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Same gender relationships clarifications?


elexier

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Kira's potential past flirtation and relationship might not ever be mentioned in the character arc as presented in the game, but it would have an effect, nonetheless, as part of her background.

 

Can you give any specific examples with this particular character?

 

As in, how would this change her character story as presented in game today?

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Can you give any specific examples with this particular character?

 

As in, how would this change her character story as presented in game today?

 

I'm really curious to see where this goes, as I am very confused at the moment.

 

I was thinking though, if there no stigma on homosexuality (and on sexualities in general) would that mean a higher instance of bi-romantics if not bisexuality? I'm not saying more gay=more bi but rather that the lack of stigma could allow for a more fluid approach to relationships.

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ok guys, so what do you think about this free to play news??? I'm afraid they will forget SGR for ever!! I'm not against free to play but perhaps this will affect the way they care for developements and new content. What do you think???
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I think you use too many questions marks.

 

In all seriousness I'm concerned about content in general, though it's possible they'll have companions as something that can be purchased via the store (at a later date) and that some of those will be SGR's. It entirely depends on how they handle content in general, but seeing as story is "fluff" and is by extension somewhat easier to produce (in comparison to Operations and gear tiers) I think we could probably be seeing more with regards to SGR's.

 

But first the really need to stop beating around the *********** bush.

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ok guys, so what do you think about this free to play news??? I'm afraid they will forget SGR for ever!! I'm not against free to play but perhaps this will affect the way they care for developements and new content. What do you think???

I think you use too many questions marks.

Agreeing with Tatile. :D But seriously...

 

With the news of FtP came the promise of more content sooner. I know that, when they talk about content, they usually mean things like Operations and Warzones and so forth. This seems natural, as companion-based content isn't a big selling point for this game, and FtP is all about promoting content that will get people to pay. :rolleyes: However, "more content sooner" can also mean the SGRs we've been waiting for. So I don't think this really changes anything. I'm still holding BioWare to their word of "this year", as I've heard nothing to change that.

 

However. If at any point, SGRs become an option that requires any kind of payment to access, even Cartel Coins, I will cancel my subscription. I refuse to support a company that would charge extra for equal representation of this sort.

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However. If at any point, SGRs become an option that requires any kind of payment to access, even Cartel Coins, I will cancel my subscription. I refuse to support a company that would charge extra for equal representation of this sort.

 

I fully agree.

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Can you give any specific examples with this particular character?

 

As in, how would this change her character story as presented in game today?

 

This is almost impossible for me to do... There are so many possibilities, and most of you will point out (and rightfully so), that just about anything changing in her past would change her in the present. And that would be when I say, I rest my case.

 

It's exactly the point I'm trying to make. Sexuality influences a person in ways that most of us just don't think about or even realize. This is not a bad thing at all, it's simply a part of being human. "PCsexual" characters are unrealistic because their sexuality, which doesn't actually exist except in reflection of the PC, has no influence on them whatsoever at any point in their lives, except in their relationship with the PC. (Keep in mind I am talking about the PCsexual character, not the truly bisexual character.)

 

I'll try the example thing -

 

Straight Kira meets a young bisexual woman early in her life, she and the woman become friends. The woman has a crush on Kira, Kira is flattered or not, but rejects her advances either way. Later on she meets bisexual/lesbian JK, gets all shy or defensive or whatever depending on the nature of the former relationship, eventually gets over that and is able to gently tease the JK about it.

 

Bisexual Kira meets a woman, they become friends. Kira gets a crush, makes an advance and is rejected - she becomes embittered and is distrustful of female flirting JK - OR she is rejected gently, is able to come to terms with it, but the friendship falls apart, when she meets female JK she is reluctant to express her interest, lest she loose her new friend. Her reaction to male JK might be different, because she might not have had the same kind of rejection, or she had a wonderful long term relationship with a guy that fell apart when something happened, or whatever... I think you get the picture.

 

As soon as the character is shown to have had a romantic relationship in the past, you've giving them a discrete sexuality - which might be bi, or gay, or straight, or somewhere in the middle. "PCsexual" characters won't have these kinds of things happening in their past, because they only reflect the PC's sexuality.

 

ETA: On the F2P stuff...

