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Same gender relationships clarifications?


elexier

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You know that the average male is 7-9% taller than the average female right ?

This of course depends slightly on race, and to a bigger extent on environment (the worse living conditions are the smaller the actual difference).

 

And not all man are taller than all woman, neither in real life nor in the game. Three of the male body-types are smaller than the biggest female in game.

 

Not to mention that the problem is not who is taller/fatter/ whatever but that there are differences in body type that need to be addressed in any scene that involves touching.

 

Why does any of that need to be addressed? Is there some scene where a smaller character makes out with a taller one, and so gets kissed on the head instead of the lips?

 

If not, I don't see the problem.

 

Also, averages and majority are just that. Doesn't mean there aren't exceptions.

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Right, and they've put all of that super duper hard work into OGRA only and haven't done squat for SGRAs, which is the original point.

 

While it's unfair to compare SWTOR and Skyrim based on quality of romance plot, it is fair to compare how they allotted that specific budget as far as OGRA vs SGRA goes.

 

Not really. They're two different games. They don't have to put the same amount of effort into it if they don't want to. It's up to you as a player to either accept it and play the game or quit.

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Why does any of that need to be addressed? Is there some scene where a smaller character makes out with a taller one, and so gets kissed on the head instead of the lips?

 

If not, I don't see the problem.

 

Also, averages and majority are just that. Doesn't mean there aren't exceptions.

 

I have not completed any romance in SW:Tor since I wait for the SGRAs, so I don´t know how much interaction actually happens.

But if interaction happens, like it does in other BioWare games, differences in the various models need to be addressed. In cut-scenes simply forcing a scene that is intended for body-type A also to play if the player avatar has body-type B can lead to rather silly cut-scenes (the ME2 examples can be found on Youtube).

And this does not only apply to physical interactions but also to verbal ones. To bring an example from DA:O Zevran will bring up a female Warden´s eyes or a male Warden´s strong hands in a banter with Morrigan if the player romances Zevran. The same is true for all other BioWare romances. To switch a romance from OG to SG more is needed than to delete the s from she and the wo from woman.

Edited by Wittand
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Unless they were written as gender-neutral in the first place, which personally I'd have no problem with. But of course that's a moot point as far as SWTOR goes.

 

I'm sure some parts are gender neutral (beyond pronoun swapping) and some parts aren't (and would need a bit more stuff changed around).

 

I don't think it's as easy or as hard as some are making it.

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Umm, this is the worst excuse I have ever read yet, the obvious solution here to make such cutscenes not look weird would be to not limit the height of all female characters to a head shorter than male ones in the first place. There's absolutely no reason for that other than trying to enforce the stereotype that all men are taller than all women which is simply not true. It's very damn annoying that the tallest, amazon-like, female character is actually.... A full head shorter than the tall male one.

 

Neither are "the norm", obviously, so why the hell put in that limit other than sexism.

 

Umm...that isn't a stereotype, it is scientific fact.

 

At least it is with Earth humans, and I'm assuming Star Wars humans are the same :p

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Umm...that isn't a stereotype, it is scientific fact.

 

At least it is with Earth humans, and I'm assuming Star Wars humans are the same :p

 

Yes, but when the scientific fact is used to passive or micro-aggressively tell people how they're supposed to look, then you have a problem. Also height restrictions are part of "ideal woman" stereotypes (as well as "ideal man" stereotypes - Tom Cruise has to use boxes and such because he's 5'6" and therefore shorter than most other leads, including female leads who are often wearing 3-4" heels).

 

There are women who are over 6' and it used to be that these women would be "treated" for their height when they were growing girls, in the belief that if they were taller than most men, no one would want to marry them. Same thing happened to short boys.

 

Yes, taller women are somewhat rare, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be represented.

 

I should mention, though, that I think all the female models in this game have issues, and that height restrictions are only one of them.

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Yes, but when the scientific fact is used to passive or micro-aggressively tell people how they're supposed to look, then you have a problem. Also height restrictions are part of "ideal woman" stereotypes (as well as "ideal man" stereotypes - Tom Cruise has to use boxes and such because he's 5'6" and therefore shorter than most other leads, including female leads who are often wearing 3-4" heels).

