Do we need more LGBTQ+ protagonists in video games?

[Scars Unseen]

I'd like to see a game that lets you define your character's sexual orientation, then has absolutely no consequences for that choice. No dialog differences, no cutscene differences, model differences or anything (for instance, because the game didn't involve a romance subplot). I'd be interested in seeing people's reaction about whether it let people relate to the character more (possibly only until they realised), or whether it was a token effort.

A little more on-topic, I'd just like to see better character writing. Generic white guys are the norm, but it's the word generic that I dislike the most. Make somebody interesting and I'll care.

While it doesn't let you purposefully choose one, Rogue Legacy has "gay" as a random modifier for your players. Hard to figure a situation where sexual orientation would matter less than in a Metroidvania style platformer.

 

[Asita]

...Such as? Barring having the protagonist suffer from prejudice against his/her sexuality[footnote]Not to be dismissive of those troubles, mind you. It's just that considering that kind of thing results in a disproportionately high suicide rate for LGBT youth that's the kind of material that I'd imagine developers would be very cautious about including.[/footnote], what stories can videogames with LGBT protagonists tell that stories without LGBT protagonists cannot?

There's a lot of Queer culture that doesn't really get touched on all that often in the media. I'm not just talking about pride parades or anything and I'm not suggesting I just want that focuses entirely on sexuality. But there's a certain amount of Queer culture that can come with LGBTQ characters that could at least be somewhat seen in a story about that character.

Can you maybe elaborate a bit? An example, perhaps? Not to be rude, but an answer that effectively boils down to "they exist" doesn't really answer the question of "what are they".

I'd like to see a game that lets you define your character's sexual orientation, then has absolutely no consequences for that choice. No dialog differences, no cutscene differences, model differences or anything (for instance, because the game didn't involve a romance subplot). I'd be interested in seeing people's reaction about whether it let people relate to the character more (possibly only until they realised), or whether it was a token effort.

So...Skyrim and Fable then? The games practically set a new low bar for "token romance".

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

No, but it wouldn't be bad thing if we did, is my opinion. I welcome developers who want to have protagonists that we don't see as often, but as long as they're a thought-out character I don't care what they are, and I wouldn't pressure developers into making their protagonists anything they don't need to be.

 

[VVThoughtBox]

No. I don't believe that video games need a LBGTQ protagonist because the character's sexuality isn't important to the plot. Plus, the topic of human sexuality goes beyond LGBTQ and is too complicated to be solved with a simple romantic side quest. How well the audiences likes the LBGT protagonist would be heavily dependent on how well the character in question.

 

[CelestDaer]

The word "More" implies that there were some to begin with and I have a hard time thinking of any LGBT protagonists in games. Trevor is the only one I can think of at the moment.

the main character from gone home, kanji tatsumi and nNaoto shirogane from persona 4, ellie from the last of us, they are few but they are not non-existant

Wait, how is Naoto LGBT? She's just a crossdresser, that's not exactly LGBT. And Kanji isn't a protagonist.

Fair enough with Ellie though.

Both of them are questionable examples at best, really. Naoto crossdresses for much the same reason that Mulan and Joan of Arc do; namely, she's trying to make it in an overwhelmingly male dominated industry and believes (rightly or wrongly) that the police would think less of her as a detective if they knew she was a woman.

Naoto crossdresses, if I'm not mistaken, because she would be immediately ostracized and ignored if she dressed as female for the job, and has denied the female truth of herself to stay in the mindset of her job. Because Japan... *shrug*

Similarly, Kanji's arc is based around the idea of him holding feminine interests which he'd become embarrassed about due to teasing and his subsequent overcompensation in adopting his 'tough guy' persona and how it caused its own set of issues. In both cases their character arcs revolve around them coming to terms with the fact that they didn't have to adapt to social expectations, a conclusion best illustrated by Golden's epilogue which shows Kanji apparently dropping his delinquent appearance and Naoto dressing more femininely.

The other problem is how much wasn't explicit in the PlayStation 2 game. Every single version of the game (or anime) since has been more intricate about their two stories. From my experience, though, the character who seems most likely to be 'gay' or even curious is Yosuke. Look at his reaction when Yu hugs him just before the end of his social link, and how eager Yosuke is to know where Yu hides his porn. Not to mention, he ALWAYS calls Yu 'partner'.

 

[VVThoughtBox]

Why do we need gay protagonists? What about gay villains and side characters?

