Twitter outrage over the "[spoiler]" quest

[Namutree]

 

Anyway, I honestly agree with you that Gears of War style machismo characters are boring...and this is part of why I don't play those kinds of games.  I just don't see it as some kind of systemic issue in gaming because there are plenty, plenty of games that have always featured diverse characters.

 

Do you see it differently?

 

Somewhat, yes. Definitely some genres are more space-mariney than others, but it is a systemic problem IMO, in that the exceptions tend to stand out. 

 

As a thought experiment, why don't you write down a list of, say, 30 games you've enjoyed over the years, and then underline the ones which had a non-white, non-male default protagonist, regardless of genre or whether they even have a protagonist.

 

I just did. My tally: 

 

One.

 

What if they have a lot of protagonists? I play Romance of the Three Kingdoms series and everyone is Chinese, but no one is the protagonist. Does that count?

[Luj1]

I hope Obsidian removes these other backer epitaphs

 

 

 

 

 

 

I assume they weren't VETTED

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Haha more cheap PR lies by Obsidian. At least come and tell the truth .... they didn't even include it in patch notes, hoping no one will notice while they indulge to liberal LGTB and SJW hipsters

[mrmonocle]

I'd really like to hear Cris' or Josh's comment on the whole issue.

Edited April 4, 2015 by mrmonocle

[Stun]

What on earth are you on about?  The limerick wasn't actual game content created by Obsidian.  It was just junk allowed into the game for the sake of a backer.

Oh, this started WAY before the limerick. Check the Caedgun's Boob Plate controversy of 2012...which happened during the kickstarter Edited April 4, 2015 by Stun

[Creslin321]

 

Somewhat, yes. Definitely some genres are more space-mariney than others, but it is a systemic problem IMO, in that the exceptions tend to stand out.

 

As a thought experiment, why don't you write down a list of, say, 30 games you've enjoyed over the years, and then underline the ones which had a non-white, non-male default protagonist, regardless of genre or whether they even have a protagonist.

 

I just did. My tally:

 

One.

 

A good many had no protagonist at all (simulations, worldbuilding games, strategy games), and some but not all allowed you to pick a gender and race, usually with little to no reactivity to the choice. All except one of the games that had a fixed protagonist or offered a default choice were set to white male.

 

You could do this systematically. Say, take the top 10 most highly-praised games from the past 10 years, put them in a table, and mark which ones have women as protagonists or secondary characters with agency, which ones have them as murder victims to provide plot motivation, prizes to be won, titillation, background decoration, etc. etc., you would get a pretty lopsided table. This is in fact what Sarkeesian has been doing in her videos. You can argue that she's been too lopsided about it (I think she has and it significantly weakens her argument), but I think that the phenomenon is very real, and that you have to be a white straight male or really steeped in patriarchal culture not to notice.

 

So yeah, I do think this is a systemic problem. I also think the fight is already over bar the shouting: everybody from Harebrained Schemes to inXile, Obsidian to Electronic Arts is now paying attention and we are seeing much less oblivious racism and sexism and much more interesting and diverse characters. The GG'ers can howl all they want, but if they want to continue playing games while boycotting the "SJW's" they're going to be very short on games to play pretty soon.

 

And you know what else? In most of these games, you'll still be able to roll a white square-jawed space marine, if that's your fantasy. Which ought to count as a win for everyone, no?

^ this is all probably true, but the White Male Protagonist cliché is not a gender/racial commentary so much as a confirmed marketing truism. Bethesda, for example, did not plaster the muscle-bound, white Nord warrior all over their Skyrim ads because they were "racist", or " socially non-progressive" or whatever. They did it because...Sales. Because 1) the white male gamer is the biggest gaming demographic; 2) marketing logic dictates that to attract a demographic, a game must send the message that they'll be able to enjoy it vicariously. Skyrim....would not have sold 3 million copies on DAY ONE if its canon protagonist was a lizard woman.

 

The time will eventually come (because the metrics are slowly showing it) where there will be just as many Female gamers as Male gamers. And when this happens, rest assured that we'll start seeing a lot more Female protagonists as default for games.

