conmag9 said:
Ugg...
Putting aside the fact that Mass Effect 2 had at least one lesbian romance...
Is the lack of a gay option really that big a deal? It's not a big symbolic condemnation (Bioware's used 'em before and even if they hadn't, not everything is meant to be symbolic) and I'm rather sick of companies being flamed for it. Shepard works with a very small team. With the probable exception of the Asari, the most widespread sexuality is heterosexual. It is not at all surprising that things might work out that way. The odds are in favor of it. And even if it weren't, the romantic subplots were incredibly token anyway. That should be more annoying really.
(1) Complaining about Bioware not doing it is justified precisely
because they've shown that they're willing to do it in the past.
(2) It's not a symbolic condemnation, but putting it in a few games and then refusing to put it in others where it makes just as much sense makes it feel like the original inclusion
was purely symbolic. Hopefully it was actually because they recognise that players would enjoy the content.
(3) What was the lesbian option in ME2? ME1 had Liara, but I can't think of who it was in ME2 (the "not female" argument about Liara is pretty dumb given that while they aren't female sex, Asari are
certainly female gendered from what we've seen).
(4) You're basing this off of odds you don't even know. How could you possibly know the statistics for sexuality in the Mass Effect universe? The fact that we haven't seen specific evidence for gay or bisexual characters could just as easily indicate that it's a completely pedestrian occurance unworthy of specific mention (looking back at old dev stuff from ME1 where "everyone is bisexual in space/the future", this is what they were originally intending) as it could that it isn't particularly prevalent.
(5) We don't know which characters are heterosexual. Some of them have no romantic dialogue at all and the ones that do have only heterosexual options. Some could easily be bisexual (again, as they were intended to be in ME1).
(6) If the romantic options are so "token", maybe you should argue that they should be done away with entirely rather than complaining about a specific type of them? Before you say "I did that", it doesn't count if you do that
after complaining about the specific type.
(7) I assure you, gay people do actually like it when there are gay people in games and gay relationship options. It isn't just a "token" thing, it's getting a rare opportunity to play a character in a way you understand implicitly and an opportunity to explore that in a different setting, which is one of the big points of RPGs.
Logan Westbrook said:
What's more, they will finally add lesbian and gay options, something that was notably absent [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/99710-BioWare-Explains-Why-Theres-No-Homosexuality-in-Mass-Effect-2] in Mass Effect 2.
Oh good, Bioware is finally going to catch up with itself!
On the other hand, I'm not entirely sure how to take this given their previous comments. Was the insistence that Shepard was canon-straight just a bullshit excuse? Was it a real intention and now they're just bowing to criticism (if so, is this a good or a bad thing?)?
