HOUSEKEEPING'S PROFILE

"Ladylike" is more of a manner thing than a gender thing. "Behave like a gentleman" is also a thing. I mean, to be fair, if Liberty was a man, nobody would say "behave like a gentleman" because instead it would be, "You NAILED it, broheim, WOOOOOO," which is to say that both genders come with their own sets of problems, so let's not make a big deal of it or we'll get into constant, unnecessary squabbles or, worse, internalized language policing over trivialities. There was no ill will on either side, and Liberty may or may not have turned it into a lady in the lake joke--I can't tell.

Also congratulations, Liberty! You're a nice lady and you do a good job so I'm surprised you didn't already have this position. Actually, what is this position, even? What new, terrible powers do you have at your disposal? Followup: can I become your sycophant?

Edit: well, Kentona made my point while I was typing, but, whatever.

author=unity
Oh man, I feel silly that I didn't mention A Very Long Rope. One of the best female leads I've ever played as in a RPG Maker game (or just in general XD)

You get a free pass for being so awesome all the time.

As a gamer? Holy shit am I for this.

As a developer? Maybe this would spark a relegitimization of 2d rpgs, which could be awesome, but then my direct competition would be big-name studios, which is fucking scary.

Enelysion probably needs to sort out a lot of bugs first. Also, I don't really see what's so appealing about it--other than the maps, which are definitely gorgeous. I played it to completion, and gameplay seemed pretty stock, difficulty fluctuated like crazy, and the story was pretty macguffiny. I'd prefer It Moves to that, at least. Kind of felt non-gamey at times, but it was legitimately creepy.

I guess my position is that there is asinine shit on both sides of the fence, and the asinine stuff, like normal, is what's being discussed. All the harassment is completely asinine, and it's essentially 4chan being 4chan, which isn't to say that 4chan being 4chan is an acceptable thing, just that it's been happening for a long time and now they have something to focus on and it's getting a lot of coverage. The idea that gaming journalism needs to be ethical is a valid point, but the REAL issue is corporate influence. Even if Zoe Quinn slept her way to the top (I don't know if she did or care one way or the other), it would be an isolated incident, but corporations have the money to influence sales on a large scale, and it's something they do.

On the other side, this has sparked a debate on the depiction of women in gaming, and they absolutely have a point: women are constantly objectified in gaming. This shouldn't be surprising, as teenage males have been pandered to for years now, and the easiest way to do that is to sell them male power fantasies. But, really, the issue isn't the misogyny; it's the underlying laziness of the writing. If social justice warriors succeed and have more female protagonists in gaming, the result will probably end up being fulfillment of female power fantasies, which is only marginally better than what we currently have since it's not triggering anyone's centuries-old internalized ire. The right path is to depict people as they actually are--i.e. everything that's good, bad, interesting, and scary about humanity, but that takes a wide perspective of the world, a keen sense of empathy, and years of thought and practice in the art of writing, which is severely underappreciated in this medium.

author=Isrieri
kentona linked a badass article on the subject that I feel explains the group pretty well.

author=kentona
#StopGamerGate2014


E:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/16/of-gamers-gates-and-disco-demolition-the-roots-of-reactionary-rage.html

Total aside, so feel free to ignore, but this article has a narrow perspective, and the comparison of gamergate to disco is completely asinine. Disco came out at the same time as the punk movement; there was a lot of anti-corporate sentiment, and disco was the most corporate entity in music at the time. It DEFINITELY wasn't black music; the reviewer must have forgotten about funk, which all the privileged white males he's railing against thought was FUCKING SWEET because it fucking IS. Disco was big in the gay scene, so I wouldn't be surprised if there were some homophobic undercurrents, but then that doesn't take new wave's (which had a big homosexual component) enormous surge in popularity within a few years after disco.

Also, diversity didn't "win" in music; popular music has always been homogenized, overly simplistic, and terrible. I've noticed a tendency in people who really care about gender, sexuality, and race issues that they think that these factors motivate everything, but they're forgetting all of the other sociological, political, and economic factors. I don't think that the central point in that article regarding gamergate is completely without merit, but I do think that it's trying to turn a complex issue into a simple one. White male privilege has been the root of several evils in the past, but it's not a catchall scapegoat. There are a lot of factors at work in 2014 just like in 1979.