Kiro Tamahime Fan Club

[Nonesuch]

I kept my own opinions out of this thread, because I knew eventually Fen would laser in on it and... yeah.


I think the important lesson to take away from it is this:

Considering Kiro had virtually no content at the time (December 2013), meaning those notes were all I had to go on, I think that paints a pretty clear picture of Kiro's behavior. You read the story, and you've had more than two years to say "Hey that seems really out of character for Kiro (even though you helped design her and all), please fix."

This happens *a lot* in TiTS. Not quite as prevalent at the start, where I was filling in bounties with virtually no information about where the NPC was or what their background could feasibly be. But if you only offer very vague information about settings and characters, and keep where the game is supposed to be going locked in your head, and have to be pestered for feedback, then it's not exactly surprising when other writers don't get what you're trying to do.

 

[CrusaderDurante]

I like Kiro in a dudebro sorta way. Get drunk, get a few chicks, and then you fuck anyway. Bonus for just being pretty cool in general. She was fun to meet, interact with, and eventually deflower. Granted, I am feeling some "burnout", but that's more tied to the fact Myrellion is our last stop for the moment.


What's not to like? 

 

[Fenoxo]

You read the story, and you've had more than two years to say "Hey that seems really out of character for Kiro (even though you helped design her and all), please fix.

But it wasn't even in game content and would probably take a lot of effort to rewrite what is essentially a rad little side-story. That and I HATE cutting well-written content. I still regret that Treated Steph had to go, even though it really needed to :/

 

[Ravelordnito]

But it wasn't even in game content and would probably take a lot of effort to rewrite what is essentially a rad little side-story. That and I HATE cutting well-written content. I still regret that Treated Steph had to go, even though it really needed to :/

It's not too late to bring back treated steph fen.

 

[Alabaster Chimes]

It's not too late to bring back treated steph fen.

Considering the MASSIVE backlash that having Steph forced treated, on live tv no less, I think its not just to late to bring it back, I think there's no way in any possible hell he could bring it back without the forums trying to fucking eat him for doing it.

 

[Etis]

While I do agree that it's pretty horrible and more than a little twisted, I'd be fine with it being in the game. I just wouldn't trigger it, big deal. I don't understand why people would draw an arbitrary line like that. The Treatment exists, New Texas exists, and everything people are going to hate about mind break and bimbofication exists.  It's all there already. Another scene involving the content in the area exclusively devoted to the content is perfectly acceptable. Because, in my mind, if people really have that much of a problem with Steph being forced to take the Treatment then they should have just a big of a problem with the entirety of New Texas. But that's not going anywhere and it doesn't need to go anywhere. The content is entirely optional. Is it a controversial and dicey bit of world building? Sure, but so is most of Myrellion, and the negative resolution available for Tarkus is also a pretty hot topic. 


Above all else, I believe fetish games should aim to be as inclusive as possible. At the end of the day, it's all fiction. No one is really hurt, and no actual ethical travesty is being committed. That's why fiction is a good outlet for such things.

The reason why NT is declared tolerable is because Treatment is never forced on tourists. Forcing it is a reason for orbital bombardment.

 

[Fenoxo]

Steph being forced to take it just isn't in character for New Texas.

 

[Nik_van_Rijn]

Back to them rails again: I can't believe I forgot to mention not one but two criminally cute busts Kiro has. Thank you, Guts-person!

 

[FerrousFlint]

Holy shit man when and where was that!?


True and that ain't right even if its a porn game


Kiro's new rating is *DUN DUN DUN* 4.7/10

I'm not sure how to react to this thread:

• I know if I come down harsh, I'm going to be accused of favoritism or whatever, but at the same time, I kind of hate how this thread was treated.
  
  
• Someone made a fan thread for one of their favorite characters, and instead of leaving that thread for fans of said character, you guys felt the need to pile in and tell the author why they were bad for liking said character. At worst, it's needlessly antagonistic. At best, it's impolite. Now, if it's a general discussion thread about that character, sure.
  
  

I also have a couple points I'd like to toss out here:

• "Literal rapist' - this one has the barest of roots in her original content. One of her initial notes was that she "steals cargoes and virginities", and wasn't averse to claiming husbands' and wives' backdoors on her way out. Savin took that to be wayyy more hardcore than I initially meant it. I always kind of figured that if she ever got rapey with someone on the job, it would be either be a sort of ironic vigilante justice (butt-fucking a known sex-slaver, for example), or because of mutual attraction/arousal (perhaps with a bit of encouraging teasing). So when Savin wrote a story with our OC's fucking, it wound up being a lot more rapey than I otherwise would've imagined it. Of course, it was Savin writing it, so it was still a damned enjoyable read. Of course I didn't complain. I suppose I should've realized it would be rolled into canon and color people's perception of her, but I have a hard time being a content nazi outside of the main game. (Though I did just reject an idea for an alien luchadore.)
  
