Open letters to BioWare regarding the m/m romances.
Mar 28, 2017 3:07:29 GMT
Natashina, VFerreira93, and 7 more like this
Post by Dirk on Mar 28, 2017 3:07:29 GMT
Dear Bioware ME team,
Congratulations on Mass Effect Andromeda launch! Seeing all your hard work being shared and enjoyed across the world must be something special. When I play this game, I can feel that this game is something definitely special.
Mass Effect series means a lot of things to me. It’s my favorite sci-fi setting. It’s a game that is incredibly fun. It has diverse, interesting, and memorable characters. It has moments with emotional impacts. And as a gay man, it has one of my favorite love stories in games, Kaidan and male Shepard. Because of these, I have a lot expectations with ME:A. And after spending a lot of time playing it, I found ME:A to be a great Mass Effect game. However, one major aspect of the game that disappointed me was m/m romance.
Before I explain my issues with m/m romance, I would like to thank you for having Gil and Reyes as m/m options and other various characters who are of LGBT+ spectrum. As you already know, representation matters, and you did a great job.
Now onto m/m romance options in ME:A. While I think Gil and Reyes are great, problems I have with m/m romance content in ME:A are the following.
First, the number of m/m romance options is lacking, compared to other orientations. Gay Scott has 2 options, straight Sara has 3, lesbian Sara has 4, and straight Scott has a total of 5. While I could understand why gay players will always have less options than straight players, 2, compared to 5, is severely lacking. I could not help but think that if you had spent time on 3rd m/m romance, rather than 5th m/f romance, the number might have been fairer.
Second, lesser contents of Gil’s romance. A cause of this problem is that he’s not a squad mate. Indeed, only gay players do not have a romance options within the squad. Because my option is not on the squad, I could not interact with him when I am exploring the beautiful planets. There are rarely any on-com conversations with him during exploration. Indeed, I have counted only two times where Gil would banter when I was on planets. An m/m LI option who is on the squad would have been nice.
Third, m/m romance scene has lesser qualities, compared to others. When I looked at Cora, Peebee, and Jaal romance culmination scene, I saw excellent and beautifully crafted scenes that are both touching and explicit. Meanwhile Gil’s romance scene barely shows any sexuality and fades to black. While explicit scenes are not always necessary, gay players should have a choice to experience that like straight players.
Fourth, related to the previous point, it is clear to me that more care and effort were spent on Reyes/Sara romance scene than Reyes/Scott scene. During the dance scene, we see that Sara passionately swing to Reyes’s arms. She also looks at Reyes’s eyes and is very close to him. Both Sara and Reyes move fluidly, and the camera focus on them holding hands and Reyes’s hand on Sara’s waist. Meanwhile, in Scott/Reyes scene, they both look stiff, and any intimacy is not really shown. One striking case is that during this scene, Scott simply looks above Reyes and not into his eyes. There are other comparisons between Scott/Reyes and Sara/Reyes, and all those show that animations in Sara/Reyes are more polished.
And lastly, the marketing that has been very tightlipped regarding same-sex romance, while very open regarding straight romance at the same time, was really tiring. We were told that there is a lot of “pretty good banging” but the uncertainty whether gay players will have that is difficult to endure. I know that you want to keep romance as a surprise, but then why revealed Cora as an option at all? You don’t have to reveal all romance options because you can simply reveal one straight male option, one gay male, one straight female, and one lesbian female.
I am sorry that these are long, but I hope that you understand my concerns. I truly hope that the m/m romance situation will be improved in the next coming contents or in the next game. Thank you for hearing me and I wish you a great success on ME:A!
Dirk
Congratulations on Mass Effect Andromeda launch! Seeing all your hard work being shared and enjoyed across the world must be something special. When I play this game, I can feel that this game is something definitely special.
Mass Effect series means a lot of things to me. It’s my favorite sci-fi setting. It’s a game that is incredibly fun. It has diverse, interesting, and memorable characters. It has moments with emotional impacts. And as a gay man, it has one of my favorite love stories in games, Kaidan and male Shepard. Because of these, I have a lot expectations with ME:A. And after spending a lot of time playing it, I found ME:A to be a great Mass Effect game. However, one major aspect of the game that disappointed me was m/m romance.
Before I explain my issues with m/m romance, I would like to thank you for having Gil and Reyes as m/m options and other various characters who are of LGBT+ spectrum. As you already know, representation matters, and you did a great job.
Now onto m/m romance options in ME:A. While I think Gil and Reyes are great, problems I have with m/m romance content in ME:A are the following.
First, the number of m/m romance options is lacking, compared to other orientations. Gay Scott has 2 options, straight Sara has 3, lesbian Sara has 4, and straight Scott has a total of 5. While I could understand why gay players will always have less options than straight players, 2, compared to 5, is severely lacking. I could not help but think that if you had spent time on 3rd m/m romance, rather than 5th m/f romance, the number might have been fairer.
Second, lesser contents of Gil’s romance. A cause of this problem is that he’s not a squad mate. Indeed, only gay players do not have a romance options within the squad. Because my option is not on the squad, I could not interact with him when I am exploring the beautiful planets. There are rarely any on-com conversations with him during exploration. Indeed, I have counted only two times where Gil would banter when I was on planets. An m/m LI option who is on the squad would have been nice.
Third, m/m romance scene has lesser qualities, compared to others. When I looked at Cora, Peebee, and Jaal romance culmination scene, I saw excellent and beautifully crafted scenes that are both touching and explicit. Meanwhile Gil’s romance scene barely shows any sexuality and fades to black. While explicit scenes are not always necessary, gay players should have a choice to experience that like straight players.
Fourth, related to the previous point, it is clear to me that more care and effort were spent on Reyes/Sara romance scene than Reyes/Scott scene. During the dance scene, we see that Sara passionately swing to Reyes’s arms. She also looks at Reyes’s eyes and is very close to him. Both Sara and Reyes move fluidly, and the camera focus on them holding hands and Reyes’s hand on Sara’s waist. Meanwhile, in Scott/Reyes scene, they both look stiff, and any intimacy is not really shown. One striking case is that during this scene, Scott simply looks above Reyes and not into his eyes. There are other comparisons between Scott/Reyes and Sara/Reyes, and all those show that animations in Sara/Reyes are more polished.
And lastly, the marketing that has been very tightlipped regarding same-sex romance, while very open regarding straight romance at the same time, was really tiring. We were told that there is a lot of “pretty good banging” but the uncertainty whether gay players will have that is difficult to endure. I know that you want to keep romance as a surprise, but then why revealed Cora as an option at all? You don’t have to reveal all romance options because you can simply reveal one straight male option, one gay male, one straight female, and one lesbian female.
I am sorry that these are long, but I hope that you understand my concerns. I truly hope that the m/m romance situation will be improved in the next coming contents or in the next game. Thank you for hearing me and I wish you a great success on ME:A!
Dirk
