Do Gays Not Exist in Bioware's Star Wars?

[cainx10a]

Yeah, it's "their choice" to exclude GLBT stuff but it's still a dick move and extremely cowardly discrimination. That applies as much to the game as to idiot forum mods. Not having anything but white soldiers in 40K is pretty dickish too. Saying "it's just their choice" is enabling privilege to stomp on minorities willy-nilly and is the entire reason the US has anti-discrimination laws about many areas because those "just choices" result in people not getting jobs for which they are qualified, not getting loans so they can buy houses and cars even after that, not getting equal admission to colleges and generally being held down, all by simple individual choice.

So yeah, it's just a game, but it's a part of that discriminatory attitude and it deserves to be fought and all you "wah wah PC wahhhh" babies can go choke on your privilege of never having to be outside looking in or worry about being treated with respect.

QFT. Give this man a cookie!

 

[thebrokenwit]

Holy shit, I just figured out another problem with this whole thing while making a sandwich.

The big problem with the statement

As I have stated before, these are terms that do not exist in Star Wars.

is in bold. You cannot say that unless you are George Lucas. (or, to a lesser extent, Leeland Chee)

What we have here is an S-Canon (maybe C-Canon) game, and the forum mod is trying to make a G-Canon statement about the Star Wars universe. In other words, mod is being a complete dick anyway for trying to assert authority on the Star Wars universe when he has little more than a fanboy's authority.

 

[PirateKing]

I did kind of think that there's no need to distinguish between heterosexual and homosexual in the Star Wars universe. They do kind of have biggers things to handle, like those Star Wars that are usually going on. Just like our government has some of those Land Wars to worry about.

 

[Clashero]

I love star wars more than ever now! No gays!

Good for Bioware for sticking to their guns...unlike Microsoft....who apologized to them.

Why's that? What is wrong with homosexuals appearing in games? KotOR, Jade Empire and Mass Effect had some sort of same-sex relationship. Need I remind that KotOR is, in fact, Star Wars?
Oh, and since when is apologizing wrong? I think what Microsoft did was quite admirable after that fiasco generated by a bigoted, childish, homophobic adolescent. Which is what, it seems to me, you are.

No, what is childish is defending them, and thinking that Microsoft was right for what they did. It is the same line of thinking as "No child left behind".

It's the: "Oh my God! That statement may offend someone!!!! You can only have freedom (of speech) as long as no one else could be remotely offended by your statement." reaction. This f'd up political correctness campaign, that needs to just die already.

They did what any sane company would do: under threat of coming under fire from very orthodox religious organizations, yellow press, and perhaps even the odd insane politician, they took the simple, effective, pragmatic way out. Later on, after the smoke settled, they came out and offered their apologies. Any person with an ounce of common sense would tell you that what they did was the safest thing to do.

 

[Lord_Ascendant]

this is how developers destroy themselves. They become homophobic.

 

[scotth266]

I'm going to wait for more info, as I think that Bioware will make some sort of statement about this. They've been very kind to the homosexual community in games, so I doubt that they'd bring on the wrath without reason.

 

[John Funk]

See this is why I'm a "homophobe". I just can't stand the fucking whining.
Homosexuality is not the norm, so there are no gays in Star Wars, because the writers don't bother to include every deviation there is in their games (like transsexuality which is the T in GLBT after all). Deal with it.

Except Bioware already portrayed a woman who loved other women in KotOR. It's a big universe, dude. If a male human can fall in love with a female Twi'lek (hey, that's interspecies, which I'm pretty sure is considered a bigger deal than same-sex) then why can't a male human fall for a male human? Or a male Twi'lek?

 

[Rath709]

Statement: It is a long story. But I will keep it short.

Recitation: Once upon a time, organic meatbags bred out of control and filled the galaxy. There are different meatbags across different planets, all bumping into each other. They talk a great deal and threaten each other for various reasons, mostly involving mating, survival, and resources. It is really quite tiresome.

 

[Clashero]

They did what any sane company would do: under threat of coming under fire from very orthodox religious organizations, yellow press, and perhaps even the odd insane politician, they took the simple, effective, pragmatic way out. Later on, after the smoke settled, they came out and offered their apologies. Any person with an ounce of common sense would tell you that what they did was the safest thing to do.

Safe doesn't mean right.

You're not seriously bashing on a company for choosing whatever option made them lose the least amount of money? From a business perspective, they did the right thing. And Microsoft is a business.
That said, it would have been better if the whole thing had just never happened.
And this is all coming from someone who doesn't particularly like Microsoft's business practices.

