Eh, not really. The whole point of grindhouse is that the violence and sex is so over the top and ridiculous that it's suppose to be fun. No one takes those movies seriously because everything is clearly done with this wink and nod that lets you know everyone is in on the joke. This game isn't that at all. The trailer plays up this grim dark hyper realism. There's no fun unless you find murdering people who don't fight back as a fun game mechanic.

@teaoverlord said:

@morelikelames: There are definitely GG people latching onto this for stupid reasons.

And yeah, giving this game any kind of attention was basically playing into the exact narrative the developers wanted. They said they were making the game because games were being ruined because of "political correctness". They knew exactly who they were pandering to and that their game would probably get a response in the current climate.

Whatever your thoughts are on Anita Sarkesian, wanting to put a character modeled after her in a video game for the sole purpose of murdering her is pretty fucking disgusting. I'm not supporting this game at all, but having nameless NPCs that are random is okay in a game like this, as awful as this game looks. But wanting to virtually murder a real person, especially one that has received death threats, seems pretty fucking terrible.

Well Hatred has now been restored to Greenlight

Wonder why? Makes you wonder if content wasn't actually the reason it was pulled initially.

GUESS WHO'S BACK?

Hatred's reinstated Greenlight page

glad it's back.

Glitch?

Considering Valve's prior statement, this doesn't make sense. Like... if they already don't want to publish the game, more votes and time isn't going to change that. The devs already said they respected Valve's decision to refuse to publish them. It's over. This popping up again just seems to be an error.

@brandondryrock: @teaoverlord: Yeah, there's idiots on the internet. I get it. They're never going to go away and not feeding trolls is like internet 101. Posting these things is baiting, it fosters THAT kind of discussion to happen every single time. EVERY SINGLE TIME. Who here disagrees that death threats are NOT ok? Who here doesn't think making a character based on someone you don't like in a game so you can kill them is petty and juvenile? Do we need the constant "but death threats are wrong" when everyone already agrees with that here? It shuts all the conversation down because it is such a nonstarter. No one is stating otherwise to begin with. Think of all the other things we could be talking about regarding this game's trailer and it getting yanked from Steam. Ya know, the relevant stuff. Why even start discussing what it says in the comment section anywhere on the internet? Have you been to the internet before? Those things have been said forever and always about everything. It swells and grows as soon as we all start talking about it. You're scratching at the argument itch and that sucker has been rubbed raw this year. You're not helping to decrease and\or silence this, you're poking it with a stick and daring it to get worse.

And its also right back on Greenlight.

valve probably realized that enough people are willing to give them money for it

or it's all been a stunt from the very beginning to get the game more attention and in the end more sales

or they realized getting rid of it in the first place was a stupid decision

@morelikelames: When nobody stands up and says that it is wrong, then those comments will continue to happen. People say "these comments only continue because it makes sensitive people mad." But they don't, they continue because their friends and other anonymous people online laugh and agree with them. Everyone is so passive on the internet that when nobody tells these trolls that they are acting like assholes, in their mind it is okay to continue to make those comments. That's why people are starting to stand up and say "stop it."

You're previous post about people saying it is Valve's right to remove the game mentioned how that stifles the discussion. You know what else does? Saying "oh there are trolls on the internet, you just have to deal with it."

Surprised there haven't been any statements about it being reinstated from Valve or the developers.

I think it's possible Valve thought by rejecting it they actually unintentionally turned it into a cause célèbre in a way they may have tried to avoid.

Another possibility is that Valve realized their content policy wasn't clear enough to justify the removal if sued.

Yet another is that sudden interest in game suggested to them they could make decent money off of it and $$$ trumped everything else.

Who knows?

Really hard to say given how opaque Valve is about their decision making process.

That was really unprofessional of Valve. What the fuck was all of that? Just a misunderstanding?

I feel like the public are just guinea pigs to the big fish on the internet. They make a decision, calculate the damage of said decision with the treasure troves of metadata they collect on us, if they dislike the response than they retract the decision and continue on their merry way of yanking more chains.

Sorry, I just watched Men, Women & Children and am a bit down on the internet right now.

It wouldn't really surprise me if that's the case. Valve's reasons for things are often mysterious and they rarely explain their business decisions much.

That wouldn't make sense. There is never any assumption that by being on Greenlight you will get published by Valve on Steam. They can remove any game they like for whatever reason they like, as it's their own publishing platform. They only have guidelines for a simple suggestion of what content is okay.

This isn't the first game they've removed from Greenlight, as they've removed and rejected tons over the years. This is no different. Some people may be dancing over this, but this is likely just a glitch or error.

This is gonna sell a lot of copy's isn't it.

@dom_catz: Depends on what you mean by a lot. Most video game players have no clue what this game is and up until it's removal I had forgotten all about it.

I think it'll do alright but I would be surprised if it did gangbusters.

