Campaign for More Male Same-Sex Romances in Fire Emblem: Three Houses

[Pau]

There's been a lot of talk across various threads about the incredibly lackluster same-sex romance options for players who choose the male avatar character (M!Byleth) in Fire Emblem: Three Houses. Players and fans are interested in showing Nintendo, Intelligent Systems, and Koei Tecmo Games that a desire for more male same-sex romance options exists, but there are no concrete plans on how to organize to best get their attention. Speaking with some posters in the other threads, I thought we could kick-start some solid discussion around getting this off the ground and choosing next steps.

Full disclosure: I am a straight woman and thus just an ally, and don't want to overstep my boundaries in posting these ideas and this thread. This OP should be a living document: these are all just brainstorming suggestions, but I can make changes as folks come to a consensus.

Brief History
For those of you who are unaware, recent Fire Emblem games have allowed players to create or choose a female or male avatar that can marry one of the other characters. Fire Emblem: Awakening had no same-sex options, while Fire Emblem: Fates had one same-sex option for female avatars and one for male avatars.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses has improved on the female same-sex romance front by offering five options. Unfortunately, male avatars are still limited to only one same-sex romance, with two fake-out same-sex platonic options that do not result in marriage or an explicit romantic relationship.

*** Statement of Goals ***
The first step would be to come to a consensus and draft a statement outlining goals. Personally, I think the ship has sailed for a boycott, but there are still many ways to raise awareness with Nintendo. We probably want to do this fairly quickly since the game has been out for more than a week at this time and many people will be finishing or have finished their first playthrough by now.

Possible Goals that have been brought up:

1. Campaign for a free patch with more same-sex romantic S-Links for M!Byleth
2. Campaign for more same-sex romantic S-Links for M!Byleth in the fourth wave paid DLC (Fourth Wave due April 30, 2020)
3. Campaign for more same-sex romantic S-Links for the playable character in future Fire Emblem games

Twitter Campaign
The next step would be to create a Twitter account and hashtag that fans can use to easily tweet their support: hopefully something as catchy as Tyeforce's #miiquality.

The strategy should be tailored to the goal, but pretty much we would be highlighting the responses from queer men whether they have decided to boycott the game because of this, their preferred solution, their love for the Fire Emblem franchise, if they have bought the game and enjoyed the one same-sex male romantic S-Link and want more, top picks for other MLM options, etc.

Allies can mention that they would be interested in playing such options and that they want gay players to have a chance to better enjoy this part of a beloved franchise. We could encourage allies to boost the tweets from queer men.

The ideal would be to spread the campaign in both English and Japanese. Which means having someone who speaks Japanese and is part of the Japanese fandom on board. Having people who can reach out to other language fandoms would be great too.

We should collect a list of queer gaming communities to reach out to, many of which are helpfully listed here: http://queersplaygames.com/. We should also create a list of high profile Twitter fans, journalists, Let's Players, and content creators that would be interested in highlighting and promoting the campaign. Also look into people who are already doing something similar, even if it's not coordinated at scale.

My Nintendo Surveys
While they are not as accessible as they were with Club Nintendo, surveys are still sent by Nintendo for specific games to individual users. This is one of the most direct lines of contact we have with Nintendo. We should try to capitalize on this - maybe have a campaign to get everyone to register their copy for the chance to receive the survey.

Data Analysis / Infographic
This is the part I'd like to particularly contribute to. Collecting and analyzing data about the Fire Emblem: Three Houses fan reaction to the one offered same-sex male S-Link and the desire for more same-sex male relationships in the game.

This includes:

• Twitter analytics mentioning Lindhardt, wanting more same-sex S-Link options, fan pairings of male characters with M!Byleth, other MLM fan pairings
• Twitter analytics of the campaign specifically
• Collection of fanart of same-sex male pairings across various platforms and data on the engagement with those art pieces (likes, retweets, etc.)
• Data on game reviews and articles mentioning the desire for more MLM options
• Data on Youtube videos about male same-sex relationships in Fire Emblem
• Potentially other important data points

Ideally the analysis would cover both English and Japanese language social media.