 

There are women who are over 6' and it used to be that these women would be "treated" for their height when they were growing girls, in the belief that if they were taller than most men, no one would want to marry them. Same thing happened to short boys.

 

Yes, taller women are somewhat rare, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be represented.

 

I should mention, though, that I think all the female models in this game have issues, and that height restrictions are only one of them.

 

I think that of both genders models myself (having issues). The problem isn't that they went for the ideal (because they didn't...or else we wouldnt have body 4).

 

The problem is TOR's charater customization just sucks :p And even if it was way more awesome, it would likely not do something people would then complain about. For instance, I can't think of one good character customization MMO that would make the body 4 male a possibility.

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I think that of both genders models myself (having issues). The problem isn't that they went for the ideal (because they didn't...or else we wouldnt have body 4).

 

I'm not male nor an artist, so I haven't studied the male form in any sort of depth to have much of an informed opinion of it, though I will say that the heads always look too big on male Body 1. Male Body 4, though, is muscle - not aesthetic muscle, really, like perhaps Body 2 might have, but practical muscle, likely from having a more physical and weight based fighting style (certain types of wrestling, perhaps?).

 

Character customisation in this game is very... simplistic. In my head my Sorcerer and Warrior have very different body types, despite both being Body 2 in-game: Sorcerer is more curvy and carries more weight in the hips (kind of like me, ALL my weight is in my hips/butt) and my Warrior has a leaner, more muscled look.

 

I don't want to say "athletic" because such a look doesn't exist.

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I'm not male nor an artist, so I haven't studied the male form in any sort of depth to have much of an informed opinion of it, though I will say that the heads always look too big on male Body 1. Male Body 4, though, is muscle - not aesthetic muscle, really, like perhaps Body 2 might have, but practical muscle, likely from having a more physical and weight based fighting style (certain types of wrestling, perhaps?).

 

Character customisation in this game is very... simplistic. In my head my Sorcerer and Warrior have very different body types, despite both being Body 2 in-game: Sorcerer is more curvy and carries more weight in the hips (kind of like me, ALL my weight is in my hips/butt) and my Warrior has a leaner, more muscled look.

 

I don't want to say "athletic" because such a look doesn't exist.

 

If we go by that page, then the body types as they are, are varied enough, and any complaints about them are they are just not physically appealing to those who don't like them. Since theres differences in build and in height. :p

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If we go by that page, then the body types as they are, are varied enough, and any complaints about them are they are just not physically appealing to those who don't like them. Since theres differences in build and in height. :p

 

What are you talking about? I was linking that image purely for the reason I stated I was linking that image - the term "athletic" does not accurately describe or demonstrate actual athletes and their bodies.

 

If anything, those images demonstrate a need for greater character customisation, particularly if one wants to have a realistic and representative system.

 

Yes, people ARE going to make characters them deem attractive to them - something you seem to be vehemently against a lot of them time, because god forbid the player actually want to look at their character. But what people deem attractive is different because we are all individuals. Currently the body types available in this game feature six that follow conventional/mainstream rules for being "attractive" and two that are anomalous to that (being Body 3 and 4 for female and male respectively) - that doesn't mean that everyone likes them, merely that everyone has to choose from them.

 

And height? Three of the women in those images are over 6 foot and others are close to it - something which is not demonstrated in this game.

 

Actually, you know what? I'm not even doing to bother anymore.

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What are you talking about? I was linking that image purely for the reason I stated I was linking that image - the term "athletic" does not accurately describe or demonstrate actual athletes and their bodies.

 

If anything, those images demonstrate a need for greater character customisation, particularly if one wants to have a realistic and representative system.

 

Yes, people ARE going to make characters them deem attractive to them - something you seem to be vehemently against a lot of them time, because god forbid the player actually want to look at their character. But what people deem attractive is different because we are all individuals. Currently the body types available in this game feature six that follow conventional/mainstream rules for being "attractive" and two that are anomalous to that (being Body 3 and 4 for female and male respectively) - that doesn't mean that everyone likes them, merely that everyone has to choose from them.

