Arachnophobia / No-Spider option

People, there is no such thing as fear of heights.
Fear of falling from a great height is quite real tho :)

On the topic:

I myself also developed a kind of fear of bugs for whatever reason, but i realize it's completely irrational so i can control it when it occurs (like a bug lands on my finger or something).

However i have to agree asking for an option to turn off spiders in a video game is really pushing it, you should work on yourself to get rid off the fear and not expect everyone to work around it.

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pengant wrote:

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Emil_kof wrote:

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pengant wrote:

Rational people are not scared of heights because they understand they are safe when up high and rational people aren't too scared to play a game with spiders in because they realise the spiders are not real. LOL (sorry I still find this very amusing)

Being afraid of heights is actually a fairly rational fear...There is a lot of danger involved and the dizziness some people experience doesn't help either.

As an example - Someone with a phobia of heights wouldn't want to look out of a window in a tall building, where as someone who is scared of heights would realise they are completely safe and be fine - but you probably wouldn't catch them skydiving!

^ This. ^ Phobias can be debilitating, cause panic attacks, and impair the person. They are an irrational fear. To put it in laymen terms that a gamer would understand, trying to rationalize a phobia is like trying to rationalize with a fanboy of Game/Studio X.

Like I said earlier, I am arachnophobe myself (and a dyslexic with tinnitus who is prone to migraines; the last two don't play well together), though I would only consider my case to be mild, especially when it comes to video games. I am not bothered by tiny spiders, daddy long legs, or scorpions, and I'm usually OK with spiders in video games, but I do have to become accustomed to them. The first few times I went through Weavers Lair I had to go super slow, my hands were extremely clammy, I jumped every time a spider used flicker strike, and even now I keep a slower pace than any other area in the game. When they added spiders dropping down from the ceiling, and redid the Weaver's fight, the process started all over. The Invasion boss spiders also freaked the shit out of me, because they just popped onto the screen from out of nowhere (and I even triggered an Alt-F4 in reaction to them on more than one occasion). Some videos or photos of spiders I am OK with, while others trigger my fear, and most spiders on TV or the big screen don't seem to affect me, such as Shelob or the spiders in the Hobbit (though it could be because I knew they were CG). For example, the still pics in this thread have had no effect on me, but the animated one with the spider on the dudes arm got my adrenaline flowing and I just quickly scrolled to the next post (so grats? on that poster). Real spiders as small as a dime freak me out, even though I know I can easily crush them under my foot. Even after being crushed into a smear, I am reluctant to wipe their remains off the floor with a paper towel.

Dealing with spiders in video games since forever (been playing since Pong!) has allowed me to become more accustomed to them in video games, but that does not mean I am unaffected by them. I was able to play the Playstation game Spider without any issue, but the spiders in Resident Evil freaked me out (moreso than the dog jumping through the window early in the game). It took effort to enter the noob spider cave near the Forsaken starting area in WoW, and the Outland spiders made me uneasy for a while. Spiders in Skyrim cause me to become uneasy as a ranged character, and I'm not sure how I would fare in melee if there was more than one on the screen, or if one popped out of nowhere. I think, for me, much has to do with the quality of the animation (and lighting), and the perspective of the camera.

Another thing I did to help was to make a spider-themed deck in MTG. It is not a competitive deck, and as such uses cards from many editions, though it did end up being a solid deck. As simple as it may sound, holding a handful of cards with spiders on them was not an easy task. Drawing a card and flipping it over to a spider was also not an easy task. The artists for MTG are damn good at their job, and I hated them for it. Today, I can play that deck without any issues.

On the other hand, I know someone who has a much more severe case and becomes uneasy by seeing them in games, even cartoony ones like in WoW. He would not fight or face spiders in PvP, even though he loves fighting in the BGs and Arenas. He required assistance with quests that took him into areas that were heavily populated by spiders. He would not do the spider wing in Naxx (ever), and has had to sit out of other battles. He's been playing games almost as long as I have, but he's not been able to acclimate himself to them, even in VG form. It is for him that mods are made to remove spiders, and he thanks and praises the modders that do so, as it allows him to enjoy many games that he would otherwise not be able to play.

You can't tell someone with a phobia to just "get over it." It just doesn't work that way. It's about as effective as asking people to play nice on the internet.

How do you not realize your entire premise is still inconsistent and awful?


my friend died, therefore seeing people die in video games is extremely upsetting to me, let me email ggg and ask if they can make a filter for that.


Its the EXACT same argument.


your trauma is no more real than mine

except it is, because mines made up purely as a hypothetical, but the points the same.

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TiltedAxis wrote:

How do you not realize your entire premise is still inconsistent and awful?


my friend died, therefore seeing people die in video games is extremely upsetting to me, let me email ggg and ask if they can make a filter for that.


Its the EXACT same argument.

WTF? That is so far off the mark that I can't even comprehend how you got there. It's so far off the mark that you must have taken a left in Albuquerque and somehow ended up somewhere in the Andromeda Galaxy.

In fact, I'd say it is deliberately off the mark, and I've no food to toss under the bridge, so you'll have to find another thread.

