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OP
OP
Scherzo

Scherzo

Member
Nov 27, 2017
1,050
You doxing or something? Maybe he grew as a person and left these shitty takes in the past and still works on new greater games at the same company.

Holy shit.

I mean it's not a matter of a singe 'bad egg'. It takes a village to decide that this take on Dante and DMC was a good idea and not, again, very toxic.
 

Miracle Ache

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,206
Sadly it was pretty much the mainstream thought process at the time. Thank god those days are (mostly) behind us.
 

Belthazar90

Banned
Jun 3, 2019
4,316
Was this considered ok at the time? I feel like it's not THAT long ago for this to be handwaved as normal.
 

KarmaCow

Member
Oct 25, 2017
9,154
You'd be hard pressed to find anything from a decade ago that isn't laced with homophobic jokes, especially in gaming. Another one that stands out is that Activision put out a "PSA" video named Fighting Against Grenade Spam for Modern Warfare 2.
 
OP
OP
Scherzo

Scherzo

Member
Nov 27, 2017
1,050
Was this considered ok at the time? I feel like it's not THAT long ago for this to be handwaved as normal.

That's kinda what got me too. That it was less than a decade ago that "Hahaha, wouldn't it be funny if Dante were gay? That couldn't possible happen, see he's fucking two women right now see?"
 

Kangi

Profile Styler
Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,948
Considering the sheer amount of very, very gay artwork of the character I'd say they failed their mission regardless
 

Bossking

Member
Nov 20, 2017
1,392
Yeah, this is old ass news. But it is still just wild thinking about how outwardly hostile Ninja Theory was to fans of DMC and to the franchise itself, and how that toxicity permeated every single aspect of DmC.

E3iEz7jXoAIiRP3


Like, hmm, I wonder what that fat, balding, soda-chugging guy wearing a "5" shirt could possibly mean
 

Alucrid

Chicken Photographer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,413
You'd be hard pressed to find anything from a decade ago that isn't laced with homophobic jokes, especially in gaming. Another one that stands out is that Activision put out a "PSA" video named Fighting Against Grenade Spam for Modern Warfare 2.

imagine an mlb pitcher signing on to do that commercial nowadays. whew
 
OP
OP
Scherzo

Scherzo

Member
Nov 27, 2017
1,050
You'd be hard pressed to find anything from a decade ago that isn't laced with homophobic jokes, especially in gaming. Another one that stands out is that Activision put out a "PSA" video named Fighting Against Grenade Spam for Modern Warfare 2.

I feel like 2013 is when the tide really started to turn in America in general, with Same-Sex Marriage bans being declared unconstitutional the next year. Of course, that might be an overly optimistic view. Obviously 'no homo' shit continued and still continues to be pretty prevalent, but the idea of someone giving a GDC talk incorporating it, which is essentially part of the promotion of the game, is just bonkers to me.
 

gabegabe

Member
Jul 5, 2018
2,736
Brazil
You doxing or something? Maybe he grew as a person and left these shitty takes in the past and still works on new greater games at the same company.

Holy shit.

I just posted a tweet from 2019 of the official Ninja Theory twitter saying that they've still worked together after all this. How the fuck is that doxing? Do you even know what it means?
 

Deleted member 56065

User-requested account closure
Member
Apr 18, 2019
725
Yeah, this is old ass news. But it is still just wild thinking about how outwardly hostile Ninja Theory was to fans of DMC and to the franchise itself, and how that toxicity permeated every single aspect of DmC.

E3iEz7jXoAIiRP3


Like, hmm, I wonder what that fat, balding, soda-chugging guy wearing a "5" shirt could possibly mean
Yeah, the way they handled the whole thing was awful and Tameem responses on twitter at the time were petty and childish.
 

L Thammy

Spacenoid
Member
Oct 25, 2017
49,983
1. Did it ever desurface?

2. Whenever this comes up, I feel like people miss that they immediately go from the slide mocking Brokeback Mountain to praising Tyler Durden as "naturally cool". Tyler Durden was a character created by a gay writer inspired by him engaging in toxic masculinity when he was trying to keep in the closet.
 

mueske

Member
Apr 11, 2019
311
Whatever, DmC Dante is still a total muscle bottom in my headcanon. No matter what the dudebro designers envisioned.
 

