Editorial: Omitting Women From Games Because "It's Too Hard" is Unacceptable

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shadowmagus

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shadowmagus said:
Oh look, more bandwagoning from the Escapist. I really need to find someplace on the internet for gaming news that isn't in it for the mouse clicks.
Is there some kind of contribution or point you're making in this post? Sounds like you're just complaining that people don't agree with something without offering up any relevant information as to why your side is right. Whether or not that post was directed at me, this does not aid in any discussion.[/quote]

It's more a observation of the quality of the discussion then of the article itself. This is called click-bait where I'm from. A hot button issue (non-issue imo) that is mostly placed to get people to click on it, and respond. I'm merely making an observation that it's sad to see the Escapist running things like this rather that reporting on actual gaming news that's important.

Though, I suppose I should understand. It's not E3 if someone doesn't create a non-argument from nothing about "gender discrepancies"
 
Apr 24, 2008
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mecegirl said:
gamegod25 said:
Yeah when my friend brought this to my attention during E3, before even thinking the first words out of my mouth were "oh fuck off" at Ubisoft and that lame excuse. And it really is a lame excuse that reeks of laziness and apathy towards their own product. It didn't help that I saw at least one person (i forget what media outlet there were with) actually defended that half assed line. Even if it weren't total bullshit then fucking do what you have to to make it work. I'm sure you can spare a few bucks from your bloated marketing budgets to do a few extra frames of animation, guys.

Not every game HAS to cater to everyone and having specifically male/female characters if it fits the story then that's fine. If thats what works and what you want for the game that's perfectly reasonable, but don't throw that lame excuse in my face and expect me to buy it.

If you don't care enough about your game to put in the effort then why should I care about it either? And if its a matter of money well then that's your fault for not budgeting properly and spending more on marketing than you should.
That's pretty much how I feel about it. If they just didn't want a female character in the story then whatever. But what is the point of saying that they wanted one, but couldn't because of "insert bullshit here"? Did they think that just saying that they wanted a female chracter would make them look more egalitarian or something? It is their game, if they really wanted a female protagonist then they should do the work for it. Especially since they are now a company large enough to pull it off, and because they have put female characters in their multiplayer modes before. But now it's too hard?

[img]http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-J2t0KDnNHlE/Ul6sJEOEMfI/AAAAAAAAAc4/HHAE-9oL3gw/s1600/15.jpg[/img]
It's not the same multiplayer. Multiplayer is triggered by entering a tavern within the singleplayer where you can apparently join in with missions that friends are already doing. It's supposed to be seamless. There is no character creation in the game, only a limited set of customisation options. Which I think means you can choose the colour of the guys robes and whether he has facial hair...

If I were a game dev I wouldn't talk to the press.

Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Oh please, they are spending literal tonnes of money painstakingly compiling data from a myriad of games to determine what features sell and what do not. Are you suggesting market research is some kind of farce?
A lot of market research is a farce, yes. Mostly studies that fail to randomize the study group or take advice from the wrong people. For example, what good is it to randomize a focus group for a video game if you don't get gamers? Or they fail to account for bias (think of the coffee example Jim Sterling uses so often).

A lot of studies are just statisticians getting paid without working hard.

shadowmagus said:
Oh look, more bandwagoning from the Escapist. I really need to find someplace on the internet for gaming news that isn't in it for the mouse clicks.
Is there some kind of contribution or point you're making in this post? Sounds like you're just complaining that people don't agree with something without offering up any relevant information as to why your side is right. Whether or not that post was directed at me, this does not aid in any discussion.
He's taking a jab at what he believes is the intention of the article, and the quality of the content on the site in general. Seems legit to me.
 

mecegirl

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Sexual Harassment Panda said:
mecegirl said:
gamegod25 said:
Yeah when my friend brought this to my attention during E3, before even thinking the first words out of my mouth were "oh fuck off" at Ubisoft and that lame excuse. And it really is a lame excuse that reeks of laziness and apathy towards their own product. It didn't help that I saw at least one person (i forget what media outlet there were with) actually defended that half assed line. Even if it weren't total bullshit then fucking do what you have to to make it work. I'm sure you can spare a few bucks from your bloated marketing budgets to do a few extra frames of animation, guys.

Not every game HAS to cater to everyone and having specifically male/female characters if it fits the story then that's fine. If thats what works and what you want for the game that's perfectly reasonable, but don't throw that lame excuse in my face and expect me to buy it.

