League of Legends Tournament Characters Banned By Iran

[Andy Chalk]

League of Legends Tournament Characters Banned By Iran

The government of Iran has banned nearly all female characters from a planned League of Legends tournament because they show too much skin.

Iran, as you are no doubt aware, is a hardline Islamist theocracy, not the most welcoming environment for Western videogames. Nonetheless, the World Cyber Games is planning a League of Legends tournament in the country, but - big surprise - it's running into some troubles with the rules.

A message posted on the WCG Iran Facebook page said the Iranian government demanded that the characters Ahri, Akali, Ashe, Caitlyn, Cassiopia, Diana, Elise, Evelyn, Fiora, Irelia, Janna, Karma, Katarina, Kayle, Leblanc, Leona, Lissandra, Lulu, Lux, Miss Fortune, Morgana, Nami, Nidalee, Oriana, Quinn, Riven, Sejuani, Shyvana, Sivir, Sona, Soraka, Syndra, Tristana, Vayne, Vi, and Zyra - all females - be banned from tournament play. The characters Diana, Fiora, Karma (only traditional skin), Kayle, Leona, Lissandra, Lulu, Lux, Nami, Quinn, Sejuani, Tristana and Vayne are being considered for inclusion.

The message has since been removed but a translation remains available on the League of Legends forums [http://forums.euw.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=1355135]. WCG Iran wrote in the comments of the deleted post that the tournament faces restrictions or possible cancellation if it doesn't comply with the demand, and event coordinator Reza Babaei told Kotaku that organizers have been working with the government for the past two months to try to come up with a solution.

There's some confusion as to whether or not this is actually an official event; WCG Iran [https://www.facebook.com/wcg.ir] described it as an "official World Cyber Games tournament," but the League of Legends forum refers to it as "an unofficial LoL event." Either way, the tourney currently scheduled to take place September 12-16, but right now it's all still up in the air.

Source: Kotaku [http://kotaku.com/female-league-of-legends-characters-banned-at-an-irania-1213754332]


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[itsthesheppy]

I feel nothing but profound sympathy for most of the people caught living in these hardcore theocracies. I know that very few of them would actually welcome or want it, but I still can't help but wince that we live in a world where some places are just so restrictive.

 

[Easton Dark]

Everyone on the list of possibles are all, incredibly, sensibly dressed and most are pretty much covered head to toe (except nami, fish cleavage doesn't make sense).

 

[Tanakh]

Skins? It's not hard to make a new skin for them just changing the skin colour to cloth colour.

Blizz did it for WoW China and other devs have also done it for other cultures, and I don't think it was a huge deal then, so... don't see it as a huge deal now.

That said, the player level might be way low... not sure if it's worth doing a reskin.

 

[IamLEAM1983]

I understand that gaming is and should be international and that it makes no sense for the eSports scene to be held back by geographical or cultural boundaries - but when you're facing a government as strict as Iran's, isn't it just better to host your competition elsewhere, ideally someplace where the organizers will understand that the Champions' appearances aren't much more than window dressing for timers and statistics?

As that's usually what motivates pro gamers - the timing, the challenge and the stats. Nobody who seriously takes to MOBAs is going to say "Sona's my main pick 'cause she's fucking hawt!". Rather, they'll mention her tactical benefits and advantages, all depending on her player's role in the team or if said player goes jungle, top, mid or bottom.

In other words; I'm all for freedom of religion but - seriously, Iran? Cool your jets. I doubt a single tourney is going to Westernize your fine Islamic youth and make them cry out for a multiplication of low-cut jeans and McDonald's.

 

[Absolutionis]

What part of Vi shows too much skin? Even if they are absurdly restrictive, they're also absurdly inconsistent.

 

[Belated]

What's the matter, Escapists? Aren't you guys always going on and on about how awful it is for a video game to feature sexy women? I know for a fact at least some of you feel showing skin in video games should be outright outlawed. Well now Iran is giving you what you want. Yeah, that's right. The world you want to live in is IRAN. You proud of that?

Okay seriously, I have to laugh at the hypocrisy here. I mean it's alright if you don't want every video game to feature sexy women, or if you don't want every woman in a certain video game to be sexy. But from the forum discussions, it seems like a lot of you think sexiness is inherently wrong in and of itself and should cease to be a thing. Perhaps because you don't understand the importance of neutral free speech, or perhaps because you're just that much of a puritan and you think fantasizing is dangerous. (When in reality, fantasizing is quite healthy and in fact NOT fantasizing is a lot more dangerous. Sexual repression can turn you nuts.)

