Silly Cody, the spoiler is for the game (Gaming)

by Kermit , Raleigh, NC, Monday, February 17, 2014, 21:02 (3935 days ago) @ Schooly D

I found the Ellen Page news non-newsworthy. And actually, I think it can be argued that the kiss in the DLC might not constitute a definitive coming out.

According to Druckmann, it definitely is a coming out.

http://kotaku.com/video-gamings-latest-breakthrough-moment-1524555480

Not everyone at Naughty Dog agreed that it was a good idea to define Ellie one way or the other. "Some of the questions at the studio," Druckmann said, "and some of the arguments were like, in defining her one way or another, are we taking away something from players? It wasn't defined, so people could imagine her being straight, or gay, or whatever. And my argument was, 'Well, those are the stories that are worth telling, that define these characters more and show who they are.' But I know some people will be upset. And they would've been upset in either direction. Someone would get upset by it. So you kind of have to shrug your shoulders and say, well, this is the story that we felt was worth telling and hopefully you're along for the ride."

Any speculation otherwise is fanfiction.

Yeah, it's a stretch to say otherwise. I'm not surprised that that was their intention. What makes it work for me is that it's believable. And they're smart enough to leave some ambiguity in. I mean, she lives as a character in our imagination (more believably than any video game character I've been exposed to). Druckmann intends her to be gay [insert obligatory not that there's anything wrong with that here]. I've also known women (and even a few men) who had similar attachments and even sexual explorations at that age and don't consider themselves gay or bisexual now, so that knowledge left room for doubt for ME. But now it sounds like I have a problem with their intention, and I don't at all. I'm just saying that people are complicated, and this is the first game I've ever played that seems to really get that, and lets us write a good portion of the story in the white spaces that they generously leave for us. If I have resistance, maybe it's that I don't really want to see Ellie winning awards as the best gay character because she's the best character (period!). It's like how some people want to make TLoU Joel's story, and others want it to be Ellie's story (it's both!). I think Druckmann gets that character trumps type and even gender. I've heard him say as much in different contexts, and that approach is what makes it valuable as art, honestly. Unfortunately, in the greater world what you are still seems to matter more than who you are to a lot of people.