Dissing Mass Effect Andromeda because it has diversity and equality

AzrealMaximillion

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Dansen said:
The game might be sub standard or bad, I don't know, and I won't until I have played it or see more reviews. However it is rather disingenuous to suggest that a significant portion of the back lash doesn't come from people with an ax to grind. There are trolls spreading misinformation and blowing things out of proportion for all high profile games, you don't have to look further than this months releases and the meta bombing of Zelda:BotW and Horizon: Zero Dawn.
Gonna have to disagree. Meta bombings on the user scores of games happens literally all the time. Stop giving power to vocal minorities. These "meta bombings" you speak of don't seem to be effective because BOTW's user score is 7.4 (which seems to be accurate if you remove the industry's nostalgia glasses for Nintendo) and Horizon Zero Dawn's User score is 8.5.

People built up trolls or "alt right people" to seem like they're a massive problem with these 3 games and its simply not the case. A lot of the reviews for Mass Effect Andromeda echo the criticisms of the people who played the demo for a week. If it were on the scale of the Ghostbusters movie of last year, your point would be a fair bit more solid, but the constant "trolls are attacking" trope isn't really accurate here. I've seen way more memes making fun of the poor animations than anything.

The only attacks on "diversity" seem to be coming with Manveer's tweets against White people and the poor writing of the game's trans character, and the latter point was only when the game came out 2 days ago. Further more the critique of the trans character came from trans gamers mostly from what I've seen.
 

Karadalis

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Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
 

rob_simple

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Nature Guardian said:
Why is it so many crappy uninspired sequels are released, but only this Mass Effect Andromeda gets bashed so much?
Dragon Age II
Assassin's Creed Unity
Deus Ex Invisible War
Every CoD game after MW2
Starfox Zero
Every Mario game in the last decade
Every Zelda game in the last decade
Mass Effect 3
DmC (Donte may Cry)
Dead Space 3
Burnout Paradise
Resident Evil 5/6/Operation Raccoon City

These are just off the top of my head, I'm sure other people can think of many more, but all of them were relentlessly bashed upon their release; some of them even killed their respective franchises.

It's not that other shit sequels don't get bashed, it's that apparently no one notices the crappy sequel bashing unless you mock the 'MUH DIVERSITY' crowd while you're doing it.
 

TheMysteriousGX

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Karadalis said:
Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
 

runic knight

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So Bioware, lead by a public face that is undeniably racist against whites yet was never called out for it, and a bunch of new recruits that have little to no experience and seem to be hired solely to satisfy some ideological reasons, made a shitty game? Sounds about right.

Oh not because they are minorities or anything vapidly dismissal like that. But because rather than look for quality talent, they instead chose based on satisfying an ideological notion. That people without talent made a product that demonstrates this in animation, writing, tone and everything else doesn't surprise me any more than it would if a company hired only christian fundamentalists regardless of talent. The entire point of failing to look at skill when hiring and picking the team sort of made this the most likely occurrence. Considering the attitude of the jackass linked on the first page, going to laugh at this failure as well.

So problem isn't diversity itself, simply the emphasizing of it instead of actual skill at the job. Probably will find out that the people involved were all friends or some shit in a display of cronyism too, but who knows.
 

Metalix Knightmare

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altnameJag said:
Karadalis said:
Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
But they usually don't refer to themselves as trans and instead refer to themselves as their preferred gender.
 

Redryhno

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AzrealMaximillion said:
The only attacks on "diversity" seem to be coming with Manveer's tweets against White people and the poor writing of the game's trans character, and the latter point was only when the game came out 2 days ago. Further more the critique of the trans character came from trans gamers mostly from what I've seen.
Nah, there's more poor diversity writing beyond the trans character. There's a couple gay guys/girls that want to bang some random guys/girls that appears to be on your crew(though I think you really have to go out of your way to know they exist before they come up) asking you, his superior, if he would go out on a date with them. And they're all so fucking shy, this isn't middle school anymore, they're supposed to be some of the best in their field. They have the confidence to abandon everything up to that point in their lives and say goodbye to everyone that had any connection to them to go on a half-baked colonization mission, but they don't have the confidence to ask someone else out once they get there. And they have the balls to try to pressure someone in a position of authority over them to do it. I've just been put in that position before by someone that wanted to go out with me(have yet to know why, I barely knew they existed) and it is NOT a place you want to be, so it's a bit of a sore issue for me.

