NEWS: Rust Randomly Chooses Players' Race For Them

[Skatologist]

It appears the moderately successful survival horror game you can find here and here for purchase and play, has decided to introduce racial features within the game. Previously, the player models within the game looked predominately Caucasian and more or less the same.

The announcement of actually introducing racial and face changes occurred in a dev blog post over a week ago claiming to introduce more skin colours and features in the future considering the vast abundance of them and deciding that players will be randomly assigned said features, having them tied to their Steam IDs. The reason for this seems to be based on Rust's theme of utter randomness and recognition of other player characters easily.

Some controversy has occurred over some players getting angry at their player models suddenly changing without their knowledge, although lead Garry Newman assures that the update has been mostly favorable so far. Mr. Newman also has ambitions of adding many more features, including aesthetic ones, to his game which is still in Early Access.



SOURCE: Kotaku

Apologies for any errors, the user writing this can not preview/edit posts or quote others at the moment

 

[lacktheknack]

That's a fantastic idea. I love it. I kind of want to buy the game now just to see how well this works as an experiment.

The only people I can see being outraged by this are the ones I would want to see outraged.

 

[MerlinCross]

Does it affect gameplay at all? No?

Then I don't expect this to change too much. Sure you might see insulting race terms increase a bit but people are going to be assholes and kill new players for whatever small supplies they've scavenged up. Same thing would happen in most survival games(read like all the zombie games). These games breed a certain type of attitude and I don't think race is at the core. What's at the core is, "I have power and you don't."

Most the time said power is having a gun or the drop on someone.

 

[inmunitas]

Maybe this could lead to an opportunity for introspection and rethinking of how we think of our digital avatars?

Anyways, interesting of them to use this as an opportunity to see the servers become a literal battleground for social issues. Ballsy move, not sure if thats one I would've taken, so I'm interested to see how it plays out. I do like the idea of not choosing your avatar's race in the same sense that none of us chose to be who we are in reality, as nobody chooses their gender or race or other characteristics like that, seems like a really cool idea, even if that may not be the intent. We all would like to play as avatars representing either ourselves, our ideal selves, or fantasy sides to ourselves (Second Life, anybody?) but it could also mean a lot to be forced to rethink how our avatars represent ourselves.

That theory heavily relies on the assumption that most players are so narcissistic that they are unable to play as, or sympathies with, an avatar that isn't an idolized image of themselves.

 

[Megalodon]

Could you imagine how the original Samus Aran reveal would go today?

Leaked months in advance?

Possibly with a dev press release along the lines of 'woe is us, nobody want to fund female protagonists', followed by feminists arguing whether Samus is a good female character for kicking seven kinds of arse or a bad character because 'man with boobs'.

 

[Kopikatsu]

Does that not strike you as a potential issue in the industry? Not even necessarily from the "sexism" aspect but from the "charts are god, we must obey charts!" aspect that sadly isn't much of an exaggeration?

Because female protagonists don't sell as well. Tomb Raider 2013 (PS3/360/PC) vs Uncharted (PS3). Same genre, similar mechanics. Lara is a well known character and part of a very long running franchise, Nathan was a brand new character in a new IP. Tomb Raider sold 3.4 million copies in the first month across all systems; Uncharted sold 4.2 million in that time. Uncharted 3 went on to sell 3.8 million copies on the very first day it was released. Time'll tell how Rise of the Tomb Raider fares compared to that, but I don't think it will be favorably.

I wonder what you want them to do. Let their profits take a large hit because... why? They'll go where the money is, no more, no less. That's not unreasonable of them either.

 

[Rayce Archer]

I still want to know why everyone is naked.

 

[Rolaoi]

I always thought random avatars would be fun. Especially if they had impact on gameplay rather than just aesthetics. Players would be forced to adapt and overcome rather than just following the most efficient route.

 

[Sanderpower]

Does that not strike you as a potential issue in the industry? Not even necessarily from the "sexism" aspect but from the "charts are god, we must obey charts!" aspect that sadly isn't much of an exaggeration?

Because female protagonists don't sell as well. Tomb Raider 2013 (PS3/360/PC) vs Uncharted (PS3). Same genre, similar mechanics. Lara is a well known character and part of a very long running franchise, Nathan was a brand new character in a new IP. Tomb Raider sold 3.4 million copies in the first month across all systems; Uncharted sold 4.2 million in that time. Uncharted 3 went on to sell 3.8 million copies on the very first day it was released. Time'll tell how Rise of the Tomb Raider fares compared to that, but I don't think it will be favorably.

I wonder what you want them to do. Let their profits take a large hit because... why? They'll go where the money is, no more, no less. That's not unreasonable of them either.

It was Uncharted 3 that was released in 2013, not the original Uncharted. It can't be a new IP if it already has two previous games and multiple spin offs.

