So as of the 'important' revelation that Tracer is gay, I've wondered just what the importance of the revelation is. Seems like there are angry videogame players (people who are not part of the 'fandom' but rather just play the game) who are angry that their (favorite) character is suddenly gay, but on the other hand also LGBT people who are thrilled to have representation.

Seems wonderful innit.

I think we can all agree that being mad over a character you like being gay is rather stupid since A) that character is fictional. What were you hoping for, to bone that fictional virtu-puss? And B) the artist ultimately decides what sexuality (if any) the character has. So already we can assume that those that are angry are mad for either a stupid reason, or a reason entirely different.

And that reason is, in my opinion, the same reason why LGBT people should be dissatisfied with the execution of this otherwise good thing. Cause it seems very much like the inclusion of Tracer as an LGBT character was done not to promote the values of diversity (getting along and such) nor to show of representation (that would imply the game was meant to show off all sides of society, which would be a nice argument if it weren't for the fact we have a sentient talking gorilla walking around, or the robot shooting orbs at people left and right) but rather as a business end idea implemented with a positive PR spin.

My reason for thinking along these lines is that they chose Tracer, who has acted as a flagship for Overwatch more or less since day one. So clearly, her gayness would have a large impact and (in theory) a larger reach. Now this is not really all that bad I guess, since it's entirely possible she was designed as a gay character, and then later on, the decision was made to have her be the figure head.

But consider also that the inclusion of LGBT characters was hyped up since the reveal, and with the approach being more of a hyped up game release than an actual release of information (which would've come unannounced, much like say patch notes, or a video released on their channel or something similar) it seems like Blizzard wanted to reach a large part of the community (both those that play the game and the fandom, who don't necessarily play the game.. at all) so as to make sure that everyone knew about it.

So that already seems to me like they made her gay because, well, diversity. It also made it feel slightly tacked on in the sense that the character doesn't really need a sexuality in order to function.

Her gayness won't affect her in game accuracy.
Her gayness won't affect her in game ultimate.
Her gayness won't affect her in game .. anything.

So what even is the point of going through the trouble of giving her a sexuality? I don't really see the added value here except for diversity, and the way it was done makes it seem like diversity for the sake of business PR and not for social awareness.

The fact that they opted for diversity is not good or bad in my eyes, it's the intent behind it that decides whether it is good or bad, at least in my eyes.

Like when we had that Harry Potter theatre show, and they casted a black Hermione. I don't really consider that pandering because as J.K. Rowling herself said (she was involved in casting IIRC) the woman was chosen for her acting capability, not the color of her skin.

This doesn't feel the same way.

Furthermore, I wonder why they didn't opt for other characters. Making Zarya be gay would be stereotypical and somewhat insulting, but it might've been interesting to see male characters be represented as homosexual. Why?

Because to me that would've shown a genuine support to the cause - female homosexuals do not quite face the same level of abuse as male homosexuals especially in gaming because there are just very few homosexual men in gaming, like the community itself. It'd have made a far greater (and believable) point if they made McCree gay for Genji or something.

Instead it seems to have been the case that they made a conscious decision to make the flagship woman a homosexual - her being a lesbian limited the fallout from the mostly male heterosexual in-game community (who likely don't care as much), her being a lesbian and thus gay improving the vision of the largely LGBT fandom. Or just the LGBT community in general (people not even involved in the game have probably taken notice, no?)

And to me that again signals a business decision, not a social awareness decision.

---

Now why is this an issue to begin with? I don't think the fallout from the community was big, at all. Overwatch is a gigantic game, with a gigantic community, and those few threads on Blizzards forums were hardly representative of all players (and I can say with moderate security that I am also sure a lot of them were sarcastic..) and I think most people do not actually give a fuck about the sexuality of the character (let alone are aware of it).

Now here's where I have to admit I am not sure what I think on the issue - it depends entirely on the intent and naturally I do not think Blizzard will openly admit they made their flagship character gay for business purposes. So I am left to make a judgement on what I feel were their motives.

If they honestly made her gay for social awareness - I don't really care, don't play the game enough to care, and don't have any real connection to the character, so good on Blizzard for representing homosexual characters I guess. I wish they had made a big a fuzz about Symmetra being autistic - that went largely under the radar, nobody gave a fuck about it, nobody really talked about it.

If they made her gay for business purposes, which I do believe they did, I feel like that's somewhat questionable behavior. For starters, that meant that a characters' gayness was used as a commodity to increase support of a product. Second off, it feels like forced diversity, which in turn feels fake.

