Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 mattyrm wrote:
Hey you know me, Im a black or white kinda guy.

Seriously though, why are you bothered about labeling yourself a gamer? You are what you say you are, there are no requirements.

Why not just "I'm a lass and sometime I play games and sometimes I walk the dog and sometimes I read books"

I don't understand why anyone outside of their teens really gives a flying feth about identifying with a buzzword club. I mean, we don't call ourselves "readers" or "dog walkers" do we?

Stop using buzzwords like "buzzword".

I'm pretty sure there are people avid about reading books that they give themselves a title relating to it. There would likely be a title for enthusiastic dog owners. Such as those that participate their pets on dog shows.

People could use titles to fit in, they could also use it to describe a part of themselves. Like saying you're a slight germaphobe or a perfectionist. I doubt you would ask people the deeper meaning of why they call themselves a 'neat freak'. Plus I think it would be stupid if someone wanted to debate with me for why I call myself a Warhammer player when neckbeards exist or something.

Yeah I think that's the point of what I was saying, I just don't like the fething trendy way people speak nowadays. I like drawing, reading, and keeping my house tidy, but I don't call myself an artist, a reader or a "neat freak" and I'm simply saying that labels seem to me to be important to people obsessed with how others perceive them.

Titles are a trendy obsession? Right...

I have a bigger problem with people trying to denounce the worth of titles than I do with people labeling themselves as being cool, random, etc.

Since the latter can actually serve a function. But it's not like I care very much, I don't use labels as far as I know, unless I'm trying to end a discussion about me in as few words as possible.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Lotet wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Are you being facetious or obtuse?

I'm not sure, I've looked up the 2 definitions and I don't feel either is appropriate to describe what I'm being. Hmm, I suppose if I can't figure it out that would make it Obtuse then.

As in, are you:
a. making a joke about me saying what something means, and then saying that thing itself has no meaning.
or
b. not understanding a very simple matter.

Given you had to explain, what do you think the answer is?

 mattyrm wrote:
I don't understand why anyone outside of their teens really gives a flying feth about identifying with a buzzword club. I mean, we don't call ourselves "readers" or "dog walkers" do we?

No, but many people outside of their teens call themselves buzzwords like, say, cinephile, athlete, republican, atheist, …
And they can be pretty passionate about it too.

 Wyzilla wrote:

I really don't understand how candy crush and other incredibly simple games on cellphones are considered a "gateway" game when you can just boot up Warframe, World of Tanks, Team Fortress 2, etc on your computer that can run on virtually anything, and are free. Is there any evidence at all to even suggest that casual gamers actually "move up", or do they just still play cellphone games? Because I highly doubt they'd make such a jump given how unrelated the two are.

But you see a lot of the people who start on these games don't have a PC which they would consider using for gaming. So saying that there are better gateway games on a PC is pointless, especially considering that it requires more effort to get than to just go into the app store and download (Install steam, set up steam account, download or find the games actual website).

You are assuming that someone who is completely new to gaming as a whole already has knowledge about the existence of Steam or those free games.

 mattyrm wrote:
Yeah I think that's the point of what I was saying, I just don't like the fething trendy way people speak nowadays. I like drawing, reading, and keeping my house tidy, but I don't call myself an artist, a reader or a "neat freak" and I'm simply saying that labels seem to me to be important to people obsessed with how others perceive them.

Its an indentifier. Its not bad. And people want games to be a culture. Which it kind of is. Its a sub culture.

 Asherian Command wrote:
And people want games to be a culture. Which it kind of is. Its a sub culture.

That is nonsensical. That is like saying “movies are a sub-culture”.

It's a subculture made up of subcultures. FPS, RPG, MMO, ECT. I think the term for it is a super-culture or something along those lines.

Can I put my subculture in your subculture?

We can try, but I don't think it will fit.

Are you saying my subculture is bigger than yours?
More seriously, I would not call movies a culture, I would not call sports a culture, so I would not call games a culture either.

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:
And people want games to be a culture. Which it kind of is. Its a sub culture.

That is nonsensical. That is like saying “movies are a sub-culture”.

Movies are a sub culture.

We have many cultures and several divisions within culture into sub cultures.

 mattyrm wrote:
I'm simply saying that labels seem to me to be important to people obsessed with how others perceive them.

