Ubisoft Writer Predicts No Gay Game Heroes Anytime Soon

Cerebrawl

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AntiChri5 said:
Anyway, what about New Vegas? I was under the impression that that handled it's gay characters rather well too.
Fallout has had it possible to have a gay/bi protagonist since at least Fallout 2, even going as far as gay marriage(shotgun wedding), can't remember if it was in the original Fallout. There's even a perk dedicated to it in New Vegas: Confirmed Bachelor (which is slang for gay).

Saints Row 3 had complete sexual freedom as well, and also let you cross-dress, or have basically any crazy outward appearance.
 

Silvanus

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BigTuk said:
Romance is subtle, and usually only crops up if there happens to be another gay character. Besides every gamer knows ROmance is just the prevolution form of Sex.. Sex is what you want sonny, ROmance is the means to that Want. You know sort of like We want to not have to live in a trash bin so we drag our asses to work everyday.

Romance is the grind to Sex's loot. Every Gamer knows that.
Spoken like a true romantic!

Great number of (straight) romantic sub-plots, though, and very few of those lead inexorably to actually-shown sex. They don't need to.
 

Madman123456

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SirBryghtside said:
I honestly think it's a really bad idea to use BioWare's pure fanservice 'romance' subplots as an example of character sexuality in gaming - okay, I'll admit it's a 'progressive' attitude, but it's never to promote any sort of character development or equality - just to make the fans' wet dreams come true. That problem comes up in BioWare games because that's what BioWare wanted to do with it from the start. I definitely recommend Fallout: New Vegas for some well-written characters of every orientation who don't want to sleep with you at the drop of a power helmet.
Well, there aren't all that many examples to chose from which is one of the reasons for this thing being "news".

If we weren't so adamant about shoe horning a love subplot into everything the characters sexuality wouldn't matter, no one would care.

Ah, just thought of a better example: Arcade Gannon from Fallout: New Vegas.
You can romance him but if you don't it's still rather obvius that he prefers male company.
 

Therumancer

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Getting away from my own overall opinions on the subject, I'll say that the solution here is that it's one of those issues where gays need to grow up. Right now we're at the point where love it or hate it, the battle has been won, it's time to pretty much get on with your lives and take advantage of the opportunities that were won. Much like Bill Cosby's comments about Black Culture, especially when it comes to education and cultural attitudes.

Now, before anyone wants to start jumping on me, because of who I am, let's be honest here... gay characters exist in video games. Something other people have pointed out. Especially if you want to get into indie titles like "Loren: Amazon Princess" or porn titles that also double as actual games like the "Lightning Warrior Raidy" series. What's more it goes all the way back to things like "Phantasmagoria 2" where part of the game is the main character you control grappling with the fact that he might be gay (as comes out in some scenes with his shrink). This is not to even getting into the legions of other characters in supporting roles ranging from "Mass Effect" and "Dragon Age" to the gay guys who trade you doll clothes in exchange for your collecting cheesecake photos of dudes for them. In short it's a pretty varied bunch when you get down to it, ranging from the serious, to the exaggerated and comedic, and pretty fair when you get down to the fact that your dealing with a pretty small group of people over all. There is a point at which the fight becomes it's own thing, something a culture needs in order to define itself, always pushing for more, even when it becomes increasingly ridiculous. There are still some gay rights battles going on, but for the most part it's not an issue within the media, especially seeing as media creators have largely been one of the biggest allies the gay rights movement has had.