If you don't care enough about your game to put in the effort then why should I care about it either? And if its a matter of money well then that's your fault for not budgeting properly and spending more on marketing than you should.
That's pretty much how I feel about it. If they just didn't want a female character in the story then whatever. But what is the point of saying that they wanted one, but couldn't because of "insert bullshit here"? Did they think that just saying that they wanted a female chracter would make them look more egalitarian or something? It is their game, if they really wanted a female protagonist then they should do the work for it. Especially since they are now a company large enough to pull it off, and because they have put female characters in their multiplayer modes before. But now it's too hard?

[img]http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-J2t0KDnNHlE/Ul6sJEOEMfI/AAAAAAAAAc4/HHAE-9oL3gw/s1600/15.jpg[/img]
It's not the same multiplayer. Multiplayer is triggered by entering a tavern within the singleplayer where you can apparently join in with missions that friends are already doing. It's supposed to be seamless. There is no character creation in the game, only a limited set of customisation options. Which I think means you can choose the colour of the guys robes and whether he has facial hair...
I'm aware that the multiplayer modes are not the same. But I don't see why they would just copy what they have already done. I don't see why they wouldn't build upon what they have already programed and up the ante by making everything customizable. They have taken the first step, hell the first three steps, they can move onwards from there.
 

Lightknight

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Reasonable Atheist said:
Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Oh please, they are spending literal tonnes of money painstakingly compiling data from a myriad of games to determine what features sell and what do not. Are you suggesting market research is some kind of farce?
A lot of market research is a farce, yes. Mostly studies that fail to randomize the study group or take advice from the wrong people. For example, what good is it to randomize a focus group for a video game if you don't get gamers? Or they fail to account for bias (think of the coffee example Jim Sterling uses so often).

A lot of studies are just statisticians getting paid without working hard.
Now i amm not exactly a fan of ubisoft myself, i have not bought a ubisoft game for my pc in quite some time due to the ridiculous demand that i install uplay. However, why should study groups be random? that seems like a way to get a lot of really pointless data, ubisoft solicits people age 6 and older who are interested in games. You know, doing research into the market for their games.... not random people.
For any study or statistical results to be valid, you have to randomize the participants or you ruin the data with various bias. You can make your study group a little more defined, like saying they need to be gamers between a certain age group. But even that, your results are only valid for gamers between that age group in that example. As long as that group is your target market, then great.
 

Lightknight

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Sexual Harassment Panda said:
Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Oh please, they are spending literal tonnes of money painstakingly compiling data from a myriad of games to determine what features sell and what do not. Are you suggesting market research is some kind of farce?
A lot of market research is a farce, yes. Mostly studies that fail to randomize the study group or take advice from the wrong people. For example, what good is it to randomize a focus group for a video game if you don't get gamers? Or they fail to account for bias (think of the coffee example Jim Sterling uses so often).

A lot of studies are just statisticians getting paid without working hard.

shadowmagus said:
Oh look, more bandwagoning from the Escapist. I really need to find someplace on the internet for gaming news that isn't in it for the mouse clicks.
Is there some kind of contribution or point you're making in this post? Sounds like you're just complaining that people don't agree with something without offering up any relevant information as to why your side is right. Whether or not that post was directed at me, this does not aid in any discussion.
He's taking a jab at what he believes is the intention of the article, and the quality of the content on the site in general. Seems legit to me.
He(she) was ambiguous about what he(she) was referring to and did not provide any additional content or reason for the statement.

If I say, "You're just repeating what other people say" then that's not establishing that what other people are saying is wrong or why that may be. It's just making a meaningless comment that doesn't achieve anything.
 

DrOswald

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Grimrider6 said:
The Plunk said:
There was an interesting post on Reddit about this that TotalBiscuit Tweeted about recently: http://www.reddit.com/r/assassinscreed/comments/27ut97/distinct_lack_of_female_characters_due_to/ci5z8i7

...

Creating female playable characters is a lot of work, and when you're on a very tight schedule you have to consider what to prioritise. When only a small segment of your target audience is going to care about not being able to play as a female character, it makes more sense to focus on something else.
This is all a bit of a moot point, though, isn't it? The argument isn't "they should shoehorn girls in afterwards", the argument is "why didn't they think about female characters and models during the planning phase?".
Because you only usually have 1 main character in a narrative focused on 1 character? This is not Saints Row or Skyrim where nothing about the main character actually matters to the story. Assassins Creed has always been a static narrative, as opposed to the mad lib western RPG approach to story telling. You get one story from Assassins Creed.

