Megamod feedback - I'm mortified at the sexism

[JimTheDinosaur]

IMO, the wasteland is really suitable to avoid this kind of situations. Why? Because being able to survive is proof enough you are a mighty one. Even when one might not like the other because of prejudices, they wouldn't probably underrate them. Only the Enclave might be an exception, because they didn't suffer the real problems of the wasteland, they are not wastelanders, and there's no triumph intrinsic to their survival: they had tech and a shelter. Everyone else, even people who don't like people who is different to them, understands surviving takes at the very least some kind of skill, so I don't think any wastelander would assume that one is inferior because of gender or race, because they already managed to survive.

Fine, but then the dialogues should have reflected this fact; instead, the Fallout world is populated to a large extent by the same mysoginistic attitudes you'd find in any other post-apoc setting, but with the difference of them offering the exact same jobs and rewards as they would to men.

It's the same problem as with the prevalence of independent female mercanaries you describe lujo: the attitudes of all the characters are more or less modeled on those in, say, the Road Warrior or a Boy and his Dog, but without the believable gender relations. In those movies, you had a by and large Hobbesian wasteland, dominated by (sexually) violent marauders, with civilization (and the large possibility for female independence) only maintained in small pockets here and there. Fallout just homogenizes the whole lot, making it much less believable in my opinion.

 

[lujo]

It's the same problem as with the prevalence of independent female mercanaries you describe lujo: the attitudes of all the characters are more or less modeled on those in, say, the Road Warrior or a Boy and his Dog, but without the believable gender relations. In those movies, you had a by and large Hobbesian wasteland, dominated by (sexually) violent marauders, with civilization (and the large possibility for female independence) only maintained in small pockets here and there. Fallout just homogenizes the whole lot, making it much less believable in my opinion.

True - but that's a stance you can have. Changing it would have the game be about the feminist struggles of the early 60ties not about being a hero of the wasteland! Ok, so real life was terrible to women (for reasons ridiculous even in real life), let's make it so that games are too? I'm not saying this is your line of reasoning, but it's what the terrible dialogue in Arroyo achieves. Women have enough of that shit in RL, it's the last thing they want to see when they sit down to play a game - and guys almost never get that shit so it's even more insulting and annoying to them if they don't pick the shaved gorilla model for whatever reason...

People who pick the male model have an easy and rather more pleasant time, and people who don't feel represented by the male model (for any reason) should have a hard time (in a plot destroying way) because it's more in tune with the 50ties western mores? Would you ever find a woman who would argue that a game where she could live a life relatively free of that shit (with the option of kicking anyone attempting it in the crotch and gettign good karma for it) should be modified to deny them that? While guys can have a nice time, because, hey, that's more "realistic"?

And this somehow justifies a player being insulted and attempted to be forcibly dragged away in the first scene because of what is purely a cosmetic choice as far as most of the game is concerned?

And a legit one:

As far as sexism and pandering goes, the male model is the obvious tastelss caricature of the two. I don't find the female one sexualy appealing - it's actually a pretty tasteful representation of a woman as far as gaming is concerned, notably so. I couldn't ever play the male one because it's groteque almost to the point of http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2013/04/24 . So I'm not looking to reenact the struggles of the women rights movement, I'm just looking to have somethign that isn't visualy grotesque on the screen representing me while I play fallout 2. And not get harrassed because of it by people I'm supposed to be helping.

EDIT: This plays a HUGE part in why it's so easy to assume that the women of fallout are really the weaker sex. The male model isn't representative of anything but Narg, and the female model looks like a regular woman. It's almost like they're not the same species, or even genres - he's a superhero, she's a passerby.


Anywho, CAN someone point me to a way to rescript klint to treat males and females equaly? Please? I have the fallout script editor, but I'm hoplessly lost in it when it comes to anything not related to just changing dialogue lines - and I want to stop Klint from running up to any women who dares take the test.

