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Beware the contributor covenant code of conduct
Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
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there are programs trying to get more men interested in teaching.

There are also programs trying to get men into assisted living positions and health care.

bamccaig said:

I think it's incredibly sexist to assert that girls and women are so feeble that their entires lives are decided for them by their environment.

Yes, but it's not sexist if you include boys, and I do :)

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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beoran
Member #12,636
March 2011

I'll have to agree to disagree. While there are some natural differences between boys and girls, the cultural influence and differences are far more influential. This is especially easy to see if one's spouse is from a different culture.

But I also can't help but notice that the net effect of feminism has been that now, women in Europe and the USA also have to work outside of the home,whill still having to work at home as well. If you can somehow gradually double the amount of people willing to work like this, then for the employers it means they can gradually halve the wages. A big achievement of the worker's movements in the 19th century was to ensure children and women did not have to work any more. An achievement that for the account of the women demolished again simply by telling women that work is desirable somehow... :p And then came the mass migration of cheap workers into Europe, while in the USA, the black people had that role. And then, when all that didn't boost the profits enough any more, the "elite" relocated and is relocating the factories to low wage countries. All while sending the oil money to our "good friends" in Saudi Arabia. It all fits neatly together.

And you know what the sneaky part of it is? It's all done under the pretext and flag of good intentions. I agree that in the 1950's women were still not legally equal to men, and same went for the black, and their rights needed to be improved. And there was a lot of useless sexual prudery. But what it all amounts to now is spreading mutual fear and distrust between everyone at the bottom rank of the social ladder. Likely to prevent us from making a fist at that 0.0001%... And Gamer "gate" or Atheism plus or now the business of the CCoC all seems to have exactly the same modus operandi. The "elite" doesn't want us to enjoy games (work more), to give away software for free (they can't compete), to disregard religion (it is an is an ideal mind control too, unfortunately). You can have free sex (family bonds are undesirable), but there is a "rape culture" (because actually you shouldn't go out to enjoy sex, but instead work more). Divide and conquer, indeed...

Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
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He's totally over-analyzing that quote about us not being apes. We are not the same species as the apes we know. He provided zero evidence to support the implicit idea that women should subject to men through the shared relationship we have with apes.

In any case, this is a bigger topic and isn't really about feminism.

Something that's also in line with what you're against, although it has nothing to do with feminism -- a comedian was ordered to pay a bunch of money because of what he said about a disabled person.

It was a distasteful joke. It sucks for that guy, he had to pay a lot. However, I don't know what that kid and his family went through as a result of this joke so it's not really my place to say. He seems well off enough to mostly shrug it off so I doubt it's causing him any sort of financial hardship. Here's a video you will most likely agree with more than I do, though:

video

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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Derezo said:

He's totally over-analyzing that quote about us not being apes. We are not the same species as the apes we know. He provided zero evidence to support the implicit idea that women should subject to men through the shared relationship we have with apes.

Sort of like Feminism and like-minded individuals have provided zero reliable evidence that women's decisions are predicated on environmental factors instead of just being their natural, personal preference. Of course, in that video he was responding to a Feminist woman that was claiming that we are not apes. Which is not really up for debate. We are. That's what he was saying. He then argued, and reasonably so, that patterns that we observe in other apes could provide insight into our own nature.

It's evident that the natural behaviors of apes is uncomfortable for the Feminist crowd because it casts a ray of doubt on the entire narrative. Of course, you don't need apes to do that. The same behaviors can be observed in people. It's just a bit more difficult to cloud the issue with the apes so they escape into the "fuck science" argument and attempt to appeal to the less intelligent among us by arguing that we obviously aren't apes because reasons and therefore it can't be in our nature to obvious things we all understand as children.

Arguing that we aren't apes pretty much destroys the woman's credibility. And that's really all the video is about. Some woman is expressing stupid ideas that are obviously very politically correct and popular, but obviously not very intelligent or backed by evidence. He enjoys tearing these things apart and does a good job of it.

Derezo said:

Something that's also in line with what you're against, although it has nothing to do with feminism -- a comedian was ordered to pay a bunch of money because of what he said about a disabled person.

