Program to your demographic Telltale
Okay, I'm all for a certain amount of unpredictability in the Telltale game series. The games are intereresting because of this. However, I'm seeing a pattern in the games which is annoying at best and a deal-breaker for newbies at worst. What I'm referring to is Telltale games habit of wiping out the attractive and vulnerable female characters. Please stop doing this. I get that you want to tell a story and you want to mix it up end evoke emotion and blah blah blah. but if you want to keep selling games, and sell lots and lots of them, and make money hand over fist so you can create MORE amazing games, you need to program them to the expectations of your primary sales demographic: young males. Spelling this out for you: IN a nutshell, we like the attractive female characters to survive. (e.g. Carly and Snow). We don't care if we smash old dudes heads with salt blocks or pummel a talking frog, but we get annoyed when the coolest heroine in the game gets a totally random hard-coded headshot that serves zero purpose other than me having to drive to gamestop to replace the controller I just smashed against the wall. :-)
Comments
Well, that's your opinion. But not everyone thinks like that. Plus we don't even know if Snow will be brought back or if she never died, because she is alive in the comics.
I don't know what to say. OP isn't upset that female characters are fridged, except that there is a loss of eye candy.
That's... kind of messed up.
Also, are young guys the primary demographic for Telltale Games? I know dudes like to assume that video games revolve around them, but I don't know how true that is, especially not in this case. Regardless, fridging of female characters is a problematic thing beyond the loss of eye candy OP is so choked up about. I honestly didn't like the direction TWAU took in its first chapter, but I'm willing to give it a chance because the premise and source material is very strong.
So you want eye candy? You realize this is an animated. Video game not real women right? So I dont get the attractive female gripe here
I agree with you, I'm pretty sure that young males is not the majority of gamers anymore, that's a very close minded way to think. It's pretty close to about 50% of each gender.
I'm all for strong females in games but I got to disagree here, and I'll point out why. Firstly when you say "We don't care about smashing dudes heads in just let the females live" that's just as bad, we are going for equality yes. Secondly even though Christa is a strong female character that didn't get killed but no mention of her here, and what about Clem ? Sure she's not physically strong but she was one of the strongest characters in the entire first season of the walking dead. Just because a character is physically weak doesn't make them a non strong character. Lastly every character death in both series has been justified so far, I'm sure this Snow thing will resolve it's self and because Telltale has a good history of making strong female characters I'm sure we are gonna see more of them in The Wolf Among US, Hell I've been reading the comic I know we'll see more.
I think that he didn't mention those two because he is talking about "attractive" females.
ok so several good points in response to my initial rant. i am inclined to agree with megamoto in regard to character equality for its own sake. i probably oversimplified what i meant to avoid a long post. as to demographics, female gamers are making definite gains in the market, especially as the tech continues to improve exponentially into several media types. i think my beef with Telltale in TWD specifically was the randomness of the event with Carly, who was an invested and fleshed-out NPC. as we play these games, we connect with the various characters and we enjoy the opportunities to make the choices which help preserve the group and individuals we like. I felt like the game presented very limited options with regard to most of episode 3. SO....bouncing back to Snow in TWAU, I am hoping there's some content or story twist down the line which may allow her to resurface, but it seems fairly unlikely.
Sometimes I despair, I really do.
I'm curious, in what way were Snow and Carley 'vulnerable'?
Telltale wrote some of the best female characters in videogames.
I really hope they don't go through any changes from "characters" to "stereotype".
I'm not saying he was talking about only the strong attractive females but if he was that would defeat the point of this argument.
They're doing this on purpose you know. So you would get pissed at them. Same thing happened with Carly, I certainly knew it was gonna happen here
As far as I can recall, the only female characters to die prior to TWD were Morgan and Momma Bosco. Even then, they were resurrected. To the OP, you're obviously new to Telltale, so don't claim to know what their trends are in their games. Secondly, your warped perception that all gamers think like you and the idea that good games are based primarily on eye candy is frankly disgusting. Go troll the Replay Games website, if it's eye candy you're after.
Who here is a woman? I AM! Jeez, isn't this way of thinking dead yet? I have been a gamer since I was 5 years old, but it wasn't my father who made me a gamer, it was my mother. Hell, she was Space Invaders champion in a state-wide competition! So thinking that the majority of gamers are males is old-fashioned and wrong. I can list to you, of the 100 people on my friends list on Xbox, a total of 17 people who are playing The Wolf Among Us right now. Know what? 15 of them are females! In a round-about way, The Wolf Among Us has some ways of being geared heavily towards female gamers, as well. It stars princesses from fairytales we all grew up with and, on a side note, Bigby is incredibly good looking. Is it possible that this was a way of making their FEMALE buyers happy? I wouldn't think Bigby would be made to look as gorgeous as he does just for "young male buyers". This is a joke! Seriously! I hate how people STILL think this way!
I'm with you, MegaMoto. Thanks for taking up for females' portrayals in video games. If you're going to play The Walking Dead or The Wolf Among Us, don't be doing so just for the eye candy. If you want to see "attractive females", go play GTA. That way, you can get alllll the "attractive females" you could want.