The data analysis would be synthesized and presented in a nice infographic that can then be sent to Nintendo and Intelligent Systems through various channels. I'm a data analyst by trade and am okay with taking on the bulk of this portion, but if someone else would like to take the lead or help out, that'd be great.

Mail-In Ideas
Valentine's Day Cards
This is a particularly awesome and cute idea from the_wart , although February is quite a bit away. It would be great in keeping up persistence.

Current Focus
Let me know what you all think. As said above, the first step is to really solidify a goal. Discussion of the other points is great, but if you are interested in such a campaign, please try to answer this question in your reply: "What should be the primary goal of this campaign?"

 

[Deleted member 16876]

Going to bump this topic as it seems to have been buried.

The gay community has my support on this issue and I hope something comes from this.

 

[Rover]

I love the Valentine's day cards idea. Easy to repeat and carry out in volume. I can donate graphic design work for whatever.

 

[Weebos]

This should be somewhat simple to patch in, given that many of the supports don't rely on any gendered aspects. They could easily just repurpose some existing ones and make them bi.

Hopefully this gains enough traction to be noticed.

 

[Kivvi]

Whit all due honestly, Claude doesn't even need much work, just patch it in Nintendo. Everybody wins.

 

[Cantaim]

I'm not much of an idea guy but would something like #FEthreechoices work? The three choices would be gay, straight and bi options for player romances.

Sorry if it's no good just spit balling while I eat lunch lol

 

[Deleted member 51845]

Id rather them remove all romance options and just focus on character support and more interesting gameplay.

 

[Aaronrules380]

I honestly think for best results we need someone who can write Japanese to draft a letter containing our concerns that can be sent directly to Int Sys. I feel like doing social media hashtags and the like, especially in english, won't provide enough info on what we want and will lead to a lot of things getting lost in a game of telephone as demands get passed (or sometimes don't even) from one hand to the next before even being translated into a language the developers can actually understand

 

[Cantaim]

Man this threads getting no love lol. Gonna give it another bump

 

[Rover]

I'm not much of an idea guy but would something like #FEthreechoices work? The three choices would be gay, straight and bi options for player romances.

Sorry if it's no good just spit balling while I eat lunch lol

Click to shrink...

That's pretty good!

 

[Sub Boss]

I honestly thought the fans didn't want any romance/dating on their Fire Emblem anymore

 

[Crayon]

Thats a great idea!!

 

[Araujo]

Gotta be honest... this one is weird for me.

"Patch Homosexuality in" does not sound like healthy representation. What if the creator of those characters simply does not envision them as being Homosexual?

Seriously, i understand Representation. Inclusiveness is good. 1 Male romantic option for gay men Vs 5 for female is weird and out of place (specially when you ignore the fact that a lot of Straight guys are A-Ok with lesbian characters for obvious reasons...) but honestly this sort of campaign doesn't seem like it has it's heart in the right place.

i would honestly lose respect for any company that changed a character due to public pressure to make him or her gay or straight. That would never feel genuine or like a win for representation or to make sexuality more visible in games that decide to approach romance like that.

Personally i think this does more harm than good to the conversation. Would very much prefer to see people rallying for any future Fire Emblem titles to be more open and have more choices. Specially to send a message to the creators and producers that there is a fanbase ready to celebrate and support these titles if they embrace those aspects on the design floor. Not shoehorned in after launch via a patch.

Just gotta be honest. "Change this character's sexual orientation via patch" sounds like a bad take in any context.

 

[SuperSah]

Cool idea but they're not going to patch this in.

 

[Deleted member 31092]

Don't use hashtag or you're gonna be labelled toxic and your entire criticism deemed invalid if only 2 idiots in a group of 300k people type something bad.

 

[Korigama]

I honestly thought the fans didn't want any romance/dating on their Fire Emblem anymore

Click to shrink...

There tends to be significant opposition to that in FE and the very idea of it in games in general around here.

 

[Deleted member 3093]

I honestly thought the fans didn't want any romance/dating on their Fire Emblem anymore

Click to shrink...

They want the games with romance to have proper representation

 

[Horohorohoro]

This is a super great idea. I'd absolutely love if they patched it in even as a straight guy myself. Gay men (and women, even if they did get more choices in this game) deserve to be represented way better. I think a hashtag campaign is a great idea too. Even if you get hate for it (people really hate hashtag campaigns for some reason), at least your message is getting through.

