#UltimateDLCSoMale: The Female DLC Character Discussion

[StarBot]

so the problem here is that Kazooie is objectified completely instead of being portrayed as her own character with her own personality.

I’m guessing you have never played Banjo and Kazooie then?

Because she is indeed her own character, the most remembered thing about her is how rude she is to everyone, including to Banjo sometimes

 

[Professor Pumpkaboo]

No one's asking for characters that suck eggs?

that why I said "what if" Its not bad to ask what would everyone feel if they got their female character but they suck. Hell, Id love layton in smash but if he sucked , id be pretty sad

 

[Mushroomguy12]

that why I said "what if" Its not bad to ask what would everyone feel if they got their female character but they suck. Hell, Id love layton in smash but if he sucked , id be pretty sad

I'd be unsatisfied just like many are unsatisfied by Kazooie when it comes to female characters, and I'd want a better female character, of which again there are plenty of choices.
Also there are plenty of male character choices I see that suck that I put up with, so not too big a deal.

(Can’t speak for everyone else though)

That's right, you can't.

can you blame people for having that mindset?

Yeah, I could.

 

[Coolboy]

I’m guessing you have never played Banjo and Kazooie then?

Because she is indeed her own character, the most remembered thing about her is how rude she is to everyone, including to Banjo sometimes

mhm i have honestly never played the games so everything i knew was from what i saw from smash,
though i admit i later looked up Kazooie on wiki since i got told shes way different outside smash so i discovered she is a whole different character in her own games with her own personality haha
so if i ever said about Kazooie not being her own character with her own personality outside smash then i will take that part back completely!
when characters get portrayed differently in other games it can be confusing to people who get introduced to them for the very first time.

 

[Khao]

Does it matter if the character sucks eggs tho?

Sure you got your chick but what if she was absolute garbage fire of a character

I mean, you could say that about literally any Smash request ever so I don't see how the question is relevant. And it's not something I'd be worried about considering Smash's track record so far. I don't think there's a single character currently in the game you could say "sucks eggs" unless you mean competitive viability, which is not something the majority of Smash players care about or even truly understand. Most people just want a character that's fun to play, representative of its source material, or both, and I don't think Smash has failed to do that even once.

 

[1FC0]

Sexualization against women is just a more common form of objectification all over the world, which is a real shame but it's not the case here.

Sexualisation means to make something appropriate for sex. Objectification means seeing something as an object. So if men would need to objectify women in order to sexualise them then that would mean that men prefer having sex with objects over having sex with real people.

But the opposite is true; men who have a real woman do not fantasize that their woman is a sex doll; but men who have a sex doll fantasize that their sex doll is a real woman. Men personify whatever they sexualise.

Either way I definitely hope that Kazooie is not being sexualised by anyone here…

 

[Mogisthelioma]

"why push an agenda for vaginas"

When this thread first began, a little voice in my head told me the conversation would eventually devolve into something like this. I didn't know it would be right.

Not trying to be aggressive or anything, I just saw this quote and almost spit out my water.

 

[RetrogamerMax]

Sexualisation means to make something appropriate for sex. Objectification means seeing something as an object. So if men would need to objectify women in order to sexualise them then that would mean that men prefer having sex with objects over having sex with real people.

But the opposite is true; men who have a real woman do not fantasize that their woman is a sex doll; but men who have a sex doll fantasize that their sex doll is a real woman. Men personify whatever they sexualise.

Either way I definitely hope that Kazooie is not being sexualised by anyone here…

Imaging someone viewing Kazooie as a sex object makes me want to throw up and vomit. A person would have to be a sick, furry, horny, perv to view Kazooie as a object of affection. Honestly, men like that still haven't grown up and are immature. Men and women should only go after someone for their character not for their body or looks.

 

[MaddaD]

When this thread first began, a little voice in my head told me the conversation would eventually devolve into something like this. I didn't know it would be right.

It always has and always will. Nobody is ever mature enough to approach the topic without it completely devolving into utter chaos, strawmans, ad hominem and "we gotta do it u guys"

Makes for a fun read though. I do enjoy a good dumpster fire.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

Imaging someone viewing Kazooie as a sex object makes me want to throw up and vomit. A person would have to be a sick, furry, horny, perv to view Kazooie as a object of affection. Honestly, men like that still haven't grown up and are immature. Men and women should only go after someone for their character not for their body or looks.

Welcome to the 21st century, where society cares less about finding true love and more about sleeping around for the sake of selfish pleasure, and nobody pays attention to another person's problems because compassion is more rare than a sirloin at Texas Roadhouse.

