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They really should stop having child NPCs in open-world games

Gaiff

SBI’s Resident Gaslighter
It adds nothing to the experience. Not once did I drive around in GTA and wonder "where are the children?" In a modern setting, they should be at school during the day and at home at night. Sometimes I can spend days without seeing a single kid and I work downtown.

All they do is detract from the experience (like in real life). Going on a rampage and murdering everything that moves? Invincible kids running around or disappearing. What's more, they're almost always the most frightening creatures in the game with how awful they look. In Cyberpunk for instance, they're just downscaled adults. Imagine my surprise when I saw a random little girl wandering around, only to see her adult counterpart with the same outfit literally 3 seconds later. In Horizon and Assassin's Creed, they're just incredibly ugly and epitomize the "A face only a mother can love" adage.

Stop putting kids in there. No one likes having kids around except for our own.
 

GymWolf

Member
I think they were ok in witcher 3.

Other than that, they offer some comedy gold for how fugly they are so i'm not against having them inside games.

Next what? Quality control on fifa so we don't have gay glitches anymore?
 
They are fine in Fallout and Assassins Creed. Horizon too inside the camps.

But on the streets in Cyberpunk? Especially if they are invincible, maybe there is a mod to remove them.
 

N30RYU

Member
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Robb

Gold Member
Case to case I guess.

What you’re describing is pretty much how it works in TotK, at least in Hateno Village. In the morning they run to school and in the night they go home. I enjoyed the quest-line bringing them school material, that was very wholesome.

Seeing them run to school as the bell rings each morning definitely ads to the atmosphere of the town.
 

Punished Miku

Gold Member
Kid NPCs could be awesome if they make more bloopers. Have them just randomly take off into a cold sprint for no reason and then wipeout and start crying. Shit like that. Have someone else shit their pants if a monster shows up and you have to save them but you try to do it without touching them. The possibilities are endless.
 
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mortal

Gold Member
I get what you mean. I think having invincible children NPC in a game, especially RPGs is immersion-breaking. It's dumb game design imo.
Create severe penalties for players who harm children NPC, otherwise, why include them in the game world at all?

Cyberpunk 2077 is especially egregious with this. Not only do the child NPCs look uncanny, but they're walking around this dangerous crime crime-ridden city with Godmode on. It's rather goofy.
 
I remember skyrim adding the option to raise kids. I don't know whatever happened to them, I don't think they ever grew up.
 

Loomy

Thinks Microaggressions are Real
You want to be able to play games without your parole office getting concerned. Got it.

On a serious note though - trees add nothing to the gameplay experience. You want them out of games too?
 

tommib

Member
I think they were ok in witcher 3.

Other than that, they offer some comedy gold for how fugly they are so i'm not against having them inside games.

Next what? Quality control on fifa so we don't have gay glitches anymore?
And where will I get my porn?
 

DanielG165

Member
The presence of children, like most things in media, depends on the context of the story and the world surrounding it. Games like GTA 5 and RDR2? Outside of Jack, yeah, kids wouldn’t really make sense in those games. But something like A Plague Tale where the main focus of the story is on children trying to survive a horrible and brutal world? Their presence makes perfect sense.
 

Skifi28

Member
The solution is make children killable like any other npc. You can go on a rampage and murder everything that moves, but if it's under 1.40cm it's suddenly too much and you have to draw the line. Bollocks.
 

Chastten

Banned
Don't really care about children in videogames, but man, you must live in a sad, sad place if you never see any children in real life.

I mean, I live in a pretty rural area so I guess that's pretty different from live in a big city, but I still plenty of children playing outside every single day and I wouldn't have it any other way.
 

Killjoy-NL

Member
It adds nothing to the experience. Not once did I drive around in GTA and wonder "where are the children?" In a modern setting, they should be at school during the day and at home at night. Sometimes I can spend days without seeing a single kid and I work downtown.

All they do is detract from the experience (like in real life). Going on a rampage and murdering everything that moves? Invincible kids running around or disappearing. What's more, they're almost always the most frightening creatures in the game with how awful they look. In Cyberpunk for instance, they're just downscaled adults. Imagine my surprise when I saw a random little girl wandering around, only to see her adult counterpart with the same outfit literally 3 seconds later. In Horizon and Assassin's Creed, they're just incredibly ugly and epitomize the "A face only a mother can love" adage.

Stop putting kids in there. No one likes having kids around except for our own.
What if you playing during holidays or summers?

Schools are closed then.
 

Giallo Corsa

Gold Member
In Cyberpunk for instance, they're just downscaled adults. Imagine my surprise when I saw a random little girl wandering around, only to see her adult counterpart with the same outfit literally 3 seconds later.

So, it's not just me that noticed it 😁😁

Also : agreed on everything
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Would be weird to not have any kids in Zelda games. Your post is weird too, not every open world game is a murder fest (and even in that case might as well ask for the kids to be under the same rules as everyone else rather than not have them at all, they were killable in Fallout 1 & 2, not 3 and on).
 
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