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Gaming While Black

I've been long waiting for a black woman in a FF game or a JRPG with multiple ones in general. Doubt Square would do it, so looks like I'm on my own for seeing that happen.

Fran_FFXII3.jpg
 
GTA V definitely has some afro hairstyles for Franklin.

Sadly the GTA Online hairstyles are incredibly limited in this area, there's like 1 dreadlocks, 1 cornrows, and then 9 billion straight shiny white people hairstyles.

Yeah, I think I was thinking about GTAO. Back when me and my friend used to play we always wondered when straight up puffy afros were coming, but the hairstyles added every update always seemed to be something silly, outlandish or just not typical black hairstyles. I think Online did have the Bob Ross curly hair perm though, which... is something I guess?
 

BigDes

Member
Except I did watch the whole thing. It's clear that you, however, didn't.

You were wrong in saying that the casting order would've made a difference in the actor's skin color. Druckmann later went on to say that it wouldn't have, and that he wouldn't have changed a thing.



You clearly haven't been following my posts in this thread if you're going to accuse me of being an SJW.

And I'm actually not "set off" at all, you're the one flailing personal insults. Perhaps because you're having a hard time accepting you were wrong on this topic?
He didn't call you an sjw.
 

Reset

Member
Lee is the first to come to my mind.
From Walking Dead? He's black. :I


are a few that come to mind. There are more in gundam stuff as a whole however.

as far as original games I can only think of

Prototype 2: Heller

L4D: Louis, Rochelle, Coach

Pokemon: Kiawe, Olivia, Marshall, Lenora, ORAS!Team Aqua leaders

right now. I think 4 of those were leads or co-lead characters.

By brown, I was talking about South Asians and Middle Easterns.
 
Being a minority as a gamer is rarely fun. I had an NPC call me a maricon (faggot) once and it was really at-odds with the tone of the game so I wanted to have a discussion about it. I was ignored in Gaming and when I posted about it in OT there were dozens of people falling over themselves to shit on me for even pointing it out.

How dare I notice something they didn't? And to have feelings about it too? Fuck me for doing that.
 

RRockman

Banned
From Walking Dead? He's black. :I




By brown, I was talking about South Asians and Middle Easterns.

Sorry, I misunderstood. And You have a point there. I cant think of any that got their own game except possibly Far Cry 4.

The lead was a native from the fictional area Kyrat which is supposed to be located somwhere in India. However I havent played that game at all, so I have no idea if the area and characters were repesented well or were caricatures.
 
Except I did watch the whole thing. It's clear that you, however, didn't.

You were wrong in saying that the casting order would've made a difference in the actor's skin color. Druckmann later went on to say that it wouldn't have, and that he wouldn't have changed a thing.



You clearly haven't been following my posts in this thread if you're going to accuse me of being an SJW.

And I'm actually not "set off" at all, you're the one flailing personal insults. Perhaps because you're having a hard time accepting you were wrong on this topic?

Could've made a difference– could've. You really think had Marlene, Henry and Sam been white, they would've all had black actors cast for those roles? As much as you'd like the takeaway to be "race doesn't matter!", casting doesn't occur in a vacuum and the character will affect the casting to some degree. For example, Troy Baker doesn't have to be a 50 year old to play Joel, but he has to sound like one. He doesn't just get to do whatever voice he wants, so long as it's quality—it has to fit the character.

You've convinced yourself that my original post was "an accusation of racism" because you can't read. You think I called you an SJW because you refuse to/can't read. You think I said Deunkmann would have definitely changed the casting had they decided Nadine was black from the jump because you'll know reading comprehension and you think the depiction of generic spear-chucking, ooga-booga mask-wearing savages in RE5 wasn't racist because you don't know what you're talking about.
 
*sigh*

Maybe because I literally just took his exact sentence and replaced the words with descriptions of the Spanish zombies' appearance & cultural heritage from RE4...thus proving it has nothing to do with racism?

Did you play either of these games? Because holy shit, these two situations are so obviously different it's fucking insane to me anyone would actually make this comparison in good faith. I love the fuck outta RE5 but its handling of an African setting is atrocious.

The bulk of the people down with RE5s depiction of Africa have never stepped foot in an African country.
 

