I feel this is a bit disingenuous. The original Steam forum post said:
when straight comin out.
Calling that even a complaint is beyond me, and mocking the poster seems unnecessary. I don’t understand the intention behind this new title. As purely a joke against that forum post, I guess, but are they trying to mock straight sexuality?
If I can express my sexuality if I’m gay, why refuse that same ability if I’m not? Maybe I’m interpreting too much into it, but I don’t find it funny. I like it when people can be proudly and openly gay/trans/bi, but I don’t see why I can’t also be proudly straight. Or in other words, this game now gives me the message “if you are not LGBT, it’s not for you” which I guess is fine if that’s what they want.
you know “straight pride” is in the same category of thing as “male pride” and “white pride”, right? it’s a homophobic thing to invoke. nobody cares that you’re part of the hegemonic sexuality group, it’s not something to be proud of.
The only reason “gay pride” exists in the first place is in reaction to oppression. The straights have in no way been suppressed, and “straight pride” is nothing but a backlash to gay liberation.
Maybe we have a different view on what pride means, but I see no reason to be ashamed of being straight, the same I see no reason to be ashamed of being white, the same I see no reason to be ashamed of being gay, the same I see no reason to be ashamed of being black. LGBT+ inclusion is not the same as straight exclusion. Gay pride, from what I understand, at its core is about being proud of yourself and not having to hide your ethnicity. That goes both ways, and I sure as hell would feel like I’m being shamed for being straight in this game. Not a great message is it?
Like I’m genuinely trying to understand here. How is shaming straights helping gay pride?
Sorta. They’re pointing out the fact is the default is straight, if you want to scream it at people well that’ll cost you some money.
It’s dumb, super petty and ultimately inane as are most identity politics. I get the point to an extent but anything to either extreme gets a bit grating and irritating.
but I don’t see why I can’t also be proudly straight
Ignoring all the power dynamics reasons why this is nonsensical, what does straight pride look like to you? What exactly are you being denied in terms of self-expression or inclusion?
its ok to vilify straightness hope this helps. you are not oppressed in any way for being straight lmao. this is the “complaining about anti-white racism” of misunderstanding sexuality power dynamics. queer people are telling you to shut up and you’re doubling down on your chauvinism, consider touch-grass you suck!
Yeah and that behavior is how the queer community loses straight allies.
When you require people to vote in your favor for your personal safety and survival, maybe don’t throw shit in their face. At some point they’ll say “fuck it, you’re on your own.”
I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the Straight moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Gays’ great stumbling block in their stride toward freedom is not the Super Straight or the Super Happy Fun American, but the Straight moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes they can set the timetable for another person’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Gay to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
If you never leave the online world then the only oppression you can know is being called mean words. That’s the only way these people can justify what they’re saying. Dang, someone called you a cissy and you don’t get a little ‘straight’ title in a game? Awesome! Hope this brutal oppression keeps going!
The rightwing/gamergate side not contesting this whole issue being called “Politics in videogames” is the biggest blunder. I don’t know the best way to call this phenomenon (political preaching?) but surely there is a better phrase. Right now you can’t talk about this stuff without getting hit by “Oh, you claim to hate politics in videogames yet you love Bioshock” type retort, when the actual thing people have problems with are californian nutcases pushing their views on US political crap onto the player as if it were gospel.
What is wrong with Californian views on identity politics, when it’s not just bad writing? Is it the acknowledgement of people that are gender nonbinary?
I just dislike a lot of the studios based there (Insomniac, naughty dog, ubisoft) for how hard they try to push POC/minority representation in their games. Especially when it doesn’t make sense (black samurai)
The lead developer of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows is in Quebec. And does it not matter that it’s based on a historical figure? Consider also that in California, you’re just more likely to encounter a diverse group of people, so wouldn’t that just be representing the world around them?
Yeah fair enough, this stuff isn’t unique to Californian developers, they are just the first that come to mind.
And does it not matter that it’s based on a historical figure?
Yasuke existed in Japan but I think they went too far in making him a protagonist. As I understand it he was a curiosity that Nobunaga kept around, not a full fledged samurai. I think it’s also important to consider the current gaming landscape. There’s titles like Dragon age Veilguard, Concord, Dustborn, Forspoken, Fintlock and others coming out these days that put heavy focus on inclusion/diversity over quality (as evidenced by poor sales numbers). It’s hard to then look at an upcoming game set in historial Japan that somehow features a black protagonist and not think that they’re trying to push some weirdo agenda rather than tell a cool story.