And if anything the LGBT community should be upset at that if that is the case - after all, you are people, not tokens to be used as 'fun quirky characters' that you can use at your whim and will to enlarge the popularity of your product. Not that I intend to tell you how to feel - but that is more or less what it is. You are being used as a business commodity - really, you're not seen as anything other than a source of popularity to be exploited. A fandom to pander to. And if they made this decision as a business decision and you are still satisfied with their choice - congratulations, you're a bit of a cop out.

So in conclusion, you could really say that the entire discussion is more or less entirely based off of the thought of whether or not they did this as a way to show social awareness, or as a PR/business move. And if it was the former, you kind of have to question why they did it the way they did it, no? Because in the end it shouldn't matter if she is gay or not - so why parade it around like some show horse? Really makes it seem like 'look at us, we're so progressive'.

The evidence that this was a business move was the fact that they hyped it. I forgot they actually made overwatch comics, and it was only when every social media circle I belong to exploded into "OMG A CHARACTER IN OVERWATCH IS GBLT" that I remembered. Who they chose for this stunt didn't really matter. However, there were a lot of people "shipping" Tracer with other female characters from the game, so I think they decided to cater to those fans and just make Tracer officially gay. I think the idea is that the comic will eventually turn readers into players.

But honestly, I've seen very few examples of characters that are gay for plot reasons or are gay "just because." It's almost always treated as a big surprise to get people talking about the "thing" again. I honestly don't think a lot of people read the comics, and this was done to increase readership and get the comic views up before the end of the year. But who really knows?

Sadly, business politics can be quite parasitic when they creep into our entertainment. Maybe when people stop getting exited/offended over a character's sexual preference we'll stop seeing this kind of abuse.

I feel like Tracer in particular was picked for a few, very good reasons, and also that Tracer was picked over a male also has some good reasons:

1. As you mentioned, Tracer is the flagship character of the franchise. I overheard a conversation in my GAME store a few days back with a kid wanting to buy Overwatch and the mother asking if the girl on the front (Tracer,) was the main character. She's plastered everywhere, and she's the one that most people know of outside the gaming community.

2. People were shipping the fuck out of Tracer (and the chicks in general.) The chicks in Overwatch are carefully structured waifu bait. Tracer is slim but has a nice ass, Mercy is a downright MILF, Widow is exotic (French accent and weird skin,) Mei is adorable in the Disney sense with her chubby cheeks and large eyes, Zarya appeals to those who like to be bench-pressed by their SO, Sym, Sombra and Pharah all fill the role of Indian, Latin and generic middle-eastern (pretty popular porn genres.) Ana doesn't fit into this list, but it fits everyone else. By making Tracer a confirmed Lesbian, suddenly a whole lot of shippers just got more substance.

3. There are no good male pairings in Overwatch. Wait, hear me out before you bombard me. There is litterally nobody good to have an MxM relationship with in Overwatch. Hanzo and Genji are brothers, Roadhog is designed to be big, bulky and repulsive, Junkrat is dangerously insane, Zenyatta is a fucking robot who has never shown to be capable of love, Reaper is edgelord supreme and constantly dying/being rebuilt, Soldier could work, but you have no one else to pair him with. Tobjorn is literally the opposite of sex, Winston is a gorilla... See the issue?

Just my thoughts of why they picked Tracer to be lesbian rather than any other character and why lesbian over gay.

@BrokenPromise Yes, I agree with more or less everything you said. The reason that this move in particular was somewhat annoying (to me) was because I strongly doubt that making a huge deal out of it is beneficial to the LGBT movement. It's like screaming 'GUYS. LOOK AT THIS CHARACTER. SHE'S GAY. HOW.. HOW UNIQUE IS THAT!!!!' and portraying homosexuals as if they're some commodity, something super special, where as in reality most homosexuals are, well, regular people.

Of course she is still a regular person (as far as we can expect that from an Overwatch hero, but she's quite normal compared to some other characters) but on the business meta-end of this all, she was portrayed as a super special character because she was gay. Which led to me making my point: if you wanted to cater to social awareness and not PR stunts, you would've made the character homosexual without the added poo-ha.

@Dannyrulx 1. Yea.

2. IDK son, Ana fits the list of being a real milf (as opposed to Mercy, who looks like a schoolboy fantasy milf). Also, I suppose pairing her and Pharah would be slightly niché. But as we know, these fandoms aren't particularly opposed to breaking taboo's like that.

Never the less, I don't feel like this particular point makes the release of her being homosexual any less screamy and pandering. Trust me from a business perspective I totally understand what they did, I just don't think it's this social awareness thing that they have portrayed it to be. Catering to shippers =/= awareness, catering to shippers = more support for your product.

