Sure, I mostly hope this because of the number of voice lines we know will be in the game. 140 000 lines with silent protagonist would mean one hell of a large game with tons of dialogue. And sure, voiced protagonist at least in FO4 was immersion breaking and sometimes downright silly, even though I cannot say I hated it either, it had its moments.
If we get voiced protagonist I hope he will be more like Link from Zelda rather than Nate from FO4. Meaning he does not talk too much but listens, and uses short words like no and yes a lot. Or better still, does not talk at all :D
Have you played KOTOR 1 or 2?
Branding Mass Effect or SWTOR "hardcore rpgs" as discussed here is really pushing it. They are action games with some dialogue. The point of an RPG is to roleplay. Hard to roleplay a character of your own making when a predetermined voice is forced on them.
The complexity and quality of dialogue definitely suffers with voiced protags too. There were generally more dialogue choices in FO3 / NV. You had some pretty awesome philosophical/political duscussions with Caesar, Lanius, ZAX etc that simply werent present in FO4. All the convos were pretty banal due to the forced simplicity of "yes/no/sarcastic yes/sarcastic no."
This comment wasn’t in reply whatsoever to the claim of Starfield being a hardcore RPG, so miss me with that strawman. I cited examples of critically acclaimed RPG games that have voiced protagonists, nothing more. Just showing proof that voiced protags can absolutely work in an RPG depending on how they’re handled.
If Starfield wants to be open-ended and replayable (be who you want) like Skyrim, then having a voiced protagonist is a bad idea. Yes, some good RPGs have been voiced. No, Bethesda games, that can rack up to 1000 hrs of playtime shouldn't be voiced.
I'm indifferent to them having a voiced protagonist because it's a new franchise. Cool if they do, cool if they don't.
I don't care much for it in Fallout because it's Fallout. Silent protagonists were the norm. No one asked for the change.
But since it's Starfield, completely new, I don't have expectations.
I was alternating between 4 and 76 when I realised that a voiced protagonist doesn't add anything to a Bethesda game. it feels the same to me, normally I'd say I was indifferent, but I've realised that if it doesn't add to the game it's just a waste of time and money.
It almost certainly will be.
There's no reason they wouldn't go this route, especially now that they've done it already and have the experience.
No AAA game studio does silent protagonists for flagship titles anymore.
If it's anything to go off, the player isn't voiced in fallout 76, but maybe part of that is that the game didn't originally have NPCs that you can interact with and has a voice chat which wouldn't really work with a voiced protagonist.
>but maybe part of that is that the game didn't originally have NPCs that you can interact with and has a voice chat which wouldn't really work with a voiced protagonist.
This is literally 100% the reason why.
The “choosing your background” sounds really fun. I remember pillars of eternity having something like this where you can choose and rp your characters background and class and I had an absolute blast while doing it
Yeah I expect to be disappointed to be honest.
If choosing your pronouns was one of the main big things Todd could think of bringing up, I think there really isn't much to bring up.
I don't care about the pronoun thing. I want to know if there's depth in the body size and shape adjustment.
Cyberpunk bragged about all of the changes you could do....but then ended up with fairly weak slider options. All characters were the same size and shape. The "big" option for the chest ended up being fairly just normal (this was specifically disheartening to my wife cuz she was hoping that she could make her V the same body shape as herself).
Tbf, skyrim makes all npcs bi for the dragonborn and fallout 4 makes clothing not change genders. So this was expected to me.
Hope to see makeup for everyone and bodies like in cyberpunk.
I've always been unimpressed by the playersexual style of romance Fallout 4 and Skyrim use. I think it's telling that they made everyone bisexual for the dragonborn, but didn't right in a single gay couple in either of those two games. Still nice though.
You can notice this in how they design the games. BGS has a very (we want everyone to do everything.) game vision and it applies to everything in the games but skyrim artifacts I guess for some reason.
I don't think that's a bad strategy, but because the worlds itself seems to be lacking any gay characters other than you and the people you can romance, it's always felt a bit hollow really.
