How do your reference slavery or discrimination in your games?

[Kupotepo]

I saw many people here willing to confront uncomfortable ideas. I do not know how to approach this and I feel nervous. Let face it that when we are building the world and create a kingdom; there is a slavery system. [I understand as the player is not important.] It is not about triggering but immersion. [I am still laughing that the devs can put it into their games, but do not want to talk about it.] You probably know that there are different slavery systems that exist. [Like how orcs enslave goblins and how lich king enslaves the dead.] Trick doesn't have to be about humans only?


Discrimination in your world: [I see some devs in here to try a new approach to role revesal.] For example, in the classic fantasy story, the demon is evil. Humans hate Demons. Demons hate Humans. How do you approach this in a new way? [For writing, not as the game because we just show what is going.] Thank you for your guidance.

I fully understand that many players around the world play games on escapism and entertainment. I completely understand.
Because as many of you, creators of ideas will sooner or later confront controversies that obviously surround us.

Nice try "game is not political." The well-research game makes the feel alive and immersion of being there. I am smiling that people think the devs target the players to attack them. Despite this devs did not know them.


Thank you for your clarify in this thing call life. [Please, I would like to talk about how to improve the game experience to players.] If you have something that is super political in nature, please talk to me in-depth at my pm if you prefer.


1.2 Do NOT discuss religion, politics or nationalism (nationalism is defined as discussions about why one country/nation is better than others or why a country/nation is bad) outside the scope of game development.

 

[The Stranger]

1.2 Do NOT discuss religion, politics or nationalism (nationalism is defined as discussions about why one country/nation is better than others or why a country/nation is bad) outside the scope of game development.

These subjects play huge roles in slavery throughout history. Even in a fantasy world, these things would define slavery, social strata, how one group of people views another group of people, etc.

Personally, I don't think creators always use concepts such as slavery as a way to confront its effects in reality. Sometimes a creator might use it to flesh out their world, but never realy explore it beyond the fact that it exists in their setting, and that's perfectly fine.

The same goes for things such as sexism, murder, conquest, and other things we now see as wrong.

I have slavery in my setting, but the story isn't about it so it's not tackled in any real way; you're given glympses of it in the story, but it's little more than fluff to help flesh out the world. It exists because I felt that it made sense for it to exist based on the society and its religion, history, social structures, and the world it exists within. The protag never abolishes it, and they don't hold modern, real world morals.

In my opinion, it really all comes down to the kind of story you want to tell.

 

[Redeye]

This is for a book series that I'm writing that used to be an RPG before the story got too linear and complicated to use in a game, but religious persecution is one of the indirect causes of a massive chunk of the conflict. Some small, character-specific themes also delves into the role of religious figures in politics, how some people vilify others who are otherwise labeled as heroes / paragons, "you create your own demons", etc.

 

[Kupotepo]

@The Stranger, thank you for your wise guidance. It is true like how Metalworking I do not have to explain how forging metal into shape because I do not know about it. I could just flesh it without a specific explanation.

 

[Niten Ichi Ryu]

Like Stranger said, either it's a thematic of your game, and you make it meaningful about it, either it's a "flavour" and you don't make the whole theme becoming a cause you need to address to avoid confusing your game's identity.

 

[Niten Ichi Ryu]

Talking about gender discrimination in medieval setting, where often it's said women can't be knights. you could have a world where there are inequalities, the aim of the game isn't to fight inequalities and break the society, but you can have maybe one character that challenges convention, and allows you some degree of social commentary, as long as you avoid proselytism.

And you could have one world with total gender equality, where women can be knights and yet you wouldn't even have to comment on this, as equality being a fact, there wouldn't be even need to comment.

What matters is, are you trying to pass a message, to world build, or a bit of both. Once your clear on that, you can select how to apply degrees of social commentary.

 

[The Stranger]

@Kupotepo Yeah, it's kinda like how writers don't need to explore and explain magic in their setting, the mechanics of their fantastical version of science, or what it was like living in a feudal society unless the story is about these topics.

 

[HumanNinjaToo]

Unless racism or slavery is an issue being specifically addressed within the story, I don't really think all the subtleties and nuances of either need to be addressed. Pretty much everyone alive knows what racism and slavery is, pretty much everyone on the planet agrees that they are bad things, so I don't see how deeply explaining either issue is relevant to the game unless it is a central theme or topic being tackled by the storytelling.

 

[Kupotepo]

@Redeye and @Niten Ichi Ryu, thank you for your guidance. Nice to meet you and know you. I never see both of you before.
Thank you for caring and warming against vision tunnel bias. It is true that I ask any simplistic question? I use Socratic questioning to reflect on seeing many directions as possible. Sorry, to be that person.

 

[Niten Ichi Ryu]

The smell of a new Maker dragged me from the woods after a 2 years hiatus, but I was pretty active before. Expect to see me more, I missed reflecting and discussing on game making.

 

[The Stranger]

@Kupotepo I don't think it's as simplistic question. The answers to this question, and many others, can differ from person to person. I see these sujects as tools I can use when crafting a story. Others might, and likely do, see things very differently.

Never be ashamed or afraid of asking questions.

 

[Kupotepo]

@The Stranger, thank you for your understanding.
@Niten Ichi Ryu, I understand you are right some games tried really hard to do social commentary. Players will feel terrible like someone shove political agenda down their throat. I understand your concern of a sorry state of affairs in the modern world which not all things allow discussing openly.

