Little Girls Can't be Sociopaths in the Apocalypse?
Ummmm, so, the only person holding a gun when they try to steal the truck is Arvo. Sorry to say, but since he a) dicked you over when you let him go without stealing his meds and b) is trying to steal the truck Kenny (not Mike or Bonnie) fixed up why isn't there a [Shoot Arvo for being a useless scumbag] option. For that matter, shoot Mike and Bonnie too. In fact, why isn't there a [Shoot/Awl to the skull a Character who is going to get you killed] option? I mean, sure, there'd be a lot less people but my god... Rebekah, Nick, Luke, Carver, Bonnie, Kenny. I would have killed half of those people way before they ate it anyways!
It's the apocalypse. People try to steal all your supplies? People try to steal a truck they didn't do anything to procure? For god's sake, if there would have been a [Shoot Bonnie for being a scumbag] option what would have been the worst outcome? Not having to listen to her whine about being sad because she screwed you a couple times?
One of the greatest things about this game is getting stuck in situations where none of the options are going to pan out perfectly but, and note you I LOVE this game, if y'all are gonna keep trying to force these "I'm only a little girl" options down our throats you're not allowing us to delve into the kind of character who might actually survive instead of one that we can have warm and fuzzy feelings about. She's going to end up psychotic anyways, let us force the hand.
Comments
How could you kill Rebekah? She was about to be a mother. OH MY. And Luke??? He was the sweetest character. Otherwise ummmm I could never see Clementine going around slaughtering her group because they 'piss her off'.
And I can respect that. The game is tailored to the decisions we make but the decisions seem to be tailored to keep the bright, shiny, hopeful side of Clementine the only option. I can accept that if it's an "option" but not if it's the only option.
Luke, love him all you want, kept trying to get the group to stay where they were. What did Lee teach Clem? "Keep moving." Luke also screwed the group twice in the same chapter (Arvo just hobbled on up to the shed when Luke was supposed to be on 'watch' and when the Walkers started rolling into the gift shop he was... well...). Got himself caught by Carver's people (crippling him), just wouldn't stop fighting with Kenny, got cornered with Sarah and couldn't figure a way out, needed a 9 year old holding a baby to cover him and STILL GOT SHOT, and really didn't do anything to stop the group from stuffing a little girl in a storage shed. Ummmm, I don't know which Luke y'all fell in love with but the Luke I saw would have gotten the awl to the skull in Episode 3.
Rebekah? Mean, nasty, loud, never killed anyone or anything, and was about to kick out Zombie bait. Plus, was the whole reason Carver came looking for the group at the cabin in the first place. I might not have given her the awl but when you got out of Carver's House of Nasty and she wouldn't stop simpering, I would have grabbed Jane's jacket and just kept rolling.
But I didn't get those options and instead I'm holding Zombie bait with Jane in Clem's House of Leftovers trying to decide if I should jack this hippy for bringing a gun into my house. Look, I can respect the idea that people want the option of keeping her a hopeful, resourceful humanist but I really would like the options for her to be a logical, practical, cynical pragmatist.
You got a lot of problems don't ya.
Some of the options we have are pretty dark. She had a set character in season 1, doesn't make much sense to just change her completely. It makes sense to make her darker with time (as an option) which is what I think season 2 was trying to do. I assume we'll get even worse options in season 3 if that's how you want to develop her character.
Killing isn't the only solution. I think Clementine is smart enough to figure it out.
Im glad there's not an option to randomly execute people that make you mad. This game is too classy for that.
Kill anyone that looks at you weird: The game
Lee wouldn't like that.
lol yeah real classy. Smashing someone's head in with a salt lick, or crow bar. Fan favs getting killed left, and right. People that you run around with for a while stabbing you in the back... I wouldn't call this game classy.
Thats the world that they live in, what do you expect? None of that is worse than having Clementine act like the Terminator.
Not entirely. Are you forgetting that part where she can cold-bloodedly shoot Kenny in the head after he kills Jane? I love that scene but I'd have to sacrifice my favorite character (Jane) to get it.
First i wanted to comment on the title of this thread.
Little Girls Can't be Sociopaths in the Apocalypse?
Absolutely they can. It's all about how they are raised or the environment in which they live in. Remember, small children or kid's have brains still developing and they grow up knowing what they are taught or according to how their lives are. If they grow up in a normal, safe environment, taught moral's and values common to most people, they will grow up in that manner. If they grow up during the apocalypse, they will learn that they need to kill and it becomes their normal and common everyday existance. By today's definition, they may be labeled sociopath's but to them it's just normal life.