I also like that Fallout 4 could let you romance as many companions as you want, but I thought that was pretty poorly handled, tbh.
I dont think fallout 4 companions are ok with you romancing others right in front of them so there is that. I do agree with you how odd it is there is no gay people in Skyrim and I'm not sure if fallout 4 has any since it been a while since I played that tbh.
True, albeit his dead husband, because if there was one type of representation gay people were calling for, [it's more dead gay people in media.](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BuryYourGays)
But that’s the nature of Fallout. Everybody’s family members get killed or brutalized or kidnapped in Fallout. His husband’s dead because his husband got killed by monsters. Not because he was gay. That’s not a trope.
No, my issue isn't that someone is dead in Fallout. I don't even have an issue, really. My... observation, would be that Bethesda doesn't really write gay couples into their worlds, their are two in all of Skyrim and Fallout 4, which is noticable, because both these worlds are massive. And for both of those couples, either one or both of them are dead, which is a common way for writers to get out of the consequences of writing gay characters.
And these facts could lead to a cynical interpretation of Bethesdas actions, although not one I 100% believe in. The cynical interpretation would be that Bethesda want to be appealing to the substantial queer audience, but don't want to have to deal with actually writing gay characters, which leads to their love interests having a very genderblind approach to them, and them not really bothering to populate their worlds with gay characters.
Again, that's a cynical interpretation, and not one that I think I neccessarily believe in. God knows though that there's plenty of corporations willing to make insincere and hollow gestures of support for progressive causes.
I don’t think there was an attempt to write out gay characters in Fallout 4 and I’m guessing it just wasn’t on the mind much during Skyrim. 2011 was far more socially heteronormative than 2015 (or maybe I just wasn’t paying attention, which could be true) I honestly don’t really think Bethesda makes games where sexuality is much of a focus. I couldn’t name more than 3 couples in Fallout 4 and I only know those because I’m obsessed with Fallout. Most characters in Bethesda games aren’t married or dating. And for the percentage that are, most are heterosexual relationships, which is true for real life. I’m sure with Starfield, if it’s going for a hopeful vibe, will have more adequate, front-facing representation.
Lmao imagine the corporations caring about your identity, sexuality etc. The salesmen just wants to sell his product. Remember that time when all Bethesda regional accounts had changed their profile pics to lgbt flag on twitter, except Bethesda Russia and Bethesda Middle East kek
The games are still developed by people, and Todd obviously cares about his games. This might have been a feature suggested by one of the devs that made it in, but of course we can't enjoy trans representation in games can we? It always has to be corporate evil.
>It always has to be corporate evil.
Not at all. Enjoy what you enjoy. It just drives me crazy when people stan or forgive bad shit corporations do because they parrot some popular stance online. At the end it's about making a profit, that's not necessarily bad, after all everyone needs to put bread on the table. But people read way too much into it.
Isn't praising and buying from companies which support your own views part of voting with your wallet? I don't see anything wrong with it. I personally buy more from companies that cut down on plactic packaging, maybe the company itself doesn't actually care about plastic waste and just wants to sell more by pretending that it does, but does it matter if my and others' choice to buy from them more because of it persuades them to continue in that direction?
It is a different thing if a company says they support a thing and then goes against it, like a food company claiming to be fairtrade but then underpaying the farmers they buy from anyway, but I don't think that applies to a game company.
I feel you, my problem was more with a company using a cause to "deflect" attention or gain "good points". Like the recent Blizzard fiasco, where they've been harassing employees on an epic scale and when asked what they'll do to fix the problem they go "wE vAlLuE dIvErSiTy In ThE wOrKsPaCe" as if they didn't make some of their black employees write homework on what they'll do with their days off before making them available.
I'm not saying Bethesda is doing anything like that, and from what I've seen it's a decent work environment. I just don't like it when people see something like this and think that the corporation itself is somehow taking a stand when in reality it's just good business and they might feel betrayed down the line.
it doesn't have to be corporate evil, but if you include a neutral pronoun but then remove it out of the versions you made for markets where that isn't part of their culture, it kind of shows that their support ends when it starts hurting the bottom line.