I tend to see the issue as being pretty well summarized by the whole "The Old Republic" controversy. The guys writing "The Old Republic" created their game and it's stories without any gay characters in it. That shouldn't be any bigger a deal than someone creating something that does have one, but it became one. Due to Bioware's handling of gay romance options this was demanded as an entitlement, even if it was something only a fairly small group of people wanted. Bioware felt their existent writing was fine, and as a result pretty much kept it the way it was (especially with the amount of money spent, and not wanting to hire voice-actors to re-do or add entire scenes), but they conceded to add some same sex stuff when they expanded the game largely because of the demand... a promise I might add they kept as they made sure there was both a gay character and a lesbian character included in the "Hutt Cartel" expansion, which they went out of their way to do. This was however not considered to be good enough, as it wasn't "in your face" enough, the whole idea was that for the "crime" of there not being any gay people in the game to begin with, there were expectations that there was going to be content added to the game that was going to specifically upset and offend homophobes due to it's constant and pervasive nature, something being screamed from the rooftops for a while and was seen as something of a betrayal when it didn't appear.

The point here is that in a lot of cases people talking about the lack of gay characters, are usually in an offhanded way pushing for straight bashing, or material that is designed to upset alleged "homophobes". Tasteful content, like what was originally demanded is already there, the whole "we're gay, we're here, and we're working" is pretty much what you'd expected... it being presented as fairly normal. The ultimate argument now coming down to "we want it to be loud and obnoxious" and honestly that's already out there too (think of the gay guys I mentioned from one of the Shadow Hearts sequels) but just doesn't work for everything.

The point is that love it or hate it, and whatever side your own, it's already been won. The major gay characters and the gay protagonist have already happened, sure it's not in every game, but then again when dealing with a minority of people it shouldn't be, but it's not being shied away from either. It's fair enough to have the opinion that you'd like to see more gay protaganists and characters if that's your thing, but to try and act like this is some kind of a real issue, or a matter of the game industry not maturing... it's really not. What's more the point about marketing is pretty valid when you get down to it, at the end of the day homosexuals are vastly outnumbered by straights, and to an extent most straight people aren't interested in gay sex, and want their tititallation to be hetero. Thus a "straight" product is going to be more profitable and not much is ever likely to change that, as accepting as someone might be of gays, as a general rule a straight guy isn't going to get all hot and bothered by two dudes. At the very least you can put it up into the same category as fans of niche game types (like serious RPGs) that don't get developed either because there are simply far bigger, and more profitable, audiences to cater to. Tolerance and societal acceptence really has nothing to do with big parts of this.


Not something I'm going to argue (I know a lot of people will want to jump on this, in part because I wrote it) just making some statements to add balance, and get a few people to perhaps think about it from another perspective.
 

Verlander

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No shit. I believe 100% in equal rights, but people HAVE to expect changes to take time, generations even. It's like folks bitching about equal job opportunities. I agree, but shit it'll take time
 

Supdupadog

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Therumancer said:
The point is that love it or hate it, and whatever side your own, it's already been won.
Dude, you don't "win" cultural diversity and stuff.

It goes on forever and ever and ever.
 

Douglas York

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You know this is all very interesting and raises a lot of good points.

God knows I love me some romance in my games when it's an OPTION and not some kind of tacked-on story filler, like the stereotypical "rescue your big titted genius scientist girlfriend from the bad guy" plot, or "finding love was the real victory" crap and leaves it open to interpretation.

Take Chris Redfield from the Resident Evil games for example. He, to my mind, is gay, always has been and until they definitively say otherwise, always will be. His reactions to Sheva, Rebecca, Jill, Leon AND Piers were friendly and/or professional but nothing more, but little things about his speech, his behaviour, and the fact that he is a beefed-up monster truck with monkey ears, makes me think he likes the guys. And you know what? Who cares?! He's still a gun-toting zombie ass-whomper regardless of who he sleeps with.

I'd be more interested in seeing a female protagonist who is over 30 and not supermodel attractive, massively butch or some kind of laughable comic monstrosity. Playing as an Indian woman in her early 40s taking down terrorists with equal parts sass and amazing gunplay would be a dream come true! But we're more likely to see an openly gay protagonist before a relateable woman.
 

