317 réponses à ce sujet

[Steppenwolf]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

If someone is only interested in appearances what would you call that person? Shallow, yes? If all it takes for you to identify with a character is a similar appearance to your own than that is shallow. I play video games to be immersed in a world other my own and I don't think strong-armed, ham-fisted affirmative action has any place in video games.

If you don't care about it, why would it bother you if a game had "a black guy here, a gay woman there, a bisexual latino dwarf thrown in for good measure?" By the same token that other people shouldn't care, don't you undermine your own position by seemingly being resistant to characters based on their appearance?

Not at all. I want BioWare to make the best characters they possibly can and putting self-imposed restrictions on characters from the outset inhibits that. If the writers sat down to start coming up with characters and had a list of minorities, social groups, etc to make characters from then those characters are worthless IMO. Above all I want well-written characters with interesting personalities. I don't want political correctness and a childish definition of inclusivity invading my video games. And I say my video games because BioWare is basically the only company making games that I love.

kukumburr wrote...

I'm curious as to why you think it's shallow to add diversity. In real life, people are all different shapes, sizes, and colors. That's normal for humans. So if you have humans in a video game, shouldn't the standard be to have that same variety? Why is it shallow to want that? Why would only wanting "white male" NOT be shallow?

Are you intentionally misinterpreting me? Video games are not real life. They're fantasy, and Dragon Age is about as fantastical as it gets. Specifically going out of your way to incorporate more ethnicities, body types, etc just for the sake of doing it is like a white yuppie cruising around a slum looking for black people to befriend because all of his friends are white. 

[n7stormrunner]

leaguer of one wrote...

n7stormrunner wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I believe it largely depend on the armour, using the example posted earlier the answer no, it is basically the same design for the men and women except making room for under the armour for breasts. if however the changes open a gap in the armour then yes it would be a problem. of couse if you can get though the armour anyhow when there is no gap or the gap is always a part of the design for men or women. then it wouldn't matter if it was "boob plate" or not you would have cut though anyway.

Is this perspective based upon any actual experience? In order to "make room for under the breasts," you'd have to structurally change the armor. Wouldn't this override the idea that the armor is essentially the same design? Wouldn't the force dissipation of a heavy, blunt hit to the armor be different? If not, why not?

a heavy blunt hit... it would depend on how changed the armour was.. a women with small enough breasts
may even be ok will male armour, those we see in video game, they have alot more, um padding. it would hurt like hell, but assuming it didn't damage the armour itself, it wouldn't be much different them male, assuming women warriors are as tough as their male counterpart, which considering child birth I don't think would be a problem. personally I would worry more about under the breast where there would be a seam for a blade to punch though.

experience with plate no, with getting hit, middle school wasn't fun for me, but highschool was very quiet.

look at nightcobra's post.

unforturely if I tried to watch that on my home computer, it would crash. I'll go to the library monday and watch it though from can piece together it's about how awkard it would make fighting not how it would stop protecting from blows... which if that was being said I wouldn't  have posted at all because that is true.

[Pasquale1234]

dan109 wrote...

I've always found the topic of "realistic" plate armor for women to be very strange. Everyone here realizes that women never actually fought in plate armor on account of being too weak to use it effectively, right? That's reality.

Now I realize that this is a fantasy game and if you want to have all sorts of women warriors running around, I've got no problem with it, but arguing about the functionality of their armor is like arguing about the functionality and "realism" of a dragon's scales. A woman warrior in a chainmail bikini is no more or less realistic than one wearing full plate. Just like dragons, they're both creatures of fantasy, so you might as well stylize them any way you want. Realism and practicality are not applicable here.

Women in armor

This one is c. 1450-1475

[dan109]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

dan109 wrote...

I've always found the topic of "realistic" plate armor for women to be very strange. Everyone here realizes that women never actually fought in plate armor on account of being too weak to use it effectively, right? That's reality.

