I think that’s wrong, because in other games it’s never been presented as cruel–either that, or being kind is difficult and being “neutral” is necessary to even win, and winning is presented as the more appealing option. it’s a game. you want to beat it. you want to be the hero. you want to be the winner.

I think a better way to word it is “most video games don’t make an effort to make you care, so you won’t go out of the way to care”. Within the space of the game, you aren’t being cruel at all! You are doing something that is literally “okay” and “go ahead and do it” with no moral strings attached, so why wouldn’t you? 

I guess what I’m trying to say is that Undertale’s “innovation” comes from being one of few games that offers that meaningful pacifist option. And it is an excellent game at making people think about video games, and about the “state of the art” as it were.

But it’s not innovating the human nature, or anything, it’s just playing (almost pandering?) to human nature. You’ve always had the potential for pacifism, but most games don’t care to see it. Undertale makes an effort to make you want to care…

…and you do. Because of course you do. Undertale wants you to care. Is it such a surprise, then, that you do what the game wants?

And that’s a reflection of video games, rather than their players. Most video games want you to level-grind.

Adding to this…

Keep reading

(via cyborgbutterflies)

polyaletheia:

krwks:

So far Undertale seems to be a metaphor for being a hot girl

This totally makes sense…

• Everyone wants to go on a date with you.
  
• Random awkward weirdos keep unexpectedly hitting (on) you in an ambiguous friendly/aggressive way, and it becomes increasingly difficult to flee.
• You’re castigated for physically defending yourself.
• You’re expected to do everyone’s emotional labour.

(via academicianzex)