Alliance is Captain America & Horde is (not) Wolverine

Lore Story Forum
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I find it ironic that people who talk about morality and lessons to learn sound like a committee of Garitoses.

(since there is a difference in the cultural background the following statement might not sound right, I do not mind comments about how it sounds in other cultural contexts)

Kind of in line with the discussions about representation in the game from the same people who create the story where even the most obvious example of representation, aka having female characters of all kinds (from heroic to villains, from goofy to wise, etc.), in practice results in having the leader of the most obvious race for such representation being consistently shown as borderline incompetent, impatient, and needing to be shown the right way by Wrynns, again and again.

I’d also add the story of Saurfang that was re-run again, but this time instead of Varok realizing something about his life and sharing his knowledge with Garrosh, it is Varok who was shown the right™ path by Anduin.

gl hf

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29

Alliance is a clown on a unicycle and the horde is a clown on a unicycle wearing red.

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Maybe that’s not the point? Maybe they want to use an established brand to promote their stories? Regardless of what it would do to the original.

gl hf

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The problem is, as per the Thrall panel, that is allgedly the point.

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Well. I mean, I do not see it in the game, just like I do not see how it would be possible to tell “revenge is bad” story in the game which in every location [Shadowlands] has me helping someone with revenge, to moderate or great success.

But at the same time I think I know what to make parallel with.

Through all our other journeys, the villains we’ve fought, the deeds we’ve accomplished in World of Warcraft so far, we’ve done these things in the name of our factions, viewed through that lens.

© https://www.polygon.com/2017/11/3/16597166/world-of-warcraft-battle-for-azeroth-news-features-reveal-wow-new-expansion

My question is: where. The intirety of Legion, at least for a mage, is a story that tells how bad the factions are, and how we must not care about them.

WoD had Khadgar’s moralization about faction.

MoP is another example of “only together” as the outcome, and infamous (IMO) “cycle of hatred” speech from Taran Zhu, and a bartender complaining that the horde and the alliance need each other.

Yet somehow in the mind of Ion it is possible to say, that those things “in the name of factions”. Like, after the full Legion filled with class orders being the way to undermine the idea of factions (IMO) suddenly having a faction specific epilogue makes all the experience “through that lens”? I mean, it does not work that way, but I guess the devs think that if they claim that’s what that means retroactively, that then it suddenly becomes true?

Same might be here. I see no respect to the original ideas, and the panel itself says nothing about the player experience in the game. But I guess somehow they think if they claim they do respect the game events/characters/themes without actively doing things to demostrate it, that it’s enough.

:man_shrugging:

gl hf

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33

Oh yeah, as I said in the Thrall panel thread Long Ago

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34

That stuff sort of reminds me of what Blizzard posted a few days ago.

https://activisionblizzard.com/newsroom/2021/06/building-inclusive-game-worlds

Its hilarious how wrong it is.

Anyway it is hilarious how far they fall from the ledge here as they are literally the burning dog in the house meme at this point.

This for instance is so false, blizzards characters are generally not multidimensional at all. They often lack dimensions and just do what the plot or writers need them to act.

Anduin is as boring as a glass wall.

And certain characters just feel like their only trait is the sexuality or skin color.

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35

I am not sure for how long with this post stay visible here, but I do find really odd comments from the devs about morality in the game that has such twisted take on the topic, that even though I am not a paragon of doing good things, have to step back sometimes and question myself “how is this even approved for release”.

Not so much specific events in the vacuum, but how out of place some elements are, how disconnected things are, how the game same says “how horrible” about thing that happen to specific characters, but when much worse is done to others - not a big deal apparently, and so on.

gl hf

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I honestly expect it to get hidden in a few hours given how americans and sensitivity go hand in hand like ketchup and mustard.

Then again, Blizzard has been standing in their ivory towers and feel proud about shadowlands (kekW) and have finally started to show some fear given that ff14 is probably gonna ram then like a train.

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37

Reposting the article cuz yeah that comment is gonna get nuked

https://activisionblizzard.com/newsroom/2021/06/building-inclusive-game-worlds

Gonna just quote stuff that stands out to me. Also, already saved on WayBackMachine, so Blizzard can’t delete this from the internet as they usually do.

One of our goals in game design is for our players to be able to see themselves represented in our games.

as our employee base has continued to expand and diversify,

ima need to see internal census values

Overwatch … of a future Earth that’s inhabited with heroes of different colors, creeds, and sexual identities—just like our employees and our global community of players.

Saying “colors” instead of “race” 3 days before Juneteenth and allegedly because of Pride Month, which started because of a Black Trans Woman and a Latina Trans Woman, is tedious

such as Symmetra, an autistic woman from India, with the ability to shape reality as a light-bending “architech,” and Doomfist, a Nigerian man with a powerful prosthetic arm and a fixation on strengthening humanity through conflict—steadily reinforces the fact that this is a game about heroes, from different countries, banding together to fight for their common causes.