Locke_Cole

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To be fair I doubt very much that people looking for a gay protagonist would be happy with one who is mentioned to be gay in passing in a brief scene and that's it, seeing as how many aren't pleased with the level of the current gay protagonists and side characters in games already. Many would want more than that. The problem for developers is that according to the data sources available, the LGBT community comprise a mere 3.5% of the American population (using America as an example but the numbers do not vary too wildly in other parts of the world) and by making a game that deals heavily with the issues of a gay protagonist instead of just mentioning it in passing would be pigeonholing itself into a small demographic. Mind you obviously more than just the 3.5% would be interested in the game, yet the target audience would not even compare to games which are marketed towards a straight audience.

This is not due to homophobia. Many people who have no problem allowing individuals to follow whatever sexual orientation and think gays are should have the same rights as straight individuals (ex: marriage), would not be too interested in a game that goes beyond a passing mention of the protagonist being gay. This is merely due to the fact that it is not their own personal desire so they are not actively seeking it. A person can accept drama movies as a completely equal genre to other film genres and have no problem with it at all while personally having zero interest in watching dramas. By the same token it's quite understandable if people who identify as LGBT don't wish to have a straight sexual orientation presented to them in games. Unfortunately gamers who identify as LGBT are a minority and developers who wish to make a game that sells exceedingly well will target as general an audience as possible. It's simply looking at general consumer numbers and demand. If you want a game to be successful you can't simply market it towards a tiny fraction of the market.
 

Boogie Knight

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I'd love to see a macho military style shooter series present us with a completely badass, take no bullshit main character. Wait for three or four games, then the character comes out when it becomes an issue. The reason he never confided before was because he knew it would be a big deal. And what would really make this great would be is looking back at the earlier games, the character's sexuality was totally believable in retrospect.
 

lacktheknack

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thisbymaster said:
And nothing was lost.
...but nothing is gained... either...?

OT: I like to bring up Trevor from the schlockfest that was "Phantasmagoria 2: A Puzzle of Flesh". On the sex front, we had a low-charisma main character in a love triangle (typical) with lots of bondage and an S&M club coupled with gratuitous boob scenes. You know... schlock horror stuff. And the main character has a gay best friend, Trevor.

Trevor is the most realistic gay guy in games until well into the 2000s. -_____-

He's NEVER played up as gay. All we get is the main character asking him if he's "found a good guy yet" and one creepy scene near the end where a monster version of Trevor asks the main character for a kiss. He's a supportive friend who's genuinely concerned for the increasingly bizarre murders happening around hi co-worker who he genuinely non-sexually cares about. He laughs at inappropriate things and feels sorry afterwards, he jokes and laughs with people at lunch, he does some investigative work to clear someone's name, he expresses doubts and insecurities about his love life, and is generally a pleasant and nice guy... who just happens to be gay. He was the only character I was genuinely worried for when the killer started hunting him.

So... yeah, gaming industry. Take your cues from sex-sells based schlocky horror cash-in sequels from the 90s. It will probably go over fine.
 

Mik Sunrider

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So wait? Ellie from The Last of Us is one of the main characters in The Last of Us, you play her quite a bit in Winter, and she is the only playable character in Left Behind DLC ... and she is gay. So ? This article is out of date, I think.
 

Something Amyss

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Boogie Knight said:
I'd love to see a macho military style shooter series present us with a completely badass, take no bullshit main character. Wait for three or four games, then the character comes out when it becomes an issue. The reason he never confided before was because he knew it would be a big deal. And what would really make this great would be is looking back at the earlier games, the character's sexuality was totally believable in retrospect.
Your views intrigue me and I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

But seriously, the line between "macho" and "homoerotic" is already a pretty fine one, and jokes about X and Y being lovers are about a dime a dozen, yet this sort of revelation would probably still be a big shitstorm.
 

