Support NeoGAF

[Weltall Zero]

Warning, wall of text incoming.

Here, I'll quote the relevant part of your post again for easier readability:

My point was that it is not so black and white. The person who says he is not able to relate to something might not know how to phrase it better to avoid to confusion. Maybe english isn't even his first language so he's using the only english words he's familiar with to substitute the more nuanced ones from his own language. Maybe he doesn't even realize that he'll be accused of lacking empathy based on one word.

What does that even have to do with anything? I'm saying precisely that "lacking empathy" is not a damn accusation, is a fact about people that we have to accept and understand. You seem still to be stuck thinking lack of empathy is a sin we have to punish. I now understand your "rake on the coals" comment; you didn't understand (or bothered to read) the first thing about my post.

Regarding your "point", I can only judge people's feelings from what they tell me. I'm not in their heads and neither are you, and if they tell me they can't relate to a character, then I'm going to assume they can't relate to a character, which is the very literal definition of "lack of empathy". That you want to then make that be a negative thing to condemn is entirely up to you. If you think people should not be crucified for saying they don't relate to a character, then you're right, but not because they might not actually mean they don't relate to a character, that's bullshit (and frankly patronizing; English is not my first language and I can still express myself well enough, thank you very much). Crucifying them is wrong because nobody should be crucified for having low empathy, especially when they can't do anything about it. That's the entire damn point of my original post, by the way; I apologize for the spoiler, in case you meant to actually read it sometime.

Regarding your numerous thoughts on this interesting subject - I went through your post history for this thread to see if there is indeed anything interesting and this popped out:

Translation: I skimmed over your post the first time, saw something to attack, and did so without bothering to read or understand any of it; and now I realize I messed up, but hell if I'm going to admit it, and will rather skim your previous post and do the exact damn thing and get it wrong again.

I hear you like thesaurus?

I like agreeing on definitions, especially the whole damn term we are discussing in the first place.

Let's see what MW says about empathy.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/empathy

Well if it isn't exactly the definition I provided. So, what's your point? That assuming empathy on everyone lead me to be unable to understand people with less empathy? Well, I admitted as much. Do you really think the irony was lost on me?

Note that this isn't a personal attack on you - honestly I'm not that interested in the subject,

Well, at least you're being honest about the latter; it's been pretty obvious from the start.

I'm just using your example here to try and understand the logic behind the thinking in these rather sweeping statements that permeate the thread.
So we have a person A who claims he has strong empathy.
And we have a person B who is perceived to be lacking empathy based on the statements they've made in relation to fictional person C.

I, personally, didn't say anything about fictional people; again, if you took two minutes to read my post you would see I'm talking every single time about real people. Not even theorethically real people; but actual, existing people with names and surnames.

Person A fails to understand or relate to person B's state of mind
Person B cannot seem to relate to fictional person C, either due to physical of psychological characteristics of the person C.

You're mixing up what I said about my significant other (person A and B) with the post where I was replying to about not relating = lack of empathy. Rereading the posts might help clear your confusion.

To add to that, you are mixing up the capacity for general empathy (or even empathy for a particular group of people, or animals, etc.), with feeling empathy in a particular case. I would think both the differences and relationships between both to be self-evident, but you seem to be trying to make the point that "lack of empathy in a particular case" = "lack of empathy in all cases", which hopefully should be evidently ridiculous. A person who is normally emphatetic may not feel empathy in a particular case without that single example invalidating their entire predisposition, and viceversa.

So, in the interest of the discussion, explain to me why should the Person A in this case be shown to exhibit a strong sense of empathy but Person B would not?

What is your actual point? That until I was able to understand that some people have more or less empathy, I was unable to understand them, and they were a blind spot for my own empathy? That's precisely the point I'm making. Otherwise, stop implying things and say them outright.

If you think I'm saying lightly that my significant other, the one person I've shared the last decade with, has low empathy, by my own, her own, and other people's admissions, and that you can offer a better assessment without having spoken a word with her, then frankly I don't know what to say.

And if you think having more natural empathy makes me think I'm "better" than her, then I hate to repeat myself, but read my first post again (or at all) because the entire point has gone over your head. It seems to me you are taking this entirely as "empathy is a game score and you're putting people down if you point out, indeed admit, they have less than you", rather than actually having any discussion about it.

 

[10k]

I am not a lombax.

Deep down, we're all Lombax's.

 

[chillybright]

In retrospect, some people can relate better with avatars who like them. Not just males. And that is totally fine.

You see female posters in this very thread expressing their interests in GTA games with female protagonist.

I remember the heated discussion on GAF when female link will not be available in the new Zelda game.

I also remember another thread asking for gender neutral option in character creations.

Granted, these two examples are player avatars, not a fully fleshed out character in The Last of Us. A strict equivalent would be say if the next Tomb Raider or Life is Strange has male lead. Would there be some dissatisfaction from female gamers who enjoyed the previous installments?

Moreover, most gaffers has played video games for their entire life. The ability to insert into any character has been ingrained into our bones. But to many less hardcore gamers, this is not the case, and being able to relate is vital for them to enjoy the game.

 

[Via Purifico]

Telling people that they should relate to someone in a game when they don't is a pretty hilarious ideal. Let people relate to who they want, it doesn't affect you in the slightest and it's not weird at all. People relate and don't relate to all kinds of different things and people, that's why we're different.