What I like about Telltale is that they write characters that is likable but also very likely to die within the next ten minutes or so simply because it's what the plot needs. Like having Carley or Snow die because that allows them to make more interesting stories. They acknowledge the fact that the characters are tools and the story is their master and not the other way around. And THAT is why their recent stories has been really good.
So yeah, I can see the OP's point but I do not agree with it. Sometimes it's good to kill a character you like simply because it throws you off balance and you wonder what will happen next. That is of course if the death was written well enough, which Telltale has shown that they can do very well, just look at TWD Ep. 5.
Females should have an equal chance to die as any male and "pleasing their demographic" shouldn't interfere with the story, which is what you're suggesting.
Bigby is crazy hot, and so is Snow ! However that's not why I like them, I like Bigby because he's a jerkass with a heart of gold, and he's funny, so many good lines. As for Snow, she's just a boss, I could imagine her giving the best speeches before a battle, she keeps a calm head in bad moments. That's why I like the characters.
I love you, man! Haha! You are my new best friend! XD
In all seriousness, you are absolutely right. I wasn't implying that the only reason a woman could like Bigby or a man could like Snow was based upon their looks, all I'm saying is that they appear to be marketed toward the gender who will find them attractive. I've honestly never been the type of girl who likes wolf-men or anything like that, but I'll be darned if I didn't fall for Bigby! I'm glad you agree with me and weren't quick to jump me for having an opinion.
Amen, bro! I think it's also blatantly obvious that it wasn't just the female characters who died in TWD. What about all of the males? In the universe of TWD, it doesn't matter if you were a frumpy housewife or a supermodel, you have the same shot at either being shot in the face or bitten by a walker. Let's not forget that Lily shot Doug, if he was the survivor in your game. It wasn't based solely on her being an attractive female.
Well said. I agree wholeheartedly.
I dont know if youve read the comics but I think they sexed him up some for the game. He looks more grizzled in the comic but you do get to see him in his speedo underwear lol
Must... SEE! XD Thanks for the tip. I've not read the comics, but I know he varies quite a bit in appearance. Still hot, but hotter in the game. You're awesome!
As a proud member of the young male demographic, I respectfully disagree with you TC.
I've played KOTOR 1, KOTOR 2, Jade Empire, and the Mass Effect trilogy - all Bioware RPGs, and some of the best games ever to feature a protagonist whose speech and behaviour you can control.
And you know what I found? Your love interests NEVER die; at least not without a pretty obvious chance to save them. You simply pick a companion that you like, and chances are you're able to romance them at some point. And you know what? That approach has all the suspense of your average dating sim; which is to say, not much. (Uhh, I mean.... Dating sim? What's that? ;o)
I never played Walking Dead, so TWAU was my first experience with a game just flat-out killing off a character that I perceived to be a possible love interest. I had no knowledge of the comics either, so when it was revealed I actually - you won't believe this - FELT AN EMOTION.
I think the game industry these days is afraid of doing anything story-wise that might offend gamers, or make them experience anything but fuzzy-headed enjoyment... And it's just depressing for someone, like me, who enjoys it when media challenges them. It's like gaming is an ocean of B-movie equivalents, and developers like Telltale are the only ones brave enough to remember that gaming can be a form of art, and that art isn't meant to just make people mindlessly happy and carefree all the time. It's meant to surprise, and change people's perspectives in new and exciting ways!
It makes me sad that there are hordes of young male dudebros out there who'd give that up just to keep an attractive female character around to play house with.
So... I guess what I'm trying to say is this; we haven't known eachother long, Telltale, but I love you. Don't ever change.
/rant
Haha.. +1 for cool jack.. Made me laugh.. I'm just upset that all possible "romance interests" as some would put it.. Keep getting killed.. Telltale has no heart! Lol.. And if someone says it moves the plot along.. Please smack yourself for me.. I can't reach, haha.. A love interest can move the plot along.. Lots of things can be done with that, both positive and negative. Many many examples can be listed. But it has all been said before.. And I'm tired.
We can still get Bigby flipping out over Snow's death like Sam did in Sam & Max Season 3 Episode 3.
Come on, that's ridic. One the main reasons I love Telltale games is that they don't cater to just one demographic (you seem to be describing 12-15 year old boys) and rarely offend my feminist sensibilities. Believe it or not, the "vulnerable (seriously?), attractive female characters" don't just exist for your viewing pleasure. On the other hand, I agree about not killing them off - but I'm reserving judgement in case things aren't what they seem.
Of course this guy's profile picture would be Larry's -___-
Larry was always for getting laid and we were always for him to be at the butt of yet more jokes. Oh wait, wrong game...
First of all males are not the only ones who play games.And also there is no guarantee that Snow or even Faith are really dead.It's a prequel to the comics so it's actually impossible for at least Snow to be really dead.And I guess that if Bigby can figure a way to bring her back he will also be able to bring Faith back.
From a guy that read the novels, I'm pretty sure she's not dead. In the world of Fables, the relationship between Bigby and Snow is one where such a feat of bringing of her back to life would not maintain the canocity (not even sure that's a word) of the novels