Now I realize that this is a fantasy game and if you want to have all sorts of women warriors running around, I've got no problem with it, but arguing about the functionality of their armor is like arguing about the functionality and "realism" of a dragon's scales. A woman warrior in a chainmail bikini is no more or less realistic than one wearing full plate. Just like dragons, they're both creatures of fantasy, so you might as well stylize them any way you want. Realism and practicality are not applicable here.

Women in armor

A quote from the link you provided. The very first paragraph in fact:

"While this is not necessarily evidence of women warriors, it does show how illustrators and artists imagined that a woman might have worn armor – in many cases, how an illustrator imagined that a queen from centuries before might have looked, though wearing armor contemporary to the illustrator’s own era."

I didn't say there weren't any drawings of women warriors wearing plate. And I'm sure you can dig up some images of queens and such in ceremonial armor, but its design has nothing to do with practical combat applications.

Modifié par dan109, 23 février 2014 - 07:59 .

[MesTarrant]

Well this topic exploded while I was gone.

dan109 wrote...

I've always found the topic of "realistic" plate armor for women to be very strange. Everyone here realizes that women never actually fought in plate armor on account of being too weak to use it effectively, right? That's reality.

Now I realize that this is a fantasy game and if you want to have all sorts of women warriors running around, I've got no problem with it, but arguing about the functionality of their armor is like arguing about the functionality and "realism" of a dragon's scales. A woman warrior in a chainmail bikini is no more or less realistic than one wearing full plate. Just like dragons, they're both creatures of fantasy, so you might as well stylize them any way you want. Realism and practicality are not applicable here.

The "reality" is that women are much stronger than you think. Wearing some armor is not restricted to bulging body builders.


I get your argument about fantasy and things don't need to be realistic. Well then why can't we have men in skimpy armor. Why is it always just the women? Give me a man in armor-briefs and THEN we can talk. <3

[n7stormrunner]

MesTarrant wrote...

Well this topic exploded while I was gone.

dan109 wrote...

I've always found the topic of "realistic" plate armor for women to be very strange. Everyone here realizes that women never actually fought in plate armor on account of being too weak to use it effectively, right? That's reality.

Now I realize that this is a fantasy game and if you want to have all sorts of women warriors running around, I've got no problem with it, but arguing about the functionality of their armor is like arguing about the functionality and "realism" of a dragon's scales. A woman warrior in a chainmail bikini is no more or less realistic than one wearing full plate. Just like dragons, they're both creatures of fantasy, so you might as well stylize them any way you want. Realism and practicality are not applicable here.

The "reality" is that women are much stronger than you think. Wearing some armor is not restricted to bulging body builders.


I get your argument about fantasy and things don't need to be realistic. Well then why can't we have men in skimpy armor. Why is it always just the women? Give me a man in armor-briefs and THEN we can talk. <3

so gladiator armors then?

[dan109]

MesTarrant wrote...
The "reality" is that women are much stronger than you think. Wearing some armor is not restricted to bulging body builders.

If that were true, certainly there would have been women knights and such, but that wasn't the case. There's a reason why warfare was restricted to men at the time when it was all about physical prowess.

I get your argument about fantasy and things don't need to be realistic. Well then why can't we have men in skimpy armor. Why is it always just the women? Give me a man in armor-briefs and THEN we can talk. <3

I've got no problem with it whatsoever. Not once did I watch a movie like 300 or Conan or whatever and go "This is unrealistic because they're wearing underwear!"

[MesTarrant]

n7stormrunner wrote...

MesTarrant wrote...

Well this topic exploded while I was gone.

dan109 wrote...

I've always found the topic of "realistic" plate armor for women to be very strange. Everyone here realizes that women never actually fought in plate armor on account of being too weak to use it effectively, right? That's reality.

Now I realize that this is a fantasy game and if you want to have all sorts of women warriors running around, I've got no problem with it, but arguing about the functionality of their armor is like arguing about the functionality and "realism" of a dragon's scales. A woman warrior in a chainmail bikini is no more or less realistic than one wearing full plate. Just like dragons, they're both creatures of fantasy, so you might as well stylize them any way you want. Realism and practicality are not applicable here.