 

Here's the features.

 

Look at the very first one on the list - Story Content. It's listed as being fully accessible to both subscription and free players. OGRA/SGRA would be considered story content folks. Don't painc, the sky is not falling. ;):D:cool:

Edited by Zandilar
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ETA: On the F2P stuff...

 

Here's the features.

 

Look at the very first one on the list - Story Content. It's listed as being fully accessible to both subscription and free players. OGRA/SGRA would be considered story content folks. Don't painc, the sky is not falling. ;):D:cool:

Excellent point, and thank you. I wasn't really worried that the sky was actually falling, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who's heard nightmare stories about F2P games turning into the sort of thing where nearly every action you could do beyond "attack", "loot", and "die" had a charge attached. Though now that I think about it, they might be a bit exaggerated. :o Thanks for the reassurance, though.

i'm sure bioware is going to continue developing your stories, including SGR's, because that will be profitable for them in a business model where the story is free. there is no way that this news implies that they will focus on cash shop items. no way, bro.

Yes, of course, because writers and voice actors and people who put together dialogue scenes are of course the driving force behind cash shop items, so all their time will clearly be taken up with that. :rolleyes:

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Excellent point, and thank you. I wasn't really worried that the sky was actually falling, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who's heard nightmare stories about F2P games turning into the sort of thing where nearly every action you could do beyond "attack", "loot", and "die" had a charge attached. Though now that I think about it, they might be a bit exaggerated. :o Thanks for the reassurance, though.

 

Well, they have a subscription option. Which is pay for a completely unlocked game, in this case. Free players still get the story content, but they're restricted in other areas. Anyone with a subscription won't have to pay to unlock anything in the basic game, though it appears that there will be items to buy - but even then, subscription players get a stipend of their micro-transaction currency just for playing. It remains to be seen how generous the stipend is, though.

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Well, they have a subscription option. Which is pay for a completely unlocked game, in this case. Free players still get the story content, but they're restricted in other areas. Anyone with a subscription won't have to pay to unlock anything in the basic game, though it appears that there will be items to buy - but even then, subscription players get a stipend of their micro-transaction currency just for playing. It remains to be seen how generous the stipend is, though.

 

Sounds like how Turbine does it for LotRO.

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Well, they have a subscription option. Which is pay for a completely unlocked game, in this case. Free players still get the story content, but they're restricted in other areas. Anyone with a subscription won't have to pay to unlock anything in the basic game, though it appears that there will be items to buy - but even then, subscription players get a stipend of their micro-transaction currency just for playing. It remains to be seen how generous the stipend is, though.

Sounds like how Turbine does it for LotRO.

Yeah, like I said, I'm willing to wait and see how F2P really affects the game. I'm glad at the promise of more frequent content updates, and it'll be interesting to see if this changes the marketing at all - since the storyline is the only thing that's completely unrestricted, they might start pushing it as a selling point again. If that's the case, we might actually see SGRs *GASP!* mentioned as upcoming content, since it's the kind of thing everyone will (at least in theory) have access to.

 

Considering the haters and nay-sayers' tendencies, I think it would be awesomely hilarious if SGRs ended up attracting people in droves who were glad to see these kinds of relationships available in a game like this. :)

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Yeah, like I said, I'm willing to wait and see how F2P really affects the game.

 

I have to confess that going F2P didn't change LotRO that much. A bunch of players hopped on prior to WoW's Cataclysm expansion coming out which pushed the server populations up. A bunch of people got extremely disruptive in the general channels (not saying they were the same people, I honestly don't know) and then when Cataclysm hit the stands everything quietened down again. I have a lifetime subscription to LotRO so I didn't really feel the pinch of losing a bunch of features but if I didn't have a lifetime subscription I'd be paying for it because it's good enough to warrant it.

 

Nowadays the payment options are just a Thing that's There. I recently bought the last expansion for it entirely with their Turbine point currency. The impact on the game really wasn't significant as long as you have a subscription. Even without a subscription I'm sure it's a very playable game.

 

I see the same sort of thing happening to SWTOR and in a way it's good that it's happening so soon in the MMO's life because it'll cement itself in people's minds as Just How It Is quite quickly.

