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Post by JDarkside on Jun 24, 2015 20:01:31 GMT -5
I think he was saying that Ayn Rand's Fountainhead just wasn't as relatable due to having a niche audience, not necessarily praising it. No, he's saying that the work moves people because of its themes and not because of the ethnicity of its characters. This argument also vastly ignores the entire argument it's arguing against. Nobody is saying that a work can't be effective because a protagonist is a straight white guy, some of my favorite games have characters in the lead or in a majority of scenes like that. What people are saying is that there are some thing you can only do with different types of characters, and that simply having those characters can have a positive effect on thousands of lives.
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Post by 16bitter on Jun 24, 2015 20:28:51 GMT -5
What you're arguing is that gaming should be staying still exactly where it is, simply because you shoose to dislike what you don't even bother to understand. Not liking how some people overreact to non-controversies is one thing, asking the entire medium stay the way it is just boggles the mind. No medium got better by staying still. The experiments that didn't work disappeared with time or inspired more interesting movements, and the ones that worked off the bat catch on (which we're starting to see with fantasy WRPGs adding in homosexual characters in the main cast). Games aren't turning to ash, there's more gay characters out there now, and the games are still of the same quality they'd be if those characters weren't gay. I'm not arguing that at all. I tried to make it clear that I don't have a problem playing as a female character, nor would I have a problem playing as a LGBT character if they appeared in games that weren't RPGs or visual novels (I mostly play actions games), which is an eventuality as more minorities enter the industry. When throngs of people start complaining about games or shaming developers for not shoehorning in minority characters, I find it alarming. It's not an artist's or an industry's responsibility to accommodate everyone; forcing them to alter their intended creation is what offends me as a connoisseur of art, I didn't mean to suggest that I was offended in a socio-political sense. Considering that most of the industry is comprised of white males and considering how poorly they tend to write for marginalized groups, I'd almost think you'd want less of that until more minority designers/writers were working in the industry. As for the Rand reference, it was off the top of my head, but the point remains valid: the central theme of that book has no ties to race, gender, culture, or economic standing and was written by a female immigrant. The characters' physiology is irrelevant; had all the main characters been Native American bisexual females the plot and tone would certainly have been different, but the theme would not be altered. It doesn't translate to gaming necessarily, but in a novel, it is the ideas and emotions that are most important, not the plot or the specifics of the characters. And as for cubism, well, take a look at a Rembrandt or a Bouguereau and see how the former movement is a regression of the artform, not an advancement.
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Post by 16bitter on Jun 24, 2015 20:31:08 GMT -5
I think he was saying that Ayn Rand's Fountainhead just wasn't as relatable due to having a niche audience, not necessarily praising it. Nobody is saying that a work can't be effective because a protagonist is a straight white guy, some of my favorite games have characters in the lead or in a majority of scenes like that. Actually, I had gotten the impression that you were saying just that. I apologize for the misunderstanding. Still no love lost for cubism though
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Post by Neo Rasa on Jun 24, 2015 20:40:16 GMT -5
If you mean that Bouguereau, attempting a traditionalist portraiture take similar to Rembrandt but 200 years too late is a regression compared to Rembrandt I totally have to agree with that. But cubism was a massively influential movement, effecting not just visual arts but music, architecture, etc. as well. Like you're basically saying all design in the western hemisphere from 1910 through the 30s is inherently worse than what you view as an objective ideal of "the artform," like I don't even know what is going on with this. Like I understand if you don't like a given style, but you don't think that's a bit out there?
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Post by Joseph Joestar on Jun 24, 2015 20:42:49 GMT -5
Steven Universe looks like shit.
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Post by JDarkside on Jun 24, 2015 20:46:58 GMT -5
If you mean that Bouguereau, attempting a traditionalist portraiture take similar to Rembrandt but 200 years too late is a regression compared to Rembrandt I totally have to agree with that. But cubism was a massively influential movement, effecting not just visual arts but music, architecture, etc. as well. Like you're basically saying all design in the western hemisphere from 1910 through the 30s is inherently worse than what you view as an objective ideal of "the artform," like I don't even know what is going on with this. Like I understand if you don't like a given style, but you don't think that's a bit out there? Cubism helped make minimalism a thing, and as a wannabe graphic designer, that means I cannot hate it in any way. Honestly like the simplicity of it. There's always been a weird obsession with appreciating effort over the actual result in the painting world, always came off as snobby to me. Just because you can paint a complex, impressive scene doesn't mean it's any more valid or effective as a simple painting of colored rectangles. Less can be more, and sometimes more is more, it's all situational.