I find this entire conversation bizarre. I can understand why the thing first kicked up. I, like everyone else, assumed you just picked a avatar for the co-op from a list. If that was the case then a female avatar would certainly be called for and the rage would be justified.

But Ubisoft decided to be clever, taking advantage of their unique medium to make it so each avatar is the custom version of Arno, the main character. Each person sees the other guys as generic assassins while seeing themselves as Arno. This is clever and good game design, maximizing development resource utility to bring us a huge value add. In the current AAA environment of stupidly overblown budgets and insane sales expectations, it is good to see a developer being smart about how they make their game, saving money and time where they can so they can deliver us a better game for less development dollars.

I also thought this would end the controversy. They had a good reason all the assassins were men and almost identical, they all represent the same man. It would be very strange to have a woman avatar representing a male character which the controlling player sees as male. It also would not address the core problem of exclusivity because female players would still be unable to play as a female assassin. I mean, if they wanted to include a female assassin they would have to create a second protagonist in a single protagonist story. Perhaps they should have made the main character female from the start, but it would be unreasonable to demand that they make a second redundant protagonist in a static narrative.

Boy was I wrong. People started to demand just that. Why didn't they think about female characters and models during the planning phase? Because why in the world would you create a redundant main character? The fact that they even considered it is bizarre.

Imagine if this sort of logic was applied to any other types of fixed narrative:

J.K. Rowling is so sexist. Why didn't she consider inclusivity from the start? Clearly she should have written a second version of the Harry Potter series, "Harrina Potter", so her female readers could read about a witch instead of a wizard. What? That would be too much work? What a lazy writer. #womenaretoohardtowrite

Or what about movies? Why couldn't they have made a female version of Django in Django Unchained? Too much work? So lazy! #womenaretoohardtofilm

Or what animation? Why couldn't they have created a female version of Hiccup for little girls in How to Train Your Dragon? #womenaretoohardtoanimate

I just don't get it. Is there something I am missing? How is demanding genderswapable protagonists in a fixed narrative in any way reasonable?
 
Apr 24, 2008
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mecegirl said:
Sexual Harassment Panda said:
mecegirl said:
gamegod25 said:
Yeah when my friend brought this to my attention during E3, before even thinking the first words out of my mouth were "oh fuck off" at Ubisoft and that lame excuse. And it really is a lame excuse that reeks of laziness and apathy towards their own product. It didn't help that I saw at least one person (i forget what media outlet there were with) actually defended that half assed line. Even if it weren't total bullshit then fucking do what you have to to make it work. I'm sure you can spare a few bucks from your bloated marketing budgets to do a few extra frames of animation, guys.

Not every game HAS to cater to everyone and having specifically male/female characters if it fits the story then that's fine. If thats what works and what you want for the game that's perfectly reasonable, but don't throw that lame excuse in my face and expect me to buy it.

If you don't care enough about your game to put in the effort then why should I care about it either? And if its a matter of money well then that's your fault for not budgeting properly and spending more on marketing than you should.
That's pretty much how I feel about it. If they just didn't want a female character in the story then whatever. But what is the point of saying that they wanted one, but couldn't because of "insert bullshit here"? Did they think that just saying that they wanted a female chracter would make them look more egalitarian or something? It is their game, if they really wanted a female protagonist then they should do the work for it. Especially since they are now a company large enough to pull it off, and because they have put female characters in their multiplayer modes before. But now it's too hard?

[img]http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-J2t0KDnNHlE/Ul6sJEOEMfI/AAAAAAAAAc4/HHAE-9oL3gw/s1600/15.jpg[/img]
It's not the same multiplayer. Multiplayer is triggered by entering a tavern within the singleplayer where you can apparently join in with missions that friends are already doing. It's supposed to be seamless. There is no character creation in the game, only a limited set of customisation options. Which I think means you can choose the colour of the guys robes and whether he has facial hair...
I'm aware that the multiplayer modes are not the same. But I don't see why they would just copy what they have already done. I don't see why they wouldn't build upon what they have already programed and up the ante by making everything customizable. They have taken the first step, hell the first three steps, they can move onwards from there.
Has their current multiplayer set-up been much of a success?

I've played all the AC games and barely touched the MP portion of it. Integration within the campaign genuinely might be a good thing. Obviously, I reserve judgement for when I've played the damn thing, but I think this sounds pretty cool.
 