That's outrageous. It was you that first informed me that we had such things as "human rights tribunals" and this is further evidence that we need to disband them. He's a fucking comedian. To fine him for making a joke is effectively preventing him from doing his job. I am so frustrated to learn about this.

Derezo said:

Here's a video you will most likely agree with more than I do, though.

Sounds like a troll trap, but what exactly don't you agree with about a video criticizing the punishment of a comedian for making jokes during a comedy act? That's the whole fucking point of comedy. To make light of things that are not light. To break the tension and let us laugh about it. There's no use for comedy if that isn't so.

>:(>:(>:(

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
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bamccaig said:

Arguing that we aren't apes pretty much destroys the woman's credibility. And that's really all the video is about.

We are not the same species as apes that we observe in nature. That much I know. In what way are you saying that we are apes? In some form of literal sense, or that we are the ancestors of apes? These are not social problems that apes found in nature debate among themselves that we are aware.

Quote:

To fine him for making a joke is effectively preventing him from doing his job.

He was in no way required to add this disabled individual into his routine, and the plaintiff is in no way required to be subject to such embarrassment.

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

torhu
Member #2,727
September 2002
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Derezo, nobody thinks that you are actually this stupid, just give it up ;D

Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
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You guys keep arguing this silly points, not me ::)

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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Quora is always a source of interesting discussions.
Another article I found interesting in regard to GamerGate and 3rd wave feminism.
To show the world has lost their minds and need to get back to reality, TIME ran this:
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When did a "culture critic" become more important in games than a legendary game creator?
This one made me laugh:
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Okay, what the hell?!
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torhu
Member #2,727
September 2002
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TIME has really lost the plot. Someone posted this article on Facebook a couple of days ago. I'm guessing there was no fact checking done, the journalist probably just gathered a bunch of information that suited the narrative he wanted to portray. While some of what he's saying is true, some of it is misleading, and other parts are just plain wrong. There is no excuse for using dishonest people like Sarkeesian as sources or "experts" when a google search would reveal what she is doing. Media with a strong liberal bias is just as bad as right-wing media outlets when it comes to the lack of interest in facts and objective journalism, and the pure disrespect for their audience.

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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It appears Youtube reviewers are getting sick of Social Justice Warriors and the like:

video

People have hit their limits with political correctness and are fighting back. Some are crediting GamerGate as the catalyst because gamers were the first fan base that actually fought back and made a difference. A guy at Gawker even said GamerGate was the most difficult group they ever fought, before quickly going into the media narrative and trying to dismiss them as a hate mob of teenagers (even though majority of the supporters are open about who they are and are mid-20s and older). The narrative against the consumer revolt has pretty much been a comical thing to behold for the past two years.

With Anita, it is amazing how she is getting away with fraud. Her tropes series was backed with almost $160k, claimed her videos would be well researched and released by the end of 2012, but here we are rapidly nearing the end of 2016 and she hasn't even released all the videos that she claimed she would. When pushed for answers, she blames GamerGate, the Twitter hashtag and faceless trolls online that said mean things to her as to why she hasn't finished four years later. Her research? Taking Let's Play footage from Youtubers to help sell her narrative that games are sexist and make gamers sexist even if the footage or game objective proves her claim wrong. Like claiming Hitman encourages killing innocent women while the footage shows a penalty for killing them. Watchdogs she claims you can ignore crimes even though the whole premise of the game is to stop crimes.

The jaw dropping aspect is that if you say she claims games make gamers sexist you get people asking "Where does she specifically state that?!" Apparently her followers can't put two and two together, her videos are pointing sexist tropes and almost every video at some point states games are teaching gamers this, ergo she is saying it without flat out saying it because she knows that blatant accusation will get her laughed at just like Jack Thompson and his games make gamers violent fiasco.

For me, being a GG supporter, the sweet point for the past two years was watching Wu, Quinn, Sarkeesian, Harper, Alexander, and numerous others paint GG as a hate mob that was misogynistic, homophobic, etc. Just for evidence after evidence to show that Quinn and Harper openly take part in bullying people while claiming to be anti-bullying, recently a person working for Quinn's "Anti-harassment group" was just outed as a serial harasser and abuser, they have all come out defending pedophilia, etc. They have shown that they are the terrible people in this debate while their claims of GG and the supporters being terrible hinge on anonymous trolls that said mean things. I've shown several times where antis actually offered free code for Smash Bros and other games to have people tweet racist comments or threats while including the GG hashtag, but like idiots wouldn't delete the original tweet with the offer after the tweet was made by a random guy. Most of the tweets that actually were heinous were from accounts that were just made or had never said anything to the hashtag except the one racist, sexist, or threatening tweet.

