Blizzard Dev Offers Apology for Response to Sexualization Question

[Wanicochil]

Ignoring all other game companies, focusing entirely on Blizzard, name three high-profile characters of theirs who dress like pole dancers. I will grant Sylvannas as half-a-point, out of the goodness of my heart.

Um, most female WoW player characters once they pick up some gear? Gear that is all enclosing on males and yet somehow little more than a midriff exposing chainmail bikini on a female? And before you say they're not high profile, who do you see more often? A random NPC or the thousands of chars running about?

K.

I'm sorry what?
My high end female characters have literally 0 skin shown, my Tauren has more skin shown then them, one even has tentacles for a face currently (The mage)
Either you are confusing WoW high end gear for asain MMO, or you never played high end WoW

 

[scw55]

What exactly is wrong with what he said? If anything, I think RPS should be ashamed for driving the guy into a corner like that. He's a game developer, he was there to talk about the game he was developing and not gender politics.

I haven't seen many of the HotS character models yet but the ones I have seen seemed fairly reasonable, unless they're considering the naked Zerg Queen ***** of the Universe as hyper-sexualized?

There's two shirtless men (who share the same model and have different textures). In the scheme of gender politics in video games, that makes things quite equal.

 

[Kungfusam]

I am 100% with the dev. The entire gaming industry has taken this whole sexualisation issue to absurd lengths. Frankly, it's embarrassing.

Right, the issue should be mentioned like once a year, and then ignored after that. It should definitely not be brought up when talking with a developer of a potentially huge game that sexualizes most of its female characters in a very boring way.

The only reason this issue is "embarrassing" is that games journalists are able to bring it up so often because it constantly keeps happening. It's embarrassing that games continue to be so juvenile. It's great that Blizzard wants to make awesome looking characters. I don't think anyone would be complaining in a few female characters were sexualized, but it is a problem when it is basically being presented as the norm. Is hyper-sexualization the only way to make female characters "cool"?

I agree he could've given a better response, but it wasn't a bad one. They want to make cool looking characters. Done.

No, it was a terrible response. He acted like you have to be making a political statement in order to not have ridiculous female characters. He also basically said, "Well, this is a video game, so it doesn't matter", as if video games were just throwaway non-culture.

Video games are the most important new form of popular culture. It is a big problem if that culture continues to perpetuate a demeaning view of women.

It was a loaded question with the usual "you either agree with us or we label you sexist " had nothing to with the game or even character design, it was just another attempt at enforcing their ideology becuase to them their ideology is everything. Was there ever a question about representing Catholic or Muslim belief or minorities, no because their feminists therefore all must be feminists

Also videogames are a hobby, at best a form of art, but never a culture

 

[Pyrian]

What you will see is people complaining that every female character has to be sexy, and has to be put in skimpy, retarded armor or tight battle dresses instead of, you know, actual armor, like the men, who get to just be powerful instead of powerful and sexy fanservice.

See, here's the thing. The central point of your argument is in the words "EVERY" and "HAS TO". Without those, you don't really have an argument. There's really no big deal if "SOME" or "MOST" will "CHOOSE" to underdress. So, the existence of examples does not prove your point, but the existence of counter-examples DOES disprove your point.

But you can buy a shirt (tabard?) to put over it(!)... because that somehow changes the design choices someone made to sexualize every female character.

And here, we get at the truth of the matter. You're not upset that people HAVE to be sexualized. You're upset that they CAN choose to be.

 

[Pyrian]

See, here's the thing. The central point of your argument is in the words "EVERY" and "HAS TO". Without those, you don't really have an argument. There's really no big deal if "SOME" or "MOST" will "CHOOSE" to underdress. So, the existence of examples does not prove your point, but the existence of counter-examples DOES disprove your point.

Yes, go find me a few examples of female characters dressed as something other than something crossed with a stripper; that'll prove that there isn't a problem where female characters are disproportionately designed (Because a character can't "choose" to underdress, a designer chooses to put them in retarded outfits) as fanservice first, powerful second.

