Monday 19 March 2012

Gay Evolution of the Video games


I think it was a year ago when I had lots of free time and I asked my fellow readers / bloggers / online friends of a good PC game to play. Gauss Jordan back then suggested Mass Effect. I got Mass Effect 2 and I loved it. Thanks for that by the way. I never thanked you for the suggestion.

Since I liked the 2nd game, it was only natural that after I read some very good reviews about it, I got the recently released 3rd instalment of the game. Thank you so much for the birthday gift JJ! Since Skyrim was getting a bit old and after I spent many (way too many) hours playing it, I’ve now started devoting my free time in ‘Mass Effect 3’. And boy was I for a treat?

The game takes place in the future, in space. There’s an evil alien invasion and you, Commander (I think) Shepard of the spacecraft Normandy are trying to save the Galaxy. It doesn’t sound like the most original story ever but the details, subplots, graphics and action make it a really interesting and captivating game. While Shepard’s trying to unite the various species against the new common threat, he (I’m playing a male character) interacts with his ship’s crew, gets to know them and finishes missions provided by them.

One of the crew members is Stephen Cortez. He’s a Lieutenant and pilot for the good guys. While I as Shepard was visiting the deck, I was told that I need to speak to Stephen, so I headed down to the Armoury. There I find a crying Stephen, so I asked him what’s wrong. Do you know what he said? His husband died on one of the evil alien invasion? I’ll repeat that: ‘his husband’! I was like wow, that’s cool!

Cortez crying over his husband

So, I did my research. I don’t want any spoilers for the plot of the game, so I was cautious on what I could find. Apparently, Stephen is the only opening gay character of the game that was actually even married. There’s also the possibility to have ‘intimate’ moments with him if you are a male Shepard. You can select the gender at the beginning of the game. So, I’ll see what the future holds.

Shepard and Cortez

This development is not something completely new. In Skyrim as well a male character could marry another male NPC (that’s Not Playable Characters for the non-geeks). This option was also allowed in the ‘Sims’ series and these are only three widely accepted games that I just thought of. Compared to the Sims though, both Mass Effect and Skyrim are considered to be violent action packed games which I believe have a different (male, younger, heterosexual) target group than ‘The Sims’. So, are gay characters in video games becoming mainstream? There’s even apparently a gay sex scene later in the game if you decide to make Steve and Shepard an item. I’ll definitely make that happen…

On the other hand, I have found some online forums where this option is condemned and homophobic hatred comments are posted. I’m not going to comment on them and decide simply to ignore them. I do love the existence of gay characters in video games. People from various backgrounds should have this kind of incentives. It’s even nicer to have a gay Commander fighting to save the whole galaxy! Gay characters shouldn’t follow stereotypes.

6 comments:

  1. Kind of an aside, but I always wondered by sci-fi shows set in the future (I'm mostly thinking Star Trek here) didn't have prominent gay characters.

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  2. I hear more and more of this viz. angry out cry at even the mere mention of the gay character. The Right wants us to have absolutely no appearance in anything.

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  3. They should start making more games like this... I'm a gamer and always like, man if only I could hook up with that hot guy... Just some romance in a cool action game is totally a plus... And stuff...

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  4. @Erik Rubright I don't know. It's funny how many gay people are into sci-fi / fantasy stuff, but there aren't many gay characters. Maybe there's a market niche to take advantage of.

    @Ur-Spo I believe we'll get there. Slowly but surely... :-)

    @Anonymous I'm totally with you on that.

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  5. Gay characters make me so happy :-)

    Greg and I got sucked into Skyrim over the winter and like you spent way too much time on it. LOL

    My character (a male Nord) got married to Argis. I picked him mostly because of his voice. I'd like to know who the voice actor was who recorded Argis's lines, because I'd love to make out with him! His voice is dreamy...

    Greg is interested in trying out Mass Effect 3, but I don't want to get sucked into that like I was with Skyrim.

    When will the X-rated video games arrive?

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    1. I haven't been married in Skyrim yet. After finishing almost all the campaigns, including the main one, I've started to drift off Skyrim. I'm now enjoying Mass Effect 3. I will probably go back to it at some point.
      X-rated video games? Hmmmmmm

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