Lae'zel and Shadowheart can be mean sometimes, and it's okay to embrace women in video games like them.
The least important part of a character is their sex.
If Gamers Want More Powerful Women Then Stop Being Afraid Of Them
Submitted 11 months ago by stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to games@lemmy.world
https://www.thegamer.com/baldurs-gate-3-mean-women-female-characters-laezel-shadowheart/
Comments
ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
Minthara, a companion who could previously only be recruited by joining her side and more or less committing genocide on a grove full of tieflings, can now simply be knocked out and talked to at a later point in the game where all of that drama can be ignored.
Minthara was being mind-controlled. When she’s free, she’s still evil but not that evil - she even asks the player character what his excuse for killing the tieflings is (since he wasn’t mind-controlled).
Frogster8@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Nice… A big old spoiler
Cethin@lemmy.zip 11 months ago
Yeah, I blew her the fuck up. I didn’t think she was a companion until I looted her and she had underwear and a backpack. Strangely only companions wear underwear in BG3. I don’t know what’s up with that.
Frogster8@lemmy.world 11 months ago
What…? This isn’t a real issue
Carighan@lemmy.world 11 months ago
I would add another thing to this I wish the author would talk about instead of immediately projecting onto their own prejudices: People generally prefer the “good” option in games.
And I don’t even necessarily mean whatever the game calls Paragon-vs-Renegade. I mean the fact that for a game where you recruit characters to your “camp”, naturally losing characters feels like a fail state. Like you messed something up. As a result, players will intuitively lean to options that present the least “bad outcome”, in this context meaning the less often NPCs leave your camp the better. Recruiting someone is a victory, someone leaving is a defeat. The games present it as such, so it’s no wonder players err towards wanting everyone there.
brsrklf@jlai.lu 11 months ago
I know it’s very hard for me to care about Mass Effect 1 Ashley Williams.
I know she’s supposed to turn good (maybe?) in sequels, but, hey, you’ve got to sacrifice someone at the end of 1, because cheap emotional engagement trick.
May as well send the one-dimensional specist asshole with absolutely no other character trait.
stopthatgirl7@kbin.social 11 months ago
the one-dimensional specist asshole with absolutely no other character trait.
I used to think that about Ashley until I did what I nicknamed my Asshole Run. I was an Adept, so I usually had Ashley and Tali around me. I ended up listening to their elevator conversations, and Ashley treated Tali a lot differently than she did Wrex or Garrus (the ones she saw as a military threat) - she warmed up to her and treated Tali like a little sister. So when Tali died in that run on 3, Ashley was gutted and was crying when you go talk to her afterwards. Seeing her actually have a character arc made me like her a lot more.
Carighan@lemmy.world 11 months ago
I know she’s supposed to turn good (maybe?) in sequels, but, hey, you’ve got to sacrifice someone at the end of 1, because cheap emotional engagement trick.
Yeah but that’s the other thing, that’s how you get gamers to let somebody from their group go: You force an obvious “One or the other”-pick. I can totally see how we as consumers can more readily accept that than we can accept the very understandable part of Karlach leaving as that was not presented right in the moment you made the choice. It didn’t feel like there should not be any Option C at all.
RileyIsBad@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Look, I’m a lesbian, all hot girls intimidate me.
Paradachshund@lemmy.today 11 months ago
Do people actually have a problem with them?
5200@lemmy.world 11 months ago
So the author argues that unlikable characters should be liked because: buzzword, buzzword, woman, buzzword and that the customers are wrong. It’s art, it’s subjective, and that means people can also not like it. If it is indeed the case a vocal group of customers are finding it hard to get into the game because some characters are perceived as badly written, I doubt this is because they are all misogynistic neck-beards.
falsem@kbin.social 11 months ago
Yeah, "people don't like the racist authoritarian because she's a woman" sure is a hot take.