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oops I'm late to this video! happy pride!

as a genderqueer person myself, this was a very refreshing video to watch and feel seen with <3 explaining how “nonbinary” works is a complicated subject that really doesn’t have to be with the right mindframe. i say genderqueer and i just present however the fuck i want, because thats what it means to me! it means not having to tie myself into one definition or another, but allowing the natural change of life to mean i can feel and be whoever i want to be everyday

Ok so the lust route you can try to force Mia to kiss you (resulting in her rightfully slapping you and calling you a despicable monster) and in the trust route she reveals that a co worker tried to sexually assault so that makes the lust route even WORSE

I'd still smash

Everyone watching this video for the topic: Me watching it for the Overwatch gameplay: Haha, kill that Mercy >:)

You have answered many questions and broadened my scope. Thank you for helping educate ignorant people like me. I have been trying to wrap my head around the concept and I think this was the inch of space I needed to get that door of understanding open.

This game is so weird about Catholics and only Catholics..... what was it written by protestants??? I thought this beef died decades ago

Yaknow, I'm sort of disappointed that you hosted this with a vtuber: seeing you physically break down as you go on and on would have been hilarious. As it is now I feel like you're stuck with a customer service smile and now that I'm writing this down no that's funnier

so basically, a character is nonbinary if they are nonbinary, they can look like whoever but if they say they are nonbinary then they are nonbinary

I am happily non-binary , although , I also happen to be AFAB and have a more feminine presenting voice and appearance , despite seeing myself as androgynous . It's hard for me to feel "real" with my identity , which makes the lack of actual human characters who choose to identify as non-binary because that's who they are as people instead of "Ooh mystery person" a lot harder for me , because it just gives me an extra sense of not feeling human , like I don't belong . I definitely relate to a character like Venture appearance wise , although Venture is definitely a more idealized version of myself LOL and I am happy about the newer representation !! I hope to see more representation in the future , esp more feminine/masculine presenting enbies like myself !! Just because you express yourself that leans towards a specific binary [ or sometimes not exactly by choice in my case ] doesn't make you any less non-binary !! I feel like this is also where the mystery aspect in some NB characters comes from , because the "ideal" NB person wouldn't give you any hints of being male or female , making them a "mystery" , and to be honest , I strive for that too !! But it's not the case for everyone , as said in this video , there isn't a "right" way to be non-binary , or even just a few right ways , you can be non-binary however you see fit !! Which does make creating characters harder , so I ABSOLUTELY commend representation of enby folk in almost any capacity !! Since it is still "new" to a lot of people , so tackling it in media may seem daunting at first . This video really made me smile , you are incredibly respectful and goes over this topic extremely thoroughly !!

Fl4k was such a funny lgbt tie in. Like they are a Robot, why does them being Non binary mean anything? Robots are like that by default, you arent representating anything more than dumbasses

I think Non Binary characters need to be done the same as Trans characters. You need to think of 2 things, what were they born as and what does being Non Binary means to them. The born gender is going to effect the base design and from my experience alot of non binary people lean into their born gender appearance wise more often. You have to treat this born gender as a base. From there think what does being Non Binary mean to them, how do they express it, how does it change how they think and would it even come across in how they look. By combing these two things you create an actual character and not a puppet of representation

well, time to watch a video about a game i've never played

Side note: Your baby dva gameplay is great

I'm a huge fan of when a character's design doesn't always correlate with their gender identity in obvious ways, in the same way that you can't tell a real person's gender by just looking at them.

Still yet to watch the video but before I wanna add that I think Apex has the best trans representation in any big video game thus far. First they had Bloodhound and were the first to have a nonbinary character just... be. They dont really talk about how Bloodhound is nonbinary and I like that tbh, they're just a hunter rather than a nonbinary hunter. Apex is also the first big game that Im aware of that has the blls to introduce a binary trans character in Catalyst and I will forever love them for that. Catalyst herself does reference being trans a little but only in passing (has a few equippable voice lines about it and an intro line makes a little reference to it). Alike Bloodhound, it feels like shes a character more than just representation. Like how Bloodhound is a hunter before being nonbinary, Catalyst is a witch before being trans and most of her character references that more than anything, though being trans is still a big part of her identity. Anyways big up Apex Legends it's lgbtq+ representation is great

i’m so glad this video popped up in my feed as a nonbinary person. most nonbinary rep in games has disappointed me, but the best i’ve seen has been from indie games. i hope as time goes on we can both see more enby characters in mainstream games, and see fans of those games actually respect these characters