 

 

Just a note on your Skyrim statement, I'm pretty sure they put a white male on the cover because it's Skryim (Scandanavia), homeland of the Nords (Norse), who are all white.  Having a game called "Norway" and then having a Indian guy on the cover wouldn't make much sense .

 

Regardless though, I get your point that companies are going to market to what they see as their primary demographic, and I don't really see anything wrong with that.  It's just business...if my money was on the line, and if I thought I could get more profits with a white guy than a black guy on the cover, I would put a white guy on there.

[Hatred]

I'd really like to hear Cris' or Josh's comment on the whole issue.

 What kind of sane adult who wasn't bored witless would willing walk into this cave of retarded teeth gnashing trolls kicking up a stink over nothing  ? It has been pointed out already that no one cares about this. I used to wonder why the devs dont really engage with the community in these forums. This thread has been very informative in terms of answering that question.

[mdrgp]

They can't remove the quest. I mean it even has an ending slide if you do things in a certain way

[rkade8583]

I am so sick of these people. I left gamergate because I was sick of these people. I left twitter and facebook for awhile because I was sick of these people. I stopped listening to my morning radio show because one of the DJs turned into one of these people.

 

STOP LISTENING TO THE ENTITLED MORALITY POLICE AND MAKE THE GAME YOU WANT TO MAKE, DEVELOPERS OF ALL GAMES EVERYWHERE!!!

Edited April 4, 2015 by rkade8583

[Hatred]

 

What on earth are you on about?  The limerick wasn't actual game content created by Obsidian.  It was just junk allowed into the game for the sake of a backer.

Oh, this started WAY before the limerick. Check the Caedgun's Boob Plate controversy of 2012...which happened during the kickstarter

 

So you are one of those people who don't think boobplate is stupid. Even if you don't think its stupid is it really hard for you to realise that everyone else does ? A woman in plate armour looks a lot like a man in plate armour. 

[PrimeJunta]

@Creslin The genres you've played may be less problematic than the ones I've played (I've never played an MMO or MOBA for example). May be; I suspect that if you did a finer tally of tropes a similar pattern would emerge. E.g. in the MOBA's, how's the armor and clothing design? One fantasy game trope that sticks out is the boobplate/chainmail bikini. How is it in the games you play? If, in general, women wear boobplate or chainmail bikinis where men wear full plate, why do you think that is? From where I'm at, it looks pretty obvious -- it's because the players are mostly male and want to look at boobs, so the clothing design caters to them. 

 

The main point I'm making is that the culture has shifted fast, where it counts: among the people actually making the games. There are a few holdouts, but pretty soon now that's what they'll be and it'll be perfectly fine. I've nothing against a studio making only games catering to white males, as long as they're just one studio among many catering to different groups of people. IMO gaming is richer for having characters like Kana Rua, Sagani, Pallegina, and is0bel rather than the almost all-white cast of BG1+2. (I believe Yoshimo is the only nonwhite companion character in them, and we all know what his story is. Unless you count Viconia, and if you do, the drow are not exactly an example you would want to trot out if arguing that dark-skinned people get fairly represented...)

[PrimeJunta]

Just a note on your Skyrim statement, I'm pretty sure they put a white male on the cover because it's Skryim (Scandanavia), homeland of the Nords (Norse), who are all white.  Having a game called "Norway" and then having a Indian guy on the cover wouldn't make much sense .

 

Haha it's funny you should mention this, because the last Norwegian I met actually was originally from Sri Lanka. We were sitting on the plane from Aarhus to Copenhagen...

[SnarkyArky]

Never ever give bullies anything. When they figure out their threats work they will be back for more because they know you will give in. This is something Obsidian should be strong enough to ignore.

[Creslin321]

 

 

What on earth are you on about?  The limerick wasn't actual game content created by Obsidian.  It was just junk allowed into the game for the sake of a backer.

Oh, this started WAY before the limerick. Check the Caedgun's Boob Plate controversy of 2012...which happened during the kickstarter

 

So you are one of those people who don't think boobplate is stupid. Even if you don't think its stupid is it really hard for you to realise that everyone else does ? A woman in plate armour looks a lot like a man in plate armour. 

