fastballspecial
Member
Well, he's not wrong.
Neil Druckmann talks about Nathan Drake mass murderer discussion, calls out NeoGAF
- Thread starter Dawg
- Start date
I'll just never get this argument. Even beyond the basic argument that it's just a game and we really shouldn't care, if you want to get into the psychology and ideology of it all Nathan Drake is still simply killing "bad guys." He isn't murdering innocent bystanders and stabbing puppies.
By my count, everyone he can kill in these games is either shooting at him first (so it's self-defense) or they are people that are trying to take over/destroy the world and he should stop them regardless for the good of humankind.
By my count, everyone he can kill in these games is either shooting at him first (so it's self-defense) or they are people that are trying to take over/destroy the world and he should stop them regardless for the good of humankind.
Hydrargyrus
Member
Yes, I think what Neil has said is correct .
We are, as a group of gamers, a good reference for some things, but we tend to overreact and exaggerate for almost everything. Once you start to participate actively in forum discussions , you become too critical , sometimes even without reason and you stop playing the games for its final reason: to have a good time, and you are forced to make an analysis of what you are playing instead of playing it for fun.
We are, as a group of gamers, a good reference for some things, but we tend to overreact and exaggerate for almost everything. Once you start to participate actively in forum discussions , you become too critical , sometimes even without reason and you stop playing the games for its final reason: to have a good time, and you are forced to make an analysis of what you are playing instead of playing it for fun.
It was classified as Action Adventure, last I checked.
Not to mention, the context of the story suggests nothing of the sort. From the context of the story, you'd expect something more akin to the traditional Tomb Raider games, where there's a bit of combat, a bit of platforming and some puzzles.
Besthelboy
Banned
From this day forward do we avoid him as much as we can also?
Love Deterrence
Member
That's fair. I'm all for games featuring protagonists of a variety of races and genders, but only if that's what the artists and designers have in mind for their character. I wouldn't want to play as a character that the game designer themselves didn't create with all of his/her heart -- for example, a character who makes their way into a game due to fan backlash rather than one created from planned artistic direction. Because if developers were to cave into that sort of pressure, then why would they even be a part of an industry such as this - one founded on creativity, expression, uniqueness? That's how I look at it anyway.
Steverulez
Member
Same here. Thought never crossed my mind until I read about it here and it still baffles me.
Because even when you're "just killing bad guys" the frequency in which nathan drake is killing dudes for profit is astronomical, to the point of sociopathy. You can argue it doesn't matter because it's a video game, but it's still one of those observations that comes about when we think about how Uncharted is art what imitates life.
Kuro Madoushi
Unconfirmed Member
Personally, I believe he should take that criticism and use it to make a better game. There's absolutely NO FUCKING NEED to have 15 or more enemies in a shut off area attacking you one at at time! They're all fearless! They see one dude take out 14 other guys, and they just keep coming! The building is falling down around them, and they're worried more about shooting Drake than escaping! They never run out of bullets! They rarely flank! They take a hit, and instead of running away, THEY CHARGE DRAKE!
The thing I liked about TLOU is that it eschews this 'for the most part'. There are still a ton of enemies if you alert them, but there's the option for the majority of the game to avoid them completely. Metal Gear can fall into the same category, you don't HAVE to murder everyone and can slip by them all if you wish. Drake isn't given a choice, and instead is forced into a shooting arena with very little skill involved.
If they want to have gunfights, I don't mind them, but don't have guys constantly spawning all the fucking time. Make them more intense instead of drawn out. Make them more 'cinematic' and have the enemies 'interactive' instead of running to cover and shooting you. Give you more options to avoid the fight or ways to take out a bunch of them all at once so you don't have to fight them all at once (which would totally fit into the Uncharted world). I loved exploring the world, and the story, and finding treasure, and finding inventive ways using stealth and otherwise to take out enemies. Fighting wave 3 out of wave 5 of the teleporting motherfuckers who have way too much health and can kill you easily 'AND NOT GIVE YOU A CHOICE OUT OF THE FIGHT' is super fucking boring.
To me, Drake is an explorer and treasure hunter, who they've characterized as the 'every man'. Well, last time I fucking checked, we're not all goddamn Rambo.
PS Fuck you, Druckman
The thing I liked about TLOU is that it eschews this 'for the most part'. There are still a ton of enemies if you alert them, but there's the option for the majority of the game to avoid them completely. Metal Gear can fall into the same category, you don't HAVE to murder everyone and can slip by them all if you wish. Drake isn't given a choice, and instead is forced into a shooting arena with very little skill involved.
