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Fallen Earth may drop "Mature" rating for "Teen" rating...
Burntvet
Member RarePosts: 3,465
Hey guys, it's been a while since I've posted here, but I have something of interest...
I took the time to go to one of the recent events where the Fallen Earth folks travel around to meet the fans and other indie developers and got to talking to the devs that were there.
Of particular note, it appears to be that there is considerable pressure to bring the Mature rating of the game, down to Teen, mostly for the reason of sales and distribution. It seems that several of the big box, non-gaming stores will not/don't want to put boxes on the shelves for a title having a Mature rating. It could be that the devs saw the spectacular non-success of AoC, and decided to go this route. (That tried to launch with an M, right? I don't recall what the final decision in the US was myself..)
This decision, should it be finalized, will have some significant impact on the general gameplay. Less gore, most likely. Less/no profanity/nudity, almost certainly. No gambling/"drug" use in there, who knows...
Aside from that, the FE folks were every bit as nice and appreciative of their community and fans IRL as they have been on the official boards, and they appreciate all the feedback they get from different places.
Comments
Do you think AoC would have done better with a Teen rating?
The Mature rating of Fallout 3 may have kept it out of Walmart, but other stores were selling out. (Pun intended)
And when it comes to selling to teenagers, which do you think they prefer?
Note: I don't shop at Walmart, especially for video games, so have no clue whether they actually did carry Fallout 3 in spit of their penchent of censoring the product they carry.
Don't get me wrong, I am all for giving the devs more freedom to put what they want in, not less. I was asking about AoC,because I didn't know what actually happened at release, I know it was supposed to M, and then there was some change right before launch, but didn't know what the outcome was....
As to the rating change, that is up to them...
Well when i tested FE i didnt really see anything that would make it Mature.
They were always planning to release it as M, with all the drug/language elements as well as with the planned inclusion of gambling and bloody combat. This was mentioned in a few of the old Questions of the Week. That may have changed between then and now. I also seem to recall one of the devs telling someone else at the event that they had to go through and remove the 80+ instances that "Fuck" was used in NPC dialogue, but I may be mistaken...
Don't get me wrong, I am all for giving the devs more freedom to put what they want in, not less. I was asking about AoC,because I didn't know what actually happened at release, I know it was supposed to M, and then there was some change right before launch, but didn't know what the outcome was....
As to the rating change, that is up to them...
I only saw the reports about what went on with AoC. It actually looked like it might break a million in sales, until the reports of it being released with bugs hit. Quick deflation of game population ensued over the next few months. I actually bought, and played for a while. It was indeed mature in content (blood & body parts). Game play was good and the client was stable. The only problem left was the empty servers.
As for FE, I just hope they stick to their guns. Nothing I've seen about the game makes it over the top, in terms of content. It actually seems quite tame if you look at the few videos out on yahoo. The rating may be more for the genre, and player base. I know the official forums have gotten pretty bad at times. Good community does not always equal clean language.
From what I have seen there is nothing to make it mature. I was surprised to hear it would be mature.
If box sales were all that mattered for an MMORPG, AoC would be considered one of the biggest hits in years. The M rating didn't hurt initial sales at all. It may even have boosted them (everyone was a little shocked at how many boxes sold the first month). AoC fell apart because the game was unfinished, lacking core systems (stats did nothing at launch) and falling far short on content.
I can't see an M rating hurting this game in any way.
I like the setting, the screenshots seem to offer a mixed bag. How it plays and the quality and quantity of content will make or break the game, not it's rating.
Want to know more about GW2 and why there is so much buzz? Start here: Guild Wars 2 Mass Info for the Uninitiated
I think the concept of a "Mature" rated game is appealing to people for a couple reasons:
- Players can expect more serious story-telling in which particular aspects are not considered taboo. Details like the graphic brutality of death, sexual relationships of characters, a lack of respect or favor for religious creeds, examples of extreme opinions, realism in the way people conduct dialogues (harsh language), and in general, less pussy-footing around sensitive issues and the need to be politically correct. A less tame gaming experience.
- Exclusion of less mature players (I know, "maturity" in an MMO? Riiight..) and specifically, children. Less global chat about teenager's school lives, angst-saturated shallow social lives, and other subject matter generally associated with the 13 - 17 crowd.
For me personally it's the second reason. I absolutely can't stand that shit. I am starting to believe that FE is toning down any subject matter that might earn it a Mature rating. And that's a turn-off for me.
at the end of the day as long as the game is fun and does what it promises then i will play it. The fact they are taking some mature content out of the game should not affect it unless it changes the game significantly gameplay and story wise etc. It could also make the game appear to a wider audience which would help the community.
