What's with all the female ship captains?

[David Davidson]

I know anno isn't exactly the most historically accurate however since you are technically serving the Queen (in the campaign anyway) shouldn't all your captains be men? I mean it was bad luck (and is even today according to some sailors) to have women on a ship, especially a warship (and there was good reason for this belief, put 300 salty seamen on a ship of the line for a voyage lasting a month with rations of rum and grog and have a few women on board and things aren't exactly going to go very well.
I can get a female pirate captain, there is at least historical fact showing that some women became pirates and two even became pirate captains however in the Royal navy women were prohibited from serving aboard ships until 1994, that's a little far off 1800, although the game feels more like 1860-1905.

[Primigenia]

Originally posted by ElPrezCBF:

Just because the game is not fully realistic (as it should be to avoid compromising gameplay for the sake of over-realism), it doesn't mean it must take the other extreme and completely ignore players who consider some amount of historical accuracy to be immersive. I like how Xcom 2 allows you to customize your squad mix down to the gender, although that word has become a political minefield in today's context. Basically, I think games should allow players to decide their level of immersion through customization or at least allow modding to do so.

yes 👍🏻

[mittim]

The games timeframe was the hightime of the class struggle between workers and factory owners, resulting in unions and marxism. And marxism was for gender equality. So having a few documents ingame to hint at these themes seems more historicaly accurate/immersive I would say.
So to me a few things you mentioned seem to be a historical reference. You might see them as propaganda, I see them as history.

And I still dont get why the artisans being "gay" is a problem, but queer specialists is fine?

[Primigenia]

Originally posted by mittim:

The games timeframe was the hightime of the class struggle between workers and factory owners, resulting in unions and marxism. And marxism was for gender equality. So having a few documents ingame to hint at these themes seems more historicaly accurate/immersive I would say.
So to me a few things you mentioned seem to be a historical reference. You might see them as propaganda, I see them as history.

And I still dont get why the artisans being "gay" is a problem, but queer specialists is fine?

Yes and age of empires 2 timeframe has crusades and spanish genocide conquest of mexico, Anno 1404 same with the religion wars, port royale 4 + Anno 1602/1701 were at the height of the atlantic slave trade but you don't really see it isn't it? you just play the game, and you build your beautiful imperial cathedral, and your sultan's mosque, and fight the pirates, and grow different cities with different styles and architectures and that's it. or in the case of Age of empires you build your armies and towns and knights and priests and you go on your marry way to try and win against the mayan priests and plumed archers. Wouldn't it just be silly to have half of the knights in AoE2 being female? And yet I'm happy half of the civilian pop are women, what a strange thing right?

There are a million ways things can be done and portrayed and funnily enough in the last 5-7 years we've got an explosion of political propaganda in games in the style of DEI and wokeness. Starfield did it, Assassin's creed did it, Suicide squad did it, Saints row did it, Wolfenstein youngblood did it, and the gamers are having none of it.

As I said many times before even in this very thread, Anno 1800 isn't that bad, but it sure has some elements of it and pretending they're not there it's just being willingly blind to it.

[mittim]

Originally posted by Primigenia:

Originally posted by mittim:

The games timeframe was the hightime of the class struggle between workers and factory owners, resulting in unions and marxism. And marxism was for gender equality. So having a few documents ingame to hint at these themes seems more historicaly accurate/immersive I would say.
So to me a few things you mentioned seem to be a historical reference. You might see them as propaganda, I see them as history.

And I still dont get why the artisans being "gay" is a problem, but queer specialists is fine?

Yes and age of empires 2 timeframe has crusades and spanish genocide conquest of mexico, Anno 1404 same with the religion wars, port royale 4 + Anno 1602/1701 were at the height of the atlantic slave trade but you don't really see it and if so it's not about propagandizing or virtue signaling pro/against these things using modern political lenses isn't it? you just play the game, and you build your beautiful imperial cathedral, and your sultan's mosque, and fight the pirates, and grow different cities with different styles and architectures and that's it. or in the case of Age of empires you build your armies and towns and knights and priests and you go on your marry way to try and win against the mayan priests and plumed archers. Wouldn't it just be silly to have half of the knights in AoE2 being female? And yet I'm happy half of the divilian pop are women, what a strange thing right?

There are a million ways things can be done and portrayed and funnily enough in the last 5-7 years we've got an explosion of political propaganda in games in the style of DEI and wokeness. Starfield did it, Assassin's creed did it, Suicide squad did it, Saints row did it, Wolfenstein youngblood did it, and the gamers are having none of it.

