I know my kids are, but the fantasy elements seem to mitigate the violence, somehow, in my mind. Even though the game is, on many levels, functionally identical to the Fallout games, I don’t feel nearly as comfortable letting them play Fallout yet, but I don’t really mind them playing Skyrim. But I do “play” it with them, offering occasional guidance and explanation.
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Oh, we played a bunch of these! They were all fun and funny, but after a (fairly long) while they did seem to get somewhat samey.
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I’m not OK with our son playing Fallout, so he’s forbidden for now. You have to kill people (sooooo, so many people), and the corpses linger. And then there’s the drugs and possibly sex (was in New Vegas, haven’t encountered it in 4 - yet - nobody spoil that, m’kay, I’ve only recently cleaned out the car factory, I have many quests to go.)
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I remember reading something where someone was playing Fallout4 VR. They said it was infinitely more disturbing, because there was even a greater sense that these were people. Especially sneak-kills. And it does sound disturbing (and I have played 3, NV and 4). The most disturbing thought was “what about someone who isn’t disturbed at all?” They mentioned that it wasn’t as bad in a heavier fantasy/space game, because there is a bigger reality gap.
So, you’re right. There is something about Fallout that might be a little TOO real for a kid, SuperMutants and ghouls notwithstanding.
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I’m playing Human Resource Machine by the same folks who made Little Inferno. It’s a programming game. It’s hilarious and I’m having a lot of fun but I got stuck on the first multiplication level. 
Never had so much fun with debugging though. 
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Loved Little Inferno. Love games that play with the whole form like that (e.g. have you played THERE IS NO GAME? https://www.scirra.com/arcade/adventure-games/there-is-no-game-817).
HR Machine looks even better… Look forward to checking it out!
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I had not but I just played it. 
The voice over reminds me of Clancy Brown.
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Y’know, it’s a real problem for me. As much as I loved the first two Bioshock games, bloody graphic violence and all, I had a tough time enjoying Bioshock Infinite because so very many of the people you have to kill in that latter game seem so very human compared to the drug-addled homicidally insane splicers of Rapture. I mean, they’re all human, but it’s tough to identify with the splicers. They’re blood-spattered and completely out of their tree and will leap to tear you apart the moment they notice you. In Columbia, most of the denizens are hateful racist fucks, but you get the impression that most of them have families to go home to at the end of the day, and that most of them are ignorant and misled rather than purely bloodthirsty. The game goes out of its way to try to justify you killing them (self-defense at least, along with their hateful racism and mob violence mentality), but nonetheless I found it a lot harder to enjoy the game.
So I feel similarly toward some other RPGs. I kinda hated GTA5 since it didn’t feel so much like a game as it resembled a “bad day in L.A.” simulator. There isn’t a whole lot in that game I couldn’t do IRL if the mood struck me, and since the mood to mow down pedestrians, wreck cars, kill hookers, and tow cars for a crackhead doesn’t strike me often, it’s not a game for me.
Fallout games are totally in my wheelhouse, but even though there’s a certain science-fiction distance between our worlds (the Fallout future taking place a couple hundred years after a global nuclear war that took place about a century after the embrace of atomic power more or less froze American culture in a solidly 1950s aesthetic for some reason), it still feels eerily plausible in some respects, and you kill people very often with real-world weapons, and their blood and viscera fly everywhere in ridiculously grotesque fashion. Often you come across dismembered corpses put up for display by raiders, or stashed for future snacking by Super Mutants. Really, the game is far bloodier than it strictly needs to be, and I do love to play it (you generally don’t have to kill innocents in it, though it’s certainly an option), but it’s too dark and nasty for my kids.
Skyrim, however, though mechanically pretty much the same game, is a different story. A great deal of the violence in that game is magical fantasy violence. There are no guns, bombs, grenades, or cannons. Instead it has bows and arrows, and edged melee weapons, which aren’t really problematic weapons of modern violence. And somehow there’s considerably less dismemberment in Skyrim than Fallout, except for the very occasional decapitation. And somehow it all seems much less realistic, too.
Maybe I’m just a bad parent.
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Utterly agree with all you’ve said. When we think about the moral outrage that accompanied the fatalities in Mortal Kombat two-and-a-half decades ago, compared to the meticulous, lovingly detailed murder simulators we run now…!
Again, so much this, as the young/cool people say (also, “tow cars for a crackhead”, LOL!). I’ve felt this way about GTA games since San Andreas, where the verisimilitude really started to get effective and I found I didn’t much enjoy pedalling a kid’s bike through economically disenfranchised neighbourhoods, eating fast food and spraypainting walls…
Re. Skyrim, yes again, fantasy always has that remove, indeed. SF to a certain degree too (again, I let my kids zap Covenant in Halo when they were quite small.
