For those of you leaving positive comments, thank you. As fun as it is for me to argue with chuds, it can get exhausting. I really appreciate everyone who came to watch this rambling 3 minute rant about a stupid non-troversy and share your own experiences with all the whacky and wonderful characters and stories this game has to offer. And to all the people getting their knickers in a twist over the video description, you clearly didn't read it fully, AND you're just proving my point that calling shit "woke" is meaningless. Either way, keep malding. It's incredibly funny to me. For the rest of you, thank you for commenting. There have already been examples provided that I either forgot about, or didn't know were ever a thing. 💙
This was truly an amazing commentary. It goes to show that trolls and ignorant people will latch onto the next nearest 'controversy" just so they'll feel better about themselves.
IIRC the couple you mentioned even explicitly stated that the strife they got was not because they were a gay couple but that they where an interracial couple.
The example you gave... they have been living rentfree inside my head since I found them 5 years ago. I hope they're eternally bonded or an adventure and doing okay. I just love them so much ;-; I once wanted to write fanfiction about them but the fact that they don't have name is what stopped me. I can't keep on calling them 'that miqote' or 'the hyur'... Would be nice if they made a comeback one day.
when you say "progression" you mean everything is gay and "love is love" What the arc was about is people who believed in false gods creating their own destiny against a regime that saw the devastation that using aether to summon "gods" was doing. Youre putting a bullshit label for modern shit in a guise to try and push your narrative. Youre a retard
FFXIV hasn't always been good at being progressive-the Lancer and Archer questlines from 2.0 are notorious among Duskwight/Keeper fans for mishandling the elements of bigotry and racism presented in its writing. But it has always TRIED, for which I'm very thankful.
The core conflict of Shadowbringers was Emet-Selch believing that the unsundered world was a utopia - something Endwalker reveals to be a giant sham - and that anything was worth doing to bring it back; including the genocide of your entire people, seeing as he considered you "not even truly alive." All of these elements, the idealization of a lost past better world that was replaced by a debauched and degenerate simulacrum of it; the dehumanization of its inhabitants, all of it point towards the fascistic logical conclusion of extreme conservatism. I'm not saying Emet-Selch would be one of those Twitter "Classical Traditions" Greek statue icon accounts that always post neo-Nazi dogwhistles. I think that the core concept with Emet-Selch is that he's enmired in grief and is willing to go to every extent to cure himself of it, including lying to himself (the old world was better, you guys aren't really alive; all of that is basically self-justification) but by pure accident(?), he ends up resembling it to a T. Something to which Alphinaud most astutely responds "your value judgments don't matter tho" and basically says that the lives of the currently living, however debased Emet-Selch considers them, still matter. If I take woke to mean what it actually seems to mean, "progressive" ideology, then by all accounts, the fan-beloved Shadowbringers was very much unequivocally "woke." The problem is that the people that use this useless, vapid, term as a bludgeon continually move the goalposts and refuse to define it consistently.
That is such a perfect read of Emet's character. I think that a major aspect of his motivation is his guilt for taking for granted the beauty of his world and his friendships. He realized that he never fully appreciated what he had with Hythlodaeus and Azem and it blinded him to the grief and suffering he caused, and would cause, to the people who live now and experience the same beauties that he did. And yes, that's ultimately the crux of my argument. "Woke" is a thought terminating cliche used as an attack word, and will never be adequately defined, as it HAS to remain vague. It needs to be able to mean whatever the person using it needs it to mean at that particular moment.
No, actually, it's not a critique of conservatism. It's a critique of gnostic cults like Marxism, Nazism, fascism, hegelianism, or any of the other collectivist branches that have sprouted out in the 20th-21st century. All of these believe in the idea of forcing people back to a hypothetical utopia that was taken and sundered from us, the true gods, by a demon (demiurge, capitalism, Jews, patriarchy, etc.) and that any who do not wish this aren't human and therefore can be killed like an animal. The Ascians are representative of gnostic belief, not conservatism. It's a repudiation of woke.
@joshuamaurer9784 Alright, I'mma break my rule of not being directly rude to anyone that comments. What the absolute fuck are you talking about? Do you actually understand what ANY of those words mean?
@@FreyaWardYT maybe don't delete my comment. But let me lay it out for you. The Ascians were the original "gods". Hydalen (the demiurge in this story) sunders the gods and creates the mortal prisons (shards). All of the people are a piece of the original gods, just like in gnostic belief. Hydalen, through the lens of the Ascians, is seen as a demon and her followers likewise. Those Ascians the unsundered raise up are now have the "gnos", or divine knowledge that they were once god. They long collect humanity back to this utopia through the calamities, bringing back human souls to the source to make their ultimate sacrificial ritual to bring back paradise and the other Ascians through our death. Gnostic and hermetic belief, especially the dialectic, were combined by Hegel and continued through Marx and his derivative, murderous followings. Woke, or identity politics, is the continuation of the dialectic through Marx, Gramsci, Marcuse, de Beauvoir, Butler, and others. All to get back to something not never existed. It's right there in black and white. In fact, Wuk Lamat is a conservative, if annoying, character. She is about preserving the empire her father created and the culture of the peoples that make up its fabric. The brothers are progressives. Koana is a classical liberal who wishes to bring sharlayan technology and ideology without care of how that will erode the cultures of Tural. Zoraal Ja is collectivist who will subjugate all to his will through brute force and terror in the name of "peace". Again, destroying all cultures and dissent in his path. It is a rejection of progressive ideas. Nothing she is doing is at all progressive but a continuation of the status quo.
lol tourists. post your character from lodestone. I can bet you ive been playing longer than you. Tourist, you only came here because you were told it was "diverse and inclusive and not toxic"
I suppose that those people would flip if they saw the culinarian questline from 1.0. A character that just dressed and pretended to be a woman to have their place in the restaurant. And it's sad they get no mention in the current questline version.
You're absolutely correct. This game has always been incredibly progressive. These dingdongs have no idea what they are talking about. It's as if they've never played FFXIV before.
