Hitman: Absolution

[youmeyou]

Preview for the E3 demo is up. Looks a lot like its predecessors. (And nothing like the controversial cinematic). But, again, I'm seeing this without having experienced the game myself.

[Nappi]

Much more promising than the first gameplay trailer. This could even be the Hitman game I have been waiting for.

[Codicier]

The big problem that we face here in the UK that many of the efforts to deal with some of the more archaic attitudes to race, gender, and sex have been heavy-handed and handled in a very top-down bureaucratic way. It is created a significant backlash who rally around the idea of "having an opinion gone mad" which Lad culture has fed off.

If there is a nihilist view behind it I think it's a very shallowly held one. Of course there are outright asshats so horrid you avoid them like the plague, but they the easy people to deal. The difficulty is the edge cases, when you find yourself sitting with close friends or family and thinking "did I just hear what they said right?" you don't want to think badly of people you care about.

You know the sort of thing people say."My mate Jim is a good bloke but it can be a bit of a dirty old man, but he doesn't mean anything by it.", then you find yourself thinking ' yeah he generally is a nice bloke even if some of the things he says about women make me squirm' and maybe if you know Jim well enough one day when he makes comments you say something try and reason with him a bit. Remind him about people he cares about and how he would feel if someone else acted that way towards them, and maybe if you're lucky he changes a little.

I don't think it gets us anywhere if we try & tell people what they should think, ultimately change comes from within not without (forgive me for going psychology 101 there ).

Of course the problem with this approach is that it needs a two-way communication, and at times the Internet can be pretty much one way broadcasting of views.

Or to put it another way: Hate the game, not the player!

[Roderick]

I respectfully beg to differ: coming into contact with some of the thoughtful views espoused on this very forum, I began to think about it and am now a more nuanced person in this field.

The recipient may be unwilling to change from within, but there has to be a volume of educational material that they can read, otherwise they stand no chance at all of become better people. This is a problem of education and I'm not so cynical yet to think that everyone refuses to change when they're taught something new and exciting.

[Lu]

I disagree with what you said as well, Codicier. Ultimately the change comes from within, but if outside pressure isn't there, then there is no drive to change. Be it learning about things and changing your mind yourself, or being called out on your bullshit by others, which might lead to a bit of self-reflection. If I keep shitting on the sidewalk and everyone ignores it, then it must be okay to shit on the sidewalk.

Poop metaphors come easy to me. I'm a classy dude.

[Codicier]

@ Rodi & PiratePoo

What I'm trying to get at is when I've had to call someone on this sort of thing I try to concentrate on saying that the act is bad, and not start demonising the person who does it. Otherwise they just entrench their views.

The outside pressure absolutely needs to be there, but it needs to try and reach people through empathy and not logic.

[Roderick]

OK, yeah, of course. Though I do prefer a mixture of empathy and logic.

One of the things I find a little annoying is the assumption a lot of the rants against male privilege I've read have that the person reading it, be he male, is surely right at that moment feeling all hot and angry at being called out on his behavior. That's a generalisation that I'd do without, it seems very nasty and derogative. You don't know who's reading your stuff.

[subbes]

But what's the alternative? That the dude objecting to being called out at his male privilege is level-headedly and non-emotionally being an asshole? I'd rather assume an "oh shit whaaaaat" knee-jerk reaction from a hurt dude than a cold and calculating anti-feminist supervillain (or something).

[brkl]

Those guys are the worst.

[miffy495]

I'm curious as to what kind of name an anti-feminist supervillain would have. I propose a contest.

[Brannigan]

Rush Limbaugh?

[Chris]

I'm curious as to what kind of name an anti-feminist supervillain would have. I propose a contest.

"Agent 47"

[Brannigan]

Good point, you win

[Roderick]

The Suffragette Sufferer

[miffy495]

"Agent 47"

Hahahaha. Well played.

[ThunderPeel2001]

At this point I just feel all the immature assholes making Video games are going to run the medium so far into the gutter that government regulations will become necessary. The gaming equivalent of the Hayes Code is just around the corner. And when I hear about videos like this, I don't want to argue with it.

Slightly OT: I always used to laugh when I heard people describe the "graphic deaths" in Mortal Kombat. It was just tabloid fodder used to sell newspapers by demonising games. Those old 16-bit graphics were only slightly more detailed than Mario. The intensity and realism of the violence was so tame that I challenged anyone offended by their descriptions to watch one of the infamous "fatalities". The reaction to those things was always, "Is that it?!". They were mean-spirited, sure, but they were also laughably unrealisitic in their execution and ideas.

As if game developers would put something as gross as those descriptions made them sound into a Video game. I mean, as if...

Then I happened across this video (don't watch if you're feeling sensitive)

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[Nappi]

Still seems good to me. I'm glad that they made it possible to turn off the assists. I will probably use most of them because I suck, but I imagine that "series veterans" or whatever would be really pissed if they were always on.

[toblix]

Yeah, that looks pretty fun. It disturbs me a little how they're laughing and joking about killing all these innocent people, but I guess video games.

[brkl]

Looks good, but... the nuns, oh, the nuns.

[Irishjohn]

Yeah, that looks pretty fun. It disturbs me a little how they're laughing and joking about killing all these innocent people, but I guess video games.

Yeah... it's not THAT bad, but the dogs humping was lame. It's funny, maybe I'm getting old, but I found the Borderlands 2 trailer with the wimaweh stuff pretty gruesome and disturbing. But yeah, this looks great, I think I might go and reinstall Blood Money.

Looks good, but... the nuns, oh, the nuns.

The nuns, indeed. Ugh.

[Murdoc]

Just watched Streets of Hope...

Did hitman get a time machine? I'm confused.

They always had an odd lense of America in the other games, but this is a bit out too lunch. I mean I get the architecture is from the 50s, but why are their still greasers and the signage and products on the shelf old timey?

Just weird.

[Orv]

Well that video sold me on the game, and I chuckled a fair bit at Lenny.

Murdoc, I am 100% sure there are at least 5 towns somewhere in rural areas of the United States who are about decades behind, culturally. Probably more.

[Erkki]

The game seems to have a Phaedrus mode:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/08/17/make-a-hit-see-hitmans-new-contracts-mode-in-action/

Exciting!

[toblix]

Interesting developments happening: PC Gamer have provided two interesting and hilariously conflicting things:

• A bad review with a score of 62 gamer unitz
  
• They're giving a 35% discount already.
  

TO THE SPECULATRON!

[Brannigan]