But that's not a big deal. You admitted it yourself, earlier. Reasonable people don't object if you have the option to play a sexy character. It's when every female has to be sexy that there's a problem.

But you don't really care about that, do you? You want all the sexy options gone altogether. That's the truth of where you're coming from. You start with the reasonable objection to every woman being hypersexualized, but when that turns out to be inaccurate, you have to fall back, and admit what you really want.

 

[Loop Stricken]

Why pick on blizzard? Their female characters are usually very strong women.

Because we can see their FLESH of course.

All that delicious necrotic pale grey flesh on Sylvanas...

 

[Bocaj2000]

The interesting thing is that I'm not upset the lack of a social statement. I'm instead disappointed about the lack of an artistic statement. "We're just making characters who look cool," is an artistically empty statement that I expect from a high schooler, but not from a character designer and game developer. I am disappoint.

EDIT: Also, many character designers have a bad habit of not being able to draw ugly women. Blizzard is unfortunately included in this grouping. They weren't always like this. They used to be a company that created the original three classics that we have all grown to love due to their serious atmospheres, but have instead decided to go down a different path. But that's a topic for another thread...

 

[Loop Stricken]

Blah blah posts multiple images of characters using Sylvanas' model

Let me just show you my female WoW characters. Bearing in mind I am a straight male.

Spoiler: Beware! Such sexy! So skimp! Wow!

Ye Gods, it's like a flesh buffet!

 

[wulf3n]

Can't you see we're all being played for sheep?

The writer at RPS doesn't give a shit about this issue. I mean he does, but not in the "I want to make things better" sense, but rather the I can capitalize on the issue.

 

[Lictor Face]

You mean Moba characters are sexualized? I never realised that myself. Dota has precious little sexualized character other than Queen of Pain ( Her lore makes her a bdsm lord so I guess that is fairly relevant. ) and possibly Lina.

Other than that I'm not seeing much relevance, to the Moba genre anyway

 

[Playful Pony]

I don't think that reply warranted so much arm flailing really, and I don't see why they felt like sneaking a question (andi it's barely one) about sexualization of female character in there. I certainly agree that the debate should be had, but not by making such backhanded stabs at each other.

Why pick on blizzard? Their female characters are usually very strong women.

Well, I don't have much of a history or experience with Blizzard as a developer, but I a moment in WoW that really stuck with me (and put me off the game as a whole after that) was when my friend and I had gotten to level 60 (or was it 70?) at the same time, and had gotten some new armor with pretty neat stats. He put his on and got some really sweet looking kind of dragon-armor. I put mine on, and I got this monstrosity [http://i.imgur.com/fNEXJxf.jpg] (alternative race pic here [http://dwarfwench.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/pink.jpg]).

It has a heart on its bikinibottom! Way to make me feel like a badass WoW!

The look of that armor may have changed long ago, I haven't played for quite some time, but I just remember that moment vividly for some reason. I was playing that Dranei race, a paladin, and up until that point I had been pretty pleased with the equipment I had gotten. I guess it's meant mostly for men that play women characters (and I'm sure at least some women like this look), but it really annoyed me that this was the equivalent to my male friends badassness! Disclaimer disclaimer, I'm not saying Blizzard are terrible people, I don't know if they are...

 

[Ticklefist]

Pretty soon Blizzard's just gonna have to call the game Friend Zone All-Stars.

 

[likalaruku]

Well, I'm a chick & I don't think he said anything sexist.

Look at that plothole riddled series Charmed; a show run by women, supposedly aimed women, with some pretty thick misandry... The characters in that show dressed provocatively because they thought it was cool. The same could probably be said for Sex in the City & Real House Wives, but I'll be damned if I could sit through them.