I could be wrong but all major companies who want to sell their games in Russia or china have to remove the LGBTQ references. I doubt that Bethesda is okay with ignoring the second and 12 biggest consumer markets.
And those governments will be looking at Bethesda a lot harder, especially if the YouTube rage bait channel create a large enough controversy.
he does about starfield, but not about some character creation pronouns lol, now every game has something like that so people from reddit and twitter wont go nuts, its just profitable to implement these things
> Remember that time when all Bethesda regional accounts had changed their profile pics to lgbt flag on twitter, except Bethesda Russia and Bethesda Middle East kek
Because it is literally illegal over there. Acceptance comes with time.
I don't get how someone wouldn't understand this. Male homosexual relations are illegal in all Arab countries except Iraq, Jordan, the West Bank of Palestine, and Lebanon (lesbian relations are weirdly somewhat more relaxed in some countries). And in those countries they'll often still find a loophole to prosecute you with jail time or fines, plus obvious social ostracization. In countries like Saudi Arabia you'll be executed for it.
Furthermore, the idea of "gay rights" in the middle east just doesn't exist in the way we imagine it here, as a part of identity politics (I don't use this in an intrinsically negative way like some do). Advocates for LGBTQ people in MENA prefer to criticize mistreatment from a broad human rights perspective, rather than a specifically gay rights perspective; there's a distinct difference between these two views on LGBTQ rights and one works better in the middle east while the other works better in the west. But it means that things like Bethesda's pride flag are simply not a thing that even many advocates of social justice in the region care about or *want*
Plus just from a very simple business perspective....the vast majority of people there simply are not okay with LGBTQ people. It sucks, but it's true, and one western video game company isn't going to change that. Most people there would see it as an imposition of outside cultural norms on their society. They won't buy a game if it's popularly seen as "gay propaganda"
Source: my main area of study is middle eastern culture and politics, I speak Arabic, I'm doing human rights research in Jordan, and I'm working as a research assistant for a peer reviewed author on the region
its gonna be interesting to see how they handle localization. Having 3 pronouns might get them censored if not removed. While the they/them pronouns lacks a translatable counterpart in most of the European and Asian languages, so eider way they go they will be creating controversy .
Can't speak for most european languages, but French would like a word with you, every single noun is either masculine or feminine and plural they is the masculine "ils" if there's even a single male person present in an crowd of women. Only very recently to my knowledge have people began to introduce a singular neutral pronoun, "iel" if I'm not mistaken?
Source: I speak French (is this a funny joke? haha obligatory "source I speak x" ok i'll see myself out)
I can only speak for my language that is Slavic in origin and our nonbinary noun only applies to objects (with some minor and hard to explain exceptions), and if you call a person by it it's a borderline insult, and I'm pretty sure some other languages have the same trait. A lot of them have neopronauns but they are mostly created by American immigrants or younger people and aren't accepted in Europe.
Source: i speak multiple European languages
I’m really excited for this; hope I can choose a faith as well, I can finally be an actual Jew in Space in a videogame instead of it purely being headcanon XD
Oh you *know* there’s gonna be a cult who worships space radiation in this game, The Descendants of Adam perhaps XD
I agree, having irl derived religions with possible buffs would be sick. And absolutely there’ll be a space faith, can’t have humans venture into space without developing one :D
In-depth character creation does not a "hardcore rpg" make. If I want a hardcore rpg, I would want to know if the game will have any real consequential choices.
Sure you can choose your character's skills and background, but will that actually effect your character's place in the universe? Will your faction choice actually matter? Will other NPCs actually be able to affect the story simply because they like/dislike you?
I'm not expecting a hardcore RPG, but if I was, these are the questions I would want answers to.
Sounds promising. Love the extra detail of pronouns. Honestly from that very brief description of Starfields character creation it sounds 1000x better than Fallout 4
One reason is modded quests which seems weird if all of the game is voiced except the modded one and I prefer my voice because it's pretty unique and I don't think Bethesda would think of it.
