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Developers call out Ubisoft on their stance regarding playable female characters

Bizazedo

Member
I honestly wonder what the reaction would be if they said,

"We've done market studies and the majority of players who buy games in this genre are male. We are catering to them. Period."

No studio would ever officially say this, but I have trouble believing it's not the motivation behind many decisions. That being said, IF it's true (remember I used the word genre), is it acceptable?

i.e, do the customers drive the design? And if so, is that okay?
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
It's disappointing to see a developer take such a position. I want to play as a female character wherever and whenever it make sense that I should be able to.
Please read every single one of my posts that explains the issue. It doesn't make sense here in this game.
 

Yopis

Member
But isn't this being built from the ground up on a tight development schedule?


People have already made up their minds. Most before they even post, or have all the facts, will default to a girls/boys side of an imaginary battlefield.

People dismiss facts to make points about gender such as the gait differences. Hope they find a way to get female assassins in the game but only if they do right. When I cared about the series, that's the toon I used.

Will give Ubi the benifit of the doubt. Think It's wrong to force or shame features on a dev team. They have a good track record that should count for something.
 
Well..here it kind of doesn't make sense that you should be able to The way co-op works in Unit is that at most you would be able to see other people play as female character and it would be just you seeing them like this, they themselves would still play as male from their perspective. With set up like this it kind of does seem like a waste of resources and needless complication to put female model there.

I have no idea what you're trying to say. If I was into Assassin's Creed, I'd just want to play as a girl.
 

Interfectum

Member
I find it both hilarious and disappointing how much shit Ubisoft gets for not being inclusive when some of their plot lines and characters have been some of the most progressive I've seen in gaming. Even subtle things like relationships and family have a genuine feeling to them.

Seems because they can manage to do yearly games everyone just piles on the "lol yearly milk ubi shit lul."
 

Ascenion

Member
I have no idea what you're trying to say. If I was into Assassin's Creed, I'd just want to play as a girl.
You don't get to pick your character. On your screen you are always Arno, the main character. You would only appear as a female to other players in Co-op.
 

Kinyou

Member
I have no idea what you're trying to say. If I was into Assassin's Creed, I'd just want to play as a girl.
The point is that despite the game being a coop game with multiple characters, everyone plays as the male main character. So basically it's like asking for a character like Nathan Drake to be female.
 

sjay1994

Member
it doesn't count because UBISOFT didn't make it a AAA entry in a major console or shout it out from the rooftops and dedicate massive funds for advertising it.

or something like that.

Yeah they did.

5978b_playstation_all_stars_battle_royale_areas_51DmnCeFfCL.jpg


Sony and ubi advertised it as the game you would buy a vita for.
 
You don't get to pick your character. On your screen you are always Arno, the main character. You would only appear as a female to other players in Co-op.
Well that's kinda useless then.
The point is that despite the game being a coop game with multiple characters, everyone plays as the male main character. So basically it's like asking for a character like Nathan Drake to be female.
I don't see why story reasons are preventing them from inserting a female version of the main character that you see.
 

Kuldar

Member
I find it both hilarious and disappointing how much shit Ubisoft gets for not being inclusive when some of their plot lines and characters have been some of the most progressive I've seen in gaming. Even subtle things like relationships and family have a genuine feeling to them.

Seems because they can manage to do yearly games everyone just piles on the "lol yearly milk ubi shit lul."
To be honest they fucked up when they used the ressource card to explain the lack of playable woman.
If they just said that there is only one playable character, the main protagonist Arno, they would avoid a lot of this controversy.
 
Because there are already so many games where you can play as a male. In the majority of games I own the lead is a male and I have enjoyed playing them. I have no problems playing as a male, but I would also like more games centred around female characters. Why is that so hard for you to grasp?



And stop using this ridiculous extreme argument. Nobody is asking for this. It wasn't even implied in my post.
This thread wasn't about having more games centered around women this was about how ubi should make a female playable character cause all they had was male. They obviously didn't design this game with female protagonist in mind so people are condemning them. I say bring on more women in games I don't really care but if games like AC uncharted etc don't have female playable characters its not a reason to condemn a studio.
 

sjay1994

Member
I prefer playing as female characters in video games.

Femshep, Fem Boss, RPG's. If a game lets me be a female I'll take the option. But I don't demand every dev give me the option.