 

 

Personally, I think that that boobplate is no less realistic then other things that happen in fantasy games regarding armor.  Like plate armor wearers swimming, plate armor being put on without assistance, plate armor never rusting on needing maintenance, plate armor not effecting your speed at all.

 

Point is that fantasy games are fiction and lots of unrealistic stuff happens in them in order to make the gameplay better, please the audience, or fit with the developer's vision.

 

If the dev wants to make a more "gritty" game without silly things like boobplate, that's great.  If the dev wants to make a more "pulpy" game with things like boobplate, that's great too.

[Emerwyn]

 

 

Anyway, I honestly agree with you that Gears of War style machismo characters are boring...and this is part of why I don't play those kinds of games.  I just don't see it as some kind of systemic issue in gaming because there are plenty, plenty of games that have always featured diverse characters.

 

Do you see it differently?

 

Somewhat, yes. Definitely some genres are more space-mariney than others, but it is a systemic problem IMO, in that the exceptions tend to stand out. 

 

As a thought experiment, why don't you write down a list of, say, 30 games you've enjoyed over the years, and then underline the ones which had a non-white, non-male default protagonist, regardless of genre or whether they even have a protagonist.

 

 

 

I just did this experiment, only in the last year my ten most enjoyed games were:

 

- Shadowrun Returns (you can create your main character, and choose gender and race. Option for dark skinned included)

- Divinity: Orinignal Sin (you can create two main characters, and choose gender and race. Option for dark skinned included)

- Blackguards 2 (locked female main character)

- Tomb Raider (locked female character)

- Might and Magic X: Legacy (you can create 4 characters, you get to choose races and genders for all. Option for dark skinned included)

- Dark Souls 2 (you create your main character, you get to choose race and gender. Option for dark skinned included)

- The Evil Within (Male white main character. Female sidekick that you get to play as the main character in the sequel/DLC)

- Resident Evil Revelations 2 (two campaigns, 4 main characters, of which one is male and three are female)

- Dragon Age Inquisition (you get to create your main character, and choose gender and race. Option for dark skinned included. Option for romancing dark skinned and male NPCs included. Even when playing as a man.)

- Middle Earth: Shadows of Mordor (Damn it, here it is. The locked white male character that makes the game industry systemic.)

 

Of all those games, none of them has predominant white male symbology. DOS' cover has a male and female characters walking in tandem where none is predominant, MMX shows a party fighting, with two males and two females, and the rest of the games in that list mostly have covers that consist in banners with ornaments that fit the game's theme. 

 

My favourite game/trilogy in the last decade, Mass Effect, allows you to create any race, and any gender main character, and allows any combination of romances with both females, males, dark skinned and homosexuals (and aliens  ). The main cover of the game even has a dual design, one with the male version of Shepard, and another with the female version of Shepard.

 

 

 

You usually make valid posts PrimeJunta, but what you posted this one time around was mere and baseless bulls*it, which is also what some of these feminist SJW believe in their heart, even when it's not true. This is not the 60's, the world has changed quite a bit in the last few decades, and we love it.

 

The problem is that unfortunately, some people prefer to keep playing victim, because it's easier to blame everyone else for me being a failure. Also gives you that powerful feeling of being a warrior, fighting against the system. Truth is you had the same treatment as everyone else, and you did not qualify. Assume it, and improve next time around.

Edited April 4, 2015 by Emerwyn

[Creslin321]

@Creslin The genres you've played may be less problematic than the ones I've played (I've never played an MMO or MOBA for example). May be; I suspect that if you did a finer tally of tropes a similar pattern would emerge. E.g. in the MOBA's, how's the armor and clothing design? One fantasy game trope that sticks out is the boobplate/chainmail bikini. How is it in the games you play? If, in general, women wear boobplate or chainmail bikinis where men wear full plate, why do you think that is? From where I'm at, it looks pretty obvious -- it's because the players are mostly male and want to look at boobs, so the clothing design caters to them. 