The "reality" is that women are much stronger than you think. Wearing some armor is not restricted to bulging body builders.


I get your argument about fantasy and things don't need to be realistic. Well then why can't we have men in skimpy armor. Why is it always just the women? Give me a man in armor-briefs and THEN we can talk. <3

so gladiator armors then?

Mm! In a game! Preferably a Bioware game! 

[MesTarrant]

dan109 wrote...

MesTarrant wrote...
The "reality" is that women are much stronger than you think. Wearing some armor is not restricted to bulging body builders.

If that were true, certainly there would have been women knights and such, but that wasn't the case. There's a reason why warfare was restricted to men at the time when it was all about physical prowess.

I get your argument about fantasy and things don't need to be realistic. Well then why can't we have men in skimpy armor. Why is it always just the women? Give me a man in armor-briefs and THEN we can talk. <3

I've got no problem with it whatsoever. Not once did I watch a movie like 300 or Conan or whatever and go "This is unrealistic because they're wearing underwear!"

Warfare was restricted to women because of sexism. End of story.


Love the movie examples but we are talking about Dragon Age, the game.

[MesTarrant]

dan109 wrote...

MesTarrant wrote...
Warfare was restricted to women because of sexism. End of story.

And why was there sexism? In order to dominate and subjugate a group of people you have to be stronger than they are, no?

I don't quite understand what you are saying.


If you're taking this argument out of the fantasy world and are beginning to try to argue to me why you think men were justified in their sexism towards women in the REAL WORLD, then I think you need to start a thread somewhere outside of a Bioware forum. 


There has never been, and never will be, a valid "reason" for one group of people to discrimininate, belittle, and denumanize another group of people. 


Please think before you post. We are still talking about a video game.

[n7stormrunner]

MesTarrant wrote...

n7stormrunner wrote...

MesTarrant wrote...

Well this topic exploded while I was gone.

dan109 wrote...

I've always found the topic of "realistic" plate armor for women to be very strange. Everyone here realizes that women never actually fought in plate armor on account of being too weak to use it effectively, right? That's reality.

Now I realize that this is a fantasy game and if you want to have all sorts of women warriors running around, I've got no problem with it, but arguing about the functionality of their armor is like arguing about the functionality and "realism" of a dragon's scales. A woman warrior in a chainmail bikini is no more or less realistic than one wearing full plate. Just like dragons, they're both creatures of fantasy, so you might as well stylize them any way you want. Realism and practicality are not applicable here.

The "reality" is that women are much stronger than you think. Wearing some armor is not restricted to bulging body builders.


I get your argument about fantasy and things don't need to be realistic. Well then why can't we have men in skimpy armor. Why is it always just the women? Give me a man in armor-briefs and THEN we can talk. <3

so gladiator armors then?

Mm! In a game! Preferably a Bioware game! 

though it is questionable how much protectiion it would give... I'm not sure how real/fake it was but I used to have a drawing I found on the internet of a gladiator in a pair of briefs, a big helmet and a lot of muscle. than again da is a fantasy game.

[n7stormrunner]

dan109 wrote...

MesTarrant wrote...
Warfare was restricted to women because of sexism. End of story.

And why was there sexism? In order to dominate and subjugate a group of people you have to be stronger than they are, no?

actually no, I can tell you that from experience

[kukumburr]

BasilKarlo wrote...

Not at all. I want BioWare to make the best characters they possibly can and putting self-imposed restrictions on characters from the outset inhibits that. If the writers sat down to start coming up with characters and had a list of minorities, social groups, etc to make characters from then those characters are worthless IMO. Above all I want well-written characters with interesting personalities. I don't want political correctness and a childish definition of inclusivity invading my video games. And I say my video games because BioWare is basically the only company making games that I love.

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but when they start designing characters I don't think they sit down and say "Ok, we need a black character, a white character, and a brown character. Start from there." I would guess they start more from how a potential character would fit in the story and what his/her basic personality traits are, regardless of appearance. So if they had initially designed a character to have light skin but later changed him to have darker skin for the sake of diversity, what exactly do you think is being lost here? Why would this change anything fundamental about the character? What is being restricted?

