Ubisoft: Straighter. Whiter. Duder.

[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.