Tag: diversity

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Indivisible is a crowd-funded RPG by the creators of Skullgirls, the project was successfully funded and flooded our inbox with requests for commentary.  It opened up with the trailer below, and revealed more info and characters as it reached funding goals.

Now, as you can see the cast game has a very diverse cast both in terms of demographics, and in quality of attire.  

While overall it’s easy to see why so many people are getting excited about this, a couple of major issues jumped out at me.  So, for now, I’m going to address the matters that are specific to BABD in very broad strokes.

(Obviously this is based entirely off the crowdfunding campaign, since the game isn’t released yet)

Things that are awesome, specifically related to the blog:

These things are not awesome:

  • Phoebe’s outfit seems to be ridiculously sexualized, as though to compensate the audience for her being bulky in size
  • Anja’s transformation in the in game footage doesn’t seem anywhere near as intimidating or powerful, rather more of a cutesy palette swap
  • Qadira doesn’t appear on the line-up above because she was one of the last characters to be revealed.
  • Conventional sexy ladies seemed to be prioritized up the front of the line-up, to the extent Thorani’s gets dangerously close to the women as reward trope.
  • Pretty much all the guys have weapons and/or obvious martial abilities while Thorani, Yan, Phoebe, Zahra and Nuna (ie most of the female early release Incarnations) look support or non-combative roles
  • I have no idea what is going on with Yan’s costume… it looks suspiciously like like a Playboy Bunny outfit.

So overall, there’s some really cool stuff and I can really see why many people are super hyped up for this game, but in the context of the issues this blog examines, there are some big problems here.

Some of them might get changed before release, but a lot of them are also with how they choose to pitch this game.

– wincenworks

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We’ve had a few people contact us with great excitement to let us know about Illaoi, the Kraken Priestess – and I was initially reluctant to look at any design by Riot that could potentially involve tentacles.  After all, they are basically the go-to for the creatively bankrupt seeking to produce “sex sells” fantasy artwork.

But now I look at it and the videos showing her attacks…

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This is what improvement looks like.  While there’s still room for discussion, this is a clear shift away from their old design principles.  And special thanks to @lightlunas for directing us to this gem:

“This isn’t a commonly known fact, but a huge chunk of League’s female characters actually share an identical (or near identical) face and body, and are only differentiated by their hair and clothing.”

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– wincenworks

If by “not a commonly known fact” they mean “public knowledge”…

~Ozzie

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This is why we find it difficult to celebrate Blizzard’s baby steps towards progress – they are already so self-congratulatory about it that they basically gave up before they started.

Okay, yes, baby steps, Blizzard has got a long history of being terrible and a lot unlearning to do.  But they could at least try to show some self-awareness of this.

Dirty Bomb, a game which I feel we have actually tragically under-represented in our positive examples, has managed to incorporate diversity and gear equality without making it a novelty item.  How? By making diversity a genuine priority – that’s why their line up looks more like this:

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– wincenworks

And it’s not only body diversity which seems to be a challenge for female Overwatch characters, so is their AGE!

D.Va is actually the youngest in the whole ensemble (19). Female characters don’t get older than 34 37 (Mercy), while male ones range from 20 (if you count Zenyatta, a robot) or 25 (Junkrat) all the way up to 61 (Reinhardt).

The overall design of D.Va is perplexing on so many levels, too. What new is she supposed to contribute? Yet another young, thin, conventionally pretty woman in a catsuit… something the game (and the industry as a whole) so totally lacked before! Even her silly pseudonym rubs in that she’s a diva. 
The idea of a Korean professional gamer-turned-mecha pilot is very cool (even if the backstory rips off Evangelion/Pacific Rim), but why make her look so generic… and paint her mech pink? 

My most optimistic guess: one of many Blizzard’s Creepy Marketing Guys saw Zarya and said “So, we’re doing female tanks now? Okay, but next one is gonna be the SEXY tank! And make her more PINK!”

~Ozzie

more on Overwatch | more on Blizzard

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re: this post on double standards of body type diversity in SMITE and Overwatch

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cited: our first post about Zarya

(green)

CLEARLY, Zarya can not be a step in the right direction AND a token exception AT THE SAME TIME, because… Uh… It’s so not like she’s literally the only female Overwatch character who is not conventionally pretty*, thin and/or sexualzied, right?

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…right???

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How about “she’s BOTH a token exception and a step in the right direction”, then?

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~Ozzie

Okay… well, if we limit ourselves to just athletes in say… Olympic level condition… this is a sample of the body and features diversity we might expect:

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Given that Blizzard has said they’re making this game to improve representation for women in video games and even address things like “why all the bikinis?”

