… It should have never been in the game to begin with; that was the point I was trying to make.
I agree with you. I’ve long thought that epilepsy warnings on games are a slap in the face. “We’ve identified there’s a problem, but we’re not going to do anything about it.” Meanwhile, there are three different colorblindness modes that are pure ease of use options, not safety options.
If they had designed that sequence with epilepsy in mind, they could have come up with something that was as visually delightful without being dangerous. By ignoring it, they had to quickly patch in a completely humdrum visual effect over it.
But we’re off-topic here.
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I’m aware; in fact, Epic gave me the entire series for free. But they arent FPS RPGs.
It is equally obvious and reasonable to expect you to use the vast resources available at your fingertips to research the things you don’t understand about a widely oppressed minority.
If you have an actual interest in learning about the community, you’ll find that folks are all too interested to talk.
If you don’t want the burden of interacting with a human, there’s a near infinite amount of trans opinions online you can read to get a gestalt about the problems these people face in society.
“Other people are also bigots” is not a great defense for your argument.
“Other issues exist, and so we can conclude that this issue are not important” is also not a great argument.
“Other developers might be put off by upset people! Who will think of the future developers?” is, like the others, a terrible argument.
Given that one of the knockout titles from 2020, Hades, has explicitly trans themed issues in it, I don’t think “developer fear” is what’s at play here either. I think the studio is using the plight of an oppressed minority as a cynical tool to boost their online reach. “The only bad news is not being news”, and It’s gross.
This sounds exactly like, “I don’t have a racist bone in my body” or “I don’t care what color you are, blue, purple, pink, whatever.” Your comments above really do make you sound like you do have some internalized transphobia.
It’s going to be an unpopular opinion, but I think it’s fine to fear things we don’t understand.
We fear the unknown or the unfamiliar. What we do with that transphobia is a whole different matter. Just listen to folks when they tell you what is important to them, and believe them when they say it is important, even if it seems trivial and dumb too you.
That’s really all there is to it. Listen to people. Believe them.
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My two cents that no one asked for:
CD Project Red tried to cash in on “wokeness” by pretending to GAF about trans people by “representing” them at all and hyping that in marketing, then some fans are surprised some trans people don’t particularly like the representation.
This triggers some folks who aren’t trans for … reasons… and they feel the need to tell trans people how they should act. Yet “be grateful for what we give you or else go fuck yourselves” though is kind of not a rational or intelligent argument itself either.
I have a hard time feeling bad for CDPR because I’m 100 percent sure they’ll be fine. Like… just fine. What I don’t understand is people who aren’t trans trying to explain what trans people need to do to get respect from them. That’s not how that even works and you know it. Don’t believe me? What are any of you who feel that way going to do for me personally to earn my respect? Probably not much right? If I give you a list will you obey it? Probably not, because you don’t believe you should have to. In fact expecting that would probably make me seem obnoxious and entitled. And yet somehow people have that expectation of trans people and still perceive them as being entitled if any of them say “hey this looks like the same old shit with a different bow stuck on it.” Well… that’s the point isn’t it? That’s how marginalization works.
Sometimes I think that by focusing on “representation” media and entertainment companies have really managed to have their cake and eat it too for a long long time when it comes to balancing sales numbers in a fearful and bigoted society with advantageous marketing that plays to narratives of some kind of vague social benefit and edgy progressivism. But I really don’t know what to make of that thought beyond that…
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I really doubt they are being intentionally transphobic. Everyone on there is oversexualized not just trans. They even bothered putting an option to change your genitalia despite the gender appearance. Honestly, I rather have an oversexualized transgender ad than the stereotypical man in a dress cleche often seen in media used to humiliate us. To show this is actually inclusive rather than non inclusive. To think that we are accepted enough to be attractive and not this horrible monster out to get you to me is inclusive. Nit picking everything makes people think your only there to complain. It is true we should stand against injustice towards any community, but not to the point when people can’t fend for you especially when they are trying too in the first place.
I think even this is a charitable interpretation. My impression is that CDPR decided to use the body mod elements of cyberpunk as an excuse to fetishize trans bodies, rightfully took a lot of shit for it, and then made half-assed and clumsy attempts to cover for it by putting a trans flag sticker on some cars and … not much else.
From the sound of it, CDPR also has a racism problem too.
To be clear to the people in this thread for whom this point apparently still isn’t landing: it’s not necessarily bad to lean on tropes, even bad ones, when creating art. But if you’re going to put bad tropes and stereotypes in your game without the game’s narrative dissecting them, then you’re just uncritically perpetuating them, and that’s bad.
(Also, if you’re going to insist that video games are art, you can’t have that without them also being critiqued as art the same way as movies, TV shows, novels, etc. It’s a whole package, and if you don’t like what critical analysis of your games is revealing, maybe don’t yell at the critics…)
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Ignoring real problems because they don’t affect you personally doesn’t make those problems ‘just magically go away.’
Trans people say it’s problematic and transphobic; I tend to listen to them over someone with no skin in the game.
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As @alahmnat said above everything gets critiqued and nothing is just a game.
Not if it hurts people, whoever they are.
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I transitioned 7 years ago. You don’t know me.
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That’s always a bullshit excuse.
Nothing is fabricated out of thin air; every book, every comic, every game, every single pastime that we invent is based on factors that exist in the real world, whether they are consciously or subsconciously represented.
Newsflash:
I don’t want to.
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And you still don’t think this game is insensitive in creation and delivery?
Fair enough. But I hugely disagree.
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I did many multiples of 7 years ago. I would suggest that appreciating one transphobic depiction because it’s not as awful as one you’re more familiar with is a low bar. And asking for so little is like saying this guy hit me with a belt - but this guy only slaps me - see - that’s progress.
We deserve better.
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Assuming that claim is true… you know how there are self-hating Black folks who go out of their way to work against their own interests?
Seems to me that every marginalized demographic probably has an equivalent, including the Trans community.
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Newsflash you want everyone else to know you and your importance. Why should they if you don’t give them the time of day? I am not saying this from a point of hatred but the shear understanding that I rather be accepted than feared. I have been abused on many fronts. Daily yearly. Living the streets. I even had a guy told me that they liked me because I was fetish because I could not get pregnant and it made me sad.This game was supposed to be anti corp thus the ads. Just sayin
I found the opening scenes of A Fantastic Woman to be a lovely depiction of a romance and trans women being depicted as desired and desirable - and respected.
I’d love to see a great rom-com with one of us as the lead. Do you have anything similar to suggest viewing?
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There was that web series a few years back, set in I think San Francisco, that followed the lives of multiple trans women. It was harsh, funny and sweet and best of all featured actual trans actors!
Shame on me for not being able to remember the title.
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My bad, it was Los Angeles.
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I never saw Dirty, Sexy Money - have you?
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