It doesn't seem likely that the Greeks would depict their Gods as black.

[CEO of Cunny]

I'd rather the dev just say it's for inclusivity than to make up some convoluted excuse to justify their artistic decision. C'mon, if you're gonna do it then just admit it. The game is good, it's not like it's some deal breaker for me, it's just a weird thing to see because the Greeks would have never depicted their gods in such a way. The greeks had a term for Africans which is "aithiops" which means "burnt skin." They make this distinction because the skin color of the Africans was a very unique feature that the Greeks did not see in people around their civilization. Even in the Illiad and Odyssey Homer depicted the Ethiopians as having lived on the edge of the Earth close to the sun which "burnt" their skin.

The Greeks for the most part interacted with other Mediterranian people which is why their Gods have bodies, facial features, hairstyles, and weapons that would have had meaning or familiarity to their people. This is the same for any civilization that developed their own deities. It would be weird if Ixtlilton was suddenly asian or if Chang'e was suddenly depicted as white. At the end of the day it's your game so you can do whatever you want, but it just looks weird because it makes no sense. I'm not gonna make the argument that it's disrespectful because I support freedom of expression but it sorta comes out of nowhere seeing that the game isn't going full whacky like "Smite."

[Darth Bokeh]

I suggest you search for "athena black" on this forum and peruse the graveyard of locked posts.

I wonder how long this one will last.

Someone did post an interesting link, though, in one of those:

https://www.quora.com/Are-there-any-black-people-in-Greek-mythology

[Suzaku]

"Why isn't my fantasy mythological pure fiction game historically accurate?"

[CEO of Cunny]

Originally posted by 1sot0pe:

I suggest you search for "athena black" on this forum and peruse the graveyard of locked posts.

I wonder how long this one will last.

Someone did post an interesting link, though, in one of those:

https://www.quora.com/Are-there-any-black-people-in-Greek-mythology

Ah yes the scholarly source that is Quora. I already mentioned that the Greeks knew about black people, it doesn't mean that their Gods are depicted as such. The "burnt skin" they spoke of was a very surprising thing to see for Greeks which is why there was so much mythology written with Ethiopians because they needed some way to wrap their heads around why these people looked so different from the other people they interacted with. As such they made mythology revolving around them being close to the sun and having their skin burnt.

As I've said before the issue I have is that it just looks weird. The Greek Gods, just like Hindu Gods, Shinto Gods, or any other Gods often have facial features, weapons, clothing, and all sorts of other traits that are specific to the people who worshipped them. The thing the dev said about the Gods being the same throughout the world isn't entirely accurate either as beliefs changed, especially when around the time of the Romans who worshipped the same Gods. They basically believed that those Gods only watched over Rome and the other Gods watched over their own lands. If you go far enough back into the Torah's history you'll also see this, however, in modern translations this has been changed because monotheists wanted to push the one God narrative.

But yeah, I'd rather the devs just say they wanted inclusivity than trying to come up with some random reason to make Athena black when she was in no way based off Africans or any other dark skinned people. The Greek Gods look Greek just as the Shinto Gods look Asian and our modern interpretation of Jesus in America looks like a white guy with blue eyes.

[Nibbie]

"“We knew going into Hades that we wanted this to be the story of a big dysfunctional family set in the Underworld of Greek myth, told from the Underworld’s point of view,” he wrote in an email. “As we discussed and researched the Olympians from canon sources, something stood out that in retrospect was obvious: They’re called the Greek gods because they were worshiped in ancient Greece, not because they themselves are ethnically Greek.”"
"“Zeus rules all the heavens, not just the airspace over Greece,” Kasavin wrote. “Poseidon rules all the sea and land. They sprang from the Titans, who sprang from primordial Chaos, the source of all creation. So it stands to reason that the gods represent all the people of the world, at least indirectly.”
-Greg Kasavin, the creative director of Supergiant Games

I don't see any issue with it personally. They are known form changers in the first place, Zeus could look like a cow and it would still be accurate. From a quick search, Athena was described as "olive skinned", so black isn't far from that description at all. Darker skinned people were also represented in multiple places in their mythology, so as a god's representation doesn't feel like a big stretch.