 

[Poodlestrike]

Great ideas, all around. It's bullshit that women get 5 times the options to same sex S-rank.

 

[Fanto]

Great thread, thanks so much for making this!

 

[TimeFire]

This is a great idea. I'm not very hopeful it will work for Three Houses specifically but we gotta make ourselves loud for the next game.

 

[Deleted member 10737]

great idea, but sadly and honestly i don't see them patching the game to add more options at this point. but putting pressure on them is a great way to make them think about adding more same sex relationships in the next game.

 

[Khanimus]

I doubt anything is changing for Three Houses.

This is Nintendo - a staunchly conservative company who not even 5 years ago released a Fire Emblem game featuring gay conversion therapy, and whose "make good" in this game amounted to "okay well the cute girls can hook up, and... eh, that's enough."

Make your voices heard, but make no mistake, you're talking to a company who has to be dragged kicking and screaming to make inclusive choices, and that probably speaks to something about their development culture. Don't let them off the hook.

 

[Bard]

I honestly thought the fans didn't want any romance/dating on their Fire Emblem anymore

Click to shrink...

People don't want children from units shoehorned in without the game having a believable reason for them being there. Romance and pairing at the end of the game has been a part of the games for a while already.

 

[artemis]

Good luck, you're gonna need it.

 

[Neoxon]

This is a great idea. I'm not very hopeful it will work for Three Houses specifically but we gotta make ourselves loud for the next game.

Click to shrink...

Basically this. Even if it's too late for Three Houses, we can make an impact for the next game.

 

[Poltergust]

Gotta be honest... this one is weird for me.

"Patch Homosexuality in" does not sound like healthy representation. What if the creator of those characters simply does not envision them as being Homosexual?

Seriously, i understand Representation. Inclusiveness is good. 1 Male romantic option for gay men Vs 5 for female is weird and out of place (specially when you ignore the fact that a lot of Straight guys are A-Ok with lesbian characters for obvious reasons...) but honestly this sort of campaign doesn't seem like it has it's heart in the right place.

i would honestly lose respect for any company that changed a character due to public pressure to make him or her gay or straight. That would never feel genuine or like a win for representation or to make sexuality more visible in games that decide to approach romance like that.

Personally i think this does more harm than good to the conversation. Would very much prefer to see people rallying for any future Fire Emblem titles to be more open and have more choices. Specially to send a message to the creators and producers that there is a fanbase ready to celebrate and support these titles if they embrace those aspects on the design floor. Not shoehorned in after launch via a patch.

Just gotta be honest. "Change this character's sexual orientation via patch" sounds like a bad take in any context.

Click to shrink...

There is apparently evidence in a datamine that Claude and Raphael were originally going to be bi like Lindhardt is, but that never actually made it into the final product. Would you be OK if a future patch actually made them so?

That said, I don't remember if that was ever confirmed though, so take what I said with a grain of salt.

 

[ManNR]

I'm sympathetic to the desire for more choices & options and I am certainly sympathetic to equal treatment.

Just for personal clarity am I mistaken in thinking that romance options are basically non-existent in this game regardless of sexual orientation?

I'd sooner ask for ways to pair up students with one another than with my protag. It seems to me that romance is an afterthought in this game as a whole.

I haven't beaten it yet so I may be missing something key but based on what I've read & what I'm experiencing on my own playthrough there isn't much going on romance-wise in this game at all.

Before I have to edit my post: I know there is a ring to exchange with a few characters but I was under the impression that even those interactions don't dive deep into romance.

I'm really just sad that I can't get Sylvain beyond a B relationship status with any of the people in my Golden Deer house. Why can't this thirsty boy find love, romantic or otherwise?

Finally, it is not my intent to belittle your campaign. I'm just under the impression that romance has been largely dumped from the game.

 

[Mekanos]

I doubt anything is changing for Three Houses.

This is Nintendo - a staunchly conservative company who not even 5 years ago released a Fire Emblem game featuring gay conversion therapy, and whose "make good" in this game amounted to "okay well the cute girls can hook up, and... eh, that's enough."

