As a big Atlus fan this is so very disappointing. They could've handled it very well and mature in this version of the game, but instead they chose the route they seemingly always choose when it comes to gender and sexuality: the easy one.
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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)
- Thread starter HylianSeven
- Start date
This is the first time i've actively been repelled from buying a game on the basis of these kinds of social issues, but this pattern is getting too shitty to ignore. Not giving Atlus my money for this product...i thought that the Persona 5 and Persona 4 gay scenes were poorly handled, but i wanted to say it was just due to ignorance of how LGBT people might feel because of how repressed minority groups are in the eyes of the right wing portion of Japan. Now i feel like the mindset of whoever is writing these scripts actually has something in their mind they want to say about this.
The term "policore" has already invaded the right wing of Japan's vocabulary, i absolutely think its intentional.
The term "policore" has already invaded the right wing of Japan's vocabulary, i absolutely think its intentional.
Atlas USA having no say in this doesn't mean that everyone working at Atlus USA aren't still super complicit in normalizing transphobia and hatred. Their job is literally to adapt a hateful work into English and market it the US. Anyone working there should absolutely be ashamed of themselves.
oy vey.
as a trans person this just comes off as cis developers being clueless. "wouldn't your life be so much easier if you hadn't transitioned?"
no. the fact is that many trans people's lives may not even continue if they didn't transition. the rate of suicide for people of trans experience is astronomical, especially if they remain in the closet.
what are you talking about? persona 5 was TERRIBLE with queer issues. sure, there was one minor drag queen character who is never made fun of, but the running "joke" of the gay dudes trying to harrass/assault your teen boy party members is like the worst of the worst gay stereotypes.
and trans issues have been handled horribly in the past too. the entire goal of naoto's dungeon in p4 is to prevent naoto from having a gender reassignment surgery (granted it's taking place in a demonic tv world, but the implication is still that GRS is a bad thing). then after the dungeon naoto decides she doesn't identify as a boy after all and atlus includes her in all kind of gross fanservice stuff for straight guys.
kanji's sexuality is glossed over and whitewashed as well after his dungeon.
atlus has never been a friend of the queer community.
as a trans person this just comes off as cis developers being clueless. "wouldn't your life be so much easier if you hadn't transitioned?"
no. the fact is that many trans people's lives may not even continue if they didn't transition. the rate of suicide for people of trans experience is astronomical, especially if they remain in the closet.
what are you talking about? persona 5 was TERRIBLE with queer issues. sure, there was one minor drag queen character who is never made fun of, but the running "joke" of the gay dudes trying to harrass/assault your teen boy party members is like the worst of the worst gay stereotypes.
and trans issues have been handled horribly in the past too. the entire goal of naoto's dungeon in p4 is to prevent naoto from having a gender reassignment surgery (granted it's taking place in a demonic tv world, but the implication is still that GRS is a bad thing). then after the dungeon naoto decides she doesn't identify as a boy after all and atlus includes her in all kind of gross fanservice stuff for straight guys.
kanji's sexuality is glossed over and whitewashed as well after his dungeon.
atlus has never been a friend of the queer community.
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A lot has changed on the discussion of trans issues since 2011. It was nowhere near as visible of an issue as it is now.
I mean... this is not a tough nut to crack, no offense. Erica did not transition in this timeline. There is no vague implication that she ever will outside of this dialogue, and even then the only possible inference is that Toby used a feminine pronoun and Erica affirmed it. It's just camp. That's the bit. She still likes him, but instead of being a woman she's now an effeminate gay man. The circumstances are "worse" for Toby now, who importantly was already the butt of a joke for being involved with a trans woman in the first place. It's just a rehash of the earlier joke. He's gay or something. Rimshot.
GTFO with this shit Atlus.
Also, I never knew Erica was trans. Didn't pick up on that and never got that ending, but always found her to be a cool character. So learning all this is dissappointing.
Also, I never knew Erica was trans. Didn't pick up on that and never got that ending, but always found her to be a cool character. So learning all this is dissappointing.
I see Atlus Japan has not learn anything after all these years .
Only way they going learn is if people stop spending money on there games.
Now Atlus USA has to deal with this fallout .
Only way they going learn is if people stop spending money on there games.
Now Atlus USA has to deal with this fallout .
I disagreed with a lot of the interpretations of Ericas handling in OG Catherine. But the easiest thing to fix, the credits, was the biggest offense and I can't believe they didn't change that.
