There's nothing wrong about games appealing to their audiences. That is just Creating Things 101. 

There's also nothing wrong about desiring diversity in creative spaces. Bringing in a diverse range of people with a diverse range of experiences can help writing to better express those different viewpoints through their characters, allowing art to better provide a wider breadth of experiences. 

Being woke means you prefer to read books, instead of burning them.
The Woke rubbish is just that... Rubbish. I.E. People without a brain-cell to think for themselves and just wish to follow all the other conservative sheep rather than put forth a genuine rebuttal/argument.



Always classed myself as a centrist... I support the free market, working man, strong border/immigration... But also support people not being assholes to each other and treating each other differently. I.E. LGBTQI, womens rights etc'.
In short, I don't care about political ideology, I care about the particular argument set forth and will opt for whatever argument is most beneficial for the benefit of all.

For those who wish to see where their political alignment falls check out the political compass here: https://www.politicalcompass.org/
But do note... There are differences between how far left/right you are perceived on a per-nation basis, the USA tends to be a step over to the right compared to Australia (And likely most of Europe) for example.

Almost anything they don't like involving women or minorities in lead roles is woke now. 

And the anti-woke crowd are demanding safe spaces in gaming.
They have become the SJW's of the 2019's.

There's no equivalent to the anti-woke community on the other side.
The "woke crowd" are not review bombing games for having male/white/straight leads. 
I don't recall a single thread complaining about a white male lead. But we've easily had hundreds of threads/articles complaining about females, etc.

These over-reactions are not at all proportional to any issues that are actually there. (And there are some)
This is mainly because grifters want money from engagement. They will invent problems with rage-bait, so they're not missing out on that sweet $.
This got notably worse after Twitter allowed monetization.

And now it's gotten to the point where "Ciri is woke".

Example of someone that's been drinking too much of the anti-woke grifter brain rot from Grummz (who scammed his community out of $300 000) and the usual suspects:

The problem is constantly making accusations with no actual evidence. It's a waste of time for everyone.
A series with 3 games as a male lead = perfectly fine.
1 game as a female lead = "woke"

*Slight ending spoiler*

Witcher 3 was largely set up for Ciri to be the next Witcher.
And even if it wasn't, that would be fine too.

There are people who simply prefer female leads (me), and 1 out of 4 games is less than fair. If we get to 4 vs 3, then there would be some validity to your wishes for another male protagonist.

It's fine if someone says "this isn't for me" and leaves it at that. But unfortunately that's not all you guys are doing.

Yes. This is what my original post said. I just edited to be clearer. Of course it’s a problem for people to automatically assume something is woke because there’s a female or minority lead, BUT can you blame them? The amount of money that goes into DEI is insane, and  a lot of the big investors in the world right now are requiring DEI if a project wants to be funded, which is wrong. 

If they are not the majority they sure are the ones making the loudest noise on the net.  I have not seen any game that has stuck to those basic references called woke. What I have seen a lot is that any game that goes against those references get labeled woke in a heartbeat and you only have to go to just about every internet forum to see the word thrown around like a giant hammer.

I'd have to blame them because of 1.) how often it turns out to be unsubstantiated and they don't learn from their mistakes, and 2.) how often it causes problems for people getting caught in the crossfire when they just want to have fun discussing videogames, and the thread gets derailed.

This is from the same crowd that say "keep politics out of my entertainment", but they're the ones bringing it into everyone else's entertainment (disccussions).

I understand if you feel (whether its correct or not) that the devs did this to you somehow by putting something into a game, and that you want to respond to that.
But the people in gaming communities didn't do that. They're not involved. But they're always the ones paying the price when the threads get derailed.

I'll give an example of something that happened here (and elswewhere online).

When Street Fighter 6 was revealed, all the characters had design reworks for their outfits.
Cammy already wore next to nothing (a leotard). You can't exactly go from that to wearing less. So naturally now she has leggings.
Likewise, Zangief who only wore shorts before now wears pants as well.

