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[Major Spoilers] One of the endings in Catherine: Full Body gets extremely transphobic... moreso than that original (OP Updated Feb. 17)

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Caz

Caz

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ATLUS has an unfortunate history of transphobia dating all the way back to the PS1 era:


Transphobia has become a very gross recurrence in their games (Persona in particular really drops the ball every time it touches upon gender identity) that, quite frankly, should not have happened anywhere near as often as it has up to now. Hopefully someone at ATLUS wakes up to the much-deserved criticism that Catherine's re-release is receiving and issues an apology at minimum because this needs to stop.
 
Raijinto

Raijinto

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How, *how* did the multiple people who made this game think this was a good idea.

It needs to be changed or I know I'm not buying the game and I hope a lot more people don't as well.
 
hums

hums

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I think we are misinterpreting it
 
nerdypxel

nerdypxel

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Oct 27, 2017
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User Banned (Permanent): Transphobia; Account in Junior Phase
I don't want to defend Atlus if the situation is like it's told by those tweets, but is it okay to say so many fuck yous on a basis of one picture?
We don't know how if unfolds in-game, and whether or not Atlus comes up with a decent reason to this transition - maybe Erica had some kind of trauma that affected her, and Qatherine just prevents that trauma?
I know it's hard to do it on Internet, but, please, let's just try not to accuse developers of something until we have full proof.
 
lizzardpt

lizzardpt

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Feb 6, 2019
100
Damn the more I read about this, the worse it gets.

I was excited for this game, but fuck this, fuck this game.
 
Ms.Galaxy

Ms.Galaxy

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Oct 25, 2017
1,653
At this point, I just want Atlus to just stop adding LGBT+ characters into their games. Just full on fucking stop. Every time, every single fucking time, it just ends up being completely homophobic and/or transphobic and at this point they're doing this on purpose with malicious intent. The original portrayal of Erica was already bad but they somehow made it worse, you cannot fucking say it was done out of ignorance anymore. They had eight fucking years to learn from their mistakes and instead they double downed on it and made it worse.
 
Kalor

Kalor

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nerdypxel said:
I don't want to defend Atlus if the situation is like it's told by those tweets, but is it okay to say so many fuck yous on a basis of one picture?
We don't know how if unfolds in-game, and whether or not Atlus comes up with a decent reason to this transition - maybe Erica had some kind of trauma that affected her, and Qatherine just prevents that trauma?
I know it's hard to do it on Internet, but, please, let's just try not to accuse developers of something until we have full proof.
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People here have played the game. It's not based on one image.
 
TheMrPliskin

TheMrPliskin

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Oct 26, 2017
3,564
This is infuriating. I love the original game, I love pretty much all the games Hashino has directed but at this point I'm just fucking done with his shit. P5 already put me at the breaking point and this finally broke me.

My interest in this remake was already lower than it should've been due to a lot of the marketing and this just killed any interest I had at all, it's also entirely killed my interest in any new games with Hashino's involvement.

There's no excuses for them to not do better.
 
Kinsei

Kinsei

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Oct 25, 2017
20,519
hums said:
I think we are misinterpreting it
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The most generous interpretation is that they only intended this as a butterfly effect thing that delayed her transition. Never mind the fact that Vincent dating Catherine somehow delays Erica's transition is ridiculous. There was absolutely no good reason to show Erica pre-transition.
nerdypxel said:
I don't want to defend Atlus if the situation is like it's told by those tweets, but is it okay to say so many fuck yous on a basis of one picture?
We don't know how if unfolds in-game, and whether or not Atlus comes up with a decent reason to this transition - maybe Erica had some kind of trauma that affected her, and Qatherine just prevents that trauma?
I know it's hard to do it on Internet, but, please, let's just try not to accuse developers of something until we have full proof.
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That would be even worse.
 
Caz

Caz

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nerdypxel said:
I don't want to defend Atlus if the situation is like it's told by those tweets, but is it okay to say so many fuck yous on a basis of one picture?
We don't know how if unfolds in-game, and whether or not Atlus comes up with a decent reason to this transition - maybe Erica had some kind of trauma that affected her, and Qatherine just prevents that trauma?
I know it's hard to do it on Internet, but, please, let's just try not to accuse developers of something until we have full proof.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
See my above post. ATLUS has repeatedly included transphobic content in its games. There is no reason to believe Catherine: Full Body is being "misinterpreted" or "lacking context" or whatever the preferred excuse is.
 
nerdypxel

nerdypxel

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Oct 27, 2017
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Caz said:
See my above post. ATLUS has repeatedly included transphobic content in its games. There is no reason to believe Catherine: Full Body is being "misinterpreted" or "lacking context" or whatever the preferred excuse is.
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Maybe my 3 years in law school were meaningless, but is it just "not okay" to convict like that?
 
Ragnite

Ragnite

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Oct 27, 2017
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Where is it specifically mentioned that Catherine went back in time to "make everyone's lives better"?
 
