Overwatch Promotes Bad Game Design

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

For arguments sake, let me also tell you why it is good game design to have a diverse, easily recognizable cast: It makes it easier to identify your opponents at a moments glance. When you see the olive skinned woman in a Sari you know that's Symmetra. When you see the gorilla you know that's Winston. When the petite girl zips by you that's Tracer and the Robot beside you is Bastion. This is not only good game design, this is arguably great game design. The amount of visual and aural design that goes into making the player instantly recognize a character is staggering. Overwatch uses its' diversity to great effect to aid the player in understanding what they are facing and who their team mates are playing as. Had the entire cast been gruffy 30-something white dudes with 5 o'clock shadows, you can bet your ass that you'd never get the same instinctive recognition of who's attacking you. For comparison, just look at Rainbow Six: Siege, which does a decent job at distinctive design, yet falls short because almost all characters are wearing shades of black and brown and wearing huge body armors.

You are on fire, but do not require an extinguisher.

Anyway, I wish I had thought to make popcorn because this thread is becoming seriously amusing.

Wynn is complaining that the entire game core (varied characters and abilities, which is what makes it different and more fun than most other shooters) isn't fun for him, and argues that it's bad game design rather than just a difference in taste.

That alone is hilarious. It's like me going "Street Fighter has shit balance because each character has several difficult frame-perfect type moves that require complex inputs, that's bad design, it should be more like Naruto Clash of Ninja 2, where you just need 2 buttons to fight, so you can more easily get to the fun part of reading your opponent. Why all these complex commands and stuff?!", instead of, oh I don't know, accepting that Street Fighter isn't for me, and that I should go play Smash instead.

Let alone "Why not have a few characters who are better overall with less abilities and no ULT". Which would break the game in half, as suddenly you have characters who are just overall more powerful, but lack the power spikes that are essential to taking major objectives most of the time. These no-ult characters would be either brokenly overpowered as they could run-and-gun entire teams down, or they'd be worthless because they lack the sudden power spike that an Ult provides.

Let ALONE "too complex". Kids can play the game just fine. It's really not that complex.

And I'm not even gonna TOUCH point number 6, oh my GOD. Overwatch is an international task force. The game is about many places on earth. It would be weird NOT to have a diverse cast (on top of it helping differentiate the characters in gameplay). And considering the lacking plot, I'm surprised Wynn is making a mountain of of the molehill anyway.

 

[Neverhoodian]

Had the entire cast been gruffy 30-something white dudes with 5 o'clock shadows, you can bet your ass that you'd never get the same instinctive recognition of who's attacking you.

If you'll allow me to play Devil's Advocate for a second, may I remind you that TF2's cast consists mainly of "gruffy 30-something white dudes with 5 o'clock shadows," and I never had any problems telling them apart thanks to their distinctive silhouettes:

Don't get me wrong, I agree with your argument as a whole. I'm just saying you CAN have a (mostly) racially homogeneous cast in a class-based shooter and make them distinctive from one another.

 

[Catnip1024]

Issue 6: Diversity for Diversity's Sake

Issue 6: Diversity for Sales's Sake
There, fixed it. All of these diversity driven viral shitflinging contests only serve to throw the games name out there, increasing sales and awareness.

As for the rest, it's a mashup of LoL, TF2 and COD that does nothing new apart from the setting. So if it's promoting anything, it's promoting a continuation of the same issues that have been around for years.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

Issue 6: Diversity for Diversity's Sake

Issue 6: Diversity for Sales's Sake
There, fixed it. All of these diversity driven viral shitflinging contests only serve to throw the games name out there, increasing sales and awareness.

As for the rest, it's a mashup of LoL, TF2 and COD that does nothing new apart from the setting. So if it's promoting anything, it's promoting a continuation of the same issues that have been around for years.

I had not thought about the sales aspect of this, but yeah, trying to attract a little bit of every group by being as diverse as possible through copy-pasting various aspects whether body type or culture, I suppose would yield greater sales.

