Overwatch tries to pander to gender diversity activists and fails

[Deleted]

You see this thread right here?


This is why we can't have nice things.




No one should bitch about "lack of diversity" in a video game (especially with such pointless metrics as usually exist.) If you want an "adequately" diverse video game, make your own damn video game. On that same token, however... no one should bitch about "the existence of diversity" in a video game. You want a non-diverse video game? Well, guess what, make your own damn video game.

I'm of the mind to let developers do what they see fit.

Most people don't have the resources to make their own video game. That's a faulty argument and you know it. Besides, no one is forcing Blizzard to do anything. We've simply asked (and most of the asking I've seen has been pretty polite) and they've answered. Blizzard came right out of the gate telling us that diversity was an important goal for Overwatch. That's why there's been extra scrutiny because they opened up that discussion day one at Blizzcon. So it sounds to me like this is what they want to do.

[Kaleredar]

Pretty sure that's exactly what the OP is arguing for...Diversity for the sake of diversity is a terrible idea and just leads to token bullshit. Diversity because it makes your game better and more varied is awesome but only if you really want to do it. If you feel forced to do it then it's going to come across just that way, forced. Devs shouldn't make their games by checking off a list until they've included something for everyone. They should just do what feels natural to the story and compelling. If people want to see more diverse characters then encourage more diverse writers and developers, try and get more awesome minority writers and developers to share their views and add to the cauldron of ideas. These demands for diversity where it may not be wanted by the people making the game are only going to hurt the artistic merit of the genre, not help it.

I see no reason for this "Russian chick" to be a mark off a checklist. "Bodybuilder Russian" is a pretty standard stereotype.

They didn't go out of their way to explain that she's some transgender russian wiccan merfolk-otherkin or somesuch.

[Dnusha]

Man.. this new female is awful.

[Deleted]

I agree entirely. And just goes to show how lazy Blizzard is with characters.

The only thing that is actually annoying about Zarya is people circle jerking (Apparently not Kotaku though?) about her as if she's the best character ever because she's a female character who isn't a Barbie Doll.

I don't think those stereotypes are a problem provided their character arcs go beyond them, and while it may be too much to hope from Blizzard they really have the potential to. There's nothing wrong with the game having a flashy, stylised surface.

[KrazyK923]

I don't think those stereotypes are a problem provided their character arcs go beyond them, and while it may be too much to hope from Blizzard they really have the potential to. There's nothing wrong with the game having a flashy, stylised surface.

I take issue with characters who are introduced and a main, or sole, focus on them is a box on a checklist. Far more often than not, they end up being completely shallow characters because their express purpose was to pander to some minority. And I say that as a gay man.

How many times have gay characters been added and their primary character trait is that they're gay? Probably the majority of all gay characters in video games, movies, and television. Insert other minorities here. Sure, sometimes its great to have a character whose story ends up defined by being Black or Transgendered, but more often than not in the medium of storytelling, its just used to try and pass some random litmus test that some person will end up complaining on Tumblr about if it wasn't fulfilled.

Make a character interesting with their own motivations and backstory and then make them gay or hispanic or have ADHD or whatever the hell else.

Zarya's entire pitch they sold to us during her own introduction was that she wasn't a straight caucasian woman with a hourglass figure.

ESPECIALLY Blizzard of all people. They've historically had fantastic female characters, and this seems little more than pandering to gender activists who just incessantly bleat until they get their way.

[Deleted]

They didn't go out of their way to explain that she's some transgender russian wiccan merfolk-otherkin or somesuch.

Yet.

/10chars

[Collected]

What annoyed me is Blizzard talked as if they've somehow failed on this issue before but I don't believe they have. I don't think Blizzard should be even referring to this issue.. especially not before announcing a female character with a larger build. It just isn't required from them. The variety of female forms in WoW proves Blizzard has never had an issue with female characters.