The only downside of being a supporter of GamerGate is that I've been flat out told that I will never get a job in the industry due to just supporting it. Yep, been told they will make sure any employer knows I supported GG and make sure that it means I hate women (good old narrative). Guess it is a good thing I gave up working in the industry professionally years before GG happened :).

video

[Append]
Just so you know, everyone that disagrees with anything feminist related will be labeled GG just because. If you don't agree 100% with their accusations of games and gmaers then you are the typical, outdated gamer trope and therefore a secret supporter of GamerGate.

[Append II]
Apparently BLM is getting a GamerGate-esque movement promoting empowerment and just like GG media and writers are labeling them misogynists, et. al. Does that make BLM equivalent to the 3rd wave feminists? :-/
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beoran
Member #12,636
March 2011

Yeah, that's GG a debacle as well... Problem is some unsavory online troll and bullying groups like Bapthomet are involved in it and they love to cause mayhem on both sides for their own amusement, and to keep theflames of conflict burning. Not to mention the pro GG camp is being played just as much as the anti one. It's all divide and conquer again.

I'm in favour of respectful discussion and against bullying people online. So what I dislike about GG, though is that people on both sides are callous towards cases where their opponents were bullied. Interestingly enough I was first bullied online on line by two or three ladies way back some time in 2000.... To blame men for online bullying is just absurd, women can be just as insidious.

Nevertheless I find that making games more fun for women and girls also is a valid concern. And I do think that the damsel in distress trope is often quite trite and not really so interesting to use in games, even if the damsel is male. But again it's the means used that I strongly object to. The anti GG camp could make valid points without resorting to lying and paining their opponents as bad people just for disagreeing with them.

All in alll though I think wthe GG name is something to give up on, it's too tainted with that nonsense about Ms. Quinn and harassment claims. Keep the movement, keep the priniples, but change the name. "Gamers for ethics", or something like that. They can't realistically be anti that.

I think an important problem in western society right now is the loss of the ability to disagree respectfully. "I Disapprove of What You Say, But I Will Defend to the Death Your Right to Say It" -- Evelyn Beatrice Hall. A quote to strive for.

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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beoran said:

Nevertheless I find that making games more fun for women and girls also is a valid concern. And I do think that the damsel in distress trope is often quite trite and not really so interesting to use in games, even if the damsel is male.

You can't expect to create video games similar to the boy's games that appeal to most girls if most girls just don't like the same video game mechanics. It probably won't happen. Our brains are wired differently. Nothing in particular has stopped girls from playing games for the past 40 years except that most don't enjoy them. Had they enjoyed them too there would already be a market for them.

There are countless female video games. They just aren't respected by "gamers" because "gamers" represent a group that enjoy playing complex, rich, action or adventure games. Most games for girls are casual to the extreme. Drag and drop, intoxicating "points" sounds, stupid easy games with little to no coordination required and mostly just pats on the back for every interaction. There are exceptions. I have countless female Steam friends from Counter-Strike: Source. Mostly because I used to be a single male so I collected them. ;) But countless of them can kick my ass at CS without trying. Girls that like it and are even skilled at it exist. They're even common. Just about every game you're playing with a female, and almost certainly every day. They just aren't there in the same numbers as males.

You can't begin to create games for girls until you can identify the game mechanics that girls generally would enjoy. You won't find anybody willing to try that in such a miss (no pun intended) industry. Most games are flops. As with movies and music, relatively few projects are complete successes. Probably many times more fail than succeed. Who would take a risk on a formula that is completely unproven when in reality most of the industry won't even deviate from the proven patterns that are successful. Except for indie developers you don't see any risk taking at all.