There are quite a few sexy characters in League of Legends. Caitlyn for example, especially in her officer outfit. Miss Fortune, especially in her midriff-baring default outfit with tight pants. And Ashe's Woad outfit is particularly revealing. Just to name the ones that I use most frequently. So yes, given that League has sexy women, and given that a lot of Escapists seem to be against any kind of sexiness in video games, it would therefore follow that a lot of Escapists agree with Iran. So I reiterate: How does that feel?

 

[omega 616]

Even though I hate religions control on people, I do like they are wanting more covered females... I'm not familiar with lol but I'm all for females being more covered in gaming.

I often feel like the only difference between an in game whore and an in game female warrior is one holds a weapon.

I just don't like the reason why it is an issue.

 

[loa]

What's the matter, Escapists? Aren't you guys always going on and on about how awful it is for a video game to feature sexy women?

It's not about that they do it, it is about everyone doing it. Get it right.

 

[Belated]

What's the matter, Escapists? Aren't you guys always going on and on about how awful it is for a video game to feature sexy women?

It's not about that they do it, it is about everyone doing it. Get it right.

Come now, I said "a lot of you", not "all of you". If you don't think that way, you're not one of them. In fact, I'm with you in this regard. Not all women should be sexy and not all video games should feature sexy women. But there are in fact many people on here who are automatically against any kind of sexiness anywhere. For example, I once spoke to a poster who - I'm not making this up - thought bikinis should be taken off the market.

Even if you're not all that extreme (I have met some open-minded people on here as well. Those are generally the ones who friend me.) The Escapist and Kotaku communities do seem to attract the more prudish types overall.

 

[hickwarrior]

What's the matter, Escapists? Aren't you guys always going on and on about how awful it is for a video game to feature sexy women?

To be fair, restricting it like this isn't the answer. The problem has to do with variety, but how can we make that variety other than by making games with women as protagonist in them? By ourselves as an independent developer. And that could take so much time to actually get publicity for the game as well as having the game be good in and of itself.

Also, I don't think you should throw everyone under the bus here when this is blatant censorship. I'm not even sure if any of the female champs are tournament viable, but it does feel like a large selection is getting banned that could be.

So, we just need less censorship and more variety. But how can we as consumers advocate that variety? Buy transistor? Then what? I don't feel like we have much of a choice when you get down to it.

But at one point, might as well shrug if I look at all the other media. They show mostly attractive women regardless. Might as well take it for granted that this exists.

EDIT: Well, I'll leave the rant here. Maybe I am doing what grey said I'd be doing, but not under the pretense of it just being an opinion. I just read your reply to it, so I kind of got ninja'd there.

 

[RJ 17]

I've never played LoL but that sounds like literally half the roster. Quite honestly I'm surprised they're even holding a tournament there, seems to me like Iran isn't exactly a gamer-friendly country.

Beyond that, I hate to be "that guy" but......if they do go through with this.....wouldn't that make it a target for "extremist Islamists"? Seems to me that if they're willing to send bomb threats to a guy who made a cartoon featuring Muhammad, they likely wouldn't take too kindly to a large group of people reveling in the unholy sin of looking at scantily clad game characters. >.>

What's the matter, Escapists? Aren't you guys always going on and on about how awful it is for a video game to feature sexy women?

It's not about that they do it, it is about everyone doing it. Get it right.

Come now, I said "a lot of you", not "all of you". If you don't think that way, you're not one of them. In fact, I'm with you in this regard. Not all women should be sexy and not all video games should feature sexy women. But there are in fact many people on here who are automatically against any kind of sexiness anywhere. For example, I once spoke to a poster who - I'm not making this up - thought bikinis should be taken off the market.

Even if you're not all that extreme (I have met some open-minded people on here as well. Those are generally the ones who friend me.) The Escapist and Kotaku communities do seem to attract the more prudish types overall.

If a poll I did a week or two ago is anything to go by, the majority of people around here actually aren't bothered by it. I'm sure there's some are as I honestly can't see any reason to doubt your anti-bikini anecdote, but I posed the simple question of "Do you like sexy women in games?" (or something along those lines, can't remember the exact wording) with three options: "Yes, I actually prefer them that way", "No, I find it to be offensive/degrading/etc.", or "It honestly doesn't bother me enough to care one way or the other."

I had expected the "no" response to have the majority of the votes, but in actuality it had the fewest. In fact, the "I prefer them that way" beat out the anti-sexy response, though the majority went with "I really don't care one way or the other (i.e. they don't look for it, but they're not bothered by it)."