Catalix

And on the sixth day the LORD David Bowie created man and woman in His image. And he saw that it was good. On the seventh day the LORD created videogames so that He might take the bloody day off for once.
I mean, a lot of this is potentially thanks to the Disney source material, and beyond that the cultural undertones that cast light as good and dark as evil.

Making the heroes lighter/whiter and the villains darker/blacker was and largely is standard practice, with all the attendant grubbiness that perpetuates.
Dark skin signifying a person's evil nature is a bullshit concept that shouldn't be perpetuated. There's no excusing it's blatant occurences in modern media.

Using the color of a character's outfit to symbolize their moral alliance is perfectly fine. But using a character's skin tone to do the same thing? That's just fucked up. The fact that it's being done so casually in a high profile AAA franchise like Kingdom Hearts is even more fucked up.
 

BigDes

Member
"You clearly haven't been following my posts in this thread if you're going to accuse me of being an SJW"

Either this means you believe they called you the dreadful SJW and therefore shows you misread their post

Or

Its a complete nonsequitor of a response that makes zero sense as an answer to the original post in question.
 
Guys wtf, are you serious. Fran is literally a take on first tweet found in OP and the second. Also as someone brought up a very sexualized female of color.


The picture of Fran was in response to the request of a black woman in a Final Fantasy game. Now, don't take that as a "you should be happy with this ONE black female character!" response, because that's not at all what is being conveyed.

That being said, are there any females (of any shade) in the Final Fantasy franchise that are not "sexualized"?
 
Yeah, the representation is pretty awful. I usually just end up making a female character...

White Knight Chronicles was pretty good though, little under the radar game I really like the character creator in it.
 

Striker

Member
Yeah, I think I was thinking about GTAO. Back when me and my friend used to play we always wondered when straight up puffy afros were coming, but the hairstyles added every update always seemed to be something silly, outlandish or just not typical black hairstyles. I think Online did have the Bob Ross curly hair perm though, which... is something I guess?
They didn't have much at all really until some updates were added. There are around seven total cornrow styles, dreads, high top fade, and the Bob Ross puffy curls are there. Shaved head is a basic hairstyle for everybody but it's just one, generic getup. There should be more of those, and there should be long hairstyles too (none currently).
 

BigDes

Member
The picture of Fran was in response to the request of a black woman in a Final Fantasy game. Now, don't take that as a "you should be happy with this ONE black female character!" response, because that's not at all what is being conveyed.

That being said, are there any females (of any shade) in the Final Fantasy franchise that are not "sexualized"?
Yes, quite a number of examples. Aerith, eiko, the kids from ffiv etc.
 
Could've made a difference– could've. You really think had Marlene, Henry and Sam been white, they would've all had black actors cast for those roles? As much as you'd like the takeaway to be "race doesn't matter!", casting doesn't occur in a vacuum and the character will affect the casting to some degree. For example, Troy Baker doesn't have to be a 50 year old to play Joel, but he has to sound like one. He doesn't just get to do whatever voice he wants, so long as it's quality—it has to fit the character.

You've convinced yourself that my original post was "an accusation of racism" because you can't read. You think I called you an SJW because you refuse to/can't read. You think I said Deunkmann would have definitely changed the casting had they decided Nadine was black from the jump because you'll know reading comprehension and you think the depiction of generic spear-chucking, ooga-booga mask-wearing savages in RE5 wasn't racist because you don't know what you're talking about.

You just continue to put words in my mouth for God knows what reason. Maybe because (as I suspected earlier) you're really taking your fallacy in this discussion personally.

  1. It's funny how you stand behind "could've" in one sentence, only to switch to "would've" in the next. Review your English: one's a conditional, the other's an absolute (we'll come back to this, you make the mistake later as well).
    There are tons of things that "could've" happened in TLOU's or U4's casting. What I do know for sure is that Druckmann said he "wouldn't" have changed a thing about U4's. So there's your answer.
  2. I never said the words "an accusation of racism" and don't think "race doesn't matter," you should really learn what putting things in air-quotes means. And also work on reading comp.
    I said that Naughty Dog's casting of Nadine wasn't racist as many assumed it was. And that RE5's depiction of zombies wasn't suddenly racist just because it had black people doing largely similar things as the Spanish zombies in RE4.
  3. Sounds like you could also use some education on what the word "if" means. It's a conditional statement. Not an absolute like you're incorrectly saying it is.
  4. Neil's last name isn't spelled "Deunkmann." Maybe learning to read might be too much for you. Start with spelling.
 

dottme

Member
I'm just going to assume you don't see many "black people" where you're from.