With this in mind, one could argue this is not:

Diversity for Diversity's Sake

but indeed as you said:

Diversity for Sales's Sake

Good point. That being said, from a creative standpoint even if the sales aspect were not part of the equation, I still do not agree with diversity for diversity's sake as it takes away from emphasizing the diversity inside each character and instead emphasizes the diversity of a character roster as a whole.

 

[Avnger]

Issue 6: Diversity for Sales's Sake

Perhaps you can explain this since Wynn hasn't when asked by other people. Why is the fact that character is a nationality/race/sexuality/gender something other than American white straight male something that must be explained or given a specific reason for existing when the same requirement isn't made for "the default?"

I can easily make the claim that TF2 is Non-Diversity for Sale's Sake or Non-Diversity for Non-Diversity's Sake and it means the same amount of absolutely nothing.

 

[DeliveryGodNoah_v1legacy]

My god, we're going to be stuck on this number 6 forever now, aren't we? This isn't even about game design anymore...I'm out.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

[pointless dribble]

Issue 6 deals with a philosophical divide between wanting a roster of characters varied in relation to each other, and wanting a roster of varied qualities relative only to the character at hand for the sake of enhancing the character. In the former you have soulless placeholders promoting the collective group's overall sense of diversity. In the latter you have soulful character designs promoting how each character is unique in their own way without having to necessarily be diverse in relation to everyone else. It is incredibly ignorant to call this line of thought on fictional character design bigoted and it is incredibly unethical to imply I am racist or sexist for promoting it. The point of argumentation is to talk out the logic of two viewpoints, not attack the credibility of the person disagreeing as if this is combat rather than a discussion.

honestly, it feels like you're just talking in circles here. Going on and on about how Overwatch has bad diversity....without explanation. And that it should have good diversity...without an example.

Three replies in and you still haven't explained your position, or advanced the discussion in any meaningful way.

What exactly is "soulful character designs promoting how each character is unique in their own way"

and what exactly is "soulless placeholders promoting the collective group's overall sense of diversity."

And how is Overwatch an example of the latter, and what exactly would be an example of the former. And how exactly would those two things be different?

And how would you change Overwatch to make it the former definition instead of the latter?

I've asked you twice now for examples for how you would improve Overwatch's characters, but you seem allergic to discussion when you're not talking down to someone.

"you seem allergic to discussion when you're not talking down to someone."

<spoiler=Discussion Ethics>Read the first two words of the edit you put into your quotation of my words. I have pointed out insults being thrown at me, only for you to say I am talking down to someone. Defending oneself from insults and accusations is not talking down, and to imply as much gives a no-win situation in which no matter what the person does, they must either accept the shit being slung at them or defend their self from it and in the process be accused of somehow talking down to the people flinging shit. IF you want a discussion, how about engaging in one without starting further social drama through your own ironic condescension in the process of claiming I am engaging in the same behavior.


<spoiler=Soulful Character Design>
Since you ask for this elaboration, I will now proceed to explain, as I otherwise would not know to do if nobody asks. When I say soulful character designs, I mean creating the character with a core intention or theme in mind and organizing the character in a way which better enhances or realizes those core aspects of the character. This would be in direct contrast to creating a character in order to emphasize how they are diverse in relation to the other characters.

<spoiler=Soulless Placeholders + Soulful Character Design Expanded>
Soulless placeholders I was thinking was self-explanatory but I can explain that one fairly well. If a character is in a roster for the sake of fulfilling a specific role, that would be what I call a soulless placeholder. If however a character is in a roster because that character is fucking great as an individual rather than because they fulfill a specific role, that would be a soulful character. Keep in mind, this role is not necessarily gameplay-oriented. In other words, fulfilling the role of being a homosexual, or black, for the sake of being them. I want a character who is homosexual BECAUSE that enhances who the character is. In the case of Tracer she isn't what I'd actually call a soulless placeholder (unlike several other characters) because her being homosexual legitimately made sense based on how she has acted from appearing at the rally to the way of dressing as well as her personality and looks. It wasn't flamboyantly in-your-face but it made sense and felt like it was a quality which extended from and enhancer her as a character. It was a fitting tasteful thing to make part of her character which is different from much of the roster's characters who seem to be there for the sake of being different rather than being a great character. Coupled with her speed and positivity she is at a core and surface level a childish positive character who loves freedom which is conveyed even through her gameplay of being quick and travelling through time.

