Saturday, June 26, 2010

And the (final) survey says ...

A little over a month ago (or was it longer than that?) I posed the following question in a poll that was posted along the right side of the site: How do you feel about games with gay characters and storylines?

The most popular response was "I wish there were *a lot* more of them," which earned seven votes (out of 18).

"I'd love it if they were more common, but I won't die if they continue to be a rarity" came in second, with five votes, followed by "Eh, I'm fine with the status quo" (four votes).

Somewhat surprisingly, "Ugh, keep gay characters and storylines out of my games!" garnered two votes.

If you're up for it, I'd love to hear what prompted some of you to choose a particular response. Why are you hankering for more games with gay characters/storylines--or, alternately, why are you hoping such characters/storylines stay far away from the games you purchase and play?

3 comments:

Viewtiful_Justin said...

You know, I wouldn't be against gay characters in video games, but I'm not dying to see them. Maybe that's because any minority in a video game tends to be stereotyped pretty heavily at first. So...there's that messiness.

But the option to play as gay or straight in games like The Sims and the like is very refreshing.

Bryan Ochalla said...

Thanks for chiming in, Justin!

I can see what you're saying -- I don't want a bunch of games with stereotyped LGBT characters either. I would, though, welcome quite a few more non-stereotyped LGBT characters in games.

Honestly, I think the best examples -- at least for the next few years -- are going to come from indie devs who are themselves gay.

I just don't think someone who isn't gay -- and who is working for a big, mainstream developer -- is going to find much success at it at this point.

Viewtiful_Justin said...

True story.