I didn't mind Wuk's voice actress one single bit. I just thought it was annoying that she was omnipresent. Especially after the lv 95 questline when things become a "way-over-your-head-show" for her. And I wasn't amused she stole the WoL's thunder in the last trial. But her voice actress was fine.
Having a few gay characters or interracial couples or progressive themes does not make something woke. Also the examples you gave in the description as fan speculations are just that fan speculations, to me, Emet and Hythlodaeus, Ryne and Gaia, Cid and Nero are just normal friendships and nothing beyond that. We do have to take into account that fans are thirsty and a lot of em love to make their own head canons and there is nothing wrong with having head canons, problems rise if one starts to claim that their head canon is official canon.
Woke has no definition to begin with, I have heard dozens of people, and entire groups on the right call any gay character, or even Black character being included woke. Haurchefant is explicitly bi in the Japanese text which is the main one(He's into you regardless of gender.) and there's been an explicit gay couple in the game since 2015 who refer to themselves as a couple directly. The fairy ppl in shadow bringer are all non-binary(literally use they/them pronouns.) as well. The game unavoidably has progressive stuff, which will unavoidably lead to it being called woke, as the term is intentionally not well-defied but rather a thought-terminating cliché.
So essentially you tolerate gay people as consumable pieces of fanservice for your perusal and enjoyment but god forbid we actually cared about them as people with complex inner worlds and personalities and lives and you had to hear about that? Thanks for spelling out the obvious undercurrent behind your line of thought. Woke is meaningless. You are homophobic.
@@crazagres1839 When it comes to woke, most have their own interpretation of it and don't really care about any "official" definition, in my opinion, the best way to go about it is just to take what is most commonly referred to as woke and that is it. Woke as a term is one of those that keeps changing a lot and often and everyone kinda has an idea on what it is. Oh the historians of the future are going to have one hell of a headache when they are trying to figure out what it was exactly. I like the term playersexual for characters that are exclusively attracted to the player character in games where the player can make their own character. For example: in BG3 Gale appears as a straight man based on his backstory, one romantic/sexual relationship and that is with a goddess, but in-game he is attracted to the player character no matter what the player character is.
@@Nuinwing The very idea of you believing that there is an "official" definition reveals the lack of understanding on the topic. The entire point of the term is to do what you're doing, you're dancing to the tune perfectly. You're meant to assign your set of values to it, it's an empty canvas to paint onto. Anything progressive you disagree with or mind a lot is now woke, and what you don't disagree with isn't. It's that simple. It's not complex for quite literally anyone but the people caught up in the low-effort manipulation people are doing. The way people use woke most is any involvement from people or relationships seen as not the traditionally socially acceptable. By a mile that's how it's used the most. Such as woman or black people in major roles, interracial relationships, gay relationships, etc. These all fall under - what you define as the closest to the correct definition of "woke" is. You don't really know enough about Gale to make the call into either direction tbh, but he's prop just bi.
@@crazagres1839 the Fairy people in ShB is non-binary only in English localization thanks to Kate; so that is a bad example that was English local changing context to force something Kate should not be allowed to be only local head under Koji she already pulled these liberties but there was some form of control who knows what she will do next. secondly woke-ism is meant to term progressive ideologies which tend to place everything under labels for example you are black so by nature you are oppressed; you are white so by nature you have privilege; you are acting different than your born gender so by nature you are trans; being woke is actually detrimental as it leads to a non-progressive society as you are raised under a specific assumption and you can never be anything else this then causes those that are placed in the privileged label to usually resort to what is called over correctness which in itself can be racism; sexism and discrimination as a whole. so being woke is good but being overtly woke can be bad for example when a company over corrects and sacrifices quality for inclusiveness or like starfield that basically had a quest revolving around a trans person; these things have been in games for long gay; bi; trans you name it and it is not being complained about however don't sacrifice quality to push over correctness.
I agree with you, as a french christian I am not woke at all and dont like it but playing FFXIV is so great and I really enjoy the fact that this is for everyone.
honestly my gripe with eng vas in general is the fact that shit sometimes sounds too amateurish. Wuk Lamat's reaction to the alpaca spit in ENG was just terrible, so terrible that even French did it better, and I don't even know french, but at least there was some level of a scream.
Honestly? I refuse to fault her ENG VA for it. Being transfem myself, and struggling ENORMOUSLY with voice training, on top of the fact that there are thousands of voiced NPC's in this game, and just about as many VA's, they can't all be perfect, or even good. I think she's a fine VA, and she clearly put in the effort. With time and more experience I think she could become great.
@@FreyaWardYT both the english VA and Square are at fault here. If you aren't good enough you shouldn't have gotten the job it's simple as that. Consumers don't care that someone is struggling, afterall they pay money for the product and expect the same quality they got before. Mixed reviews are there for a reason. Every VA sounds good except Wuk Lamat.
It doesn't matter what sexuality or gender VA has. What matters is the quality of their performance. And in case with Wuk Lamat it's not that great. That's the whole thing. Defending subpar performance with an arguement that VA is trans is about as trasphobic as it is to criticize it on a similar basis. You need not look further than Aoi Shouta to realize its just a lack of skill.
@@FreyaWardYT i don't think you can fault the VA you should fault the ones that hired her... there is no way that this massive game could not find a better VA for the MAIN character of the expansion. Imo her voice and accent is very fitting but she cant express any emotions besides "optimistic/excited". The why really does not matter but if that is the best she can do then there had to have been better choices. also "thousands of voiced NPC's"?? there are like 100 at most (not counting no name NPC's that have 1 line at most and even then its no where near 1000). and the last time i felt the voice acting being this noticably bad was minfilia in ARR.
@@TheMastiser You're right. At absolute most it's probably closer to a couple hundred across the localizations. That was me talking out of my ass, and I'm more than likely way off base. But it doesn't change the fact that Lamat's voice acting wouldn't be nearly as much of a talking point if it had been a cis woman, who sounded exactly the same, and gave the exact same performance. Some people are upset that she has a trans VA, and they have been making that abundantly clear. Meanwhile, there has also been an absolute flood of support and admiration for her VA. Wuk Lamat IS a well liked character, and a lot of people enjoyed her voice acting.