 

[Cruickshank]

the main character from gone home, kanji tatsumi and nNaoto shirogane from persona 4, ellie from the last of us, they are few but they are not non-existant

neither Kanji nor Naoto were gay, kanji was unsure at first as he was attracted to naoto who he thought was a guy (spoiler alert, naoto is a girl), and he had a complex built up in his head since he liked cute things but was supposed to be manly, naoto was definitely not gay, she just dressed as a guy and used male pronouns to describe herself as she knew that she would get dismissed professionally for being female.
seriously, so many people believe those 2 characters are gay that i wonder how many of them actually played the game or even payed attention while doing so. they explain all i said in greater detail in the game, kanji not being gay but the other guys not quite being sure around him is a running joke the entire game.

 

[CGAdam]

Why do we need gay protagonists? What about gay villains and side characters?

Ah, but as soon as you do that, you're portraying alternate sexualities as evil and will offend that community. Then you get blasted on social media and fired for having your own opinion.

 

[Swarles]

-snip-

Can you maybe elaborate a bit? An example, perhaps? Not to be rude, but an answer that effectively boils down to "they exist" doesn't really answer the question of "what are they".

Of course. To start off there's offshoots like the Queercore scene which is somewhat intertwined with the punk scene but has it's own unique identity with specific zines, art, and experimental film as well as large focus on a more "in your face" brand of activism. Honestly if we have games like Sunset Overdrive which advertises itself as a sort of punk rock shooter I don't think there's any reason not to incorporate at least a bit of that culture in it anyway.

Or you could go at it stereotypically and incorporate things like camp, drag, disco and Madonna but it really probably wouldn't go over all that well.

Even just looking at history and incorporating some LGBT stuff even if it is just references.

I'm not trying to say I want all this stuff in games and I don't think all of it would work but what I am saying is that there is a culture surrounding it and even just using it in passing reference can give more depth. It also can't be entirely focused on these things though, you can't just have a gay character who's into kitschy things and say "Yeah, that's it, there's our character."

Why do we need gay protagonists? What about gay villains and side characters?

There are enough gay villains, in fact there's probably too many. It used to be that some form of "sexual deviancy" was enough to make a character a villain in a story. Think of Silence of the Lambs, JFK, or Pulp Fiction. None of those are bad movies and in fact two of them are some of the best movies ever made but they do fall into that stereotype. Even though it's tapered off a bit you still have a wealth of gay villains like in Skyfall, and that Tron movie that everyone forgot about. In video games, while it's not explicitly stated, you still get a lot of effeminate male villains and gruff male heroes. The upcoming Far Cry 4 looks like it's going to have a much more feminine bad guy, Saints Row: The Third, Skyward Sword, Street Fighter's Vega. Video game developers play into the male insecurity by having these characters act in a way they can find to be uncomfortable and that way is making them be stereotypically homosexual. I'm not saying any of these games are bad, in fact most of them are quite good, what I am saying is that the effeminate ambiguously gay villain is something that's already becoming a bit tiresome.

 

[Maxtro]

Roughly 3.5% of the United States population is gay.

Therefor I propose that 3.5% of video game protagonists should be LGBT.

Now will a game with an openly LGBT protagonist sell? That's a different question.

 

[Rozalia1]

No. If they do not wish to have a story having one than that is that, push for more people who would for game development I suppose...though that won't really matter in studios where things have to go through the conservative rich men (big reason right there why you don't see a huge influx any time soon).

Roughly 3.5% of the United States population is gay.

Therefor I propose that 3.5% of video game protagonists should be LGBT.

Now will a game with an openly LGBT protagonist sell? That's a different question.

The United States is the world? News to me.

 

[Nieroshai]

I find that in most games, sexuality doesn't even come up. So in these scenarios, who knows, Samus could be a lesbian. When it does come up, sure, anything goes, but let's not go in the direction of insisting that sexually ambiguous characters gain a sexuality just because we need representation.

 

[TristanBelmont]

Well, Gears of War was kinda ridiculously homo-erotically "bro" in a lot of weird ways. Persona......and that's about it.....
Poison, from the Final Fight/Street Fighter universe has always been thought of as trans, but nothing has ever been stated for sures....

 

[teamcharlie]

Yep. We do indeed need more LGBTQ+ stories in video games. It's true that we need more stories of people of different races and ages and body types than thin-to-muscly white guys in their late teens-early 40s, and it's true that they're needed in lots of different media, but I think stories with LGBTQ+ protagonists are most needed in video games for political reasons that have been clearly explained in better ways than I will today.

Now, I have no personal interest in playing an LGBTQ+ character in a video game. That's not to say it's something I'd actively avoid, yet if every single game I ever played starred a white heterosexual male protagonist I'd be fine with it. But I think that restricting peoples' ability to tell specific stories, deal with specific issues, or represent certain people in deference to others for normative reasons or imagined economic reasons is an atrocious policy that harms creativity in a broad senses, psychologically threatens members of historically oppressed groups, and encourages poor behavior in the future. And yes, LGBTQ+ groups have received the worst treatment in this regard as far as video games go. As far as I can tell, the best remedy for this situation is to make as many LGBTQ+ protagonists as possible in as high of profile games as possible until this sad state of affairs is remedied.