You may not like it, but the damsel in distress trope is popular because it feels good for the target audience (which happens to be the audience most likely to buy games that their designers are interested in and capable of making). Arguably it's such a big part of our society because it has benefited our species. I believe it sends a realistic message that women are weaker and as men we are expected to look out for them. And at the same time, women are expected to appreciate being looked out for. You can only really oppose it when your mind is wrapped up in the absurd idea that women are the same as men and just an oppressed class of people by artificial means at the hands of the Shitlord Patriarchy(tm). You need to be completely irrational to not understand why that exists and why it's popular.

beoran said:

All in alll though I think wthe GG name is something to give up on, it's too tainted with that nonsense about Ms. Quinn and harassment claims. Keep the movement, keep the priniples, but change the name.

"Gamers for ethics", or something like that. They can't realistically be anti that.

In general I'd say that's a valid idea, except that no matter what name the movement goes by it will always be tainted by trolls and sock puppets. I don't think any name is needed because you don't need group think. You just need good ideas. They can't taint good ideas. The same is true of "Feminism". No matter how well intentioned some activists are, there will always be others to ruin the name. The only thing that can't be ruined by trolls and sock puppets and sociopaths and haters is a good idea that has no affiliation.

beoran said:

I think an important problem in western society right now is the loss of the ability to disagree respectfully. "I Disapprove of What You Say, But I Will Defend to the Death Your Right to Say It" -- Evelyn Beatrice Hall. A quote to strive for.

Agreed. Though I think that's just the tip of the iceberg. It's not just about agreement or disagreement. It's about control of ideas. And along with that, control of behavior. It's generally about total control.

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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beoran said:

I'm in favour of respectful discussion and against bullying people online. So what I dislike about GG, though is that people on both sides are callous towards cases where their opponents were bullied. Interestingly enough I was first bullied online on line by two or three ladies way back some time in 2000.... To blame men for online bullying is just absurd, women can be just as insidious.

I'm all for discussion about combating online harassment and bullying. My issue is that 3rd wave feminists are trivializing harassment, bullying, as well as rape. Candace Owens is an African American woman that is making a site called Social Autopsy. She stated it was a employer database for bosses to find if their employees have bullied or harassed people online. According to Owens, who says she has recorded and documented all emails, phone calls, and DMs in Twitter from different journalists claiming they wanted to know more about SA just to turn around and write a pro-Quinn site and attack Owens. The twist is that Quinn contacted Owens site requesting an email directly to Owens, which they did so per Owens approval, but it was a private email that hadn't been doxed and only her associates knew. Apparently Quinn became irate wanting Owens to shutdown the SA plans and when she didn't Owens suddenly got "GamerGate" hate mail to an email that only Quinn had received. Even Owens said she knew it was Quinn and Harper behind it and I believe she even wrote an article or two and appeared on The Ralph Retort live podcast to talk about it. The reason I'm pointing this out is because it appears the ones in the anti-gamergate camp that claim to be anti-harassment, anti-bullying, anti-doxing, are in actuality harassers, doxers, and bullies so any discussion with them is pointless.
Video by feminist group that openly trivializes rape:

video

Quote:

Nevertheless I find that making games more fun for women and girls also is a valid concern. And I do think that the damsel in distress trope is often quite trite and not really so interesting to use in games, even if the damsel is male. But again it's the means used that I strongly object to. The anti GG camp could make valid points without resorting to lying and paining their opponents as bad people just for disagreeing with them.

Even GamerGate supporters have said they are fine with companies making games aimed at women or making future games more inclusive to women. The problem is that the ones demanding change are demanding existing franchises be changed. Brianna Wu co-authored an article stating that Samus Aran was transgender and tried to use the story of her being half human and half alien (newhalf) as proof by saying that in Japan newhalf was a a trangender term. Apparently, developers can't repurpose a term for a game.

Antis were demanding that Link be made a girl from now on. So when they announced the female character that looked similar to Link they went nuts saying they had won. When it came out that it was a separate character and not a female Link they went ape shit saying it was just a Ms. Male Trope. They claimed there were no strong female characters in movies either, guess they missed the Alien franchise, the Terminator Franchise, Blade Runner, etc. The antis don't want games to be fun, they want more games like Depression Quest and Home Alone and have even stated they enjoy ruining gamers fun.