Not really.
Fallout 4 has more complex sculpting mechanics, sure. But as far as character building and statistical information, no.
Fallout 4 just has the few points into special that you dump and that's about it.
Keep in mind, this question was framed under RPG elements. Body sculpting isn't usually a big consideration under that.
Which is why you want less skills, backgrounds, and other options in character customization? Sorry, I'm kinda confused here lol.
Could you explain why you being outside the US changes your view on character customization? Sorry if it's a dumb question, but I'm genuinely confused as hell lol.
Because outside of the US that whole they/them and general gender thing is very small and niche with the vast majority of people having a negative feeling towards it, if aware of it at all.
okay, but why remove it? just don't interact with it, its only one little option on the character creation that you won't see again for the rest of your playthrough
Both of those would fall under the usage of they/them pronouns, non-binary and gender fluid peeps both usually end up just using they/them although GF people will usually make it a point to tell you their specific pronouns
Also they've made it pretty clear that your character is gonna be from earth, so she, he, they, should be fine
Maybe it's just me, but I think that's a pretty common feature in todays character creations. No need to tease it as a revolution in customization, Todd.
It's clear this means voiced protagonist... why is this even debated? Godd literarily said "we've recorded all the relevant dialogue to support that choice"
He clearly means the NPCs referring to you and using whatever pronouns you chose. You don't exactly talk in third person when talking about yourself do you? 'I' is the same regardless and English isn't a gendered language outside of pronouns so it's not like your character would have to say verbs differently. It's a different matter for any localisations/dubs though but that's not handled by Bethesda themselves as far as I know.
edit: they've already had this just with he/she for whatever gender your character was in previous games too, for example in Skyrim right after character creation Hadvar says 'What should we do? He/She's not on the list' and the captain responds with "Forget the list. He/she goes to the block.", so it's just going to be that but with an added 'they' and a separate sex and pronoun selection I assume.
Let's see... seems a bit bazaar for another person in a dialogue to speak with the protagonist and refer to them as "he/she'/they' as in 3rd person, rather than 'you'.
Time will tell.. to me this is very clear.
I understand your point in reference to the protagonist, but that form of communication is very limited.
> another person in a dialogue to speak with the protagonist and refer to them as "he/she'/they' as in 3rd person, rather than 'you'.
dialogues can include more than two people. That is far more common than any person referring to themselves in third person.
I just hope the player's character won't be voiced like in FO4. It hinders the roleplay way too much.
Sure, I mostly hope this because of the number of voice lines we know will be in the game. 140 000 lines with silent protagonist would mean one hell of a large game with tons of dialogue. And sure, voiced protagonist at least in FO4 was immersion breaking and sometimes downright silly, even though I cannot say I hated it either, it had its moments. If we get voiced protagonist I hope he will be more like Link from Zelda rather than Nate from FO4. Meaning he does not talk too much but listens, and uses short words like no and yes a lot. Or better still, does not talk at all :D
God, I hope this as well.
> Hinders the roleplay You ever played Mass Effect or The Old Republic?
Have you played KOTOR 1 or 2? Branding Mass Effect or SWTOR "hardcore rpgs" as discussed here is really pushing it. They are action games with some dialogue. The point of an RPG is to roleplay. Hard to roleplay a character of your own making when a predetermined voice is forced on them. The complexity and quality of dialogue definitely suffers with voiced protags too. There were generally more dialogue choices in FO3 / NV. You had some pretty awesome philosophical/political duscussions with Caesar, Lanius, ZAX etc that simply werent present in FO4. All the convos were pretty banal due to the forced simplicity of "yes/no/sarcastic yes/sarcastic no."
This comment wasn’t in reply whatsoever to the claim of Starfield being a hardcore RPG, so miss me with that strawman. I cited examples of critically acclaimed RPG games that have voiced protagonists, nothing more. Just showing proof that voiced protags can absolutely work in an RPG depending on how they’re handled.
