Current Events > Ubisoft leadership: "Women don't sell"

(+) Yeah! (+)

Nice to see Schreier doing well at a mainstream publication.

Ubisoft can eat a dick though, if women "didn't sell", then why is Cotton still relevant today after nearly 30 years? There's plenty of games that sell decently with female leads.
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cuttin_in_farm posted...

Legit question. Has there been a recent game that failed largely due to a female protag?

Isnt this an outdated belief? By old white dudes?

Yes

thats what makes it sexist. Because it is a factually incorrect belief that games with female protagonists dont sell. There plenty of big name games that prove otherwise

the Assassins Creed franchise, one of gaming biggest franchises at this point, is not going to struggle to sell a game with a woman as the main character

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*Looks up TLoU2 sales numbers*

Riiiiight...

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They're clearly blind to waifu culture. Then again, Wayforward is probably one of the few Western companies to truly capitalize on that.

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was ubisoft the company with the president who said that gaming was the last safe space left for straight white men?

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Guns_of_Verdun posted...

They're right

Even in Mass Effect less than 1 in 5 players play as femshep and that's a "progressive" company

How man Call of Duty players do you think respect women?

Surprising since like all of CE apparently played femshep

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Tomb Raider, TLOU2, Metroid, Horizon, etc etc etc

This is just empirically false lol. Female protagonists aren't even a new thing in games. Mrs Pac-Man was the big sequel to Pac-MAN FFS.

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bIuerain posted...

Tomb Raider, TLOU2, Metroid, Horizon, etc etc etc

This is just empirically false lol. Female protagonists aren't even a new thing in games. Mrs Pac-Man was the big sequel to Pac-MAN FFS.

Counterpoints:

• Lara Croft's original draw was partially tied to her overt sexual appeal
• TLOU2 was a sequel that could ride on TLOU1.
• You never knew Samus' gender until the end of Metroid 1 & while well known now, she primarily wears power armor most of the time.
• Nothing to say about Horizon.
• Mrs. Pac-Man was not only a sequel, but one that wasn't even fully designed by Namco.

It's not impossible to sell with a female character, but hard truth is that more often than not, most people find it easier to relate with a character that is the same race, gender, etc. as themselves, otherwise the issue from lack of female leads would mostly not exist.

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darkbuster posted...

Counterpoints:
* Lara Croft's original draw was partially tied to her overt sexual appeal
* TLOU2 was a sequel that could ride on TLOU1.
* You never knew Samus' gender until the end of Metroid 1 & while well known now, she primarily wears power armor most of the time.
* Nothing to say about Horizon.
* Mrs. Pac-Man was not only a sequel, but one that wasn't even fully designed by Namco.

It's not impossible to sell with a female character, but hard truth is that more often than not, most people find it easier to relate with a character that is the same race, gender, etc. as themselves, otherwise the issue from lack of female leads would mostly not exist.

your argument for TLOU2 is an argument for why an Assassins Creed game could have a female protagonist

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Touhou seems to be doing okay.

darkbuster posted...

truth is that more often than not, most people find it easier to relate with a character that is the same race, gender, etc. as themselves, otherwise the issue from lack of female leads would mostly not exist.

This is something else I disagree with. Its just another point people bring up without thinking. Anyone can relate to a character with abandonment. Anyone can relate to a character with social issues. Etc etc.

What youre trying to highlight is representation which is different than who you can relate to. Lack of representation causes subconscious influences when people dont see themselves in media. See: homosexuality and how every couple is heterosexual.

If a little girl is new to her school and is having trouble fitting in because her home life is dysfunctional and she has low self-esteemed, Im not suddenly going to find it hard to relate to her just because shes a girl.

The issue is that female characters often times just arent given compelling characters. Or are given cliche story arcs like woman in predominantly male field.

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Choco posted...

i'm sure the """anti-censorship""" crowd will complain about this as much as they complain about sjws or whatever

Workplace discrimination and harassment isnt funny at all, and certainly not the time to shitpost about other people being hypocrites when you yourself do absolutely nothing.

darkbuster posted...

