Ubisoft: Straighter. Whiter. Duder.

[Gregory Wollf]

Thank you for building this piece, I appreciate the balanced stance. You're analysis confirms my own personal ideas that the people who say "creating female characters is a lot of work," and the people who say "you can create female characters in just a day," are essentially talking about two different things. While perhaps not as entertaining as Jim Sterling's criticism I think it cuts through to the point where popular criticism has missed the mark.

 

[Lightknight]

Absolutely, I don't disagree at all. But when they're basing the only protagonist off of that market then they're going to lean a lot more heavily towards the 80%. Wouldn't you agree?

Not quite to the degree we see, no. I would expect the market to lean in their favour, but I would expect a little more originality and exploration than we see now.

The problem is that you're looking in agreggate. If you're a developer or writer making a story for YOUR game then you're only looking at making your own game for the market you see before you. If you ever look at another game it's to look at what was done right and what wasn't. This isn't like hiring people and then looking back and realizing that your hiring practices are statistically racist. This is like hiring one person and that's it.

It is not Asscred's developers responsibility that other developers also catered to the largest demographic. People are pretending like things should follow natural trends but that's not the case. Every new game has a set of developers thinking only of their game and what the face of their target market is. Until the vast majority of those faces stops being male then we're going to continue to see male protagonists. I'm sorry if this upsets you or anyone else but it's the same reason why the majority voters will always win until they're not majorities. There's simply strength in numbers. I get that. It's reasonable of them as a company to go that way.

I agree that it's perfectly reasonable for us to express the demand for diverse characters. But it's unreasonable for us to go all "ur racist/sexist" when they cater to the largest market segment there is. If I go into the panty hose business I'm not going to focus any significant resources on making my stockings ball-friendly. If I see enough demand I may make some side models but the main lines of panty hose is going to remain the same for the comfort of my main clientele.

It takes only one man to write a book, but publishers and publicity and contracts will frequently make the difference between exposure and a release never seeing the light of day.

The horror genre holds some of the greatest and most recognisable titles in gaming's history. Resident Evil, Silent Hill, etc. It wasn't the gamers who thought horror was dead-- that's something I'm convinced Jim Sterling's right about. Developers simply made their decisions and moved away from horror because they had decided franchises would work better if they were the same as all the other franchises.

Ok, I'm uncertain what the point is though? What the gamers "thought" was irrelevant until it was proven to be financially viable by less risk adverse groups. That really only serves to prove the point and agrees with Jim that these AAA publishers are out of touch regardless. Unless someone shows them that something isn't that risky, then it's extremely rare we'll see big risks being taken. It looks like Sony of all companies is willing to take these risks for some reason.

And here's something to actually consider. Maybe this doesn't do what we think it will? Maybe it does lose far more male gamers than the female gamers it gains? We have to consider the idea that there actually is a difference between sexes in gaming preferences in the same way there is in movies. It is not sexist to consider this possibility. Marketing products to the wrong demographics will lose you money. However, this opens up a much better realm of possibility. That games made for men won't have a female character slapped in it. We could eventually see games actually made for women. Not that women can't like dudebro action games. I mean, I'm likely going home to play COD with my wife in five minutes because that's what she wants to do. But why not have games that fit that romance genre or whatever else we find are different between us when large numbers are taken into account?

 

[McMarbles]

Remember when there was that controversy about Nintendo leaving gay marriage out of Tomodachi Life, and they made that really stupid statement about "social commentary", and the Internet blew up? And then they made a much better statement and it pretty much went away?

Yeah, this is that all over again. It's less the choice they made, more the insanely stupid excuse they used to defend it.

 

[hermes]

Honestly and truly, anyone who refuses to play a game series because the main character doesn't have BLANK in common with them is childish and shallow. I mean, so what? I played the PS Vita game, and Aveline had nothing at all in common with me. She was Black, Female, aristocratic, an athlete, a killer, etc. So what? I say again; so FUCKING what?

It may have been less of an issue because you still had eight million other games that did represent you. It's very easy to say "so EFFING what?" when the issue doesn't affect you.

But the Assassins Creed games were never made to represent ME. Out of their playable characters, one is Arab, one is Native American, two are black, one is a woman, one is Welsh, another one is Italian, two are American and another one is British. Needless to say, none of those profiles fits me entirely, yet I had no problem with playing any of them in the past, because it was never about MY version of the story with MY version of the character, but the story the game director told with the characters they created.