Alucrid

Chicken Photographer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,413
I feel like 2013 is when the tide really started to turn in America in general, with Same-Sex Marriage bans being declared unconstitutional the next year. Of course, that might be an overly optimistic view. Obviously 'no homo' shit continued and still continues to be pretty prevalent, but the idea of someone giving a GDC talk incorporating it, which is essentially part of the promotion of the game, is just bonkers to me.

oddly enough GDC 2013 was going on at the same time as Hollingsworth v. Perry was at the supreme court
 

Deleted member 14089

Oct 27, 2017
6,264
Was this considered ok at the time? I feel like it's not THAT long ago for this to be handwaved as normal.

The talk wasn't as apparent and the thoughts of the devs at that time weren't as out in the open, as with this GDC. I imagine the "joke" he did at 1:46 was approved by ninja theory in a way and even though he does not say anything outright, it is implied. Also funny that he uses fight club afterwards, which is a movie about toxic masculinity, but also had the total opposite effect in the and where it amplified toxic masculinity in a way XD.

It's more the edgy design, use of profanity and overall personality changes that did not sit well with many fans and some of the general audience at the time so all of the above wasn't called out at all. At least not in a grand manner. I played dmc back in the day not knowing all of the above at all. I thought it was alright back then and the gameplay is still good, but it's obvious that it hasn't aged as well LOL.

Time has changed for good in a way (not implying that everything is ok now) and it's certainly a shameful moment for Ninja Theory.
 

Pyro

God help us the mods are making weekend threads
Member
Jul 30, 2018
14,505
United States
and people who never saw it before and are stunned that they never heard about it

giphy.gif


Disappointing to see this. I've always loved punk Dante because of how well he fit into the universe NT created where demons are corporations, FOX news, etc. but I didn't realize this was part of the design process behind him. Not that long ago but seems crazily outdated now and kinda hilarious since that version of Dante has always struck me as bisexual as fuck (like me lol).
 

Bossking

Member
Nov 20, 2017
1,392
I know Itsuno says he loved DmC and has nothing but positive things to say about it, but it's really hard not to consider Faust just like, a direct response to that GDC slide.




Like I know it's supposed to be a nod to a Japanese pop star for some reason (not even MJ), but just, giving Dante a cowboy hat after that game? With how many deep cuts this game has for the DMC community? It's WAY too coincidental.
 

White Glint

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
3,617
I bring it up in every vapid "DmC was so underrated" thread but y'know, people just hate on this game because they changed Dante's hair color, right.
 

Belthazar90

Banned
Jun 3, 2019
4,316
The talk wasn't as apparent and the thoughts of the devs at that time weren't as out in the open, as with this GDC. I imagine the "joke" he did at 1:46 was approved by ninja theory in a way and even though he does not say anything outright, it is implied. Also funny that he uses fight club afterwards, which is a movie about toxic masculinity, but also had the total opposite effect in the and where it amplified toxic masculinity in a way XD.

I hate when those concepts backfire due to the audience's lack of basic cognition. Here in Brazil we had a very famous movie about police brutality and corruption and most of the audience just thought the cops were badass and went on to idolize the main character.
 

grumpybat

Member
Apr 12, 2021
527
USA
I see Ninja Theory has the requisite pride flag on their social media logo, but i'm not 100% buying it. Game developers need to go out of their way to prove they're NOT homophobic / transphobic via action not words. I refuse to give them the benefit of the doubt.
 

Stop It

Bad Cat
Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,350
It doesn't help that any time the DmC reboot gets brought up, the games press still fully defends the game and continues to peddle the 'fans were mad because they changed Dante's hair' nonsense.
The thing is that the media seem to have blind spots like this is sad.

Just because Ninja Theory are well received for other issues doesn't mean they should've be called up on this.

It absolutely was stupid, retrograde and shouldn't ever have been done.
 

Ashlette

Member
Oct 28, 2017
3,254
Yeah, this is old ass news. But it is still just wild thinking about how outwardly hostile Ninja Theory was to fans of DMC and to the franchise itself, and how that toxicity permeated every single aspect of DmC.

E3iEz7jXoAIiRP3


Like, hmm, I wonder what that fat, balding, soda-chugging guy wearing a "5" shirt could possibly mean

A year before DmC released, Black Mirror casted a light on how we treat cruelty towards plus-sized people as amusement in One Million Merits.

