Blizzard to Remove "Sexy" Tracer Pose in Overwatch - Update

[LawAndChaos]

From what I gather:
Person 1 (Who's literally 1 person): Hey, I don't think this pose fits the character.
Team 1: NO! FUCK YOU! YOU RESPECT THE DEV'S DESIGN!!
Blizzard: Hey, Person 1, we think you're right. We were on the fence ourselves. We're going to change it like we wanted to anyhow.
Team 1: NOOOO! DAMN SJWS!! FUCK YOOOOOUUUUUU!!!! WE CAN'T RESPECT THE DEV'S DESIGN DECISION!!! *Tantrums, makes polls, creates protesting fanart, seeks attention off it, trolls.* FUCK YOU AAAAAAAAAAALL!!! HOW DARE YOU!!! SJWS WANT TO DESTROY ALL T&A!!! Even though they haven't said as much, nor is any more T&A disappearing! NO! They want it all gone! They want the game to be boring!! BOOTY BOOTY BOOTY!!!!!

Fipps (literally one person) (paraphrased): Everything's great except this one pose for Tracer because it doesn't fit her character. Since she's showing her ass off in this rather innocuous over the shoulder pose you are removing her entire character and reducing her to a sex object. You should change this because my little girl who shouldn't be playing this game is going to play this game and shouldn't have to see something that can influence her opinion of how women should behave.

Kaplan (exact words): "We'll replace the pose. We want everyone to feel strong and heroic in our community. The last thing we want to do is make someone feel uncomfortable, under-appreciated or misrepresented. Apologies and we'll continue to try to do better."

This was followed by Kaplan damage controlling the instant people got mad. Whether or not it's an "sjw" thing is irrelevant. Kaplan decided to immediately pander to the poster's sex-negative and borderline sexist sensibilities despite the possible fact that they would've "changed the pose anyway" which I personally am skeptical about.

Your reduction of the conversation to "just a bunch of people angry about an ass" is very enlightening, however. Please, continue.

There's no way Blizzard could have done this quietly. Absolutely no way. People are playing the beta, and seeing Tracer's poses. A change would have had people asking questions, and going ape shit because they can't see Tracer's butt anymore. It'd still spread, and become a similar monster. It doesn't matter if the developers want it that way. They'd still rage against the SJW Boogeyman.

"Where did this pose go?"

"Oh, we weren't too fond of it, so we decided to remove it. We'll be coming up with a better one, so sit tight."

"Oh, alright!"

This was all they needed to do. All they needed to do. No muss, no fuss.

Oh, but I forgot, gamers are "GRRR I NO SEE ASS NO MORE ME MAD RAWR RAWR" as you've made so very clear to us.

Why's "Because we want to" a questionable behavior when it concerns Devs when it's adjusting a character to be more in line with what they want her to be written like, yet not so when it's, frankly, keeping her sexy?

That's the question here, though: Did they want to? That's what people are so riled up about. Had they changed the pose before responding to Fipps, it would've never blown up like this. Some would've complained, but it would've been a small group of complaints rather than a big group. Whether they were planning to change it and Kaplan's response was poorly timed or if they really did want to remove it because one person bitched about how sexy it is; this is what people want to know.

Kaplan's statement afterward just sounds like damage controlling because of how poorly timed and worded his response to Fipps was.

Plus, no one really saw anything wrong with the pose itself. If it's no big deal, why remove something that people put work into making in the first place?

The "Media" shouldn't be telling developers what to do, especially when anyone in either camp expects developer freedom. They're welcome to voice disapproval, but holding them to task? That's not their job. It removes developer freedom. I, frankly, can't recall a time where the Media actually pressured someone to change how the game is designed directly, granted my memory is pretty horrid, but still, I'm pretty on the pulse of situations like this, especially since they're so damn hard to miss.

The people bitching about creative freedom are typically the ones complaining about the fact that nowadays creative freedom is "creative freedom so long as you bend to social pressure and immediately comply with any calls for inclusivity before the torches and pitchforks come out."

I don't disagree with their decision to remove the pose; in the end it's their choice. But if it was something that THEY truly chose I personally doubt, and I'm disappointed they chose to remove the pose outright rather than rework it with a bit less butt so Tracer could still do the stereotypical superhero back to the camera thing so players still would have that option available to them.

Yeah, the climate of gaming might be changing from general acceptance of women being in dental floss and 3 doritos to something of wanting women to not always be dressed that way, but direct pressure to make them change something? When has that happened?

*sigh*

You're one of those people that believes gaming used to be some sort of disgusting dark age of all women in bikinis and all men being drooling apes, aren't you?

Like, the only real examples I can remember off the top of my head was Divinity: Original Sin's midriff outrage, Street Fighter 5's ass slap on Mika and dynamic camera angle on Cammy, Fire Emblem's skinship minigame being cut, etc.

These things are either pressured into change or are a result of devs becoming more aware that they really don't need any negative PR from accusations of misogyny or whatever.

This is the age of gaming we've arrived in. Game devs should all wear their politics and social beliefs on their sleeve and let that slip into the creative process, all games should "have a message" and "be art" and therefore "should not reinforce negative social constructs" and blah blah blah.

The advantage games have as entertainment media is they don't NEED to have a message or be art. They can get enough of a pass by being fun. Otherwise retro games that focus almost exclusively on gameplay wouldn't sell, now would they?

And why is it that there's call for it when the Developer admitted they wanted it this way? Are you looking to strip developer creativity in favor of seeing a character's butt?

I may be missing the point, but frankly, I'm calling things as I see them.

The team admitted nothing. Kaplan said "this is my choice, but we would NEVER compromise our creative vision you guys, I promise."

This was AFTER his virtue signalling to Fipps, not before.

 

[Revnak_v1legacy]

From what I gather:
Person 1 (Who's literally 1 person): Hey, I don't think this pose fits the character.
Team 1: NO! FUCK YOU! YOU RESPECT THE DEV'S DESIGN!!
Blizzard: Hey, Person 1, we think you're right. We were on the fence ourselves. We're going to change it like we wanted to anyhow.
Team 1: NOOOO! DAMN SJWS!! FUCK YOOOOOUUUUUU!!!! WE CAN'T RESPECT THE DEV'S DESIGN DECISION!!! *Tantrums, makes polls, creates protesting fanart, seeks attention off it, trolls.* FUCK YOU AAAAAAAAAAALL!!! HOW DARE YOU!!! SJWS WANT TO DESTROY ALL T&A!!! Even though they haven't said as much, nor is any more T&A disappearing! NO! They want it all gone! They want the game to be boring!! BOOTY BOOTY BOOTY!!!!!

Fipps (literally one person) (paraphrased): Everything's great except this one pose for Tracer because it doesn't fit her character. Since she's showing her ass off in this rather innocuous over the shoulder pose you are removing her entire character and reducing her to a sex object. You should change this because my little girl who shouldn't be playing this game is going to play this game and shouldn't have to see something that can influence her opinion of how women should behave.

Kaplan (exact words): "We'll replace the pose. We want everyone to feel strong and heroic in our community. The last thing we want to do is make someone feel uncomfortable, under-appreciated or misrepresented. Apologies and we'll continue to try to do better."

This was followed by Kaplan damage controlling the instant people got mad. Whether or not it's an "sjw" thing is irrelevant. Kaplan decided to immediately pander to the poster's sex-negative and borderline sexist sensibilities despite the possible fact that they would've "changed the pose anyway" which I personally am skeptical about.

Your reduction of the conversation to "just a bunch of people angry about an ass" is very enlightening, however. Please, continue.

So he responded to criticism in a rather bland way and said they were going to replace the pose. Think for a minute, is this a scenario you could easily see yourself carrying out? Someone makes a criticism of a thing you were planning to remove, would you, in your response, be sure to clarify you had already intended to remove it? Definitely?

And from what I can tell, it is a bunch of people mad about an ass much of the time.

There's no way Blizzard could have done this quietly. Absolutely no way. People are playing the beta, and seeing Tracer's poses. A change would have had people asking questions, and going ape shit because they can't see Tracer's butt anymore. It'd still spread, and become a similar monster. It doesn't matter if the developers want it that way. They'd still rage against the SJW Boogeyman.