Missrepresentative? Yes. Missed opportunity? Sure. But this is Assassins Creed, not Fallout. The protagonists of Assassins Creed are who they are, not a tabula rasa for players to roleplay themselves.

 

[Silvanus]

The problem is that you're looking in agreggate. If you're a developer or writer making a story for YOUR game then you're only looking at making your own game for the market you see before you. If you ever look at another game it's to look at what was done right and what wasn't. This isn't like hiring people and then looking back and realizing that your hiring practices are statistically racist. This is like hiring one person and that's it.

It is not Asscred's developers responsibility that other developers also catered to the largest demographic. People are pretending like things should follow natural trends but that's not the case. Every new game has a set of developers thinking only of their game and what the face of their target market is. Until the vast majority of those faces stops being male then we're going to continue to see male protagonists. I'm sorry if this upsets you or anyone else but it's the same reason why the majority voters will always win until they're not majorities. There's simply strength in numbers. I get that. It's reasonable of them as a company to go that way.

I agree that it's perfectly reasonable for us to express the demand for diverse characters. But it's unreasonable for us to go all "ur racist/sexist" when they cater to the largest market segment there is. If I go into the panty hose business I'm not going to focus any significant resources on making my stockings ball-friendly. If I see enough demand I may make some side models but the main lines of panty hose is going to remain the same for the comfort of my main clientele.

Marketers have to look in aggregate. If they look at the market and identify the largest demographic, but don't think to look at the other media that occupies the same space as them, they're being pretty shortsighted and simplistic. No media exists in a vacuum.

For what it's worth, I don't think the developers/ marketers are sexist or racist, but I do think they're unimaginative, and that the art suffers as a result. Money may be an explanatory factor, but I don't find it a particularly good one.

Ok, I'm uncertain what the point is though? What the gamers "thought" was irrelevant until it was proven to be financially viable by less risk adverse groups. That really only serves to prove the point and agrees with Jim that these AAA publishers are out of touch regardless. Unless someone shows them that something isn't that risky, then it's extremely rare we'll see big risks being taken. It looks like Sony of all companies is willing to take these risks for some reason.

Aye-- that's the problem. That's what I'm encouraging; people making bold decisions and convincing those that are complacent and unadventurous that there's more fertile ground here than they seem to believe. Criticism is an important part of that. There are quite a few people requesting more diversity now: it's harder to ignore.

And here's something to actually consider. Maybe this doesn't do what we think it will? Maybe it does lose far more male gamers than the female gamers it gains? We have to consider the idea that there actually is a difference between sexes in gaming preferences in the same way there is in movies. It is not sexist to consider this possibility. Marketing products to the wrong demographics will lose you money. However, this opens up a much better realm of possibility. That games made for men won't have a female character slapped in it. We could eventually see games actually made for women. Not that women can't like dudebro action games. I mean, I'm likely going home to play COD with my wife in five minutes because that's what she wants to do. But why not have games that fit that romance genre or whatever else we find are different between us when large numbers are taken into account?

I agree entirely. More exploration into different genres is something I would very much welcome. Again, it's something that hasn't happened, because the innovation and invention seem to be dirty words (unless they're used emptily).

But the Assassins Creed games were never made to represent ME. Out of their playable characters, one is Arab, one is Native American, two are black, one is a woman, one is Welsh, another one is Italian, two are American and another one is British. Needless to say, none of those profiles fits me entirely, yet I had no problem with playing any of them in the past, because it was never about MY version of the story with MY version of the character, but the story the game director told with the characters they created.

Missrepresentative? Yes. Missed opportunity? Sure. But this is Assassins Creed, not Fallout. The protagonists of Assassins Creed are who they are, not a tabula rasa for players to roleplay themselves.

I agree with the first part. The AC series is pretty good, overall, on the diversity front.

I think the second paragraph slightly misses the point. It's not about roleplaying oneself; there's still a huge amount of power in identifying with protagonists and characters in a piece of art.

 

[The Real Sandman]

This is the studio that published what is often said to be one of the best female characters in gaming (Jade, Beyond: Good and Evil) and had an Assasin's Creed game with a black female protagonist (AC Liberation).

And even after these games failed to get sales in the range of the rest of their franchise(Liberation) or bombed outright (B:GaE), they still released a game with a little girl as the main character (Child of Light).