Saying that, I can't wait to play as Chloe in Uncharted or Ellie in TLOU2, both are fantastic characters,

That's not even the point being made, it's that people are suddenly turned off from a franchise they enjoyed before but all bets are off because it's a female lead this time and use "well i'm not playing this cause I can't relate to a female"

There are tons of examples of male leads who are in very unrelatable situations but that's not a problem then.

 

[Mcdohl]

You can relate to the MC regardless of gender/age/race, imo.

Yes, you can probably relate more to a character who is more similar to you, but we're all humans with relate-able needs and desires.

And in fact, I would argue it's easier to relate to characters in realistic settings than fantasy settings.

 

[Johnny Cage In The Shower]

Why most of the argument here are about "relating" to the protagonist of a game anyway?

What about being interested in the character or (more importantly) being curious about the world the character is exploring? Most games are about exploration, of the (more or less) hostile and dangerous or simply just mysterious world your avatar is put into.

I may not have munch in common with a paper thin, cartoon dog with a beanie that raps... But I am sure as heck curious to know what's the next cool thing he's going to meet and the things he is going to rap about.

 

[Eusis]

My argument is that women expressing romantic intimacy shouldn't gross you out or make you uncomfortable, and neither should two men doing the same.

That's fucked up.

What might be most important is to try to REMEMBER it really shouldn't be a big deal and rolling with it even if it makes you uncomfortable. You may not be the complete master of how you feel, but it is important to separate what is genuinely bad from what is just awkward likely due to societal pressures. And you sit through that stuff a few times you probably won't care as much eventually.

 

[Kinyou]

I'm a woman and I would definitely buy and play a GTA game with a female protagonist. Not sure why that would be a surprise. For all the reasons that men seem to prefer playing as other men, so they can relate or empathize, I'd feel the same way about playing as a woman. Sure I play plenty of games as a dude already and I'm used to attempting to get the same emotional resonance from them, but when I have played games with characters that are more like me I obviously get a little more from them.

I think the thing is that as games get more and more story driven, I'm finding myself getting less and less invested in them since they aren't my stories or even close. Playing as "The Impossible White Man" dealing with the "White Man's Burden" has been done to death in video games and in movies. I'm not suggesting that these are bad narratives or that they don't deserve to be made, just that they are increasingly alienating and a bit played out for me. So yeah, a female protag in a GTA game would be fucking amazing to me.

I'm just not sure for how many people this is the one critera for buying or not buying the game. Similarly I don't believe there actually are all that many men who'd refuse to buy a good game because it features a woman.

It would be interesting to see if there are stats to back it up. Like was there a big bump in how many women bought Dishonored 2 to compared to Dishonored 1?

 

[Weltall Zero]

Why most of the argument here are about "relating" to the protagonist of a game anyway?

What about being interested in the character or (more importantly) being curious about the world the character is exploring? Most games are about exploration, of the (more or less) hostile and dangerous or simply just mysterious world your avatar is put into.

I may not have munch in common with a paper thin, cartoon dog with a beanie that raps... But I am sure as heck curious to know what's the next cool thing he's going to meet and the things he is going to rap about.

That's frankly an excellent point that I think bears discussing as well. Parallel to the fact that one may actually relate more or less to a given character, is the fact that some people may need to relate more in order to enjoy the games.

I think this may be related (heh) with the fact that some games are more narrative in nature, while others may be more gameplay-based. I suspect a visual novel where the character was metaphorically as paper-thin as Parappa physically is would be quite a painful experience to slog through for anyone. Conversely, pure gameplay games such as Spelunky, Nuclear Throne, Enter the Gungeon, etc. can probably be enjoyed by anyone no matter if the main character is a human or a mute blob of eyes.

Since people play games for different reasons, they gravitate to different types of games. Perhaps it's not a stretch to think that people more inclined towards narrative games are more used to relate to their main characters?

I think a frankly interesting study could be made out of all this, or at least I would love to see a poll that contrasted all these points. Anyone here that has the means and inclination?

 

[bati]

*snip*

I'm not gonna quote every word from your post because

Spoiler

it amounts to whole lot of nothing and I actually find it hilarious how personally offended you got

you seem to be posting under the impression that my initial post (with raking over the coals) was aimed at you, it wasn't, it was a general summary of how the poster of the quoted text in the OP was treated in the thread that sparked the creation of this one. This is the second time I'm explaining this, I cannot write it any clearer, if you still don't get it then that is your problem.

Same goes for the rest of what I wrote - it wasn't aimed at you, I just used your example to illustrate how funny it is when someone claims that another person lacks empathy (or in your case, provides a dictionary definition) and then in the same breath quickly adds how they cannot understand another position.

None of the persons I've used in my hypothetical example are you or your SO (seriously man, what the fuck, why would I even bring her up in this scenario? You sound like you're projecting some insecurities here). It's a direct analogy to some of the posts that can be found on the last few pages of this thread.

Now if you're done with this mememememe rhetoric I'd kindly invite you pull your head out of your own fucking ass and maybe take your own advice about reading other people's posts.

 

[someday]

I'm just not sure for how many people this is the one critera for buying or not buying the game. Similarly I don't believe there actually are all that many men who'd refuse to buy a good game because it features a woman.

It would be interesting to see if there are stats to back it up. Like was there a big bump in how many women bought Dishonored 2 to compared to Dishonored 1?

