ANALYSIS: Opponents of playersexuality argue that it erases queer representation. Does it really?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Controversial opinion time: Dragon Age II<\/em><\/a> is the best game in Bioware\u2019s Dragon Age franchise. I would even go so far as to say that it\u2019s one of the best video games ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n True video game connoisseurs are likely rolling their eyes at this point. And they\u2019re not wrong to. Dragon Age II<\/em> was put together on a rushed timeline<\/a> (barely a year and a half of development<\/a>), and the cut corners are obvious: maps repeat over and over, the fighting design is bad, the loot is boring, the armour uninspiring. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But what hooked me was the writing\u2014particularly the characters. The game revolves around a group of six companions who join your player-character, Hawke, to protect the city of Kirkwall. Your companions are simultaneously infuriating and compelling: they fight with each other, they help you, they betray you and (most importantly) they fall in love with you. Of the game\u2019s four romanceable characters, all four are bi or pansexual: interested in the player character no matter their gender. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When Dragon Age II<\/em> was released in 2011, its sheer number of queer romance options was an anomaly. Games like the Sims<\/em><\/a> (2000) and Fable II<\/em><\/a> <\/em>(2008) allowed gay relationships<\/a>, although they usually weren\u2019t paired with a long romantic storyline. Bioware cultivated a reputation for being queer-friendly; Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic<\/em><\/a> (2003) and Mass Effect 1<\/em><\/a> <\/em>(2007) and 2<\/em><\/a> (2010) all included queer romance options.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What set Dragon Age II<\/em> apart from its competition was abundance. If you wanted to pursue a queer relationship, you had exactly the same number of potential companions as someone looking to pursue a straight relationship. And these relationships would be as deeply drawn and as beautifully animated as the straight ones. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I found this game mechanic, now dubbed \u201cplayersexuality,\u201d liberating. In other video games, my favourite characters were often locked away from me by my choice of gender. If I wanted to, say, pursue Tali\u2019Zorah in Mass Effect<\/em>, I had to start the game over as a male protagonist. No such calculations were necessary in Dragon Age II<\/em>. And it wasn\u2019t just the freedom I appreciated: as a recently out bisexual, I was also smitten with a game that let me play the hero alongside a group of queer, pan and bisexual characters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Since Dragon Age II<\/em>, more and more games use a playersexual approach to romance, from indie games like Stardew Valley<\/em> (2016) and Boyfriend Dungeon<\/em> (2021), to big-budget role-playing games like Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> (2023). The fourth installment in the Dragon Age series, The Veilguard<\/em> (2024), has also re-embraced playersexuality, with all seven of the companions available for a player character to pursue<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But while playersexuality attracted me to the Dragon Age franchise, it has also been a lightning rod for very disparate groups of gamers. Conservative players, for example, argued that the LGBTQ2S+ relationships in Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> were shoehorned in to \u201csatisfy diversity quotas<\/a>.\u201d Players of Dragon Age II<\/em> complained that the companion Anders would always flirt with Hawke (male or female), which made it impossible to avoid queer content; they derided the all-bisexual cast as unrealistic, and as abandoning Bioware\u2019s \u201cmain demographic\u201d (straight male gamers<\/a>). <\/p>\n\n\n\n While their motivations are wildly different from conservative reviewers, some queer players also view playersexuality as empty inclusion. Playersexuality gets derided as a lazy shortcut by game writers and developers who can\u2019t be bothered to write properly queer (or straight) characters<\/a>. For these players, playersexuality is not representation\u2014it allows the player to pursue queer relationships, but without queer characterization. Queerness is not a fundamental part of the character\u2019s identity; it\u2019s a tactical decision to make gameplay easier, rather than a writing choice about a character\u2019s innate traits<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s not hard to understand why critics see playersexuality as a time-saving shortcut. Dragon Age II<\/em>\u2019s abundant romance options were explicitly the product of the game\u2019s time crunch. In an interview with Kotaku<\/em>, Dragon Age II\u2019<\/em>s lead writer David Gaider explained that the shortened development schedule meant the writers only had time to develop four romance options<\/a>: \u201cIf we decide to make them sort of a spread of sexualities that are immutable, then there\u2019s no choice for the player. They have one character available to them, and we didn\u2019t like that idea.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n At the same time, making a romance accessible to all players doesn\u2019t always save labour. In Dragon Age: Inquisition<\/em> (2014), Iron Bull\u2019s romance was originally restricted to characters of specific species because of Bull\u2019s anachronistic character design. Opening up his romance to all player characters was only possible because the cinematic designers put in massive amounts of time to make multiple versions of the romance scenes<\/a>. Meanwhile, fans speculate that the reason Inquisition<\/em> characters Cullen and Solas have such restricted romances (they can only be pursued by female elves and, in the case of Cullen, humans), is because they were last-minute romance additions to Inquisition<\/em><\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For some fans, there\u2019s a difference between playersexual characters, who have no sexual orientation beyond the player character, and bi or pan characters. Fans squabble heavily over whether certain characters \u201ccount\u201d as bisexual\u2014in forums<\/a>, you\u2019ll see some people argue that Dragon Age II<\/em> companions aren\u2019t<\/em> bisexual in contrast to Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em>; while others will point to Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> as an example of crude playersexuality in contrast to the \u201cgood\u201d bisexual representation in Dragon Age II.<\/em> Even game developers seem to use the terms interchangeably: in one interview, the writers of Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> said that all the companions are pansexual, and a few lines later, called their characters \u201cplayersexual<\/a>.