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It's a story GamePolitics passed on more than a month ago and, to be honest, we're still not sure how much ink the user-modified topless female characters in Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion
On April 2nd a source we know and trust pointed us to the patch at Adult Game Reviews (definitely not safe for work). The site also has nude skins for the previous Elder Scrolls RPG, Morrowind as well as for Tomb Raider, The Sims and several other games.
But the patch available there may also be found at Oblivion Source, a fan site which describes itself as "dedicated to the upcoming Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion game and TES (The Elder Scrolls series) games in general..."
The creator of the nude Oblivion patch, "Maeyanie," uploaded the file on March 24th, just four days after Oblivion's release. Maeyanie's comments to the file seem to place responsibility for the creation of the breasts in question with the developer:
"In the process of trying to create a nude skin for Oblivion, I found Bethesda had already done all the work for me. They just covered it up with underwear afterwards... Please note, this is a realistic nudity mod, not a pornographic one. The file included removes the bra welded to the skin of females of all races, showing things as most people know they are in the real world after removing upper body clothing. It will not show every female in the game as topless."
Beyond the usual tech challenges, Maeyanie's motivation for creating the topless patch is given as:
"I do this because I hate government/society/whatever forcing companies to 'protect our innocent population from seeing those evil dirty things 50% of them possess personally anyways' not because I'm trying to turn it into a porn game."
Maeyanie mentions also that he or she was unable to patch the lower character torsos - thus sparing the world genitalia-equipped Oblivion characters. As of this writing, the patch is still available at both Oblivion Source and Adult Game Reviews, but GP wonders how long that will last.
Although Maeyenie's feedback among Oblivion Source users was generally positive, a long volley of comments appended to the patch file page indicate that some fans almost immediately feared a Hot Coffee redux. Cook commented "DON'T RECREATE HOTCOFFEE!! I give you a 1 (rating out of 10). I appreciate your work, but be afraid of the oppressive game companies..."
chr43 wrote, "If you want nudity, go buy a porn game or movie instead of ruining a good game. Eric added, "...you guys are really pathetic. Please stop reinforcing negative gamer stereotypes that people who play games are sexually frustrated deviants."
The comments appear to have taken their toll on Maeyanie, who wrote, "Due to the number of thoroughly depressing comments, I'm no longer providing any support or updates. Nor will I release any further mods of this nature, for this game or others. I'm not regretting having made this. But I am regretting releasing it to the horny, immature masses out there..."
Want to talk about it? You can discuss this story via the "comments" feature (click below), or in the new GamePolitics Forums...
May 4 2006, 16:27:18 UTC 6 years ago
Nice...
Blame others because something is your own darn fault. Maeyanie must not be a Game Politics reader...May 4 2006, 16:43:55 UTC 6 years ago
How depressing.
May 4 2006, 16:50:30 UTC 6 years ago
Shows what I know.
Actually, I would have made the same decision if I had it to do over again.
May 4 2006, 16:46:29 UTC 6 years ago
Great job ESRB
Moves like this discourages modders and developers from creating exciting content, whatever it is. In your zeal to satisfy the few loud mouths that have have critisized you, you're going to alienate developers, modders, and most importantly, the gamers who are the ultimate customers of this industry.May 5 2006, 04:28:08 UTC 6 years ago
Re: Great job ESRB
Indeed. Let's ban art and music that has 'naughty' content in it too. Let's ban Metallica while we're at it. Hooaah! [/Sarcasm] -.-May 4 2006, 16:49:01 UTC 6 years ago
You hate the government or society or whatever so you make it possible to play a character topless in a video game....good move there ace personal problems much? Now I don't like censorship that much either but I am not going to make a mod for a game and then claim I did it to spite the people I hate.
"Due to the number of thoroughly depressing comments, I'm no longer providing any support or updates. Nor will I release any further mods of this nature, for this game or others. I'm not regretting having made this. But I am regretting releasing it to the horny, immature masses out there..."
Horny immature masses?? What makes them so immature, the fact they don't agree with your I hate the government boob mod? Sounds to me that these people don't think a topless woman is needed in a RPG, and I have to agree what moron would run through a game topless just to see animated boobs? They would be dead animated boobs very quickly due to lack of armor. And what makes them horny? They seem to hate your mod, I guess if someone doesn't agree with you they are a ignorant chronic masturbator...hmmm sounds familiar don't you guys think?