I think the big distinction here is that while other identities are POSITIVELY defined (i.e. defined by the things that they ARE), non-binary identities are NEGATIVELY defined (i.e. defined by what they AREN'T). This means that coding and signifiers that the author uses to define the character's qualities, while the typical route, is actually COUNTERPRODUCTIVE when depicting non binary identities. My experience of being nonbinary has been mostly retrospective - realizing that I engage in gendered behaviours, but that I do so because each individual one resonates with me in isolation, rather than having some internal 'compass' of gender. Which is to say, my experience has had gendered expression be INCIDENTAL to self expression, rather than DRIVING self expression. And that sense of apathy for/lack of understanding of 'gender' as a concept and vague set of rules, means that there's no direct interface between my internal identity and what other people perceive as my gendered expression. On the one hand, the idea of a character picking aspects of their expression completely without thought to their gendered connotations WOULD be effective representation, but it would be extremely difficult to actually COMMUNICATE in design or media, without just outright expositing that information in sledgehammer prose.

21:01 its so great to see that there are other people that are insane and objectively wrong. V3 was also my first and i dont think i wouldve stuck with the series through its intense and frequent lows if that first trial hadnt whooped my ass so unbelievably hard.

I don't think the writers bothered to look up the exchange rate between euro and usd, because half a million euro is still only about half a million dollars, and I can't imagine going through all this for that much

Most of the things I would've said has been better put in other comments, so I'm only going to give my two cents about Valérie's character, as a french person myself. Seeing another blond, haughty, obnoxious, rich white kid who's also "nobility" is so boring (at least they got an accurate french name with the nobility particle "de/d' " correct), why are so many representation like that... Oh, that's right, Japan's romantization of Paris, one singular town, albeit the biggest, of an entire country - that belong to the historical mess that is the delimitation of European countries, so you know, inherently multi-cultural. But really, what I wanted to comment about was the "Fléau" comment she made, it sent me. I have NEVER seen that word used like that, like some kind of interjection. Honestly, I may have never even heard someone use that word, if it was not to quote some literary work or talk about the pokemon attack named as such. Where did they even pull such expression from? It feels definitely incorrectly used.

The worst thing about this game by far, for me personally, is that I look almost identical to Harrison - down to the clothing style. I'll never know peace again, my friends will never let me live this down. Can't look at myself in the mirror anymore. I shall proceed to launch myself into the fucking sun

i just found it funny how bigots are trying to misgender venture as both a woman and a man. 😂

Fl4kk ny favorite no binary binary character

personally, i love venture and bloodhound being androgynous and clove being less androgynous because its a lot of representation for the entire spectrum (plus i like to imagine clove being immortal has smth to do with them feeling like they dont fit in a binary ^^)

Just don't use any 1s or 0s duh. Not sure if infinity signs are allowed.

I haven't watched the vid yet but I have to say, as an enby that looks like someone's teenage brother, I wish there were more characters that looked more average-enby, instead of the over the top designs that are so common.

As an nonbinary artist, a lot of the time when trying to create an enby character is trying to replace gender with another thing completely different, because most people won't be able to tell gender if the thing they are looking at only gives them star vibes

this was a super awesome video

What a well done video!! I appreciated how much you took into account the anecdotal experiences from non binary people in your circle when researching for this video. There's just so much nuance when it comes to gender identity across the board, but especially for enby's. Props to ya :D!!

I am surprised to see that no one mentioned Kris from Deltarune here yet. I like them a lot, I think their design was done really well although it does kind of rely on the mysterious and enigmatic trope if you think about it

my friend's nonbinary, and when Clover and Venture dropped at nearly the same time they were so hyped for it :D in game, they love Clover but find Venture incredibly annoying tho LMFAO

