She can only be cured one way... with RAPE?

[AstinDextor]

WTF was up with that? Why the hell was the decision made to describe it as rape? And if you are calling it rape, why the hell can I not say "No it's cool, I don't think I'll be raping anybody today"?

[AstinDextor]

The filtered word rhymes with grape...

[THARN]

dont have the game- but that sounds pretty f'd up to me..

[󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡]

Is ♥♥♥♥ like this really in this game?

[Human]

Originally posted by Seatroll:

Is ♥♥♥♥ like this really in this game?

There is no grape in game, but for some reason the characters decide to call a mental procedure which is meant to heal a character the grape word.

Which makes it even more hilarious: Arkail and Styx have to undergo the same procedure, but the grape word is only used when the female character has to go through it.

I'm not even sure if it's sad and disturbing or just hilarious in its irony.

[[SSL]Siatu]

I gotta say that the use of that word challenge me too! I suppose that they considered it to be grape because it was an invasive penetration of her mind by the two characters that was fundamentally not consentual. As in she was in a state of catatonia and therefore could not give consent.

In that way I suppose you might call it grape, but on the other hand when someone is brought into the ER and is non-responsive the doctors don't say, "Get them to surgery, I'm going to have to perform an emergency scalpel grape." I sure did lol out loud with great incredulity when that happened!

[ed]

Originally posted by Sjon:

I have seen a review of this game, and they mentioned the use of this word. It troubled me AN AWFUL LOT actually, so much so that I am now doubting to buy the game. Is that the only time it has been used, or does it happen more often? Is the game itself fun enough to see past this and still enjoy the game?

The word is used maybe twice, and never in any context that's not talking about the unpleasant mental procedure. There are no sexual undertones in the sequence at all, it's a fairly standard "journey to the center of the mind" arc and each of the three characters participating in it has to take turns getting their butt kicked and being helped by the others.

Incidentally, the mage explaining all this to the player characters makes it very clear that the woman (who is an arch-mage and therefore has very dangerous mind-affecting magics) will be the driving force behind everything unpleasant that happens to the men in their stages of the journey. Her unconscious, traumatized mind is incapable of recognizing that anyone's there to help her, which is why they have to force the issue to get her to wake up in time.

The small part of her that IS conscious and recognizes that they're not the enemy manifests alongside them on the journey, helping them against the dangers the rest of her is throwing at them.

It's all very weird, but not sexual or sexualized violence in any way.

Originally posted by Sjon:

I don't understand what went through the developer's mind. What makes it even worse is this:

Originally posted by vvnovg:

the grape word is only used when the female character has to go through it.

Incorrect. The female character in question also very casually states she's going to take a team of mages and mind-(the word Steam censors) the enemy forces later on.

Basically the writer/s were very clearly trying to invoke the Mind (Censored Word) trope without actually quoting tvtropes in a video game.

Now this is not to say that I don't think the use of the word was dumb and awkward. However, I cut them some slack because it's very apparent that everyone on the writing staff for this game speaks English only as a second language. (I also have a friend in France who has told me that, while of course they view the actual crime in question to be just as terrible, simply saying the word itself is not as inherently shocking and offensive as it is to Americans and whoever else. It's basically no different from saying "murder.")

They really should have had a native English speaker go over the entire script, and this is one of the reasons why. I like this game a lot, but in order to like it you have to be able to forgive things like the low budget and rough edges re: translation.

The next game they made in this setting, Styx Master of Shadows, has a much more natural-sounding script and doesn't do anything like the awkwardness of "mind (censored)" even though mental invasion continues to be a major thing that happens. So it looks like they learned from their mistakes and did have more native speakers involved as they continued the series.

[Aegix Drakan]

Honestly, as much as I love this game, the way they kinda casually used that word to describe hopping into someone's mind and making them confront the thing that haunts them REALLY feels like they were using the word for shock value.

You're basically just performing Persona 4 therapy on someone. Go in, everyone confronts their demons, people come out stronger. Done. No need for the R word there. Yes, I understand you're hopping into the mind of someone who is unconscious and who really really really doesn't want to face those memories, but the R word isn't really required there.

They HAD to know that word would raise controversy and I think they did it on purpose.

Good to hear the Styx-focused game doesn't make the same mistake.

It's honestly the only part of this game that really irked me. The rest was excellent (ok, barring two incredibly unfair fights near the end, but that's beside the point)