"Where did this pose go?"

"Oh, we weren't too fond of it, so we decided to remove it. We'll be coming up with a better one, so sit tight."

"Oh, alright!"

This was all they needed to do. All they needed to do. No muss, no fuss.

Oh, but I forgot, gamers are "GRRR I NO SEE ASS NO MORE ME MAD RAWR RAWR" as you've made so very clear to us.

Which is why nobody cared about the changes to FE, Xenoblade, Street Fighter...

Why's "Because we want to" a questionable behavior when it concerns Devs when it's adjusting a character to be more in line with what they want her to be written like, yet not so when it's, frankly, keeping her sexy?

That's the question here, though: Did they want to? That's what people are so riled up about. Had they changed the pose before responding to Fipps, it would've never blown up like this. Some would've complained, but it would've been a small group of complaints rather than a big group. Whether they were planning to change it and Kaplan's response was poorly timed or if they really did want to remove it because one person bitched about how sexy it is; this is what people want to know.

Kaplan's statement afterward just sounds like damage controlling because of how poorly timed and worded his response to Fipps was.

Plus, no one really saw anything wrong with the pose itself. If it's no big deal, why remove something that people put work into making in the first place?

Because any change to a game must now be the result of a conspiracy within an enigma. Nobody actually cares about the way their characters behave regarding sexuality, they're just pressured into it.

And here's a possible answer to your question, maybe the developers had an issue with it.

The "Media" shouldn't be telling developers what to do, especially when anyone in either camp expects developer freedom. They're welcome to voice disapproval, but holding them to task? That's not their job. It removes developer freedom. I, frankly, can't recall a time where the Media actually pressured someone to change how the game is designed directly, granted my memory is pretty horrid, but still, I'm pretty on the pulse of situations like this, especially since they're so damn hard to miss.

The people bitching about creative freedom are typically the ones complaining about the fact that nowadays creative freedom is "creative freedom so long as you bend to social pressure and immediately comply with any calls for inclusivity before the torches and pitchforks come out."

I don't disagree with their decision to remove the pose; in the end it's their choice. But if it was something that THEY truly chose I personally doubt, and I'm disappointed they chose to remove the pose outright rather than rework it with a bit less butt so Tracer could still do the stereotypical superhero back to the camera thing so players still would have that option available to them.

You don't disagree, but you do disagree, and also you think they're lying. What?

How do you know they have no intention of replacing the pose? It's a Beta, there are still changes left to be made.

Yeah, the climate of gaming might be changing from general acceptance of women being in dental floss and 3 doritos to something of wanting women to not always be dressed that way, but direct pressure to make them change something? When has that happened?

*sigh*

You're one of those people that believes gaming used to be some sort of disgusting dark age of all women in bikinis and all men being drooling apes, aren't you?

Like, the only real examples I can remember off the top of my head was Divinity: Original Sin's midriff outrage, Street Fighter 5's ass slap on Mika and dynamic camera angle on Cammy, Fire Emblem's skinship minigame being cut, among some others.

These things are either pressured into change or are a result of devs becoming more aware that they really don't need any negative PR from accusations of misogyny or whatever.

This is the age of gaming we've arrived in. Game devs should all wear their politics and social beliefs on their sleeve and let that slip into the creative process, all games should "have a message" and "be art" and therefore "should not reinforce negative social constructs" and blah blah blah.

The advantage games have as entertainment media is they don't NEED to have a message or be art. They can get enough of a pass by being fun. Otherwise retro games that focus almost exclusively on gameplay wouldn't sell, now would they?

Entertainment is art too. And not all games have to have a message, but lacking a message doesn't free a game from criticism. Also, given how each of those games wound up being more controversial for making changes, I'm not seeing how they're apparently bowing to pressure rather than making their own decisions.

And why is it that there's call for it when the Developer admitted they wanted it this way? Are you looking to strip developer creativity in favor of seeing a character's butt?

I may be missing the point, but frankly, I'm calling things as I see them.

The team admitted nothing. Kaplan said "this is my choice, but we would NEVER compromise our creative vision you guys, I promise."

This was AFTER his virtue signalling to Fipps, not before.

So Kaplan no longer represents the team? At all?

And how is a response to a single forum thread, not a widely spread video, not a widely spread column, not even a widely spread tweet, but a single damn forum thread, virtue signaling?

Further, wouldn't you just be more suspicious if he had said they would maintain their integrity while making his first post there, or holding it against him if he had done so before? And why should he have to defend his own integrity before it is being called into question?

 

[LawAndChaos]

So he responded to criticism in a rather bland way and said they were going to replace the pose. Think for a minute, is this a scenario you could easily see yourself carrying out? Someone makes a criticism of a thing you were planning to remove, would you, in your response, be sure to clarify you had already intended to remove it? Definitely?

Well, yeah. I'd definitely clarify that it was something already planned to be changed or removed if that was the case. If I didn't then in a case like this it would look like I was making the decision based upon a single thread of criticism.

Which is why nobody cared about the changes to FE, Xenoblade, Street Fighter...

Wait, there were changes to Xenoblade?

The FE stuff died down when people actually played the game and saw it was just a single mechanic that was removed. Part of this I blame on Awakening and the reputation the series got as a "waifu simulator" by people new to the series. I'll concede this change was just a case of culture clash rather than SJW anything.
I'm actually also miffed at the lack of gay options in Fire Emblem, which changed when Fates came along. Granted there aren't many gay options, but hey, they're there, and that's the start of the beautiful future of shipping everyone with everyone.

Street Fighter was a weird case to me, because it seems so frivolous. If the butt slap was such a problem, why not zoom out a bit so the camera's not so close? Why remove a camera angle that makes for a more dynamic shot simply because the view is "scandalous" in some way?

I think the confusion is what spawns the outrage.

Because any change to a game must now be the result of a conspiracy within an enigma. Nobody actually cares about the way their characters behave regarding sexuality, they're just pressured into it.

And here's a possible answer to your question, maybe the developers had an issue with it.

Then why not come out and say that from the start and avoid all this crap?
If I recall correctly there was even a moment where the thread was locked to put a halt to discussion.
Looking at it my theory is the only reason this even spread out of those forums was because of the lock.

You don't disagree, but you do disagree, and also you think they're lying. What?

How do you know they have no intention of replacing the pose? It's a Beta, there are still changes left to be made.

Lemme rephrase; I agree that it is their choice, and that they are free to make that choice. I do not agree with the reasoning that was presented behind the choice, but the removal of the pose itself, I am impartial to.
Yes, that's a weird stance to take.

I want them to have creative freedom, so I accept their choice.
I don't want a precedent set where anyone claiming things like "because she shows her butt in a pose she's a sex object" results in things being changed or removed. People should be able to create what they want and have REAL feedback instead of this sex-negative and dishonest critique.

And yes, I feel Fipps was being dishonest in his critique and attempting to push a narrative. I would even go so far as to argue he was being backhandedly polite to the devs by implying that they were ruining Tracer's character as if he knew the sort of character THEY wanted to create more than the devs themselves. Not to mention that his post has gems like "Tracer's butt pose is unsuited for a trained killer" and "Widowmaker is more suited to being sexy as a femme fetale" despite the fact that Tracer is a heroic roguish type and Widowmaker is a walking cyber-corpse. Not denying that Tracer kills people, mind, but she doesn't strike me as a 'trained killer' compared to someone like Reaper, for instance.

TLDR: It seemed initially that they were caving to Fipps illogical demands in an attempt to virtue signal. Kaplan clarified they have something better in the works, but people were (possibly even still are) nervous at the possibility that yet another dev was going along with the sex-negative regressives who believe that if the audience can see your ass you have no redeeming qualities.

Entertainment is art too. And not all games have to have a message, but lacking a message doesn't free a game from criticism. Also, given how each of those games wound up being more controversial for making changes, I'm not seeing how they're apparently bowing to pressure rather than making their own decisions.

Lacking a message doesn't free a game from criticism. That doesn't mean we should criticize a game for lacking a message.

