Women in games are not systematically oppressed - a vertical slice

[NemotheElvenPanda]

I think people are confusing a game that's sexist with a game that depicts sexism. Taking the infamous Witcher 2 as the example, its habit on depicting women in scantly clad outfits most of the time outside of brothels is a bit problematic, especially since Saskia's armor has a fair bit of cleavage even though she's a deadly warrior. That can be considered sexist. Artistic maybe, because the Witcher does know how to make a convincing setting by how so much of the clothing is actually based on historical outfits, but there's no reason for boob armor in a setting that wants to take itself seriously as realistic.

On the other hand however, the way women are treated as prostitutes, mothers, and sorceresses depicts sexism in a realistic light because of how the Witcher universe works which is based on what options women had available for them in European history. To call that sexist is to call historical fiction based in a setting like 15th century Europe as sexist.

Going back to Saskia again, while her armor is problematic she is genuinely a powerful and admirable figure, so much so that people look past her sex. The sorceresses themselves are extremely influential and strong both in their positions as mages and advisors where they play the kingdoms for their own power. So really, if you look hard enough you can things that are either sexist, depict sexism, or go against it altogether. It's easy to just label a game as sexist or not without taking into consideration in other factors, which is something people like Anita don't do very often. Games should be held to that standard, but making them all out to be tool of the Patriarchy doesn't really help matters when it comes to making both fun and empowering games that people of all kinds can enjoy.

 

[nuclearday]

"It's true there are and have been good female characters in games now and in the past. But that doesn't mean it can't be better, right? I mean I like the graphics we have today, but I wouldn't mind seeing even better graphics, or better storytelling. And better characters is something everyone can get behind right?

I was nodding along until this part completely lost me.


Yes, we all want better characters. Most gamers don't care about the sex of the character, only if they're good or not. That being the case, equating "more female/minority characters" with "having better characters" is extremely wrong. No, having more female characters will not affect how good the characters we have are, not one bit. Having more minorities won't affect how good the character we have are, either. Female or minority characters aren't better than white male ones by definition. To imply that is beyond wrong.



We want good characters, that's it. That's IT. If you think the only way for characters to improve is for them to be more diverse rather than more, I dunno, interesting, better written, with good voice acting, in an interesting plot, you know, stuff that actually matters, you're not really in it for "better games overall" as you claim but rather to fight some political battle.

But... you're putting words in my mouth there. I didn't say anything about "more female/minority characters." I'm sorry, but you even underlined the part of my quote where I said "better characters."

You're arguing against a stance I didn't take (where I was basically saying I think a big problem is the degree of misunderstanding and jumped conclusions around this topic, oddly.) As such, there's not really much to respond to. I'm sorry if I was unclear or could have put it another way - but nowhere in my post did say anything about more female characters, and that's what you're basing your entire reply on...

 

[Gorrath]

I think your definition of "sexist" is too narrow.

Just because a game has female NPCs or a good female supporting cast, doesn't automatically mean the game is not sexist. Because the portrayal of those females within the game can still be considered to be sexist.

I'm going to have to agree to this. I mean, sure, Guild Wars 2 including the option to play as a female is nice. Making the game so that female characters get special versions of all the armor that prioritize showing off their model bodies over actually protecting them isn't. The same can be said of Skyrim (boobplate), and Dota 2, as well as Divinity, which, in case anyone's forgotten, had to be reminded that dressing their female characters up like strippers was bad.

bikini clad but not sexual supporting female character. NOT SEXIST.

And then there's this. I haven't played it, but what the hell is this bikini clad female character who is not sexual?

On the whole "boob-plate" thing. While I do agree that having low cut/non-existant versions of armor made to show off cleavage is more than a little silly, there's nothing wrong with armor tailored to fit the female form, including the breasts. Skyrim didn't have two sets of obsidian armor, one that covered the chest, for men, and one that covered nothing but a g-string for women. Both sets fully covered their form. I was pleasantly surprised by Skyrim for their armor designs. If they were running around in chain mail bikinis, I could see more of an argument there. Hell, even today the U.S. Army has tested body armor specifically designed to fit the female body better. I'm not refuting your criticism though, just to be clear, just that one example.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

"It's true there are and have been good female characters in games now and in the past. But that doesn't mean it can't be better, right? I mean I like the graphics we have today, but I wouldn't mind seeing even better graphics, or better storytelling. And better characters is something everyone can get behind right?

