You want an explanation for her sudden change in personality? Chaotic Neutral.
hmmm... I don't really like the "Chaotic Neutral means anything" line of thinking.
If I was to explain it, I would just say that she is clearly a very good manipulator (judging from high charisma, high intelligence, and the story about her and the pirate ship) and that the sultry persona wasn't the only way to be the femme fatale of the Baldur's Gate saga. Maybe the testier and more sarcastic character you see in Siege of Dragonspear is her real personality.
Mmmm well my world view and Absolute Good do exist in a vacuum outside of time that can not be changed and are always True and Perfect. This however is unacceptable to the now pervasive and I guess main stream relativism of North America. So it is silly for me to expect any milky soft serve for the older fatter stolid solid rooted crowd who was mildly offended discovering there was dirty a mouthed gnome who used a masturbation slang insult in 1998.
I like the game overall - and in cases where I find npcs growing offensive in a fantasy setting I can always thwack them to chunks as Dorn got treated properly outside the Paladin Temple. I was able to treat those evil leftest gold redistributers the same too - but in this expansion there are less characters to choose from so they need to add a more pleasing male ego side kick.
I am recommending an Alex Jones Bezerker with a dramatic impasse like the either/or character pairing ones already in the game where you have to choose between the Tempus Priest Person character of 'Law and Good' and the Mad Man of unfettered freedom and raging "Chaos Neutral or Chaotic Evil?" "Alex Jones" Bezerker Illuminati hunter. Alex would accuse the Tempust Priest of being a false priest and Illuminati and the Tempest priest would accuse Alex of being a mad raging lunatic who just wanted gold and dried iron rations horded away when he had to hide and eat in his dungeon because the flaming fist was after him for attacking the Ducal Palace. Alex Jones could voice the character as I know he is addicted to liquor, Japanese computer games and comics, and of course playing a Bezerker in Baldurs Gate. I bet if you contacted him he would offer to do the voice acting for free. You could make him romanceable only by female elves and gnomes. I think pretty much every 40+ year old white guy like me who grew up in a conservative family has a fantasy of being Alex Jones and getting all the strong female romances he must have had. This could really counter balance all the other persons who would romance the Tempus Person Priest.
Oh like I said you need to get that boy - now girl person in London named Paris- they most famous and well spoken person of that sort in popular culture now.
If you wont put in Alex Jones I would say choose some girly girl to do a cleric of cyric who is crazy but lovable - I think you should get that girl from Kill bill - Ko-Ko the one with the bowling ball - no fat white 35+ fat nerd guy could ever hold a grudge against her no matter what she said or did in the game. Just let her do the voice mostly in Japanese and put the translations in English.
Insofar as my thoughts go regarding what could be potentially changed in a modern interpretation of the Baldur's Gate setting...well, I'll leave that to if and when it ever becomes relevant.
Oh I do hope that's our first potential tease of the project that IS something you're attached to.
I would like to remind everyone that it's better to refrain from both trolling and calling others trolls, because these two things violate the site rules evenly.
You want an explanation for her sudden change in personality? Chaotic Neutral.
Why? Why is that an explanation? I've never seen the CN alignment described as randomly changing personality from month to month or having a multiple personality disorder. I know it's pretty standard for bad writers to use CN as a basis for "insane" or "quirky" characters or for uncreative players to use it as an excuse for doing whatever they like "LOL, chaotic neutral remember :-D", but nowhere does CN require such things.
Now as far as I've played with the "new" Safana, her personality hasn't strayed much from what I expect of the character. I don't think there's any damage done, but time will tell. But if it does indeed start to stray a lot from what's established in the original content then I expect a better reason than "LOL, Chaotic Neutral!"
Why all the complaints about butchering? You ever try to eat a cow that hasn't been butchered? Not fun.
There is precedent for stuff happening between episodes in the BG saga. In BG2, Imoen suddenly has Mage levels! Butchered! Now Beamdog is explaining how that happened.
Maybe someday we'll get the Siege of Safana episode where she and Coran go sideways. Relationships can be traumatic. I can see it affecting her in unforeseen ways.