Even Stan Lee weighed in on the ordeal as it is going on in comics too. He stated "I wouldn’t mind, if Peter Parker had originally been black, a Latino, an Indian or anything else, that he stay that way, but we originally made him white. I don’t see any reason to change that.”

“It has nothing to do with being anti-gay, or anti-black, or anti-Latino, or anything like that. I say create new characters the way you want to.”

"I don’t see any reason to change the sexual proclivities of a character once they’ve already been established.”

I feel this applies to games and movies. Games can always be made specifically aimed at women so these people wanting existing franchises to change by making mainstay character gender swap is ridiculous. Though, after seeing the fiasco with Ghostbusters, I'm going to guess most game companies won't take that same risk.

Quote:

All in all though I think with the GG name is something to give up on, it's too tainted with that nonsense about Ms. Quinn and harassment claims. Keep the movement, keep the principles, but change the name. "Gamers for ethics", or something like that. They can't realistically be anti that.

Not possible. A GamerGate supporter had a panel at SXSW and the panel was called SavePoint. Media instantly labeled it a GamerGate panel because of the people being on it supporting the consumer revolt. The media has made the same argument you have about taking a new name, but every tag they made was instantly connected to GamerGate by the media instead of letting it stand on its own. GG supporters have already come to realize that after two years it isn't possible to change names and instead have continued to fight and start to make their own sites for gamers.

http://deepfreeze.it/ was born from GamerGate being ignored in regards of calling out corruption.

As for bullying, remember according to the media GG is the bad guys that allegedly bullied and harassed:

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{"name":"Media-coordination.jpg","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/d\/a\/da734fba1f4d5bfd2e5284228a9df4ca.jpg","w":800,"h":612,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/d\/a\/da734fba1f4d5bfd2e5284228a9df4ca"}Media-coordination.jpg
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Then you have an anti-gg indie dev trying to shame a convention, yet GG are the reactionaries that act out of anger:
{"name":"gg1mcap.png","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/5\/a\/5aed7633dd5bdcc424a59408bd64bc62.png","w":600,"h":379,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/5\/a\/5aed7633dd5bdcc424a59408bd64bc62"}gg1mcap.png
Also, don't forget, it is GG that is the problem, not the media (below is a former Polygon writer whom quit months before GG started):
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One last thing on name changing, every area has groups of fans fed up with feminists trying to tell them to feel bad for what they like. A group formed around the Hugo awards and the media quickly claimed it was just GamerGate trying to stir up trouble in other areas. Media outlets are shitting on the fan base in favor of pushing feminist idealogues and have created GamerGate and its supporters into the ultimate boogeyman in all forms of entertainment. GG was claimed to only be about 20 or 30 people with sockpuppet accounts. Then Harper made the block bot that has a list of 10k and growing users blocked. Now they are blaming GamerGate for ruining the Ghostbuster movie. The media has conflated GG from a small group of "basement dwelling nerds living with their moms" to a insanely massive group able to impact a movie's opening night.

Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
avatar

bamccaig said:

Nothing in particular has stopped girls from playing games for the past 40 years except that most don't enjoy them.

I agree with most of what you said in your post, because the market is primarily men the games are designed to the market. Most games are also developed by men. Issues about story, plot, game design, etc appealing to a male audience are pretty well resolved by that argument -- the market gets what it wants and men do want different things then girls.

I still would say that is why women struggle in that environment. They really don't get treated as equals, when their gender is revealed in online situations, and when few women are in a group of many men, such as this forum, they are singled out and can feel bothered by the extra attention because of their gender.

They have an up-hill battle to climb and that is why they form groups and try to create "aweness of their cause", sometimes in poor ways but they do what they can. :P

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
avatar

@Derezo
The problem is that I don't see many female gamers actually complaining about the games. Quite the opposite. I see more female gamers pissed about feminists and sjws being offended for them and demanding equality in representation instead of just letting them enjoy the games.

My question is, of all the women that get special attention or unwanted attention on forums and in games how many of them report it to the proper people? On forums it should be reported to site administrators and moderators, in games it should be reported to customer support and community managers. Most games also give the player tools now to mute or even block users that are being jerks. For example, GTA V lets a player mute all users they find annoying. Consoles let you block other users from sending you invites or messages, same with PC game platforms like Steam. Facebook, Twitter, and other social media sites also have features to block or silence immature jerks. It's only an uphill climb if they ignore the tools that are in place to help them.

