Asklemmy

44156 readers

882 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy 🔍

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

Open-ended question
Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

Lemmyverse: community search
sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
!lemmy411@lemmy.ca: a community for finding communities

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS

786

What was a profound moment that a video game caused you to experience, and why? (reddthat.com)

submitted 1 year ago by RagnarokOnline@reddthat.com to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

394 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The moment that inspired this question:

A long time ago I was playing an MMO called Voyage of the Century Online. A major part of the game was sailing around on a galleon ship and having naval battles in the 1600s.

The game basically allowed you to sail around all of the oceans of the 1600s world and explore. The game was populated with a lot of NPC ships that you could raid and pick up its cargo for loot.

One time, I was sailing around the western coast of Africa and I came across some slavers. This was shocking to me at the time, and I was like “oh, I’m gonna fuck these racist slavers up!”

I proceed to engage the slave ship in battle and win. As I approach the wreckage, I’m bummed out because there wasn’t any loot. Like every ship up until this point had at least some spare cannon balls or treasure, but this one had nothing.

… then it hit me. A slave ship’s cargo would be… people. I sunk this ship and the reason there wasn’t any loot was because I killed the cargo. I felt so bad.

I just sat there for a little while and felt guilty, but I always appreciated that the developers included that detail so I could be humbled in my own self-righteousness. Not all issues can be solved with force.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] BackpackCat@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago

When I was around 8 years old I was lucky enough to get a PS2 for Christmas. Because I was young, my dad and I usually played games together so he could help me out if things got tough. One of the first games we played on the PS2 was ICO. My dad picked it up in the whim because he thought the box art was interesting knowing basically nothing. I still remember when the first cutscenes booted up and our jaws dropped to the floor. It was so much more beautiful and cinematic than any we had played. It was one of the first time I truly felt transported another world and I grew so attached to the horned boy and glowing girl. We played it every day and, talked about all the mysteries and theories we about it when we weren't. When we finally defeated the epic last boss fight against the dark queen and the Castle start collapsing I got scared for the horned boy and glowing girl. I couldn't tell you how long it actually took for the final scene to appear but it felt like forever. When I saw my lil horned friend finally escaped the castle and was on a beautiful beach with a boat he could be able anywhere, I couldn't help but to start crying it was just such a great ending and was so cathartic after going through a dark and mysterious castle for so long.

I think it really changed the way I thought about the medium. That a game where I couldn't really tell you what exactly what was happening and had no understandable dialogue could move me so much changed the way I thought about the medium and media in general. Nobody can ever convince me games are not art because I know I connected to ICO in a way in a way beyond just having fun. The fact it's been over 20 years and I still recall my emotions so vividly I think is a testament to the power of video games as an artistic medium.