Of course there was sexist content in BG1 -- I always kicked out Jaheria asap because I hated the whole Honeymooners type humor.
Jaheria was a nag and Khalid was a henpecked husband. It's a sexist trope. BG2 Jaheria was better but I found the romance 'timing' creepy. And I never used Safana. By the time you found I found her I already had Imoen's points distributed the way I wanted.
You can be critical of something and still a fan. And I think that was Amber Scott was saying -- she wanted to improve the game and she did.
Jaheira was not a nag. She was strong-willed and assertive. Hardly sexist tropes. Heck I found her one of the strongest female characters in BG. And I find it sad that her personality has been deemed "problematic"
1. Create a perfectly fine expansion pack that has better environments and better writing than BG1 or BG2. 2. Have one character make a joke, and another character admit to being transgender. 3. Get hate mail. 4. Cave. 5. Vow to remove the joke. 6. Vow to not write trans characters so poorly in the future, even though there was *nothing wrong* with this one.
So once again the people that were quietly enjoying the game and not taking issue with anything at all... now have something to take issue with, because they weren't bothered until the creators of the game that was fine *as is* aside from bug-squishing and further engine/UI improvements, decided to change something that wasn't problematic at all.
How the heck can I take this game, or I guess *any* game these days given what just happened with Overwatch, with *any* salt when all it takes is a very loud minority to force changes the rest of us don't even think need to be made?
Your whole post is practically you assessing that there was nothing wrong with the transgender cleric, but not a single argument for why it wasn't, or anything else of substance. We had tons of people, even transgendered ones themselves, coming and very carefully argue for why the character was poorly developed and ended up being more hurtful than helpful for both the series and transgendered people themselves.
Did you think the character was well-written? Or do you just not care since she's a minor character? It's very hard to debate this when you don't even put forth your stance of view on it, and only keep assessing things out of thin air.
Either way, you're viewing it as caving. I think most people view it as admitting faults. And that's a sign of strength, not weakness.
How the heck can I take this game, or I guess *any* game these days given what just happened with Overwatch, with *any* salt when all it takes is a very loud minority to force changes the rest of us don't even think need to be made?
Suggestion: you can act like an adult and stop freaking out over every little imagined controversy that comes along. Devs may make fixes, because they probably ran out of time to make the original fix. So what? People like to act as if game devs are being pushed around by the backlash here, but that's not really the case. Trent almost flat-out told the Safana story nay-sayers to f*** off. Clearly, there's a few things that Beamdog thought about doing and wasn't quite able to do. As a software developer, I can tell you that happens ALL THE TIME. The only reason it's an issue of any kind is because a bunch of jackasses are being immature about it.
I've ignored this whole thing, I couldn't really care what its all about. I still have 2-3 weeks of BG 1 left to complete so by then the dust should have settled, the bugs should be fixed and I can then download SOD.
Maybe it doesn't matter because I am just one person but I support the Beamdog Team on whatever path they choose in this matter. I just want to play their awesome enhanced editions and the expansion and have fun and have a lot of admiration for their team and forum staff.
I also think people have a right to voice their concerns, whatever they may be. I don't have to respect their concerns or like what they say but I do support their right to say it.
What I don't support in any way are threats or the review bombing campaign. I can't abide by that.
Seeing David Gaider post on this forum made me happy. I'm going to back to work to break my back some more but at least I'm in a better mood now.
Jaheira was not a nag. She was strong-willed and assertive. Hardly sexist tropes. Heck I found her one of the strongest female characters in BG. And I find it sad that her personality has been deemed "problematic"
I'm glad we can have this conversation -- you have your take, I have mine; neither of us has the power to 'deem' [*] the NPC one way or another. Likewise the developer in question expressed an opinion -- she didn't 'deem' the character.
So what's really at issue? I think this is a campaign against one woman -- and I think it matters that she is an opinionated woman. Her opponents want her to be silenced, scared and, ultimately, fired. A putatively anti-censorship movement is trying to censor her.
