Thursday, October 23, 2014

Are GoR games broken?

While browsing certain forums or randomly looking at other hentai game dev blogs or Patreon campaigns, I've recently stumbled over a lot discussions or statements about one big topic:

The "problem" of rewarding players in a hentai game by losing!



But is this really a "problem"?

I don't think so, at least, it's not really a "problem" or that big of a problem in my opinion.

Honestly, I guess I have a pretty much unique standpoint regarding this matter.
The reason for this is because I constantly have to think of the origins of game over rape hentai games.
And I think once people understand "the origins", it's pretty much clear why game over hentai games (game over rape, or short: GoR games) exist in the first place.



So, what are those origins I'm talking about?

Well, I think nearly everyone has played a "non-hentai" game with a heroine.
Some of those games have enemies that make stupid comments or do something else that implies sexual stuff.
One example would be the game "Bullet Witch", enemies in that game do stupid comments all the time, especially when the heroine is KO-ed, but instead of seeing something, you only see the "game over" screen, and hear some stupid comment from one of the enemies.

And yeah... that's pretty much it.
Those games, that don't show anything (well they are non-hentai games) but instead "imply" that something might happen afterwards are pretty much the origin.
At least that's what I think.

The reason "we" (as team) do GoR hentai games is because we want to tell the story of what happens after the heroine "fails".
It's not about rewarding anyone for playing badly and losing all the time.
It's because we want to tell a story, because we want to show what regular (non-hentai) games can't show. And yeah, it's also because it's about hentai content, I don't like the idea of showing a characters death and stuff, but hentai is okay.

I don't think that anything on this "mechanic" is broken or flawed.
It's just a way a game, or rather a story represents itself.
And looking at other hentai games sales and statistics (yeah I do that a lot), games with GoR seem to sell better than games that reward winning, but not having any GoR related content at all.
I'm just saying, people like it... so why trying to "fix" something that is not broken?


Some people might argue, that there is no "drive" for the player to actually win and succeed... but... there is!
People want to see all the game overs, which means, they have to progress in the game, see new enemies and lose against them. In the end, if you want to see the last animation/scene, you need to face the last boss, and lose to him/her.
Which pretty much means you need to get past all obstacles before the final bossfight.
And yeah... while you're at it, why not beating the final boss once in a while?

I really think, that there's no reason to "fix" anything here.
Some people like the concept behind GoR, others don't.
But that's personal preference, and everyone has a different opinion on nearly everything.


I myself actually prefer to NOT lose on purpose in a GoR game.
I like to fight as hard as possible, failing eventually, and then seeing the game over scene.
That's what makes GoR hentai games so special for me.
(unless they're way too easy and you need to lose on purpose... that's not something that excites myself... I need a really good, really hard fight, else it's not exciting)


Looking at the whole GoR from this point of view, it's pretty much like some of the "non-hentai" games out there, I mean regular games that are fun to play.
Take that, and add game over scenes to it, so the player sees what happens to the heroine once she fails. That's GoR! That's the idea behind it! That's the reason why it exists in the first place!
No need to fix anything here, it's not broken after all.

And, since this isn't enough for some people, I figured it would be good to add ingame hentai animations during regular gameplay whenever the heroine is knocked to the ground, but is not defeated yet.
This adds to the overall GoR-feeling.


But that's just my personal opinion, some people dislike GoR hentai games or don't understand the concept behind it. It's perfectly okay to do other kinds of (hentai) games.
I just thought it would be nice to voice this kind of opinion, as everyone else is constantly talking about how "bad" this whole concept is, or how "flawed" the gameplay is.

I must admit, yeah, looking at it from a game-design standpoint, it's weird to have the player "lose" sometimes on purpose, as there's some "interesting" stuff behind losing (the scenes and animations that come with losing).
But then again, the whole idea, and the roots of GoR are way way deeper.

I mean, it's not that you can "beat" the game by losing all the time.
You actually need to win (defeat the enemy) in order to progress.
So the basic principle of needing to "win" in order to "progress" is still there, right?


