Which games (if any) successfully managed to be mature?

[DriacKin]

This is a serious question.

In recent years, the phrase 'mature' has been applied to games like 'God of War', 'The Witcher', 'Mass Effect', 'Indigo Prophecy', etc... All of these games contain several 'mature topics' like sex, violence, cursing, or nudity. Yet, in almost all of these games, this 'matureness' is used just for shock value or for the lulz, instead of actually adding value to the story or characters. In my opinion, none of these games dealt with these topics in a mature fashion.

In contrast, imo, 'Taxi Driver' is a good example of a film that is actually mature. At face value, this film deals with several of the same 'mature topics' that you might find in a game like 'Dragon Age'. 'Taxi Driver' had scenes depicting violence, gore, cursing, sex, underage hookers, a pedophile pimp, and a guy watching porn videos. Heck, it even had a scene where the main character was covered in blood after a combat encounter.
And yet, unlike 'Dragon Age', all of these mature scenes in 'Taxi Driver' served a purpose. They helped us understand the main character and gave us a better understanding of how he perceived the rest of the world. None of this stuff was ever thrown in just for shock value. As a result, this becomes a film that takes several 'mature topics' and deals with all of them in a mature way.

That being said, which games (if any) successfully managed to deal with these topics maturely?

 

[Nostradumbass]

Fallout. drugs, sex, harsh language, violence, and apart from particular moments those themes were usually used quite seriously.

Fallout 2 was a lot more immature. Fallout 3... well, enough said.

 

[DraQ]

Witcher minus sex-cards and some female models.

 

[Jasede]

I don't think I ever played a mature game.

Except, perhaps, Dreamweb. The game contains sex and drugs and violence and gore, but never for its own sake. Just to tell its story and perhaps increase the sense of schizophrenia. Is my character really insane, or am I really saving the world by murdering these seven people I was told to kill in my dreams? The more you play the more of a monster the main character becomes, even though he never talks.

The game ends with one of the best ending sequences I have ever seen, too, leaving you strangely bewildered and maybe even with your mouth agape.

 

[Lesifoere]

The Void has female nudity (and male too, actually, but it's not very pretty to look at and it's transparent) out the wazoo. Doesn't stop it from being mature: much of the nudity is actually tasteful and not even that erotic, unless you've got a swing-set fetish.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Grim Fandango?

 

[JarlFrank]

Does a game need sex, violence and nudity in order to be mature?

 

[Jasede]

No, why?
Also, yeah.

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[Emotional Vampire]

define maturity

 

[Ch1ef]

Troika

 

[sqeecoo]

define "define"

 

[AzraelCC]

Maturity for me is a more realistic approach to issues. An approach that tries not to be tainted by romanticized notions of life. It has emotional violence rather than physical ones. A story with child molestation can be immature if it resorts to cliches. However, if the said story can capture the disturbing context of the scenario it presents, then it can be labeled as a mature work.

Sanitarium was pretty mature. Sure, the story behind the protagonist was pretty cheesy, but the way his story was told in fragments was pretty mature in its tackling of insanity.

Fallout was also mature--it asks the question of "what can change the nature of a man" far better than PS:T did. When the main character can no longer return to the home he fought to save, because it was no longer home, that was a really complex and nuanced exploration of one's nature changing. Maybe it's time, or experience, or maybe the fact that the main character was chosen (which suggests destiny); whatever the case, the innocence lost can never be regained. That's pretty mature in my book.

 

[ghostdog]

I consider mature games to be the games that stay true to their setting, with believable, well written dialog and themes that can be fully appreciated by ... adults ? ( - define adults...) Of course this definition -as all definitions- is bullshit deep down, but whatever.


Fallout
Torment
Arcanum
Bloodlines
Deus Ex
System Shock 2
I have no mouth and I must scream
Sanitarium
Grim Fandago (yeah humor can be mature)
Shadow Of The Comet
Gabriel Knight
The Last Express
Silent Hill
Mafia
No One Lives For Ever
Thief
Half Life
Jedi Knight 2
Betrayal At Krondor
Anachronox (did I mention that humor can be mature?)


Also nudity does not define maturity or immaturity.

 

[SuicideBunny]

torment was mature without boobies, cursing, or next-gen gore.

 

[DriacKin]

define maturity

I thought I already did in my original post.

My question was whether or not any games have ever taken 'mature topics' like sex, violence, drugs, prostitution, pedophelia, etc... and depicted them in a serious fashion, instead of just throwing them in to give the world a false sense of grittiness or grimdark realism.

 

[Jasede]

I think we may have played different PS:T. Mine had many boobies and people cursed all the time. And there was gore also.

Gabriel Knight, though, that is a good one, I can agree with that one.

 

[Elzair]

The Ultima series.

 

[Phelot]

Games like Penumbra, Silent Hill, STALKER are pretty mature to me, mostly because they don't flaunt tits and retarded gore around. I can't really think of any recent RPGs that strike me as mature. Usually the minute a game is hyped as being mature, it is anything but.

There is this strange confusion with just what maturity is. Right now it seems to be blood and sex and riveting talks on "racism" is the standard maturity. It never seems to occur to folks that these are juvenile issues a la Mortal Kombat or Doom.

 

[DriacKin]

There is this strange confusion with just what maturity is. Right now it seems to be blood and sex and riveting talks on "racism" is the standard maturity. It never seems to occur to folks that these are juvenile issues a la Mortal Kombat or Doom.

I disagree that the issues are juvenile. What is juvenile is the manner in which they are depicted in modern games. Instead of asking thought-provoking questions about racism or the nature of racism, these games just give us the same contrived scenario over and over and give us the exact same message that we've already heard a million times before. In addition, most game developers have no idea what the word 'subtlety' means.

I think that films/games/literature based on issues like sex, violence, racism, etc... can be perfectly fine as long the authors use them to ask interesting questions or give us a unique perspective.

 

[racofer]

Tetris.

 

[BirdsCanFly]

Fallout
Torment
Arcanum
Bloodlines
Deus Ex
System Shock 2
I have no mouth and I must scream
Sanitarium
Grim Fandago (yeah humor can be mature)
Shadow Of The Comet
Gabriel Knight
The Last Express
Silent Hill
Mafia
No One Lives For Ever
Thief
Half Life
Jedi Knight 2
Betrayal At Krondor
Anachronox (did I mention that humor can be mature?)

That's a pretty good list.

 

[entertainer]

OFP

 

[Flatlander]

I have already played my Alter Ego card for the day, but what the hell. I haven't played other games where you can get butt raped and killed at the age of six.

Also the dying of old age scene is rather touching, almost like when Aeris died *sob*

 

[Erzherzog]

Witcher minus sex-cards and some female models.

 

[DriacKin]

Witcher minus sex-cards and some female models.

Really?
Even without the sex-cards, I found much of the dialogue to be juvenile and far too silly to be taken seriously.
In addition, imo, the feud between the humans and non-humans was pretty shallow and felt like a very generic tale of racism. We've seen this shit before in a million different games/films/books, and CDP gave us nothing interesting that we haven't seen before in this category. Ultimately, it was too shallow to take seriously.