AKA Pretty much all of humanity. Seriously you say this like social perceptions aren't one of most important things to human life outside of our basic needs for food, water and shelter.

nomotog wrote:

 Compel wrote:
I made a long post about that a while ago with my suggestions on it.

Short version is, if an jerk starts being a jerk. Just pipe and say, "dude, that's not cool."

Don't start 'white knighting' or anything well, quite frankly, creepy like that. Just a simple. "that's not cool" followed by citing Wheaton's Law.

Then get back to killing stuff or saving the galaxy or whatever you were doing.

I never understood what white knighting was.

White knighting is generally when white CIS males come to the deffense of white CIS women, since the white knights deems the women so feeble they are uncapable of holding their own grounds or opinion and needs rescuing... or similar variations thereof.

The irony is so thick you couldn't cut trough it with an angle grinder from both sides...

 mattyrm wrote:
Yeah I think that's the point of what I was saying, I just don't like the fething trendy way people speak nowadays. I like drawing, reading, and keeping my house tidy, but I don't call myself an artist, a reader or a "neat freak" and I'm simply saying that labels seem to me to be important to people obsessed with how others perceive them.

Labels are important for the purposes of differentiating and of course establishing one's identity, in the same way that Americans don't refer to themselves as "Continental Americans", but Texans, or Italians, etc.

I appreciate that the lables you're referring to are a lot less clear cut than the above, and while I see no harm in someone choosing between calling themselves a "board game geek", or a "gamer", yes it is silly when those people get into lengthy discussions about what constitutes a member of their label, because if they thouht about it , they'd realise the boundaries of such labels are arbitrary. A fine example I come across are fans of metal bands, getting into shouting matches about whether something is "symphonic metal" or "power metal.

When it could instead be both, Symphonic Power Metal (see: Rhapsody of Fire).

 thegreatchimp wrote:

 mattyrm wrote:
Yeah I think that's the point of what I was saying, I just don't like the fething trendy way people speak nowadays. I like drawing, reading, and keeping my house tidy, but I don't call myself an artist, a reader or a "neat freak" and I'm simply saying that labels seem to me to be important to people obsessed with how others perceive them.

Labels are important for the purposes of differentiating and of course establishing one's identity, in the same way that Americans don't refer to themselves as "Continental Americans", but Texans, or Italians, etc.

I appreciate that the lables you're referring to are a lot less clear cut than the above, and while I see no harm in someone choosing between calling themselves a "board game geek", or a "gamer", yes it is silly when those people get into lengthy discussions about what constitutes a member of their label, because if they thouht about it , they'd realise the boundaries of such labels are arbitrary. A fine example I come across are fans of metal bands, getting into shouting matches about whether something is "symphonic metal" or "power metal.

Yes and everyone is free to use whatever ones they please, that was my point, I personally don't consider it important. I have never referred to myself as a "gamer" because I am not 15 and I dont feel a need to fit in, and I reckon I play more games than most. Conversely if you played golf on a Sega in 1997, you are free to call yourself a gamer if you so wish, my point was simply that I hate all these little clubs we invent as I hate the discussion about "what makes someone a X" and frequently wonder why people even bother to engage in said discussions.

If you can call yourself a Muslim when you don't pray very often and you occasionally like a pint (millions do), then you are free to call yourself whatever the feth you like. I was mainly referencing the whole "you aren't a proper gamer if you only play on the PC" or whatever the feth it was.

I just find the whole thing facile and wonder why people would bother concerning themselves with the opinions of people that ask such daft fething questions. I think"what makes you a gamer then?" is about as daft a question as "why are there still apes if we evolved from apes?"

 Melissia wrote:
When it could instead be both, Symphonic Power Metal (see: Rhapsody of Fire).

Exactly! -That's exactly what one level-headed poster told a bunch of fans and haters squabbling over an Amaranthe song. Not that it stopped them giving themselves brain aneurysms trying to out-shout eachother.

 Asherian Command wrote:

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
That is like saying “movies are a sub-culture”.

Movies are a sub culture.

BAAHAHAH!

Sorry, that really made my day. Thanks Ash.

This is actually part of the problem with GG. There's a vocal subset of gamers who have a pretty narrow definition of "gamer", and it is defined, basically, as "those who agree with us", while discounting the vast majority of video-game-playing people (which is the definition of the term to me).