Honestly this one especially is a good example of letting something get out of hand.

So Kaplan no longer represents the team? At all?

"As the game director, I have final creative say over what does or does not go into the game. With this particular decision, it was an easy one to make-not just for me, but for the art team as well."

Well, you got me I guess. I was slashing the nose to spite the face or something, I suppose.

And how is a response to a single forum thread, not a widely spread video, not a widely spread column, not even a widely spread tweet, but a single damn forum thread, virtue signaling?

Because looking at it head on, it looks just like that.

"We'll replace the pose. We want everyone to feel strong and heroic in our community. The last thing we want to do is make someone feel uncomfortable, under-appreciated or misrepresented. Apologies and we'll continue to try to do better."

Even in a single forum post, this is a response from the game's director, and that holds weight.
A lot of people took his word at face value, and assumed he was doing as if he had been instructed to.

"We'll replace the pose," as opposed to "We have been considering replacing this pose," or "No worries, it's just a placeholder."
I won't deny that people would be claiming they weren't telling the truth, but I'd say that'd be more because every other character has that over-the-shoulder pose to begin with, which would raise a few eyebrows.

Virtue signalling, as in "look how inclusive we are you guys, we agree that Tracer's butt pose hurts her as a character so no more butt pose. Now nobody will be uncomfortable playing our game because we removed this one character pose and everyone will get to feel strong and heroic. Aren't we such great, progressive game devs?"

Further, wouldn't you just be more suspicious if he had said they would maintain their integrity while making his first post there, or holding it against him if he had done so before? And why should he have to defend his own integrity before it is being called into question?

I'd have been less suspicious if he hadn't made the initial response and then waited before clarifying that his team had been on the fence about it.

Laying everything out on the table right off the bat would've caused a stir, but I highly doubt it would've blown up nearly as much as it did.

Even something like "this pose has been a matter of contention for us, and we're discussing it with the team" or something reassuring like that would've alleviated concerns greatly.

 

[Revnak_v1legacy]

So he responded to criticism in a rather bland way and said they were going to replace the pose. Think for a minute, is this a scenario you could easily see yourself carrying out? Someone makes a criticism of a thing you were planning to remove, would you, in your response, be sure to clarify you had already intended to remove it? Definitely?

Well, yeah. I'd definitely clarify that it was something already planned to be changed or removed if that was the case. If I didn't then in a case like this it would look like I was making the decision based upon a single thread of criticism.

You've never made a communication flub in a random forum post? I doubt that.

Which is why nobody cared about the changes to FE, Xenoblade, Street Fighter...

Wait, there were changes to Xenoblade?

The FE stuff died down when people actually played the game and saw it was just a single mechanic that was removed. Part of this I blame on Awakening and the reputation the series got as a "waifu simulator" by people new to the series. I'll concede this change was just a case of culture clash rather than SJW anything.
I'm actually also miffed at the lack of gay options in Fire Emblem, which changed when Fates came along. Granted there aren't many gay options, but hey, they're there, and that's the start of the beautiful future of shipping everyone with everyone.

Street Fighter was a weird case to me, because it seems so frivolous. If the butt slap was such a problem, why not zoom out a bit so the camera's not so close? Why remove a camera angle that makes for a more dynamic shot simply because the view is "scandalous" in some way?

I think the confusion is what spawns the outrage.

Yeah, FE died down so much they tried to get somebody fired over it.

I don't know, but I don't think confusion should ever be allowed to spawn outrage, or at the very least I don't think it ever justifies it.

Because any change to a game must now be the result of a conspiracy within an enigma. Nobody actually cares about the way their characters behave regarding sexuality, they're just pressured into it.

And here's a possible answer to your question, maybe the developers had an issue with it.

Then why not come out and say that from the start and avoid all this crap?
If I recall correctly there was even a moment where the thread was locked to put a halt to discussion.
Looking at it my theory is the only reason this even spread out of those forums was because of the lock.

Because they didn't expect this to be a big deal, because it isn't a big deal.

Which was locked by mods who have nothing to do with the game, not the developers. Who, it should be noted, unlocked the thread themselves.

You don't disagree, but you do disagree, and also you think they're lying. What?

How do you know they have no intention of replacing the pose? It's a Beta, there are still changes left to be made.

Lemme rephrase; I agree that it is their choice, and that they are free to make that choice. I do not agree with the reasoning that was presented behind the choice, but the removal of the pose itself, I am impartial to.
Yes, that's a weird stance to take.

I want them to have creative freedom, so I accept their choice.
I don't want a precedent set where anyone claiming things like "because she shows her butt in a pose she's a sex object" results in things being changed or removed. People should be able to create what they want and have REAL feedback instead of this sex-negative and dishonest critique.

And yes, I feel Fipps was being dishonest in his critique and attempting to push a narrative. I would even go so far as to argue he was being backhandedly polite to the devs by implying that they were ruining Tracer's character as if he knew the sort of character THEY wanted to create more than the devs themselves. Not to mention that his post has gems like "Tracer's butt pose is unsuited for a trained killer" and "Widowmaker is more suited to being sexy as a femme fetale" despite the fact that Tracer is a heroic roguish type and Widowmaker is a walking cyber-corpse. Not denying that Tracer kills people, mind, but she doesn't strike me as a 'trained killer' compared to someone like Reaper, for instance.

TLDR: It seemed initially that they were caving to Fipps illogical demands in an attempt to virtue signal. Kaplan clarified they have something better in the works, but people were (possibly even still are) nervous at the possibility that yet another dev was going along with the sex-negative regressives who believe that if the audience can see your ass you have no redeeming qualities.

And "seemed" is not enough to justify this level of outrage given the shaky justification. Further, why would you assume that they're going to cave to some "sex-negative" ideology when they also clearly have other far more sexual characters still in the game? How do you justify that?

Entertainment is art too. And not all games have to have a message, but lacking a message doesn't free a game from criticism. Also, given how each of those games wound up being more controversial for making changes, I'm not seeing how they're apparently bowing to pressure rather than making their own decisions.

Lacking a message doesn't free a game from criticism. That doesn't mean we should criticize a game for lacking a message.

Honestly this one especially is a good example of letting something get out of hand.

I'm not seeing any criticism of the game for lacking a message, though I am seeing plenty of criticism of the game for inconsistent character design. As for games in general, generally what I see is a criticism of unintentional messages in games, not of the lack of a message.

So Kaplan no longer represents the team? At all?

"As the game director, I have final creative say over what does or does not go into the game. With this particular decision, it was an easy one to make-not just for me, but for the art team as well."

Well, you got me I guess. I was slashing the nose to spite the face or something, I suppose.

I'm going to be honest, I don't see people accept being wrong here often. You have made me a happy man today.

And how is a response to a single forum thread, not a widely spread video, not a widely spread column, not even a widely spread tweet, but a single damn forum thread, virtue signaling?

Because looking at it head on, it looks just like that.

"We'll replace the pose. We want everyone to feel strong and heroic in our community. The last thing we want to do is make someone feel uncomfortable, under-appreciated or misrepresented. Apologies and we'll continue to try to do better."

Even in a single forum post, this is a response from the game's director, and that holds weight.
A lot of people took his word at face value, and assumed he was doing as if he had been instructed to.

"We'll replace the pose," as opposed to "We have been considering replacing this pose," or "No worries, it's just a placeholder."
I won't deny that people would be claiming they weren't telling the truth, but I'd say that'd be more because every other character has that over-the-shoulder pose to begin with, which would raise a few eyebrows.

Virtue signalling, as in "look how inclusive we are you guys, we agree that Tracer's butt pose hurts her as a character so no more butt pose. Now nobody will be uncomfortable playing our game because we removed this one character pose and everyone will get to feel strong and heroic. Aren't we such great, progressive game devs?"

Then just posting it in the community feedback section of their own forums doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Their phrasing makes me think they weren't really thinking much about the response, not that they were thinking super strategicly like you are claiming. In the case of regular devs, I tend to assume foolishness before I assume malice.

Further, wouldn't you just be more suspicious if he had said they would maintain their integrity while making his first post there, or holding it against him if he had done so before? And why should he have to defend his own integrity before it is being called into question?

