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mornelithe on 01 April 2016
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Wright said:
mornelithe said:
Still don't understand the obsession with taking already established characters and twisting them to suit a social narrative. I would think creating new characters with new stories would be something the LGBT community could get into more. It just feels like a shallow attempt at being inclusive imo.

And why exactly is it a heterosexual woman, telling a dev, what a community she isn't part of wants? Wouldn't the appropriate thing be to hire LGBT artists/writers/etc... to create what they want? Dunno, it doesn't impact me greatly, because I don't really play Zelda games anymore...but, it doesn't come across as very genuine to just co-opt existing characters.

 

It's not a social narrative. It's the fact that Nintendo seems stuck with the "standard male save-the-day hero" instead of, you know, acknowledging there are diverse people that could take his place instead. Linkle was a start, now they have to keep that path, but doesn't seem they want to, judging what we know about ZeldaU.

It IS a social narrative, and let's be crystal clear here, everytime an LGBT, or PoC character is written you get the avalanche of 'written by a white dude' (even though, you know, where Nintendo is concerned, the vast majority were written by PoC) critiques.  So, hire LGBT workers who can create realistic characters, they can relate to.  Nothing wrong with that.  But, you're not exactly giving that LGBT individual any kind of freedom when you force them to wrap Hyrule around it.  A new world, new universe etc... gives them the freedom to create whatever they want to.  Instead of, you know, trying to make it automatically profitable by using the Zelda name.

As far as the 'standard male save the day hero' blah blah blah, seriously, broaden your horizons, there are thousands of different types of games and stories out there (Hi, Metroid called, and says your narrative is shite).  Just like there are with books (and yes, they still write books where a guy saves the day), and movies (same).  Somehow, there's room for all to co-exist in books and movies, but not in games, eh?  In games a guy saving the day, well goddamn we have to do something about that right?  Not, you know, create our own unique characters, we need to take everyone else's away.  Now that's what I call inclusive, that's what I call adding something positive to the industry.

As I said, hire LGBT writers/directors etc... give them free reign.  And you can try to explain it however you want, but I'll never understand taking an established character and wrapping a narrative around it, other than for what it is.  Trying to get the game to be profitable before it even launches by latching onto an established name.