"Hey man, WalMart has the right to stock whatever they want. If WalMart doesn't want to carry gangster rap and heavy metal, then it doesn't have to. It has decided on its own that this material is completely objectionable to sell even to adults, without any prodding or threats from outside sources motivated by public political grandstanding. People should be free to make certain demands about how businesses in their communities operate, and if WalMart decides that it's better for business to marginalize consumers of that kind of stuff and support the feelings of the moral majority, that's their right."

Sorry but what the hell does this even mean? People who actually buy games on Steam? Do the people who gave Valve "crap" not buy games on Steam? Do you have anything to back that up? Or is this just one of those "oh, THOSE PEOPLE aren't real gamers. we're the real gamers!" bullshit?

And before anyone says anything, I don't give a shit about this game either way. I couldn't care less if Steam wants to sell it or not.

Obviously the real reason it's back is that it's Frog Fractions 2.

Man, some of the comments on that Greenlight page are among the worst I've ever seen on Steam. I thought Valve would be better about moderating that stuff.

Seeing the developers court these kinds of people is sickening. They might not be neo-nazis, but they sure as shit are opportunistic dirtbags.

So, some people are having a party over Hatred's inexplicable return to Greenlight, and many are taking this opportunity to use Hatred's Steam page as a platform for some rather ridiculous and hateful comments. Lots of calls to add various prominent women to the game or scenarios "honoring" recent mass shooting.

Clearly, a warning about the content of the comments. They're a small collection of ones from this evening placed in a single image, arranged by someone I know. If a mod believes these comments' inclusion is a bit too inappropriate, don't hesitate to ask for me to remove it or feel free to edit it out of this comment yourself. I will place them behind a Spoiler Block for obvious reasons, but it feels important for discussing the game and the uproar around it.

I would hope that's the eventual outcome of this, but even then, the way it has played off of and emboldened a certain subsection of people is unsettling to say the least. If that was the outcome, even as the best possible one, it'd raise a decent bit to be concerned about.

Obviously we're going to see more games like this in the future, but that doesn't change what it appears to be and the people rallying around it as another pawn in some misguided effort.

@brodehouse: So a company is not allowed to have any say in what they sell?

I guess that's as articulate a response as I could have expected.

You know, for some people who want to get politics out of games so bad, GamerGate has sure made it impossible to discuss literally anything to do with video games without it becoming a shit slinging political contest. I can't even say a stupid, shitty game looks stupid and shitty without suddenly being thrust into some sort of political battlefield where no one actually believes anything their saying and are just worried about whatever's going to help their side "win." Mark down 2014 as the year that discussion about video games on the internet became truly fucking insufferable. How the hell are we at the point where I'd rather talk to strangers about WRESTLING than video games? A business plagued by misogynist and racist practices that even the densest Gater could see and still the internet community surrounding it is about a thousand times more tolerable than just about video game forum right now.

Have fun with the rest of your "war", people. All you've accomplished is giving free publicity to a game that was only made to create publicity. Newflash: we're all fucking losing.

Guys, please calm down and remain civil or the thread will simply be closed.

I'd like to see where reinstating the game will get it. Sure it's highly likely that it will be greenlit but how many of those votes will end up in people actually buying it?

I think an important thing for folks to remember is that a ton of votes doesn't get a game Greenlit. The voting system is just there to help Valve sift through entries to decide what seems worth publishing. They are under no obligation to publish any game just because a lot of people vote for it, and as you mentioned, they may take into account the sheer amount of votes that seem to have little to do with the game and more to do with some misguided point.

Not to mention, Steam still doesn't sell AO games. So, if this game turns out as it appears, it's quite likely to not be sold on Steam anyway, just as some other games are not. I suppose they could give it the benefit of the doubt until release, but after that, its content will speak for itself.

The posts on the Greenlight page are also telling in all this. Some of those comments have been linked to here, but in light of its return to Steam, many seem to be having an even bigger party on the page, raving about how excited they are to potentially massacre "SJWs", murder prominent women, or recreate recent mass shootings, like the Norway attack by Anders Breivik. I'm not sure whether Steam's pages have moderation, but the language being used and perverse glee on display is unsettling to say the least.

I initially linked to a small sample of the comments from the page today, and mods explained that even as quotes hidden behind a spoiler tag, they were too offensive to be on the site. I can understand that decision, and you can check out the current Greenlight page to see for yourself. While it may be difficult, it's relevant to discussion of this game that we consider the people it is pandering to and the reactions surrounding it.

(If you have issues with violent or homophobic language, probably best to avoid the page for the moment. It's certainly possible Valve may attempt to clean it up if Hatred's return ends up not being a mistake, but we'll see.)

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-12-15-controversial-mass-murdering-game-hatred-appears-on-steam-greenlight

"Hi, Jaroslaw,"

"Yesterday I heard that we were taking Hatred down from Greenlight. Since I wasn't up to speed, I asked around internally to find out why we had done that. It turns out that it wasn't a good decision, and we'll be putting Hatred back up. My apologies to you and your team. Steam is about creating tools for content creators and customers."

