Tomb Raider writer expressed an interest in making Lara gay?
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I haven't played the newest Tomb Raider... but what part of raiding tombs would have me finding out/wondering about who Lara Croft is romantically interested with? And it also would have bothered me a little that possibly THE most famous strong female main character in video game history is a lesbian. Seriously, part of me rolled my eyes and went "Of course! Shes a strong woman who can kick the shit out of men so she has to be lesbian right?" even though I know that was not the intended goal. I think for now lets just focus on making three dimensional and well written female lead characters and then work in the whole sex thing later.
On a side note... does anyone else think that Kate Archer is the most underrated female lead character ever? The lead from No One lives Forever?
On a side note... does anyone else think that Kate Archer is the most underrated female lead character ever? The lead from No One lives Forever?
You know, as a writer I kinda find this thread...well...I think people are going about this the wrong way, although maybe I just have a different viewpoint of writing characters. I don't write female characters, African-Americans or homosexuals. I write Human Beings. And some of them happen to be female, some happen to be African-American, and some happen to be homosexuals. That's it.
You are really liking the insults because I disagree with you, but calm down buddy.LifeCharacter said:
On the Zevran thing, I had a lot higher than 26, I gave him gifts, was generally his buddy and he still turned on me. I was in "warm" easily. Glitch? Not sure, I just played the game. You can tell me I am wrong, but I was the one playing that game. Now I can give you the advice that not everything you read online is correct mighty researcher.
I thought this was so obvious I didn't need to clarify it, but what a character does in a video games doesn't mean the developer endorses it.I say old chap said:
Think about GTA and other extremely violent, destructive and criminal content of video games. The developers don't endorse that. This is well covered ground since the dark days of Jack Thompson talking crap about video games trying to get them censored, and it goes both ways.
And it's only a "marketing gimmick" if it only sounds good in marketing but isn't actually any good in practice. Otherwise you could say EVERYTHING about a game is a "marketing gimmick" with farcical circumstance like "Oh the game is good? That's such a marketing gimmick".
There is no reason this would be just a gimmick.
You blatantly misquoted that.feauxx said:
Remember Me is getting released with that content. Faith and a .45 had bigger problems. Like being awful in the most basic aspects of game design.
It's not a scandal, it's ONE SINGLE PUBLISHER MORON running his mouth. The fact is the writer never even thought about it.
Remember, publishers overwhelmingly don't play games, they are bankers and hedge fund managers and see video game publishing as easy money.
"That, right there, is objectification at work"
No, get your dictionary out and learn your grammar, this is SUBJECTification!
"Alex scored a goal"
"Alex" is the subject, "a goal" is the object.
When they are the protagonist they are the subject, and what the character does has to line up with player's choice. This is also why male protagonists haven't kissed people either, unless it's been a player controlled choice.
This isn't a problem in other media, we don't care about sexy girls in Bond-movies kissing. The writer of this article has put zero thought into this and has just been sensationalist.
"I don't think I've actually seen a playable female protagonist kiss a guy in a game."
Just as rare as a male character kissing.
Ignorant and baseless statements like these just show how worthless this writer's insight is, worst for how this is the basis of his argument.
I think there is a problem with MARKETING and sexism, not a problem with GAMING and sexism.
It mentions the lack of women on front covers of games as proof that gamers don't want women in their game... then why does it change when actually in the game? This is because marketing morons are moron, they can't see the wood for the trees, games that are all about women in leading roles, still they depend on outdated poorly conducted studies that say shit like "don't put a woman on the cover of a product with more than X% adoption by males".
Publishers are - generally - morons, it should be obvious from how many publishers are made up of people who left hedge funds because they couldn't cut it.
Well the new Lara is not at all the butch stereotype. There is an amazing disconnect between the violence in gameplay and how she acts in cut-scenes.Tyler Trahan said:
Nor could you possibly describe the original Lara as butch, she lived in a big luxurious mansion, she had extremely eloquent voice. Apart from occasional violent gunplay, she was no "butch" she wasn't a Vasquez type character. And really, an obsession with travelling the world to obtain artefacts of mysticism and hunting cryptozoology (she hunted down and killed Bigfoot), that's hardly a Butch lesbian stereotype.
And is the Vasquez stereotype is over used? No, it's very rare, it's just the few few rare examples are pounced upon.
The actual stereotype? Marcus Fenix, Solid Snake, Master Chief, John Marston, Captain Price. Gruff stoic men with guns and the gruffer the voice the better.