Zarya is currently the quick “we fixed it” response from a company with a long history of going back on their “fixes”.  They’re preaching that they want to fulfill the desire for diversity – but the sexy purple skinned assassin lady, a robot, a gorilla all got priority over so many types of real people.

Currently they are only vaguely close to meeting their stated goals due to a few isolated, individual characters.  Pretty much all the tokenism alarm bells are ringing loud and clear.

“Much good work is lost for the lack of a little more.“ –  Edward H. Harriman

– wincenworks

*Not to say that Zarya is ugly. She’s still “unconventional” in the safest way possible.

more on character design | more on Blizzard | more on Overwatch

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theworstblogdotgeocities:

lowpolyhighfun:

A friend’s request for a bodily comparison of the gods and goddesses of Smite.

bikiniarmorbattledamage

I’m having a flashback to this Overwatch silhouette comparison (pre-Zarya, the token exception, that is):

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original source: [x]

Eyup. Typical. Men tend to be all shapes and sizes, while women are just slight variations of the same “shapely” figure.

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[x]

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[x]

~Ozzie

With a very few exceptions, pretty much every time I see a game brag about diverse body shapes – I wonder if they hired the same “expert” consultant that Levi’s did:

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– wincenworks

more on double standards | more on character design | more on SMITE | more on Overwatch

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We’ve been noted by several watchers that Blizzard, in response to Overwatch female character designs criticism, added a new heroine to the game’s roster, Zarya.

paganpaladin said:

What are your thoughts on Zarya from Overwatch?

shswildcat59 submitted:

i noticed this wasn’t submitted yet. i could totally be wrong. but Blizzard’s new game Overwatch just released a new character and i think she looks fairly decent. the boob/sleeveless shirt is a bit meh? but hey its probably supposed to be form fitting/Underarmour type shirt so maybe its supposed to look like that http://us.battle.net/overwatch/en/heroes/zarya/

Sas Alexander submitted:

So, I have seen Overwatch mentioned here before, and I just found Blizzard added 2 new characters to the game. One of them is Zarya, a muscular, Russian woman in a pretty cool armor. And why? Because the fans asked for diversity! She still have a booblate, but it’s at least a progression.

kureijiatisuto said:

I’m curious if any of you have seen the new female character announced for Overwatch. Her name is Zarya. She isn’t perfect, but I think it’s a step in the right direction. Thoughts?

Gotta admit, she looks glorious. Not as glory-ous as Joe Keatinge/Sophie Campbell Glory, but close, and we sincerely hope she’s a start for more genuine body diversity among Blizzard’s heroines.

Still, why the boobplate? And why couldn’t they do this in the first place, without the need to be called out on bingo-worthy designs and the disturbing gender dimorphism in Overwatch?

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With Blizzard’s less-than-stellar track record, Zarya is merely a baby step. A step in the right direction, but nonetheless a baby step.

~Ozzie

In isolation, I have to admit those guns alone make her pretty awesome despite the boobplate.  However, much like with another “band aid” female character, Bellona – I can’t help but see a lot of issues with this:

  • Maybe it’s just the haircut, way they’ve stylized her features and the gorget… but I can’t help but think she reminds me of a certain man and if he was a visual inspiration it’s all kinds of problematic.
  • Fans asked for diversity, so they got the muscular Russian, heavy gunner stereotype.
  • All the problems that were in Overwatch before are still there now
  • Blizzard have a history of saying they recognize a problem, they’re going to fix it, making a token effort to look like improving and then going back to their old ways.

If someone promises to do something, delivers trash and then says they’ll fix it – it’s kind of nice if they bring you a little gift… but only if they actually fix what they promised.  Blizzard hasn’t done that, they’ve just done a rush job that’s broken them out of “all women are skinny” mold.

They haven’t gone and fixed the original designs, they haven’t admitted they made some major design mistakes or fixed anything in the line up aside from add a new female character.

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I mean don’t get me wrong… I’m thrilled that they decided to make a female heavy weapons expert and I hope that this helps every studio get over their fear of creating female characters that don’t look like Barbie – but it doesn’t fix any of the other problems, or show any willingness to.

– wincenworks

more Overwatch on BABD | about double standard in Overwatch character design | more about character design on BABD | more about double standards on BABD

edit: Changed Sophie Campbell’s name accordingly in my comment. Thanks to starryeyeddowner for the heads up!
edit 2: fixed the link to above artist’s Glory gallery

~Ozzie