However, I make a reflection of a hermit. I think about how violence, death, and enslavement impact your characters and they do not talk about it. It is like how we have death and we do not talk about it. It is not the theme per se, but their livelihood. However, it is true that if the devs prefer the setting to a peaceful harmony society because no suffering would happen. Yeah, it is just my child's wonder thinking.
I also think if I choose to silent what characters want to say, I will feel like I would block their authentic self. It is true that some character is reserved, forthright, talkative, or outgoing.

@HumanNinjaToo, I am truly sorry forgeting you. Thank you for always willing to give me an guidance to better myself.

 

[Shikamon]

I guess I'll take an approach like Dragon Quest, Slavery is only done by the bad guy. The bad guy use slaves to build their castle, fort, or dungeon. In my case, the bad guy is a demon lord-kinda. It feels like general things for demon culture/tradition to enslave lower ( or weaker) beings accordingly their social stratum.
That can be used as a conflict or reason for the battle between mortal and demon. It also teaches some morals for the audience (especially) that slavery is bad or all races should be equal.

 

[CraneSoft]

I'm a firm believer of "Show, Don't Tell" (unless the slavery is strictly restricted to backstory and lore), and most of the time there is no need to elaborate on them beyond X hates Y for Z reason. Unless discrimination is an integral element and/or is the primary source of conflict behind the whole plot on a regional/national scale (Eg. Detroit), fantasy racism is mostly unrealistic and is generally used only as an excuse to drive the plot forward on a personal (individual) scale.

 

[Kuro DCupu]

.... here's a different view.
Discrimination (in entertainment) is often used as a convenient tool to show what's right and what's wrong.

"I wanna show my character do something cool.
Punching people is cool if it's justified.
Let's make the target say the 'N' word first."
Point achieved.

To be honest, I don't like it treated that way. Yes, it makes a clear point. But that's just shallow...
Sorry to mention this.
Say, do you think racism will cease if black people never exist? But it will, in different forms. Maybe the next racist target will be fat people. If fat people don't exist, next will be short people. Next will be ugly people. Next will be dumb people, etc.

It's a curse for us as both social AND individual creatures. It's normal if it's not too exaggerated otherwise it's too unnatural. To me, it's not strong enough to be used as a tool to point out the bad guy. Personally, I think it's a dumb reason, even though there are some real cases of those.

No, in my world discrimination will not be the main reason for any problem.

 

[gstv87]

I might be a little cliche at *referencing* the theme, because I actually wrote a scene involving a labor camp in times of war, refugees, religious revolutions and feudal classicism.

I still have one civilization that needs shaping, so I'm considering giving them a true equality environment (they already have it, but I want it to be a little more utopian, over-the-top) and have it contrast with the rest of the world.
most of the civs in the story have equality, but to some degree or another they still have slaves of some type: some have animals for farming, some have people working the lesser jobs, some have a ruling clergy that lives off people's obedience, etc.
I'd love to write an interaction between these characters and the free ones, and work around how they don't get one another, for whatever reason.
having farmers puzzled that at the other side of the pond there's no farming because everything is grown in hydroponic bays? that'd be cool.

 

[Kupotepo]

@CraneSoft, thank you for your guidance that the show and don't tell are standard of good game making. Thanks.

I thanks you for mentioning that it is easy plot of hating and loving because it is expressed in universal of animals. However, I still wonder if your world have free labors like for example elves captures orcs force them to do labor work. Do orcs complain and talk bad about their oppressors? Or the orcs have the sign languages.
Imagine like we have a discussion right now. We like talk about broad range of subjects, so the characters in our world.
Do you prefer less dialogues? I understand and value what you are thinking. Plus many of us just skip the dialogues or even the cutscenes if it disputed our clicking and keyboard pressing time.

Sorry, I do not think it is clear because I do not addressed. I tried to apply psychology into how characters supposed to communicate? Do you think of backfire? I fully understand that game is completely unique experience compared to others media.

 

[CraneSoft]

@Kupotepo My world actually has elements far worse than slavery (namely mass trafficking and systematic domestication) of a specific race and the player can see the absolutely horrifying results of it, or get all their information they need via a simple quest description - I don't need any cutscenes or unnecessary dialogue to show how F-ed up they are. I'm not saying that dialogues aren't important however, as SOME explanation or exposition is definitely needed at some point depending on the scenario, it can be even as simple as the motivation of the oppressors "We do it for profit and giggles because we are the Evil Inc."

How much dialogue you write ultimately boils down to : Are those extra (psychology issues) communication necessary to progress the plot at all? If not, then you should keep it to a bare minimum or omit it entirely, after all, there is nothing the player can do about the discrimination unless the goal of the game is to reform society itself.

 

[Kuro DCupu]

Mmmm, this is another story concept I was working on. It's adapted from a compilation of local folklore.
Describing a world where Human, Youkai, and Giant living together in a modern setting.
Human are blessed by gods and given the potential to manipulate plants (plant-bending). It's so OP that they could monopoly the world resources. Youkai and Giant don't have this ability. They just have the power to destroy. In the past, this is the reason for war. But it's just the history of the current setting. They live together in harmony now.

How could the power to destroy brings harmony? So I make up a new culture of entertainment. Every harvest season (each month due to plant benders) they did "Siege Festival". Some kind of sport that simulated war where the point is Human VS Youkai + Giant. As the defender, Human will be at disadvantage. Their role is just to defend until the day ended. Every score the Youkai / Giant makes will be added to their right for this month's harvest.

I believe this method is fair.
- It respects each other traditions.
- Prevents discrimination by making everyone embrace and be proud of their difference.
- Brings business to the entertainment industries.

 

[Kupotepo]

@CraneSoft, goodmorning and thank you for your practical guidance. I understand now that I will cause the sadness upon the players. [That is true that the devs have to make players fun as possible.]