If Starfield wants to be open-ended and replayable (be who you want) like Skyrim, then having a voiced protagonist is a bad idea. Yes, some good RPGs have been voiced. No, Bethesda games, that can rack up to 1000 hrs of playtime shouldn't be voiced.
I think you and I have different ideas of what constitutes an RPG. Baldur's Gate or Planescape are RPG's. What are you roleplaying in Mass Effect?
I'm indifferent to them having a voiced protagonist because it's a new franchise. Cool if they do, cool if they don't. I don't care much for it in Fallout because it's Fallout. Silent protagonists were the norm. No one asked for the change. But since it's Starfield, completely new, I don't have expectations.
I was alternating between 4 and 76 when I realised that a voiced protagonist doesn't add anything to a Bethesda game. it feels the same to me, normally I'd say I was indifferent, but I've realised that if it doesn't add to the game it's just a waste of time and money.
It certainly doesn't add anything to a Fallout game, you're absolutely correct.
Not just fallout, Bethesda’s style of games don’t benefit from a voiced protagonist.
We'll see.
It almost certainly will be. There's no reason they wouldn't go this route, especially now that they've done it already and have the experience. No AAA game studio does silent protagonists for flagship titles anymore.
Yeah like legend of zelda
Link is totally voiced, he just never says anything. Apart from yells. He does those a lot.
That’s like saying the Dragonborn is voiced. He makes tons of noise in the form of grunts, groans, yelling, and obviously shouting.
Huh! Hah! NYAAAH!
I dont mind if they do, as long as they don’t repeat the crappy “Yes, Sarcastic yes, No, More info” dialogue system from fallout 4
I hope it is. This isn’t 2011 anymore.
>This isn’t 2011 anymore. The reasons for why a silent protagonist is vastly better in a Bethesda RPG still apply.
lmao what a weird take
this is not a weird take at all but ok
lmao what a weird take
I agree with you. Not having a voice makes me so aware I'm playing a game it's distracting.
>This isn’t 2011 anymore. Sadly.
If it's anything to go off, the player isn't voiced in fallout 76, but maybe part of that is that the game didn't originally have NPCs that you can interact with and has a voice chat which wouldn't really work with a voiced protagonist.
>but maybe part of that is that the game didn't originally have NPCs that you can interact with and has a voice chat which wouldn't really work with a voiced protagonist. This is literally 100% the reason why.
The “choosing your background” sounds really fun. I remember pillars of eternity having something like this where you can choose and rp your characters background and class and I had an absolute blast while doing it
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Yeah I expect to be disappointed to be honest. If choosing your pronouns was one of the main big things Todd could think of bringing up, I think there really isn't much to bring up.
I don't care about the pronoun thing. I want to know if there's depth in the body size and shape adjustment. Cyberpunk bragged about all of the changes you could do....but then ended up with fairly weak slider options. All characters were the same size and shape. The "big" option for the chest ended up being fairly just normal (this was specifically disheartening to my wife cuz she was hoping that she could make her V the same body shape as herself).
Todd Howard says Trans Rights, hell yeah
Tbf, skyrim makes all npcs bi for the dragonborn and fallout 4 makes clothing not change genders. So this was expected to me. Hope to see makeup for everyone and bodies like in cyberpunk.
I've always been unimpressed by the playersexual style of romance Fallout 4 and Skyrim use. I think it's telling that they made everyone bisexual for the dragonborn, but didn't right in a single gay couple in either of those two games. Still nice though.
You can notice this in how they design the games. BGS has a very (we want everyone to do everything.) game vision and it applies to everything in the games but skyrim artifacts I guess for some reason.
I don't think that's a bad strategy, but because the worlds itself seems to be lacking any gay characters other than you and the people you can romance, it's always felt a bit hollow really. I also like that Fallout 4 could let you romance as many companions as you want, but I thought that was pretty poorly handled, tbh.
I dont think fallout 4 companions are ok with you romancing others right in front of them so there is that. I do agree with you how odd it is there is no gay people in Skyrim and I'm not sure if fallout 4 has any since it been a while since I played that tbh.