Loved this video because its interesting to see a perspective on enby representation in regards to shooter games. I was wowed by the "way too many enby characters are robots in heavy clothing" part because I hadn't seen much of that in the genres I'm more familiar with. (VNs, JRPGs and monster catching games) I've found that "enby equals non human" is still annoyingly common in all genres, but ij the ones I play theres more of a tendancy to have them be scantily clad/neutral outfits (for aliens) or not have clothes at all if theyre a robot (or inorganic creatures like golems) So its interesting how a robot in baggy clothes would be refreshing and new to me, while its overused in other games. Its fascinating too how even within the genres I like, theres a lot of variation on cliche enby tropes. The thing about colour in particular! Purple feels like its the default go-to for a lot of western VNs and modern JRPGs, while I noticed a huuuuuge amount of green in older jrpgs around the 90s and 2000s. That colour's also the biggest enby shorthand in pokenon fangames and I wonder if its just a coincidence or they were inspired bt those games? Ive also found that while "enby = has to always be androgenous and covered up" is common in actual defined characters, when it comes to customiseable protagonist it's ENDLESSLY ANNOYING to only have "looks exactly like cis" as an option. Most VNs and JRPGs with an option just still have Two Binary Bodies, two very stereotypically gendered voices, and all you can do is pick a third pronoun. And pokemon fangames annoy me so much cos they tend to have a new design for the enby option and its.. still just exactly the same as the binary. Pokemon Reborn has two whole new designs for enby options, and theyre just a heavy femme and heavy masc option. Pokemon Uranium only has one design for an enby option and they STILL look 99% masculine, just with a ponytail on top. Basically, I find it frustrating that we both have "enby must always look androgenous" and "enby can NEVER look androgenous" as dumb tropes in different genres of game. And I completely agree that we just need more variety of nonbinary characters in general instead of this weird "we're trying to make a statement on what All Enbies Look Like". Also I find it extremely funny in retrospect that some of the earliest enby characters in gaming are ironically more varied visually because none of these tropes had been established yet. Quina in FF9 is honestly an icon! Nobody had decided enby characters all have to be skinny and young yet, so we get an 80 year old freaky kabuki monster battle chef who stabs dragons with a 5ft tall spork. I think it works best to to it this way, just design them like anyone else, pick a look that suits their personality instead of getting too hung up on One Way To Be Enby. Like lol, we're breaking out of the binary, of course theres gonna be infinite more options out there! It aint just a trinary! 😂

This is very funny to me because I'm an autistic lover of character design and also a trans guy (mostly binary but like. Probably not the kind most people would expect. My ideal presentation is Whimsical Gentleman.) and like. The solution is to just. Not think about gendered character design unless it's STRICTLY necessary. I don't draw or design men or women or enbies, I draw people first and foremost. Unless the character's basic concept is *strictly* based in something gendered, like a dieselpunk femme fatale, then don't think about it too much (and even then, you might want to think about gender-inverting your idea!). Same goes for body types: in real life, all people come in all shapes. Literally just stop caring about it, it's so freeing. Maybe that's why people tell me I have a talent. And why I love giving facial hair to my nonbinary characters. yeah the autism is visible aint it edit: i may have forgotten this video is probably aimed at people who design characters for mass appeal to neurotypical societt

I love your videos damn

my favourite nb characters are raqio and setsu from gnosia. by far. their design and character is really well made, since they focus on their character first and then designed outfits afterwards, or at least it seemed that way. setsu is the type of nb, that seems conscious and shy about their body. they wear kind of androgynous looking clothes, yet their hair and pretty face + nurturing personality caused me to think they were a girl, till someone pointed out they werent. which is kinda surprising, since i think they might actually be biologically male. then theres raqio, which is literally the complete opposite. fancy af. over the top af. goesnt give af. also annoying af and a lil shit but beloved regardless. he is clearly male representing, even tho he wears heavy makeup, heals, dresses and skin tight pants. and he doesnt give af about people thinking hes a guy or even seeing his body. hell, he literally builds a giant statue of him naked with his dick out, prolly outta gold or bronze too. you almost couldve taken a shower with him too, if there wasnt women cockblocking you. im actually curious what other ppl think about that shower scene, cus i seen some ytber say its disrespectful and disgusting to "show a nb person naked like that", tho its raqio, who literally states in the same scene that he doesnt give af how you perceive him, or what you think of him, since he is above you and you are too terminally stupid and incompetent for him to care about your opinion. and as a nb person myself, im rather disappointed that you couldnt shower with him nor comet, since it is in character for both of them. plus in character for my character to be down bad for raqio. not comet tho. comet is cool. but comet is 16.

You'll also often encounter the fact that masc traits are seen as pervasively more dominant. Like if you designed a character that's fem in hairstyles, clothing and colour scheme but gave them a beard, they will just be seen as a man in a dress most of the time, simply due to how we're taught to view feminine traits as inferior and not defining.

