Developers call out Ubisoft on their stance regarding playable female characters

The fact that we're talking about a projection of an avatar that you yourself never get to see as you're playing is what slays me.

Thinking about it the lack of a female option in Team Fortress 2 as an example is far more 'egregious'. There is no single player, all models are visible for everyone etc etc, it's ARENA MULTIPLAYER with no story. But even there when the guys at Valve sat down and thought of fun character concepts their minds went to lanky Australian guy, hyper Bostonian guy, hooded frenchman etc. I would never want them to go into a conference room and go to a character creator "Hey this black Scottish demoman concept is great. The jokes, the looks, everything is awesome... but we need to junk it and put in something female."

The issue in AC:V with seamless drop in co-op where the character the player themselves never changes is so much more minor than that that this whole frenzy completely and totally confuses me.
 
Yeah the poutrage culture that's come to gaming in the past year or so is getting a bit silly. Kinda like that review with that guy noticing there wasn't enough diversity in Mario Kart or people arguing over the gender of Kirby. I guess a "good" game right now has to have women (but not too sexy) and it has to be 1080p or higher.

I saw it as a non-issue. Sounds like they're kinda just doing like the co-op in early halo. Copy the model, change the color a little. Get some co-op gameplay. This isn't some great social injustice that will unravel society.

I agree... Don't forget you have to sprinkle in gay marriage too if you want to hit all the check points.
 
In the context of AC:Unity and the seamless co-op what does a female character add besides something aesthetically pleasing? If they were to say reskin all of Arno's animations to a female skin yet still the gameplay exactly the same as it is now then what it add to the game? How does it affect it? You always see yourself as Arno so what does other players seeing you as a female add to the game overall? Genuinely curious. It's not like the narrative changes. Or anything like that. But what does it add?

Well as I have said before, it adds the sense that it's not just men who come help. In the past games with recruits, there were women recruits, now suddenly in co-op it's only guys. That takes away from the narrative to not have women. How does adding the clothing of the co-op partners add more than adding women?
 
How does adding the clothing of the co-op partners add more than adding women?
Because changing clothes of the Arno model is already in the single player game it just carries over the seamless drop in co-op. Honestly changing the face is the *least* amount of work they could do to get co-op put into the main single player game.
 
Because changing clothes of the Arno model is already in the single player game it just carries over the seamless drop in co-op. Honestly changing the face is the *least* amount of work they could do to get co-op put into the main single player game.

Easy-ness adds more?
 
I completely agree with everything you said, and if Ubisoft just said "we wanted male leads from the very beginning and didn't consider female assassins" it would have felt just right, because it's the same over and over again in AAA space.

I really don't get this. If it had never been a consideration to make a female alternate they'd be in the clear, but because they did and had to offer the reason why it was cut it's open season on them?

Well as I have said before, it adds the sense that it's not just men who come help. In the past games with recruits, there were women recruits, now suddenly in co-op it's only guys. That takes away from the narrative to not have women. How does adding the clothing of the co-op partners add more than adding women?

We have no idea whether there will be female AI.
 
Because changing clothes of the Arno model is already in the single player game it just carries over the seamless drop in co-op. Honestly changing the face is the *least* amount of work they could do to get co-op put into the main single player game.

Exactly: they half-assed co-op, and people are now using the fiction that the game itself has set up over multiple iterations to question the oddity of what comes out (eg banners with four clones of the main character).
 
Didn't you say it was unimportant and silly to want other people to see you as a woman in co-op, but now other people seeing your clothes is "completely important".

Women less important than clothing accessories?


Well, male gamers aren't often "forgotten" yet women often are, and in this case sent to the cutting room floor.
No, it's unimportant in this specific context considering all the things they have to polish before the game ships. And yes, seeing a female avatar is less important than making sure all the customization options translate well into the seamless co-op that this game is trying to incorporate. Not to mention all the other things that are aspects of the game itself. The things that add to the gameplay on more than just an aesthetic level. It's easy to do a simple face swap. But as we've shown you multiple times before it's either hard to do the female one correctly, or it's relatively lame to do it lazily. Because then we get things like this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ye0Rl16elKo
or something that looks very unnatural
9jjgr

https://imgflip.com/gif/9jjgr
 
In the context of AC:Unity and the seamless co-op what does a female character add besides something aesthetically pleasing? If they were to say reskin all of Arno's animations to a female skin yet still the gameplay exactly the same as it is now then what it add to the game? How does it affect it? You always see yourself as Arno so what does other players seeing you as a female add to the game overall? Genuinely curious. It's not like the narrative changes. Or anything like that. But what does it add?

