Tag: transgender

News

The Sims finally loosens up its gender restrictions

Prior to last week, characters in The Sims 4 (2014) were at a bit of a paradox. They could have any skin color the player wanted—including nonexistent ones—move and present themselves in a variety of cartoonish manners, have one of dozens of slightly different styles of eyebrows or chin lengths (yes, chin lengths), and could even have different interests and life goals tailored to the player’s choice. But a man with long hair? That, apparently, was just too much. Of course, it wasn’t that the game didn’t have any options for long hair available. In fact, there were almost as many…
News

Internet Murder Revenge Fantasy is a first-hand look at growing up online

As a transgender girl growing up in the American Midwest, childhood was a lonely experience for me. I was still questioning so much of who I was, and at the time, there weren’t many resources out there to help me work through it. Transfeminist literature like Julia Serano’s Whipping Girl (2007) had yet to be published, and I had to resort to older and more unhelpful narratives instead, like a 1998 book a mother wrote about her daughter’s transition titled Mom, I Need to Be a Girl. Finding myself in a real-world culture that was unwilling to talk about LGBT issues for…
News

Did Rust just become the first transgender MMO?

Unlike many other online multiplayer games, Rust doesn’t give players any control over what their character looks like. Instead, it randomly generates a set of features and ties them permanently to the player’s Steam account. This means that, even if they leave the game, their character will look the same when they return. It’s a fitting choice, given how primal the world of the survival-based Rust is. Just as in real life, Rust doesn’t let you choose what you want to look like, but instead spits you out naked into its world with a body you had no say in, and tells…
News

When everyday life is a performance

This Is My Costume explores life with a non-binary gender identity and its parallels with performative attire. It’s a short point-and-click adventure that was made by game design team Pride Interactive for a recent Ludum Dare, in which the theme was “You Are The Monster.” It begins with the protagonist, Finch, getting dressed—first by putting on a binder, then a t-shirt that reads “this is my costume,” and some cat ears. Later, during a short walk around a party, the character is shown relating more to an abandoned balloon in the corner than the other party-goers, longing to be elsewhere. Once they…
In Brief

Navigate a Queer Zine Fair as a trans woman

In game designer Morgan Sea’s Zine Fair Lady, players navigate a queer zine fair through the eyes of a transgender woman. Though such spaces often ostensibly aim to be inclusive toward people of all sexual orientations and genders, in practice, organizers and attendees focus most on the most well-understood members of the queer community—cisgender gays and lesbians—while invalidating the identities of others.Zine Fair Lady comes with a content warning that reads “Transmisogyny, nudity, & sex talk”; limited interactions give players some insights about the small ways individuals are marginalized even in purportedly accepting spaces. In one instance, the player character…