So yeah, seems the majority of Escapists either like sexy female characters or aren't bothered by it. The poll had a surprisingly large response, each possible answer had over 100 votes, but there you have it: the people who are actually offended/disgusted by sexy female characters are actually the minority.

Granted: I fully understand that an internet forum poll is hardly scientific, just sharing the results.

Edit:
Here's a link to that poll I mentioned in case you were interested.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.824474-Poll-Lets-Get-Some-Honesty-Shall-We-Regarding-Big-Breasts-Sexy-Female-Game-Characters?page=1

 

[fnartilter]

So yes, given that League has sexy women, and given that a lot of Escapists seem to be against any kind of sexiness in video games, it would therefore follow that a lot of Escapists agree with Iran. So I reiterate: How does that feel?

I think you're confusing sexyness with a lack of character and character diversity. The cliche is of the one dimensional, fit, busty, bare-midriff female character plot device for the protagonist's story. That is what most people are against.

Omega616 clearly should move to the international space station where there are all of ten people, and everyone is always dressed warmly. That way he won't have any clashes with nudity or religion.

 

[rofltehcat]

Leona? Kayle?? Tristana??? Seriously? Why didn't they ban Annie while they were at it?

Can't they simply make a (inofficial, mandatory) skin pack with headscarfs and burquas? It wouldn't be great but having female fighters at all would probably be better than not having any at all... though some already on the list like Kayle are really not showing much (any?) skin at all nor are very sexualized.
Making skins wasn't really hard back when I reworked a Kog'Maw Yoshi skin. (original model was from someone else, no idea if someone continued it) If a Yoshi skin is possible I'm sure they can make more appropriate reskins.

Edit: My bad, those I named actually seem to be considered to be allowed, it seems. Still, them being banned at first at all is still far too much.

 

[MCerberus]

What part of Vi shows too much skin? Even if they are absurdly restrictive, they're also absurdly inconsistent.

She wears a miniskirt under her armor and has a tattoo I guess is the reason?

edit- I fall into Iron Stylus' (one of the League character devs) thinking about this. Sexy lady characters are good. Non-sexy lady characters are good. Skins that switch things around are good. Also the splash art probably has too big... tracts of land.

 

[Belated]

What's the matter, Escapists? Aren't you guys always going on and on about how awful it is for a video game to feature sexy women?

Also, I don't think you should throw everyone under the bus here when this is blatant censorship. I'm not even sure if any of the female champs are tournament viable, but it does feel like a large selection is getting banned that could be.

EDIT: Well, I'll leave the rant here. Maybe I am doing what grey said I'd be doing, but not under the pretense of it just being an opinion. I just read your reply to it, so I kind of got ninja'd there.

So yeah, seems the majority of Escapists either like sexy female characters or aren't bothered by it. The poll had a surprisingly large response, each possible answer had over 100 votes, but there you have it: the people who are actually offended/disgusted by sexy female characters are actually the minority.

"A lot" is a bit of a tightrope, because I could have meant "most" or I could have meant "many", but you know that I'm covering my ass against any accusations that I mean "all". And in fact, I did mean "many" rather than "most". Though I am aware it's a bit of a dirty arguing trick to use specific wording to cover my ass.

But even then, the opinions of those "many" hardline prudes seem to be represented more frequently on here than on most other websites I frequent. That's basically what I'm getting at. For example, why is it that Dragon's Crown was so controversial? Only one of the characters was sexy to mainstream gamer tastes. (Yeah I know the muscly woman wasn't wearing much, but even my friend who has a fetish for muscular females wouldn't be into her, so she doesn't count.[/i] And the rest of them were pretty well-dressed, if I recall. The elf certainly was. There it was, a perfect example that gave us a little bit of sexiness without making everybody sexy, which is presumably the middle ground that most Escapists want. And yet it became a big controversy. Over that one sexy character. Why?

And indeed, most of the female characters are tournament-viable. I can testify to the strengths of, again, Ashe, Miss Fortune, and Caitlyn. In fact some people think Caitlyn is unbalanced. A lot (not all) of the women in League are sexualized, but none of them are useless. They're taken as seriously as any others. In fact, I think it's a sign of respect that League recently decided to retire the "battle bra" skin of the ice warrior character for some more heavy armor that wouldn't induce hypothermia, but at the same time allowed the original skin to still be used among those who bought that character earlier.