If ubi can't or wont let me be female, thats their decision. It's dissapointing, but I am not up and arms with it.

Also, bizarre how people are calling ubi sexist. The producer on AC:U is a woman.
 

Interfectum

Member
I don't see why story reasons is preventing them from inserting a female version of the main character that you see.

I'd rather have one solid main character than have a developer split their resources to two semi-solid ones. Should I demand Larry Croft be playable in Tomb Raider because I don't want to play a woman?
 

Karkador

Banned
I honestly wonder what the reaction would be if they said,

"We've done market studies and the majority of players who buy games in this genre are male. We are catering to them. Period."

No studio would ever officially say this, but I have trouble believing it's not the motivation behind many decisions. That being said, IF it's true (remember I used the word genre), is it acceptable?

i.e, do the customers drive the design? And if so, is that okay?

"Market studies" is often talked about in these threads, but rarely qualified. It's entirely possible for market research to be done poorly, and with lower quality standards, since market research is usually kept secret and is not peer reviewed or anything like that. So I'm always wondering if it's not a loop feeding back into itself- the product is made for males, the research says males play it more, so let's continue to make it for males.
 
It is really nonsensical that a studio as huge as Ubisoft with hundreds upon hundreds of people working on Assassin's Creed can't hire a voice actress to redub all of the protagonist's lines and create a female model for players to choose from.

Bioware does it and they are a relatively small studio, divided into thirds mind you, that build huge and expansive worlds. Hell even the voice actress for FemShep stated she would love to play a female lead assassin for Ubisoft.

I believe that every game that stars a new protagonist each iteration, like Assassin's Creed or Far Cry should let you choose between a set male character and a set female character. Otherwise you alienate half of your install base and insult them with petty excuses. Shame on you Ubisoft.
 
This thread wasn't about having more games centered around women this was about how ubi should make a female playable character cause all they had was male. They obviously didn't design this game with female protagonist in mind so people are condemning them. I say bring on more women in games I don't really care but if games like AC uncharted etc don't have female playable characters its not a reason to condemn a studio.

Yes, it is about AC, but I was responding to your asinine questions about why people should care etc.
 

Glass Rebel

Member
The memories have never been totally consistent. My playthrough has always been different than your playthrough. The Animus isn't an accurate replaying of the memory, but the limited freedom you've been provided always ensures the same outcome. Why should we expect anything different now?

Abstergo improved the animus so people can relive the same memory at the same time. In order to avoid desynchronization, the animus make them see other people as other characters than Arno. In this memory Arno was working with other assassins, so the animus can change the way these assassins act and remplace them with acts of the other people reliving the memory at the same time.
For a lore explanation of why they are doing that... well... the team work was so important and complex that it was impossible for the animus to do it itself and someone couldn't synchronize with the memory by doing it alone.

What I'm trying to say is, the things the Animus can do are so arbitrary because it's fantasy space science magic. For some reason the Animus can do all sorts of shit but it can't let you see yourself as a woman. You can relive your ancestor's memories through your DNA (although you don't even need that anymore) and 4 people can relive the same person at the same time without causing any inconsistencies. But playing as a woman is where they draw the line. Playing as, I don't know, Annette instead of Arno is where the science magic stops.
 

Galactic Fork

A little fluff between the ears never did any harm...
It's not outlandish, but what's the point? Why do it? You will never see how you look in someone else's game so why would it matter. Plus you're always Arno, looks aside why would you move like a woman as Arno? All the other people see is a skin.

1a) If you see people who aren't Arno on your screen, then it is random assassins from your game world helping you. Having some women models would show that some of the other assassins in the world are women. It matters because it expands the world.

1b) If you see people who all are Arno... That's just stupid.

2a) Your actual character isn't being moved to other people's console. Your character's details are being sent. And the other person's Console generates a character to appear on their own screen. So when your screen displays Arno making the animation Arno_animation_stabbydeath, the other person's screen displays, instead of a male model, a female model making the animation F_Assassin_Animation_Stabbydeath.

2b)Seriously stupid. Arno has some weird memories of going on random assassin missions with 3 other versions of himself.
 
I'd rather have one solid main character than have a developer split their resources to two semi-solid ones. Should I demand Larry Croft be playable in Tomb Raider because I don't want to play a women?