“strengthening humanity through conflict” isn’t the romantic hot take to assign to a Nigerian man they think it is

especially not with the ongoing civil armed conflict in Nigeria

That approach is first and foremost about serving our primary core value of Gameplay First —everything is in service of the game experience.

There it is again.

While we do our best to create multidimensional characters and avoid defining them by a single trait, such as their sexuality, gender identity, or skin color,

It’s funny to me that they refuse to acknowledge that it’s not just skin color, but PEOPLE’S ETHNICITIES AND CULTURES that are imbedded into the narrative.

Our players can immediately spot things that aren’t authentic, so as the leader of our story and franchise development team, I try hard not to influence the creative process.

So she’s admitted she’s forced their hand a few times. That explains… things, given the rest of this article’s tone.

We don’t always get it right. And sometimes even though we have the right intent, the execution falls short in the eyes of different members of our game communities.

This feels like a response to when I @'d Danuser and Golden last week when they jointly tweeted a ridiculous tone-deaf comment on Black history (the Tulsa Massacre) that got disproportionate interactions when compared to likes (zero) and responses (one random alliance troll)

Another thing that’s true of Blizzard is that while a single author or team of authors often drives the overall vision for a story, no one person owns or controls the final product. It’s a highly collaborative process that brings together a talented, diverse group of people across different disciplines who are all passionate about creating polished, high-quality experiences and delivering for our players.

Scapegoat escape hatch argument

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38

Then I feel that they should have created their own fantasy book franchise or video game to tell those stories.

I feel like this is the same problem the Star Wars movies had with the most recent releases. If you just do your own disjoined stories in an extended universe and have no overarching plan and ruin existing beloved characters to do so… then people are gonna be ticked.

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39

Ah, as someone with a little bit of SW dev experience, although in another field (microcontrollers), I do recognize the approach. Although here it’s better known as “designed by a committee”.

And to no surprise, this is also the area where blizz is neither alone nor unique, and other companies try to figure out ways to make such approach work, so it’s not like there is nowhere to look for advise / ideas.

/offtop
one of examples related to a progress of one infamous committee that tries to make things decently (till about 56:30, approx 3 min total; a representative from Microsoft)

Can’t say how “objectively good” the approach is, but something tells me that this is not what the devs use not only internally but also in any attempts to collaborate with the users. [and it also has clear stucture that anybody who wants can see, and responcibilities across the members]

gl hf

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40

ended up writing a thread on the twitters over this hot mess article, and threw in some stuff from the Thrall panel thread too

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41

I always interpreted the origin of Thrall to be about him experiencing some of the worst traits of humanity. The woman that helped him just helped him realize not every human is a monster like his abusers.

I think what would make sense as far as believing some of the anti Orc racism is basically an abused child wanting the affection of their parent and internalizing their awful words, taking on a form of internalized racism in this case. Wowpedia does mention Thrall tried to just do better to earn more than the few moments of kindness from Blackmoore until one day he accepted the need to escape.

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which is fine, v Nat Turner, but like

*gestures to everything that followed, including the dev’s framing Orcish-ness as a fundamental problem *

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43

Well yeah, it is pretty obvious everything but the early writing of the Horde Warcraft 3 created has been very confused with the intended themes.
I think some people are disgustingly negligent with what messages their work sends.

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44

My patience will increase 200% if Golden/someone were to come out and say “We mispoke, and we apologize. Garrosh was bad because of his personal choices as an individual, albeit due to generational trauma, not because he was the Orc-iest Orc to have ever Orc’d as we previously stated”

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45

I got into Shadowlands because I wanted to take a look at what Ion’s “we’re going to listen to the feedback” worth. Even when their approach with covenants, conduit energy, and a bunch of other things totally flopped, his last comment on the topic was “I would still do it”.

I am not sure the devs would admit that their story direction is not suitable for the audience they have.
Even when they talk about the mistakes (like Danuser’s T&E interview), it’s presented as “we could’ve shown something better”, as if a few sprinkles over an odd substance would turn it into something amazing.

I can imagine some devs trying to talk their way out of it like “just wait till 9.2, it’ll totally fix everything”.

But I do not think their hubris will allow them to recognize that sometimes however they like something, in a commercial product it has to go.

gl hf

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46

Garrosh’s problem wasn’t that he was an Orc. It was his own self-perception of what being an Orc meant TO HIM. It was his own ideas of what being an Orc was that led him down his path.

And I’m certain that was the intended message of the Devs in that statement.
They just need a better spokesman.

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47

No Golden literally said:

She attributed his problem to his being the Orciest Orc.

Would this be said of any other race?

If Anduin became the most humany human would that lead to “bad things”?

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