I was nodding along until this part completely lost me.


Yes, we all want better characters. Most gamers don't care about the sex of the character, only if they're good or not. That being the case, equating "more female/minority characters" with "having better characters" is extremely wrong. No, having more female characters will not affect how good the characters we have are, not one bit. Having more minorities won't affect how good the character we have are, either. Female or minority characters aren't better than white male ones by definition. To imply that is beyond wrong.



We want good characters, that's it. That's IT. If you think the only way for characters to improve is for them to be more diverse rather than more, I dunno, interesting, better written, with good voice acting, in an interesting plot, you know, stuff that actually matters, you're not really in it for "better games overall" as you claim but rather to fight some political battle.

But... you're putting words in my mouth there. I didn't say anything about "more female/minority characters." I'm sorry, but you even underlined the part of my quote where I said "better characters."

You're arguing against a stance I didn't take (where I was basically saying I think a big problem is the degree of misunderstanding and jumped conclusions around this topic, oddly.) As such, there's not really much to respond to. I'm sorry if I was unclear or could have put it another way - but nowhere in my post did say anything about more female characters, and that's what you're basing your entire reply on...

I said that you implied it, not that you said it. Clearly, when you are making a post about more inclusive chars, list progress of graphics and sound etc. and then equate the evolution of the quality of characters to more diverse characters, you're implying that one achieves the other.

Were it not so, why is it relevant to even have the quoted paragraph in there. Were it not pertaining to how diversity is a good idea which will push the medium forward, why would you even bother saying we all want games to improve more. Wouldn't that be an obvious thing? Do you think people need to randomly be made aware of that fact for no reason? If so, why?


No, I think within the context of the entire post, you're implying that diversity will make for better characters. Not better writing or scenarios or situations or voice acting but simply diversity will be good enough to move the medium forward.

The honest attitude to have is to admit that even if all characters ever are white brown haired dudes, they still can be better than a rainbow of diversity if they are actually better-written and better acted and in better games. This being the case, pushing for better writing and acting and storytelling is what one would occupy oneself with were they to actually wanna push games forward. When you don't do that, you put something else, "inclusivity" or whatever, above the betterment of games. I hope you can understand why such an act is frustrating when it comes from someone claiming to actually wanna help games and nothing else.

 

[Artaneius]

Would this be better?

Sure, why wouldn't it be? She's standing like a person rather than a mannequin in a Victoria's Secret window.

Wow... your just looking for an argument. And people wonder why this crap is happening... *facepalm* Why don't you harass Victoria Secret then for being "sexist"? Maybe because their lawyers and security would throw you out the moment you spoke your intentions... Then again, just a random guess.

 

[SNCommand]

Eh, I like to view boobplate as a valid diversion from reality in the same sense that you don't have to eat and pee, and you don't get killed or have your armor destroyed by receiving hits

I don't mind games with boobplates and six pack plates

 

[Artaneius]

On the whole "boob-plate" thing. While I do agree that having low cut/non-existant versions of armor made to show off cleavage is more than a little silly, there's nothing wrong with armor tailored to fit the female form, including the breasts. Skyrim didn't have two sets of obsidian armor, one that covered the chest, for men, and one that covered nothing but a g-string for women. Both sets fully covered their form. I was pleasantly surprised by Skyrim for their armor designs. If they were running around in chain mail bikinis, I could see more of an argument there. Hell, even today the U.S. Army has tested body armor specifically designed to fit the female body better. I'm not refuting your criticism though, just to be clear, just that one example.

The problem is that that's not how armor actually works, nor how breasts work. For the former, boobplate [http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/boob-plate-armor-would-kill-you] pretty much negates the purpose of plate since it directs every attack directly into your chest instead of deflecting it, as well as being incredibly dangerous on its own since if you fall forward you drive a nice metal spike into your sternum and kill yourself.

For the latter, breasts don't need individual metal bowls to stick themselves inside to rest. In fact, I'd imagine that that would be incredibly uncomfortable to do. Do you know how women actually wear armor? The same way as men, except with some possible bindings over their breasts to hold them still. The only difference between male and female armor should be the dimensions based upon different builds and the ratio of body parts. As far as I'm aware, the female armor the US Army is designing is based around these things, not adding kevlar bras to the armor.