 

And height? Three of the women in those images are over 6 foot and others are close to it - something which is not demonstrated in this game.

 

Actually, you know what? I'm not even doing to bother anymore.

 

o.O I never once said don't make a character that doesn't look good to you. When have I ever said that?

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I'd like them to plug in a slider system. Height, Body type (endo-, meso-, ectomorph), body weight, muscle mass. That'd side-step this whole argument by giving people considerably more variation; if you end up with an 'idealised' form then that's your doing, not the game's. Hell, a Sims 3 style system would work.

 

And, you know, some furniture that works.

 

Oh, and full SGRAs.

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I think it is important to respect everyones options in regards to this. What some people like can make others uncomfortable. The game can have it's options as longest nothing is impossed or forced on to players. I would personally would like the option to make my companion (pets) weather they are homosexual or straight. That way no awkward dialogue is going to occur. This way everyone can have the Star Wars experience they want to have and not ruin other players experience. You want to make you character straight or not.....just to have that option is all that I would ask. Also more customizations avaliable for companions early in the game would be kool. Keeping tasteful for everyone of course.
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Umm, this is the worst excuse I have ever read yet, the obvious solution here to make such cutscenes not look weird would be to not limit the height of all female characters to a head shorter than male ones in the first place. There's absolutely no reason for that other than trying to enforce the stereotype that all men are taller than all women which is simply not true. It's very damn annoying that the tallest, amazon-like, female character is actually.... A full head shorter than the tall male one.

 

Neither are "the norm", obviously, so why the hell put in that limit other than sexism.

 

Though I agree that the game should allow female characters to use the tallest male height, it's not a stereotype. Men are generally taller than women, and thus the tallest men will almost always be significantly taller than the tallest women. The developers' mistake has very little to do with sexism; it has much more to do with the fact that Bioware heavily underestimated how important character customization is in an MMO.

 

SWTOR flat-out sucks at character customization across the board. Some idiot in Austin probably thought that adding real-world-reminiscent limits on the relative size of females would help to immerse players, but unfortunately the opposite tends to be true: players will generally be more inclined to stay with an MMO if they can customize their characters to feel like unique individuals.

 

And yeah, apologies to BW if the word, "idiot," is a little harsh -- but seriously; I'm about fed up. It would be one thing if the game just sucked at character creation (it does), but that's just the tip of the ice berg here. Bioware spent a year showing us armor models in advertisements, trailers, on NPCs, and even the freaking character-creation screen that are unattainable for players in the game proper. And now, after a year of empty promises, EA/Bioware suddenly introduces some of the most-requested cosmetic options as $15 microtransactions. And if that isn't bad enough, the $15 doesn't even give you the outfit on more than one character. $15 doesn't even give you an outfit that you can transfer to a different character.

 

Yeah. Sorry for the mini, off-topic rant. I came back to this thread because I was heartened to see Hickman finally address the SGR crowd in his latest state of the game speech. I was also a little disappointed on your behalf, because what's coming in Makeb doesn't sound like it even scratches the surface of what SGR advocates have justifiably expected.

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Yeah. Sorry for the mini, off-topic rant. I came back to this thread because I was heartened to see Hickman finally address the SGR crowd in his latest state of the game speech. I was also a little disappointed on your behalf, because what's coming in Makeb doesn't sound like it even scratches the surface of what SGR advocates have justifiably expected.

 

I'll be honest, if Bioware can start introducing SGRA's now, when they should have been in at launch, then it's possible they'll start introducing other things that should have realistically been in at launch: chat bubbles, hood toggles, chairs, that sort of thing.

 

And thank you also, for realising that a bunch of [Flirt]s with (presumably) throw-away NPCs doesn't match up with actual, fully voiced, fully storied, companion romances. I am sick to death of people telling us "oh meh gawd, you're getting some throw-away NPC [Flirt]s! Why can't you just be happy? Gawds, this is cutting into me getting PvP/PvE/Story Content/Pazaak racing!"

