Don't forget the Swedes. There is such an obscene abundance of Swedish entertainment, I'm seriously getting tired of seeing and hearing about them. Swedes. They're everywhere.
Why are there still so many white men in video games
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Don't forget the Swedes. There is such an obscene abundance of Swedish entertainment, I'm seriously getting tired of seeing and hearing about them. Swedes. They're everywhere.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
And also encouraging the men who want to see more strong females to actually go out and do the same.
flatearthpandas
Member
What the fuck are you on about? I'm almost awestruck that you began this rant by telling me all the assumptions I've been making.
I've delivered the same facts twice and I'll do so a final time. Historically, in the arts, white men have predominately wrote white male characters. Historically, the best female and minority representation has come from females and minorities. Gaming has so many white males because the majority of writers, directors, and producers are currently white males. It is a simple precedent that you can follow throughout all of history, up to and including modern times.
Got it?
unclethursday
Banned
Except people are assuming that the co-op has different 'characters' working together. It's really the same character for each player. They're clones of each other. They're all playing their game's main character, whatever his name is. It's just their character has whatever weapons and armor customization on them that they have in their game.
People pointing out how Ubisoft is being lazy by only allowing 4 similar looking male characters aren't noticing the real thing. It's not similar looking characters... IT'S THE SAME CHARACTER SHOWN UP TO 4 TIMES.
So, in reality, they're being even lazier by not even making different male characters to play.
But, we wouldn't want facts to get in the way of people's righteous indignation.
Yeah, here is the correct answer.
The barrier to entry for game development has never been lower. Unity is free, online distribution is easy, and many colleges now offer classes in game design (and they probably all have programming courses).
So rather than spend 20 hours a week on the internet complaining about how sexist/racist/homophobic the game industry is, you'd probably be better off spending that time learning how to program. Hell, you don't even have to choose programming... game development requires artists, 3D modelers, musicians, and writers.
Team up with some like minded individuals, and make games that are true to YOUR artistic vision... rather than infringe on the rights of others to express THEIR vision.
Some of it has to do with the fact that KPOP and JPOP is largely sung in Korean and Japanese. Most of these bands that are successful worldwide are bands with English songs.
unclethursday
Banned
Unreal Engine 4 is also very cheap.
But, remember, telling people to learn how to make their own games to show the world how it could be done is apparently bad:
http://gamersofcolor.tumblr.com/pos...t-that-men-are-telling-us-to-make-video-games
And gross. It's gross to suggest someone learn how to do something, apparently.
There's only a really noticeable shortage in the, albeit very popular, shooter genres. There are a lot of strong female characters if you look outside of that. It's the same with movies. Is it as big an issue that action movie stars are generally strong guys with short hair?
I play so many games with female lead characters. Just type female protagonist into Steam search. There is some demand too, because people have tagged a lot of games with that. Only one game shows up for male protagonist, Dead Space.
njean777
Member
The push of anti-intellectualism is hilarious. God forbid anyone learn something new.
Someone missed the hubbub around the ME3 ending. Plenty of gamers got called entitled. And the "why don't you do it yourself" is an argument that gets thrown around plenty of times. From art to politics. In fact is it even so ingrained that we have an idiom for it: "put up or shut up"
Some might take issue with the argument for other reasons but it's not solely applied to women
flatearthpandas
Member
There's also the more inspiring "be the change you want to see in the world". I don't think anyone is applauding the lack of representation, but it is an effect of current circumstance. All we can really do is make sure that the people interested in diversity are not barred access to the potential to realize their vision. We can't force anyone else to realize it for them.
Winterfang
Banned
I have no problem with White Men characters, White People are alright in my book.
Nope because you still assume white developers want to create only white characters, want to create only white male characters. because they want to cater to the players which are dominantly white gamers which are dominantly white male gamers.
Steve Youngblood
Member
This isn't anti-intellectualism. While it's not invalid to suggest learning the process of making games -- as obviously more diversity in the field of creating games will most likely lead to more diversity in character portrayals and settings -- it is also dismissive and sometimes insulting in the manner that it is presented. I'm not saying that some aren't abrasive, but I think many people talking about this topic are simply challenging creators to have more diverse characters. Despite how it might seem when you view it within the context of one or two contentious topics on a message board, nobody is stopping creators from doing whatever they want. They aren't being run out of town. GTA V caught a lot of flack last year about its focus on male leads to tell a story about masculinity, and it went on to sell a billion copies (OK, that number is slightly exaggerated). Dragon's Crown got a lot of attention about the female character designs, and it went on to be Vanillaware's best selling game ever.