\u201d The term \u201cplayersexuality\u201d itself is nebulous, with no agreed-upon definition or clear origin point (it seems to have emerged organically around 2016 in in video game fandom). <\/p>\n\n\n\n Leah in Stardew Valley<\/em> is a good example of a purely playersexual character. Her entire sexual orientation\u2014nay, her entire backstory\u2014has been constructed to make Leah available to you (whoever you are). As players have discovered, if you play a man, Leah has an ex-boyfriend, but if you play a woman, Leah has an ex-girlfriend. The game even substitutes in an alternate animation to Leah\u2019s ex when they come to visit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But Leah is much more the exception than the rule. Companions like Bellara (Veilguard<\/em>), Gale (Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em>) and Anders (Dragon Age II<\/em>) have prior relationships they\u2019ll talk about in-game\u2014and not ones that change according to your gender (although Anders will only discuss his ex-lover Karl with a male Hawke). Some of your companions will hook up\u2014or pair up\u2014if you don\u2019t pursue a relationship with them, like Lace Harding and Taash (Veilguard<\/em>), and Lae\u2019zel and Astarion (Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em>). And unlike Stardew Valley<\/em> where all the \u201ccanonical\u201d couples are straight, Dragon Age II<\/em>, Veilguard<\/em> and Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> include queer pairings between non-player characters like Dame Aylin and Isobel. Queerness is an independent part of both the world-building and of individual character\u2019s identity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Many of the arguments against playersexuality, moreover, are tinged with biphobia. Fans demand canonical evidence that characters like Fenris or Harding are \u201cbisexual\u201d and not \u201cjust\u201d playersexual; writers and fans argue that Astarion\u2019s flamboyant mannerisms mean he\u2019s a \u201cgay-coded\u201d character whose gayness has been erased<\/a> by his pansexuality; others say that it\u2019s just not \u201crealistic<\/a>\u201d to have this many bi characters<\/a> in a cast. These arguments all veer close to classic biphobic tropes: that bisexuality doesn\u2019t \u201ccount\u201d unless it\u2019s been proven, that bisexuals are secretly monosexual and that \u201creal\u201d bisexuality is rare and otherwise a kind of fad. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There is, in some of these complaints, a sense that a bisexual character just isn\u2019t queer enough to count. One of the most common arguments against playersexuality is that it\u2019s impossible for writers to tell queer stories with an all-bisexual cast<\/a>. The story of Dorian in Dragon Age: Inquisition<\/em>, in which Dorian escapes his family after they try to force him through magical conversion therapy, is held up as the example of a story that could not exist in a playersexual cast<\/a>. But while you could not tell Dorian\u2019s exact story with a bisexual character, you could tell a pretty close one: many bisexuals and pansexuals also have traumatic coming-out stories with their family; many are subjected to familial violence. And there are plenty of queer stories among the all-bisexual\/pansexual casts of Dragon Age II<\/em>, Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> and Veilguard<\/em>, from Karlach\u2019s inability to touch her lover, to Anders\u2019s trauma over his forbidden relationship, to Leliana\u2019s tendency to fall in love with the powerful women who employ her. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, it is obviously a fantasy to have a group of four, or seven or eight characters who are all bisexual and all interested in you<\/em>. But when we\u2019re playing a game like Baldur\u2019s Gate 3<\/em> or Dragon Age: The Veilguard<\/em>, we\u2019re all<\/em> pursuing a fantasy. In these kinds of role-playing games (RPGs), the player character is a black hole who warps the storyline around them. Your companions abandon their lives, sacrifice their interests, change their ideals to follow you. So why is this player-centric power fantasy only a problem when it comes to sexuality (and not, say, when it comes to the inclusion of dragons)? <\/p>\n\n\n\n The debate around playersexuality stands in for a larger debate about what kind<\/em> of queer fantasy players want in video games. It\u2019s perfectly valid for a player to want an RPG (or a dating sim) with clearly defined sexualities. It makes sense for a player to want to be excited by a lesbian<\/em> character and not just a broadly Sapphic one. At the same time, I bristle at the idea that defined sexualities, locked by gender, are the forms of queer gaming. It seems myopic to view \u201cgood representation\u201d as only those games whose romances follow 21st-century Western ideas of sexual orientation. I value the utopia of an all-queer cast, the joy of a chaotically bisexual troop of heroes, the abundance of unlocked romance options, the ability to explore many different kinds of queer relationships. There are a variety of ways for game writers and developers to thoughtfully include queer relationships. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Unfortunately, it\u2019s not possible for writers and game developers to fulfill everyone\u2019s ideal queer fantasy in a single game. The good news is that there are now many games\u2014both indie and Triple-A\u2014that incorporate LGBTQ2S+ romance options of some stripe. Some use playersexuality. Some don\u2019t. Even in the Dragon Age franchise, there is variety: the first and third game include defined sexualities, with characters either straight, bisexual or gay\/lesbian. And that variety, that abundance, is a good thing. We are no longer in the same place of scarcity, where one big-budget game with a gay character was the only queer representation we might see all year and where one gay character had to carry the hopes and fantasies of an entire gaming community. There are a plethora of queer storylines, and we\u2019re just now getting to the point where there are enough games to tell all those stories. As for me? I\u2019ll be out in Veilguard<\/em>, recruiting my merry band of pansexuals on the way to saving the world. Maybe some of you will join me. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ANALYSIS: Opponents of playersexuality argue that it erases queer representation. Does it really?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1196,"featured_media":270265,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editorial_slug":"99","_editorial_slug":"99","exclude_from_latest_block":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,4],"contributors":[2716],"topic":[75,99,2221],"clients":[],"series":[],"timeliness":[60],"editorial_format":[33],"type-of-work":[2536],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270263"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1196"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270263"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":270269,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270263\/revisions\/270269"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"contributors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributors?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"clients","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/clients?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"timeliness","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/timeliness?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"editorial_format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/editorial_format?post=270263"},{"taxonomy":"type-of-work","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type-of-work?post=270263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}