I heard some stuff about this. I recently bought it. But I didn’t hear any actual details. Just that it’s “woke” now lol. I just saw a few thumbnails mainly and I don’t click that bc if you click ONE video that even remotely leans to the right as a male, it’ll just start spamming you with alt-right content. Apparently the voice actor for Wuk Lamat is trans? That’s just like, I don’t even know. It’s not even a concern to me? I hear that there’s not enough voice acting in the quests and I think then that it’s poorly made. Not the voice actors fault, but rather the guy who wrote the story. Who we know to be the one who made the most controversial parts of the entire game. Everything from Characters like Lyse or the Shonene feel of the story in StB, (imo that’s bad for a game like FF that’s supposed to be more than just anime tropes) to World Design he sort of messes it all up imo. He’s not a great writer. But I forgive him because it’s FFXIV and more specifically/importantly because Yoshi P trusts his judgement.
I think that most serious criticism (I.E people who aren't trolls or actual plants calling stuff woke like dunderheads) i've encountered comes from the fact that Wuk Lamat is an obnoxious character, mind you this is something people complained about Lyse during Stormblood aswell, so I dont think it's too outlandish of a complaint. I haven't played the expansion yet so I wont confirm or deny that, but that seems to be the most agreed upon complaint people have.
See, the problem is this doesn't work. The Lyse complaints also had the undercurrent that Lyse basically did nothing in her expansion but brood and think herself unworthy then eventually gained confidence - through no work of her own - which is actually true. She was nominally the protagonist, but the Warrior of Light did most of the work. In Dawntrail, Wuk Lamat IS actually the protagonist. She does all the fucking things that drive the plot! That's good! And if you think about it, considering the SQEX writing team got a sensitivity reading, is probably very much for nominally "woke" reasons, which is to say that we de facto "Europeans" do not actually interfere that much with the politics of Tural - at least inasmuch as we only intervened with the blessing of a Turali driving these actions. A lot of people were worried precisely about the possibly colonial undertones that the expansion could have, and it gracefully avoided those.
@@untemperance Yet they gave all of the supposedly native meso-american equivalent races Hispanic accents. The Spanish were some of the most brutal colonizers in history. If you want to look at more ingame examples of the cultures there apparently requiring "western" interference to make progress: Without Wuk Lamat hiring Eorzeans to do all the heavy lifting for her bid for the throne, those bird people whose names I forget would not have remembered their own tradition to help make their crops grow, or how about the alternative "western" innovation of fertilizer brought in by big bro catboi? Come to think of it, without his Eorzean education, the whole continent would have seen precious little innovation. Or perhaps the most questionable example of all. If we hadn't come there to help Wuk Lamat, the Mamool Ja would have very likely continued their tradition of infanticide. If you're one of these people who find issues with fiction perpetuating ancient real world issues, there's a lot to be mad at in this game. There might be more examples that I'm not remembering right now, but gracefully avoiding colonial undertones really depends on the angle you look at the game with. From the VA casting to story choices pointing vaguely to a "white saviour" mindset, if you really want to find issues, they are there aplenty.
I agree with you, it's even a joke between my playgroup : FF XIV is woke as fuck BUT Hytholodaeus and Emet are not in a couple. They're clearly in a polycule with Azem. We have this inside joke that you get the "LGBTQ Blessing" each time there's a rainbow that gets you something nice : - in treasure hunt, you have a rainbow that get's you a free win - in the eden raid, the two lesbians are trying to transform a grey stone into a rainbow stone - SPOILER for Dawntrail : in Solution Nine, you get a "rainbow juice" and a rainbow power up aura
@@FreyaWardYT Yeah, the game always has been progressive. I didn't even know that Wuk Lamat VA was trans, i just loved her acting especially the lvl 97 cutscene. She's not as legendary as Emet's acting but she's good. Hater will always be hater but CBU 3 is an ally. Just look at Dion from FFXVI.
The german VA of Wuk Lamat is amazing, but the script got issues and is very "stick up your butt" especially at the start, which does not fit Lamaty'i. FFXIV always has been openminded, i love that.
I like Wuk Lamat. But there are things i like and dislike. First about the VA, i dont care who the VA is, if trans, male, female whatever. Many of my japanese anime male characters are voiced by a women. What i care for is the talent, and work they put in. And for Wuk Lamat, the voice fits, the dialect fits but what is the most disappointing and also what breaks the illusion of the story is a game is. She could not project any emotions into her voice. All her voice did was getting louder or lower, faster or slower. There was no anger, no sadness. Joy was in, but thats basicly the base voice she did. Second, Wuk is being more present then the WoL that is true. But i see this as a, "Hey we saved the planed, killed the 2 oldest "Primals" now we gotta chill". Dont forget right after 6.0 it was said "We" as Scions should fall back. Disband. We are now just a adventurer that helps a new frind on her way. See her grow. Because we already have seen so much, joy, sadnes, anger and loss. Wuk hasnt. We accompany her on her journey to "hear feel think" like Thancred told to Wuks Brother on Many Fires. So for me it was just that. I journey as a helper. We dont know whats gonna happen afterwards for 7.1-7.6 This will show us if we will take back focus to us as "WoL". My prediction though will be that up to 7.3 we will help Wuk and Lil Jaja get their positions as kings. And then we focus on us againe.
I hate saying anything about stuff like that, because the whole woke topic is a very american thing and as a european, I am obviously not anywhere near an american conservative when it comes to political opinon, but.... These are the same people that got bitchy back in EW when they renamed the beast tribes. They know fuck all about the game or its community, so they should really stop yelling.
True. I didn't know that the English VA was trans until after I was done with the story. I just didn't like their acting or the character of Wuk Lamat. The Japanese VA at least sounded better, but didn't change the problem with the character. Though now that I know that the English VA was trans, they didn't do it for the other languages, and they were noticeably worse, I have to think they were hired not on ability but to check a box.