But back to the point of "make a game yourself!" I certainly don't think it's bad to encourage women and minorities and whoever else to get into the field of making games at a broad level. But when used against an individual, it is a silencing technique. While one might be able to make more of an impact from within the field, there's nothing wrong with airing grievances from the outside. As consumers, this kind of dialogue is important. While voting with one's wallet may send the loudest message, there's nothing egregious about challenging designers to be more inclusive. If they proceed to stick with what they know, that's also OK. However, given the prevalence of the topic, it would be prudent for studios to employ PR people to explain the decisions made.
The reason why it's a silencing technique to suggest "make your own games" is because in the short term, it's completely impractical, and in the long-term, it's difficult at best. Someone who picks up a programming book today is years away from being able to so much as make a simple, marketable indie title that would probably feature abstract characters and simple gameplay. They're a lot further away than that from actually being able to be in a position to influence AAA development.
Making a game is hard. Depending on the scope, even my definition of "hard" can vary wildly. Let me just preemptively respond to a post someone might offer in reply.
No, the point isn't that it's not worth trying. The point is that the barrier to comment and advocate for things like diversity and inclusiveness does not need to be that high. Especially when it's not clear to me the damage these current conversations are having. AAA dev studios are huge and have (I hope) talented PR managers on hand to deal with concerns like these from fans. It's not apparent to me at all that -- even if you call these "attacks" unfair -- all this talk and advocacy for social progress is hurting these top tier, AAA franchises being targeted. As such, I don't understand why it's necessary to attempt to silence the concerns of the so-called social justice warriors.
Honestly, I don't think that this is a topic that has to hit home for everyone. If this isn't a pressing concern for you, my advice is to ignore these kinds of threads. I'm not saying that as a silencing technique either. I'm saying it because I have always been and continue to be baffled by the inability of those who are against these topics to understand that their need to undermine the opposition only fuels their resolve. If everyone who found Sarkeesian to be a lackluster commentator at best had learned long ago to just ignore her commentary, I question whether she would be as prominent as she is right now.
Anita Sarkeesian did a web series awhile back from kickstarter money and it was terrible. It was full of inaccuracies to support her claims. She is a saavy business woman though. Push buttons, speak in absolutes and get quoted not long and she will be called an expert and we will see her on CNN.
flatearthpandas
Member
No, I merely state that white males have predominately created white male characters throughout all of history and continue to predominately do so today. I have not made any comment on what they want to create or who they are creating it for and will continue not to comment on it when there is such a simple explanation for this.
Clockwork5
Member
Because people are racist.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Exactly. Context. She spoke in a pure absolute while using a video that also was an example of an absolute that ignores way too many games to be take seriously.
is she the true gamer that got exposed by dude from Youtube... that did some deep deep research on her?
wonderdung
Member
As much as these threads are ban bait, I find it hard to live up to whatever standards Ms. Sarkeesian seems to want. If you put a woman in a video game, it's a trope. If you don't, it's unacceptable. How do you win?
I don't recall seeing a video with positive examples from her, but perhaps it'd be prudent to illustrate that she can actually find things done well. If she can't, her criticism is inevitable regardless of the choices we make as developers and therefore not worth anything. It's too early to make that assertion, but it's in the back of a lot of people's minds.
I don't recall seeing a video with positive examples from her, but perhaps it'd be prudent to illustrate that she can actually find things done well. If she can't, her criticism is inevitable regardless of the choices we make as developers and therefore not worth anything. It's too early to make that assertion, but it's in the back of a lot of people's minds.
Why wouldn't there? I'll better leave it to game designers to figure out what kind of character they want to have in their game.
I have a vision for a game and it has a white kid protagonist. Why white? I don't know, it's how I see it in my mind and I wouldn't change it just for the sake of it being different from other game characters. I'm white male and my family and friends are white so I guess maybe my imagination and the way I think is influenced by my surroundings. But that's how things are.
I have a vision for a game and it has a white kid protagonist. Why white? I don't know, it's how I see it in my mind and I wouldn't change it just for the sake of it being different from other game characters. I'm white male and my family and friends are white so I guess maybe my imagination and the way I think is influenced by my surroundings. But that's how things are.
And you assume that they want to cater to white male audience. See how this works?
Yes, and those people who are willing to do something hard should be the ONLY ones to decide what the fruits of their labor should be.
Good developers follow their own vision, whatever that vision is. They don't design by committee or worry about storms in a teacup.
Has Anita played iDOLM@STER Cinderella Girls? That has like over 100 females in it!
Maybe it's because some of my favourite series are games like Wario Ware and Rhythm Tengoku so the lack of females in games has never been a problem for me (i.e. there are plenty of females in aforementioned games). I tend to never play the games like the ones shown in the video she tweeted. It's almost like a completely foreign world to me. So I guess there is a problem in those games but if one just focuses on a small subset it's quite easy to point out a problem. Though I notice her beef was with white men when the video itself focused on men and there were some non white men in there. Maybe not enough, but that is still twisting the message.
Maybe it's because some of my favourite series are games like Wario Ware and Rhythm Tengoku so the lack of females in games has never been a problem for me (i.e. there are plenty of females in aforementioned games). I tend to never play the games like the ones shown in the video she tweeted. It's almost like a completely foreign world to me. So I guess there is a problem in those games but if one just focuses on a small subset it's quite easy to point out a problem. Though I notice her beef was with white men when the video itself focused on men and there were some non white men in there. Maybe not enough, but that is still twisting the message.
That's, at best, extremely naive and unlikely to be true. It matches barely any of what developers say about the process in interviews, and while I can't speak for gaming in particular I've pointed out an example from my industry of execs forcing a male protagonist on someone with about the maximum possible clout a creator could have.
Steve Youngblood
Member
You're not going to convince me that many AAA game stories are the result of auteurs with strong, uncompromising visions. And for those that do feel strongly about not compromising their vision and fail in the eyes of some critics to promote diversity, I'm sure they can handle themselves when questioned about the lack of diversity in their game. Or the PR people they employ will be able to.
ramuh
Member
If i isn't a independent developer it's run by execs put in place by a board of directors that are put in place by shareholders. The end result is shareholders want the most profit.
That's not to say a diverse character-driven lineup wouldn't make money. But you have to convince shareholders it's a good idea. That's where the conversations need to be had.
Do you have evidence to suggest gamers want to play only white men in video games?
And actually the assumption argument works perfectly fine because we will end up agreeing that since you don't know what gamers want and since I don't know what gamers do not want then creating many white men in video games to cater to white male gamers or gamers is wrong because it is a wrong assumption.
The fact still stands that the "voices" for change are on the rise, are more vocal, more in numbers and companies actually respond whereas years ago they would not. You can assume that this is a minority calling for a change that is small and insignificant but too bad you can't say that what they want which is more respectable representation of women in video games and more female protagonists and more gender options is wrong.
This change is good. And before you say who are you to say what is good or bad (in case) you might as well explain to me why it is not a good change.
So I see how it works.
faceless007
Member
Wait I thought it was because they were just following the market demographics.
Wait I thought it was because they were just defaulting to making characters that they're familiar with.
Oh, I get it, you said good developers, which given your criteria of not designing by committee, excludes all AAA developers. Touche.
Well, at best they just have a limited perspective.
At the worst they are just plain bad writers. (Ride to Hell Retribution, etc)
Which then leads to this question - does the issue boil down to the lack of quality writers who can step outside their 'comfort zone' (one example being brooding white males who are tasked with protecting innocent young women)? Or are the writers operating largely on the directives of marketing executives to primarily target certain demographics (e.g. 18-35 white males)? Likely a mix of both, plus other factors.
edit - El_Gato's post above echoes what I'm trying to say.
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It's funny seeing people excuse lack of diversity with "it's their vision!" and yet those same people are also saying lack of diversity is because these developers have to appeal to a target demographic.
Masquerader
Member
Ride to Hell was the single worst story ever made in any form of media up until then. I'm glad that plenty of people realised that the logic of having sex with a lady straight after you kill someone harrassing her is a bit inebriated. I laughed so hard at the entire game, mind.
First of all MOST anime/manga characters look white to everybody, accept the people that like the anime and drank the koolaid on the characters not looking white years and years ago...yet another fabricated, but still inculcated notion about human characteristics. Second, dealing with hyper-sexualized white female characters in a thread covering the lack of diversity in games is not even remotely off-topic considering the 400 lb. in the room on this topic is and always will be, until it's fixed, whether inculcation of certain ideas about certain characteristics being exclusive to certain kinds of people is right or wrong. There's no grey area and there's no way to get around the fact that video game players are inundated, almost exclusively, with white male heroes and hyper-sexualised white female characters.
Part of the problem, the part that's germane to this topic, is that it's something that's been that way for such a long time that there's no question that it influences the way people think...you can see that already with the constant snark response to questions about it on this forum and others. The other problem, which is not completely on topic here is that this is a trend that has been picked up from every major media form since media began thus making a contribution to nationwide if not global brainwashing using fictional ideas about certain real characteristics being associated exclusively with certain types of real people.
This rather contradicts the argument that devs are just ~pursuing their artistic dreams~, though, right? If it's all pleasing the money men, and I agree that it is, then surely the best solution is to raise an almighty stink and remind them that other markets exist. (Hell, there's a significant amount of white men who feel a lot less of a connection to the dadcaricatures we get now than to the nervous chill and anticipation of Lara stepping into a tomb or Samus stepping into a space tomb!)
Valjean Lafitte
Banned
Why do we need another racism/sexism thread in Gaming Discussion?
Nah, man.
Having a non-white or female MC in a game instantly makes me more interested. I get to play as a white guy IRL every day. I prefer to have a break from that while I play a game.
unclethursday
Banned
As is the gender feminist/SJW call of 'check your privilege'. It's a silencing technique designed to shame the person they don't want to listen to. The SJW I mentioned before, in that same post, wondered if my privilege had blinded me so much (because I don't care what the main protagonist's race/gender/species/sexual preference/religion is), and he probably lives a far more privileged life than me, considering he has the opportunity to whine and moan on Tumblr all hours of the day and night while I have to work 60 hours a week to make ends meet.
Anything worth doing is hard. Anything one is passionate about will take effort to make work. The difficulty about it is an excuse, nothing more. If one really wants to do something they're passionate about, they will have to bite the bullet and put in some effort.
I do video reviews on the side. I'm all self taught in how to use Final Cut Pro and Adobe Premiere. And you know what? It was fucking HARD to learn how to use those programs at even a basic level (and I am still far from being a great video editor). It was also expensive buying the various programs and the 4 game recording hardware items I have bought over the years. Between everything, I've spent probably around $3K, PLUS I'm buying a new computer that is going to cost about that much that is designed around video editing.
I work 60 hours a week. I do the video reviews for no money and on weekends. Recording hours of footage takes, well, hours. Going through that footage to look for clips to be used in the review takes easily 3-4 times as long as it took to record the footage. Then I have to write up and record my voice over. Then I have to edit it all together. When I first started, it could take me 8+ hours, straight, to try and edit everything together. Now I've cut that in half on the actual editing side (I still have to pick and choose the right clips and sequence them together, which still takes time).
But it's not like I just sat down and suddenly was *trumpets playing, cue echo voice* MEGA AWESOME VIDEO EDITOR *trumpets stop*. It took time and effort and was fucking difficult. It was long nights editing until 6, 7 or 8 AM. It was looking through my clips and finding out I didn't have something I was talking about and wanted to show, so I had to record new footage. It was deciding my voice over didn't sound as good as I hoped and rerecording that. It was waiting hours for my older computer to render the damn final product so I could then watch it to make sure everything came out good. Then the long process of uploading them. It was forcing myself to do all this when I wasn't in the mood.
I do this, even though I get hardly any views on my reviews. Because I'm passionate about it and, goddammit, even if no one watches them, I can't sit back and say it was too difficult to learn.
I stream to Twitch, even though very few, if anyone ever watches. It's disheartening, but I still do it. I even upgraded my internet to make sure I was streaming at the highest possible quality.
And I do all of this out of my own pocket and in what is otherwise my own free time.
These people can bitch and moan on Tumblr and such all day and night, but they can't be arsed to try to learn something. They can't be bothered to actually DO anything about what they feel is wrong, besides like, blog and reblog. And that's why I despise SJWs. If they'd leave the security of their computer chair once in a while to stop their bitching and actually do something I might actually have some respect for them.
But, please, don't try to rationalize and defend anyone who decides something is too difficult or impractical to be done if they're passionate about it. I turn 40 in literally just under a month (July 13), and I'm still learning and doing the difficult things I am passionate about. What's the excuse for all these late teens and twenty-something SJWs and gender feminists? It's too difficult? Boo fucking hoo.
Are you seriously playing the " Are you trying to opress us"- card? One way to miss the point.
Receipts
Why do so many posters need to crash against the rocks of the eternal shore and be broken?