What about choice? What if you want to play as a female character? I do in many RPGs and such even when it doesn't make much of a difference to story etc. There are so many male characters that given the chance I often choose to play a female.
 
What about choice? What if you want to play as a female character? I do in many RPGs and such even when it doesn't make much of a difference to story etc. There are so many male characters that given the chance I often choose to play a female.
This isn't an rpg series. This is Assassin's creed. Where you always play as an established character. Not a blank slate.
 
Just it's not sexist to say that games like Tomb Raider don't have playable men during development. What if during production they planned to let you play as Lara's dad but decided to drop it to get a more focused product and spend resources elsewhere. That's not sexist or done with malicious intent. It's just something that happens.

You can play as men during the multiplayer so that's not a very good comparison. Playable men was clearly a part of the development of Tomb Raider. Even though Lara's animations are clearly the most important, they still found the time to make animations for men.
 
Yeah the poutrage culture that's come to gaming in the past year or so is getting a bit silly. Kinda like that review with that guy noticing there wasn't enough diversity in Mario Kart or people arguing over the gender of Kirby. I guess a "good" game right now has to have women (but not too sexy) and it has to be 1080p or higher.

I saw it as a non-issue. Sounds like they're kinda just doing like the co-op in early halo. Copy the model, change the color a little. Get some co-op gameplay. This isn't some great social injustice that will unravel society.

It's not about "being too sexy" it's about objectifying women. I want characters with more to get off their chest than a wet t-shirt.
 
What about choice? What if you want to play as a female character? I do in many RPGs and such even when it doesn't make much of a difference to story etc. There are so many male characters that given the chance I often choose to play a female.
AC is not an RPG. It's extremely character driven story wise since you are reliving a predetermined life. The character isn't you, thus you don't really have a right to gender choice.
 
Well as I have said before, it adds the sense that it's not just men who come help. In the past games with recruits, there were women recruits, now suddenly in co-op it's only guys. That takes away from the narrative to not have women. How does adding the clothing of the co-op partners add more than adding women?
We've already seen what looks to be like a female assassin already. You're acting like they won't include them in the story at all. When they always do. There is always at least one major female character who's an assassin.
JKnzS4w.jpg

For all we know she could be the assassin that murders the guy and was executed and that could be a major plot point.
 
And yes, seeing a female avatar is less important than making sure all the customization options translate well
Why, when you will always see your avatar as-is regardless?

It's easy to do a simple face swap.
But what does that add?

For all we know she could be the assassin that murders the guy and was executed and that could be a major plot point.
No, you're ignorant for assuming there will be female assassins in this game. Talking out of your ass! etc.
 
You can play as men during the multiplayer so that's not a very good comparison. Playable men was clearly a part of the development of Tomb Raider. Even though Lara's animations are clearly the most important, they still found the time to make animations for men.
And the multiplayer in tomb raider is half assed. But you're right it's a bad example.
 
You can play as men during the multiplayer so that's not a very good comparison. Playable men was clearly a part of the development of Tomb Raider. Even though Lara's animations are clearly the most important, they still found the time to make animations for men.
Not a good argument given the polish argument. Tomb Raider's mp was very rough around the edges. Yeah it had men, but halfassed men that used the same animations as every other mp character.
Edit: keep getting to these slightly late and seeming repetitive. I blame my mobile network.
 
We have no idea whether there will be female AI.

That would make me question this decision even more honestly. If there are female AI assassins with corresponding animations, why couldn't they just use that character model for Co-Op avatars?
 
It's not about "being too sexy" it's about objectifying women. I want characters with more to get off their chest than a wet t-shirt.
This is a completely different topic but there is no obvious line at all between a female character that objectifies women and a female character that is strong and confident in her sexuality. You don't want to be sex-negative either.
 
