Ninjamedic said:
The only problem I have with using Saints Row as an example is the fact that the Player Character is a Customisable Avatar. While fine for RPGS, Sandbox Games and other games with a custom PC, it doesn't really say much about games like Red Dead Redemption or GTA V where the characters/story are written specifically to the one intended vision of the designers for those characters.
This may be irrational of me, but given the current mentality to design and events like Retake Mass Effect, isn't there a risk of a precedent that will only result in another set of checkboxes for developers to make their games 'acceptable'? Don't think I disagree with the spirit of your argument, I just think there needs to be a caveat about this being for encouragement of new ideas and not to be interpreted as something to be expected from the get go of a games inception.
Did any of what I said make sense?
I understand what you fear. However, at the same time I don't find there to be much reason to fear those things ever happening.
Here's the thing, people who don't want any change have brought up before why the giant tits that flop all over the place, and the almost naked women just lying around the place will never leave. They bring it up as the reason there will never be the change, but it is in fact the reason you shouldn't fear any "change in precedent".
There are a lot of people who enjoy that look. Enough that some games can(and some try) to make it a big part of their marketing. Say what you will about Dead or Alive's gameplay being good or not, but you can't say they haven't used the looks of their female characters to sell copies. There is a market for people who want their Jiggle Physics. Even if the precedent changed to that not being the first thing devs want to make, it still will be made plenty because it has an audience.
That's the problem Jim is talking about though. Not just with this issue, but on a whole lot of the industries issues. The people who like that are just one part of the audience. As Jim put it; People aren't trying to actually "broaden the audience. They're going after the same audience everyone else is thinking that's all that they can do without trying to find new/different people, because that would mean they would have to CHANGE what they do.
Again, one part of this argument stems from a false presumption that the giant tits that jiggle even if the girl isn't really moving is THE only thing that people find to be a sexy female look. People don't want no more sexy female characters. They want different kinds of sexy characters. You don't have to have crazy body proportions, and be half naked to be sexy!
In fact I'd say it often hurts the chances of a character being considered "sexy" if they do that, because it comes off as trying to hard.
If a precedent is made, we will not lose the Jiggle Physics. We will only gain new/different types of female characters.
Legion said:
I both agree and disagree.
I agree with the point you are making, but at the same time you seem to be countering a point that doesn't seem to be exactly the one being made (at least from what I have really seen).
When I see people complain about games being restricted I don't see them meaning in the sense that they will have less creativity. They tend to mean that they will have less creative freedom. That by caving into people saying "This is bad" or "You shouldn't be doing that" they are paving the way for people to dictate what developers can and cannot do. That would be stopping developers from making the games that they want to make and they will end up only making games that the loudest people want made, so as not to get any backlash from it.
I suppose the Mass Effect 3 ending is a good example. They chose to make the ending as it was originally and people complained about it extremely vocally. So they released the extended cut. Many people argued that by caving into the people complaining the developers gave up their creativity, because they didn't make the ending that they thought the game should have, they gave in and created the ending that the complainers wanted.
I think the fear is that if enough people start complaining about certain features in games, it will become considered socially unacceptable to have those features at all. In some ways that is actually a valid point. If people complain non-stop about sexy female characters, then eventually they are going to stop being made at all, because developers don't want the constant outrage over it from tarnishing the games reputation and giving it negative press.
First: As I said before, people don't want sexy characters to go away. They just want different kinds of sexy characters, not just the same old same old.
Second: BioWare didn't make the ending the complainers wanted. They changed their ending, on their terms.
People wanted Shep. to be able to live. They didn't get that(I still say that one end where we see Shep. breathing is just bull to be ignored).
People wanted a way to beat the Reapers with out the Star child's help. Those that took that path(shot him) got a continued Reaper cycle.
I once had a short talk with Grey about that in the comments of his comic. And he explained exactly what they needed to do, and what they did eventually, and then some.
They just had to explain the ending more to the audience. ME2 starts with Shep. dying in the most extreme way they could think of. Shep should not have survived. But soon after, we get him/her right back. Why wasn't there THAT much hate for this? Because they took their time to explain it, and that it wasn't easy or simple. That is what they do with the changes to the end of ME3.
The major parts of it stay the same(with a few exceptions like the relays not being destroyed completely), and adding extra scenes in that gave us more information about what was going on.
Even after all that it's still a bit unclear completely what the end means, but most people found it to be enough.
I am with Jim 100% on his side of the ME3 end altering. In the end everyone could complain all they want, but Bioware had the final call. They heard what people were saying, and chose to change the end a bit because they wanted to. They looked at their work, and decided that they could deal with changing their artistic vision.
IF they really had faith in the ending, and had no doubts that it was the was it was meant to be. They would have stuck with it.
They didn't give in because "the fans forced them". They did it because the fans convinced them that they had a point. And in the end I think they found a good middle way to improve the work without changing it into something completely different.
As for the complaint about sexism in The Last of Us and Bioshock? I never really heard of such complaints until the article on the escapist about Naughty Dogs response to it. And I don't think you can argue(well) that asking for more types of female characters has lost us more creative things that the current precedent that women characters that aren't sexualized can't sell games.
Heck, look at the games you brought up. Bioshock Infinite couldn't have Elisabeth on the front cover, The Last of Us had to fight to get Ellie on the front, and to get women in to test out the game. There is no need to worry about a terrible precedent being put in the industry because there already is one.
Look. There is something I want to make clear to both of you.
I like you two. You're cool people, and I enjoy seeing you around the Escapist.
That said, while I can understand what it is you're worried about, and I agree if the change were to come the way you're afraid it will, it would be bad.
However, from my perspective it just seems very less than likely, and hard to even say possible. I just don't see these fears ever coming true.
For the benefit of the doubt though; lets say that we start seeing the jiggle physics "go away"(even in the doom of doom results I don't think it would go away completely).
To paraphrase MoveiBob, who was always and still is on the side that the ME3 ending shouldn't have been changed; "If these things we are trying to keep can be lost, by just having a reasoned discussion about them. What is the real value of what we are trying to protect?"
Would keeping the abundance of Jiggle Physics, be worth not seeing different types of sexy characters more often, if that really was the sacrifice we would have to make?
Again, I don't even think we have to lose the Jiggle to gain the other types. We won't be seeing less of it. We would be seeing more of other things.
Sorry to be so long. I hope you both have good days, and better weeks.
=w= b
Also, Thank God for Jim.