Your video description is exactly what's wrong with this community. "Oh there's some platonic friendship in the dialogue? They're obviously bi/gay/enby" Like jfc keep that to urself pls
@@FreyaWardYT " Haurchefant is clearly bi, as he is absolutely into the player character, regardless of gender. The Japanese version of the game makes this extremely explicit. This is something of a recurring trend among NPC's. G'raha Tia for example." 🧍 and the entire "fan speculation" part. Should I repeat myself or...
I mean sure, repeat yourself enough and it might actually click for you. Here, I'll make it simple. Haurchefant's JP lines make it clear that he is incredibly thirsty for the WoL. A cursory glance at a direct translation (even better if you can read Japanaese) will prove this. I very explicitly reference ships as fan speculation. You're halfway there, just keep reading, and you'll see that I write "jokes aside" in the very next paragraph, before describing the very real trend of progressive sociopolitical commentary in the game.
FFXIV was never woke, and it's not now. You are just as reactionary as the people freaking out because they think it's woke. The problem has nothing to do with Wuk Lamat's voice actor, and anybody latching onto that is just a normie easily swept up in mainstream arguments. The problem is that Wuk Lamat isn't a good character, and there was way too much focus on her. It was like making Jarjarbinks the main character of a Star Wars movie. The trans voice actor is just an easy thing to latch onto for people because it's true that a lot of the time localizers that ruin Japanese media do happen to be trans or trans-adjacent in some way. Unfortunately for whoever voiced Wuk that is not the case here and they'll be blamed for the character itself being bad simply for voice acting it. You could easily make the point that FFXIV is a right-wing game because it features different races, that are often times insular/traditional and not warm to outsiders. You could argue that Godbert in the Gold Saucer saying that Nanamo should stop using Ul Dah's taxes to support refugees is as well. The fact is that these people are characters that represent ideas that present themselves in the real world. The idea that FFXIV has any sort of political agenda is hilarious.
There are big differences between open-minded and woke. And I have to disagree, neither Haurchefant nor Graha Tia seem to be bi nor "into" the player (in a romantic or sexual way, i mean), they admire the WoL as a hero and see the WoL as a very deep friend. People can have deep relationships and even feelings for someone without it being romantic or sexual, but as trusted friends.
There isn't. Woke is and has always been a thought-terminating cliche meant specifically for morons to not have to actually think about topics and could just mindlessly call everything they cannot explain or agree with woke.
@@brenthayes7237 first of all, I've NEVER heard of that EVER being the case in jp text. Secondly, it's the fact that the voice acting is complete garbage, The meaning of woke is having characters like Wuk Lamat who are F being voiced by a trans person for diversity hires. That's why people call it woke, because the actor isn't good. The "accent" is all over the place and they were CLEARLY hired for pure diversity points. Which shouldnt' have even been the case since Yoshi P himself confirmed there were not going to be any LGBT characters.
What Brent said. Now, this is a minor correction honestly - Kyoai, your point remains valid - but yeah, in the original Japanese dialogue dudes' horny AF for the WoL. I fully agree with your statement about G'raha, though. It's pretty clear his respect for the WoL is for what they've done, and we're not the only character he fanboys over. :D
@@Miztique That actually is the case in the JP version lmao. He's hella horny for the WoL regardless of gender. This has always been the trick of the devil in this case and the most important point however. Wherever Wuk Lamats voice actor is a trans woman or not - we have no way of knowing if she was a diversity hire. The Assumption without evidence that she is - reveals the lie. You would mind not because of the quality of voice action - which is frankly quite good, she carries the entire expansion on that back - but because there is a trans woman involved supposedly. Wuk Lamats accent is insanely consistent. The accent itself isn't even something you have to like because that is something ultimately subjective, but it's absolutely and objectively consistent and high quality through the entire expansion. Absolute nothing burger of an argument. You can pick out her lines from Anywhere in the expansion and they'll fit in just fine. Yoshi Ps supposed quote on no LGBT characters is a complete meme. The warrior of light is allowed to be gay and literally marry people of the same sex without any complaint. The three people who're absolutely obsessed with the WoL are all man and make no distinction based on gender. Haurchefant is insanely horny and Aymeric Literally asks you out for a date, where you then have a Private Dinner where he specifically wants it to be so. The Wanderer's Palace NPC are openly gay that's no secret they literally say they are a couple and no lesser because of their differences. A male lalafell is having uh.. let's say dreams of "questionable purity" about Raubahn, just to name a couple. There's more but its frankly pointless to dig for it - its blatantly there. Openly gay couples have been a thing since at least 2015 in FF14.
The whole problem here is Wuk Lamat and the story pacing. Her personality is annoying and the voice acting delivery is much worse than other characters. Even her motivational speeches and angry shouts have 0 omph behind them. They should've hired a better english VA as I've heard only we do have this problem. as for story pacing there is a lot of useless stuff, I get that the whole xpack is about getting to know everyone and how they live but it could be seriously cut by half and the free space filled with something more interesting. Even by the end of it where we aren't supposed to have a lot of time around we are still walking around learning about farming, come on.
I don't think anything you mentioned makes the game particularly woke at all. Woke isn't simply when 'gay character exist.' Woke is an ideology. It DOES exist in FFXIV, but I don't think it goes back as far as you say. One example I found that is unequivocably Woke is that one lopporit in the beast tribe quests that uses they/them pronouns and nobody questions it, they all respect the they/them pronouns. That would be an ideology thing. X character being gay, or allowing gay couples is just normal. You might say that's progressive, but you'd be hard pressed to say that's Woke.
Woke means entirely different things based on who you ask. The existence of gay or even black characters, and their inclusion by itself absolutely has been used an an example of stuff being woke by countless people. Ya'll are not equally good at wearing that mask.
My problem is that the eng voice just sounds tremendously amateurish, like reading a script or like any attempt are emotion sounds off. If it was a minor character cool but considering this msq is 89% wuk lamat it's honestly kinda disrespectful to make the main voice of the expantion someone that on the surface looks like a diversity hire. Then again eng audio has always been cursed so one could also argue is just normal Tho Honestly I can agree that most of the usual words from both sides of the political spectrum are just noise at this point with how overused they are, to me people need to separate politics from performance.