Well, that's my opinion on the whole matter, and I know that a lot of people might disagree with me there. But that's life, for every opinion there is, there is at least one other opinion that's opposing.

(on a side note: yeah, I don't like "victory rape" games at all... I really don't like them)


Anyway, feel free to voice your opinion in the comments below!


P.S:
I'll do a new blogpost about our upcoming stuff in the next couple days.
As I already mentioned on twitter, we'll continue working on games starting 1st november.
Also, the stuff we're up to might have something to do with chapter 1 - page 1 of our webcomic!

21 comments:

  1. For me, GOR also comes from all the games I played as a kid where enemies had "grab" moves. Especially in old 3d games, what enemies were actually doing to you during an animation was sometimes..very vague. Vague to the point of looking very sexual, especially when there wasn't blood.

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    1. I totally forgot about those, yes.
      It's actually quite surprising how often these kind of things appear in regular (non-hentai) games.
      And I guess it also had a huge influence on the whole "idea" of GoR hentai games.

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  2. Maybe it's about balancing winning to be just as enjoyable as losing. For example, I think most GoR go:
    1. Losing is more enjoyable than winning, so I have to win (in danger of becoming a chore) to proceed, in order to enjoy further GoR.

    Admittedly the enjoyment is not the same (or subjective) for everyone, but I think a balanced win-lose GoR would better satisfy many.

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    1. I think winning feels less of a chore, if the gameplay is actually fun.
      (which is not the case in most hentai games, I think)

      Other than that, there's always the problem if you add hentai rewards to "winning".
      Either it's hard to come up with hentai content for "winning".
      Or the game becomes a bit awkward, because it might cause the player to rape the enemy, or something like that.
      (that's something I don't enjoy at all, and something I don't want to have in the games I'll do in the future)

      Well, I do have a game concept in mind about a female ninja that seduces the enemy, has consensual sex with them... and kills them afterward or something like that.
      But uh... it also includes a lot of stealth stuff and needs way too many graphics...
      So we're not going to do that game for a loooong time.
      (it's simply too expensive to make, or rather, the developement time would be too long)

      But then again, this isn't really rewarding the player for winning, as it's actually a regular "combat-mechanic".
      Losing would get the similar results... so... this really doesn't make that much of a difference.

      I'll better not go into the details about this one too much, since it would end up in a wall of text...

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    2. What I meant to say was:
      Rewarding the player for "winning" is very complicated, if you don't want to turn it into a "victory rape" game.

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  3. I have to agree with you. I can understand that the idea of "rewarding" players for losing is kind of odd, but... I do feel the popularity or idea of GoR evolved out of the idea of, "So what IF we could see what losing entailed?"

    I mean, you had like say in Yggdra Union, Ortega makes pretty thinly veiled suggestions that he's probably going to rape Rosary or Yggdra. Losing that stage (or perhaps having Yggdra or Rosary be defeated by him) in a GoR game would naturally have you see him carrying out his suggestion. Instead of just a game over (Well, if Yggdra dies. Rosary isn't mission critical).

    Though I recall hearing Blaze Union had a similar situation, where all the female units fight some bandits who all pretty much suggest they'll rape them all. And if you lose, the game over pretty much confirms it, but I can't say for sure as I've never seen a script dump of the game, and Blaze Union was never translated.

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    1. Yggdra Union looks like a cool game!
      Never seen that one before (yeah, a lot of cool games don't come to my country... sometimes they're available, but are only available via amazon, if you don't know that it exists, you have pretty much no chance of getting or seeing it at all).

      In the game "One Way Heroics", if you play a female character and bandits ambush you, they'll do perverted comments too.
      And if you "die" in that game, well... the game doesn't exactly say you're dead.
      The game over text makes some vague statement that the enemy stands above you, looking down on your character hungrily (or something), and then "your journey ends".

      Thinking about it, a game like that with game over hentai would be funny too.
      (but since there are so many RPG-ish hentai games out there, it wouldn't stick out enough...)

