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NikhilR said:

One aspect to keep in mind with protagonists (women or otherwise) is what a default is and how the audience feels about it.

No, that's exactly the thing you shouldn't keep in mind, because for this you'd have to assume that there is some default "normal" state and everything else is just a modification of that default. That's not true in real life, and it doesn't seem healthy to hold that thought in public minds through art.
If you just continue to conform to - to respect - their prejudice, then you only help the "core audience" to stay close-minded and entitled in their ignorance. Only sustain the state of unconscious fear and hatred before the "unknown" and "exotic".
Games shape us, shape communities, like any other art. It's not just about reaching new audience - it's about imagining the world where we don't treat others as collections of labels and modifiers. If you can imagine it, it can eventually become. If we only look at most efficient way to sell product, than we might as well say goodbye to the industry now - it wouldn't be worth saving. There would be no point to it.
Looking at some gaming communities now, you'd think we're on the fast track to the past, when it was okay to assume that the typical gamer is an ugly teen with zero self-respect or life... and everyone else were not "real" gamers.

Gonna pre-face this rant by saying this just represents my opinion as an individual, as a person, homo sapiens.

@NikhilR

EDIT: im not gonna comment on the culture war stuff as i agree and disagree with tons of points and thats a whole other thing.
Im going to just mention stuff me as a dev and as a consumer think about some behaviours from our industry that need to change for sucess : 


- Insulting\belitling the consumers ( gamers ) due to their less informed\wrong opinions. We cant expect consumers to know how the pie is made and that maybe that game that came out crappy had a ton of reasons for their development to be a nightmare, thus outputting a game that doesnt resonate with the fanbase\butchers an established IP. I have a motto "retards get the mute button", that means people that send threats\insults, i simply mute them and dont engage, i dont put them in the same basked as consumers that are disgrunted.

- We are one of the few industries where consumers pay full price for a broken\unfinished product. Imagine buying a meal or a car where half of it was missing\didnt work, i know this might not be a "fair" comparizon, but lets just use the alegory. I honestly think we have a ton of understanding from the consumer base and "expectancy" on a broken product. We should be inputable full refunds if the product we deliver is broken, thats my consumer opinion.

- Toxic positivity IS a big problem imo. Lots of artists know each other and are friends and mingle quite often, thus making the "honest" feedback on what they are making hard to give, either for personal reasons\political reasons, wich usually make actual legitimate feedback beeing grouped with mean spirited feedback ( i have never seen mean spirited feedback given in my career btw, even if its "brutal" feedback, it always has a valid point ). Not beeing able to freely give feedback on stuff that isnt up to par\will make the final product suffer, due to us beeing afraid to hurt someone`s feelings is insane, learn to detach yourself from your work, saying something isnt working isnt an attack on you, artist, but a "this isnt working with the big picture"

- im 100% in favour of hiring based solely on merit and i believe it should be like that in all jobs. But atm people that come from diverse backgrounds are also under fire cause they can be assumed to be hired not based on merit, this definately backfired imo to people that had nothing to do with those decisions. 

- Devs should be given media training due to how they expose themselves and engage in social media. Beeing vitriolic\acting insane\unhinged in social media will definately put you in a bad spot considering the company youre supposed to represent. I believe devs should have the right to free speech but also have in mind that working for very public companies puts them in an easier path to be misconstructed\everything they say can be taken out of context. And honestly there are a ton of people in this industry that behave like total insane people that make me think "hell i wouldnt be caught working alongside this person even if they gave me a million bucks" We are humans, people make mistakes, people sometimes act like retards sometimes and thats normal. Dont expect people not to act on it if you publicly display that. 

- At the end of they day games come out broken\unoptimized\requiring NASA computers to run due to poor resource management\production hell. I as an artist and beeing involved in productions know the pain of this on my colleagues and i feel for them, hell even tho Concord for example, didnt resonate with the consumer base ( wich i totally get why ) i find the weapon art for instance simply gorgeous, great materials, great design etc, does this mean that the artists involved in that production are "bad" ? some might be not up to par ! but some of them are also great ! this happens everywhere. At the end of the day it comes to resource management and a shitty pre-production "we do it as we go" mindset with design by comitee beeing the imperative norm, wich imo, just bogs down everything and makes baking a cake a nightmare.

- We are not "better" than other people with other jobs nor we should be cut slack due to that. At the end of the day this is a job, a VERY fullfilling job that i feel super lucky to have and love to do, but not in a million years i will ask people to cut me some slack due to things that are outside of my control. What is in my control i should definately be held up to standards, and thats how i operate in life.

I know this is maybe unpopular with my colleagues, but i like to be honest and not say "this is okay" when it clearly isnt, i wouldnt be helping anyone like that. And we are all humans that want to do the best we can, wich sometimes simply doesnt happen by a miriad of factors.

Again, im sure people disagree with me and thats okay, this is what i believe as an individual and i am always open to learn from my mistakes\other perspectives  

I would recommend not reading so much down in all these internet rabbit holes, and instead just plain making more art. Put in the time to get better at your craft.