Comments on: Torture, Warcraft and Missing the Bigger Picture http://www.graemebunton.com/2008/12/10/torture-warcraft-and-missing-the-bigger-picture Burn Baby Burn Tue, 20 Apr 2010 16:43:54 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: andy http://www.graemebunton.com/2008/12/10/torture-warcraft-and-missing-the-bigger-picture/comment-page-1#comment-35 andy Thu, 18 Dec 2008 08:12:07 +0000 http://www.graemebunton.com/?p=206#comment-35 I just learned the word Leitmotif. I've seen it pop up everywhere since I learned it. I wonder if it applies here. Also, Graeme you gave some sweet context for a non-WoW player like myself, I read that article on BoingBoing and I was a little taken aback. Your comments put it all in perspective, and the links you gave show that the quest is avoidable and that Richard seems more interested in the Design elements than the Moral issues. The moral issues being the keypoints used to define how a story progresses in a videogame, dialogs to click through, quests to agree to etc. I find it pretty funny how it all blew up so that I read about it. Then again BoingBoing is kinda random. I just learned the word Leitmotif. I’ve seen it pop up everywhere since I learned it. I wonder if it applies here. Also, Graeme you gave some sweet context for a non-WoW player like myself, I read that article on BoingBoing and I was a little taken aback. Your comments put it all in perspective, and the links you gave show that the quest is avoidable and that Richard seems more interested in the Design elements than the Moral issues. The moral issues being the keypoints used to define how a story progresses in a videogame, dialogs to click through, quests to agree to etc. I find it pretty funny how it all blew up so that I read about it. Then again BoingBoing is kinda random.

]]> By: Richard Bartle http://www.graemebunton.com/2008/12/10/torture-warcraft-and-missing-the-bigger-picture/comment-page-1#comment-34 Richard Bartle Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:32:58 +0000 http://www.graemebunton.com/?p=206#comment-34 >I think that Blizzard is trying to get you to feel a little bit like Arthas in a quest for vengeance and justice. This could well be true - but you have no way of knowing. That's the point I'm trying to make here: if Blizzard is indeed hoping that this quest is causing players to take a tiny step in the direction of a means-justifies-the-ends descent into evil, then they have to mark it somehow - they can't just leave it unspoken. There needs to be something that causes players to think "you know what you just did, don't you?", otherwise it looks as if the quest is routine and Blizzard is OK with torture. The action needs to have consequences, in other words. As it stands, many players zoom right past it without a second thought. Unless they've been told it's part of the story, they're not going to become engaged with the narrative, and won't care if they do eventually confront Arthas and he accuses them of behaving just as badly as he has - they'll just skip the text because all they want is the XP. It's a nice piece of design to introduce these elements, but it's not been done properly. That's all I was saying here. Richard >I think that Blizzard is trying to get you to feel a little bit like Arthas in a quest for vengeance and justice.

This could well be true – but you have no way of knowing. That’s the point I’m trying to make here: if Blizzard is indeed hoping that this quest is causing players to take a tiny step in the direction of a means-justifies-the-ends descent into evil, then they have to mark it somehow – they can’t just leave it unspoken. There needs to be something that causes players to think “you know what you just did, don’t you?”, otherwise it looks as if the quest is routine and Blizzard is OK with torture. The action needs to have consequences, in other words.

As it stands, many players zoom right past it without a second thought. Unless they’ve been told it’s part of the story, they’re not going to become engaged with the narrative, and won’t care if they do eventually confront Arthas and he accuses them of behaving just as badly as he has – they’ll just skip the text because all they want is the XP.

It’s a nice piece of design to introduce these elements, but it’s not been done properly. That’s all I was saying here.

Richard

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