As someone who's gender queer but presents as 100% feminine and is perceived by others as just a woman, I love this video and thank you so much for talking about something that's been swimming in my head for years lol.

I do love the "waaaowww!" after fishing

Enby here. It's nice to see someone talking about how wild it is that so much of how we see the world/engage with gender/sexuality is from the perspective of the binary. Happy pride~

Very interesting video as always, but I would have liked for you to define what sex and gender are. Especially since these concepts don't always exist in different cultures/languages

The ending statement is really true. You don't really see characters of a binary gender constantly talking about how they are a man or woman or making it their personality, and that is the reason why Sasha from Inescapable annoys me so much. They have no personality *outside* their gender. Nonbinary people are just like everyone else in that they have their own hobbies, favorite food, likes, dislikes, etc., but their relation to gender identity has to be done tactfully to get people to care.

Oh wow, I remember thinking this game had promise as a spiritual successor before it got released. Just slipped my mind about this game. I already know from the first two minutes that you absolutely murdered the game with words lol

Enby representation is such a difficult concept and I'm glad someone has taken the time to discuss the issues faced in designing an enby character. Something I have found interesting is the assumption that Venture is AFAB, which is completely unconfirmed. Actually looking at them, the biggest flags suggesting being AFAB are the eyeliner and lighter voice (and maybe the hair). Other than that, there could be plenty of reason to assume they are AMAB, but almost everyone assumes AFAB including the transphobes using she/her pronouns. This brings up the problem of social biases again though, because what can you even do? Broader audiences thinking in binary terms will always be the biggest obstruction because any femininity means woman almost instantly. AFAB enbies presenting with fem features is somehow fine while the thought of AMAB enbies wearing eyeliner is simply not considered. This is only one of many things, but it's the one that's frustrated me most recently. Thank you again for bringing this topic up and opening a forum for these issues to be discussed.

as someone who is non binary, one of my absolute favorite NB characters in media is Testament from Guilty Gear a character who was localized as both male and female and constantly flip flopping before finally landing on Non Binary as of their recent appearance and having that be shown not just through their design being ambiguous but also focusing more on their unique personality compared to the rest of the cast and their individualism in how they act as opposed to a list of predetermined “non binary traits” speaks much more to the NB experience (at least in my opinion)

love this video, 10/10. i like how the solution to the problem is basically “idk, maybe just design more NB characters if you’re worried about good representation”. also, i can’t remember if you’ve said wether you’re autistic or not, but seeing that you did justice to the NB community without being a part of it, i would love to see you do a similar video on autistic representation in video games. especially if you want to discuss how BLATANTLY AUTISTIC CODED venture is. i can grasp why blizzard doesn’t want to put the autism label on a character they didn’t explicitly create as being autistic, but holy cow, venture is peak autism representation to the point that i cried while gushing about it to my partner. there are absolutely autistic people who are similar to the canonically autistic Symmetra and i don’t want to invalidate that, but we NEVER get to see “feral special interest rock eating” autism rep that Venture is to me, and there are a ton of the “everything must be orderly and perfect in my world that i design with my genius (:” characters that Sym represents that only encompass a very stereotypical and narrow view of “acceptable” autistic people

Once again I'll say that Floofty from Bugsnax is my favorite nb rep in any game. Floofty is the insane unhinged muppet we all need. Being non binary myself it was really cool to have a nb character who was far from a perfect person but still wasn't treated any different from any of the other characters. Also, shout out to testament from Guilty Gear! I haven't played the game but God damn do I get gender envy from them.

It reminds me of aro and ace rep. People just dont know how to interct with those concepts because they are seen as basic human things. Trying tp make characters that are defined by a lack of something, rather than a substitition is a pretty difficult thing for most creators to understand.

ima be fr, i still don't rlly understand non-binary, but like it's fine n wtv. w venture i feel like they did it wrong bc venture is annoying asf and literally described as "quirky" n that word to binary or wtv ppl inspires the image of the "weird kids" who are like cliche non-binary. i feel like venture should have just been "normal" acting bc the hero that is most annoying to me personality-wise just so happens to be the non-binary one. ion got anything against nobody jus wanna say

I've honestly been thinking about this a lot recently. Gender presentation, gender identity, and even sexual orientation are so entwined in the popular consciousness, I'm honestly not sure how to make nonconforming identities *or* nonconforming presentations of binary identities intuitive to the general public