One issue is that art, theatrical performances, writing, all of that is inherently political. If you separate politics from art, for example, then you have a meaningless blob. Our experiences, all of which are acquired as a result of politics (inherently so, as we grow up in a society, which is governed by politics), shape our perspective of the world, and when we put what we see to the canvas or the page or whatever is your medium, we are engaging in politics. You cannot create art devoid of bias. Not even generative AI can do that -- computer code is anecdotally supposed to be "objective" and even their model is literally all bias! There is no escape, it just happens because you're human and the things that you create, are made by a human. When you try to distance yourself from politics, you are also inherently making a political statement. Apoliticism, as an idea, is itself a product of the deeply entrenched politics of human civilisations, informed by the perception of the current status quo or an idea that things were somehow "less political" in the past. The part about this looking like a diversity hire, I'll take as mentioned in good faith, but I do want to point out that had the VA been a cis caucasian woman who was performing poorly, we would not be seeing "diversity hire" at all in this discussion. That, too, reveals important details about the political leanings of the people who are commenting on the topic.
@@ruk_necahual I agree except for that begging sentence. "If you separate politics from art, for example, then you have a meaningless blob." this is just insanely untrue it hurts. Not all art is political. Implying so is quite literally the exact opposite of what art actually is. It couldn't be further from correct
@@mentholnewport Art is an expression of perspective and imagination. You cannot create a piece of artwork without implicitly putting a lot of yourself on the table. It's not that I don't understand the sentiment you're gunning for, but you are shaped by the times that you live in, and that will inform the manner in which you express your creativity. Even if you're just drawing what you see, like a tree, you are invariably exposing a lot about yourself and your perceptions to the world around you. Moreover trying to define what art is, is a topic that has been hotly debated for probably thousands of years. Politics also inform that; how many times have viewers not decried some expressions of art as "obscene" or "vulgar" or even just "not art"? What about, say, the pornographic? It meets all the criteria of, say, film, and is itself an expression, however base one might consider it. Would you consider it art? Does it make a difference if it's drawn, filmed, sculpted in stone or given any other expression than through film? Why do you feel the way you feel about it? My point being that anything to do with human perception is inherently going to contain, and be coloured by your personal politics in one shape or form, whether expressing it by creating art, or critiquing it.
@@ruk_necahual This is just false and most of your writing is obtuse word play. You're now broadening the definition of politics in a sort of moving the goal post way. Politics at it's very simplest is the idea and activities that come from making decisions in groups. To say drawing a tree would contains someone's "personal politics" is just unprovable. Art is completely subjective. There is no argument there. No debate. Politics absolutely can be and honestly are usually a part of artwork. I won't deny that at all. But it isn't always politics. When a child draws a smiley face that doesn't contain politics of any sort but is unquestionably art. If we're going to consider being happy a child's "personal politics" then we've fully stepped into delusional territory
For me I can say that I don´t like Wuk Lamatn not because of the voice actor I had no idea that she is trans. She sounds like a whiny kid for me. The character only sees what she wants to see and has no grasp what happends or why it happends. Not a suitable character as a leader.
There's no problem with Wuk's voice actor being trans. There's problem with her/him being terrible at that. At first i unironically loved Wuk's voice, but at the latter stages of dt it became nigh abominable. I literally clinged my teeth during the last trial (sickest thing ever) because of Wuk's terrible voice acting. I don't know whose fault is this, but oh boy, my adoration for Wuk quickly became contempt.
Literally just watched it...I honestly did like Wuk's voice in the beginning too (first introduction) but yeah...I had to switch to JP real quick and I'm so glad I did. It's honestly like you're playing a completely different game.
I don't see anyone really calling it woke. Mostly just calling out the poor writing this expansion, especially bad writing around Wuk's character. That would transcend language. Also the English VA's performance isn't terrible, just a bit mid. Though after learning the VA is trans that actually made me more impressed with his performance pulling off an accent along with sounding feminine enough to not notice.
i wana get this out there but im gay have a bf and i do love seeing lgbtq+ stuff in games the only thing i dislike is when its shoved down your throat (not making a dirty joke clear your minds) if its like normal stuff normal stuff oh im trans im fine but if its only about that as a main plot thing its iffy with me but stuff like a guy or girl doing the overly gay/lesbian stuff for comady i laugh
People like seeing their struggles represented in a way that provides catharsis. For those that can't relate directly, it can offer a means to educate, or provide an alternative perspective on an issue they may not have thought more about. It's not being shoved down anyone's throat, it's merely asking one to engage and understand with someone from another walk of life
@@FreyaWardYT yea i understand that and i just wana reiterate i dont mind it just for me if it gets to much i kinda zone out not saying its a bad thing is all and before people think im putting it down im not
@@jaynedoug9453 thats true im agreeing just personaly i dont mind it im ok with it being a partial focus i like playing games with it just not when its allong the lines of there gay/lesbian because we need to hit our quota like the devs put it in for the sake of "quick put gays in for the publicity and nothing else" i understand my comment may does sound like im being negative about it when i ment to try and be positive about it im not good at wording things properly and make myself sound like a jerk
For those of you leaving positive comments, thank you. As fun as it is for me to argue with chuds, it can get exhausting. I really appreciate everyone who came to watch this rambling 3 minute rant about a stupid non-troversy and share your own experiences with all the whacky and wonderful characters and stories this game has to offer.
And to all the people getting their knickers in a twist over the video description, you clearly didn't read it fully, AND you're just proving my point that calling shit "woke" is meaningless. Either way, keep malding. It's incredibly funny to me. For the rest of you, thank you for commenting. There have already been examples provided that I either forgot about, or didn't know were ever a thing. 💙
This was truly an amazing commentary. It goes to show that trolls and ignorant people will latch onto the next nearest 'controversy" just so they'll feel better about themselves.
My problem is not that Wuk Lamat's voice actor is trans. My problem is that G'raha Tia made me gay.
Have you met Koana? Or as his family calls him "G'raha Blast"
@@JackDaloots He's allowed in my harem if G'raha allows it
Fair!