Counterpoints:
* Lara Croft's original draw was partially tied to her overt sexual appeal
* TLOU2 was a sequel that could ride on TLOU1.
* You never knew Samus' gender until the end of Metroid 1 & while well known now, she primarily wears power armor most of the time.
* Nothing to say about Horizon.
* Mrs. Pac-Man was not only a sequel, but one that wasn't even fully designed by Namco.

It's not impossible to sell with a female character, but hard truth is that more often than not, most people find it easier to relate with a character that is the same race, gender, etc. as themselves, otherwise the issue from lack of female leads would mostly not exist.

I would argue that the issue exists because most people are stupid. There are billions of men and women on Earth. Sharing genitals does not exactly make you a relatable person.

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TheGoldenEel posted...

your argument for TLOU2 is an argument for why an Assassins Creed game could have a female protagonist

True, but when you've got to pitch this stuff to executives who unlikely have any deeper understanding of the media they preside over, the "safest" options are what's typically desired. Even if it can still sell, a female protagonist might lower sales from what could have been.

Questionmarktarius posted...

Touhou seems to be doing okay.

Touhou is also one of the longest running embodiment of waifu culture, but it is a long running series of nearly exclusive female characters.

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"People will tolerate a character in a franchise that they are already 10 games deep into" is not a very compelling argument for why one type of character should be used over another.

The argument needs to be about how you can sell a successful new franchise with a female protagonist, not just that you can throw it into a game that your fans are going to buy no matter what.

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What about all the booth babes?

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Every single dude in that picture looks like they got plastic surgery to look like a rapist
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Who do you think knows more about what sells to what demographic:

-Some random woke dude on Twitter who is almost certaiy virtue signalling by even gas lighting the statement about female leads not selling.

-Or guys whose job is to MAKE MONEY and MAXIMIZE SALES AT ALL COSTS who probably do marketing analysis for this sort of thing.

I'm gonna go with the later. Also, I feel a lot of examples brought forward to female leads selling aren't good examples. Lara Croft is a largely super vapid lead, Samus arguably even more so and any attempt to humanize her in Other M was met with backlash, and Horizon had robot fucking dinosaurs and insane graphics so prob could have a turd for a protagonist and sold.

Ass Creed is actually pretty damn story driven, so this isn't just a pretty face kicking ass and taking names, you'll probably have some actual relationship drama and stuff that is actually unique to a female character that a primarily male audience might not resonate with.

Even Aloy from Horizon was arguably very much so a male lead just in a female body to where the story pretty much made her as Tom boy as possible, no relationship drama or anything like that, etc.

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MajesticFerret posted...

-Or guys whose job is to MAKE MONEY and MAXIMIZE SALES AT ALL COSTS who probably do marketing analysis for this sort of thing.

As we all know what makes games successful is rich white executives making decisions based on focus group feedback

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Hot women do sell tho >_>

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How about they just keep offering a choice for the player and make both genders of the main character compelling ?


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darkbuster posted...

Counterpoints:
* Lara Croft's original draw was partially tied to her overt sexual appeal
* TLOU2 was a sequel that could ride on TLOU1.
* You never knew Samus' gender until the end of Metroid 1 & while well known now, she primarily wears power armor most of the time.
* Nothing to say about Horizon.
* Mrs. Pac-Man was not only a sequel, but one that wasn't even fully designed by Namco.

It's not impossible to sell with a female character, but hard truth is that more often than not, most people find it easier to relate with a character that is the same race, gender, etc. as themselves, otherwise the issue from lack of female leads would mostly not exist.

Point by point:

*So? Sex appeal or not, Tomb Raider was a big seller. The whole franchise is a direct contradiction of "women don't sell."

*TLOU2 sold 4 million copies right out the gate. At this point it's set to maybe even outsell the original.

