Tag: diversity
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Conquering the Cyber Kingdom: Analyzing Bowsette
On Sept. 19, Twitter user haniwa (@ayyk92) posted a fan comic whose conclusion focused on a blonde woman with horns, a visual mix of official characters Princess Peach and Bowser from Nintendo’s Super Mario franchise. This fan creation would be nicknamed Bowsette. The fan comic has now garnered over 80 thousand retweets and motivated many to post…
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Fat-Shaming in Villain Design
The problem of fat-shaming stems from many places. First and foremost, it comes from the alarmist tendencies of reporting on the “obesity epidemic.” It comes from doctors seeking money from pharmaceutical companies, prescribing weight loss medications, cholesterol medications, and various procedures to people who typically do not even need them. It comes from a lack…
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How Breath of the Wild Failed Princess Zelda and Representation
The most recent incarnation of Zelda will not be included in the Smash Bros Ultimate roster, because she is ‘not much of a fighter’. This is a fair estimation of the character, which reflects how Breath of The Wild failed Zelda and representation. Characters in the game are varying in their development, but Zelda really suffered. What…
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How The Sims Became a Champion for LGBTQ Representation in Gaming
When talking about The Sims, an adjective that could very accurately describe it is influential. The follow-up project to creator Will Wright’s SimCity, the game was something that had never been tried before: an intimate simulation of real life where the player can act as either caretaker or doom-bringer for the characters in their charge.…
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Super Lesbian Animal RPG Is A Treasure In The Making
No, you read that right. Super Lesbian Animal RPG is an actual game in development. Now, this should be said straight away. If the title alone has triggered you with its promise of same sex relationships among anthropomorphic animals, you’re going to have a bad time. Seriously, stop reading right now and go back to…
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New Normative Comment Clinic: Don’t Worry N4G, We’re Here to Help
It’s been a sad week here at New Normative. As I’m sure you’re all aware… we’ve been banned from N4G. Good old N4G, the “Hottest Game News and Rumors” site. I know it’s a tragedy, but it’ll be okay, because our N4G friends can still find us here. With this in mind, we’d like to…
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Butterfly Soup: The Bisexual Visual Novel We’ve Been Waiting For
There are three main things you have to know about Butterfly Soup, 1) It’s very, very gay, 2) It’s also very, very bi, and 3) it knows how to do representation very, very well. The creator of the visual novel, Brianna Lei, describes the game as “A game about gay Asian girls playing baseball and…
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Horror Games That Don’t Rely On the ‘Mental Illness is Scary’ Trope
If I asked you to think about the average horror game setting, then chances are that your mind probably wandered to an abandoned mental hospital, or a spooky forest inhabited by “crazy people.” I know mine does. The horror game market is so overly saturated in games about mentally ill villains, that it’s clear many…
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Stardew Valley’s Diversity Problem and the Mod I Used to Fix it
Early on in Stardew Valley’s development, longtime fans of farming simulators such as, Harvest Moon and Rune Factory, had a few hopes for the Western take on a genre, long dominated by the hyper heteronormative, mono-racial series that is, Harvest Moon. One of those hopes was that Stardew Valley would be racially diverse. And to…
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Diversity Experiences of IndieCade 2017
One thing that really stands out about indie games is the plethora of non-traditional games. I don’t just mean in terms of mechanics, but experiences. I know someone’s going to shout about “social justice warriors,” but I’m betting many of those same people choose female avatars when given the option or even main a female…
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Two Scoops Aims to Bring More Diversity to Dating Sims
Characters in Western dating sims are often similar: the protagonist, a transfer student or new employee, choosing between a slate of potential love interests – the quiet bookworm; a jock with a roguish smile and a heart of gold; someone aloof and mysterious; a cheery goofball. More troublingly, they are also usually all thin, straight,…
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Kindness is Key: How You Can Improve Games Culture
Some days, it can feel like games are inextricably embedded in a swamp of hostility. Kindness just isn’t something traditionally associated with gaming. That’s a pretty discouraging thought for people who want to change that, or even just to exist and enjoy games freely without being exposed to bile. But here’s the thing: that existing…
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Happy Birthday Overwatch: A Look Back
On May 24, Overwatch celebrates its first anniversary. And it’s been a hell of a year. The game has been front and centre in major industry talking points without pause: sexualisation, diversity, harassment, fan culture, Doing It Right™ versus getting away with its continued failures, and, of course, a deluge of memes. In short, Overwatch has…
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The Hypocrisy of our Love of Sheik: A Character to be Seen and Not Heard
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, wasn’t a very popular game in my social group. The Scottish kids I grew up with were more interested in soccer, boy-girl pop groups, and Furbys. As such, I never really heard the name ‘Zelda’ being thrown around. [SPOILERS For Breath of the Wild, Ocarina of Time, and…
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Why We Need a Bigger Feminist Let’s Play Community
If there’s one thing that I wish there was more of on YouTube, it’d be more feminism, specifically within the Let’s Play community. There are many Let’s Players out there who have called themselves feminists, or at least hold some feminist values, but imagine a video game channel that was dedicated purely to feminist discourse…
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Inclusivity in Overwatch Continues to Improve
At his recent DICE Summit talk, director Jeff Kaplan mentioned again the importance of inclusivity in Overwatch. This has been a continued rhetoric of the Blizzard team, and, most importantly, one that has been built upon significantly in the game’s post-release lifetime. That lifetime has been a rollercoaster. Overwatch has not only been one of…