But Not Too Gay (Gay characters in videogames)

Part of the problem is there's a lack of outright stated gay characters in games, as it is. It's kind of hard to discuss well portrayed and poorly portrayed gay characters, when outside of mooks with no lines at all, there isn't much of a sample to choose from.

Camp Gay =/= Openly gay, in my opinion. Openly gay just means that it's obvious in story someone is homosexual, and does not need Word of Gay to have it confirmed.

Heather is pretty obviously gay. She more or less says that she's joining to ogle the girls in your army. Girl from Harvest Moon not so much as Heather.

Fallout New Vegas is, as per usual with traditional Fallout games, chalk full of potential gay-ness.

• Veronica is a lesbian.
• Arcade is gay.
• Rose is bisexual.
• Cass will do Anything That Moves once she's drunk enough.
• One of the NCR snipers is a lesbian.
• Major Knight is gay.
• Prostitutes don't care about your gender, largely, except for one gay kid in Westside.
• There are other sorts of "interest groups" represented, like robo-sexuals, BDSM, and people attracted to ghouls.
• There are implications of Ceasar's Legion gay-ness; which is more pronounced, given that it happened quite a lot in real-world Rome.
• There's a sort of transsexual aesthetic to the Super Mutants, since it doesn't matter whether they were male or female before getting dipped in the FEV, they always look like giant hulking male brutes.

Asric and Jadaar. That is all.

Well, one of the main characters of Enchanted Arms is absolutely flaming to the point of just WT Fery.

The issue is that Sterling said it was great that the character was openly gay, but "acted normal".

What is he saying?

That he doesn't want to deal with anything but Straight Gay men.

I think New Vegas did it pretty well, Arcade is pretty gay and it's obvious when you meet him if you pay attention, plus he flirts a bit, not Straight Gay but still a good balance.

I thought Arcade was the best kind of gay character in any medium. You can't really tell he's gay until it's outright stated, and it's not treated as weird or unusual.

Well, Veronica is just about the same as Arcade. She's not butch, she's not Fanservice (okay, except for being voiced by Felicia Day), her admission of preference isn't considered strange or that unusual, and her sexuality is an important part of her character history (adding to her estrangement issues with the Brotherhood), but not something that defines her (her quest regarding her faction is ideological not about her gender/sexuality issues).

But why is it only okay for Arcade to be gay as long as he's not "too" gay?

Perhaps they mean that they're tired of seeing the stereotype of all (known) gay characters being complete flamers. It may be bothersome for some to be straight gay, but I think we can agree that flamer-gay characters in media are far more common.

Yea, but in gaming, gay characters of any type are still pretty rare, let alone Straight Gay types.

I think the editorial in the OP implied that "real" gay men aren't "too gay", which isn't true either.

Is Sliding Scale Of Gayness tropeable?

edited 1st Dec '10 12:51:58 PM by SpellBlade

Sounds like it has potential, actually...

Was Jann from Valkyria Chronicles mentioned yet? Tough as nails. Blows up tanks. Has effeminate mannerisms and wears make-up and gets all wiggly over his crush on Largo.

I love Jan.

edited 1st Dec '10 1:07:41 PM by Bur

I can't decide whether I like his English voice or his Japanese voice better. They're both awesome.

^^I mentioned him on the first page.

He pounds the rears of tanks into submission with his explosive stick. You can't go wrong with Jann.

Question: What about Bi The Way characters?

I totally fail at remembering posts. WELL, HE'S AWESOME ENOUGH TO MENTION AGAIN.

The only bi character I can think of off the top of my head is Tatsuya from P2, because of having both male and female romantic options. One can reasonably assume a level of bisexuality.

edited 2nd Dec '10 7:28:12 AM by Bur

Well apparently there's quite a few video game bi characters according to that trope page... Color me surprised.

edited 2nd Dec '10 7:38:17 AM by Customer

The gay elf from Dragon Age is bi, if I remember correctly.

I think his name was Zephran or something like that.

Zevren. Also Leliana the French Bard.

Also Sky and Silk Fox from Jade Empire, Lira and Kelly from Mass Effect and so on and so forth.

Really, Bioware seems to prefer it that way (presumably because it means less work)

Considering that Fallout is stuck in the fifties, shouldn't homosexuality at least seen as weird there? Or makes living After the End people more tolerant?