Even then why only compare the differing genders of the main character? They have different story lines, different characters, and the previous games in the franchise received different reviews. Therefore consumers would expect something (and get something) different from the games.

Also Tomb Raider was a reboot while Uncharted 3 was a sequel. Therefore they aren't even exactly the same because Uncharted is continuing a story while Tomb Raider is starting a whole new one. Hell, one could argue that Tomb Raider(2013) is a more of a "new IP" because of it's reboot status then Uncharted 3 is because of it's sequel status.

 

[Kopikatsu]

Does that not strike you as a potential issue in the industry? Not even necessarily from the "sexism" aspect but from the "charts are god, we must obey charts!" aspect that sadly isn't much of an exaggeration?

Because female protagonists don't sell as well. Tomb Raider 2013 (PS3/360/PC) vs Uncharted (PS3). Same genre, similar mechanics. Lara is a well known character and part of a very long running franchise, Nathan was a brand new character in a new IP. Tomb Raider sold 3.4 million copies in the first month across all systems; Uncharted sold 4.2 million in that time. Uncharted 3 went on to sell 3.8 million copies on the very first day it was released. Time'll tell how Rise of the Tomb Raider fares compared to that, but I don't think it will be favorably.

I wonder what you want them to do. Let their profits take a large hit because... why? They'll go where the money is, no more, no less. That's not unreasonable of them either.

It was Uncharted 3 that was released in 2013, not the original Uncharted. It can't be a new IP if it already has two previous games and multiple spin offs.

Even then why only compare the differing genders of the main character? They have different story lines, different characters, and the previous games in the franchise received different reviews. Therefore consumers would expect something (and get something) different from the games.

Also Tomb Raider was a reboot while Uncharted 3 was a sequel. Therefore they aren't even exactly the same because Uncharted is continuing a story while Tomb Raider is starting a whole new one. Hell, one could argue that Tomb Raider(2013) is a more of a "new IP" because of it's reboot status then Uncharted 3 is because of it's sequel status.

I compared Tomb Raider to Uncharted 1. Then mentioned Uncharted 3 in regards to Rise of the Tomb Raider.

 

[seris]

I think this is pretty cool, but ive already been seeing complaints on the facepunch forums about users getting called racial slurs because of their characters skin color

 

[Gladion]

snip

I hope you are aware of the flimsiness of your argumentation. The idea that a game's success or lack thereof can be attributed to the main character's identity is always being brought up when a game "underperforms", and completely ignores other factors such as release schedule, total sales (why just look at first month sales? Overall, Tomb Raider did better than Uncharted) and even fucking quality of the product itself.
What I'm saying is that you make it sound like this very simple formula (male protagonist will guarantee more sales than female protagonist), when it's really just a shorthand excuse for people in the industry who cannot admit that their games may not be as fantastic as they think they are. The same is being said for non-white male characters, an argument that completely ignores that the best-selling game of the best-selling platform of all time has a black protagonist.

 

[Vigormortis]

...having them tied to their Steam IDs.

This is the only part I take issue with.

I'm all for having a character's features chosen through an RNG, but to force players to have to stick with the first (and only) set of random features their character gets, with no possibility for changing them or rolling for a new set?

Mmm, can't say I'm behind that. I love Facepunch's idea here, just not entirely the execution. Giving players more options is almost always a better design choice than limiting them. Especially when you expect the players to rely on, and then stick with, whatever the RNG gives them.

[sub]inb4 You're just racist!!![/sub]

 

[Sanderpower]

Does that not strike you as a potential issue in the industry? Not even necessarily from the "sexism" aspect but from the "charts are god, we must obey charts!" aspect that sadly isn't much of an exaggeration?

Because female protagonists don't sell as well. Tomb Raider 2013 (PS3/360/PC) vs Uncharted (PS3). Same genre, similar mechanics. Lara is a well known character and part of a very long running franchise, Nathan was a brand new character in a new IP. Tomb Raider sold 3.4 million copies in the first month across all systems; Uncharted sold 4.2 million in that time. Uncharted 3 went on to sell 3.8 million copies on the very first day it was released. Time'll tell how Rise of the Tomb Raider fares compared to that, but I don't think it will be favorably.

I wonder what you want them to do. Let their profits take a large hit because... why? They'll go where the money is, no more, no less. That's not unreasonable of them either.

It was Uncharted 3 that was released in 2013, not the original Uncharted. It can't be a new IP if it already has two previous games and multiple spin offs.

Even then why only compare the differing genders of the main character? They have different story lines, different characters, and the previous games in the franchise received different reviews. Therefore consumers would expect something (and get something) different from the games.

Also Tomb Raider was a reboot while Uncharted 3 was a sequel. Therefore they aren't even exactly the same because Uncharted is continuing a story while Tomb Raider is starting a whole new one. Hell, one could argue that Tomb Raider(2013) is a more of a "new IP" because of it's reboot status then Uncharted 3 is because of it's sequel status.

