Is this game for adults or kids?

Me thinks it should be somewhere in the middle of the stances I've seen throught the thread.

Let's go back to real life a bit, albeit not the best kind of example for the internets, but oh well, I'm not witty or creative enough to come up with anything else...

Say you have a group of friends, you're 10 in total, then someone presents you with number 11.

11 is nice and all, but at some point he starts flipping out and calls someone a fuckwad.

We all let that slide, he calms down, everything goes back to normal.

Now let's say 11 starts constantly flipping out, throwing tantrums, being generally a pain in the ass to be with.

What would you do then? would you let it slide and just have him around? or would you tell him to get the hell out and shun him from your group? (trying to draw a parallel with banning/muting here)

Everyone has the right to free speech but if you're running around in public screaming like a jackass, the police are going to come and tell you to shut up.

But no, this is a mature game so let's let children run around with stupid offensive names.

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emtwo a écrit :

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RoryC_GGG a écrit :

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emtwo a écrit :

This seems in contradiction to the several GGG posts in this forum encouraging players to report "offensive" names regardless of whether or not they are "hateful." And again, it seems that what is deemed "offensive" or "hateful" is narrowly defined by only one value set.

We would rather that fringe/borderline cases are still reported to us so we can review them, instead of offensive ones not getting reported because people didn't think they qualified.

If you think that we should moderate the names differently or if you have any further suggestions, please let us know, we are always open to feedback and I'll read through everything in this thread.

I'll give you a perfect example. While I disagree strongly with censorship, I try not to personally attack someone except for the rare cases where it may actually serve as a wake-up call and change behavior for the better. There is a guy a few posts above me who agrees with me, and is beginning to get personally inflammatory towards the statements you've made. What do you do in this situation? You could ban him, you could suspend him, you could delete his post, you could even lock the thread.

Do you know what the best choice is? Let it go. Ignore it.

This game already has an ignore feature in place, and if people are offended by someone's name or the things they have said, even if they are intended to be extremely hateful or hurtful or bigoted, people can choose to be adults and just let it go. Being offended is a choice.

When you implement a system to censor these people, you always run the risk of infringing someone's beliefs because there is not a single idea in the entire world that someone, somewhere does not find offensive. My only suggestion is to let people say what they want and encourage anyone who does not like it to use the ignore feature. The people that are really trying to be offensive are only rewarded when you give them the strong reaction they are looking for anyway.

It's responses like this that KKK members used when they would "peacefully" assemble. "If it doesn't physically hurt someone, we shouldn't be forbidden from our freedom of speech and right to assembly."

So I did not read all of this discussion, but I really don´t know what OP´s problem.

Here in PoE you find people from all over the world who want to have some fun. Most of these people had parents who taught them at least the basics of social behaviour, and that means behaviour and politeness against other people, doesn´t matter where they come from. These two things are the basic of people living together in peace and behaviour and politeness enable people to work ( or here: play) together. Probably you won´t call your friends in this game assholes, rapers or retarted idiots constantly, cause you should be aware, that after short time they won´t be your friends anymore and don´t want to play with you.

So, why do you want to call people bad names, or choose names for your char that are clearly offensive (for example xyraper, xyhater) ??? What PoE and GGG can expect is a kind of human being behaviour, that is common to people all over the world: Don´t insult and don´t provocate others. That simple! Don´t start a war with words because this destroys the fun in the game and people will stay away not only from you, but also from the game.

I hope OP now understood, that it is absolutely not adult to be offensive, neither in behaviour against others, nor in the choice of the charname. In opposite, this shows only a lack of social integrity, a lack of education (that is to blame on the family) and a stubborn mind, aggressive mind, that does not want to respect others, but acts like a rowdy in the schoolyard.

What OP pointed out in his posting is not a contradiction: This game got content that is not meant for little kids, you have to have a certain age to play PoE. And therefore GGG can expect that poeple playing here know at least the basic behaviour that is demanded in contact with other adult people. And if somebody does not want to keep to this standard, he has to be educated ( cause obviously his parents missed to do it) and taught how to behave in the adult civilized world.

Up to now I saw GGG doing a pretty good job on that:))

We play this game to relax and spend our evening having some fun after hard work of a day. It is same thing as we have drink or play cards or play billiard table with our friends on club. We adult hardly use offensive words in such occasion. Do you?

Why do you think that adults can use such offensive words on internet online game, then? Is there something special about online game? What is difference between billiard game on club and online game on internet in terms of using offensive words to your playmates?

Why do you ruin fun of playmates who are just having some good time, with your offensive words?
Just behave on adult online game, same as you would in normal adult social club. Then, all will be OK.