<spoiler=Improvements to Overwatch Roster>
If I were to change Overwatch to steer away from merely having a bunch of characters fulfilling roles for the sake of fulfilling them (in terms of both gameplay and character qualities/themes) and instead steer it towards having characters that exist because the character's core identity and overall theme is genuinely high quality... that would be a broad difference in creative direction that it is too late to have. Jeff Kaplan should have when these characters were being developed, ensured that the characters were each good enough that they would stand on their own just as well as Tracer does. This would mean every quality a character has in some way either enhances or makes sense with that character rather than enhances the diversity of the roster. If a character EVER has a quality that is not helping the character be a better character but is instead solely existing to promote diversity in the roster, that is poor character design. But what's done is done. No matter what I say, these characters are what they are now that they are released, and should not be fundamentally changed even if it would improve the characters, because that would outright require changing who the characters are and it is too late for that now that people own the game and are attached. That being said,
that did not stop Jeff Kaplan from fundamentally changing Roadhog as a character by taking away the hook-and-kill mechanic which defined him as a scary masked bully assassin.

 

[Godzillarich(aka tf2godz)]

You know this could have been a very interesting thread where we talk about overwatch and online shooters and/or moda design and then you brought up number six and now the thread has become dumb.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

Issue 6: Diversity for Sales's Sake

Perhaps you can explain this since Wynn hasn't when asked by other people. Why is the fact that character is a nationality/race/sexuality/gender something other than American white straight male something that must be explained or given a specific reason for existing when the same requirement isn't made for "the default?"

I can easily make the claim that TF2 is Non-Diversity for Sale's Sake or Non-Diversity for Non-Diversity's Sake and it means the same amount of absolutely nothing.

Not in the OP or any of my posts have I brought up American white straight male being a default that does not need explanation; it needs explanation too and is by no means a default. You and the rest of the posters here need to quit assuming these things and jumping to these racist misogynist conclusions that have nothing to do with the point of issue 6 which is strictly about the creative process of using diversity for the sake of a diverse roster rather than for the sake of having diverse aspects within each character meant to enhance each character.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

You know this could have been a very interesting thread where we talk about overwatch and online shooters and/or moda design and then you brought up number six and now the thread has become dumb.

If people grow dumb when confronted with controversy then they need to grow more familiar with it. You and any other level-headed poster should always feel free to post and discuss what is reasonable rather than exacerbate unnecessary social drama.

 

[Catnip1024]

Perhaps you can explain this since Wynn hasn't when asked by other people. Why is the fact that character is a nationality/race/sexuality/gender something other than American white straight male something that must be explained or given a specific reason for existing when the same requirement isn't made for "the default?"

I can easily make the claim that TF2 is Non-Diversity for Sale's Sake or Non-Diversity for Non-Diversity's Sake and it means the same amount of absolutely nothing.

I was referring more to the probably artificially orchestrated shenanigans around the release of various bits of information. The whole Tracer being a lesbian thing springs to mind.

But either way, I do believe that the roster of characters was entirely driven by commercial aspects. Like in most games. COD goes for gritty supersoldiers because "realism", Overwatch goes down the slightly more comic book route. If I gave enough of a damn to critique it properly, it obviously sources characters from each region of the world, particularly those areas likely to sell large numbers of games. Also, diversity in the character pool leads to increased merchandising potential.

So my adjustment of Wynn's heading is completely valid. I would argue that your statement on TF2 is wildly inaccurate - you have Russians, Australians, a black Glaswegian. You can't tell what the Pyro looks like. It's a >10 year old game, I'm pretty happy to forgive it not having a cast of women as well.