Why, when you will always see your avatar as-is regardless?


But what does that add?
It adds more time to for the development and polish of other more important aspects of the game. Like seamless side quests, MMA mission structure, and AI polish just to name a few off the top of my head. It also allows for seamless multiplayer where everyone is playing as a fluid well animated assassin.
 
Well... it does seem a little silly to say that they couldn't add a female model due to LOE but I'm a bit torn on this topic due to not having first hand knowledge of their budget and game design.

I wonder if due to the backlash they will find a way to incorporate a female model... or maybe they will have some sort of DLC component to have a female counterpart for Arno... in which they can add her in co-op to appease the masses (in some form)

either way... doesn't seem like this will stay an issue IMO.
 
Attentive readers will observe that this wouldn't resolve the Assassin's Creed Unity situation. If Ubisoft Montreal's argument is that you always appear as Arno and there are no avatars in the game, that wouldn't be covered by this. But correcting the kind of inequality that we see in games at present isn't about going after specific instances. It's about targeting fundamental attitudes and behaviour - and you do that by setting an example.

Wait, what? We understand this:
If Ubisoft Montreal's argument is that you always appear as Arno and there are no avatars in the game, that wouldn't be covered by this.

And that this isn't a specific instance of sexism:

But correcting the kind of inequality that we see in games at present isn't about going after specific instances.

And we understand that Ubisoft excels in making female characters (which nullifies the fundamental attitudes and behavior as it applies to Ubisoft):

Changing fundamental attitudes and behaviour. This is also why Amancio is horribly wrong about the relevance of this issue to Assassin's Creed Unity, because up to now Assassin's Creed has been setting a decent, if not spectacular example. It has plenty of strong female characters. It always let you play as women in multiplayer (cutting multiplayer from Unity certainly has not helped this situation). And there is even an Assassin's Creed game starring a woman.

And yet:
It's about targeting fundamental attitudes and behaviour - and you do that by setting an example.

To summarize: We know that Ubisoft didn't do anything that was exactly sexist. We know that when it comes to fundamental attitudes and behavior, Ubisoft has a great track record. But we're using them to set an example.
 
That would make me question this decision even more honestly. If there are female AI assassins with corresponding animations, why couldn't they just use that character model for Co-Op avatars?
Since you are Arno, they need all his animations thus there would still be a good deal of work to be done.
 
No, it's unimportant in this specific context considering all the things they have to polish before the game ships. And yes, seeing a female avatar is less important than making sure all the customization options translate well into the seamless co-op that this game is trying to incorporate. Not to mention all the other things that are aspects of the game itself. The things that add to the gameplay on more than just an aesthetic level. It's easy to do a simple face swap. But as we've shown you multiple times before it's either hard to do the female one correctly, or it's relatively lame to do it lazily. Because then we get things like this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ye0Rl16elKo
or something that looks very unnatural
9jjgr

https://imgflip.com/gif/9jjgr

And I was talking about waaay back before they cut women co-op partners. They could have decided instead of cutting women, to just make a bunch of pre-created assassins (men, women, different races, etc) to appear in place of your partners' Arno. That would have taken much much less work. And kept the seamless co-op, and satisfied their desire to keep the women in. After all, they said "it was dear to the production team" and they were "inches away" from having it.

It would have been a choice between other players seeing your clothing, or seeing an assortment of assassins. Personally, I find others seeing my accessories less important.
 
We've already seen what looks to be like a female assassin already. You're acting like they won't include them in the story at all. When they always do. There is always at least one major female character who's an assassin.
JKnzS4w.jpg

For all we know she could be the assassin that murders the guy and was executed and that could be a major plot point.

Wait, what? After all this talking in this thread you have been saying... Hypothetically, making the lead a female character would not have had this outcome and would not be considered a major plot point but having a man as the main with a women you can even play as would be. This makes ZERO sense. If they could have made a whole story to include her existence, then EVERYTHING they have said regarding the technicalities would have made no sense. She would have animation, voice and all that extra just to be at the end of the game.
 
