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If you want to represent a diverse society, it is good that you also have diverse toys and games. These symbolize the world in which the child grows up. A look at how Games makers are showing GenZ and Millennials rainbow diversity.

In previous articles I showed how the youngest consumers can become acquainted with (rainbow) diversity through toys, for example Barbie, LEGO or the products of Fisher-Price and Hasbro. This is very relevant in the context of the customer journey From Representation to Respect. But the slightly older youngsters are not forgotten, although you may not even have to say this to this group – Millennials and GenZ, the most free-thinking generations ever. Instead of toys, they will spend most of their ‘playtime’ on gaming, films and cartoons. And there are many communication and marketing possibilities here.

Woke

Sam, an ambassador for LGBT+ youth organization Just Like Us, believes there is a general “negative attitude” towards LGBT people in the gaming world. “Whenever a queer character is announced, you usually see people complaining that it’s just being done to be ‘woke’ or ‘to further a political agenda,’” he says. It is of course disturbing, but Sam sees that times are changing. “I think LGBT+ representation in video games has definitely come a long way since the ’80s. Members of the queer community appear as fully fleshed out characters and not just as villains or the usual negative stereotypes,” he says, adding that The Last of Us was one of the first games to champion LGBT+ characters. [more on this next time] “I’d like to see more characters in video games that represent the length and breadth of the rainbow community, and I think the popularity of The Last of Us will certainly help with that.”

The beginning – and the developments

Gamesradar’s Sam Greer looked through thousands of game titles a few years ago and found only 179 games with an LGBT character. Of those, only 83 had queer characters that were also playable. And of that group, only eight have a main character who is pre-written as queer, rather than having that as an option for the player.

Although LGBT characters have been appearing in video games since the 1980s (in 1985 we met Paco in “Le crime du parking”, who was both a drug dealer and a murderer – this was in the days when video games were still played with a quill pen and a carrier pigeon), but they have been quite rare for a long time. This reflects the general heteronormativity of the medium that has long prevailed. For example, in the 2006 game Dead Rising, there is a mission where you have to defend a group of gay characters who are depicted as flamboyant and stereotypical.

As in other media, LGBT characters in games often suffer from the “bury the gays” trauma, a persistent convention that requires them to meet an unhappy end in some way. According to video game website Kotaku, these characters are “largely defined by a pain that their straight counterparts do not share.”

But there are developments.

SIMS

SIMS 4 (with 70 million players) is, according to Wiki, “a social simulation game. There is no primary goal to achieve, and instead the player is encouraged to make choices and fully participate in an interactive environment.” Of course, this also encourages diversity, and producer EA did not disappoint.

Last year saw the release of the most far-reaching update to LGBT gameplay, with a brand new way to represent the sexual identities of players and their virtual characters. Designed in collaboration with LGBT organizations It Gets Better and GLAAD, this update added two new scales for sexual and romantic identities. The changes were revealed alongside the release of the new SIMS 4 High School expansion pack, which lets you play as a teenager going through the trials and tribulations of high school. It is no coincidence that the combined package could precisely represent a difficult period for many LGBT youth, even in virtual gaming worlds.

The first version was launched in 2000, and already at that time attention was paid to the gender and sexuality spectrum. Regardless of public opinion, early game developers looked for ways to incorporate same-sex relationships into the game. To avoid homophobic backlash, “violent negative interactions” between same-sex characters were blocked on the game. There were also romantic storylines and “LGBT Easter eggs” in early drafts.

Candy Crush

Also Candy Crush – one of the most successful games ever, with around 3 billion downloads for the whole Candy family, and now with more than 250 million active players – has not only explicitly incorporated the 6-colored rainbow into their already very colorful decor during Pride month for several years, but also added a special competition. For example, last year the word LOVE was spread over four screens, where you could crush the letters one by one, often starting with candies in the 6 colors mentioned.

Baldur’s Gate – the queerest game ever

In the popular Baldur’s Gate series (chosen several times as ‘Game of the Year’ since 1990), episode 3 was recently released. It stars a sexy vampire DILF named Astarion, who “will seduce any fool with a heartbeat”. It is also called “the queerest game of all time”. Not only can you court all characters regardless of gender, there are also trans-inclusive options. Baldur’s Gate 3 simply forgets the binary division of persons, instead allowing you to choose one of four ‘body types’ instead of typical binary gender options. Plus, the game lets you customize your character all the way down to their genitals (even letting you choose from a range of, er, pubic hair styles) and their pronouns.

Transgender YouTube star Abigail Thorn provides the voice for the NPC (Non-Player Character) character Nocturne.

Nintendo Switch

In a 2020 video, Nintendo lets people show off their dance moves to Panic! At The Disco’s “High Hopes” as they follow the instructions of “Just Dance 2020”. Gay superstar Lil Nas X tells XFINITY customers they can get an extended version of the game demo featuring his song “Old Town Road.”

Microsoft Xbox

Microsoft Xbox recently also contributed to the bright pink Barbie world. A candy pink console was released with pink controllers, a set of Xbox-themed dolls, the signature little pink Corvette was added to the new Forza Horizon 5 game, and the ultimate fan dream – a custom Xbox Series S built into a real Barbie DreamHouse.

Conclusion

Reaching young people with expressions of diversity as an everyday matter is of great importance for normalizing all types of identities, characters and persons. And thus for achieving Respect in the customer journey. The generations that are interested in these types of games are usually the Millennials and GenZ. Although they are ‘basically’ open-minded and positively critical in the field of Inclusion, it is good that this is demonstrated in a playful way. In this way, society is reflected more realistically, also in games.

Alfred Verhoeven is a marketer and is in the final phase of his PhD research Marketing the Rainbow. He previously wrote for ILOVEGAY about Diversity in Toys, LEGO does the rainbow and the alphabet, Barbiemania and the shortage of pink paint, Bud Light and the 4 bln dollar woman, Dutch retailer HEMA loves everybody, Pronouns, About those rainbows, Alphabet soup, M&M’s and the lesbian invasion, Magnum and the lesbian wedding,  Marketing the Rainbow: the process and all that came before it, Sport and (un)sportmanship,  Why you need a supplier diversity program, BeNeLux LGBTIQ+ Business Chamber (BGLBC), From B2C and B2B to B2G and G2G (oh, and G2C), The Men from Atlantis, The other kind of cruising, Booking.com, Home Deco, Haters and trolls: the ‘letter to the editor’ of the 21st century, 5 Bizarre LGBT Videos, TRANSparency, Transgender persons as a target group, Matchmaking, 5 videos that went viral, From Representation To Respect, Cultural sensitivities and social involvement in marketing, 4 reasons to practice diversity and The Rules of Market Segmentation.