And people say phones and video games are at fault for depression.

 

[Deleted member]

Welcome to the 21st century, where society cares less about finding true love and more about sleeping around for the sake of selfish pleasure,

o/ Guilty...
but happy!

 

[Planet Cool]

though i admit i later looked up Kazooie on wiki since i got told shes way different outside smash so i discovered she is a whole different character in her own games with her own personality haha

She doesn't talk in Smash, so you don't really see the snarky side of her personality (kind of like Cranky Kong in Tropical Freeze), but most of her animations are taken directly from the games, including the famous one where she pecks Banjo on the head and laughs about it.

Imaging someone viewing Kazooie as a sex object makes me want to throw up and vomit. A person would have to be a sick, furry, horny, perv to view Kazooie as a object of affection. Honestly, men like that still haven't grown up and are immature. Men and women should only go after someone for their character not for their body or looks.

Isn't this a little extreme? Affection can mean lots of different things. You can feel "affection" for animal characters because they're funny or likable. I'm sure plenty of weirdos out there are horny for Kazooie (this is the internet, after all), but I really don't think she's popular for her sex appeal.

 

[Khao]

When this thread first began, a little voice in my head told me the conversation would eventually devolve into something like this. I didn't know it would be right.

Not trying to be aggressive or anything, I just saw this quote and almost spit out my water.

I'm not the one who first brought up genitals and agendas. I'm sorry if I was too aggressive about it, I just don't feel as if Ryu Myuutsu was arguing in good faith, unlike most other people who came to this thread to disagree without having to talk down to the supporters.

Still, if my post was too violent and caused any amount of toxicity, I apologize. That's not at all what I wanted.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

I'm not the one who first brought up genitals and agendas. I'm sorry if I was too aggressive about it, I just don't feel as if Ryu Myuutsu was arguing in good faith, unlike most other people who came to this thread to disagree without having to talk down to the supporters.

Still, if my post was too violent and caused any amount of toxicity, I apologize. That's not at all what I wanted.

Not at all, I was just trying an attempt at humor considering the recent escalation from women's representation to the critical importance of genitalia.

 

[Deleted member]

Not at all, I was just trying an attempt at humor considering the recent escalation from women's representation to the critical importance of genitalia.

Ahh...the feeling of opening this can of worms of a subject. This was expected anyway, yet I'm quite apalled by some of the responses.

 

[Ryu Myuutsu]

Sheesh, I didn't expect such a passive-agressive response.

I have read your posts. You're being condescending to everyone making almost no points whatsoever. You mock people for caring about gender and dismissing the idea entirely. The fact that you say that you don't have a problem with clones for bringing in new personalities but saying that the very idea of requesting a character due to gender (when in no case is that the only factor) is just... contradictory to me. Like you said, new personalities can bring a lot of enjoyment to the game for multiple people. A larger variety of characters makes for a potentially more approachable roster. How in the world is gender any difference, and why would that detract from other factors? Yes, there is already a lot of variety here, but the roster does have a massive gender imbalance. Wether or not that's a problem is up to you. But all you're doing is going "why push an agenda for vaginas" as if having a desire for that to change is an insult to humanity. No one's pushing an agenda. Including more women won't make the game political. These people are literally just noticing that more male characters are getting added than female and saying it would be cool if that wasn't the case.

Seems to me like the one with an agenda is not the people you're arguing with.

You said you read my posts, but you saying that I'm making no points whatsoever assures me that you didn't. And if I sounded passive aggressive is because you entered an ongoing discussion without proper knowledge on what was being talked about before and that would mean making a massive retread on the subject. I read every post since the first page before beginning to write so I could understand the ideas the best way I could before sharing my own thoughts; your posting makes me think that you haven't, so I suppose it wouldn't hurt going back a bit after.

Including more women in Smash has never been the problem. It's about gender being the main deciding factor for including a character and turning it into a cause for social representation. That is my main problem. First post starts by making a parallel to the gender disparity in the 2018 Grammy Awards with Ultimate's roster. A post follows up by posting a tweet saying "It's not about adding diversity for the sake of diversity, it's about subtracting homogeneity for the sake of realism"; only problem with this is that 'Smash' and 'realism' don't often mix in the same sentence and we are talking about the same game that has electric mice, turtle dragons, an ape, a monkey, a plant, space animals, a dinosaur, etc. fighting each other. So now we are engaging in the silly concept of grounding in Smash into realism. Although, to be fair to TC, she did say she doesn't want gender to be the most important criteria.