[*] as in 'doom' / pass final and definitive judgement
1. Create a perfectly fine expansion pack that has better environments and better writing than BG1 or BG2. 2. Have one character make a joke, and another character admit to being transgender. 3. Get hate mail. 4. Cave. 5. Vow to remove the joke. 6. Vow to not write trans characters so poorly in the future, even though there was *nothing wrong* with this one.
So once again the people that were quietly enjoying the game and not taking issue with anything at all... now have something to take issue with, because they weren't bothered until the creators of the game that was fine *as is* aside from bug-squishing and further engine/UI improvements, decided to change something that wasn't problematic at all.
How the heck can I take this game, or I guess *any* game these days given what just happened with Overwatch, with *any* salt when all it takes is a very loud minority to force changes the rest of us don't even think need to be made?
Your whole post is practically you assessing that there was nothing wrong with the transgender cleric, but not a single argument for why it wasn't, or anything else of substance. We had tons of people, even transgendered ones themselves, coming and very carefully argue for why the character was poorly developed and ended up being more hurtful than helpful for both the series and transgendered people themselves.
Did you think the character was well-written? Or do you just not care since she's a minor character? It's very hard to debate this when you don't even put forth your stance of view on it, and only keep assessing things out of thin air.
Either way, you're viewing it as caving. I think most people view it as admitting faults. And that's a sign of strength, not weakness.
The point is, it doesn't matter whether the trans character was well-written or not - a developer has a right to include whatever content they want in their games without fear of being bullied into acquiescence. I would've been fine if they had changed Mizhena or removed the Minsc line in response to player feedback made in good faith, but this was an instance of gamergate making a company choose between changing its content or facing an ongoing review bombing campaign (which, interestingly, doesn't seem to have let up). For some of us, the very idea that a group of bullies - most of whom have never played the game - now have the ability to dictate content is very discouraging.
As for trans people being on your side, I've seen at least two articles in gaming publications written by trans authors roundly condemning what Gamergate has done here and have seen others within these forums express their happiness at having been represented. Please don't use trans people who agree with you as a shield while you know that a significant number of gamerbros came here in the last few days to post blatantly hateful and virulent anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.
This was not an instance of people offering constructive feedback in some kind of grand forum of ideas. This was a supposedly pro free speech group attempting to censor and suppress by influencing reviews and sales. Even if Beamdog genuinely believes that the content should be removed/improved, the tone and timing of their statement does read very much like appeasement.
That said, I understand that I have no control over the change and will make the best of it by encouraging a trans protrayal that doesn't pull any punches. Unlike Gamergate, I have no intention of throwing a tantrum because Beamdog has done something I disagree with.
Jaheira was not a nag. She was strong-willed and assertive. Hardly sexist tropes. Heck I found her one of the strongest female characters in BG. And I find it sad that her personality has been deemed "problematic"
I'm glad we can have this conversation -- you have your take, I have mine; neither of us has the power to 'deem' [*] the NPC one way or another. Likewise the developer in question expressed an opinion -- she didn't 'deem' the character.
So what's really at issue? I think this is a campaign against one woman -- and I think it matters that she is an opinionated woman. Her opponents want her to be silenced, scared and, ultimately, fired. A putatively anti-censorship movement is trying to censor her.
[*] as in 'doom' / pass final and definitive judgement
I don't want her fired, silenced, or scared. I don't even know her. Even after reading that interview. And I'm certainly not part of any campaign. I'm just one guy who plays Baldur's gate games.
But I still think it's sad that characters like Jaheira and Safana have to be "corrected". First, because I find nothing sexist about their portrayal at all. I mean, female characters played for comedy? What about Minsc? What about Tiax? What about Corran? Or Xan? All male characters played far more for laughs.
Secondly, it manipulates already established characters and makes them act...out of character. Like rewriting Han Solo to not shoot first in '"A New Hope"
I get that not every character is for everybody. People may find this or that character repellent. Maybe even offensive. Maybe you don't want a vampy femme fatale in your group. Maybe you find Jaheira's take-charge attitude grating. That's fine. But there are so many companion characters to choose from here. We can always find another to take her place. Heck, the Enhanced Edition has already added four!