I honestly prefer no nudity in my games thank you, it adds nothing to the story line of the game or even the game play, now I know some people do and that is their views more power to them. But as posted in the story I have to agree, it is people like this who make everyone think that gamers are nothing but violent porn junkies.
May 4 2006, 17:01:32 UTC 6 years ago
Opps.
This should have been a response. Reposting:I don't know, if Maeyenie is being truthfull in what they said, I could see this as a 'form of protest' mod. If the peep is honestly annoyed at how stigmatized simple nudity has become,....
Also.. while I am not familiar with this specific game and it's characters, given what I have seen in many RPGs (and other classes of games) over the years, I would say that bare breasts is more tastefull and realistic then many of the skimpy 'we arn't trying to be erotic, really! believe us!' outfits that female characters are crammed into in many games.
I actually would call those flames kinda offensive? Nudity 'ruining' a good game? Go buy a porn? These sound like what the person was working against.. the idea that nudes don't have to be OOC titiliation, and they don't have to be porn either.
6 years ago
May 4 2006, 16:55:39 UTC 6 years ago
May 4 2006, 18:13:13 UTC 6 years ago
That being said, I see no problem with the modder finding the fact that the breast models were already in the game - in fact, I'm glad they did. It's another stupid coverup of something stupid, you can either be honest and upfront about things, or you can hide them. Somebody was going to find this thing eventually, what good does it do as gamers to work to cover it up?
May 4 2006, 18:50:24 UTC 6 years ago
May 4 2006, 19:48:19 UTC 6 years ago
I guess all games have to be rated 'M', then.
And OMGBOOBIES!, get the pyre all ready folks! We's gots sum burnin' to do!
I still think Bethesda should just blame the mod on an unforseeable wardrobe malfunction.
:P
6 years ago
6 years ago
May 4 2006, 19:49:38 UTC 6 years ago
What an idiot.
"I'm not regretting having made this. But I am regretting releasing it to the horny, immature masses out there..."Show me a gaming site that isn't infested with horny male gamers and isn't a Christian gaming site, and I'll show you a monkey riding a pogo stick.
May 4 2006, 21:23:13 UTC 6 years ago
Re: What an idiot.
Show me a gaming site, and I'll show you a site populated with people at least SLIGHTLY interested in sex.Male, female, christian or agnostic, everybody's interested. Whether they fess up to it or not, they're still interested.
May 4 2006, 21:56:00 UTC 6 years ago
Re: What an idiot.
Damn... Now I want to see the monkey.May 4 2006, 23:31:44 UTC 6 years ago
Re: What an idiot.
Even Christian gaming sites aren't immune, just modded stricter.May 4 2006, 20:57:54 UTC 6 years ago
For the love of god, people...
For a couple years, please just stop unlocking hidden sex-related content in games. Congratulations, mister stick-it-to-the-man game modder, your titty mod is going to have the exact opposite effect that you wanted. Opportunist politicians from both sides of the fence will use this to criticize the game industry and pass even more bad laws."I hate what the government's doing, so I'm going to make it worse!" Here's some news for you: being in-your-face doesn't make changes happen, it just serves to give more ammo to the reactionary assholes out there (like ones who can't post to this board, for instance). People need to see that video games, much like movies, can be used for artistic expression.
May 4 2006, 22:25:57 UTC 6 years ago
Pragmatism vs Idealism.
Ah, one of the classic debates in any type of activism. Both sides of it have points, and neither is perfect.Sometimes not antagonizing the censors and letting things cool down is nessesary.
But sometimes, rolling over in submission can be the wrong thing to do, it can knock a debate back, give strenth to the censors, and make the chilling effect freezing indeed.
One example of where you line of logic might not extend far enough into the future. Ok, say this adds fuel to the fire. Politicians try passing more crazy laws, I'll give you that effect. But so far, those laws have been tossed out, which gives strength to the gamming community, NOT the politicians.
While on the other hand, stopping the mods, or even the ESRB's rather quick 'possiblity for nudity requires an M rather' takes strenth away from the gamming community and gives it to the politicians in a way the courts can't. Game ratings, companies, and moders end up scared and censor themselves in ways that the government couldn't hope to have enough power to do.
Either dirrection could backfire on us....
6 years ago
May 5 2006, 05:13:09 UTC 6 years ago
Re: For the love of god, people...
It's a modders life to find things in games they can do to change it. Of course, it isn't exactly for the best (not everything can be), they are still finding things to pass the time, just like we pass the time with playing games, and a number of other things.You can't blame a community for what they do best. Besides, they are using ammo that won't work well with the gun of the situation. Modder's are outside the publishers, and therfore are not part. These politicians are attacking the publishers for what the Modders did. Therefore, the politicians, if are tackled correctly, will eventually fall out.