The second problem I have with this is that now we are demanding developers like Sakurai to add a female character for the sake of fulfilling this criteria. If the 5th DLC character happens to be female, then so be it, I know Sakurai and Nintendo will have a good reason to pick them. But a developer shouldn't be adhering to those ideals to make everyone happy because that could compromise their own artistic vision. There are some devs out there who feel that they are stepping on a mine field when making design choices due to how the audience may react. In the end though, this isn't a real issue with Smash because Sakurai and Nintendo are just going to what they want without worrying about what others may say. Smash shouldn't be burdened with those kinds of diversity issues; it's the gaming industry that needs to create more diverse characters and whatnot. So if you still think that some people here don't have an agenda, then I don't know what else to tell you.

If I may sound a bit condescending towards some it's because I don't have that much respect for the issue itself, not every issue deserves to be withheld under the same standards. I feel it's a bit narcissistic to seek self representation in a game that is about representing characters from video game franchises like jumping plumbers and apes rather than to accurately depict races and genders. I also think it's silly to project these ideas that are born from the current sociopolitical spectrum in the western world into a game made by japanese developers who come from a country with very different values and cultural views. If people, mostly young ones, feel the need to even go as far to make hashtags about this, it's because they have too much time on their hands and don't have real problems to deal with. I came here to speak my mind, not to make friends; one should prioritize speaking the truth rather than to seeking to please people by telling them what they want to hear in this kind of discussion. So people prefer to think that I'm toxic instead.

The gaming industry has always had a male bias, stemming from the false assumption that only boys (and more recently, adult men) like video games. That's why video game characters are disproportionately male and why the Smash Bros. roster looks the way it does. Including more female characters is one way to help combat that bias. I don't know about you, but I think making Smash slightly more welcoming to girls and women is more important than accurately representing the (very problematic) history of electronic toys.

Besides, it's not like there aren't dozens of female characters who "have a place in the gaming industry" but aren't in Smash. For example, Chun Li and Lara Croft are more iconic than any three Fighter Pass characters (and several base roster characters) combined.

But were THEY chosen because they were male? Nobody ever answers me this. Do you picture Sakurai and Nintendo siting down on a meeting and deciding that they should be in because they are guys?

And what you said is true. It's a bias from the gaming industry. Not Smash. Therefore, it's not Smash's job to right this. They have their own criteria for picking up fighters. They choose characters because they are icons and/or fun. Paraphrasing, but in the Terry presentation he said "being fun is more important than whether a character is old or new, or if they're recognizable to everyone or not."

I don't care if the next fighter is male or female, I just hope they are fun.

 

[Planet Cool]

But were THEY chosen because they were male? Nobody ever answers me this. Do you picture Sakurai and Nintendo siting down on a meeting and deciding that they should be in because they are guys?

I was actually going to say something like "No one thinks Sakurai and his team are maliciously excluding female characters from Smash," but didn't because I thought it went without saying. True story.

 

[Khao]

A lot of specific things I want to say, so I'll break the quote a little bit.

You said you read my posts, but you saying that I'm making no points whatsoever assures me that you didn't. And if I sounded passive aggressive is because you entered an ongoing discussion without proper knowledge on what was being talked about before and that would mean making a massive retread on the subject. I read every post since the first page before beginning to write so I could understand the ideas the best way I could before sharing my own thoughts; your posting makes me think that you haven't, so I suppose it wouldn't hurt going back a bit after.

I said "almost" no points. But fair enough. I do tend to be a lurker on discussions and jump in when I think it gets interesting, I know that can look a bit weird sometimes.

Including more women in Smash has never been the problem. It's about gender being the main deciding factor for including a character and turning it into a cause for social representation. That is my main problem. First post starts by making a parallel to the gender disparity in the 2018 Grammy Awards with Ultimate's roster. A post follows up by posting a tweet saying "It's not about adding diversity for the sake of diversity, it's about subtracting homogeneity for the sake of realism"; only problem with this is that 'Smash' and 'realism' don't often mix in the same sentence and we are talking about the same game that has electric mice, turtle dragons, an ape, a monkey, a plant, space animals, a dinosaur, etc. fighting each other. So now we are engaging in the silly concept of grounding in Smash into realism. Although, to be fair to TC, she did say she doesn't want gender to be the most important criteria.

Getting a bit too focused on the word "realism" there. Realism in this context doesn't mean the opposite of fantasy (both concepts are not mutually exclusive anyway, a fantasy world without consistency can absolutely be fairly called unrealistic, but that's another discussion entirely!).