Charles Brooker doesn't miss
 

Luckett_X

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,406
Leeds, UK
The level design may have been a notch above normal DMC sequel fair in DmC, but that vile trash game almost buried the franchise for good with all of its edgelord shit like this. Haven't bought a Ninja Theory game since, because their cozying up to mental health authorities with Hellblade for grants and other financial assistance also feels like when a skeezball CEO goes to work at a charity for a few years to accumulate "positive social chits".
 

Praedyth

Member
Feb 25, 2020
6,519
Brazil
I made some quick search on Twitter about the guy and found out he made the original concept for Senua. No idea if he's working on Hellblade 2 or if he worked on Bleeding Edge.



Just pointing it out that this same person still worked with Ninja Theory after this awful presentation.

The Ninja Theory name with the rainbow colors suits the thread right
 

DevilPuncher

Aggressively Mediocre
Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,685
It's why I don't really support Ninja Theory in any capacity. A lot of the marketing for the game was just so weird and toxic already, but this was something else.
 

Rendering...

Member
Oct 30, 2017
19,089
As disgusting now as it was then. Inexcusable.

But wasn't this stuff already in the wild? I've seen screens from that presentation in a lot of DmC threads over the years.
 

Moogle

Top Mog
Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,765
1. Did it ever desurface?

2. Whenever this comes up, I feel like people miss that they immediately go from the slide mocking Brokeback Mountain to praising Tyler Durden as "naturally cool". Tyler Durden was a character created by a gay writer inspired by him engaging in toxic masculinity when he was trying to keep in the closet.

Tyler Durden is worshipped by straight dudes who don't understand basic storytelling and so think he's heroic and had good ideas. He's not some kind of gay icon.
 

Roytheone

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,140
Yeah, this sucks. It's a shame because the game itself was fantastic, but their attitude towards this sucked.
 

Tyrant Rave

Has A Pretty Cool Jacket
Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,696
As disgusting now as it was then. Inexcusable.

But wasn't this stuff already in the wild? I've seen screens from that presentation in a lot of DmC threads over the years.
It was, but I always feel like I only see people deeply familiar with the series post it. It's not something I remember getting a lot of attention back then. I think that's a big part of why the tweet bringing it up again is getting attention.
 

Fantastical

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,365
People did stuff that would never happen today 10 years ago. It's gross but I'm not going to get too mad, personally. Hopefully this guy wouldn't do this today.

The weird thing is, I swear to god DmC Dante was designed to appeal to gay men lol. I don't usually call videogame characters hot, but he's hot in a way most other videogame characters aren't.
 

Phellps

Member
Oct 25, 2017
10,800
Not surprising that one of the cringiest edgelord games out there was the direct result of this mentality.

People did stuff that would never happen today 10 years ago. It's gross but I'm not going to get too mad, personally. Hopefully this guy wouldn't do this today.



The weird thing is, I swear to god DmC Dante was designed to appeal to gay men lol. I don't usually call videogame characters hot, but he's hot in a way most other videogame characters aren't.
I'm all for being mindful of when things happened when analyzing past events, but DmC dropped a year after BioWare included three queer romances in Mass Effect 3. I think we could hold 2013 to a higher standard, this wasn't 2005.
 

Alpheus

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,647
I remember this somewhat, not that long after I kinda fell off DMC as a franchise. Which is a shame because by that point I had fun memories of the first and third game. Second game was certainly...an experience to be sure but yea, given that I was coming to terms with being gay as a young adult (just figuring my life out in general as ya do in college) I just simply wasn't gonna involve myself with that installment. Cut to when the PS4 version came out and my supportive brother was kind enough to buy me this game XD. I briefly played it and I'll definitely get back to it but I definitely remember the discourse surrounding this presentation as the point where I stopped keeping up with DMC as a franchise. Then there was that Trish costume thing though that is it's own thing entirely that deserves its own discussion (which I have seen this board have that discussion wrt that Trish thing)edit: and ofc the whole Rueben Langdon situation.

I'd like to think the people involved from NT, have grown since then, whether they have the decency to at least own up to it is entirely within their purview of course and is none of my business.
 
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