Reasonable Atheist

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Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Oh please, they are spending literal tonnes of money painstakingly compiling data from a myriad of games to determine what features sell and what do not. Are you suggesting market research is some kind of farce?
A lot of market research is a farce, yes. Mostly studies that fail to randomize the study group or take advice from the wrong people. For example, what good is it to randomize a focus group for a video game if you don't get gamers? Or they fail to account for bias (think of the coffee example Jim Sterling uses so often).

A lot of studies are just statisticians getting paid without working hard.
Now i amm not exactly a fan of ubisoft myself, i have not bought a ubisoft game for my pc in quite some time due to the ridiculous demand that i install uplay. However, why should study groups be random? that seems like a way to get a lot of really pointless data, ubisoft solicits people age 6 and older who are interested in games. You know, doing research into the market for their games.... not random people.
For any study or statistical results to be valid, you have to randomize the participants or you ruin the data with various bias. You can make your study group a little more defined, like saying they need to be gamers between a certain age group. But even that, your results are only valid for gamers between that age group in that example. As long as that group is your target market, then great.
But statistics data for everyone on earth would be totally useless, why even bother? the only data they need is for people interested in the type of media they produce, so they base their studies on consumers of that media. If you are doing a study on the effects of diabetes medication, you get a group of people with diabetes to study and seperate them into a med group, and a control group. It would make no sense at all to test the effectiveness of medications on a cross section of all people, and it makes no sense to do market research for "stealth" third person action games on people who do not want to buy them in the first place. Earth is not the market, the market is. Am i just crazy here?
 

mecegirl

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Sexual Harassment Panda said:
Has their current multiplayer set-up been much of a success?

I've played all the AC games and barely touched the MP portion of it. Integration within the campaign genuinely might be a good thing. Obviously, I reserve judgement for when I've played the damn thing, but I think this sounds pretty cool.
I couldn't even tell ya why they have chosen to push a new multiplayer mode for Unity. I know that people played around with the one in Black Flag. I haven't really heard much of a consensus that it was good. I also haven't heard that it sucked. It played well enough for me though. :/

But basically I'm of the mind that sequels should improve upon what sucks, and make what was awesome, more awesome.

So disregarding the female chracter issue, the fact that there is only one dude feels like a let down in and of itself. Its not even four distinct guys, but just one in four different cloaks. Like, I get that they just want folks to use their customized Arno, but it feels a bit weak when you put that in multiplayer mode. Like it was cool back in the day to have four color coded characters. Now...they have the technology to make some really cool shit. Even Halo moved on from multiple Master Cheifs to letting you use alien races in co-op.
 
Apr 24, 2008
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mecegirl said:
Sexual Harassment Panda said:
Has their current multiplayer set-up been much of a success?

I've played all the AC games and barely touched the MP portion of it. Integration within the campaign genuinely might be a good thing. Obviously, I reserve judgement for when I've played the damn thing, but I think this sounds pretty cool.
I couldn't even tell ya why they have chosen to push a new multiplayer mode for Unity. I know that people played around with the one in Black Flag. I haven't really heard much of a consensus that it was good. I also haven't heard that it sucked. It played well enough for me though. :/

But basically I'm of the mind that sequels should improve upon what sucks, and make what was awesome, more awesome.

So disregarding the female chracter issue, the fact that there is only one dude feels like a let down in and of itself. Its not even four distinct guys, but just one in four different cloaks. Like, I get that they just want folks to use their customized Arno, but it feels a bit weak when you put that in multiplayer mode. Like it was cool back in the day to have four color coded characters. Now...they have the technology to make some really cool shit. Even Halo moved on from multiple Master Cheifs to letting you use alien races in co-op.
I think it sounds cool.

You're playing singleplayer, you go to a tavern and learn that friend x is doing mission x in place x... You get into their game, you go to that place and you get involved. The potential for awesome there is high, to my mind. It's much cooler than the deathmatch that they already have. Ideally there would be more customisation, but this sounds good regardless, and I could completely believe it would take a lot of work to make that a reality.

Hopefully it will be a reality in future incarnations.
 

mecegirl

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Sexual Harassment Panda said:
I think it sounds cool.

You're playing singleplayer, you go to a tavern and learn that friend x is doing mission x in place x... You get into their game, you go to that place and you get involved. The potential for awesome there is high, to my mind. It's much cooler than the deathmatch that they already have. Ideally there would be more customisation, but this sounds good regardless, and I could completely believe it would take a lot of work to make that a reality.

Hopefully it will be a reality in future incarnations.
I think they have just dropped the player vs player mode all together for a straight up cooperative mode. Which doesn't bother me, but I'm sure some will miss it.
 