 

[JimTheDinosaur]

Changing it would have the game be about the feminist struggles of the early 60ties not about being a hero of the wasteland!...
People who pick the male model have an easy and rather more pleasant time, and people who don't feel represented by the male model (for any reason) should have a hard time (in a plot destroying way) because it's more in tune with the 50ties western mores? Would you ever find a woman who would argue that a game where she could live a life relatively free of that shit (with the option of kicking anyone attempting it in the crotch and gettign good karma for it) should be modified to deny them that? While guys can have a nice time, because, hey, that's more "realistic"?

You don't pick a "model", you pick a gender. I don't really get your hangup on the graphical representations, it's a crpg for god's sake: it's about the character's stats, not his model. Also, the game wouldn't become "about" females struggling, any more than playing the game with IN<4 becomes "about" being mentally handicapped. It's about imposing gameplay-relevant challenges based on the stats the player chooses for his character; there's no reason in and of itself to exclude gender from this principle.

 

[lujo]

You don't pick a "model", you pick a gender. I don't really get your hangup on the graphical representations, it's a crpg for god's sake: it's about the character's stats, not his model. Also, the game wouldn't become "about" females struggling, any more than playing the game with IN<4 becomes "about" being mentally handicapped. It's about imposing realistic challenges based on the stats the player chooses for his character; there's no reason in and of itself to exclude gender from this principle.

No I don't! That's the thing, I don't pick a woman, I pick a model. Why?

Because the male model is impossibly unrealistic, and the two models are from completely different genres! Just open the game up and compare them - he's a superman, she's a passerby. She looks like a person, he doesn't! The visual representation is at the heart of why it's so easy to think of fallout females as the weaker sex - the male model is NOT representative of the male sex, except bodybuilders and (some) pornstars. He's a superhero or a shaved ape - and he's unconvincing as anything else. He's superman, she's everyman.

You're not VIC - but you don't look like Vic. You're not Marcus - but you don't look like Marcus. You're not cassidy (or you might even be) but you don't look like Cassidy. You're not Sulik... But you look like suliks twin! It's so unconvincing that it makes a non-Narg playthrough break immersion for me all the time. Especially since the game has a few different male models which convey different characteristics - but you always look a bodybuilder with a broom shoved up your ass.

So you pick a woman because you can't look at that caricature and the women at least look realistic and look like they could be whoever you're playing. It's a concession on my part - because the male is just not an option! The game allows for it pretty well, it's one of the few games out there where it works out that way - the woman is the less grotesque choice of model. Gender comes into it so rarely that you can pretty much ignore it if you're not interested in the childish pandering (sleeping around). So little, in fact, that the choice is pretty much cosmetic and comes down to what you want to look at while you play. (even after many walkthgoughs, I had to consult a guide to check out what the mechanical options of being a woman and a man are, I've missed or skipped most of them before, that's how mechanicaly irrelevant it was).

But as an aesthetic/immersion choice it's a choice between looking at either:

http://herculesbodybuilding.blogspot.com/2013/05/bodybuildier.html

or:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lafuria/249793092/in/faves-manuelcastano/

for 80-odd hours regardless of what kind of character I play. Is someone supposed to catch flak because he isn't into pick no.1? Which one of these could represent or develop into more different people? (couldn't find a more pedestrian looking woman on the internet, the fallout 2 model is probably the most blank-slate one anyone ever decided to represent in media)

And it's much easier to not bring gender into it in such a godawful way as it had been in the modded Arroyo for all the other reasons, than it is to make new models. All it takes is someone explaining to, say, me how to rescript Klint, and I'd probably be able to clean the rest up a little bit and all's fine. Could someone help, please?




@Jim: And there's no reason to include ONLY ONE GENDER. And there's just no convincing way to face a superman in a 50ties setting with challenges based on gender. The guy in the mod gets called a chosen one before he completes a trial - the woman gets yelled at for coming close to the temple. The game simply isn't supposed to work like that. Please, install the megamod and just do the conversation with Klint a couple of times as a woman, and then look at the scene as a guy. It's mind-blowing.

 

[Lexx]

Well, the character models are due to the comic book influence. For example, check out the one Fo1 loading screen with male and female vault dwellers and compare it to any (old) comic book cover. In this case, it's simply the games style.

