What's with the "they" pronouns when referring to your character in the events? All of them are male.

[RiisWolf]

And given how you have no control over the identity of your chosen characters, all of whom are dudes, I doubt there'd be any option to play girl characters in the future. So what's the big idea there?
Like "Fortwright pushes the gate open with all their might." That's just wrong. He's one bear, and he's a clearly a man as are all player characters.

[MonteBearo]

This is simply in the interests of localisation, as player characters actually aren't all dudes - they can be male or female. "Fortwright, Burrows, Shipwright" are all surnames; forenames are displayed above the surname on the character screen. The differences between the artwork for each sex are deliberately subtle.

[RiisWolf]

Having no difference does not make your work subtle. Even those being subtle about it adhere to a pattern, a clue that signifies a difference even though it's difficult to find. A sign all of the player characters lack compared to the few times (or maybe just the one time) there is a girl on screen.

If you want the art to be neutral, then you can just say so. So why not say it?

Also I didn't say that example sentence to say that I think Fortwright is a guy because of his name. Boys can have girl names too; some names are neutral, fitting anyone. And because of that it bares next to no meaning. That is not including names with the purpose of describing what they are.

It doesn't mean names can't be used as the only way to tell boys from girls in your work. It means it won't be perceived as such thanks to how increasingly meaningless it inherently is.

[MonteBearo]

Originally posted by RiisWolf:

Having no difference does not make your work subtle. Even those being subtle about it adhere to a pattern, a clue that signifies a difference even though it's difficult to find.

You are correct - those being subtle would follow a pattern; a pattern like making female characters have differences in their eye or ear shapes to male characters.[i.imgur.com]

If you didn't or can't notice the differences, that's fine - in your own words - they are 'difficult to find', but they are certainly there.

Please don't condescend developers about the content of their own games. We made them, we put a lot of thought into them, and we certainly know what's in them!

[RiisWolf]

Why didn't you point it out sooner? Instead of making it sound like you've confused neutral with subtle or make up things like 343i did.

Nobody is arguing that you don't know what's in there. I'm saying say the right thing. Turns out you were telling the truth.

So, there are male and female sprites and PCs. The only identifying placeholder text in all events the player characters is involved is their name. Even though the game knows and keeps track of who a boy or girl. Got it. Thanks for the reply.

[Speaker Terenus]

I find it interesting that, while playing this game, the one thing that stood out enough to you to warrant a discussion in the community tab was pronoun usage. And though this is a great game, it clearly needs work in a couple areas. So why, out of everything you may or may not have experienced during your time with this game, did this little detail stick out the most to you?

[holy-death]

Originally posted by MonteBearo:

You are correct - those being subtle would follow a pattern; a pattern like making female characters have differences in their eye or ear shapes to male characters.[i.imgur.com]

If you didn't or can't notice the differences, that's fine - in your own words - they are 'difficult to find', but they are certainly there.

Frankly, I wouldn't have realized these differences relate to characters' gender. I'd chalk it up to slightly different "facial patterns", so to speak.

Do you plan on making more noticeable changes (slimmer shapes, adding slight curves in places, etc.)?

Originally posted by Speaker Terenus:

So why, out of everything you may or may not have experienced during your time with this game, did this little detail stick out the most to you?

I am not the OP, but I think I can answer - it's because of the language.

Some languages don't have neutral pronouns (such as "singular they"). Now imagine people using one of these languages when reading English and "translating" it into their own language in their minds:

They are most likely going - especially if they are not fluent English speakers - to understand the usage of the word "they" as referring to multiple entities (or a group, if you will), which can feel pretty jarring when the context clearly indicates a single person.

In fact, in this case even a dictionary wouldn't be of help, exactly because some languages don't have neutral pronouns (as I mentioned earlier). You'd have to come up with a completely new word for that purpose, which sounds like a task for linguists. If that is even applicable to the language in question.

[RiisWolf]

@Speaker Terenus: Because if all of them were male, then there is absolutely no reason for it. If there's no reason, then why? Were they trying not to offend someone? Is it another case of events having no variation*? They did put placeholder text in these events, it's awfully odd (and lazy) that they don't have placeholder text for any noun or pronoun outside of the character's name. Even though, now it's been confirmed that there are female PCs, which the game knows is female. Speaking of which, Holy is correct. What about everyone else? The only other language I know that notably neutral is Japanese, most European languages not as neutral, assuming they even were at all. Just like English, he/she/her/him are all also neutral until you know the identity of the subject you are referring. All of that begs the question even more.
Not that it was the first thing I thought about. Even though I did take lessons in French, Spanish, and one time in elementary shool, German.