And as for having to justify when the character isn't a white male, perhaps I missed all this (I very rarely read the GID type discussions because of how massively petty they get), but I've never really noticed that. Mirrors Edge works well with Faith, Horizon: Zero Dawn works with whatshername. There are only a couple of instances where I can recall the character having jarred (the one that springs to mind is Witcher 3 in the bits where you play as thingy), and that's largely where it's a corruption of an existing franchise.

 

[oRevanchisto]

Issues 1-6: I'm an idiot and suck at OW so much I can't even get out of Gold Competitive.

Issue 6: Diversity for Sales's Sake

Perhaps you can explain this since Wynn hasn't when asked by other people. Why is the fact that character is a nationality/race/sexuality/gender something other than American white straight male something that must be explained or given a specific reason for existing when the same requirement isn't made for "the default?"

I can easily make the claim that TF2 is Non-Diversity for Sale's Sake or Non-Diversity for Non-Diversity's Sake and it means the same amount of absolutely nothing.

Not in the OP or any of my posts have I brought up American white straight male being a default that does not need explanation; it needs explanation too and is by no means a default. You and the rest of the posters here need to quit assuming these things and jumping to these racist misogynist conclusions that have nothing to do with the point of issue 6 which is strictly about the creative process of using diversity for the sake of a diverse roster rather than for the sake of having diverse aspects within each character meant to enhance each character.

Huh, I never knew my skin color needed an explanation. OP you're full of shit.

 

[DaCosta]

"That being said, that did not stop Jeff Kaplan from fundamentally changing Roadhog as a character by taking away the hook-and-kill mechanic which defined him as a scary masked bully assassin."

Context? Last time I checked Roadhog still had his hook....

This month Roadhog had the damage in his left click reduced, and his rate of fire and clip size increased. This means that while his overall dps is roughly the same, now his hook-shoot-melee combo can't instantly kill most of the heroes in roster anymore. He can still kill 5 of them, and will leave 10 or 11 others with just 2 to 15 hp left, so as long as you play with your team, his viability hasn't changed much.

The problem is that a lot of Roadhog mains don't like to play with their team. They are the ones who see the message "No Tanks!", and proceed to pick Roadhog and never stay with their team to actually tank, instead trying to flank on their own and be a dps. The team player Roadhogs will make it work just fine by focusing on damaged enemies.

 

[tippy2k2]

Lot of passive agressive poo flinging going on in here and I for one am sick of everyone tattling on each other for doing the same thing to one another so...

EDIT: The thread has been unlocked. I expect people to debate this like adults and stop with the passive-aggressive skating near the line but not quite over the line but close enough that it's giving the Mod a G-D headache insults. Thank you.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

"That being said, that did not stop Jeff Kaplan from fundamentally changing Roadhog as a character by taking away the hook-and-kill mechanic which defined him as a scary masked bully assassin."

Context? Last time I checked Roadhog still had his hook....

This month Roadhog had the damage in his left click reduced, and his rate of fire and clip size increased. This means that while his overall dps is roughly the same, now his hook-shoot-melee combo can't instantly kill most of the heroes in roster anymore. He can still kill 5 of them, and will leave 10 or 11 others with just 2 to 15 hp left, so as long as you play with your team, his viability hasn't changed much.

The problem is that a lot of Roadhog mains don't like to play with their team. They are the ones who see the message "No Tanks!", and proceed to pick Roadhog and never stay with their team to actually tank, instead trying to flank on their own and be a dps. The team player Roadhogs will make it work just fine by focusing on damaged enemies.

ah okay, so it really doesn't have much of anything to do with his character design or core identity then

I mean, he's still a Kiwi bloke from an irradiated Australia that was a farmer turned road warrior, on an extended crime spree with his goofy friend who promised to pay him afterwards

seems like thats still holding up

He doesn't come off as the scary bully assassin he once did now that his most powerful move is so weak I won't even touch his character.