 

[lujo]

Well, the character models are due to the comic book influence. For example, check out the one Fo1 loading screen with male and female vault dwellers and compare it to any (old) comic book cover. In this case, it's simply the games style.

I know! But it's a perfectly legit notion to pick a girl because her model is less of a comic-book caricature and thus helps hugely with the immersion (on an elementary level) - you don't have to have the slightest inclination towards a higher difficulty because of it.

But getting higher difficulty / more unpleasant experience just because you went with a more realistic skin texture is like a big slap in the face...

 

[MIB88]

2) Then you have 5-6 dialogue options, 4 of which amount to "Sorry master, can you please take me back to the kitchen?", but pretty much whatever you do you end up conceding that you need a muclebound fathead to help you with the tutorial level. And the guide sayes it's mandatory only for female chosen ones, while the male ones can say "they don't feel like it" O.O I've maybe played the game (in any incarnation) as a guy once in over a dozen playthroughs - I'm equally bored to tears with the Temple of trials! So I'm supposed to stare at a gay porn model for the entire game if I want to skip it?

You have an... interesting way of seeing things. Or, at least an interesting way of talking about this stuff. Reminds of certain politicians and "news"-casters, who overuse hyperbole and want to spin things whichever way, regardless of the facts. You pick and choose a handful of quotes and scenarios, blatantly disregard others facts, and infer way too much to make whatever point you want. I don't particularly care. Really. As I've said: I don't plan on engaging in a discussion about this nor changing anything with this part of the game. However, I quoted the above just to point out something that is wrong for anyone else who wants to play the mod:

Like I said earlier, not all options lead to that NPC outside the Temple helping the player. Also, the guide that you referenced does not say it is mandatory for female characters to play the tutorial. What the guide says is that you can skip the tutorial if you play as a male and meet certain requirements (specifically, if you go inside the Temple and get seriously wounded).

 

[lujo]

2) Then you have 5-6 dialogue options, 4 of which amount to "Sorry master, can you please take me back to the kitchen?", but pretty much whatever you do you end up conceding that you need a muclebound fathead to help you with the tutorial level. And the guide sayes it's mandatory only for female chosen ones, while the male ones can say "they don't feel like it" O.O I've maybe played the game (in any incarnation) as a guy once in over a dozen playthroughs - I'm equally bored to tears with the Temple of trials! So I'm supposed to stare at a gay porn model for the entire game if I want to skip it?

You have an... interesting way of seeing things. Or, at least an interesting way of talking about this stuff. Reminds of certain politicians and "news"-casters, who overuse hyperbole and want to spin things whichever way, regardless of the facts. You pick and choose a handful of quotes and scenarios, blatantly disregard others facts, and infer way too much to make whatever point you want. I don't particularly care. Really. As I've said: I don't plan on engaging in a discussion about this nor changing anything with this part of the game. However, I quoted the above just to point out something that is wrong for anyone else who wants to play the mod:

Like I said earlier, not all options lead to that NPC outside the Temple helping the player. Also, the guide that you referenced does not say it is mandatory for female characters to play the tutorial. What the guide says is that you can skip the tutorial if you play as a male and meet certain requirements (specifically, if you go inside the Temple and get seriously wounded).

Whait, what exactly is wrong with what I said?

Does the male get to chose his time to talk with the NPC? Yes.
Does he get adressed as the chosen one? Yes.
Are his dialogue options clearer? Yes.
Does the female get run up to and yelled at for trying to play the tutorial level? Yes.
Are there options where you agree that you shouldn't be doing it because you're a woman? Yes.
Is this contradictory to what cameron sayes later? Yes.
Does it matter that you can refuse help, if the male can ASK for help, while the female gets help pushed in her face? Yes.
Why? Because they need it or not need it equaly based on their stats, not gender.

Can all this be very jarring, contra productive or offensive? Yes!

