Forums » The Parlor Room » Read Thread

Coming Out Simulator 2014

"Be careful what you say. In this conversation simulator, everyone will remember every dialogue option you pick, and your choices drive the story. This game is semi-autobiographical. You play as a fictionalized version of this game's author in the year 2010, during a night that changed their life forever. If that seems confusing or awkward, well, that's the gist of being forced to come out to one's parents, isn't it?"

....totally worth the 10 minutes or so it takes to play. ^_^

Warning, spoilers ahead.  TL;DR, I'd give it a 1/8 if this was an actual storygame.  I have no sympathy or empathy for this guy.

To be honest, I did not like it.  I tried the angriest path I could get, I tried the nicest path I could get, but I find the whole thing so...superficial.  It always ended up the same thing, and the fact that the guy had the AUDACITY to bring his father, a person totally unknown to him for YEARS, into this sort of scenario and just make up the idea his father was an ignorant fuck is just something I cannot give this true FAGGOT a pat on the back on.  The fact that he shoves dialogue that doesn't allow anyone to question him, his actions, or ANYTHING but the backgorund context that he gives his own commentary on as a form as his own sense of "closure" (whoops, it isn't!).  By now, I know it's a DAMN HARD struggle to come out to anyone about this sort of stuff, especially to one's own parents.  But this?

This shit becomes NOTHING in comparison to real stories I've heard from students around me; students who had to exchange schools because of the extent of abuse they had to suffer at the hands of not their peers, but by the STAFF.  Students who were broken down and had to be rebuilt by counselling centers and an entire school's worth of encouragement to get them moving.

I've had good, bad, and really weird and really unexpected stories in my memory, but by far, the fact that it looked like this way only showed me how WEAK this guy really is.  Not be strength or pride or having to do with his actual self, but by how he just gave up everything to "search for himself", when he pretty much refused to keep together what he had.

That, and he knew, and now EVERYONE knows he's made mistakes, but that doesn't change the fact that he gave up people that he had formed very close bonds with so easily.

THAT is weak.  THIS kind of shit is the stuff that ticks me off.

Hm. Well...

"the guy had the AUDACITY to bring his father, a person totally unknown to him for YEARS, into this sort of scenario"

If that's an accurate description (and I don't think we have enough information to know if it is -- maybe his dad IS still in his life, and maybe came out to him separately, and got that kind of reaction), then I'd say 'Dad' deserves what he got. :P

"but that doesn't change the fact that he gave up people that he had formed very close bonds with so easily".

I'm not even sure what you mean here... yeah, he moved away, but people do that. We have no reason to think he's cut his family out of his life -- just that he's gotten some distance. Or do you mean his ex? Again, we don't have much information there -- maybe they're still in touch as friends, maybe not. It seems like they broke up independently of what happened, though. Again... people do that.

Anyway, I thought the most interesting thing about this piece was the use of characters 'remembering' things, even when they weren't important to the final outcome. He used it a little too heavy-handedly, I think, but I do think it's a technique that could be worth the extra effort to implement, when designing interactive conversations.

I highly doubt the breaking up was independent, given how close those dates were.  Also, if you remember the dialogue, he refers to his own family as "hurtful people", as if he made his family strangers.  I also highly doubt that he would try to open up about it to his Dad, who was said to have left the family prior to 2010.

Pretty certain he said that he ran away from home and disconnected from his 'hateful' family, so.... Yeah.

HE'S STILL A FUCKING COWARD AND AN ASSHOLE, MORESO THAN ANY OTHER MEMBER OF THE LGBT DEMOGRAPHIC THEN ANYONE ELSE I'VE SEEN, AND HE HAS THE HUBRIS TO GO AND TRY TO MAKE HIS EXPERIENCE A MODEL FOR OTHER PEOPLE STRUGGLING TO GET OUT THE CLOSET?  BULLSHIT.

I honestly liked it :p

I shall very truthfully say that this game is pretty damn gay.

You don't say?

XD

Coins, I wrote a haiku about you.Hopefully it will appease your inflated ego. 

You're kind of an ass

But also funny sometimes

Homophobic, much?

Haha damn that's what I was gonna say!

In more than one way, honestly.

Ugh. So we're supposed to feel bad for a guy who repeatedly lied to his parents, had sex behind their back while claiming to 'study', hating his mother who quite obviously loved him because she was 'intolerant' and 'hateful', and was overall just a jerk of a child?

Kind of reminded me of how my teenage younger sibling reacted to my mother giving advice to her (Stay away from college-age guys until you're older, listen to cleaner music or something, dress more appropriately, etc.), so she began texting all her friends about how unfair it and had a fit for like, a week. It cooled down after that, but it was ridiculous and dumb. Only difference is that in the game the guy had sex (in Highschool no less!) which  screwed him up big time (hehe). 