I'd have been less suspicious if he hadn't made the initial response and then waited before clarifying that his team had been on the fence about it.

Laying everything out on the table right off the bat would've caused a stir, but I highly doubt it would've blown up nearly as much as it did.

Even something like "this pose has been a matter of contention for us, and we're discussing it with the team" or something reassuring like that would've alleviated concerns greatly.

Why should he have to clarify so much? Why do people always have to assume the worst, not of obviously corrupt publishers, but of random devs? Why must we all utterly lack patience? It's just a single post on a forum, they hadn't even removed the pose yet.

 

[LawAndChaos]

You've never made a communication flub in a random forum post? I doubt that.

Well of course I have.
It's just, y'know, I wouldn't want to leave it uncorrected for too long. It's never good to leave something to fester if it came across unclear or potentially misconstrued.

Yeah, FE died down so much they tried to get somebody fired over it.

Okay that's a little of an overreaction, I agree.
I never heard about this before, TBH. I just thought it was something everyone bitched about for a while and it went away.

Honestly the only bitching I think peeps have with Intelligent Systems now is that new Paper Mario.

But yeah, that is absurd, I agree.

I don't know, but I don't think confusion should ever be allowed to spawn outrage, or at the very least I don't think it ever justifies it.

I think that it's a case of people getting mad at what they can't understand.

Like people can't understand why Tracer's pose was a big deal, and perceive the change as them cowtowing to what they perceive as flawed logic (from Fipps).

Not saying that's the case, per se, just saying that could be the possibility of why people lost their shit over it; people misinterpreting intent and blowing it out of proportion.

Because they didn't expect this to be a big deal, because it isn't a big deal.

Yeaaaaaah, that is true.
I stand by my opinion that the initial response by Kaplan could've been worded much better than how it was.
Failing to clarify allowed it to be misconstrued and as a result this whole mess came about.

I think a lot of people didn't take issue with the pose removal as much the initial response from Kaplan. I keep seeing people argue that "it's all about the butt" and "why should anyone care it's just a pose," when "why should it be removed if it's no big deal?" just as easily applies.

Reading through the full thread there are a lot of arguments both against and for the pose's removal. Someone even suggested just making the pose an additional option, others suggested rotating the model a little bit to make the butt less prominent while keeping the pose. Many argued for and against it fitting her character, etc and so on.

In the end it is Blizz's character, so they do decide what to do with it. It's just a lot of people felt that Fipps was attempting to make demands of Blizz to change Tracer to fit in with HIS interpretation of her based on what little was known about her character, and it looked to everyone like they were "caving."

I'm still buying the game when my wallet manages to claw itself out of the grave; this pose change isn't going to change my desire to play the game, or as Tracer.

I just want to see for certain that we are not seeing yet another example of PC pressure influencing development and artistic design.

Which was locked by mods who have nothing to do with the game, not the developers. Who, it should be noted, unlocked the thread themselves.

Ah, right.
Mods.
Erm...oops.

I still think locking the thread wasn't the best idea all the same. Shutting down the discussion (which hadn't been too heated, honestly; just a lot of people being very critical of Fipps' viewpoints) didn't cool things down in the least.
Kudos on Kaplan for reopening the discussion, but it feels kind of pointless to continue the thread now that the change has already gone through.

And "seemed" is not enough to justify this level of outrage given the shaky justification. Further, why would you assume that they're going to cave to some "sex-negative" ideology when they also clearly have other far more sexual characters still in the game? How do you justify that?

Well that's part of why it's odd. Why just Tracer? Why can she not be anything other than "pure English waifu who should not know what it means to be sexy?" Why is it wrong for a heroine to be sexy in a game that's suited for older audiences?

I won't argue the outrage is overblown, I don't think I ever said the outrage was justified (if I did, then I shouldn't have because I don't feel the outrage is justified). I merely said that it only got that way because the team let it.

I'm not seeing any criticism of the game for lacking a message, though I am seeing plenty of criticism of the game for inconsistent character design. As for games in general, generally what I see is a criticism of unintentional messages in games, not of the lack of a message.

Well that's Overwatch for you. Variety of Overwatch's calibur breeds an anachronistic set of designs. I don't think the designs are inconsistent by any means, though; they all come from different parts of the world and different organizations; Overwatch itself is essentially just the means to connect these various heroes together into a hero network. In fact considering the heroes' identities are all in a database, we can assume they even have some variant of the registered supers act from Civil War, which has potential for interesting future lore.

And games in general having "unintentional messages" essentially condemns authors regardless of authorial intent, by making them guilty regardless of their real intent.
If a man saves a woman in a story, they are perpetuating the damsel trope and reinforcing negative female stereotypes. Even if the story is about a man saving the woman because she is important to him and he goes through hell to save her, she is implied to be weak for needing to be rescued, even if she is subjected to hell herself in being taken.

I mean looking at Ellie from the Last of Us, one could argue that her treatment during the game from various characters promotes negative treatment of women and in the same breath be praised for making her someone who is continuously defiant and strong in the face of danger. In the same paragraph, one could complain that she has to be saved by Joel in the game's climax, and how it invalidates her previous moments of strength because she's left vulnerable and incapable of agency within the game's final moments; that it "always has to be the woman getting saved in the end."

The lead singer of Twisted Sister said it best: "If you go in expecting to find it, you're gonna find it."

I'm going to be honest, I don't see people accept being wrong here often. You have made me a happy man today.

This is a place of intellectual discussion; I'm not about to go on presuming I'm right when I'm wrong.
Hug it out with me, man. I might be a bit sharp tongued at times, but I don't want to perpetuate hostility.

Then just posting it in the community feedback section of their own forums doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Their phrasing makes me think they weren't really thinking much about the response, not that they were thinking super strategically like you are claiming. In the case of regular devs, I tend to assume foolishness before I assume malice.

I suppose this is a case of holding Blizz devs to a higher standa--hahaha, oh man, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, that's a terrible argument on my part.

You're probably right. I'm willing to assume it was just a thoughtless response more than anything. I think people were just expecting them to take feedback more seriously than just "oh yeah ok, we're 100% on board with ya, let's delete that butt pose" without further clarification.

Why should he have to clarify so much? Why do people always have to assume the worst, not of obviously corrupt publishers, but of random devs? Why must we all utterly lack patience? It's just a single post on a forum, they hadn't even removed the pose yet.

Well I'm not saying they should write an essay or anything. I mean, just letting people know they were already considering its removal to begin with would've done a lot. If there's one thing people have begun to expect from devs, it's transparency. When something within the game changes, they want to know why. The devs do not HAVE to share anything, but doing so is considered an act of good faith towards potential customers who have an interest, or are passionate about the game.

And they already stated they were removing the pose and standing by removing the pose. The pose is only still around because they hadn't replaced it yet, but from what I understand they have a replacement cooked up, so that pose will be gone very soon.

Also, I appreciate you being confused by people on the internet being impatient. It warms my heart to see someone who hasn't become a bitter, cynical misanthrope yet.

 

[sumanoskae]

While I'm sure the team at Blizzard would appreciate the idea that you think that they're perfectly self-reflective and think long and hard about every last bit of their design, I'd suggest you, as well as everyone else with such notions, drop the idea that creators never create something and later decide they didn't like it or it didn't really fit.

Are you asserting that you think they would have changed the animation even if nobody objected to it? Because I think that's the key; if they had a problem with it, they obviously didn't think it was offensive enough to make an issue out of.

Animation is an arduous process; you can't animate something by accident, even a little thing.

The argument that just because her character has absolutely no reference to her sexuality or implies that she'd display her sexuality as a victory pose isn't exactly a strong one.

Well shit, then I guess it's a good thing that I said nothing of the sort. My argument was that there was no point in REMOVING the animation; my stance on it is neutral, not positive.

If she was going to be the type of character that displays flirtatious behavior, it should probably be established and form a consistent part of her character, rather than appear in exactly one pose she does after she wins. When a character displays behavior that does not line up with what has been established as their character, one shouldn't just assume that despite literally everything else about the character that this is perfectly in line with what they've been established to be.

