Do Game Designers Have A Social Obligation?

Darren over at Common Sense Gamer asks a curious question – do game designers have a social obligation to consider issues such as race, class, ability, and sexual orientation in their games?  We think we’re in a good position to respond to this, since this is the exact reason why The Border House exists.

“Understood that sexuality is a very personal and hot topic that gets everyone’s panties in a knot, but do we really need to represent every single human condition within our games just to make a social point? It’s an interesting topic and ultimately I think the answer has to be “no”. If we insist that game designers start being socially conscious on every human condition, I think we’ll start really hating our gaming sessions. If we go by the theory that “games are art” (…/cringe…), then do we really want to tell the artist how they should create?”

Source

We ask – why does including non-standard types of characters mean that the game is making a “social point”?  How do you think an Asian-American woman feels when you tell her that including a Japanese female character in a North American MMO is a “social point”?  Do you think the disabled woman in a wheelchair entering a grocery store thinks she’s making a “social point” every time she leaves her house?  We have designed our games to be so inherently fit, muscular, white American, that it’s now an exception and a social point to include people outside our comfort zone.  We’re also so comfortable in this privilege that most people don’t even recognize the lack of accurate representation as a problem.  Something has to change there.

In all forms of entertainment, there are varying levels of diversity.  In television, there is a growing number of racially diverse main characters.  More and more, we’re seeing LGBT representation in leading roles.  For once, having a gay character on television doesn’t mean the whole episode or series has a gay theme or tackles gay issues.  That’s just the ‘way it is’ now.  TV show representation of culturally diverse people is still a long way off from where it needs to be, but video games are even further away.

An image of a female NPC in Mass Effect

Game designers are intelligent, creative people.  Some of the best educational preparation for a designer is one of the following degrees:  Philosophy, History, Psychology, Literary Studies, Politics, and Creative Writing/English.  This is because designing games that appeal to a real life audience involves writing some ‘familiar’ into the story.  It’s why we have post-apocalyptic games with familiar settings.  It’s why our characters in games often need to eat, rest, and form relationships even though they are just pixels on the screen.  It’s the entire reason we feel emotionally moved in RPGs and they can move us to cry and laugh.  It’s why our medium is such a powerful tool for moving people.

What real world issues do game designers have to be aware of right now?  They have to be aware of localization so their game can be played in other countries.  They have to be aware of ESRB ratings, and what is allowed so that a game targeted to tweens and teens doesn’t contain any inappropriate content.  They have to be aware of laws in other countries that might prevent the game from shipping.  Take a look at Fallout 3, for example, which had three social controversies surrounding it.  First, it wasn’t able to be released in India because of religious and cultural sentiments, including mutated cows that would offend the Indian culture who have a strong reverence of Brahman cows.  In Japan, a special version of Fallout 3 was released that didn’t allow an atomic bomb to detonate in a side quest, and changed a name so that it wasn’t a Japanese political reference.  Australia actually made Fallout 3 change the drug name Morphine to Med-X so that it wasn’t a real-life drug reference.

So why should designers need to be aware of some cultural sensitivities and not others?  Why is it that in India a video game cannot insult an animal, but in the United States, it’s okay to be racist and offensive towards human beings?  You don’t need a degree in Diversity Studies to become a game designer, but you should have a basic understanding about the complexity behind designing relateable characters for your audience.  In the real world, I can’t go a day without interacting with someone who isn’t white, someone who isn’t thin or fit bodied, someone who doesn’t fit the false standards of beauty, someone who isn’t gay.  Why can I play a game for days without interacting with someone who isn’t a muscular white NPC?  And why would it be a ‘social point’ to accurately represent the people who are playing the games and living in our world?

I have utmost faith in game designers.  My significant other is one of the best (in my humble and completely subjective opinion) and I have tons of friends who do this for a living.  I really don’t think it’s that difficult to consider people as diverse and unique.  It’s unfortunate that video game bloggers think it’s such a chore to expect game designers to consider the sensitivities and standard variance in the people who play their games.  I think that’s what they’re paid to do – know their audience, create fun and meaningful experiences for them, and do so within the budget and timelines given.  If a designer isn’t in it to do something meaningful within their medium for people who aren’t JUST LIKE THEM, they should probably do something else for their paycheck.  This world is full of people who aren’t a white male Commander Shepard.

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