Animals are expendable people too

Discussion in 'Clockwork Empires General' started by Bohandas, Nov 10, 2012.

  1. Bohandas

    Bohandas Member

    We already know that the game will allow for capricious disregard for the safety and happiness of our villagers, but will we be able to display the same or greater level of disregard and cruelty for their livestock and pets? I think we should be.

    For example, a noblewoman residing in the village might not be satisfied with just any new fur coat, she wants a fur coat made out of such-and-such villager's pet fluffy, just like the villain from 101 Dalmatians.

    Or a farm could, as a time and cost cutting measure, herd cows directly into a giant meat grinder instead of slaughtering them and then grinding them up.

    (edit:
    Or, as another example, if vermin get into your food storerooms you could upgrade from mousetraps to tiny anti-personnel mines)
     
    Vitellozzo likes this.
  2. Its strange that I'd have no problem feeding the minds of the insane to Eldritch abominations but at the same time I'm a little hesitant to slaughter animals using a massive, cog-covered grinder.
     
  3. Nadd

    Nadd Member

    It would only be fair to nature. Can't be showing malevolent preference towards humans. The pigs might be watching a human plugged into a giant whispering crystal, having his madness (and possibly a little sanity) sucked out by tubes, and wonder, "Whens my turn...SNORT?"

    Also this might allow for a higher range of fancy hats in peacock/coonskin/pigsnout/tusked fancy hats.

    I agree
     
  4. Kamisma

    Kamisma Member

    Settlers had screaming pigs brought to the butchershop, I remember in Settlers 3 the little guys would take one under their arms and you could see the head of the pig waving as they brought it to the butcher, as if he was saying "no ! please no ! i taste bad ! don't eat me !"

    Ah good times.
     
    Vitellozzo likes this.
  5. lujo86

    lujo86 Member

    I guess it's the whole "cruelty to animals" thing. Why draw controversy to something which will probably be a great game anyway?

    Fact of the matter is that most people can work up reasons for disregarding the lives of humans, what with humans having a long track record of being horrible dicks and being up there with plastic on the "worst things that could happen to a biosphere" list. Animals... eh, we get squeamish about harming the ones we grow for food (plenty of us do, anyway). Why go down this slippery slope?

    Heck, the darn diggles are so cute that I whish they could've been helpers in DoD rather then stuff you have to slaughter wholesale. Then your average person who's not hardcore into pixel bashing doesn't think about DoD as "that game where you kill the cute ducklings/platypusses". Why repeat that? :)
     
  6. Bohandas

    Bohandas Member

    That's what makes it funny.

    Have you ever heard of Scott Adams' "Two-of-Six" rule of humor? It states that if you create a work combining any two or more of the following categories, it'll usually be funny:





    1) cuteness
    2) meanness
    3) bizarreness
    4) recognizability
    5) naughtiness
    6) cleverness

    So slaughtering cute animals, especially bizarre cute animals with drills for noses, is something that lends itself to being funny.
     
    Vitellozzo likes this.
  7. lujo86

    lujo86 Member

    Oddly enough, I always sort of found it of the nervous "ha-ha, i'm not really participating in this am I, noone's gonna mention it later, a-ha-hah, and whoever put me through this isn't really a detached pyschopat, right? Right? ...right?" kind of funny. I mean the whole "slaughtering of cute animals" bit.

    Then again, there is cuteness and there is disney, and there is meanness and there is Happy Tree Friends, but I'd wager plenty of people wouldn't want their animal slaughtering presented as comedy - it may have it's potential and appeal, but it's rather strong, and sets a very specific tone which may or may not be necessary.
     
    Ernst Poppenschlaffen likes this.
  8. Turbo164

    Turbo164 Member

    Maybe cows/chickens/ocelots are butchered humanely, while only the Diggles get special walk-in grinder factories? :p
     
  9. Bohandas

    Bohandas Member

    This is an acceptable compromise
     
    Alistaire likes this.
  10. Kamisma

    Kamisma Member

    Oh I remember another game. It was a shareware or something, i think. You had to lead a herd of sheeps through a maze leading to the butcher's truck. The maze was obviously filled with atrocious traps that would kill the sheeps in funky ways.

