Earlier this week, a game on my Steam wishlist went on sale (50% off). This game was reminiscent of classic 2D scrolling combat games from the late 90's. Additionally, it was designed on the principle that you aren't required to dodge everything (unlike Japanese "bullet hell" games).

Top it off with a wide variety of customization and gear and a great soundtrack... you might be wondering why I uninstalled it and requested a refund after only an hour?

Because it also contained some incredibly crass and obscene humor that wasn't documented anywhere on the store page (actually it was even missing an ESRB rating). There was no option to disable the crass and obscene content either.

WHY do so many developers have to add crass and obscene "humor"? They take an otherwise excellent game and dump crap on it.

In the old days there were games that were actually funny with no obscene/crass references. These days, if I see "Comedy" or "Humor" tags on a game, I usually stay away from it.
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This weekend there are a lot of popular games on sale on Steam... all of them with serious content or design issues.

Dark Souls I and II? "Incredibly difficult, dark, and gritty" No thanks. Oh and I also heard that the series is mainly developed for consoles and the PC version svcks.
Saints Row series? Oh wait, crass humor, obscene humor, and craploads of bad language. Forget it.
The Witcher series also on discount. The most recent one's on sale at 30% off... and what's in the tags? "Mature" content. No thanks.

Why do developers have to ruin games one way or another? When's a developer going to make a game with none of the common flaws?
What's wrong with having a good clean premium game with no seriously objectionable or obscene content?

After much searching, it looks like no one makes any games that I would want anymore.

I've been looking for another good premium single-player open world/sandbox game (besides Skyrim which I finished several times), but all the ones that aren't dark/gritty/mature have obscene/crass humor.

If I filter out anything with dark/gritty/mature or obscene/crass humor, almost all of the premium open world/sandbox games are filtered out. What's left?
RTS and tower defense? I hate RTS games because there's no time to think or plan.
FPS multiplayer? MOBAs I hate PvP and competitive games.
Survival horror? No thanks. If I see "Zombies" in the tags I immediately mark it as "not interested".
Casual games? Too simplistic.
Puzzle games? No, I prefer combat-oriented games. Most puzzle games are frustrating anyway.
2D scrolling combat games? All of recent ones are crap low quality games from Japan with no upgrades and only a handful of levels.
Turn-based strategy? I already have plenty of those.
Point-and-click adventures and visual novels aren't games.
Sports video games? No thanks, if I'm going to play sports, I'm actually going to play a real sport instead of getting fat in front of a screen.
Simulations? Uninteresting and unoriginal.
MMOs? Those are way too expensive.

What's left for me? Probably nothing. If the entire video game industry disappeared, it wouldn't matter to me because they wouldn't have made anything I like anyways.
Almost all the games I've been buying recently are classics from the 1995-2002 era anyway.

Digital, please do not take what I am about to say as anything mean or personal against you in anyway, but..



it seems from alot of the threads you post, you hate just about every kind of game out there.. perhaps you are just burnt out on gaming in general, and perhaps you should consider exploring some other hobbies as well..



once again, I am not trying to be mean or anything, its just that the majority of your threads are complaining about games..

I'll be mean.

You are way too picky and every post you make about games borders on the ridiculous.

I've asked this before, and I'll ask it again. What games actually do fit your criteria?

I think you would've loved the Puritans back in the day

A game not catering to your taste is not a "content and design flaw". But I don't see why I bother making that point anymore.

But you're right about one thing. It does seem as if nothing is left in video games to serve your entertainment needs. And as funnybunny suggest, you should probably look for another hobby if you find video games this unsatisfying.

May I suggest painting?

Challenge accepted. Here are some specifications and standards for games that I've been looking for (and as far as I know, none have been made recently)

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General rules/content guidelines (applicable to all of these specifications)
-No excessive gore or horror. Virtual blood and gore are a waste of CPU/GPU resources and disk space anyway.
-No nudity or similarly "mature" themes. Any of these will result in being automatically filtered out and instantly disqualified.
-No obscene or crass humor.
-Bad language is highly discouraged.
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#1: Premium Open-World game
-Well-balanced gear, character build, and skill system with an FPS/TPS interface balancing player skill and character skill
-Respawns
-Modding support much preferred - the more the better
-Not cover/stealth based - avoid damage by dodging and blocking, or use defensive and healing abilities
-Full and integrated support for AI-controlled followers (single-player multi-character)
-Several large independent quest lines
-Preferred: Zones split by level instead of everything scaling with character level
-Little or no reliance on consumable items: dynamic regeneration of health and resources to prevent the player from becoming stuck due to lack of supplies
-Balanced around tactical use of abilities; no damage that would cause instant or near-instant death between characters of similar level. Perhaps something similar to the original Guild Wars.