Here, it means that there's a disbalance in gender ratios in a context where it's not really necessarily justified. I've said as much before, but I don't think this is necessarily a problem by itself. But I do think there's value in attempting to improve it if possible.

The second problem I have with this is that now we are demanding developers like Sakurai to add a female character for the sake of fulfilling this criteria. If the 5th DLC character happens to be female, then so be it, I know Sakurai and Nintendo will have a good reason to pick them. But a developer shouldn't be adhering to those ideals to make everyone happy because that could compromise their own artistic vision. There are some devs out there who feel that they are stepping on a mine field when making design choices due to how the audience may react. In the end though, this isn't a real issue with Smash because Sakurai and Nintendo are just going to what they want without worrying about what others may say. Smash shouldn't be burdened with those kinds of diversity issues; it's the gaming industry that needs to create more diverse characters and whatnot. So if you still think that some people here don't have an agenda, then I don't know what else to tell you.

So I mostly agree with this. Sakurai can't please everyone. He shouldn't ever try to please everyone, as that only ever leads to an unfocused project with no creative vision. But I don't think this is really an unreasonable demand when it's something that has a chance to happen anyway. I'd understand the agenda talk if these people where demonizing Sakurai and his team, making unreasonable jumps in logic and trying to justify **** by all means possible, but I don't think that is at all what's happening here. Of course there's some politics inevitably involved in the desire, but I fail to see how it's anything but harmless even.

Like, picture this scenario.

Sakurai has two potential character choices, but can only feasibly implement one for whatever reason (Maybe there's only time to include one of them. Maybe they come from the same company. Maybe they're too conceptually similar, take your pick).

Both these characters have had a more or less equivalent impact in the gaming industry. Both have a long history of popular games. Both of them have a more or less equivalent moveset potential. Both of them have been requested by fans. Both of them are highly recognizeable, marketable, and have a place in the modern gaming landscape. One of them is male, the other is female.

Would it be a bad thing for Sakurai to choose the female character due to a desire to improve gender imbalance assuming all those other variables are true? Because I wouldn't feel like it is. This is a bit of an assumption, but I do feel like Sakurai actually cares about having a properly balanced roster in several kinds of attributes. He doesn't seem to like including too many similar characters in concept if he can avoid it, so I think there's precedent for this even ignoring the political debate.

At the end, the truth is that Smash will always be heavily unbalanced gender-wise due to the fact that the gaming industry simply produces more male protagonists, but if there's a chance to make it better without sacrificing any of the core values of the project, I think it's worth taking it.

And just to clarify, if this same scenario had a "less valuable" female character and a "more valuable" male character (under whatever standards Sakurai chooses to have), I'd agree that choosing the male character would be the only proper choice. In my eyes, the... "weight" that genders adds to a character's value is tiny. But I think it very much exists. It's not a deciding factor on its own, but it can be a plus.

If I may sound a bit condescending towards some it's because I don't have that much respect for the issue itself, not every issue deserves to be withheld under the same standards. I feel it's a bit narcissistic to seek self representation in a game that is about representing characters from video game franchises like jumping plumbers and apes rather than to accurately depict races and genders. I also think it's silly to project these ideas that are born from the current sociopolitical spectrum in the western world into a game made by japanese developers who come from a country with very different values and cultural views. If people, mostly young ones, feel the need to even go as far to make hashtags about this, it's because they have too much time on their hands and don't have real problems to deal with. I came here to speak my mind, not to make friends; one should prioritize speaking the truth rather than to seeking to please people by telling them what they want to hear in this kind of discussion. So people prefer to think that I'm toxic instead.

This is the part I take issue with, but I feel like if I elaborate too much I'll be mostly repeating what I already said in the previous paragraphs. I just fail to see anything malicious behind this desire. And you're fueling this with political views way more directly than anyone else in the thread, and unnecessarily judging people for it.

But were THEY chosen because they were male? Nobody ever answers me this. Do you picture Sakurai and Nintendo siting down on a meeting and deciding that they should be in because they are guys?

If it helps, the answer is no. Everyone knows that the answer is no. Everyone knows that you know that the answer is no. Everyone knows that you know that everyone knows that the answer is no. There's no need to answer a rethorical question.

And what you said is true. It's a bias from the gaming industry. Not Smash. Therefore, it's not Smash's job to right this. They have their own criteria for picking up fighters. They choose characters because they are icons and/or fun.

I 100% agree with this.

Paraphrasing, but in the Terry presentation he said "being fun is more important than whether a character is old or new, or if they're recognizable to everyone or not."

