My apologies if this comes across as defensive; such is not the intent. That said, you seem to have made some incorrect assumptions, and for better or for worse I tend to take it upon myself to fix misconceptions.
While your reaction makes sense based on the way Phoebe phrased things, it's also untrue. There *are* games stuffed full of rape and torture. Alice is NOT one of them.
Now, Alice IS the game of horrible things; Phoebe has accurately described its genesis. Every character is defined by at least one horrible thing, sometimes more.
NOT ALL HORRIBLE THINGS ARE RAPE AND TORTURE. Horrible things can mean suicidal tendencies, sadism, crippling addiction, moral apathy, insanity, delusional paranoia, or any number of other things, many of which are so common in LARPing as to seem comparatively normal. These are things that may not seem to the reader/player to be in the same ballpark, but from the perspective of the writer/GMs, who see the origins, consequences, and interconnections they form, these things differ more in their degree of horribleness than in whether or not they ARE horrible.
We omit this information in the blurb because we know the number of characters directly involved with any given kind of horribleness. We also know that some characters' horribleness is basically internal, and won't affect other people.
If we were to say "at least one character in this game deals with rape" - which would be the truly most accurate way to say it - frankly, many players who otherwise would enjoy the game (and might not even have any contact with rape) would not sign up.
no subject
While your reaction makes sense based on the way Phoebe phrased things, it's also untrue. There *are* games stuffed full of rape and torture. Alice is NOT one of them.
Now, Alice IS the game of horrible things; Phoebe has accurately described its genesis. Every character is defined by at least one horrible thing, sometimes more.
NOT ALL HORRIBLE THINGS ARE RAPE AND TORTURE. Horrible things can mean suicidal tendencies, sadism, crippling addiction, moral apathy, insanity, delusional paranoia, or any number of other things, many of which are so common in LARPing as to seem comparatively normal. These are things that may not seem to the reader/player to be in the same ballpark, but from the perspective of the writer/GMs, who see the origins, consequences, and interconnections they form, these things differ more in their degree of horribleness than in whether or not they ARE horrible.
We omit this information in the blurb because we know the number of characters directly involved with any given kind of horribleness. We also know that some characters' horribleness is basically internal, and won't affect other people.
If we were to say "at least one character in this game deals with rape" - which would be the truly most accurate way to say it - frankly, many players who otherwise would enjoy the game (and might not even have any contact with rape) would not sign up.