Why the choice of a black female Genghis Khan with white male subordinate and white female player?

[Knight]

I'm just genuinely interested in what went on in the minds of the people in charge of the commercial to make these decisions.

Wouldn't it have made more sense to have Genghis khan and his mongol subordinates look like mongols?


For those who haven't seen it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZx9XHdD5m4

[egg fu]

pretty sure she suppose to be a commander, not black queen genghis khan. also its a 20 second haha live action clip showcasing the absurdity of civ.

really not that big of a deal unless you're knee deep in culture war bs. comments on the video though shows how incredibly racist some people can be, they're not even triggered by the white guy. just the black woman commander.

[z3rk]

Originally posted by egg fu:

pretty sure she suppose to be a commander, not black queen genghis khan. also its a 20 second haha live action clip showcasing the absurdity of civ.

really not that big of a deal unless you're knee deep in culture war bs. comments on the video though shows how incredibly racist some people can be, they're not even triggered by the white guy. just the black woman commander.

Absurdity? Of the civ? Weren't the recent comments defending the ages system as being as true to the original history as possible?
Im shocked, shocked! Well, not that shocked!

But at least they know they are a joke poorly delivered on their own

[Verraco]

I'm tired of this s***

[ixinyoka]

Originally posted by egg fu:

pretty sure she suppose to be a commander, not black queen genghis khan. also its a 20 second haha live action clip showcasing the absurdity of civ.

really not that big of a deal unless you're knee deep in culture war bs. comments on the video though shows how incredibly racist some people can be, they're not even triggered by the white guy. just the black woman commander.

good.

[ParabolaWaVe]

She's meant to be the player, I guess. Its ironic, because this is pretty much the same marketing concept Ara used in their promo material. I mean, not even in marketing Civ was able to come up with ideas of its own.

[The Doctor]

It's a joke, and an ironic one at that, displaying an almost British level self-deprecation which I'd appreciate if they were British. It's even almost funny but I can't help feeling that this is going to backfire on them as it's just going to be taken as seriously as a cancer diagnosis by the angry 'fans'.

If anything, it reminds me of this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaSJrOIYrGA

[PengoPaddy]

Originally posted by ParabolaWaVe:

She's meant to be the player

I wonder what percentage of Civ players are black women? I suspect very low, which makes the marketing choice at this time interesting.

[Rhapsody]

Originally posted by The Doctor:

It's a joke, and an ironic one at that, displaying an almost British level self-deprecation

This tbh. The color of the actors doesn't really matter.

[jariel]

dont let those culture war worms get to your brain, they get you..

[Rule34_Sniper]

Wonder if they do the same with Martin Luther King by having him be a white dude.

[rodatam]

Fatigue

[Witch ~]

Even if we ignore all the racist remarks, that trailer is just plain awful. Live action of some people in cheap costumes just talking to each other and standing around? Who directed this crap?
Compare it to this absolute masterpiece that still gives me the shivers. The slow build-up, the absolute fantastic music all combined with the amazing narrator and the quotes that really make you feel emotional. THIS is what civ players want (and a better game)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVuNhNHxbD4

[Nye]

Genghis Khan was a BLACK QUEEN, everyone knows this wtf

[Esau]

Originally posted by ParabolaWaVe:

She's meant to be the player, I guess. Its ironic, because this is pretty much the same marketing concept Ara used in their promo material. I mean, not even in marketing Civ was able to come up with ideas of its own.

Nah, she's definitely not supposed to be the player. She mentions the player by name. She's clearly supposed to be some kind of a commander since everyone looks to her for leadership. I actually felt like in a different world this would have been a good commercial, in that it's absurdist and those were always what I looked forward to back in the 90's and early 00's in videogame commercials. Like so:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ukynbff4cQU

In the sense of being absurd it's a good commercial, but it totally ignores the reality of modern western society. That is, people have been inundated with drives for diversity, thus any instance of it would be responded to about as well as someone with a thick Russian accent making a cheese ad in the 80's. What's more, Firaxis has been dragged through the coals for months due to their shoddy launch of Civ VII. A better play would have been to either make something they were sure would not irritate large groups of people, or make nothing at all and push to fix the (many) flaws of Civ VII.

All that said, as someone who finds DEI an abhorrent practice I didn't find it offensive. I found it a hilarious misstep on their part that will only dig their hole further, but it certainly didn't anger me.

[Ultimate Sadistic Creature]

Probably because the people running Firaxis's PR are idiots. It went over so well, they removed it from the main channel.

It showcases virtually nothing about the game and reduces it to a really dumb joke, and a tone deaf one at that. Didn't they see what happened to Jaguar about 6 months ago?