In the Tomb Raider multiplayer you can play as a man, so what's your point? I don't think I've seen anyone in this thread asking for two different playable main characters.

Edit: I meant for playing the entire game with. The co-op is only for specific missions.
 

Kuldar

Member
Well that's kinda useless then.

I don't see why story reasons are preventing them from inserting a female version of the main character that you see.
In the context of Assassin's Creed lore, you are reliving the memory of someone through his/her DNA. So the gender is tied to the DNA of this person. If you reliving the memory of a man, you can't be a woman and vice versa. But they can always come with a change in the lore to allow it. I think they just don't care.

It's funny because, there is multiple texts in AC games and in AC Initiates website about man reliving woman memory and vice versa. Some of them are unconfortable about this and other are ok. I always wondered if it was a meta commentary about the gender of the main protagonist in video game.
 
I'd rather have one solid main character than have a developer split their resources to two semi-solid ones. Should I demand Larry Croft be playable in Tomb Raider because I don't want to play a women?
The female character doesn't have to be in the story, only in playable spaces. You don't even need to acknowledge her. Think Halo 1 and 2 co-op with a second Spartan.

As for Tomb Raider, if it's a co-op mode we're talking about I guess, yeah, but if you had to play as a man in almost every game when you aren't a man, options are a great thing.
Well we don't know the story yet. He might have some specific male issues to deal with.
See above.
 

inm8num2

Member
I honestly wonder what the reaction would be if they said,

"We've done market studies and the majority of players who buy games in this genre are male. We are catering to them. Period."

No studio would ever officially say this, but I have trouble believing it's not the motivation behind many decisions. That being said, IF it's true (remember I used the word genre), is it acceptable?

i.e, do the customers drive the design? And if so, is that okay?

I'd say it's absolutely the reason. Teenage males don't want to play as women. They want to play as overpowered fantasy versions of themselves. Big publishers cater to this because that's where the money is.
 

Yopis

Member
I prefer playing as female characters in video games.

Femshep, Fem Boss, RPG's. If a game lets me be a female I'll take the option. But I don't demand every dev give me the option.

If ubi can't or wont let me be female, thats their decision. It's dissapointing, but I am not up and arms with it.

Also, bizarre how people are calling ubi sexist. The producer on AC:U is a woman.


More glossing over facts to prove a point, terrible way to go about this.
 

Sundown

Banned
I think indies will lead the way to equal, or at the very least, better representation amongst race and gender going forward. It's easy to understand why big publishers like Ubisoft are less willing to take risks when they've invested tens of millions into a game aimed for a certain demographic. Yes, they have released smaller games with female protagonists, and I think they will continue to do so, but I think the day we see a female MC in an Assassin's Creed or Far Cry game is still a long way down the road. It will happen eventually, but it's a slow process - a process I think indies seem to be accelerating, so I have faith one day we will have that.

As far as customisable characters go, yeah, there's little to no excuse for that. C'mon, son.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Hey hey hey, cut Ubisoft a break! They need HD assets of that in order to work! Well fuck.
So you want Ubisoft to reuse animations for a female character in a game that has a completely different rig from the main character in this game. While also ignoring the fact that this game has parkour designed for 1:1 scale and not 1:3 scale like in the past games. Hmm. What a great idea that definitely doesn't have any consequences or repurcussions whatsoever. I think people need a good example of what happens when this is attempted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNbCpZ4WbMI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91BNne988Y4
Watch at your own risk unless you aren't planning on sleeping tonight.
In all seriousness. Can people stop ignoring the fact that this isn't just another AnvilNext engine game where all the original animations come from Connor? Because it doesn't add anything to the discussion other than more misinformation. Also imagine how much work it would take to get that to look even remotely as natural and fluid as a next gen game.
 

Wiktor

Member
In the Tomb Raider multiplayer you can play as a man, so what's your point? I don't think I've seen anyone in this thread asking for two different playable main characters.

Edit: I meant for playing the entire game with. The co-op is only for specific missions.

Ermmm...what? But by asking to play as a woman in Unity co-op you totally are demanding different main character for entire game
 
Tbh, if Ubisoft was actually honest in there answer and just said, they didn't want to make a female character. I'd be okay with that, mostly because they wouldn't take as much heat for it, but once again it opens up that conversation about the industry at least after 30+ years trying to capture all audiences the way intended. They want to make all this money, and bloat budgets but fail to garner interest from all sides of the gender and racial world.