Does it make any sense in the context of:

- The village elder being a woman?
- The chosen one being implored for the test in the cutscene before the game starts (of which the guard has to be aware of)
- The game assuming every chosen one finishing the test (it's mandatory)
- There being an option to pick a pre made woman chosen one
- Cameron outright stating that it's perfectly ok to be a woman chosen one
- there being 0 mechanical reasons why a woman would have any problems with the test based on gender rather than stats
- The level of mysoginy exibited being present pretty much only in evil characters throughout the game
- the "gender" not influencing anything compared to stats in-game, and there being precedents of charaters considering your stats before your gender even if they're sexist (except for sexual encounters)
- you having to go on an epic quest to help Arroyo prosper

To answer to all of this is a clear as day no, scientificaly provable

Only way to not see this as a jarring problem on several levels:

- if you assume that a woman should feel obliged to go on an epic quest for the benefit of people who treat her like Jesus Mordino would

Would any woman ever do that?

- Only if you hold her children/loved ones at gunpoint, and maybe not even then

Level of difficulty in copying the male part of Klints dialogue to apply to both sexes?

- Not very much

Problems afterwards?

- None whatsoever



So what's the problem? Why do you defend something which is wrong every way you approach it except if you approach it with an assumption, not one supported by the game overall, that women should have a hard time because... that's your idea of how it's supposed to be? Even if it's comedicaly and socipaticaly wrong? It's very likely easy to change, so what's the deal?

The first quest for guys should be completing the temple of trials, and the first quest for girls should be trying to get a sexist idiot (who's in the wrong about the rules) off your case? Really?

 

[MIB88]

Whait, what exactly is wrong with what I said?
...

Why do you defend something which is wrong every way you approach it except...

Last time in this thread. Go back and read your very first post. Some highlights:

...1) Right off the bat a musclebound fathead runs up to you and yells at you: "WTF IS A WOMAN DOING TRYING TO PLAY THIS GAME!".

2)...but pretty much whatever you do you end up conceding that you need a muclebound fathead to help you with the tutorial level. And the guide sayes it's mandatory only for female chosen ones, while the male ones can say "they don't feel like it" O.O...

a)... you've uninstalled the mod, reinstalled either the vanilla or the restoration patch and enjoyed a sexism free experience of a wonderful RPG where you can actually play a woman and have an epically good time.

b)... and get progressively more inclined to go outside, find a feminst and tell her you are sorry you're a guy. Being a guy, I've never had a chance to experience what's it like to be treated like complete garbabge just because of your sex, but you could teach seminars in universities with the current Arroyo as a showcase what all the feminist fuss IS about...

4) THEN, after getting saddled with a hypercompetent NPC on the grounds of being a woman (guys can apparently skip the boring tutorial all togather, according to the guide)...

5) And after experiencing contempt at every turn from Arroyo, a village supposedly cut of from the 50's inspired world, you are supposed to go out and save the village. Why? There is no reason not to burn it to the ground, call the enclave with the coordinates and lead the vertibird napalm assault - you should get positive karma for that! A fluffer in new reno get better treatment and more respect than a female chosen one in the megamod Arroyo. And this outlook is endemic to Arroyo! In other places, only complete and obvious asshats treat you like that! Arroyo is the most contemptible place on the map for a female!...

EDIT: 7) And when you reach Cameron in the temple, who questions you on the Fallout lore (not a big fan of that solution) - he openly states that there is no reason a woman can't be the chosen one (because, doooh, it's fallout 2, being able to play a girl was a selling point of that game)! Except every shirtless well toned macho male homosexual in the village up to that point and past that point just radiates abuse and condescension - for no good reason! What in the world were all the "GO TO THE KITCHEN YOU AREN'T MENT TO PLAY THE GAME AS A GIRL!" with "STAY BACK WOMAN LET MAN HANDLE IT FOR YOU!" bullshit for then?

If you want to engage me in an intelligent conversation, hyperbole isn't the way to do it. Some fine exaggerations up there. This mod is one of the worst examples of sexism you have ever encountered? Really? Huh. Ok.
In your first post you also say every character in Arroyo hates women, while simultaneously pointing out that the Cameron, Hakunin, and some others don't. Or that you can enjoy a sexism-free game if you play the original game or RP. Never played to New Reno, huh? You don't seem to be in full command of the facts (either about the rest of the game, stuff you have misinterpreted from the guide, etc.) I'm not saying you aren't. But your words suggest otherwise.