That said, I think Clem grew up in a more normal environment and had someone like Lee who taught her that she has to fight or do bad thing's in order to survive, but he also tried to make sure she retained her humanity. She was really a good person as the world was falling apart around her, but she was also mature enough to know to hide from the dangerous walker's and didn't want to see the ugliness that people around her had to do.
In season 2, she had grown and realized that in order to survive, she couldn't just close her eye's to the current world, she couldn't fear the ugly but had to accept it and just deal with it. Her innocent childhood was lost but she could still survive and grow up having to accept her world was a terrible place now and terrible thing's will happen and she will have to do some of it herself.
I for one want to see Clem as the playable character in season 3. We all loved her and wanted to take care of that innocent, sweet little girl from season 1, but now in season 2 she's had to become more tough inside and out. I think some people just miss the season 1 cute Clem and don't want to play her as a little killer.. I myself do. I want to see her grow and become a little badass because I put surviving as her main priority.
I had her stay and watch Carver's death because I felt she needed to see it. She needed to see what sort of thing's that happen in her world and not be afraid of the ugliness. She did turn her eyes away for a moment, it still botherd her to see that, but she kept looking. It was to toughen her up because no walker will spare her just because she's cute, no bandit will leave her alone just because she's scared.
My Clem stayed with the group of people she feel's she can trust because she is safer that way, and she can like them all, make friends and do her best to protect them, but at the end of the day, it's all about doing what's best for herself.
Really, tell that to this girl:
LOL THIS. I totally forgot her name but she's exactly who I was thinking of when I saw this thread!
It's Lizzie. Thought she was a really interesting character until she killed Micah. Then I was like, holy hell this kid is fucking crazy.
Leave them if they're bad, shoot them if they're a threat.
Am i the only person that is like ???? Why would you want Clementine to be a crazy person.
I don't get it either unless they think playing as a psycho is more fun or something
So, as the weirdo who started this, I suppose I should now attempt to explain away all of the naysayers and "haters".
But that's not gonna happen. Sorry if that gets anyone's junk twisted.
Everyone who has replied has very good points, gif'd or otherwise, but I have a feeling a lot of you are missing the greater point. This game isn't designed so that YOUR decisions are the only one's that make the story go. Yes, the game is tailored to your decisions. Yes, a lot of you think that a slow march from innocence to stout and thoughtful survivor of the apocalypse represents more of a balanced and complex characterization that we'd like to see "our" protagonist take. I can respect and totally understand that.
But to hell with the lot of you if you think that your interpretation of Clem's journey is the only one with merit because you feel like your moral and ethical guides should predetermine the fate of this girl and there's no room for derivation into darker, angrier, more corrupt realms of thought. The decisions you make in the game direct the storytelling? Sure, if you're forced to believe that an adolescent girl is incapable of vicious actions, unabashed brutality, and the type of gut-wrenching joie d'vie that would make a billy goat puke then of course you're going to think all of that is perfectly rational. And I applaud your naivete. But some of us, call us sick and depraved or whatever other self-righteous ad hominem you can muster (preferably in .gif form, those are awesome
are less impressed with the luke-warm attachment to pop child-psych where children are to be coddled and nurtured until they become psychopaths on their own accord (without an apocalypse to weigh in on the merit of their depravity) and would rather allow nature to take it's course. And in this version of nature, nature is brutal, unforgiving, and savage mistress that prefers the [Eat You] option to the [Let You Live Peacefully] option.
All I'm asking is that we give Clem the option to spit in nature's face and see where the chips land. You don't want to play "that" character? Don't. No one's saying you should. Your decisions are YOUR choice, fair enough. But at least give us the options to explore the darker side of what could become "Clem the Destroyer".
Not a sociopath. Delusional adolescent, perhaps, but in no way a sociopath. She doesn't understand her decisions are wrong. Sociopaths understand their decisions may be right or wrong dependent on society but fails to give a flying f---.
No, a lot of people have said that. It kinda makes me sad but I understand. People so quickly assume that, if forced into a life or death situation, making a decision that values one life over another makes someone crazy. In the apocalypse, however, it doesn't make you crazy. It gives you the choice of being an optimist, a humanist, or a pragmatist. If you don't like one of those options, don't take it. Just don't deny someone who would take "pragmatist" the opportunity to do so.
I was onboard with the OP when I read the title...
...but then I realized OP just wants to be really "edgy" 'n dark. Why don't you go play Postal or Fallout or some other RPG if you want to masturbate to your fantasies of being a violent lunatic?