Oh, doing more work adds more time? Fascinating. No really, answer the question: what does swapping the face add?
Doing more work on other aspects on the game because you decided to do the cost efficient easier way to do a seamless next-gen feature adds a lot to the game. Doing less work on other aspects of the game because you spent too much time polishing an aspect of next-gen seamless co-op adds nothing to the game, it takes away. What seems easier to do to you?
Creating and rigging a separate facial model
Creating a separate body and facial model that has a different body size and different rigging
The answer is obvious and you're really being patronizing.
 
Personally, I find others seeing my accessories less important.
What slays me is, you can't even tell that other people see your accessories

What seems easier to do to you?
Creating and rigging a separate facial model
Creating a separate body and facial model that has a different body size and different rigging
The answer is obvious and you're really being patronizing.
You're not answering my question.
 
They had to drop the competitive multiplayer due to time constraints, but still some say the developers are 'too lazy' for not including a female player character?
 
And I was talking about waaay back before they cut women co-op partners. They could have decided instead of cutting women, to just make a bunch of pre-created assassins (men, women, different races, etc) to appear in place of your partners' Arno. That would have taken much much less work. And kept the seamless co-op, and satisfied their desire to keep the women in. After all, they said "it was dear to the production team" and they were "inches away" from having it.

It would have been a choice between other players seeing your clothing, or seeing an assortment of assassins. Personally, I find others seeing my accessories less important.
That's not how the game works. You don't play as preset assassins. Preset assassins aren't seamless. Suddenly playing as a different character is not seamless. You can't have This is not an rpg.
 
Wait, what? After all this talking in this thread you have been saying... Hypothetically, making the lead a female character would not have had this outcome and would not be considered a major plot point but having a man as the main with a women you can even play as would be. This makes ZERO sense. If they could have made a whole story to include her existence, then EVERYTHING they have said regarding the technicalities would have made no sense. She would have animation, voice and all that extra just to be at the end of the game.
We;re talking from a gameplay perspective. I never said that the game would be drastically changed if they had a female lead. I was just discussing the notion of spending time and resources on making a female playable character appear on another player's screen and the ridiculousness that comes with it. The main character is Arno, that's a given, that's a fact, there's nothing offensive about that in anyway shape or form. The plot and the characters and all that discussion are a different discussion altogether.
 
That's not how the game works. You don't play as preset assassins. Preset assassins aren't seamless. Suddenly playing as a different character is not seamless. You can't have This is not an rpg.

You did read "to appear in place of your partners' Arno." right? I mean, you bolded it. You had to have read it.

[Dang it, I should've combined those... sorry.]
 
The fact that we're talking about a projection of an avatar that you yourself never get to see as you're playing is what slays me.

Thinking about it the lack of a female option in Team Fortress 2 as an example is far more 'egregious'. There is no single player, all models are visible for everyone etc etc, it's ARENA MULTIPLAYER with no story. But even there when the guys at Valve sat down and thought of fun character concepts their minds went to lanky Australian guy, hyper Bostonian guy, hooded frenchman etc. I would never want them to go into a conference room and go to a character creator "Hey this black Scottish demoman concept is great. The jokes, the looks, everything is awesome... but we need to junk it and put in something female."

The issue in AC:V with seamless drop in co-op where the character the player themselves never changes is so much more minor than that that this whole frenzy completely and totally confuses me.

Couldn't have said it better myself. For all the cases where a lack of a female character IS kind of glaring, this is such a minor and insignificant case.
 
Ok. What would be more work, face swap the Arno model
What does face-swapping the model add? Why waste precious resources for this purely-aesthetic decision? What 10/10 feature did they have to cut in order to add something that may or may not positively impact the game??
 
I don't quite get the criticisms. You are always playing as the same character (Arno) in both single and multiplayer. Just like you always play as Aiden in WD.

So do people want a choice to make Arno male or female throughout the entire single player campaign (a choose your gender before the game begins)? Or do they want the ability to have Arno change into a female every time you join someones game or they join yours?

I'm all for trying to get Ubisoft to consider making a full on console assasins creed with a female protagonist. But this game is pretty much done at this point in terms of content. The first option would probably be impossible at this point and the second would be jarring and weird. You're always Arno whether you are in your game or someone elses.
 