Finally, I haven't defended anything by saying:

As I've said: I don't plan on engaging in a discussion about this nor changing anything with this part of the game.

No defense offered in either of my posts in this thread. It's the type of conversation I would have with my friends, not 'random internet people.' Still, I have no plan on changing it, even though it would be quite easy. (Not because I'm a sexist/misogynist... just spiteful. Besides: Once word's gotten out that I've gone soft, then it's work, work, work, all the time, catering to others with their requests.)

 

[Endocore]

I've played Fallout 2 and most of the various mods a great many times indeed. My very most memorable, engaging, and enjoyable game of Fallout 2 ever was a Megamod game, wherein I role-played a female Chosen One. For most of that game, my player-character did indeed feel spiteful towards the Arroyans-- but in the end, after seeing all the miseries the Wasteland had to offer, she decided there are far worse places in the world than a primitive tribal village despite any concomitant rustic sensibilities expressed by its inhabitants.

Regardless of lujo's sentiments, lujo's tone is entirely offensive-- clearly, because lujo quite deliberately means to offend. He's the worst sort of ideologue, believing those who disagree with him are not simply wrong-- he believes those who disagree with him are morally defective human beings, and his holy duty is to brain-wash, er, educate such folks.

lujo doesn't argue "The New Vision mod is poorly designed to facilitate a satisfactory role-playing experience as it arbitrarily restricts the player's freedom to pursue his own vision of the player-character." Instead, lujo shrieks "This is morally wrong! I'm offended! Not only that, but I've decided on behalf of everyone that nobody should be allowed to see these ideas I've decided are evil! Change it now!" lujo apparently feels strongly that any instance of an opinion contrary to his political ideology must not merely be squashed but prevented from ever occuring in the future. After all, the very title of lujo's thread is in fact the admonition: "Megamod feedback - I'm mortified at the sexism." Mr. Orwell outlined this approach and its inevitable results rather well some years ago:

Syme bit off another fragment of the dark-coloured bread, chewed it briefly, and went on:

'Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed, will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten. Already, in the Eleventh Edition, we're not far from that point. But the process will still be continuing long after you and I are dead. Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller. Even now, of course, there's no reason or excuse for committing thoughtcrime. It's merely a question of self-discipline, reality-control.
But in the end there won't be any need even for that. The Revolution will be complete when the language is perfect. Newspeak is Ingsoc and Ingsoc is Newspeak,' he added with a sort of mystical satisfaction. 'Has it ever occurred to you, Winston, that by the year 2050, at the very latest, not a single human being will be alive who could understand such a conversation as we are having now?'

I say to lujo: how dare you. I'll decide what's suitable for perusal in my own imagination, and I'll not afford you any say whatsoever in the matter.

All of us, including lujo, have in these cases of some content we find objectionable two sensible options:

1) Don't play.
2) Roll your own.

lujo is free to learn the modding ropes just like anyone else and make whatever sort of version of the game he wants, in which case I would be free to ignore his work. A cursory inspection of lujo's language, however, makes clear this isn't really what he wants at all... he wants his "Bourgeois YET OF COURSE Fashionably Leftist" version of the game to be the only version available for everyone. Again I say, how dare you.

The really sad part of this whole affair is that while lujo's self-righteous tone and presumptuous attitude are repugnant, I in fact agree with the component of his sentiment arguing New Vision and a number of other Russian mods take an offensively juvenile tone in regard to female player-characters that is detrimental to role-playing. I believe that since most of us will agree that facilitating a role-playing experience to rival even a well-run table-top game with live participants is the primary virtue of Fallout and Fallout 2, this aspect of New Vision et. al. is unfortunate and misguided. For example, consider Oblivion Lost-- if the player selects a female player-character, his character explodes at the start of the game as apparent "punishment" for being "silly enough" to choose a female player-character. Merely installing that mod took me longer than I spent playing before I shortly thereafter deleted the whole fileset from my HDD.

