I feel Earthbound, the classic SNES RPG where Ness debuted, is a masterclass on NPC dialogue. The dialogue is so well crafted it makes you eager to talk to each NPC you come by, knowing even if they don't give you relevant information they will give you a silly hot take on the world they occupy. It makes everything so much more rich. The Rabbit Girl referenced in the article is from Undertale by Toby Fox, who cut his teeth in gamemaking creating Earthbound mods. I suspect this is why his characters in Undertale follow a similar whimsical nature to this early influence of his. Undertale borrowed a lot from Earthbound's character construction.
I've been playing through Earthbound over the last few weeks and consistently find the writers and localization team put in just the right extra 10% to turn a "bleh" interaction into one you think about for days to come. For example, in a nod to the greedy, one character grumbles about the loan he gave to your family and now he "lives in poverty" - all while standing in the biggest house in the game.
Later on, a key item with key information gets shipped to your character via the equivalent of Fedex "Neglected Class." A rumpled delivery man eventually shows up and tells you "Anyway, he said... well... uh... I forgot. Yep, I forgot... actually I forgot the stuff I was supposed to deliver, too. I think it was some weird machine to make trout-flavored yogurt. Yeah, I forgot it at the desert... I'm not going back that way, so don't ask me to get the package... I mean, it's your package, right? So YOU go get it! Go on, get out of here." You then have to schlep to another part of the game to recover the package the delivery man decided just wasn't worth his time [0]
If you've played the game and want to figure out why some of the quirkiness just WORKS, I would recommend the later parts of Tim Roger's piece from a decade or so ago [1].
[1] http://archive.is/fMD7F (edit - huh, yeah this article has NOT aged well at all I should have taken a closer look since it first was released long ago, but I'll leave it here for the sake of discussion & derivative comments).
Agreed on Earthbound. I will add one more data point. GTA V. We learn about each character through the banter and their actions and not some long winded exposition. If there was a time I could not help feeling for the characters lately, it was GTA. They felt so tragic.
> That piece you suggest by Tim Roger is disgusting to read in its casual misogynistic violence.
I mean, he is quoting/paraphrasing Shigesato Itoi, the producer of Mother 2. The part about prostitutes only constitutes the first 2 paragraphs, so it seems unfair to make assumptions about the entire article based on the opening paragraphs (which, again, paraphrase Shigesato Itoi)
Not sure why you're getting downvoted - flippantly talking about murdering prostitutes is... not good to say the least. The choice to refer the the hypothetical prostitute as "it" is enlightening too...
Obviously written words can't literally punch you in the face, but I think that joint understanding of that is implicit when we both know that the thing being referred to is written words. Nevertheless the article pretty flippantly talks about murdering prostitutes as an allegory to games.
(I know the first part of it is a quote from the games creator, but the rest of the article continues to riff off of it without a hint of "huh? that's a weird thing to say.")
It's like you people think the world began in 2010. We've been through a drastic shift in what popular culture considers polite in the last decade. Nothing was weird about that metaphor in the nineties, it would have been seen as middle of the road edgy and nothing more.
As for "obviously written words can't literally punch you in the face"—No. That's what the theory GP plucked the phrase from implies, that hurtful language is literally violence.
I'm also fairly sure casually talking about murdering prostitutes didn't just become uncomfortable in most circles in the last decade, although I'm not quite old enough to confirm that anecdotally myself.
You can find out for yourself, if you're curious. Grab some vernacular fiction from the time period. Watch some movies. Even better, drop by a library or used book store and pick up some popular humor magazines, you'll be pretty surprised.
It wouldn't shock if after some digging you find that people of thirty years ago were barbarians. This wouldn't be the first time someone felt that about those in the recent past, but at least you'll start to develop an understanding of how quickly culture can change. The more you read, the more you'll get a sense for what changes are superficial and which are more profound. You may even begin to recognize the currents that took us from there to here.
They say the past is a foreign country, and they say it for a reason.
It has never been a respected profession. Homicide has always been an occupational hazard.
GTA3 (1999/2000?) put it into the popular consciousness by allowing players to emulate it, but IME nobody really started getting shamed for joking about it until around 2010 (coincidental to trans issues becoming mainstream?).
As fucked as this is, my distaste for this particular metaphor is somehow the thing that just triggered me to think metaphors are kind of bullshit. You can literally make a metaphor out of anything, apparently.
I'm now trying to figure out if there's a more tasteful way to make really terrible metaphors just for the sake of showing that point... I'm honestly not sure if it would work any other way but to be painfully awful though.
EDIT: I've made progress I think: It is dark humor and requires repetition, but I think what might work is some awful singular simile/metaphor that gets bent into every single shape possible by everyone, like a prostitute. Once the metaphor gets used enough, it could become a one line argument about how "your metaphor sucks."
E.g. "life is like a box of chocolates blah blah blah," and in response "yeah, life is like a prostitute..." (with no follow up). The point being, you totally could follow it up with some bastardized metaphor, but unlike the original person making one, you have the good sense not to continue.
Related: "They called it the Aristocrats"
EDIT 2: It might not have to be darkly offensive, it could just be annoying. Maybe "x is like a sandwich" or something, where you can always just add layers as though they're ingredients.. I dunno. I don't think it has the stain power, but there is a joke here at the expense of all metaphors.
EDIT 3: I THINK I GOT IT!
"X is like (an) onion(s)." Reference to the popular "Ogres are like onions" quote from Shrek. It's not quite as moldable as "prostitutes," and maybe a bit childish. But it has stain power, and could seemingly get the point across.
I've been playing through Earthbound over the last few weeks and consistently find the writers and localization team put in just the right extra 10% to turn a "bleh" interaction into one you think about for days to come. For example, in a nod to the greedy, one character grumbles about the loan he gave to your family and now he "lives in poverty" - all while standing in the biggest house in the game.
Later on, a key item with key information gets shipped to your character via the equivalent of Fedex "Neglected Class." A rumpled delivery man eventually shows up and tells you "Anyway, he said... well... uh... I forgot. Yep, I forgot... actually I forgot the stuff I was supposed to deliver, too. I think it was some weird machine to make trout-flavored yogurt. Yeah, I forgot it at the desert... I'm not going back that way, so don't ask me to get the package... I mean, it's your package, right? So YOU go get it! Go on, get out of here." You then have to schlep to another part of the game to recover the package the delivery man decided just wasn't worth his time [0]
If you've played the game and want to figure out why some of the quirkiness just WORKS, I would recommend the later parts of Tim Roger's piece from a decade or so ago [1].
[0] https://youtu.be/EIoLcNLyd0g?t=27902
[1] http://archive.is/fMD7F (edit - huh, yeah this article has NOT aged well at all I should have taken a closer look since it first was released long ago, but I'll leave it here for the sake of discussion & derivative comments).