 

The main point I'm making is that the culture has shifted fast, where it counts: among the people actually making the games. There are a few holdouts, but pretty soon now that's what they'll be and it'll be perfectly fine. I've nothing against a studio making only games catering to white males, as long as they're just one studio among many catering to different groups of people. IMO gaming is richer for having characters like Kana Rua, Sagani, Pallegina, and is0bel rather than the almost all-white cast of BG1+2. (I believe Yoshimo is the only nonwhite companion character in them, and we all know what his story is. Unless you count Viconia, and if you do, the drow are not exactly an example you would want to trot out if arguing that dark-skinned people get fairly represented...)

 

Some MOBAs are big on sexuality and boob physics (Smite), but some aren't (DOTA2).  Even then, I see absolutely no issue with having sexualized men or women in a game.  I mean, even Joss Whedon, who is pretty progressive, knows that it's probably a good idea to put the sexy actress in a tight leather jumpsuit because that's what men want to see.  I guess my question would be why do you feel that sexualized characters are a problem?  Sexuality is a fundamental part of human nature, so I see no issue with catering to it in games or any other media for that matter.

 

As for your second paragraph, I think it's a bit silly to try to give fantasy races a direct analog to "real life" races.  I never saw Kana Rua as anything but an Aumana, and I never saw Viconia as anything but Drow.  The point is that it's fantasy, I don't think that all fantasy needs to have some kind of real life equivalent for everything, and I think it may be detrimental if devs try to do this.  It's definitely fine for fantasy to try to have a message about a real world problem...but acting as if everything in fantasy as a real world analog is silly.

 

Anyway, as to the whole cultural change thing...

 

I think that things are becoming more diverse, and really I think that's a good thing...but I don't think that's going to result in any huge changes.  I think that more races will wind up being represented, but I don't really see sexualized characters going away, and I don't see Michael Bay games going away.  The drive for sex and violence is far to fundamental of a human desire for devs not to cater to it.

[Lerina]

To those people who think that Sawyer or Obsidian should make some sort of "statement" dealing with this new butthurt: No, they shouldn't. That's what got them into hot water in the first place with the epitaph. If anything, the big thing Sawyer should have learned from this is to keep his fingers to himself on Twitter when these situations come up, until and unless the publicity team think there's something worth saying about it. If he'd kept his trigger-fingers to himself, the epitaph would have blown over in a few days when the morality police realized Obsidian didn't care about them.

 

Now, full disclosure, I don't play PoE myself, but my husband does, and I've been enjoying listening to it. (It's not my kind of game, but I can enjoy the story, even if I don't want to play through the mechanics, what a shock, right?!) He hasn't gotten to the quest mentioned here yet, but now I'm looking forward to when he does, so we can see for ourselves what it's like. Hell, we had a ball with him trying to play a psycho last night, because he died horribly trying to slaughter the starting caravan, just to see if it could be done. (It was VERY funny, he failed miserably.)

 

As for protecting children in video games, my thoughts on that, being from a military family, are thus: Why should children receive special status in games that they don't have in real life? Kids in real life can be killed during wars, by crazy people, or flat out by accidents or illness. Honestly, the fact that they're invincible in games crosses a bit into uncanny valley for me, because for heaven's sake, they NEVER leave, die, or grow up. Does that not strike anyone else as just a little bit weird?

[Creslin321]

 

Just a note on your Skyrim statement, I'm pretty sure they put a white male on the cover because it's Skryim (Scandanavia), homeland of the Nords (Norse), who are all white.  Having a game called "Norway" and then having a Indian guy on the cover wouldn't make much sense .

 

Haha it's funny you should mention this, because the last Norwegian I met actually was originally from Sri Lanka. We were sitting on the plane from Aarhus to Copenhagen...

 

 

Probably not liking in the middle ages .  And come on, a Sri Lankan immigrant is not "representative" of the Norse people or culture.  Just like how I'm not representative of the American people or heritage, yet I live here .

Edited April 4, 2015 by Creslin321

[Hatred]

 

 

 

What on earth are you on about?  The limerick wasn't actual game content created by Obsidian.  It was just junk allowed into the game for the sake of a backer.

