fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2290 ]

[ SECRET POST #2290 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2289 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.

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02.

[Dangan Ronpa]

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03.

[Berserk]

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04.

[Thomas Was Alone]

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05.

[Paranatural]

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06.

[Supernatural]

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07.

[Christoph Waltz]

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08.

[Lost In Austen]

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09.

[Les Miserables]

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10.

[Harry Potter]

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11.

[Amanda Palmer]

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12.

[Bioshock Infinite]

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13.

[Red Riding Hood]

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14.

[Girls Next Door]

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15.

[Arthur]

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16.

[Roosterteeth]

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 038 secrets from Secret Submission Post #327.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 2 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Eh, when PoCs are almost never represented in media--ESPECIALLY video games--and you make the first video game to deal with actual non-elf racism in a long time about how the oppressed are just as bad? Yes, it's actually about extremism, but still.

I totally see it.

Nothing against how the game does it, it's just very frustrating, I imagine. It doesn't help the main two characters are white and there's only one major black character and she is actually said aloud to be just as bad as the racist murderous kidnapping genocidal asshole.

Again, I understand it's about extremism. But the game was not morally or philosophically deep enough, I think, to go over these kind of issues, since it abandoned the civil war and Vox Populi as a premise half way through the game.

Would it have been better the make Daisy white then? Irish perhaps?

I think as far as that subject went any choice they'd have made was a no win situation unless they changed the game entirely.

Interesting fact: Daisy was originally Irish, and changed to be a black woman later. I'm not sure why that choice was made. My guess would be that maybe they wanted a prominent character in the game that WASN'T white but I honestly don't know if that's the reason.

Yeah, i was hinting at that, but you know it would have just been "no prominent black people in this game, and the ones that are there are under command of a white leader. Typical."

I think they might have changed it because they didn't want to have two Irish rebel leaders (well, kinda) in both their games. It might have seemed a bit like a rehash, and could have had implications.

Forgive me my ignorance, I don't know about the history of black and Irish people but... Her name is still Fitzroy. Isn't she... still Irish? Or of Irish decent, to the extent that a white Daisy Fitzroy could of been?

Also, Ken Levine says (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwsjALh2vYA) that Daisy exists the way she does for a reason. Black and poor people were at the bottom of the rung in Columbia, it took someone with her kind of experience and resentment to rise up so forcefully. Her race is a part of her character, and maybe he thought her being black better reflected that.

I'm surprised we haven't had feminist wank yet. Oooh! /crosses fingers

/crosses toes

not 100% sure but I think that sometimes slaves took on the last names of their masters, so her having an Irish last name doesn't necessarily mean that she's of Irish descent...just that an Irishman owned one of her ancestors once upon a time.

IIRC that's why Malcolm X changed his last name. He didn't want a last name associated with slave owners.

Though I was aware of this unfortunate bit of history (I think, I can't remember, Scrubber, your nose is bleeding), my question was sort of... could she still be Irish? I mean, within reason? Were the races in this period so segregated socially that a black Irish person would be basically impossible? Then of course, she could be a black person from Ireland and...

This is all a bit stupid I guess. We'll never know.

It would have been better if they didn't change the direction of the game midway through and stopped making it about Columbia.

I think as far as that subject went any choice they'd have made was a no win situation unless they changed the game entirely.

Not entirely. It's clear from the game itself and from the marketing that came earlier that it was going to be a very different game. So we're left with a first half that negatively colors the second half, or vice versa.

I do understand some of the frustration from that angle, but at the same time I feel like if characters from minority races can't be portrayed as complex and varied as white characters--even if it means that they're villains sometimes--then they'll never be portrayed as really equal or as viable characters? (it could be that I just play too many JRPGs and such to see the problem, though. I only ever play shooters if they're co-op like Left 4 Dead or if they're heavy on story like BI.)

Maybe some more POC allies would've been helpful? All I can think of off the top of my head is the gunsmith (sort of) and the mixed-race couple (if you throw the ball at the announcer).

But Daisy wasn't complex or varied. She was oppressed, lashed out, tried killing a kid later. That's not complex at all.

then they'll never be portrayed as really equal or as viable characters?

Yes, but when you have very, very few heroic black characters? This argument falls apart then. And the portrayal of black men in JRPGs is almost always funny black men being totally so black because Japan is massively racist and thinks black guys are hilarious.

Maybe some more POC allies would've been helpful?

It would have been. You do have several sympathetic white characters, even heroic.

That said, the game was about extremism. It's clear the second half of the game suddenly got a huge development shift, because it's clearly setting up this huge civil war and that all gets ignored so it can be refocused on Elizabeth and Booker. The issue is it looks like the devs were *trying* to set up a story that would have more characters, deeper themes, a more complex philosophy that let you understand better the extremism of the first half...but then it gets abandoned. So you're left with your ridiculously over the top extremist lunatics.

this. Daisy (or anyone not named Elizabeth or Booker, really) was very one-note, which was disappointing, especially since all the previews hyped up the Vox/Founders conflict. And then the halfway point comes and the game entirely shifts gears, which wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing but it comes at the expense of the themes and characters they set up in the first half. It's like they came up with all these cool concepts but didn't know how to piece them all together so just went "fuck it" and decided to focus on timey wimeyness instead. Ken Levine said they had to cut about 5 games worth of content and it definitely shows.