I don't know the stats either but going by this thread and others, there's a not small group of men who are uncomfortable playing as women and aren't shy about saying it. Check out the thread about Ellie being the main playable character in the new TLoU game for more.

As for Dishonored, I just bought the new one but hadn't bought the first. Luckily it came bundled with the first game though so I'll play it. I can't speak for every woman but I absolutely was more intrigued by the new game because of it.

 

[The Spoony Hou]

Makes me wonder how Tetris got popular.

 

[Lime]

Honestly I find it off-putting that diverse representation is put on the shoulders of people who aren't part of the "straight white American male" group. As if it's only *if* people not part of this group has to individually demand diverse representation, and only then would minority characters be justified in being in a game.

In fact, everyone, especially the white men around the world, benefits from a diverse representation of the different modalities that we inhabit in the world.

 

[psychowave]

I'm just not sure for how many people this is the one critera for buying or not buying the game. Similarly I don't believe there actually are all that many men who'd refuse to buy a good game because it features a woman.

It would be interesting to see if there are stats to back it up. Like was there a big bump in how many women bought Dishonored 2 to compared to Dishonored 1?

I think it's a little more complicated than that. For example, I wouldn't have bought, say, GTA V or Watch Dogs even if they had featured a female protagonist, because I find the treatment of non-playable female characters in those games disgusting and it makes me uncomfortable.

 

[LegendofDragoonLives]

That's not even the point being made, it's that people are suddenly turned off from a franchise they enjoyed before but all bets are off because it's a female lead this time and use "well i'm not playing this cause I can't relate to a female"

There are tons of examples of male leads who are in very unrelatable situations but that's not a problem then.

And? If they're unrelatable to them, that's fine. This is a complete non-issues. It went from having a 95% of the time male character in the first to the second being 100% female. Some people are going to be turned off by this and there's others that are turned off by what I consider dumb shit in plenty of other games. I just shrug because it's their preference. If a girl were to tell me that she's not feeling most SP games with lead male characters, I would say that sucks since you're missing out on a ton of games but you do you. Who the fuck am I or anyone to tell someone who they should feel relatable to or how it's wrong if you don't for a certain someone.

Some of the gaffers just need to climb down from their high horses and deal that some people don't think or visualize things as they do, and it's not wrong just because that's the case. I'm sure TLOU2 is going to sell more than the first one did, esp if we compare PS3 vs PS4 sales and not PS3 and PS4 sales of TLOU1.

 

[bati]

I think it's a little more complicated than that. For example, I wouldn't have bought, say, GTA V or Watch Dogs even if they had featured a female protagonist, because I find the treatment of non-playable female characters in those games disgusting and it makes me uncomfortable.

That's the real challenge here, finding people like you. Maybe with some kind of targeted campaign (on sites like IGN etc) and then polling the non-buyers and applying qualitative analysis to data to determine the underlying reasons. But if we're talking strictly about the effect of a female character on sales here then it should be fairly straightforward to contact the owners of the second game, determining their sex, checking if they own the first game and then going from there. Or vice versa, contacting the (male) owners of the first game and if they don't own the second one trying to determine if the new female character played any role in this.

 

[Tigress]

Same. I'd love to play female Trevor aka Tricia.

That would be so awesome. Trevor was my favorite character cause his personality fit how I play gta (and really how most people play it as you aren't given the tools to be nice to people, just ways of being an asshole). And I would love a female version.

And for those saying it's not realistic: 1. Females can be just as cruel and hardasses (I hate this stereotype that we're all sweet and nice and if we aren't we're just nags). Hell there was a female cartel leader IRL that, well she was cartel, that says it all. 2. When the fuck was gta realistic? Please let me know when I can blow up a lot of cars and go on a killing spree and just stay out of the cops' sight for 5 minutes and all is forgotte.

 

[Ephidel]

I'm going to be doing a lot of generalising in this post. Despite how it may look I'm not actually applying what I'm saying to ALL people or ALL men or ALL women or ALL minorites (though I do think it will probably apply to MANY people, MANY men, MANY women and MANY minorities), so please don't take what I'm saying as some poorly thought out slight against anyone specific, or about "you" (in the singular or in the plural).

Men struggle to relate to women because for most of their life they never have to. The same applies to white people and their inability to relate to people of other skin colours, ethnicities or backgrounds, or straight people and their inability to relate to people of other sexualities, or people who conform to gender norms who can't relate to people with more diverse gender identities.

They don't have to and they aren't taught to.

In day to day life things cater to them and they never really have to change themselves to get what they want or need. People will accept them the way they are because that is the way most people are.

Once you're any form of minority that starts to change.

As a minority you will grow up experiencing media full of people who are not you, and you learn to empathise with them anyway. You're essentially forced to. And you learn that there are lots of different people of different types (and that you're one of them) and they're all people just like you.

Whereas if you're a white guy you grow up experiencing media FULL of people like you. You'll play games full of other white people where you aren't challenged to empathise with anything different so you don't really try. You never really have to it so it doesn't really seem important, and eventually you don't really think about it at all. It generates a sort of "distance".

It's why if something awful happens to, for example, a woman, quite often men don't understand. They don't understand why it is bad, or how it is bad, or why someone would think it is all that bad. They don't understand why it needs challenging, or sympathy, because it's too far removed from them - they can't imagine feeling that way.