But this is a terrible excuse. The time they spent in making 4 male character models that pretty much are all the same, they could of at least made on female. To make it seem like it so much more expensive to make a female character is kind of lame to me. It's almost like they are saying, in order to make a female, she must be extremely sexy and have very very exaggerated feminine qualities. Even up to sounds like huffing and puffing or women tennis moans. Like really? What's even more sad is, they are one of the biggest gaming companies in the industry and there is absolutely no way they don't have at least a staff of more than 50 women they could of used as models. It's a terrible excuse.

Yes, I firmly believe that if a developer has a vision of what they want their game to look and achieve, we should respect it. However, excuses as to why you couldn't add one character in there that just happens to be a different shade if color and a different gender is really sad.
 
Ermmm...what? But by asking to play as a woman in Unity co-op you totally are demanding different main character for entire game

I mean literally just putting a different skin on a character during co-op missions isn't really asking for much. Not that I'm asking for that, but the idea that it's similar to having a male version of Lara Croft is absurd.
 

Kinyou

Member
The female character doesn't have to be in the story, only in playable spaces. You don't even need to acknowledge her. Think Halo 1 and 2 co-op with a second Spartan.

See above.
I assume that they're trying to integrate the coop seamlessly. They don't want you switching characters, they don't want you to feel like you're now playing a different portion of the game. At least is that how they seemed to approach it with watchdogs and how other players can hack you out of nowhere
 

Ascenion

Member
1a) If you see people who aren't Arno on your screen, then it is random assassins from your game world helping you. Having some women models would show that some of the other assassins in the world are women. It matters because it expands the world.

1b) If you see people who all are Arno... That's just stupid.

2a) Your actual character isn't being moved to other people's console. Your character's details are being sent. And the other person's Console generates a character to appear on their own screen. So when your screen displays Arno making the animation Arno_animation_stabbydeath, the other person's screen displays, instead of a male model, a female model making the animation F_Assassin_Animation_Stabbydeath.

2b)Seriously stupid. Arno has some weird memories of going on random assassin missions with 3 other versions of himself.
On my phone so not the best image but
250px-Assassin's_Creed_Unity_Cover.jpg

from this it looks like they specifically designed 3 assassins for you to be so not random NPCs. You make very good points but again from Ubisoft's standpoint why? I'm not disagreeing with you I'm just asking if you were them why would you put time into additional animations when you could easily just copy Arno's and use random male grunts.
 

enzo_gt

tagged by Blackace
Such a disappointing thread. Assumptions that: resources are infinite "because Ubi", cutscenes are not a factor, they wouldn't inevitably get called out for reusing animation anyways, they didn't have a black female lead in a multiplatform title already, they wouldn't have to remodel customizations and retest pretty much everything Arno-related in the game so there's no funky clipping or other issues, and worst of all that the developer didn't already rationalize it using Arno as the common thread between co-op players. Just a cascade of shoddy arguments and selective ignorance to twist the state of affairs into an outrage for something they are not obligated or necessarily responsible for doing considering the focus on replicating Arno's experience in co-op, which is the bottom line. There's a reason there is only limited aesthetic customization in place already.

Want to play as female characters and don't really care for respecting the replication of Arno's experience in the narrative for each player? Well you'll be glad to know there's undoubtably a standalone MP game coming soon.
 

DarkJC

Member
I'd say it's absolutely the reason. Teenage males don't want to play as women. They want to play as overpowered fantasy versions of themselves. Big publishers cater to this because that's where the money is.

MMOs prove this is not true at all. Tons of teenage males play as women in those games.
 
I assume that they're trying to integrate the coop seamlessly. They don't want you switching characters, they don't want you to feel like you're now playing a different portion of the game. At least is that how they seemed to approach it with watchdogs and how other players can hack you out of nowhere

I dunno, seemed to work perfectly fine in Halo 1 and 2. Wasn't seamless, the second Spartan just disappeared, and players were fine with it. What I'm saying isn't anything radically new.

