Xeth Nyrrow wrote on Sep 7, 2024, 16:05:
Are you saying the battle of woke vs anti-woke is what killed this game more than anything? I agree that it's a polarizing force that ended up hurting more than helping but the bad core game play and bland design was the real cause imo. The over-the-top reactions by everyone I agree is a big issue, primarily because of social media's ubiquitous nature. It just amplifies everything and we see the impact immediately instead of days or weeks afterwards now.

I'm saying the reaction to the game was a primary cause in its demise. Optics and publicity are an important part of selling a product. Dustborn has a similar problem (and is also laden with gameplay complaints). Both it and Concord were not overly well received by both sides of the woke/anti-woke divide. One sides blows the DEI dogwhistle and the other side says it's pandering. Thus my previous statement of extreme reactionism and every side playing the vicitmhood card comes in to play.

You can recover from a bad launch. It's difficult as Hell but not impossible. No Man's Sky is a good example of this. So are most Bethesda games (Not you, Starfield. Sit down). What you cannot recover from is a bad look.

I want to be clear that I am all for inclusion and I think there plenty of examples we can use to illustrate where it was done well and naturally. For example, Suvi in Mass Effect: Andromeda was gay and Claire in Cyberpunk 2077 was trans. Those were neat bits of information about them as characters but it wasn't their whole personality. But when you make that one of the points of your game, you're not stepping on a landmine. You're jumping up and down on it with both feet as hard as you can. It's like the corporations that go balls deep on Pride Month. My LGBTQIA+ friends look at it with no small amount of derision because they know it's pandering to generate more revenue. Then you have the other side (MAGAts, "DEI IS TEH DEBIL" mouthbreathers, and so on) that go apeshit as well.

Regardless of their persuasion, no one likes having an ideology, any ideology, shoved in their face and that is exactly what happens when you make "representation" a selling point. Do it naturally and do it in a way that makes sense to the overall universe your entertainment is presenting. Then it becomes part of the universe.