Sex doesn't work in art.

[opus132]

I think this is really what rubs most people the wrong way. It's not just the "gay" stuff, it's the fact everybody is horny and flirty out of nowhere and regardless of their character.

People who play games like this want to be engrossed in the story, they want to feel they are living out their favored fantasy novel. They want to feel like they are directly experiencing what Frodo did in Lord of the Rings and so on.

Remember how sad your relationship with Dak'kon was, or how tragic the Deionarra backstory was in Torment? Remember feeling sympathy for Kelrdon, or having feeling of camaraderie for Kivan despite BG1 having very scant NPC interactions, just going by the portrait and the voice acting?

Now imagine if all those characters tried to have sex with you the second you met them. Just random "wink wink" sex innuendos or lustful stares. Imagine the second you meet Minsc he wants to jump in your pants.

I don't see how you can call this art. If Tolkien did this in his books he would be called an hack.

[Quillithe]

Originally posted by opus132:

Originally posted by CapnCorndog:

Anyone who starts from a premise of "sex being objectively worse than violence" isn't worth discussing anything with. The time making any counter-arguments would be wasted on you.

And yet it is absolutely true and deep down you agree with it as well.

Like i said, 99% of people would be much more comfortable with their children watching a violent movie than see explicit pornography, and my hunch is you would too.

If you want an even more pertinent example, you would rather have your small children either play or watch you play Doom Eternal than have them walk into the room while you are picking between Penis A or Penis B during character creation in BG3 itself. My hunch is that the first thing you would do is alt+tab the game in a nanosecond.

So don't give me this crap that you don't actually believe that sex is worse than violence, since you all do.

Just because you have a screwed up sense of morality doesn't mean others do too, sorry.

[opus132]

Originally posted by Jeysie:

Opus: You're acting like we wouldn't simply alt-tab Doom as well.

I don't think most people would in that situation.

[Jowain]

I disagree; I think sex works very well in art, it sometimes drive it, but my main issue is how quick it is in this particular piece of art.
This game hit a lot of Dragon Age: Origins vibes for me, which was a huge part of why I picked it, even had my first character be a human noble because it's the first origin I played back then.

However in Origins all your relationships are slow, you meet the character, you interact with them you talk to them. You do quests and story beats with them, make choices they can agree with, give them gifts and do the very specific story moments that changes things, the romance doesn't happen until the 3rd act where everything is coming to a close and it's victory or death in the face of the oncoming horde.

Baldur's Gate 3 Act 1 isn't even over and already Shadowheart is ready to roll and I've only seen a few in depths scenes with her. Not to mention a lot of choices don't seem to matter?
Idk, I feel the supposed romance just cuts out a lot of the key stuff that made it worth pursuing, Baldur's Gate 3 romances feel like a cake with only icing and none of the filling.

Where's the chase? Where's the hard skill checks to get someone to open up? Where's the many conversations that matter? And why is this happening Act 1?
This just feels... hollow, empty and meaningless? Granted we're facing a certain horrible and grim fate, but so did the Grey Warden of Dragon Age: Origins.

[Quillithe]

Originally posted by Jeysie:

Opus: You're acting like we wouldn't simply alt-tab Doom as well.

Yeah, I mean there's a 50% chance the kid sees a penis pretty regularly anyway. I think Doom is much worse.

[Jeysie]

Originally posted by opus132:

Originally posted by Jeysie:

Opus: You're acting like we wouldn't simply alt-tab Doom as well.

I don't think most people would in that situation.

Then most people are pretty bad parents.

Originally posted by Quillithe:

Yeah, I mean there's a 50% chance the kid sees a penis pretty regularly anyway. I think Doom is much worse.

Right?

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Humans are one of a very species of animal that mostly prefer to mate in private.

No one knows why for sure, but one theory says it's a strategy for dealing with rivalry.

[BRIMStone]

tbf though which of yall has played DnD a good ammount of times? and of that group, how many of you *havent* had some kind of "seduction" or sex moment, whether it was due to being funny or whatever the reason....

im willing to bet most people have had something like that, in one DnD group, apparently in another session everyone ended up in a situation they rolled for their ♥♥♥♥ sizes, cuz it was funny at the time due to whatever happened in game...iirc the short character had the biggest one, which made it funnier im told.

anyway my point is there's alot of that in DnD already and alot of DnD *IS* a "teen fiction novel" cuz alot of teens or younger adults are the ones playing it and making up stories...

[.Master Jiren, The Strongest]

shadowheart being the only reasonable choice for a straight dude means you want to romance her. after 3 years of having shadowheart be extremely difficult to talk to, we now have her story opened up fully. And the result is that she ends up being a simp for you, like everyone else. In fact, the new shadowheart is so different from the EA shadowheart that its jarring. Gave me whiplash when she was making a move on -me-. Now if I spent 3 years trying to woo the same girl, then yes, her reaction would be realistic. But canonically you've only been with her a few days, maybe a week or 2 at most, and shes head over heels in love with you.

