Gender in gaming.

[Far eyes]

I dont play games on voice chat, and i am literally a dude with barely any accent and a mostly deepish voice. :P

@Anteros

Yah i have actually been reading into that a bit, see the problem there is the "noise" ratio that i mentioned earlier. I played the original games back in the day, all of the series. I was not very..   enamored with the quality of there work on the enhanced addition, they did a few things but it was also a buggy peace of crap. They already had something of a reputation for that. My and actually a lot of peoples criticism for the current offering is not that they have a gay character, a trans character. Its that those characters are written dirt poor. boogie2988 actually made a fairly decent video on it.

It smacks of 90s token gay guy in sitcom's.

I am not saying there is not a ratio of retard who want to hate on people because they are different, or just thoughtlessly want to get on a "bandwagon"  i am not denying or excusing the amount of truly idiotic shit going on just to be clear. I am just saying my own criticism and a few of those i have herd on it is aimed at the quality of the writing not the appearance of the characters.

Personally i was never a fan of the idea of having the One token gay character and then maybe like two possible female love interests, your choice of chocolate or vanilla. I understand the necessarily of it considering the game has to be made, voiced acted and written in a manageable amount of time but having more options in such things in general, if its relevant to the game would be nice. 
   

[Anteros]

Yeah, I know those "critics". Half of them will mention that they have personally nothing against gay people, while the others won't even bother.

I remember all the hate Dragon Age 2 got, not merely because it wasn't as good as DA:O (it really wasn't), but because some dudes couldn't tolerate that a male NPC would hit on their characters (Here is a famous example: http://www.nomorelost.org/2011/03/25/straight-male-gamer-told-to-get-over-it-by-bioware/
It happened again with DA:I (Another example: http://the-geek-spot.blogspot.com/2014/12/dainquisition-review-inaccuracies-worry.html)
It's always the same rethoric, with diversity included for political correctness and furthering liberal agendas, not because perhaps, those people exist and might wish to see someone like them in their favorite medias. 

[Blythe]

I am not saying there is not a ratio of retard who want to hate on people because they are different,

While I get the idea/sentiment that your post is conveying, using 'retard' as a pejorative isn't really helpful. Is usually better to avoid doing that.

[Skynet]

Granted, misogyny, transphobia and bigotry in general are rampant everywhere, not just in the gaming industry, but bigot gamers are particularly vocal about it. They may not be the worst, but they're certainly bad, and too numerous for many people who aren't white cis-males to feel comfortable or even safe in some case. You can't even just ignore them because of how loud they are.
Recent example: http://www.craveonline.com/entertainment/972903-gamers-flood-baldurs-gate-expansion-negative-reviews-introduces-transsexual-character

And while not as terrible as the rapes and death threats, you get tired fast from having people make inappropriate comments because your character has breasts or from being told that your wizard can't be dark skinned because medieval settings should only have white people. It doesn't happen everytime, thanks heaven, but often enough that it's a real problem. And yes, those are the actions of a minority, but it still a significant number of people, each of whom can be an ignoble jerk to dozens of people.

Related to Baldur's Gate: Ed Greenwood weighed in on this just now.

[HannibalBarca]

I hate shit like this.  The shit the female author has put up with.  It goes without saying that I've had experience with this--my mother put up with it, my ex put up with it, my 14 year old trans son has put up with it.  Not entirely in gaming or cons or the like, but just because I'm a straight white male doesn't make me blind to the horrific crap people who are not white, straight, or cisgender males have to put up with.  Because of events in my childhood I'd rather not mention, I have a very sore spot with bullying and abuse, particularly with those who are marginalized in the world.

I've been gaming since I was ten; I started with the original D&D in 1979.  I've played with groups of mostly white guys from my teens, but have been involved with everything from family groups and friends to game shop PUGs and convention room tabletops.  Being a big, tall white male has shielded me from a lot of the abuse others have had to put up with; what it hasn't done, however, is make me tone-deaf or antagonistic to that abuse.  My ex got groped by a guy at a con many years ago when I wasn't with her--but was close enough to both see him do it, and hear his excuse.  She's an extrovert and had no problem getting in his face and angrily giving him a piece of her mind, but I had him up against the wall when I got to them.  I'm a silent, calm person 99.9% of the time--it tends to come with the territory of being bigger than everyone else in the room and never feeling threatened--but she had to pull me off of him for fear of me getting arrested after doing something really stupid.  What he did wasn't even the match to the fuse--it was what he said: "Chill out, it was just a little squeeze."  He might as well have said stop struggling, bitch to my ears.  Assaulting someone is bad enough...but defending it by telling the victim she shouldn't make a big deal about it...