But Daisy wasn't complex or varied. She was oppressed, lashed out, tried killing a kid later. That's not complex at all.

She didn't start out that way, though. I've only played the preorder minigame and the game itself, but between those both I got a pretty good idea of how Daisy STARTED with good intentions and ended up as extreme as she did. I wouldn't be surprised if more supplemental materials expand on that even more. (Isn't there a novel about the rise of the Vox?)

Yes, but when you have very, very few heroic black characters? This argument falls apart then.

What about the three black characters in Left 4 Dead 1 and 2? Lee and Clementine in The Walking Dead? Yes, there should be more, but we are getting black heroes, and I don't like the idea that all black characters should be heroes (any more than all female characters in games should be heroic). I want more heroes for sure, but I'll take one character that's actually interesting and well thought out over 10 characters from some sort of oppressed minority or subgroup that are portrayed as good people but are otherwise just...bland.

I do agree that they had a little TOO much plot for their own good, though. It would've been nice if they focused a bit more on the Vox after Comstock House and cleaned up some of those plot wholes before the big timey wimey reveal.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, it wasn't PERFECT, and I would've liked more time with Daisy but I also think that the people saying that the Vox should've been good guys is way off base.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we'll either get DLC where we can play as Martyr!Booker or Daisy herself. That's my dream.

It did in some of the demos. Like the "trial" of the public worker that paralleled the opening lottery a bit.

We do have DLC coming. It did promise more story...

But... Clementine isn't black??

She was designed so that she could "look like she was Lee's daughter." I know she has lighter skin than Lee does but she still looks black to me?

pretty sure she is supposed to be black. like above anon said, she was designed to look like she could be lee's daughter, and her skin color and hair are very similar to that of one of my black friends so yeah, i'd say she's black.

This is pretty much an issue with much of media as a whole, and while I agree with you, it still kind of sucks to see Bioshock take heat based on issues with media in the west as a whole rather than its own merits as a story.

Still video games almost never tackle the issue from a non-fantasy standpoint so its not quite as tired as it is in movies or books. Unfortunately, we are unlikely to see it from a non-fantasy setting for awhile, can you imagine the blowup that would occur if a studio full of white male nerds tried to tackle racism or sexism in a serious historical setting, you would be able to see the flame wars from the moon.

I know, but games don't exist in a vacuum--hell, this game is taking a *lot* from modern day views on religion and American society and politics. So it's not even fair to say the devs could rightly ignore the media's portrayal at large. The issue is that they *did* try to tackle racism and whatnot...they just abandoned any sense of philosophy and morality midway through the game.

Edited 2013-04-10 23:58 (UTC)

Yeah sorry flubbed that last sentence in my last post, what I meant was could you imagine devs trying to tackle historical racism and sexism from the point of view of the oppressed or trying to write a fictional scenario where your standard white bread male protagonist was part of the oppressed group, its sort of a damned if you do and damned if you don't situation.

In regards to Bioshock I get the feeling that they started out with more of a focus on the conflict and then changed it partway through development to more of a character focus. You can see this in the really early trailers that focus on the vox/founder conflict then the later trailers and press releases focusing more and more on Elizabeth and booker.

...you know, I wouldn't be surprised if they switched focus just because of how much of a pain it was to make Elizabeth work.

the race of the protagonist, primary antagonist, deuteragonist and daisy fitzroy were more or less integral to the story of columbia, which was secondary to the plot and its focus on constants and variables.

the vox populi didn't just represent poc though, they represented the downtrodden and destitute, those who were fucked over by comstock and fink, and that group was comprised mostly of poc and those of irish descent. it could be argued, thus, that daisy could have been white and irish (as iirc they originally intended her to be) but then the wank would be about white saviours (and to an extent it already is since one alternate booker was a martyr for the vox cause).

infinite wasn't telling us that the oppressed were just as bad as comstock, fink and all the other institutional oppressors. infinite was telling us, through fitzroy's cause, that extremism is harmful regardless of which side you are on. fitzroy didn't want to stop at liberating the oppressed or making life better for those people. she wanted to punish the oppressors in violent ways - not just the oppressors, even, but all those associated with them. her focus was on revenge, not a better life, which the game made obvious between first meeting her and watching her die. i equate it to how they portrayed atlas/frank fontaine in bioshock 1, though to a lesser extent. fitzroy was depicted as being a beacon of hope for the otherwise hopeless, but in the end she shows her true colours.

but then the wank would be about white saviours (and to an extent it already is since one alternate booker was a martyr for the vox cause).

I've been following a LP of this and am kind of surprised this would be the case in the fandom--I suppose partially to blame because this is missable, but one of the voxophones (sp?) makes it clear that Booker wasn't trying to be a martyr or hero at all. He just gets used as a martyr after the fact because the circumstances of his death make a good story to rally people around.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ SECRET POST #2290 ]

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