This is all that baggage that I pointed out earlier. What, exactly, is it about Tracer that makes this pose out of character for her? I see no relation between puckishness and ass flaunting; why does she need an excuse to do it? Showing off your sex appeal is pretty fucking common - lots of people do it for lots of reasons.

Again, I'm sure the team at Blizzard appreciates your willingness to assume that they just don't make mistakes when it comes to creating characters, but I think they might, as shown by their willingness to engage with people who criticize what they make, appreciate a willingness to point out what might simply just be a mistake or an oversight that they just didn't think too hard about

I'm glad they're willing to listen, since that's exactly what I'm doing.

Learning to take criticism is an invaluable tool for artists. I'm merely asserting that I think this critique in particular is stupid and that I think they'd be better off ignoring it.

You're making the assumption that what I'm disapproving of is that Blizzard bent to someone else's feedback; what I'm actually doing is providing my own feedback.

 

[Rebel_Raven]

From what I gather:
Person 1 (Who's literally 1 person): Hey, I don't think this pose fits the character.
Team 1: NO! FUCK YOU! YOU RESPECT THE DEV'S DESIGN!!
Blizzard: Hey, Person 1, we think you're right. We were on the fence ourselves. We're going to change it like we wanted to anyhow.
Team 1: NOOOO! DAMN SJWS!! FUCK YOOOOOUUUUUU!!!! WE CAN'T RESPECT THE DEV'S DESIGN DECISION!!! *Tantrums, makes polls, creates protesting fanart, seeks attention off it, trolls.* FUCK YOU AAAAAAAAAAALL!!! HOW DARE YOU!!! SJWS WANT TO DESTROY ALL T&A!!! Even though they haven't said as much, nor is any more T&A disappearing! NO! They want it all gone! They want the game to be boring!! BOOTY BOOTY BOOTY!!!!!

Fipps (literally one person) (paraphrased): Everything's great except this one pose for Tracer because it doesn't fit her character. Since she's showing her ass off in this rather innocuous over the shoulder pose you are removing her entire character and reducing her to a sex object. You should change this because my little girl who shouldn't be playing this game is going to play this game and shouldn't have to see something that can influence her opinion of how women should behave.

Kaplan (exact words): "We'll replace the pose. We want everyone to feel strong and heroic in our community. The last thing we want to do is make someone feel uncomfortable, under-appreciated or misrepresented. Apologies and we'll continue to try to do better."

This was followed by Kaplan damage controlling the instant people got mad. Whether or not it's an "sjw" thing is irrelevant. Kaplan decided to immediately pander to the poster's sex-negative and borderline sexist sensibilities despite the possible fact that they would've "changed the pose anyway" which I personally am skeptical about.

Your reduction of the conversation to "just a bunch of people angry about an ass" is very enlightening, however. Please, continue.

Paraphrasing is hard to take because it's based off of memory which can skew, or bias one way or the other.
Still, that's ONE incident, and strangely there's lots more T&A around. Again, I ask, in all seriousness, does Blackwidow's Butt enlarge when she puts on her goggles?]http://hackerbot.net/blog/54-game-characters/366-widowmaker-overwatch Forget the nature of the page, the gif of her inflating butt is what I'm after to make my point.
I know she has a neckline that plunges harder than a barrel off of Niagra falls.

Have you seen the rest of the roster? there's tons of sex appeal still around that no one is talking about.

There's no way Blizzard could have done this quietly. Absolutely no way. People are playing the beta, and seeing Tracer's poses. A change would have had people asking questions, and going ape shit because they can't see Tracer's butt anymore. It'd still spread, and become a similar monster. It doesn't matter if the developers want it that way. They'd still rage against the SJW Boogeyman.

"Where did this pose go?"

"Oh, we weren't too fond of it, so we decided to remove it. We'll be coming up with a better one, so sit tight."

"Oh, alright!"

This was all they needed to do. All they needed to do. No muss, no fuss.

Oh, but I forgot, gamers are "GRRR I NO SEE ASS NO MORE ME MAD RAWR RAWR" as you've made so very clear to us.

I find your faith in the loud members of the gaming community, nevermind the people firmly against "feminists" and "SJWs" a bit disturbing.
Sure, that's probably how you, or I would act, but to pretend we're the template for facebook users, youtubers, twitter users, and heck, some escapists is kinda absurd (They actually made a poll on the pose! No respect for the developer's acts, there, IMO), IMO.
If they weren't the face of the gaming community on this matter, I wouldn't implicate that I think they are at all.
I don't doubt there's a very quiet, very under the radar sizable amount of reasonable people out there, but the issue is they're quiet. they're not policing the idiots, they aren't calling out the assholes, or much of anything, are they? Not that I expect them to take action, mind you, but they certainly aren't doing anything to change the face of gamers on this issue.

I mean look at the Chun Li boob jiggle glitch. It certainly wasn't normal that only p2's Chun Li would have wobbley DOA boobs while P1 didn't. People pitched a fit over the news it was going to be fixed, and there were suggestions that Chun Li should keep the DoA boob wobble. Just that instance for example.

Why's "Because we want to" a questionable behavior when it concerns Devs when it's adjusting a character to be more in line with what they want her to be written like, yet not so when it's, frankly, keeping her sexy?

That's the question here, though: Did they want to? That's what people are so riled up about. Had they changed the pose before responding to Fipps, it would've never blown up like this. Some would've complained, but it would've been a small group of complaints rather than a big group. Whether they were planning to change it and Kaplan's response was poorly timed or if they really did want to remove it because one person bitched about how sexy it is; this is what people want to know.

Kaplan's statement afterward just sounds like damage controlling because of how poorly timed and worded his response to Fipps was.

Plus, no one really saw anything wrong with the pose itself. If it's no big deal, why remove something that people put work into making in the first place?

Why would we want to question a Developer's desire to improve a character cosmetically and have her be more true to her personality over posing in painted on pants? Sure if it changed her stats, I could see a long, massive discussion, but this is just a pose.

See, while you have a point in the notion that maybe they didn't want to change the pose, it certanly doesn't negate the point that maybe they did want to change her pose after all.

Again, people, often arguing against inclusion in the long run, say that if women were to be added, they have to be well written! Well, this is their argument, yet they don't want tracer to be better written. They want to keep the pose that shows her butt.
I say this after years, and years of trying to make a case for more women in videogames, especially as player characters, which has more or less happened.

The "Media" shouldn't be telling developers what to do, especially when anyone in either camp expects developer freedom. They're welcome to voice disapproval, but holding them to task? That's not their job. It removes developer freedom. I, frankly, can't recall a time where the Media actually pressured someone to change how the game is designed directly, granted my memory is pretty horrid, but still, I'm pretty on the pulse of situations like this, especially since they're so damn hard to miss.

The people bitching about creative freedom are typically the ones complaining about the fact that nowadays creative freedom is "creative freedom so long as you bend to social pressure and immediately comply with any calls for inclusivity before the torches and pitchforks come out."

I don't disagree with their decision to remove the pose; in the end it's their choice. But if it was something that THEY truly chose I personally doubt, and I'm disappointed they chose to remove the pose outright rather than rework it with a bit less butt so Tracer could still do the stereotypical superhero back to the camera thing so players still would have that option available to them.

Yeah, the "Pander to me" crowd is on all sides, but honestly, it just seems way more two faced on the "Team 1" example. They're often people defending the developer's desire to, say, show midriff and have fantasy over function female armor while having the best of both worlds on guys, or, say, to keep Tracer's pose, and generally fight tooth and nail to keep sexuality no matter what.

At least the people that want inclusiveness seem to be more honest in that they want more inclusiveness, and not try to boot people out, and that, IMO, inclusivity would spice things up in the gaming world.

Yeah, the climate of gaming might be changing from general acceptance of women being in dental floss and 3 doritos to something of wanting women to not always be dressed that way, but direct pressure to make them change something? When has that happened?

*sigh*

You're one of those people that believes gaming used to be some sort of disgusting dark age of all women in bikinis and all men being drooling apes, aren't you?