The trans character I'm just seeing as a rehash of the Baldur's Gate expansion that came out like...2 years ago? Just a largely random character that can't wait to tell the new stranger they have literally just met that they used to be a dude and your responses to that are some manner of "you're so brave" in a universe that has(or at least should considering the other things that have happened) the tools to transition without much problem. Just seems so worthless to call yourself trans if the whole "problem" with being trans is that you don't want to be known as trans(outside of a giving advice or understanding) or what you were before. I mean, if it's going to be a character trait you have to have in the game, at least let it be something that happens after you do some jobs for/with them and let it actually be a reveal instead of something that's said straight up front.

Let it be a Chakwas/Garrus buddy-buddy relationship where you're friends first, put some actual effort into the character's story and personality, if nothing else, just don't let it start with "I USED TO HAVE A DICK I NEVER FELT FIT WITH THE REST OF ME".



altnameJag said:
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
From what I've read up on and listened to from others on the internet, outside of a few times of giving advice and letting people know what it's like...they actually do. They transitioned because they wanted to be on the other side of the fence, not because they feel like straddling it or ripping off their piece of it to go off by themselves to go build a new fence for everyone like them...

I mean, why the hell would it be called transitioning if it weren't a halfway point between what they were and what they want to be?
 

gyrobot_v1legacy

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Or a side quest where a geth wants gender designation and we get a surprisingly deep miniquest on gender roles and how organics have it harder than synthetics. One guy thought of something that tackles lgbt issues on ME that doesnt feel like Dragonspear all over again.

"A Geth companion/quest giver is gender-less but wants to understand human sexuality, has some modifications done for a gender toggle switch (maybe you need to fetch the parts). you get lots of humorous moments and dialog trees where you can illiterate on gender roles and how ironic it is that the robot can simply flip a switch, yet organics have to go though so much trouble and still fall short."
 

IamGamer41

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bastardofmelbourne said:
zellosoli said:
except for Manveer Heir (the racist game dave) who was not fired and in fact stated that the higher ups in bioware supported his comments, that kinda turned me off a bit (only brief research on this so i'm open to correction on this)
No, that's broadly true [https://i.imgur.com/r0vxSNc.png], at least according to Heir himself.

The man himself sounds like an extremely unlikeable person, but that's distinct from whatever skills he possesses in game design. From what I hear the gameplay is the only good thing about Andromeda, so he may well know his shit. In which case...I guess don't fire him? I don't want to be the guy who says "you must fire this man because of an unrelated thing he said on Twitter!" because then I'd feel pretty dang hypocritical.

Though it'd be nice if he could at least get a stern rebuke from his boss for being deliberately obnoxious [https://lucien0maverick.files.wordpress.com/2016/08/manveer-heir-white-tears.jpg]. I mean, there's "have a rational discussion about systemic racial privilege" and then there's "trolling." I'll let you guess which one Heir's more enthusiastic about.

Yet if he was a white man saying that about blacks he would be canned no matter how good he was a programing. There would be no stern talking to like you suggested. The double standards EA/Bioware showed by keeping this guy employed is very telling. Yet they couldn't because Heir would have cried racism. Racism is wrong on every front period.
 

wulf3n

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Meh, you're always going to get some level of that sort of criticism, doubly so for Bioware games, at least since Dragon Age 2.

What I find interesting is the notion that the animations/character models/story/glitches are worse than the original Mass Effect trilogy.

Now to be fair I haven't yet played Andromeda and I could very well have had a more "unique" experience than others with the original Mass Effect trilogy (all Bioware games since KotoR even) but bad animations, character models and glitches are a staple of Bioware games. I sometimes wonder if people are looking at the original series through rose tinted glasses.

Story is a more subjective concept, especially from my perspective as I maintain ME1 was irrefutably the best written out of all. Things have gone down hill, story wise, since Drew Karpyshyn left
 

Erttheking

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Metalix Knightmare said:
altnameJag said:
Karadalis said:
Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
But they usually don't refer to themselves as trans and instead refer to themselves as their preferred gender.
It's both. Trans basically means that you weren't born as the gender you identify as. There's a reason there's pre and post op transgender.
 

Redryhno

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wulf3n said:
Story is a more subjective concept, especially from my perspective as I maintain ME1 was irrefutably the best written out of all. Things have gone down hill, story wise, since Drew Karpyshyn left
I wouldn't say it's the best myself, amazing introduction to the universe and absolutely amazing for the designs of the aliens being more than rubber ears and eyeshadow, but story-wise, sorta meh with the exception of a few key moments(Akuze background adding so much to some quests, Virmire if you bothered to learn about Ash and Kaiden, really made my second playthrough difficult at that point, and getting Saren to kill himself). However I will agree that Karpyshian leaving largely spelled the end of Mass Effect for me.

