There were much hubub about how Neil was forcing Ellie to be gay just to look "progressive", IIRC. That ND catering to the SJW folks and the like.
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
Campaign for More Male Same-Sex Romances in Fire Emblem: Three Houses
- Thread starter Pau
- Start date
There were much hubub about how Neil was forcing Ellie to be gay just to look "progressive", IIRC. That ND catering to the SJW folks and the like.
Hey, what about #FireEmblemThreeQuality? Maybe we could vote on which hashtag to use for this campaign so everyone is on the same page.
No they didn't and it didn't work. We didn't get any more gay relationships, only lesbian ones. People here wanted more of BOTH.
Three Houses is definitely some progress, even if there aren't as many male same-sex options for the avatar. There are quite a few strongly homoromantic non-avatar A/A+ supports and paired endings between men -- about as much obviously gay sub-text as the rest of the series combined, tbh.
And while yeah, it would clearly be best if they made these things overt, they still made me smile.
Honestly I think we should use threequality think it works better haha.
OP
OP
Not quite sure how to facilitate coming to a consensus over the goal. I'm gonna go through the thread again and quote pros/cons for each side.
FireEmblemThreeQuality is good! I will add a poll once we get more suggestions. :)
excellent article on queerness in FE:TH
OP
OP
Thank you for posting. We should start a running list of such articles. Maybe in a Google Doc?
I was wondering if it would be okay to reach out to writers like this for the data analytics part, asking them if they would like to provide numbers for traffic/engagement to include in our infographic.
This is a really great article. It explains everything thouroughly, and even addresses the past failures in Awakening, Fates and Valentia.
I'm gonna make a separate topic for this. I think it's important that people see that a large media outlet talking about this issue.
Edit: https://www.resetera.com/threads/vi...ed-gay-characters-it-needs-queer-life.133822/
Last edited:
OP
OP
Definitely deserves its own thread: it's such a thorough look at the issue.
What do you all think about the points it brings up in context of a campaign like this?
I think one of the most important things is how it's important to get queer people involved in the development process for games.
What channels? Also, are you going to send it to NoA/Treehouse, NoJ/Intelligent Systems, or both cultures?
OP
OP
I don't see any downsides of sending the same statement and infographic to all of them through various means. I figured we could send the following:
- Intelligent Systems Mailed (Japanese)
- Fire Emblem Twitter (Japanese)
- Treehouse Mailed (English)
- Treehouse Twitter (English)
If I had to say my current focus... I would say I'm willing to sacrifice any more gay content in Three Houses,
But my goal for this campaign is to get an EQUAL amount of MxF, FxM, MxM, and FxF romances in the NEXT game. The numbers don't have to be exact but they should look more like 5/5/5/5 instead of 10/10/3/3.
OP
OP
Thread died down again, which might be just due to lack of interest, or I'm not doing a good job facilitating discussion. :P I don't think I'm the one who should make the call for what we ultimately decide on as our goal. Maybe people from each camp can take a stab at writing a draft statement and we go around voting and editing as a group? Should we just leave it up to a vote (thread poll)?
This game seems super duper light on romance to begin with. There's no fade to black banging scenes like awakening. My S rank was literally "i find you attractive." Its like mild flirting at worst.
I support the concept, though.
I support the concept, though.
Waiting for the next game becomes a viscous cycle though. I don't think it's out of the realm of possibilities to get Nintendo to adjust some of the S supports and record a bit of new dialogue. They certainly have the means to do so.
There is precedent. Mass Effect Andromeda added a gay romance in a patch.
OP
OP
Done!
In the meantime, I'm going to get started on the data analysis part.
If anyone wants to draft some example statements for the three poll options, feel free. I imagine short and sweet is best.
Thanks for the poll.
I'm for patching Three Houses. If we keep expecting them to do it "next time" we just fall into the same patterns. We deserve change now.
I'm for patching Three Houses. If we keep expecting them to do it "next time" we just fall into the same patterns. We deserve change now.
Yep. I expected them to do it "next time" after Fates and we got Three Houses. I voited for the free patch
I voted for the free patch not because I think it's likely to happen, but because I think a campaign for the most ambitious option will still influence the paid DLC and the next game.
I voted paid DLC because they already confirmed new characters are coming as DLC and I don't think they'll be patching in bisexual supports for existing characters. Not because I want to pay but because it's the most realistic possibility imo.
I think it's past time for "raising awareness". They have to be aware already.
I think it's past time for "raising awareness". They have to be aware already.
I think patching the game is still unrealistic and counterproductive, the goal should be about awareness so we can include outlets rather than a specific push
The campaign has to be about future games of its basically already kind of dead in the water. This game is mostly done, even with the plans detailed for DLC.
Nah, I say make the goal a patch. Even if that fails to happen, awareness will be the end result. No reason not to pick the more ambitious goal when the worst outcome of picking that goal is achieving the less ambitious goal.
I dont think going for the most aggressive approach is the way to rally support or integrate media, especially when we all know its unrealistic
Well the non-aggressive approach has gotten nothing already, so I don't see much risk in trying aggressive.
Unfortunately, option 2 in this poll is just really not realistic :( I feel like it would be a lost cause to try and push for this one. But the other two (mainly the first one) are realistic goals that we can and should strive for!