Like, the only real examples I can remember off the top of my head was Divinity: Original Sin's midriff outrage, Street Fighter 5's ass slap on Mika and dynamic camera angle on Cammy, Fire Emblem's skinship minigame being cut, etc.

These things are either pressured into change or are a result of devs becoming more aware that they really don't need any negative PR from accusations of misogyny or whatever.

This is the age of gaming we've arrived in. Game devs should all wear their politics and social beliefs on their sleeve and let that slip into the creative process, all games should "have a message" and "be art" and therefore "should not reinforce negative social constructs" and blah blah blah.

The advantage games have as entertainment media is they don't NEED to have a message or be art. They can get enough of a pass by being fun. Otherwise retro games that focus almost exclusively on gameplay wouldn't sell, now would they?

Minus the men are drooling apes part, yeah. You want to show me how gaming between, say, 2000, and 2013 wasn't filled with women as objects, macguffins, unplayable, and so forth in mainstream gaming over, say, the sort of characters we have lately?
We still have women wearing impossibly skimpy clothes, but ya know what? It's not all that's being put out there, and I'm actually okay with the balance. Hell, I play Senran Kagura in general, and while I don't openly in public, I'm open to saying I play it, and enjoy it. I like the dragon's crown Sorceress. I want DoAX3 in NA. I don't mind the fan service, it's that just until lately, within the past few years it really hasn't felt like there's been much more to women in games than that.
Hell, I wouldn't have minded the skinship minigame in fire emblem. Honestly, I think they might have broken the relationship system when they took it out because there's endless heart earning.

You missed Chun Li's boob wobble to say the least which I think lends proof to my argument.
Also Karin, and Cammy's face remodeling.

Okay, the devs are becoming more aware that shamelessly making women sexy might lead to problems. The media, however hasn't had a direct impact here. Frankly, I don't think any one person has, rather it's a general mob of individuals.

IMO very rarely have the Developers been free from politics as evidenced by the long line of copycat games, straight white brunette cookie cutter guy protagonists, the radical changes of formula to pander to CoD/BW junkies, the fear of playable female characters ruining games, etc.
The "art" has basically been dead since games started using polygons, IMO.

I agree that games should be fun, but the fun really does diminish when the industry doesn't want to be inclusive for some people. Enough some people that they can make a gigantic fuss.

And why is it that there's call for it when the Developer admitted they wanted it this way? Are you looking to strip developer creativity in favor of seeing a character's butt?

I may be missing the point, but frankly, I'm calling things as I see them.

The team admitted nothing. Kaplan said "this is my choice, but we would NEVER compromise our creative vision you guys, I promise."

This was AFTER his virtue signalling to Fipps, not before.

I could have sworn the team was on the fence over Tracer's butt pose.
Ah, yeah, this, from the same post, IIRC.

While I stand by my previous comment, I realize I should have been more clear. As the game director, I have final creative say over what does or does not go into the game. With this particular decision, it was an easy one to make?not just for me, but for the art team as well. We actually already have an alternate pose that we love and we feel speaks more to the character of Tracer. We weren?t entirely happy with the original pose, it was always one that we wrestled with creatively. That the pose had been called into question from an appropriateness standpoint by players in our community did help influence our decision?getting that kind of feedback is part of the reason we?re holding a closed beta test?but it wasn?t the only factor. We made the decision to go with a different pose in part because we shared some of the same concerns, but also because we wanted to create something better.

That's a solid admittance that they wanted the pose to be replaced, IMO.

 

[SlumlordThanatos]

Why would we want to question a Developer's desire to improve a character cosmetically and have her be more true to her personality over posing in painted on pants? Sure if it changed her stats, I could see a long, massive discussion, but this is just a pose.

See, while you have a point in the notion that maybe they didn't want to change the pose, it certanly doesn't negate the point that maybe they did want to change her pose after all.

As I've said before and will probably say again, perception is reality. With Jeff Kaplan's initial statement on the subject, the perception was that the change was being made for reasons other than artistic ones. Once that perception sank in, changing it wasn't going to be as easy as saying "Oh, we actually WERE making the change for artistic reasons, it just happened to coincide with this one guy's complaint about Tracer's painted on pants!"

The issue isn't that the pose was being removed. The issue is the perception that the reasons behind the removal weren't aimed towards improving the game, but pandering to a vocal minority. It might not actually be true, but as long as the perception exists, it might as well be.

 

[Rebel_Raven]

Why would we want to question a Developer's desire to improve a character cosmetically and have her be more true to her personality over posing in painted on pants? Sure if it changed her stats, I could see a long, massive discussion, but this is just a pose.

See, while you have a point in the notion that maybe they didn't want to change the pose, it certanly doesn't negate the point that maybe they did want to change her pose after all.

As I've said before and will probably say again, perception is reality. With Jeff Kaplan's initial statement on the subject, the perception was that the change was being made for reasons other than artistic ones. Once that perception sank in, changing it wasn't going to be as easy as saying "Oh, we actually WERE making the change for artistic reasons, it just happened to coincide with this one guy's complaint about Tracer's painted on pants!"

The issue isn't that the pose was being removed. The issue is the perception that the reasons behind the removal weren't aimed towards improving the game, but pandering to a vocal minority. It might not actually be true, but as long as the perception exists, it might as well be.

An unfortunate truth, I suppose. It's a shame that people basically have to jump to those conclusions these days. Still, I'd take the word of anyone working at Blizzard over anyone not working at Blizzard more often than not since most arguments against the change are tainted, imo.

Also the perception is reality saying applies to the people that were complaining about the change as well. This does lead to the notion that Tracer's butt played a larger role in this than you say as far as I'm concerned, among other things.

Anyhow, Tracer's pose was changed to "strut" which people have said is better. I hadn't seen it in action, rather a screen cap, and it is nice. More playful, IMO. Likely fits Tracer better. Still has butt, too.

 

[LawAndChaos]

Paraphrasing is hard to take because it's based off of memory which can skew, or bias one way or the other.

Well I mostly paraphrased because it was either that or regurgitate the entire long ass post. I just figured I'd take some of the core tenets of the criticism Fipps was giving to get the basic point across.
I didn't paraphrase from memory. I reread Fipps OP beforehand, and read through the thread in question. Fipps frequently backpedaled or evaded certain counterpoints throughout before Kaplan's announcement.

Still, that's ONE incident, and strangely there's lots more T&A around. Again, I ask, in all seriousness, does Blackwidow's Butt enlarge when she puts on her goggles?]http://hackerbot.net/blog/54-game-characters/366-widowmaker-overwatch Forget the nature of the page, the gif of her inflating butt is what I'm after to make my point.
I know she has a neckline that plunges harder than a barrel off of Niagra falls.

I think that's a glitch. Also, there have been people (myself included) kinda going "eh" at Widow's design. TBH as a character who's intended to be a (literal) cold-blooded assassin, you'd think she'd do something about that neckline. Ofc tight suits are quite practical for movement, so that aspect of her is just fine.

I think though that it's the presence of other sex appeal that makes people question why THIS sex appeal specifically is a problem. On the surface it makes no sense.

I find your faith in the loud members of the gaming community, nevermind the people firmly against "feminists" and "SJWs" a bit disturbing.

Ah, but the dark siiiiiiiiiiiede...

Ugh, it's hard to translate Palpatine's voice into text.

Sure, that's probably how you, or I would act, but to pretend we're the template for facebook users, youtubers, twitter users, and heck, some escapists is kinda absurd (They actually made a poll on the pose! No respect for the developer's acts, there, IMO), IMO.

Well honestly there's the possibility they felt the devs weren't having respect for them, so this brings up the "eye for an eye" problem I once mentioned somewhere else. But reading through the thread, I barely saw that much outrage at all. Maybe I wasn't there to see it at the time. All that's there now are posters being critical of Fipps original critique and trying to poke holes in it.

If they weren't the face of the gaming community on this matter, I wouldn't implicate that I think they are at all.

Broad strokes for a few folks.

I don't doubt there's a very quiet, very under the radar sizable amount of reasonable people out there, but the issue is they're quiet. they're not policing the idiots, they aren't calling out the assholes, or much of anything, are they? Not that I expect them to take action, mind you, but they certainly aren't doing anything to change the face of gamers on this issue.

