Heteronormaltivity in games

[Aramis Night]

I think Path of Exile deserves a mention for having implemented a gay character in a rather interesting way.

It's an aRPG, so there's not really much story on any of the playable characters beyond some very basic background and even in that background there's no mention of the Ranger being gay.

Here's the interesting thing though, in the game there's a zone, the Siren's Lair. Inside that zone phantoms appear that beckon the player to enter deeper. The four male characters are all faced with mostly naked female phantoms. The Witch, the other female character besides the ranger, is faced with mostly naked male phantoms. The Ranger however, a female character, is faced with mostly naked female phantoms as well.

I thought that was a rather interesting way to put some extra information on the characters in the game.

Now that is brilliant. It makes me that much prouder of supporting Grinding Gear Games kickstarter. Though I am a little disappointed that they took the dead infants off the beach in the first act. Such a shame.

 

[CelestDaer]

Kanji isn't gay.

Whatever he is, I think he still fits into a discussion of non-heterosexuality in games.

Why? It's never stated that he's anything but straight, he's just more in tune with his feminine side, having grown up in a textile shop. Other than Yosuke's constant ribbing, there's nothing giving him a suggestion of being gay. At best, he's curious, but only until he faces his Shadow...

 

[jehk]

The claim was that large publically traded AAA game development companies operate with a profit motive as their primary consideration with every decision made. For stating this, I am deemed a crackpot.

He's not making excuses. Business is Business. Economics has everything to do with it.

Corporations don't care about your views on social justice. Money, that is all.

The above is the original claim you made. Economics doesn't have everything to do with it and they don't just care about money. No, I'm not denying profit as a motive and claiming pure altruism either.

Making such a generalization about a multitude of complex and diverse entities is a ridiculous claim.

EDIT: If you've changed you claim then cool. We don't have to argue. The above is specially what I have problems with.

Profit is the unifying theme of every corporation regardless how diverse. Without it, they cease to exist. To expect a corporation to not pursue profit, is like expecting us to stop breathing. As generalizations go I feel pretty safe with this one.

Except for non-profits right? They exist. A lot of 'em do.

I don't expect a corporation not to pursue profit (double negative omg head hurts). This is your straw man. I'm claiming corporations have plenty of other purists besides profit. It's not black or white.

I'm tired of saying the same thing over and over. Have a good day.

 

[jehk]

Kanji isn't gay.

Whatever he is, I think he still fits into a discussion of non-heterosexuality in games.

Why? It's never stated that he's anything but straight, he's just more in tune with his feminine side, having grown up in a textile shop. Other than Yosuke's constant ribbing, there's nothing giving him a suggestion of being gay. At best, he's curious, but only until he faces his Shadow...

I have to agree with you. I think Kanji's story is more about being trapped by the male gender role/ideal.

 

[jehk]

Nevermind.

 

[Nieroshai]

Here's the primary reason: it would take a MASTER writer to avoid the character looking like a platitude meant just to please the fans. Bill in The Last of Us was very well-written, but his sexuality was left to be guessed at. I can think of several gay characters, but I can count on one hand the ones written well. Also, it is very hard for a straight man to write a cay man because he doesn't have that perspective. It is the same for trying to write an accurate female perspective: we can only emulate what we see on the outside, not how they feel and what they think on the inside. So I say again, with emphasis, only a genius writer or a gay writer can write a gay character that works. Otherwise, you get what you see everywhere else.

 

[Demongeneral109]

not for anything, but you have to realize that being straight is the norm, and in fact, we are evolutionary inclined to be so for the sake of baby making. Being heterosexual is standard, and so that is the way it is in games. If you meet someone new IRL, you don't assume gay until proven straight, its the other way around. As such, it makes sense to say "if a character is going to be gay, it needs to be a central aspect of his character" because there are unique challenges about being gay that will never exist for straight people. By necessity, there must be different standards.

Of course I realise heterosexuality is the norm-- it'd be hard to miss! You'll notice, however, that I'm not asking that for homosexual protagonists to become the new "norm"; I'll be happy with just a few.

I do not see the logic in saying, "if a character is gay, it needs to be a central aspect of his character", because I see nothing that excludes gay people from quests/ wars/ zombie apocalypses/ any other video game premise.