#2: 2D Scrolling combat game
-Something similar to Tyrian or Raptor.
-Game loops back to the start on completion ("new game plus" option)
-Wide variety of gear, upgrades and spaceships/aircraft
-Modding support highly preferred
-No instant death; player's spaceship/aircraft must be able to withstand significant amounts of damage. The more shields and armor, the better.

#3: 3D space combat game
-Something similar to Descent: Freespace or Tachyon: The Fringe - with much better balance, more spaceships, and more gear/upgrades
-Open world/sandbox if possible
-AI-controlled squadmates
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As far as I know:
-No one has made anything fitting specification #1 well, although Skyrim comes much closer to it than anything else. Almost every premium game made after 2012 would be disqualified under the general rules and content guidelines.
-Specification #2 is easily done but for some reason all of the 2D scrolling combat games come out of Japan now and they all svck.
-No one makes 3D space combat games anymore because there's no way to port a game with over 100 keybinds to a console.

If you want a discussion, you'll probably have to come up with some examples of games you find acceptable. Personal opinion, preference and simply everyone not being identical in background or sense of humor ensures that not everyone will agree something is crass/objectionable/problematic/whatever.

If you pay attention, you can find things that might be objectionable to someone in every game. Go back to Neverwinter Nights, and one of the henchmen you can pick up, Tomi Undergallows, in fact he's the first henchman you can pick up turns out to be an escaped prisoner from the District prison. He's wanted for "deflowering" a pasha's daughter and being a thief in general. Linu La'neral the really clumsy elf has [imo] a great backstory about how she met her now deceased husband and convinced him she was interested in him. Blatant and in your face? No. Enough to bother someone, probably.

Wasn't asking for specifications. I was asking for examples. What games, if any, fit this criteria? Go as far back into gaming history as you like, I want to see an example or two.

Look, if it's that bad just don't play. I've stopped gaming over the last six months or so, but I'm not going to bother complaining about it because if I don't like it that's my problem. Evidently most people still find games that I dislike to be enjoyable (specifically, the movement towards a very shallow learning curve in multiplayers, or repetitive gameplay in those that don't have that aspect), so it's better for everyone if I just leave (and, ideally, find a more productive hobby).

Okay, personally, I think you're denying yourself some of the most amazing gaming experiences of all time based on having such absurdly strict specifications, but let me see if I can't think up some examples for you to check out.

Can't really think of anything for Spec #1. Those specifications are strict to the point of being out of touch with the limitations of the genre.

For Spec #2, give Japan a chance. Ikaruga, Crimzon Clover, Revolver 360 are all fantastic, challenging games. You just aren't going to find much "gear". 99% of the time, even in classic Western SHMUPs, you had a couple of loadouts and that was it. Give Revolver 360 a chance in particular.

For Spec #3, that's easy. The X series takes the open world and fleet thing to the absolute max. Elite: Dangerous is pretty popular, although since you criticized simulators for being boring, I doubt you'd like it that much. Also, Star Citizen's dogfight build has been out for a while, check that out.

Just a comment here: Blood is actually rarely a waste of system resources. First, most of the time the performance impact from having them is incredibly light. Second, they are included to evoke tone, build atmosphere, or simply provide cathartic release to the player. Just because you don't personally like the inclusion of gore in a game does not invalidate it as a design element or make it a waste. I personally love over-the-top stuff in my games, and I reckon there's a lot more consumers along my lines than yours. The market speaks for itself.

I dunno. I play a lot of games and I'm just not seeing a wide spread of gore and crass humor. I kinda see the same percentage of advlt material in games as movies.

In other words some games have advlt material and some don't.

But where is the gore? I don't see it over done in the TES games. Fallout 3 is blunt about being a game strictly for advlts. The crass humor and gore fits there because it's intended.