No.  I reserve the right to see red in that instance.  I also reserve the right to be ashamed as a white man...but really more as a human being.

Most people I've gamed with, even most white guys I've gamed with, have never been a problem like that.  But that means that some of them have been.  And I've both spoken and acted--decisively and immediately--when it did.  That in and of itself usually makes a difference in the situation.  Most people are non-confrontational, and if someone becomes the squeaky wheel, or in my case a loud-as-fuck angry wheel, they get the drift and don't push it or continue their behavior.  It may not cure them of their misogyny, homophobia, or other mental ailments, but it keeps them in line, and maybe makes them think about it the next time they consider being an asshole.

[Anteros]

Related to Baldur's Gate: Ed Greenwood weighed in on this just now.

I'm super happy to read Ed Greenwood comment on the situation. :-)
On the other hand, the first damn comment on his reaction links to this: http://nichegamer.com/2016/04/04/tale-dragons-memes-dragonspears-writing-horrid/
And of course the guy who pretends to be bothered by the writing's quality is really bothered by the "social justice pandering" also known as "including people and opinions he doesn't like".
Seriously, when did the term justice become negative anyway?
Also, I have to show this part:

Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide

Secondly, and perhaps even worse than Corwin’s broken mess of a character, is the modification done to Safana. While I understand Beamdog’s writers were angry at Safana for being a man-teasing “slut”, I never saw her character in such a way. To me, she was a manipulative woman who learned she could coerce men to do her bidding by complimenting them. Any woman who has had a successful first date after the age of 13 is well aware of the truth in that strategy. Though considering your average bitter female 30-something social keyboard warrior dines with cats and spends every night dampening their iPhone with tears shed while swiping through Tinder profiles, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to you that they despise having to admit that fact.

Yeah, it's obvious the writing's quality is the main conern here. Give me a break.

[Lustful Bride]

I'm super happy to read Ed Greenwood comment on the situation. :-)
On the other hand, the first damn comment on his reaction links to this: http://nichegamer.com/2016/04/04/tale-dragons-memes-dragonspears-writing-horrid/
And of course the guy who pretends to be bothered by the writing's quality is really bothered by the "social justice pandering" also known as "including people and opinions he doesn't like".
Seriously, when did the term justice become negative anyway?
Also, I have to show this part:

Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide

Secondly, and perhaps even worse than Corwin’s broken mess of a character, is the modification done to Safana. While I understand Beamdog’s writers were angry at Safana for being a man-teasing “slut”, I never saw her character in such a way. To me, she was a manipulative woman who learned she could coerce men to do her bidding by complimenting them. Any woman who has had a successful first date after the age of 13 is well aware of the truth in that strategy. Though considering your average bitter female 30-something social keyboard warrior dines with cats and spends every night dampening their iPhone with tears shed while swiping through Tinder profiles, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to you that they despise having to admit that fact.

Yeah, it's obvious the writing's quality is the main conern here. Give me a break.

*Fans you and brings out the Fire Extinguisher* easy there easy, you will upset Mr. Snowball the third and then the Keyboard warriors might have to get off their Lazy Boy chairs for once.

Though I'm picking up what your saying and I like it. :-)

[Anteros]

Sorry abouut getting angry, here. :-[

[Lustful Bride]

Sorry abouut getting angry, here. :-[

No its good, Plus you were still cohesive and that's the important part....you have no idea how hard I'm resisting the urge to quote Palpatine.

You know...I haven't felt so informed and educated from a thread in the PROC in a long time. I like it. :-)

[la dame en noir]

Sorry abouut getting angry, here. :-[

Don't ever apologize for your anger as a person that has be discriminated against.

[Anteros]

Thanks, you two.

[Lustful Bride]

Thanks, you two.

There is no need for thanks. For only together can we achieve a better world. For until Every Human on earth is equal, then no one is equal.

(Aliens don't count :P )

I would add more but this is around the time I just start rambling incoherently like a crazy cat lady.

[Far eyes]

Dragon Age 2

From what i remember about Inquisition most of the characters were rather well written so i am more or less happy about thatr par to for that game, it felt a little like a single player mmo but thats game design problem.

