[Dilmah G]

Silent Threat Reborn, Blue Planet, PI are all probably at 'damn' and 'hell' level at most, so if you're okay with that...

I could've sworn there's at least one expletive in BP...

Heh, how old is your brother anyway?

And to profanity ****ing you up at an early age, I heard most of them before I even started going to Primary School (though I don't think I picked them up at that stage), and put them into my used vocabulary at about 7/8 years of age. They're just words, people.

[NeoKnight]

Heh, how old is your brother anyway?

Well his age probably isn't as important as his home environment, which, like mine, is our parents' house. Hence comes the guidelines that we both have to follow for the time being, one of which being a moratorium against uncivilized language. FreeSpace itself was one minor exception to this rule, since as someone pointed out earlier, even the retail campaign isn't completely obscenity-free. But in interest of not pushing things too far, I was hoping for some fan-made campaigns that were exempt from any language issues. I've been playing through PI, and so far so good.   

And to profanity ****ing you up at an early age, I heard most of them before I even started going to Primary School (though I don't think I picked them up at that stage), and put them into my used vocabulary at about 7/8 years of age. They're just words, people.

While it's true that "they're just words", it's important to remember that words can be very, very powerful. After all, if you're not careful with them,  they're exactly the thing that can get you monkeyed...     

[Thaeris]

I played through Cardinal Spear again today and didn't remember any profanity.

Depending on the difficulty level you set the campaign at, it's pretty good for a variety of skill levels. The VA is refreshingly different from standard FS and generally enjoyable. There's also a great mission variety as well. Again, I'll recommend this one...

Also, I think it's really swell that you're looking out for your sibling like this. 

<Thaeris gives NeoKnight mad props.  >

[Dilmah G]

Heh, how old is your brother anyway?

Well his age probably isn't as important as his home environment, which, like mine, is our parents' house. Hence comes the guidelines that we both have to follow for the time being, one of which being a moratorium against uncivilized language. FreeSpace itself was one minor exception to this rule, since as someone pointed out earlier, even the retail campaign isn't completely obscenity-free. But in interest of not pushing things too far, I was hoping for some fan-made campaigns that were exempt from any language issues. I've been playing through PI, and so far so good.   

I see, I see.

And to profanity ****ing you up at an early age, I heard most of them before I even started going to Primary School (though I don't think I picked them up at that stage), and put them into my used vocabulary at about 7/8 years of age. They're just words, people.

While it's true that "they're just words", it's important to remember that words can be very, very powerful. After all, if you're not careful with them,  they're exactly the thing that can get you monkeyed...     

Yeah, yeah, well, it's important you learn the words in question in the right context, I guess.

Also, I think it's really swell that you're looking out for your sibling like this. 

<Thaeris gives NeoKnight mad props.  >

Amen to that.

[Snail]

Well given how most user made campaigns aren't voice acted, it's even less of a problem.

[Thaeris]

If you employ Sam or Anna, you still might be in for a surprise, though... 

[lostllama]

Yes, Windmills would be a good idea regarding language

Actually, there is definitely at least one swearword in Windmills (but, IIRC, I think you only hear it if you make a certain decision part-way through the final mission).

[NeoKnight]

All of this got me thinking about how nice it would be to have an optional "censoring" feature in the next FreeSpace Open release. Basically it would find offensive words in the game dialogue and replace them with asterisks or something. I'm not a programmer so I don't know how difficult it would be to implement, but it sure would be convenient for some people like me. It would also make me feel a lot more comfortable introducing the game to some of my younger friends. How would I go about suggesting this feature to the SCP team? Is there a particular board or thread where I should post the idea?

[General Battuta]

FreeSpace Source Code Project.

I have no idea how difficult it would be. It would need to look at all mission messages on the fly and temporarily change them.

You could just do it yourself in notepad, though.

[The E]

If you want to suggest that feature, the SCP board (a few boards down from this one, under community projects) would be the right address.

From a programming POV, it isn't all that hard, but it is just as easy to just open up missions in notepad++ and use its search/replace functions to do that manually.