I don't care if the next fighter is male or female, I just hope they are fun.

This is the best take. I'll take whoever they throw in. In this day and age, I'm just excited to see new worlds being brought into Smash no matter what they are. Even if I don't know who they are and they don't appeal to my specific interest (like three of the DLC characters released so far!) I'll be glad to connect in some way to a piece of gaming history I've never had a chance to experience before.

But at the end of the day, I just don't think that mentality is necessarily contradictory to the desires of this thread's supporters, and I sure don't think that lacking that mentality is narcissistic.

A lot of what you say is true.

Sakurai can't please everyone.

However, Sakurai can please someone.

And it's not a bad thing to hope for that someone to be you.

 

[Ben Holt]

Take with a grain of salt, but a leaker that predicted Simon, Richter, Isabelle, Ken, and Banjo said that they heard that Atlus wants Kasumi to be an Echo Fighter of Joker.

 

[Deleted member]

Take with a grain of salt, but a leaker that predicted Simon, Richter, Isabelle, Ken, and Banjo said that they heard that Atlus wants Kasumi to be an Echo Fighter of Joker.

Then again, we have Shifty whose Hayabusa claim didn't come to pass...or so I thought.

Then again, it's just a want.

 

[Coolboy]

on a more positive note..happy new year to everyone here! :D
this thread needs some positivity, hopefully 2020 will be a great year and hopefully we will see a few female DLC characters as well!

 

[Mogisthelioma]

The gaming industry has always had a male bias, stemming from the false assumption that only boys (and more recently, adult men) like video games.

Mmm, I wouldn't go that far. "Bias" is a little extreme, no? The reason we see so many male characters is because the developers of those games want to appeal to their demographic. If that means having more male characters than female, that's what they'll do. It's not because of some malicious pro-male bias that excludes females, it's because the developers want to reach their target audience.

I'm sure everyone has seen this chart before, but I'll post it here just in case:

Spoiler: Percentage of female players per game genre

Consider this: A group of game developers are trying to market a brand new first-person shooter in the United States. They are a little known company so they want to stand out. They decide to do so by having the most creative and lovable characters in their game that will attract millions to play it. But then comes the issue of gender.

One person says: "We have to make sure that we have equal representation of males and females, we can't be sexist! If we have more females, then we'll get praise for diversity!"

Another person says: "That's ridiculous! We're trying to appeal to a majority male audience. We should be focused on demographic appeal. If we force female characters into the game for the sake of diversity, people will criticize us."

Obviously the second person is correct. If the game is trying to appeal to a majority male audience, they want the game to reflect the interests of their audience, which would mean having a majority male cast. I'm not implying that male gamers are sexist, but that a male will naturally be drawn to play games featuring characters of the same sex.

Of course, the developers could side with the first person and take a risk of having half of their charactres be female. There's nothing wrong with this at all, and there's a decent chance the game will earn much praise, win awards, and make more revenue than expected because it appealed to their target audience in a much different way. But there's also a chance they'll receive criticism for "giving in" to the idea of diversity, have "forced diversity" pointed at them, and have less people buy the game because now it appeals to their target audience in a way the audience is less interested. It's a risk, and it's a risk many developers can't afford to take.

Thus, naturally you are going to see more male characters than females in video games. Not because game developers have a pro-male bias, but because they are trying to appeal to their target audience as much as possible.

Including more female characters is one way to help combat that bias.

Again, I doubt this. Everyone has seen the effect Battlefield 5 had on the gaming community as a whole. Perhaps that's only an exception, but it should be established that having more females in a game doesn't necessarily combat any "bias" that exists in the gaming world. Besides, it's not the Smash developers job to have more females in their games. They're drawing from preexisting characters that end up being popular. The majority of those characters are male, and the majority of people don't have a problem with it. And if it isn't broken, don't fix it. Sure, there's value to be gained by having more females in Smash, but it shouldn't be a priority for the developers.

I think the best response is to link this video about how Nintendo does feminism best:

I have spoken.

 

[Night Gale]

Bias isn't extreme at all. Historically, video game marketing favored men regardless of genre. Compared to women, men have less of a preference for a character's gender overall, but a majority of video game characters are male anyway, and a lot of women have been designed with male players in mind. That bolstered a cycle of exclusion and created a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts. The industry knows it f***ed up way back when, and its trying to correct itself today. A good example is Splatoon. The creators knew that Nintendo lacked strong female protagonists and considered only using girl Inklings. They decided not to, but they put more emphasis on the girls in advertising anyway. The end result was a successful game where a majority of the players used the female character. Another example that I provided earlier in the thread is Senran Kagura. Women were not its intended target audience, but it's also a lighthearted game filled with a cast of cute magical ninja girls, a dressup/diorama photo mode, and a decent story, that has simple yet satisfactory gameplay. I like bringing this up because trying to cater to a target audience is stupid in general, and instead they should try to appeal to as many people as possible. Senran didn't do it intentionally, but it is better off for it.