DA2..   see i would say i had a problem with that character but, its not that he was gay or that he came onto you in the patented clumsy Bioware way*. Its that he was essentially "staff girl" dressed up as a guy. I do not know if the term "Staff girl" gets used anymore but it tended to refer to the stereo type of the female hero in a group but she was only allowed to do specific things, this usually left her in the roll of a healer type character.

*Again see my earlier point about single token gay guy, i found him unappealing. But then again i do believe the female choices were skanky pirate chick and emo elf girl...    and i think the guy who fall into DA2 form a Final Fantasy game but i avoided him mostly so i dont really know. So eye rolling characters all around, really one of the cool characters in the game you had no option of a romance with of any kind was your dwarf buddy. And my lanky mage toon might have liked him  O:)   

That and DA2 had a loooot of problems that had noting to do with anybody's sexuality unless it was the game getting fucked past like act 1-2 :P

EDIR: Thinking on it i think its actually for the most part the tokenisam i object to, if its a part of your world and setting and *Shrug* why should it not be, then it should not be a single special snowflake character. Actually a lot of early RPGs did this with the "Girlfriend" character

[Far eyes]

But that means that some of them have been.  And I've both spoken and acted--decisively and immediately--when it did.  That in and of itself usually makes a difference in the situation.

I would perhaps make the argument just on a wide non case specific basis that it could very well just be the case of misinformation. Nobody is born knowing all things, and i have experienced a lot of cases of sexism and racism* ware the person the comment came from never full realized it until he was spoken to about it. I have had friends who while they were 16 said some of the most idiotic sexist things, he grew out of it he got challenged on those concept by me and another friend and he is not like that now.

*Nationalism often times in my region

Personally i believe there are generally two groups. One will say things because they just run there mouths never fully understanding what they are saying, some of these people calmly and rationally challenged and on there stances will see it for wrong and become perfectly pleasant company. For some its an ingrained belief and well there is no real point in arguing with that section, you just deal with them in the appropriate manner. 

I just dont like conflating the two into one, because its not a helpful way of dealing with a situation. It also sucks ass sometimes to have to be the guy to deal with it, because having the same discussion 7 bejilion times makes you feel like a teacher. I had that roll in my gaming club for a good couple of years, its sort of an unofficial title.     

[Nachtmahr]

I think I'd have appreciated a little heads-up about the rather graphic and.. Frankly terrifying nature of that article. Not that it wasn't on point and a perfectly fine article, but I didn't really know quite what I was in for when I went to read it.

Anyways, I think it's important to remember that of course it's not the whole gaming community at large that's like this, but it is disturbingly common. The unfiltered brutality that the internet has allowed us to practice through a shroud of anonymity means that a whole lot of people think they can do or say just about anything on the internet, and they'll either never get caught or claim that the person who's doing something wrong is the one investigating them afterwards.

Online social hubs have also only recently begun to show any real interest in trying to dampen online harassment, but generally speaking anyone is apparently still fair game when it comes to these gruesome assaults. You'll see people excusing it with the fact that "Oh, it's just words on a monitor, get over it!" or that "They should have seen it coming" but that doesn't make it okay. If you move to a neighborhood in real life that's known for it's high crime-rate, then that doesn't make the crimes any less criminal. Yeah, a lot of women and minority people today know that if they reveal anything about themselves, they're going to be on the receiving end of this kind of abuse, and isn't that sickening?

I wish I could think of some kind of suggestion as to how we would solve this, but the only thing that comes up is that game developers and other people with some amount of power and influence needs to take some responsibility and not just sit back and ignore it. These vile, disgusting people who do this sort of thing aren't facing any consequences, and wen that's the case then how are they supposed to ever understand how wrong it is? Education, it seems, is always the answer. But how do you teach someone what's right and what's wrong when doing the right thing comes with no reward and doing the wrong thing comes with no consequences? And how do we police modern, online communities without loosing the wonderful gift that online freedom is to begin with?

I wish things were better, and maybe they will be one day. But right now I can't say I have a whole lot of hope left.

[Tairis]

I really love it when people jump on one issue and ignore the rest. Yes, some people were being everything phobic idiots about there being a transcharacter in the BG expansion. Did anyone actually read the reviews, though, or any of the dialogue that was written for the game? A alot of those terrible reviews were from people mad that the game didn't work, not about the characters at all.