[Dragon]

Be carefull with it, or it will run into

Code: [Select]

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Scu'nthorpeProblem(HLP Forums are suffering from said problem, so copypaste the URL to adress bar and remove the apostrophe from it to see what I'm talking about)
This may be funny to read about, but during campaign it can ruin the entire mood (imagine something like that slipping in Transcend).

EDIT:Edited because word filter borked the link.

[Droid803]

Word filters make me rage, particularly because of that problem.
(Especially the April Fool's ones which mis-replace stuff and basically makes the forum worthless for a day! That is beside the topic though).

It's also precisely why an automated censoring program will never work.
Either it's too easy to bypass (or won't catch everything), or it's so draconian that what gets spat out doesn't communicate anymore...

[NeoKnight]

If you want to suggest that feature, the SCP board (a few boards down from this one, under community projects) would be the right address.

Thanks, I'll think about doing that.

From a programming POV, it isn't all that hard, but it is just as easy to just open up missions in notepad++ and use its search/replace functions to do that manually.

While I could do the editing myself, it would be time-consuming to continually alter the dialogue of every new campaign that's released. An integrated feature in FSO sounds much more appealing, since it would be a one-time project (which I'd be willing to help with in any way I could).

It's also precisely why an automated censoring program will never work.
Either it's too easy to bypass (or won't catch everything), or it's so draconian that what gets spat out doesn't communicate anymore...

Well if the feature were to be implemented then bypassing it would (hopefully) be as simple as checking/unchecking an option box for those who want to do so. And although a censoring function probably won't catch everything, I think it's still better than nothing at all. And, if after being censored, a sentence doesn't make any intelligible sense, I would be very glad I used the feature. 

[Droid803]

The problem with making no sense is more with accidental censoring on 'normal words', you know, like "assault fighter".
However, if people who use it don't mind, then I guess it's a non-issue.

[High Max]

 

[Thaeris]

Hmmm...

I wonder, would an algorithm for a censor program just operate on a string library? For example, given an explitative "word," the filter could either replace that word with a corresponding non-offensive term or replace it with "****" or something like that. However, "wordanotherword," (ex: assault) is not censored as this string does not correspond to the one in the library.

I imagine this program would just be a big if-else if-else chain or a switch statement... It would have to scan the uploaded dialogue each word at a time between the gaps (whatever the space is in ASCII). The explicative library might just be a table of strings... depending on the language, you could have a table for English, French, Polish, etc.

The thing is, wouldn't this just potentially slow down FSO?

[Dragon]

I think that an easier way than going throught all this would be finding a younger brother something else to play.
It shouldn't be that difficult, there are plenty of games suitable for children. (For example: Real War doesn't have any swearing, just like the most of RTS games. Also, the first Silent Hunter, but it may be nearly impossible to get those days, as it's a DOS game. Plus it's difficult.)
We don't need word filters in FSO, especially if they will cause preformance issues or slow down implementing more important features.
Not to mention that word filter won't work on anything with VA.

[The E]

It's not that big a deal, really. Just a couple of regular expressions (Google it). But honestly, I'd rather have, well, ANYTHING else in the engine instead of a word filter.


Besides, what about neologisms like "Frak"? Are they offensive? Should they be included?

[Droid803]

If you block Frak, then I'm going to start using "Flak" instead of "Frak".
And then...it's the end 'cause you'll start having command talking about **** guns on the Aeolus.

If someone made a standalone program that just modified the right part of mission files, fine, but I don't think it should be built into FSO.

[Thaeris]

Again, this would be a feature you'd enable or disable on the Launcher. If you wouldn't want it on, you wouldn't turn it on. The reason this probably won't be implemented is that most people would never use it...

Frankly, I don't care to see it done, either. But I do understand NeoKnight's concerns - heck, I though StarCraft was pretty filthy in terms of language when I was younger... Once more, the author of the campaign should make a part to write a good story, and a good story doesn't need to be profane. And if it does use profanity, it should be tasteful.