I always thought that the way Jaheira acted in 1 was due to a bad mood. She waits at the inn for her good friend, only to find out he's dead, so now she has to take orders by some wet-behind-the-ears kid and his adopted sister!
Jaheira was not a nag. She was strong-willed and assertive. Hardly sexist tropes. Heck I found her one of the strongest female characters in BG. And I find it sad that her personality has been deemed "problematic"
I'm glad we can have this conversation -- you have your take, I have mine; neither of us has the power to 'deem' [*] the NPC one way or another. Likewise the developer in question expressed an opinion -- she didn't 'deem' the character.
So what's really at issue? I think this is a campaign against one woman -- and I think it matters that she is an opinionated woman. Her opponents want her to be silenced, scared and, ultimately, fired. A putatively anti-censorship movement is trying to censor her.
[*] as in 'doom' / pass final and definitive judgement
I don't want her fired, silenced, or scared. I don't even know her. Even after reading that interview. And I'm certainly not part of any campaign. I'm just one guy who plays Baldur's gate games.
But I still think it's sad that characters like Jaheira and Safana have to be "corrected". First, because I find nothing sexist about their portrayal at all. I mean, female characters played for comedy? What about Minsc? What about Tiax? What about Corran? Or Xan? All male characters played far more for laughs.
Secondly, it manipulates already established characters and makes them act...out of character. Like rewriting Han Solo to not shoot first in '"A New Hope"
I get that not every character is for everybody. People may find this or that character repellent. Maybe even offensive. Maybe you don't want a vampy femme fatale in your group. Maybe you find Jaheira's take-charge attitude grating. That's fine. But there are so many companion characters to choose from here. We can always find another to take her place. Heck, the Enhanced Edition has already added four!
Safana was allegedly reduced to her flirtatiousness and sexuality in BGI. In SoD, she was so sexual and flirtatious that I dropped her from the party in annoyance. Jaheira is portrayed exactly as I remember her in both BGI and BGII. Where exactly are these drastic changes you're referring to?
You quote the word "corrected" as if its something anyone has ever actually said. See David Gaider's post earlier in this thread - it perfectly explains what perceptions of sexism in Baldur's Gate are all about.
The point is, it doesn't matter whether the trans character was well-written or not - a developer has a right to include whatever content they want in their games without fear of being bullied into acquiescence.
Oh, it matters. It matters a ton. Developers have the right to include whatever they want into a game, and consumers have the right to critique that game however they want. And since they are video game developers and have to care about silly things such as sales and public image, they will always have to consider that critique.
Now, I'm not saying that I condone of the behaviour of rating it a 0 or 1 on metacritic simply due to these things, since that's just ignorant and hateful, but it's still their right to do so. That's how metacritic's system is designed. If you want to rate a game 0 out of nothing but spite you can do that, and you can't forbid it simply due to the romantic vision that developers should have unlimited creative freedom and never having to care about how their product is being viewed by the public.
I would've been fine if they had changed Mizhena or removed the Minsc line in response to player feedback made in good faith, but this was an instance of gamergate making a company choose between changing its content or facing an ongoing review bombing campaign (which, interestingly, doesn't seem to have let up). For some of us, the very idea that a group of bullies - most of whom have never played the game - now have the ability to dictate content is very discouraging.
The people who complained about Mizhena was far from just gamergate people. I was one of them, despite trying to defend it as well as I could at the beginning. But the more I learned about the underdevelopment of the character, the less I could, or wanted, to. And here is where the good writing would have changed things. Yes, haters might still be there, but the ones of us who opposed them would have been able to actually do a good job at it.
As far as I understood, there was a general consensus of the character being under-developed. Which is what Trent acknowledged. Nothing more than that.
As for trans people being on your side, I've seen at least two articles in gaming publications written by trans authors roundly condemning what Gamergate has done here and have seen others within these forums express their happiness at having been represented. Please don't use trans people who agree with you as a shield while you know that a significant number of gamerbros came here in the last few days to post blatantly hateful and virulent anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.
Care to link? I'm very interested in knowing what they think, providing they've actually played the game.
