Interesting Links for 15-03-2016

[andrewducker]

RBS replace 550 financial advisers with automated systems First they came for the financial advisers, and I said nothing... (Okay, first they came for the assembly-line workers, but they weren't middle class, so it wasn't considered very important.)
(tags: automation advice finance ) How Gut Bacteria Are Shaking Up Cancer Research (tags: cancer

Comments

[bart_calendar]

1. I t hink excluding characters w here you can set the race yourself is sort of bullshit.

2. How the hell did that writer not know Ellie in Last Of Us was gay until the downloadable content? Also she's not the only gay character in that game.

[andrewducker]

I think that (1) is reasonable, for some comparisons. It's like counting black characters in a book, and not including ones that don't have a skin color mentioned anywhere. Sure, they could be black, but the author didn't set out to make them black. So you get a half-mark for giving people options, but it's not the same as actually setting out to create a good black woman character.

[bart_calendar]

Do we not give Ridley Scott credit for Ellen Ripley then?

He wrote Ripley as male but when Signorney turned up realized she would be great for the role and that nothing in the dialogue referenced her specifically as male so he cast her in what is probably the greatest feminist role of all time.

[andrewducker]

Yes, but he did cast a woman as Ripley, so he gets credit for that. And game creators who create characters who are black get credit for that - moreso than they do for giving you characters where you can define their looks yourself.

I think there's two things here: White male main characters in games vs "minority" characters in games. And games which allow you to do whatever you like. The latter is clearly awesome - but you also have plenty of games which have a voiced main character, and thus you need to ahve them be at least somewhat defined. Having those characters be a mix of races, genders, etc. is also important.

[bart_calendar]

Democracy always goes into retreat when economies go to hell.

The pattern has been repeated through pretty much all of history.

[andrewducker]

True.

[asher63]

I like the switchable windows. I like the style of the article, too - very clear and readable without being dumbed down.

[steer]

Since the article was written we also get Michonne from Walking Dead.

Hatshepsut as a Civ 4 leader (depending on what you count as a playable character of course as Civ leader really just influences your skills for the game).

http://civilization.wikia.com/wiki/Hatshepsut_(Civ4)

I thought there was also a civilisation like game where you could play Queen Ranavalona of Madagascar (fascinating historical character). Google fu is letting me down though (or maybe memory is).

It's still not so many though.

[asher63]

Oh, yay on the Xena.