[Immitis]

But why would Russian women not be allowed to be portrayed as strong individuals? Just because one Russian woman is portrayed as a tank, which role she actually fulfills, why would that mean all Russian women are built like that? Do these people even have access to Google? Just follow your average adult link and search for your Russian women. But by god no ... that would be fair as well, because those women clearly are thin because of the industry they work in


Kotaku is full of trolls, both the 'editors' and their fanbase.

to be fair strong slightly more manly russian women has been a stereotype for a very long time. its not used as often nowadays but its definitely something that exists.

another example is mother russia from kick-ass



not that i agree with the people who are saying this is a negative thing, pretty much all the characters in overwatch are massive stereotypes and caricatures of things OR just a massive crazypants idea.

for example tracers accent, the cowboy gunslinger, the asian dude who just happens to be dressed like a ninja and use a bow and arrow and who just so happens to be named after a famous samurai. or the mega Buddhist robot.

so while a big muscle bound russian woman is a stereotype, stereotypes are kind of overwatches thing and part of its charm.

i love zarya, i think shes awesome and sexy.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I agree entirely. And just goes to show how lazy Blizzard is with characters.

The only thing that is actually annoying about Zarya is people circle jerking (Apparently not Kotaku though?) about her as if she's the best character ever because she's a female character who isn't a Barbie Doll.

Or perhaps at this point, every possible idea has already been sterotyped.and the only thing left to do is to embrace the sterotypeness.

However, I do agree with Krazy that there is a difference between creating a character who just happens to be apart of a sterotype, and creating one just to be a sterotype. Zarya... I'm not going to accuse Blizzard of explictly adding her just for the sake of having a non Barbie female, but... it is pretty clear that they are trying to go the latter route. It feels almost as if the so really wanted a non barbie female that they ran far away in the opposite direction when creating her. Sure; I may be wrong and someone really did have an idea for a buff lady engineer with heavy weaponry and this is just a coincidence...

[KrazyK923]

Or perhaps at this point, every possible idea has already been sterotyped.and the only thing left to do is to embrace the sterotypeness.

I donno, once again, Dorian, Sera, Veronica, these characters were interesting and the "trait" that defined them as a minority was only tangentially related, if at all, to their character and backstory. I'm sure there are others but its 4am and my brain is half off.

[Flutterguy]

Funny enough, all the armor she's wear is hiding what's probably a pretty nice figure, just muscular. And she looks pretty stacked to me judging by that breast plate.

[Kaleredar]

I agree entirely. And just goes to show how lazy Blizzard is with characters.

This is a game where story is an afterthought. Blizzard has said so themselves. Stereotypes like these (as in, character templates) set the mood for characters and make them... well, fun.

Like, cowboy guy looks pretty damn cool. He looks like a cowboy. He feels like a cowboy. He plays like what I imagine a sci-fi cowboy would play like. Why not just let him be a cowboy?

If our exposure to these characters is basically predicated upon 10 minute matches where we shoot eachother in the face, why do we need some complex breakdown of a character's subtle intricacies to make them "interesting?" You can accomplish that for all intents and purposes with a cool design.

Let's say we made it so cowboy guy didn't look like a cowboy and had him look like some Joe Shmoe instead, but still had all the same abilities and used the same weapon. And so you don't wonder why this guy is wielding a peacemaker and rolling around, you go through the subtlety of explaining "well his advanced combat training, following the mugging of his sister, to help combat crime was augmented with an inherited colt peacemaker that, using his technical skills acquired at UCLA, he enhanced to act in both rapid fire and single-fire modes and fire modern munitions rounds. In addition, he spent seven years developing a heat-seaking targeting system that he could wire into an auto-fire enabled trigger mechanism on his handgun; he found this complicated by the antique condition of the pistol, and had to seek the help of a renowned gunsmith in Ohio to help develop the adequate firing mechanism. Furthermore, his time spent in the military special ops unit based in Nevada facilitated the development of a combat roll and increased stamina for prolonged combat; something that served him well in the coming Overwatch conflicts."


Or... you just make him look like a goddamn cowboy and everyone loves him and instantly believes his abilities.

[Cthulhu 2020]

I agree entirely. And just goes to show how lazy Blizzard is with characters.

The only thing that is actually annoying about Zarya is people circle jerking (Apparently not Kotaku though?) about her as if she's the best character ever because she's a female character who isn't a Barbie Doll.

I'd have to respectfully disagree, as it seems like plenty of thought is going into character design.

I give them kudos for Pharah too, because they didn't give her sexy boobie-plate armor that would crush a sternum with even a small amount of force.