Make your voices heard, but make no mistake, you're talking to a company who has to be dragged kicking and screaming to make inclusive choices, and that probably speaks to something about their development culture. Don't let them off the hook.

Click to shrink...

My thoughts exactly. Nintendo will be among the last of the major game companies to embrace change.

 

[GDGF]

This is very well thought idea. You have my support. Love the card proposal.

 

[julian]

I still believe one of the simpler ways to get better options in the future is to encourage people to choose the same sex options. They're gathering data on every choice, so choosing the same sex option would show them with clear data that users are interested in where that option leads.

The hard part is convincing players they should do that.

 

[Lady Gaia]

I'm all in favor of supporting the campaign, so I'll be subscribing and watching for more details as the twitter hashtag is chosen et al. It's downright odd that they'd do a great job of catering to me as a lesbian but not having more than one lone gay male option? Wacky. You have to think there was a discussion about that at some point, and how the

 

[Dremorak]

I honestly thought the fans didn't want any romance/dating on their Fire Emblem anymore

Click to shrink...

I heard on the bombcast that there isn't actually any romance its more like "who would you marry if you could" at one point in the game and that it?
How many people here have played it and (no spoilers please as I and probably many others here havent played it yet) is it actually a romance system, like an ongoing thing or is it literally one text box at one point in the game?

 

[Kewlmyc]

I could see more options happening in a potential 5th route DLC (datamines apparently show support levels between the 3 lords which is currently impossible), but that would probably be with new characters, if they get introduced.

A more realistic result would be Nintendo hearing the outcry from part of the fanbase, and adding more options to the next game. The games are improving with gay options in each game, so it's more than possible.

Anyway, I hope change does happen. Even if it's an improvement over Fates, a 1 to 5 (or is it 6) male to female options is absurd.

 

[KingE]

I've been playing for about 50 hours and have seen no romance system in the game. Only thing that comes close is drinking tea with your students one on one. Which can be both male or female. Any other romance aspect comes from students acting interested in you but it just a tease mostly. and you can reply with what ever option they give you. Not really a dating sim type game.

 

[Yeshua]

I think the main goal should be a patch to add same-sex relationship for all characters that are bi but for some absurd reason can only be dated by the main character if he/she is of opposite sex, I personally noted 2-4 characters that fit that criteria in the Blue Lion house

Spoiler

Felix & Sylvain are pretty much confirmed in their A+ support and Dimitri & Annette are likely

We shouldn't shy from asking a lot, as long as it's well reasoned, the less we ask the less we'll get if anything.

Anyway thanks for making this thread and hopefully it will work.

 

[Kewlmyc]

I heard on the bombcast that there isn't actually any romance its more like "who would you marry if you could" at one point in the game and that it?
How many people here have played it and (no spoilers please as I and probably many others here havent played it yet) is it actually a romance system, like an ongoing thing or is it literally one text box at one point in the game?

Click to shrink...

You can potentially get an "A" support rank with everyone in the game, but only members of the opposite sex and certain same sex characters have a "S" rank option.

Towards the end of the game, you get to ask one of your A supports who has the "S" rank option if they'll marry you. All you really get is a "cute" cutscene with your new spouse and some "where are they now" dialogue during the credits.

 

[Sacul64]

So I'm still early in the game but on the current bombcast they had a woman guest that made it sound like the S ranks aren't even romantic options like in the old game (I think she equated them to a pinky swear). I have noticed as well that it seems like only your MC can get S ranks but no one else can? That all I can really comment on this early in the game. Fire emblem is one of the first games I had seen m/m relationships in with Raven and the Monk character. So it seems strange to see the series called out.

 

[Dremorak]

You can potentially get an "A" support rank with everyone in the game, but only members of the opposite sex and certain same sex characters have a "S" rank option.

Towards the end of the game, you get to ask one of your A supports who has the "S" rank option if they'll marry you. All you really get is a "cute" cutscene with your new spouse and some "where are they now" dialogue during the credits.

Click to shrink...

lol, in that case I have 2 thoughts
1. It sounds like it would have been stupid easy for them to add more options. Hell, they could probably put an update in that adds in everyone else as an option.
2. After all this controversy I really thought this was a bigger part of the game. I wonder if a lot of the people who are upset dont realise how small this part of the game is. TBH it sounds like an afterthought in more ways than one.