This was not an instance of people offering constructive feedback in some kind of grand forum of ideas. This was a supposedly pro free speech group attempting to censor and suppress by influencing reviews and sales. Even if Beamdog genuinely believes that the content should be removed/improved, the tone and timing of their statement does read very much like appeasement.
Actually there was, too. There has been a lot, a lot of topics on this forum that considered what could've been done better, how the situation should be handled, etc. Two big sides of the coins, one is the unreasonable haters that rate it 0 on sites, one is the concerned gamers who actually liked the exp but not the character.
That said, I understand that I have no control over the change and will make the best of it by encouraging a trans protrayal that doesn't pull any punches. Unlike Gamergate, I have no intention of throwing a tantrum because Beamdog has done something I disagree with.
How about encouraging well-developed portrayals, despite of the content?
@Tenrecc I agree with you that there were some legitimate criticisms (some of which I shared) and that some of them were offered constructively. But there was also a bullying campaign and an early flood of transphobic attacks before the devs started playing drums with the banhammer. I am totally for gamergate's right to complain, come here and argue, lash out at the devs on twitter (sans threats), etc. I can't get behind you on the idea that review bombing should be seen as a natural consequence, however. And I wouldn't be nearly as upset about it if this were EA or Bethesda or some other large company that could handle it...people's livelihoods were potentially on the line with this release.
But to answer your request, here's a link to one of the trans-authored articles I found:
The source is the Mary Sue, which you might find objectionable, but it is a trans perspective nonetheless. I don't know if she's played the game, but I don't think that's a criteria we should be requiring given how many gamergaters clearly haven't played it either. The article is well-researched.
I would like to post the other one but I have a meeting in about 30 minutes and can't seem to find it. I originally stumbled across both using the keywords "Siege of Dragonspear Metacritic" on Google if that helps.
They will probably make him less one-dimentional in BG3.
Yeah, we know he sucks, but whe don't know WHY he sucks (hint: Noober sucks because he sucks). We'll get an hour long epic quest (that automatically fails and gibs your entire party, even on easy mode, because Noober sucks). We'll find out his tragic history (but won't care, because Noober sucks). But most of all, we'll be able to pay what it's worth for such a game (-10.00 because we should get payed for having to deal with Noober).
In Baldur's Gate 3, some unlucky wild magic transforms every humanoid in the Sword Coast into Noobers. A plucky young Noober and a band of loyal Noobers travel the lands, battling Noobers in order to find a way to reverse the spell before other nations join together and wipe out the Noobers for good.
In Baldur's Gate 3, some unlucky wild magic transforms every humanaid in the Sword Coast into Noobers. A plucky young Noober and a band of loyal Noobers travel the lands, battling Noobers in order to find a way to reverse the spell before other nations join together and wipe out the Noobers for good.
The twist is that the game automatically fails and you get a game over just by clicking play ! Because you're Noober, and that in itself is a fail, like Yamcha.
Also, I disagree with BG being "sexist", BG had a lot of diversity and a lot of interesting characters - thinking it is sexist is isolating a few points in the story and ignoring the whole diversity of the game.
I don't know if I would call BG "sexist" so much as a product of its time. It is no longer the 20th century, and things that once passed without comment get looked at with a different lens now. Does that mean we toss everything that made BG what it is out the window? No, but neither can we ignore that times have changed. We do not exist in a vacuum, and neither do the games we write.
In many respects you can get away with a lot more. Stuff is less severely censored and more acceptable in most cases (see Witcher games).
The justification for changing their personality should be that the characters in BG1 just didn't have enough personality really (that really was a product of its time since BG2 blazed the trail there). Sexism should never really have been used as a justification for changing personalities and the problem now is that a lot of people view those changes through the lens of that interview (when really it should be about adding more depth to every character regardless of gender, as none of them had it in BG1).
Anyway, I haven't played too much of expansion, but Safana doesn't seem to have changed all that much judging by her one-liners. Jaheira changed a lot in BG2, she was realistically toned down, fleshed out and became so much less annoying than in BG1 (where she was basically just grumpy and sarcastic without NPC project). It sounds like they just continued that trend. And this is good because if you are bridging content then you need to keep or improve that sense of continuity.
