Warren Spector Comments "The Ultra Violence Has To Stop" and Why He Left Eidos

[The Youth Counselor]

Recently Warren Spector gave an interview where he opined and shared on gaming trends he finds disturbing, his reaction to the recent controversial Eidos trailers, why he left Eidos, and how he handled violence in Deus Ex.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...ce-has-to-stop

Warren Spector: The ultraviolence has to stop. We have to stop loving it. I just don't believe in the effects argument at all, but I do believe that we are fetishizing violence, and now in some cases actually combining it with an adolescent approach to sexuality. I just think it's in bad taste. Ultimately I think it will cause us trouble.

Q: Are you telling me you didn't like the Hitman: Absolution trailer?

Warren Spector: I left Eidos in 2004 because I looked around at E3 and saw the new Hitman game where you get to kill with a meat hook, and 25 to Life, the game about kids killing cops, and Crash & Burn the racing game where the idea is to create the fieriest, most amazing explosions, not to win the race... I looked around my own booth and realized I just had one of those 'which thing is not like the other' moments. I thought it was bad then, and now I think it's just beyond bad.

We've gone too far. The slow-motion blood spurts, the impalement by deadly assassins, the knives, shoulders, elbows to the throat. You know, Deus Ex had its moments of violence, but they were designed - whether they succeeded or not I can't say - but they were designed to make you uncomfortable, and I don't see that happening now. I think we're just appealing to an adolescent mindset and calling it mature. It's time to stop. I'm just glad I work for a company like Disney, where not only is that not something that's encouraged, you can't even do it, and I'm fine with it.

Q: You don't even think about that as something you're looking for.

Warren Spector: Absolutely not. I mean, there are spreading blood pools under innocent dogs when you kill them in Deus Ex, and I wanted you to feel disturbed if you actually pulled the trigger. It worked, or at least it worked on my wife, who still has not finished that game, by the way.

[JCpie]

There's already a discussion in the Hive but whatever.

[sonicsidewinder]

lol

[m G h m u o s]

I think its too late O__o The film industry has already disensitized extreme violence for so many.

The only way to truely shock someone now it to breach the next sense, like smelling the blood of guy who just got shot. Could be interesting for a video game character to have some reaction to killing someone like vomitting, but then again it didn't really hit me in MGS4.

[ColBashar]

I get what Spector is saying but I think this is more a matter of the game industry making it to the big leagues. The discussion of violence in video games is hardly new and becomes ancient history when you extend it to media as a whole. Games have just reached the level of sophistication (or, more accurately, PCs and consoles have reached the level of computational power) where games can have the same visceral impact as film. The "ultraviolence" as Spector puts it, isn't going to go away, though I do expect the ESRB to come in and sequester it more firmly. Where we're now seeing games compete the be the bloodiest and most violent, that will probably turn around as companies strive to reach a broader audience by conforming their games to the standards set for the "T for Teen" rating.

As to the future of gaming, I may not be a soothsayer but I think I have a good idea of where the industry is going. With the advent of crowd-funding through websites like kickstarter game developers are no longer entirely dependent on publishers to pay their all their bills. With consumers basically paying upfront for products that have not yet been developed, this allows developers the injection of capital needed to reach a level of development where publishers are more willing to invest their money. This will open the door for a more consumer driven industry and allow greater opportunity for niche developers to cater to their small corner.

Does this mean indie games are the future? Are AAA titles going the way of the dinosaur? Of course not. The game industry is not a monolithic being moving in a straight line, it's a community that will grow in every direction at once, slowing where it meets resistance and rushing to where it finds none. The big budget, ultraviolent titles Spector saw around him at E3 are like the big budget summer blockbusters of Hollywood, high spenders and high earners. Epic Mickey by contrast is The King's Speech or Million Dollar Baby, it may be critically acclaimed and universally honoured as a work of art, but that doesn't mean it's going to rake in Michael Bay level profits.

But Disney isn't funding Epic Mickey for the sake of profit, the money they make in earnings is secondary to the much bigger picture of keeping their meme alive and expanding it to new environments. Had Spector proposed the same game but with entirely new IP then it would either still be nothing more than a design prospectus -or- entered into development with a much smaller budget and set of expectations.

