Hatred
So, for those of you who haven't heard about this controversial title. Hatred is a game in which you take the role of a "spree shooter" who is very mentally damaged and his reaction to the "human worms" is to cause a "genocide crusade."
From what I've heard, the game has recently been given an "Adults Only (AO)" rating because of the motives the main character has and the overall bleak tone of the game.
What I wanted to discuss is if you think Hatred is an integral form of art or just an excuse for people to constantly push out more violent and desensitizing products? Keep in mind Hatred doesn't look too far off from Postal, that was released nearly eighteen years ago (I believe around 1997). And that game also had you take control of a spree shooter, complete with an "elementary school" level.
My thoughts on Hatred are quite scarce, since it looks overall dull and boring to me. If the primary objective is to slaughter innocent people as the priority the protagonist is working to achieve, I see little value as to it's existence. And that's the key word: value, I see none. I'm not necessary disturbed by the content in the trailer. Taken out of the bleak and grisly context it's presented, I've done far worse to innocent pedestrians in Saints Row, Grand Theft Auto, or even Just Cause. But presenting a game so blatantly despondent and lacking of any redeemable value or enjoyment and saying "that's the point, don't you get it?" is a cop-out in my opinion.
Anyway, what are your thoughts? Is Hatred a game that you consider "too far" in terms of it's content or do you think it's just a "radical" form of artistic expression?
Comments
Art? All I see is a guy running around shooting innocent people XD. Too far? I guess it kind of is. If that's the motive of this character, and pretty much all you do in the game then I'd say yes. I wouldn't want to play it, but maybe some people would enjoy it, as long as it doesn't influence anything. Overall to me it just looks like a boring, weird game.
A pointless game with a gameplay idea that you can already do in games such as GTA, Mortal Kombat, or Saints Row, except the whole experience is presented in a serious, heavy handed, and uncomfortable direction instead of being a satire of violence or invoking a sense of black comedy.
Not really interested, you can already do that in GTA 5. That game i will imagine will be 100000X than this game.
I wouldn't buy it. Not because of the violence but because it sounds rather boring.
I don't see Steam selling it. Who is going to sell it. Best Buy LOL.
Steam will sell it, the Gaben said so.
I shouldn't be that surprised, they sold the rambo game for 30.00 US Dollars. I know because i bought it....
I laugh at the moral code of Steam. They won't let people fap of animated BOOBS, but they'll let them murder innocent women/children and call that a game. LOL Steam.
Yes Steam, oh mighty Steam! HAIL GABEN
I don't know why other big companies don't have Steam services. Fuck steam, it doesn't even work half the time. If i was a CEO like Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates, i be getting into that SON.
Steam doesn't work for you? Well that's what you get for being in Gaben's wrong side.
i don't care to be honest,
I rarely play video games anymore.
Okay.
2edgy4me
nah, but really it seems like a bleak game since all you're supposed to do is just go around finding innocent people to kill. especially with the way it's presented, with the main character being all broody, dark, and loathsome. bleh.
I thought Steam had pulled it from their service...
Seeing as though it's now officially AO.
I agree. I suppose you could argue that Hatred is art in the same way a film like Henry or a book like American Psycho is art. The difference here is that Hatred is a video game. Video games create a different atmosphere around the plot. Whereas a film or book shows or describes exactly what it wants you to see, games are all reflective of the gamer. That's why A Clockwork Orange or Taxi Driver wouldn't work as a game, they're very precisely woven narratives.
Hatred seems to be doing the whole "shock value is art" thing that many forms of our entertainment desensitizes us to believe is actually "hard-hitting topics." I've played the original Postal for all of four minutes before falling asleep on myself and quitting it, too many "dark" and "foreboding" tones clashing quite sloppily together with balls-to-the-wall violence made me believe I was playing a snuff-film. Really, in my opinion, the only game to adequately capture "violence can be art" was Manhunt.
Not all that bleak though. Hell, Carmaggeddon and Postal allowed the player to slaughter children for bonus points.
It seems the tone set in the game is what's turning a lot of people off. In my opinion, it looks so boring.
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Wait, is Postal a game based on 'Going Postal?'. I recall a Seinfeld episode where they were talking about Newman's job and I forget who said, and I am paraphrasing here, 'Aren't postal workers people who go and shoot up places?.' to which Newman replied, 'Sometimes. It's the mail! It just keeps coming and coming and coming....'
it's just in terms of story and ways of actually engaging the player, it's really bleak. the game's just centered around killing people in gruesome ways and that's about it. It's just relying on shock value and ~edge~ which grows realllly tiresome.
"Going postal" is a term for a mid 80's series of violent shootouts by several postal workers because they were laid-off. Having no other ways to support themselves (since being a postal worker pays fairly good for a job you need little formal education to obtain) they came to the conclusion just wiping their co-workers, managers, and civilians was the best option.
And, yes Postal is based off of the term "going postal." You play as a mentally disturbed man who was laid off and goes on a killing spree. Including a hospital and elementary school "level."
Nope, you can find boobs now. I don't just mean The Witcher; they're selling eroge now too.
I mean, so I've heard...
Holy crap... that's fucked up...
It reminds me of this movie "Rampage" which people kept going on about how it was 'morally problematc.' No, there were no moral quesitions, just somebody running around killing a bunch of people. The only moral question was about the movie's existence, or if you want you can pull some abstract message of moral nihilism, but even if you try that it just shows how weak the film. Just 'what is evil? Is there evil?" With no further developmet. And that's me bending over backwards to give it the benefit of the doubt. I imagine it's the same here. I really don't care much. You can argue it's satire, but I highly doubt it, and if it's one the meta level it's pretty weak.
I've played Postal 2, not the first one, and it's replete with random cultural references, and innane humor, and it jokes about how debased it is, so there's some (entertainment/satire)value there.