Gaizokubanou

I can sympathize why you guys are disliking that proposal because it flies too close to silencing dissent... ok so how about this perspective? We have limited attention and volume of speech we can generate, yes? So instead of looking it as staying silent, look at it as giving your valuable resource to something worthy. Like I would have gladly traded few articles on condemning Hatred for few one say, praising Snakebird. Edit: Or at least let's be more practical about timing as well. Lot of 'negative' press came out few months before release - prime time for hype campaign because release days are super important sales wise. Post release analysis could be just as thoughtful, if not more (cause you can actually see the game for yourself), and would probably not have helped the game's sale by much.

This game and its surrounding situation reminds me of one of those anime fights where one guy's power is to absorb your attacks and the idiots keep on attacking that guy anyway cause 'we gotta stop it' only to make it grow stronger. Paragraph 1 2 and 4 touches on the irony of negative press (intended to damage the reputation of the game) giving the game iconic status that it never deserved. What you said there is indeed mentioned but only in paragraph 3.

Getting very tangential here but... Yeah agree with bjorn on those, none of those examples spring to my mind as single step that revolutionized instantly. Take gunpowder for example... it's been weaponized since what, early 1200s? But it wasn't this tool that instantly changed warfare. The early gunpowder weapons were complimentary to non firearms early on and took hundreds of years of tiny refinement before ousting other weapons. It's just very easy step to recognize so perhaps that's why it's cited so often but things like rifling or even just tactical changes like tercio perhaps had greater change than first weaponization of gunpowder. We certainly celebrate moments because well, it's more manageable. But none of those things happened out of nothing, all of those events/inventions took years of buildup before and after to take effect. I mean maybe Ghandhi's application of non-violence to politics in such scale is closest in that list of being single step, but others certainly doesn't seem that way to me. Getting back more on topic... Why can't you do both? Push for bandaid fixes while also discussing other matters in pursuit of more permanent improvement? We should be able to hold discussion on both fronts, yes?

Bit late but to add some cheery mood Why thank you, I really appreciate this. When you posted this it definitely did feel like my point of view was getting glossed over too often. That did get cleared up but nontheless thanks~

Ah clever stuff. Meanwhile I was surrounded by drug dealers and fake jersey ebay sellers :x

Refund system is needed but I feel for those who might suffer cause of the 2 hour time because their game is meant to be cheap and short~ https://twitter.com/qwiboo/status/607234020372418560 Hope something like that isn't caused by the 2 hour window : / I didn't know that was even possible because last time I traded in at Gamestop, the trade in values were so horrible it was hard to imagine getting games any cheaper than that. But that was while back so maybe they offer lot better values now?

Wow that picture is strangely mesmerizing. My thought exactly but not sure what kind of amazing it is. That babyface is just too much. Edit: did google image search of Baki, wtf lol

If I had to take a guess, probably cause the industry is way too white-male occupied, with lot of creators just continue to chime in their view points and desires. A guess though, cause as Korean-American male, I'm leaning toward Indian woman protagonist in my work (but purely for look and a call sign nickname, race is otherwise irrelevant for this work) so I don't quite understand the desire to recreate their own desires in the most basic form.

Yoo I edited response about ignorance while you posted that~ If so, then I was clearly mistaken and wasn't really arguing with anyone on any ground! Maybe that is all I ever posted were~ About kdrama yes kdramas are much more grounded than Witcher 3 is for sure, but I meant just anything korean produced, most of which exclusively deals with Koreans in whatever fictional world.

Yeah my initial posts weren't clearly the most well thought out (as I interacted in this discussion my views got more formed). But on the topic of unintentional silencing, I am making these points because I think the only reason Witcher 3 got highlighted for this absence of diversity is because Poland happens to be predominantly white country today, so they made exclusively white (human wise) game which coincides with white-washing of places like USA where the diversity is much more prevalent (so absence of other skin tone has different meaning). That's why I keep referencing Korea or Bolleywood or whatnot... to demonstrate that we take no issue with absence of diversity when local production team makes something that reflects on their local scene... just because that local scene is predominantly white, I don't think they need to bear the failings of industries with more diverse background (like USA). I think both the origin of production and end product absolutely matters when measuring ethical responsibility of the creators. Like I wouldn't excuse any production, bolleywood, kdramas or anime if they depicted modern day Manhattan life as one of exclusively white experience, and same goes for CD Projekt Red. But if Bolleywood, Kdrama or Anime created purely fictional setting and they failed to include any other human race other than indian/korean/japanese, it would have been a missed opportunity for better work but not an ethical failing on their end. And I'm just extending that same thought to CD Projekt Red because its geographical origin is where population is so overwhelmingly uniform (if I'm factually wrong on this then well I would concede this point completely of course). But if VC (suppose to be most diverse city in the world) based studio did something like Witcher 3, then I would find that highly troublesome and unethical of them to do so. I think ignorance is too strong. Whenever someone chooses to create a fiction, obviously they are ignoring 99.99999% of reality because our minds can only hold so little about the realities of the world. And so to me, the word ignorance means absence of knowledge and understanding that you are expected to have given your life and capabilities, otherwise we are all infinitely ignorant and the word has no meaning. So given that, when people from very homogeneous nations create works that are very homogeneous, I don't find that to be ignorant because that's just what their life experience is. Hmm perhaps you are right that the tone and setting of Metro is way more Soviet Union than I realized (was too focused on mechanical aspects). And same with me on Polish/Slavic, like IDK what to look for so maybe Witcher 3 is indeed way more blend than say, Metro was.