So whether it's the four man indie developer working out of somebody's garage, the sophisticated social networking app, or the 800-man big budget production, all of these bring me to the same conclusion. The games industry has reached adulthood. They keys to the city are no longer in the hands of one group, be it the programmers of the 80s-90s who monopolized the skills, or the suits of the 90s-oughts who monopolized the capital. Pretty soon I expect we'll even see government subsidies for game development much in the same manner as the European style film councils.

So I don't really see Spector's observations of E3 as representative of the game industry as a whole so much as of the convention itself. It's E3 that's changed and it's those changes that are sad, in that they are the manifestation of a lost childhood. I don't blame him; I'd be upset, too. But while one particular, and very visible, segment of the game industry does seem to be trending toward more visceral and adolescent themes, I don't believe it's representative of the industry as a whole. I recently played an adventure game in which it was impossible to die. That's a far cry from the Roberta Williams style of game that seemed to take special delight in finding many different ways to kill off the protagonist. Not all games trend toward violence and the only reason it's become a serious discussion now (as opposed to when it was silly in the 90s) is not because the -quantity- of the violence portrayed in games has increased but the -quality- of it has in terms of the dramatic improvement seen in graphics.

But this article also highlights why I really wish Warren Spector -would- make another shooter. The fact that he's critical of the genre, or the direction it is heading, tells me that he is just the right sort of person who would be able to do an action game properly. Breaking into the Paris hotel and having Icarus suggest I re-evaluate my motives for riffling through an innocent stranger's property did make me stop and think about the actions that I was performing. While I wouldn't steal in real life, outright theft has been a trope of RPGs since the early days to the point where it is SOP to gamers. Deus Ex helped me re-evaluate my gaming experience and encouraged me to approach games not merely from a standpoint of effectiveness but also morality. I might have no qualms about gunning down MJ12 troopers en mass, but there was no way I was going to harm Private Lloyd, Sgt. Berry, or the host of other UNATCO troopers who but a few hours ago were fighting at my side, or the riot cops whose only crime was to show up at work in Hell's Kitchen, or the US Marines performing their duty in guarding their post from sneaky super-spies.

[Romeo]

Frankly, I think this comes across as incredibly hypocritical. When I do violence, it's only because I want to make you uncomfortable. But if someone else does violence? Clearly it's a problem. Yes, we have assassins stabbing you in the throat these days. Yes we have a gun with a chainsaw bayonet on it. Yes, we have snapped necks in Deus Ex 3. We also had literally exploding bodies in the original Deus Ex.

I will concede that the Hitman trailer was awful (In ways beyond the violent nature of it), but for Spector to condemn people for making violent games when nearly all of his are too screams of a double-standard.

[68_pie]

/merge

[Romeo]

Nah, generally Spector-reports are kept outside the Hive, I'll leave this be.

[Pinky_Powers]

Anyone who makes a Wii-only Disney game has no right to comment on the industry as a whole. He no longer participates in the industry.

Yes, I'm still pissed that Epic Mickey didn't come out on PC.

[ColBashar]

Bear in mind the distinction that Spector isn't condemning violence, Romeo. What he's condemning is "ultraviolence", which I interpret to mean gratuitous or violence for the sake of itself. Basically he's drawing a line in the sand and saying this is the point that he won't cross. I may not agree with his sentiment but I don't think it makes him a hypocrite.

Bear in mind also that DX is the first shooter that I know of where it's possible to complete the game without actually killing anybody. Okay, maybe it is preceded by Thief, but being a Looking Glass game it's not a far stretch that he influenced or was influenced by that game. So as violent as DX was, he still gave the player the option as to the degree of force he wanted to utilize to achieve objectives. Contrast that to the majority of shooters where killing is a requirement to complete the game.

Spector could have made a pedantic game where non-lethal actions were made eminently preferable, perhaps through experience point bonuses (!) or making the attacks silent (!) but he instead he made it equal if not more difficult than outright killing. That's not because he endorses the taking of life but because he wanted to create a moral quandary. Does the player take the quick and easy Dark Side path or choose the more difficult but righteous option? He tries to offer suggestions through dialogue but avoids forcing the player's hand (Anna Navarre being the odd exception).

I think Spector's issue with E3 today compared to year 2000 is really twofold. First, over the last action games as a genre have taken the lion's share of development capital, which in turn increases their visibility at E3. Strategy games and adventure games can be made relatively on the cheap, which is why these are often made by niche developers who have little or no representation at the convention. To make a competing action game almost demands a large budget and large budgets attract media attention.