Somehow the only way to bring that alien situation "close enough" for them to understand is to apply it to people close to them - wives, sisters, mothers, or daughters - women they do care about. Because somehow they have no empathy for people at large, so the only thing you can do to try and generate some is to make it relevant to them.

You can see this in the men who disavowed Trump's pussy grabbing comments "as a husband and father" instead of just because the comments were vile. Or when inappropriate comments in the office are just jokes, or just something you have to put up with -- unless it's happening to their wife, in which case they're going to go break some noses.

The things that are happening only matter to them if they're happening to them by extension.
(And frankly, even that ends up generating a rather flawed form of empathy where they're not really outraged about the actions or the terribleness of the thing, but on behalf of the people affected the way they would be).

Whereas, for me, if something awful happens I can understand that it's an awful thing without having to do that odd comparison gap-bridging. I don't have to wonder how I would feel if the situation applied to my brother-in-law's step-cousin.

To try and bring this back around to gaming:

I would prefer it if there were more games with female leads, not because I can't associate with male leads but because I genuinely believe that having more varied leads will lead to more varied stories with more varied perspectives, and I would prefer that that.
... That said, yes, I'd also prefer it just because I believe the fact I can identify with male leads that doesn't that I should have to. At least not all the time.
(Now yes, my not wanting to identify with a male lead can be equally true for a man not wanting to identify with a female lead, but mine comes from a place of being willing and able but a little tired of it, whereas most of the time their desire comes from being unwilling to engage and not wanting to leave their comfort zone).

And for anyone going "Why is this all about identifying with characters anyway, what if I just want to play as a character that's interesting?" or "It's not about a male character or a female character, I just want to play a character I like" or even the more blunt "I just don't want to play a woman"
Why do you find a black character, or a female character, or a gay character less interesting than a straight white male one? Why do you like that male character more than that female one? Why don't you want to play a woman?
Seriously, why?

I'd even say it's especially dumb in the case of TLOU-II.
It's still the same creators, the same genre, the same setting, the same or similar gameplay, and it's not even like they're throwing a new character at you - it's one you already know and probably like from the original. They're changing the lead character. That's it. Why, if you enjoyed the first one, would Ellie being the lead be enough to turn you off the second one?
It doesn't make sense. Unless, of course, you're completely adverse to playing a game with a lead that doesn't look like you. In which case you should probably do some serious soul searching to identify why that's a breaking point for you.

I don't understand why, if women come out and try to challenge men who say "I don't want to play a game with a female lead because I can't identify with that" by countering "What about all the women who have to play games with male leads" the response isn't "Huh, that's a fair point" or "Hmm, I guess if I find it uncomfortable they might too".

Instead the response is "What, so it's okay for WOMEN to struggle to identify with male characters but not for MEN to fail to identify with female ones? That's sexist!" or "Well, they don't seem to have any problem with it so let's just keep going the way we are" or "Women are okay with playing male characters though, but men aren't okay playing women characters. So everyone is happy with male leads!"

They don't understand the need for change because they don't even realise how skewed and underdeveloped their own sense of empathy is.

It's similar to the way some people struggle to identify institutional racism against black people - They grow up and they don't experience any racism themselves, they don't notice anything happening, and so they assume there isn't any. So when black people say "Hey, wait, actually there's a shit ton of racism" the instant reponse isn't "Wait really, what can I do?" it's "No there isn't, I'd have seen that, you're blowing everything out of proportion" or "I've experienced hardship too. It's not racism, life is just shit".

Sometimes people just can't see past themselves. They can't see that their own perspectives are skewed and could use some serious work.

The inability to understand women is similar. Men aren't just aren't taught to empathise with women - if anything they're taught to expect things of them.
Whereas women are taught that society expects them to be alert to the wants and needs of others. And be thoughtful. And to de-escalate situations. And to develop umpteen ways to say "no" or "go away" without using those exact words. (Which, frankly, is another problem all it's own, but I'll stop going off on that tangent).

Essentially though, women and minorities are challenged to identify with people that are different to themselves because a majority of people are different from themselves, whereas (straight, white) men typically aren't because they're accepted as the norm.

They were never challenged to empathise with others growing up, so they didn't, and now they don't, and they would rather just keep things the way they are because that's comfortable for them and they don't really see the need for anything else.

That's why things need to change.

Yes, this is a bigger issue than just gaming, but that's not a reason to ignore it in the gaming space. People are influenced by the media they consume, so why not start here?

If we start introducing people to a wider variety of people and teach them to look at things from other perspectives when they're younger then maybe they'll grow up to be better, well adjusted, more well rounded adults.

If we start now maybe the next generation of gamers can be a little bit better than us.

 

[AntraxSuicide]

I'm not gonna quote every word from your post because

Spoiler

it amounts to whole lot of nothing and I actually find it hilarious how personally offended you got

you seem to be posting under the impression that my initial post (with raking over the coals) was aimed at you, it wasn't, it was a general summary of how the poster of the quoted text in the OP was treated in the thread that sparked the creation of this one. This is the second time I'm explaining this, I cannot write it any clearer, if you still don't get it then that is your problem.

Same goes for the rest of what I wrote - it wasn't aimed at you, I just used your example to illustrate how funny it is when someone claims that another person lacks empathy (or in your case, provides a dictionary definition) and then in the same breath quickly adds how they cannot understand another position.