IIRC the couple you mentioned even explicitly stated that the strife they got was not because they were a gay couple but that they where an interracial couple.
gay and interracial doesnt mean woke retard.
what does is promoting the ideologies.
The example you gave... they have been living rentfree inside my head since I found them 5 years ago. I hope they're eternally bonded or an adventure and doing okay. I just love them so much ;-; I once wanted to write fanfiction about them but the fact that they don't have name is what stopped me. I can't keep on calling them 'that miqote' or 'the hyur'... Would be nice if they made a comeback one day.
One of the biggest arcs of the series was a disagreement between Hyper-Conservatism vs Progression.
uh no, no it wasnt
when you say "progression" you mean everything is gay and "love is love"
What the arc was about is people who believed in false gods creating their own destiny against a regime that saw the devastation that using aether to summon "gods" was doing. Youre putting a bullshit label for modern shit in a guise to try and push your narrative. Youre a retard
@@jimmythecrow oh no, my argument is utterly dismantled.
FFXIV hasn't always been good at being progressive-the Lancer and Archer questlines from 2.0 are notorious among Duskwight/Keeper fans for mishandling the elements of bigotry and racism presented in its writing. But it has always TRIED, for which I'm very thankful.
The core conflict of Shadowbringers was Emet-Selch believing that the unsundered world was a utopia - something Endwalker reveals to be a giant sham - and that anything was worth doing to bring it back; including the genocide of your entire people, seeing as he considered you "not even truly alive." All of these elements, the idealization of a lost past better world that was replaced by a debauched and degenerate simulacrum of it; the dehumanization of its inhabitants, all of it point towards the fascistic logical conclusion of extreme conservatism. I'm not saying Emet-Selch would be one of those Twitter "Classical Traditions" Greek statue icon accounts that always post neo-Nazi dogwhistles. I think that the core concept with Emet-Selch is that he's enmired in grief and is willing to go to every extent to cure himself of it, including lying to himself (the old world was better, you guys aren't really alive; all of that is basically self-justification) but by pure accident(?), he ends up resembling it to a T. Something to which Alphinaud most astutely responds "your value judgments don't matter tho" and basically says that the lives of the currently living, however debased Emet-Selch considers them, still matter.
If I take woke to mean what it actually seems to mean, "progressive" ideology, then by all accounts, the fan-beloved Shadowbringers was very much unequivocally "woke." The problem is that the people that use this useless, vapid, term as a bludgeon continually move the goalposts and refuse to define it consistently.
That is such a perfect read of Emet's character. I think that a major aspect of his motivation is his guilt for taking for granted the beauty of his world and his friendships. He realized that he never fully appreciated what he had with Hythlodaeus and Azem and it blinded him to the grief and suffering he caused, and would cause, to the people who live now and experience the same beauties that he did.
And yes, that's ultimately the crux of my argument. "Woke" is a thought terminating cliche used as an attack word, and will never be adequately defined, as it HAS to remain vague. It needs to be able to mean whatever the person using it needs it to mean at that particular moment.
YES!
That's it. That's the comment. I love Emet, i'd have burned the worlds for him be he (I) was wrong.
No, actually, it's not a critique of conservatism. It's a critique of gnostic cults like Marxism, Nazism, fascism, hegelianism, or any of the other collectivist branches that have sprouted out in the 20th-21st century. All of these believe in the idea of forcing people back to a hypothetical utopia that was taken and sundered from us, the true gods, by a demon (demiurge, capitalism, Jews, patriarchy, etc.) and that any who do not wish this aren't human and therefore can be killed like an animal. The Ascians are representative of gnostic belief, not conservatism. It's a repudiation of woke.
@joshuamaurer9784 Alright, I'mma break my rule of not being directly rude to anyone that comments. What the absolute fuck are you talking about? Do you actually understand what ANY of those words mean?
@@FreyaWardYT maybe don't delete my comment. But let me lay it out for you. The Ascians were the original "gods". Hydalen (the demiurge in this story) sunders the gods and creates the mortal prisons (shards). All of the people are a piece of the original gods, just like in gnostic belief. Hydalen, through the lens of the Ascians, is seen as a demon and her followers likewise. Those Ascians the unsundered raise up are now have the "gnos", or divine knowledge that they were once god. They long collect humanity back to this utopia through the calamities, bringing back human souls to the source to make their ultimate sacrificial ritual to bring back paradise and the other Ascians through our death. Gnostic and hermetic belief, especially the dialectic, were combined by Hegel and continued through Marx and his derivative, murderous followings. Woke, or identity politics, is the continuation of the dialectic through Marx, Gramsci, Marcuse, de Beauvoir, Butler, and others. All to get back to something not never existed. It's right there in black and white. In fact, Wuk Lamat is a conservative, if annoying, character. She is about preserving the empire her father created and the culture of the peoples that make up its fabric. The brothers are progressives. Koana is a classical liberal who wishes to bring sharlayan technology and ideology without care of how that will erode the cultures of Tural. Zoraal Ja is collectivist who will subjugate all to his will through brute force and terror in the name of "peace". Again, destroying all cultures and dissent in his path. It is a rejection of progressive ideas. Nothing she is doing is at all progressive but a continuation of the status quo.
Culture war tourists who never played FF are suddnely mad about a game they know nothing about
Seems to be a reoccurring theme
lol tourists. post your character from lodestone. I can bet you ive been playing longer than you. Tourist, you only came here because you were told it was "diverse and inclusive and not toxic"
@@jimmythecrow That's exactly what a tourist sheep would say.
I suppose that those people would flip if they saw the culinarian questline from 1.0. A character that just dressed and pretended to be a woman to have their place in the restaurant. And it's sad they get no mention in the current questline version.
You're absolutely correct. This game has always been incredibly progressive. These dingdongs have no idea what they are talking about. It's as if they've never played FFXIV before.
I didn't mind Wuk's voice actress one single bit. I just thought it was annoying that she was omnipresent. Especially after the lv 95 questline when things become a "way-over-your-head-show" for her. And I wasn't amused she stole the WoL's thunder in the last trial. But her voice actress was fine.