3. I don't really know, they are still equally masculine, each and every one of them. And Junkrat and Roadhog most certainly do get shipped by the fandom and I can totally see why. They just match up. Which to me is even bigger proof that they didn't make this decision for the sake of LGBT awareness but simply to earn support and/or money.

Also this kind of goes against the things they did with Tracer - Tracer has a girlfriend that is not at all involved with Overwatch Program? So why can't they make someone for Soldier outside of the program? I think they didn't because male homosexuality is still a bigger no-no than female sexuality ever was or will be.

@Buddha I understand your frustration. It's sad our entertainment industry plays these games with us, but it is everywhere. The only reason why we're talking about this is because overwatch is so big. But it happens everywhere.

I am a bit curious who everyone else would have made gay though, and how that would have been any less scummy. would the gay community have taken offense if Winsten was made gay? an ugly, hairy ape representing the GBLT movement?

It really is a shame that Tracer's preference in genitals was the draw for the comic. There's actually a really cool story about the spirit of Christmas in there, but it's been entirely overshadowed.

I think that it's simply the decision that makes the most sense for Blizzard, because of all the reasons you all have mentioned already.

The LGBT community is happy because they got a 'high-profile' lesbian character.
The players don't need to care because literally nothing has changed in-game because of this (though admittedly the idea of her having some sorta wobbling when aiming at female characters is pretty funny).
The worst rational reaction people can have to this is exactly what you are expressing: questioning the necessity, effect and so on of the decision. And there's nothing wrong with healthy debate.
The only ones who react truly negatively are people the majority shrugs off anyway.

So yeah, I think there's no agenda (gay or otherwise) being pushed with this. It's just an advantageous move for Blizzard's image and after all, what else do they need to care for?

Edit: Also @BrokenPromise. Much love. :P

I think it's sad when people base their gaming decisions on the sexual orientation of characters.

I don't give a fuck what orientation my character is, if it's a male going for females or a male going for orange sheep, I really don't care. Gameplay, people. It seems like we're getting marketing for everything but gameplay these days. Pretty graphics, they threw this name and that in, he/she is gay, but god forbid we market on the quality of the gameplay.

Mass Effect and Dragon Age and plenty other popular games had gay characters from day one and we all acted appropriately, its almost insulting to see these E-Weebs treat Overwatch as if it's making history here. Every time I hear something new about the game it makes me not want to play it. Team Fortress Waifu Edition Tumblr Bait bullshit. I cant wait till this franchise becomes out of date and cringe just like Undertale is.



Overwatch isnt original.

I am going to be completely honest, I expected Tracer to be gay so this wasn't that big of a shocker (honestly shouldn't be for anyone). Going to admit I thought it might end up being someone in the game already but that's probably since I've seen to much shippidty ship shipping.

I've got not problem with it since to me its just another part of Tracer's character. I remember I heard this in a Youtube video that its because people have known her for the better part of a year or two, people have gotten to know her other quirks like energy, cheerfulness, playfulness, etc. As such, being gay is just part of her instead of her most defining feature unlike if Blizzard released a new character who was gay.

People just need to chill the fuck out yo, Overwatch ain't going to become some tumblr TF2 knockoff and to me, the people who care about the sexual orientation of character are literally on the same damn coin wether they call it "social progress" or "SJW trash", don't make a difference in the end, just the two sides of the same coin. It comes down to: Do you care about a character's sexuality or do you not? Its not like Tracer being gay suddenly has any game play effects or changes to her voice lines.

But hey, at the end of the day, its just like Kermit the Frog: Ain't none of my business apparently.

I am going to be completely honest, I expected Tracer to be gay so this wasn't that big of a shocker (honestly shouldn't be for anyone). Going to admit I thought it might end up being someone in the game already but that's probably since I've seen to much shippidty ship shipping.

I've got not problem with it since to me its just another part of Tracer's character. I remember I heard this in a Youtube video that its because people have known her for the better part of a year or two, people have gotten to know her other quirks like energy, cheerfulness, playfulness, etc. As such, being gay is just part of her instead of her most defining feature unlike if Blizzard released a new character who was gay.

People just need to chill the fuck out yo, Overwatch ain't going to become some tumblr TF2 knockoff and to me, the people who care about the sexual orientation of character are literally on the same damn coin wether they call it "social progress" or "SJW trash", don't make a difference in the end, just the two sides of the same coin. It comes down to: Do you care about a character's sexuality or do you not? Its not like Tracer being gay suddenly has any game play effects or changes to her voice lines.

But hey, at the end of the day, its just like Kermit the Frog: Ain't none of my business apparently.