A sound critique of these themes, then, consists in consideration of the notion that games should be fun. In the context of FO/FO2, the consensus of players over time has concluded that these games are fun because they maximize the player's freedom to pursue any particular playthrough according to his own interests and maximize the player's freedom to develop a player-character protagonist of his own conception. If a theme or game mechanic interferes with these pursuits, then we can conclude the result is a lousy FO/FO2 game or mod.

Hence though hard-boiled realism in regard to those innate and biological differences betwixt the sexes that directly contribute to the social structure of any primitive society-- including in a post-apocalyptic wasteland representing a disintegration of civilization-- may be an interesting theme to explore in literature or cinema, accomodations must be made in an interactive game whose purpose is to facilitate maximum entertainment of the player. If any particular game fails to provide such accomodations in a satisfactory way, we again reach the terminus:

1) Don't play.
2) Roll your own.

As for lujo's political ideology, which is easily deduced from his numerous repetitive comments: for the record, I find his ideology vapid and objectionable. Nonetheless, unlike lujo I won't offer arguments on the matter, I won't insist he agree that I might even legitimately hold such a view much less insist that he agree with any propositions I might express, and I would certainly not even consider as "arguments" propositions lujo seems intent on offering, such as: "But surely you must agree with me, because otherwise you're a brutish chauvanist FIEND!" and "I'm going to keep repeating my mantra until I shout down all opposition!" In other words, I respect lujo's right to hold my opinions as offensive as I hold his.

In other words, let's not grow distracted here-- though lujo may now take a different tack and attempt to derail criticism by seeking to argue the merits of his ideology or the deficiency of any opposing ideology, he has initiated this discussion for the single purpose of demanding (rather stridently, in fact) not debate of ideas but simple censorship that precludes any debate. Silence, rather than discussion, is the demand presented by lujo; hopefully others won't take his bait and be drawn into extraneous matters. This discussion in fact has little or nothing to do with the New Vision mod or MIB88's approach to gathering (rather than filtering) other mods for use in the Megamod.

In closing, for a better insight into what lujo means when he says

...find a feminst and tell her you are sorry you're a guy.

we find again that Mr. Orwell summarized the motivating and underlying principle of all such talk some time ago:

O'Brien smiled slightly. 'You are a flaw in the pattern, Winston. You are a stain that must be wiped out. Did I not tell you just now that we are different from the persecutors of the past? We are not content with negative obedience, nor even with the most abject submission. When finally you surrender to us, it must be of your own free will. We do not destroy the heretic because he resists us: so long as he resists us we never destroy him. We convert him, we capture his inner mind, we reshape him. We burn all evil and all illusion out of him; we bring him over to our side, not in appearance, but genuinely, heart and soul. We make him one of ourselves before we kill him. It is intolerable to us that an erroneous thought should exist anywhere in the world, however secret and powerless it may be. Even in the instant of death we cannot permit any deviation. In the old days the heretic walked to the stake still a heretic, proclaiming his heresy, exulting in it. Even the victim of the Russian purges could carry rebellion locked up in his skull as he walked down the passage waiting for the bullet. But we make the brain perfect before we blow it
out.

 

[MIB88]

... I believe that since most of us will agree that facilitating a role-playing experience to rival even a well-run table-top game with live participants is the primary virtue of Fallout and Fallout 2, this aspect of New Vision et. al. is unfortunate and misguided...

A sound critique of these themes, then, consists in consideration of the notion that games should be fun. In the context of FO/FO2, the consensus of players over time has concluded that these games are fun because they maximize the player's freedom to pursue any particular playthrough according to his own interests and maximize the player's freedom to develop a player-character protagonist of his own conception. If a theme or game mechanic interferes with these pursuits, then we can conclude the result is a lousy FO/FO2 game or mod...

Hence though hard-boiled realism in regard to those innate and biological differences betwixt the sexes that directly contribute to the social structure of any primitive society-- including in a post-apocalyptic wasteland representing a disintegration of civilization-- may be an interesting theme to explore in literature or cinema, accomodations must be made in an interactive game whose purpose is to facilitate maximum entertainment of the player...

