This begs for some clarifications – off-putting to whom exactly, and why is that a concern?
Please, give some examples of how you think incorporating a range of characters with different opinions can get in the way of good writing. What do you even think good writing is?
(incorporating a range of characters can be difficult to write. But “get in the way”? I really have to wonder what it is that you’re picturing here)
I explained things more in my reply to another commenter ans saw yours after. I tried to be more succinct there.
I understand enjoying representation. I am of Celtic stock. I love a proper depiction of Celtic mythology and lore, especially if I get to play as a character with such a background. Celtic mythology is rarely accurately represented in media. But I dont demand it to be included or even expect it unless it is in a setting where its lack of inclusion would be circumspect or narrative-breaking, and I certainly wouldn’t demand it be included in a setting where it doesn’t belong. I dont need to play an Irishman in a story set in a mythical ancient China.
Religion is another example. I can count on one hand where Christianity is positively represented in CoG games and only a single instance outside of WoD where it is included at all. I dont demand or expect its inclusion especially outside of where it is narrative appropriate.
It comes across as rather narcissistic in my opinion to expect or demand inclusivity.
If it can be included in a way that doesnt break immersion or endanger the narrative then I would suggest inclusion to enhance marketability. The other commenters on this thread have stated the same. Though with perhaps different motives. I suggested including romance on a different thread because it increases marketability. I would do the same here. So long as in both cases the narrative is maintained and not compromised.
I do think that inclusivity is a valuable thing to reach for and I think that it’s a good thing that this ideal is reflected in so many COG/HG works. I wouldn’t couch that as ideological coddling.
That said, I vehemently agree with this.
I do believe that choice-based games as a medium can definitely be used as a platform to tell interesting stories that benefit from constraining who the player can be. A positive example: I’m loving the demo for To Feast On Fear, which is a Gothic WiP focused on a gender-locked MC (a woman) who transforms into a werewolf-like entity.
I really feel that if I’d had the option to play a cis man from minute one in this setting, even if the world’s gender norms were inverted by that choice, the impact of the story would have been blunted somewhat. And being honest, I probably would have chosen that option without thinking, without even realizing that it would harm my experience of the game.
In my mind, that is a story and an experience that by existing makes IF as a whole more inclusive. So I do think I’d be intrigued as to whether there were potential stories waiting to be told by professional authors via the COG label that contemplated more fixed protagonists (in all sorts of ways).
Maybe COG just doesn’t receive many pitches to that effect. I can certainly guess that they might do worse commercially. I don’t know.
Though to be fair, I think this is just a general art thing, not a COG thing per se. Other audiences and mediums have their own skews when it comes to which stories their creators want to tell, and which stories their audiences want to consume.
I’ve noticed this argument against inclusivity usually falls back to historical accuracy and realism. I find this an interesting argument because it reads to me as an argument like: I find myself entertained by historical accuracy versus historically-inspired stories.
I find the history of mankind as one of oppression, violence, domination, colonialism, and discrimination. One where the powerful subjugates and destroys histories and stories of the conquered peoples (or combines the conquered peoples’ beliefs as their own).
So, I really like when stories set in historically-inspired settings have inclusive options that never existed, as it entertains me to live in a history that could have played out differently.
For those who argue in favor of historical realism over inclusivity, where are your limits as to how much accuracy is needed in stories?
To sum up those three(?) long ranty posts for those who don’t want to put themselves through unnecessary nonsense:
I don’t like it when stories don’t match my own ideas of the world so that means it is bad. Something something narrative something.
ETA some other much smarter people than me have already written some great things about why complaints about historical inaccuracy miss the point. I’ll just link those below:
I can see this as argument for works which are placed in actual historical settings and where such attitudes are documented, as opposed to vague belief, “i’m strongly convinced this is just how things were in the past” while ignoring all possible evidence to the contrary… but then this makes for a very narrow niche.
See, this is where we’ll have to differ. These are your examples of historical settings?
Ironheart: “Pilot and customize a giant iron war mech in this alternate medieval history! The Papacy, Caliphate, and the Mongols are at war, and they all have mechs.”
Chronicon Apocalyptica: “Battle Norse raiders, ghosts, and changelings to save medieval England! But beware, if the elves can capture the Book you hold, the world will end.”
Silverworld: “Survive the past, save the future! Explore a savage Stone Age world where you’ll face jungles, terrifying beasts, and a cruel pre-human civilization!”
None of these are historical by a long shot, and in fact their hook is that they play fast and loose with history. If you can somehow buy “medieval England with elves or giant mechs” as history-adjacent but “gay people are not persecuted there” breaks your immersion as going too far in the fantasy la la land, i think this is a level of cognitive dissonance that simply can’t be argued with or even taken seriously.
It bears repeating (as I seem to be doing a lot) that the pop-cultural understanding of history is a distorted form which has been warped by both the incompleteness of sources, and the selective erasure and misinterpretation of those sources by others in the interim. The past was a much weirder place than most people give it credit for.