[APPEND] Another video of why feminism has such a negative view among so many people:

video

Well this is interesting:
video

beoran
Member #12,636
March 2011

I don't know about adult ladies but my girl does seem to enjoy games that have female characters in them more. Of course she plays the casual dress-up games with princess characters. But she even sometimes likes to play RPGs that she is too young to understand quite a bit, walking here and there, just because she likes the female characters in there. From this highly unrepresentative sample of one I'd say that she probably thinks: "These are girls, I am a girl, so this game is for me", no matter if the game is casual or not. That's what I'm talking about, really. I'd like her to play more complex games, but if there are no girl characters she isn't too interested. And that's what is hard to find, more somewhat complex games with girl characters.

As for those anti GG people, they are not gamers, so they aren't really interested in games. It's just something to push their ideology. It's just a way to criticise others without wanting to enjoy yourself really. So, I'm definitely not talking about making games to please them, since there is no pleasing them anyway. And they are not buyers anyway. Wanting to change established characters or series just for ideology is nonsense.

Much like that the CCoC is also for ideology. I barely see any serious open source contributions from the people who edited it.

On the topic of Zelda, what I wouldn't mind is a Zelda where you could play both Link AND Zelda. To keep it in the genre and with the character's personality, Link's route could be more action based with sword fights and Zelda's more puzzle based with bow fights. sometimes they help each other out, and the final battle they fight together. Symbolic of how the sexes should help each other, not fight each other. :)

On the topic of the damsel in distress trope, it's a subtrope of "saving a person", which according to my literature teacher in high school was one of the 3 trite bases of story, together with "discovering a treasure or secret", and "changing the social order or the government structure". Sure those 3 are very popular, and I see why, but I think it's worth while to try to avoid those 3 as much as possible for a more original approach to a game's plot. In some games series, the overuse of the damsel in distress is ridiculous. I'd almost think that Princess Peach actually prefers Bowser over Mario at the rate she allows herself to be "abducted".

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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beoran said:

I don't know about adult ladies but my girl does seem to enjoy games that have female characters in them more. Of course she plays the casual dress-up games with princess characters. But she even sometimes likes to play RPGs that she is too young to understand quite a bit, walking here and there, just because she likes the female characters in there. From this highly unrepresentative sample of one I'd say that she probably thinks: "These are girls, I am a girl, so this game is for me", no matter if the game is casual or not. That's what I'm talking about, really. I'd like her to play more complex games, but if there are no girl characters she isn't too interested. And that's what is hard to find, more somewhat complex games with girl characters.

I understand you point, but I don't think the problem is not enough games made for girls, I think the problem is that those games don't get much marketing push. I can recall a lot of the Gamecube games I loved I had never heard of due to limited or almost no marketing for it.

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On the topic of Zelda, what I wouldn't mind is a Zelda where you could play both Link AND Zelda. To keep it in the genre and with the character's personality, Link's route could be more action based with sword fights and Zelda's more puzzle based with bow fights. sometimes they help each other out, and the final battle they fight together. Symbolic of how the sexes should help each other, not fight each other.

I agree, maybe make her depend on more magic based items and puzzles. I never did play Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon or Zelda's Adventure, but both of those put you as Zelda saving Link after he is kidnapped.

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On the topic of the damsel in distress trope, it's a subtrope of "saving a person", which according to my literature teacher in high school was one of the 3 trite bases of story, together with "discovering a treasure or secret", and "changing the social order or the government structure". Sure those 3 are very popular, and I see why, but I think it's worth while to try to avoid those 3 as much as possible for a more original approach to a game's plot.

Saying to avoid those and calling for an original approach for the game's plot is easy to say, but it is extremely difficult to come up with an original approach that will be believable to the player. You want to gamer to beat you game and if they are told they have to fight hordes of enemies, sit through puzzles, or get to the final boss just because then it loses their attention pretty fast. There are tons of games that try to be original, but in the end have to fall back on one of those three tropes to keep players locked to the screen and story in order to beat the game. That is just my personal observation though.