 

[Pau]

I love the Valentine's day cards idea. Easy to repeat and carry out in volume. I can donate graphic design work for whatever.

Click to shrink...

Thank you! It's a really great idea. Honestly my one concern is how far February is.

I'm not much of an idea guy but would something like #FEthreechoices work? The three choices would be gay, straight and bi options for player romances.

Sorry if it's no good just spit balling while I eat lunch lol

Click to shrink...

No worries, that's much better than anything I could come up with. :P I'll add it to the OP as a potential option!

Id rather them remove all romance options and just focus on character support and more interesting gameplay.

Click to shrink...

I personally rarely use the romance options: in my first playthrough I didn't have my F!Byleth end up with anyone because I honestly think Byleth is so boring that seems like punishment for their potential partner. :P

But it's easy for me to say that as a straight woman who gets almost the whole cast of male characters to choose from. I don't see Nintendo and Intelligent Systems removing this part of the game any time soon, and I'd rather people have options that they can ignore than a lack of options. I also want more non-player characters have m/m end game pairings, since that's a mechanic I like more as an older FE fan. (Ike and Soren are boyfriends and no one will convince me otherwise.)

I honestly think for best results we need someone who can write Japanese to draft a letter containing our concerns that can be sent directly to Int Sys. I feel like doing social media hashtags and the like, especially in english, won't provide enough info on what we want and will lead to a lot of things getting lost in a game of telephone as demands get passed (or sometimes don't even) from one hand to the next before even being translated into a language the developers can actually understand

Click to shrink...

I agree that having it be in Japanese would have the best result, which is why I mentioned the idea is to have this campaign and materials in both Japanese and English. Do you think doing an English fan campaign would be a waste of time?

Gotta be honest... this one is weird for me.

"Patch Homosexuality in" does not sound like healthy representation. What if the creator of those characters simply does not envision them as being Homosexual?

Seriously, i understand Representation. Inclusiveness is good. 1 Male romantic option for gay men Vs 5 for female is weird and out of place (specially when you ignore the fact that a lot of Straight guys are A-Ok with lesbian characters for obvious reasons...) but honestly this sort of campaign doesn't seem like it has it's heart in the right place.

i would honestly lose respect for any company that changed a character due to public pressure to make him or her gay or straight. That would never feel genuine or like a win for representation or to make sexuality more visible in games that decide to approach romance like that.

Personally i think this does more harm than good to the conversation. Would very much prefer to see people rallying for any future Fire Emblem titles to be more open and have more choices. Specially to send a message to the creators and producers that there is a fanbase ready to celebrate and support these titles if they embrace those aspects on the design floor. Not shoehorned in after launch via a patch.

Just gotta be honest. "Change this character's sexual orientation via patch" sounds like a bad take in any context.

Click to shrink...

I'm a little confused at your comment of a campaign like this not having it's heart in the right place, or I'm misunderstanding how you are using the phase. What do you consider being the right place?

I mentioned in the OP that we should specify a goal, and that goal doesn't have to be a patch. That goal, like the others (including one you mention in your post), is there as a possibility because it's one that gay male players have mentioned in past threads. Part of the discussion is around whether or not this would be the best goal to focus on for such a campaign. Ultimately, it's gay men who can decide if this particular method is a win for representation, if it's something they want, and if it's worth campaigning for in luie of other possibilities. Those of us who are allies are just here to help make a win, whatever that looks like, more possible.

As for the creators not envisioning the characters to be homosexual, many of the male characters already actually can have an implicit ending with another male character, just not the player avatar. But besides that, I'd personally side-eye any creator that says they are incapable of envisioning more than one gay male character but five gay female characters. If they really want to give the game open dating sim options, why not be as inclusive as possible? Why not let them know that there is a desire for more inclusivity?

 

[alpha]

I'm for it. Ideally I'd like them to boot the relationship stuff out entirely on both sides, but as long as it's here there should be equal representation.

 

[Lord Vatek]

lol, in that case I have 2 thoughts
1. It sounds like it would have been stupid easy for them to add more options. Hell, they could probably put an update in that adds in everyone else as an option.
2. After all this controversy I really thought this was a bigger part of the game. I wonder if a lot of the people who are upset dont realise how small this part of the game is. TBH it sounds like an afterthought in more ways than one.