Rutskarn

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Adam Jensen said:
He's right about sales. I wouldn't buy a game with a gay protagonist. I don't have a problem admitting that because I'm not homophobic. I don't feel the need to fake extra political correctness. I don't have anything against homosexuality, I just hate mandatory romances in video games. That's not why I play them. And it would be especially weird if that mandatory romance isn't something that I can relate to. I want to relate to the protagonist. I can't do that if you shove his/her sexuality in my face like it's somehow important.
Having a gay protagonist by no means implies the game will have mandatory romance. There are plenty of games with "casually" heterosexual characters, whose sexuality is implied only in the occasional reference to an ex, flirtation, or other incidental piece of dialogue.

Would you refuse to a character who is gay, but whose sexuality is of only passing significance to the plot?
 

Therumancer

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Supdupadog said:
Therumancer said:
The point is that love it or hate it, and whatever side your own, it's already been won.
Dude, you don't "win" cultural diversity and stuff.

It goes on forever and ever and ever.
Actually you do. It's only really an issue when your being unfairly prevented from doing the same things as everyone else. Saying that if your black you simply cannot hold X job, or you cannot show a gay person being gay in the media, or whatever else. Once those kinds of barriers are removed, the legitimacy of the battle is over with. The opportunities exist, it's not up for people to embrace them. The opportunities being there does NOT mean your going to see people of these groups equally represented in media alongside the majority when the number of people is no where near that great, it simply means society is not going to prevent any representation. At the end of the day for the overwhelming majority of people this means going out and living a normal life, living paycheck to paycheck, and taking your orders from someone else, before eventually passing away after an unremarkable life, having never come close to realizing your dreams. Your typical black guy is not going to get to be part of the upper 1% even if everyone would like to be there, and your gay guy isn't likely to be a movie star playing gay characters, or whatever else. No one will prevent this from happening, and a few will probably make it, but most won't, and of course with relatively small groups of people those on the "dream level" are going to represent a small percentage of the group at the top, which will always largely be made up of the majority. Most media will be heterosexual in it's orientation as the majority is heterosexual, at least in the US, the majority of the 1% will be white because at least for the moment whites are the majority (though with time that will probably change given current trends, and when it does you'll gradually see the top 1% change as fortunes are inevitably lost and gained by say latinos who seem poised to become the new majority according to many sociologists, the 1% probably changing a generation or two after the societal breakdown changes).

People want to keep these issues alive forever and ever and ever, because it becomes easier for a one time minority to blame "oppression" for their failures. A people fighting a real battle tend to look at the top echelons of society and the media, without often thinking ahead that opportunity does not mean being guaranteed a spot at the top. It's easier to blame whites, straights, or whomever else, than to just realize that being one of the masses sucks, and it doesn't matter who you are. Being able to be promoted to management at work and in theory to one day wind up running the company doesn't mean it's going to happen for you, and discrimination has nothing to do with it. What's more politically the spectre of discrimination provides a powerful took for keeping people rallied, when there are no real issues left, nobody is say going to throw you in jail for being gay, or a TV show is not going to be banned for having a gay character in it, politicians wanting to hold together power bases breed unreasonable expectations leading to people thinking "well it must be discrimination if 50% of the video game characters aren't gay, equal would be 50% right?" (ignoring of course the simple fact that since gays are a small minority you'd still see a small minority represented in the media) and points like the one made in this article. At the end of the day these kind of arguments tend to go back to large political organizations that basically need a conflict to exist. Nobody is going to just flat out disband a powerful gay rights group, or something like the NAACP, especially given the amount of money and power commanded by the people at the top. Without a fair agenda or any real enemies or battles to fight new ones are created. This is how you get things like Al Sharpton, Jessie Jackson, and the NAACP going after George Zimmerman for shooting some dude who was beating his head into the pavement, even going so far as to lie about what the guy who attacked him looked like, it's important to have enemies/issues and make them seem like a real threat, because without them the power goes away.