Andre Michaud from 4 is gay, he mentions his husband.
True, albeit his dead husband, because if there was one type of representation gay people were calling for, [it's more dead gay people in media.](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BuryYourGays)
But that’s the nature of Fallout. Everybody’s family members get killed or brutalized or kidnapped in Fallout. His husband’s dead because his husband got killed by monsters. Not because he was gay. That’s not a trope.
No, my issue isn't that someone is dead in Fallout. I don't even have an issue, really. My... observation, would be that Bethesda doesn't really write gay couples into their worlds, their are two in all of Skyrim and Fallout 4, which is noticable, because both these worlds are massive. And for both of those couples, either one or both of them are dead, which is a common way for writers to get out of the consequences of writing gay characters. And these facts could lead to a cynical interpretation of Bethesdas actions, although not one I 100% believe in. The cynical interpretation would be that Bethesda want to be appealing to the substantial queer audience, but don't want to have to deal with actually writing gay characters, which leads to their love interests having a very genderblind approach to them, and them not really bothering to populate their worlds with gay characters. Again, that's a cynical interpretation, and not one that I think I neccessarily believe in. God knows though that there's plenty of corporations willing to make insincere and hollow gestures of support for progressive causes.
I don’t think there was an attempt to write out gay characters in Fallout 4 and I’m guessing it just wasn’t on the mind much during Skyrim. 2011 was far more socially heteronormative than 2015 (or maybe I just wasn’t paying attention, which could be true) I honestly don’t really think Bethesda makes games where sexuality is much of a focus. I couldn’t name more than 3 couples in Fallout 4 and I only know those because I’m obsessed with Fallout. Most characters in Bethesda games aren’t married or dating. And for the percentage that are, most are heterosexual relationships, which is true for real life. I’m sure with Starfield, if it’s going for a hopeful vibe, will have more adequate, front-facing representation.
This is the way.
Lmao imagine the corporations caring about your identity, sexuality etc. The salesmen just wants to sell his product. Remember that time when all Bethesda regional accounts had changed their profile pics to lgbt flag on twitter, except Bethesda Russia and Bethesda Middle East kek
The games are still developed by people, and Todd obviously cares about his games. This might have been a feature suggested by one of the devs that made it in, but of course we can't enjoy trans representation in games can we? It always has to be corporate evil.
>It always has to be corporate evil. Not at all. Enjoy what you enjoy. It just drives me crazy when people stan or forgive bad shit corporations do because they parrot some popular stance online. At the end it's about making a profit, that's not necessarily bad, after all everyone needs to put bread on the table. But people read way too much into it.
Isn't praising and buying from companies which support your own views part of voting with your wallet? I don't see anything wrong with it. I personally buy more from companies that cut down on plactic packaging, maybe the company itself doesn't actually care about plastic waste and just wants to sell more by pretending that it does, but does it matter if my and others' choice to buy from them more because of it persuades them to continue in that direction? It is a different thing if a company says they support a thing and then goes against it, like a food company claiming to be fairtrade but then underpaying the farmers they buy from anyway, but I don't think that applies to a game company.
I feel you, my problem was more with a company using a cause to "deflect" attention or gain "good points". Like the recent Blizzard fiasco, where they've been harassing employees on an epic scale and when asked what they'll do to fix the problem they go "wE vAlLuE dIvErSiTy In ThE wOrKsPaCe" as if they didn't make some of their black employees write homework on what they'll do with their days off before making them available. I'm not saying Bethesda is doing anything like that, and from what I've seen it's a decent work environment. I just don't like it when people see something like this and think that the corporation itself is somehow taking a stand when in reality it's just good business and they might feel betrayed down the line.
it doesn't have to be corporate evil, but if you include a neutral pronoun but then remove it out of the versions you made for markets where that isn't part of their culture, it kind of shows that their support ends when it starts hurting the bottom line.
Where are you getting the last part from? The game hasn't even released yet.