On the whole "boob-plate" thing. While I do agree that having low cut/non-existant versions of armor made to show off cleavage is more than a little silly, there's nothing wrong with armor tailored to fit the female form, including the breasts. Skyrim didn't have two sets of obsidian armor, one that covered the chest, for men, and one that covered nothing but a g-string for women. Both sets fully covered their form. I was pleasantly surprised by Skyrim for their armor designs. If they were running around in chain mail bikinis, I could see more of an argument there. Hell, even today the U.S. Army has tested body armor specifically designed to fit the female body better. I'm not refuting your criticism though, just to be clear, just that one example.

The problem is that that's not how armor actually works, nor how breasts work. For the former, boobplate [http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/boob-plate-armor-would-kill-you] pretty much negates the purpose of plate since it directs every attack directly into your chest instead of deflecting it, as well as being incredibly dangerous on its own since if you fall forward you drive a nice metal spike into your sternum and kill yourself.

For the latter, breasts don't need individual metal bowls to stick themselves inside to rest. In fact, I'd imagine that that would be incredibly uncomfortable to do. Do you know how women actually wear armor? The same way as men, except with some possible bindings over their breasts to hold them still. The only difference between male and female armor should be the dimensions based upon different builds and the ratio of body parts. As far as I'm aware, the female armor the US Army is designing is based around these things, not adding kevlar bras to the armor.

LOL, if you really wanted the developers to be "realistic" with armor from the medieval period then woman most likely wouldn't be playable. Armor in modern times is much different than mail or plate armor and so were the politics too. People play games to escape reality not be forced to be educated about equality, realistic armor, or the average woman's capabilities. That would be boring for both men and woman gamers that are trying to escape reality for awhile.

 

[Atmos Duality]

That doesn't end the "not a gamer/customer" argument, it attempts to ignore it by pushing it back a step.

The "not a gamer" argument ended the moment it became about finding some arbitrary list of qualifiers for the term "gamer" beyond "one that plays games".

"Vote with your wallet" in this instance is realistic. Albeit a bit reductive since if gamers only support products they know they will like, boundaries never get pushed and the medium stagnates (kinda like Hollywood and their obsession with remakes).

Of course that's discounting basic human curiosity. Unless the market is in such an insular state that collapse is imminent, curiosity will eventually win out.

 

[nuclearday]

I said that you implied it, not that you said it. Clearly, when you are making a post about more inclusive chars, list progress of graphics and sound etc. and then equate the evolution of the quality of characters to more diverse characters, you're implying that one achieves the other.

Were it not so, why is it relevant to even have the quoted paragraph in there. Were it not pertaining to how diversity is a good idea which will push the medium forward, why would you even bother saying we all want games to improve more. Wouldn't that be an obvious thing? Do you think people need to randomly be made aware of that fact for no reason? If so, why?


No, I think within the context of the entire post, you're implying that diversity will make for better characters. Not better writing or scenarios or situations or voice acting but simply diversity will be good enough to move the medium forward.

The honest attitude to have is to admit that even if all characters ever are white brown haired dudes, they still can be better than a rainbow of diversity if they are actually better-written and better acted and in better games. This being the case, pushing for better writing and acting and storytelling is what one would occupy oneself with were they to actually wanna push games forward. When you don't do that, you put something else, "inclusivity" or whatever, above the betterment of games. I hope you can understand why such an act is frustrating when it comes from someone claiming to actually wanna help games and nothing else.

I mean, I wrote a fairly long post, there. There's a number of things I actually stated as my confirmed stance, but you're going to choose to focus on an assumption about something you think I implied? That's a confusing way to try to have a conversation with someone.

Fine, if you want to talk about my stance on diversity in gaming, as opposed to issues of how characters are represented, I guess I can go down that road...?

Yeah, I think it's more important that a good writer have well-written characters, whatever they are. A more diverse cast of characters is generally a good thing if I were to make a broad generalization. But that's going to depend on the story you're telling, as well. I think it's the sort of issue you'd have to look at on a case-by-base basis, and even in those cases I'd rather not have stock token characters. I don't really disagree with you on this, I think...

