IGN Interview with Yoshi-P about diversity inclusions in FFXVI leaves a lot to be desired.
- Thread starter Ashodin
- Start date
So this fictional, fantasy, completely made up setting doesn't have diversity because it doesn't make sense for this fictional, fantasy, completely made up setting to have it?
Nah, that ain't it. Need to do better here.
Nah, that ain't it. Need to do better here.
Yeah like honestly to me it shouldn't even need any sort of narrative or thematic justification to include POC, they can exist in places even where it doesn't make "sense", which is the beauty of fantasy and fiction. Eh, I'm quite annoyed by this continuous justification for the exclusion of non-whites.
I just read the full article now. Did Koji just "power of friendship" his way through that answer....I can't.
OP
OP
Reminder that what I posted were excerpts from the full response, as he makes a remark about Final Fantasy being about struggles of the characters, not that that adds much to the response.
Having to write paragraphs to what essentially was a yes or no question is not great optics.
Having to write paragraphs to what essentially was a yes or no question is not great optics.
Trash answer , they have 2 other AAA games from SE that have PoC in them .
Maybe he should look inside company to see what they doing .
Maybe he should look inside company to see what they doing .
Well damn, that's an awesome answer and better than what Yoshi-P has said.
I was thinking this lol, all this bs about 'one continent = one race'. Ok, make them all black then. That's something we'll probably never see in our lifetimes tho.
I do think, though, that there's a running issue with fantasy stories since they're often based on a pop culture interpretation of European medieval history which further reenforces a lack of diversity. Like, for sci-fi, a lot of formative works tried to take a futuristic outlook and saw diversity as just some inevitable reality in the future, so other works would carry that forward. That's not necessarily to say that the people making it are more progressive, but if they try to create something that resembles the work that's inspired them it might do a little better just because of that.
Even the idea of fantasy "races" invokes the pseudoscientific idea of race, that different types of humans can be classified by identifying external traits, as if humans are vastly different species. In a fantasy world that's true of human-like creatures such as dwarves or elves - they may be far removed from humans in terms of their biology and have different points of origin from human entirely. You might even have subspecies, like how you'll have duegar who are dwarves that are adapted to a different environment and have mechanically different abilities as a result.
Fantasy often sets you up to expect an explanation for why this group is here and why they look different, because one of the measures by which it's judged is the creativity and detail of the world it provides. But then you apply that to humans and it gets really weird, because we don't really need any special justifications for that in a totally constructed setting.
That's not to say that this is a sufficient explanation or that Final Fantasy has an excuse because of its genre, but I don't think it's that surprising for it to fail on this level if there isn't active interest to fix it.
Even the idea of fantasy "races" invokes the pseudoscientific idea of race, that different types of humans can be classified by identifying external traits, as if humans are vastly different species. In a fantasy world that's true of human-like creatures such as dwarves or elves - they may be far removed from humans in terms of their biology and have different points of origin from human entirely. You might even have subspecies, like how you'll have duegar who are dwarves that are adapted to a different environment and have mechanically different abilities as a result.
Fantasy often sets you up to expect an explanation for why this group is here and why they look different, because one of the measures by which it's judged is the creativity and detail of the world it provides. But then you apply that to humans and it gets really weird, because we don't really need any special justifications for that in a totally constructed setting.
That's not to say that this is a sufficient explanation or that Final Fantasy has an excuse because of its genre, but I don't think it's that surprising for it to fail on this level if there isn't active interest to fix it.
The trailers made this super obvious. But yeah, as a FF14 player, it's pretty clear they could do better with diversity.
Talking up the "realism" of the racial makeup of a fantasy setting where people turn into fucking fire demons and leap 30 feat in the air to do melee combos sure is a choice.
The answers are terrible and only help confirm a lot of concerns many of us have with regards to the game's cast. Did they have people transforming into mythical beasts in realistic medieval Europe jw. If you can justify magic but not racial diversity then your motivations aren't "accuracy."
There were red flags that people hand waved based on their personal belief that there aren't enough Dudes(TM) in video games, so this sets the bar for what to expect from the game in a pretty disappointing way.
There were red flags that people hand waved based on their personal belief that there aren't enough Dudes(TM) in video games, so this sets the bar for what to expect from the game in a pretty disappointing way.
OP
OP
Due to the underlying geographical, technological, and geopolitical constraints of this setting, Valisthea was never going to realistically be as diverse as say a modern-day Earth
This sentence is going to live in my head rent-free all the way to the game's release
A simple "We fucked up, we're going to make it better next time" would be preferable to this answer.
Silk Road was in the first century. Almost all known world, at that time, was connected. And after that it was connected by boat.
Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease lol What I would give to have a big budget game like this with no white characters.
Don't worry, people have been pointing it out for a while as well. You weren't alone.