The amount of female representation in video games has increased over the years, as well the amount of women involved in the creating process, and the industry needs more of that sh*t. What we are witnessing now is a generation of girls who have more video game role models compared to when I was little, an industry that is starting to include them more in their marketing decisions, and a culture where playing games is mainstream. Naturally, there's some backlash from sexist dastards, but that's because they're unable to get with the times; the community will be better off without their misogyny and general toxicity. The graph you provided is going to look a hell of a lot different in a generation or so. Tomb Raider is what got me interested in playing video games, and I can attribute some of that to Lara Croft. I know for certain that I'm not the only one, and that Tomb Raider is what helped inspire some women to become game developers. And a character like Lara Croft would not exist if it literally wasn't for the two token female characters in Virtua Fighter being more popular than their male counterparts.

 

[scoobymcsnack]

Are there any studies that have been done to show which gender males and females tend to gravitate towards for a game? I’ve seen a couple people in this thread say they want a female character to feel more represented, but I also know from personal experience that not every girl cares about this.
So I was curious if there was a study to show if a majority of girls gravitate towards female characters or not. And the same for guys, as I’ve seen people in this thread claim that male characters appeal to male players more, which I don’t know if that’s necessarily true.

 

[Planet Cool]

Anybody who complains about "forced diversity" is a sexist (or some other kind of prejudiced asshat, depending on the context) and should never be taken seriously by anyone.

 

[Professor Pumpkaboo]

Are there any studies that have been done to show which gender males and females tend to gravitate towards for a game? I’ve seen a couple people in this thread say they want a female character to feel more represented, but I also know from personal experience that not every girl cares about this.
So I was curious if there was a study to show if a majority of girls gravitate towards female characters or not. And the same for guys, as I’ve seen people in this thread claim that male characters appeal to male players more, which I don’t know if that’s necessarily true.

Like, if you show me a picture of Layton and Emmy and Luke and Flora, Id very quickly go to Layton and Luke. Hell, I like Laytons Son way more then his daughter. and dont get me started on the poularity of Otome games

 

[Deleted member]

Anybody who complains about "forced diversity" is a sexist (or some other kind of prejudiced asshat, depending on the context) and should never be taken seriously by anyone.

That's a ridiculous thing to say.

Forcing anything is never a good thing. Diversity is a good thing, but never when it's forced. Just let it happen naturally, don't shove it down peoples throats. There's plenty of examples all over the world whether it's media, politics, society etc. where a "forced diversity" agenda has lead to disaster and divide.

And this is coming from a very, very, very liberal minded individual.

nj posting the silliest thing said in this thread, you had some tough competition though. Now get real. Please or nobody is gonna take you seriously.

 

[Mushroomguy12]

That's a ridiculous thing to say.

Forcing anything is never a good thing. Diversity is a good thing, but never when it's forced. Just let it happen naturally, don't shove it down peoples throats. There's plenty of examples all over the world whether it's media, politics, society etc. where a "forced diversity" agenda has lead to disaster and divide.

And this is coming from a very, very, very liberal minded individual.

nj posting the silliest thing said in this thread, you had some tough competition though. Now get real. Please or nobody is gonna take you seriously.

Perhaps there are times where that legitimately applies, but the term "forced diversity" has become overused to the point that 90% of the time it's used in a situation where diversity isn't forced at all. Overall it's a very subjective term that can be abused like any other, such as SJW (after all, how would you objectively determine whether something is forced or not?). Most of the time I see the term it's certainly not being used in good faith, but rather to describe a subjective aspect about a work of art that the user disagrees with.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

Anybody who complains about "forced diversity" is a sexist (or some other kind of prejudiced asshat, depending on the context) and should never be taken seriously by anyone.

Forced diversity exists and it's a bad thing, but it's definitely blown up. People use the term incorrectly most of the time anyway. Forced diversity is when creators intentionally throw in minority characters in the name of having "all the colors of the rainbow," not necessarily when they want to fix a gender imbalance (although it CAN happen in our scenario). It's almost impossible to tell whether or not a character was forced into the game unless the creators say so.