Click to shrink...

It's actually arguably a bigger deal in this game than it ever has been. They actually devote a couple of main story scenes to it.

 

[Kewlmyc]

lol, in that case I have 2 thoughts
1. It sounds like it would have been stupid easy for them to add more options. Hell, they could probably put an update in that adds in everyone else as an option.
2. After all this controversy I really thought this was a bigger part of the game. I wonder if a lot of the people who are upset dont realise how small this part of the game is. TBH it sounds like an afterthought in more ways than one.

Click to shrink...

Nah, it shouldn't be that hard honestly, though the might have to draw some new art or record some new lines since the entire game is fully voiced. If they really wanted to, a patch or season pass included update is possible, though I don't see either happening. Improving for the next game seems like the best, most realistic result of this.

 

[Aaronrules380]

Thank you! It's a really great idea. Honestly my one concern is how far February is.


No worries, that's much better than anything I could come up with. :P I'll add it to the OP as a potential option!


I personally rarely use the romance options: in my first playthrough I didn't have my F!Byleth end up with anyone because I honestly think Byleth is so boring that seems like punishment for their potential partner. :P

But it's easy for me to say that as a straight woman who gets almost the whole cast of male characters to choose from. I don't see Nintendo and Intelligent Systems removing this part of the game any time soon, and I'd rather people have options that they can ignore than a lack of options. I also want more non-player characters have m/m end game pairings, since that's a mechanic I like more as an older FE fan. (Ike and Soren are boyfriends and no one will convince me otherwise.)


I agree that having it be in Japanese would have the best result, which is why I mentioned the idea is to have this campaign and materials in both Japanese and English. Do you think doing an English fan campaign would be a waste of time?


I'm a little confused at your comment of a campaign like this not having it's heart in the right place, or I'm misunderstanding how you are using the phase. What do you consider being the right place?

I mentioned in the OP that we should specify a goal, and that goal doesn't have to be a patch. That goal, like the others (including one you mention in your post), is there as a possibility because it's one that gay male players have mentioned in past threads. Part of the discussion is around whether or not this would be the best goal to focus on for such a campaign. Ultimately, it's gay men who can decide if this particular method is a win for representation, if it's something they want, and if it's worth campaigning for in luie of other possibilities. Those of us who are allies are just here to help make a win, whatever that looks like, more possible.

As for the creators not envisioning the characters to be homosexual, many of the male characters already actually can have an implicit ending with another male character, just not the player avatar. But besides that, I'd personally side-eye any creator that says they are incapable of envisioning more than one gay male character but five gay female characters. If they really want to give the game open dating sim options, why not be as inclusive as possible? Why not let them know that there is a desire for more inclusivity?

Click to shrink...

It's definitely still worthwhile, but it just feels like without a direct line we're essentially playing a game of telephone and one that can be cut off at any time by a bad actor (or even just someone who doesn't care enough but isn't strictly speaking malicious towards the LGBT community) just not passing on the message and that means it's very hard for the message to go through properly

 

[WellbornWarrior]

The whole romance thing has the far worse overarching problem that it doesn't work because the main character is an emotionless stand in and therefore it comes off as unbelievable that everyone is so affectionate to him.

They should've just cut all the romance stuff for the main character since it's an unfortunate remnant of the 3DS era. Let only the side characters have preset romances, including gay ones. That's the only way to make it somewhat believable. And even then it's questionable if the devs can actually pull it off since they're the same ones that made that awful gay conversion therapy thing in Fates.

 

[TheYanger]

I'm for it. Ideally I'd like them to boot the relationship stuff out entirely on both sides, but as long as it's here there should be equal representation.

Click to shrink...

I mean...it really doesn't have 'relationships' in any real sense in this game. you literally just happen to get married at the end if you choose to.

 

[Araujo]

There is apparently evidence in a datamine that Claude and Raphael were originally going to be bi like Lindhardt is, but that never actually made it into the final product. Would you be OK if a future patch actually made them so?

That said, I don't remember if that was ever confirmed though, so take what I said with a grain of salt.