I maintain that story-wise, ME2 is the best simply because it was very much a character-focused story and I'm a sucker for suicide mission plots. ME2's launch trailer if I'm remembering right is still the most viewed of EA's main channel and Mass Effect's official.
 

SpaceDoctor

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The transgender character is absolutely ridiculous. Transgender people never casually mention their traumatic backstory and previous name when they're first meeting somebody. If you're going to throw in a minor trans character, at least make it realistic, holy shit.

Metalix Knightmare said:
altnameJag said:
Karadalis said:
Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
But they usually don't refer to themselves as trans and instead refer to themselves as their preferred gender.
Transgender woman here, this isn't true. Plenty of trans men and women go through surgery and still identify as transgender. The basis for the identity stems from the gender transitioning itself, that's it.

We really have no objective way of stating why transgender people exist, so theoretically it would make sense that transgender people exist in the Mass Effect universe. But the fact that a transgender character has to run away to Andromeda because of gender discrimination makes no sense. Gay people are totally cool, and the Asari can do whatever they want, but apparently being trans is too much for everyone? What?

It's pretty clear BioWare just decided to slap in a trans character to win over trans players. It feels really ignorant and unapologetically bad, which is sad. I'm pretty sure the whole team was patting themselves on the back up to and through release date, until trans players came across the scene and started pointing out how shitty it is.
 

Kwak

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bartholen said:
bastardofmelbourne said:
bartholen said:
Cultural lesson: here in Finland we have a term called "amis mustache", which has nothing to do with the amish.
In Australia, we call this phenomenon "bum fluff."
Just out of curiosity, does it have further specific implications attached to it like "amis moustache", or is it just a general term? I get that the "bum" part refers to either homelessness or a literal bum, but does it go beyond that?
No, it literally refers to the hair that grows on the cheeks of the buttocks, that light and fluffy covering that belongs on your posterior, not your face.
It's a playful way of saying you're a really shit man, because men are made by the girth and strength of their facial hair follicles, and nothing else.

ETA.. there's also something about the very first facial hair you grow that has a very different appearance to what typically appears on a man who periodically shaves, so it's also a dig at adulthood's first tentative appearance on an adolescent.
I think it looks cool. The beard of a man who never shaved that first growth vs that of those who did the expected and required manhood ritual seems different.
 

Here Comes Tomorrow

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SpaceDoctor said:
The transgender character is absolutely ridiculous. Transgender people never casually mention their traumatic backstory and previous name when they're first meeting somebody. If you're going to throw in a minor trans character, at least make it realistic, holy shit.

Metalix Knightmare said:
altnameJag said:
Karadalis said:
Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
But they usually don't refer to themselves as trans and instead refer to themselves as their preferred gender.
Transgender woman here, this isn't true. Plenty of trans men and women go through surgery and still identify as transgender. The basis for the identity stems from the gender transitioning itself, that's it.

We really have no objective way of stating why transgender people exist, so theoretically it would make sense that transgender people exist in the Mass Effect universe. But the fact that a transgender character has to run away to Andromeda because of gender discrimination makes no sense. Gay people are totally cool, and the Asari can do whatever they want, but apparently being trans is too much for everyone? What?

It's pretty clear BioWare just decided to slap in a trans character to win over trans players. It feels really ignorant and unapologetically bad, which is sad. I'm pretty sure the whole team was patting themselves on the back up to and through release date, until trans players came across the scene and started pointing out how shitty it is.
I'm glad they included the character because it's so shamelessly shoved in there it's hilarious.

"I was working in a boring job filling test tubes BY THE WAY I WAS CALLED STEPHAN AND NOW I'M TRANS AND CALLED HAINLY WHICH IS A GIRLS NAME I GUESS?"

Though I'm confused that people hate how it was handled here but in that Baldur's Gate mod that did EXACTLY the same thing people were quick to defend it when other pointed out how ridiculous it was that someone would just out themselves like that.

Reminder:
 

SpaceDoctor

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Here Comes Tomorrow said:
SpaceDoctor said:
The transgender character is absolutely ridiculous. Transgender people never casually mention their traumatic backstory and previous name when they're first meeting somebody. If you're going to throw in a minor trans character, at least make it realistic, holy shit.

Metalix Knightmare said:
altnameJag said:
Karadalis said:
Is there a trans character in the game?

Are you telling me that they have unlocked the tech to travel to another galaxy...

Yet havent figured out how to swap genders better then what we have currently?

Why ARE there even "trans" people in the future? Isnt the whole "trans" identity only a thing because it takes so friggin long to actually transition from one gender to another currently? (leaving aside the fact that i yet have to meet a "trans" that actually wants to be called a "trans" instead of the gender they want to be) You gonna tell me we have biotic space magic and super heal bio gel but no way to turn Hans into Gretel in tiffy?

