Video Games & "Myth of Neutrality"

[stromboli]

you people are so out of touch. You know the video games are teaching our youth to be thrill killers for when the Lizard Overlords reveal themselves and their nasty plan.

Or not. I have two sons who are both gamers, have both been in the military-one still is- and are responsible, non violent parents. I really think upon close examination that other factors, like home environments and racial attitudes and other political nonsense, play into it. It is never as simple as it seems.

[Hydra009]

http://jezebel.com/why-isnt-it-called-no-womans-sky-1785411230

Yeah.  Caught the news on Reddit.  Someone commented that Jezebel doesn't even normally do reviews anyways (the sister site takes care of that), so it seems like they just wanted to make some sort of statement.  I don't think they realize they're only hurting themselves, though.

[stromboli]

Sounds better than "nobody's sky" and in context is less gender specific than woman would be.

[mauricio]

I know, right?  I saw that and thought it must be a joke.  Who would possibly be so brittle and eager to take offense that they'd misconstrue something as innocuous as the "no man's land" idiom as a sexist slight?  Apparently, SJWs.  There's no distinguishing the parody and the real thing anymore.

what I do not get is that it's widely understood that 'man' can be used as a gender neutral synonym of human being. But they seem to be unable to understand that.

[trdsf]

The realism argument is bunk if the author does not want realism, there is no reason to be white only if the author does not want it to be white only, there is not reason for there to be POC if the author wants it to be white only. This is art. The author is free to choose whatever he wants in his creation, specially when it comes to aesthetics like character looks.

Well, speaking as a writer myself -- when I create a new character, if I don't have a specific reason for a character to be a particular gender or ethnicity, I roll d100 against the known demographics of the area the character came from because if I were any whiter, I'd glow in the dark.  So I don't trust my instincts as far as race, gender and ethnicity goes.  I want it to look more like reality than the clutter inside my head.

[Sal1981]

They'd have an argument if, by rolling a white character, you got a boost to Charisma or something more so than a black character.

Don't get me started on rolling for the different races and their specializations. I mean, why aren't the SJWs crying about zombie privilege in WoW for getting underwater holding breath privilege? Or what about the trolls get a whole different specs than orcs? I mean, don't we all want to be equal?

This is so stupid.

[Hakurei Reimu]

The existence of Witcher 3 implies the existence of Witcher 2 and the existence of the original Witcher. In short, this is not a blank slate for which we are free to construct any sort of background whatsoever. If the previous games lacked for diversity, the sudden appearance of multiple human races in Witcher 3 is something that needs an explanation. Are the new races slaves? That implies a multi-continent-spanning empire of great power to supply the slaves. Are they immigrants? Then the nation's wealth and influence is such that people will make a trans-continental journey just to make a living there. Merchants? Again, more of the same kind of thing.

And keep in mind, this is all within a human lifetime. A medieval human's lifetime.

Unless a backstory of how the world of Witcher became more racially diversified can be constructed and more importantly be convincing and relevant, then the change serves no story purpose and is in fact political â€" you are making the change to chase the nebulous promise of "diversity," and not for the sake of anything really important to the story. If you're not playing a game for its background, storyline, and gameplay, then the cosmetic changes of a few people being of your race is not going to change your mind.

This is not to say that a newly-minted franchise that does include a multi-racial population would not be equally enganging. Such a franchise would be a blank slate for which any background is possible. But unless you're willing to engage in some heavy-duty and skilled worldsmithing, the only thing that adding new human races will do to the Witcher series is break its mythos for very dubious gain.

There's a grain of truth to the "historical accuracy" charge, only it's not historical accuracy to the real world that's the problem, but that fictional world's historical accuracy. It's much, much easier to craft a new game with a new setting that includes racial diversity from the get-go than to change an already established franchise that never had it before.

As for Rust, there is a deep paradox at work here: if race is not important to the game, why assign or fix your race at all; and if race is important to the game, why assign it randomly?

[PickelledEggs]

As for Rust, there is a deep paradox at work here: if race is not important to the game, why assign or fix your race at all; and if race is important to the game, why assign it randomly?

The possibility exists that they will put the choice to choose race/sex. It's in an extremely early stage. Only recently they added something other than a naked beige guy.

And the reason they only started with a random beige guy is pretty obvious. It's easier to sculpt a guy's chest than it is to sculpt boobs. They added the female avatar down the line.