[CEO of Cunny]

Originally posted by Nibbie:

"“We knew going into Hades that we wanted this to be the story of a big dysfunctional family set in the Underworld of Greek myth, told from the Underworld’s point of view,” he wrote in an email. “As we discussed and researched the Olympians from canon sources, something stood out that in retrospect was obvious: They’re called the Greek gods because they were worshiped in ancient Greece, not because they themselves are ethnically Greek.”"
"“Zeus rules all the heavens, not just the airspace over Greece,” Kasavin wrote. “Poseidon rules all the sea and land. They sprang from the Titans, who sprang from primordial Chaos, the source of all creation. So it stands to reason that the gods represent all the people of the world, at least indirectly.”
-Greg Kasavin, the creative director of Supergiant Games

I don't see any issue with it personally. They are known form changers in the first place, Zeus could look like a cow and it would still be accurate. From a quick search, Athena was described as "olive skinned", so black isn't far from that description at all. Darker skinned people were also represented in multiple places in their mythology, so as a god's representation doesn't feel like a big stretch.

I don't think you know what olive skinned is. The Greeks were fair and olive skinned depending on their line of work. You're basically just backing up what I said. Dark skinned people existed in their mythology but they were clearly outsiders and their skin color was of great interest to the Greeks. If the Gods were black they would have described them as so and they wouldn't have looked like the Greeks.

[Darth Bokeh]

I find it interesting that people tend to get worked up about the races of the gods in this game while not mentioning the many other ways it differs from historical Greek mythology.

To me, I care as much about the other historical inaccuracies as much as the races of the gods - not at all. To me, it's just an enjoyable story with beautiful artwork and depictions of the Greek gods.

It's different. So what?

I can go learn about the real Greek myths and enjoy both. I don't care if stories inspired by the real myths differ.

EDIT:

And

Originally posted by Captain Sugoi:

Originally posted by 1sot0pe:

I suggest you search for "athena black" on this forum and peruse the graveyard of locked posts.

I wonder how long this one will last.

Someone did post an interesting link, though, in one of those:

https://www.quora.com/Are-there-any-black-people-in-Greek-mythology

Ah yes the scholarly source that is Quora.

Ah yes, the scholarly source that is the anonymous Steam forum poster.

[C4RNIVOR3]

But let me repeat what I've said before, which is: The Greek gods are so called because they were worshiped in Greece, not because they themselves were ethnically Greek. They are gods who rule the entire world. Zeus does not just rule the small airspace over Greece. They are a big family, much like humankind. That is why we still talk about them after thousands of years, and why we at Supergiant endeavored to make this game.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1145360/discussions/0/2944747978659938481/?ctp=3#c2944747978660551163

[DatFancy]

I don't understand the argument that the Greek called Africans a phrase that meant "burnt skin". Is this implying the term is derogatory? If there were no people of color in their area for lifetimes, and they saw someone with a darker skin complexion, it would make sense to have that phrase come about.

I really believe arguments against women being in old war games, or other races being included in other times or areas in games is just a cover-up for racists trying to provoke artists. Why are we talking about this, why does it matter? Its a game. The fact that it comes up at all is strange.

If we want to have a conversation about different races in this time/place then we can do this, but threads that are randomly created saying "wow, weird, Athena's black? WeirdChamp guys" - unproductive, racist, and just cringe.

This game's amazing I do not believe it should be deduced to some racial bias a fraction of a fraction of the player count has.

[八云式]

Okay? So Greek don't depict their gods as black... What does it relate to this game, where gods are real and the Greek pantheon manages the whole world?

[Husker_85]

OP is one of those people that doesn't know they're racist because everyone they grew up around is white and "doesn't see race".

[jbrd_]

Originally posted by Isaac Clark:

OP is one of those people that doesn't know they're racist because everyone they grew up around is white and "doesn't see race".

Judging from OP's profile, he doesn't see age either. Big yikes.

[Evarrice]

I didn't care what they all looked like.

They're all hot!

[DatFancy]

Originally posted by ♪ Evarrice ♫:

I didn't care what they all looked like.

They're all hot!

Poseidon kinda creepy, Hades, Hermes...

[a passerby]

Damn. I had no idea we were playing a historical game. Here I thought this was just an adaptation of Greek mythology

[Nomad]

It's just how they wanna interpret it. IRL ancient Greece, Ares was the butt of jokes and always made fun of, but in this game he is treated with the same respect as other gods.