It's funny, because I've seen blood go flying without that. There are videos or people gushing blood. Check them out. Now imagine it with it. It would cause way more damage than a rifle bullet to an un-armored opponent. No need to get snarky.

I agree, an option for this is always the best option,that way people get what they want. But i will say,that sometimes the animations themselves are more brutal than seeing the blood.
I would like a little more gore,because it makes sense with what we do and use in these games,though i do agree fallout was over the top. Like you said people are free to agree or disagree,this is why options are important. Gore in general is blood,breaks,guts etc,but like i said,animations can look far worse in some cases,and kids/younger people can put two and two together.

I got my 10 year nephew into oblivion,he loves it,me and his dad deemed it ok for him,whether there is blood or not. He was actually more worried about language,but in general the elder scrolls does not have bad language. The "option" ( key word here ) to turn blood/gore off is good,for the reason you mentioned,but we can't turn off brutal animations.I also doubt we can turn people getting burnt off too,which is just as brutal in my eyes....Each to their own

You didn't even see the worst of it. No machinegun necessary, you could do the same thing to a Raider by sniping with a BB gun.

Of course, some peoples' idea of "realistic" comes from playing video games where a "warhammer" consists of a tractor-trailer with a handle attached, or a well-thrown punch will remove body parts.

The bit about Almalexia isn't "on topic", but I'd tend to be more sympathetic toward that idea than having absurd and excessive gore.

Question by someone here on the forums: "Also what are your opinions on full on nudity and realistic gore and brutality, if you had a say in it would it be an option, just for the sake of making a game realistic and deep, kinda like the elderscrolls games have tried to be since the start."

Wise answer by a wise dev on the forums: "I fully concur. Sometimes, after playtesting through a quest, I'll sit back and feel...I don't know. A lacuna. Something missing, you know? Like, we were reaching for something great, but just didn't quite make it there. It's times like these that I wonder that maybe, just maybe, if the designer had free rein to add nudity and constant, almost distracting levels of gore to the quest, that they would hit that spark, that fire of a really awesome narrative that would make the game "great" for me. Don't get me wrong. Afterwards, I'll spend hours, sometimes a full work-day, researching all sorts of graphic brutality, just to get my fix, you know? But, it's not the same as being able to do it in-game, to see those corpses and nipbles in real-time. If only, if only...

(Please take the above as a joke. I was laying it on pretty thick, but if it wasn't clear, no, I'm fine with our current level of gore and nudity, thanks. )"

*moderator note: never edit a moderators edit or warning will ensue*

I think I've seen a video where you can cut of someones leg if you shoot him with flamethrower for too long, but I think that there were mods used.
Part about Almalexia was just a joke.

I agree, the lack of effects on the body really is a realism turn-off. i dont want to feel like a guy with a club, wacking a dummy, i want my sword to leave scars, sever limbs, and cause bleeding. As for gor and organs like l4d, i dont care much. You have to take into account that L4d was centered around gore. That is the main theme of the game, therefore had to have great ammounts of effort put into its immersive qualities. Not to mention that a decaying zombie would be a lot easier to cut down than a brawny Nord. So, forget about explicit gore and bloodymess-esque qualities, but id love to see that my sword is actually not a club. i mean really, if i spend 3 minutes slaughtering a mountain troll in heated combat, his body shouldnt be glistening with perfection in the sunlight after he falls. After a brutal fight, i want to be able to look down and tell that it was a brutal fight afterwards.

Other than to simply dismiss it by saying that it is "not adding anything" or "just isn't the way TES has been" which are really non-argument cop outs... I'd like someone to explain really why anyone wouldn't want some more realism in the combat graphics? Maybe "realistic gore" as the thread title says would be too much, I personally also don't think that we need guts and brains falling out, but how in the world is it undesirable to add some mesh deformations for localized wounds, even some rare decapitations or limb severing for killing blows that are power attacks, and blood that remains on the ground for more than a few seconds? I don't want explosive "hyper realistic" or "unrealistic" gore myself, no fountains of blood and body parts flying off constantly, but I can't even understand the mindset that with increased graphical capabilities that anyone would not want to improve upon an aspect of the game that is lacking. What does it add? It adds a sense of realism, emotion, accomplishment, and gravitas to the combat as well as ties the graphics and physics together with the actions taking place so as to remove the "something is wrong here" feeling of having just had a brutal fight only to have your opponent looking lie they are asleep instead of dead. I just don't get the opposition to fixing these flaws at all.

Imagine watching an epic movie with lots of combat, and every time someone dies they just lay down and look asleep, and there is no blood at all... it would be very distracting and unacceptable... cheezey and weird. Its no different in TES.

Isn't it already good? Watch the trailer and you can see blood spurting from the undead warrior getting ax'd in the face and the Dovahkiin getting blood stained while fighting that dragon. Cuts, bruises, scars and broken armors and swords is good enough for me.

Although I don't want Fallout unrealistic gore (shot from a pistol and the entire body explodes...) I do want realistic gore...so yeah I agree with the OP.