The Vasquez type character is so rare it doesn't even qualify for sterotype status, it's a rarely used trope, and almost unheard of in a leading role.
And really... one don't have a lot of choices for it not to be Lara Croft due to the huge lack of female protagonists in gaming anyway.
What new character have we had in the last 15 years to choose from? Master Chief, no, a guy. Nathan Drake, no, a guy. Marcus Fenix, no, a guy. Raiden, nope, still a guy (though he at least takes on negative female tropes like impractically styled hair and high heels in combat). Of all the characters of new COD, all male. Of all the new characters created in the past 15 years, what new female action heroes have we got?
It's not that she's "the MOST famous strong female main character" but "THE strong female main character in" for action adventure games. Due to the lack of alternatives.
(this is the point where I'm not directly responding to your quote, so don't take it directed solely at you)
I partially blame the problem with the past decade of games focusing on militarism, where military organisations tend to be very homogenous including along gender lines. And pursuing the mirage of "realism" they note how most criminals are male (for GTA games) and most soldiers are male, they of course "realistically" end up with all males.
And the point is males going on violent quests is just so established... it's not reasonable, it's simply established, we are used to it and don't so easily question it.
If you were to have a female lead for Bioshock or Red Dead Redemption, then buffoon pundits would cry
Frankly people need to stop crying gimmick over any variation from the straight-white-male lead which is in itself a gimmick that is only tolerated for it's such consistent use. Gimmick being something that seems good only on the surface, but scratching deeper you see the negativity or the pointlessness.
Lara was a massive-breasted sex object? You have you actually played the games?I say old chap said:
It's as dumb as saying Duke Nukem was a male stripper because he was an oiled body builder wearing a tight revealing vest and pointless sunglasses.
Read the pieces? Books smarts are only as smart as the person writing them, and most of these are written by people who haven't played the games or don't remember anything about them. It's not very smart for someone to write so much about what they know next to nothing about.
Any gay character written in a video game will be horrible because video game writing is horrible. Lara was okay pre-reboot( I dont know how she is now, not interested in the new game), but saying that "Oh I thought about making her gay!" just screams as attention grabbing to me.
I love this thread.
Jesus Christ, this is absurd. Look at this thing. The writer considered making a character gay and you're up in arms. I thought the Escapist was supposed to be fairly liberal, and yet here you are basically showing some pretty blatant homophobia. Sure, you dress it up nice under the veil of "It'd just be cheap titillation!" but come on. This is ridiculous. Essentially what you're saying is that any female homosexuality is nothing but pandering to men. Next you'll be saying that real life lesbians are only doing it for attention.
Jesus Christ, this is absurd. Look at this thing. The writer considered making a character gay and you're up in arms. I thought the Escapist was supposed to be fairly liberal, and yet here you are basically showing some pretty blatant homophobia. Sure, you dress it up nice under the veil of "It'd just be cheap titillation!" but come on. This is ridiculous. Essentially what you're saying is that any female homosexuality is nothing but pandering to men. Next you'll be saying that real life lesbians are only doing it for attention.
If sexual relationships are going to be there, they cannot be a basis for the player "caring" about a non-player-character being kidnapped/ransomed or otherwise in jeopardy. Far better the other way around, that someone in love with them is a reason to get the player character out of an impossible jam.
And this is true whether male or female in homosexual or heterosexual partnership, just because the player character cares about them, doesn't automatically mean the real-world-player will care. I really didn't care about Dom's wife in Gears of War and it's not because i'm prejudiced against heterosexual relationships. Without a common link then the player will be obliged to go on the quest, not really motivated. You also cannot do this as it is so overused, the player can see this shit coming, they are going to want to get attachment to a character if they are going to be ransomed in some way or another later.
What I think works better is to take a far more basic relationship such as a parent figure or adopted child. Almost everyone has some sort of parent figure, even if it wasn't their biological parents, that important person to look up to. I cared far more about Indiana Jones saving his Dad in The Last Crusade, or Nathan Drake saving his father-figure Sullivan in Uncharted 3 than any other rescue quest. Partially because I think anyone can appreciate the care people have wrapped up in their guardians. Similar could work with a child but it couldn't just be "he's you're son, now care about him" it would work far better with an adopted son within the game time that you grow to care for more than any other random kid.
If Relationships are not controlled by the player RPG style (and hence line up player's intent with playable-character's intent) then they must be there to humanise the playable-character, to establish they have a broader range of feelings and emotions.