 

[RJ 17]

Leona? Kayle?? Tristana??? Seriously? Why didn't they ban Annie while they were at it?

Can't they simply make a (inofficial, mandatory) skin pack with headscarfs and burquas? It wouldn't be great but having female fighters at all would probably be better than not having any at all... though some already on the list like Kayle are really not showing much (any?) skin at all nor are very sexualized.
Making skins wasn't really hard back when I reworked a Kog'Maw Yoshi skin. (original model was from someone else, no idea if someone continued it) If a Yoshi skin is possible I'm sure they can make more appropriate reskins.

Edit: My bad, those I named actually seem to be considered to be allowed, it seems. Still, them being banned at first at all is still far too much.

Or they could, you know, NOT have the tournament in a country where women are so oppressed that the half the game's roster is banned. That could probably work too.

Seriously, the fact that they want to have a tournament in Iran is bewildering to me. Not because I doubt there's gamers in Iran, not because I don't think those gamers deserve to have a tournament in their own country, but purely because of what this article points out: the government is a giant bag of dicks.

 

[RJ 17]

But even then, the opinions of those "many" hardline prudes seem to be represented more frequently on here than on most other websites I frequent.

That's a problem you do run into a lot here on this site, but there's a reason for it. It's kinda the same reason that local nightly news in American cities is always filled with how many people got murdered, how many bloody car accidents there were, how many bodies turned up under the highway overpass. Quite simply it's easier to talk about negative things than it is positive things. When someone goes on a "rant", chances are they're ranting about something that pisses them off rather than ranting about something they absolutely love.

Take the ending to Mass Effect 3. By the "vocal" response seen around this site, you'd have figured almost everyone here hated the game and cursed upon it's makers in anyone who might enjoy the game..................yet it was still voted the Game of the Year by this website. That's probably holds about as much validity (that is to say: little) as the poll I linked, but still: it happened. The thing is that defenders of a give subject generally don't take their defensive arguments to the internet. Why? Because the internet is full of haters. If they post a well thought out reasoning and explanation for why there's nothing wrong with game characters being sexy, their in-box would be absolutely flooded with people shouting from the rooftops and ripping apart every little word they said because someone dared to stand up with an opinion that was contrary to their own.

That's actually why I made that poll in the first place: I wanted to see if I could get some honest answers to judge whether the "popular opinion" (OMG DRAGON'S CROWN HAS BIG BOUNCY BEWBIES AND THAT'S FUCKING HORRIBLE!!!!RRRRAAAAAGGGGHHH!!!!!) was indeed the "popular" opinion. Turns out nearly 1K Escapists said "Meh, "sexy" female characters in a game really aren't that big of a deal to me."

Edit: While the poll itself was just general "how do you feel about "sexy" female characters?", I made it during/in response to all the hub-bub about the Sorceress, that's why I mention it here.

 

[DugMachine]

What's the point of the tournament anyways if you're going to ban half the roster? Damn, I can count quite a few that are pretty much mandatory at a competitive level.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

But even then, the opinions of those "many" hardline prudes seem to be represented more frequently on here than on most other websites I frequent. That's basically what I'm getting at. For example, why is it that Dragon's Crown was so controversial? Only one of the characters was sexy to mainstream gamer tastes. (Yeah I know the muscly woman wasn't wearing much, but even my friend who has a fetish for muscular females wouldn't be into her, so she doesn't count.[/i] And the rest of them were pretty well-dressed, if I recall. The elf certainly was. There it was, a perfect example that gave us a little bit of sexiness without making everybody sexy, which is presumably the middle ground that most Escapists want. And yet it became a big controversy. Over that one sexy character. Why?

Are you just playing thick or are you genuinely that ignorant? It's not about Amazon or Sorceress, it's about nearly every other female character in the game. Curvy women (and often scantly clad) who serve little but to be rescued and twist into poses that display both chest and posterior, or spreading their legs wide for no reason but to provide some cheap fanservice. If the biggest problem was Sorceress then you could at least say "Well, at least she's large and in charge", but the game's also littered with damsels, and let's not even get into the secret poking/groping mini-game that's hidden in the game.

You should at least play the darn game before passing judgement on how much or how little fanservice there's in it. Amazon and Sorceress are basically the tip of the iceberg.

What's the point of the tournament anyways if you're going to ban half the roster? Damn, I can count quite a few that are pretty much mandatory at a competitive level.

And indeed, good luck running a competitive build without Sona, Elisa or Janna available as support picks. Hell, most support characters are female in LoL.