To clarify: I don't just mean that we need a game where the main character might be gay, for example. I mean that we need games in which the protagonist is gay no matter what the player decides to do.

 

[VVThoughtBox]

Why do we need gay protagonists? What about gay villains and side characters?

@Swarles
There are enough gay villains, in fact there's probably too many. It used to be that some form of "sexual deviancy" was enough to make a character a villain in a story. Think of Silence of the Lambs, JFK, or Pulp Fiction. None of those are bad movies and in fact two of them are some of the best movies ever made but they do fall into that stereotype. Even though it's tapered off a bit you still have a wealth of gay villains like in Skyfall, and that Tron movie that everyone forgot about. In video games, while it's not explicitly stated, you still get a lot of effeminate male villains and gruff male heroes. The upcoming Far Cry 4 looks like it's going to have a much more feminine bad guy, Saints Row: The Third, Skyward Sword, Street Fighter's Vega. Video game developers play into the male insecurity by having these characters act in a way they can find to be uncomfortable and that way is making them be stereotypically homosexual. I'm not saying any of these games are bad, in fact most of them are quite good, what I am saying is that the effeminate ambiguously gay villain is something that's already becoming a bit tiresome.[/quote]


But if people want more LGBT characters in fiction, then they're going to have to be comfortable with the LGBT character in question playing more than just the role of the hero. We would need complex LGBT side characters, mentors, authority figures, and for better or worse, the role of the villain. I don't think that there's much demand for a squeaky clean gay character in video games, I'd argue that would want something resembling a character arc from the LGBT character.

Edit: I wish there was an easier way to quote people. I was trying to address Swarles.

 

[the_deku_nutt]

No, what we NEED are games with solid storytelling and controller breaking gameplay that challenges the player to the limits of their abilities. I don't care if my character is green, gay, female, 2 headed, or likes to fondle small rodents the wrong way. If introducing any of these elements makes the gameplay more interesting, then go ahead. Don't introduce pointless inclusionary political correctness into games "just for the sake of it". First and foremost, we're playing games people. If your sexuality is so important to you, then GO HAVE SEX. Stop foistering it off into every form of entertainment medium and crying foul just because Harry Potter and Ron Weasley never had that steamy moment of which you'd dreamed.


Cue the flaming.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

the main character from gone home, kanji tatsumi and nNaoto shirogane from persona 4, ellie from the last of us, they are few but they are not non-existant

neither Kanji nor Naoto were gay, kanji was unsure at first as he was attracted to naoto who he thought was a guy (spoiler alert, naoto is a girl), and he had a complex built up in his head since he liked cute things but was supposed to be manly, naoto was definitely not gay, she just dressed as a guy and used male pronouns to describe herself as she knew that she would get dismissed professionally for being female.
seriously, so many people believe those 2 characters are gay that i wonder how many of them actually played the game or even payed attention while doing so. they explain all i said in greater detail in the game, kanji not being gay but the other guys not quite being sure around him is a running joke the entire game.

i didnt say naoto was gay, but she could fit within LGBTQ definition since hes a transvestite

the idea that kanji was gay was never really resolved but i think it was heavily implied he was bisexual

 

[White Lightning]

No. How many games even have the protagonist even mention their sexual orientation? No Mass Effect and the like don't count because you choose it. The Last of Us or whatever it was did, and that's all I can think of other then that really dumb one, it was a movie about a sad lesbian or something but everyone made it out to be an amazing game.

I'd rather have a game focus on an interesting story rather then who the character likes to bone. I mean at best such an addition would be a footnote.

"Captain, the bad guys are doing things!"
"Holy shit balls! what are they doing?"
"I don't know, but I'm a transsexual."

Seriously? Is that what you want? That's how it's gonna end up if you keep asking for crap like this. If a developer feels like doing it because it's part of an interesting story then cool! If it's forced in because people kept bitching then it's not cool, and will probably cause more bitching and they won't try it again.

 

[Supdupadog]

I don't know why people get all stuck on "Well if they write them well" crap. Like somehow if the protagonist is gay, whole story has to revolve around that.

Like a game can't just be the same murder-everyone-everything-nearby button fest and the main character has an off-mention of their boyfriend or how much they like man butt. Like other straight protagonist do.

Like any game with LGBTQ has to be thoughtful paced stuff. *cough*borderlands2*cough*

I'm flattered we apparently warrant a pedestal to stay out of arms reach, but we're not that special. Just throw us in with the usual cover shooter bull crap.