Are you intentionally misinterpreting me? Video games are not real life. They're fantasy, and Dragon Age is about as fantastical as it gets. Specifically going out of your way to incorporate more ethnicities, body types, etc just for the sake of doing it is like a white yuppie cruising around a slum looking for black people to befriend because all of his friends are white. 

Fantasy is based on real life. If you're going to use a race called "human" in a video game certain expectations go along with that because humans exist in real life. You would expect them to be similar to how they are in real life unless they give you a specific reason within the game world to think otherwise. If you create a race within your fantasy world that does not exist in real life (such as qunari) then you can go hog wild. Make it whatever color or shape you want it to be because players don't have pre-existing expectations for it. If you disagree with this then that's fine and I'll stop attempting to argue it.

[dan109]

MesTarrant wrote...
I don't quite understand what you are saying.


If you're taking this argument out of the fantasy world and are beginning to try to argue to me why you think men were justified in their sexism towards women in the REAL WORLD, then I think you need to start a thread somewhere outside of a Bioware forum.

Come on now, you're smarter than this. Don't use strawmen arguements. I never said it was justified from a moral standpoint, I said that the reason that it was possible for men to dominate women was the strength difference. The reason I brought it up was to counter your points that women were excluded from warfare because of sexism, and that women are a lot stronger than I think. And the reason why any of that matters is that the realism of armor design goes out the window when the person wearing it isn't able to use it at all in the first place.

But you seem to be taking this somewhat personally, so let's end this discussion before it gets heated. I'm not looking to start a flame war here.

[Allan Schumacher]

Not at all. I want BioWare to make the best characters they possibly can and putting self-imposed restrictions on characters from the outset inhibits that. If the writers sat down to start coming up with characters and had a list of minorities, social groups, etc to make characters from then those characters are worthless IMO. Above all I want well-written characters with interesting personalities. I don't want political correctness and a childish definition of inclusivity invading my video games. And I say my video games because BioWare is basically the only company making games that I love.

How much of a self-imposed restriction is the character's skin colour or appearance?

If you were to take a blender and mix and match random ethnicity into the characters of the Dragon Age games, how much would the story change?

[Steppenwolf]

kukumburr wrote...

BasilKarlo wrote...
Not at all. I want BioWare to make the best characters they possibly can and putting self-imposed restrictions on characters from the outset inhibits that. If the writers sat down to start coming up with characters and had a list of minorities, social groups, etc to make characters from then those characters are worthless IMO. Above all I want well-written characters with interesting personalities. I don't want political correctness and a childish definition of inclusivity invading my video games. And I say my video games because BioWare is basically the only company making games that I love.

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but when they start designing characters I don't think they sit down and say "Ok, we need a black character, a white character, and a brown character. Start from there." I would guess they start more from how a potential character would fit in the story and what his/her basic personality traits are, regardless of appearance. So if they had initially designed a character to have light skin but later changed him to have darker skin for the sake of diversity, what exactly do you think is being lost here? Why would this change anything fundamental about the character? What is being restricted?

That's a completely different situation than what I said. Again, are you intentionally misinterpreting me? 

kukumburr wrote...

Are you intentionally misinterpreting me? Video games are not real life. They're fantasy, and Dragon Age is about as fantastical as it gets. Specifically going out of your way to incorporate more ethnicities, body types, etc just for the sake of doing it is like a white yuppie cruising around a slum looking for black people to befriend because all of his friends are white. 

Fantasy is based on real life. If you're going to use a race called "human" in a video game certain expectations go along with that because humans exist in real life. You would expect them to be similar to how they are in real life unless they give you a specific reason within the game world to think otherwise. If you create a race within your fantasy world that does not exist in real life (such as qunari) then you can go hog wild. Make it whatever color or shape you want it to be because players don't have pre-existing expectations for it. If you disagree with this then that's fine and I'll stop attempting to argue it.