You're misunderstanding. Why should someone put a homosexual character in a game if they want to put in a heterosexual one? If they don't need a reason to be there then you are also saying there's no reason to put them there either. This isn't like the issue with female representation in games, homosexuals do not make up about half the population so there's no reason to increase the number of them as adding more won't make the stories any more realistic.

Homosexuals make up more than 0% of the population, so the current proportion of protagonists is indeed unrealistic.

It again comes down to the fact that sexuality is irrelevant in about 90% of human interaction, and about 99% of video game character interaction(which generally falls into the 'shoot at' category. The reason I say it needs to be at a central element is that if it simply doesn't matter, then why bring it up? Its true that gay people can be the hero in a war...ect... but when would this ever come up? Hell, one could argue that Ramirez in COD could be gay, or price, or any number of action protagonist, but since it doesn't matter, there is no need to add the extrenious detail. That is why it needs to be central, otherwise it comes across as pandering, When everyone found out dumbledore was gay, the gay community actually got kind of pissed because it totally didn't matter for his character and came across as pandering.

 

[ReinWeisserRitter]

I don't give a tenth of a damn what the sexuality of any character is, but particularly a video game character; who they're boning, or not boning, has absolutely nothing to do with the primary focus for me, which is playing the game.

Of course, this is coming from someone who doesn't want anything more than a passing mention of sexuality in video games. Any sexuality.

Besides that, the more people demand unconventional sexuality be isolated and brought to light, the longer it's going to be unconventional. Something that's constantly given special attention isn't normal, people, whether your intentions while perpetuating its abnormality are good or not.

 

[Syzygy23]

I don't want to play as a gay man in a game. I don't like playing as a female either. Thats probably why things like that are optional and can be skipped.

What if I don't want to play as a straight man? Can I skip that in Dead Space? Or Gears of War? Or Grand Theft Auto?

Are you the majority of humanity? No? Then that's the way the cookie crumbles. The target audience for these games is made up of mostly heteronormal, male gamers. Not to mention that the dev teams are also disproportionately hetero.

You want games focused on gay characters romancing their gay partners/love interests, you'll probably have to do it yourself.

 

[Silvanus]

It again comes down to the fact that sexuality is irrelevant in about 90% of human interaction, and about 99% of video game character interaction(which generally falls into the 'shoot at' category. The reason I say it needs to be at a central element is that if it simply doesn't matter, then why bring it up? Its true that gay people can be the hero in a war...ect... but when would this ever come up? Hell, one could argue that Ramirez in COD could be gay, or price, or any number of action protagonist, but since it doesn't matter, there is no need to add the extrenious detail. That is why it needs to be central, otherwise it comes across as pandering, When everyone found out dumbledore was gay, the gay community actually got kind of pissed because it totally didn't matter for his character and came across as pandering.

Romance is indeed irrelevant to COD.

Romance was not irrelevant to FF7, 8 & X, Nightfall, Dead Space (mostly #1), Heavy Rain, Shadow of the Colossus, the Uncharted series, Red Dead, & Braid. That's just games I have direct experience of. It's simply not true that romance is never relevant in games. Romance, not sexuality; If I was advocating a straight romance in something, nobody would accuse me of trying to bring "sexuality" into it.

Dumbledore's sexuality was somewhat relevant to his background with Gellert Grindelwald, actually.

 

[Hagi]

Now that is brilliant. It makes me that much prouder of supporting Grinding Gear Games kickstarter. Though I am a little disappointed that they took the dead infants off the beach in the first act. Such a shame.

Spoiler: If it's any consolation there's still dead baby murals in the game.

I know, I know... Not the same as real dead baby. But still... it's something...

 

[Lightknight]

Romance is indeed irrelevant to COD.

Romance was not irrelevant to FF7, 8 & X, Nightfall, Dead Space (mostly #1), Heavy Rain, Shadow of the Colossus, the Uncharted series, Red Dead, & Braid. That's just games I have direct experience of. It's simply not true that romance is never relevant in games. Romance, not sexuality; If I was advocating a straight romance in something, nobody would accuse me of trying to bring "sexuality" into it.

Keep in mind that games are generally intended for as wide an audience as possible (hopefully without sacrificing the intention of the game, *coughdeadspace3cough*). With that concept, do you think it's a wise business decision to create a game with a homosexual character when the majority of gamers are heterosexual (likely over 95%1 unless homosexuals are more likely to be gamers than heterosexuals are)? Don't get me wrong, I understand your feelings here and completely get it. I support you being able to make whatever decisions you want to in a game and really want the future of gaming to be about cutomiseability in this way. But if it's a slight negative for you to have to play as a heterosexual, why is it fair to turn that around to negatively impact the 95% of gamers in games that are non-customiseable? Not only would it potentially significantly limit the target market (e.g. punish the company brave enough to do this) but it would also impact the heterosexual gamers in the same way you feel impacted when playing heterosexual-normative games.