 

As if some how Bioware making more romances is going to make them suddenly give up the rest of the game. It's depressing that this game is in such a state that so many people are so paranoid about content they like. And instead of talking to Bioware, they take it out on people who are different to them.

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As if some how Bioware making more romances is going to make them suddenly give up the rest of the game. It's depressing that this game is in such a state that so many people are so paranoid about content they like. And instead of talking to Bioware, they take it out on people who are different to them.

 

It's a phenomenon that unfortunately is quite common in game communities. In WoW it was housing, or generally role playing content, that functioned as the scapegoat, people laying blame on people wanting it in since they would for some reason get less of a game because of that. Interestingly, when Blizz listened to the "vast majority" who didn't care about role playing content, they created "Cataclysm" and tanked. Now MoP is considered to be rather successful, I might suggest for the amount of fluff and RPG content it possesses, but there would still be people on the official WoW boards who'd tell me I'm wrong and suggest I should go elsewhere to find the game that's "for me".

 

Whenever someone brings up the "majority" argument, be very aware, since if what they suggest really reflects the opinions of "the vast majority", the vast majority is stupid.

 

On another note, I've been inspired by the recent discussions here (been lurking) and wrote something about being a female gamer and how we're some kind of a mystery to gaming companies. If you'd like to read, you'll find it here:

 

http://mellowtopia.tumblr.com/

 

It has a reference to the lack of SGR in SWTOR as well, if only a minor one. ;)

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Yes, but when the scientific fact is used to passive or micro-aggressively tell people how they're supposed to look, then you have a problem. Also height restrictions are part of "ideal woman" stereotypes (as well as "ideal man" stereotypes - Tom Cruise has to use boxes and such because he's 5'6" and therefore shorter than most other leads, including female leads who are often wearing 3-4" heels).

 

There are women who are over 6' and it used to be that these women would be "treated" for their height when they were growing girls, in the belief that if they were taller than most men, no one would want to marry them. Same thing happened to short boys.

 

Yes, taller women are somewhat rare, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be represented.

 

I should mention, though, that I think all the female models in this game have issues, and that height restrictions are only one of them.

 

If we accept that there is going to be a fixed number of body-types and not a number-modifier for centimeters, kg, weight distribution, etc, with each of the body-types being 'bigger' than the previous, you pretty much have 4 options:

1) Male=Female for all body-types 2) Male > Female for all body-types 3)Female > Male for all body-types

4) Mixed (i.e body-type 1: m>f, 2:f> m, etc)

The problem is that bioware has to pick only one of the 4 available (unless they took the time to give us an actual character creation tool, but they didn't....). However, no matter which one they picked they could 'offend' someone, at least by your reasoning. For instance with 4) a woman might be 'offended' and say, like you did, 'are short women supposed to be shorter than short men?' or with 1) ,a man might be offended and say 'are fat men supposed to be equally tall with fat women?'

When it comes to how one looks (and many other things), even forcing them to be 'equal' to others is restrictive and offensive. Bioware couldn't avoid not making a not-perfect choice, so they might as well go with the averages.

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Two things -

 

First, @neohunterunico, I only have to respect the fact that people can have their own opinions. I am not obliged to respect the actual opinion they hold, especially if it isn't based in any fact or even in reality. In fact, I am just as entitled to hold an opinion that their opinion is a bunch of rubbish, and they should respect the fact that I can hold that opinion, even if their opinion of my opinion is that mine is rubbish too.

 

Second, the whole thing with character models is kind of a short cut many games (not just SWTOR) take because making scalable textures (for armour and the like) is a rather time consuming endeavour. Some games scale their character creation more, but you'll notice that most MMOs go for a simplistic approach - which might, in fact, have some scale sliders, but those sliders are limited in what they can do. Just look at Skyrim, a game known for it's attention to detail, and you'll see that you can't change your character's height, the weight sliders are quite limited, and most of the sliders are to do with the character's face.