Lightknight

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Reasonable Atheist said:
Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Lightknight said:
Reasonable Atheist said:
Oh please, they are spending literal tonnes of money painstakingly compiling data from a myriad of games to determine what features sell and what do not. Are you suggesting market research is some kind of farce?
A lot of market research is a farce, yes. Mostly studies that fail to randomize the study group or take advice from the wrong people. For example, what good is it to randomize a focus group for a video game if you don't get gamers? Or they fail to account for bias (think of the coffee example Jim Sterling uses so often).

A lot of studies are just statisticians getting paid without working hard.
Now i amm not exactly a fan of ubisoft myself, i have not bought a ubisoft game for my pc in quite some time due to the ridiculous demand that i install uplay. However, why should study groups be random? that seems like a way to get a lot of really pointless data, ubisoft solicits people age 6 and older who are interested in games. You know, doing research into the market for their games.... not random people.
For any study or statistical results to be valid, you have to randomize the participants or you ruin the data with various bias. You can make your study group a little more defined, like saying they need to be gamers between a certain age group. But even that, your results are only valid for gamers between that age group in that example. As long as that group is your target market, then great.
But statistics data for everyone on earth would be totally useless, why even bother? the only data they need is for people interested in the type of media they produce, so they base their studies on consumers of that media. If you are doing a study on the effects of diabetes medication, you get a group of people with diabetes to study and seperate them into a med group, and a control group. It would make no sense at all to test the effectiveness of medications on a cross section of all people, and it makes no sense to do market research for "stealth" third person action games on people who do not want to buy them in the first place. Earth is not the market, the market is. Am i just crazy here?
No, you're just misunderstanding.

You come up with a group that fits your target market that you want to learn more about. Like above, that'd be gamers of a certain age range. What needs to be random is how you select voters out of that demographic. You have to randomize it or you ruin the data. For example, if you're an assassin's creed developer and you only select the group from an assassin's creed convention then you've limited the range of the study.

You have to come up with a larger pool that fits into your target demographic and randomize the people in that pool to select. People get randomization wrong all the time.
 

Elberik

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I always feel sorry for studios when they're asked the loaded question "why didn't you include women in your game?" because there's no good way to answer it. No matter what they say someone will get mad/offended. AAA games are the products of countless programmers, artists, and writer plus a few people who only care about getting a return on their investment. Every year the exact same complaints are logged, maybe it's time to stop looking for fruit in a barren field.
 

Delance

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It seems to me that "Why did you excluide XXX from your game?" is a tricky question. There's no right way to answer it and regardless of what the company says it may cause an uproar. Since no narrative-driven game can be completely inclusive, in theory every company out there could be on Ubisoft's place right now.
 

Erttheking

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Chaosritter said:
Bully? Bully. Really? That's the word we're going with? Devs complaining about being "bullied" sounds a lot like how the one percenters complain about how cruel society is to them. IE, it's a load of hot air. And you're missing my point, the point is that you're not using the word right. If you're going to insult a group of people that disagree with you, at least use the right word.

Because those are stupid reasons. "We're not comfortable with it"? "We didn't see the necessity"? Devs being "uncomfortable" with making any main characters that aren't brown haired heterosexual white men in their mid thirties is one of the main problems with the industry. And as a writer, I have to say that one of the big things about being a writer is getting OUT of your comfort zone. If you don't, you never grow as a writer. "We didn't see the necessity?" What's the necessity they see in their army of generic white heterosexual men then? Yes, they do have reasons. It's just that nine times out of ten they're stupid corporate pandering reasons.

1. My point still stands. And here's the thing, I don't care if they had "the right" to pull it, "their right" to pull it does not mean I can't call them out on their bullshit. For some reason you're acting like devs having "the right" to do something makes them immune to call criticism. I could walk into the middle of a town meeting, take a turn up at the podium to say my piece, and then call every last person in the audience every last foul word I could think of. I had the right to do that, but people are still gonna be pissed at me and call me out on my bullshit. These people who complain about there not being enough DLC? They're idiots. Just like the people who wanted the Xbox One original DRM back. I know it's just "their opinion" but their opinion is uneducated.