It isn't the same as hiring an employee. 100% of the time that games are offered to a AAA audience the demographics will still have hugh proportion being heterosexual with the very small minority being gay or lesbian. There isn't a line of gay characters being told that they'll get a call back with the decision they never have. It is just a character designed to function as an avatar for the gamers.

So I guess I have to ask, is it enough that there are games in which you can be anyone and anything including homosexual? Or is it more important that you have a game in which the player must be homosexual? If the former, then there are ever more of those options available, it holds a bright future. If the latter, you've got to ask yourself why that in particular is so important. I've had this discussion with LGBT friends and the answer often surprises them as well.

1(I'm basing the demographics on the LGBT US demographics [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_demographics_of_the_United_States], I'm not sure what the world-wide proportion would be but in the US it's actually less than 4% and that's including bisexuals and transexuals which would not necessarily be concerned with a homosexual option. Without whom the number would drop to less than 2%)

Dumbledore's sexuality was somewhat relevant to his background with Gellert Grindelwald, actually.

It certainly added some gravity to the referenced confrontation.

 

[Sam Lowry]

maybe someone already mentioned it(if someone did please don't hurt me, I'm new here) but in Phantasmagoria 2 your best friend was a fairly well-written gay man and the main character is actually bisexual.

For it's time(1996) it was pretty progressive.

 

[Aramis Night]

The claim was that large publically traded AAA game development companies operate with a profit motive as their primary consideration with every decision made. For stating this, I am deemed a crackpot.

He's not making excuses. Business is Business. Economics has everything to do with it.

Corporations don't care about your views on social justice. Money, that is all.

The above is the original claim you made. Economics doesn't have everything to do with it and they don't just care about money. No, I'm not denying profit as a motive and claiming pure altruism either.

Making such a generalization about a multitude of complex and diverse entities is a ridiculous claim.

EDIT: If you've changed you claim then cool. We don't have to argue. The above is specially what I have problems with.

Profit is the unifying theme of every corporation regardless how diverse. Without it, they cease to exist. To expect a corporation to not pursue profit, is like expecting us to stop breathing. As generalizations go I feel pretty safe with this one.

Except for non-profits right? They exist. A lot of 'em do.

I don't expect a corporation not to pursue profit (double negative omg head hurts). This is your straw man. I'm claiming corporations have plenty of other purists besides profit. It's not black or white.

I'm tired of saying the same thing over and over. Have a good day.

Yep. All those non-profit AAA video game developers will certainly be willing to put forth their millions to fund a game with a gay protagonist. Oh wait...

 

[Kanova]

It again comes down to the fact that sexuality is irrelevant in about 90% of human interaction, and about 99% of video game character interaction(which generally falls into the 'shoot at' category. The reason I say it needs to be at a central element is that if it simply doesn't matter, then why bring it up? Its true that gay people can be the hero in a war...ect... but when would this ever come up? Hell, one could argue that Ramirez in COD could be gay, or price, or any number of action protagonist, but since it doesn't matter, there is no need to add the extrenious detail. That is why it needs to be central, otherwise it comes across as pandering, When everyone found out dumbledore was gay, the gay community actually got kind of pissed because it totally didn't matter for his character and came across as pandering.

EXACTLY. That's the thing, if it isn't relevant to the story, its checklist stuff. If they actually make it have some gay romance or sexuality, a lot of people would be uncomfortable with it and the game would lose buyers. That is why it hasn't been done yet. It isn't really that hard to understand.

Also, do gays really get uncomfortable playing as straight people, because it is the normal thing. If you gays do, you must be uncomfortable ALL the time being surrounded by us normals.

 

[thebakedpotato]

I don't want to play as a gay man in a game. I don't like playing as a female either. Thats probably why things like that are optional and can be skipped.

What if I don't want to play as a straight man? Can I skip that in Dead Space? Or Gears of War? Or Grand Theft Auto?

Are you the majority of humanity? No? Then that's the way the cookie crumbles. The target audience for these games is made up of mostly heteronormal, male gamers. Not to mention that the dev teams are also disproportionately hetero.

