All’s Fair In Games And War?

In a world that has taken political correctness to ridiculous levels we have been brought up to believe that any prejudice in real life is completely uncalled for.  With video games becoming an increasing part of people’s lives, is the virtual world following the real world as closely? The other day as I was playing Virtual Families, a life sim, it suddenly dawned on me that this fun little game actually contained nothing but white, straight characters — with the only choice being a random event of adoption if you didn’t want a “traditional” family. I had played this game very happily for a great deal of time before I even noticed this and so it got me thinking — are we even aware of whether a game is politically correct or not? Is this something that could have been gotten away with in the past but is now becoming a more noticeable trait as games strive towards realism?

Although easily forgotten these days, there was a time when inclusion of a black character was radically noticeable.  One of the earliest examples being in the simply named Basketball (1979) on the Atari 800. 1986 saw the birth of one of the most memorable female playable characters, Samus Aran from the Metroid series. When these events occurred it was a big step forward and now similar steps have been made to pave the way for gay characters, such as Makoto in Enchanted Arms. Additionally we also see multiple “minorities” portrayed in games such as Darci Stern in Urban Chaos, a tough black woman. People hear about political correctness issues in games and instantly snap to the idea of video game violence but this is simply the media inserting ideas that have left more subtle issues hidden and forgotten.

From my experience of gamers — it is a harsh thing to accept, but — the main demographic is still that of the young white male.  Many of these gamers are more comfortable playing as what they know. The ‘ability to relate’ appears to be very important when bonding with the character from the latest FPS, despite the gaming world being seen to most outsiders as a breakaway from reality and an escape from who you really are. As an openly bisexual female it is rare for me to feel that bond and I have spent my gaming career accepting that I will have to play as whoever is available.  Is it different for those with a greater variety of characters available that match traits they contain themselves? It was time to put some questions out to the public.

I set off on a journey to gather opinions about how people’s gaming experiences were shaped by the political correctness of the game and whether or not it even made an impact. I was surprised to discover that the majority of my original sample had never thought about it and had not really noticed whether a game was following a trend or not. Then it hit me. Maybe I was looking in the wrong place. Rightly or wrongly, there are many gaming communities out there  for gay, lesbian or even Christian (etc.) people. Would these groups have a different take? Surprisingly the overwhelming result was still that most people did not notice or were “unaffected” by stereotypes and political correctness issues. However, I’m not going to pigeon-hole people, and there were numerous people scattered in all my sample groups who felt very strongly on the issue. Those who noticed seemed to notice instantly and said it had a definite impact on their opinion of the game overall. However, they all felt powerless to impact the industry in any way.

A growing number of games are allowing you to create your own character and this to me appears to be the way forward. Although not in the majority, I discovered a significant enough percentage of my sample groups (a little under a third) would prefer more openness to different cultures and minorities. In some cases only a simple skin colour change option would be needed to make people happy, just to give that bit of control and to allow the player to connect in a way that the Caucasian male has been able to for a long time. Surely a small amount of coding could make a difference to the developers reputation that would more than pay for itself in goodwill and public relations?

It has been argued to me that on the flip side there are many portrayals of minorities that have seeped through over the years, but the majority of those cases I do not feel are “positive portrayals” and only go towards enforcing stereotypes. A good example of this is Makoto in Enchanted Arms. He is definitely an obvious portrayal of a gay male and the game was hailed for including the character. However, (and it is a big however) he was, in my opinion, needlessly camp to a level that pushed past tongue in cheek and became an annoying joke. Some players have actually stopped playing the game due to the immense irritation provoked by Makoto. The bottom line is that there seemed to be little purpose in portraying the character in this way. This is something that has been repeating throughout my sample’s answers — it is fine to portray a character however you want as long as it is in line with the story and not just for the sake of it  — and it is for this very reason that I must praise Mass Effect.

Mass Effect not only gave the player the choice of gender and race in their lead character, it also allowed the character to make a choice on sexuality, allowing gay, straight or even cross-species. The unique thing about this was that the sexuality of the character was not flaunted and used in the main story, and indeed you could complete the game without showing any sexual interest in anyone.   If you did choose to partner up with someone that did not affect the character as a whole. A gay male would not have camp aspects, a gay female would not have man-hating tendencies, the choice you made did not induce any stereotypes and in no way affected the other decisions you made throughout the game. It was simply an option and that gives it a gold star in my book.

Another good example, which you’ve probably been waiting for me to mention, is The Sims. From day one The Sims allowed us to create whoever we want and to allow us to pair ourselves with whoever we want. Then came The Sims 2. Although it is not hugely obvious, this is a game that created every character with a built in sexuality. Yes, you could sway their decisions and make them fall in love with whoever you want but I found numerous times that a “straight” character would be kissing the same sex neighbour as soon as their spouse went to work! Adulterous? Yes. Funny? Laugh out loud. A good use of free will in games? Definitely! Like Mass Effect, The Sims gave us different sexualities and races that didn’t affect the personalities of the characters.

I am really shocked at the number of people who have not noticed political correctness issues in games, whether they are good or bad. Have our brains become too accustomed to the idea that it will always be a burly bloke or a stunning woman wielding a gun? Have we forgotten that some qualities of life need to be fed through to the virtual world if we want games to keep improving? Or is it simply a case of pandering to the wants of the majority? If it is the latter, how much work is really being done to check what the majority do want? If the majority appear to be oblivious to prejudices — and how minorities are being portrayed — then surely it would do developers no harm to embrace the needs of us who do notice and want a more balanced and realistic world to play in.

There are a vast number of games that have given positive portrayals to minorities over the years, but unfortunately there are also a vast number that have gone down the easy route or portrayed minorities in a stereotypical fashion that is not helpful to progressing games design. All I ask is that next time you sit down to play a game you at least give a fleeting thought to the charcater you are playing and whether there is a healthy message behind that character. If everyone can at least start to think about character portrayal maybe the industry will continue to progress in a positive manner, for everyone.