None of the persons I've used in my hypothetical example are you or your SO (seriously man, what the fuck, why would I even bring her up in this scenario? You sound like you're projecting some insecurities here). It's a direct analogy to some of the posts that can be found on the last few pages of this thread.

Now if you're done with this mememememe rhetoric I'd kindly invite you pull your head out of your own fucking ass and maybe take your own advice about reading other people's posts.

The reason you're getting blow back on this is because you're making the "people who don't like Nazis are the real racists" argument.

 

[Tosyn_88]

Give this Op a medal, amazing thread. We honestly need more conversations like this

 

[Hero_of_the_Day]

Makes me wonder how Tetris got popular.

I'm always waiting for a long piece to fill my void.

 

[Fuz]

I'd say "depends on the game", but thinking about it... I never had this problem, ever, and I love some of the female characters I played.

So, I'd say it depends on personal sensibilities.

Oh, and by the way, it's totally ok not to be able to relate to a character of a different sex than yours. As long as you aren't a dick about it.

 

[autoduelist]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_privilege

How is this even a response to my post? Yes, it's an issue that most protagonists are white male. That has nothing to do with the fact that plenty of people either specifically want to play characters they identify with, while some specifically like to play characters with differing characteristics. The people who repeatedly state in this thread that, for example, 'I like to play as the other gender' are establishing the same exact desire as people who want to play their own gender, just on the other side of the coin. It's the same exact desire to identify, yet for some reason, only one side gets shamed. It makes no sense. And broad stroking 'white privilege' is not an answer. There is nothing wrong with someone [anyone] wanting to play, say, a black women. There is also nothing wrong with someone preferring to play a white male. This idea that somehow one of those two preferences is in anyway 'wrong' is the only part of this conversation that is fundamentally wrong. Personally, I don't care who the main character is, period. If I did have a preference, it's a preference, and there would be nothing wrong with that either.

 

[bati]

The reason you're getting blow back on this is because you're making the "people who don't like Nazis are the real racists" argument.

No, I've merely shown that being self righteous doesn't make you any less of a hypocrite. I don't know what you were hoping to achieve with your analogy where one of the sides is guilty of war crimes and thus objectively bad, but it didn't work because it doesn't apply to the present situation.

 

[Weltall Zero]

[snip]
Now if you're done with this mememememe rhetoric I'd kindly invite you pull your head out of your own fucking ass and maybe take your own advice about reading other people's posts.

Hahah, right below my reply to another poster, what a backfire. Don't worry, I'm reading other people's posts; just not yours, on account of you being on my ignore list from now on. Bye.

 

[chillybright]

The reason you're getting blow back on this is because you're making the "people who don't like Nazis are the real racists" argument.

nah.

Those posts in the original OP were simply stating their preference. They didn't go out of their way to force their preference onto other people. I don't know how you can equalize them to Nazis.

 

[johannesbergcrantz]

Well, that's his problem really. And If you're one of those who really wants to consider videogames a real "art-form" -Because its -YOUR- free-time-hobby of choice (after all..)
you better be willing to let the artists express their artistic vision, rather than just serve you your infantile, boyhood, slaughter-fest-dream-of-choice on a silver platter.
Because that would be the exact opposite of any sort of artistic pretension
In the context of "tlou" this becomes extra funny OC since by many its concidered to be "the pinnacle of gaming" artistically speaking.

 

[Frozenprince]

How is this even a response to my post? Yes, it's an issue that most protagonists are white male. That has nothing to do with the fact that plenty of people either specifically want to play characters they identify with, while some specifically like to play characters with differing characteristics. The people who repeatedly state in this thread that, for example, 'I like to play as the other gender' are establishing the same exact desire as people who want to play their own gender, just on the other side of the coin. It's the same exact desire to identify, yet for some reason, only one side gets shamed. It makes no sense. And broad stroking 'white privilege' is not an answer. There is nothing wrong with someone [anyone] wanting to play, say, a black women. There is also nothing wrong with someone preferring to play a white male. This idea that somehow one of those two preferences is in anyway 'wrong' is the only part of this conversation that is fundamentally wrong. Personally, I don't care who the main character is, period. If I did have a preference, it's a preference, and there would be nothing wrong with that either.

Because it's a privilege reserved to a very select group of people to even HAVE preferences.

Minorities don't get a choice in having "preferences". White heterosexual men are the default, and always have been. Having a "preference" is nothing more than an excuse to live within the bubble of your own privilege.

 

[MartyStu]

I'm going to be doing a lot of generalising in this post. Despite how it may look I'm not actually applying what I'm saying to ALL people or ALL men or ALL women or ALL minorites (though I do think it will probably apply to MANY people, MANY men, MANY women and MANY minorities), so please don't take what I'm saying as some poorly thought out slight against anyone specific, or about "you" (in the singular or in the plural).

Men struggle to relate to women because for most of their life they never have to. The same applies to white people and their inability to relate to people of other skin colours, ethnicities or backgrounds, or straight people and their inability to relate to people of other sexualities, or people who conform to gender norms who can't relate to people with more diverse gender identities.

They don't have to and they aren't taught to.

In day to day life things cater to them and they never really have to change themselves to get what they want or need. People will accept them the way they are because that is the way most people are.

Once you're any form of minority that starts to change.

As a minority you will grow up experiencing media full of people who are not you, and you learn to empathise with them anyway. You're essentially forced to. And you learn that there are lots of different people of different types (and that you're one of them) and they're all people just like you.