I'm sorry but I'm just not seeing a mass invasion of rated R content in games. Yeah it's there but it's no more than what's been in PC games since the advent of graphics in the early 90s.


Heck, Leisure Suit Larry was out in the early 90s. Daggerfall had nudity in the 90s. It's no different now than before.

Edit: I forgot to add, I play a lot of MMOs and I can tell you for $15 a month they are the cheapest form of game entertainment. I've saved so much money over the years from playing MMOs and not buying single player games.

Spec #1 isn't unreasonable - for example, think about a design spec somewhere between Skyrim, Mass Effect 2, Unreal Tournament, Guild Wars, and Might and Magic 6-8.

If you've only seen a few loadouts in Western SHMUPs, then you haven't played Tyrian 2000.

That's... pretty unreasonable. That's five radically different games/series. I have no idea what that would even look like, nothing like that has ever been accomplished and for a good reason. The perfection of Unreal Tournament, for example, is in its simplicity. It is a highly focused product, it does one thing very, very well. The devs, as a result, are masters of that one thing. It wouldn't work if you had to split dev time between the amazing arena shooting of UT with the large world and massive questlines of a Might and Magic game or Skyrim, unless you had the largest and most diverse dev team ever, each team within that the size of a normal dev team and working on a specific thing. The budget to make it good at all would be astronomical.

We all have pipe-dream games we want to see made someday but are too absurdly ambitious to ever happen. The thing is, most people don't make ours into a standard that every game even vaguely like it must reach. That's unreasonable.

Also, the game that most fits that description, though with copious interpretation (relatively open world, extremely tight combat, both competitive and cooperative multiplayer, and an intriguing lore/storyline)? Dark Souls. I'm not even that big of a fan, be it's the only thing I could think of that even comes close to what you seem to be looking for. The PC port doesn't svck at all if you use a gamepad, which frankly is to be expected with that sort of thing. It's darkly lit and if you don't pay attention to design can seem dark (never gritty, though). In fact, it's probably one of the most uplifting games out there once you realize what the dev's are doing. It's also one of those games that's perfect for re-igniting one's joy for gaming. The sad thing is, based on the impression you give off, you'll never play it, since you've apparently judged it unworthy without even trying it.

And no, I haven't played Tyrian 2000. Perhaps I should. Sounds interesting.

In a way I can agree with the OP here. I also think games like Saints Row rely too much on foul language, obscene humor etc. Not to mention games like the new Mortal Kombat games relying too much on disgusting detailed gore for no good reason.

Where did the fun humor go, the kind that wasn′t foul but just fun?

But I got myself covered as I have the games I want to play and not enough time to play them even, much less getting and playing new ones

Do we really want to discuss this again? It went nowhere last time.

It kind of sounds like you should maybe go outside every now and then, OP.

A good advice in general

But still, make humor fun, not crass

its still there.. although mostly in JRPGs

those are all very different kinds of games though... its almost like asking "I want a movie thats a mix between Star Wars, Airplane, Casablanca, and Human Centipede"..

I love it when scorpions do headstands in Fallout 3

gotta admit.. I didn't really think I would like Fallout 3 when it first launched, as I was never a fan of post-apocalyptic stuff.. but, after I actually gave it a chance, I loved it. gameplay was fun, had some very humorous characters and quests..



see OP, if you are willing to step a bit outside your comfort zone, you will find games you enjoy that you didn't think you would when simply reading a page about them..

Why? That's strictly a matter of opinion. There's nothing wrong with people being amused by crass things, even if it's not to your or OP's taste.

I'd watch that.

You know, it's funny, I have plenty of recent games that fit that description. Guacamelee! and Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance are the two that pop into mind since I've been play recently. I like self-awareness, camp, and OTT-ness far more than scatalogical humor or referential humor and while the latter of those in particular dominates the indie scene, I've never really had that hard a time finding games to fit my preference. Sure, games like Saint's Row are crass to the extreme, but that's the most extreme example in mainstream gaming.

That said, crassness isn't bad. I still chuckle at farts. It's just what people are into. It dominates the market right now, but different sorts of humor never really went away. They just aren't in vogue.

Oh, I like it too, but not when it becomes the norm.