Ok, Endocore. Point taken. I will look at it and consider options. No promises though! And, I'm not placing it at the top of the list of things to add/change. You suck!

However, in the game, we are always limited: you can't do something because your character doesn't have the requisite level, or high enough of a skill, or a particular stat level, are too good, are too bad, has too many NPCs, affiliation with another group, etc. I bring this up to merely point out limitations/conditions are going to exist. Why shouldn't gender be a condition? You can do things in the game already because you are a female (quests involving Metzger, Myron, and the car come to mind). Sure, we want maximum fun in the game. It may be 'fun' for a character to eliminate entire towns. Doesn't mean they should be exempt from all the bounty hunter encounters just because they find those annoying. That is the price they pay for their actions. I think gender should have an impact.

 

[JimTheDinosaur]

However, in the game, we are always limited: you can't do something because your character doesn't have the requisite level, or high enough of a skill, or a particular stat level, are too good, are too bad, has too many NPCs, affiliation with another group, etc. I bring this up to merely point out limitations/conditions are going to exist. Why shouldn't gender be a condition? You can do things in the game already because you are a female (quests involving Metzger, Myron, and the car come to mind). Sure, we want maximum fun in the game. It may be 'fun' for a character to eliminate entire towns. Doesn't mean they should be exempt from all the bounty hunter encounters just because they find those annoying. That is the price they pay for their actions. I think gender should have an impact.

Bingo. The biggest C&C element of any crpg comes (or at least should come) at character creation. If the identity you choose for your character ceases to have consequences, and you are "free" to do whatever you like, then you might as well not be playing an rpg at all. Every rpg is based on a balance between player skill and character skill: total freedom means that player skill becomes predominant.

Also, I demand that lujo counters Endocore's Orwell with at least one Simone de Bouveoir reference. This thread is already gold, but it could be so much better.

 

[UniversalWolf]

...you are supposed to go out and save the village. Why? There is no reason not to burn it to the ground...

FWIW, I've felt this way about Arroyo since the first time I played Fallout 2.

 

[lujo]

[quote="Endocore"In other words, let's not grow distracted here-- though lujo may now take a different tack and attempt to derail criticism [/quote]

Naah, I'm really a tactless outraged fool and not really deeply profound guy who's run into something that is undefensible enough to keep railing at it way past the point of being constructive, if my approach ever was. No sarcasm. As for it being undefensible - I agree with all the arguments presented by Endocore, and consider myself completely disposable in the whole argument. What he said about the subject is right and comes before my own dignity, sense of entitlement or any need for personal acknowledgment.

And err, I don't mind MIB88 defending his integrity as a modder - and the rest of the mod was the opposite of objectionable, but I'm sad to report that most of the how-to and modding software links are broken and that I'm entirely talentless when it comes to modding. I've been trying to get the script editor to work so I can offer a small hotfix for anyone who wants one for this small particular thing that can (sadly easily) sour the megamod experience. Which is otherwise awesome.

Completely unofficial and optional, for those who want it, and the makers can adjust the mod itself if they feel like it how they feel like when they feel like it - or not at all. If anyone can just point me to a working decompiler or script editing program (or clue me in to how exactly it is done). I've figured out dialogue line editing from Dude101's advice - but FSE is giving me trouble.

All I'd do is - set Klints behaivior to treat boys and girls as he treats boys now (no running and being opinionated when it comes to gender, or at lest not as strongly as now), and have the important villagers more likeable and appreciative towards a chosen one and less self centered (as to point out the fact that there is a crisis that takes precedence in importance over the regualr hunting activities). I could do the latter just by editing dialogue lines (I'd have to know where they are stored exactly), but I cant stop Klint from running if I don't know what controls that.

Srry about everything, and I hope someone shuts me up for good by helping me get to work.

 

[JimTheDinosaur]

...you are supposed to go out and save the village. Why? There is no reason not to burn it to the ground...

FWIW, I've felt this way about Arroyo since the first time I played Fallout 2.