Whereas if you're a white guy you grow up experiencing media FULL of people like you. You'll play games full of other white people where you aren't challenged to empathise with anything different so you don't really try. You never really have to it so it doesn't really seem important, and eventually you don't really think about it at all. It generates a sort of "distance".

It's why if something awful happens to, for example, a woman, quite often men don't understand. They don't understand why it is bad, or how it is bad, or why someone would think it is all that bad. They don't understand why it needs challenging, or sympathy, because it's too far removed from them - they can't imagine feeling that way.

Somehow the only way to bring that alien situation "close enough" for them to understand is to apply it to people close to them - wives, sisters, mothers, or daughters - women they do care about. Because somehow they have no empathy for people at large, so the only thing you can do to try and generate some is to make it relevant to them.

You can see this in the men who disavowed Trump's pussy grabbing comments "as a husband and father" instead of just because the comments were vile. Or when inappropriate comments in the office are just jokes, or just something you have to put up with -- unless it's happening to their wife, in which case they're going to go break some noses.

The things that are happening only matter to them if they're happening to them by extension.
(And frankly, even that ends up generating a rather flawed form of empathy where they're not really outraged about the actions or the terribleness of the thing, but on behalf of the people affected the way they would be).

Whereas, for me, if something awful happens I can understand that it's an awful thing without having to do that odd comparison gap-bridging. I don't have to wonder how I would feel if the situation applied to my brother-in-law's step-cousin.

To try and bring this back around to gaming:

I would prefer it if there were more games with female leads, not because I can't associate with male leads but because I genuinely believe that having more varied leads will lead to more varied stories with more varied perspectives, and I would prefer that that.
... That said, yes, I'd also prefer it just because I believe the fact I can identify with male leads that doesn't that I should have to. At least not all the time.
(Now yes, my not wanting to identify with a male lead can be equally true for a man not wanting to identify with a female lead, but mine comes from a place of being willing and able but a little tired of it, whereas most of the time their desire comes from being unwilling to engage and not wanting to leave their comfort zone).

And for anyone going "Why is this all about identifying with characters anyway, what if I just want to play as a character that's interesting?" or "It's not about a male character or a female character, I just want to play a character I like" or even the more blunt "I just don't want to play a woman"
Why do you find a black character, or a female character, or a gay character less interesting than a straight white male one? Why do you like that male character more than that female one? Why don't you want to play a woman?
Seriously, why?

I'd even say it's especially dumb in the case of TLOU-II.
It's still the same creators, the same genre, the same setting, the same or similar gameplay, and it's not even like they're throwing a new character at you - it's one you already know and probably like from the original. They're changing the lead character. That's it. Why, if you enjoyed the first one, would Ellie being the lead be enough to turn you off the second one?
It doesn't make sense. Unless, of course, you're completely adverse to playing a game with a lead that doesn't look like you. In which case you should probably do some serious soul searching to identify why that's a breaking point for you.

I don't understand why, if women come out and try to challenge men who say "I don't want to play a game with a female lead because I can't identify with that" by countering "What about all the women who have to play games with male leads" the response isn't "Huh, that's a fair point" or "Hmm, I guess if I find it uncomfortable they might too".

Instead the response is "What, so it's okay for WOMEN to struggle to identify with male characters but not for MEN to fail to identify with female ones? That's sexist!" or "Well, they don't seem to have any problem with it so let's just keep going the way we are" or "Women are okay with playing male characters though, but men aren't okay playing women characters. So everyone is happy with male leads!"

They don't understand the need for change because they don't even realise how skewed and underdeveloped their own sense of empathy is.

It's similar to the way some people struggle to identify institutional racism against black people - They grow up and they don't experience any racism themselves, they don't notice anything happening, and so they assume there isn't any. So when black people say "Hey, wait, actually there's a shit ton of racism" the instant reponse isn't "Wait really, what can I do?" it's "No there isn't, I'd have seen that, you're blowing everything out of proportion" or "I've experienced hardship too. It's not racism, life is just shit".

Sometimes people just can't see past themselves. They can't see that their own perspectives are skewed and could use some serious work.

The inability to understand women is similar. Men aren't just aren't taught to empathise with women - if anything they're taught to expect things of them.
Whereas women are taught that society expects them to be alert to the wants and needs of others. And be thoughtful. And to de-escalate situations. And to develop umpteen ways to say "no" or "go away" without using those exact words. (Which, frankly, is another problem all it's own, but I'll stop going off on that tangent).

Essentially though, women and minorities are challenged to identify with people that are different to themselves because a majority of people are different from themselves, whereas (straight, white) men typically aren't because they're accepted as the norm.

They were never challenged to empathise with others growing up, so they didn't, and now they don't, and they would rather just keep things the way they are because that's comfortable for them and they don't really see the need for anything else.

That's why things need to change.

Yes, this is a bigger issue than just gaming, but that's not a reason to ignore it in the gaming space. People are influenced by the media they consume, so why not start here?

If we start introducing people to a wider variety of people and teach them to look at things from other perspectives when they're younger then maybe they'll grow up to be better, well adjusted, more well rounded adults.

If we start now maybe the next generation of gamers can be a little bit better than us.

Props. This is pretty much perfect from top to bottom. I have nothing to add.