 

[Gizen]

I'm gonna say these are all pretty piss poor responses.

They're only piss poor responses because you're focusing on the parts where people call your reasoning stupid and completely ignoring the parts where they tell you why it's stupid.

Let's see... we got someone calling it not an argument in good faith without giving a reason even upon request.

That part I just mentioned, where you've been ignoring people tearing your arguments apart and then double down on providing criticisms that have no relation to game design is why your argument is not in good faith.

The user Gizen called issue 6 a bullshit complaint with no substance while calling all the other points whiny bitching and they thus conclude issue 6 being bullshit "shouldn't be a surprise;" well I guess a series of thought-out points on why a video game's design is flawed can be chalked up to whiny bitching like any other criticism in the world can if you don't agree with it.

Once again, focusing on people calling your arguments stupid and disregarding the reason why. My first post in this thread pre-dates any of the things you've quoted, and all subsequent posts were made as a result of you not actually responding to any points of debate that anybody made. Furthermore, you focus entirely on me calling out your arguments as being substanceless bullshit (which they are, they made be thought-out, but they're certainly not well thought-out) and ignore the parts of my posts where I've gone into great detail (specifically regarding point 6 because it's the one that's so poorly thought-out as to be offensive) about why your arguments are flawed.

DaCosta insists I HAVE, to be claiming the American White Male is the default state of being... because... reasons; I suppose promoting putting thought into the diverse aspects of fictional characters for the character's sake rather than the sake of diversity in relation to other characters is actually a basis for real life racist misogyny...

Yes. Yes it does. You're saying that to make a character gay, or black, or female, or autistic, or whatever, that it has to be justified. The implication in such a statement is that a character who's straight, or white, or male, or 'normal' does not need to be justified. You can't deny the implication is there, because otherwise this is a statement you could make about virtually every single video game or even the vast majority of works of fiction ever made, and if that was the case it would be an issue so omnipresent and pervasive that it wouldn't even be worth calling out. Afterall, why is it worth calling it out in Overwatch as one of the major ways it promotes bad game design when every single game does it? As such the implication is clear, not every game does it, that somehow the majority of games, which feature generic white male protagonists, are justified by default. That's prejudiced. It's racist, it's sexist, it's homophobic, it's bullshit, but most of all it's incredibly subtle.

Welcome to the real world of prejudice, which rarely ever takes the form of open shouting of racial slurs or blatant evil like slavery and nazis, but rather imposes much smaller, easier to overlook forms of inequality such as demanding stricter standards out of minorities right down to demanding they have a more meaningful purpose in our fiction.

Gizen comes back swinging, calling this a bullshit argument and me a bigot because, pfft, who needs arguments when you can just insult the the opponent's arguments and the opponent.

Two things. First off, I should not have called you a bigot. The correct word I was looking for at the time was prejudiced, but my brain blanked on it, and I was in a fight-y mood so I just went with the first word that came to mind, which was bigoted. So for that, I'm sorry... or rather, I would be sorry, but your responses since then have only brought that insult closer to the point of accuracy.

Second, AGAIN, you're focusing on the fact that people are mean to you while ignoring the why, because I GAVE you arguments and you know it, but you're not acknowledging them because you still have no response to them.

Gethsamani, the user aptly labelled "Hardcore Feminazi" under their username, proceeds to defend Gizen's arguments as valid, (because apparently basic argument ethics don't matter) and then proceeds to reiterate how justifying diversity, in a fictional video game, requires assuming the Caucasian Male is "default."

There's no assumption here. It is the default. That's simply a statement of fact. To look at the majority of games and deny that the main character on average is a caucasion male is to deny reality.

Maybe using the words "subjective" and "political" and "diversity" triggered an animal instinct in some of you to abandon basic argumentation ethics and give short snide remarks as some of you might be used to doing in political contexts, rather than deliver neutral reasonable retorts.

