Apologies to Sugarstar

[Cathy]

wow. still shocked you got such a negative reaction for your very reasonable post. I suppose this thread will now get locked too. But I wanted you to know that I agree with you. A significant number of NPCs are "like me" in racial features, but I noticed there were essentially Caucasian and Chinese NPCs. I was happy the devs at least included some Chinese NPCs and other features such as festivals more similar to Asian festivals than Western ones.

Clearly, I am in the minority on this one, no pun intended. I also play another game that's 90% men, and I see something similar there the way women are treated. I don't have a good answer, I just know I don't like it.

[Lobster Lord]

And again: Racial diversity isn't completely about skin colour. Never has been. This game should improve and deepen the individualities and personalities of each NPC.

Let's take a look at Sonia. She is clearly a character who shares appearance traits with Native Americans. So what is her personality all about? What Django a great chef is and that she wants to marry some rich guy in the future. Nothing cultural, nothing special. That's it.

Or Musa. What is the deal with him? Again nothing cultural about him. He is rich. Like... WOW.

I could easily continue with this. It would only show that the majority of NPCs in the game lack specific and likeable personalities/backgrounds, which make them to "interesting individuals".

[XBL Laberbacke]

Originally posted by Lobster Lord:

Or Musa. What is the deal with him? Again nothing cultural about him. He is rich. Like... WOW.

You could even argue in his case it's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_discrimination because unlike in real life where blacks are often shown (not necessarily ARE, but SHOWN) as poor criminals, he's a nice rich guy. This could be viewed overreaction of people who want to say "look at us, we are definitely not racist". Every race or group IRL has bad people and good people, so neither extreme is anything but unhelpful.

A solution would be to make all characters non-human, but that makes empathising a lot harder for everybody.

In short, damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Bonus information: I don't care about anyone in this game, they could all be floating cubes and it would make no difference to me. Actually, now that I think of it: "Thomas Was Alone" had great characters. And they were RECTANGLES.

[Adesanya]

One thing you might want to remember also is that this is set not in 2018, or 1968, or anything in between. It's POST-APOC. If the background is any indication, the apoc happened some time ago, at least one generation, as 'your' father had that workshop that brings you to Portia.

Now IRL, I am African American with all that entails. I don't have a problem with this game BECAUSE it;s so far in the future, I like to think humanity has come past "all that nonsense" that exists up to and including 2018. In my save Portia has 2 people of African descent. Me and Musa .... whatever. It's all good to me.

On an aside, Sonia may look Native American, but sistah girl's accent is either Bronx or Brooklin .. which for the record is not a race, it's a culture. *winks*

[Verdi]

Originally posted by XBL Laberbacke:

Originally posted by Lobster Lord:

Or Musa. What is the deal with him? Again nothing cultural about him. He is rich. Like... WOW.

You could even argue in his case it's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_discrimination because unlike in real life where blacks are often shown (not necessarily ARE, but SHOWN) as poor criminals, he's a nice rich guy. This could be viewed overreaction of people who want to say "look at us, we are definitely not racist". Every race or group IRL has bad people and good people, so neither extreme is anything but unhelpful.

..........Are you really citing a rich black man as an example of... reverse discrimination? I realize you said it was a potential overreaction but... There is just way too much to unpack there. I really hope people see how very wrong that is on so many levels.

This thread might get locked too judging by what happened with the last one, because apparently people find it inflammatory. I just... don't understand. Someone dares ask for a few more well-developed characters of color in a video game and there's all this outrage. It really should not be difficult or alienating for people of color to make this kind of request. It's should be just the same as asking for any kind of content to be added. The fact that people respond with this insane level of salt over what is an innocent, single paragraph thread is just wild to me.

Here's some food for thought for all the angry people out there. Ask yourself: what are you really mad about? Because it isn't a zero sum game. The devs add content all the time. Would fleshing out Musa's backstory really be so far out of their way? No. Would adding a few more interesting NPCs and more thoroughly exploring the backstories of the ones we have, like Remington be taking bread from your mouth? No. Offering more and better representation to people of color would not in any way damage the game experience, strain the devs nor take anything away from the quality overall. It really should not be difficult to just view the request with open-heartedness.

Also, one last edit: I wanna thank the Dev team for their candor in the previous thread.

[XBL Laberbacke]

Originally posted by Delilah:

Someone dares ask for a few more well-developed characters of color in a video game

Nonono. Not well-developed. It was "we need people with different shades of skin just because". The point is, where should they come from? There's no space for more characters, and randomly change some of the existing ones' LOOKS ONLY? That would prove that the change was completely unnecessary.