Immediately people were complaining all over the internet about Capcom "going woke". Including on this forum.
Just hours later it was revealed that Cammy's original outfit is actually unlockable for free. Same for every other character.

Whops, right?
The responsible thing to do here is to learn from this and not jump to conclusions next time.
But no apology. And they just throw spagetti at the wall next time as well, and hope it sticks.

Grifters perpetuate this problem because their primary concern is making money from this.
That includes beating others to the punch with the ragebait, so they will say things that are wrong even when they would know this by simply making a 10 second Google search first.

Another example:

He's insinuating that the person on the right is the new handler. But that's incorrect.

He could have just gone to the official website, and clicked on Characters before making that comment.
He at least admitted to his mistake (only after getting community noted and torched in the comments) but the damage had already been done at that point. And he got his engagement quota from both posts.

But usually there's no definitive evidence one way or the other.
The percieved problem for the anti-woke crowd becomes a lot bigger than it really is when people can monetize from it.
I think the Ciri thing is an example of how being in that bubble can easily warp people's perception.

She's older.
It's a new engine with more realistic models.
And she's set up in W3 to be the natural successor to Geralt.

A good game is never going to become bad from having "woke content.
Nor can a bad game become good from having it.
It can make the game a bit better or worse. Like any other factor.
But a lot more important things go into what makes a game good.

It's me, or many of this "supposed cultures accepting a third genre as normal" are basically using it in Gods, on trying to explain actual known genetic problems o simply the homosexual conduct?

For exemple: A dual-genered god in an old culture is NOT a third accepted genre. Is a dual-gendered God: masculine and femenine in one. Where is the third? Some cultures did that, but is not that strange.

Indians trying to explain 2000 years ago the hermafroditism, or an ambiguos genitalia, is not a third genre, is just Indians trying to understand why 0,02% of new born humans have that problem, and in any way can be considered a new genre because is absolutely residual and it does not represent any change in the human reproduction system. Is just a genetic problem that is present and known in humans (as in another mammals) like other genetic-base problems well known, as for example, Siamese twins (also historically adored in some cultures as some special beings or even Gods, and don't tell me they are a third genre).
There is also the Klinefelter syndrome, or 47,XXY cromosome. A genetic syndrome that has to be tested to be diagnosed. That's NONE a third genre. 
As any other kind of malformations and/or genetic problems during the conception or pregnancy, has to be treated as genetic problems during the gestation.

The Naples case... seems to me just an homosexuality "recognition" by that city... in the best case. Homosexuality can be persecuted (or celebrated) in some places, but it is NOT a sexual genre: is just a sexual preference by individual beings, even in animals. It is well known since ancient times (for example in the Old Greece), and many many cultures knew and in some cases recognized its existence (denying it is stupid, as it is stupid trying to treat and change those people in its personal sexual impulse preferences). BUT in any case you cannot consider those individuals as a third genre. They are obviously not. They are male or female. Just that. If you want to speak about "eunucs"... well, they are just castrated males, normally by medieval political and personal reasons inside a monarch's court (common in arab world, but also present in other places like China or Europe). Italians used to castrate pre-puber young male children (normally children from poor families) and called them "castrati", to use them as opera "female voice" singers until XIX century. Why? because italians for some stupid reason forbid women to sang in the opera. Naples was, precisely, one of the cities were castrati existed. That "tradition" is in fact, very related to Catholic church tastes, a very important religion in Italy as thay have the catholic headquarters (the Vatican) since the old roman times.  Castrati and other eunucs are, in no way, a good thing to celebrate and much less to see as a third genre.

The Hawaian case, and native american cases... I have no idea about them, maybe Hawai is similar to Indian case, don't know. The native americans believing in more than 100 genres... needs to be very well explained if is true, because it has to be some good explanation about that and "what they understand as a genre". 100 genres in humans are just insane and difficult to defend in a serious way.