Second, I suspect that the advance in graphics technology has made games seem a little bit too real for him. As he stated in the article, the motion capture rig he's using for Epic Mickey is even more complex than the one used by Peter Jackson in Lord of the Rings. That's a far cry from the wooden key frame animations of Deus Ex. I'm guessing that games have breached the uncanny valley and where he didn't have a problem killing poorly rendered objects, the level of realism modern graphic engines offer makes representations of violence more disturbing to him.

Mainly I think he just sees where the industry has gone and wants to step back the clock a bit to the "good old days". To a certain extent it's not very different from many arguments I've seen on this forum from people talking about how gameplay was better in DX even as HR marks an improvement in almost every other regard.

[IwantedOrange]

He's abolutely right about that. This trend let people love violence. Nobody wants to get hurt, but when the violence is in a game, they start loving it. That is sick!
And many gamers (expecially young gamers) simply don't understand the danger for their mind, and how virtual violence affects their personality, reactions and attitudes. They think in their ignorance, that it's just a game. But the influence is there. The preparedness for real violence is going up.

[68_pie]

Originally Posted by Romeo

Nah, generally Spector-reports are kept outside the Hive, I'll leave this be.

It was more a complaint that he jacked my news item and couldn't be arsed to check whether it had already been posted

[m G h m u o s]

He's abolutely right about that. This trend let people love violence. Nobody wants to get hurt, but when the violence is in a game, they start loving it. That is sick!

A lot of games give the ability for a character to sprint, yet many gamers still don't get their recommended daily excercise? How is this possible? How is this physically, humanly possible? Seriously, even on a molecular level this just makes no darn sense.

I mean I played a game where I zoom into giant pink stars as a robot rainbow unicorn and I've been launching myself into night sky ever since.

[-=fox=-]

Originally Posted by m G h m u o s

A lot of games give the ability for a character to sprint, yet many gamers still don't get their recommended daily excercise? How is this possible? How is this physically, humanly possible? Seriously, even on a molecular level this just makes no darn sense.

I mean I played a game where I zoom into giant pink stars as a robot rainbow unicorn and I've been launching myself into night sky ever since.

I certainly believe that media (including fictional media) does influence people on various levels and to various degrees. Even more so if something gets repeated over and over again. Just look how successful advertising psychology is.

[Romeo]

Originally Posted by ColBashar

Bear in mind the distinction that Spector isn't condemning violence, Romeo. What he's condemning is "ultraviolence", which I interpret to mean gratuitous or violence for the sake of itself. Basically he's drawing a line in the sand and saying this is the point that he won't cross. I may not agree with his sentiment but I don't think it makes him a hypocrite.

Bear in mind also that DX is the first shooter that I know of where it's possible to complete the game without actually killing anybody. Okay, maybe it is preceded by Thief, but being a Looking Glass game it's not a far stretch that he influenced or was influenced by that game. So as violent as DX was, he still gave the player the option as to the degree of force he wanted to utilize to achieve objectives. Contrast that to the majority of shooters where killing is a requirement to complete the game.

Spector could have made a pedantic game where non-lethal actions were made eminently preferable, perhaps through experience point bonuses (!) or making the attacks silent (!) but he instead he made it equal if not more difficult than outright killing. That's not because he endorses the taking of life but because he wanted to create a moral quandary. Does the player take the quick and easy Dark Side path or choose the more difficult but righteous option? He tries to offer suggestions through dialogue but avoids forcing the player's hand (Anna Navarre being the odd exception).

I think Spector's issue with E3 today compared to year 2000 is really twofold. First, over the last action games as a genre have taken the lion's share of development capital, which in turn increases their visibility at E3. Strategy games and adventure games can be made relatively on the cheap, which is why these are often made by niche developers who have little or no representation at the convention. To make a competing action game almost demands a large budget and large budgets attract media attention.

Second, I suspect that the advance in graphics technology has made games seem a little bit too real for him. As he stated in the article, the motion capture rig he's using for Epic Mickey is even more complex than the one used by Peter Jackson in Lord of the Rings. That's a far cry from the wooden key frame animations of Deus Ex. I'm guessing that games have breached the uncanny valley and where he didn't have a problem killing poorly rendered objects, the level of realism modern graphic engines offer makes representations of violence more disturbing to him.