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emtwo a écrit :

The idea that X word is offensive and should be censored but Y word is not offensive, or the idea that this is vulgar and insulting and that is not, are derived from Judeo-Christian values and an ethno-centric view of the world.

Lots of cultures have varying ideas of what is rude and what is unacceptably offensive. What's considered unspeakable to some cultures (or personal backgrounds) may not mean anything to another. Taboos, superstitions and standards of what is acceptable have been around since before people starting painting in caves and for good reason.

Survival.

25,000 years ago Thag didn't get a temporary ban on speaking if he offended Mog. They went at it with fists, feet teeth and nails (and maybe a stone weapon) until the offending party was dead or maimed. We still have cultures where saying the wrong thing to the wrong person can get you killed. It is the epitome of ethocentrism to ascribe language sensitivity to any one culture.

Words have power. Using them well, or using them poorly will affect all kinds of things in your life, whether you are aware of it or not. Sometimes biting your tongue is the wisest thing that you can say in a situation.

As for GGG and POE - I can't speak for what they find acceptable, but I do know they have allowed a lot more thn I have seen other game companies allow.

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emtwo a écrit :

How exactly do you make the jump from "not flipping out every time somebody says something you don't like" to "encouraging hate speech?" Straw man much?

It wasn't much of a jump - just a few posts above you stated:

(the bolding is mine for emphasis)

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emtwo a écrit :

This game already has an ignore feature in place, and if people are offended by someone's name or the things they have said, even if they are intended to be extremely hateful or hurtful or bigoted, people can choose to be adults and just let it go. Being offended is a choice.

To the defense of what you said - Acceptance is not quite the same thing as encouragement, but in psychological circles and in some legal cases) silence is tantamount to approval. That's why the connection was made.

I do think there are people who need to grow some thicker skin, just as there are those that need to learn a modicum of restraint.

Would pretty much get a 12+ rating here.

Fantasy, most enemies aren't Human rather human alike, blood and gore pretty low level.

TES Oblivion got a 12+ rating too.

It's not like you are cutting off limbs, there aren't any finishing moves, there aren't guns/rifles etc.

Other instances which could result in a higher rating 16+ are also missing such as blasphemy, real money gambling.


And since it's not storybased like The Witcher for example where you can't really tell what's good and evil that flag for 18+ rating is out too.

The only way PoE would get a higher rating would be year 2004 or earlier if you go far into the past early ninties or 80s it would prolly be 18+ restricted advertisement. But at that time even strategic games which are 6+ or 12+ now had restricted 18+ ratings for simulating wars.

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OverUsedChewToy a écrit :

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seem to indicate that the game is only intended for children that adhere to a set of Judeo-Christian values and narrow sense of morality

Implying being against hate speech and intolerance is solely the province of judeo-christian values (some judeo-christian values go against this). Try Humanist, it fits better.

In that case, these values are good, other values often are terrible. Objectively. Feel free to cry about it.

Most value sets have words, phrases or acts that they find offensive. The specific words, phrases and acts that most of Western Culture - and GGG - find offensive are derived solely from Judeo-Christian values. This is what I was saying, not that Judeo-Christians are the only ones to have such rules.

And for those of you making the jump from PoE to the KKK, this is a false equivalency. In real life, there are physical limitations to how well you can actually ignore someone. It's easy to ignore someone who insults you once. It's harder if they're following you around and getting in your face continuously. It's near impossible if they're becoming physically threatening.

PoE is not real life though, you just /ignore and it's like they don't even exist.

As a side-note, to ascribe a specific value-set to Humanism shows a lack of understanding what Humanism is. The mistake is understandable though, given the varied and often nebulous definitions of Humanism. I prefer Kurt Vonegut's definition; that Humanism is the belief that we all have the capacity to be decent human beings without fear of punishment nor expectation of reward in the afterlife.

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emtwo a écrit :

when you say "for adults" doesn't mean "for twats" you're actually dead wrong. If you get offended by someone being a "twat," you're actually more childish than the twat.

Even as an adult, it is impossible to always know what will offend someone else, but on the flipside, it is always possible to choose not to be offended by it, especially when you have an ignore function.

That was a long-winded way to backpeddle out of the suggestion that acting like a twat should be protected under an adult's game. And to answer it, no, being tolerant of twats doesn't make you an adult either.

There's very little which actually offends me (I don't care what character name or swear words people use in chat, but if GGG does, then I accept that), least of all on the internet, but that doesn't mean that there isn't behaviour which I'd just rather not to see. Idiocy is an eyesore, whether it offends you or not.

Tolerating twats is something that the government has to put up with when it comes to its citizens, as opposed to a private company which has every right to regulate/forbid twatish behaviour. The great thing is you also have every right to no longer do business with the company.