This sub-set of gamers is rather vociferously and fiercely defending this erroneous concept of shared culture... which, in the end, is not surprising, because for a lot of these people, they don't have anything left, outside of this self-identity. Apart from the ones who are truly trolling (and thus posting inflammatory statements purely for the attention), those of this sub-set apparently lack the social skills to get on with other people outside their sub-culture (which is defined as male, white, player of a certain, select list of VG titles), or identifies with this group's definition of "gamer", regardless of their actual lifestyle habits, and regardless of objective facts.

 Psienesis wrote:
This is actually part of the problem with GG. There's a vocal subset of gamers who have a pretty narrow definition of "gamer", and it is defined, basically, as "those who agree with us", while discounting the vast majority of video-game-playing people (which is the definition of the term to me).

This sub-set of gamers is rather vociferously and fiercely defending this erroneous concept of shared culture... which, in the end, is not surprising, because for a lot of these people, they don't have anything left, outside of this self-identity. Apart from the ones who are truly trolling (and thus posting inflammatory statements purely for the attention), those of this sub-set apparently lack the social skills to get on with other people outside their sub-culture (which is defined as male, white, player of a certain, select list of VG titles), or identifies with this group's definition of "gamer", regardless of their actual lifestyle habits, and regardless of objective facts.

I agree with your post, however I personally have a slightly stricter definition for "gamer". To me, a gamer is one who games on a console, or PC, or TT games. And by PC, I don't mean Facebook games, or mobile apps on the phone. To me, a "gamer" is one who has made an invested interest in games, ie. They've bought their X Box, Playstation, Steam software, or Origin or CD Rom, and the like, even if they really only have a casual interest in those things; there is still a greater level of investment into the games than someone who just purchased more lives on Candy Crush or Farmville (if that's even a thing still)

 Psienesis wrote:
This is actually part of the problem with GG. There's a vocal subset of gamers who have a pretty narrow definition of "gamer", and it is defined, basically, as "those who agree with us", while discounting the vast majority of video-game-playing people (which is the definition of the term to me).

This sub-set of gamers is rather vociferously and fiercely defending this erroneous concept of shared culture... which, in the end, is not surprising, because for a lot of these people, they don't have anything left, outside of this self-identity. Apart from the ones who are truly trolling (and thus posting inflammatory statements purely for the attention), those of this sub-set apparently lack the social skills to get on with other people outside their sub-culture (which is defined as male, white, player of a certain, select list of VG titles), or identifies with this group's definition of "gamer", regardless of their actual lifestyle habits, and regardless of objective facts.

Honestly I think the "GAMERS ARE DED" was a show that journalists are corrupt as hell and ultimately immature little brats for the most part when it comes to gaming journalism. I also think that this is the same fault that ruins titles at large including feminism which has basically gotten dragged through the mud. What saddens me is that I actually like the concept of gamers are dead. Define a gamer. What is a gamer? Somebody that just plays SNES games? Does it include casual players that really only play facebook/android/apple games? Does it not? In all reality, all gamer really means is that you play games be it "hardcore", "core", or "casual". Now then, let's argue that a gamer doesn't include somebody that just plays one game or just facebook games. Even then, we have that same tribal attitude. You've got your PC elitists, your console freaks, and everything else. It's basically just a mess of tribalism.

On a side note, reading up on it I frankly don't see why publishers think that making a female = the main character and then kiss a guy or girl or whatever is automatically going to crash sales. I mean, maybe I'm delusional but honestly I would have rather had Mass Effect's male character be the female. Don't know why but I always liked her more. Toss on the fact that games like FO, Skyrim, etc where people get options there's actually a significant number of males that will play females just because they want to (and the models aren't even really sexual most of the time in either of those games if I can remember). So really I can't help but be perplexed why developers think it's that much of an issue. Honestly I'd love to hear an explanation of why publishers really think that sex/race/ethnicity/sexuality really influence it. Especially sicne a lot of main characters are often dull, bland, and empty of characterization or just basically have the most stereotypical characteristics to push forth the plot.

EDIT: Huh, I was looking it up and apparently femshep wasn't as commonly played as I expected. Apparently it approached almost 20%. Honestly it somewhat surprises me considering I've largely heard people prefer femshep over maleshep.