 

Having said that if relationships are a paid feature at all I'm going to be a little annoyed on principle. If SGRAs are paid and OGRAs aren't I'll quit immediately. Having said that I don't think this'll happen. BW:A would need to be monumentally stupid to thrust their game out there as an example of bigotry in that respect (and, yes, free OGRAs but paid SGRAs would indeed be bigotry).

 

As long as the paid-feature advertising in-game isn't too excessive I really don't think it'll be an issue. And if the bulk of it is on Nar Shaddaa it could even be considered in-character!

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If at any point, SGRs become an option that requires any kind of payment to access, even Cartel Coins, I will cancel my subscription. I refuse to support a company that would charge extra for equal representation of this sort.

 

Yes, if they went "Pay to Gay", I have to say I'd be very disappointed. I don't know whether I would continue to play or not. FTP couldn't keep me coming back to LotRO or AION (which didn't hold much for me to begin with) and I am not sure if even my delerious heights of lifelong Star Wars nerdom (I am old enough to have been initially exposed to SW in the original 1977 release - I was eight years old, so it totally hooked me) could outweigh the sense of dismissiveness after all that has been said and all that as yet has failed to materialize in regards to SGR. I like the game for what it is. But I have been led to expect this, and it is important to me. We'll have to see.

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I've got to ask because I haven't been able to figure it out.

 

What's the A stand for in SGRA?

 

The Same-Gender Relationship part is obvious, but I can not come up with an A.

 

Free me from my confusion!

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I've got to ask because I haven't been able to figure it out.

 

What's the A stand for in SGRA?

 

The Same-Gender Relationship part is obvious, but I can not come up with an A.

 

Free me from my confusion!

 

A stands for Arcs, as in story arcs.

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This is almost impossible for me to do... There are so many possibilities, and most of you will point out (and rightfully so), that just about anything changing in her past would change her in the present. And that would be when I say, I rest my case.

 

I just need a few examples and not a listing of all possible changes.

 

I don't agree that "just about anything changing in her past would change her in the present" if those aspects of her character are not presented in the game...and for this particular character, nothing about her sexuality past or present is presented in game. So, I'll ask it like this...if they'd make Kira an option for females, what would have to change in her over-all character arc beyond the [flirt] lines for females? What stuff that's not even related to romance/sexuality would have to change about her character?

 

It's exactly the point I'm trying to make. Sexuality influences a person in ways that most of us just don't think about or even realize. This is not a bad thing at all, it's simply a part of being human. "PCsexual" characters are unrealistic because their sexuality, which doesn't actually exist except in reflection of the PC, has no influence on them whatsoever at any point in their lives, except in their relationship with the PC. (Keep in mind I am talking about the PCsexual character, not the truly bisexual character.)

 

But we are talking about video game characters with which we only see a very small portion of their overall personality/history/etc. Again, in today's game, there's no information on Kira's sexuality outside of the possibility of a PC flirting with her...does that make her a poorly written character?

 

 

Straight Kira meets a young bisexual woman early in her life, she and the woman become friends. The woman has a crush on Kira, Kira is flattered or not, but rejects her advances either way. Later on she meets bisexual/lesbian JK, gets all shy or defensive or whatever depending on the nature of the former relationship, eventually gets over that and is able to gently tease the JK about it.

 

Bisexual Kira meets a woman, they become friends. Kira gets a crush, makes an advance and is rejected - she becomes embittered and is distrustful of female flirting JK - OR she is rejected gently, is able to come to terms with it, but the friendship falls apart, when she meets female JK she is reluctant to express her interest, lest she loose her new friend. Her reaction to male JK might be different, because she might not have had the same kind of rejection, or she had a wonderful long term relationship with a guy that fell apart when something happened, or whatever... I think you get the picture.

 

But, again, if a character's past sexual history isn't brought up in game, how would this stuff (that we will never know about) affect other things about the character?

 

Also, this type of stuff would specifically affect romance conversations. They could still do a PC sexual thing and have Kira mention a female lover in the past for a Fem JK and a male one for a Male JK if they desired.

 

 

As soon as the character is shown to have had a romantic relationship in the past, you've giving them a discrete sexuality - which might be bi, or gay, or straight, or somewhere in the middle. "PCsexual" characters won't have these kinds of things happening in their past, because they only reflect the PC's sexuality.