Well said right here. The only opposition I have to the whole thing is that it feels like Blizzard DID do this solely to make money, and well... I'm not called "The Weeaboo Communist" because it sounds stupid. I do suppose it's totally possible this was a planned part of her character based off of someone's actual vision for her instead of a CEO slamming his fist down on a table and saying "If we make her gay, then gay people will buy our stuff!" But I can't shake the feeling that this was just for money, and most of this thread sees it that way too. There's nothing wrong with her being gay, and it's even a good bit of representation (even if it DOES just so happen to cater to both male lesbian fetishists and actual lesbians at the same time as if it's an extremely good business decision using an attractive character to turn a profit), but all I see is Blizzard using the LGBTQ community for a quick buck by pretending to be on their side.

At least it's Blizzard, a video game company that doesn't actively screw over nearly as many people as corporations that take on other roles. Like the entire fast food industry. And to be fair, given the amount of times I've heard someone on some line of it all saying something about X Blizzard higher up being [Insert Literally Any Sexual (Or Otherwise Since The Gaming Community Is Quickly Becoming More And More Tied to /pol/) Minority You Can Possibly Imagine Here]. So it's possible that there's genuine good will and support behind it all. Which would honestly make it okay, but I guess I'll never know what the case is because I won't get to talk with whoever made the decision.

@Keyguyperson I mean I agree with what you're saying mostly, the question I have for you is; hasn't Tumblr increasingly been fetishizing male homosexuals too?

@ClocktowerEchos I don't really care. I barely play the game, I have no connection to Tracer (tbh, think she's a tad annoying) but what is increasingly annoying to me is the way a) the agenda is being pushed where being 'socially aware' is a PR stunt and b) the way homosexuals treat this like some big victory where as in reality homosexual couples have been a thing in videogames forever, and nobody ever gave a shit.

No, they only like it now because, uh.. idk, fandom?

I am a bit curious who everyone else would have made gay though, and how that would have been any less scummy.

I'd make Winston gay. I mean, it's a homosexual giant talking sentient gorilla, what is there not to love about that?

For a more serious homosexual character I'd probably make McCree gay, and do it from the start. A) it has that brokeback appeal, and B) give him voicelines commenting on Genji's ass in that spandex ninja suit. That'd be fucking hilarious.

Something even the 'whiny straight cishet males' could have a giggle about.

Hell probably same for Tracer - if they made it humorous and included in the game rather than some outside thing that doesn't affect the game at all (not even voicelines, for example 'Hey Tracer, your ass is looking mighty swift in that suit' 'Uhh, thanks, but I have a girlfriend, Torbjorn' or something) which made it seem like some strange agenda. I'm sure nobody would've given a shit then.

I can tell you that her gayness definitely affects her in-game cancer. Someone always has to pick Tracer now, in every match I've played since the comic.

Even if they aren't good as Tracer.

Especially when they aren't good as Tracer.

Blizzard has already said that Tracer is merely the first LGBTQ+ (how many letters is it now?) character to be revealed. Based on Hanzo's extremely fashionable haircut in the same comic, I'm assuming he will be next (though obviously not in a gay relationship with his brother). @Buddha, you missed the most popular MxM pairing in the whole fandom, which is Hanzo + McCree. I doubt Blizzard will ever make that a thing but it's feasible. They're both handsome, masculine men, and making them gay would be a strong statement.

@Hank McCree and Hanzo just scares me because it goes full Brokeback meets Samurai and that's just a scary combination.



Truth be told I think the only thing that bothers me about this entire situation is that it feels like they're using homosexuality as a parade horse to show how progressive and cool they are (seemingly) and if anything I consider that more offensive to homosexuals and bisexuals than anything. So in turn the entire thing is dependent on their intent.

I'm honestly of the opinion that this is the sort of representation that we can stand to see more of-- it's incredibly rare these days to find LGBT characters with personalities and roles outside of their identity. By making Tracer gay and then deciding to not change her character at all, Blizzard effectively established that her sexuality is not her defining characteristic (even if this wasn't necessarily their intent.)

I'd also argue that, given the low quality and general scarcity of LGBT representation in the media, even if this whole thing is a massive corporate ploy, it's sending the message that a large portion of the public is willing to shell out money for non-straight (and hopefully non-cis) characters. If Blizzard can prove that LGBT characters are profitable, that could encourage other large businesses to head in that direction and eventually result in some more solid representation in the future.

Edit: just realized how old this thread was. Sorry to drag it back from the dead, y'all.

You still can't air strafe in Overwatch.

Saw the title and thought it was about someone here. Never played Overwatch.

It's nothing new. It's old hat actually. I've played lesbian characters before, in better games.

I don't know what everybody's problem is. They've finally made British time travel porn accessible to people who aren't gay for Doctor Who.