If they want to have gunfights, I don't mind them, but don't have guys constantly spawning all the fucking time. Make them more intense instead of drawn out. Make them more 'cinematic' and have the enemies 'interactive' instead of running to cover and shooting you. Give you more options to avoid the fight or ways to take out a bunch of them all at once so you don't have to fight them all at once (which would totally fit into the Uncharted world). I loved exploring the world, and the story, and finding treasure, and finding inventive ways using stealth and otherwise to take out enemies. Fighting wave 3 out of wave 5 of the teleporting motherfuckers who have way too much health and can kill you easily 'AND NOT GIVE YOU A CHOICE OUT OF THE FIGHT' is super fucking boring.
To me, Drake is an explorer and treasure hunter, who they've characterized as the 'every man'. Well, last time I fucking checked, we're not all goddamn Rambo.
PS Fuck you, Druckman
His point is pretty bad. He's saying lighting is the same as character dissonance? Noooope. Lighting is important from a technical aspect but it hardly has an effect on the narrative presented. Character dissonance has a very important effect on how you perceive the main character and his story.
And also he says Indiana Jones killed a bunch of Nazis. He killed when he had to but he doesn't really kill THAT many people.
And also he says Indiana Jones killed a bunch of Nazis. He killed when he had to but he doesn't really kill THAT many people.
NoctisVsStar
Member
I agree I don't want developers to create something just because of pressure or to accommodate a few. If it was part of their initial vision great but if it wasn't that's great too.
I feel when you cave in to demand especially if it wasn't in your heart to begin with, it just feels half assed.
RiccochetJ
Gold Member
But Uncharted isn't what we should think about when we think about what imitates life. It's what we should think about when it imitates Raiders of the Lost Ark or Commando.
I thought the Drake being a serial killer was just a meme. People actually have a problem with the shooting? Out of all the games where you ruthlessly murder thousands, people choose to criticize a game where you have to kill out of self defense? I don't understand that. Seems really bizarre. If you think the killing in Uncharted is wrong that's fine, but you basically have to swear off AAA gaming in that case.
Maybe it's because people identify with Drake more than your typical protagonist so the killing feels more out of place?
Maybe it's because people identify with Drake more than your typical protagonist so the killing feels more out of place?
lmao are the supernatural events in uncharted imitating life as well?
I think this is a misunderstanding of what the "every-man" character is supposed to be. It's not supposed to be a character who is only as capable as regular people, it's supposed to be a character who is relatable and imperfect in a way that regular people will be able to more easily imagine themselves doing crazy, over the top things. It's just an easier vessel to step into the fantasy, a more personable way for the audience to want to be the character, an easier way to make you feel like goddamn Rambo.
Completely missing his point on both counts. Well lit nighttime scenes in movies are a conceit audiences accept in order to buy into the fiction. It's the conceit audiences make that is the comparison, not the technical aspect of lighting. An action scene featuring 30 enemies in a videogame is a conceit players accept in order to feel an adequate amount of danger and challenge in order to buy into the fantasy of playing as the character.
Similarly, it's the tone of the violence in Indiana Jones that is the point of comparison, not the amount.
NoctisVsStar
Member
I've raided a few it just depends what kind of "tomb" we're talking about.. ;P
LapinAgile
Member
I play games to feel like goddamn Rambo, and if the character I am goddamn Rambo-ing as is likeable than all the better. Also Druckmann didn't work on Uncharted 3 which had the worst offending enemy spawnfests. Also ending constructive criticism with a "fuck you" to the person you want to address is a cheap shot and not very polite.
He's not killing for profit.
every man should be raiding those tombs.
As much as the crazy skinhead mercenary does, sure.
Imitation does not mean a 1 to 1 recreation you guys. But the farther away we get from reality, the harder a pill it is for the player to swallow. It's why Uncharted 3, while having some beautiful set pieces, is the weakest in the trilogy for me.
Perfectly fair criticism, but you've described nearly every video game ever made. Why is this your hobby? Genuine question.
NoctisVsStar
Member
TheRedSnifit
Member
I've always wondered why people give so much attention to a franchise with only one good game.
This is just not true. You can kill 30 enemies because they balance it that way. They're just dumb bullet sponges. If you put 1 enemy on screen but you can die in one shot, it will be incredibly tense and the danger will be very real in a way those 30 enemy sequences never could be. They want you mowing down all these dudes because that's what's easiest. Put a bunch of dudes and it doesn't matter how smart they are and then if you want to ramp the difficulty up you give them more health and more damage.
He's killing to get past the other crazy antagonist who wants whatever treasure he's going after. Whether or not halfway through the narrative Nathan suddenly has a moral reason to abandon the treasure in order to do what's right is irrelevant.
Sure, the beginning of UC2 places an emphasis on stealth and protecting the lives of people not really involved in the heist or the over arching plot (I don't know if i'd call public security innocent bystanders considering they are protecting the...maguffin), but let's not get crazy, Nathan raids the base of a notorious murderous warlord to steal a map.