Portia is a small settlement, not New York City. Small settlements are mostly homogenous.

[Verdi]

Originally posted by XBL Laberbacke:

Portia is a small settlement, not New York City. Small settlements are mostly homogenous.

If you mean to say that a small settlement would be mostly homogenous in terms of race, this kind of emphasis on "realism" is a distraction. Given that the game already features seven identical brothers who all wear the same shirt, I don't really think realism is a valid argument.

You are making a lot of assumptions about Sugarstar and what they intended. Their request was deeply personal and not at all arbitrary. They want to see more people who reflect their own identity and there is nothing wrong with that. In fact, as evidenced here... They aren't the only one who feels that way, either.

Sure, you might find it difficult to empathize with, since you said before that all the characters in the game could be "floating cubes" for all you care. That's fine for you—no one is judging, but please recognize that your experience of life isn't universal. There are a lot of different perspectives and people have different needs.

[XBL Laberbacke]

So now I get attacked? Fine, go on.

[Verdi]

Originally posted by XBL Laberbacke:

So now I get attacked? Fine, go on.

At what point were you attacked? My words might've inspired some emotional discomfort, but if you go back and re-read what I've said, you'll see I made it a point to say no one was judging your point of view.

With respect, if you're upset it could be valuable to do a bit of reflection on why you feel the way you feel.

[Cathy]

Originally posted by Delilah:

Originally posted by XBL Laberbacke:

You could even argue in his case it's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_discrimination because unlike in real life where blacks are often shown (not necessarily ARE, but SHOWN) as poor criminals, he's a nice rich guy. This could be viewed overreaction of people who want to say "look at us, we are definitely not racist". Every race or group IRL has bad people and good people, so neither extreme is anything but unhelpful.

..........Are you really citing a rich black man as an example of... reverse discrimination? :hcs_nora: I realize you said it was a potential overreaction but... There is just way too much to unpack there. I really hope people see how very wrong that is on so many levels.

This thread might get locked too judging by what happened with the last one, because apparently people find it inflammatory. I just... don't understand. Someone dares ask for a few more well-developed characters of color in a video game and there's all this outrage. It really should not be difficult or alienating for people of color to make this kind of request. It's should be just the same as asking for any kind of content to be added. The fact that people respond with this insane level of salt over what is an innocent, single paragraph thread is just wild to me.

Here's some food for thought for all the angry people out there. Ask yourself: what are you really mad about? Because it isn't a zero sum game. The devs add content all the time. Would fleshing out Musa's backstory really be so far out of their way? No. Would adding a few more interesting NPCs and more thoroughly exploring the backstories of the ones we have, like Remington be taking bread from your mouth? No. Offering more and better representation to people of color would not in any way damage the game experience, strain the devs nor take anything away from the quality overall. It really should not be difficult to just view the request with open-heartedness.

Also, one last edit: I wanna thank the Dev team for their candor in the previous thread.

Totally, agree with you.

Look, someone else complained that the characters were too short and he wanted to make his taller. No one said anything. Someone else made a comment about fat and skinny. No reaction. Someone else said the older NPCs should be marriageable. No reaction.

Every other characteristic possible, aside from two heads and wings, has been suggested for both NPC and character config, and no one complains. But one suggestion that some NPCs might have a darker skin tone, not to mention cultural aspects of their persona, and people flip because they might have to look at someone not like them while playing the game.

Easy solution: Add a toggle in options. People that only want to see NPCs in their own race can have all NPCs toggled. There's a word for that, but if it makes people happy, fine. Personally, I don't want to play a game with all male or all female (or all binary), or all short or all tall, or all young or all old... or all of any one race. it's just boring.

For comparison, here's the world today:
Worlds Population by Race East Asian 24% (Korea, Mongolia, China, Japan) South Asian 21% (India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal) Southeast Asian 9% (Cambodia, Burma, Philippines, Malaysia) Black 15% White 15% Hispanic 8% Middle Eastern 8%

[XBL Laberbacke]

Originally posted by Cathy Dekker:

Look, someone else complained that the characters were too short and he wanted to make his taller. No one said anything. Someone else made a comment about fat and skinny. No reaction. Someone else said the older NPCs should be marriageable. No reaction.

Not true. I said something when that came up the first time. Couldn't be bothered subsequent times.

[Verdi]

Originally posted by XBL Laberbacke:

Originally posted by Cathy Dekker:

Look, someone else complained that the characters were too short and he wanted to make his taller. No one said anything. Someone else made a comment about fat and skinny. No reaction. Someone else said the older NPCs should be marriageable. No reaction.

Not true. I said something when that came up the first time. Couldn't be bothered subsequent times.