This to me feels like a game company did a shitty job and now they're using a controversy to try and claim it's just prejudice that's getting them bad reviews.

However, it did get noticed by one of the employees, who pretty much responded in the worst possible manner.

And here's a news article from 2014 relating to one of the Tumblr post's stories.

Since I seem to always be playing Devil's Advocate here... did anyone actually read what that guy stated? Why exactly is that the 'worst possible manner' and why is it that she is automatically 100% credible whereas this guy must be full of it? Everything he's stating there is that she waged a campaign of harassment against Wyrd and never provided any evidence of her claims.

No one else finds it bizarre that this woman is claiming that she wasn't just sexually harassed, but that she has been aggressively sexually assaulted literally for 10+ years by apparently every male gamer she's met? This doesn't seem the least bit hyperbolic? I'll 100% believe that this is something that has happened and needs to be addressed, but I find my incredulity strained to its breaking point that this woman has somehow managed to get sexually attacked at every single game store and convention she's gone to.

I also read the actual judicial decision from her case, here http://www.manitobahumanrights.ca/publications/legal/garland.pdf

The entire case seems to be based on the testimony of 4 people: her, one co-worker, the man that harassed her, and her employer. No physical evidence was provided. No recordings, no written communication, no witnesses outside those already directly involved with one side of the case or the other. This is frankly a very large case of 'he said-she said' and the judge decided that 'she said' was more credible.

She also makes a claim that a Privateer Press representative smacked her on the ass. I've worked with that company as a Pressganger (the same position as the man she claims harassed her in that instance). They have a strict harassment policy and no mention of any complaints about such an incident. Which, considering she knows what a Pressganger is and who Privateer Press is, and clearly has no issue making public statements why would she not complain to that company?

I've owned a game store, repped for companies, and generally been gaming for over a decade. Most gamers I know barely talk to strangers of EITHER gender without prompting from a more outgoing third party... yet somehow this woman has managed to find not one, but dozens upon dozens of the most sexually aggressive tabletop gamers in the world? The level of sexual aggression she describes I don't even see that frequently in actual bars and clubs where alcohol is flowing.

I think stupid and bigoted people need to be put in their place and yes, I think gamers especially are conflict avoidant so people don't get called out like they should... but this? Everything in her language, diction, the situations she describes comes across as so extreme, so frequent, and so stereotypical that I find it hard to believe. Especially when all indications are they she has never once actually provided any evidence of any of these claims beyond 'This totally happened'.

Edit: Especially after reading her blog that is full with various Tumbr-riffic posts like 'mansplaining!' and anita sarkeesian quotes.

Not to mention gems like this:

    The presentation of Kylo Ren as a whiny, insecure little shit is brilliant because, frankly, whiny insecure little shits are usually the people who actually do become evil in real life.

    Nerds want a Star Wars bad guy to be a stone-cold badass like Darth Vader because this lets them off the hook for self-examination, as nerds are absolutely nothing like Darth Vader. Kylo Ren, however, is a nerd: he acts like one, he has the backstory of one, and when he takes his helmet off, he even looks like one. Far from ruining the film, this actually makes it the most mature entry to date in the Star Wars canon, because it forces the greatest amount of self-examination on the part of its core audience.

[Far eyes]

This to me feels like a game company did a shitty job and now they're using a controversy to try and claim it's just prejudice that's getting them bad reviews.

The BG enhanced edition they did was also buggy, i think it still might be buggy i have not actually checked in a long while. They got a lot of flack for that one and if i remember correctly were not highly praised for there additions. A monk and a "Sits in the corner totaly a badass because he is dark and brooding anti-paladin special snow flake" is i belive the full class description. I think besides that no other major characters were added though i could be wrong, the game kind of collapsed on me at some point frequent crashes and so on.

[Tairis]

The BG enhanced edition they did was also buggy, i think it still might be buggy i have not actually checked in a long while. They got a lot of flack for that one and if i remember correctly were not highly praised for there additions. A monk and a "Sits in the corner totaly a badass because he is dark and brooding anti-paladin special snow flake" is i belive the full class description. I think besides that no other major characters were added though i could be wrong, the game kind of collapsed on me at some point frequent crashes and so on.

Yea the first... 6 months+ after they released it BG Enhanced was a complete mess. From what I've seen its been mostly fixed but you can still find a slew of those negative reviews too.