*Okay? Samus is female and the protagonist of one of Nintendo's flagship titles, and her being female hasn't been a secret in over 30 years. Granted, Nintendo is barely doing anything with the franchise these days, but it was still a big seller for two generations of consoles between the GC/GBA and Wii/DS. It's a direct contradiction of "women don't sell." A big part of the marketing of Smash Bros Brawl was introducing Zero Suit Samus. One of Metroid's villains, Ridley, was also a huge reveal for Ultimate. If female protagonists didn't sell, no one would even know who Ridley is.

*Right. A new franchise coming right out the gate with a female protagonist, and selling big, serves as a strong counterpoint to "women don't sell."

*Mrs Pac-Man I concede, I was half-joking with that bit. Pac-Man is a yellow pie with a slice taken out. His wife is that but with a red bow on top and some lipstick.

There's countless other examples of successful female-lead games. Bayonetta, Shantae, Mirror's Edge, Perfect Dark, Hell Blade, etc etc. Like, it's just straight up not true lol.

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cuttin_in_farm posted...

What youre trying to highlight is representation which is different than who you can relate to. Lack of representation causes subconscious influences when people dont see themselves in media. See: homosexuality and how every couple is heterosexual.

Regardless of what you want to call it, the point is that it's easier to relate with a character that is more like oneself, & sharing traits such as race & gender makes that easier. Tyler Perry probably wouldn't have a business model without it.

MajesticFerret posted...

-Or guys whose job is to MAKE MONEY and MAXIMIZE SALES AT ALL COSTS who probably do marketing analysis for this sort of thing.

Twitter activists are only truly interested in pushing their own their own social beliefs on others, but the guy in marketing probably has no real comprehension of what actually makes a hit, beyond what they can derive from statistics, which is why you get bland "design by committee" style media, that just involves sticking a bunch of elements that were in prior successes. The reality is that creative work takes creative minds, & trying to run it with statistics can only produce bland derivatives.

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darkbuster posted...

Regardless of what you want to call it, the point is that it's easier to relate with a character that is more like oneself, & sharing traits such as race & gender makes that easier.

Again, I disagree with this notion. For the obvious reason that sharing a gender or race does not equal similar experiences. At all.

Youre referring to representation which has very little to do with how you personally relate to a character.

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Metroid: *exists*
Horizon Zero Dawn: *exists*
Ubisoft: Women don't sell.

Uh...what?

eston posted...

no, gamers just want compelling characters who are appropriate to the setting

Funny, when you consider the "We need moar dIVeRsiTY in our video games, movies, etc." spiel parroted by a certain group.

Only reason I bought FFVII remake was Tifa.

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Though the broad statement is a bit hyperbolic, it's likely true to a certain extent. Something absolutely superb or filled with hype will generally sell well no matter what, but you can probably see certain percentage drops if you look at it from a broad perspective. There are probably some games that would have done better with X-demographic by XX% if the lead was X, Y, or Z. These are companies that likely have focus groups for just judging the marketing appeal of only box art, so they're dealing with way more internal data.

Unless it is sequel to a game I really liked (Nier 2), I never buy games that force you to play as a female character. Just don't like playing girls sorry

There's a reason they put Alexios on the cover despite having Kassandra as the clear canon choice.

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It's a shame Tomb Raider, Metroid, Horizon Dawn etc never sold any games. I guess Ubisoft is right.

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I think this is a complicated issue. It's clearly not accurate to say that it's impossible for a female led game to sell well but I don't think saying "TLOU2(or whatever) sold well therefore the point has no merit" really works. Just look at the kid market for example. Plenty of times I've had nephews visit and I'll be playing a game with a femMC and they'll be like "why you playing as a girl Uncle? that's lame". And I really can't imagine my nephews are unique in that regard. Young males are a pretty big force in the industry and if you're going for max profit catering to them would probably lead to more money then catering to people that would prefer a femMC.

nemu posted...