Basically this.
Having a few gay characters or interracial couples or progressive themes does not make something woke.
Also the examples you gave in the description as fan speculations are just that fan speculations, to me, Emet and Hythlodaeus, Ryne and Gaia, Cid and Nero are just normal friendships and nothing beyond that.
We do have to take into account that fans are thirsty and a lot of em love to make their own head canons and there is nothing wrong with having head canons, problems rise if one starts to claim that their head canon is official canon.
Woke has no definition to begin with, I have heard dozens of people, and entire groups on the right call any gay character, or even Black character being included woke. Haurchefant is explicitly bi in the Japanese text which is the main one(He's into you regardless of gender.) and there's been an explicit gay couple in the game since 2015 who refer to themselves as a couple directly. The fairy ppl in shadow bringer are all non-binary(literally use they/them pronouns.) as well. The game unavoidably has progressive stuff, which will unavoidably lead to it being called woke, as the term is intentionally not well-defied but rather a thought-terminating cliché.
So essentially you tolerate gay people as consumable pieces of fanservice for your perusal and enjoyment but god forbid we actually cared about them as people with complex inner worlds and personalities and lives and you had to hear about that? Thanks for spelling out the obvious undercurrent behind your line of thought. Woke is meaningless. You are homophobic.
@@crazagres1839 When it comes to woke, most have their own interpretation of it and don't really care about any "official" definition, in my opinion, the best way to go about it is just to take what is most commonly referred to as woke and that is it. Woke as a term is one of those that keeps changing a lot and often and everyone kinda has an idea on what it is.
Oh the historians of the future are going to have one hell of a headache when they are trying to figure out what it was exactly.
I like the term playersexual for characters that are exclusively attracted to the player character in games where the player can make their own character.
For example: in BG3 Gale appears as a straight man based on his backstory, one romantic/sexual relationship and that is with a goddess, but in-game he is attracted to the player character no matter what the player character is.
@@Nuinwing The very idea of you believing that there is an "official" definition reveals the lack of understanding on the topic. The entire point of the term is to do what you're doing, you're dancing to the tune perfectly. You're meant to assign your set of values to it, it's an empty canvas to paint onto. Anything progressive you disagree with or mind a lot is now woke, and what you don't disagree with isn't. It's that simple. It's not complex for quite literally anyone but the people caught up in the low-effort manipulation people are doing.
The way people use woke most is any involvement from people or relationships seen as not the traditionally socially acceptable. By a mile that's how it's used the most. Such as woman or black people in major roles, interracial relationships, gay relationships, etc. These all fall under - what you define as the closest to the correct definition of "woke" is.
You don't really know enough about Gale to make the call into either direction tbh, but he's prop just bi.
@@crazagres1839 the Fairy people in ShB is non-binary only in English localization thanks to Kate; so that is a bad example that was English local changing context to force something Kate should not be allowed to be only local head under Koji she already pulled these liberties but there was some form of control who knows what she will do next.
secondly woke-ism is meant to term progressive ideologies which tend to place everything under labels for example you are black so by nature you are oppressed; you are white so by nature you have privilege; you are acting different than your born gender so by nature you are trans; being woke is actually detrimental as it leads to a non-progressive society as you are raised under a specific assumption and you can never be anything else this then causes those that are placed in the privileged label to usually resort to what is called over correctness which in itself can be racism; sexism and discrimination as a whole. so being woke is good but being overtly woke can be bad for example when a company over corrects and sacrifices quality for inclusiveness or like starfield that basically had a quest revolving around a trans person; these things have been in games for long gay; bi; trans you name it and it is not being complained about however don't sacrifice quality to push over correctness.
I agree with you, as a french christian I am not woke at all and dont like it but playing FFXIV is so great and I really enjoy the fact that this is for everyone.
honestly my gripe with eng vas in general is the fact that shit sometimes sounds too amateurish. Wuk Lamat's reaction to the alpaca spit in ENG was just terrible, so terrible that even French did it better, and I don't even know french, but at least there was some level of a scream.
Honestly? I refuse to fault her ENG VA for it. Being transfem myself, and struggling ENORMOUSLY with voice training, on top of the fact that there are thousands of voiced NPC's in this game, and just about as many VA's, they can't all be perfect, or even good. I think she's a fine VA, and she clearly put in the effort. With time and more experience I think she could become great.
@@FreyaWardYT both the english VA and Square are at fault here. If you aren't good enough you shouldn't have gotten the job it's simple as that. Consumers don't care that someone is struggling, afterall they pay money for the product and expect the same quality they got before. Mixed reviews are there for a reason. Every VA sounds good except Wuk Lamat.
It doesn't matter what sexuality or gender VA has. What matters is the quality of their performance. And in case with Wuk Lamat it's not that great.
That's the whole thing. Defending subpar performance with an arguement that VA is trans is about as trasphobic as it is to criticize it on a similar basis. You need not look further than Aoi Shouta to realize its just a lack of skill.
@@FreyaWardYT i don't think you can fault the VA you should fault the ones that hired her... there is no way that this massive game could not find a better VA for the MAIN character of the expansion. Imo her voice and accent is very fitting but she cant express any emotions besides "optimistic/excited". The why really does not matter but if that is the best she can do then there had to have been better choices.
also "thousands of voiced NPC's"?? there are like 100 at most (not counting no name NPC's that have 1 line at most and even then its no where near 1000). and the last time i felt the voice acting being this noticably bad was minfilia in ARR.
@@TheMastiser You're right. At absolute most it's probably closer to a couple hundred across the localizations. That was me talking out of my ass, and I'm more than likely way off base.
But it doesn't change the fact that Lamat's voice acting wouldn't be nearly as much of a talking point if it had been a cis woman, who sounded exactly the same, and gave the exact same performance. Some people are upset that she has a trans VA, and they have been making that abundantly clear. Meanwhile, there has also been an absolute flood of support and admiration for her VA. Wuk Lamat IS a well liked character, and a lot of people enjoyed her voice acting.