@ Holy-Death: I thought the darker eye lids were just an inconsistency in sprite art since it was clear that there is more than one. The size difference threw me off because of the inconsistencies the character select screen created: the left PC is shown bigger than the right PC, and some of the left PCs are sometimes the female sprites. Even though all female sprites are smaller than the male, the left side offsets any difference in size. And I noticed their method of telling the sexes apart weren't as obvious simple eye lashes, even though it turned out that the darker eye lids are thicker eye lashes, even though apparently only two PC races have those. After verifying that there IS a difference and that why there is more than one PC sprite. However because that difference was a matter of how pronounced or sharp their features were. Males are more pronounced while females are less but more expressive. But something's not quite right here, yet again. 9 of 10 times when it's clear, it's male. 10 of 10 when it's unclear, it could be anything. I'm not going to assume just because they have a slimmer body type that those are most likely female. But the NPCs are not the topic here, the PCs and the events describing their actions are.

After the dev verified that the two PC sprites are male and female I looked again to spot the differences. The female mouses have a spot on their noses and a slightly smaller mouth. The male bears are wider, while the smaller female is oddly narrower, which is most noticeable if you look toward the top of their heads. Female wolves' eyes are not as sharp as the males, although they're borderline the exact same. Donno about the hares yet because I haven't looked. And the dev provided weasel and beaver examples.

[The Musketeer]

I noticed the differences after a couple runs and seeing the different sprites, points to you for that Monte! I love your attention to detail

[Allie Boballie]

I personally really like the gender neutrality. The characters don't exactly have much explicit personality, so you can project what you want onto them. Also, it really doesn't hurt to normalize they/them pronouns for people who want to use them.

[♥~Jack~♥]

I'm struggling to figure out why this is even an issue. It could be due to placeholder text, in-world lore reasons, localization, or simply artistic choice. In the end, it's not our business. The devs have one or many reasons and they're not obligated to share them with us even though they did. If it's that much of a problem then refund the game and go back to living with boolean data types.

[PudgyElderGod]

Originally posted by ♥~Jack~♥:

I'm struggling to figure out why this even an issue. It could be due to placeholder text, in-world lore reasons, localization, or simply artistic choice. In the end, it's not our business. The devs have one or many reasons and they're not obligated to share them with us even though they did. If it's that much of a problem then refund the game and go back to living with boolean data types.

Because some people like to throw tiny baby fits over creators being "too woke" for their tastes.

[RiisWolf]

Wouldn't you think I'd say something to Vatra then? Instead here I am replying to someone taking the time to make assumptions on something he didn't take the time to read.

[holy-death]

Originally posted by RiisWolf:

Wouldn't you think I'd say something to Vatra then? Instead here I am replying to someone taking the time to make assumptions on something he didn't take the time to read.

They are both Americans. As such I doubt they realize how different languages can be and how tricky the translation from English into something else can be. But, hey, apparently how the game communicates things via text is "not our business".

[Zeel Ara]

It must be nice live a life so devoid of real problems that pronouns in a video game can seem relevant or noteworthy.

[PudgyElderGod]

Originally posted by holy-death:

Originally posted by RiisWolf:

Wouldn't you think I'd say something to Vatra then? Instead here I am replying to someone taking the time to make assumptions on something he didn't take the time to read.

They are both Americans. As such I doubt they realize how different languages can be and how tricky the translation from English into something else can be. But, hey, apparently how the game communicates things via text is "not our business".

OP lives in Georgia, dude. They're also from the states. Your whole "other languages" argument would have more merit if the original premise of the post was about language-based identification issues and not "All these characters are guys so why are they using they/them?"

While I agree that this kind of thing can get confusing in more gendered languages, it's also not inherently wrong for the game's focus to be how the identities of the characters are conveyed in the English language. At the very least, Montebearo is English and it makes sense that they would focus on their own spoken language, doubly so given that English is effectively Lingua Franca.

Furthermore, I notice you're not actually coming in here complaining about issues you, or at the very least people you know, have been having understanding who and what is being referred to due to how they/them gets translated. Is this an actual issue you are encountering or is this just a Thing for you? Do you also like to hop in on Swedish games and start giving devs flak on how their content translates to French?