Gideon Weems
Member #3,925
October 2003

I only need to read the first post. Thank you for the insight.

Derezo
Member #1,666
April 2001
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The problem is that I don't see many female gamers actually complaining about the games. Quite the opposite. I see more female gamers pissed about feminists and sjws being offended for them and demanding equality in representation instead of just letting them enjoy the games.

Much of that is because of what you're looking at. It is pretty clear that you follow a lot of anti-feminism type of material that focuses on that type of thing.

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of all the women that get special attention or unwanted attention on forums and in games how many of them report it to the proper people?

Some may, but often there is no proper person -- or it's not clear who that is. The typical response is to leave that community, or to make your gender not apparent any longer.

"He who controls the stuffing controls the Universe"

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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For me personally I get much more invested in a game that has the promise of female character. It's automatic immersion. That's a motivation that I can appreciate. I suffered through Borderlands and half of Borderlands 2 even though I don't really enjoy the game mechanics very much. The only reason I did it: the mysterious woman that would occasionally appear almost as a ghost to guide the player. Naturally I assumed I would meet her some day.

After the original ending was terrible I ended up Googling for spoilers to find out if I'd ever meet that girl... Turns out the answer was apparently no. I pretty much quit playing Borderlands 2 at that point.

I think that trying to motivate me to struggle through a game without a female of some kind as a reward would be difficult. It has been done. If I recall correctly, Soldier of Fortune II didn't have one. Of course, it kept you busy with constant gunfights instead. I think for the male demographic those are your primary choices. The female character doesn't have to be a "damsel", but I highly suggest there be one for motivation if you want people to play your game. Otherwise, you better have really clever game mechanics or lots of fun (not too frustrating) action to keep us busy and entertained instead of motivated.

Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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Derezo said:

Much of that is because of what you're looking at. It is pretty clear that you follow a lot of anti-feminism type of material that focuses on that type of thing.

Actually it is from talking to female gamers and even game devs. Most of the devs I talk to say the people that complain are in the minority, but the problem is that now the media is running with the minority claims and making it seem like the majority, putting pressure on them to change their idea of the game.

Political correctness has become such a thorn in the sides of developers that even Elysian Shadows team addressed it on their blog. Found themselves forcing changes on their own work and censoring their ideas due to fearing outrage from SJWs. Developers are supposed to have the freedom to make the games they want, but SJWs are making a minor problem into a major issue and it is compounded by the fact of SJWs being in the industry.

It's funny that you think I only follow anti-feminist when in fact it was following feminists that made me start subscribing to anti-feminists. For example, a feminist blew up over Call of Duty adding women to the online mode saying it promoted women being violent. Feminists demanded Assassin's Creed to add women, when they were added, feminist writers said it wasn't genuine and just an attempt to sell the game to women. My negative view of feminism is because of watching the vocal feminist demand something, get it, and then go completely ape shit over the little flaw they can find in the solution. Let's not forget that on Twitter writers for Polygon, Kotaku, Destructoid, RockPaperShotgun, and a few other sites claim they are feminists and have a history of writing articles attacking gamers, games, and devs for liking and making games they deem wrong, good old wrong think.

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After four years, if a person hasn't played Borderlands 2 or hasn't beat it then they aren't going to so I'm going to reply to your spoiler:

bamccaig said:

After the original ending was terrible I ended up Googling for spoilers to find out if I'd ever meet that girl... Turns out the answer was apparently no. I pretty much quit playing Borderlands 2 at that point.

You do finally meet Angel, but it is only to kill her per her request in Borderland 2. According to the story, Angel is Handsome Jack's daughter who is a Siren like Lilith. He has trapped her and forced her to trick the characters from Borderlands 1 and she does the same for part of Borderlands 2, but then starts working against her father. You get the Vault Key from her and then she dies.

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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Nice video about the female characters in video games. That's awesome. Thanks for posting.

That lead me indirectly to this, which isn't entirely on-topic, but broadly related...

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Specter Phoenix
Member #1,425
July 2001
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Here is another video from a female developer from three years ago:

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I love how she claims indie are more creative writers than AAA games. I'm apparently playing the wrong indie games because while I play indies games that are fun, I usually think the story is lacking in most of them.



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