  
• Mary Sue - I don't rightly get this one. She doesn't have a super special snowflake backstory. She got off her home planet, became a pirate, and got a horsecock. She's decent in a fight and good at picking up drunk girls in bars. The only really sue-ish quality I've seen point out was in what amounted to a fan-story. (Yes, Savin writes a lot of stuff for the game, but he wasn't on the clock for that story (I think)).
  
  

So, you guys think Kiro is a terrible, shitty, shitty character because of a story Savin wrote, and not her 100+ pages of ingame content? ...okay.


Fuck these forums are bizarre sometimes.

I can't help but think sometimes if Kiro, Urta, and Tamani were more masculine characters, and complete bastards, not a lot people would have that much criticism, either because that character type is so common in porn that its the standard (either as the villain or the insert) or because "Hey, the game is lesser without them because... repression."


To me, if Kiro turned out to be Urta 2.0... then fine. Urta was a solid character in CoC, she had a backstory, a character arc, and a resolution depending on how you resolved it - which is more than what some characters got. She was also "somewhat" sympathetic, I think if Fenoxo allowed more "grim" elements to the game Urta's story might've even ended being tragic in some obvious places.

While I do agree that it's pretty horrible and more than a little twisted, I'd be fine with it being in the game. I just wouldn't trigger it, big deal. I don't understand why people would draw an arbitrary line like that. The Treatment exists, New Texas exists, and everything people are going to hate about mind break and bimbofication exists. It's all there already. Another scene involving the content in the area exclusively devoted to the content is perfectly acceptable. Because, in my mind, if people really have that much of a problem with Steph being forced to take the Treatment then they should have just as big of a problem with the entirety of New Texas. But that's not going anywhere and it doesn't need to go anywhere. The content is entirely optional. Is it a controversial and dicey bit of world building? Sure, but so is most of Myrellion, and the negative resolution available for Tarkus is also a pretty hot topic.


Above all else, I believe fetish games should aim to be as inclusive as possible. At the end of the day, it's all fiction. No one is really hurt, and no actual ethical travesty is being committed. That's why fiction is a good outlet for such things.

I never saw this topic come up before, but I don't think inclusion was the problem (unless it was then fuck me for talkin'), it could've been that mind break, bimbofication, and other "forced" content in hentai and porn art in general is so common and focused on already that this seemed too familiar and in spite of a character that it felt heavy-handed. Although, I can't believe Steph is anything but annoying and unsympathetic because she hits that sweet spot of being IRRITATINGLY stupid and yet AGGRAVATINGLY interesting that you have to know more about her adventures. I mean *YOU KNOW* she's gonna get raped, you know she's gonna get ahegao'd, and you know she's gonna walk away just to get shit on another day. Wash, rinse, repeat, join in next time for Steph Irson's "The Cock Hunter".


No, I'm not saying "I hate her, get rid of her. Waaaaaah!" I'm just saying that I would of preferred a male parody but undergoing similar misadventures. To. This. Day. Their hasn't been any decent male!rape stories out their, unless their gender benders or futanaris (in this one case I don't mind).

 

[Couch]

I can't help but think sometimes if Kiro, Urta, and Tamani were more masculine characters, and complete bastards, not a lot people would have that much criticism, either because that character type is so common in porn that its the standard (either as the villain or the insert) or because "Hey, the game is lesser without them because... repression."

You obviously never saw the million billion threads about people wanting to kill Kelt.  I suppose it's to Kiro's credit that even vocal detractors usually don't leave her to die of her own stupidity.

I never saw this topic come up before, but I don't think inclusion was the problem (unless it was then fuck me for talkin'), it could've been that mind break, bimbofication, and other "forced" content in hentai and porn art in general is so common and focused on already that this seemed too familiar and in spite of a character that it felt heavy-handed.

There were several issues.  One was that the only reason visitors can feel safe on New Texas is knowing that the Treatment isn't communicable and that nobody's going to force it on you.  Steph's scene featured a bull casually injecting her with it while raping her.  The rape is bad enough, because this isn't a barbarian or semi-sentient creature we're talking about here, it's a human being just up and deciding to rape her, but the fact that he was able to just up and decide to Treat her against her will was frankly horrifying enough that I have never partaken in any sex scene on New Texas or with any Treated character since, nor will I ever again.  I know it's not going to happen, but once you raise the specter that it could, you produce a fear that's very difficult to overcome.