    Twas funny because even though you did your best to save the sheeps, in the end they always would go to butcher truck :p
     
  11. Why would you want to grind up Diggles? I for one hope I can befriend them and maybe encourage my colonists to start worshipping them.
     
    TheJadedMieu, Turbo164 and lujo86 like this.
  12. Turbo164

    Turbo164 Member

    No see you grind the diggles up, then shape the diggleburger into the shape of a diggle, stick some Blessed Cogs into it, and zap it with Perfectly Safe Tesla Coils until it comes back to life, better than ever! Why it should dig at least 37% faster with those enhancements!
     
  13. You'd either end up with a homogenised Franken-diggle. Or a lightly seared, diggle burger with Blessed Cogs jutting out of it. I can't think of an easier way to incur the wrath of the Diggle Gods. Those are dangerous thoughts you're having, Turbo.
     
  14. lujo86

    lujo86 Member

    What's for the lack of better word, funny, is that there were people who atually did that sort of thing to humans IRL. For science. Except some weren't scientists, but they enjoyed it in some way, possibly even thought it was funny. I don't see a game feature which would let players roleplay Jeffrey Dahmer, Joseph Mengele or the Japanese guys in China as having a broad appeal, but maybe it's just me. Or at least getting graphic about it.

    Plus, the dwarves in dwarf fortress are a generally unapealling lot that you don't feel sorry for, and people getting cthulu'd can still work in the context especially if theyre presented in the right light. Animals just don't have the "asking for it" framework that humans do, and anyway a diggle makes for a very unconvincing antagonist and a complete anti-villan.
     
  15. Bohandas

    Bohandas Member

    Well what about excessive, disproportionate responses to vermin animals like rats and so-forth, that get into your stockpiles?

    Instead of mousetraps you could send in guys with flamethrowers. Or catch the mice in glue traps but then have them elaborately executed..

    Or you could use chemical and/or biological weapons against them. Using chemical weapons to exterminate infestations is a real thing, so it would be funny to take it the next logical step further and use biological weapons.
     
    mailersmate likes this.
  16. lujo86

    lujo86 Member

    Well that IS funny in the comedicaly disproportionate retribution sort of way, and you'd be laughing at the guys with flamethrowers for sure. Point of note there is the fact that it's the humans who are comedic there, doubly so if there's chtulhu around and they bust out the big guns to get rid of the rats :D It's why the diggle sort of works - the protagonist of DoD is always hinted at as being a bit of a idiot hero / comedic sociopath satirical figure.

    Not to mention if something of the sort is linked to a mechanic which annoys the players (like vermin being major pests), you wouldn't even mind busting out the big guns, or setting foxes on them and having an infestation of foxes sometimes later. If you could "cure" it with gorrillas who then become pests, after a long series of self-inflicted-neverending-chain-of-pest-related-stupidity, you'd have proper reasons to start nuking them. All the more fun if that means you're left with no ammo for chtulhu when he turns up - it would be an aesopy hilarious way to fail ^^
     
    Bohandas likes this.
  17. Loren

    Loren Member

    People. Animals. They are both one and the same. I see no reason to separate the groups and only be allowed to do certain things to one or the other. I learned this at a young age. See spoiler:
     
  18. Bohandas

    Bohandas Member

    The best thing would be if it could go either way, or better yet BOTH at once.
     
  19. Bohandas

    Bohandas Member

    Exactly! This kind of thing would be hilarious.

    Or during a mousetrap shortage you could use spare landmines from the military and accidently blow your own people up like in that one Aqua Teen Hunger Force episode.

    EDIT:
    (Is that clip OK to link to here? One of the characters says "Damn" repeatedly after being blown up.)
     
  20. astaldaran

    astaldaran Member

    My thought is the game shouldn't go to lengths to make it so you can torture anything, humans or animals; DF doesn't do this. The thing is in DF sometimes there is just such a struggle to survive or you are making such a dangerous project that things happen which are sad and or funny whether it be to dwarfs or animals. Seems like the same should be true of this game; just make it "real" and in the fallen nature of the nature itself will lead to destruction for whatever or whomever gets in the way.

    In saying that, I suppose the game would have to deliberately make things real..like having people go insane (or animals for that matter).
     
    lujo86 likes this.