It seems you’re the one who’s focusing more on avoiding inclusivity than in if the games are good our not.
Every year, we have a LOT of bad games, some pure thrash. You only seem concerned about those who don’t conform to your seemingly low acceptance for diversity. Sure, Concord failed because a playable character was overweight. Not a mediocre hero shooter for 40 dollars when great ones are free. Veilguard has been positively received outside of 4 Chan.
And dustborn. The fact that to are dragging an indie game already aiming to a very specific demographic shows how little you understand that not every game is made for you.
I guess this is what being a closeted bigot looks like.
Indicators are showing that Dragon Age is selling just fine. And it’s not like they get to their planning meeting and ask, “Can we spend some more time on the game design? It’s got real problems,” only to be met with, “No, we’ve got to really focus on diversity this quarter.” They’re not related. While I hardly trust Ubisoft to wow audiences with a cool story, it’s not hard to imagine the related struggles that a foreigner and a woman might have to bond over in that setting.
Naughty Dog’s most famous games (containing humans) are based around white male leads. It’s basically just Uncharted Lost Legacy and TLOU2 that have diverged from that, and not by very much.
Literally the only game of Insomniac’s I can find (outside of anthropomorphic games like Ratchet&Clank) that even leans to minorities is Spider-Man: Miles Morales, which is based on a comic character that was already popular. Even the games based around Peter were going to acknowledge he’s the type of person to work at food banks and embrace New York’s diversity; that’s the pre-existing character.
Nobody complained when Assassin’s Creed had Leonardo da Vinci hand you a tank or a glider, or a female Spartan mysthios fight mythical gods, or have London gang runners that fight in hoods from rooftops. Assassin’s Creed has always ventured into the unrealistically cinematic extensions of common historical myths, and they’re not even the first to turn Yasuke into a samurai. Netflix put out an animated series on that a while back and it was awesome.
I do not expect an answer, but I genuinely think you should quietly ask yourself the question: Are you a racist?
I’m thinking of three games specifically from these studios, TLOU2 basing the whole narrative around a woman hulk, spiderman 2 with the long story segments as Mary jane and the whole debacle on Yasuke. But yeah it’s not just these three california studios that are putting out games with this stuff, they are just the first that come to mind.
Nobody complained when Assassin’s Creed had Leonardo da Vinci hand you a tank or a glider
Yeah fair enough, people will have different lines in the sand for this stuff. I get that this series has time travel and aliens and whatever, but I think everyone can agree that if they randomly put, for example, modern sportscars into a historical setting it would be too unbelievable and ruin immersion. A massive black samurai slaughtering asians in feudal japan (and then seeing them bow down to him in another scene) has that effect for me.
(For the record I did look up on primary sources from japanese historians and everything points to the man being just Nobunaga’s pet curiosity. It helps that here’s all the shady stuff going on where the english and japanese versions of Thomas Lockley’s books say different things)
Are you a racist?
I am not. I just dislike when developers sacrifice the game’s story, quality or whatever in order to put in representation. I don’t understand why the story can’t just have a diverse cast and be done with it, right now it feels like all these studios are focusing on diversity first and foremost as a major selling point when it should be just a normal thing that doesn’t need to be highlighted
No matter how many times I reread this comment, I don’t see how this reasoning would convince anyone - including yourself - of its position. The point about translation, for instance, not only feels like a non-sequitor but ignores the wealth of subjectivity that inherently goes into translating text to other languages.
I’m not trying to reject you just out of spite; I genuinely don’t think internet arguments like this are ever “winnable” for anyone. If you come up with a better description for what it is you oppose, feel free to mention it, but otherwise, I’d say do some self-reflecting.
I want to touch up on this. The reason I didn’t write much about my claim about for Yasuke not being a proper samurai is because it is my understanding that it is the default position and thus doesn’t need to be proven by evidence. But if I was asked to provide evidence, I would link the comparison of his translated and untranslated book in this post. Since Thomas Lockley is the main source behind the myth, I think discrediting his book should be enough to also discredit Yasuke’s role as a proper samurai.
We acknowledge that the game is a work of fiction. Historical fiction, but fiction none-the-less.
If every fifth character is also black, I think there is a point that can be made about verisimilitude and taking liberties; but since we know he really existed and that there has been debate on what he did, having a work of fiction that portrays him as a samurai under Nobunga doesn’t seem unreasonable.
