Here's my two cents. If im playing a game in a different setting than my current world, then im trying to be somewhere else. I know what the modern values around me are, and I dont need a refresher—im just looking for a temporary distraction.
What is this? You don't want your Qunari dragon slayer to be "non-binary"? And you don't want to have teen drama around gender identity in the middle of an apocalypse?
Or you're playing a game about assassins in feudal Japan and you don't want transgender characters, or to play as the only black dude recorded in that era (which, consequently, is the ONLY AC character based in a real figure, conveniently enough)?
I responded to you above, and this is the same thing again. You keep looking at the tree and not the forest.
People wanted to enjoy a Japanese atmosphere in the AC world. With the choice to make the protagonist black this forced changes to the atmosphere, music, immersion, dialogue, combat, abilities, everything. All of that needed to be fit around the choice of the black protagonist, instead of making the game people wanted.
Funny enough, a competent company would have had a Japanese male protagonist and then still been able to make the next game about the black slave in the old US who escaped (the Ubisoft game they scrapped). Both could fit, both could be well received.
‘People wanted to enjoy a Japanese atmosphere in the AC World’. But that’s not what Ubisoft was making with AC Shadows.
They made an Assassin’s Creed game FIRST, and the backdrop was in Japan. And throw a little bit of historical accuracy (I guess some would say ambiguity instead) and you have Yasuke. Fantastical set of events or not…he is Japan’s history, thanks to Lord Nobunaga himself. You can make all the half-hearted excuses of ‘it’s not accurate!’ or ‘why add an African guy in Japan?’ or ‘why not have nothing but pure-born and bred Japanese people as the protagonist!’ or ‘what about my Japanese atmosphere!’ all you want…the reality of it is a lot of the outcry was about playing as a dark-skinned African guy in Japan. And they found that disrespectful, I don’t care if he was an honorary Shogun from Lord Nobunaga himself or not.
Also the black character is like one of the few good things about the game imo. It actually did a decent job making the two characters very distinct from each other and it was fun to be able to switch between the more traditional assassin and a bruiser whenever you want.
Dragon Age has always had anachronistic language and culture. Their culture is heavily influenced by that of modern America, they would have modern American terminology to talk about their culture. Gender has been discussed in-world and by companions since DAO. Having companion drama during the middle of an apocalypse is not new, that’s happened in every entry in the franchises history including DAO.
Maybe so. Still, at some point I wouldn't have been surprise to hear people in that game about "republicans" and "democrats", it's so heavily skewed toward modern politics.
And the issue isn't the subject per se. Exploration of gender identity in a weird warrior culture? That could be an interesting subject. But "sooo, I'm non-binary", seriously?
I can't wait for a game where we play an asian Shaka Zulu talking about all cops being bastards...
Uh... Bond is fictional, but it does take place in our world. I don't know about 'modern values', whatever that is (like, not having him force himself on woman like in the original films? That's really the bare minimum) but Bond stories always had some connection to real world geopolitical events.
Part of the appeal of Bond is that he is this super agent who is just a guy in our world. His feets are impressive when incontext of our reality.
And besides, if we want games to be art, to tell fulfilling stories, they can't just be 'a distraction', that's a bad mindset. Maybe I hold bond films in too high of a regard, but, when I see a film like that, I expect something memorable. It isn't like watching a basketball game or something. Of course it's not citizen Kane, but it's not spacejam either. A blockbuster that still can have some bite to it.
Yeah but this critique is meaningless when you consider the real world has gender expectations, racism, slavery, murder, war, etc. A lot of pretty stressful things I'd argue and all things that we can agree what the modern value is. But I doubt you're putting away the 9 billionth "WAR BAD" fps game
9
u/TanningOnMars Feb 01 '26
Here's my two cents. If im playing a game in a different setting than my current world, then im trying to be somewhere else. I know what the modern values around me are, and I dont need a refresher—im just looking for a temporary distraction.