People pointed to Rey in Star Wars as a forced diversity character but then bashed her for being a Mary Sue. I get it, her writing is awful, but I see nothing that remotely suggests she was forced into the movies as a diversity pick. It's as if all characters ever created must default to a straight white male, and there must be some good reason for them to be female/not white/LGBT, or it's forced diversity. Frankl, that's the part that I see as sexist/racist/homophobic, not the simple act of complaining about it.

I think it's objectively reasonable for the audience of a product to complain about forced diversity when it happens. If the creators of a movie/book/game/etc. are adopting tokenism, their viewers have every right to be displeased or even offended. Nobody wants to be seen as a trophy for a movie or game in the name of having a diverse cast or whatever. It would be better for a movie or game to have a cast of entirely straight white men than to have a "diverse" cast only for the sake of having "all the colors of the rainbow." This is coming from someone who considers himself pretty left of center.

 

[Night Gale]

Are there any studies that have been done to show which gender males and females tend to gravitate towards for a game? I’ve seen a couple people in this thread say they want a female character to feel more represented, but I also know from personal experience that not every girl cares about this.
So I was curious if there was a study to show if a majority of girls gravitate towards female characters or not. And the same for guys, as I’ve seen people in this thread claim that male characters appeal to male players more, which I don’t know if that’s necessarily true.

There are studies, and I'll get to that momentarily, but first I'm going to point out how the industry, especially the mobile market, is manipulating them to take advantage of their female demographic. Alright, so a lot of women play mobile games (even though a majority of them are designed with male consumers in mind). Here's another article and the data of its source. Studies also claim that women are more likely to make microtransactions on mobile. I'm sure that more research needs to be done to properly draw a conclusion, but this is interesting to be aware of. Anywho, it turns out that compared to male characters, mobile games are more likely to charge players for women. So, let's recap: more women play mobile than men, women are more likely to make in-game purchases, and mobile developers are more likely to regulate women to paid DLC. We're starting to see this in the console market as well. Now to wrap this up neatly and address your initial question. Yes, several studies have been conducted, and the consensus is that men are more willing to gender-swap in games while women are more likely to pick female characters. Obviously, the samples used in the studies do not represent the population at large. However, all you have to do is look at games that present options like Splatoon, Street Fighter, Dead or Alive, and Soul Calibur to realize that women are the more popular characters overall, regardless of who uses them. I think it's an indicator that men are more likely to swap between the two and women aren't, because otherwise the usage/popularity of female characters wouldn't be as prevalent as it is when options are presented, and the industry wouldn't charge people for female characters more often than their male counterparts (and don't get me started on that costume bulls***). More importantly, the mobile industry knows that women are: more likely to pick other women, spend money on microtransactions, and dominate the mobile market. This is most likely why they regulate female characters to paid DLC compared to male characters: overall, everyone is more willing to pay for it. So, yes, I believe that women have more of an affinity for selecting the same gender compared to men. Everything I said seems to support that notion.

I'm a woman but I have no preference. When I was younger, female characters appealed to me way more. When I was a teenager, I mostly used men because I played online a lot and people left me the f*** alone. Today it makes no difference; I pick whatever seems the most badass to me.

 

[Planet Cool]

Forced diversity exists and it's a bad thing

Gonna have to disagree here. There's absolutely nothing bad about including characters of many different backgrounds and the only reason anyone ever complains about it is that they don't like certain minorities. (This can get wild, too, like the time some people threw a fit because an avatar in an Xbox ad had a prosthetic limb.)

Also, Rey is fine. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[Deleted member]

Gonna have to disagree here.

You are insane if you actually believe this.

There's absolutely nothing bad about including characters of many different backgrounds and the only reason anyone ever complains about it is that they don't like certain minorities. (This can get wild, too, like the time some people threw a fit because an avatar in an Xbox ad had a prosthetic limb.)

You are conflating forced diversity with regular diversity. These are two completely different things that exist. One good. One bad. How are you not understanding this?

 

[Mogisthelioma]

Gonna have to disagree here. There's absolutely nothing bad about including characters of many different backgrounds and the only reason anyone ever complains about it is that they don't like certain minorities. (This can get wild, too, like the time some people threw a fit because an avatar in an Xbox ad had a prosthetic limb.)

Also, Rey is fine. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Someone clearly didn't read my post.

I literally said Rey was fine. That. Was. My. Point. Thank you for pointing it out. I was criticizing people who call her "Forced Diversity" because there's no reason to believe that she is forced in any way.