2. What does that have to do with anything? They're very legitimate criticisms.

Samus whining was far from the only thing wrong with that game. The shoe horned in mother symbolism that was completely OOC (If she thought that Metroid was her child, she gave it up to be experimented on remarkably quick) the fact that she was completely subservient to a jackass commander who literally shoots her in the back with her being so subservient to him that she didn't turn on her Varia suit in a room where she needed it to survive because he didn't give her the green light. Oh, and you're missing the entire point of why people think Other M was sexist. Samus was the only female character in a game filled with big burly marines. She was the sole female presence, which is why the gross mishandling of her character was such a punch in the face. Dom was in a game filled with other big burly marines who were constantly kicking ass and taking names, so it was hardly the insult Samus in Other M was. Also his whining was in character considering the fact that finding his wife was his sole purpose in life and with her passing he really didn't have much going. Also let's be honest, he was ALWAYS a whiny *****. Stoic characters don't refuse to shut their mouths about their missing wives. Samus was whiny because...Hell if I know. Her daddy figure didn't love her?

No, you use words like entitled and SJW, which really aren't that different because they're designed to insult the other party. Don't act like you're above the influence, because you're not.

Which begs the question, if there are so many female gamers, how come the industry is obsessed with it's generic cookie cutter protagonists? And I find it ironic that you're using that article to prove that the industry isn't that sexist when the article is complaining about how sexist the industry is. Kinda shot yourself in the foot there. And your link between the population of female gamers and the complainers only being a vocal minority needs a citation of its own.

No, it's not. In fact, it's pretty damn sexist that the industry thinks so lowly of men that they think I can't handle playing outside my gender. The whole point of that statement is that I want variety. If there was nothing but black people in gaming, and I mean like 95%, I'd want white people to balance it out. But that's not the case, heterosexual white men dominate everything, and it's like eating the same meal over and over again for a month. I'm sick of it and I want something different.

Always comes back to "the game sells" doesn't it? Frankly I find that argument is just a cheep ploy to avoid talking about the issue in the first place, basically coming down to "It's popular, so shut up." Funny, because I don't think that excuse would fly when it comes to criticizing Micheal Bay or Stephine Meyer, but then again the gaming community pulls out all kinds of excuses that wouldn't fly anywhere else.
 

GalanDun

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Aaron Sylvester said:
GalanDun said:
I'd like to draw everyone's attention to Yahtzee's weekly podcast/hour long gameplay sample that he posted this week.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=pukzwCC4xkc
Contained within, he and his friend Gabriel Morton talk about this issue. I feel it could give rise to some excellent discussion. I like the way they pose this in a way that I as a games designer can sympathize with.
Could you please say roughly what time in that video Yahtzee starts talking about it? Sorry but it's over an hour long :S
Uhhhh....... I know it's somewhere towards the beginning. Hold on, lemme check. Okay, I was wrong. It's after the 30 minute mark. Okay, the discussion about the new Assassin's Creed game starts at about 33:30
 

Lightknight

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Elberik said:
I always feel sorry for studios when they're asked the loaded question "why didn't you include women in your game?" because there's no good way to answer it. No matter what they say someone will get mad/offended. AAA games are the products of countless programmers, artists, and writer plus a few people who only care about getting a return on their investment. Every year the exact same complaints are logged, maybe it's time to stop looking for fruit in a barren field.
If they were smart, they would say, "Money. Next question please." Vague enough to mean multiple things (development time, voice acting, etc) , clear enough to be a good reason.
 

Eryc Duhart

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Lightknight said:
Elberik said:
I always feel sorry for studios when they're asked the loaded question "why didn't you include women in your game?" because there's no good way to answer it. No matter what they say someone will get mad/offended. AAA games are the products of countless programmers, artists, and writer plus a few people who only care about getting a return on their investment. Every year the exact same complaints are logged, maybe it's time to stop looking for fruit in a barren field.
If they were smart, they would say, "Money. Next question please." Vague enough to mean multiple things (development time, voice acting, etc) , clear enough to be a good reason.
It's not a good reason, but it's an honest answer that most will "accept"
 

wulf3n

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Strazdas said:
Didnt final fantasy 13 went into negative to the point where SE had to rethink their strategy? didnt play it thought not sure about its characters, was never attracted to FF franchise.
Well the FF13 shipped sold 6.6 million copies world wide, with FF13-2 selling around half that. Not exactly what I'd call a failure.

Strazdas said:
Baynetta isnt AAA.
That's even more impressive then. I was going to exclude it given that it's sales figures were somewhat lower than the others I pointed out, it was still on par with most other AAA "successes".
 

Amir Kondori

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Ubisoft shows their contempt for their customers over and over again. The "double the work" line is such an obvious lie, designed to give them an acceptable out because their marketing department thinks a game with a female lead won't sell.