You have to stop looking at this matter from a rational point of view. Having a phobia doesn't make you an idiot. They are well aware that most spiders, especially digital ones, can't hurt them. And yet it makes them feel uncomfortable or worse to see them.
It's easy to claim that there is no problem when you don't suffer from a phobia yourself.

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CycloneJack wrote:

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TiltedAxis wrote:

How do you not realize your entire premise is still inconsistent and awful?


my friend died, therefore seeing people die in video games is extremely upsetting to me, let me email ggg and ask if they can make a filter for that.


Its the EXACT same argument.

WTF? That is so far off the mark that I can't even comprehend how you got there. It's so far off the mark that you must have taken a left in Albuquerque and somehow ended up somewhere in the Andromeda Galaxy.

In fact, I'd say it is deliberately off the mark, and I've no food to toss under the bridge, so you'll have to find another thread.

Not trolling at all, it isn't off the mark at all, your entire premise is based on how debilitating your problem is to you, but its still YOUR problem. You're still asking a game developer to modify their game for your own personal interest due to your personal problems, my example is the exact same thing.

Try to actually counter my point, not just troll.

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kruemel2222 wrote:

You have to stop looking at this matter from a rational point of view. Having a phobia doesn't make you an idiot. They are well aware that most spiders, especially digital ones, can't hurt them. And yet it makes them feel uncomfortable or worse to see them.
It's easy to claim that there is no problem when you don't suffer from a phobia yourself.

Super irrelevant, my argument has nothing to do with how bad the problem is.

how come it's always the senses of sight and sound that drive people to madness? it's always something seen or heard that isn't there, or seeing or hearing things in a different way as sane people. people never go insane because of something they smell or their sense of touch goes haywire and they think rough is smooth and vice versa, it's almost always sight and/or sound.

am I saying it's insane to have an irrational fear of harmless spider? yes, I am. most spiders you see in life are actually harvestmen, 6 legged creatures who's apparent 4th set of legs is actually a pair of mandibles.

Let me tell you something about real fear. I am a different animal than human beings. My life cycle is different and much slower, my behavior is different and I am much more calm and reserved, lastly my intellectual capacity and moral compass far outreach what human beings are capable of.

My life has been relentless, horrific torment. I've been robbed, jailed, starved, suffocated, deprived, humiliated, mocked, insulted in about every way it's possible to be insulted, had control of my life completely ripped out of my hands numerous times and suffered the most abusive treatment at the hands of the animal known as man as you can possibly imagine.

I don't like to leave my house. It is almost impossible for me to do so without something catastrophic happening. If i'm arrested, somebody hits my car on purpose, somebody acts aggressively toward me for no reason or shouts at me I take it in stride because it's actually remarkable if it doesn't happen.

I live under real threat. My life in this pig pen of human civilization is a living nightmare. you human beings are the most despicable, revolting, and disgusting things I can't image anyone even wanting to keep you as pets. You are farther below me than an animal is below you, and I am closer to the animals than I am to you humans, on a higher level than you could ever imagine, let alone realize.

I don't have much pity for you in your imaginary fear of little bugs. sorry.

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TiltedAxis wrote:

Not trolling at all, it isn't off the mark at all, your entire premise is based on how debilitating your problem is to you, but its still YOUR problem. You're still asking a game developer to modify their game for your own personal interest due to your personal problems, my example is the exact same thing.

Try to actually counter my point, not just troll.

Actually, it is not my problem, as I can play the game just fine. And no, your analogy of a friend dying was way off. It is obvious you have no concept of what a phobia is, and I'll not take the time to go any further on that subject with you.

As for the OP's request, all GGG needs to do is to spend a few minutes looking into this (or other similar issues as they are brought up) to see how easy/difficult it would be to do, and then determine if the benefits would outweigh the costs. If they do, and they determine that it can be done in a few man hours, then they would gain some points with a portion of their community. It is a QoL issue, nothing more.

That said, if this, or other similar requests, would take a considerable amount of work, due to how the game was initially designed and programmed, then I would agree that they should not take the time to do so. These would need to be considered on a case by case basis.

It is no different from them looking into modifying the current UI. You and I may think that the current UI is fine, but there are some that dislike it. Apparently GGG felt that the benefits of making a new UI outweighed the costs.

A company that takes a little time to makes things better for a portion of their community always wins.

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TiltedAxis wrote:

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kruemel2222 wrote:

You have to stop looking at this matter from a rational point of view. Having a phobia doesn't make you an idiot. They are well aware that most spiders, especially digital ones, can't hurt them. And yet it makes them feel uncomfortable or worse to see them.
It's easy to claim that there is no problem when you don't suffer from a phobia yourself.

Super irrelevant, my argument has nothing to do with how bad the problem is.

I really don't care about your argument and I wasn't even addressing you in particular (that's why I didn't quote your post). I just wanted to point out that a phobia is a real problem for some people, that there doesn't have to be a rational way to explain it and hopefully get some people to think about what they are writing before posting blatant troll posts.