Fantasy is not a reflection of reality. If it was it wouldn't be fantasy. Who cares if humans exist on Thedas? Why must every ethnicity, social group, sexuality, etc be represented just there are humans? Where does the "realism" end? Surely not every ethnicity can be present on Thedas. The geography of the planet is entirely different. What about realism in other areas of the game? Like armors and weapons? How about the violence? Why don't they just remove the magic and monsters and make it entirely realistic? 

[Allan Schumacher]

that women are a lot stronger than I think. And the reason why any of that matters is that the realism of armor design goes out the window when the person wearing it isn't able to use it at all in the first place.

Real plate armor isn't that heavy. It's about 15-20kg distributed across the entire weight of the body mitigating its overall effect. There'd be no shortage of women that were capable of wearing plate armor and being effective at using it.

Troops today carry more weight than plate armor.

[Steppenwolf]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Not at all. I want BioWare to make the best characters they possibly can and putting self-imposed restrictions on characters from the outset inhibits that. If the writers sat down to start coming up with characters and had a list of minorities, social groups, etc to make characters from then those characters are worthless IMO. Above all I want well-written characters with interesting personalities. I don't want political correctness and a childish definition of inclusivity invading my video games. And I say my video games because BioWare is basically the only company making games that I love.

How much of a self-imposed restriction is the character's skin colour or appearance?

If you were to take a blender and mix and match random ethnicity into the characters of the Dragon Age games, how much would the story change?

How would it benefit? Why do things just to do them instead of creating characters organically? Why make race a focus at all?

[Hanako Ikezawa]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

that women are a lot stronger than I think. And the reason why any of that matters is that the realism of armor design goes out the window when the person wearing it isn't able to use it at all in the first place.

Real plate armor isn't that heavy. It's about 15-20kg distributed across the entire weight of the body mitigating its overall effect. There'd be no shortage of women that were capable of wearing plate armor and being effective at using it.

Troops today carry more weight than plate armor.

Aw, you beat me to it Mr. Schumacher.

[Allan Schumacher]

BasilKarlo wrote...

How would it benefit? Why do things just to do them instead of creating characters organically? Why make race a focus at all?

A benefit, it seems, is simply that some people would go "hey, I appreciate that."

Here's part of the issue I think people have: most of our staff is white, and as such our "default" when "race doesn't matter at all" is simply "white person."

However, if race doesn't matter at all, then all feedback like this is is a thought of "hey, can you make someone with a different colour skin?"  To which, if race doesn't matter at all, only changes something at the beginning of the development and wouldn't affect the organic creation of a character.


As a white person though, I have a predisposition to think of race (or other deviations from myself, really) only when I think it DOES matter.  Which is problematic, because it means that without any external influence, in a game where race doesn't matter I'll be inclined to make primarily white people.  Now, I'm just making a supposition here, but the idea that I may see things differently if I grew up rarely seeing white people in the fiction I consumed could be disappointing doesn't seem WAY out there for me.


So, if we're at a situation where you and I feel race doesn't matter and we don't care, while someone else goes "Hey, I think it'd be value added if you mixed it up a little bit," and it doesn't actually take much beyond letting art/design know "make this person different than a white person" then it seems like it's a small gain for a small cost.  You and I won't care, but someone else comes away feeling a bit better about the game.

Even then, there being no benefit or detriment to doing so doesn't strike me as a compelling reason not to.


Or are you suggesting that going to an artist and saying "draw me a man" and "draw me a black man" (or even more generally, draw me a non-white man) is a significant self-imposed restriction?

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 23 février 2014 - 09:23 .

[karushna5]

Man these threads make me so depressed. I mean bioware is one of the most inclusive to women gamers and to be a woman gamer is hard. I dont know if I believe in the 45% thing, but I do know having a hobby where wanting to be basically respected is something you have to fight for tooth and nail so much that you can grow to hate it as much as you love it, and can put a damper on being part of it.