Goro Majima

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Thank you for the major spoiler in the title, so I had zero chances to avid it. Well done.
 
Miller

Miller

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Oct 25, 2017
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nerdypxel said:
We don't know how if unfolds in-game, and whether or not Atlus comes up with a decent reason to this transition - maybe Erica had some kind of trauma that affected her, and Qatherine just prevents that trauma?
Click to expand...
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The nicest thing anyone will say to you about this quote is me suggesting you do some research on why this assumption is itself problematic.

Goro Majima said:
Thank you for the major spoiler in the title, so I had zero chances to avid it. Well done.
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???

The title says a thematic element of an ending. It's so nebulous that it could hint at an infinite number of things. It's like saying the climax of Infinity War is violent or sad. It barely says anything at all.
 
EdibleKnife

EdibleKnife

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Oct 29, 2017
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Syrenne said:
Hello, trans woman who works in the industry and also is about a dozen hours into the Japanese version of Full Body here. A few things:

1.)
The tweet isn't misrepresenting that specific ending. It's absolutely fucked. Also not the only transphobic moment in the game. When Vincent sees that Rin has male genitalia for the first time he feels tricked and instinctively hits Rin, causing her to run away. The rest of her route, should you pursue it, is about tracking her down.

2.) From Japanese industry scuttlebutt, this is 100% Hashino and his view of LGBTQ and global issues. Sickening given that he said that Full Body was the "completed" concept of the original Catherine, that they supposedly had to hold back on because society was in a different place 8 years ago. And then they made it worse.

3.) Atlus self-professes to not thinking at all about the global market when making games. I know very directly from current and former Atlus USA employees that they will never listen to Atlus USA when they make suggestions or voice opinions about the contents of the games. That said, it isn't only the Western audience that finds this shit gross. The Japanese market did in fact complain about Erica in the original game, and I've already seen early complaints about Full Body's treatment. To say that there isn't an active and vocal LGBTQ community in Japan is ignorance; they just don't get international media coverage.

4.) I have it on good authority that Atlus USA has been...doing their best with what they've been given. But I still expect this content to be in the Western release. Ugh.
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Yeah I'm done. I was even willing to buy Classic on Steam but I just want nothing to do with the Catherine series, maybe even Atlus for now. Shits an embarrassment. A gross, harmful, completely uneccesssary and avoidable embarrassment.
 
TheMrPliskin

TheMrPliskin

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nerdypxel said:
Maybe my 3 years in law school were meaningless, but is it just "not okay" to convict like that?
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Yes they were, because this isn't a courtroom. Also people have posted numerous examples from this game and previous that are informing their opinion on the matter. Maybe try reading the thread before rushing to post next time.
Goro Majima said:
Thank you for the major spoiler in the title, so I had zero chances to avid it. Well done.
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Zero chances to avoid what?
 

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To clarify, how's that dialogue between Erica and Toby even intended to be a """joke""" or a """punchline"""? I can't wrap my head around it. Is it just "Erica didn't transition in this timeline so she's a guy now so it's ironic and funny that she implies she's a girl who's interested in Toby har har har"? If anything in a vacuum it seems like it's just reaffirming/implying Erica identifies as a woman to me (which certainly doesn't excuse anything about why she's shown without transition in the first place, but was perhaps a very, very, very bad attempt at conveying Erica still loves Toby in this timeline, as a woman).
 
Grandia

Grandia

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So how did the original Catherine make it unscathed considering its transphobia in the first place?
 
EdibleKnife

EdibleKnife

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Massicot said:
Already seeing people saying stuff like "Japan doesn't care about the sjw agenda." Ugh.
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To that I just have to say to such pricks that the creators chose to create the remake and the storyline. They chose to take the fucking wrong stance openly and put themselves up for criticism. No reddit, gamergate, anti-saw,etc fuck has a leg to stand on about how "Japan doesn't care about politics" when this is just a straight slap to the face of an entire group of fans and their allies. An insult to trans people's actual humanity. It seems like people like Hashino care a whole lot about the "SJW agenda" and made it loud and clear.
 
Cokesouls

Cokesouls

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Oct 28, 2017
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I never their transphobia bullshit went as far back as P2...
They're my favorite developer or were. I dunno anymore.
I feel so sad for the trans community :(
 
cw_sasuke

cw_sasuke

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Oct 27, 2017
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Thats not a good look.

Dont know what they were thinking. Especially since this isnt some JP only niche PSP/PSV title but a game releasing on PS4 in the west this year.
 
LossAversion

LossAversion

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Oct 28, 2017
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Can the writers at Atlus grow the fuck up already? Persona 5 was generally okay in regards to this stuff (though definitely not perfect) but this sounds awful. Kanji should have been handled so much better in Persona 4 as well. I was so worried about Sylvando in Dragon Quest XI but the way he was handled puts Atlus to shame. They need to take some lessons from Square.
 
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