I FUCKING CARE TWIG. I DO. Except that I haven't. I said that the production was of polish culture. They made generic grim-dark tolkien clone in the end, sure (the post you got my quote from, I said this exact same thing already...). But was done through whatever lense of perspective they had. You know what, I put up with your snark ass shit all the time cause most of the time it's just funny and whatnot but your willfull disregard of my actual posts for you to pigeon hole my views is getting gross man. Stop it please. Actually address what I wrote instead of what you think I wrote. When my post included this only for you to accuse me of using "silencing tactics" to stop people from asking for more diverse games from CD Projekt is ludicrous. I explicitly posted that I'm for asking for these changes. It cannot get any clearer.

This is interesting cause despite Witcher series' (Video game) obvious aim at global market, I always saw it as something very foreign as both Korean and American simply because of the development team being so geographically focused. Same with Metro series for example. They may tell a fairly 'generic' story in a sense (Witcher is not too far off from all other grim-dark tolkien clones, Metro games didn't really deviate much from any other shooters), but I never get this sense that devs that are that region focused 'owed' it to me or others to represent me or others. To show contrast to this would be Ubisoft's reluctance to include playable women in AC Unity... that I see as an ethical failing. Because nobody here is arguing that CD Projekt deserves to be praised or anything of the sort. Everyone here seems to agree that at the very least, it is a clear missed opportunity as better representation would have been for the better. The difference that me and few others are trying to raise is whether they had moral obligation to do so. I think not, for the same reason I don't call foul to every Kdrama for being purely korean (in modern korea setting of course, where you would think there is even less of a reason to be so korean in today's global economy!!! (despite ease of tourism, inter-racial mingling of any sort is still extremely rare for most koreans in korea)), or call bolleywood "ignorant" (that's what that article accuses CD Projekt of, ignorance) because it is so predominantly indian... The racial melting pot of USA or VC is both amazing and erasure of that through omission would be a gross ethical misconduct, but otherwise in mostly homogeneous nations around the world, I wouldn't blame them for not doing their full diligence in regards to better representation regardless of their skin color. I'm all for asking/suggesting to CDProjekt for better representation for their future games. I just don't think they were 'ignorant' and did something wrong for not doing so is all.

Not necessarily underwhelming, but most frustrating was vanilla (or was it after 1st expansion?) Hearts of Iron 3. Played a game with USSR in 1936 scenario, and beat Germany for the first time so that felt nice til the result of the surrender came in.... Entire France and Germany turned into USA occupied land cause the game at that time didn't have proper victory for USSR set in. I was PISSED. Good thing the game was relatively easy to mod so I went on week long spree of modding in my own Germany surrender event for USSR...

Not when all I wanted to explain was the fact that I thought it was excusable The fantasy works I'm refering to are probably way too 'trashy' if you are raising that kind of comparisons hehehe. I'm talking about original Dragonball (NOT Z, original started off as loosely inspired fiction on the popular mischievous monkey king tale) level here, which IIRC has like zero resemblance to specific time and history.

Hmm, maybe. I know that it would be weird thing to sell to Korean audience on a medieval Korean themed fiction with non-korean looking character so I just applied that in reverse here (my sister's webcomic is korean themed but has few explicitly non-korean looking characters (who are suppose to be non humans), her western audience didn't really care to take note of but her korean audience instantly assumed that all of those non-korean looking characters had to be non-native). Maybe that says something more about her korean audience (I know that Korea has shitload of racism/sexism/ageism in its culture). Maybe I just got too used to overt racism that this kind of problems aren't bothering me much as they should :/ Had to google Ursula LeGuin cause of my very limited knowledge... her works seem really cool, so sure.

AFAIK most fantasy works of this type use aesthetics but ditch any historical resemblance regards to political framework outside of vague "big evil empire" type of trope which are too vague to mean much. Ehm, I don't want to "preserve" this type of production at all. Maybe I wasn't really clear on this so my apologies if I wasn't, but I think Witcher 3 could have benefited greatly from good inclusion (like, avoiding balatant tokenism or bad racist tropes) of non-white cast... just that it just doesn't seem like the best example of the problems of white washing in western media (which I agree is very real) because of its very specific national/cultural context. To clarify again, I thought it was excusable, not commendable.

