THE FEMALE PERSPECTIVE IN DEVELOPMENT ā FOLLOW UP
"A while back you talked about how there was a scenario in the game that came off as āRape-likeā and needed to be rewritten, I was just curious and wanted to know how it panned out differently and how you made it better for all your fans.ā ā fan question
The post in question was this one, where I mentioned a peer review of a plot with a situation that ācould easily be interpreted as a form of rapeā. During the review, the female members of the peer group mentioned how uncomfortable it made them feelā¦and because that wasnāt the writerās intention, he ended up changing it.
Some people took that to mean the writer had actually put a rape into the story, and just didnāt realize it until the female writers pointed it outāwhich wasnāt the case at all, but since I couldnāt go into detail of the specifics, there wasnāt really any way to clarify.
But Dragon Age: Inquisition is out now, so Iāll clarify. For those wishing to avoid spoilers, this is the point at which you bow out.
The plot in question was āChampions of the Justā, the one you get if you go to Therinfal Redoubt after the templars and the Lord Seeker. Youāll recall there is a section where Envy has taken the form of Leliana, and is poking and prodding at the Inquisitorās psyche in order to determine what makes him/her tick.
If I recall correctly, this early version of the plot had it so that the player wasnāt aware they were inside their head. The fight with the Lord Seeker was quickly ended, the templars wrapped up and the player heads back to Havenā¦almost too easily. Haven is too quiet, and Leliana is there asking odd questions and testing the playerās responses.
One of these things had Envy-Leliana attempting to seduce you. It was creepy and weird, and one of the places where the player was allowed to go, āWoah! This definitely isnāt right!ā But the player also had the opportunity to accept.
There were going to be severe consequences for accepting, but regardless of that the thing that was pointed out was how the creepiness of the situation went beyond the demon-seduction itself and more how it seemed to be a sexual violation of Leliana by-proxy. Never mind that it was Envy initiating it, you thought (or seemingly thought) you were sleeping with Leliana, and it made for uncomfortable follow-up trying to imagine whether that was something we could just let slide and/or whether it should be something you could address with the real Lelianaā¦or whether it should be allowed at all.
The circumstances could have been changed, perhaps, and while the peer group discussed it, the fact remained that it wasnāt an element the writer wanted to introduceāit was supposed to be about Envy and its creepy probing only, so he elected to take it out (and, ultimately, the entire set-up of that part of the plot changed anyhow).
I normally wouldnāt discuss an early form of a plot (all of them went through similar revisions on a constant basis), or bring up a plot point which got dropped (which happens a lot), except that in this specific case it felt telling that none of us guys really thought much beyond the authorās intention, and the introduction of an alternate interpretation (gender-based, or at least it seemed such) proved to be an incredibly valuable discussion point that we might have missed if the dynamics on the team had been differentā¦which made me think how much of it might get missed elsewhere. Thus I believed it worth mentioning.
