State of gaming: Early 2017. "Mass Effect Andromeda"

How I write characters:

They're an asswhole
They're are depressed beyond belief.
A mixture of the two.

This may get boring for some people, but eh, it keeps things interesting.
 
CT Phipps said:
Speaking as a novelist, one of the first books I wrote was something I was immensely proud of. It was, however, nothing more than a power fantasy where the white protagonist was adored by all the (useless) female characters who were attracted to him, there was nobody but other white people, and it was all about how he was awesome.
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Are you sure it had anything to do with race and not that you wrote an uber mary-sue character?
 
CT Phipps said:
Amusingly, it seems that includes making more badass female characters to play.

:)
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I think that's pretty bullshit, we've had badass female characters since like...What? Metroid?

I think designing a game with 2 main characters, with the only change being their gender, is needless waste of resources for voice acting, animation, and models.

I thought gender was a social construct. ;P
 
Uh no, why would you want to take options away from people?

The problem with gaming is that it's getting too homogenous on the mainstream side, everything used to be a Linear cinematic shooter last gen, now everything is an open world with "activities". We should promote the growth of the indie scene and smaller non AAA games.
 
Walpknut said:
Uh no, why would you want to take options away from people?

The problem with gaming is that it's getting too homogenous on the mainstream side, everything used to be a Linear cinematic shooter last gen, now everything is an open world with "activities". We should promote the growth of the indie scene and smaller non AAA games.
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That's been going on for a long time. The indie scene is prone to the same trending nature of mainstream games, though. How many sidescrollers are there on the market now...? Or the substantial number of open-world games (many of which are complete trash)...
 
Indie is an everything goes world, of course there is gonna be a degree of repetition on everything. Nobody here even said "Indie games only ever have unique games", what the Indie scene offers is variety in choice, which the AAA market is severily lacking, specially nowadays.
 
ThatZenoGuy said:
I think that's pretty bullshit, we've had badass female characters since like...What? Metroid?

I think designing a game with 2 main characters, with the only change being their gender, is needless waste of resources for voice acting, animation, and models.

I thought gender was a social construct. ;P
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I think plenty of guys like playing guys and plenty of girls like playing girls.

As for example, the Litherial skin for "Shadow over Mordor" was MASSIVELY popular.
 
I usually make character of both genders in games that allow it and I have even played as geometric shapes and formless sentient blobs of liquid. I think this thing about "Guys on like to play as guys" is just marketing conditioning.
 
CT Phipps said:
@Prone Squanderer

Speaking as a novelist, one of the first books I wrote was something I was immensely proud of. It was, however, nothing more than a power fantasy where the white protagonist was adored by all the (useless) female characters who were attracted to him, there was nobody but other white people, and it was all about how he was awesome.

One of my beta reviewers said it was tiresome and boring because of it. That led me to re-examine representation in my books and how people were presented in my story as well as the larger concepts of marketing. I ditched the book and made my future books in mind with this. I now have a fairly decent-sized GLTB fanbase plus have received lots of praise for my inclusion of minorities. Some of whom have e-mailed me and said how much they appreciated seeing non-white protagonists in science fiction and genre work.

They said my books felt more real and true to life because they weren't all lily white straight people.
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You said it yourself, an "awesome character adored by (useless) women". That's the reason it was boring, they'd likely say the same regardless of what race your characters are. Having someone all adored and apparently awesome is boring whether they're a white character or not.

My point is you shouldn't be pressurized into adding one of every race in the story just for the sake of adding them. No one should, because then those characters are written as their race first rather than as actual people. I don't get invested into characters because of their race or gender, I get invested in personality, their motives, the way they see the world.

EDIT: I'm not saying don't add other cultures and creeds. If it makes sense and has reason to be in the story and it's well-written then fire away. Hopefully you understand what I'm trying to say anyway.
 
It's absolutely fine to be more inclusive. I mean, I think we can all agree that New Vegas did it right. It had all sorts of characters, lesbians, gays, ambiguously bi, ancient mutated war machines with the minds of crazy grandmas, necrotic vaqueros... They were characters, and they all felt quite natural. Making every NPC bi just so every player character can have a romance with them is idiotic and Mary-Sues the player unnecessarily.
There should be more varied main characters. No need to play the same brown-haired white dude all over again, although for some games that's just the most fitting prototype. I'm sorry for not believing in social constructs, but I'd find a short fat lesbian rather unfitting as a badass space marine. Female badass space marine? Totally works, just look at Vasquez, I believed every minute of her. Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor in Terminator 2, and Lena Heady later in TSCC, absolutely. But Emilia Clarke as Sarah Connor in Terminator: Genisys? Nope. Physics don't lie, and I cringe everytime some tiny skinny girl throws around dudes two heads taller than her. Technique can only do so much, and if Ronda Rousey fought Hafthor Björnsson, she'd fucking die, simple as that. Or any male MMA fighter, really. Come to think of it, she can't even beat female MMA fighters these days... But I digress.
Yeah, there should be more varied characters. Maybe less Octavia Butler style of "ugly black woman brings humanity to salvation by eradicating heterosexuality" and more like Simon Ings' "muslim warrior woman fucking kicks arse in the most grim cyberpunk world you can imagine".
Just write a good character, not because of politics, but because of originality where it makes sense. Fat lesbian xenoarcheologist on Mars? Sure. Fat lesbian Spess Merheen grunt? Maybe less so.
The thing is, the brown-haired white dude is safe. It's bland, and you don't offend anyone when you let him do horrible things, let him be a walking stereotype, or do horrible things to him. You might get scolded for using too many clichés, but that's about it. It's the disposable character, as replacable as it gets. Safe. If you write a minority character you have to avoid all sorts of traps, because you'll get a lot more shit. From all sides, really, not just the SJW crowd.
 