I see Ubisoft have now come up with new explanations and addendums behind their reasoning. This is where they do themselves no favors at all, scrambling around for answers from different quarters.

It would be nice to see someone just be decisive and take a stand, but you can understand them trying to put out fires. They have bosses and PR departments and whatnot over their shoulder, not to mention budgets in the 10s of millions of dollars. They have to be careful not to say anything that could offend or bring more heat or negative publicity.

I do think the internet echo chamber makes these issues seem more than what they really are, though. While most people would support the idea of greater female representation in gaming as a general rule, the reality is not many would hold the lack of it against a specific game - unless it was an RPG or something.
 
The fact that we're talking about a [i]projection of an avatar that you yourself never get to see as you're playing[/i] is what slays me.

Thinking about it the lack of a female option in Team Fortress 2 as an example is far more 'egregious'. There is no single player, all models are visible for everyone etc etc, it's ARENA MULTIPLAYER with no story. But even there when the guys at Valve sat down and thought of fun character concepts their minds went to lanky Australian guy, hyper Bostonian guy, hooded frenchman etc. I would never want them to go into a conference room and go to a character creator "Hey this black Scottish demoman concept is great. The jokes, the looks, everything is awesome... but we need to junk it and put in something female."

The issue in AC:V with seamless drop in co-op where the character the player themselves never changes is so much more minor than that that this whole frenzy completely and totally confuses me.
Thank you. It's a simple projection with a different face. It's not that hard to figure out why this way works more than the alternatives. It's simple logic. Even to those who evidently don't know anything about game development. Or animation.
 
Now that I think about it, wasn't there supposed to be another game for the last-gen consoles? No chance for another female assassin in that game?
 
What does face-swapping the model add? Why waste precious resources for this purely-aesthetic decision? What 10/10 feature did they have to cut in order to add something that may or may not positively impact the game??

That's something the project planners and technical staff at Ubisfot could answer for you. The fact that they don't even have competitive multiplayer though leads me to believe almost nothing. It seems the bare minimum they could do to avoid the four clones problem in seamless drop in co-op.
 
It's not exclusion. It's a story. A story can be about one lead character. And that person can be male. It's like saying Pride and Prejudice is exclusionary because Elizabeth Bennet is the main character and is a woman. It's nonsense.
You're not actually addressing my argument. Do you agree or disagree that you can use "There's nothing wrong with ________ in and of itself being a game featuring a make lead in a single player campaign" to dismiss criticism of any game not having representation? If so, then if no single work is at issue, how can the totality of all works being fine be anything other than fine?

I agree with you. We're on the same page. The problem is with the CONTEXT and the OVERALL CULTURE and that is where the issue lies. The game itself is fine. If there were 3 other games coming out around the same time with female leads there would be no issue. The problem is that those 3 other games aren't coming out. That is the problem to be solved. Not AC:V.
Every game itself is fine.

Look, I think we're having a breakdown of communication here based on whether there's a distinction between games singularly and games in a broader context. You're contending, if I'm understanding you correctly, that this game, and every other game (if we extrapolate your argument out) is fine, but the totality of games, in a broad sense, is missing representation and that's bad. I'm contending that they are tied together; the problem exists broadly because individual games keep making design decisions that are exclusionary, whether it's for a reason (telling a story) or not (because that's how they designed it.) One leads to the other. The problem doesn't exist except through every game making decisions to have majority characters. Because you're arguing that future games should be inclusive, but if they're not, hire can be problem when they can justify it? They can certainly justify it by pointing to their story or modes.

Let me be crystal clear: I'm not saying that every game needs be designed a certain way, or that designers have check boxes to address, or certain designs are inherently bad, or you can't or shouldn't have majority characters. But to say no game by itself is an issue makes me wonder how the totality of that can be different. Does that make sense?

Your contention that a single player campaign with seamless drop in co-op (which doesn't allow you to choose the model your character is in your own game) is a 'wrong' design decision frankly disgusts me.
Don't worry, you continuing to miss the thrust of my arguments is starting to disgust me. Because you should probably read my posts again, and realize that I'm not making a value judgement on whether or not the designs are good or bad, but explaining what people are arguing. I really don't appreciate being told what I'm contending. Edit: if you're getting that from what I'm saying, then that's been a breakdown in what I'm attempting communicate and what you're getting from that.
 