I didn't realize you have to have a certain "darkness" to be considered "black".

This is just reminding me how some people complain in Europe.
-> when they are in Europe, they are discriminated because they are too black
-> when they are in Africa, they are discriminated because they are too white.

So they don't know if they are white or black at the end:(
 

RedFury

Member
The picture of Fran was in response to the request of a black woman in a Final Fantasy game. Now, don't take that as a "you should be happy with this ONE black female character!" response, because that's not at all what is being conveyed.

That being said, are there any females (of any shade) in the Final Fantasy franchise that are not "sexualized"?
Aerith and Ramza
Jk
 

RRockman

Banned
The picture of Fran was in response to the request of a black woman in a Final Fantasy game. Now, don't take that as a "you should be happy with this ONE black female character!" response, because that's not at all what is being conveyed.

That being said, are there any females (of any shade) in the Final Fantasy franchise that are not "sexualized"?

I don't think Selphie (FF8) was nor Garnet (FF9). There's still Yuffie (FF7), and Terra (FF6) as well. I know that there many girls in their first appearance weren't all that sexualized that changed later on, like Yuna and Rikku (FF10, 10-2) and Penelo (FF12, FF12RW) for sure. But there should should still be a sizable anount of female playable characters that aren't sexualized.
 
I don't think Selphie(FF8) was nor Garnet(FF9). There's still Yuffie(FF7), and Terra (FF6) as well. I know that there many girls in thier first appearence weren't all that sexualized that changed later on, like Yuna and Rikku (FF10, 10-2) and Penelo (FF12, FF12RW) for sure. But there should should still be a sizable anount of female playable characters that aren't sexualized.


Yep. I'm pretty sure at this point, SE has portrayed most of the 8-bit/16-bit differently in CGI.

If we consider NPCs, well....that's a different story.
 

BigDes

Member
Let me restate the question so we can steer clear of pedantic bullshit:

Are there any WOMEN in the FF series that are not "sexualized"?

You've got 1 point for Aerith so far.
Ok

Looks like we've got the unnecessarily hostile twins in the thread at the moment.
 
Did you play either of these games? Because holy shit, these two situations are so obviously different it's fucking insane to me anyone would actually make this comparison in good faith. I love the fuck outta RE5 but its handling of an African setting is atrocious.
I've played both, from start to finish, multiple times.

The two situations aren't obviously different, but you're welcome to think anything is 'fucking insane' that you'd like.

The bulk of the people down with RE5s depiction of Africa have never stepped foot in an African country.

Proof, please.
 

BigDes

Member
Thing with FF is that while it does feature without a lot of non sexualized female characters they all seem to fall into the mother, maiden, whore, crone tropes.
 
Let me restate the question so we can steer clear of pedantic bullshit:

Are there any WOMEN in the FF series that are not "sexualized"?

You've got 1 point for Aerith so far.

Quistis, Agrias, Meliadoul, Rafa, Penelo, Rinoa (don't remember anything explicit with her, even her ball dress isn't bad), Freya, Faris, I personally like Fang, but some people might not like the tribal Sarong look. Dunno if it would count to your definition, Garnet isn't really sexy but Zidane is the one who actively crushes on her and cops a feel, she doesn't do anything sexual herself.
 
You just continue to put words in my mouth for God knows what reason. Maybe because (as I suspected earlier) you're really taking your fallacy in this discussion personally.
[/LIST]

Ah.

Now we've reached the key point, the best part.

"You're all the racists/bigots and are attacking me".

Hmm.

Hmmmmm.
 

BlackJace

Member
Pokemon has been getting better slowly. However, I was pretty fuckin disappointed to see that the only ethnically black hairstyle were cornrows. Give me a fade or curls one day pls
 
Yikes. Seems your ability to use air-quotes and comprehend reading properly are just as horrible as Spring-Loaded's.

Seek help.

Constantly telling people they can't read, insulting them, deriding their intelligence for even having the sheer temerity to disagree with you. Then lashing out when people call you on it and throw something in return.

Nah I think I'm good.
 
Constantly telling people they can't read, insulting them, deriding their intelligence for even having the sheer temerity to disagree with you. Then lashing out when people call you on it and throw something in return.