A Roman Emperor held court in full drag (although there’s a strengthening consensus that Elagabalus was actually a trans woman), an 18th century Russian Imperial Regent was in a bisexual polycule, one of the war criminals executed in the aftermath of WW2 was a gender-fluid Manchurian Princess, and one of the British secret agents executed at Dachau was an Indian Muslim.
Our popular conception of medieval history where everything is brown, men were men, women were property, and anyone who wasn’t cishet was burned at the stake or simply didn’t exist, is more of a function of the pop-fantasy descendants of Tolkien’s Legendarium, as transcribed by people who didn’t have a fraction of his background in actual history or the culture of the Early Medieval. Tellingly, the one author who might be described as Tolkien’s academic ‘heir’ definitely does not have this issue - and he also writes his historically-inspired settings as if they were far weirder than conventional pop-culture allows the past to be.
Unless this is something you’ve studied seriously, chances are, your idea of the past - even the relatively recent past - is a distortion of a distortion, and the worldbuilding assumptions of someone like E. Gary Gygax or George R. R. Martin reflect that set of double-distortions.
Normally I’d just pass on commenting when something like this comes up, but…
You already explained how this is possible. It’s a fantasy.
I don’t know exactly which WIP you’re referring to here, but fantasy inherently implies something that is fantastical. If you can suspend your disbelief for magic and dragons, why is it so hard to do the same for the existence of trans people, or people of colour? Is it really such a big stretch to imagine a society, even a patriarchal one, that tolerates diversity a little bit more than it has historically?
Also, historically men held court in skirts, heels and makeup all the time. “Blouses” were worn by all kinds of workmen. Hell, arguably one of the most famous paintings of Louis XIV is him showing off his high heels and stockings.
Straight couples are not the only couples capable of reproduction, and there are other options for those who can’t/don’t want to adopt. Society wouldn’t collapse if “gay, non-binary or transgender” people–people like me, by the way–become more common. That’s both an absurd and hurtful thing to imply.
There’s more I want to say, but there are others typing and this is getting long enough.
Also…
Thanks for the suggestion! Yet another for the ever-growing list.
okay but TO BE FAIR there are some really good bits in Chaucer that substantiate the historical existence of giant mechanical fighting devices.
Well, first of all, don’t call it ‘‘transgenderism’’ since trans people are not an ideology, they’re just people.
Is this that much of a problem? As long as the setting the writer uses isn’t based on a real moment in Earth’s history, who are we to say it’s historical? After all, it’s a setting and not our real world. You may even be right, and an author may be basing their setting too much on social dynamics we had in our history without taking into account how minorities were treated. Still, I don’t think the issue is inclusivity, it’s how those minorities are treated by the narrative.
So why do we assume a fantasy world is going to follow the same patriarchal and heteronormartive beliefs that developed on Earth? Isn’t that reader bias in what we expect to be the norm? Sometimes authors fail to differentiate their world and our world, and we find a pitfall like the one you did, where someone wearing a blouse and skirt is jarring for the setting according to some readers. But isn’t that solvable not by removing the inclusivity, but by making the inclusivity more interactive with the story?
And speaking of being historical. Our world has had people and civilizations that had different practices and beliefs than those you believe are the historical norm. But I believe Cathaprak has put it much better than I ever could.
I find this very silly. Queer people and minorities can be racist and bigots. Being more open about one’s gender identity in stories doesn’t mean that society cannot commit crimes, be bigoted, or have other problems. As said, people are people, with the good and bad things that come with it
I give you, Louis de Bourbon, Prince de Condé, Louis XIV’s cousin, rival, and for a time, one of his greatest Generals, wearing so much makeup that it forms almost a solid mask.
To further elaborate on your point: heels were invented as ways to help cavalrymen keep their feet in the stirrup, skirts were once common unisex wear (the term to “gird your loins” comes the process of binding up that skirt for freedom of movement), and stockings were once so common as menswear that the street mobs of the French Revolution defined themselves as such by refusing to wear them
ngl i wrote that entire post to plug TFOF (though I do believe there’s a place for gender-locked stories within an inclusive portfolio of art)
As someone writing a fem-locked story; thank you for expressing this opinion 
It does sometimes feel like doing what you’re not supposed to do (though I fully understand why people prefer GoC and treat it as standard).
From the start, CoG decided that one of its brand features was that people of any gender should be able to see themselves in the protagonist.
That doesn’t mean they thought gender-constrained IF was bad. They just kept it over on the Hosted label–like Heather Albano’s epic Study in Steampunk, one of the all-time greats, or Cataphrak’s Infinity Saga.
CoG itself isn’t a platform that accepts all stories in the medium; it’s a curated brand, with lots of room for variation, but some things they try hard to keep consistent.
