Realism, How far should it be taken

you play a nameless character, not joan or arc or jan zizka, or even some minor notable history character. you’re literally anonymous, so your actions will likely be confined to believable fiction. helping poor people…by proxy of helping your lord perform some service, guarding his property, etc, makes more sense in the context of this game than a “journey to power”

Now you’re looking awfully misinformed…again. So go to the “game” page and read about our “hero” “The son of a blacksmith will emerge a hero” So yeah, you pretty much are like Joan d’arc or any other random hero figure that became plucked from obscurity by their actions.

if he was like joan of arc, we’d know about him from history books. clearly, he’s nameless. apparently the paradox went over your head.

Ok well now I see where we are divided. The setting the fighting the clothing are historically accurate, but this game is a fiction. This is a historically accurate setting, but the story isn’t one from history, but written by the developers.

Actually, it’s a mix of both. A historical story bent a bit here and there, filled with our stuff where gaps were left by the time. The hero is not nameless technically speaking, his name is Jindřich/Henry. But I guess 213 is talking about his historical existence. I am not sure if we confirmed whether Henry is or isn’t a historical figure si I will leave that question unanswered.

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My opinion, take it or leave it, but I think that we need to we careful that we are not stereotyping in order to create a digital reality. If we want to create realism it needs to be appropriate for the playing audience and represent fairly the period in which it is intended to be set. Making broad assumptions about the way that society was may be relatable to our modern perception of living, but will not necessarily throw players into the ‘real’ 15th century world. Cancer and homosexuality ‘didn’t exist’ in that time. Not because they were not happening, but because there was often no stigma or understanding attached to them. Fundamental Christians - particularly the Catholic religion would have been hugely supportive of anything that was ‘written in stone’ in the Bible including ideas such as Leviticus’ ‘Do not lie with a man’ but at the same time the rise of Protestantism at the beginning of the 16th Century must have been a backlash at the strict and controlling preaching of the Church, hence the more liberal ideas about marriage and social relations that developed. Cancer was not formally recognised until the 18th century, but has been technically recorded for almost 3000 years.

Including all the aforementioned ideas into the game is neither a positive nor negative thing, provided they are treated appropriately and help create the immersive word that the developers are trying to provide. If you are going to claim it to be a natural and realistic world then these things ought at least be considered and appropriated into the possibilities within the engine. I don’t want to see rape, ever, whether in reality or a game, but it would certainly provide me with an interesting and immersive moral conundrum that would set the game aside from anything I have ever played before…

Incidentally by ‘avoiding’ topics like homosexuality or failing to include them because it would ‘complicate’ the reality that is being created, you are actually raising a greater issue that we assume that topics such as religious motivation or sexuality are not or were not part of a ‘normal’ day to day world, which they are. Homosexuality does not complicate the reality that is being created, it is a natural dimension that by all rights and purposes of an augmented-reality game, should just be there without question. This does not mean that you need to have stereotypically camp or overtly forward ‘gay’ characters (why is it that people seem to imagine gay people as sexual predators?!) to make things ‘equal’ but character profiles, including NPCs should have the possibility (perhaps with low percentage to represent realistic statistics?) of carrying a particular sexuality/religious trait, just as they should have a particular temperament, skill or social status (perceived or otherwise)

That’s my thought anyway. I’m interested to know what people think.

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your reasoning for why homosexuality should “just be there” is rather tenuous.

it’s not about complication, but time and resource management. why spend time on that when there are so much other more interesting facets of the medieval setting?

i just see people applying modern understanding of homosexuality. like people made signals at corners to have gay encounters or such. very doubtful homosexuality was practiced in any way that would lend itself to meaningful portrayal beyond “social issue”, and life-long closet cases would be far likelier.

I agree with everything @ltdew said. That’s exactly what I believe as well, except said much more eloquently than I could say myself. Especially the points about how avoiding the topic altogether is an even greater issue.

@213 seems to not be reading anything anyone has said so far though. I haven’t seen anyone advocate for openly gay characters. I don’t see how something like an optional side quest dealing with homosexuality would take any extra time or resources. It would take the same amount of time as any other side quest dealing with a facet of medieval society.

This game is set in 1403, a period in Czech history rife with religious and social tensions. If they were going to make a game trying to avoid social issues, they should have set it in a different time.

And anyways, medieval treatment of homosexuality is extremely relevant to the modern controversies surrounding homosexuality. It’s in fact the historical predecessor to them. There was very little stigma attached to homosexuality in the western world before the rise and spread of christianity and monotheism in general (There was still some - but that’s a different topic). Most of the modern preconceptions and anti-homosexual sentiments come from these periods of religious dominance of society.