Another is that many saw it as New Texas content, which sparked quite a lot of controversy that's only died down in the years since because it's not going away, leaking out into the rest of the game.  Steph had been in the game for well over a year by that point as non-Treated content, and the scene irrevocably made her content part of that very specific set of fetishes.


The third was that players actually got to go out and meet Steph in person, and her dialogue there did a lot to humanize her, which unintentionally caused the joke to stop being funny because players suddenly knew her too well to laugh at her misfortune anymore.


Deleting content is something that should never be done save in the most dire of circumstances.  That it was done with Treated Steph should tell you just how big an issue it was.

 

[Starstruck]

-snip-


Above all else, I believe fetish games should aim to be as inclusive as possible. At the end of the day, it's all fiction. No one is really hurt, and no actual ethical travesty is being committed. That's why fiction is a good outlet for such things.

Finally somebody speaks sense! I never could wrap my head around it when someone religiously enforces ethics on an interactive porn game. It's here for a reason and that is to be an acceptable outlet for fetishes that in the real world are frowned upon and/or even downright illegal. TiTs may not be the magical fetish paradise that was Mareth, but it's still a hyper-hedonistic science fiction adventure.

 

[Klaptrap]

Finally somebody speaks sense! I never could wrap my head around it when someone religiously enforces ethics on an interactive porn game. It's here for a reason and that is to be an acceptable outlet for fetishes that in the real world are frowned upon and/or even downright illegal. TiTs may not be the magical fetish paradise that was Mareth, but it's still a hyper-hedonistic science fiction adventure.

This is not about ethics in video game journalism porn, or about the legality of the fetishes involved. The reason Steph's treatment got removed was because, as Savin and Couch said, it didn't fit with what we know about NT and many people didn't like it.


I can understand that you feel upset that they removed content that you felt was perfectly fine, or maybe you're upset about needless censorship, but TiTS is not an equal-oppertunity fetish game. Some fetishes just don't play nice with others and if contamination happens, people will get upset. That's ultimately what this is about, making the readers happy, and if that means that some stuff needs to be kept relatively out of sight (NT) or outright banned (see ban list) then that simply gets done.

 

[FerrousFlint]

Finally somebody speaks sense! I never could wrap my head around it when someone religiously enforces ethics on an interactive porn game. It's here for a reason and that is to be an acceptable outlet for fetishes that in the real world are frowned upon and/or even downright illegal. TiTs may not be the magical fetish paradise that was Mareth, but it's still a hyper-hedonistic science fiction adventure.

This is not about ethics in video game journalism porn, or about the legality of the fetishes involved. The reason Steph's treatment got removed was because, as Savin and Couch said, it didn't fit with what we know about NT and many people didn't like it.


I can understand that you feel upset that they removed content that you felt was perfectly fine, or maybe you're upset about needless censorship, but TiTS is not an equal-oppertunity fetish game. Some fetishes just don't play nice with others and if contamination happens, people will get upset. That's ultimately what this is about, making the readers happy, and if that means that some stuff needs to be kept relatively out of sight (NT) or outright banned (see ban list) then that simply gets done.

Boy, are these conversations starting to become commonplace...

 

[Starstruck]

-snip-

As a roleplayer myself I do understand and sympathize with the need to prune content that's out of place in the lore, thats not what irks me. Rather its the way readers persecute content that doesn't agree with them, such as Doctor Badger, Kiro and Del, as well as Myrellion and and of course New Texas.

 

[Nonesuch]

Boy, are these conversations are starting to become commonplace...

We've had this discussion many times before, buddy boy. It gets extremely wearying seeing it get dredged up again and again. The Irson thing was changed for good reasons. That is where it ends.

As a roleplayer myself I do understand and sympathize with the need to prune content that's out of place in the lore, thats not what irks me. Rather its the way readers persecute content that doesn't agree with them, such as Doctor Badger, Kiro and Del, as well as Myrellion and and of course New Texas.

Nobody is persecuting anything, complex-seeker. Some people feel that certain NPCs are poorly judged, presented or do not fit the tone of the game. Always the discussion regarding them is how they could be improved or added to without impacting players who enjoy that content, and how the editing process might be refined so we don't end up with these issues again.

I can't help but think sometimes if Kiro, Urta, and Tamani were more masculine characters, and complete bastards, not a lot people would have that much criticism, either because that character type is so common in porn that its the standard (either as the villain or the insert) or because "Hey, the game is lesser without them because... repression."

