Sandy Peterson, a developer who worked on Age of Empires II, Halo Wars, Doom II, and others recently shared how Microsoft had embraced proto-woke policies in the 90s and cajoled him into making a Korean faction in an attempt to play the DEI representation game.
I don't necessarily think that this was proto-woke. It was Microsoft trying to cash in where it had sold 3 million copies and did not want to offend Muslims. Something that people still don't want to do today.
Ahhh, the things you never realize growing up, playing these games, because you're far too young to understand or notice such things, only to grow up and see things like this and, while not exactly tainting your views of the games, definitely opens ones eyes to such horrid practices, and coming to the bitter realization of how much these have been problems for years. Also, the fact of not wanting to "risk insulting Muslim Communities" just kinda reminds me of the original concept of "The Slenderman" movie, which was completely redone when that one "incident" regarding Slenderman happened years back. I'll say the same thing about that, this, and any other instances of this sort of tiptoing around people's sensitivities that will continue to happen in the future: If you're THAT worried about offending someone, cancel the project and don't do it. Because otherwise, especially nowadays with the Slenderman example but not Halo 2, it will usually end in tragic failure. If you're more worried about what the people who are probably already preordained to hate your product think of your product, you're already doomed to failure, and forever will be.
It’s the same old same old. We can’t offend Muslims by calling a repentant bad guy turned good guy the Dervish, but it’s totally fine using Christian imagery for the evil side that wants to exterminate the universe.
Yes. Game makers and their journo shills didn't wake up one morning in August 2014 and decide to wage war on the gamers. This has been a slow boil ever since video games went from a nerdy shareware hobby to big business. See Kushner's *Masters of Doom* which shows how the trouble started when makers started designing with an eye avoid giving offense. Very much proto-woke.
I don't necessarily think that this was proto-woke. It was Microsoft trying to cash in where it had sold 3 million copies and did not want to offend Muslims. Something that people still don't want to do today.
Ahhh, the things you never realize growing up, playing these games, because you're far too young to understand or notice such things, only to grow up and see things like this and, while not exactly tainting your views of the games, definitely opens ones eyes to such horrid practices, and coming to the bitter realization of how much these have been problems for years. Also, the fact of not wanting to "risk insulting Muslim Communities" just kinda reminds me of the original concept of "The Slenderman" movie, which was completely redone when that one "incident" regarding Slenderman happened years back. I'll say the same thing about that, this, and any other instances of this sort of tiptoing around people's sensitivities that will continue to happen in the future: If you're THAT worried about offending someone, cancel the project and don't do it. Because otherwise, especially nowadays with the Slenderman example but not Halo 2, it will usually end in tragic failure. If you're more worried about what the people who are probably already preordained to hate your product think of your product, you're already doomed to failure, and forever will be.
It’s the same old same old. We can’t offend Muslims by calling a repentant bad guy turned good guy the Dervish, but it’s totally fine using Christian imagery for the evil side that wants to exterminate the universe.
Yes. Game makers and their journo shills didn't wake up one morning in August 2014 and decide to wage war on the gamers. This has been a slow boil ever since video games went from a nerdy shareware hobby to big business. See Kushner's *Masters of Doom* which shows how the trouble started when makers started designing with an eye avoid giving offense. Very much proto-woke.