I compared Tomb Raider to Uncharted 1. Then mentioned Uncharted 3 in regards to Rise of the Tomb Raider.

You're still comparing games that were released 6 years apart, you could of compared it to Tomb Raider: Legend which was released in 2006 (albeit the PS3 version didn't come out until a bit later and it was on multiple platforms) solid 4.8 million copies.

Like I said before, they may have a similar "treasure hunter genre" but they still have a different story, characters, background history, marketing, reviews, etc.

Looking solely at the differing gender of the protagonists is confusing correlation with causation and ignoring far to many other factors that could just as well explain the difference in sells.

 

[Kopikatsu]

snip

I hope you are aware of the flimsiness of your argumentation. The idea that a game's success or lack thereof can be attributed to the main character's identity is always being brought up when a game "underperforms", and completely ignores other factors such as release schedule, total sales (why just look at first month sales? Overall, Tomb Raider did better than Uncharted) and even fucking quality of the product itself.
What I'm saying is that you make it sound like this very simple formula (male protagonist will guarantee more sales than female protagonist), when it's really just a shorthand excuse for people in the industry who cannot admit that their games may not be as fantastic as they think they are. The same is being said for non-white male characters, an argument that completely ignores that the best-selling game of the best-selling platform of all time has a black protagonist.

Generally when determining if something is a success, companies look at the initial influx of sales for a variety of reasons (not the least of which is because they make the most profit on those. Further sales can occur at discounted prices, or as pre-owned in which case the company receives a big 0% of the profits). Another reason is because Tomb Raider was sold on multiple systems while Uncharted was only sold on one. Had Uncharted been multi-platform, I'm sure that it would have outperformed Tomb Raider in total as well.

And what game are you talking about? IIRC the most popular game ever is Tetris.

 

[The Bucket]

snip

I hope you are aware of the flimsiness of your argumentation. The idea that a game's success or lack thereof can be attributed to the main character's identity is always being brought up when a game "underperforms", and completely ignores other factors such as release schedule, total sales (why just look at first month sales? Overall, Tomb Raider did better than Uncharted) and even fucking quality of the product itself.
What I'm saying is that you make it sound like this very simple formula (male protagonist will guarantee more sales than female protagonist), when it's really just a shorthand excuse for people in the industry who cannot admit that their games may not be as fantastic as they think they are. The same is being said for non-white male characters, an argument that completely ignores that the best-selling game of the best-selling platform of all time has a black protagonist.

Generally when determining if something is a success, companies look at the initial influx of sales for a variety of reasons (not the least of which is because they make the most profit on those. Further sales can occur at discounted prices, or as pre-owned in which case the company receives a big 0% of the profits). Another reason is because Tomb Raider was sold on multiple systems while Uncharted was only sold on one. Had Uncharted been multi-platform, I'm sure that it would have outperformed Tomb Raider in total as well.

And what game are you talking about? IIRC the most popular game ever is Tetris.

Pretty sure he means San Andreas, since as far as I know the PS2 is still the best selling console

 

[inmunitas]

That theory heavily relies on the assumption that most players are so narcissistic that they are unable to play as, or sympathies with, an avatar that isn't an idolized image of themselves.

Less so that people can't do that, and more so that we're simply not used to doing it. Really the only genre where the player isn't usually playing an idealized version of themselves in some way or another is the nearly-dead adventure genre or the horror genre that is becoming more and more oriented towards violent engagement with the horror, eg Dead Space and Resident Evil.

I'm not sure how you can come to the conclusion that every video game protagonists, apart from a select few, are some how an self-idealization of every player. Where is the research to back that assertion up?

If anything the horror genre has become less about "violent engagement with the horror" Five Nights at Freddy's, Alan Wake, Amnesia: The Dark Descent and Alien: Isolation are all examples of the new "non-violent engagement" take on the horror genre. Resident Evil is an old series that dates back to the 90s and Dead Space isn't exactly a recent IP ether. As for the adventure genre nearly-dead? When it's one of the most popular genres. Seriously? Again, I don't see how you can come to that conclusion.

Possibly with a dev press release along the lines of 'woe is us, nobody want to fund female protagonists'

Does that not strike you as a potential issue in the industry? Not even necessarily from the "sexism" aspect but from the "charts are god, we must obey charts!" aspect that sadly isn't much of an exaggeration?

It has traditionally known to be the publishes that have shied away from female protagonists, typically on the basis that they don't believe that a title with a female protagonists would sell as well. I suspect it probably has something to do with applying "marketing" research for other types of media to video games, without checking whether or not such an assumption is valid for interactive media. On top of that, I'm not aware that anyone covering the industry, nor in academia, has ever even really been in a position to counter that argument.

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