We've been doing general awareness forever though. Like, people are aware. Nintendo is aware. Everyone is aware.
If we're not specific, nothing ever happens.
Definitely don't disagree with you. I just feel like some free dlc for this kinda thing might be lazily thrown together, since it seems like they really don't care. But at the same time some low effort dlc could lead to something better in the next game.
This could be patched in.
I've only played as femByleth, so i don't know how it works with the male supports but the female-female ones are sweet and some quite flirt-y.
I imagine though, it could be pandering for cismale players, so the more reason to give more options for gay male players.
I've only played as femByleth, so i don't know how it works with the male supports but the female-female ones are sweet and some quite flirt-y.
I imagine though, it could be pandering for cismale players, so the more reason to give more options for gay male players.
OP
OP
More people voted in the poll than I expected! It's pretty close. My partner suggested for the Valentine's Day card we could offer some stock messages, including asking for the patch-in or a more general note. (Alternatively, people could opt to have the card mailed to them first so they can handwrite in whatever they want.)
Do you think the way in which we communicate it can mitigate that?
I mean I think phrasing only gets you so far and setting a very ambitious goal only serves to narrow your audience because people are ultimately going to find the goal unrealistic. I think a simple, realistic, and positive message is easier to pick up in media. I dont see outlets making "Gay romances should be patched in" articles, but "Fire Emblem Representation should be better so everyone can enjoy the game to its fullest" is a much more palatable to get media involved. I think it works a lot better with the statistics proposal as information on why it matters in a general sense than for a specific push. Setting an ambitious goal only makes it a lot harder than building from the ground up with franchise specific information.
I disagree with this. As I mentioned above, no one is unaware of gay people, and the lack of quality content created for us, unless they are unfathomably stupid or willfully ignorant.
Just saying "you need to do better" is too nebulous, what does "better" mean to people who are not part of the queer community? We can't just expect them to get it right based on faith, because that leads us to situations like these.
A few weeks ago I made a topic here urging straight gamers to get involved, and stand up for queer content, and I was raked over the coals for not being specific enough. I was shocked by how many "tell me exactly what to do" responses I got. At first I was really frustrated by these responses because they felt disingenuous, but I realized that many people need to be pushed to do the right thing, and the best way to do that is to give them specific actions they can take.
If we don't start narrowing in on tangible results we want, we'll just keep getting weak willed half measures and spineless PR responses about how "important" we are, while we dine on crumbs.
The goal is there, its just not trying to push for something unattainable. You want to push for "tangible", a free patch for a game, imo, isnt happening. DLC is more attainable, but even then I question how much is drawn out in advance. The goal is to say why this is not acceptable and why future titles should address, its not a "figure it out". Nor do I understand how a more aggressive goal fixes the problem of people being willfully ignorant, im just trying to cast the most approachable and wide net
Nintendo has offered free DLC updates to many of their games. It's not unattainable.
If we think it's impossible before we even start, then we've already been defeated. And any effort to get something tangible is not in vain even if we don't succeed.
We've already gone through the "this isn't acceptable" phase many times already, and it's frankly not enough. I'm tired of just saying what I don't want, I'm gonna say what I do want, and I want Three Houses to be fixed.
I dont recall free content updates that were protested for rather than naturally planned by Nintendo.
I think any push is a good push, but there are better pushes than others and making an unrealistic goal is going to narrow your scope. Even looking at era which is more progressive minded than other sites had issues with the thread that first pushed for this. I dont see the point handcuffing yourself off the bat. The goal should be volume, not a desired end result. A free patch would be the best ending, but I think you are setting yourself up for failure to pin all your hopes on the hardest thing to accomplish
I don't think it's unrealistic, and while ERA is more progressive by contrast, it's not the queer haven it's made out to be.
I don't feel restrained by asking for a specific outcome, it makes it easier to focus IMO. The idea of setting up a better path for future games is inherent in a request to fix what is right in front of us. It's not like if we achieve this goal we'll be fine with whatever failures happen in the future. It's not a payoff for continued silence going forward. This fight doesn't stop until we get consistent quality content. So let's start that right now.
Point being its more uphill outside of here, not that era is perfect in this regard
I still think making it that way makes it a lot easier to handwave away, but in any case this is my stance on it at this point.
Wow so happy to see a thread like this. Regarding the poll, I'd say the 1st two options are both good goals.
I agree we need to give more specific directives and goals for improvement, which is why I think finding someone who can relay the message in Japanese directly to IntSys is imperative number 1. Because it doesn't matter what our stated goals are or how direct or concrete they are if we can't communicate them properly to the actual developers
This is exactly how I feel
This has happened with Mario Maker, Splatoon, and also Bioware patched in a gay romance for free.
Nintendo is already planning a Mario Maker 2 update to fix local multiplayer issues that fans protested about
Wasnt that because people were complaining before the game even dropped and because the game meant to promote Nintendo's paid online system didnt have a online feature even though it was already present in the game as well as not even being out yet? Sorry I dont see the equivalence, nor are your other dlc mentions good comparisons
OP
OP
Someone has offered to take a stab at the first draft of the Japanese translation. I'm thinking we can also post in the Learning Japanese OT for help.
I haven't sent a message to their Tumblr yet. I dunno if Pau or Hours Left have