And I've made it clear that having a diverse cast, fundamentally, is a good thing. It's the intention behind such that comes into question. Should diversity come naturally, awesome. Should it be forced, and tokenism is created. Your post just regurgitated things I have already established. Is that so hard to understand?

 

[Night Gale]

My take is that countless s***ty works that aren't 'diverse' seldom gain the same outrage. I think forced diversity is a buzzword that's subjective as all f***. I think you guys have some valid points and I understand what you're trying to say, but I also believe any racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. kind of person can throw that term around and complain whenever a type of person they don't like is included in a work of fiction for whatever reason, whether it's good or bad. I think attempting to classify things as 'forced diversity' is a complete waste of time.

 

[Deleted member]

My take is that countless s***ty works that aren't 'diverse' seldom gain the same outrage. I think forced diversity is a buzzword that's subjective as all f***. I think you guys have some valid points and I understand what you're trying to say, but I also believe any racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. kind of person can throw that term around and complain whenever a type of person they don't like is included in a work of fiction for whatever reason, whether it's good or bad. I think attempting to classify things as 'forced diversity' is a complete waste of time.

Y'know, you do have a point. There are a lot of awful people in the world that do use the term to fuel their deplorable arguments. It is up to us to differentiate between a bigot and someone who disagrees without assuming everyone is just bigoted. It's hard to just sweep it under the rug and call it a buzzword when there are legitimate people that have legitimate concerns about it. It happens on both sides of the political spectrum regardless of whether it's about diversity or something else that is a near-taboo political phenomena in 2020. However, does that mean we should say things like?:

Anybody who complains about "forced diversity" is a sexist

No. Nobody who disagrees or may have concerns with the subject matter should be dismissed and labeled because your point of view doesn't match up with theirs. As a liberal, a leftist and a progressive, I greatly disavow this kind of attitude.

 

[TheYungLink]

If a work of art includes badly written minorities, the problem isn't the minorities. It's the bad writing. Ergo, no, if Smash includes a female DLC character and they (somehow, against all odds, because I doubt Sakurai and his team would do anything less than a great job) mess it up, the problem was never going to be "including a female character at the """expense""" of a popular male character". It was that they did a bad job.

Ergo, forced diversity in art doesn't exist. No examples people bring up are valid at all. "Forced diversity" is a laughable concept.

 

[Planet Cool]

I literally said Rey was fine. That. Was. My. Point. Thank you for pointing it out. I was criticizing people who call her "Forced Diversity" because there's no reason to believe that she is forced in any way.

You said "her writing is awful" and I was disagreeing with that. Not that it matters. This is clearly a discussion for another thread (or better yet, for no thread at all).

And I've made it clear that having a diverse cast, fundamentally, is a good thing. It's the intention behind such that comes into question. Should diversity come naturally, awesome. Should it be forced, and tokenism is created. Your post just regurgitated things I have already established. Is that so hard to understand?

Here's the thing: in my experience, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, complaints about tokenism are really complaints that a given character isn't straight, white and/or male. The idea of tokenism assumes that minority characters have to justify themselves and majority characters don't. What counts as a "natural" way to put, say, a black character in a story? How is it different from the "unnatural" alternative? Would you ask the same of a white character? These kinds of questions can very easily take us someplace ugly and I think it's important to be cognizant of that.

Maybe tokenism can be a problem in some media, but video games are different because they invite us to take ownership of the characters in a way that books and movies don't. In a multiplayer game with dozens of playable characters, especially one like Smash that obeys no real-world logic, there's no good reason not to diversify the roster a little. Give more people the chance to see themselves reflected in the characters.

For the record, I don't mean to sound aggressive and I'm sorry if I already have. You seem to be arguing in good faith and I don't mean to accuse you personally of being anti-woman. I just think there are some important factors you aren't considering.

 

[scoobymcsnack]

What counts as a "natural" way to put, say, a black character in a story? How is it different from the "unnatural" alternative?

I think it largely depends on the context of the story. If I’m writing a story, for whatever form of media, that takes place in an ancient African tribe, and I just throw in a random white guy just for the sake of diversity, it’s pretty forced. Maybe if I had a reason for him being there it wouldn’t be bad, but without a good backstory it comes across as forced
Of course this is a very specific example, as for the most part forced diversity is pretty uncommon

 

[Night Gale]

Throwing in random white guys is a trope.

Seriously though if a creator wants to put any kind of character in their work, they can. It isn't forced.

 

[Ben Holt]

Throwing in random white guys is a trope.

Seriously though if a creator wants to put any kind of character in their work, they can. It isn't forced.

Did someone call for a random white guy?