"Good luck with your game."

"Gabe."

Probably a wise decision to leave the game up for now. Not because it has a good chance to grow into something worthwhile but simply because the reasons for taking it down seemed unclear and arbitrary. Good to know Valve is still willing to re-evaluate their decisions.

Hopefully that'll be the end of all kinds of morons co-opting this little scandal for their garbage political rants. Unlikely though.

I'm glad to see it's back up. And I find it fascinating how certain people on this board are trying really hard to throw this game under the bus using some guilt by association.

I have no interest in playing Hatred, and will probably never purchase it.

I am, however, glad that Valve has chosen to change their stance on selling it.

The game is fucked up and I will never play it. I don't like killing civillians and innocent people in video games. Maybe some teenagers are into that, but that's... That's just messed up. Next on the fucked up ladder- RapeLay, just one level above this shit.

So should Assassin's Creed, GTA V, Manhunt and countless other games be taken off Steam as well? I hate to break it to you but there are hundreds of games that allow you to kill innocent people, the difference with Hatred is it doesn't try to make it seem like the character is doing good or something noble along the way. That's actually pretty cool and doesn't give you the "likeable guy that has killed 2000 people" bullshit like Uncharted.

I don't see why it really matters and it's interesting to have a game approach things from the much more gruesome side, the side you usually only read about in the history books or on TV.

So, it's Hotline Miami minus the subtlety? No thanks.

The decision for anyone not to play it is absolutely fine. There's no way I'm going to play this. What concerns me is the many calls for this to not exist, or not be widely available, confirming that these people do believe that there is a real and dangerous effect to playing videogames.

Movies, both critically acclaimed and panned (so it's not even an issue of quality) are readily available to the public (Saw is one that comes to mind). I doubt there are many places that consider these movies or even discussion of them taboo, so what's the extra element with videogames? The interaction. So it seems like they're saying that playing this game can or will have an effect. I do not agree. The industry doesn't agree either, normally. Here, most people seem fine with this argument even though it isn't being made directly. It's the subtext of what's being said.

@truthtellah: You seem to be a actively against having Hatred sold on Steam. There is no reason to deny people their enjoyment when it doesn't harm anyone. You are in the same boat as the people that were against Depression Quest.

@tits_matador: Businesses have the right to sell whatever they want, which is why when conservative political groups lean on businesses to make them conform to their preferred norms, we support the business's right to cave. We are in no way setting a bad precedent for those who want to marginalize and ghettoize the art they consider immoral or harmful. After all, freedom of speech should only be defended when we're discussing the government, because businesses have their own thoughts and religious beliefs. If a social political group wants to prevent a niche piece of art from being sold at major retailers, that's completely okay, that in no way privileges conservative or normative art over subversive art.

Did you know those rappers are threatening to rape and kill each other in their rap songs? They talk about women in the crudest language possible! They threaten police officers and promote smoking marijuana! This is not okay! People will get hurt if this music is allowed to coexist with Whitney Houston and U2. It will make people believe listening to this music is okay! Why did rap music have to be rebellious by being vulgar and menacing and confrontational, why can't they just be rebellious like U2 is rebellious? There's nothing about 'taking the life of his wife and young daughter' in U2 songs.

Nope. Tarantino's versions do mimic grindhouse with a wink and a nod, but the movies he's mimicking don't necessarily do that. The violence and sex is over the top not because it's supposed to be fun, but because the makers were exploiting those factors to draw people in to see their movie.

@mikemcn would be correct if the makers of this game are exploiting the violence in their game to get people to buy it, regardless of its quality.

have people forgotten that this is a fucking video game? Nobody is actually going out and killing "real" civilians. So can we please stop with the whole "i find this offensive" therefore, nobody is allowed to play this.

If you kill innocents in Assassin's Creed the game tells you to stop doing it, in GTA V you are punished for killing innocent people by becoming wanted. While Manhunt is a gruesome game, it is about a game where someone is ordered to take out gangs. Uncharted has Nathan Drake fighting against people that want to kill him too! It isn't like Drake is just running around a village murdering everyone on his way to ancient artifacts.

In Hatred the stated objective of the game is to go on a killing spree to kill as many innocent people as possible because the protagonist is tired of society. There is a huge difference between a Call of Duty game for example where it is two factions facing off against each other, and a teenage angst fantasy where someone tired of society goes on a killing spree.

@brodehouse: Im sorry but those songs have all the right to exist , you and I may not like it but what you are saying is down right censorship lane. If you still think like that then you are agreeing with any group that tries to do the same , which could lead to groups that are for example anti homosexuality or anything like that being right and so on and forth.

Good for Valve from backing up from their decision.

@aetheldod said:

I know English isn't your first language, but what Brode was doing is called satire. He's making fun of the stance of people who say that Hatred shouldn't exist, or that discussions about it should be banned based on moral grounds, by highlighting the absurdity of that argument and grafting it onto an existing censorship battle that was lost (namely rap music).

He does that a lot, actually.