Bethesda and Bioware are, in most cases for most of their games, somewhat on the leading edge of inclusion, in that their main characters are defined by their stories, and can be of either gender.

Even KOTOR, for example, has a canon appearance/gender for Revan, but you are not constrained to that, and can even slightly change the story of KOTOR 2, which also had a canon story behind the Jedi Exile, by dictating what gender your KOTOR 1 Revan was, and what decisions you made at certain points.

Of course, then we have a "canon" male Revan and the "canon" female Exile in The Old Republic... but, if you like, you can comment to Revan "I thought you were a woman" when you meet him, since it is 300 years later.

 StarTrotter wrote:
Honestly I think the "GAMERS ARE DED" was a

... basically non-event that some immature brats used as an excuse to justify gaking everywhere and harassing even more fervently the people they disliked.

 StarTrotter wrote:
EDIT: Huh, I was looking it up and apparently femshep wasn't as commonly played as I expected. Apparently it approached almost 20%. Honestly it somewhat surprises me considering I've largely heard people prefer femshep over maleshep.

Maleshep was the "Default", so the choice was biased towards it. It was on the packaging until the third game-- and even then it was the default packaging, with femshep being only an alternate cover-- and it was on the advertisements as well.

It shouldn't be surprising that it was that low, given this-- Shepard was assumed to be male by the marketing team and was defaulted to male by the game. But compared to that, imagine a game where the default character was female, and you had to go in to a customization menu in order to change her to male, and which all the packaging showed the default female, and all the advertising, press releases, interviews, etc. assumed you were playing a female character. One could reasonably expect a percentage of people to just click through to start the game instead of mucking about with customization, or would assume that the game was primarily developed for the female rather than male protagonist..

.. I can't start a game of Mass Effect without spending 45 minutes designing my FemShep.

Of course, she's almost always based on one or another of the Inquisitor NPCs, or their Interrogators, from my DH games, but, still....

 Melissia wrote:

 StarTrotter wrote:
Honestly I think the "GAMERS ARE DED" was a

... basically non-event that some immature brats used as an excuse to justify gaking everywhere and harassing even more fervently the people they disliked.

Well, it was certainly an event for me, in that it showed that sites like Kotaku and the others had no interest in my 'business' and I have avoided them since. I didn't gak anywhere or harass anyone about it.

I thought the women and minorities who were derided as sock puppets for supporting GG was a far more interesting turn of events though. Now that was immature brats gaking everywhere and harassing people just for disagreeing with them.

Can we please let GamerGate die?

Get off the topic of gamergate please. This thread does not deal with it. IF you wish to discuss gamergate. Go to reddit or ask a mod for permission to open a gamergate thread up. Just be aware people will get heated about it.

Thank you

GamerGate is an issue and I understand that there is a problem in games media, but lets face it has very little to do with representation of women. It is a problem with games media, ethics and harassment.

So with that in mind.

Women in games need more representation......

Now lets switch over from that to.

How is the games industry including women going? (do not bring up Zoey Quinn) Would an introduction of more women in the industry help change this?

Should the old stereotype of programmers being woman, make a come back?

What should education do to make programming more appealing? Or anything in education become more appealing for games media?

Should more women be represented in the games media? How should we go about this?

How about the representation of female protagonists? Are they more memorable then men?

Should writing be improved in games overall?

"those who agree with us"

I could make fun of some many things about that.

Mostly Tumblr users and the internet in general

I would point you to atheism + something eerily similar to the gamergate issue.

And I am not joking :/

BAAHAHAH!

Sorry, that really made my day. Thanks Ash.

I try my best to be intentionally funny


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AdeptSister wrote:
Can we please let GamerGate die?

Sure. Once Games Journalism bites the dust. Which it is by the looks of it. (mostly Gawker by the looks of it. But lets face we are all better off without gawker, nothing of value will be lost if they go down)

basically non-event that some immature brats used as an excuse to justify gaking everywhere and harassing even more fervently the people they disliked.

Hey look ma! Someone is Generalizing and using a fallacy at the same time!

Black and white fallacy by the looks of it. Simplifying it to such a degree that it is easily understandable *Basically*.

Anyway. The problem I feel is that anyone saying that statement needs to rethink and reread. But this thread is about women representation. Not harassment of them.

You say you want the thread to not become full of gamergate garbage, but then you post gamergate garbage. Which is it, Ash?