BigGuyCIA said:
Great fucking movie.
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But everyone hates it because it's feminist and has strong women in it!

Wait, no, that doesn't sound right. Everyone fucking loves it because it's a goddamn great movie!
Yeah, that feels better.
 
Hassknecht said:
It's absolutely fine to be more inclusive. I mean, I think we can all agree that New Vegas did it right. It had all sorts of characters, lesbians, gays, ambiguously bi, ancient mutated war machines with the minds of crazy grandmas, necrotic vaqueros... They were characters, and they all felt quite natural. Making every NPC bi just so every player character can have a romance with them is idiotic and Mary-Sues the player unnecessarily.
There should be more varied main characters. No need to play the same brown-haired white dude all over again, although for some games that's just the most fitting prototype. I'm sorry for not believing in social constructs, but I'd find a short fat lesbian rather unfitting as a badass space marine. Female badass space marine? Totally works, just look at Vasquez, I believed every minute of her. Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor in Terminator 2, and Lena Heady later in TSCC, absolutely. But Emilia Clarke as Sarah Connor in Terminator: Genisys? Nope. Physics don't lie, and I cringe everytime some tiny skinny girl throws around dudes two heads taller than her. Technique can only do so much, and if Ronda Rousey fought Hafthor Björnsson, she'd fucking die, simple as that. Or any male MMA fighter, really. Come to think of it, she can't even beat female MMA fighters these days... But I digress.
Yeah, there should be more varied characters. Maybe less Octavia Butler style of "ugly black woman brings humanity to salvation by eradicating heterosexuality" and more like Simon Ings' "muslim warrior woman fucking kicks arse in the most grim cyberpunk world you can imagine".
Just write a good character, not because of politics, but because of originality where it makes sense. Fat lesbian xenoarcheologist on Mars? Sure. Fat lesbian Spess Merheen grunt? Maybe less so.
The thing is, the brown-haired white dude is safe. It's bland, and you don't offend anyone when you let him do horrible things, let him be a walking stereotype, or do horrible things to him. You might get scolded for using too many clichés, but that's about it. It's the disposable character, as replacable as it gets. Safe. If you write a minority character you have to avoid all sorts of traps, because you'll get a lot more shit. From all sides, really, not just the SJW crowd.
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Oh, I'm aware of the problems with the book. I'm just pointing out the problems were related and got corrected.

It was a first attempt after all.
 
Wasn't really talking about your book, just making a general point, especially about pandering to certain groups.
 
ThatZenoGuy said:
Why should we make games 'inclusive' for women? 9_6

All games are already available to chicks, what else can you do? Paint them pink?
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Thats a fairly poor way of viewing women don't you think? Im not saying pander to everyone, or else your games a mess and your trying to make everyone happy. But trying to make gaming abit more female friendly never did anyone harm. I dont mean change games by that necessarily either, just idk be less "BOYZ CLUB ONLY BITCH, THIS WHAT U GET FOR NOT FUCKING ME IN HIGH SCHOOL"

Ofc im Not saying people on this forum are like that but there are many out there like that.
 
Hassknecht said:
Wasn't really talking about your book, just making a general point, especially about pandering to certain groups.
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I know, I was just making a point that "pandering" can often be just looking at your stuff in a new light. A friend of mine, Peter Clines, did a superhero zombie book set in Los Angeles where the protagonists were all white and the enemies were a Hispanic gang.

He then realized, MAYBE in LA, it'd be good to have some non-white characters as good guys.
 
Bioware claims to champion diversity yet they insist on all their aliens being monoethnic and monocultural biped humanoids with animal traits. The most interesting, their world got was with the Krogan Salarian Genophage storyline.
 
Walpknut said:
Bioware claims to champion diversity yet they insist on all their aliens being monoethnic and monocultural biped humanoids with animal traits. The most interesting, their world got was with the Krogan Salarian Genophage storyline.
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To reuse your comment: Uh, who cares about diversity among fictional subgroups?
 
Never said that. I said who gives a fuck wether what people like to play or what is considered a true gamer.

Come to think of it, their human characters are also mono cultural, they aren't mono ethnic but they all sound exactly the same, with the only characters who don't being the obvious antagonists in whatever situation the player is in. The same face syndrome is more due to enginge limitations so I am not gonna hold that against them.
 
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