Mainly I think he just sees where the industry has gone and wants to step back the clock a bit to the "good old days". To a certain extent it's not very different from many arguments I've seen on this forum from people talking about how gameplay was better in DX even as HR marks an improvement in almost every other regard.

Again, we're talking about an individual who's most famous game can have you enemies explode in to tiny chunks of meat. In what manner is that considered violence for the sake of violence? It doesn't make me any more uncomfortable than any other violent game, he didn't do it in some unique and mature manner. It would be different if these characters we could kill were unique, and had backstories like family, dreams and aspirations, and the like. Sure, then the mutilation might provoke some sympathy and unease. But as it is, the gibbing in Deus Ex was no more mature than it was in the Unreal series, for example. Which brings me back to my first point: Extremely hypocritical.

Originally Posted by 68_pie

It was more a complaint that he jacked my news item and couldn't be arsed to check whether it had already been posted

Fair enough, I can understand the frustration.

Originally Posted by -=fox=-

I certainly believe that media (including fictional media) does influence people on various levels and to various degrees. Even more so if something gets repeated over and over again. Just look how successful advertising psychology is.

I can agree with that. But on a basic, psychological level, there is a division between our media and our thought process in almost all circumstances. I have never played Battlefield and thought "I'm really in the mood to shoot someone now." And the same goes for virtually any individual on Earth. Those who do have such a thought were likely already suffering severe psychological issues to begin with, and would've found an excuse even without gaming or other media.

One thing I will give you however is desensitization. I showed my younger brother the opening fifteen minutes of Saving Private Ryan last week. Horrifying glimpse of what humanity is capable of doing to itself, and a depressing look at our history. My brother watched that and thought it looked silly, because he would've just done what he does in Call of Duty. He's become too detatched from the violence, it didn't strike him that he'd be watching his friends ripped to ribbons around him.

[SDF121]

somewhat relevant...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSBn7...ure=plpp_video

[JCpie]

Originally Posted by Romeo

Again, we're talking about an individual who's most famous game can have you enemies explode in to tiny chunks of meat. In what manner is that considered violence for the sake of violence? It doesn't make me any more uncomfortable than any other violent game, he didn't do it in some unique and mature manner. It would be different if these characters we could kill were unique, and had backstories like family, dreams and aspirations, and the like. Sure, then the mutilation might provoke some sympathy and unease. But as it is, the gibbing in Deus Ex was no more mature than it was in the Unreal series, for example. Which brings me back to my first point: Extremely hypocritical.

I guess it IS hypocritical, but I wouldn't say "extremely". Deus Ex doesn't have people blindly break the Geneva Conventions every ten minutes, and Deus Ex doesn't force you to torture someone to advance through the game. Violence isn't the sole selling point of Deus Ex.

Spector is mainly addressing the quantity and emphasis of the violence, and how much more graphic and hyped it has become, rather than condoning any inclusion of violence in a game.

Originally Posted by Romeo

One thing I will give you however is desensitization. I showed my younger brother the opening fifteen minutes of Saving Private Ryan last week. Horrifying glimpse of what humanity is capable of doing to itself, and a depressing look at our history. My brother watched that and thought it looked silly, because he would've just done what he does in Call of Duty. He's become too detatched from the violence, it didn't strike him that he'd be watching his friends ripped to ribbons around him.

I remember people laughing at the arm scene and people saying how stupid they were. I also remember watching a film about Gandhi in that same class, people laughing at peaceful protesters being beaten with sticks.


Band of Brothers is better.

[-=fox=-]

Originally Posted by SDF121

somewhat relevant...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSBn7...ure=plpp_video

Yes, some interesting aspects, that I hadn't considered yet. His DXHR-review is very interesting, too -> make sure to watch it, EM!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X43i8...feature=relmfu

Originally Posted by JCpie

Band of Brothers is better.

Brotherhood is even better.

Originally Posted by Romeo

But on a basic, psychological level, there is a division between our media and our thought process in almost all circumstances. I have never played Battlefield and thought "I'm really in the mood to shoot someone now." And the same goes for virtually any individual on Earth. Those who do have such a thought were likely already suffering severe psychological issues to begin with, and would've found an excuse even without gaming or other media.