 

[Weltall Zero]

Men struggle to relate to women because for most of their life they never have to.
[...]
They don't have to and they aren't taught to.
[...]
Or when inappropriate comments in the office are just jokes, or just something you have to put up with -- unless it's happening to their wife, in which case they're going to go break some noses.

Excellent post, really sums up all there is to be said. I can't shake a feeling that no matter how eloquently it is put, precisely those who would benefit the most from reading it are those that are going to ignore it.

Regarding the points I quoted above, I was raised entirely by women (my mother and my grandmother), so perhaps that's why I automatically empathize with them; I just didn't make the connection that "empathy with women" may lead to "empathy in general". Often it seems I'm the only one unconfortable with casual sexism, which is probably as frequent here in Spain as in the US. Sometimes even the women present will side with the sexist position (a very, very typical example is equating "sexy" clothing with promiscuous behaviour, only stated in rather less flattering terms), which is depressing.

People and especially men emphatically don't like to think of themselves as sexist, or even consider the possibility that a remark of theirs is sexist, which means treading a minefield to even suggest any problems; getting them to understand the issue without being offended is like disarming a bomb, and unfortunately I don't always have the guts or energy to speak up. Plus as a guy it always seems people default to think you're white knighting (even with no females present!).

The fact that this may be entirely due to my upbringing is somewhat worrying, as it would mean there is no easy way to get adults to be more empathetic. Yet it kind of rings true considering how little I've seen people change regarding this during their adult lives. :/

 

[Paper Sparrow]

*snip*

Thanks for posting that. I was having trouble thinking of how to write my thoughts on this subject, because it feels like you need to address so many points at once to keep the conversation from going in circles.

You did a good job laying it all out.

 

[Eusis]

To have a good female lead means a rethink of work flow, best to have female producers and such. There is no point of having a female skin like EA did with mass effect and fifa, then some players cheering their political bravery.

We have to understand male and female are fundamentally different, its not stereotype

And just maybe many females are just less invested in action movies and games?

I don't see why we should be speaking on behalf of female gamers as someone said earlier.

FFS Mass Effect is from a developer that always made RPGs where you could decide your characters and FIFA is a PROFESSIONAL SPORTS LEAGUE WITH A FEMALE SIDE. You couldn't pick two worse examples.

And gender and sexual identities can be murky. Some of us might want to indulge another side of us on the gender front, or just try something different on the other fronts. So there is a self gratifying aspect for some of us if requires that to please you, nevermind the women straight up putting their two cents in.

 

[QuantumZebra]

Guys who can't empathize with women probably don't think of women as their equals/as human beings. If you realize that a woman is a person who can feel and think all the same things you do, and that there is no special "woman-ness" preventing her from being just like you, then it is easy to place yourself in her shoes.

Also true for people that complain about non-whites in leading roles of movies (or games even).

this

you could swap out Lara Croft or Nathan Drake or Master Chief or whoever for their opposite gender and it would change barely anything in the games (other than changing their love interests.........or not )

 

[someday]

snip

Fucking thank you. You said everything I've been feeling since coming across this thread and a few others. Perfect.

 

[gelf]

Why most of the argument here are about "relating" to the protagonist of a game anyway?

What about being interested in the character or (more importantly) being curious about the world the character is exploring? Most games are about exploration, of the (more or less) hostile and dangerous or simply just mysterious world your avatar is put into.

I may not have munch in common with a paper thin, cartoon dog with a beanie that raps... But I am sure as heck curious to know what's the next cool thing he's going to meet and the things he is going to rap about.

This is where I stand too. It surprises me that people even need to relate to a main character. If truly relating to a main character was something I needed then I'm not sure what games I would play or movies I'd watch as the majority of male characters aren't any more relatable to me then then the female ones. In TLOU Joel is just as far away from me as Ellie.

 

[A Link to the Past]

To have a good female lead means a rethink of work flow, best to have female producers and such. There is no point of having a female skin like EA did with mass effect and fifa, then some players cheering their political bravery.

We have to understand male and female are fundamentally different, its not stereotype

And just maybe many females are just less invested in action movies and games?

I don't see why we should be speaking on behalf of female gamers as someone said earlier.

Let's really stop and consider this: the only people who speak for female gamers are the same people who say "hey don't speak for female gamers." The idea that female gamers do not actually care actively only exists as a result of apathy for female gamers. It's an idea that actively erases the voices of women, and as we speak you are posing this idea that people are speaking for female gamers while you operate on the assumption that everyone in this thread is a man.

 

[Red Liquorice]

Props. This is pretty much perfect from top to bottom. I have nothing to add.

I second that.

 

[JCH!]

I find this 'I can't relate to a girl!' stance completely ridiculous but I also find the need some people have of being represented or identifying with videogame characters ridiculous.

I have never seen videogame characters as an extension of myself nor do I do it with other types of media. It was Shepard who defeated the Reapers, not me. It was Link who rescued Zelda, not me. It was Harry Potter who went to Hogwarts, not me. It was Ripley who fought the Xenomorph, not me. This doesn't make me enjoy the games/books/movies any less.

I want diversity in videogames because it's boring to always play as a variation of the same guy, that it makes some people happy because now they feel represented is just a bonus.

 

[Yabberwocky]

----

Fantastically put, thank you.

Props. This is pretty much perfect from top to bottom. I have nothing to add.

Yeah, it was extremely well done.