 

At least in SWTOR we get a choice of four distinct body types (one very thin, one "normal", one significantly tall/muscular model, one "fat" model) even if they are uneven between male and female (the "fat" model in particular). If you're going to complain about extreme (and unrealistic) gender dimorphism in games, might I suggest you go and vent your annoyance at WoW first.

 

(And so I'm not comparing an apple to an orange - the character customization in GW2 might seem like it's probably more involved than in SWTOR, but the difference in heights you can choose is limited, and the difference in physiques are mostly illusionary based on skin texture, not on significant differences to the model.)

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It's a phenomenon that unfortunately is quite common in game communities. In WoW it was housing, or generally role playing content, that functioned as the scapegoat, people laying blame on people wanting it in since they would for some reason get less of a game because of that. Interestingly, when Blizz listened to the "vast majority" who didn't care about role playing content, they created "Cataclysm" and tanked. Now MoP is considered to be rather successful, I might suggest for the amount of fluff and RPG content it possesses, but there would still be people on the official WoW boards who'd tell me I'm wrong and suggest I should go elsewhere to find the game that's "for me".

 

Whenever someone brings up the "majority" argument, be very aware, since if what they suggest really reflects the opinions of "the vast majority", the vast majority is stupid.

 

On another note, I've been inspired by the recent discussions here (been lurking) and wrote something about being a female gamer and how we're some kind of a mystery to gaming companies. If you'd like to read, you'll find it here:

 

http://mellowtopia.tumblr.com/

 

It has a reference to the lack of SGR in SWTOR as well, if only a minor one. ;)

 

It sould 3.3 million copies int he first 24 hours and recieved good critical reviews. How exactly did WoW: Catalysm...tank?

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Two things -

 

First, @neohunterunico, I only have to respect the fact that people can have their own opinions. I am not obliged to respect the actual opinion they hold, especially if it isn't based in any fact or even in reality. In fact, I am just as entitled to hold an opinion that their opinion is a bunch of rubbish, and they should respect the fact that I can hold that opinion, even if their opinion of my opinion is that mine is rubbish too.

 

Second, the whole thing with character models is kind of a short cut many games (not just SWTOR) take because making scalable textures (for armour and the like) is a rather time consuming endeavour. Some games scale their character creation more, but you'll notice that most MMOs go for a simplistic approach - which might, in fact, have some scale sliders, but those sliders are limited in what they can do. Just look at Skyrim, a game known for it's attention to detail, and you'll see that you can't change your character's height, the weight sliders are quite limited, and most of the sliders are to do with the character's face.

 

At least in SWTOR we get a choice of four distinct body types (one very thin, one "normal", one significantly tall/muscular model, one "fat" model) even if they are uneven between male and female (the "fat" model in particular). If you're going to complain about extreme (and unrealistic) gender dimorphism in games, might I suggest you go and vent your annoyance at WoW first.

 

(And so I'm not comparing an apple to an orange - the character customization in GW2 might seem like it's probably more involved than in SWTOR, but the difference in heights you can choose is limited, and the difference in physiques are mostly illusionary based on skin texture, not on significant differences to the model.)

 

I just wish the heights and weights weren't so intricately tied together. If you want to play a short character, you're stuck being rail thin. No option for short with normal weight, short with muscular build, or short with fat build. It's kind of a bummer.

Edited by Ohamsie
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Interestingly, when Blizz listened to the "vast majority" who didn't care about role playing content, they created "Cataclysm" and tanked. Now MoP is considered to be rather successful, I might suggest for the amount of fluff and RPG content it possesses, but there would still be people on the official WoW boards who'd tell me I'm wrong and suggest I should go elsewhere to find the game that's "for me".

 

Cataclysm tanked?? MMO companies would give their left eye for their expansions to experience the "failure" Cataclysm did.

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I just wish the heights and weights weren't so intricately tied together. If you want to play a short character, you're stuck being rail thin. No option for short with normal weight, short with muscular build, or short with fat build. It's kind of a bummer.

 

And that's just the body. When you get into details like head and hair... I was driven nuts a few times trying to get the closest cookie-cutter selections that matched the character appearance I was going for.

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