Though the broad statement is a bit hyperbolic, it's likely true to a certain extent. Something absolutely superb or filled with hype will generally sell well no matter what, but you can probably see certain percentage drops if you look at it from a broad perspective. There are probably some games that would have done better with X-demographic by XX% if the lead was X, Y, or Z. These are companies that likely have focus groups for just judging the marketing appeal of only box art, so they're dealing with way more internal data.

Alien Isolation would probably have made more sales and gotten a sequel if it had a male protagonist

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brotrrwinner posted...

This might be a bitter pill to swallow for some but here goes: choosing to have a male character over a female one due to financial reasons isn't sexism

Lol yeah this so hard.

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Grischnak posted...

Young males are a pretty big force in the industry and if you're going for max profit catering to them would probably lead to more money then catering to people that would prefer a femMC.

Maybe this is a "dudebro" issue.

Looked gf posted...

Alien Isolation would probably have made more sales and gotten a sequel if it had a male protagonist

Considering the source material... I kinda doubt that. Pandering to fans of Alien was most of the game's marketing.

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Is this toxic masculinity

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Looked gf posted...

Alien Isolation would probably have made more sales and gotten a sequel if it had a male protagonist

Something only someone who has never heard of the franchise would say.

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GallisOTK posted...

The decision to add a playable male option isn't sexist in itself, but their reasoning for why to add it definitely is.

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bIuerain posted...

Considering the source material... I kinda doubt that. Pandering to fans of Alien was most of the game's marketing.

Well obviously but Im just speculating from this topic. The publisher said sales were terrible, would a male lead/different storyline have made a difference? Idk

Funkydog posted...

Something only someone who has never heard of the franchise would say.

Oh fuck off. AI is in one of my all time favourites

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hockeybub89 posted...

Fuck those sexist assholes

Facts don't care about your feelings

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The developers wanted to have a game with a woman protagonist. Executives said no.

If this was literally anything else (even the genders being flipped) we'd have #Gamers flipping out about it.

Looked gf posted...

The publisher said sales were terrible, would a male lead/different storyline have made a difference? Idk

It was a stealthy horror game that followed Colonial Marines and got a bad review at IGN. So no. Prey also flopped.

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Yeah Im fairly certain the main character being an unseen first person female in Alien Isolation did not affect its sales

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https://twitter.com/disco_jill/status/1285590827830517761

Ubisoft suck. No wonder their games are all so safe.

The Gamergate-type crowd liked to pretend this stuff doesn't happen though and that developers can make a game starring any character they want.

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suggesting that people hated Other M because it attempted to "humanize" Samus is remarkably disingenuous

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hyperpowder posted...

*Looks up TLoU2 sales numbers*

Riiiiight...

I actually know someone who isn't interested in it because you play as Ellie. He is right though RE2 sold more than RE3. Silent Hill 2 more than 3. DOA is the least popular 3d fighting series probably because of it's mostly female cast. Also is anyone hyped for The Medium and Returnal? You know the games with the middle age women.

These dweebs had the audacity to put that message of inclusion at the start of their games and then pull crap like this

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I think The Medium and Returnal look great. But they're more mid budget games so they'll never be as big as the others.

The big counter-point to this is Horizon Zero Dawn. Which is a game that is very similar to Assassin's Creed. It probably wasn't far off from outselling the last two AC games either which considering it's an exclusive says a lot too.

I don't see why a female led Assassin's Creed game wouldn't sell.

We hear this same shit for movies and then people wonder why they make stuff like Captain Marvel into a big deal.

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Are we acting like people weren't mad they had to play with CJ in GTA San Andreas because he's black?

BTW...I played and beat Rise of the Tomb Raider this past weekend and it felt like I was playing Uncharted.

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1NfamousACE_2 posted...

Are we acting like people weren't mad they had to play with CJ in GTA San Andreas because he's black?

BTW...I played and beat Rise of the Tomb Raider this past weekend and it felt like I was playing Uncharted.

Btw GTA San Andreas sold incredibly well

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