They do not have the publicity to do well in "Box Stores" in the first place. They should not box it at all since I guarantee you anyone who has ever heard of this game has heard it from gaming sites and would probably rather directly download it than buy it in a box.
This game will bomb in the stores because this game is not hyped enough to draw the sales. Instead of dropping their rating, they should come up with a better distribution plan that cuts out unnesseary costs like packaging and shipping.
But then again, maybe they are stuck in a contract with a distributer and this advice may be too late. Their distribution strategy makes me worry personally. There is no way they can afford extravagant costs like this with such a limited customer pool.
--When you resubscribe to SWG, an 18 yearold Stripper finds Jesus, gives up stripping, and moves with a rolex reverend to Hawaii.
--In MMORPG's l007 is the opiate of the masses.
--The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence!
--CCP could cut off an Eve player's fun bits, and that player would say that it was good CCP did that.
Well, they do have plenty of time to hype it. Its not like it's coming out tomorrow. Its still in alpha or beta or something, right?
Plenty of time to ring the "Come look at us" bell and have people check it out.
"TO MICHAEL!"
T or M there isn't that much of a difference to make it worth while making it M really. About the only useful thing it could add would be addiction to combat drugs or certain medicines to make the healing game more challenging and stratigic. i.e. If your constantly getting shot up and requiring painkillers you get addicted to them and start taking damage if you don't get your fix.
Gore as in blood splatter effects just take up valuable bandwidth and slow the game down so if I can turn them off I usually do. Decapitation and removal of limbs while entertaining the first few times gets a bit boring after a while.
Nudity well in an MMO if I want nudity I could play Second Life for free and see all the naked pixels I want without to much effort.
Swearing well it doesn't add alot mostly it just becomes annoying with most of the people using the f word every other word they type just because they can. At least it sounds like the devs were fairly resonsible with the script if they only had to remove it 80 odd times from over 5000 missions.
The only under 18 crowd it removes is the ones with resposible parents who usually act alot older than they are and if they didn't tell you how old they were you would think they were 30+ years old.
So there we go one interesting addition an M rated game can bring to the table if the devs impliment such a feature versus 2 pretty annoying ones that will deffinatly appear without help from the devs and another who gives a crud about one the devs also have to impliment.
A word about box sales and such. If you look at the reason the game came into being in the first place that is as a demonstration of their MMO engine and it's development tools I would hazzard a guess that the devs arn't really looking for the game to be a run away success by itself. Breaking evan would be enough. They can then say to potential customers for the engine come look at what you can do with this thing, here is a populated world already running with our engine these are the specs your customers need to get this kind of quality game. The company takes a look at the game says wow thats awsome and buys the engine and the studio makes money.
The lesser of two evils is still evil.
There is nothing more dangerous than a true believer.
Its no secret that FE Alpha was a full go in the late of 2008, you as a user had a chance to enter the Alpha (Family / Friends) stages last year from a promotion that only Gamespot.com could apply for.
The community is outstanding and developers still listening for more idea's from the community as well.
The whole issue of dropping the Mature rating to Teen (If true), I dont think it will make a major impact on the gameplay. The game is very unique and different compared to any other mmorpg that is currently out there, going by the videos on youtube.com
I can deal with a mmo that doesnt have blood, boobs, harsh language and decapations. I dont need these features to have fun in a mmorpg, some would be nice, but not needed.
All of those, in moderate amounts, can add to the immersion if the background story of the game suggests they should be there. As an example, I remember Neocron:
The game plays in a post-apocalyptic world with a Mad Max feeling. In the first version, it included a seedy red light district with topless whores, turf wars among player factions and similar stuff. Overall very nicely done in terms of atmosphere (the coding quality sucked). The game was released with a mature rating in Germany.
For Neocron2, the publisher tried to get a wider audience and was aming for the equivalent of a Teen rating. Now the hookers had to wear bikini tops and the GMs were trying to cut down on the swearing by players. That certainly put a damper on the atmosphere.
Funnily enough, except for a few NPCs that still cussed like sailors. I guess the developers simply forgot to fix those
.
ESRB. Bleh.
I wish people wouldn't think so much of the vulgar mature themes like decapitations and more about real mature themes like relationships, long running consequences for actions and making ethical decisions, maturity should be shades of grey and not black and white.
It would be very interesting to have an addiction mechanic, would be the equivalent of res sickness in other games i'd imagine.
Here's hoping there is a nice roleplay community at launch, since the post-apocalyptic setting and freedom is a very rich tapestry for weaving stories and lives.
<Welcome to my world>
the bigger the 18 symbol the more younger teens will want it, thats the sad truth. but its not the computer game makers fault they should just roll with it. it will be a huge shame if they cut FE down to teen. fuck walmart the retards sell guns but not mature games... that says it all really.
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