Anyway, I found him as an ugly human being, regardless of sexuality. 

Really, the person whom I feel bad for is his mother. The father is an almost stereotypical jerk, and the kid is a homosexual James Dean of an asshole to her.

From a technical aspect, the game was rather cool. Texting your choices was a neat way to do the CYOA aspect. 

I thought he came across as a prick. The mom was a little on the intolerant side, but she seemed like she genuinely cared.

What really irked me was the way he included a no longer present father into the story, while basing it off a true story. It claims to have "real dialog," which is bullshit considering he talked about being hit by his father, when he was no longer even present when the incident took place.

Still, those few complaints aside, it was a good way to blow 10 minutes.

I got annoyed with the texting pop up approach to this story so I didn't even get past the part where they were in bed, but considering the guy said it didn't end IN BLOOD, my interest was decreased from "barely" to "nil" anyway.

(And the promise of the story ending in tears wasn't enough for me to get past that awful text pop up style, ugh)

Swift and Tan's comments in this thread were pretty funny though.
 

I got to the same point and felt it was just going to be a boring and depressing story. Though after reading the comments I almost wished I had played the whole thing to see why this guy was so horrible. His tone was sort of annoying to begin with... 

How do I see the spoilers?

Hilight them. Or if you're on a phone, select, copy, and paste into a text program (like Notes on the iPhone)

Never mind, I don't understand this shit.

HIGHLIGHT THAT SHIT, COPY,  PASTE INTO ANY TEXTBOX.

Only those who have read the story can see the spoilers.

I got three endings and looked back at a few tomes to see what happened with the choices made

I like the interface and the cell phone design gimmick. The sound and graphics are pretty solid for the most part. As far as gameplay goes, this is a really good game. It's interesting the way choices are used in this here. The sound direction, with the ticking background was a good touch. It did well for the mood. Usually I would prefer music, but this was a case where it worked. I also liked the conversations with the mother and the boyfriend.The overall story was good and played out fairly well. Some of the endings were more interesting than others. Not much else to say.

For dislikes, I did not like that cat clock ending that scene. It really broke me out the game when it shouldn't have. Some of the decisions also felt worthless, most notably the what whaaat waaaaat choices, unless I somehow missed the weight of it. Originally, I liked the father character dialogue until I realized he was added in. It's a shame since I'm not unfamiliar with people that would say things like that. For something meant to reflect on a personal experience, I don't expect anything sympathetic or relatable, but I do expect some level of honesty and sincerity, even if I agree that it was a good decision to keep his little brother out of the game. Also, the game did hit two pet peeves of mind. By the end, it felt like the conversation I had with the creator of the game was putting words in my mouth, and I dislike when that happens in a game. That, and the title Coming Out Simulator 2014 doesn't feel right for the game. Maybe it's because it gave me the expectation that I would not be playing someone else's personal story? I don't know, just not fond of it.

So yeah, outside the father thing, it was only the little things that bugged me. For something made by one person, even with his experience, pretty good.

Please tell me I'm not the only one uncomforable seeing all this talk about the creator's personal life and choices on this thread. All I wanted to do was play a game and post without feeling the need to analyze the author more than I think is comfortable. Not to mention (and maybe it's just me and my expereinces), but I get the feeling like there's way more to this guy's family dynamic and problems than his coming out story.

In your spoilers:

That's kind of why people are annoyed at the author. He withheld information and made the story biased to his view of things, he may have also lied about certain things in the story as well. 

To add to what Tara said-  There's two different things happening here:  There's the game itself, as a game; but also the author's personal story.

The author chose to tell everyone that this was semi-autobiographical.  It was important to him that the people who played/read the story understood it as a fictionalized account of his experience.

I think that opens him up to having people discuss the story as it relates to his life and his choices.

Yeah, definitely have to agree with what you said, it does open up discussion on his life. I suppose seeing so many posts about the creator's character(not the fictional character definition) unintentionally made me feel obligated to say something about who he is as a person, when I had no desire to do so, especially based off a semi-true game. Also, I may have to take back what I said about the father. While his appearance in the event wasn't truthful, I did feel a level of sincerity. Just another one of many fictional things in this story.

I was surprised to find that I actually liked the game, both its format and its content. I might not agree with his choices in the end, but maybe it's because I also grew up in a similar Asian household, a lot of the interactions between characters felt pretty realistic to me (although the father was a bit exaggerated). It's won't change my opinions on family and homosexuality, but it was definitely worth the time to play and an interesting thought experiment for someone who's not part of the LGBT community.

Which are, exactly?