And then of course there's Mercy and Widowmaker, who have form-fitting clothing and even show some skin, and then there's tracer, plucky twig-girl.

It seems like they're providing something for everyone's "tastes" instead of just plastering the same face/body type over all the female characters and changing the hair/clothing, like a lot of games/comic books are guilty of. Take the hair and clothes off 90% of female comic book heroes and you'd have an army of clones. THAT would be lazy.

[Deleted]

I take issue with characters who are introduced and a main, or sole, focus on them is a box on a checklist. Far more often than not, they end up being completely shallow characters because their express purpose was to pander to some minority. And I say that as a gay man.

How many times have gay characters been added and their primary character trait is that they're gay? Probably the majority of all gay characters in video games, movies, and television. Insert other minorities here. Sure, sometimes its great to have a character whose story ends up defined by being Black or Transgendered, but more often than not in the medium of storytelling, its just used to try and pass some random litmus test that some person will end up complaining on Tumblr about if it wasn't fulfilled.

Make a character interesting with their own motivations and backstory and then make them gay or hispanic or have ADHD or whatever the hell else.

Zarya's entire pitch they sold to us during her own introduction was that she wasn't a straight caucasian woman with a hourglass figure.

ESPECIALLY Blizzard of all people. They've historically had fantastic female characters, and this seems little more than pandering to gender activists who just incessantly bleat until they get their way.

Blizzard have had historically quite bad female characters if you ask me. Ironically due to Dwarves and Tauren and stuff body type is perhaps the least of their concerns but it is still good to see that diversity added to Overwatch, where it was distinctly lacking before. The fact is that writers do not usually just incidentally write characters outside of their own walk of life. So to have any diversity Blizzard really needs to go out of their way to put it in. There's nothing wrong with that if the character is well written. Yes, part of their pitch about Zarya was her body type. But they also spoke of her character and ideals. She doesn't sound like a stereotypical butch in her character to me. But we are far to early in the development of her character to say either way.

[KrazyK923]

Or... you just make him look like a god damn cowboy and everyone loves him and instantly believes his abilities.

I don't disagree at all. I would say that the profession of Cowboy defining somebody and being a burly woman are two different things.

One is a gender/sexuality trait and one is a profession. Literally anybody can be a cowboy. The same is not true for a female with a large body type.

- - - Updated - - -

Blizzard have had historically quite bad female characters if you ask me. Ironically due to Dwarves and Tauren and stuff body type is perhaps the least of their concerns but it is still good to see that diversity added to Overwatch, where it was distinctly lacking before. The fact is that writers do not usually just incidentally write characters outside of their own walk of life. So to have any diversity Blizzard really needs to go out of their way to put it in. There's nothing wrong with that if the character is well written. Yes, part of their pitch about Zarya was her body type. But they also spoke of her character and ideals. She doesn't sound like a stereotypical butch in her character to me. But we are far to early in the development of her character to say either way.

And her character and ideals were focused almost exclusively on why she was a buff female. The only part that was not related to her being a non-regular body type is her finding the laser cannon or whatever her weapon was.

As for "bad female characters" I'm not sure what you're referring to here. There have been strong females in Blizzard games since Starcraft 1 and even arguably earlier in Warcraft 2 with Alleria and Garona.

I give them kudos for Pharah too, because they didn't give her sexy boobie-plate armor that would crush a sternum with even a small amount of force.

And then of course there's Mercy and Widowmaker, who have form-fitting clothing and even show some skin, and then there's tracer, plucky twig-girl.

It seems like they're providing something for everyone's "tastes" instead of just plastering the same face/body type over all the female characters and changing the hair/clothing, like a lot of games/comic books are guilty of. Take the hair and clothes off 90% of female comic book heroes and you'd have an army of clones. THAT would be lazy.

As do I. Because I don't recall them talking about Pharah, Mercy, Tracer, or Widowmaker in terms of body types nearly as much, or at all for some of them, as they did for Zarya. They were just characters who had their own backstory and one happened to be black, one was a bigger woman in basically power armor, ect. In fact, I think the only time body type or gender was mentioned at Blizzcon's Overwatch stuff was by a fan question, and then later on by people who weren't Blizzard talking about the bodytype of Pharah.