You get more diverse characters in gaming when there's a more diverse group of people creating games - we have lot of stories revolving around white male characters because there's just more of them making games right now. A more diverse group of content creators I'd like to see simply because more viewpoints is better, I think. Not even in terms of "oh, now we have three more black protagonists and two more female protagonists," but just you're more likely to have different and original takes on similar characters when they're coming from people with different backgrounds and perspectives to bring to the table.

And you get more people in the industry when they feel better represented. Yes - in terms of quality. (I suppose I now have to specifically state this every time I suppose...) So it's a chicken or egg thing.

Anyway, I'm sorry if I sound frustrated, but I make a post about how I think there's a lot of misrepresentation and people opposing created stances; I specifically make a statement that I think the issue is the quality of representation overall and an awareness of potential problems, and then you insist on talking about something else. You said you agreed with half of what I said, and then oppose me on a stance you assume I hold, but in actuality I don't think we're far off from.

As for this:

The honest attitude to have is to admit that even if all characters ever are white brown haired dudes, they still can be better than a rainbow of diversity if they are actually better-written and better acted and in better games.

That's rather hyperbolic. You want me to choose between a world where only one character is ever written for video games versus one where there's an even number of every ethnicity but they badly-written?

 

[Gorrath]

On the whole "boob-plate" thing. While I do agree that having low cut/non-existant versions of armor made to show off cleavage is more than a little silly, there's nothing wrong with armor tailored to fit the female form, including the breasts. Skyrim didn't have two sets of obsidian armor, one that covered the chest, for men, and one that covered nothing but a g-string for women. Both sets fully covered their form. I was pleasantly surprised by Skyrim for their armor designs. If they were running around in chain mail bikinis, I could see more of an argument there. Hell, even today the U.S. Army has tested body armor specifically designed to fit the female body better. I'm not refuting your criticism though, just to be clear, just that one example.

The problem is that that's not how armor actually works, nor how breasts work. For the former, boobplate [http://www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/boob-plate-armor-would-kill-you] pretty much negates the purpose of plate since it directs every attack directly into your chest instead of deflecting it, as well as being incredibly dangerous on its own since if you fall forward you drive a nice metal spike into your sternum and kill yourself.

For the latter, breasts don't need individual metal bowls to stick themselves inside to rest. In fact, I'd imagine that that would be incredibly uncomfortable to do. Do you know how women actually wear armor? The same way as men, except with some possible bindings over their breasts to hold them still. The only difference between male and female armor should be the dimensions based upon different builds and the ratio of body parts. As far as I'm aware, the female armor the US Army is designing is based around these things, not adding kevlar bras to the armor.

I think you have missed my points, likely because there were two in there and they were not well separated. What I said was that male and female body armor did not need to be designed the same because the male and female figure is different. The U.S. Army's flak vests are an example of why that claim I made was valid.

A separate point was that Skyrim's body armor didn't come off as all the offensive to me because it covered both the male and female characters fully. Whether or not "boob-plate" would actually work or be a good idea is irrelevant to that, since Skyrim's armor has jack all to do with reality for the most part. Personally, I find Skyrim's armor to not be too bad in comparison to say, chain mail bikinis. Your own opinion on that may vary. It's very possible the boob-plate design was chosen so that the player could tell the sex of the character at a glance even when covered in obsidian armor head to toe. It does not seem unreasonable that the designers chose to base the look of the armor on player interaction with the world and not whether or not it'd be a good idea in real life.

In essence, there are two reasons why male and female armor in games might look different from one another and not be based on sexism. One because of reality of differing body types and two because of visual design and player interaction. That's what I'm on about.

EDIT: Wanted to throw a personal opinion in here as well. I would LOVE to play a game where I couldn't actually tell the sex of an armored person at a glance. Trying to romance someone who's gender was a total mystery to me could be a very fun and exciting set up. I get why developers do that sort of visual cuing, but it'd be nice to have some mystery some times. That's why Tali was immensely popular; mystery is fun.

 

[Gorrath]

I think you have missed my points, likely because there were two in there and they were not well separated. What I said was that male and female body armor did not need to be designed the same because the male and female figure is different. The U.S. Army's flak vests are an example of why that claim I made was valid.

Well, yes, the male and female body is generally different, it's just that the differences tend not to be centered around breasts and how to let the world know that the person wearing the armor has them.