I do find something fascinating in seeing people squirm when confronted with the idea that little girls are capable of violence and cruelty. But a character like Clementine, who is established to be hopeful and loving and mature, isn't the type to suddenly live up to some crazy kid's fantasy of being a cannibalistic baby-rapist or whatever the hell OP wants.
I dont know if you intended it but you come off rather hostile here. In any case, we've seen Clem get darker. I dont have a problem with that as I think its natural under the circumstances, but I havent seen any indication that she's going to all of sudden become psychotic and perform acts of unabashed brutality. It doesnt fit the character as we know her.
Hah, I think wanting to murder everyone in sight is a little more than sociopathic my friend.
Because it's a linear story game.
I agree, there should have been an option to shoot the car thiefs. It wouldn't matter if the outcome still got you shot- we know that Telltale only gives an illusion of choice, but there SHOULD be the choice. Even if it doesn't change anything in the long run. Especially since the people stealing the car were out of the picture for the remainder of the game and I somehow don't see them making a big comeback next season.
I also wished for an option to shoot Jane when her deception is revealed. I mean, they give us an option to shoot Kenny after he kills Jane, so we end up alone. Why not let us do the same with Jane? Personally, I haven't wanted the option to shoot someone in the face so much since Lilly killed Carley. But in both cases, I wasn't given one. I would have taken it in an instant if it had been there.
Well, there was an option to shoot Mike, but they took it out of the final product. I guess to make shooting you know who more impactful, I don't know.
I personally would rather Clementine happy for a season, than relive season 2. I guess some people would find that boring.
Shhh, you'll provoke the "But it's not realistic for her to be happy!!1" people.
My favorite moment was the campfire, could you imagine a entire season of that. I would prefer that over rehashing of Season 2.
I will accept the idea that I want something more '"edgy" 'n dark'. However, the whole concept of this being a masturbatory fantasy of mine is not just silly but way sicker than what I'm suggesting. But hey, if you're gonna go that way, whatever.
As the OP, I would respond this way: After my original and subsequent posts, do you really think I've got a hard on for adolescent sociopaths? It's not about the idea that I'd prefer to play a game that doesn't limit the players to cuddle-monkey, softball choices that sell you more of a fantasy than reality would, right? It's the fact that I want to sit here a yurk my jerkin thinking about a little girl eating babies?
Wow... project much? Go back and actually think about what I was posting for more than a knee-jerk. I'm not saying that I'd be just constantly picking the [Eat Babies] options. What I'm saying is that having those options not only fleshes out available ideologies (again, pragmatism and such) but allows the player to develop a character that isn't bound by a predetermined ethos. Again, you never have to take those options. If you prefer, you can be disgusted by the idea that someone would accept that option (or even consider it) but if it's the difference between [Eat Babies] and [Starve to Death], you can go ahead and die an early death if you'd prefer.
I apologize for the whiff of hostility. It wasn't the intention. And I totally agree that that unabashed brutality wouldn't "fit the character as we know her". That's my contention, however. Her character, no matter what you do, is predetermined at a very basic level. Pick this choice, you lose this friend, chose this option you lose both friends, but the baby lives and you're protecting it. Old friends vs new friends? Pick. But no matter what you're "kinda screwed". But are you? Or are you stuck with a set of options that, in a 'realistic' situation (yes, I know that's a crap assumption) and we, as players, didn't have to face the 'realistic' consequences (cause, again, none of it's real) why the hell shouldn't you have the option to [Salt Lick A.J.].
Again, you don't have to take or even like those options. But aren't those of us who'd like to see those possibilities explored curiostiy as valuable as those of you who'd continually pick the safe and cuddly options?
Not everyone in sight. Jane was gonna survive. Molly from towards the end of Season 1? If Kenny would have calmed the hell down towards the end, he would have made it. If Mike and Bonnie wouldn't have tried to rob us, they would have been fine. It's not just a murder spree. It's a [Did You Just Try to Screw Me?] murder spree. And honestly, all I wanted to do is really just have the option to put a bullet in Arvo's skull. If Mike and Bonnie would have begged for forgiveness, I honestly would have forgiven... Mike. I would have plunked Bonnie. But you're sitting there with a gun on 3 people, only one of them holding a gun and he's the only one in that group you SHOULD kill, where's that option?
[Kill Arvo]
You're right, they totally could've had a "shoot Arvo" option.
They could've even had Clem miss, or had Arvo survive the shot, and still kept everything else the same.
isn't it strange that Clem is somewhat sane, considering what have been happening to her?
you do realise that a character is not static.
shes still learning / encountering new ways
A character might not be static but you expect some consistency don't you?