But it's not really a division as you call it, I'd envision it more like a permeatable membrane that's betwen a person's psyche and external input. As you said, desensitisation is quite real and I doubt that this is the only effect there is.

[Pinky_Powers]

Originally Posted by -=fox=-

Yes, some interesting aspects, that I hadn't considered yet. His DXHR-review is very interesting, too -> make sure to watch it, EM!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X43i8...feature=relmfu

I don't understand his complaint about the various perspectives on augmentation HR presents. Why is it wrong that we see different people with different opinions? And why is it wrong that some of those opinions might seem vaguely nonsensical? That seems remarkably realistic to me, and much better than having only one domineering perspective we are asked to agree with.

On the other hand, I do agree with most everything else he says, particularly that they don't go deep enough into fleshing these arguments out.

[sonicsidewinder]

Originally Posted by 68_pie

It was more a complaint that he jacked my news item and couldn't be arsed to check whether it had already been posted

I'm with you, lad. I recognise your bringing to the fore-front of this knowledge.

[Romeo]

Originally Posted by JCpie

I guess it IS hypocritical, but I wouldn't say "extremely". Deus Ex doesn't have people blindly break the Geneva Conventions every ten minutes, and Deus Ex doesn't force you to torture someone to advance through the game. Violence isn't the sole selling point of Deus Ex.

Spector is mainly addressing the quantity and emphasis of the violence, and how much more graphic and hyped it has become, rather than condoning any inclusion of violence in a game.



I remember people laughing at the arm scene and people saying how stupid they were. I also remember watching a film about Gandhi in that same class, people laughing at peaceful protesters being beaten with sticks.


Band of Brothers is better.

I do. Eidos doesn't have violence for any worse a reason than he ever has. Yes, the trailer for the last Hitman was awful, and it was berated as such. But it doesn't represent the game's levels of violence, and it certainly doesn't reflect Eidos' overall game library. Hell, the Deus Ex WITHOUT Spector has been the least violent one so far.

Yeah, I almost feel like some people have lost touch with how horrifying things are when you're in the situation. You see a guy spin at the track then go off-course, and you'll wonder why he's taking so long getting back on track. You do that yourself, and you have to suppress your instinct to stay put because your body thinks you're about to die. And that's to say nothing of the even more horrifying implications of being cut-down en masse in a war situation. And overall Band of Brothers is a great movie to me, but the opening 15 minutes in Saving Private Ryan are untouchable in their quality, in my books. Curiously, the next most intense war scene to me isn't even in a war film - Children of Men's "final act" is the next best one (In my opinion).

[Caradoc]

I don't know what to think about Spector these days. I respect him ofcourse for the work he has done. His resume of games speaks for itself. Because of Dx1 I will always see him as a game dev guru, but regarding his comments about video game violence... i wonder if it is a disney company man speaking or Spector himself?

I'm not personally intrested in Disney games, atleast arcade type jumping games which Epic mickey seems to be. The game has a stunning art style and I adore all the references to the classic cartoons etc, but as a video game I doubt i'd enjoy the jumping platform type gameplay.

I quess i can understand his desire to try something entirely different for a chance and IW fiasko likely has something do with that decision as well, but I wished he had made a pc rpg instead of a console arcade game :|

[Kodaemon]

Originally Posted by Romeo

the Deus Ex WITHOUT Spector has been the least violent one so far.

Has it, now?

[Shralla]

Originally Posted by JCpie

I remember people laughing at the arm scene and people saying how stupid they were. I also remember watching a film about Gandhi in that same class, people laughing at peaceful protesters being beaten with sticks.

People are immature and they laugh at things that make them feel uncomfortable. Sure some of them may have genuinely found it funny, but most of it is just a defense mechanism, which I think is a fairly healthy response.

[Romeo]

Originally Posted by Kodaemon

Has it, now?

Deus Ex: The ability to turn your enemies in to tiny bits of meat.
Invisible War: Every shot rewarded with an eruption of blood.
Human Revolution: Almost no blood to speak of.

Originally Posted by Shralla

People are immature and they laugh at things that make them feel uncomfortable. Sure some of them may have genuinely found it funny, but most of it is just a defense mechanism, which I think is a fairly healthy response.

Aye, I think I can agree with that. Not universally, but in some cases. You can always tell the difference though. One seems nervous and confused, the other seems to be genuinely enjoying it.