A separate point was that Skyrim's body armor didn't come off as all the offensive to me because it covered both the male and female characters fully. Whether or not "boob-plate" would actually work or be a good idea is irrelevant to that, since Skyrim's armor has jack all to do with reality for the most part. Personally, I find Skyrim's armor to not be too bad in comparison to say, chain mail bikinis. Your own opinion on that may vary. It's very possible the boob-plate design was chosen so that the player could tell the sex of the character at a glance even when covered in obsidian armor head to toe. It does not seem unreasonable that the designers chose to base the look of the armor on player interaction with the world and not whether or not it'd be a good idea in real life.

Skyrim's armor isn't that bad, that is true, but that doesn't make it okay. And the reasoning of making it easier to identify which gender the person under the armor is unnecessary since it's pretty easy to tell based on the size and shape of the armor without noting that the more slender of the two builds also has breasts.

In essence, there are two reasons why male and female armor in games might look different from one another and not be based on sexism. One because of reality of differing body types and two because of visual design and player interaction. That's what I'm on about.

The first one is fine, because it's based around reality and doesn't apply itself to the "look breasts!" school of design. The latter is iffy at best, because if your visual design decides that female characters must have some sort of breasts displayed at all times, it's not exactly hard to see the sexism unless the male characters have some sort of exaggerated codpiece to make things equivalent. Otherwise you risk coming across as deciding that men get to look normal in their armor, but women have to look feminine in it for some reason.

Well, no, the male equivalent would be chest armor that has the male chest also accentuated. Why people go right to "giant codpiece" as the equivalent to chest armor is a bit bizarre to me. I'm not sure why you claim that a full chest piece on a female character model would constitute "displaying their breasts". Their breasts are still fully hidden. That might seem pedantic, but it is worth noting since there really are sets of armor in games that do "display" the breasts of the female model.

The whole point would be that yes, you do want you female characters to look like female models in their armor so that the player can easily tell the difference at a glance. The breasts are a (usually) easy way to differentiate between the sexes this way. If you want this effect and decide to go with something like female characters being more slender, that is much harder to notice at a glance and I don't really see how it fixes the sexism claims since it then pigeon holes all the females in the game into being slender.

You could argue that Skyrim didn't need to visually differentiate between male and female characters while in their armor, and that's something that's worth discussing, but if they've already decided that that's what they want to do, boob-plate that covers the whole body is a pretty damned innocuous and effective way to go about it.

 

[JimB]

Wow...you're just looking for an argument.

No, you are projecting your own stance onto me, Artaneius. You could have just as easily asked me how I reconcile the seeming contradictions in my position as insulted me--easier, even--but instead, you thought it would be more fun to blame me for "this crap" (whatever that means) and accuse me of cowardice. Of the two of us, I feel perfectly comfortable saying you are the one looking for an argument, and as such I will thank you in the future not to act as if you know my motivations. Not only do you not understand me, you have displayed absolutely no interest in understanding anything about me.

 

[Netrigan]

IMO, sexism, racism, nationalism, etc, if you add an -ism at the end it means hatred is present.

I believe you can joke about women, different races, different nations without meaning you hate them, it might make you a bit of an asshole, though that's not as bad as being a racist, a sexist or a nationalist...

People throw around words they don't understand, and people get offended easily.

Anita Sharkeesian, or hoever you spell her name, is what I call a fire starter. She gets offended or upset about something, and she deems it a crime, or villainous, or basically WRONG to do at all. Are video games like Mario, Skyrim, GTA, Saints Row racist? Are they REALLY sexist? Of course not. They do in no way, advocate the hatred of ANY kind of person. Are they representations of REAL LIFE? Of course not, they are NOT SUPPOSED TO BE.

Why then do people like Anita, claim that its harmful to real people? Fear, ignorance, it can be a multitude of reasons, whats important is that you educate yourself. Anyone who spends a good deal of time playing video games knows that whenever video games appear on the news and they claim we're being brainwashed into killing, that it's ridiculous. People need to likewise stop listening to people like Anita when she says we're being brainwashed into being sexist. It's just not true. We give her far too much attention, money, etc. and I suppose it stems from not properly thinking about and understanding these issues ourselves enough, and for that maybe we have fire starters like her to blame. She may only be making things worse, but at least she is making people stop and think. Once we all figure our as a society that games are Okay, that will be the end of it.