And here's the interesting thing (again, pointing out the differences between people & opinions).



To me, that first sentence? Sounds like "explicit gore and bloodymess-esque qualities" to me.

You have an awesome signature!

Sure. The more realistic the better. Bur at the same time, if you're going to go that far, which requires a level of maturity, then you should be able to accept nudity at the same time. You can't honestly be okay with cutting into a person's gut and see intestines untwine out, yet have some arbitrary notions about nudity.



That sounds like a personal problem. . . And also, you're whipped. :rolleyes:

I really want gore, and I also get sick to death of the anti-gore crowd thinking they are superior to everyone else. If you ask 'Why should we have gore?', then I'll ask you why we shouldn't have gore.

Because I would like to be able to play it when my grandkids are in the room. And I would like just enough to know I'm doing damage but not so much as to take away from hitting with a sword and not doing much damage because my stats are low and because I just don't need to see all that gore to know I did damage. A small spatter of blood conveys the same message. It's a desire to play a game, some game with less blood and no severed limbs. It's my preference just like you have your preference and I am in no way superior to anyone I assure you. But I can and do express my desire to not have over the top gore in every single game I play. Some games should be left less gory because some people prefer it. There are a massive number of games with massive gore out there. Why oh why does this one have to have it also? Oblivion style gore fit the game well. It was enough and yet still little enough I didn't have to worry overly much about the kids being here for a visit.

And, I got the message I was doing major damage despite it not having over the top gore. :shrug:

Being able to impale my sword into my enemies stomach as a finishing move is good enough for me.

But OB got an M rating didn't it? It has burning corpses hanging from hooks and bodies turned inside out as skin sacks for treasure chests, as well as some disturbing themes and pretty nasty looking zombies. Its not a game for kids in the first place, and it shouldn't be tailored to children... games that aspire to photo-realistic graphics and physics need to have the actions that the characters in that environment take part in more closely match that level of realism. Leave the non-gore games to cartoony and stylized games like platformers and jrpgs... games with real substance and photo-realism should have gore just as much as they should have wind in the tree branches and realistic facial expressions.

And another way to look at it....

Two basic options presented are
1) Gore
2) No gore (minor blood decals/whatever)

Two basic groups presented are
1) Want gore (realism, and/or "it's cool/wicked/edgy", etc)
2) Don't want gore (don't like it; can't stand it; don't want to upset others nearby, parents or children, etc)

Four combinations:
1) Gore + Likes Gore = will play the game
2) Gore + Don't like gore = good odds of not playing the game
3) No gore + Likes Gore = good odds of playing the game (but wishing it was better)
4) No gore + Don't like gore = will play the game


Basically, the loss for not having gore (gore fans annoyed that it could have been better, but still likely to play) might not be as bad as the loss for having gore (anti-gore fans more likely to skip it, or be forced to skip it)


Now, maybe I'm wrong. But I know from reading movie sites that the "I wish it were R rated and covered in blood" fans still seem to watch the PG-13 action flicks. Whereas I know that I skip the R-rated action movies that I would otherwise have seen, because they dump an extra bucket of guts on it. (Watchmen, for example)

:shrug:

If you don't want them seeing gore, then they shouldn't be in the room.

I don't think there is too much risk of children becoming traumatized because their grandparents sat and played games while they watched, my Grandfather used to take me for walks in the countryside for heaven's sake!

Is it really the point that people "will play it" though? Things shouldn't have to be watered down to people's sensibilities. I am in the crowd that thinks video games have been elevated to the level of a true art form... and this sort of "make everyone happy" stuff dilutes the pure expressions of that art form. Censorship and ratings and keeping things tame for the sake of marketability are crimes against the human spirit IMO... its not a matter of subjective taste in if you like gore or don't like gore. Powerful art makes us examine thing in greater detail, be confronted head-on with things both breathtakingly beautiful and unbearably ugly, in an unbridled way, not commercialized and tamed to make everything vanilla. Will I play Skyrim without gore? Yes. Is it diminishing its artistic credence to omit it? Yes.

It was rated T when it first was released and later changed.



There are plenty of games I don't play when they are around. That said, if you read all my posts in this thread you would know that is not the only reason. It's got to do with style and the style of TES has always been to focus on other aspects of the game. For one, how do you make a sword hit with realistic gore if your stats are low? You will need to hit them with a sword maybe 30 times to kill them. Realistically they would be cut to pieces by then. But in order to make stats matter there would be little damage done for the first 10 or 15 blows. How would you make an RPG seem realistic in combat and make it seem like you were cutting them to shreads?

I am satisfied with the amount of gore that has always been present in TES. But I do not want more. Oblivion was fine and it was done with taste.

And btw, I walk a mile each and every day and when the Grandkids are here I walk with them. When Oblivion came out, my grandkids lived with me for heaven's sake. We have an opened walled house and I would have had to play in the bathroom to have the door closed. I guess parents and grandparents should just stop gaming. (that won't happen)

I sure want more gore than in Oblivion, but although I love it in Fallout it shouldn't be as much as in FO.