Oh, this started WAY before the limerick. Check the Caedgun's Boob Plate controversy of 2012...which happened during the kickstarter

 

So you are one of those people who don't think boobplate is stupid. Even if you don't think its stupid is it really hard for you to realise that everyone else does ? A woman in plate armour looks a lot like a man in plate armour. 

 

 

Personally, I think that that boobplate is no less realistic then other things that happen in fantasy games regarding armor.  Like plate armor wearers swimming, plate armor being put on without assistance, plate armor never rusting on needing maintenance, plate armor not effecting your speed at all.

 

Point is that fantasy games are fiction and lots of unrealistic stuff happens in them in order to make the gameplay better, please the audience, or fit with the developer's vision.

 

If the dev wants to make a more "gritty" game without silly things like boobplate, that's great.  If the dev wants to make a more "pulpy" game with things like boobplate, that's great too.

 

 Please note that I didn't say it was unrealistic. I said it was stupid. I am not one of those fools complaining about things not being realistic enough and that breaking my immersion. Boobplate is stupid. It looks stupid. I do  have a very strong bias towards armour which looks functional and that means armour which looks like actual armour from real life since people used what worked. 

 Nothing cool or powerful looking in my opinion about armour which looks dysfunctional. I just want my armour to look cool. A bit of artistic license with this is fine imo but not to the point where the armour no longer appears functional. This is of course my own subjective opinion.

 I really appreciate that the armour and weapons in this game are modeled of what worked. In an anime I am ok with someone wielding a sword that would be impossible to in real life but in my games I prefer swords which look like they would hurt someone.

 I don't feel that catering to my viewpoint in this amounts to pleasing some group of people with a social agenda.

edit :I guess in a roundabout way you could say that means I want realistic armour. That is true. Its not the point I was trying to make when I said boobplate was stupid though. If you are going to give me unrealistic armour I want some damn wings on it. Not boobplate.

Edited April 4, 2015 by Hatred

[rkade8583]

Never ever give bullies anything. When they figure out their threats work they will be back for more because they know you will give in. This is something Obsidian should be strong enough to ignore.

Honest to god, I'm going to take Firedorn's word that they originally weren't going to censor his limerick because I am a hopeless optimist. Using that as the foundation, I don't think they'll cave.

 

I'm just sick of these damn moral crusaders demanding people change their art (drawing, writing, playing, creating) because they don't like it. At least the crusaders of the 80s and 90s had the decency to look snazzy when they were demonizing our hobby,

 

Seriously, I am really tired of it. Every damn day it feels like they're chipping away more and more of the things I enjoy (one of them being unfettered artistic vision from people who are way more creative than I am.)

 

I mean disagree all you want. Hell, boycott the game if you hate it but please stop trying to make your opinions the law of the land. Let the free market do that. If enough people boycott the game, maybe devs will listen to you. Outright DEMANDING is childish, entitled, and morally wrong and you'll notice that I'm merely ASKING them to stop, nay BEGGING them to stop. I am not DEMANDING they stop.

[PrimeJunta]

@Emerwyn This is much too crazy a place for a dissertation on the topic, but unfortunately that's what's needed. Because... well, you're wrong. The gender imbalance exists everywhere, it's much worse in science/engineering/technology than most other fields, and it's especially bad in gaming. And it is not due to differences in ability. For example, one simple experiment has been repeated many times over and always yields the same results: you send CV's with randomized male and female names (or "black" and "white" names) to a bunch of potential employers, and then you tally up who gets invited to interviews. Guess what? The white males win, every time. Even when whoever is vetting the CV's is herself a woman, and/or nonwhite.

 

Two things though: I should have given more thought to my quick thought-experiment. You really ought to look at more than just the gender of the protagonist. Who are the NPC's? Who are the main supporting characters? What's their role? Etc. etc. And: you took games only from the last year, which in fact reflects much of the change I'm referencing. If you took a ten-year perspective, the picture would be very different already with the limited "protagonist test" I proposed. What's more, I was asking you to look at the default -- many of the games indeed allow you to select the race and gender, but what's the default option? Defaults say a lot about the unconscious biases at work here.