A movie, a book, a video game can have something in it that's not real. That's not normal. That's not ethical, that's not moral, that doesn't make it wrong. An artistic work usually aims to do one thing, tell a story, or, entertain you.

Anything that is made by people will be loved by certain people and hated by others, video games are not the exception. If you dislike a movie, book or game you shouldn't try to get it banned, censored or changed. That's not your right. Your right is to use that product and like it or not like it. You also have the right to make your own product. The imagination is a wonderful thing. Get to work.

That's... over-simplifying the issue.

For starters, you can watch those Tropes vs Women videos and see for yourself - she's not actually demonizing those games. And even goes out of her way specifically to state that she doesn't "hate" these games for conforming to existing stereotypes, and even that it's fundamentally okay to enjoy a game even if it has flaws.

The average pro-feminist gamer isn't holding bonfires made of Super Mario games any more than the average... (I don't know a non-insulting term for the converse view, actually) other gamer thinks that the proper way to respond to something they don't agree with is with lude comments and expletives.

Too often this conversation is couched in inaccurate and unrealistic absolutes. The level of mis-understanding and jumped conclusions that's taken place in response to what's really just a fairly dry school research paper read in front of a green screen would be hilarious - if we were talking about something I didn't feel was actually somewhat important and mattered.

This is what the communal conversation looks like from my end:

"Hey, you know how there's talk that maybe minorities should have better roles in videogames and how every character doesn't need to be a white guy? Well maybe we should also look at how women are portrayed and work toward a more inclusive gaming community as a whole. We could start by raising awareness and expanding the vocabulary of the average gamer to be more familiar with standard trends in gaming and giving them the tools to have a more critical eye towards these issues."

"Hey! Games are not sexist because Samus! I like Super Mario, don't tell me I should hate it for feminist standards that didn't exist for the industry decades ago!"

"It's true there are and have been good female characters in games now and in the past. But that doesn't mean it can't be better, right? I mean I like the graphics we have today, but I wouldn't mind seeing even better graphics, or better storytelling. And better characters is something everyone can get behind right?

Besides, I don't hate those games. I can have fun with and even love a game that has flaws. The objective isn't to vilify gaming, but raise awareness. If you're going to have a damsel in distress at least be aware that's what you're doing."

"But it's art, and it's a fantasy setting so women should be treated poorly in "

"Art is a great answer. But a good artist is at least aware of what they're doing. It's one thing to create something with a specific purpose with the full knowledge that's what you're doing, it's another to do so arbitrarily or through accident or ignorance.

As for setting - there is a (I thought obvious) distinction between how a character is treated by other characters within the story, and how a character is written and portrayed by the author. You can have a pro-feminist female character that is treated poorly by other characters. Of course you can. No one is saying otherwise. It's all about implementation, knowledge of what you're doing, and awareness of the subject."

And so on...

It's not an all-or-nothing gambit, here. No one's going to come take your video games away. I'm a feminist, sure. But I also own a copy of DOA Beach Volleyball. The issue is not that are specific examples that can be sighted for contributing to sexist tropes - it is the prevalence of such tropes and the general ignorance of their existence that's problematic.

I love throwing around Alan Moore in these discussions, but I take these videos as an outsider going, "you know you do this a lot right? Maybe it would be interesting and widen the appeal of gaming if you tried do something else."

And that's exactly what Alan Moore strove to do with his work. When he noticed he was using the narrative trick of continuing a sentence into another panel and using the last phrase to draw a parallel with another scene, he stopped doing it. It was a good trick, but relying on it too much was lazy. When he wrote V For Vendetta, he created various challenges for himself (such as no sound effects) and wrote a classic.

What I find depressing when watching these videos isn't the sexism, but seeing the same cliched scene play out again and again and again and again and again. Such as the random encounters where simplistic scenarios play out, and you see the same basic scene playing out across several games... and it wasn't good or memorable in any of them. It's just an excuse to churn out some lazy content for the sandbox. Kind of like shoving a racing mini-game into any city-based sandbox game, even if it's not really fun.

