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[100k]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

100k wrote...

Speaking of marketing strategies

Do you guys think ME3 should have an overall theme/feel to it? This was something that Halo 3, Gears 3, and even MGS4 used.

With Halo, the theme was pretty sad and gloomy. Dark and emotional. For almost all of the trailers, an overall feeling of desperate struggle and hopelessness was evoked.

With MGS4, the theme was (in typical Kojima style) very melodramatic, long and elaborate, etc.

With Gears 3, the theme is currently the idea of "brothers to the end".

The thing that they shared was that they all emphasized a series coming to its end.

So, do you think Mass Effect 3 should have something like this? What do you think it should be about? Family? Hopelessly outnumbered? Hope?

I would go with defiance. Outclassed and outgunned by the Reapers, we'll probably lose but I'll be damned if I'm not going to drag as many of those cybernetic sons of ****es with me on the way to hell.

Good idea!

[CulturalGeekGirl]

I'd go with hope.

[Leonia]

Here's the sad thing. You know what it would cost to make up a banner ad featuring both ManShep and FemShep having a conversation with Thane or Garrus, and run it for a week on Girl Genius? $200 or less. What would it cost to do a huge Webcomic push, making campaigns and blanketing a bunch of comics with female main characters for a month? Probably a few thousand dollars. That is nothing. Game companies spend more than that on crudite at the launch party. Would it earn out? I'd be curious to see, but I'd guarantee you'd get more back from it than you get from the crudite.

That really puts things in perspective, doesn't it? And now I am dieing to see some webcomics. Please, Bioware, please?

(the rest of your post is spot on as well, CGG, it's almost like we had the same adolescent gaming experiences and I wonder just how many other girls are in the same boat?)

[Gibb_Shepard]

Go away, you guys already have a 1000+ page thread about this stuff.

I just can't see how the marketing of the game affects you so. Who cares? Seriously. What will be accomplished once female shepard is shown in a trailer? How will this make your life better?

[AngelicMachinery]

Gibb_Shepard wrote...

Go away, you guys already have a 1000+ page thread about this stuff.

I just can't see how the marketing of the game affects you so. Who cares? Seriously. What will be accomplished once female shepard is shown in a trailer? How will this make your life better?

If its such a miniscule thing, why do you seem annoyed that people are asking?

[Leonia]

Gibb_Shepard wrote...

Go away, you guys already have a 1000+ page thread about this stuff.

I just can't see how the marketing of the game affects you so. Who cares? Seriously. What will be accomplished once female shepard is shown in a trailer? How will this make your life better?

I'm guessing you're a man, right? It's not about just markettng for us, we would like to see the industry as a whole change the way it treats female gamers. Bioware could take a few bold steps in the right direction, they've already started with some baby steps in DA2. It's not going to hurt your experience so why are you so annoyed?

Modifié par leonia42, 28 avril 2011 - 06:27 .

[Rurik_Niall]

Again, your problem here is male/female aren't things my mind processes, if they made a Barbie game that was well written, featured great gameplay, and excellent voice acting I wouldn't think twice about buying it, it's a good game I couldn't care less about how or to who it was marketed. And you have to keep in mind games like Mass Effect are largely a niche market. Be honest when was the last time you saw a commercial on TV for a role playing game? You're a lot more likely to see commercials for straight up action games like Halo or Prototype, or even for Japanese menu based strategy games like Final Fantasy, but Baldur's Gate or KotOR? They're pretty much confined to E3 trailers, magazine ads, and word of mouth. E3 trailers are something which are mostly going to appeal to the people who follow the industry and know Bioware's reputation, magazine ads can just show a small image of her next to saying you can customise your Shepard, and word of mouth is just all around the best form of advertisement.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Gibb_Shepard wrote...

Go away, you guys already have a 1000+ page thread about this stuff.

I just can't see how the marketing of the game affects you so. Who cares? Seriously. What will be accomplished once female shepard is shown in a trailer? How will this make your life better?

This isn't about me.

It's about a 16-year-old-girl somewhere who will never know how awesome Mass Effect is, because marketing doens't feel like trying to reach her.

