My List of 45 Things a Gay Character Needs In Order for Me to Think They’re Necessary

See My List of 45 Things a Gay Character Needs In Order for Me to Think They’re Necessary on thehardtimes.net

Gamers were a mistake.

One of the most annoying things to pop up post-GamerGate is the idea that minority characters “need a reason to exist”, they should not make reference to their minority status, that they’re existence is inherently political and any attempt to bring them in games is “forced diversity” which leads to “white genocide”.

It’s rather strange isn’t it? The archetypical game characters don’t need a reason to exist. How do protagonists being white add to the story? How aren’t heterosexual story archs not being “forced down our throats”? How aren’t typical protagonists “political”. The world’s a big place, there’s room for plenty of stories and archs to be told. Ironically, Assasin’s Creed Odyssey planned on having Kassandra as the sole protagonist, but Ubisoft exects (#FuckUbisoft) vetoed the plan, which is why Alexios is there too, even though the story archs are the same.

That’s not to say every game featuring a black protagonist need to be a heavy handed critique of systemic racism. It’s be a bit much if Crash Bandicoot got a black character and experienced racism.