 

How many current romance options are shown to have had a romantic relationship in the past?

 

Since Kira didn't, is she technically "PCsexual"?

 

I'm basically still confused by what you are trying to say. It seems like you are saying that romance characters who lack a "sexual past" or any other kind of indication of their sexuality outside of the PC romance are poorly written as romance options (and possibly characters in general) and that these past histories should inform their overall character arc somehow (and not just be a flavor change in the romance).

 

However, most romance options in BW games (including this one) have characters who lack any of this and it seems like that worked well for them in the past...so why change it? These BW characters have included ones that were open to both genders as well as OGRA exclusive characters.

 

I personally have no issues with either 'PCSexual" characters or ones that have more defined sexualities in game (Kaliyo)...I can't agree with the blanket statement that "PCSexual" is just bad writing no matter what.

Edited by stuffystuffs
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Zandilar

 

You make good points . I think that up to a point you are correct that PCsexual is not a simple thing .

In a game the storytelling is much more fluid than in a book for 2 reasons. First it can be different for each readers (up to a point) and those difference can be because of my choices in the game. In that sense having a companion could be straight for my PC and Gay for yours is not necessarily bad writing . Also reason is that the companion’s stories are much less detailed than they would be in a book. We get a few conversations to progress from first flirt to marriage and kids. This means that we as players have to fill the stories in our own imaginations from the clues we are getting. However even in the stories we do get there are limits to how much you can stretch things and not break it.

 

I will try and give an example

Lets take the agent. If I play a male straight agent I already may interpret Kaliyo`s back strory to mean she is straight . When I meet the twilek female I assume she is merely a friend. I flirt with Kaliyo and things progress. All works I don’t see anything in the story to contradict my assumption. I could also have interpreted that meeting with the twilek as meaning there was more and therefore assume that she is bi. (this is actually how I took it) Again in the current game nothing prevents me from doing that. A no point does she contradict that assumption.

Now lets see it prom the point of view of the Female agent. The straight female as the games stands now can only assume Kalyio is straight because with the personality she is showing if she was not she would surely make some remarks or passes at the agent . However in a SGRA enabled game it would be easy enough to have those same conversations that she has with the male agent and it would not break the story. I however do not see ( save major rewriting) how her story could make her gay.

 

Similarly I could see the whole arc with Risha work well for female smuggler if she was bi but making her gay would again be difficult. In the other hand I don’t recall any conversation with Akaavi that would not work for a gay Akaavi as long as the correct pronouns were used .

 

Re-reading this I am not sure how much sens it makes so you can ignore it if you think it is just incoherent rambling

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Yeah, like I said, I'm willing to wait and see how F2P really affects the game. I'm glad at the promise of more frequent content updates, and it'll be interesting to see if this changes the marketing at all - since the storyline is the only thing that's completely unrestricted, they might start pushing it as a selling point again. If that's the case, we might actually see SGRs *GASP!* mentioned as upcoming content, since it's the kind of thing everyone will (at least in theory) have access to.

 

Considering the haters and nay-sayers' tendencies, I think it would be awesomely hilarious if SGRs ended up attracting people in droves who were glad to see these kinds of relationships available in a game like this. :)

 

Well, one of the reasons EA has chosen to implement f2p is the fact that players are leaving. There are quite a lot of MMOs out there, after all, and with "secret world" EA has introduced in-house competition. And how many MMOs will anyone realistically play, at once? So people make one or two choices, and that is that. But how many MMORPGs are out there with SGRA-content? Well currently none I guess :rolleyes:, but that may well change.

One of the reason I chose to immerse myself in SWTOR is the potential for SGRAs, the other being KOTOR, of course. And I have a friend who has never before played a videogame, but is willing to jump into this one, for abovementioned reason. And the fun of it, of course. So introducing SGRAs even in f2p might garner more players than anticipated.

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I can't vouch for even the slightest validity, but some allegedly anonymous ex Bioware employee tweeted that they're changing the ESRB to Everyone and no SGR. Might be a good time to really push Bioware to make an updated official statement. Obviously it's an odd claim considering I don't think they'd actually go back and *edit* existing material. Edited by chuixupu
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