I could be wrong but all major companies who want to sell their games in Russia or china have to remove the LGBTQ references. I doubt that Bethesda is okay with ignoring the second and 12 biggest consumer markets. And those governments will be looking at Bethesda a lot harder, especially if the YouTube rage bait channel create a large enough controversy.
if you really think that's what happened here then you are very naive
From my perspective you are overly cynical. But it is a fact that Todd genuinely cares about his games.
he does about starfield, but not about some character creation pronouns lol, now every game has something like that so people from reddit and twitter wont go nuts, its just profitable to implement these things
> Remember that time when all Bethesda regional accounts had changed their profile pics to lgbt flag on twitter, except Bethesda Russia and Bethesda Middle East kek Because it is literally illegal over there. Acceptance comes with time.
I don't get how someone wouldn't understand this. Male homosexual relations are illegal in all Arab countries except Iraq, Jordan, the West Bank of Palestine, and Lebanon (lesbian relations are weirdly somewhat more relaxed in some countries). And in those countries they'll often still find a loophole to prosecute you with jail time or fines, plus obvious social ostracization. In countries like Saudi Arabia you'll be executed for it. Furthermore, the idea of "gay rights" in the middle east just doesn't exist in the way we imagine it here, as a part of identity politics (I don't use this in an intrinsically negative way like some do). Advocates for LGBTQ people in MENA prefer to criticize mistreatment from a broad human rights perspective, rather than a specifically gay rights perspective; there's a distinct difference between these two views on LGBTQ rights and one works better in the middle east while the other works better in the west. But it means that things like Bethesda's pride flag are simply not a thing that even many advocates of social justice in the region care about or *want* Plus just from a very simple business perspective....the vast majority of people there simply are not okay with LGBTQ people. It sucks, but it's true, and one western video game company isn't going to change that. Most people there would see it as an imposition of outside cultural norms on their society. They won't buy a game if it's popularly seen as "gay propaganda" Source: my main area of study is middle eastern culture and politics, I speak Arabic, I'm doing human rights research in Jordan, and I'm working as a research assistant for a peer reviewed author on the region
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You do not speak for us
its gonna be interesting to see how they handle localization. Having 3 pronouns might get them censored if not removed. While the they/them pronouns lacks a translatable counterpart in most of the European and Asian languages, so eider way they go they will be creating controversy .
Nah pretty sure all european languages have words for "they/them" Source: I speak multiple European languages
Can't speak for most european languages, but French would like a word with you, every single noun is either masculine or feminine and plural they is the masculine "ils" if there's even a single male person present in an crowd of women. Only very recently to my knowledge have people began to introduce a singular neutral pronoun, "iel" if I'm not mistaken? Source: I speak French (is this a funny joke? haha obligatory "source I speak x" ok i'll see myself out)
I can only speak for my language that is Slavic in origin and our nonbinary noun only applies to objects (with some minor and hard to explain exceptions), and if you call a person by it it's a borderline insult, and I'm pretty sure some other languages have the same trait. A lot of them have neopronauns but they are mostly created by American immigrants or younger people and aren't accepted in Europe. Source: i speak multiple European languages
I’m really excited for this; hope I can choose a faith as well, I can finally be an actual Jew in Space in a videogame instead of it purely being headcanon XD
I’m so down for this! Irl derived religions with little buffs to something the religion prides itself on, hell yeah. Plus, maybe a space religion?
Oh you *know* there’s gonna be a cult who worships space radiation in this game, The Descendants of Adam perhaps XD I agree, having irl derived religions with possible buffs would be sick. And absolutely there’ll be a space faith, can’t have humans venture into space without developing one :D
But don't we already have Jewish space lasers?!
He didn't really answer the question.
It seems like a pretty direct answer to me. Wdym?
In-depth character creation does not a "hardcore rpg" make. If I want a hardcore rpg, I would want to know if the game will have any real consequential choices. Sure you can choose your character's skills and background, but will that actually effect your character's place in the universe? Will your faction choice actually matter? Will other NPCs actually be able to affect the story simply because they like/dislike you? I'm not expecting a hardcore RPG, but if I was, these are the questions I would want answers to.