I think they meant you see other players as preset assassins, not that you change into one.
So what you're literally asking for right now is that not only do they have to make all these outfits and customization outfits look good for Arno. But now they have to also create varied character models of varying genders and body types that also have their own rigging and animation issues to figure out. Do you realize that you're just asking for them to do more and more work that would heavily take away from other resources?
 
That's something the project planners and technical staff at Ubisfot could answer for you. The fact that they don't even have competitive multiplayer though leads me to believe almost nothing. It seems the bare minimum they could do to avoid the four clones problem in seamless drop in co-op.

I agree, they literally did the bare minimum to half-ass this co-op, and now they're realizing that they bit off more than they could chew, because making half-assed decisions sometimes opens you up to larger criticisms than you were ever intending.

Do you realize that you're just asking for them to do more and more work that would heavily take away from other resources?
Think about all the resources that could have been opened-up if they didn't add this half-assed co-op just to have a marketing bullet-point. Oh wait, the effect of that marketing bullet-point is diminishing due to bad press.
 
If a game doesn't have a certain feature because the devs are working on tons of other features then it's quite self entitled to push for one feature that may or may not affect the game in a positive way and may hinder the development and refinement of other features. And there's no sexism in the notion that working on a female playable character in a game with a male lead may hinder development.

And none of his movements seem feminine or like somethings a female assassin would do in a grounded setting like the one for this game.

They care about making a polished next gen game. First and foremost. That's their and pretty much every team's priority. And guess what. Making a playable female character=a less polished version of AC:Unity. Sorry. That's just the way it works in this specific context with this specific next gen game.


What's the problem with choosing a male lead for this project? Because of the prominent women? Well what about the prominent men?.

No, it's really self entitled to crucify, belittle, and sometimes blatantly insult a creative team for a game they're working harder on than any other game they've ever made for something that doesn't really add to the overall player experience besides something that is subjectively aesthetically pleasing. Especially not when there would be no uproar if they decided to do the opposite and the situation was reversed.

A female playable character in a game with an established male playable character does not take precedence over literally every other aspect of the game. That results in a less polished game. "Oh sorry there aren't as many side missions in the game, we could've polished that but we had our guys working on "x." And that's where the problem lies in requesting something that I reiterate, doesn't add anything to the game besides something that's aesthetically pleasing.

I've seen the repercussions of a team focusing on something that didn't necessarily add anything to a project.

In my honest opinion. If the situation was reversed. I wouldn't be bothered in anyway shape or form. But I definitely wouldn't be seeing an outrage from my fellow male AC fans saying that we're being forgotten.

Crossing Eden, you have posted so many things in this thread, and yet you have done absolutely nothing to ease the tensions of sexism in the argument.

Saying that adding female PCs to the game "adds nothing to the experience besides something that's subjectively aesthetically pleasing" is not only tone deaf (you're talking like adding women to the game is only to titillate), but it's speaking from your own subjective view where playing as a girl is unimportant and having side missions is more important than giving more humans a presence in the game, too.

I mean, do you not realize how your argument sums up to "doing anything related to female characters in this game would make it a worse game", and what that sounds like?

I think your " reverse sexism " angle in this thread says it all; you have no idea what other people playing games see and experience. I would really kindly suggest that you try and be more mindful of that.


I agree... Don't forget you have to sprinkle in gay marriage too if you want to hit all the check points.

Oh, what a bitter, nonsense thing to say.
 
Saying that adding female PCs to the game "adds nothing to the experience besides something that's subjectively aesthetically pleasing" is not only tone deaf (you're talking like adding women to the game is only to titillate), but it's speaking from your own subjective view where playing as a girl is unimportant and having side missions is more important than giving more humans a presence in the game, too.
I'm not talking about s. I'm talking in the specific context of this game and it's development, the workload involved in making these changes, and the ridiculous implications that sexism is part of the reason why they weren't included, not to mention that i'm not talking about female characters. I'm talking about the main character. Btw, I'll say it once again,you the player. never And I mean NEVER see yourself as a female. So what people are asking all amounts to a projection that other players see.
 
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