I mean, the best romance I've seen in years was in Clint Eastwood's J. Edgar, a sexless but passionate relationship between two men. It was an on screen relationship I could really believe in. I see certain significant aspects to homosexual relationships whether between men or between women, by removing the inter-gender barrier, and how it's not a partnership of convenience to "have a family" or conforming.
It's because of love, pure and simple, crazy about each other.
And I think that would be best set against the narrative, than work for it. Have the lover be a conflicting agent though not the main antagonist, but something like an government agent or gang leader. And you get rid of the BS like "no, I'm the man in this relationship" starting from more possibilities rather than the usual squabbles.
And this is true whether male or female in homosexual or heterosexual partnership, just because the player character cares about them, doesn't automatically mean the real-world-player will care. I really didn't care about Dom's wife in Gears of War and it's not because i'm prejudiced against heterosexual relationships. Without a common link then the player will be obliged to go on the quest, not really motivated. You also cannot do this as it is so overused, the player can see this shit coming, they are going to want to get attachment to a character if they are going to be ransomed in some way or another later.
What I think works better is to take a far more basic relationship such as a parent figure or adopted child. Almost everyone has some sort of parent figure, even if it wasn't their biological parents, that important person to look up to. I cared far more about Indiana Jones saving his Dad in The Last Crusade, or Nathan Drake saving his father-figure Sullivan in Uncharted 3 than any other rescue quest. Partially because I think anyone can appreciate the care people have wrapped up in their guardians. Similar could work with a child but it couldn't just be "he's you're son, now care about him" it would work far better with an adopted son within the game time that you grow to care for more than any other random kid.
If Relationships are not controlled by the player RPG style (and hence line up player's intent with playable-character's intent) then they must be there to humanise the playable-character, to establish they have a broader range of feelings and emotions.
I mean, the best romance I've seen in years was in Clint Eastwood's J. Edgar, a sexless but passionate relationship between two men. It was an on screen relationship I could really believe in. I see certain significant aspects to homosexual relationships whether between men or between women, by removing the inter-gender barrier, and how it's not a partnership of convenience to "have a family" or conforming.
It's because of love, pure and simple, crazy about each other.
And I think that would be best set against the narrative, than work for it. Have the lover be a conflicting agent though not the main antagonist, but something like an government agent or gang leader. And you get rid of the BS like "no, I'm the man in this relationship" starting from more possibilities rather than the usual squabbles.
What difference would it make unless they changed some missions to have importance placed on that sexuality? press a to 'scissor', press b to 'fist', press x to be 'tender', press y to be 'rough. I really don't get this...what difference does her sexuality make? The worst that would happen is there might be a kiss and maybe a little innuendo that would change nothing in the gameplay so i can see no problem either way.
It's a sad fucking day when what is essentially a puzzle game becomes involved in considering sex to sell itself. Make a good game and you don't need sex to sell everything. As ever, the current trends towards such things are retarded at best
It's a sad fucking day when what is essentially a puzzle game becomes involved in considering sex to sell itself. Make a good game and you don't need sex to sell everything. As ever, the current trends towards such things are retarded at best
No. Even if his intentions are noble, no. If this were a male character (make Nathan Drake gay, that could be interesting) fine, do NOT do it to Lara Croft. Even if they have succeeded in making more than a, how did Yahtzee put it, a bong with a couple of footballs nailed to it, it doesn't change the fact that to the wider culture that's what she'll always be. Making her gay just screams of; we want sales so hey look we have this hot chick who doesn't wear a huge amount, get wets and uses guns and oh yeah, she likes chicks!
Lara has always been fairly asexual. She's aware of herself as a sexual object and uses it when it'll help her get ahead with whatever mission she's on (she pretty much flirted Larson into not killing her in Anniversary even when he had a clear shot but then killed him soon after because he stood in her way) but she never needed a love interest. It rarely fits her character (Kurtis worked because they were both pretty much as uninterested in each other that they were sort of drawn to one another by how committed to thier own causes they were).
Lara has always been fairly asexual. She's aware of herself as a sexual object and uses it when it'll help her get ahead with whatever mission she's on (she pretty much flirted Larson into not killing her in Anniversary even when he had a clear shot but then killed him soon after because he stood in her way) but she never needed a love interest. It rarely fits her character (Kurtis worked because they were both pretty much as uninterested in each other that they were sort of drawn to one another by how committed to thier own causes they were).
what are you on about? butch women can't be rich and eloquent? femme women can't be gay? a strong female can be anything, butch or femme, and those are tired old stereotypes in the first place. a girl is not automatically butch if she's strong and gay.Treblaine said: