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[Dawg]

RaD are basically presenting this game as 100% accurate documentary + werewolves.

Are they? I'll admit, I don't follow this game as much as other games, but if they have a legit explanation, I might reconsider my stance. Thing is, it's easy to use "We are going for a historically accurate game" as an excuse to not have [playable] characters with a different skin.

I do agree this thread shouldn't just focus on The Order 1886 though. It's just one game out of many. This is a widespread issue, not just related to a single game. It's not like I'm not getting this game if they don't have black characters or anything. I mean, as I said before... there shouldn't be a reason to go for a specific skin color. I feel like the artists and designers should use whatever they want. It's their choice. I wouldn't like forced skin colors either. It's just that it is so obvious almost any game goes for the white male protagonist because it's... what we're used to?

 

[jackissocool]

Are they? I'll admit, I don't follow this game as much as other games, but if they have a legit explanation, I might reconsider my stance. Thing is, it's easy to use "We are going for a historically accurate game" as an excuse to not have [playable] characters with a different skin.

Yes, they are. Class conflict is a major plot point. You play as the ruling class (at least to start). Pretty much all the gameplay we've seen has you been fighting against people rebelling against the monarchy.

Edit: Oops I thought you quoted something else I said. Still, the answer is yes. They are talking a whole lot about very accurately recreating London of the time. It's enormously important to them and kind of the whole premise of the game.

 

[Enzom21]

There are enough people in here saying I'd be ridiculous if no minorities appear in The Order, yet we don't know much about the game yet. You seem very aggressive with all the swearing as well, lay off a bit.

What is the thread about? What was the OP about? You chose to ignore all of that and come in here and wag your fucking(don't tell me to lay off) finger at people because they are discussing a real issue?
No one is being aggressive, so calm down.

 

[SkyOdin]

but a bunch of lily white british dudes speaking shakespearean english is a-ok

That does bring to mind an interesting point. Shakespeare's Julius Caesar was loaded with anachronisms. In fact, all of Shakespeare's works were. Despite being mostly set in various far flung exotic locales, all of his works described stuff like clothing as if it was contemporary English dress. A person portraying soldier under julius Caesar would act on stage wearing contemporary armor. The very idea that the portrayal of a fictionalized historical setting needs to be done in an "historically accurate" manner is a modern concept.

Not that modern movies and stories are any better at historical accuracy. When I was in college studying history, one of my teachers turned her Medieval History class into a film class. We spent the entire quarter watching Hollywood movies set in historical settings, and going over how accurate they were. Almost all of them were awful at historical accuracy. Some were glaringly bad (Gladiator), others were at least okay (Monty Python and the Holy Grail).

But the reality is that whenever we create a story set in a historical setting, it is by its very nature a complete fantasy peppered with anachronism and modern ideas. We are modern people; we don't live in these settings. Ultimately, we are being selective about what we add to that setting, whether we realize it or not. To create true historical accuracy, we would have to find some way to create something without human control. After all, history was not created, it happened.

When someone creates something, their intentions are carried over to the creation. These can be intentional or unintentional, but they are there. However, it is better for there to be a good reason to add in any element to a setting. To be honest, I have no problem with anachronism in historical settings as long as the work doesn't go around touting its "historical accuracy". As someone who sat through that history/film class I mentioned, I'm sick to death of bullshit claims to "historical accuracy". I'd take a setting rife with fantasy and anachronism as long as it puts forward good ideas.

And I don't think celebrating racism and whitewashing history to appeal to people's modern misunderstanding of race counts as a good idea, accurate or not. Of all the various things to focus on as important to historical accuracy, why choose racism? Why is racism one of the important and inviolable pillars of human society that most be consistently preserved in any and all works set in historical time-periods? People don't care that if they throw multi-color printing presses into ancient Rome (I'm looking at you Gladiator...), so why should they care about the accurate portrayal of racism?

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

Honestly most of the time devs just don't care.

They're not thinking about having different kinds of people in their games because it just doesn't occur to them. I doubt there colleagues are telling each other "hey man, don't put black people in the game, that's just weird!"

As more people play games and as people who have been playing games for a long time get older and start having their own kids, representation becomes something they think about more and look for, and as the industry matures to have better storytelling and more original stories we'll probably see more. But it doesn't happen in a vacuum, so people do need to be vocal.

Others also need to realize that asking for/wondering about more representation is not an attack or criticism.

 

[SMOK3Y]

What shits me is when in MGS2 I changed to raiden!!! Just let me be Snake... But it's same if I play games I just wanna be like me white. Not that I care if I'm not white

 

[jackissocool]

And I don't think celebrating racism and whitewashing history to appeal to people's modern misunderstanding of race counts as a good idea, accurate or not. Of all the various things to focus on as important to historical accuracy, why choose racism? Why is racism one of the important and inviolable pillars of human society that most be consistently preserved in any and all works set in historical time-periods? People don't care that if they throw multi-color printing presses into ancient Rome (I'm looking at you Gladiator...), so why should they care about the accurate portrayal of racism?

The only way to understand the way the world is today is to look at historical context. If we ignored a long and dark history of racism, then the only possible explanation for the uneven spread of class among races is inherent racial differences, and that's obvious bullshit. The reason for that today is because of the history of racism. I think oppression is the most important thing to recreate accurately (when your goal is accuracy) because that's how you learn to fight oppression today.

 

[Jito]

What is the thread about? What was the OP about? You chose to ignore all of that and come in here and wag your fucking(don't tell me to lay off) finger at people because they are discussing a real issue?
No one is being aggressive, so calm down.

I'm wagging my finger (lol) at those slating The Order in here for lack of minorities when we know nothing about it, not belitteling the thread like you seem to think. An yeah you're being aggressive.

 

[Dawg]

Honestly most of the time devs just don't care.

They're not thinking about having different kinds of people in their games because it just doesn't occur to them. I doubt there colleagues are telling each other "hey man, don't put black people in the game, that's just weird!"

As more people play games and as people who have been playing games for a long time get older and start having their own kids, representation becomes something they think about more and look for, and as the industry matures to have better storytelling and more original stories we'll probably see more. But it doesn't happen in a vacuum, so people do need to be vocal.

Others also need to realize that asking for/wondering about more representation is not an attack or criticism.

If devs didn't care and they're not thinking about this stuff and just do whatever they want... then why is the vast majority of videogame characters white? In real life, the world has way more diversity. I think if people really didn't care, then we would see way more black, asian, indian and other races, to be honest.

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

If devs didn't care and they're not thinking about this stuff and just do whatever they want... then why is the vast majority of videogame characters white? In real life, the world has way more diversity. I think if people really didn't care, then we would see way more black, asian, indian and other races, to be honest.

I mean they don't care about diversity. That unless it's part of the pitch or tied into the story in a big way, they're probably not even thinking about it. Obviously there are some which is why we occasionally get more fleshed out stories, games, and characters but it seem that the majority just aren't thinking about it.

 

[jackissocool]

If devs didn't care and they're not thinking about this stuff and just do whatever they want... then why is the vast majority of videogame characters white? In real life, the world has way more diversity. I think if people really didn't care, then we would see way more black, asian, indian and other races, to be honest.

No, it's mostly that it just doesn't occur to them. It's a cycle. Media mostly presents white people, so when someone makes media, they think to make them white. Also consider that most people in the US are white, and we tend to make characters like ourselves. It's rarely intentional racism. That's part of the reason it's so insidious - because it's something people don't even realize they're doing.

 

[LycanXIII]

As long as the character doesn't end up the Winston of the group, I wouldn't care.

 

[Niven]

Do these people also find a women being one of the main protagonist jarring because I can assure you in Victoria England that is not what a women's role would have been

 

[Dawg]

I mean they don't care about diversity. That unless it's part of the pitch or tied into the story in a big way, they're probably not even thinking about it. Obviously there are some which is why we occasionally get more fleshed out stories, games, and characters but it seem that the majority just aren't thinking about it.

No, it's mostly that it just doesn't occur to them. It's a cycle. Media mostly presents white people, so when someone makes media, they think to make them white. Also consider that most people in the US are white, and we tend to make characters like ourselves. It's rarely intentional racism. That's part of the reason it's so insidious - because it's something people don't even realize they're doing.

Yeah, it's what I said earlier. We're so used to it that we don't even think about changing it. In a way, I can't really blame people since most of it is just natural. I guess it's just a shame for people who wish to see different ethnicities in a game.

But when I play a game like GTA: San Andreas or TWD, I'm not thinking to myself "Wow, I'm playing a game with a black main character. Now I like this game even more!". No. I just like the game because... the game is good. I won't like a game more because it features a character with a different skin color. It just fits the game.

 

[SkyOdin]

The only way to understand the way the world is today is to look at historical context. If we ignored a long and dark history of racism, then the only possible explanation for the uneven spread of class among races is inherent racial differences, and that's obvious bullshit. The reason for that today is because of the history of racism. I think oppression is the most important thing to recreate accurately (when your goal is accuracy) because that's how you learn to fight oppression today.

I'm not sure a fantasy is the best way to go about teaching someone the horrors of racism. Fantasy is the place to show people the way things can be. You need genuine historical education to teach people the past.

I'm not sure there is any benefit to using racism as a casual background element of a fantasy setting (and yes, I consider stuff like The Order to be a fantasy setting). Making it to common and ordinary in fictional works just normalizes the existence of racism. It has actually gotten to be a big problem with the generic fantasy paradigm is that racism has become a core part of it. It has become a basic assumed thing that dwarves and elves are racist as heck towards each other, and you as a reader are expected to know that just from seeing the words "elf" and "dwarf". This casual fantasy racism is so common that it is used as the basis of jokes.

Is the fact that people have so heavily internalized racism dealing with complete fantasy creatures a good thing? What is worse, many of these "fantasy" creatures often build off of old stereotypes of very real ethnicities. It is very hard to dodge the problematic overlap between orcs and racist depictions of black people. Even the "positive" depictions of orcs still lean on the stereotype of the noble savage that was popular during the height of European colonialism.

So, why is all this racism necessary? How does it help? It is just there because it has always been there. It really has become nothing more than a tool for propagating the idea of race and racism.

 

[Giever]

More on topic and less on The Order: I do enjoy it when races (either made up ones, or ones that are meant to represent those in our actual world) are presented as actually significant in fantasy games. That's kind of vague, so I'll try to explain. Basically, it's neat when the various races have actual cultures and lands/domains attached to them. It's not like I feel as though every race or ethnicity needs to be separated and categorized, but I enjoy the world-building aspect that comes along with the feeling that these people actually have a history and a place in the world.

It's great if different races are included at all, and it's fine if they're all just part of one big fantasy castle-town, or whatever. But I do appreciate it in things like Skyrim, where there's lore associated with the various races, and you can dig into stuff like that.

Quality post.

Well, glad somebody thought so.

 

[Dawg]

Part of me thinks the best way to combat racism would not be to explore the racism issues of the past and include the horrific shit they did back then, but just add a black [playable] character for example without having to come up with an actual explanation. He should just be an equal, no strings attached. I'm not saying they shouldn't have a different culture or backstory, but don't exaggerate by going all "I AM TYRONE AND I REPRESENT THE POOR BLACK COMMUNITY IN THIS GAME THAT IS TOO WEAK TO FIGHT FOR ITSELF BUT I AM AN EXCEPTION BLABLABLA"

If casual racists play a game in which you explore racism and see white people mistreat black characters, saying they're beneath them etc, I doubt they would just stop their racist behaviour. Instead, if you just try and add more black characters, I think it would have a bigger impact. I mean, people really loved Lee Everett from The Walking Dead. They didn't like him "more" because he was a black character. People liked him because he was an interesting character. As it should be.

 

[ElBoxyBrown]

Honestly most of the time devs just don't care.

They're not thinking about having different kinds of people in their games because it just doesn't occur to them. I doubt there colleagues are telling each other "hey man, don't put black people in the game, that's just weird!"

As more people play games and as people who have been playing games for a long time get older and start having their own kids, representation becomes something they think about more and look for, and as the industry matures to have better storytelling and more original stories we'll probably see more. But it doesn't happen in a vacuum, so people do need to be vocal.

Others also need to realize that asking for/wondering about more representation is not an attack or criticism.

Honestly it'll probably just come down to what companies that you know will always incorporate some diversity and what companies will still keep doing what they do. This also includes countries.

 

[kittens]

I'm sick of white hegemony in games / media / culture -- a game straying from that is generally far preferable to me than any sort of theme or historical accuracy. I simply value diversity more than those things.

 

[SkyOdin]

Part of me thinks the best way to combat racism would not be to explore the racism issues of the past and include the horrific shit they did back then, but just add a black [playable] character for example without having to come up with an actual explanation. He should just be an equal, no strings attached. I'm not saying they shouldn't have a different culture or backstory, but don't exaggerate by going all "I AM TYRONE AND I REPRESENT THE POOR BLACK COMMUNITY IN THIS GAME THAT IS TOO WEAK TO FIGHT FOR ITSELF BUT I AM AN EXCEPTION BLABLABLA"

If casual racists play a game in which you explore racism and see white people mistreat black characters, saying they're beneath them etc, I doubt they would just stop their racist behaviour. Instead, if you just try and add more black characters, I think it would have a bigger impact. I mean, people really loved Lee Everett from The Walking Dead. They didn't like him "more" because he was a black character. People liked him because he was an interesting character. As it should be.

I generally agree. Fiction is a means to show people what we want to world to be, filled with the heroes we want to exist. It should give us something to aspire to.

 

[Dawg]

I never forgot the shitstorm over CJ in San Andreas. There's a lot of closet racism in the gaming community.

Even a historical simulator like Europa Universalis 4 lets you attempt to wreck shit as Native Americans. Fiction is fiction. Werewolves should certainly be more notable than a black guy in a fantasy setting.

I feel like I missed the shitstorm over CJ. I live in Belgium and everyone I knew was fookin' hyped about San Andreas. I think Belgians just don't care. That said: this actually is an issue in my country too. We don't realize when we are racist either. So there's both sides to that coin.

 

[kittens]

Werewolves should certainly be more notable than a black guy in a fantasy setting.

It's no wonder that fantasy as a genre is racist when so many of us are only familiar with the work of white writers. In those stories, white characters are heroes and people of color are threats or exotic background decoration. When it comes to games, the only way to get out of that rut is for devs to hire people of color and to prioritize diversity and representation in the games they make. Those are the most fundamental ingredients for change.

 

[Amir0x]

I think there is absolutely no issue whatsoever with games that are showcasing specific types of cultures which might be predominately white or asian or spanish or whatever.

I think the reason it sometimes becomes an issue is in games where the world should be multicultural and there's no reason it's not, or where depictions of minority characters is laughably stereotypical, or that the severe lack of diversity within our medium makes people more desperate to try to insert these perspectives. All these are very reasonable and make most empathetic people sit up and contemplate the issue.

Another issue is the relative lack of maturity in the industry. By that I mean... it is absolutely common and very illuminating to read books or watch movies that specifically focus on particular ethnic groups which often elucidate unique socioeconomic issues within these communities or the broader society. They explore the full wonderful rainbow of human behavior and cultures, and often inform the audiences about many complex issues that are simply not given enough play in other viable mediums. Of course it's not faultless, because you can still get a show like Jane the Virgin which very respectably deals with Latino culture/faith, but still illustrates a old and relatively offensive Latino whore/saint stereotype (mother and daughter). The show is still great, but you have to be conscious about the shaky ways it sometimes deals with very complex cultural issues. But the fact that the medium is mature enough to have these type of explorations mean it's more evolved.

In gaming, it's hard to even have those types of conversations. Games so often are all white parades that it makes it harder to respectably deliver games that effectively analyze different cultures (or mix cultures in a way that doesn't seem effortlessly condescending, where every personality is whitewashed so completely that distinctive culture and socioeconomic issues don't even seem to exist). The market has been conditioned a certain way (not just by gaming, even though that's a major factor, but because of the larger societal issues at play in their own real lives) and thus need to be broken from the habit of expectations. Additionally, developers should try harder to have mature explorations of unique cultures so we can get to a point where these conversations exist in a way that is powerful enough to move the ball forward. This industry still has a long way to reach that point, not least of which is the absolute disaster that is games writing. They need better writing talent in this industry

 

[Toxi]

I find it baffling that people think a black person in London in 1886 is "jarring".

Some people here are so used to a whitewashed version of history that you'd probably be jarred by the actual thing.

 

[23qwerty]

I never forgot the shitstorm over CJ in San Andreas. There's a lot of closet racism in the gaming community.

Closet?

 

[Discotheque]

but a bunch of lily white british dudes speaking shakespearean english is a-ok

yeah i think it's been conditioned into pop culture this way. it would sound way worse seeing a medieval film with an american accent as opposed to a british one because of this reason imo. look how distracting kevin costner robin hood was.

 

[Amir0x]

I find it baffling that people think a black person in London in 1886 is "jarring".

Some people here are so used to a whitewashed version of history that you'd probably be jarred by the actual thing.

hahaha, yeah. I think the harder part is how to illustrate the very nasty and multilayered history of how minorities were treated within these cultures at these times without derailing what's supposed to be (in the minds of many devs) just a fun shoot em' up fantasy romp about vampires and werewolves some shit. Do you delve deep? Does it become a significant sideplot? Do you simply ignore that element of history altogether, which becomes offensive in a different way and can also derail the overall thematic focus of your concept? For example: the profound misrepresentation of just how bad things were for Africans in early American history in ACIII. They demonstrated there was a controversy and debate over this stuff in America, but refused to actually go all the way there and show the extent of the horror, even when you were in places that explicitly should be showing this stuff. The little debates Connor had with Samuel Adams just seemed asinine in their my-first-racism-class contriteness.

I have no problem diving into the controversy because I believe it deserves to be told the way it was, because remembering is important. We need to not repeat these behaviors or find ways to stop what is still going on today (over 20 million slaves still exist in the world today, more than at the height of the slave trade. let that sink in). So any way to splash cold water on the faces of the complacent is OK by me. I've donated and volunteered for organizations that still fight to end modern slavery, but it will debilitate you when you begin to see the extent of what you're fighting. It's insane how fucked up this world remains

 

[bobbychalkers]

I saw the sentiment that non-white playable characters in The Order: 1886 would be jarring,

This makes no sense at all and whoever said this should feel bad.

 

[DOWN]

I feel like a historical scifi fantasy is a bad example, because history has a role and that throws off the question.

Makes a little more sense when history and culture are not well represented in the first place, like maybe in Metal Gear Solid or Metro being totally fictional with little emphasis on a historic period representation outside broad setting.

 

[FinalStageBoss]

Are ppl shitting on the order in here too? At least wait 'till it's out. We know jack shit about the story and characters.

 

[Wiktor]

Really depends on world building. If it's set up as multiracial one that that's great. If they thrown plenty of people of color in a world without easy mass trasportation just for shit and giggles then I find it lazy and bad. But to be perfectly honest, games still are pretty undeveloped as storytelling medium and their whole point is gameplay, so I find it easier to look past that than in live action or novels.

 

[orthodoxy1095]

Maybe because they like the art-style and general feeling of a setting such as Victorian England? It's not because they like those aspects that you need to include the racism too. That's not what this game is about. It would feel so forced and out of place. It's not because the people back then were assholes and racists that we should automatically mention that in every game being inspired by Victorian England.

But they didn't choose a Victorian inspired setting. They chose to literally be set in Victorian England. How do you know it would feel forced and out of place? RAD are so incompetent at writing that they can't subtly weave in the complexity of Victorian society? Ignoring the baggage that comes with that Era completely seems offensive to me.

If I make a game about 1890's America, particularly the South, dropped in werewolves and Tesla guns, it would be alright to include a black cast without any contextualization of the racial divisions and prejudice at the time? That just sounds like whitewashing history and picking the "fun" parts of a setting that you like.

 

[Jac_Solar]

No, and it's weird that people would care. As long as the game is enjoyable, what does it matter what color the avatar is?

 

[Dawg]

But they didn't choose a Victorian inspired setting. They chose to literally be set in Victorian England. How do you know it would feel forced and out of place? RAD are so incompetent at writing that they can't subtly weave in the complexity of Victorian society? Ignoring the baggage that comes with that Era completely seems offensive to me.

If I make a game about 1890's America, particularly the South, dropped in werewolves and Tesla guns, it would be alright to include a black cast without any contextualization of the racial divisions and prejudice at the time? That just sounds like whitewashing history and picking the "fun" parts of a setting that you like.

Why would anyone make a videogame about that time period if the focus wasn't already on racism though? Your example isn't very realistic imho. I'm just so sick of the foreigner nature and "poor me" undertone whenever a character with a different skin color joins the ranks. It's just so cliché.

And if you're so set on the idea on carrying the true baggage of that era into this game, wouldn't you agree a woman in their group isn't very realistic either? I have a feeling women in that era would be treated somewhat... different.

 

[Mihael Mello Keehl]

But they didn't choose a Victorian inspired setting. They chose to literally be set in Victorian England. How do you know it would feel forced and out of place? RAD are so incompetent at writing that they can't subtly weave in the complexity of Victorian society? Ignoring the baggage that comes with that Era completely seems offensive to me.

If I make a game about 1890's America, particularly the South, dropped in werewolves and Tesla guns, it would be alright to include a black cast without any contextualization of the racial divisions and prejudice at the time? That just sounds like whitewashing history and picking the "fun" parts of a setting that you like.

Why not? You already got werewolves and such who cares about the history of the race. Your playing a game with fantasy in it. The only time in a game you should include history dealing with racism is if it based on it. Good things videogames dont go there. The reasoning that race, must be explained in a video game is kinda bullshit real talk. The excuses are just terrible and dont make any sense. Black must be explained but other race not? yeah... no.

 

[RedSwirl]

It sucks that non-whites aren't "allowed" to be in certain time periods and fantasy settings in fictional work because suspension of disbelief or creative direction or whatever excuse they make up quick enough.

If it's the main character you play, wooooo boy, prepare for the "how do I relate" debates.

Well one problem is all the historical settings people are using are pretty much centered around Europe, with Japanese developers doing historical Japan and China.

...and do we even know black people didn't live in Victorian England? I honestly have no idea. Why can't there just be people in the game from various corners of the British Empire?

 

[MCN]

...and do we even know black people didn't live in Victorian England? I honestly have no idea. Why can't there just be people in the game from various corners of the British Empire?

There were rather a lot of black people in Victorian England, largely due to the whole "Empire" thing we had going on back then.

 

[GorillaJu]

For me when I'm playing or watching something it's the feeling that minority characters were shoehorned in to appease whiners that bothers me, even though I completely sympathize with said whiners for having grievances about minorities being underrepresented.

I'd rather a setting like AC vita or L4D2. I really like when games go outside the norm of grizzled white dude for their protagonists but I can't help feeling like sometimes the inclusion of "token" characters of particular races feels cheap.

 

[Abounder]

There's a TV show called A Penny Dreadful which is also set in the late 1800's and is about killing supernatural monsters, and I never heard anyone say the black character was jarring. And when it comes to video games there's custom characterization especially in MMORPGs.

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

For me when I'm playing or watching something it's the feeling that minority characters were shoehorned in to appease whiners that bothers me, even though I completely sympathize with said whiners for having grievances about minorities being underrepresented.

I'd rather a setting like AC vita or L4D2. I really like when games go outside the norm of grizzled white dude for their protagonists but I can't help feeling like sometimes the inclusion of "token" characters of particular races feels cheap.

"Shoehorned"

"Whiners"

 

[Stardust_Comet]

It's very silly that people do bother to go to such lengths to try defend why a black person can't appear in a certain game because it'd be "jarring". There's a perfectly logical answer to that and no one needs to go into any length to behave like there's a proper justification to why a minority would fit in.

The real reason is, we're so accustomed to a whitewashed society in the gaming world, that seeing minorities being represented is "different" and "different" is "weird".

Give it a few years. If every game keeps coming up with minorities appearing all over the place, it will no longer be different and we'll all grow accustomed to it. Then enough time will pass and we'll all look back "do you remember that time when only white people appeared in games? Yeah, those were some crazy times! I don't even think I can play those games anymore without being confused!"

On the plus side, we'll find something else to nitpick at when they try to throw in something "new" to the gaming world that has always been a thing in real life.

 

[RubberJohnny]

Cause the Order is an oppressive organization ruled by rich white royalty. Making a black person a member would need some explanation why a group that fights the poor and the oppressed would accept someone who was poor and oppressed (the norm for black people in England at the time) or why this black person was not poor and oppressed (the good example someone gave that I really liked was that they be a wealthy merchant from another country).

Ok, here's how you solve this "The Order is not an opporessive organisation", we can do this because the same group writing the setting is writing the story!

 

[GorillaJu]

"Shoehorned"

"Whiners"

You're working for RAD, and you've designed your characters based on the story you're telling and the world you're creating, and then you read some disparaging comments on Twitter about how your game is a perfect example of racism in the game industry for lacking minority characters, so you change one of the characters in your cast to a black guy, another one to an Asian guy, and then re-write their histories to appease the people who are criticizing you.

That is what I would call shoehorning in to appease the whiners.

As I said in my post, that doesn't mean that people don't have a right to be aggrieved by trends that favor white characters and want to change that to add more diversity to game software. In fact I support people vocalizing their concerns because that's the best way to get it changed.

However, I'd like to see more games like L4D2 and AC Vita that have stories written for minority characters from the ground up. In the case of the hypothetical RAD dev, I'd rather they just make the game how they original wanted, but seriously consider the criticism they received for their next game.

 

[LiK]

this reminds me of people complaining when Thor movie decided to have nonwhites for gods.

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

You're working for RAD, and you've designed your characters based on the story you're telling and the world you're creating, and then you read some disparaging comments on Twitter about how your game is a perfect example of racism in the game industry for lacking minority characters, so you change one of the characters in your cast to a black guy, another one to an Asian guy, and then re-write their histories to appease the people who are criticizing you.

That is what I would call shoehorning in to appease the whiners.

As I said in my post, that doesn't mean that people don't have a right to be aggrieved by trends that favor white characters and want to change that to add more diversity to game software. In fact I support people vocalizing their concerns because that's the best way to get it changed.

However, I'd like to see more games like L4D2 and AC Vita that have stories written for minority characters from the ground up. In the case of the hypothetical RAD dev, I'd rather they just make the game how they original wanted, but seriously consider the criticism they received for their next game.

No one's trying to force these devs to change the characters. You don't seem to have understood the point of the thread, and you clearly don't sympathize with people who'd like more representation if you're calling them whiners, nor do you seem to understand that changing a character's race/story this far into the dev cycle is not feasible or that hypothetical would have never been written. "Shoehorning" like that doesn't happen, so we're only left with any inclusion of minority characters labeled as shoehorning, especially if the writing isn't good, even though other characters aren't considered shoehorned in even if they are complete shit.

 

[GorillaJu]

No one's trying to force these devs to change the characters. You don't seem to have understood the point of the thread, and you clearly don't sympathize with people who'd like more representation if you're calling them whiners, nor do you seem to understand that changing a character's race/story this far into the dev cycle is not feasible or that hypothetical would have never been written. "Shoehorning" like that doesn't happen, so we're only left with any inclusion of minority characters labeled as shoehorning, especially if the writing isn't good, even though other characters aren't considered shoehorned in even if they are complete shit.

No, you are absolutely wrong on that - I do sympathize with people regardless of if I call them whiners or not. I am a whiner myself. Squeaky wheel gets the grease, and all that. As I said, I want more variety in game protagonists and characters. Personally I can count on one hand the amount of games I've bought in the last 2 or 3 years that star a white male protagonist, and when a game is starring a female or a minority race I'm more likely to buy it because I enjoy the variety. So you can stop your assumptions.

The point of the thread was asking about how we feel about the argument that realism dictates that minorities are excluded from game stories, and I provided an aside, that while I like games with diversity, I don't like it when it feels like certain people are shoehorned into the story because they want to appease people who will complain if they don't or sell more to a certain demographic.

If one of the party members in Persona 3 or 4 were revealed to be a white person because Atlus thought it'd sell more abroad even though it's intended to be a Japanese story told through a Japanese lens, I'd be less inclined to support the game because it'd feel like cheap pandering.

 

[Log4Girlz]

1886 is based on Victorian England. Plain and simple. Its a fantastical alternate history, but its still Victorian England. There's no reason why blacks or minorities should be portrayed as a protagonist in the game as this would be unrealistic. It would break my sense of immersion if I'm shooting a werewolf and then suddenly a black character were to help me in killing it, because that would be completely inaccurate. There were no blacks in Victorian England. We have to draw a line somewhere. It doesn't make sense just to toss minorities into my werewolf hunting title. The sense of realism would be thrown out the window.


lolol

 

[Brawly Likes to Brawl]

This reminds of a decade old thread on here from back when San Andreas was announced. It was filled with people whining about how they couldn't "relate" to playing as a black man in GTA. In the medium where there are countless games featuring Italian plumbers that save kingdoms and Japanese teenagers that kill gods everyday while studying for exams, the minute you're asked to play as a black man living in the hood, that's when it suddenly matters whether or not a main character's life is relatable to yours?

And when SA actually came it ended up being a fan favorite anyways, so they were kicking up dust for no reason.

 

[NeoFaff]

I find fluorescent green or purple people in rpgs jarring.

 

[redcrayon]

yeah i think it's been conditioned into pop culture this way. it would sound way worse seeing a medieval film with an american accent as opposed to a british one because of this reason imo. look how distracting kevin costner robin hood was.

I was far more bothered by how he managed to walk from the south coast to Nottingham via (the apparently about four feet high, defeating the point of it's existence) Hadrian's Wall. I mean, how shocking a grasp of the country's geography can you have when making a huge, major film about a famous mythological character from there? It would be like a bunch of British guys deciding to make a major film set during the opening of the war of independence and having the lead US character (now played by a Canadian) wandering around the east coast of the US but stopping to take in the Grand Canyon (now twelve inches deep) just because it was the only landmark they could think of but couldn't be arsed to research when slamming out the script in the pub. And then releasing the film in the US. I mean, it's not like anyone from that country might be interested in it, would it!

Then we had Russell Crowe's accent in his 'reimagining' (where Robin is a plucky archer hilariously giving gratefully accepted, obviously revelatory strategic advice to the lords of the realm about the importance of sticking your archers on the high ground in battle) that was so bad he refused to talk about it in interviews! Was it supposed to be English? Irish? Scottish? American? NZ? Who knows.

Ah well, at least there's 'Men in Tights'. Where, 'unlike other Robin Hood's' Cary Lewes 'can talk with an English Accent'. And it's got a black sheriff too

Ah well, I suppose it's all no worse than the cinematic interpretations of other tales. It's not like King Arthur, Hercules or Perseus have gotten off lightly in the last decade or so either.