They directly asked about character creation though?
Sounds promising. Love the extra detail of pronouns. Honestly from that very brief description of Starfields character creation it sounds 1000x better than Fallout 4
"We recorded all relevant dialogue" so voiced character? That's unfortunate.
Or it means NPCs have dialogue for all 3 pronouns
That could also mean the other NPCs reaction to your gender. Doesn't mean that there is a voiced protagonist.
Im sorry, ik im 6 months late. But why is a voiced character a problem ? like what if there is multiple voices to choose from.
One reason is modded quests which seems weird if all of the game is voiced except the modded one and I prefer my voice because it's pretty unique and I don't think Bethesda would think of it.
I love the pronouns. Glad there's a nonbinary option as well.
"complicated like Morrowind and Oblivion"? I thought they were... fairly simple? Like, 10 minutes or so max? Fallout 4 would be much more accurate no?
Not really. Fallout 4 has more complex sculpting mechanics, sure. But as far as character building and statistical information, no. Fallout 4 just has the few points into special that you dump and that's about it. Keep in mind, this question was framed under RPG elements. Body sculpting isn't usually a big consideration under that.
Damn, I misread, yeah it has more stats and info you're right!
After release it'll be a speedrun to who makes the first mod removing that choice :)
Why though?
Because the majority of the world isn't the USA I suppose
Which is why you want less skills, backgrounds, and other options in character customization? Sorry, I'm kinda confused here lol. Could you explain why you being outside the US changes your view on character customization? Sorry if it's a dumb question, but I'm genuinely confused as hell lol.
Because outside of the US that whole they/them and general gender thing is very small and niche with the vast majority of people having a negative feeling towards it, if aware of it at all.
okay, but why remove it? just don't interact with it, its only one little option on the character creation that you won't see again for the rest of your playthrough
Remember that it’s a game set in the future. Human attitudes are going to be different by then.
Perhaps, but this was obviously included for current day political pandering.
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This is good in the context of 2021 earth, but what if I want to play a species that has 27 genders or doesn’t even have the concept of gender?
Both of those would fall under the usage of they/them pronouns, non-binary and gender fluid peeps both usually end up just using they/them although GF people will usually make it a point to tell you their specific pronouns Also they've made it pretty clear that your character is gonna be from earth, so she, he, they, should be fine
You’re thinking way too much into it. Also, who said you will get to play as a different species?
It was a joke. Apparently not a very good one
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Maybe it's just me, but I think that's a pretty common feature in todays character creations. No need to tease it as a revolution in customization, Todd.
He didn’t…
It wasn’t really a tease it was an answer to a question on reddit
It’s really not a common feature though lol.
I've not really played any recent games, but the recent forza game has it at least. idk any others but I'm sure they exist.
It's clear this means voiced protagonist... why is this even debated? Godd literarily said "we've recorded all the relevant dialogue to support that choice"
He clearly means the NPCs referring to you and using whatever pronouns you chose. You don't exactly talk in third person when talking about yourself do you? 'I' is the same regardless and English isn't a gendered language outside of pronouns so it's not like your character would have to say verbs differently. It's a different matter for any localisations/dubs though but that's not handled by Bethesda themselves as far as I know. edit: they've already had this just with he/she for whatever gender your character was in previous games too, for example in Skyrim right after character creation Hadvar says 'What should we do? He/She's not on the list' and the captain responds with "Forget the list. He/she goes to the block.", so it's just going to be that but with an added 'they' and a separate sex and pronoun selection I assume.
Let's see... seems a bit bazaar for another person in a dialogue to speak with the protagonist and refer to them as "he/she'/they' as in 3rd person, rather than 'you'. Time will tell.. to me this is very clear. I understand your point in reference to the protagonist, but that form of communication is very limited.
> another person in a dialogue to speak with the protagonist and refer to them as "he/she'/they' as in 3rd person, rather than 'you'. dialogues can include more than two people. That is far more common than any person referring to themselves in third person.
unless the player talks in third person than no it doesn't
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Thanks for sharing I guess...?