April 2020 In-Game Events

[Jdast]

Three Earth humans have died in space, but they died inside their vehicle after it sprang a leak.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_11

 

Aha! I knew it! So you do, in point of fact, know about Non-Earth / Terran humans!

 

Expect a knock on the door soon...

 

 

Dasty

[Void_Singer]

Thanks OP, I haven't played Pandemic 2 and Plague Inc in a while, and I'm due for a replay.... time to wipe out Madagascar and Greenland again >=)

[phalczen]

I long debated writing this reply, mostly because its content will never ease the pain of the OP. I am truly sorry that you, or anyone has lost a loved one from this, or suffered any physical or emotional harm from this disease, and for reasons which I will keep confidential I sympathize with you, without knowing the depth of pain and sorrow you must be experiencing. My heartfelt condolences go to you.

 

1.) The Rakghoul Resurgence event is not about infecting and killing people, quite the opposite. THORN stands for the The Hyland Organizaion for Rakghoul Neutralization and the themes of the event, most of the missions, are actually about responding to the pandemic. It is true that there are some achievements related to passing the infection along, and a hidden daily for infecting (not killing) characters (who can then use the vaccine to cure themselves.) There are PvP related achievements as well, which is no different than other planets and other events, and the galaxy is at war, and while the achievement is specific to the event zone, the player kills count regardless of whether you, or the targeted player, have the disease. One can opt-out from being the target of both achievements, in that you can stay in a pve gameplay focus area or you can purchase an anti-viral kit relic or vaccine, protecting you from those who would do you harm in the hunt for achievements.

 

2.) The event has been in the game for years, long before the pandemic, and is part of a recurring rotation, so its presence now is not directly intended as spiteful to people suffering from the pandemic.

 

3.) Entertainment companies have on occasion delayed various launches of content, like a feature film, because it is about a topic that relates to a recent tragedy or other devastating event. Professional sports competitions may be delayed because of mass tragedies. It is noteworthy that Netflix or VUDU or other streaming services have not removed customer's ability to watch movies like "Steven King's The Stand," Michael Crichton's "Andromeda Strain," Outbreak, Contagion, etc. Bioware certainly could have elected to disable the Rakghoul event in light of the unprecedented nature of these times, and it would be regarded as being sensitive.

 

4.) We know that in-game events cannot simply be turned on or off. Turning them off requires a patch, and the next patch isn't scheduled until April 14th. To boot, the team is all working remotely, which means its an added burden to have them delay or interrupt their work on 6.1.1, to create and deploy a patch before April 7 to shut off the Rakghoul event. Pointing out that there is work involved in that endeavor is not a comment about its worthiness. Just because it would take developer time, and service interruption, to perform doesn't mean the effort to be sensitive to people who are suffering any kind of negative effects from this pandemic is worthless.

 

5.) Hopefully one can accept that at its face value, the Rakghoul Resurgence was never intended as an insult to people suffering from COVID-19 or any other infectious disease, and that Bioware did not know when the pandemic would be have its peak effect on people at the time the event schedule was put into a patch.

 

6.) Perhaps it is not a stretch to consider that as a whole, with social distancing measures, and the sense of isolation all of us feel right now, that multiplayer video gaming has become a way for some people to feel more connected, and SWTOR is definitely a game that fits that criteria.

 

7.) There is a lot of death that occurs in the game, often through incredibly violent means. The game actively incentivizes role-playing evil, cruelty, depravity, slavery, discrimination, murder, etc. That it provides such fantasy experiences does not mean its creators, or its real life players, are, in their real-lives, violent, evil, cruel, depraved, slavers, discriminatory, homicidal, etc. Nor does it mean its creators or players are indifferent to death and suffering of any person from any source.

 

Anyway, that's all I have to say on the topic. I apologize to anyone whom I have offended, and I don't expect the post will ease the OPs pain, nor am I attempting to get the OP to love an invent about infection during a pandemic. But perhaps, it provides some rationale to take a step back and minimize emotion about a topic while still remaining sensitive to the tragedies people are experiencing now all over the world.