You really could not be more wrong about that. Kiro gets away with raping Kaede and basically being a womanizing scumbag BECAUSE she's a futa. She is in many ways a crystallisation of certain rather unpleasant attitudes regarding female hermaphrodites in fantasy porn. There's no way a male who acts like she does would be as popular, indeed would probably be deeply unpopular, at least with this audience.

 

[SorenMageofMareth]

Steph being forced to take it just isn't in character for New Texas.

This.  There's a whole bunch other reasons but at the end of the day the biggest reason is that if famous people and rich people, or mega corp starlettes or stars  all the sorts of people whom New texas is fellating to survive in it's current  state are no longer safe on New Texas in such a public cavalier way New Texas would get metaphorically nuked into the ground.


The internet backlash that lead to the content deletion would spread like wildfire among her earnest fans, among the obsessed with guns, among the rich, among the egalatarians, among the Church of the Oner's, among people afraid of what modding can do to the mind etc.  And unlike the outer reachs where no one cares, and fewer people in the core really know what happens  New Texas is in the Core.  the Dreadnoughts can drop in, no will drop in.   And everyone of their backers that didn't turn on them would step aside because they have skeletons they need to hide and they probably already have all the black box shit they need the treatment for. 


And just crucifying that one dude would not be enough. Through the humanisation of one all become real.  The UCG would not hear the end of it until a cure was made possible and New Texas government was sent into a sun. 

 

[Longbow]

Honestly, I always figured that one of the real problems with New Texas was tonal consistency with the rest of the game up until that point. You can tell just from how people treat the rival that it's clear different people have different ideas of what the game's tone is supposed to be.


Nothing too heavy really happens on Mhen'ga, so it's hardly strange that some people interpret TiTS' tone as being rather lighthearted early on. You have a few pockets of harder stuff on Tarkus, but you can stretch someone's willingness to play along without breaking it. New Texas, I think, was responsible for tone whiplash for a lot of people. Permanent debilitation isn't something a lot of people considered lighthearted, and it stretched their lighthearted mindset a little too far. That's the real issue here, isn't it? Mindset. You can get people to accept fun, lighthearted things, and you can get them to accept darker, edgy things. Getting people to accept both at the same time, though, is more difficult.


I don't know whether Fen was joking or not about the treatment being a hook for a quest for a cure. If he's being serious then I think the treatment's place in the game makes a lot more sense. It's possible to have a resort planet of bimbo cow people without the treatment, so that particular element feels a little incomplete without more to its existence, I feel.


I really do feel like the game's tone is a little... confused, sometimes. It has multiple people writing for it, so having a little leeway for things like consistency is helpful. Still, when I look at Myrellion compared to the earlier content, I can't help but wonder if the game was always meant to turn out this way, or if something changed at one point.


Oh, also, I like Kiro just fine. I would like some more scuzzy characters to scuzz out with. Double-teaming Dr. Khan with Kara was delightful. I wouldn't mind doing things like that with Kiro.

 

[Alabaster Chimes]

 

[FerrousFlint]

We've had this discussion many times before, buddy boy. It gets extremely wearying seeing it get dredged up again and again. The Irson thing was changed for good reasons. That is where it ends.

I was just talking about the whole "fetish persecution" thing I see a lot now, not Steph Irson being perpetually railroaded all the time.

You really could not be more wrong about that. Kiro gets away with raping Kaede and basically being a womanizing scumbag BECAUSE she's a futa. She is in many ways a crystallisation of certain rather unpleasant attitudes regarding female hermaphrodites in fantasy porn. There's no way a male who acts like she does would be as popular, indeed would probably be deeply unpopular, at least with this audience.

Other than being depressingly uncommon to almost non-existent and pushed to the sidelines, I don't really see that many unpleasant attitudes towards herms, And Kiro getting away with it, I'm pretty sure us being able to fuck her repeatedly or leave her permanently plugged up to a machine is karma enough.

Steph being forced to take it just isn't in character for New Texas.

I can believe that its out of character for NT, but I don't believe its out of character for Steph to fall for or be subjected to it HARD.

Honestly, I always figured that one of the real problems with New Texas was tonal consistency with the rest of the game up until that point. You can tell just from how people treat the rival that it's clear different people have different ideas of what the game's tone is supposed to be.


I don't know whether Fen was joking or not about the treatment being a hook for a quest for a cure. If he's being serious then I think the treatment's place in the game makes a lot more sense. It's possible to have a resort planet of bimbo cow people without the treatment, so that particular element feels a little incomplete without more to its existence, I feel.

Oh well if that's the case I'm looking forward to seeing the whole NT arc work out. Treatment dealt with or not, I always like to see the resolution to stories like that.