[Creslin321]

 

 

 

 

What on earth are you on about?  The limerick wasn't actual game content created by Obsidian.  It was just junk allowed into the game for the sake of a backer.

Oh, this started WAY before the limerick. Check the Caedgun's Boob Plate controversy of 2012...which happened during the kickstarter

 

So you are one of those people who don't think boobplate is stupid. Even if you don't think its stupid is it really hard for you to realise that everyone else does ? A woman in plate armour looks a lot like a man in plate armour. 

 

 

Personally, I think that that boobplate is no less realistic then other things that happen in fantasy games regarding armor.  Like plate armor wearers swimming, plate armor being put on without assistance, plate armor never rusting on needing maintenance, plate armor not effecting your speed at all.

 

Point is that fantasy games are fiction and lots of unrealistic stuff happens in them in order to make the gameplay better, please the audience, or fit with the developer's vision.

 

If the dev wants to make a more "gritty" game without silly things like boobplate, that's great.  If the dev wants to make a more "pulpy" game with things like boobplate, that's great too.

 

 Please note that I didn't say it was unrealistic. I said it was stupid. I am not one of those fools complaining about things not being realistic enough and that breaking my immersion. Boobplate is stupid. It looks stupid. I do  have a very strong bias towards armour which looks functional and that means armour which looks like actual armour from real life since people used what worked. 

 Nothing cool or powerful looking in my opinion about armour which looks dysfunctional. I just want my armour to look cool. A bit of artistic license with this is fine imo but not to the point where the armour no longer appears functional. This is of course my own subjective opinion.

 I really appreciate that the armour and weapons in this game are modeled of what worked. In an anime I am ok with someone wielding a sword that would be impossible to life but in my games I prefer swords which look like they would hurt someone.

 I don't feel that catering to my viewpoint in this amounts to pleasing some group of people with a social agenda.

 

 

Then that's totally fine .  Everyone has different tastes.  Personally, I'm indifferent on boobplate.

[dirigible]

Somewhat, yes. Definitely some genres are more space-mariney than others, but it is a systemic problem IMO, in that the exceptions tend to stand out. 

As a thought experiment, why don't you write down a list of, say, 30 games you've enjoyed over the years, and then underline the ones which had a non-white, non-male default protagonist, regardless of genre or whether they even have a protagonist.

I just did. My tally: 

One.

A good many had no protagonist at all (simulations, worldbuilding games, strategy games), and some but not all allowed you to pick a gender and race, usually with little to no reactivity to the choice. All except one of the games that had a fixed protagonist or offered a default choice were set to white male.

Hey, I'll try this too.

 

I'll go by my top 20 most played games on Steam, in order.

 

Skyrim - no canon default protagonist for any of the Elder Scrolls games. The box art shows a Nord male Dragonborn.

Civilization V - no default protagonist, wide variety of ethnicities and both sexes represented among civ leaders

Dark Souls - no default protagonist, can make any race or sex you want

Dark Souls II - same as DS1

Divinity Original Sin - Default protagonists on box are are a white male AND a white female

Crusader Kings II - No default protagonist, but due to the theme & setting the vast majority of useful characters are going to be white males. Still, you could play an African Woman if you were inclined. Box art shows a white male.

XCOM Enemy Unkown - faceless protagonist. Soldiers are both men and women from across the globe.

Natural Selection II - Marines are men and women, both white.

Morrowind - same as Skyrim, but the box art character is a dunmer male

Wasteland 2 - no default main character. Men and women of various colors are options.

Shadowrun Dragonfall - no default main character, can make men, women, black, white, yellow, green, etc.

Xenonauts - same as XCOM

Insurgency - all characters are male. Half are American, half are vaguely middle-eastern. The tutorial is given from the perspective of an American soldier.

Banished - no main character. The civilians are all white-ish men and women (and children).

Warlock Master of the Arcane - no default main character. Game has men, women, skeletons, dragons, etc.