May 5 2006, 01:04:13 UTC 6 years ago
Stupid, really
I'm not sure why Bethesda is taking heat for this, and the ESRB is overreacting due to the Hot Coffee thing. A mod is a mod. Why should Bethsoft be responsible for what modders do with their game? And frankly, why should anyone care? If some dude makes a bewbie mod & people want to download it, more power to them. I didn't know that boobs were such taboo, in fact I'm pretty sure that I was very fimailar with them before I was even old enough to talk. Hot coffee was stupid enough (too pixelated, clothed characters dry humping. Call the Spice channel somebody!) but at least there was some actual sexual aspect to the whole thing. This is just over the top. I'm pretty sure the French wouldn't bat an eyelash at something like this. Why are we letting a few puritans dictacte what we do with OUR OWN games?A PG13 rated movie can contain brief nudity, yet a T rated game with no nudity in the finished product has to be rated M 17+ for a user created mod that most people will never see? Stop this place, I want to get off.
May 5 2006, 03:25:00 UTC 6 years ago
May 5 2006, 05:07:37 UTC 6 years ago
The mod is taking the female model, and removing the bra (normally, you would have to do that to see something real like that.)
The problem Bethesda has is that they put that in the game. Now, I can understand that, because the game is realistic, and the model plays the part to give off a more realistic feel. The thing is, it's no one's fault but the people that use the mod. If the player tinkers with the game, it's because its part of their computer, and they are liable to do what they want since its THEIR computer.
Now of course, the mod isn't exactly the greatest thing to hit, nor the baddest, but it's out in public. Adn that's the problem Bethesda has right now.
The comments she was getting seemed harsh, and supportive at the same time. I didn't go down too far, but thats what I saw. S/He didn't deserve those comments. It was a modder's job to mod the game, and S/He did what S/He did best. I wished that the outcome of the decision was different, but I guess that's how life is. Public eye isn't what people have on their agenda all the time, and S/He got hit big time.
May 5 2006, 16:55:30 UTC 6 years ago
Why not? If someone wants to see the boobs on their female characters, then more power to them. They're required to intentionally search for and download this mod and then install it. It doesn't happen by "accident".
IMHO, its a lot of trouble to get porn if thats what someone is looking for. Just do a google image search for boobs or something. I don't really see what the big stink is all about.
I also reason that if little johnny really wants to look at breasts, he'll find them and changing the ESRB rating to "M" isn't going to make a bit of difference...again, its all about good parenting and the government minding its own business.
May 5 2006, 17:47:32 UTC 6 years ago
People could mod Microsoft Windows XP to show a naked chick instead of Windows XP on the start up screen then distribute the information.
I dont think anyone would hold microsoft liable for that for the same reason that Bethesda shouldnt be held liable. It just makes no common sense.
May 7 2006, 19:13:57 UTC 6 years ago
(i say : photoshoooop !)
June 29 2006, 05:19:41 UTC 5 years ago
Comments from the author.
Well, I check Google to see how famous I am these days, and this comes up right on the top. So, I just had to come and post a reply here. This is going to be a one-time thing, so don't get excited.The author's guess as to what exactly I meant by the depressing immature masses comment is pretty wrong. I don't care about hypocrites who take the time to look up a nude patch purely to say something bad about it. (I mean really, if it was that offensive why look at it in the first place?)
In fact, most of the comments I found the most depressing were supportive ones. They were the "OMGOMGOMG K00L BOOBIESBOOBIES!1!1!1" comments that got me. That's not at all what I was going for with this. Though, I admit, I really should have expected it.
Myself, I'm not American. Where I live, it's perfectly legal for a woman to walk around topless in public. I've done it myself, a few times, on exceptionally hot days. Personally I don't see any greater problem with topless women than topless men, and THOSE are in a lot of games.
Yes, despite all the people who assumed otherwise, Maeyanie really is a feminine sounding name. Google for 'Maeyanie' if you want, as of writing this at least the top 10 are all actually about me. Excuse me for throwing a wrench into a pile of comments and theories about what I'm like, but it had to be done.
And Bethesda, I'll say this again in case anyone reads it. I really am sorry for my contribution to messing up your rating. I sincerely disagree with the ESRB on this one, and I see from this thread many other people do too, but the damage is done regardless.