The main reason why Beyond Good and Evil and Liberation were not that successful was thanks to Ubi not giving them proper exposure or advertising, especially with BG&E. What is the point of spending millions of dollars on a product and not bother to get the word out? Sure BG&E found an audience later as something of a cult classic, but the damage was already done.

Also, the ladies of BG&E, AC Liberation, and Child of Light are drastically outnumbered by

Assassin's Creed 1, 2, Brotherhood, Revalations, 3, and 4
Watch_Dogs
The Splinter Cell series
The Prince of Persia series
Call of Juarez 1, 2, and Gunslinger
The Far Cry series

Overall, Ubi's catalog is kind of a sausage fest.

 

[Aaron Sylvester]

A friend of mine is a rock climber and also gamer and she WAS playing through this franchise because it was well made and she enjoyed a lot of the similarities of climbing and doing crazy agile things. Then she found out about how they're not going to bother with female protags in the future game and took serious offense to it. So much so she put away the games and refuses to play through the rest of them, disgusted by Ubi.

I think your rock-climber friend needs to sort out a few problems of her own in that case, if she takes offense to things in media that easily. Taking offense to a decision made by the developer about characters or story? That's like taking offense to The Hobbit for having no Chinese dwarves, or getting offended because the God Of War protagonist wasn't female.

To that extent, they may be ignoring their female fanbase

So any game that doesn't have playable females is "ignoring their female fanbase"? Interesting.

 

[rasputin0009]

If Ubisoft was a startup company, I'd believe that it would take significantly more resources to add a second gender. But they're not. They have 5 or more studios working on each game and years upon years of assets waiting to be utilized. They've made previous playable Assassin's Creed females; use those models/animations as a basis. A bonus idea would be to use the same people who made those assets and have the experience modifying them to work on creating new female models/animations. A couple of days, max. Ubisoft is too big to give these shitty of excuses.

 

[Something Amyss]

Assassin's Creed Liberation didn't get as much advertising because it wasn't a cross platform release (the HD multiplatform version came later), you can't blame Ubisoft for not advertising something that wouldn't reach half the usual consumers, purely due to not coming out on a platform those consumers own.

Weren't you the one who brought this up? The sales of a game that was not well marketed on a handheld that did poorly in the first place should have more explanatory power than the "girl" factor. The idea that people would drop 200 bucks (since most people didn't have a PSP) for a game that didn't see significant marketing and was treated like an also-ran is inane, yet that's more or less the only way the conclusion that an audience "chomping at the bit" might come into play here.

Arthur Dent had an easier time with city planning.

 

[Chris Slime]

It's almost like game devs are a bunch of 30 something white males making games about characters they can personally relate to. The representation "problem" in video games is one that will fix itself as it's new under represented audience matures to adulthood with a interest in games and makes games with stories they can relate to. A white male dominated industry will always produce products that relate to an interest of white males. All these articles and ranting at the industry and Ubisoft is all so much pissing in the wind really.

 

[Grim Sterling]

I think your rock-climber friend needs to sort out a few problems of her own in that case, if she takes offense to things in media that easily. Taking offense to a decision made by the developer about characters or story? That's like taking offense to The Hobbit for having no Chinese dwarves, or getting offended because the God Of War protagonist wasn't female.

To that extent, they may be ignoring their female fanbase

So any game that doesn't have playable females is "ignoring their female fanbase"? Interesting.

Well I agree her reaction was a bit extreme, but it was a reaction none the less. People can be 'put off' for their own personal sticking points, and her disappointment with the news about this was enough to sour her appreciation for their work. She is also not a hardcore gamer, with a lot of other hobbies and time consuming things to do, so dropping a game franchise that she doesn't enjoy thoroughly is not a huge loss for her.

I don't think it's the idea of not having a female player is ignoring them so much as almost NEVER having it as an option. What I was saying was in line with some of what was said in Jim's other rants on Ubi where they claim to be listening to their fans, but what actions are taken don't necessarily reflect said listening. Also I said "May be" not "is"; There 'may be' a spaghetti monster in your closet, but there 'is' a coat hanger. Big difference.

Personally I will play their games when and if I have time, but I will not go out of my way to drop full price on them. I am less inclined to go after a game touted as having another bland cardboard protag to play as (especially if the overall plot/story is said to be lacking). But if they add variety and depth then hey, good stuff.