And if she plays Mass Effect, her life will be better, because she will have played Mass Effect.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

Again, your problem here is male/female aren't things my mind processes, if they made a Barbie game that was well written, featured great gameplay, and excellent voice acting I wouldn't think twice about buying it, it's a good game I couldn't care less about how or to who it was marketed. And you have to keep in mind games like Mass Effect are largely a niche market. Be honest when was the last time you saw a commercial on TV for a role playing game? You're a lot more likely to see commercials for straight up action games like Halo or Prototype, or even for Japanese menu based strategy games like Final Fantasy, but Baldur's Gate or KotOR? They're pretty much confined to E3 trailers, magazine ads, and word of mouth. E3 trailers are something which are mostly going to appeal to the people who follow the industry and know Bioware's reputation, magazine ads can just show a small image of her next to saying you can customise your Shepard, and word of mouth is just all around the best form of advertisement.

Let me pick out the key part of my wall of text, and ask you the question: Here, I've cleverly removed gender from the equation.

Say you were a Salarian. And there was a new game out that was Krogan stabbing Salarians while the Salarians babbled incoherently and begged for their lives. If the gameplay was fun, would you want to play it? A game where your race was shown to be stupid, incompetent, and useless? If the end of the game was that all Salarians were dead, and the Turian, Krogan and Asari stood around saying "and now the universe is a better place," would it matter if the gameplay was good? Would you play a game where your race was treated like garbage, when there were other games out there that were just as good, where Salarians were portrayed accurately?

As Salarians, we know there are a lot of games on the market. In some of them, all species in the galaxy are treated fairly. In some of them, certain species are degraded. So it's best to spend our credits on games where we know species are all treated fairly.

If there are two games I can buy, both equally well-writen, and one of them depicts Salarians as a valuable part of galactic life, while the other game portrays them as a race of bumbling busybodies, it's better to spend my credits on the one that treats my race fairly, if the games are both inherently "fun."

Now hopefully the ad campaigns will allow me to see how that particular game treats Salarians.

[Rurik_Niall]

leonia42 wrote...

I'm guessing you're a man, right? It's not about just markettng for us, we would like to see the industry as a whole change the way it treats female gamers. Bioware could take a few bold steps in the right direction, they've already started with some baby steps in DA2. It's not going to hurt your experience so why are you so annoyed?

See, we kind of agree but I think our ideas of the right direction differ. You think they should market things to both genders while I think they should market them to neither gender, we both want the two genders to be equal but the way in which we think it should be done differs. My ideal world neither advertisers nor consumers would give a damn about gender, unless it's a product that only one gender has a real use for like bras or something then gender shouldn't matter.

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

Let me pick out the key part of
my wall of text, and ask you the question: Here, I've cleverly removed
gender from the equation.

Say you were a Salarian. And there was
a new game out that was Krogan stabbing Salarians while the Salarians
babbled incoherently and begged for their lives. If the gameplay was
fun, would you want to play it? A game where your race was shown to be
stupid, incompetent, and useless? If the end of the game was that all
Salarians were dead, and the Turian, Krogan and Asari stood around
saying "and now the universe is a better place," would it matter if the
gameplay was good? Would you play a game where your race was treated
like garbage, when there were other games out there that were just as
good, where Salarians were portrayed accurately?

As Salarians, we
know there are a lot of games on the market. In some of them, all
species in the galaxy are treated fairly. In some of them, certain
species are degraded. So it's best to spend our credits on games where
we know species are all treated fairly.

If there are two games
I can buy, both equally well-writen, and one of them depicts Salarians
as a valuable part of galactic life, while the other game portrays them
as a race of bumbling busybodies, it's better to spend my credits on the
one that treats my race fairly, if the games are both inherently "fun."


Now hopefully the ad campaigns will allow me to see how that particular game treats Salarians.

As long as it's fun I see no reason why not. As a human I dislike a vast majority of my own species anyway.

Modifié par Rurik_Niall, 28 avril 2011 - 06:40 .

[Shimmer_Gloom]

Absolutely. The reason I care is because I want the things Bioware is doing to become the new standard. I want game companies to treat women and minorities and players in general with respect. I want forethought and heart in my games.

And I want other people to play these games. I want that 16 year old girl to enjoy games just like I enjoy games. Why? I dunno, human empathy is a weird thing. Go figure.

[Shimmer_Gloom]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

leonia42 wrote...

I'm guessing you're a man, right? It's not about just markettng for us, we would like to see the industry as a whole change the way it treats female gamers. Bioware could take a few bold steps in the right direction, they've already started with some baby steps in DA2. It's not going to hurt your experience so why are you so annoyed?