 

[Future]

All this crap brings me back to all the white dudes complaining about CJ in GTA: San Andreas. I wtf'ed then and I'm going to to wtf now.

I mean sure, it's understandable you can't relate. But imagine if every race and sex other than white man complained to the stars about the thousands of other games that they can't relate to because the main character doesn't look like them

Props to rockstar back in the day, and props to naughty dog now.

 

[psychowave]

I find this 'I can't relate to a girl!' stance completely ridiculous but I also find the need some people have of being represented or identifying with videogame characters ridiculous.

I have never seen videogame characters as an extension of myself nor do I do it with other types of media. It was Shepard who defeated the Reapers, not me. It was Link who rescued Zelda, not me. It was Harry Potter who went to Hogwarts, not me. It was Ripley who fought the Xenomorph, not me. This doesn't make me enjoy the games/books/movies any less.

I want diversity in videogames because it's boring to always play as a variation of the same guy, that it makes some people happy because now they feel represented is just a bonus.

This is a classic example of taking something for granted. Of course you don't understand the need for representation in media. You already have it.

 

[JCH!]

This is a classic example of taking something for granted. Of course you don't understand the need for representation in media. You already have it.

I expected this reply. Can't argue with it.

 

[Weltall Zero]

Rereading Ephidel's excellent post, I think this is my favorite part:

I don't understand why, if women come out and try to challenge men who say "I don't want to play a game with a female lead because I can't identify with that" by countering "What about all the women who have to play games with male leads" the response isn't "Huh, that's a fair point" or "Hmm, I guess if I find it uncomfortable they might too".

This is the core of the question, the inability, not just to recognize the imbalance, but to notice the attribute at all; to see gender as neutral when it's not female. For those people, games aren't divided into "games where you play as a male" and "games where you play as a female", but "games" and "games where you play as a female" (replace gender with skin color, etc.). "games" could never be a problem to anyone, it's such an innocuous category! That's probably where the "stop SJWs from messing with my games!" comes from, too.

I'm reminded of the decades-long discussion about "female Transformers", and how many fans consider them "illogical" for a species that doesn't reproduce sexually. To them, Transformers are genderless... even when every single one of them is referred to as "he" and voiced by a male.

 

[Maximo]

I'm finding myself more and more these days playing a female if the choice comes up, tired of male voice actors phoning it in or maybe I'm just grown bored of it, stopped playing a male in Fallout 4 and went with the famale who only picked the sarcastic dialogue option, it was amazing.

 

[KonradLaw]

I;m not sure how much I emphatize with videogame characters to be honest. I'm male and I vastly prefer male leads in movies, comics, novels and tv shows. Female lead downrages the interest I have in any product from that media. But somehow it never did for games. It doesn;t matter to me who I'm playing and some female characters from games are among my favorite game characters ever made, while I can't say the same about female characters from other mediums. I wonder if it's the interactivity that changes everything for me.

 

[Madame M]

I can relate to a girl when playing Resident Evil I could almost feel like a Jill Sandwich too

 

[ocean]

I'm not a prince with magical powers prophetized to save the world with my anscestor's ghost swords. I can't say I "relate"
to Noctis at all. Still loving FFXV. I'm not a bitter Middle Aged white dude in a post zombie apocalypse America surrounded by death, and couldn't "relate" to Joel at all. TLoU was still sheer genius.

It's an extremely silly convention. If there was a game about a Latin American banker with a steady relationship and large circle of friends I'm sure I'd "relate" but I can't see how that would make me enjoy the game any more or less.

It's a line of reasoning I find quite strange tbh.

 

[Theanine3D]

...

Men struggle to relate to women because for most of their life they never have to. The same applies to white people and their inability to relate to people of other skin colours, ethnicities or backgrounds, or straight people and their inability to relate to people of other sexualities, or people who conform to gender norms who can't relate to people with more diverse gender identities.

They don't have to and they aren't taught to.

In day to day life things cater to them and they never really have to change themselves to get what they want or need. People will accept them the way they are because that is the way most people are.
...

You hit the nail on the head, awesome post.

 

[Astral Dog]

I play games partly because i dont want to feel engrossed by myself.

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

I'm not a prince with magical powers prophetized to save the world with my anscestor's ghost swords. I can't say I "relate"
to Noctis at all. Still loving FFXV. I'm not a bitter Middle Aged white dude in a post zombie apocalypse America surrounded by death, and couldn't "relate" to Joel at all. TLoU was still sheer genius.

It's an extremely silly convention. If there was a game about a Latin American banker with a steady relationship and large circle of friends I'm sure I'd "relate" but I can't see how that would make me enjoy the game any more or less.

It's a line of reasoning I find quite strange tbh.

You don't need to be like the characters (or people, in real life) to relate to them: the whole idea of empathy is that you understand the thoughts and feelings that the other is experiencing from their frame of reference, regardless of what that frame of reference is, regardless of gender, ethnicity, cultural background, etc. Saying you can't relate to a character is saying that their feelings and thoughts are alien, that they don't resonate to you.

Humans are perfectly capable of relating to things that are completely different from them. I mean, I've never been a trash-compacting little robot stranded on Earth, but I sure as hell could empathise with Wall-E's loneliness. It's easier to relate to something or someone that is like you, but it's not required.

Relating to characters in a narrative game (book, movie, play etc) enhances it in that the emotional investment is deeper and resonates more.