I’ve never played The Last Of Us but I’m told there’s a scene where you slowly strangle someone in intimate close-up… the 20-something friend who told me said it made even him feel uncomfortable, and he’s, y’know, of that generation. (Not that I’m against games being uncomfortable or challenging, and that game is M-rated, but there’s an interesting/important debate to be had here). It’s funny, I’m an average guy, love my genre movies and my gaming and grew up on action/adventure etc. but it’s ALWAYS struck me as strange that 99% of us spend our lives hoping to avoid violence and yet 99% of our entertainment - even our highbrow, respectable, dramatic entertainment is - obsessed with exactly that subject.
I think that too. Or “Maybe I’m just a bad parent AND an old prude.”
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I have $20 in my (virtual) pocket and I need a recommendation for something to play. It needs to be something I can hop in and out of (spend 20 minutes playing as a break from work) but absorbing. It needs to be something that’s going to really be a unique and thoughtful experience. I’m looking for something to play on the PC, so I prefer something not ported over from a touch-screen. Steam says I like “atmospheric” games and puzzlers. All I know is that I wish I could play Portal for the first time forever.
Any suggestions?
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I’ve heard intriguing things about This War of Mine - might be a bit dark
though?
Think they’re mentioned above, but if you haven’t played 'em, the modern
XCOMs are wonderful… Turn-based, save-anytime strategy deep in atmosphere
and rich in design, perfect for stop-start gaming (if you can manage to
stop after 20 mins!)
Others you’ve probably either already got or ruled out: Braid, Limbo…
Maybe The Witness?
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I’m still playing New Vegas, four years after initial purchase. Turning it into Tale of Two Wastelands (combined 3 GOTY and New Vegas Ultimate) has helped with the longevity. There are a lot of mods, including ones that add entire new regions to explore and get icked out by.
Um. On the puzzle/atmospheric side, there is Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture. Or even Life is Strange.
I usually play the free shooter Fistful of Frags; on most servers, a round is 15 minutes - perfect for killing time.
Two handheld games got a lot of my attention: Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, and Mega Man Battle Network 3. Action RPGs that can be explored in ten minute chunks at a time with a lot of playtime.
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I’m going to put in a strong recommendation for ‘The Talos Principle’. While it’s fun to get lost in for an evening, it can certainly be a pop-in and pop-out sort of game in the tradition of Portal. If you like atmospheric puzzlers, you really owe it to yourself to pick this up at some point.
It’s outside your declared price point, but you can take the demo for a spin for free.
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Hmm. Excellent suggestions! I actually played This War of Mine and it’s exactly the kind of game I’m talking about - atmospheric, unique, thoughtful. But yes, way too dark. In a thoughtful way.
I’ve played XCom (maybe 2?) on the iPad and enjoyed it, but got a little lost in all the base-building activities. I have no patience for crafting. But turn based games are definitely something I enjoy. I might have to explore that series on the PC a bit.
Limbo I played a long time ago, and loved. Braid I don’t think I ever plaid, and will check that out. I did play INSIDE recently and liked that well enough (it’s in the same genre, I think) but the ending left me wanting…
The Witness looks good. It looks a little similar to Firewatch which I played and enjoyed. There’s something about this new genre of games that make you feel alone that is interesting, but also a little sad. Everyone’s Gone to the Rapture that @tinoesroho sroho mentioned looks like that genre too. One question though, @moosemalloy; is Life Is Strange one of those Choose Your Own Adventure type games like the Walking Dead was? I was very mixed about the walking dead game because it was more like watching a story than playing a game. Not very satisfying.
@messana: I did play Talos a few months ago, and I enjoyed the puzzles, but the plot failed to engage me and I got a little tired after awhile (it’s a really long game!). I also got a little obsessed with finding all the bonus stars or whatever they were, and it wasn’t easy to find them without spending hours wandering around, so I often felt the need to use a walkthough which sort of detracted from the gameplay. I didn’t finish it. Does the ending bring it all together?
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The plot really engaged me, and although I tried to get all the bonus stars, I gave up on many of them eventually - settling on just enough to advance the plot. I thought the ending tied it all together with a rather unusual (but not unpredictable) approach and loved it for that reason. If the plot was less engaging for you, I suspect the ending would not be as satisfying, so I can’t in good conscience say that you must go back and finish it.
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I think this is why I haven’t finished this game. We have several other “zombie” games which I may finish before this one.
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Dead Island’s title cinematic makes me laugh every time. Who do you voodoo?
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This game, too, awaits my play. Mr. Kidd played the heck out of it for a few months.
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