I'm not saying BG3 should use time skips to make things more realistic, but I am saying that Shadowheart seems to grow attached to you unrealistically quickly, especially given that she was the most abbrassive person in the party and then jumps so hard for you, it doesnt feel earned.

[Renegat]

tell that greek statues with private parts at full exposel and i think they now much more about art then you. and second if you don't like sex in game don't romance anyone cause romance not art by your logic at all. hope that help you if not i don't care

[Rupert Giles]

OP is right on the mark.

[Powercrank]

Originally posted by opus132:

Originally posted by CapnCorndog:

Anyone who starts from a premise of "sex being objectively worse than violence" isn't worth discussing anything with. The time making any counter-arguments would be wasted on you.

And yet it is absolutely true and deep down you agree with it as well.

Like i said, 99% of people would be much more comfortable with their children watching a violent movie than see explicit pornography, and my hunch is you would too.

If you want an even more pertinent example, you would rather have your small children either play or watch you play Doom Eternal than have them walk into the room while you are picking between Penis A or Penis B during character creation in BG3 itself. My hunch is that the first thing you would do is alt+tab the game in a nanosecond.

So don't give me this crap that you don't actually believe that sex is worse than violence, since you all do.

when your only response is making up a bunch of stories and projecting you have no response

[Call Sign: Raven]

Originally posted by opus132:

Originally posted by MrSaturn69420:

I don't want to feel like I'm directly experiencing anything like this. What an awful notion. i.e. Why would I want to engross myself in the experience of being kidnapped by a flying tentacle monster?

I want to witness a story as a third-party, not feel like I'm experiencing what Frodo experienced firsthand.

This is the problem with trying to speak up for a group when you are an individual. You can ONLY speak for yourself.

Experiencing things first hand in a ROLE playing game? You are right what a strange concept.

I'm speaking for myself, as are you. Please carefully read replies before offering your opinions. I'm mentioning that it's strange to try to speak for a group that is going to have different prefs per individual.

[Call Sign: Raven]

Originally posted by BRIMStone:

tbf though which of yall has played DnD a good ammount of times? and of that group, how many of you *havent* had some kind of "seduction" or sex moment, whether it was due to being funny or whatever the reason....

im willing to bet most people have had something like that, in one DnD group, apparently in another session everyone ended up in a situation they rolled for their ♥♥♥♥ sizes, cuz it was funny at the time due to whatever happened in game...iirc the short character had the biggest one, which made it funnier im told.

anyway my point is there's alot of that in DnD already and alot of DnD *IS* a "teen fiction novel" cuz alot of teens or younger adults are the ones playing it and making up stories...

I used to DM for a small group. We ran campaigns together for nearly 10 years every weekend. Very fun times! And uh, some of those guys were horny, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ lol. I was always weary of putting them in a situation with elven bartenders LOL

[Shodingus]

Originally posted by opus132:

I think this is really what rubs most people the wrong way. It's not just the "gay" stuff, it's the fact everybody is horny and flirty out of nowhere and regardless of their character.

People who play games like this want to be engrossed in the story, they want to feel they are living out their favored fantasy novel. They want to feel like they are directly experiencing what Frodo did in Lord of the Rings and so on.

Remember how sad your relationship with Dak'kon was, or how tragic the Deionarra backstory was in Torment? Remember feeling sympathy for Kelrdon, or having feeling of camaraderie for Kivan despite BG1 having very scant NPC interactions, just going by the portrait and the voice acting?

Now imagine if all those characters tried to have sex with you the second you met them. Just random "wink wink" sex innuendos or lustful stares. Imagine the second you meet Minsc he wants to jump in your pants.

I don't see how you can call this art. If Tolkien did this in his books he would be called an hack.

I think the bigger issue is not so much that sex can't work in art, sex or sexuality absolutely can work in art but the problem is it needs to be tasteful. And BD3 has no idea what tasteful sexuality is, instead they give you bestiality with a druid transformed into a bear and a bugbear trying to rail an ogre

["L"]

Originally posted by opus132:

I think this is really what rubs most people the wrong way. It's not just the "gay" stuff, it's the fact everybody is horny and flirty out of nowhere and regardless of their character.

People who play games like this want to be engrossed in the story, they want to feel they are living out their favored fantasy novel. They want to feel like they are directly experiencing what Frodo did in Lord of the Rings and so on.

Remember how sad your relationship with Dak'kon was, or how tragic the Deionarra backstory was in Torment? Remember feeling sympathy for Kelrdon, or having feeling of camaraderie for Kivan despite BG1 having very scant NPC interactions, just going by the portrait and the voice acting?

Now imagine if all those characters tried to have sex with you the second you met them. Just random "wink wink" sex innuendos or lustful stares. Imagine the second you meet Minsc he wants to jump in your pants.

I don't see how you can call this art. If Tolkien did this in his books he would be called an hack.

Then don't play the game. I like it, you seem like a loser wasting their time ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about *checks notes* sex in video games. Then don't play the ones that have it.

Most I've played don't have it at all. Play them?