Re: The previous post.

I had a very interesting discussion with SM last night regarding the little hak I use, which reminded me of previous discussions about similar content (for example, mentioning ADWR to someone). This shouldn't be taken as an offence or sound stereotypical, but I noticed that especially mentioned to US players, the reactions are always a little bit more extreme compared to euopeans. It's a thing hard to understand for me, but I think I'm a little bit wiser now.

You can see the same kind of reaction on many boards where games or mods that include adult content are discussed. They usually vary between extreme praise and extreme negative reactions, while I made the observation that a european player much more often shrugs and just says "yes, I like it" or "hmm, it's not that I really need it".

I mentioned the adult content in the Witcher. My guess was that it got the high PG rating because of the language, and always thought the retouching of some nipples in the game was a rather extreme self-censorship by Atari. I laughed at it, said the nude cards in the Witcher are nothing a 12 year old hasn't seen before, and calling it "adult content" is just ridiculous.
Well, I was really shocked when he followed the link, came back and said it's clearly 18+... Everything nipple is 18+. Shocking for someone who sees pictures like that in advertisements, fashion magazines etc. daily. Fine, of course the pictures in the Witcher are shown in a sexual context, and they are more sexual than, say, an advertisement for a body lotion, but still, nothing more is shown, and i'd give it a 16 just for the context and inviting expression. That's extreme, usually, here at least, 16+ means pubic hair is shown.

I don't want to raise the "US = prudish" thing again, I know that of course every society is a mix of everything. But there's always a common standard, the middle way. The standard in most european countries is, you see nipples every day, in every magazine and not in a sexual context. TV movies, cinema movies that are rated 12+. It's just an everyday thing and noone associates it with porn or something to make you horny. Now, the "middle" in the US is 18+, which clearly marks it as adult content and directly associated with sexuality. Of course that explains that the reactions towards content like that are more extreme and doesnt automaticly mean every american is a puritan. It's just a different view because of different standards. I talked to some of he most relaxed american friends I have, but the reaction on it was always.... different than our standards. It's strange. I think to understand it, a european should imagine looking at game content that would clearly be 18+ in most european countries. Some Language in the Witcher would meet our 18+ rating, no doubt, the dialogues in ADWR too, but the pictures and a naked Vampire? Never.

Well, anyway, it was avery insightful chat, but I still see no point in removing such a (for our standards) harmless little hak that just shows some cute cartoonish skin. This is no US mod and it's not directly aimed at a US playerbase. But nevertheless, everyone should play it, and it would just be sad if players from the region automatically associate it with adult/porn/"social" servers just because of some minor details. Rest asured, it won't be anything like that, you an try out the module should it ever see daylight and will never see any extremes. You can play like on every other server, just remember to keep your pants on, that's all. :D

Edit: I wish there was a way to hide the time stamp down there... does everyone have to know that I slept all day, woke up at 1 am and write blog entries at 4? :P

Update May... um... what day is it? Look at the timestamp.

Maybe nothing new to everyone else, but I only saw this today:



Oooooh my god. If I was living in the US, I'd throw my TV out of the window. For everyone who trusts the media: Yes, my mod will be highly pornographic. Your kid's mind will be seriously damaged, and I can't guarantee an adult will not turn into a mass murderer or rapist after having played it. Better run now.