So much of this stuff is just so damn boring. Oh, look, another shoot-out in a strip club. The strip club has become the new sewer.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I said that you implied it, not that you said it. Clearly, when you are making a post about more inclusive chars, list progress of graphics and sound etc. and then equate the evolution of the quality of characters to more diverse characters, you're implying that one achieves the other.

Were it not so, why is it relevant to even have the quoted paragraph in there. Were it not pertaining to how diversity is a good idea which will push the medium forward, why would you even bother saying we all want games to improve more. Wouldn't that be an obvious thing? Do you think people need to randomly be made aware of that fact for no reason? If so, why?


No, I think within the context of the entire post, you're implying that diversity will make for better characters. Not better writing or scenarios or situations or voice acting but simply diversity will be good enough to move the medium forward.

The honest attitude to have is to admit that even if all characters ever are white brown haired dudes, they still can be better than a rainbow of diversity if they are actually better-written and better acted and in better games. This being the case, pushing for better writing and acting and storytelling is what one would occupy oneself with were they to actually wanna push games forward. When you don't do that, you put something else, "inclusivity" or whatever, above the betterment of games. I hope you can understand why such an act is frustrating when it comes from someone claiming to actually wanna help games and nothing else.

I mean, I wrote a fairly long post, there. There's a number of things I actually stated as my confirmed stance, but you're going to choose to focus on an assumption about something you think I implied? That's a confusing way to try to have a conversation with someone.

Fine, if you want to talk about my stance on diversity in gaming, as opposed to issues of how characters are represented, I guess I can go down that road...?

Yeah, I think it's more important that a good writer have well-written characters, whatever they are. A more diverse cast of characters is generally a good thing if I were to make a broad generalization. But that's going to depend on the story you're telling, as well. I think it's the sort of issue you'd have to look at on a case-by-base basis, and even in those cases I'd rather not have stock token characters. I don't really disagree with you on this, I think...

You get more diverse characters in gaming when there's a more diverse group of people creating games - we have lot of stories revolving around white male characters because there's just more of them making games right now. A more diverse group of content creators I'd like to see simply because more viewpoints is better, I think. Not even in terms of "oh, now we have three more black protagonists and two more female protagonists," but just you're more likely to have different and original takes on similar characters when they're coming from people with different backgrounds and perspectives to bring to the table.

And you get more people in the industry when they feel better represented. Yes - in terms of quality. (I suppose I now have to specifically state this every time I suppose...) So it's a chicken or egg thing.

Anyway, I'm sorry if I sound frustrated, but I make a post about how I think there's a lot of misrepresentation and people opposing created stances; I specifically make a statement that I think the issue is the quality of representation overall and an awareness of potential problems, and then you insist on talking about something else. You said you agreed with half of what I said, and then oppose me on a stance you assume I hold, but in actuality I don't think we're far off from.

Here's the thing, if you wanna tell a good story and you think you can do that the best with a diverse cast, that's awesome. What's problematic is inherently thinking that there's some intrinsic benefit to diversity. Ultimately, how good the game will be is based wholly on how good a story is written and told and all those factors. Using diversity as a tool wherever the artist deems it necessary is equal to using any other thing in storytelling. That being the case, diversity is like...long hair versus baldness on an enemy or having an old guy instead of a young guy teach you moves or having a pet cat instead of a pet parrot. It's just one more "thing" which if used right can make for good games. It's NOT a magic elixir which will single-handedly elevate gaming to a new level. Therefore, to fight for diversity in such a way is misguided. That'd be like fighting for any one random factor such as "more one-armed samurai in games!" or "more snake enemies who spit poison in games!". It really makes little sense to make an issue out of something like that.


Like I said, I was agreeing with you until that part, I don't have anything to say about stuff I agree with past that I agree with it so I just focused on the stuff I took issue with. I think that's rational.

That's rather hyperbolic. You want me to choose between a world where only one character is ever written for video games versus one where there's an even number of every ethnicity but they badly-written?

I want you to acknowledge the possibility and thus focus on the truly meaningful areas of writing voice acting, artwork, game design etc. If we do that, everyone benefits. As time passes, more people of various background will eventually get to make games and having been brought up in a culture which worships these qualities rather than hollow diversity for diversity's sake they will give us the well written people of diverse backgrounds that you want. If we just tout diversity for its own sake we'll just get the game equivalent of Tiler Perry movies and get stuck there.