A neutral retort is no retort. To be neutral is to have no opinion on the matter. Someone with no opinion isn't going to participate in an argument to begin with, because why would they? They're neutral on the matter, they don't care. This notion of neutrality and non-biased as some sort of gold standard to aspire to only applies when you're goal is non-participation.

Maybe these words triggered a reaction that some of you just HAVE to convey the person who disagrees with you is a bigot and be rude to them and if they complain about that rudeness it means they are running from the arguments.

We're not being rude to you because we disagree, we're being rude because, as I've detailed above, you don't argue in good faith, which means a proper debate can not be had.

But there is nothing, and I mean NOTHING bigoted about wanting characters to have purpose behind their designs.

You're absolutely right. There is nothing bigoted about wanting characters to have purpose behind their designs. The bigotry comes into play when you don't personally like the purpose behind their designs and then proceed to make statements which have prejudicial implications as to why you don't like that purpose.

Where some of you got white male as somehow being a default state of being, I can only assume came from a quite sexist racist source of thought somewhere far outside the realm of anything I have said or implied.

You may be very careful with what you outright say, but you're nowhere near as cautious with what you imply as you like to think you are.

Issue 6 deals with a philosophical divide between wanting a roster of characters varied in relation to each other, and wanting a roster of varied qualities relative only to the character at hand for the sake of enhancing the character. In the former you have soulless placeholders promoting the collective group's overall sense of diversity. In the latter you have soulful character designs promoting how each character is unique in their own way without having to necessarily be diverse in relation to everyone else.

This statement is gibberish. It is literal nonsense. "a roster of varied qualities relative only to the character at hand for the sake of enhancing the character" is a statement that genuinely means nothing.

"A character with different attributes that make it better" would be a translation of what you just said. What does that even mean? Anything. It could literally mean anything. What qualifies as an attribute that'll improve a character? Anything could, depending entirely on who we're talking about, what kind of character they want, and what role they want it to play. This is why I'm telling you your arguments are bullshit nonsense. You're using a lot of fancy, flowering language to hide the fact that you're not actually saying fuck all.

It is incredibly ignorant to call this line of thought on fictional character design bigoted and it is incredibly unethical to imply I am racist or sexist for promoting it.

You're right, it is ignorant to call this line of thought prejudiced by itself, and that's mainly because that line of thought barely qualifies as thought to begin with. But it's not by itself, it's attached to the statement 'diversity for the sake of diversity is bad'. This is a declaration that you do not like the roster's current list of 'varied qualities', that being qualities of foreign cultures and alternative sexualities. It is also a statement that says that 'diversity for diversity's sake' actively harms the game, because if it did not actively harm the game, it would be neutral instead of bad. If it's actively harming the game, that in turn implies that the game would be improved by the simple act of removing diversity. When pressed to explain HOW it would improve the game to actively make the game less diverse, you did not explain. All you did was point to the least diverse member of the current roster, at which point you were pressed to explain your reasoning in greater detail and instead you made this big post whining about how all the people are being mean to you while, ONCE AGAIN disregarding the ever important reason why.

The point of argumentation is to talk out the logic of two viewpoints, not attack the credibility of the person disagreeing as if this is combat rather than a discussion.

You can do both and one does not negate the other. If somebody were to come up and enter a debate leading with the outrageous claim that the earth is flat, he would be judged an idiot and treated as a laughingstock. He could have avoided that by not making such an outrageous claim, but now it's too late and the onus is upon him to demonstrate he's not an idiot.

You've made outrageous claims, we've judged you for them while simultaneously rebutting them. You have repeatedly only responded to the judgments, but it is the rebuttals that demand a response if you intend to actually change the way people view you.

 

[Epyc Wynn]

[there aren't scissors big enough for a snip like this]

I'm not really interested in changing how you view me. I just care about good game design. Some aspects match the characters, but many just feel forced for the sake of diversity rather than improving the character. If you can't pick up on that, then I can't persuade you to.