See, we kind of agree but I think our ideas of the right direction differ. You think they should market things to both genders while I think they should market them to neither gender, we both want the two genders to be equal but the way in which we think it should be done differs. My ideal world neither advertisers nor consumers would give a damn about gender, unless it's a product that only one gender has a real use for like bras or something then gender shouldn't matter.

But gender DOES matter.  Just becuase it doesn't matter to you doesn't mean it can't matter to others.  You may, in fact, be 'non-gendered.'  But to all those people out that that DO have a gender, its an important thing.

And until the world treats both genders equally it really wont matter.  But this has yet to happen and probably never will.

[Rurik_Niall]

Both genders are still being treated equally if neither gender is being targeted but rather the people being targeted are simply that, people.

[Shimmer_Gloom]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

Both genders are still being treated equally if neither gender is being targeted but rather the people being targeted are simply that, people.

Sigh.  I was making a statement on how society as a whole treats genders differently... I totally support gender equality.  But 'life,' does not.  That was my point.  Bleg.  I'm tired.  Will check in on how this is doing come weekend.

[Leonia]

Honestly, I'd prefer the marketting to be gender-neutral.. I wasn't suggesting there needs to be a girl and boy version of the ME3 cover art or anything (and my post that was quoted was a jab at someone who was more or less trolling and wasn't a blanket statement of my stance on the issue). I'd like an N7 logo with a nice backdrop, personally. But as CGG says, gender still matters, especially to a bunch of women who are living in a world that still doesn't treat them as equals.

Bioware's current approach doesn't bother me, personally, but I know it affects many others and its those people we should be thinking about.

Modifié par leonia42, 28 avril 2011 - 06:57 .

[Rurik_Niall]

If it's any consolation men have it a lot rougher when it comes to society as a whole accepting the idea that they can like whatever they want. If a girl is into video games people find it mildly strange at best, if a guy likes something that society deems as being girly however they're ruthlessly mocked, especially by their own gender. I could lay into them with my well rehearsed speech about girls being able to like manly things and simply get off with being called tomboys so why can't guys get the same treatment, but if I'm in a hurry or just not in the mood I just have to smile and say "It's for my (non-existent) niece or daughter."

Modifié par Rurik_Niall, 28 avril 2011 - 07:02 .

[Merci357]

Just from my own personal experience, I almost missed Mass Effect, because of the marketing. Granted, I wasn't that big into gaming back when it was released, mainly due to time constraints. Without doing any research (mind you, I've only seen a few advertisements) I had no interest in playing this generic male space hero.
I picked it up way later, a few days before DA:O was released, right out of the bargain bin, out of curiosity and just to fill the gap until DA. And to my surprise, you could play as a female - and that fact alone gave the space hero story an interesting enough twist. The fantastic and rich universe got me hooked since then.

Campaigns like "Your mom hates this" (Dead Space 2) only reinforce prejudices that gaming is only for (male) adolescents. The marketing should try to tap those that are not gamers yet, not trying to win those that already play. And a generic Commander Sheploo won't do that. Why no different approach, at least once in a while?

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

Both genders are still being treated equally if neither gender is being targeted but rather the people being targeted are simply that, people.

But that's not what's happening.

I'm trying really hard not to bring anything too controversial in the real world into this, and you are making it really difficult. Hehe.

It's Ok. I just have to go back to the Salarians. How do you think a Salarian kid would feel if all the media they were presented with growing up told them, in no uncertain terms, that Salarians were stupid and worthless, and only Turians and Asari were good at anything? What most of the media that child was exposed to told that little Salarian that it was unreasonable to expect to be treated as an equal by the obviously superior Salarians and Asari? 

Games, books and television have a lot of influence on how you grow up. There's a really touching story about a little girl in the 1960s reading the Earthsea books and being amazed, because it was the first time she ever read a fantasy story where the hero looked like her. I wish I could find the original article, it always makes me cry. Earthsea was the first mainsteam fantasy book that had a nonwhite protagonist and that was important to the little girl reading the book. You wouldn't say that little girl was being stupid for being glad to see someone who looked like her represented in fantasy for the first time, would you?

If you're a girl and you grow up being told that female doctors don't exist, you're less likely to believe you can grow up to be a doctor. You might still break through, there's always a first, but not having good role models reduces your chances. If you're a little girl and you grow up being told there are no female heroes, you're less likely to believe you can do great things. And they don't need to tell you explicitly that there are no female heroes. They just have to show you a lot of heroes, and have all of them be male. You'll get the picture.