The point is pretty much like the one Bill Cosby makes about education and black culture. The opportunities exist, it's the fault of Black America that it keeps squandering them with things like the whole "git rich or die trying" attitude pretty much spitting in the face of what civil rights leaders had been fighting for, with blacks retroactively becoming exactly the kind of entitled problem so many people fighting for them insisted wouldn't happen. While it wasn't Bill there was for example in 1915 a silent movie called "Birth Of A Nation" which was pretty racist, having to do with the founding of the KKK (as if it was a good thing), the entire "fried chicken is racist" thing arguably came from that movie as one of the scenes had to do with a "what if blacks were elected officials" and had a bunch of black people that were supposed to be officials lounging around being rowdy, with one of them eating Fried Chicken with his feet on the table in the middle of town hall (if I remember). A recent article about the insult aimed at Tiger Woods made a reference to it. You look at that kind of stereotype, and then compare attitude among a lot of blacks now that the battle has been won, and need to ask yourself if the point of what they were fighting for was entirely missed. You literally have a situation where a lot of blacks would rather be dead, face down in a ghetto with a gun in their hand and drugs in their pocket, than to work 9 to 5, which is "tantamount to slavery, replacing a bullwhip with a paycheck". With gay America it's a similar thing to an extent, it's not a crime to be gay anymore, nobody is going to ban a book or a film for having homosexuality in it, the opportunities are all there. Lacking any other real issues it's all about "well, why aren't there more gay characters" and things like that. That's no more a sign of racism and
oppression as a black guy not being in the top 1% is.... and no, a minority will never have the presence of the
majority in any aspect of a society, that's not racism, it's simple math, if everyone has the same opportunities you won't see them outright prohibited, and more than if you couldn't have any at all, but your never going to them having equal representation than a those with more or a presence within society. If you add societal intertia into it and institutions that are self-perpetuating (like say old money) that does mean it can take generations before changes
catch up there, not because of racism or bigotry, because that's simply how things work. After all half the point of civil liberties was specifically to give equal opportunities, not to try and take anything other people already had
away from them. In the context of gay rights, one could argue this is a big part of why so many people have gotten irritated about pushes to retroactively insert gays into established franchises, effectively "taking them away" rather than the opportunities being exploited to simply see the occasional gay character appear in newer media that came about once it was no longer illegal to do so.


I guess this post won't go over as intended (not that I'm going to argue it seriously) because I imagine using Black America and education/opportunities as a counterpoint is a little controversial itself in this crowd. I've never been the best at trying to make these kinds of points. The bottom line of what I'm saying here is that the legitimacy of these kinds of arguments DOES end once the opportunities have been won. Once you start saying "this is what we're entitled to see right now" and presenting it as right and proper, instead of simply saying you should have the opportunity to make it happen, that's not a legimate complaint. In this article in particular the guy is acting like there is some kind of an issue with gays being under represented in video games, and really that's not the case when you consider what a minority they are, there are indeed loads of examples. What's more as the issue becomes harder to make a big deal out of, you've had to see the whole "gays in gaming/media" change the argument to continue to have something to fight about. After all in this article simply having gays there being *gasp* normal people isn't enough, having a few games with gay sex scenes (Dragon Age) apparently doesn't count now either. It's becoming pushing for the sake of pushing, when really it's just time to say "hey, we won" and give it a rest. Indeed it seems more likely that gay America is going to create it's own backlash by pushing too hard, a lot like you've also seen with attacks on Black culture, which is what apparently prompted Bill Cosby to start coming out years ago to speak on the subject (and as I've said before, I disagree with him on a lot of stuff outside of this, but if you haven't, I really think people should read his stuff on black culture and education).
 

Something Amyss

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Mik Sunrider said:
So wait? Ellie from The Last of Us is one of the main characters in The Last of Us, you play her quite a bit in Winter, and she is the only playable character in Left Behind DLC ... and she is gay. So ? This article is out of date, I think.
She's not the main character, the main story doesn't even address her being gay, and her sexuality was so unclear that the devs had to come out and make a statement most people still don't seem to know about in order to confirm it.

How is this article or the sentiment out of date again?