 

[Xeivous]

@Longbow I think that the game's tone is supposed to start out pretty light hearted, rich kid setting out to be like their dad and earn their fortune in the crazy porn-game universe, but later on was supposed to really get into moments of dark clarity about what kind of universe a porn-game universe would be like past all the fun and sex. The transition from Mhen'ga to Myrellion is fair enough in it's change of tone as it rather gently eases players into the whole thing. The Problem with NT is that it bludgeons players with how fucked up the whole planet is far too early on without anyone besides Cass really going against the whole thing to provide contrast to the society's fuckedness.


As for the rival, there seem to be two main camps of thought regarding their eventual fate. Reconciliation and Revenge. Both of which are rather in line with choices that the player already has and the universe as a whole atm.

 

[Nik_van_Rijn]

Nobody is persecuting anything, complex-seeker. Some people feel that certain NPCs are poorly judged, presented or do not fit the tone of the game. Always the discussion regarding them is how they could be improved or added to without impacting players who enjoy that content, and how the editing process might be refined so we don't end up with these issues again.

Maybe that's how such discussion should be handled, or how they are handled behind closed doors and between various authors. However you don't need to look farther than the begining of this thread to see that open discussions on these forums often don't go like that.

 There's no way a male who acts like she does would be as popular, indeed would probably be deeply unpopular, at least with this audience.

Dane. Nuff said. 

 

[Xeivous]

Dane. Nuff said. 

Doesn't he do it on your cousin's orders? I never lose to him so I've never read the scene or how the interaction on Tarkus changes.


Plus he's doesn't come off as a scumbag in the slightest elsewhere and is pretty much a perfect employee all the time.

 

[Etis]

Dane. Nuff said. 

There aren't much known about Dane's personality now. We only have encouner with him on Poe A aside of main plot, and it is too specific to say something. And plot encounters... They aren't outside of "fight for the top position" game design.

 

[Starstruck]

Maybe that's how such discussion should be handled, or how they are handled behind closed doors and between various authors. However you don't need to look farther than the begining of this thread to see that open discussions on these forums often don't go like that.

Pretty much, and besides nothing is ever forced on you perse, when you find content that you don't like or you're not comfortable with its an exceedingly simple task to simply avoid triggering that content ever again. There shouldn't be a need for nay-sayers to voice their discontent as loudly and obnoxiously as possible. Maybe I'm in a minority here but to tell an author how to "Improve" on a product that they poured their soul into writing just because some may find it offensive strikes me as conceited and incredibly disrepectful.

 

[CrusaderDurante]

Doesn't he do it on your cousin's orders? I never lose to him so I've never read the scene or how the interaction on Tarkus changes.


Plus he's doesn't come off as a scumbag in the slightest elsewhere and is pretty much a perfect employee all the time.

Dane is basically a 9 to 5 villain, especially once you consider he may end up on your crew because of the Myrellion incident. 


It's hard to truly hate someone who's doing their job. 

 

[Xeivous]

There aren't much known about Dane's personality now. We only have encouner with him on Poe A aside of main plot, and it is too specific to say something. And plot encounters... They aren't outside of "fight for the top position" game design.

How do you encounter Dane on Poe A?

Dane is basically a 9 to 5 villain, especially once you consider he may end up on your crew because of the Myrellion incident. 


It's hard to truly hate someone who's doing their job. 

I do need a bro to go drinking with that I'm not fucking.

 

[CrusaderDurante]

I do need a bro to go drinking with that I'm not fucking.

Don't get too drunk, you might...knot be ready for the outcome.


I'll see myself out...

 

[Etis]

How do you encounter Dane on Poe A?

Female centaur TF.

 

[Xeivous]

Don't get too drunk, you might...knot be ready for the outcome.


I'll see myself out...

If anyone is getting the knot, it's going to be him if I have any say in it.

Female centaur TF.

Well that's interesting...

 

[Longbow]

Oh well if that's the case I'm looking forward to seeing the whole NT arc work out. Treatment dealt with or not, I always like to see the resolution to stories like that.

I would also like to see some kind of resolution to it. Like I said, it feels a little incomplete as it is now.


@Xeivous I agree, the transition from Mhen'ga to Myrellion is more gradual, in stark contrast to New Texas. You make a good that I neglected to make in my previous post, in that it's possible to successfully change the tone of a story, and that doing so gradually helps avoid tone whiplash. In the spirit of being fair, I will also say that tone whiplash can be used as a tool on its own to accomplish certain things.


Also, I do agree that the rival choice doesn't really clash with anything at the moment. It's similar to other choices you have. I just think that the choice a player prefers can be indicative of how they view the tone of the game. In some cases, at least. I could be wrong, of course.