I'm having flashbacks to fall. But aside from that, I'm going to take a Crack at explaining the difference between the humor of Minsc or Tiax, and playing up Safana's flirtatiousness, and why one is sexist and one is not.
The main issue here is a matter of the source of he camedy. Comedy generally works because it takes an expectation and turns it on its head, or subverts it, or it taps into something we regard as a "truth." Different parts of comedy engage one of two methods of thinking. Critical or cerebral comedy, like satire, engages our critical mind. Less cerebral comedy completely bypasses our critical mind.
Jaheira and Khalid's relationship was not played as a satire off the "hen pecked husband." It was played completely straight. It didn't challenge you to think about marital relationships in a new way, it was meant to make you go "oh women! It's so funny that Khalid is such a wuss he just let's his wife walk all over him!" This is harmful, as it reinforces a prevalent sexist cultural, ideology, rather than challenges it.
Similarly is Safana's utter lack of characterization. She was crammed into a box, labeled as "female Fatale. " The entirety of her existence was determined by her sexual relationship with me , as Jaheira was (in both original games) largely defined by her relationship to men. As was Aerie, and Nalia. Even Viconia has her deeper background defined by her brother, and she's from a stlarning matriarchy. This further enforces the false idea that women are defined by their relationships with men.
Minsc and Tiax, to compare, are identified not by vague sexist types meant to make them subjugated. Instead, their types (big, dumb hero; megalomaniacal evil priest) are meant to empower them. They are not defined primarily in terms of their relationships to others. Without Dynaheir, Minsc would still be a big dumb hero. But what is Safana if you take away her flirtatiousness? Not much. Or Jaheira if you take away Khalid in the original game? Boring Faldorn, basically.
Femininity in and of itself is fine. For instance, I would say Alora is undeniably feminine, but she's also self determining, with her own goals and desires, and not defined primarily in terms of her relationship to males. This is a healthy portrayal of a woman, as is Neera.
The main issue here is a matter of the source of he camedy. Comedy generally works because it takes an expectation and turns it on its head, or subverts it,
Jaheira and Khalid's relationship was not played as a satire off the "hen pecked husband." It was played completely straight. It didn't challenge you to think about marital relationships in a new way, it was meant to make you go "oh women! It's so funny that Khalid is such a wuss he just let's his wife walk all over him!" This is harmful, as it reinforces a prevalent sexist cultural, ideology, rather than challenges it.
I agree with your premise, but completely disagree with your conclusion
Expectation: Man is the head of the household, woman is subservient Khalid and Jaheira: The exact opposite
This is what makes them funny and memorable. I completely disagree that it was played "completely straight". If anything, Khalid's stumbling over every word is proof of the opposite.
Fair point but it also doesn't challenge the concept of a man being the head of a household. It isn't satirical, the humor comes from "isn't it funny when women try to be men?"
Comments
I like the game overall - and in cases where I find npcs growing offensive in a fantasy setting I can always thwack them to chunks as Dorn got treated properly outside the Paladin Temple. I was able to treat those evil leftest gold redistributers the same too - but in this expansion there are less characters to choose from so they need to add a more pleasing male ego side kick.
I am recommending an Alex Jones Bezerker with a dramatic impasse like the either/or character pairing ones already in the game where you have to choose between the Tempus Priest Person character of 'Law and Good' and the Mad Man of unfettered freedom and raging "Chaos Neutral or Chaotic Evil?" "Alex Jones" Bezerker Illuminati hunter. Alex would accuse the Tempust Priest of being a false priest and Illuminati and the Tempest priest would accuse Alex of being a mad raging lunatic who just wanted gold and dried iron rations horded away when he had to hide and eat in his dungeon because the flaming fist was after him for attacking the Ducal Palace. Alex Jones could voice the character as I know he is addicted to liquor, Japanese computer games and comics, and of course playing a Bezerker in Baldurs Gate. I bet if you contacted him he would offer to do the voice acting for free. You could make him romanceable only by female elves and gnomes. I think pretty much every 40+ year old white guy like me who grew up in a conservative family has a fantasy of being Alex Jones and getting all the strong female romances he must have had. This could really counter balance all the other persons who would romance the Tempus Person Priest.
