How grim or bleak are you comfy playing?

[Brian Boru]

this one seems more bleak than I'm likely to enjoy

…talking about Disco Elysium, had me nodding. I don't enjoy any 'unpleasant' content in games, such interludes are always to be got thru on the quickest way back to the pleasantly enjoyable. Bioshock, Dishonored—dropped them after a few hours. I'll mod night cycle out of a game when possible, segments with flashlight annoy.

How about you?

 

[Zloth]

Bioshock didn't bug me. Dishonored did some, but the gameplay was fun enough for me to easily play through it.

I think it's easier for me if I'm playing a character that's (looks at Bioshock) - well, at least not overtly messed up. A sad main character plus a sad setting, and I'm disconnecting. Dear Esther would be an example. There wasn't even a happy, go-lucky loud tie in that one.

 

[Pifanjr]

Good question, I'm not sure how to answer it. I had no problems with Dishonored and Disco Elysium's main character is so depressing it wraps around to being funny most of the time (the only exceptions being when you get a game over because of it). One game that does come to mind as being too grim is Diablo 4, where both the characters and the environment seem depressing wherever you go and whatever you do, at least from the bits I've seen.

 

[stormluisss]

…talking about Disco Elysium, had me nodding. I don't enjoy any 'unpleasant' content in games, such interludes are always to be got thru on the quickest way back to the pleasantly enjoyable. Bioshock, Dishonored—dropped them after a few hours. I'll mod night cycle out of a game when possible, segments with flashlight annoy.

How about you?

Well, on the contrary, I probably like such tense moments, but there is something I don’t like at all. I'm a trypophobe and for some reason I often see pictures that really irritate my nervous system with a bunch of holes or something similar. That's why I can't play all of these games. Does anyone else have similar phobias?

 

[VillainousVelKoz]

I heavily gravitate towards games with desolate atmospheres and stories. I second Dishonored here and Spec Ops: The Line also comes to mind. I'm not exactly sure why. I find that, although I played these two several years ago, I still remember how they made me feel.

 

[Frag Maniac]

Haven't played Disco Elysium, and you weren't exactly specific about what bothered you in that, Bioshock, or Dishonored. Lack of specificity is one of my pet peeves, in games and game critiques btw, just sayin.

I can say though that I never have and never will play top down view games, which is one of the main things about Disco Elysium I would not like. It's just not NEARLY as immersive for me as an in your face, up close, 3D world.

Having played Starfield a lot and am now starting a third playthrough on my 2nd NG+, I feel I need to speak on repetition. At first glance, and I know I have said as much, Starfield seems like it would be very repetitious to go through all the 10 NG+ playthroughs.

Starfield NG+ however is NOT your typical NG+. There are actually 10 possible universes you can be reborn into, you can skip or play the main quest each time, and there is plenty content in the game to experience a new feel each NG+, as well as new Skills to build.

Aside from that, you can experiment with many different types of loadouts, ships and outposts to build/rebuild, planets to explore/harvest, weapons to mod, pharmaceuticals to craft/try, and companion quests and relationships to embark on.

A NG+ can be looped through relatively quickly if you just focus on Artifacts and Powers, or slowly if you're looking to try quests you haven't, like the many side activities, or flesh out your skills. Skills are retained each NG+ though, so you only have to build them once.

For the most part, the "grind" parts of the game are far shorter and thus less tedious feeling each NG+, mainly due to having all the Powers, most of the Skills, and a working familiarity with where to obtain key useful items. This alone makes it MUCH less monotonous.

It's also hard to remember ALL the new perks of the 10 levels of Starborn suits and ships, even if you've read spoilers about them ahead of time. I'm loving my 2nd Starborn suit. It has 7% more resistance against ALL damage types, uses 25% less O2, and weapons weight 50% less.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

I've never been bothered at all by a bleak tone in a game or any other media, on the contrary often things can be more interesting because of it.

 

[Johnway]

i don't think there has been any games that have stopped me from playing because of bleak content, unless you count stardew valley where i couldn't decide who my digital waiful was and promptly stopped playing.

The only time when a game irks me is when i have to make a choice. you know; permanent choices where key characters are killed off after much investment, all options are just awful/bad/grim (witcher3) and/or not making the perfect run results in a bad result (like in pillars of eternity). hasn't stopped me playing them but at the same time it vexes me that sometimes i play with a walkthrough open just to make sure i make the best choices.

I can't understand those who intentionally play the game like a monster, i feel no joy/power being bad/evil. I find it more rewarding to build something from the ground rather then trampling on what remains into the dirt.