You're entitled to your opinions but... like.... why would you oppose more diverse options?

[AsianGirlLover]

Originally posted by Delilah:

You're entitled to your opinions but... like.... why would you oppose more diverse options?

He already answered that

Originally posted by XBL Laberbacke:

Portia is a small settlement, not New York City. Small settlements are mostly homogenous.

Let’s just put it this way: I could reasonably see Portia having another character introduced that was not Asian or White and had a fleshed-out story and reason for showing up.

What I’m against is randomly making established characters darker in skin tone because they’re currently the “wrong” skin color.

I’m also against introducing a random person who strings several letters behind them to describe how unique they are for not being “binary.” It’s pandering and not something that happens often in our clown world reality, so why would a person like that even be alive after the apocalypse when the most of humanity was already wiped out?

TL:DR: we’re not against diversity, we’re against pandering and forcing characters in at expense to the story. Put a character in because they belong in that world and have something to contribute, not just because of something as superficial as “they look different.”

[Verdi]

Originally posted by AsianGirlLover:

He already answered that

He didn't answer it here. I asked because I was interested.

Originally posted by AsianGirlLover:

Let’s just put it this way: I could reasonably see Portia having another character introduced that was not Asian or White and had a fleshed-out story and reason for showing up.

What I’m against is randomly making established characters darker in skin tone because they’re currently the “wrong” skin color.

No one that I've seen comment on this issue so far has suggested that established characters should have their skintones darkened. Where did you get this from?

Originally posted by AsianGirlLover:

I’m also against introducing a random person who strings several letters behind them to describe how unique they are for not being “binary.” It’s pandering and not something that happens often in our clown world reality, so why would a person like that even be alive after the apocalypse when the most of humanity was already wiped out?

Who suggested this? Again, I'm confused. Where did you get this rhetoric?

Originally posted by AsianGirlLover:

TL:DR: we’re not against diversity, we’re against pandering and forcing characters in at expense to the story. Put a character in because they belong in that world and have something to contribute, not just because of something as superficial as “they look different.”

First, I think we can all be confident that any character the devs choose to write into this game would have an obvious purpose. To assume otherwise is just bad faith.

Including a character of color would not come at the expense of the story. This game is still in early access; the story is as of yet, unfinished. There are established characters that lack development and are being updated as we go along. Bringing in a new character would hardly be out of their way.

You know, not a single character to date that has been inserted into this story has needed an elaborate justification for existing. There are many that do not have a justification at all, like the Hulu brothers. So why is it considered "pandering" to want to include more characters of color when quoting the statistic from Cathy Dekker earlier on, black and white ethnicities even out to to be the same in terms of percentage?

Hmmm. This might be worth thinking about, yeah?

[AsianGirlLover]

To OP and anyone else who may be interested: it’s also important to keep in mind that this game is also being marketed and sold in China.

The Chinese market is practically a gold mine in comparison to the West where games like this rarely get as much attention (Stardew Valley, Harvest Moon, etc.).

With that in mind, it’s important to also know that, unlike the West, China has not been indoctrinated into hating itself or its people, which is why when the movie Black Panther featured in theaters there, they had to change the posters to hide the hero’s face because many Chinese will candidly say they dislike the features of a black man. You can even google reviews for the movie in China and read how it was canned because they found it to be “too dark.”

So, with this in mind, Pathea games finds themselves in a position where they need to decide to either appeal to the majority and let the game’s characters stay as they are, or cave in to a minority and suffer a backlash from their Chinese playerbase.

Of course, not all Chinese people hold the same opinions, but they have a healthy preference for their own people which makes them less open to an idea such as this.

[Verdi]

Originally posted by AsianGirlLover:

With that in mind, it’s important to also know that, unlike the West, China has not been indoctrinated into hating itself or its people, which is why when the movie Black Panther featured in theaters there, they had to change the posters to hide the hero’s face because many Chinese will candidly say they dislike the features of a black man. You can even google reviews for the movie in China and read how it was canned because they found it to be “too dark.”

So, with this in mind, Pathea games finds themselves in a position where they need to decide to either appeal to the majority and let the game’s characters stay as they are, or cave in to a minority and suffer a backlash from their Chinese playerbase.

Of course, not all Chinese people hold the same opinions, but they have a healthy preference for their own people which makes them less open to an idea such as this.

So acceptance of racial diversity is "indoctrination" and "self-hatred." Ahh, I see. You know, I appreciate your showing your true colors. I don't think there's any need to engage with you further.

I really hope the devs do lock this thread, so you can get deplatformed. It's a shame such an innocent game has attracted such hateful and indefensible rhetoric.