For what it's worth, I think this conversation is way cooler than the usual "look what idiots exist online" that this thread usually gets used for

Going bit tangential but IMO one of best way you could do this is to just write them as any other character you would create... like, unless your setting demands racial tension, ignore the differences other than appearances of it. Use racial diversity as just another tool for how characters look and that's it because unless there is a contextual reason (which IRL there are lot of but in fictional world there could easily be none), that's all our racial differences are, just looks.

Hey now, let's dial it back a bit. I don't think neither me or I Saw Dasein is arguing that absence of non-white is a commendable choice made by CD Projekt Red... just that it is excusable. At least that's the vibe I'm getting from reading his/her post. I'm not getting "That doesn't belong here!" message at all.

There could be racist agenda attached to it like you said, but I would like to offer a counterpoint from my view which is of Korean who immigrated to USA in early teen. It is this medieval (pre age of sails?) setting. When I think of european medieval (that's what most tolkien inspired fantasy settings are, I think?), I think of white people and expect white people. This isn't because I'm thinking only white human beings existed in medieval good old days... it's because the setting is western medieval. I would expect majority chinese cast for something based on medieval china, or korean cast for something korean, etc. I see tolkien based fantasy setting as something inherently foreign, so I'm ok with it being foreign to me. Granted I've shown my ultra high tolerence for status quo in this forum so maybe it is more along the line of that but maybe not perhaps? Then there is what I Saw Dasein said about this game being product of Poland. Let's just replace Poland with Korea. There is Korean book based on Korean mythology, and Korean devs make a game based on that book with exclusively Korean cast... stuff like that is generated in korea quite frequently (and judging by how often Japan becomes center of the world in few japanese fictions I read, similar with china, USA, etc, I gather this is bit of a norm) so Witcher 3 just doesn't feel like the best example of this white washing problem (which I think is both real but kinda mis-evaluated at the same time) because of its very specific national/cultural identity. You are absolutely right that there is no reason AGAINST inclusion of non-whites in Witcher 3. But that's not necessarily same as necessity to include, which is what I think is lacking cause of its polish context. I see it more as missed opportunity with Witcher 3, not a wrongdoing. So when people say "I wish there were non-whites in Witcher 3", think that's totally cool and fine etc. But when they say Witcher 3 is racist eehh not so sure, maybe but I would need more convincing then the 2 articles linked.

Coercing young children to pick up or drop certain behavioral traits are critical for their well being IMO. I think that definition is quite good. The two examples you stated, first one with donut, if the person offering seriously can't take polite decline then it is a coercion (eat this or I'll be pissed at you), albeit a mild one but still, and the latter seems like a clear coercion cause their built in status has clear and extreme strings attached to the offer. By being a slave owner, one is very likely to be constantly in a coercive state against their slaves. Edit: Will think on latter bit more with much more milder forms of slavery where slavery wasn't complete ownership as it was during colonialism, but rather another status closer to say, indentured servants. Edit2: Removed a sentence to make the argument more coherent.

Deadpan I think you are going to be right about Man-At-Arms. Riposte can trigger off multi target attack, trigger multiple times and hits for higher damage and crit so... yeah... it's pretty broken ATM :x

Door and piloting systems are very useful (as far as subsystems can be) against flagship though. I think medbay gave lot of blues so if you can afford it, lvl 2 early on more than pays for itself so it indirectly contributes to flagship. Oxygen is just really bad overall, didn't even know there were events for that? But anyways these are all secondaries that have marginal use compared to main systems (shield-weapon-power) in every combat aspect of the game (the blue option benefit you mention is distinctively out of combat benefit) so it's only expected that they remain so for the last fight. I'm interested in what your thoughts are on how the main combat aspect conflicts from main game to flagship.

I agree with your general point in that I liked FTL, including the final boss, but I somewhat sympathize with those who didn't like the final boss because the game does have this strong flavor of "do whatever you can (including running away) to survive" feel to it. So to find out that there is this guaranteed final boss that your ship has to measure up to could be a let down because it isn't exactly 100% aligned with the survival flavor. I personally think the mismatch in tone is very minor and agree with you that it works, but I can see why it would be a huge break for some. So I imagine that those who don't like the final boss... if the flagship wasn't guaranteed end-game event but rather random encounter from sector 8+ (and sectors just go on forever perhaps?), they probably won't like that enemy still but might like the game a lot more, even if they always end up dying to the exact same encounter. Granted this whole ordeal started cause tberton said FTL was deeply flawed, and I would definitely disagree with that. But I can see how it felt misleading to others. From the get go I viewed entirety of FTL's system as one where every event and decisions boil down to how well your ship can fight, so big tough boss in the end kinda made sense. But I'm thinking SAM/SBM/undermind9/tberton probably enjoyed the game initially as a journey with combat attached instead.

Not with Pokemon specifically, but that's a common occurrence with lot of old games that I could have enjoyed when I was dumber or just didn't realize certain exploitative features. Sometimes though, exploiting unintended feature ends up being more fun so kinda splits both ways I guess.