Keep in mind I'm only taking this position for co-op/multiplayer. If it's a single-player game then it's more understandable, I think.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
But this is a terrible excuse. The time they spent in making 4 male character models that pretty much are all the same, they could of at least made on female.
It's not four different character models. It's the same character in 4 different outfits using different weapons. They were showing off the diversity of the outfits, items, weapons and skill points available for the main character. The only thing that changes on another player's screen is the face. Creating a convincing female would take a lot of work. Emphasis on the word convincing. They're going for a whole new level of quality and prefer that everything look good on the main character instead of one half assed female character. You wouldn't as a girl in the first place so what's the problem here?
 

drotahorror

Member
It is what it is. It sucks but they're not in the game. If no females prevents you from not playing the game then play a game that has females. I've never looked at a game and said "No Doods!?!?!? Fuck it, I'm out!! I've also never said "there's girls!?!? I'm out". Seems like it's getting out of hand tbh.

I've met people that won't play games if it's a female lead.
 

Kinyou

Member
I dunno, seemed to work perfectly fine in Halo 1 and 2. Wasn't seamless, the second Spartan just disappeared, and players were fine with it. What I'm saying isn't anything radically new.

Keep in mind I'm only taking this position for co-op/multiplayer. If it's a single-player game then it's more understandable, I think.
Yeah, I get that it's possible but it simply doesn't seem to fit be their design vision. They don't want to create a split between coop and single player. Other devs have no problem with doing that but here they want to do it differently.
 

sjay1994

Member
Tbh, if Ubisoft was actually honest in there answer and just said, they didn't want to make a female character. I'd be okay with that, mostly because they wouldn't take as much heat for it, but once again it opens up that conversation about the industry at least after 30+ years trying to capture all audiences the way intended. They want to make all this money, and bloat budgets but fail to garner interest from all sides of the gender and racial world.

But this is a terrible excuse. The time they spent in making 4 male character models that pretty much are all the same, they could of at least made on female. To make it seem like it so much more expensive to make a female character is kind of lame to me. It's almost like they are saying, in order to make a female, she must be extremely sexy and have very very exaggerated feminine qualities. Even up to sounds like huffing and puffing or women tennis moans. Like really? What's even more sad is, they are one of the biggest gaming companies in the industry and there is absolutely no way they don't have at least a staff of more than 50 women they could of used as models. It's a terrible excuse.

Yes, I firmly believe that if a developer has a vision of what they want their game to look and achieve, we should respect it. However, excuses as to why you couldn't add one character in there that just happens to be a different shade if color and a different gender is really sad.

Agreed.

This whole animation thing is flimsy.

Even though, AC:U probably has the most complex animations in the series.

img-1-1.gif


The idea that it requires double the work for a female character makes little sense to me. I mean, they have had female multiplayer characters in the past for AC, Aveline used most of Connors animations for liberation (then again, it did look weird since Aveline had Connors brutish sprinting), etc.

So the whole females are harder to animate makes little sense. Not to mention the fact 10 studios are working on this game. Some people on the team could take the load and do it? I'm not upset that there is no female character, but the reasoning behind it is flimsy.

The Far Cry comment makes zero sense because do animations for the player character really matter in a First Person game? The only thing you see are the characters hands or feet.

They should have just said, we don't want to make a female character, or the story didn't call for it.

My guess they said this so they didn't offend anyone.
 

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
I mean literally just putting a different skin on a character during co-op missions isn't really asking for much. Not that I'm asking for that, but the idea that it's similar to having a male version of Lara Croft is absurd.
If this wasn't a next gen game with some of the most complex rigs in the gaming world i'd be inclined to agree with you. However, that's completely false. It IS asking for much due to the complex nature of everything involved. And it's not worth it in the end because the person wouldn't even know that they're playing as a female in the first place.
 

Ascenion

Member
I dunno, seemed to work perfectly fine in Halo 1 and 2. Wasn't seamless, the second Spartan just disappeared, and players were fine with it. What I'm saying isn't anything radically new.

Keep in mind I'm only taking this position for co-op/multiplayer. If it's a single-player game then it's more understandable, I think.
If you played watch dogs its just like that games hacking and tailing. Press a few buttons and bam you stay in your single player world but now another player is either after you or you're after them, but to you they look like any other NPC and vice versa. Once that is over your single player missions just pop back up on the map.
 
The everyone seeing their player as the main character is a much better excuse for why they omitted female models, wonder why didn't they lead with that in their initial answer?
 
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