ME as a setting is so riddled with plotholes i think the only thing saving it ARE the graphic glitches...
...people don't stop being trans after they get a sex change, man.
But they usually don't refer to themselves as trans and instead refer to themselves as their preferred gender.
Transgender woman here, this isn't true. Plenty of trans men and women go through surgery and still identify as transgender. The basis for the identity stems from the gender transitioning itself, that's it.

We really have no objective way of stating why transgender people exist, so theoretically it would make sense that transgender people exist in the Mass Effect universe. But the fact that a transgender character has to run away to Andromeda because of gender discrimination makes no sense. Gay people are totally cool, and the Asari can do whatever they want, but apparently being trans is too much for everyone? What?

It's pretty clear BioWare just decided to slap in a trans character to win over trans players. It feels really ignorant and unapologetically bad, which is sad. I'm pretty sure the whole team was patting themselves on the back up to and through release date, until trans players came across the scene and started pointing out how shitty it is.
I'm glad they included the character because it's so shamelessly shoved in there it's hilarious.

"I was working in a boring job filling test tubes BY THE WAY I WAS CALLED STEPHAN AND NOW I'M TRANS AND CALLED HAINLY WHICH IS A GIRLS NAME I GUESS?"

Though I'm confused that people hate how it was handled here but in that Baldur's Gate mod that did EXACTLY the same thing people were quick to defend it when other pointed out how ridiculous it was that someone would just out themselves like that.

Reminder:
With Baldur's Gate, I think players were more likely to defend the attempt because a) there was such a huge negative outpouring against it, and b) it was really the first time someone had tried to create a transgender woman in an RPG. Most trans people had problems with it, but they at least wanted to give credit where credit was due.

But this character is exactly like BG's. It's like BioWare learned nothing from the whole controversy, which has people pissed off. Plus, unlike BG, trans players were the first to point out how awful Andromeda's character's is -- the original tweet pointing out the character's flaws was posted by lonelytiefling, who is a trans woman living in the UK.

Not to mention, it's BioWare of all places that messed this up, which is just insult to injury. Their writing can be awkward, but they did gay characters right early on in ME. There's a higher standard there; half-assed trans characters aren't acceptable with that kind of legacy.

undeadsuitor said:
Wait...where's this trans character in Andromeda? I definitely want to see what their actual conversation is instead of relying on an interpretation of an interpretation.
Yeah, here's the original post by lonelytiefling: https://twitter.com/lonelytiefling/status/843808789858045952
 

AzrealMaximillion

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Here Comes Tomorrow said:
I'm glad they included the character because it's so shamelessly shoved in there it's hilarious.

"I was working in a boring job filling test tubes BY THE WAY I WAS CALLED STEPHAN AND NOW I'M TRANS AND CALLED HAINLY WHICH IS A GIRLS NAME I GUESS?"

Though I'm confused that people hate how it was handled here but in that Baldur's Gate mod that did EXACTLY the same thing people were quick to defend it when other pointed out how ridiculous it was that someone would just out themselves like that.

Reminder:
People were quick to defend the Trans character because it was announced before the game's release. We didn't see how poorly the character was written until after the expansion came out and it was called out by trans people first just like this character.


Look at how they're now advertising that they've put a character with autism and a gay character in the upcoming Power Rangers movie. Notice how there's no big backlash? No one cares with the same intensity about identity politics. We're generally more often than not, critiquing how the media is acting like we're still in the late 80s. I hope to hell that the diversity characters in the new Power Rangers are written well, because from Ghostbusters to BG to ME:A they've shown that they don't know how to write them respectfully. Its always in a patronizing and pandering manner, which is insulting, because it treats minorities and LGBTQ+ people in a prejudiced manner. What's worse is that they're doing it for a buck.
 

Makabriel

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You know, I did find it kinda jarring that 1 out of the 9(?) preset characters was "Standard White Protagonist". All for diversity, but all of the other selections were pretty out there and didn't interest me in the least for using them even as a base to start from
 

Nature Guardian

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So, I've read about that shoehorned trans character in Andromeda. I'm a fervid SJW, but even I have to admit that was so badly shoehorned it could almost be offensive.

Human beings really have a way to turn everything, even the most positive things, into something that makes you pissed.

So what am I supposed to do? If I praise the inclusivity of ME:A, I also praise how badly and tokenistically it was done. If I complain about how badly it was done, it sends a message that developers shouldn't try progress and inclusivity.