[Cassandraks]

I have to agree with Tairis, being a women who has been around gaming and gaming groups and all that kind of stuff. There isn't the doubt that there are idiot gamers out there that are capable of doing stuff like this. But the amount of it she has said she has gone through is a little hard to swallow. Honestly if it was me, I would have moved and found a much friendlier place to game and live. If all these gamers are like this where she is, then I can only imagine what the non gamer guys are like.

Perhaps also I am a little more old school, it has been a while since I have been around game groups and game stores. Perhaps now they are filled with these confident men who don't mind spitting sexist comments at women, or groping them. I remember going into game stores, and every male eye looking at me because OMG a female walked in and oh no I am going to crap myself. The groups I have been around, if they ever said something ignorant and they would say ignorant stuff around me. But it was because they were comfortable around me, hell I was one of the guys. If they were doing it just to be a jerk, that is one thing and they know I would have beat the crap out of them. But they never did that kind of stuff, they were respectful of women. If anything ever like this happened around them, I know a few while male gamers, who would have made sure to rip off the arm the hand that groped was attached to and made the guy who did it eat it.

So maybe it is a different crowd now, perhaps I have been away from it for to long. I don't know. I have no doubt there is a problem out there, but I believe it is smaller then what is being said. It all seems a bit to hate filled and exaggerated to me.  No women should ever have to go through anything like this, hell no person out there should have to. But it is also stuff like this that makes it harder for those that things like this happens to. Just the stuff being said about the police, and bosses and such. Would make a lot of girls I think, rethink about saying anything at all to anyone. In which there is more help out there for them, then is being said.

[Lustful Bride]

I have to agree with Tairis, being a women who has been around gaming and gaming groups and all that kind of stuff. There isn't the doubt that there are idiot gamers out there that are capable of doing stuff like this. But the amount of it she has said she has gone through is a little hard to swallow. Honestly if it was me, I would have moved and found a much friendlier place to game and live. If all these gamers are like this where she is, then I can only imagine what the non gamer guys are like.

I think its a possibility that she might be taking the stories of other women who went through this and saying that all of that happened to her when in reaity maybe only 2 or 3 of them are her stories.

[Cassandraks]

I think its a possibility that she might be taking the stories of other women who went through this and saying that all of that happened to her when in reaity maybe only 2 or 3 of them are her stories.

Maybe. But it is still deceptive, and doesn't really help anyone in the end. If she had just been honest and said this was from different women. It would have went better, and less bitter.

[Skynet]

I really love it when people jump on one issue and ignore the rest. Yes, some people were being everything phobic idiots about there being a transcharacter in the BG expansion. Did anyone actually read the reviews, though, or any of the dialogue that was written for the game? A alot of those terrible reviews were from people mad that the game didn't work, not about the characters at all.

Oh there are definitely problems with the game, but the prejudiced people have definitely poisoned the well by weighing in on it. There's quite a few folks framing it as "inserting political agendas into video games" along with criticism of the bugs in an attempt to frame it as something nobler than it really is (something GamerGate did with their "ethics in gaming journalism" back in 2014).

And that thing makes it harder to tell apart which ones are being made in good faith or not. Particularly from /r/kotakuinaction, which definitely have some people angry at the inclusion of a transgender NPC but rephrasing it as the NPC going "hi I'm trans" when in fact it's only something that happens if you ask her about her name via two conversation prompts. The fact that posters over there are talking about it repeatedly in spite of the complaints that "it's not about transphobia" is akin to shouting "I'm not yelling!"

So there is some dishonesty going around; is there deserved criticism? Yes. Would the game be getting hammered as much on MetaCritic and non-Steam stores (where you don't have to purchase the game to review) were it not for that and having Minsc do a dig at GamerGate? No it wouldn't. By getting involved they're making it harder to separate legitimate critics, thus undermining the good cause.

[TheGlyphstone]

How does Minsc take a dig at GamerGate without breaking the fourth wall (not that I would put a 4th wall violation past him)?

[Skynet]

How does Minsc take a dig at GamerGate without breaking the fourth wall (not that I would put a 4th wall violation past him)?

He says as one of his random lines "really, it's all about ethics in heroic adventuring!"

This option was later taken out, in that it didn't fit his character to say something like that.

[TheGlyphstone]

huh. Yeah, that doesn't fit him at all.