HG is a platform with minimal constraints, and has also had (as far as we can tell) more commercially successful blockbuster games than CoG. If you want to tell a gender-constrained story, HG is there for you. The audience on the whole seems to prefer gender choice, but that’s a feature of the market, not the platform.
Aye, I’m aware! I just think it’s a shame personally. It’s COG’s prerogative as a business, of course, so it’s not exactly something I’m going to jump up and down about. I can certainly see how it would have helped to ensure that the brand’s ethos of inclusivity was baked in from an early stage, via the creation of a broad stable of stories with strong customization.
But I also know that COG attracts professional authors who can raise the profile of both brands in a way that HG doesn’t, commerciality aside, for reasons we’re both aware of that have been litigated over many threads (so I won’t bring them here). So I don’t think that HG ‘solves’ this, and I do wonder if there are authors who might have great IF stories in them but prefer more defined protagonists than COG allows. Stuff that could help raise the profile of the medium past the niche it currently occupies.
Like I said, I do know the context, I just don’t know if I agree it’s a necessary constraint today in the way it might have been when nobody knew what COG was or what it stood for. But again, it’s certainly COG’s prerogative to manage their brands however they so please, just as it’s ours to hold different views. I’m sure they have information that leads them to conclude that this part of the brand is still right for them.
I guess so? I mean, yes, definitely, on the attracting professional authors part. But…I feel like the real star pros of the CoG line aren’t the ones who brought an audience with them, but the ones who built it here. Harris Powell-Smith; Kreg Segall; Jeffrey Dean; William Brown; Kevin Gold; Paul Wang; Jim Dattilo; Zach Sergi, back in the day when Heroes Rise was our biggest seller; Kyle Marquis, game after incredible game.
Max Gladstone will have brought some Craft fans over; Emily Short, some classic IF fans. The Nebula nominee authors are known in sci-fi circles, and their work will have made CoG better known in that community. But I don’t think we’ve actually had a blockbuster come out of that group yet – nothing that I would really say has expanded our niche. What did grow our audience was the WoD IP, but that’s where CoG’s home-grown stable of pros have been most conspicuously successful, rather than big names from the outside. Meanwhile, HG has put out loads of blockbusters, some fun pulp, some written with real narrative and prose craft.
If the company got a pitch from a pro author that had a defined protagonist – which is, indeed, exactly what hapened with Heather Albano and Steampunk back in the day – I don’t think they should be at all embarrassed about pointing the author to HG.
This Q wasn’t targeted at me but I couldn’t help thinking of a specific game that just came out this year that included so many characters from so many different backgrounds (race, gender, sexuality, religion) that it was hard to keep track of any of them and they pretty much all fell flat as a result. tbh I found some of the depictions a little offensive when it came to my own minority groups. You just can’t flesh out so many characters in such a short time, and especially not without more research and effort.
The story itself was chaotic and all over the place and had mixed reviews at best. There were other factors involved in this, but I think the story would have been more coherent with fewer characters and greater focus.
I hate pointing fingers but for the sake of discussion the game I’m thinking of is Posthuman: Guardians vs PSION.
This isn’t always the case of course. The new Hunter the Reckoning game also showcased a wide variety of characters (which felt very natural in a modern Hollywood setting), but the game was much, much longer and the characterization far more compelling so I think it worked quite a bit better.
End of the day though, stories can have any number of different functions. Sometimes it’s nice to read a story about someone like me. Sometimes it’s nice to play someone totally different. I think of how much I enjoyed RDR2 specifically because Arthur Morgan is completely different from me…as with Hamartia’s anecdote, had I been given the chance to play a female character, I would’ve, and I wouldn’t have enjoyed the game as much. But I also enjoy the free reign I’m given in Wayhaven to craft my detective the way I like with minimal to no gameplay punishments. No it doesn’t make sense how much the vampires are into my detective with how incompetent, rude, or unserious she can be. But no I do not care, because it’s fun.
CoG has their own brand that works for them, but as Havenstone pointed out, it’s not the only way to tell stories.
You already had plenty of responses to this but I’m still going to add my thoughts as well
The explanation is compassion. People always had compassion, no matter what your understanding of history tells you compassion was there somewhere. And compassionate people have always been open to people just being themselves. Some people would love for you to think that the first gay and trans people popped up around the time people started dying their hair blue and came up with the term woke. But we’ve always been here and we’ve always had friends. So if a story contains an ounce of compassion it will have room for everyone.
My sentiments exactly. There are even some stories where you have the option and I would prefer it be locked. I forget the title at the moment, but there is a WiP with a Roman Empire setting but the Empire is ruled by women as only women can use magic. Excellent piece of work and I will need to find the author so I can credit them as such. But the story when played from a male perspective in this restrictive society makes it so much more poignant as you must navigate the terrain of such a society. I believe it very much should be played from that perspective to get the full impact of the story, and yet I do not begrudge the author for marketing it to a wider audience. Exclusion in that case would elevate the art but there are always things to consider.