Speak for yourself of about how interesting it is or isn’t. For those of us interested in all facets of past societies, it would be very interesting.

Really, if homosexuality had been a non-issue at the time, there would be no need to write write religious and secular laws detailing punishments for it. Or any reason for historical sources to mention it at all.

While I understand to an extent where you are coming from, you have to remember that speaking or writing about sexuality was taboo until very recently - so unless you have been reading only primary historical documents about the period, any more modern sources would be heavily biased against historical sexuality based topics. It’s a comparatively new scholarly field.

EDIT: Some small changes. Also, wanted to link to this old but interesting article on this very subject: http://h2g2.com/edited_entry/A7715315

Interesting points from the article:

  • Homosexuality as a word seems to have first been used in the 19th century. Before that, homosexual acts were lumped in with the rest of sodomy.
  • “Interestingly, it was thought that any man was capable of performing a homosexual act, a view very different to the idea of innate sexuality that we tend to think today.”

The author of the article is supposedly a historian. It would have been nice if they included a better bibliography though. Still worth a read.

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@ltdew & @abinhof Well said mates.

This thread used to not be a clone of [homosexuality in game][1] but than people stated to suggest it was and it became one. Funny enough I don’t think it’s Madras doing at all.

So now i’m considering quoting myselfe from over there.

there i actually did it!
[1]: Homosexuality in gaming

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What if combat were something like this?
http://forum.kingdomcomerpg.com/uploads/default/10096/b07527561e60bb8e.png

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that would be some realistic combat :stuck_out_tongue:
in all seriousness, as a suggestion for realism regarding weapons in the game; a longsword at this period should be rather inexpensive, but you shouldn’t be allowed to wear it in towns as it was the high status symbol of a knight.
EDIT: unless there was a way to be knighted in game, you shouldn’t be allowed to wear them. my mistake

Have you guys watched AC Unity?

The crowd is so real…there was a bunch of 4 ppl draggin a body to sell it in the mortuary

that’s sarcasm right?

nope, its just a thumbs up

There are good crowd systems out there, so it can be done (apart from what game has it).

The point is to make it immersive so the player can feel it.

a lot lacks from AC unity amazing game but nothing really happens in the day to day life of the people its all repetitive so i wouldnt take much from unity apart from the advances in graphics

whatever you guys are arguing about realism and specific in game actions: chill out, there’s gonna be a mod for it :slight_smile:

Technically No homosexuals did not exist back then, the term itself didn’t exist until the early 1900’s.

There is very little to zero evidence that people even defined themselves sexually until the 19th century.
History of homosexual terminology, Ancient Rome

During the time period in which our game takes place the Church and its political views were in place so those caught performing same sex acts or other sexual acts deemed sinful were punished harshly.
The Middle Ages, Homosexuality in medieval Europe, Punishment in medieval times

So based on the above information we can develop an understanding of the potential mentality our Character would have had in the time/setting of our game.

A. would not feel a social need to define his sexual practices
B. if he was interested in a same sex relationship he would have to hide it for fear of potentially being killed.
C. would more then likely have be indoctrinated since youth to share the same opinions as the church and the rest of society at large.

the above statement (although insensitive) is very true, especially with the arguments that have been presented by some.

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As a concept no then rain would not have existed.

No quite the opposite I proved the point that you are approaching the concept of homosexuality 611 years ago with modern concepts that would have not been applicable to the time period.

Persons in that time who had same sex relationships would not have had a term for it ( at-least not historically recorded ), the church however used the term Sodomite in a derogatory sense to explain those who performed oral, anal, or acts of bestiality.

Any same sex relationships would have been kept away from public attention for fear of persecution.

So no I never said it didn’t exist I merely pointed out your understanding of the concept did not exist.

to what extent we will have relationships in this game is not yet fully known so to argue whether or not we should have the choice to be with a same sex partner is pointless.

I personally don’t care if its implemented I just want it to be historically accurate which means that:

A. it would have been kept so secret its not noticed, thus being pointless.

B. the individuals whose relationship became public knowledge more then likely would have been publicly punished for it, and frankly I don’t think public executions of homosexuals in a game will go over to well for WarHorses PR.

Human rights and equal rights are concept of the 20th century so lets stop trying to be time police.

If you choose to respond I suggest reading these to posts that happen to only be just a lil north of mine.
Post 53, Itdew
Post 55, abinhof

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work on your reading comprehension.

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