Exactly! I wonder how many people in this thread who are actively arguing against diversity have made the "Video games are escapism!" argument in other threads? They should really consolidate their position and clarify that video games are an experience where you play as a white guy in a made-up setting that's different from the real world but not TOO different in a way that might be intimidating.
Ah, didn't realize we were only discussing western 'AAA' games.
A lot of Japanese developers, as well as smaller western developers, do have 'strong, uncompromising' visions. Video games are an art form, no matter what some want to believe, and artists should be free to express their vision.
Of course, you're free not to buy it.
Well put - this will do nicely IMHO.
MightyHedgehog
Member
What explains a similar level of homogeneous faces for games in the Japanese-dominated console past? What about all of the non-white lead creatives at various developers who face their game with a generic white protag or a team of them? It's clear that it's less about who is making them and more about what is considered the least offensive or generic while fitting into a metric-driven mean for what is attractive to the broadest number of potential buyers...a group that is much more diverse today than in the predominantly white male-driven past. It's all about the safest, best-calculated approach to getting that money, but in the process, it does reinforce stereotypes and prolong and strengthen the persistence of certain untrue, unfair notions. It's a pattern of media, in general, that favors one (as the ideal) more than the rest even if the population it's facing isn't nearly so monolithic. A generic fair-skinned male as hero is still the default image today even as there is a much greater national and ethnic diversity in the audience buying and playing games today than there ever has been in the past.
Vigilant Gambit
Member
The reason why the majority of game protagonists are white is because the majority of people making games is white.
And the reason for that is that the barrier to entry for game development is lowest for white men.
I am a black game developer. I went to school specifically to learn how to make video games. I graduated years ago, and am fully capable of doing it, but it is not my day job. Most of the people in my graduating class (as well as the ones before and after mine) were white men. Most of the people working at my company are white men. We have 3 female developers and one other black developer. Literally every other employee (in development, anyway) is a dude, and only a handful of them are minorities (less than 10%).
I am an outlier. I won't go into much detail about my background, but I was uniquely able to have the sort of childhood where I grew up as a nerd with access to computers very early on in life (2nd grade). I also grew up in New York City, which has one of the most segregated educational systems in the country. So pretty much all of my friends were minorities, and the vast majority of them were ignorant of anything technological that they couldn't be exposed to from a TV. It really wasn't until I moved to Florida (and thus started going to school with white people) that I began to see an overlap between the Internet and real life, and even then, it was really only white people that were aware of anything outside of MySpace.
More than anything else, it's a messaging issue. I decided I wanted to get into the game industry in some way at the age of 5. Most people, and certainly most minorities, don't do this. I was given the opportunity to actually stick to that dream, at least until I got old enough to realize that I was better off putting it to the side for a while.
But most minorities try to succeed either via sports or music because that's what we're told by society. A black guy learning to program is weird, so he's discouraged from it by default. An Asian or white guy? Totally normal.
And the reason for that is that the barrier to entry for game development is lowest for white men.
I am a black game developer. I went to school specifically to learn how to make video games. I graduated years ago, and am fully capable of doing it, but it is not my day job. Most of the people in my graduating class (as well as the ones before and after mine) were white men. Most of the people working at my company are white men. We have 3 female developers and one other black developer. Literally every other employee (in development, anyway) is a dude, and only a handful of them are minorities (less than 10%).
I am an outlier. I won't go into much detail about my background, but I was uniquely able to have the sort of childhood where I grew up as a nerd with access to computers very early on in life (2nd grade). I also grew up in New York City, which has one of the most segregated educational systems in the country. So pretty much all of my friends were minorities, and the vast majority of them were ignorant of anything technological that they couldn't be exposed to from a TV. It really wasn't until I moved to Florida (and thus started going to school with white people) that I began to see an overlap between the Internet and real life, and even then, it was really only white people that were aware of anything outside of MySpace.
More than anything else, it's a messaging issue. I decided I wanted to get into the game industry in some way at the age of 5. Most people, and certainly most minorities, don't do this. I was given the opportunity to actually stick to that dream, at least until I got old enough to realize that I was better off putting it to the side for a while.
But most minorities try to succeed either via sports or music because that's what we're told by society. A black guy learning to program is weird, so he's discouraged from it by default. An Asian or white guy? Totally normal.
So why would Japanese people then only draw white people? Anime characters looked like this even long before they got popular in the west and even today it's rather niche
Prototype Viktor
Member
Because pesky mirrors in the games
(1st person)
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