You want games focused on gay characters romancing their gay partners/love interests, you'll probably have to do it yourself.

Fuck that shit. I'm in America and I have enough money to buy that crap. I am a market.
I've bought over 20 games this year alone, while a lot of other gamers pirate crap.

Capitalism, solve my problems!

 

[wintercoat]

I don't want to play as a gay man in a game. I don't like playing as a female either. Thats probably why things like that are optional and can be skipped.

What if I don't want to play as a straight man? Can I skip that in Dead Space? Or Gears of War? Or Grand Theft Auto?

Are you the majority of humanity? No? Then that's the way the cookie crumbles. The target audience for these games is made up of mostly heteronormal, male gamers. Not to mention that the dev teams are also disproportionately hetero.

You want games focused on gay characters romancing their gay partners/love interests, you'll probably have to do it yourself.

Fuck that shit. I'm in America and I have enough money to buy that crap. I am a market.
I've bought over 20 games this year alone, while a lot of other gamers pirate crap.

Capitalism, solve my problems!

Good for you! That still doesn't change the fact that homosexuals are still a minority market. Every homosexual that exists could be a regular game buyer, and they'd still be a minority market. Just because you, a single person, bought a fair amount of games this year doesn't change that fact.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Also, isn't Lillet Blan from GrimGrimoire heavily implied to be a lesbian? I rarely see people mention her. I liked GrimGrimoire. Had a great cast of characters.

 

[Silvanus]

Keep in mind that games are generally intended for as wide an audience as possible (hopefully without sacrificing the intention of the game, *coughdeadspace3cough*). With that concept, do you think it's a wise business decision to create a game with a homosexual character when the majority of gamers are heterosexual (likely over 95%1 unless homosexuals are more likely to be gamers than heterosexuals are)? Don't get me wrong, I understand your feelings here and completely get it. I support you being able to make whatever decisions you want to in a game and really want the future of gaming to be about cutomiseability in this way. But if it's a slight negative for you to have to play as a heterosexual, why is it fair to turn that around to negatively impact the 95% of gamers in games that are non-customiseable? Not only would it potentially significantly limit the target market (e.g. punish the company brave enough to do this) but it would also impact the heterosexual gamers in the same way you feel impacted when playing heterosexual-normative games.

I think you're slightly misunderstanding my problem, here. It's not a slight negative for me when I play a game with a heterosexual protagonist.

It only becomes a negative when that's all there is to play.

It isn't the same as hiring an employee. 100% of the time that games are offered to a AAA audience the demographics will still have hugh proportion being heterosexual with the very small minority being gay or lesbian. There isn't a line of gay characters being told that they'll get a call back with the decision they never have. It is just a character designed to function as an avatar for the gamers.

In games with high customisation, or even those with silent protagonists, the protagonist is indeed an avatar for the gamer-- but not so in many others. I dread to think which players are seeing themselves in F.3.A.R.'s Point Man!

So I guess I have to ask, is it enough that there are games in which you can be anyone and anything including homosexual? Or is it more important that you have a game in which the player must be homosexual? If the former, then there are ever more of those options available, it holds a bright future. If the latter, you've got to ask yourself why that in particular is so important. I've had this discussion with LGBT friends and the answer often surprises them as well.

I don't think it is "so important", exactly.

I'm just sick of gay people being considered unimportant. Straight people take for granted how much things are weighted towards them. In video games, they don't exist as protagonists outside self-customisation. In films, they don't exist as protagonists outside of tragedies. I know books with gay protagonists exist, but since I've never sought one out specifically, I've never found one-- I'm a prolific reader, and I've only ever encountered straight protagonists there, as well. As background characters, they're fine, but don't let them take the protagonist's role, lest they make straight people flip their shit as they momentarily forget they have the other 99% of media to turn to.

This wasn't aimed at you, Lightknight, you mentioned that you do sympathise earlier. It was just a general rant.

Good for you! That still doesn't change the fact that homosexuals are still a minority market. Every homosexual that exists could be a regular game buyer, and they'd still be a minority market. Just because you, a single person, bought a fair amount of games this year doesn't change that fact.

I'd have thought that most straight gamers wouldn't be small-minded enough to avoid those games on that basis alone.

Oddly enough, quite a few boys played Tomb Raider, Metroid, Portal & Mirror's Edge.