From their own description they made a character with their own story and motivations and then changed how they looked. That's the opposite of what happened with Zarya, and that's the problem. It smacks of catering to a group of people who think their screaming of forcing diversity into games is a just one. I want good characters. I wouldn't give two shits if a game came out with a 100% white, straight, cast if the story was good and the characters were well-rounded.

I think maybe the worst part is that those people who are yelling those things will never be placated. Even if you kowtow to them and do what they want, they'll immediately move onto another thing and begin yelling their opinion is how it should be across the industry.

[Louisa Bannon]

Both Kotaku and Anita Sarkeesian are dangerous to game design because their agenda has nothing to do with fun or interesting games, its just some dumb politically correct overlay that they want to impose on gaming culture as outsiders. And when you read the comments on Kotaku about this crap you will quickly discover that whatever attempt is made to appease their agenda is going to be disparaged because Social Justice Warriors are basically chronically dissatisfied assholes no matter what they get.

Nobody designing games could possibly work the way Social Justice Warriors want it to work: design wonderfully entertaining games around our anticipated politically correct misgivings about the stuff you do.

Purely from a development standpoint, this Social Justice Warrior faction is best ignored. They are not the gaming market nor will they ever be. They are outsiders.

[Jawless Jones]

I would guess her full name is Aleksandra "Definitely Not Vi" Zaryanova

Kinda disturbing how similar she looks to female victims of steroid abuse though...

[Deleted]

Both Kotaku and Anita Sarkeesian are dangerous to game design because their agenda has nothing to do with fun or interesting games, its just some dumb politically correct overlay that they want to impose on gaming culture as outsiders. And when you read the comments on Kotaku about this crap you will quickly discover that whatever attempt is made to appease their agenda is going to be disparaged because Social Justice Warriors are basically chronically dissatisfied assholes no matter what they get.

Nobody designing games could possibly work the way Social Justice Warriors want it to work: design wonderfully entertaining games around our anticipated politically correct misgivings about the stuff you do.

Purely from a development standpoint, this Social Justice Warrior faction is best ignored. They are not the gaming market nor will they ever be. They are outsiders.

Why do people think that diversity and interesting gameplay are mutually exclusive? Even if Zarya is a complete stereotype designed to appeal to SJW, and she has no character development and was only made so they had a bulky woman, she still looks like she'll have a fun play style.

Besides, no one is forcing people to do anything. I think people are just in denial about the fact that Blizzard has actually had a change of heart and cares about the issue.

[KrazyK923]

Why do people think that diversity and interesting gameplay are mutually exclusive? Even if Zarya is a complete stereotype designed to appeal to SJW, and she has no character development and was only made so they had a bulky woman, she still looks like she'll have a fun play style.

Besides, no one is forcing people to do anything. I think people are just in denial about the fact that Blizzard has actually had a change of heart and cares about the issue.

I don't think anybody is in denial at all. I think people are worried that Blizzard changed something while seemingly doing so because a minority of people were whining on Tumblr, and the like 2 people who complained about it at Blizzcon, about how their game should be changed to fit some litmus test of diversity.

Also a character's purpose and their play style have almost nothing to do with one another. Zarya could be the best hero in the game (And I think her abilities are cool), that doesn't mean she doesn't seem like a complete Token character.

[Kaleredar]

I don't disagree at all. I would say that the profession of Cowboy defining somebody and being a burly woman are two different things.

One is a gender/sexuality trait and one is a profession. Literally anybody can be a cowboy. The same is not true for a female with a large body type.

But he's still just that: a cowboy. Chiseled jaw. Bristly facial hair. A stereotype.

Not everyone can be plucky and british or sophisticated and a gorilla. But they're still, in their own ways, stereotypes. And that helps manifest their character. Which isn't bad when you're going for "quick read," which Blizzard is doing.

Does that make them "uncreative?" Well, I don't think so. There's that saying "Good artists borrow, great artists steal." So you take the idea of the "quintessential cowboy" and you make him as badass as possible. There's a novelty to be had in pushing a concept as far as you can take it, even if that concept isn't unique. Like with Zenyatta (the robot monk guy.) He seems pretty cool. But "zen master" is not a "novel idea." But the way he weaves his combat with his moves and the imagery they use with him makes him pretty unique in my mind.