‘Hatred,’ the video game shouldn’t exist and is disgusting

[binary solo]

When rape simulators exist in this industry I can't quite understand how people can get too upset about a murder spree simulator.

IMO killing is killing in video games. And the number of games where all the killing is "righteous" is very few, and largely they are fantasy games where you're killing demons, or zombies (already dead) or other evil, scary creatures. I see in the article some moralising about GTA and murder in the name of a broader narrative becomes somehow OK. But the essence of GTA, as I understand it never having played it, is that you are a criminal and you do kill some people and that can include cops. Fact of the matter is even if you play through carrying out the minimal amount of killing possible in GTA if done IRL and you got caught by the cops you'd be spending life in prison, and in some states you be for the chair, or the needle.

And Shadow of Mordor is aiiight because of finishing moves? Wut? Oh yeah, world context and orcses of course. All orcses are evil and must be killed.

Any game where your killing IRL would not be defensible in law is only different to Hatred by body count. Sugar coating it with justification by narrative is total BS. In some ways Hatred is a more honest game.

I quite liked in Uncharted 3 where Marlowe challenged Nate by asking how is he any different to her, after all he's probably killed more people than Marlowe in pursuit of his treasures. Unfortunately there's not much introspection on Nate's part. But of course we justify Nate's killing because Nate winds up saving the world from a magical WMD, though throughout half of the game (and half of the killing) Nate thinks he's just pursuing ordinary treasure to enrich himself. Especially in Uncharted 3 he has no idea that the end game is a WMD right until the end.

I won't be playing Hatred myself because the premise doesn't interest me and to me the game would get very boring very quickly. But I'm not going to pretend that this game sits far outside the norm of violent video games. In fact I believe what is getting it all the press is that people recognise that it sits dangerously close to the norm, and I would argue sits within the norm. But the world is full of false moral outrage, and false justifications. So hypocrisy continues. The makers of Hatred perhaps don't realise it, but they have made a game that is social commentary, therefore they have made something that is pure art without realising it. When you make something that shines a bright light on the ugliest aspects of an entertainment medium that is sugar coated by the things the talk about in their justification piece, that is social commentary through art. "we wanted to make something that is pure gameplay entertainment." And what did they come up with? A never ending killing spree. How is it they came to the conclusion that this is what video games get reduced to when breaking them down to "pure gameplay"? That in itself is social commentary. They are saying, in effect that in their opinion all video games amount to is different ways of killing. And they are probably 80% right, because excluding sports games and party games, what games don't involve killing as a core element of the game?