Relevant screenshots of several Rance games appear to be easily available on a certain site, the URL of which I should probably spoiler just for emphasis (due to being NSFW and probably NSF everywhere else too).

it's g.e-hentai.org

A quick perusal of collections for Rance 1, 3, and 4 indicates low to modest ratios of explicit to non-explicit images (less than that of some visual novels with which I am familiar), and pixelation-type censorship of visible genitalia.

All individuals depicted naked appear to be at least late teens, with physical characteristics consistent with those of an adult Asian woman, in my opinion.

From all the conversation about Sengoku Rance, it is clear that if there is one good thing about the story of these games, it's that the main character is very anti-pedophile.

The pink haired girl is 16, right?

Okay, so this is most likely not pedo-pandering... however, is it pornographic?

Sengoku Rance is fairly representative of the franchise, so no, not quite.

edited 15th Jun '12 8:35:10 AM by Arha

Not really. There´s lots of gameplay and normal story scenes in between each sex scene.

Sil? (didn´t looked at the CG´s, but it´s the only pink-haired girl I can think of the franchise right now) In the first game she should be around that age, if not older.

edited 15th Jun '12 10:01:36 AM by Marche90

I know we all love Death Of The Author, but you got to ask yourself, Did the creators of these games put in the rape scenes for titillation? I think so. And that is when it becomes pornography.

Just to note, I think that for the sake of deciding what stays or gets cut, it only counts as porn if there's more pornographic elements than there is plot. Gameplay also, when it comes to a game like Rance.

Perhaps, they did... however, for the purposes of the P5, I can't just give a work the axe just because of that. If the work has more... substantial material (i.e: plot, gameplay) than those rape scenes, then it gets the pass.

Also, who said I like the Death Of The Author trope? I sure didn't.

Ah, no. This is when it becomes Fanservice. The definition of 'pornography' were are using here (not just for Rance, but for all reviewed works) is for when the work is primary played for titillation. If it can be reasonable supposed titillation is not the main goal, than we are not calling it 'porn'.

edited 15th Jun '12 11:08:23 AM by Heatth

Just because the work fetishes weird shit doesn't make it porn. We've been over that before.

Unless the weird shit is children. Then it can die in a fire.

Well, then it's pedo pandering, which is a different issue, but yeah that goes immediately.

Nice of them, to create a plot that makes your rapes not only justified, but even heroic. How charming.

I'd argue that the entire point of being a hero who can rape girls with no consequences or even just reprimand (and not in a world where it's always inconsequential, since people here have already explained that other characters who do it are treated as evil) is titillation in itself.

edited 15th Jun '12 12:23:09 PM by GendoIkari

All I care about whether or not there's more to the works than the rapes.

Komodin: There is. There's some pretty lengthy gameplay involved and in the second game I think there was some sort of romantic subplot of sorts as well as the whole saving the village by the magical power of rape. It's definitely lighter on the plot than Sengoku Rance, but then looking through the cg gallery there's also apparently significantly less sex.

Sure there is - given how many praises I've heard for the actual gameplay part, the strategy engine must be solid - but does not override my personal concern over it. You play a rapist who never gets any comeuppance, and no, do not bring the "he's still a hero who saves the world" argument up; from how he's described in the Characters page of the article, his heroics are only motivated by the desire to fuck even more girls.

But the P5 seem to have found no problem with a series sporting such concept to be here, so whatever. Out.

The P5 is not here to judge the morality of works. They are here to decide if a work is pedo-pandering or purely pornographic. Period. The presence of rape—even Black Comedy Rape—in and of itself does not fall foul of the content policy and therefore is not under the purview of the P5.

Regardless of the personal feelings of the P5 members (and IIRC from the other thread, many of them agree with you about the skeeviness of the concept), they are not allowed to cut something just because it's morally objectionable or disturbing. If we were purging the wiki of everything highly disturbing, then most hardcore horror and all the squick flicks would be getting removed, too.

Thank you, Nocturna. That was exactly what I was going to say.

Suffice it to say that if we were voting based on what we personally found morally objectionable (except for the pedophilia ones), then I would be voting devil-head a lot more, and I'm sure the others would as well.

While you're right that we're not out to cut everything morally objectionable, and that a work featuring "fanservicey rape" by itself isn't an automatic ground for cutting under (current) P5 policy, it is within the P5's discretion to decide whether a borderline work has enough problematic elements to push it into either the "primarily meant for porn" or "pedophile pandering" when it would get a pass without them otherwise.

A prime example would be Kiss X Sis, which for the most part was just a fanservice heavy show, with the fanservice mostly centered on characters that were old enough to not be considered pedophile pandering. However since the show featured teenagers involved in incest, water works, and a list of other fetishes, it was enough for P5 members to vote to cut it when other fanservice-heavy shows got a pass.

From what I'm seeing, this series is falling on the "too many problematic elements to let slide". Just going part-way through the Let's Play linked earlier, it's already referenced several female characters being raped, the fact that rape is a driving force for the main character (who the player is meant to identify with), molestation scenes, consexual sex scenes, masturbation scenes, the fact that an "Assault" button is present for every female character the hero comes across (whether or not he can go through with it), and that one of the aforementioned rape victims was an actual child who had been magically aged up to look like an adult (the fact that Rance regrets it after he finds out doesn't help, either.)

That all of this is apparently played for laughs doesn't remove the fact that these problematic elements exist. And in my personal opinion as a panel member, just as it was with Kiss X Sis, there's enough of them present in this work that I feel it violates our site policy, and should get a devil head.

edited 15th Jun '12 3:04:19 PM by Meeble

I have no love for Kiss X Sis*

heh, I love how the custom title is still working

, but it those are the reasons for it to be cut, I disagree strongly with it. Hell, none of these fetishes can even be considered 'immoral'! It is great abuse of power to vote to cut something just because you find it squirky.

Being a main character doesn't mean the player is meant to identify with him. Just saying.

I mean, come on. We have a whole trope about evil protagonists. This reasons is not cut worthy.

edited 15th Jun '12 3:19:59 PM by Heatth

My concern here isn't whether the elements of a story are immoral, it's whether the elements are problematic insofar as our content violations policy is concerned. And as I've said in the past, "too many problematic elements can push an otherwise borderline work into cut territory."

From what I've seen so far, I feel this series meets that threshold. Other panel members may disagree, and if I'm out-voted then that's just part of the process. But for now, this seems like a situation that calls for a devil head from me.

I don't think you're actually supposed to relate to Rance. He's the butt of a lot of jokes and most people only put up with him because they have to. Whether or not that makes anything better is a matter of opinion, I suppose, since the story still condones it.

Yes, Sil is who I meant. And if we started cutting works with a Villain Protagonist well...puts anti slip on slopes

We do not even need to play the games to know that Rance is without a doubt a bad man, we are suppose to associate with him, nor do we want to associate with him. Gameplay and story elements are still very large parts of the game, according to people who have encountered it.

It is not pure porn, and we are not moral guardians. Neither is Rance. We are people keeping this site alive, Rance is a excessively messed up Villan protagonist, and we should avoid stepping out of jurisdiction when cutting things with 5P powers. (Cutting something that isn't porn, or pedophilia is something we should avoid like 4kids translations, or the devil.)

Also, On Kiss Xsis, wasn't there an underage character as a romance interest? I'm pretty sure I heard gushing about that manga something alongside those lines from my Ex-Roomate, and that he reads it probably isn't a good sign either.

edited 15th Jun '12 8:34:05 PM by Roraborialis