Click to shrink...

If the creator of those characters and that story came out and said anything along the lines of "Yeah that was my original intent, but we ended up having to change it" then yeah, fuck yeah. Restore the creator's original intent. Further expand the world and characters. heaven's know Fire Emblem could use more characters that are more than just paper thin personalities...

I'm a little confused at your comment of a campaign like this not having it's heart in the right place, or I'm misunderstanding how you are using the phase. What do you consider being the right place?

I mentioned in the OP that we should specify a goal, and that goal doesn't have to be a patch. That goal, like the others (including one you mention in your post), is there as a possibility because it's one that gay male players have mentioned in past threads. Part of the discussion is around whether or not this would be the best goal to focus on for such a campaign. Ultimately, it's gay men who can decide if this particular method is a win for representation, if it's something they want, and if it's worth campaigning for in luie of other possibilities. Those of us who are allies are just here to help make a win, whatever that looks like, more possible.

As for the creators not envisioning the characters to be homosexual, many of the male characters already actually can have an implicit ending with another male character, just not the player avatar. But besides that, I'd personally side-eye any creator that says they are incapable of envisioning more than one gay male character but five gay female characters. If they really want to give the game open dating sim options, why not be as inclusive as possible? Why not let them know that there is a desire for more inclusivity?

Click to shrink...

I dislike the idea of users imposing change to creative vision. Specially after completion of the work. I prefer user welcoming more broad changes going forward. Empowering creators to go ahead and explore those characters in their vision. I don't want professional game creators making my OC, i want them to create characters i gravitate towards. And if i can cast my OC in that mix, i'll do so gladly.

Let me use a dumb and super extreme example.
If an RPG had an Homophobic character... not implied... just straight up, homophobic... i wouldn't want the creator to remove that character or change it. I would simply deny that product my attention or money. Because that's his creative vision, that's what they wanted to write and make. And they are allowed to do that. Im allowed to find that dumb and 150% fucking stupid to do... and i can hope they never make a dime out of it and that their creative vision never leads to profit or success... but i wouldn't want to force them to change it "cause i really like the brand it's attached to" .

On that same note... there is this...

"many of the male characters already actually can have an implicit..."

Implicit. So maybe the creator's intent was to be left to your interpretation cause they didn't want to get explicit about it. I would rather say "well i hope next time you feel comfortable going explicit, cause that soft touch implicit stuff is boring as hell... btw, if you don't, i just might stop caring all together." than going "we all know what you meant, just CHANGE IT" .

 

[Pau]

People seem to be unclear about the romance mechanics in the game, even those playing it. I'll add more details in the OP.

Going to put this up here in response to Yeshua's point in case people don't scroll down to quoted replies.

What are the downsides of asking for the developers taking action regarding Fire Emblem: Three Houses specifically instead of waiting for a later game? Do we envision a scenario where asking for DLC or a patch means the developers straight up ignore it or actively try to pull back on m/m options in the next game? Will it garner less support?

I want to say worst case scenario the developers say it's too late in the development cycle to do something now, but have heard the fans and will keep it in mind going forward.

I think the main goal should be a patch to add same-sex relationship for all characters that are bi but for some absurd reason can only be dated by the main character if he/she is of opposite sex, I personally noted 2-4 characters that fit that criteria in the Blue Lion house

Spoiler

Felix & Sylvain are pretty much confirmed in their A+ support and Dimitri & Annette are likely

We shouldn't shy from asking a lot, as long as it's well reasoned, the less we ask the less we'll get if anything.

Anyway thanks for making this thread and hopefully it will work.

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Yes, those were some of the characters I was thinking of who already have m/m A/A+ endings.

Your last point is particularly important. What are the downsides of asking for the developers taking action Fire Emblem: Three Houses instead of waiting for a later game? Do we envision a scenario where asking for DLC or a patch means the developers straight up ignore it or actively try to pull back on m/m options in the next game? I want to say worst case scenario the developers say it's too late in the development cycle to do something now, but have heard the fans and will keep it in mind going forward. Will it garner less support?

2. After all this controversy I really thought this was a bigger part of the game. I wonder if a lot of the people who are upset dont realise how small this part of the game is. TBH it sounds like an afterthought in more ways than one.

