» Mon Dec 12, 2011 1:02 am
A constructive arachnophobic topic!
Thank you for not railing that the game shouldn't have spiders or that it's insensitive to arachnophobes.
I view a disabling phobia as something like an allergy. I know two people who are peanut allergic. One of them to the level of "If I accidentally ingest microscopic amounts of peanut oil used in cooking, I will most likely die". Even that guy doesn't think that cooking with peanut oil should be disallowed. He just makes very sure to find out whether a place uses it, and doesn't go there if so. Or if he does for social reasons, he finds out if they have anything that's definitely safe and has that.
What I'm saying is, fear of a virtual spider never killed anyone. You can call it playing on a tired trope to have giant spiders in a fantasy adventure RPG setting, but I call it good fun and setting appropriate. Removing them for arachnophobes (from the game as a whole, obviously modding them out would be great since it's optional - and I bring this up because it's been asked elsewhere) would be like asking a bakery to change their recipes because they use peanut oil. A real problem in both cases, but a problem that should be addressed by the afflicted individual by dealing with it as best they can by research and avoidance, or in the case of plucky arachnophobes, taking out your frustrations on virtual targets.
By the way, I also know a psychiatrist who thinks killing the object of your phobia virtually is a great therapy tool.