As I said many times before even in this very thread, Anno 1800 isn't that bad, but it sure has some elements of it and pretending they're not there it's just being willingly blind to it.

ok I kinda agree on the first part, games were simpler back then (if you want that back just play indie games)

though I have a different outlook on the second: people today seem to be much more open talking about issues, so I find it understandable that it shows up in media we consume. Sure the question is how much, but in Anno 1800 it isnt much. I havent played any of the other games you mentioned, nor do I play much AAA games at all, so I cant tell you about that. Though I would say most gamers, me included, are fine with a normal amount of what you call wokeness, but not an extreme amount. Sure call the extreme amounts political propaganda, but not the normal amounts, todays society is diverse so why shouldnt it be represented ingame?. You seem to call things propaganda much earlier than me, to sum this up.

The other angle is the one I mentioned in my first post. Essentialy publishers only care about money, so having more diverse representation brings more diverse people into the game, so it has more sales. Though Im not sure if i would file that under wokeness, thats just capitalism.

[Primigenia]

Originally posted by mittim:

ok I kinda agree on the first part, games were simpler back then (if you want that back just play indie games)

though I have a different outlook on the second: people today seem to be much more open talking about issues, so I find it understandable that it shows up in media we consume. Sure the question is how much, but in Anno 1800 it isnt much. I havent played any of the other games you mentioned, nor do I play much AAA games at all, so I cant tell you about that. Though I would say most gamers, me included, are fine with a normal amount of what you call wokeness, but not an extreme amount. Sure call the extreme amounts political propaganda, but not the normal amounts, todays society is diverse so why shouldnt it be represented ingame?. You seem to call things propaganda much earlier than me, to sum this up.

The other angle is the one I mentioned in my first post. Essentialy publishers only care about money, so having more diverse representation brings more diverse people into the game, so it has more sales. Though Im not sure if i would file that under wokeness, thats just capitalism.

I think that's a logical fallacy, to say that a diverse society needs diversity pushed anywhere in the entertainment. I can see a character creator allowing any kind of skin tone and physical characteristic, every great game has it, Skyrim, Elden Ring, The Sims, Cyberpunk, Fortnite (although I don't really like Fortnite personally), but I can't really see this point being made with strategy games, city builders, or in general where the player is abstract. Embesa pop? great. New world pop? great, but I'm not really sure african players or south american plyers buy the game more because of the new world pops. In the exact the same way as I don't think that women buy the game more because of the famers, engineers or even the ship's captain.

A game is first and foremost it's gameplay characteristics. People who like city builders and resource management will buy Anno 1800, and it doesn't matter what gender they are or what gender the captain's ship is, on the opposite front it will be a immersion breaking characteristic, because it will break the illusion wall the player builds while playing. the queen is a woman of course, and zero complained about her, because it's in that spot between being clearly a game character, but inspired enough to reality to make it believable. Paloma, same. The airships are a bit quirky, it enters somewhat the steampunk ideas, the victorian age really aligns with it nicely, again, no one complained.

Cities skylines, a city builder set in the modern age has literally zero pop, only numbers, you never see them except when you zoom in and watch closely to the small people going around on the streets, yet it's pretty popular, because people who like city builders buy it, the pop and genders and ethnicities are irrelevant.

On the other hand if you play an Assassin's creed set in medieval japan and the main character is black, that's not going to go well. People have a certain kind of expectations, if they play a game set in medieval japan, they want to play an asian samurai, even white people or any other non asian person, because that's the ideal, that's the expectation. Just like playing Assassin's creed in ancient egypt people of any ethnicity expected a brown northern african protagonist and that's exactly what they were delivered. Zero people complained about Mirage's protagonist not being white or asian.

[mittim]

Ye what I mean is, not every game needs it or should have it, but Im not gonna mind if a game has diversity done in a sensible way without virtue signaling, ... (like Anno 1800 for me atleast).

[Primigenia]

Originally posted by mittim:

Ye what I mean is, not every game needs it or should have it, but Im not gonna mind if a game has diversity done in a sensible way without virtue signaling, ... (like Anno 1800 for me atleast).

Thank you for this conversation. I feel too often as of late people are blind to others prospective and can't really find a compromise or a way to discuss and exchange ideas without getting angry or resentful. Having different points of view on things doesn't mean that people can't try to grow, discuss or accept others' ideas.

We don't agree on some things clearly but it's nice to see we still have had a respectful conversation in which we tried to understand each other and learn.

[:3]

I would've liked more women in this game.

[dev]

Its ubisoft.