 

[Brian Boru]

Welcome to the forum 🙂

I'm a trypophobe

Huh, had to look that up—thanks Wiki:
"Trypophobia is an aversion to the sight of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes or bumps"

I'm not exactly sure why

You have a comfy normal life and feel guilty about it 😛

I still remember how they made me feel

The only such I still recall the feeling of is Ravenholm in Half Life 2—the place 'we don't go to', one of the best scenes ever in gaming.

you weren't exactly specific about what bothered you

It's a general tone or atmosphere or feeling thing, not any particular attributes—perhaps best described as a visceral or instinctive reaction. Might be lots of poorly lit locations, bugs, gore, grime, gratuitous violence, sewers, etc.

 

[Zloth]

I've never been bothered at all by a bleak tone in a game or any other media, on the contrary often things can be more interesting because of it.

Very deep. 😉

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

youtube.com

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Very deep. 😉

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

youtube.com

Wide as a puddle, deep as an... Wait, wut?

 

[Interiores]

I like dark games and where you are on the verge of a nervous breakdown, at the peak of emotions, maybe I don’t have enough emotions in life, that’s why I play these games with such pleasure.
Well, so that it’s not so scary, sometimes I can play with friends, although often they, on the contrary, add extreme excitement when they themselves scream from the next screamer.

 

[Slasken]

People might get different experiences from Dishonored. If you go in killing everyone, the game athmosphere will get grim, but if you go stealth and don't kill anyone, the mood will be lighter.

 

[Frindis]

Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. I tried it for a couple of hours and I just had to leave it. It was way too dark and depressing to the point of becoming uncomfortable.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard is definitely around my breaking point. Not only is the setting grim with the protagonist locked inside a mansion with scary beings, but he also has to keep on trucking to save his girlfriend while enduring all kinds of body torture. I will at some time finish the game, but I have to take baby steps because the game is just horribly scary.

Dark Souls is a more comfy place because while the world feels bleak, you are basically the ember against its darkness, lighting bonfires and spreading hope and that makes it a bit more pleasant. Some bosses can be difficult, but even if I bang my head against the wall a couple of times (Ornstein & Smaug, I am looking at you guys!) it still feels quite refreshing to progress in the game.

 

[Frag Maniac]

It's a general tone or atmosphere or feeling thing, not any particular attributes—perhaps best described as a visceral or instinctive reaction. Might be lots of poorly lit locations, bugs, gore, grime, gratuitous violence, sewers, etc.

Jeez, wouldn't that essentially eliminate a ton of games, since many have post apocalyptic, oppressive, or run down game worlds? It also in a way would be the Pollyanna effect, making games actually less realistic, as the world itself as we all know has increasingly more problems.

However I detest games that are nothing but hate and gore, like the ones where you play a deranged psycho that just goes around violently killing people. To me, what's most immersive is games that let you be a hero in less than ideal conditions, a sort of diamond in the rough.

 

[Brian Boru]

wouldn't that essentially eliminate a ton of games

Indeed it does, but thankfully with over 40/day releasing on Steam, + big backlog, I don't foresee me running out of options anytime soon 😀

It's nice we can all be picky and still have way more choices than we can ever play.

 

[Zed Clampet]

Missed this thread.

It does bother me, and I do, occasionally, stop playing games, or hopefully avoid them to begin with, based on how grim they are.

Sometimes it's the atmosphere, aesthetics and people (rather than story) that can get to me. I don't really enjoy most Warhammer 40k stuff because of the "grim dark" world, and some of that is aesthetics, but also everyone is bat-$hit crazy. Meanwhile Vermintide 2 was thoroughly enjoyable to me despite the end-of-the-world setting. Leaving Warhammer, Disco Elysium was dirty and had, IMO, the worst main character I'd ever come across--a lazy, horny drunkard on the verge of death and insanity due to his own life choices, and I just couldn't get into it.

This is complex for me, but sometimes it depends upon what I expect the outcome to be. For instance, @Frindis mentions Resident Evil 7, which for him is both grim and scary, but for me it isn't grim at all because I know that in Resident Evil games the hero always overcomes (RE8 would have an asterisk beside it).

Sometimes it depends on how seriously I take the story. I knew the story and setting of The Kindemen Remedy was probably going to be as bleak as possible, but I still played the demo because for some reason I found it so dark that it was amusing.

One perhaps odd thing that bothers me is insanity, perhaps because I've held on by a thread my entire life, 🤣 and also because I worked for a time in a mental institution before the development of newer antipsychotic drugs and was basically scarred for life. The presence of insanity, by itself, doesn't stop me from playing a game, though.

Great topic @Brian Boru !