Same. I've loved Catherine and Persona for how unique they were, and surprisingly deep Persona can be, so it feels so wrong that they still conform to tired old anime stereotypes.
Yes but for all of that. Their games always end up reinforcing that conformity.
Atlus US have no say in the matter. AJP a very controlling and dictate how the games is translated and how they're acted.
That very much comes from Wa philosophy. Which is personified with the saying. The nail that sticks up, gets hammered down.
Persona 5 having yet again the same homophobics jokes was already enough to make me lose hope with Studio Zero, but that's a whole new level here. How could they treat Erica in a shittier way than before ? It's impressive.
Yes but thats what I'm saying. I'm not convinced by the "just following orders" defense... I dont think Atlus USA should be let off the hook at all.
Yeah, I'm not going to say I expected it to get worse in this way, but I was really not hopeful for Atlus' handling of this topic after I saw the early trailers for this game. After playing P2IS and realizing that it handled gay content with more sensitivity and respect than any of the games that followed, I kind of started to suspect that the current lead writers just weren't that interested in the perspectives of LGBT+ people. It's a shame, cause I did like the first Catherine and P5, so I wanted to believe that the ignorance was innocent rather than willful, but nope!
You really are underestimating just how controlling AJP are.
And what you have them do ?
I'm not going to defend it, but I would consider that maybe Japan is generally behind the curve as a culture when it comes to progressivism and that, consider how back in 2011 BioWare, a now extremely trans-inclusive developer introduced trans characters as a comedy gag, and that was not some corporate mandate, it was the same writers as those who wrote the more trans-inclusive games.
Things can change and hopefully some staff can inform Hashimoto of just how controversial this is in the west as well as why, because when I see this I doubt it's targeted at anyone as a reprimand, I just think there's wrongful assumptions and cultural bias at display but I don't know japanese culture enough to truly know.
Things can change and hopefully some staff can inform Hashimoto of just how controversial this is in the west as well as why, because when I see this I doubt it's targeted at anyone as a reprimand, I just think there's wrongful assumptions and cultural bias at display but I don't know japanese culture enough to truly know.
Weather intense criticism and not be allowed to handwave it away or pass the buck exclusively up the chain to Japan.
And what do you consider them hand waving be ? As they have zero influence on AJP whatsoever.
This goes far beyond tone deaf. To just being wilfully ignorant.
Granted I haven't played Catherine since its original EU release but if I recall Catherine (the character) did not seem like the kind of person who wanted others to be happy, only to further her selfish goals. Her going back in time to make everyone's lives better seems so out of character for her. Translations being what they are they could easily lose certain nuances. I could very much see an ending where Catherine claims to be going back to improve everyone's lives but in actuality makes it worse, hence Erica not transitioning.
Or I could be wrong and this is another example of Japanese lack of understanding of the LGBT community.
Or I could be wrong and this is another example of Japanese lack of understanding of the LGBT community.
I really can't see this as tone deaf anymore. This isn't some new IP from a tiny studio, this is a remake of a game that had many years of discussion around its trans representation, and the producer explicitly stating that they wanted to acomodate how values in society changed since the first release. Then they do this.
Even Rin's route sounds shady. People have been saying it's actually handled well for what it is, but I can't help but wonder if that's just their answer to people's issues with Erica. "Well, if you want to fuck a feminine guy so much, here's another one for you."
And that's just a few years after Persona 5 got criticized for its portrayal of gay men. They're not just some clueless japanese old men, they know what they're doing. It really just comes down to a difference in values. It's not that they're not aware, or even that they don't care, they just actively dislike LGBT people.
I can't see any other answer, but I do really hope I'm wrong. Persona 4 is one of my favorite games of all time, and Catherine is a gem as well. And as much as I dislike Persona 5, I have to admit the portrayal of gay men didn't really impact my enjoyment that much, but this is just going too far, even for someone who usually doesn't skip games based on these things.
Yea I really dont know what to call this, I just know there's no excusing it. All I can really hope for is that it isnt malicious, but after them being outright confronted on Kanji being gay in an interview (which they denied on the spot) to Persona 5's treatment of gay characters does speak volumes...
Don't forget how the Persona 4 anime made the Protagonist actively take part in those Yosuke jokes every time and even added in a creepy fanservice scene with the girls during Shadow Kanji's introduction since they thought viewers would be afraid of too much gay stuff on the screen, I guess.