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Post by 16bitter on Jun 24, 2015 20:49:16 GMT -5
Well, it's more of a subjective ideal since it's just, you know, my opinion, man. But in terms of technique and complexity (which are a decent basic metric by which to measure the quality of art, discounting things like subject, selection and what not), cubism is a huge step back, a first step eventually leading to Jackson Pollock splatter nonsense and the death of painting. In music you see it with the minimalism wave of the same time period. Influential or not, "new" is not always better.
Video games for the most part have avoided this since they're derived from technology. As the tech gets better, the games will keep getting more complex and technical.
*EDIT* The less is more argument works when the artist's skill in selection is a highlight of the work, which can make up for deficits elsewhere (which may or may not exist). Again "skill" is the important word. But taken to the extreme, I doubt anyone would honestly suggest that a couple of rectangles is more aesthetically pleasing than a photo-realistic landscape. A few perfectly assembled shapes vs. a horribly botched landscape? Well that's another story.
*EDIT AGAIN* I'd be happy to argue about this all day, but it's certainly off-topic by now and I no longer have any contention to the main subject. If anyone wants to restart the art debate up on the Off-Topic board I'm game, but otherwise I'm dropping it. To the consensus of most I'm sure, lol
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Post by Resident Tsundere on Jun 24, 2015 21:24:35 GMT -5
I'm not sure if I can really add much to this conversation, but considering that my story is similar to jdarkside's in that a piece of fiction - a game, no less - (Dragon Age: Origins) helped me confront the idea of my bisexuality, I say that representation matters. Of course, not all attempts at representation will be successful, but creators deserve to try. Hell, they should try on principal. Better to try and risk failure than to not challenge yourself and the status quo, right?
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Post by Aoi on Jun 25, 2015 1:08:56 GMT -5
I actually went off on a pretty epic rant about this during E3. As many have pointed out, I feel the industry is now shoeing in minority roles just to appease one group of people. You watch the Microsoft conference, and game after game, it's politically correct females. Then, after the trailer, they'll pan the camera around an arena full of white males.
To me, this is far more offensive. I don't want a token trans hero tossed into Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed. I'm not gonna buy your crappy game just because you suddenly represented me. I'm perfectly content being a meathead white male soldier.
To make real changes, representation needs to mean something. Make our heroes black, or female, or gay, or whatever you want, but do so because you truly want them to be. If your game's good, I'll play it, regardless.
...Kinda makes you wonder if Street Fighter II could ever be made today.
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Post by Échalote on Jun 25, 2015 3:38:15 GMT -5
While I'm severely doubting the sincerity of some corporations concerning social justice (because it's a cheap way to appeal to an audience of tepid (?) liberals without really committing to it), I feel than more often than not the "shoehorning" argument is just a way to dismiss any character that isn't straight/cis/white/male, case in point being Dragon Age Inquisition's Krem who was still accused of being shoehorned despite discussion about his gender identity being completely optional. Last time I checked, SFV is still being made. Can we let go of Jack Thompson ? Please ? Pretty please ? No one is trying to censor games ffs. (as a side note, the irony of Thompson being interviewed for White supremacist "on paper" and BathtubBoy's documentary about Sarkessian will never stop to be hilarious to me) Also, IIRC there were some people who said that there was no such thing as Polish mythology (but there WAS Norse and Greek mythology) shortly before or after Witcher 3 was released. Seriously? SERIOUSLY Thing is, the claim that The Witcher is based on polish mythology is a load of bull used by mostly by people who don't care about Poland or Europe's complex history to defend the game being as white as a KKK meeting. The Witcher series has always been a hodgepodge of european folklore and myths (reminder that 1/3 of TW3 takes place on totally-not-norway).