 

[Seydaman]

Im not homophobic but I do not believe any type of homosexual content belongs in video games

Its an MMO and if i recall they said in the star wars universe, so its not like they have decided this, its just the way it is

WRONG. It's an mmo RPG, which means, if male character Iwhuppssithbuttocks wants to roleplay as a gay character in a relationship with male character iwhuupsewokfurrybuttocks, they can do it just fine.

Even having NPCs, or quest-givers who are homosexuals and could potentially even have a quest based on, you know, doing certain things to attract that member of the same sex, same sex-different race would be just fine. It's not like we are being bombarded with homo-friendly quests, not like we are getting bombarded with hetero-friendly quests either as far as I recall.

But it certainly has to do with the fact that the relationship the player had with party members were always hetero-friendly. It's not that bad if my male PC would prefer Carth over Bastilla, even if keeping Bastilla in slave vestments and a slave chain was much more satisfying for my tastes.

OK DAMN YOU, am reinstalling KoToR atm =D

that reminds me of the fable2 quest where you get good points for finding the guy a gay lover and evil points if you find a women...xD

 

[thebrokenwit]

Star Wars is a part of my most precious childhood memories; sorry, but I don't want any gayness in it.
I hope Bioware won't turn the next game set in the Old Republic into a Gay Pride parade because of this incident.

Heh. You clearly had missed how campy those films were (granted, it was light on the camp, but it was still there). Seriously, watch them now and tell me you can't see campy elements in the film.

Safe doesn't mean right.

Words like that are good in debates such as the autism vaccine debate. Not here.

Sorry you have such a problem with these people. But it doesn't make you morally superior. No individual, nor group, has a monopoly on the moral high ground. Not your bigoted kind, not the "politically correct" kind you hold in contempt. But most certainly not you.

 

[Break]

All the arguments against alternative sexuality are pretty much rendered meaningless when you live in a world where you can choose to spend the rest of your life with a humanoid octopus who communicates through farts. There would obviously be those who advocate a pure, same-species, same-sex relationship as the only true way to live, but they'd be the oddballs with the titles, while most other organisms would take romantic interest on a case-by-case basis.

At least, that's what I hope it means. Maybe Lucas just hates gays, who knows.

 

[Alex_P]

This is where things get out of hand. When you have people who want to bring the issue of homosexuality in video games because they want the issue of homosexuality to be known.

What ever happend to just sitting down and enjoying a game?

BioWare has been selling "romances" as one of the defining elements of their style of game-making for over a decade now. Now they're selling TOR as a game that brings BioWare's storytelling style to an MMOG. Some of BioWare's fans are asking about this stuff because it's a central part of how they sit down and enjoy BioWare games specifically.

People who complain about how their sexual preference is not present in a video game they play need to realize that is one of the last things in the company or the designers mind and this applies to homosexuality and heterosexuality. If there is a love interest the focus is on the romance and not the SEX.

Is there something inherently "SEX" about homosexual romance plots while het romance gets to just be "romance"?

Is "romance" truly one-size-fits-all? (Why not just write only one "romance" character into each game then, for everyone to hook up with?)

There are so many more important issues for the homosexual awareness community need to focus on and video games isn't one of them. If they want games that focus on homosexuality and not on gameplay then make their own god damn game. Don't be surprised if it does not sell well because the key element of gameplay was sacrificed to support the awareness of homosexuality.

Notice how whenever there's a conversation about "LGBT people want X in games," it refers to an outrcry on some gaming forum rather than anything anybody says on TV or writes in the press? That's because it's not LGBT activists that are pushing the issue with games (they do actually have better things to do), it's chiefly regular ol' gamers who want entertainment that's more entertaining to them personally. That's not really any more agenda-driven than the "I want a gun that shoots lightning shurikens!" crowd.

-- Alex

 

[Alone Disciple]

Look, Bioware takes it's direction from Lucas Arts....who in turn takes it from the Big Cheese himself, George.

If George's created universe does not have these terms or ideals, that his perogative, and he basically licenses his intellectual properties and what not to everyone else. Not sure why people are upset at Bioware....if you're gonna be mad, get mad at George first.

And if you still don't like it, go create your own multi-billion dollar franchise and universe that everyone can play in.

I want to play a game and get absorbed in a universe where I don't have to worry about the Political Correctness or Religious police or Moral Cause of the week for once...