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Turpuli — Two of a Kind
#sfm #shepard #masseffect #femshep #maleshep #masseffect3
Published: 2017-09-01 19:33:27 +0000 UTC; Views: 3070; Favourites: 41; Downloads: 30
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I really like it when you can customize your character in a game. I like the idea that your character can be pretty much anything you want and they're still treated the same by everyone in the game world. Well, at least mostly the same. In the eyes of the game world, the biggest difference is usually the sex of your character, and even that usually just means that you may get different romantic options/interactions (which I think is quite logical, we all have our preferences and surely the characters in games can have their own preferences). In some games like Fallout 2 and indeed Mass Effect the difference between sexes can be quite big, but in the end you're still the hero, no matter what you are.Now, I don't have anything against non-customizable lead characters, it just limits role-playing possibilities. Sometimes it makes more sense when the character is crafted to the role written for them, like in most GTA games. Makes the experience a bit more like a movie.
In my opinion, to have a truly memorable lead character, you have to have something you can't customize. Like with Mass Effect, you're one of the Alliance's biggest heroes and the first human Spectre. You're well established in the game world. Sure, you can customize your character's origin, face/hair, sex and class, but you're still paying as Shepard. My first Shepard looked like a mix of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dolph Lundgren and me, but he was still "the" Shepard
Made with SFM
Map: Anderson's Apartment by mark2580
Female Shepard for GMod by GoOr
Male Shepard for GMod by NikouT
Some adjustments to models and/or materials for SFM by me
And of course: huge thanks to Bioware for Mass Effect!
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Comments: 16
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A while back I came up with an idea to solve the 'Protagonistsexual' issue people usually raise when game developers try to fairly open up all characters for romance to all the characters you could play. I do actually support that any character you play should be able to romance anyone... unless you're going to make one character non-romanceable by anyone just for trolling purposes.
I only say this, because it's frustrating enough in real life when someone you like doesn't like you back, lol, although reasons like the choices you make to affect a game make sense to me deciding who will open to romance. Other than that, we run the risk of stereotyping 'what kind of person will reciprocate advances from a gay man' which really isn't much better than making one of the romanceable characters turn you down because of your characters racial background (that would be one hell of a shitstorm, no?). Rejection from aliens because you're not their species is a softer way to handle that aspect of attraction without it coming across as racism or sexism but it's hard to do it between same-species options without that being felt.
At the same time though, I also totally agree: it makes no sense for everyone to be interested in you, like you're the sexiest sex god of the entire universe or something!
So here's some other ideas to alternatively determine who is/isn't attracted to your character:
1) Romantic interest expressed to any other character (I think some games now do this - they 'lock you in' once you pursue romantic dialogue with someone, past just getting to know them - but it would be cool to see a more gradual tale-off)
2) Romantic interest in a specific other character (I've seen some games reflect that attitudes and conversation choices push one character towards openness towards you, whilst pushing another character towards being against interest in you but not this)
3) Doing the reverse: the 'wedding ring effect' where a particular romantic option gets more interested in you, when you show interest in someone else, or other characters have flirted with you
4) Randomising reasons for rejection, as per 'alternate universe theory' - your conversation choices, or even event choices, lock you into a specific alternate universe. You wore red to the party mission? A romanceable character has their sexuality locked into whichever it would need to be, to reject you. Why? Just because it so happens that your wearing red, indicates that that is the universe where that character is gay/straight/not open to aliens... etc.
The latter would also work with the other options I mentioned... so it doesn't feel quite so 'everyone's open until they're not'. After all, everyone can be friendly, or flirt, but turn out to be not interested in your sex. You could have a lot of fun too - imagine how many game community conversations could be had. "How did you get THEM to like you?!" "Well..." - and then you'd go through trying to figure out what was different. Was it a story decision? Was it timing? Was it that you upgraded armaments on the ship? Was it that a random item was mentioned in the in-game newsreel, or came up for sale in a shop?
It would be important to make it abstract, and that way it's not that the character (it has happened before, where a whole community of one group of people, were attracted to a character that was made unavailable to them) has been cut off from you on some flawed writing that incorporated prejudiced presumptions... it was just... you bought noodles instead of fried fish on the game-starting mission, long before you even met them.
Imagine the fanfic headcannons that people would then write, to try to explain how that difference, mattered.
Anyways... I love that you put thoughts down around protagonist designs, and I really, really love this fanart you've made! I admin a Facebook page called 'Mass Effect Female Shepard and today I'm gathering permissions from artists to post their works to our albums. If you might be up for this, let me know!
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Simple yet powerful picture. I dunno why but it almost looks like both Shepards are acknowledging each others' presence. I'm getting some Bioshock infinite vibes with this, and I like it.
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Thanks!
I sort of wanted them to recognize that there's something different looking back at them... but knowing at the same time that it's just themselves. Looking at the mirror and seeing it's not you, but still knowing that it really is you. I don't know if that makes any sense, I'm struggling to find the words to describe it
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I think that makes a lot of sense, and I'm not being sarcastic here. Both have that VERY slight feeling that "something ins'nt right here". But it's just probably nothing in their minds.
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This pic totally reminds me of a vid I pieced together showcasing my Femshep/Maleshep, www.youtube.com/watch?v=YC3kSL…
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Same here. If the game gives me the option to customize the Player Character (PC), as Mass Effect does, then I'm going to make changes. But clearly there have to be some set things about the PC. Even in games like Half-Life, where you never see Gordon you know things about him that inform who the character is.
Great picture.
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Thanks!
My first playthrough of a game is always with a customized character (if possible). Sometimes I end up with an option that was the "default". Sometimes because it felt the right option for the character, sometimes accidentally. Like when I "customized" my first Shepard's name... at first I just erased the default first name and then went to customize everything else. After almost an hour it was finally time to decide the first name for my newly customized character. I ended up with "John". I didn't realize that it was the default name until after I went through the whole game and started to create another character
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