When we get to the point where the gender ratio of video game heroes is the same as the gender ratio in the population as a whole, it truly won't matter what gender any given protagonist is. Until then, the message is clear: it's less likely that you can become a hero, little girl. Most of the time, a boy will save the day.

Bioware obviously doesn't feel this way. They have created a world where both genders are equally capable. It would be a great game to give an older teenage girl, if she was mature enough to handle the... ahem... romance scene in ME1. But there's no way anyone would realize the game provides positive female role models, from the marketing.

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 28 avril 2011 - 07:25 .

[Rurik_Niall]

And this is why I have a hard time relating to this male/female thing, to me a role model is a role model. I grew up idolising Wonderwoman, strong, smart, kind, and the physical embodiment of truth, just as much as I idolised Spiderman, again smart, kind, strong, and the embodiment of personal responsibility. There's nothing wrong with accepting a role model of the opposite gender, if they're a good role model their gender is irrelevant.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

And this is why I have a hard time relating to this male/female thing, to me a role model is a role model. I grew up idolising Wonderwoman, strong, smart, kind, and the physical embodiment of truth, just as much as I idolised Spiderman, again smart, kind, strong, and the embodiment of personal responsibility. There's nothing wrong with accepting a role model of the opposite gender, if they're a good role model their gender is irrelevant.

Look at the other example: the little girl in the 1960s, Was it wrong of her to be glad to see someone who looked like her in a book? Was that foolish or narrow-minded in some way?

People who don't get a chance to see themselves in media notice the absence. People who see themselves in media ll the time don't notice the presence.

I you see a bunch of professional baskeball players and they're all over 6'3, and you're only 5'7, you might come to the conclusion that you're unlikely to ever be able to play pro basketball. But then if you read an article about Spud Webb, the 5'7" point guard for the Detroit Pistons, you might think you have a shot.

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 28 avril 2011 - 07:44 .

[Hyper_gateway]

Currently, I have one male and 2 femshep in my playthrough, and already planning to start my 3rd femshep right after Velina.

Anyway, when I first know about Mass Effect, my choice goes to create a maleshep, the informations from the box has only shown this game is fully supported in a male role, that was the reason why I have a Sheploo. After finishing my first playthrough in ME2, I tried to create a femshep to see what will be different; surprisly, I'm seeing an equally supported character like as a male character! The more I play my first femshep, the more I was confused by Bioware's marketing strategy. Why they just leave such great part of their game out of any Ads, trailer, screenshot etc? If the character has no voice like DA, the experience will mostly the same since all it matters are from your own imagination.

Advertising an additional fully supported feature in the game is waste of money and too many risk to take? and even not mentioned this in any way at all? Then why did the developing team work that hard to make this character exist? Why would they make those femshep only romance? This is not something simply ignore but intentionally waste such a great resource which created by themselves.

Gamers or not, all of them would like to know all the possible features they can enjoy in the game, femshep as a hidden easter egg in game? and let the femshep player spray this option with no ads fee at all? That will be the worst Advertising strategy I have ever seen.

In short, made a supported feature and not use it to make more profit? This is not an business marketing at all, just simply dumped the this part of investment deep into the ocean.....

Edit: I'm not anti maleshep at all:)

Modifié par Hyper_gateway, 28 avril 2011 - 08:18 .

[Rurik_Niall]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

Look at the other example: the little girl in the 1960s, Was it wrong of her to be glad to see someone who looked like her in a book? Was that foolish or narrow-minded in some way?

People who don't get a chance to see themselves in media notice the absence. People who see themselves in media ll the time don't notice the presence.

I you see a bunch of professional baskeball players and they're all over 6'3, and you're only 5'7, you might come to the conclusion that you're unlikely to ever be able to play pro basketball. But then if you read an article about Spud Webb, the 5'7" point guard for the Detroit Pistons, you might think you have a shot.

Not wrong no, but ultimately it's the deeds and actions of a role model that matter not the race, gender, or even species. Tali, for example, is a fantastic role model for anyone, boy or girl. She's smart, an incredible engineer even by Quarian standards, loyal, and strong, not in the physical sense but you know what i mean.

Mordin is also an excellent role model for anyone, intelligent, pragmatic, compassionate but not gullible, he knows the difference between right and wrong but also knows that which is which is not always easy to determine.