Well gamers are dead, don'tchaknow?

Joking aside,
honestly "policing the idiots" sounds a lot like we should be silencing them, which I don't agree with. I mean jesus, "policing" them, really? I guess we should form a safety committee, then. You can't expect people to go across the vast internet and call every single person out for "being an asshole."
In fact, you chastising gamers in such a way for "not policing the idiots" sounds to me like an excuse to paint all gamers as "just as bad as the assholes" or "worse than the assholes."

I mean look at the Chun Li boob jiggle glitch. It certainly wasn't normal that only p2's Chun Li would have wobbley DOA boobs while P1 didn't. People pitched a fit over the news it was going to be fixed, and there were suggestions that Chun Li should keep the DoA boob wobble. Just that instance for example.

Last I checked people were making jokes about how it should be kept and that a large number of people agreed that it needed to be fixed.
As far as I know the only real outrage came from R.Mika's butt slap being removed and a dynamic camera angle getting changed for what people considered were frivolous reasons. I don't even remember any outrage over what everyone agreed was just a really funny glitch.

Why would we want to question a Developer's desire to improve a character cosmetically and have her be more true to her personality over posing in painted on pants? Sure if it changed her stats, I could see a long, massive discussion, but this is just a pose.

Then why did it need to be removed if it's just a pose? Why deny players the option?
I don't think we're going to get anywhere back and forthing in such a way.

See, while you have a point in the notion that maybe they didn't want to change the pose, it certainly doesn't negate the point that maybe they did want to change her pose after all.

So we're at an impasse, then.

Again, people, often arguing against inclusion in the long run, say that if women were to be added, they have to be well written! Well, this is their argument, yet they don't want tracer to be better written. They want to keep the pose that shows her butt.

No. No, no, no, no, no.
This is not a zero sum game.
Sexuality does not make a character automatically shit.
The argument was that the pose somehow contradicted established traits about Tracer's personality. A lot of people disagreed because the critic was basing their argument on their own perception of the character, filling in the blanks that Blizzard left.
This is what people took umbrage against.

I say this after years, and years of trying to make a case for more women in videogames, especially as player characters, which has more or less happened.

Because games with women in them never happened until all the progressives began to do their part to improve gaming.

Yeah, the "Pander to me" crowd is on all sides, but honestly, it just seems way more two faced on the "Team 1" example. They're often people defending the developer's desire to, say, show midriff and have fantasy over function female armor while having the best of both worlds on guys, or, say, to keep Tracer's pose, and generally fight tooth and nail to keep sexuality no matter what.

What's wrong with sexuality? And there is best of both worlds on girls too, depending on the game. Fantasy is just that--fantasy. Why should I have to deal with someone shouting in my ear how gross my character is in an MMO for wearing something "impractical" that exposes her midriff? Why should I put up with people shouting at me about my "virtual male privilege" in how I can have both sexy and practical clothing?

A lot of the common arguments aren't about adding in more options, but rather about removing the fanservicy stuff. And sometimes about removing characters altogether.

At least the people that want inclusiveness seem to be more honest in that they want more inclusiveness, and not try to boot people out, and that, IMO, inclusivity would spice things up in the gaming world.

Except when they try to shunt everyone with a dissenting opinion out of the conversation, which also happens when you disagree with the "honest" side.
Oops.
And inclusivity is already present. Diversity is a natural result of variety. I don't know why people feel that now, in the current year when we have a bajillion games available to everyone who is willing to play them that we need to be "inclusive" when there is almost literally something for everyone.

Minus the men are drooling apes part, yeah. You want to show me how gaming between, say, 2000, and 2013 wasn't filled with women as objects, macguffins, unplayable, and so forth in mainstream gaming over, say, the sort of characters we have lately?

Well in case the video wasn't enough, I'll do a quick check to find some examples, from, I dunno, 2000, 2005? Just a couple years as a snapshot, if that's fair?

Spoiler

2000

Spoiler

Resident Evil - Code: Veronica. Claire is the main protagonist, with a male support/love interest who is kidnapped partway through the game. But I suppose since her brother shows up to help her in the climax it doesn't count since she needed a man's help?

The Misadventures of Tron Bonne - In this game, Tron is working to pay off a ransom to save her family by any means necessary.

Perfect Dark - Joanna Dark's debut

Space Channel 5 - Ulala saves the galaxy with the power of funky dancing

Tomb Raider - As Yahtzee would probably say: archaeologist with loose moral fiber shoots endangered animals and fellow explorers to get treasure. Oh but those polygons are soooooo objectifying, amirite?

Jet Set Radio - While you play as multiple characters, one of the initial playables is female, and there are numerous additional female characters to unlock as playables.

Threads of Fate - One of the main protagonists is playable, and almost all of the female characters are presented as powerful or capable (albeit eccentric). At one point there's a motherly character who in the midst of shit going down busts out a fugging plain, regular steel sword and starts fighting one of the main bad guys to protect the people she cares about.

American McGee's Alice - A story of a young girl growing up without her family and suffering from some severe emotional and mental trauma played out in a demented version of wonderland.

The Operative: No One Lives Forever - Female protagonist in a spy film styled game

This isn't counting any RPGs and fighting games that featured playable female characters, as well as any games which give the option to play as either gender in a single role (like Pokemon, I mean, where the story is unchanged regardless of gender).

To save time let's jump ahead, hm...about 5 years.

2005

Spoiler

Kameo: Elements of Power & Perfect Dark Zero - Here comes rare with 2 more strong female protagonists. Shame about the games, though.

Fatal Frame 3 -- Typical horror story of girl in creepy village trying to not die and bustin' ghosts with an ancient Polaroid.

Ghost in the Shell -- A PSP game, so I dunno if you wanna count this or not because I don't think anyone owned a PSP.

Metal Gear Ac!d -- A PSP game again, with a playable female character, although I can't say if she was a protagonist or not because y'know...Solid Snake.

Haunting Ground -- These horror games usually use female protags to evoke sympathy and care in male gamers I think...plus the vulnerability adds to the horror and tension in these games, I think. She does still develop as a character through the story, and things go well for her if you get the best ending.

...plus I don't think it needs to be said that a woman chasing the protag to cut out her womb to take it for herself is horrifying regardless of what gender you are.

Red Ninja -- Okay this is a bad example; it's about a young woman going around murdering dudes for revenge while wearing a questionably loose kimono. Apparently the game was also shitty.

And in 2010 we had Bayonetta. Oh, but because she does sexy dancing and poses we should disregard her since she's sexy so she's clearly a shit character.

We still have women wearing impossibly skimpy clothes, but ya know what? It's not all that's being put out there, and I'm actually okay with the balance.

Let's not get self-congratulatory here.
This progressivism in gaming hasn't been around as long as gaming has, and older games had less men and women and more animals and mascot characters.

RPGs introduced diverse casts, and while they did have a lot of male protagonists, they were only the protagonists insofar as the game took place from their POV. This didn't diminish the other characters unless the writing was bad; Terra in FF6 is perceived to be the "main character" but that doesn't lessen

Spoiler

Celes' personal conflict as a member of the empire or the development of her character and how she almost gives into despair and attempts suicide after believing that she's lost everyone she's ever cared about in a ruined world, something many a gamer cried over if they weren't bawling over Aeris dying in FF7. By the by, as dumb as FF7 and Aeris' death is, she is the reason the world gets saved at the end of FF7, so I don't see how her not being "da mein characdur" diminishes her as a female character in general.

Hell, I play Senran Kagura in general, and while I don't openly in public, I'm open to saying I play it, and enjoy it. I like the dragon's crown Sorceress. I want DoAX3 in NA. I don't mind the fan service, it's that just until lately, within the past few years it really hasn't felt like there's been much more to women in games than that.
Hell, I wouldn't have minded the skinship minigame in fire emblem. Honestly, I think they might have broken the relationship system when they took it out because there's endless heart earning.