So, in the end, I only see maybe 1 (or 2 at max) cultures trying to defend seriously more than 2 genres in normal human live, there. The vast majority, accepting only 2, for physical obvious reasons.

Im only going to mention if you have a problem with grifters, you should absolutely have a problem with DEI. The grifting that is happening right now with “race coaches” and stuff… it’s ridiculous. If you are going to criticize one side for grifting, criticize the other or you aren’t any different from the same people who are making “unsubstantiated” claims. 

So anyway, what I'm getting at when people go around complaining that our sci-fi punk-ass bounty hunter anti-heroine from the distant, space-faring future is not frilly and feminine enough to be a Donald Trump voter's waifu is that it makes me wonder like "What if simply she were male? Would this controversy even exist?". If she were male, would anyone still care if she were "ugly" and "unlikable" instead of a TikTok tradwife? (Which incidentally I don't think she is, but maybe it takes the lens of a lesbian to see the appeal. ) Of course not. No one would even notice because that's how men are very often portrayed in this medium, but it's apparently a form of sexist bigotry to cop an attitude when a woman does it. Views like that feel like a judgment of more than just a game. They feel like judgments of people.

Another critique I've seen objects to the color of our theoretical protagonist's skin on the grounds that it is racist of her not to be white. To put matters in perspective thereon, I'd invite you to try and recall the last commercially successful AAA video game you've ever heard of before that centered specifically on the role of a woman of color. Personally, Tomb Raider games remain the only clear-cut examples of that I can name for you after some 37 years of gaming. That is the depth of the dearth here. And yes, I feel there is in fact merit to telling the stories of more than just one sort of person.

I liked the trailer a lot. Some have compared its aesthetic choices to those of Cyberpunk 2077. I disagree. I was never interested in Cyberpunk 2077. The writing quality here is in an entirely different league and convinces me that this will be a game not beholden to genre cliches. What we could use more of in the future, obviously, is more actual game play footage, but it was just an announcement trailer. Knowing Naughty Dog like we've come to, we should also fully expect some misdirection in some of their trailers and the possibility of there actually being more than one playable character.

I don't believe that holding these opinions makes me "woke". I believe that seriously championing ideas like the defunding or abolition of police departments and the legalization of all drugs and border crossings on racial justice grounds, opposing economic growth as a concept on environmental grounds, those are woke attitudes. If you're an affluent Westerner and your instinctive response to last year's October 7th terrorist attacks on Israel was to decide "Osama Bin Laden was right", that tends to reflect a woke on life. I use the term "woke", in short, to characterize and insult the excesses of left-wing politics as juvenile in nature because it's a juvenile-sounding term that proponents thereof used to embrace. I believe those specifically are the sorts of opinions that were most often being championed by those who used to use phrases like "stay woke". It was something primarily associated with the racial justice movement here in the United States and rooted in the theory of the case that slavery and genocide are the foundations and main legacy of the nation. Critical race theory, colonial theory, this type of thinking.

Valuing and promoting diversity, in other words, isn't the same thing as wokeness in my mind. Active concern for the interests and representation of hitherto or presently marginalized people is simply a liberal idea embraced to one degree or another by essentially the entire political left regardless of faction. I agree with Sundin's sentiments on that: Art is about empathy, and to which end a wide range of different perspectives and backgrounds and stories being told (including some you may not fully agree with) only serves to advance art. Now whether the specific "DEI" formulation and rubric for achieving that is the best one available or not is a fair subject for debate, IMO, but I'm all in favor of broad demographic representation in media, including video games (not least because I deserve to feel seen and respected just as much as you do), and I definitely don't think being a butch woman of color is a form of prejudice and hate.

I mean that doesn't really mean anything when 'woke' 'inclusive' groups want to ban Harry Potter and tried so hard to cancell games like Legacy/Black Myth Wukong/stellar Blade etc...  I am sorry but if you go to university protests they are always trying very hard to cancell lectures from 'right' winged speakers. It is clear they don't want a debate, most just want to play the victim role    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2NAKH8jdgm8