If women wear frumpy, figure-unflattering, or masculine clothes, other women are the first to criticize them for it, so even we have to admit that dressing sexy is the standard for looking cool as a woman.

With Wonder Woman, some girls just wanted to see pants on her. They knew they'd be skin-tight & show off every curve, but that was somehow more acceptable to them. My personal theory is 1)Mom Logic; I'M cold, so I want YOU to war a sweater, & 2)Resentment that female avatars don't also get to wear massive shoulder armor.

 

[SecondPrize]

Wow... RPS just smashed head long into the fail button with that one. Also, RPS wants to discuss gender politics in reference to titles that are primarily geared towards a male demographic? It's like a guy complaining about the color of the deodorant bars in the womens section of Target or vice versa.

It gets better. Have you read the response article where Greyson whines about the entire event while crying?

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/11/22/re-that-heroes-of-the-storm-interview/

No I haven't. RPS has gone to shit and I won't stain my computer with that site anymore.

 

[AuronFtw]

I know how to deal with this! have all female game characters from now on all wear burqas exclusively that way no one will be offended by them being underdressed. After all there were complaints of Lara Croft being underdressed on some sites so better safe than sorry.

The important thing is to make sure that all the female characters are handled in the same way depending on what you think about women. Either they are defined by being sexual, or they are defined by being a temptation to men. Try to avoid having your female characters have various interesting traits. That's definitely what RPS was asking for.

Or, maybe you're not understanding the issue at all.

So... like... Jaina Proudmoore, then? Strong, independant, intelligent, had potential romantic connections with Thrall and Arthas at separate times but is not characterized or bound by either, doesn't let it affect her decisions regarding various important happenings around the world, and leads a huge organization of mages to war?

And she was designed in 2002.

I'd say blizzard is ahead of the fucking curve on female character development. Anyone throwing questions like this at them in an interview is a fucking dumbass, and anyone supporting such unwarranted lambasting really needs to learn some gaming history, their ignorance is an embarrassment to gaming culture.

(This is without mentioning Alleria from Warcraft 2, Sylvanas from WC3, Kerrigan from SC even before zergitude, all of whom are strong female characters that stand up to even the strongest of male characters. Blizzard is really not the company struggling with female characters in their games.)

 

[Mersadeon]

Man, do I get tired of this, especially since people on both sides don't seem to understand even their own position. It's not about any one of these games - art is art, and if a game wants to hyper-sexualize men, women and/or anything else, then that's part of the art and shouldn't have to justify itself.
It's about the fact that EVERY game seems to do it. So we can't criticize one particular game for this - because any game has the right to do this, no matter how much we dislike it. We have to criticize the trend, but make clear that we are not saying that the game is taking an invalid approach, and that is not easy.

 

[Corran006]

Why is it Video games suffer the brunt of this problem? Last time I checked Film and TV and even books have this same problem? Do they only go after video games because its a easy target?

 

[Phasmal]

Oh well. Sounded like the dude was pretty ignorant on the subject and is now not so.
Maybe it's gotten a developer to think about how other demographics of gamers feel about their cosmetic choices in-game.
I'm not getting how that's a bad thing. Well, maybe if you're already in the pandered-to demographic it's bad... but I don't really see how.

 

[Colt47]

Did he said anything wrong?? I mean seriously, you people are exaggerating...

The problem with posting ones opinion on the internet in writing is that there is a lack of any ability to truly demonstrate the tenseness or level of seriousness of a statement. The interviewer cornered a guy in a pretty pointless sexism trap for the likely purpose of gaining headlines, and it appears to be working. Maybe the author does feel strongly about sexism in the industry, but then he probably should have picked a target that isn't deliberately targeting a demographic with little stake in the matter.

 

[wulf3n]

Oh well. Sounded like the dude was pretty ignorant on the subject and is now not so.

Now he's just spiteful for being forced by the Marketing Department to apoligise for something he didn't do out of malice and will now automatically think less of the issue and those who support it.