How God of War Ragnarok Handles the Effects of Alcoholism in a Family • Hacker News Board

Re: How God of War Ragnarok Handles the Effects of Alcoholism in a Family

#11

Post by maddumb » Sat, Dec 31, 2022, 1:27 AM UTC

skyyler wrote: post #9

maddumb wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m also fine with a game/movie about Jesus but my point isn’t so much that the figure is a sacred cow (Passion of the Christ proved there’s a lot of interest, amongst other media) but rather that /when/ he is depicted the depictions tend to run along the respectful side because it is the religion of others. And it’s not about “faithful”. I’ve played the original games and obviously “Kratos” isn’t a historical Greek…

> It’s like doing a “Sesame Street” game and Big Bird has PTSD from wasting too many people in Vietnam and then shoots up a building. As someone that grew up watching Sesame Street I would love to play this game. I know it wasn't your intention, but... That sounds rad as hell. Also, Kratos is absolutely a figure in greek myth. Just not like in the games. The games have always loosely adapted mythology. I'm kind of cu…

Lots of the details are incorrect. Let’s use the “Sesame Street” analogy because I’m glad you don’t think it sounds bad… my intention was to illustrate a concept that’s realistic and might be interesting to explore but uses a character that makes no sense to do it.

It’s like making a remake of Rambo with Elmo as the deadly killer man. Of course there will be people who are amused of the absurdity in that scenario and in general there isn’t much I can say to your taste, but if you’re going to make a story about Elmo Rambo, let’s not make a follow-up about how the Prophet Mohammed runs a gay club next.

Things I really hated: Odin is never a bad person in the mythology. A complicated one but he doesn’t trick people or deceive people, that’s Loki.

They didn’t understand that Freyja and Frigga are two different people. Yes, I know that Tim and Jim do sound similar but I assure you that doesn’t make them a single person.

Dwarves are wrong. Just, plain wrong.

Yggdrasil is completely wrong. It’s a metaphor, not so much a literal place.

And I can go on for every detail and gripe for hours.

Again, it’s because this is my religion that it is more deeply held as something to respect, but beyond that I don’t feel comfortable having others pretend to “draw lessons” about something which has been done incorrectly.

In other words, go ahead have your Elmo Rambo but don’t tell children that Elmo was born as a hard killer and then show them a machete.

Re: How God of War Ragnarok Handles the Effects of Alcoholism in a Family

#12

Post by maddumb » Sat, Dec 31, 2022, 1:33 AM UTC

lovich wrote: post #7

maddumb wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m also fine with a game/movie about Jesus but my point isn’t so much that the figure is a sacred cow (Passion of the Christ proved there’s a lot of interest, amongst other media) but rather that /when/ he is depicted the depictions tend to run along the respectful side because it is the religion of others. And it’s not about “faithful”. I’ve played the original games and obviously “Kratos” isn’t a historical Greek…

Be passionate all you want, I don't mind. I do disagree with most of your points though. For instance >To me the problem is when you want to /act/ like you’re a story game with a big dramatic plot and worldbuilding, why bother using a mythology if you’re going to piss all over it and get it entirely wrong? Not following the original story is orthogonal to having a big dramatic plot and worldbuilding. Its also just a…

Ok but you’re apparently not caring that it is sensitive and meaningful to me.

Would you make these games:

-Hitler game where you murder Jews and it is very sympathetic to Hitler.

-Mohammed game where he runs a gay nightclub that sells more alcohol than any other club on earth and in his spare time poses for nude portraits the player draws

-Slavery simulation, you play as a slave ship and it shows how you go from a poor family with a small farm to a big happy family with lots of slaves on a big farm!

-Judaism simulator! You orchestrate a large international conspiracy and the game shows every single Jewish person as conniving and evil

-Mongol horde simulator, go through china and rape until you die, textures are randomly generated and you see the Chinese that you kill have cheated on their taxes so it’s fine

The common thread between all of these awful experiences being they would show great disrespect to the material. If you truly believe “no sacred cows man haha!” Please make one of the above.

You can even make it a god of war game!

Re: How God of War Ragnarok Handles the Effects of Alcoholism in a Family

#13

Post by maddumb » Sat, Dec 31, 2022, 1:39 AM UTC

techhazard wrote: post #5

maddumb wrote: post #2

Ah yes, God of War , who are so unable to get any level of mythology correct their “Germanic” story is the equivalent of Jesus and a Chinese Emperor teaming up to defeat Hitler, who then reveals that he is simply a pawn of the Kellogg’s Cereal Company. Does that sound confusing and nonsensical to you? It /should/. God of War gets all of the details wrong and then opines about its own stupidity. If they do God of War:…

Do you have any references about what they got wrong and what the more traditional stories are? I expected they took some liberties for storytelling purposes, but if it’s as egregious as you make it out to be, I’d love to hear the common versions of the stories.

Ok so the main plot point is entirely wrong because they didn’t bother translating anything enough or caring about the mythology.

Odin’s wife is Frigg. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frigg

This is known kinda like, Luke is Leia’s sister, Mary is the mother of Jesus that type of thing. But the way you pronounce the name is nearly identical to Freyja. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freyja

Freyja is then in the game pretending to be Odin’s wife.

They get this fundamental detail wrong because they have such a poor understanding of the mythology. I’m trying to think of an equivalent for how wrong it is… like maybe using Mary Magdalene instead of Mary, Jesus’ mother as the Virgin Mary. She really wasn’t no virgin…

Re: How God of War Ragnarok Handles the Effects of Alcoholism in a Family

#14

Post by lovich » Sat, Dec 31, 2022, 2:48 AM UTC

maddumb wrote: post #4

lovich wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Id personally be fine with a take on Jesus that showed him as flawed. I kinda enjoyed Records of Ragnarok which was an anime/manga that brought in every religions icons too[1]. I don't think god of war ever sold itself as a faithful interpretation of the various religions they showed. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Record_of_Ragnarok

I’m also fine with a game/movie about Jesus but my point isn’t so much that the figure is a sacred cow (Passion of the Christ proved there’s a lot of interest, amongst other media) but rather that /when/ he is depicted the depictions tend to run along the respectful side because it is the religion of others. And it’s not about “faithful”. I’ve played the original games and obviously “Kratos” isn’t a historical Greek…

Saw your flagged comment, but I have actually seen several games like this. Think I recently saw “Sex with hitler 2” trending on steam for instance. My suggestion for you if you don’t like that content, is to not consume it. For instance I chose not to use play “Sex with Hitler 2”

Re: How God of War Ragnarok Handles the Effects of Alcoholism in a Family

#15

Post by lovich » Sat, Dec 31, 2022, 2:50 AM UTC

maddumb wrote: post #11

skyyler wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’s like doing a “Sesame Street” game and Big Bird has PTSD from wasting too many people in Vietnam and then shoots up a building. As someone that grew up watching Sesame Street I would love to play this game. I know it wasn't your intention, but... That sounds rad as hell. Also, Kratos is absolutely a figure in greek myth. Just not like in the games. The games have always loosely adapted mythology. I'm kind of cu…

Lots of the details are incorrect. Let’s use the “Sesame Street” analogy because I’m glad you don’t think it sounds bad… my intention was to illustrate a concept that’s realistic and might be interesting to explore but uses a character that makes no sense to do it. It’s like making a remake of Rambo with Elmo as the deadly killer man. Of course there will be people who are amused of the absurdity in that scenario and…

From someone who doesn’t share the same religion, this really comes off as you telling me we need to treat your story better than other stories. If I was amenable to that argument I likely would already be an adherent of your religion. As I’m not they’re both on the same category for me.