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Post by Deleted on Jun 25, 2015 4:16:59 GMT -5
I stand corrected. Although IMHO the way it was *phrased* still came across as a little snubby.
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Post by GamerL on Jun 25, 2015 5:23:04 GMT -5
I actually went off on a pretty epic rant about this during E3. As many have pointed out, I feel the industry is now shoeing in minority roles just to appease one group of people. You watch the Microsoft conference, and game after game, it's politically correct females. Then, after the trailer, they'll pan the camera around an arena full of white males. To me, this is far more offensive. I don't want a token trans hero tossed into Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed. I'm not gonna buy your crappy game just because you suddenly represented me. I'm perfectly content being a meathead white male soldier. To make real changes, representation needs to mean something. Make our heroes black, or female, or gay, or whatever you want, but do so because you truly want them to be. If your game's good, I'll play it, regardless. ...Kinda makes you wonder if Street Fighter II could ever be made today. This sort of thing can only lead to tokenism, any time a storyteller creates a certain character not because he or she really wants to or thinks there's something to be said, but to simply appease certain groups of people, it's always gonna come off half hearted. I mean I'd love to see more diversity in characters and storytelling in games, but you can't force it as many of these, well "SJWs" (best term I can think of, sorry) try to, it has to happen naturally otherwise it's gonna just feel, well, forced. And can I address an elephant in the room here? As hardcore gamers can we all agree that while story and characters and the like matter, at the end of the day what matters the most is the gameplay itself, if you're the kind of person who wouldn't play a really, really great game simply because the protagonist is a white guy well, you may be in the wrong hobby. Can we let go of Jack Thompson ? Please ? Pretty please ? No one is trying to censor games ffs. (as a side note, the irony of Thompson being interviewed for White supremacist "on paper" and BathtubBoy's documentary about Sarkessian will never stop to be hilarious to me) Anita Sarkeesian recently criticized the violence in Doom, I repeat she criticized the VIOLENCE in DOOM! And you think I'm off base with the Thompson comparison? I don't think so. And about that, it boggles my mind to think the SJWs would go after violence next, what the hell do these people expect or want video games to be?
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Post by Aoi on Jun 25, 2015 5:47:24 GMT -5
Last time I checked, SFV is still being made. Nah, I meant if it had never existed before. The entire game is just one giant stereotype. While it has come to be beloved, and able to continue being itself, I feel it'd be a politically correct mess if it were made now.
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Post by Échalote on Jun 25, 2015 5:47:50 GMT -5
(Especially since well, yes, there's a debate to be had on video games' relation to violence and its justifications, something that is caused by the fact that most video games barely attains a b-movie level of storytelling) Last time I checked, SFV is still being made. Nah, I meant if it had never existed before. The entire game is just one giant stereotype. While it has come to be beloved, and able to continue being itself, I feel it'd be a politically correct mess if it were made now. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride (honestly, i think ppl are largely overestimating the influence of tumblr and twitter)
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Post by JDarkside on Jun 25, 2015 6:14:59 GMT -5
Street Fighter is a Japanese game, the Japanese don't give a fuck about political correctness. There's still tons of anime coming out every season filled with bad jokes aimed at the LGBT.
I agree that representation should mean something, but we shouldn't be too cynical about all these token attempts at it for one reason; this is the AAA gaming industry. They change very, very slowly. This is them basically testing market waters and aiming for better publicity. That's how all business works. The goal is to get them comfortable enough with allowing different character types more often to let actual developers have more creative freedom to create those meaningful representations.
Bioware has been trying for that alone and I'm impressed by that. They trip up a lot (hey, remember the planet of the gays in that Star Wars MMO?), but they have their heart in the right place and manage to do more good than bad. For them to be able to do all that when owned by EA is kind of amazing, since this is the same company that had Faith's breast size increased significantly on Mirror's Edge advertisements and forced the developers to add gunplay nobody wanted because you got to have those all so important 18-34 white hetero male demographic.
Seeing these token attempts is a step forward. It's not satisfying, but it's a sign of things to come, and that's a good thing in my book.
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