To compare, we know that Leonardo Di Vinci didn’t hand out guns to people or build functional flying machines - but we know he designed all sorts of stuff ahead of its time, so it kinda fits in a fictional story with him in.
But only one of those seems to draw huge amounts of complaints online… And it’s actually the less historically accurate one.
I just think it’s bizarre to have a black dude protagonist in a historical japanese setting. I’ve read through the sources on Yasuke and I think it’s a stretch to say he was like a full fledged samurai. Especially given that the biggest proponent of that theory, Thomas Lockley, made some sketchy edits between the Japanese and English version of his book on him.
I just think it’s bizarre to have a black dude protagonist in a historical japanese setting.
Why? He is a historical figure. Why does a historical figure in his historical setting feel bizarre?
I’ve read through the sources on Yasuke and I think it’s a stretch to say he was like a full fledged samurai.
Potato potato. Why him being a “full fledged samurai” even matters? The series is known to take creative liberties with history.
Seriously ask yourself why having ONE SINGULAR black protagonist in a series where protagonists have so far been overwhelmingly white feels like “black people getting pushed into games”.
Because to me, it sounds like you have seen too many opinions of people getting outraged and because of that you internalized their views without asking yourself why they (and now you) feel the way they do.
Why? He is a historical figure. Why does a historical figure in his historical setting feel bizarre?
Why him being a “full fledged samurai” even matters?
This is just difference in opinion. For you it’s OK. I get that this series is only very vaguely based on history but this is a step too far for me.
Seriously ask yourself why having ONE SINGULAR black protagonist in a series where protagonists have so far been overwhelmingly white
Why MUST they make the main character in a 1580’s japanese setting black? The series hasn’t had a single asian protagonist. Couldn’t they have chosen a black history setting if this is what they wanted?
Say what you will, but implementing all manners of tags so users can express themselves, just to specifically leave out one is exclusion. “Move aside, heteros, this is our game!”.
You can argue that they deserve it, that the developer has no obligations, that they are represented everywhere else and that they should play those game instead, but it remains exclusion.
You got a few downvotes, but you’re not wrong. Another issue is if you have tags for everything except being straight, then it sort of implies that being straight is the default “normal” option, and everyone else has to go out of their way to designate themselves as not normal. It’s something that should be left up to the users to choose, instead of having a default.
Sort of like if you had race tags for everything except “white”, it would imply that being white was the expected norm, and everyone else has to mark themselves as outside the norm. Or for a more forced-binary example, what if a game had a “woman” tag, but no other gender tags? It would heavily imply that the expected default is “man”, and every woman (or really anyone who doesn’t explicitly identify as a man) has to self-select.
That being said, it’s a queer game made by queer devs for queer people. They can do whatever the hell they want with it. Not every space is meant for straight people; Queer people have often been required to go out of their way to form their own communities and spaces to avoid judgement from straight people. Demanding a “straight” tag feels a little like a straight dudebro walking into a gay bar and getting pissed when dudes flirt with him. No dudebro, you’re the one who is wrong here, because you have literally every other bar in town to go to instead. You don’t need to encroach on the gay bar, because it’s likely the only place gay people have that is truly “their” place.
Apart from them straights not being a Monolith, I feel there is a difference between not being represented and being actively excluded. You know, one is bad and one is worse.
You can and should leave a “Need a ____ tag” at the forum then. Don’t know why the article is so snarky about that, the poster of that seemed reasonable enough on the first 2 pages.
Straight representation? Lol, what? Like every major branching choice RPG with romance options offers plenty of hetero choices (Witcher, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Baldurs Gate, Cyberpunk 2077, etc). Even in Veilguard, the first AAA game I’ve played that offers nonbinary choices, still has plenty of hetero representation. Culture wars are so god damn exhausting and unwinnable.
These are the same people mad at “woke” games for not having white charcters. Their enormous amount of privliage has made them utterly blind to history or context.
It’s very fun, feels like a return to simple web chatroom type games that I’ve really been longing for. It’s real enjoyable if the idea of casual fishing with some random people seems appealing to you!
Then you should probably leave every game, because you can probably find some dumbfucks that argue about this everywhere. There are less than 30 people posting on this Steam discussion linked.
Honestly then… it probably didn’t warrant a response that will only bring more attention to their whining and more people rushing in to “support the cause”
pcgamer.com
Aktywne