And I'm not saying that the death count make the game bad or anything. I am saying it creates a weird disconnect though. It doesn't feel like Raiders or Indy, it feels like Terminator or Robocop, quick zany one liners before 20 guys get mowed down by your own personal unstoppable protagonist status.
Dr.Uckmann
Member
Druckmann has two Ns at the end. Post ignored.
It's weird to me that these discussions always get so defensive. You can enjoy Uncharted games and acknowledge that it's a little bit weird for a charismatic rogue to also be an unstoppable killing machine. It's even likely that these discussions will eventually lead to better games in the future, where characters like Nathan Drake have more actions at their disposal besides shooting things, and are more likeable and believable as a result. Naughty Dog themselves are aware of the disconnect and the impossibility of adequately contextualizing Uncharted's gameplay as it exists today. I don't know why some posters are dead set against discussing it at all.
Robot Pants
Member
Sigh.
Just get out
No, they want to replicate the feeling of watching an exciting action sequence in a big adventure movie, not having a tense cat and mouse with one scary enemy where death is incredibly easy. They are obviously capable of that if they want the tone of the game to be that, as evidenced by The Last of Us. In Uncharted they want you to feel like Indiana Jones flying out of an airplane, inflating a boat, freefalling into a river and going down the rapids without breaking a bone. They want you to be hanging off the edge of a tank, smushed against a wall, getting on a horse, jumping on the tank, punching bad guys out, shooting bazookas at jeeps, going over a cliff, jumping off the tank at the last second as it flies off a cliff and climbing up with a witty one liner.
To be fair, it's not like uncharted is the only game that does it. The new Tomb Raider has the exact same problem, but it looks like they might incorporate the mindset it takes to mow down 200-300 people on your first day using a gun in the open into the story of the next game.
There's something about being a puckish rogue that translates directly into being a one man army when it comes to video games.
Because some people have their identity attached to the product Uncharted. To paraphrase, its a videogame. Thats atleast my guess.
And they're usually shooting at you, or would be shooting at you if they saw you. What the hell do people expect Drake to do? "Bruh, I'm a pacifist, go ahead and shoot me"?
-tetsuo-
Unlimited Capacity
The context of every Uncharted game suggests that you will be killing lots of dudes.
karasu
Member
I think they thought they came up with a fun combat system. And more enemies equates to more fun. When you try to contextualize something so fundamental to gameplay you're probably going to end up treating your audience like idiots. The "problem" only arises on forums where people have a tendency to over intellectualize every facet of everything because their mom/grandpa/uncle wasn't interested in the big shooty action adventure game.
I'll be glad when I see more games realize the player is put in the shoes of a superhero and at that point of realization, it's probably reasonable to say if someone starts killing five or six of your friends it's probably time to stop shooting at the superhero and run before he kills you.
Because uh, any reasonable person wouldn't try to fight someone who killed six other people without being scratched (or who witnessed a person being shot and barely flinching from it).
But ya know,
videogames.
Also, after writing this - holy shit all FPS and 3PS protagonists are actually the T1000. It all makes so much sense now.
Because uh, any reasonable person wouldn't try to fight someone who killed six other people without being scratched (or who witnessed a person being shot and barely flinching from it).
But ya know,
videogames.
Also, after writing this - holy shit all FPS and 3PS protagonists are actually the T1000. It all makes so much sense now.
njean777
Member
I agree, if I went by Neogaf I would hate a lot of games that I like. I just tend to gloss over the critical stuff these days unless it has something interesting to say and isn't just hyperbole.
The majority of that stuff other than shooting at things is done with quick time events so that's another discussion but, for the actual action parts where you are fighting, you can make these action sequences equal tense and exciting with a few guys, you don't have to have 30 guys it's about finding the right balance. Indiana Jones movies are fucking exciting and Indiana very rarely fights anyone. Mostly he's running away because he's not trying to engage 40 dudes because that's suicide.
Action is about movement and excitement not about the act of killing. You don't have to be killing dudes to have fun. If they really wanted to make it like an Indiana Jones movie, they'd focus on a bunch of different exciting sequences not manshooting arenas.
If you make something worthwhile,
you're gonna put way too much thought into it.
Kageshinzo
Member
And yet, when games are made so that you get one-shot killed, we'll have another bunch of whiners and complainers about how the game mechanics suck. Not everyone who plays video games are core players. Some just want in on the casual fun, the highs of which are usually achieved by killing a bunch of mooks while you're sprinting and running around like a goddamn action hero.
Because an actual licensed game of the movie series that's the inspiration of uncharted has already addressed this character/action disconnect in videogame form 20 years ago? Why is this game of 20XX still confined to old tired tropes of Hollywood bullshit?
GifGafIsTheBestGaf
Member
The salt in the comments section though
Because even if they did make it one shot kills, they'd still make manshooting arenas just like they did in the Last of Us.