Sonic Generations - Sonic the Hedgehog is a male hedgehog

Legend of Grimrock - no default character. Portraits include men, women, insects, minotaurs, etc of varying colors

Valdis Story Abyssal City - 2 default main characters, 1 white male and 1 white female.

Expeditions Conquistador - no default main character. Both male and female spaniards are optional. Box Art shows a generic male Conquistador.

Prison Architect - no default main character. Prisoners and workers are all male, but come in a variety of colors.

 

So out of my top 20 most played games, 100% had either no protagonist, no default/canon protagonist, or had a non-white non-male protagonist

Edited April 4, 2015 by dirigible

[Lexx]

 

What on earth are you on about?  The limerick wasn't actual game content created by Obsidian.  It was just junk allowed into the game for the sake of a backer.

Oh, this started WAY before the limerick. Check the Caedgun's Boob Plate controversy of 2012...which happened during the kickstarter

 

Boob plate was stupid and I am glad it got removed.

[middydj]

 

 

 

Anyway, I honestly agree with you that Gears of War style machismo characters are boring...and this is part of why I don't play those kinds of games.  I just don't see it as some kind of systemic issue in gaming because there are plenty, plenty of games that have always featured diverse characters.

 

Do you see it differently?

 

Somewhat, yes. Definitely some genres are more space-mariney than others, but it is a systemic problem IMO, in that the exceptions tend to stand out. 

 

As a thought experiment, why don't you write down a list of, say, 30 games you've enjoyed over the years, and then underline the ones which had a non-white, non-male default protagonist, regardless of genre or whether they even have a protagonist.

 

 

 

I just did this experiment, only in the last year my ten most enjoyed games were:

 

- Shadowrun Returns (you can create your main character, and choose gender and race. Option for dark skinned included)

- Divinity: Orinignal Sin (you can create two main characters, and choose gender and race. Option for dark skinned included)

- Blackguards 2 (locked female main character)

- Tomb Raider (locked female character)

- Might and Magic X: Legacy (you can create 4 characters, you get to choose races and genders for all. Option for dark skinned included)

- Dark Souls 2 (you create your main character, you get to choose race and gender. Option for dark skinned included)

- The Evil Within (Male white main character. Female sidekick that you get to play as the main character in the sequel/DLC)

- Resident Evil Revelations 2 (two campaigns, 4 main characters, of which one is male and three are female)

- Dragon Age Inquisition (you get to create your main character, and choose gender and race. Option for dark skinned included. Option for romancing dark skinned and male NPCs included. Even when playing as a man.)

- Middle Earth: Shadows of Mordor (Damn it, here it is. The locked white male character that makes the game industry systemic.)

 

Of all those games, none of them has predominant white male symbology. DOS' cover has a male and female characters walking in tandem where none is predominant, MMX shows a party fighting, with two males and two females, and the rest of the games in that list mostly have covers that consist in banners with ornaments that fit the game's theme. 

 

My favourite game/trilogy in the last decade, Mass Effect, allows you to create any race, and any gender main character, and allows any combination of romances with both females, males, dark skinned and homosexuals (and aliens  ). The main cover of the game even has a dual design, one with the male version of Shepard, and another with the female version of Shepard.

 

 

 

You usually make valid posts PrimeJunta, but what you posted this one time around was mere and baseless bulls*it, which is also what some of these feminist SJW believe in their heart, even when it's not true. This is not the 60's, the world has changed quite a bit in the last few decades, and we love it.

 

The problem is that unfortunately, some people prefer to keep playing victim, because it's easier to blame everyone else for me being a failure. Also gives you that powerful feeling of being a warrior, fighting against the system. Truth is you had the same treatment as everyone else, and you did not qualify. Assume it, and improve next time around.

 

 

Speak for yourself.  Sure may not be the 60's but it's the same bull going around here in the U.S. that has been around for years. The GAME has been changed is all.  So while YOU may love it.. Some still don't.  

 

The GAME will always be played by those who win at it. 

Edited April 4, 2015 by middydj

[dirigible]

Edit: doubleposted 

Edited April 4, 2015 by dirigible