Exploding body parts don't need to be in, except maybe for a spell or two.

Dismemberment has to be in, I mean at least for axes/ swords. If you get attacked by a group of say 3 bandits it's a lot more interesting with dismemberment/ realistic gore, because in Oblivion you know after the fight they'll just lie on the ground boringly, with more gore/ dismemberments the scene would look different after each fight (only one of them dismembered, or all, or none).

And blood should stay on the ground/walls/objects for a long time, like in Fallout, I hated how it always disapeared almost immediately in Oblivion.

And of course there should be an option to turn it off, for the people who don't like it.

This is exactly the problem... the artists clearly wanted to have burning zombie corpses on hooks, decrepit nasty decaying zombies, and skin sack treasure chests. When the rating people reviewed the games, these aspects were not focused on and they missed them. I read the articles about this. It wasn't only because of the hidden upper body mesh that the game was upgraded to the M rating, it was also those gory things I mentioned that the ratings people found at a later date. These kinds of water-it-down considerations limit the artists from creating freely.

And another thing. I don't want devs spending a lot of time making realistic flying arms and guts. I want them spending time making deep and meaningful quests, interesting landscapes, interesting NPCs, and all the other aspects that has made this series the great series it has always been even without much gore.

I hate to burst your bubble but I see tons of posts with a superiority complex regarding preferring gore than I do with not wanting gore. Not everyone of course, but you see it most often from the people that want it. "My way or no way, why even play if you don't want gore, etc."

It's an interesting dynamic how when it comes to romance the opposite is true.



Decapitation and losing limbs IS extreme to many of us! It is not typical for gore to be in every game, nor do I think it needs to be added to every game. I did not play Fallout 3 because of the gore. Before someone attacks me for this (as always happens) I will say this: saying you shouldn't play an action game if you don't like gore is like saying you shouldn't watch any movies with a romance plot or sub-plot if you don't like watching pormography. People actually have "relations" so they should show it! It's not believable otherwise! That's how I read the comments that talk as if an action game simply MUST have gore. Obviously gore is a part of the Fallout series, so I'm not complaining. There are mods now to disable the gore so I'll probably play it eventually. The point is some of us just do not want to have to see it, and with tons of great games coming out lately why should I play something that disgusts me when there are other options? If you like it fine, but please don't expect everyone to have to like it too.

I don't oppose an option for people that want it, but I absolutely do not want to have to see it. What some people need to understand is that some of us do not like seeing people ripped apart etc. It's a fun game and it doesn't need every horrifying detail from real life. What's next, complaints about not having to go to the bathroom and the game not showing the deed? "My immersion is blown. Real people have to eat, drink, excrete, etc!" If people like it fine, but the "action games don't work without gore" complaint falls flat to me. The fact is the vast majority of games ever made don't have gore, even when they could have. If you've never played games without gore I suggest trying some. They aren't automatically only for little kids. Please note that the "not only for little kids" thing was directed at the sentiment that always pops up from some posters in these threads that try to act like only children or women wouldn't want to see gore. It's not a response to the quotes.


There were no "water-it-down" considerations at all. They were not aiming for any particular rating. It just happened to end up T. Just because it hits M doesn't mean it needs to push everything as far as it can without hitting AO. Thinking that is just as bad as thinking they should restrain themselves to only hit T in my opinion. Both cases are asking developers to cater to the rating rather than making the game they want. Seriously, they put a graphic erotic scene involving a dunmer and khajiit in the books of one of the games. I don't think they are particularly worried about rating other than not hitting AO.

But going to the bathroom would be part of a simulation that involved food, bathing, etc. TES is not that kind of a simulation. It is, however, a simulation of COMBAT. I've played games without gore... like platformers and turn-based games, and its fine there. With the advancements in graphics and physics that TES is going through, the game plays like a photo-realistic action game. Yes, it has deeper stores, dialogue and quests than other action games and that's what makes it so good, but because of the way the combat is presented and the graphics, the combat portions of the game play like action games. It will only be even more like an action game in Skyrim from what we've seen in the trailers.

Not wanting to see realistic death from realistic looking combat makes about as much sense to me as not wanting to see realistic branch swaying in the trees, or better facial expressions. Something the devs shouldn't spend time on? Something TES has never had before? Skyrim is evolving in many ways, you can have jobs, for one. What if I think adding jobs to the game is stupid? Is it a valid argument to say it shouldn't be included just because I don't like it? No. If they can make the story and fantasy of the game good and not sacrifice that, but also improve the quality of the combat art, then why not? Again, I don't want geysers of blood myself, but honestly, if limb severing, decapitation, and blood that stays is too much to ask for when savagely striking an opponent with a battle axe... what is this world coming to? Really, you don't like to see a moderate amount of gore to relate your action realistically to the games graphics? Why play a game that has so much combat in it then?