Click to shrink...

I already finished one route on the game: I know how "little" it actually takes up. It's not much different from the romance options in the other games (only difference is you don't get a child character out of the support), so fans aren't being upset out of ignorance. And despite it being mechanically and narratively a small portion of the game, if you go to fan discussions, one of the top things people talk about is who they are going to romance. Why should gay men have to lose out on the fun that everyone else is having?

So I'm still early in the game but on the current bombcast they had a woman guest that made it sound like the S ranks aren't even romantic options like in the old game (I think she equated them to a pinky swear). I have noticed as well that it seems like only your MC can get S ranks but no one else can? That all I can really comment on this early in the game. Fire emblem is one of the first games I had seen m/m relationships in with Raven and the Monk character. So it seems strange to see the series called out.

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Yeah, Fire Emblem has a history of characters and relationships that are interpreted as gay, although I can't think of many that are explicitly romantic the way w/m are. But this history does make the relatively small improvements for this latest game stand out even more. The calling out isn't malicious: this is my favorite video game series of all time. It makes me sad that a group of people aren't able to enjoy it in the same way that I can.

 

[Sacul64]

Yeah, Fire Emblem has a history of characters and relationships that are interpreted as gay, although I can't think of many that are explicitly romantic the way w/m are. But this history does make the relatively small improvements for this latest game stand out even more. The calling out isn't malicious: this is my favorite video game series of all time. It makes me sad that a group of people aren't able to enjoy it in the same way that I can.

Click to shrink...

I totally get that. I also wonder if part of the issue comes from how may units in this game are nobles and are expected to continue the family line. If your protagonist is a woman can she romance Edelgard? If not than it really is odd if they exclude other nobility and lords from m/m.

 

[Deleted member 13101]

What should be the primary goal of this campaign?

Frankly: Awareness. We've had a few threads on this subject already, and yet people are still running into comments about this aspect of the game for the first time.

Suggestions:

Boycotts of a product don't work. What does work are boycotts of vital advertising and booster orgs of the product makers. But, people are still fans of Nintendo even with this grievance, so this is likely to not be taken up as an effort - I don't think the goal is to cut off funding or hurt Nintendo, IS, KT, etc. to the point of compliance.

A twitter hashtag is a good idea, but can't be guaranteed to sustain energy or reach the largest and widest audience. However:

The data analysis effort suggested by Pau, resulting in infographics, is a fantastic idea.

The infographics can be widely distributed without durability problems, and would be potentially useful to the entire industry. It would probably be a much stronger signal than a hashtag by itself, as enthusiast sites can easily source twitter or Era or whomever to host an article and commentary based on the infographics. The infographic would also demonstrate that people are really fans of the game and aren't just whining. And its scope would extend beyond merely patching FETH or hopes that "the next game" improves, without giving up on having those things become a reality.

Now, if you're considering sending physical items to the developers, I would just remember the lessons of the Bioware Mass Effect 3 cupcake campaign:

- The cupcakes were an unannounced suspicious delivery to a private company - and though it's fun that many enthusiast sites receive mail and care packages these days, developers are targets and I wouldn't suggest making them a target of multiple packages (and thanks to the ESA many more enthusiasts are now potential targets too).

- The cupcakes basically demonstrated that folks were dissatisfied with the similarities of the red/green/blue endings, without highlighting at all what was intrinsically at issue in the endings, or what people really wanted the endings to represent. The cupcakes were also physically useless to the developers themselves, and were redistributed elsewhere. That said, they did work to provide an update adding an option to the ending ultimately, using the feedback from their own forums.

Finally, be specific on what is meant by "romance" in the game (fake edit: I see you covered this above, so here's my own thought on this):

- Merely having every character "available for everyone" isn't quite enough, as over time stereotypes continue to work their way into these arrangements and render choices disingenuous. Highlight how dispensing with stereotypes, no matter the gender or orientation, improves the game experience and player experience for those who seek this romance option, and for everyone.

Reaching out to other groups is also a great idea, especially the ones who have already thoroughly analyzed and dissected these types of choices (and lack of choices) in games, and the characterization of NPCs that are offered up as options. Promoting them and their work as well would increase overall awareness.

Good Luck!