Oh like I said you need to get that boy - now girl person in London named Paris- they most famous and well spoken person of that sort in popular culture now.
If you wont put in Alex Jones I would say choose some girly girl to do a cleric of cyric who is crazy but lovable - I think you should get that girl from Kill bill - Ko-Ko the one with the bowling ball - no fat white 35+ fat nerd guy could ever hold a grudge against her no matter what she said or did in the game. Just let her do the voice mostly in Japanese and put the translations in English.
alex
Ko Ko...
Paris
Now as far as I've played with the "new" Safana, her personality hasn't strayed much from what I expect of the character. I don't think there's any damage done, but time will tell. But if it does indeed start to stray a lot from what's established in the original content then I expect a better reason than "LOL, Chaotic Neutral!"
There is precedent for stuff happening between episodes in the BG saga. In BG2, Imoen suddenly has Mage levels! Butchered! Now Beamdog is explaining how that happened.
Maybe someday we'll get the Siege of Safana episode where she and Coran go sideways. Relationships can be traumatic. I can see it affecting her in unforeseen ways.
Did you think the character was well-written? Or do you just not care since she's a minor character? It's very hard to debate this when you don't even put forth your stance of view on it, and only keep assessing things out of thin air.
Either way, you're viewing it as caving. I think most people view it as admitting faults. And that's a sign of strength, not weakness.
I also think people have a right to voice their concerns, whatever they may be. I don't have to respect their concerns or like what they say but I do support their right to say it.
What I don't support in any way are threats or the review bombing campaign. I can't abide by that.
Seeing David Gaider post on this forum made me happy. I'm going to back to work to break my back some more but at least I'm in a better mood now.
1. Build a time machine
2. Travel to 1998
3. Infiltrate Black Isle Studios
4. Replace all NPCs with Noober
So what's really at issue? I think this is a campaign against one woman -- and I think it matters that she is an opinionated woman. Her opponents want her to be silenced, scared and, ultimately, fired. A putatively anti-censorship movement is trying to censor her.
[*] as in 'doom' / pass final and definitive judgement
As for trans people being on your side, I've seen at least two articles in gaming publications written by trans authors roundly condemning what Gamergate has done here and have seen others within these forums express their happiness at having been represented. Please don't use trans people who agree with you as a shield while you know that a significant number of gamerbros came here in the last few days to post blatantly hateful and virulent anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.
This was not an instance of people offering constructive feedback in some kind of grand forum of ideas. This was a supposedly pro free speech group attempting to censor and suppress by influencing reviews and sales. Even if Beamdog genuinely believes that the content should be removed/improved, the tone and timing of their statement does read very much like appeasement.
That said, I understand that I have no control over the change and will make the best of it by encouraging a trans protrayal that doesn't pull any punches. Unlike Gamergate, I have no intention of throwing a tantrum because Beamdog has done something I disagree with.
But I still think it's sad that characters like Jaheira and Safana have to be "corrected". First, because I find nothing sexist about their portrayal at all. I mean, female characters played for comedy? What about Minsc? What about Tiax? What about Corran? Or Xan? All male characters played far more for laughs.
Secondly, it manipulates already established characters and makes them act...out of character. Like rewriting Han Solo to not shoot first in '"A New Hope"
I get that not every character is for everybody. People may find this or that character repellent. Maybe even offensive. Maybe you don't want a vampy femme fatale in your group. Maybe you find Jaheira's take-charge attitude grating. That's fine. But there are so many companion characters to choose from here. We can always find another to take her place. Heck, the Enhanced Edition has already added four!
You quote the word "corrected" as if its something anyone has ever actually said. See David Gaider's post earlier in this thread - it perfectly explains what perceptions of sexism in Baldur's Gate are all about.