Short answer: I don't know the guy's heart.
But if we are to give him a good faith assessment, not intentionally, but Japanese devs haven't' really been the best here. You gotta remember that a lot of Japanese assessment of Western culture is filtered through whiteness.
Due to the underlying geographical, technological, and geopolitical constraints of this setting, Valisthea was never going to realistically be as diverse as say a modern-day Earth
This sentence is going to live in my head rent-free all the way to the game's release
Hey, the technology in Final Fantasy games does limit peoples range of travel. It's not like the series has ships that fly in the air or something.
Xenoblade came out with such a great diverse cast in a big world. FF13 still had the best poc character in the series history. This dude is here spewing bs.
*remembers the questionably racist comments from some Forspoken staff*
I suppose. =/
Due to the underlying geographical, technological, and geopolitical constraints of this setting, Valisthea was never going to realistically be as diverse as say a modern-day Earth
This sentence is going to live in my head rent-free all the way to the game's release
shit, how do I say I forgot PoC's existed in Medieval times without sounding like an ass?
ooooh I know
Yep, reminds me of chuds angry at Lord of the Rings. Dragons, giants and monsters is fine, but apparently having black people in your game is a fucking bridge too far!
The game probably doesn't have Asian characters either. It's just plain old whitewashing of media. Japan has been good at that in general.
Yeah, not a great answer - I don't think it was done maliciously, probably more out of ignorance (not that it makes it better really).
https://maryrobinettekowal.com/journal/diversity-in-historical-fantasy/ is a great little blogpost with some good links on the topic and the actual history of People Of Color in history
https://maryrobinettekowal.com/journal/diversity-in-historical-fantasy/ is a great little blogpost with some good links on the topic and the actual history of People Of Color in history
Pretty stupid response from YoshiP here when Forspoken has brown and black people featured prominently in both the real and fantasy worlds and FFVII Remake has a black party member and diversity in the NPCs.
OP cut off a bit about the interview here:
" -it can be challenging to assign distinctive ethnicities to either antagonist or protagonist without triggering audience preconceptions, inviting unwarranted speculation, and ultimately stoking flames of controversy."
Its a really dumb response and cold feet to any kind of controversy involving the themes of slavery and very obvious European/Middle Eastern war stuff going on in the game. They might know they aren't equipped to handle themes of race in a game like this but that's why you hire diverse writers and consultants.
OP cut off a bit about the interview here:
" -it can be challenging to assign distinctive ethnicities to either antagonist or protagonist without triggering audience preconceptions, inviting unwarranted speculation, and ultimately stoking flames of controversy."
Its a really dumb response and cold feet to any kind of controversy involving the themes of slavery and very obvious European/Middle Eastern war stuff going on in the game. They might know they aren't equipped to handle themes of race in a game like this but that's why you hire diverse writers and consultants.
I wouldn't say so. FFXIV (Where he is director) is much better than this.
FFXVI is a different game and creative director. He's just producer. While that does have clout, he's not solely responsible for a lot of these decisions.
I think another post here is right, a lot of what "inspired" this game's direction is derivative of media that is fundamentally filtered through western whiteness, I doubt it ever crossed their mind.
Yep so I dont buy this stuff at all. Its ridiculous. Esp when you look at certain people on the Euro side from portugal,Greece, Spain with the Moors etc. tired of these poor Eurocentric views totally disregarding that people may have lived settled during those times.
a book recently came out that turns a lot of this stuff on its head.
A New History Changes the Balance of Power Between Ethiopia and Medieval Europe
For centuries, a Eurocentric worldview disregarded the knowledge and strength of the African empire
www.smithsonianmag.com
This is great. Just changing skin colour isn't enough. Diverse characters with varied backgrounds, different stories are what's interesting.
its pretty funny that whenever theres something positive about ff16 people post yoshi p suffering from success memes but when the lack of diversity is questioned, hes no longer fully responsible, lmao
lmao, what a dork
"can't have non white people but here are two gods fighting. this is historically accurate game's gonna be full of white dudes names "kromnian M'quito durian"
already see some yoshi p defense force over here
"can't have non white people but here are two gods fighting. this is historically accurate game's gonna be full of white dudes names "kromnian M'quito durian"
already see some yoshi p defense force over here
It's ignorant, institutionalised colourism. I said this about Genshin Impact and I'll say the same thing here. The population of East Asian countries are almost entirely mono-ethnic, which means there's very few societal consideration for such matters as diversity. Add on to decades of fantasy pop culture that this game is draws upon, reinforcing such stereotypes, and small wonder that we get an answer like this.
But what disappoints me is that the FFXIV playerbase has been telling CBU3 about this problem for years, and they have shown that they've taken this feedback in Endwalker however slightly. It's a step back.