Pretty much; the whole place is a tutorial populated with either mentally "challenged" individuals (Nagor, the guy next to the well) or obnoxious comedic relief filler (Hakunin). Then again, most places in FO2 (in contrast to 1) were a pleasure to see burn.

edit:

Srry about everything, and I hope someone shuts me up for good by helping me get to work.

 

[dudejo001]

... I believe that since most of us will agree that facilitating a role-playing experience to rival even a well-run table-top game with live participants is the primary virtue of Fallout and Fallout 2, this aspect of New Vision et. al. is unfortunate and misguided...

A sound critique of these themes, then, consists in consideration of the notion that games should be fun. In the context of FO/FO2, the consensus of players over time has concluded that these games are fun because they maximize the player's freedom to pursue any particular playthrough according to his own interests and maximize the player's freedom to develop a player-character protagonist of his own conception. If a theme or game mechanic interferes with these pursuits, then we can conclude the result is a lousy FO/FO2 game or mod...

Hence though hard-boiled realism in regard to those innate and biological differences betwixt the sexes that directly contribute to the social structure of any primitive society-- including in a post-apocalyptic wasteland representing a disintegration of civilization-- may be an interesting theme to explore in literature or cinema, accomodations must be made in an interactive game whose purpose is to facilitate maximum entertainment of the player...

Ok, Endocore. Point taken. I will look at it and consider options. No promises though! And, I'm not placing it at the top of the list of things to add/change. You suck!

However, in the game, we are always limited: you can't do something because your character doesn't have the requisite level, or high enough of a skill, or a particular stat level, are too good, are too bad, has too many NPCs, affiliation with another group, etc. I bring this up to merely point out limitations/conditions are going to exist. Why shouldn't gender be a condition? You can do things in the game already because you are a female (quests involving Metzger, Myron, and the car come to mind). Sure, we want maximum fun in the game. It may be 'fun' for a character to eliminate entire towns. Doesn't mean they should be exempt from all the bounty hunter encounters just because they find those annoying. That is the price they pay for their actions. I think gender should have an impact.

One thing I can agree on is that your character holds a particular status in the game. Your character has trained for a good part of his/her life for what is considered the most difficult test in his/her society. The player's character is also the descendant of the village elder, previous survivor of the Trial.

Even as a female character, the Chosen One would command a certain level of respect. In such a context, I agree that the NPC's behavior makes little sense.

With that said, I agree that in a post-apocalyptic future where it's dog-eat-dog, women are unlikely to command much respect since they have a natural tendency to let men take all the life-threatening risks.

 

[Oppen]

Also, people, is remarkably contradictory that the elder is a woman in a mysoginist society. It just makes no sense.

I believe this treatment was intended as a joke, and I'd probably laugh a little, but Megamod itself is not intended as a parodial mod, AFAIK, and a whole town's behavior is too much for a single joke.

 

[Drobovik]

Well, I sure as hell not going to involve myself into this ideology debate. But...

come up with this:

lujo,

Second sticky from the top sure doesn't have any broken links, you so desire, to either

1) Don't play.
2) Roll your own.

Good luck, hopefully you will come up with the nice kill-sexism-in-Arroyo mod.

 

[.Pixote.]

It would have interesting if the original developers has considered a bonus and penalty system when choosing your gender right at the beginning of the game, for instance -

Man = strong, hardy (blah, blah) = +1 strength, +1 endurance, -2 intelligence.

Woman = pretty, clever ( ) = +1 charisma, +1 intelligence, -2 strength.

Thank God they didn't do it, but I will say the female aspect of the game should be more distinctive, as is there are too few cases where playing as a female makes a substantial difference. Like it or not, we have to accept the vision of the people who make these mods, and if people feel unhappy, well they can always make their own mod.

 

[Ardent]

@lujo: Download sfall modderspack. Use Google if you can't find it here.
You're interested in the sfall script editor. It does a very good job at decompiling scripts. It also opens the associated .msg files.
FSE is also good, but its setup can be a little unnerving, and the decompiler is easier to use in sfall as well.

The best way to learn scripting is looking at other scripts to see how they were handled. I suppose that's how everyone here learned to script. You can also get some tips on what each function does by reading the instructions provided with the Official Mapper.