Nah I think I'm good.

Interesting that you're directing this only to me & not Spring-Loaded, whose done all three of those things in this thread multiple times (not in return, btw).

Something tells me your problem isn't with those things, but with me.

Am I right?
 
Interesting that you're directing this only to me & not Spring-Loaded, whose done all three of those things in this thread multiple times.

Something tells me your problem isn't with those things, but with me.

Am I right?

This is what he said:

In the very video you linked, Druckmann says they cast Bailey, THEN chose to make Nadine a black South African person after he saw one of his concept artists depiction. Perhaps watch the evidence you're providing before posting. Maybe learn how to recognize an "accusation of racism" and without perceiving it as some personal attack.

Druckmann admits they cast the actor before finalizing the character's appearance. He says that any person can play any character, and that doesn't preclude hiring black actors for their black characters like they've done in TLoU. Not sure what about "finalizing a character first can inform casting" set you off, unless you're one of those Social Injustice Warriors and the mere existence of these discussions hurts your feelings.

Very clearly telling you that he's not attacking you no attempting too.

This is what you said

Except I did watch the whole thing. It's clear that you, however, didn't.

You were wrong in saying that the casting order would've made a difference in the actor's skin color. Druckmann later went on to say that it wouldn't have, and that he wouldn't have changed a thing.



You clearly haven't been following my posts in this thread if you're going to accuse me of being an SJW.

And I'm actually not "set off" at all, you're the one flailing personal insults. Perhaps because you're having a hard time accepting you were wrong on this topic?

Completely missing the point as to what he's saying completely.

Not only that, you told me to "seek help" which is oh so very charming.
 
Very clearly telling you that he's not attacking you no attempting too.

He clearly was "attempting" to attack me with phrases like "Maybe learn how to recognize an "accusation of racism" and without perceiving it as some personal attack" and "unless you're one of those Social Injustice Warriors and the mere existence of these discussions hurts your feelings."

If you don't see that, then again, please seek help for your reading comprehension.

Completely missing the point as to what he's saying completely.

Fantastic sentence.

Not only that, you told me to "seek help" which is oh so very charming.

I did, and explained why above. A 3rd grade teacher might tell you the same.

And you dodged my direct question to you, which is very telling. Tell me, why are you so bothered by me?
 
I did, and explained why above. A 3rd grade teacher might tell you the same.

The fact that you're seemingly incapable of having any dialogue without turning it into an all out attack on you and lashing out with insults is why I didn't answer your "question". Calling people idiots, yes, that's what you are doing, is not conducive to any discussion or dialogue, you're making a conscious effort to make this thread about YOU.

Attacking people's sentence structuring, reading comprehension, grammatical formatting and syntax, et al is the oldest internet trick to say "lol I'm so smart why aren't they all as smart as me".

I'm not indulging your effort to shit up yet another thread positing the issues people see in gaming with representation with making it about yourself.

Have a nice day.
 
Clearly not. He was shooting white zombies, not people.

So, then, would a black man shooting black zombies in Africa been okay?

*eyeroll*

I thought you were making comparison regarding how can black people can be offended with Resident Evil 5 and minimized their feelings with Spanish people from Spain . No eyerolling here, I might just read what you previously said wrong.
 

yunbuns

Member
tumblr_inline_odjvk2b7Wc1t3082v_540.png


As such a huge fan of this series this one hurts the most. What makes it even worse is that if we do get a brown/black woman in FF, she'll probably be a stereotype.

Does Fran from FFXII count?
doesnt Fran(FF12) count or is she not black ?( i've always thought her that way but i wouldnt know others viewpoint on her. ..... outfit doesnt help though)

She's literally not even human? Why would she count as a black woman?

Real talk, Kingdom Hearts be pissing me off with this type of shit.

The series' main villain just happens to be the darkest skinned mofo around. Even weirder, any host body that he permanently possesses also magically contracts his distinctive deep tan. Because how else can you depict the ultimate harbinger of DARKNESS? It's only natural, right?

Meanwhile the dozens of newly created do-gooders throughout the series are all fair skinned, often blue eyed, youths. I don't know what Nomura was truly getting at with these various design decisions, but it's disappointing how it all comes across.

This has been bothering for a long time too but no one bats an eye about it. I really hope we have Tiana, Pocahontas, or even the Muses from Hercules to balance this shit out.
 
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