I want characters whose character is based on them being awesome, not how to make a woman about being a woman. Fenris,Anders, Sebastian, Alistair, Zevran, Varric, Justice, Nathaniel, sten
I am sure I am forgetting a few, but other than oghren, none often seemed written specifically male, any of them could have been women, not arguing they should have, but they could have. Nothing naturally masculine about these characters, other than their looks and voice.

Compare to Isabela, Aveline, Merrill, Morrigan, Wynne, Lelianna, Sigrun, Vellanna. I love every character, I do really! But in media it just gets tiring that a woman has to be a woman first?? Isabela seems to be called er...names by every character, something that never happened to Zevran or any male character ever who slept around enough.

Nathaniel and nearly every line of his could have been a woman. I dont want a woman in armor, I want a spirit from the fade, she is a tad corny and speaks of Justice! I mean I want the writers to make all male characters, write their dialogue, and then draw and voice them feminine. I dont want catwoman, I want a batman who just so happens to be batwoman. I dont want wonder woman, I want a woman who is from krypton and faster than a speeding bullet.

[Reznore57]

I think some people tends to think feedback can maybe alter art or creative process or whatever.
Like some artist has a vision and would just go "oh no I can't do that because I have to be politicaly correct , or I have a list of demands I have to fulfill."
I think it's the artist responsabilty to filter all this , decide what is interesting , because let's face it when people are not motivated by their work , it just often doesn't work.

I mean Bioware is a big company and obviously they have to look at their market , how it's changing and everything.
But I don't think it's bad for any creative process to sometimes peak at the outside world , and just get new ideas.
I mean look at a character like Maevaris , it's possible she wouldn't have been created if some fan hasn't set some challenge for the team.
I may be wrong but it seems to me David Gaider enjoyed working on this character...
It doesn't mean that the team has to answer to everything , of course.
Or I think Matt Rhodes was writing in his blog ,having daughters made him look differently at how he used to draw women.

I tend to think sometimes being challenged in your ideas can be really good .

[n7stormrunner]

karushna5 wrote...

Man these threads make me so depressed. I mean bioware is one of the most inclusive to women gamers and to be a woman gamer is hard. I dont know if I believe in the 45% thing, but I do know having a hobby where wanting to be basically respected is something you have to fight for tooth and nail so much that you can grow to hate it as much as you love it, and can put a damper on being part of it.

I want characters whose character is based on them being awesome, not how to make a woman about being a woman. Fenris,Anders, Sebastian, Alistair, Zevran, Varric, Justice, Nathaniel, sten
I am sure I am forgetting a few, but other than oghren, none often seemed written specifically male, any of them could have been women, not arguing they should have, but they could have. Nothing naturally masculine about these characters, other than their looks and voice.

Compare to Isabela, Aveline, Merrill, Morrigan, Wynne, Lelianna, Sigrun, Vellanna. I love every character, I do really! But in media it just gets tiring that a woman has to be a woman first?? Isabela seems to be called er...names by every character, something that never happened to Zevran or any male character ever who slept around enough.

Nathaniel and nearly every line of his could have been a woman. I dont want a woman in armor, I want a spirit from the fade, she is a tad corny and speaks of Justice! I mean I want the writers to make all male characters, write their dialogue, and then draw and voice them feminine. I dont want catwoman, I want a batman who just so happens to be batwoman. I dont want wonder woman, I want a woman who is from krypton and faster than a speeding bullet.

wait I could have missed something but I don't remember most of those being treated as women first... I don't even remember being refered as women at all in less someone was flirting. and I hate to tell you but in most case gender is going to come at least once more likely if their a romance opintion.

[Dominus]

Regarding the Armor: Dragon Age to me has always been a more realistic take on the Medieval Fantasy genre of gaming, so I'd expect the armors to generally reflect that.

Regarding Race: Without delving too much into that particular topic, I'm indifferent on it. As long as racial changes are made appropriately to the game, I don't mind either way.

[n7stormrunner]

Qistina wrote...

see...for eastern women, no issue...

I think we moved that part qistina, shame looks like you put some work into it.