How to get new people?

[IyoTheHelpfulWolf]

The strange mentality that some unfortunate people have that LGBTQ gamers are trying to 'ruin games' or whatever I'll never understand. I'm sorry you have to be defensive about the whole thing, for what it's worth; someone talking their opinion about gender in video games shouldn't be so potentially polarizing. You're cool in my books, it's rare to find someone as weirdly obsessed with Dragon Age as I am.

They have this image of old games as things that never discussed social issues and were purely for escapism, and therefore see discussions of social issues in said games as encroaching on their happy place, but games back then had messages or diversity baked in sometimes as well. Environmental themes in Sonic and to an extent Final Fantasy VII, discussions of misinformation and the military industrial complex in Metal Gear Solid, class issues in Final Fantasy Tactics, and there are modern games like this such as corrupt power structures and outdated social norms in Persona 5, deconstruction of military shooters in Spec Ops: The Line, the diverse cast of Balder's Gate III, the super cute lesbian romance in Sword of the Necromancer, etc. These games wove their messaging and/or diverse casts into their game play to create a cohesive experience that was both enjoyable and got the point across either subtly or overtly.

There are games that DON'T integrate these elements well at all, however, leading to a confused mess of a game, either because the issue doesn't fit the game, the implementation of said message was just insincere corporate pandering, or the writer just can't write for shit, such as the Saints Row reboot having such "How do you do fellow kids?" energy that it makes me want to die, and these games should be constructively criticized. The problem is, partially due to their warped, nostalgic image of games as I mentioned before and partially due to rage bait culture, some people will look at these cases and blame the inclusion of social and political messages in an of itself rather than blame the writer or meddling bean counters who did it poorly, throwing all nuance out the window, when the sensible thing to do is constructively criticize the game, then play something else instead of stewing in their own frustration.

 

[Sir Auriel of Lionel]

yeah, lots of people can detect when something is made with passion, and when it's made for a paycheck. pretty much everyone would like to watch, play or read something made by someone who has a story to tell and share with the world rather than something made to make a quick buck and to ride on a bandwagon while it lasts. the former is interesting and the latter is boring.

Yeah to me as a nonbinary person that saw Taash's full companion backstory with most commentary off it's why I couldn't keep my mouth shut about Dragon Age to say, I needed to fucking tell everyone here and there that this character was not my OC, not made for me or represent anything about me. It's baffling to know it had been written by someone that was supposedly wearing the same title I claim to be because to me it looked made to be a hit piece, a strawman, to be picked at and hoisted in the air and set alight for a witch burning. Forget oil on the fire this was a molotov cocktail with extra magnesium. And if you think I'm over reacting or people would know it's not a good representation, they don't care they just see it in their face, so I have to be louder and put my gender or sexuality in the line of fire to condemn it to have some authority to reach more minds because this is seen as my mouthpiece. Just looking casually at old runs you can find comments saying the game is ruined now or writing the comment as a hindsight warning to the past that won't ever had the means to see it and it infuriates me. And then becomes a shield against criticism because any callout can get thrown back at the reviewer labeled as transphobic or hatred despite coming from the very same people hurt by it. And I'm sorry you have to see this shameful display of anger in a thread meant to question how to spread the word about this forum.

 

[Cheela]

Yeah to me as a nonbinary person that saw Taash's full companion backstory with most commentary off it's why I couldn't keep my mouth shut about Dragon Age to say, I needed to fucking tell everyone here and there that this character was not my OC, not made for me or represent anything about me. It's baffling to know it had been written by someone that was supposedly wearing the same title I claim to be because to me it looked made to be a hit piece, a strawman, to be picked at and hoisted in the air and set alight for a witch burning. Forget oil on the fire this was a molotov cocktail with extra magnesium. And if you think I'm over reacting or people would know it's not a good representation, they don't care they just see it in their face, so I have to be louder and put my gender or sexuality in the line of fire to condemn it to have some authority to reach more minds because this is seen as my mouthpiece. Just looking casually at old runs you can find comments saying the game is ruined now or writing the comment as a hindsight warning to the past that won't ever had the means to see it and it infuriates me. And then becomes a shield against criticism because any callout can get thrown back at the reviewer labeled as transphobic or hatred despite coming from the very same people hurt by it. And I'm sorry you have to see this shameful display of anger in a thread meant to question how to spread the word about this forum.

Is fine, we are in the infancy of the forum and we still need to figure out what we want here and not. But you guys discussion i think is a fair point and interesting conversation we can have here. Cause lets face it… Gender and sexuality should not be considered “political” talk and be thrown upon just cause recently the internet has been soo brainwashed into giving everything the “ideology”label. Games are art, and art has always been about expression.
Soo genuinely don’t apologize for expressing those emotions.

 

[Cheela]

And the same time i value a lot your point, like is not transphobic to say you don’t like certain representation specially if you as a non binary person don’t feel really represented by it. Cause i do believe a lot of the media recently has been trying to pander to certain audiences but failed miserably cause of not really understanding the target audience, is a complex dilemma and that is why is worth talking about it

 

[Yousef]

Honey

 

[GardeniaSky]

Honey

Yes, dear?

 

[Nebulon_Galaxy]

Damn you guys are trying to exceed the maximum word count on this homework essay?

 

[ciro64]

Is fine, we are in the infancy of the forum and we still need to figure out what we want here and not. But you guys discussion i think is a fair point and interesting conversation we can have here. Cause lets face it… Gender and sexuality should not be considered “political” talk and be thrown upon just cause recently the internet has been soo brainwashed into giving everything the “ideology”label. Games are art, and art has always been about expression.
Soo genuinely don’t apologize for expressing those emotions.

the internet has been soo brainwashed into giving everything the “ideology”label.

That's precisely why having discussion about representation is usually a pain. However, I think the space we are creating here is well-suited for having productive ones, so I welcome them here!

 

[Sir Auriel of Lionel]

View attachment 1850
Damn you guys are trying to exceed the maximum word count on this homework essay?

And for my next TED talk I will be discussing why it should be an industry standard for a Playstation to be in the breakroom for all workplaces.