Now, I'm not saying that I condone of the behaviour of rating it a 0 or 1 on metacritic simply due to these things, since that's just ignorant and hateful, but it's still their right to do so. That's how metacritic's system is designed. If you want to rate a game 0 out of nothing but spite you can do that, and you can't forbid it simply due to the romantic vision that developers should have unlimited creative freedom and never having to care about how their product is being viewed by the public. The people who complained about Mizhena was far from just gamergate people. I was one of them, despite trying to defend it as well as I could at the beginning. But the more I learned about the underdevelopment of the character, the less I could, or wanted, to. And here is where the good writing would have changed things. Yes, haters might still be there, but the ones of us who opposed them would have been able to actually do a good job at it.
As far as I understood, there was a general consensus of the character being under-developed. Which is what Trent acknowledged. Nothing more than that. Care to link? I'm very interested in knowing what they think, providing they've actually played the game. Actually there was, too. There has been a lot, a lot of topics on this forum that considered what could've been done better, how the situation should be handled, etc. Two big sides of the coins, one is the unreasonable haters that rate it 0 on sites, one is the concerned gamers who actually liked the exp but not the character. How about encouraging well-developed portrayals, despite of the content?
But to answer your request, here's a link to one of the trans-authored articles I found:
http://www.themarysue.com/siege-of-dragonspear-controversy/
The source is the Mary Sue, which you might find objectionable, but it is a trans perspective nonetheless. I don't know if she's played the game, but I don't think that's a criteria we should be requiring given how many gamergaters clearly haven't played it either. The article is well-researched.
I would like to post the other one but I have a meeting in about 30 minutes and can't seem to find it. I originally stumbled across both using the keywords "Siege of Dragonspear Metacritic" on Google if that helps.
The justification for changing their personality should be that the characters in BG1 just didn't have enough personality really (that really was a product of its time since BG2 blazed the trail there). Sexism should never really have been used as a justification for changing personalities and the problem now is that a lot of people view those changes through the lens of that interview (when really it should be about adding more depth to every character regardless of gender, as none of them had it in BG1).
Anyway, I haven't played too much of expansion, but Safana doesn't seem to have changed all that much judging by her one-liners. Jaheira changed a lot in BG2, she was realistically toned down, fleshed out and became so much less annoying than in BG1 (where she was basically just grumpy and sarcastic without NPC project). It sounds like they just continued that trend. And this is good because if you are bridging content then you need to keep or improve that sense of continuity.
The main issue here is a matter of the source of he camedy. Comedy generally works because it takes an expectation and turns it on its head, or subverts it, or it taps into something we regard as a "truth." Different parts of comedy engage one of two methods of thinking. Critical or cerebral comedy, like satire, engages our critical mind. Less cerebral comedy completely bypasses our critical mind.
Jaheira and Khalid's relationship was not played as a satire off the "hen pecked husband." It was played completely straight. It didn't challenge you to think about marital relationships in a new way, it was meant to make you go "oh women! It's so funny that Khalid is such a wuss he just let's his wife walk all over him!" This is harmful, as it reinforces a prevalent sexist cultural, ideology, rather than challenges it.
Similarly is Safana's utter lack of characterization. She was crammed into a box, labeled as "female Fatale. " The entirety of her existence was determined by her sexual relationship with me , as Jaheira was (in both original games) largely defined by her relationship to men. As was Aerie, and Nalia. Even Viconia has her deeper background defined by her brother, and she's from a stlarning matriarchy. This further enforces the false idea that women are defined by their relationships with men.
Minsc and Tiax, to compare, are identified not by vague sexist types meant to make them subjugated. Instead, their types (big, dumb hero; megalomaniacal evil priest) are meant to empower them. They are not defined primarily in terms of their relationships to others. Without Dynaheir, Minsc would still be a big dumb hero. But what is Safana if you take away her flirtatiousness? Not much. Or Jaheira if you take away Khalid in the original game? Boring Faldorn, basically.
Femininity in and of itself is fine. For instance, I would say Alora is undeniably feminine, but she's also self determining, with her own goals and desires, and not defined primarily in terms of her relationship to males. This is a healthy portrayal of a woman, as is Neera.
Expectation: Man is the head of the household, woman is subservient
Khalid and Jaheira: The exact opposite
This is what makes them funny and memorable. I completely disagree that it was played "completely straight". If anything, Khalid's stumbling over every word is proof of the opposite.