Would you argue that the Senran Kagura girls have no character? Sorceress is part of an arcade game that references DnD quite a bit so she, like every other playable in DC, is a blank slate anyway. DoAX3 is not coming to NA, whether because they feared actual backlash or because they wanted to stir up press, I dunno. But the current atmosphere surrounding gaming contributed to their decision.

There is a big pushback against fanservice among the inclusive crowd, because "misrepresentation" or whatever.
The truth is, we need to ADD, not to REMOVE.

Also I do think they broke the MyRoom mechanics by removing the game, because now it acts kind of...weird, sometimes.

You missed Chun Li's boob wobble to say the least which I think lends proof to my argument.
Also Karin, and Cammy's face remodeling.

People complained because Cammy looked like she had a duckface. And I think most of the complaints there came from Japanese players more than American ones. I didn't even know Karin's face got a remodel at all.

snip

Yes, and clearly painting large numbers of gamers who like fanservice as intellectually bankrupt morons, perverts, or misogynists will definitely help increase the demand for more female protagonists.

Wait.

Not gonna debate the whole Kaplan thing; I've already stated that he handled it poorly and let his initial message get misconstrued as "caving" to Fipps, so in the end regardless of whether he was virtue signalling or not (I changed my stance on this a couple posts up), he should've at least been transparent about what was going on with this one pose from the get go.

 

[Falling_v1legacy]

What's wrong with sexuality? And there is best of both worlds on girls too, depending on the game. Fantasy is just that--fantasy. Why should I have to deal with someone shouting in my ear how gross my character is in an MMO for wearing something "impractical" that exposes her midriff? Why should I put up with people shouting at me about my "virtual male privilege" in how I can have both sexy and practical clothing?

A lot of the common arguments aren't about adding in more options, but rather about removing the fanservicy stuff. And sometimes about removing characters altogether.

Honestly, it really isn't about wholesale removing stuff. At least not from the reasonable people I listen to. It usually has to do with the preponderance of fanservice female characters and the dearth of a variety of other sorts of characters. And yes you can throw a list of Japanese RPG's to show that there are tons of female characters out there, but with a preponderance one way, the pickings can be slim. Look, this is real stuff that affects real people. I recall a Shamus Young podcast where he was talking about his two daughters that were interested in playing a videogame he was playing for his blog. The daughters were having fun playing up until they realized it wasn't a body suit but ye ol' dental floss bathing suit and they never came back to the game. That was the female option and it wasn't very appealing. And to me, that's the main thing- wouldn't it be nice if we had a few more alternatives, a little more variety. But as soon as we see a little variation we get a big backlash: 'woah! woah! woah! You can't change THIS one! What's wrong with sexy? Do you hate sex? Are you sexist? Do you hate sexy women? Why aren't you sex positive?" When it's really about trying to get a little more variation. We're just barely touching the slider and the hand is getting swatted. 'Stop! It's time to bring sexy back.' When it did it ever go away?

There's still TONS of sexy options if that's what people want, and so there should be sexy options in the future. But there's been a preponderance in one direction, if we want to see a little more variation, then yes the proportion of fanservice will go down, though perhaps not in real terms. Consider the number of females we're getting in Overwatch, compared the original Starcraft or Warcraft franchise (RTS lore). We're not losing sexy fan service females, we just got a whole lot more female characters in general, and I personally think that's a good thing. And hell, we wound up with a pretty close to pin up pose for Tracer anyways so there's that.

 

[Aeshi]

Apparently said pose has now been replaced with:

Spoiler: This

It's almost the same animation, she's just on one leg now.

So in other words, it basically hasn't been removed and all this fuss has been over nothing.

I'm starting to wonder if Blizzard started this all on purpose as a Viral Marketing thing XD

 

[marioandsonic]

I'm starting to wonder if Blizzard started this all on purpose as a Viral Marketing thing XD

Spark a huge debate on the internet, just to get people to talk about your game?

If that's really the case, well played Blizzard. Well played...

 

[Lightknight]

Apparently said pose has now been replaced with:

Spoiler: This

It's almost the same animation, she's just on one leg now.

So in other words, it basically hasn't been removed and all this fuss has been over nothing.

I'm starting to wonder if Blizzard started this all on purpose as a Viral Marketing thing XD

If anything, the new pose is significantly sexier... so... hah. That was unexpected. They must have just not liked the original pose and thought it could be better. If you're going to emphasize the ass, then emphasize the ass and don't half-ass it (teehee).

Unspoiled here since this is central to the discussion.

http://4d663a369f9f03c3c61e-870e77779efd63f7bd6c2ee08d8cfae6.r2.cf1.rackcdn.com/images/ZNSWPLojgK2g.878x0.Z-Z96KYq.jpg

 

[Lightknight]

Anyone want to tell me how this even got as heated as it did.

I'm wonderinf if this is a sneaky case of viral marketing, forgot this game existed untill this hit the news.

Because some person said that Tracer having a pose where her ass is in the picture makes his dick feel weird when he lets his 8-year-old (overwatch is rated T for teen) daughter play it so rather than going to counseling or explaining to his daughter that women have asses too he asked Blizzard to remove it so that no one can have it if they wanted it. It was a totally optional asset that no one had to use if they didn't want to and so his request was purely to take away from everyone just because he didn't like it.

This caused a stir because we (people) hate it when someone tries to impose their views on how we consume our media and try to take things away from everyone just because they want the world to conform to them.

This also caused a stir when the staff explained that they were removing the picture because they said the sexy pose wasn't heroic or strong. So people like me thought the implication was that being sexy is weak and not heroic, taking a significant step back and degrading women who value their appearance like humans do.

But in light of the replacement. It's still sexy and the pose is more active like in mid-celebration. So maybe that's all they meant since it's certainly an even more emphasized ass now. Just like her action figure and her picture that's on the cover of the game box.

 

[Aeshi]

Unspoiled here since this is central to the discussion.

I put the image behind a spoiler more for anyone with a slow internet connection than anything, but suit yourself.

 

[Lightknight]

Unspoiled here since this is central to the discussion.

I put the image behind a spoiler more for anyone with a slow internet connection than anything, but suit yourself.

Myself be suited, thanks. It's a significant development in this story and should even be updated in the main article. Posted unspoiled so people will actually see it.

 

[Areloch]

So they went with basing her new pose on a pinup then:

I got a good hearty laugh out of that. Apparently the intent is to imply her past as a pilot by having a bomber pinup painting pose. I guess it kinda works? Though her old pose wasn't bad in my opinion either because it had that whole 'cheeky snark' attitude to it.

Both options would be better than one in my opinion.

That said, wonder if the person that started the entire thing is gunna be mad they're still 'reducing her to a sex symbol', only they're doing it more explicitly now because her pose is based on a classic pinup painting.

 

[Piecewise]

So you remove one pose...but the female characters are still wearing skin tight body suits, meaning you see their ass constantly anyways.

The award for most pointless controversy goes to...



Also, is it just me or do people purporting to be feminists these days have a very lousy view on the capacities of women? Seeing cartoon butts is gonna undermine a girl's well-being? Better get my fainting couch and smelling salts ready, just in case some bawdy language reaches her delicate ears and she swoons.

 

[Lightknight]

So they went with basing her new pose on a pinup then:

I got a good hearty laugh out of that. Apparently the intent is to imply her past as a pilot by having a bomber pinup painting pose. I guess it kinda works? Though her old pose wasn't bad in my opinion either because it had that whole 'cheeky snark' attitude to it.

Both options would be better than one in my opinion.

That said, wonder if the person that started the entire thing is gunna be mad they're still 'reducing her to a sex symbol', only they're doing it more explicitly now because her pose is based on a classic pinup painting.

At this point I wouldn't be surprised if Overwatch was either trying to generate buzz or implementing a social experiment.

I don't know if the pinup was the inspiration. I'd find it hard to believe that that is the only scenario where a person has posed in that way. But either way, they've always had Tracer's ass in prominence, even in the first trailer. Unless people can tell me how pointing your gun and butt at your opponent (aka the camera) is a tactical advantage of any kind.

And yes, it stands to reason that they could always include the other one. But seeing what they replaced it with I actually totally believe them now when they say they just weren't happy with the first stance.