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    2. Yggdra Union is a pretty fun game, though it's a pretty unknown game also. Almost no fanart presence either, which is a shame, given it is full of lovely ladies.

      And yeah, One Way Heroics did do that kind of thing. It could be interpreted as that, though I imagine the game over text was more generic for monsters that just eat you... or the darkness will when they clearly forget to keep moving right during the rape.

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    3. I took a look at Yggdra Union and it seems to be an interesting game.
      Though I can't afford buying it now, maybe some other day.
      I also looked for the dialogue of Blaze Union and you're right, there really is the stuff you mentioned.

      Well, in One Way Heroics the bandits make perverted comments when you play a female character, so the game over text fits pretty well.

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    4. You managed to find an actual script of that particular game over? I know someone said it basically says they all get raped but I was never 100% sure on that.

      I do know Blaze Union has a far more mature story though, and there's a lot of eluding to rape in it.

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    5. Yup, I'm always curious about stuff like this, so I spend several hours looking for it lol
      Anyway, if you want to read it yourself I'll post the link into the comments ^^

      It's not described in detail what happens.
      But it's pretty much clear if you read the dialogue.
      (well, it's just a fan-translation, but still)

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    6. I'm pretty interested in it. I have only a pretty general idea of that battlefield, and know the bandits make some lewd comments towards the women and have heard the game over strongly suggests they're all raped.

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    7. It's chapter 5, where the girls go on a shopping trip:
      http://www.gamefaqs.com/psp/991418-blaze-union-story-to-reach-the-future/faqs/68205

      And yes, it's pretty much clear what happens.
      Maybe that's one of the reasons why it's not being released in the west?
      (speaking of games that are not being released in the west... I'd really love to play Valkyria Chronicles 3... I played VC1 and 2, and really loved them)

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    8. That is pretty dark and pretty much confirms what happened. And yeah, I hear the number of rape references in Blaze Union didn't help. Mostly it just came out so late in the PSP cycle that they didn't wanna bring it over.

      A shame it's so niche though. I'd actually like to see artwork of this...

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    9. I particularly like games with a darker, more "serious" setting.
      (well I do like funny games too... but the darker ones are quite rare... or at least I haven't seen many)

      And yeah, sadly there's a lot of good games that never made it to the west.
      (Valkyria Chronicles 3 again...)

      Uh, you mean actual original artwork, or fanart artwork?

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    10. They're a nice change of pace. I like funny or lighter-hearted games too, but I don't shy away from darker/mature ones either. I'll take anything that's good!

      Yeah, no kidding... it's always a shame when a good Japanese game doesn't make it over.

      Well, I meant fanart artwork. I doubt there was actual rape CGs in the game after all, hahaha. Though I did also wish more of the official artwork was uploaded. I just wish the Dept. Heaven series in general had more fanart and such, but its sadly really niche.

      I still remember writing fanfiction for Yggdra Union ages ago... those were the days.

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    11. I don't think that there were hentai CGs in the game at all, yes.
      Where there any CGs at all in it?

      And regarding the fanart:
      Yup, lots of good games need more fanart.
      Fire Emblem just got popular with it's newest title, though the FE series has been around for a long time...
      More than 20 years as far as I know.

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    12. There is some CGs actually, yes. Right here!
      http://g.e-hentai.org/g/349740/23b5426219/

      They really do. It's a shame.

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    13. Ah, those are really nice!
      Thanks for sharing the information.

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  4. Games today, and H-games are part of this, aren't judged by quality but play time. If you play an H-game from start to finish, without unlocking any of the GoR scenes, you'd get about 20 minutes of play time. Given that these games can range from $10-$20 that's pretty bad. GoR scenes really add to the value of the game, by adding extra playtime.

    I feel the best games with GoR give the player more of a reward then just the satisfaction of beating the game. Sometimes you'll get a bonus CG, or unlock the gallery

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    1. Yeah, it kinda adds to the overall playtime or even the "replayability"... kinda.
      (if that makes sense)

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