But none of this is suprising to me. Atlus has never been particularly interested in developing their characters beyond stereotypes since Persona 3. They dabble in themes that present an illusion of depth, but it never pays off, it's never explored, and of course it's never explicitly pro-LGBT rights. The (modern) Persona games have always been about a power fantasy being the center of a friendship circle that you have all the control in. Complex or progressive characters simply get in the way of the mainstream appeal that safe, uncontroversial ones provide.
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That's because she didn't, she never said she was going back in time to improve everyone's lives. She goes back in time to create a timeline in which her and Vincent could meet earlier, under different circumstances.
Have they issued a statement condeming the views of this new game. They could start there.
I feel it's a representation of how far Japanese society as a whole is on issues of race, gender and sexuality. At this point it just comes across as willful ignorance.
If they are responsible for localizing hateful content and marketing it to consumers, then they don't get to handwave all responsibility away by saying "but they made all the decisions, we're just following orders". They need to share the responsibility for the global spread of an extremely hateful product. They don't get to claim total blamelessness here.
That's already better, but still really shitty to make Erica not transition for whatever reason. It's definitely not as aggressive as it first sounded like if your version is the correct one, but it's still denying her identity, it implies her transition was just a result of "circumstances", and not an expression of her true self, of who she really is and always was.
Persona 3 had a trans woman who the cast pointed out forgot to shave, humiliating her in a public space, Persona 4 famously featured Kanji's crippling fear of his own sexuality, and Persona 5 featured a gay couple who not only stalk the protagonist and Ryuji, but eventually molest Ryuji offscreen, resulting in the protagonist mocking him after the fact.
This isn't ignorance. This is malice. The series has actively made an effort to make queer people the butt of jokes, and when they're not the joke itself, it's them subjecting others to their queerness that is the "joke", such as everyone making fun of Toby for being in a sexual relationship with Erica, all because she's trans.
It's really not surprising at all to me that the one game in the SMT canon that depicts a gay relationship in a respectful manner is the one Hashino wasn't involved in the production or direction of: Persona 2.
For everyone who is talking about willful ignorance : when is the last time P Studio/Studio Zero released a game without an homophobic or transphobic joke ?
What I don't understand is why do they always include some shit like this in their games. It would be so much easier to just avoid the subject altogether and not include any LGBT stuff.
I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if there's a random closeted guy on Atlus Japan adding all this crap.
I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if there's a random closeted guy on Atlus Japan adding all this crap.
I remember all of those examples from Persona very vividly and I agree wholeheartedly. What I mean is that to me, it feels like they're not even attempting to take on the criticism they're receiving and trying to A) Understand the issues and B) Learn from their mistakes. That's why I call it willful ignorance. Of course, it absolutely comes across as malicious too. The two are not mutually exclusive.
See above.
This so much. As a black guy, my stance is that if you can't represent my people properly in your games, movies, tv shows etc then don't bother having us in there in the first place. That counts for all minorities by extension.
Of course not. Why would Atlus Japan let them sabotage their own product? People would be fired if they did that.
I see what you mean.
This kind of stuff hurts especially hard for myself and many of my friends, given I'm queer, as are many of my close friends. We all really enjoy the Persona series, but as these problematic elements continue to reappear in the series, and we grow older (and more conscious of our position in the world), it becomes a lot harder to enjoy these titles.
Atlus can fuck off. It hurts so much to enjoy a series that actively, vocally hates me.
The fact that it's, what, nearly a decade after the original game's release and they did this is just mind boggling
If we're lucky this situation will wrap around itself around and become a good thing. Because clearly at this point Atlus still hasn't gotten the memo yet regarding these issues, and maybe or maybe not this is the straw that breaks the camel's back regarding their writing of LGBT characters because of the poor handling and backlash.
If they don't address this and/or continue to write similar scenarios in their future games...good luck.
If anything you'll know they'd add more scenes featuring the two gay NPCs that you encounter twice in the game and represented in the same manner they were in the original release.
Well AtlusUSA, you have got some cleanup to do. The context overall looks pretty vile, and of course, this isn't Atlus's first foray into the "eccentric and flamboyant characteristics are evil" pool.
Talking about being tonedeaf and oblivious. There is a red thread in Atlus' story making that tries to include certain groups without having to deal with them on a proper basis, hence the depiction(/or attempted humourous take) of gays preying on teenage boys or this treatment of a trans character.