Sensitivity in gaming

[faraday]

@seraphim73 said in Sensitivity in gaming:

Like @faraday and others have said, in a war game you can expect violence, but that doesn’t mean there will be graphic descriptions of wounds or gore. If there are, probably a good thing to mention. Similarly, I don’t have a problem if there are spiders in a scene, but I don’t want detailed descriptions of them. If there’s a mention of a slaughtered village population, sure, but I don’t need descriptions of any of the details.

But what is your definition of "graphic descriptions of wounds or gore"? Everyone's going to be different there, which is why I think it's helpful to establish baseline expectations. Here's what I had on BSGU for instance:

This game can be thought of as having a TV-MA rating, intended for mature audiences. You must be over 18 to play here. RP may include crude indecent language, sexual situations, or graphic violence. The game, like the show, deals with heavy themes including genocide, war and various other traumas.

There was more to it about boundaries, but it's not relevant here. With that expectation, though, I think descriptions of slaughtered villages or limbs getting blown off is perfectly fair game without needing any particular content warning. It's right there on the tin.

If it's something that is commonly regarded as a potential trigger (rape, for instance) and outside the expectations of the game's theme/rating/boundaries, then yes, absolutely, slap a content warning on that thing. But beyond that? It's not fair to place responsibility for your own mental health on the entire game.

[Arkandel]

One difference would be whether it focuses on the wound and its significance - does that mean the character is scarred for life, incapacitated and needs to be carried, is there mortal danger, do they need to just grit their teeth and fight through, etc - versus focusing too much on the physical properties of the damage itself.

Both can be equally disturbing but in just different ways. Saving Private Ryan versus The Human Centipede.

[mietze]

@faraday will there be detailed depictions of the wound/violence, sounds, smells, npc background reactions?

There is a difference between "Private Jass takes a bullet to the head and falls, obviously dead" and describing who gets splattered, flailing, gore, ect. I know when I ask about graphic preferences, it is fleshed out detail that I am referencing, not the basic stuff with the rest left up to the player's imagination.

Just like some people are deeply bothered by visuals, some folks have a hard time with written details of certain subject matter. Petsonally I love reading horror fiction including detailed content but do not watch graphic visual films (still images don't bother me). I know for others and their brain wiring they are quite the opposite.

[Warma Sheen]

@faraday said in Sensitivity in gaming:

If it's something that is commonly regarded as a potential trigger (rape, for instance) and outside the expectations of the game's theme/rating/boundaries, then yes, absolutely, slap a content warning on that thing. But beyond that? It's not fair to place responsibility for your own mental health on the entire game.

If I was running in your game, I would suggest (or would like) a listing of those potential triggers. If the triggers are so common as to be something everyone should know, wouldn't it be better to have a place where they are listed?

As I may or may not have written before, I believe in "common sense" less and less in direct relation to distance from me. People that live on my block mostly have the same idea of what is common. People in my neighborhood less so, even less for city, state, country.

Better to list common triggers to be warned about and remove doubt.

[faraday]

@mietze said in Sensitivity in gaming:

There is a difference between "Private Jass takes a bullet to the head and falls, obviously dead" and describing who gets splattered, flailing, gore, ect. I know when I ask about graphic preferences, it is fleshed out detail that I am referencing, not the basic stuff with the rest left up to the player's imagination.

For sure. Just like there's a difference between Star Wars stormtrooper violence and Saving Private Ryan. But even Hollywood isn't consistent about its ratings, and it's arguably easier to objectify gore when it's on-screen versus when it's being described in text. It's highly subjective.

My main point, though, was that if I say "warning: graphic violence and grim post-apocalyptic themes" on the door, I don't feel the need to have that content warning duplicated on every scene where someone's writhing in pain with their leg blown off, or where a village is getting wiped out by a disaster. I think you get into warning fatigue when 90% of your scenes are being warned about just by the nature of the overall game theme. Whereas on some other game with different expectations, those scenes may very well warrant warnings.

Context matters.

[Seraphim73]

@faraday said in Sensitivity in gaming:

But what is your definition of "graphic descriptions of wounds or gore"? Everyone's going to be different there

Absolutely agree that everyone's is going to be different. I agree with @mietze on this one: If you're describing that the wound happens, I don't think it's a graphic description of a wound or gore. If you're describing blood trickling down a soldier's side, or washing over half their face from a scalp wound, I don't think that's a graphic description of a wound or gore. But if you're describing the wound in detail, describing what parts have spattered where, what's happening to entrails, or otherwise focusing a lot of attention on the wound(s), I think that crosses over the line to graphic descriptions of wounds or gore (I won't give examples there, because I don't want to go beyond the pale myself on this one).

As for your examples... I think it's a question of what the focus of the scene is. As long as you're talking more about the wounded person writhing, you're fine, but if you start describing the blown-off leg... I think that's a graphic description of a wound or gore. As long as you're more worried about the repercussions of the village getting wiped out by a disaster and the recovery efforts, you're fine, but if you start describing the corpses in detail rather than mentioning that they're there and moving on, I think that's likely to be a graphic description of a wound or gore. When the focus of the scene is the situation, I think that's totally within "violence and grim post-apocalyptic themes," but if the focus becomes the wounds themselves and the human suffering, I think then a warning beyond the standard might be warranted.

But that's just my opinion. I recognize that folks have very different opinions on where the line is, and that's fine by me.