[FDrage]

Is that still about marketing?

I'd assume by now the majority will know that you can make male and female versions of Sheppard. Also without knowing what Mass Effect is you wouldn't know (for definite) that the front face is Shepard (just from the box art). How many people go into the Store and pick-up a game because it "looks nice" without knowing anything about it nowadays, compared to those that at least look a bit up about the game?

That you can play a female as well as a male Shepard is well publicized by now as far as I'm concerned. A "face on the box" doesn't much of a different to that. One if my favourite trailers (that opening sequence for ME1) was more or less exclusive for female Shepard (at least for some time and as far as I can remember ...) What would have someone said who'd only seen these versions ?

Would it have been better to have a "more neutral" approach to Mass Effect advertisement or a more balanced one ... probably. However after 2 titles in the ME-universe with more or less the same advertisement strategy how many honestly think they change the advertisement approach?
For better or worse ... personally I don't think it will change so.

And who is this "sheploo" people are talking about ?.

Rurik_Niall wrote...

Not wrong no, but ultimately it's the
deeds and actions of a role model that matter not the race, gender, or
even species. Tali, for example, is a fantastic role model for anyone,
boy or girl. She's smart, an incredible engineer even by Quarian
standards, loyal, and strong, not in the physical sense but you know
what i mean.

Mordin is also an excellent role model for anyone,
intelligent, pragmatic, compassionate but not gullible, he knows the
difference between right and wrong but also knows that which is which is
not always easy to determine.

good point 

Modifié par FDrage, 28 avril 2011 - 07:50 .

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Rurik_Niall wrote...

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...

Look at the other example: the little girl in the 1960s, Was it wrong of her to be glad to see someone who looked like her in a book? Was that foolish or narrow-minded in some way?

People who don't get a chance to see themselves in media notice the absence. People who see themselves in media ll the time don't notice the presence.

I you see a bunch of professional baskeball players and they're all over 6'3, and you're only 5'7, you might come to the conclusion that you're unlikely to ever be able to play pro basketball. But then if you read an article about Spud Webb, the 5'7" point guard for the Detroit Pistons, you might think you have a shot.

Not wrong no, but ultimately it's the deeds and actions of a role model that matter not the race, gender, or even species. Tali, for example, is a fantastic role model for anyone, boy or girl. She's smart, an incredible engineer even by Quarian standards, loyal, and strong, not in the physical sense but you know what i mean.

Mordin is also an excellent role model for anyone, intelligent, pragmatic, compassionate but not gullible, he knows the difference between right and wrong but also knows that which is which is not always easy to determine.

We're not talking about whether or not specific characters are good role models. That isn't the issue here. I'm beginning to believe that it may be impossible to explain. One last ditch: this summary of various pieces of research related to how kids react to seeing their gender portrayed in media. The point is this: if you are told, either explicitly or implicitly, that your subgroup is less important, it can lead you to losing confidence in yourself, and various other bad things.

This is why games that portray gender equality are important, which is something that Mass Effect does. This is why people in groups who are less well-represented in media tend to enjoy media in which they are portrayed as equals.

If you assume that most girls know you can play as Female Shepard, you haven't been reading this thread. There's a huge amount of anecdotal evidence here with many girls coming in saying they didn't know you could play as FemShep for a long period of time. I myself have encountered very few people who haven't played Mass Effect but are aware that you can play as a girl. People who do realize it learned it from webcomics or word of mouth, usually years after the game was realeased. I've encountered more than a dozen gamers in the past month who play RPGs and do not know that you can play as a girl in Mass Effect.

Long story short: I think it's good when a game has female characters who aren't morons in it. I think that "women and men are portrayed as equal" is a huge positive tick in a game's favor. I think it is a valuable marketing message to get out there. I think gender equality it is a major selling point. The fact that a lot of people don't know that Mass Effect has this level of gender equality is a damn shame.

I believe portraying women and men as equal is positive. You say it shouldn't matter.

I am saying that, all other things being equal, any game where all the women are portrayed as useless is inherently worse than a game where genders are portrayed as equal. Would you disagree? 

Modifié par CulturalGeekGirl, 28 avril 2011 - 08:50 .

[Kusy]

This toppic is about how Mass Effect is not targeted to females but it should be but it shouldn't because it won't get more money by targeting females anyways so it won't.