I heard some stuff about this. I recently bought it. But I didn’t hear any actual details. Just that it’s “woke” now lol. I just saw a few thumbnails mainly and I don’t click that bc if you click ONE video that even remotely leans to the right as a male, it’ll just start spamming you with alt-right content. Apparently the voice actor for Wuk Lamat is trans? That’s just like, I don’t even know. It’s not even a concern to me? I hear that there’s not enough voice acting in the quests and I think then that it’s poorly made. Not the voice actors fault, but rather the guy who wrote the story. Who we know to be the one who made the most controversial parts of the entire game. Everything from Characters like Lyse or the Shonene feel of the story in StB, (imo that’s bad for a game like FF that’s supposed to be more than just anime tropes) to World Design he sort of messes it all up imo. He’s not a great writer. But I forgive him because it’s FFXIV and more specifically/importantly because Yoshi P trusts his judgement.
I think that most serious criticism (I.E people who aren't trolls or actual plants calling stuff woke like dunderheads) i've encountered comes from the fact that Wuk Lamat is an obnoxious character, mind you this is something people complained about Lyse during Stormblood aswell, so I dont think it's too outlandish of a complaint. I haven't played the expansion yet so I wont confirm or deny that, but that seems to be the most agreed upon complaint people have.
I can understand people thinking her obnoxious. She really does exude annoying little sister energy. I personally find it rather endearing
Have you heard of what "dog whistling" is?
See, the problem is this doesn't work. The Lyse complaints also had the undercurrent that Lyse basically did nothing in her expansion but brood and think herself unworthy then eventually gained confidence - through no work of her own - which is actually true. She was nominally the protagonist, but the Warrior of Light did most of the work. In Dawntrail, Wuk Lamat IS actually the protagonist. She does all the fucking things that drive the plot! That's good!
And if you think about it, considering the SQEX writing team got a sensitivity reading, is probably very much for nominally "woke" reasons, which is to say that we de facto "Europeans" do not actually interfere that much with the politics of Tural - at least inasmuch as we only intervened with the blessing of a Turali driving these actions. A lot of people were worried precisely about the possibly colonial undertones that the expansion could have, and it gracefully avoided those.
@@untemperance Yet they gave all of the supposedly native meso-american equivalent races Hispanic accents. The Spanish were some of the most brutal colonizers in history.
If you want to look at more ingame examples of the cultures there apparently requiring "western" interference to make progress:
Without Wuk Lamat hiring Eorzeans to do all the heavy lifting for her bid for the throne, those bird people whose names I forget would not have remembered their own tradition to help make their crops grow, or how about the alternative "western" innovation of fertilizer brought in by big bro catboi? Come to think of it, without his Eorzean education, the whole continent would have seen precious little innovation.
Or perhaps the most questionable example of all. If we hadn't come there to help Wuk Lamat, the Mamool Ja would have very likely continued their tradition of infanticide.
If you're one of these people who find issues with fiction perpetuating ancient real world issues, there's a lot to be mad at in this game. There might be more examples that I'm not remembering right now, but gracefully avoiding colonial undertones really depends on the angle you look at the game with. From the VA casting to story choices pointing vaguely to a "white saviour" mindset, if you really want to find issues, they are there aplenty.
@@RiveroftheWither A dog whistle is not finding a character annoying, i'm sorry.
I agree with you, it's even a joke between my playgroup : FF XIV is woke as fuck BUT Hytholodaeus and Emet are not in a couple. They're clearly in a polycule with Azem.
We have this inside joke that you get the "LGBTQ Blessing" each time there's a rainbow that gets you something nice :
- in treasure hunt, you have a rainbow that get's you a free win
- in the eden raid, the two lesbians are trying to transform a grey stone into a rainbow stone
- SPOILER for Dawntrail : in Solution Nine, you get a "rainbow juice" and a rainbow power up aura
I love that so much. There are SO MANY RAINBOWS in this game
@@FreyaWardYT Yeah, the game always has been progressive. I didn't even know that Wuk Lamat VA was trans, i just loved her acting especially the lvl 97 cutscene.
She's not as legendary as Emet's acting but she's good. Hater will always be hater but CBU 3 is an ally. Just look at Dion from FFXVI.
They can keep hating all they want. Lamaty'i is a precious bean and I love her. If anything happened to her, my WoL will BE the next Calamity
The german VA of Wuk Lamat is amazing, but the script got issues and is very "stick up your butt" especially at the start, which does not fit Lamaty'i.
FFXIV always has been openminded, i love that.
I like Wuk Lamat. But there are things i like and dislike.
First about the VA, i dont care who the VA is, if trans, male, female whatever. Many of my japanese anime male characters are voiced by a women. What i care for is the talent, and work they put in. And for Wuk Lamat, the voice fits, the dialect fits but what is the most disappointing and also what breaks the illusion of the story is a game is. She could not project any emotions into her voice. All her voice did was getting louder or lower, faster or slower. There was no anger, no sadness. Joy was in, but thats basicly the base voice she did.
Second, Wuk is being more present then the WoL that is true. But i see this as a, "Hey we saved the planed, killed the 2 oldest "Primals" now we gotta chill". Dont forget right after 6.0 it was said "We" as Scions should fall back. Disband. We are now just a adventurer that helps a new frind on her way. See her grow. Because we already have seen so much, joy, sadnes, anger and loss. Wuk hasnt. We accompany her on her journey to "hear feel think" like Thancred told to Wuks Brother on Many Fires.
So for me it was just that. I journey as a helper. We dont know whats gonna happen afterwards for 7.1-7.6 This will show us if we will take back focus to us as "WoL".
My prediction though will be that up to 7.3 we will help Wuk and Lil Jaja get their positions as kings. And then we focus on us againe.
I hate saying anything about stuff like that, because the whole woke topic is a very american thing and as a european, I am obviously not anywhere near an american conservative when it comes to political opinon, but....
These are the same people that got bitchy back in EW when they renamed the beast tribes. They know fuck all about the game or its community, so they should really stop yelling.
XIV is the gayest MMO out there right now. What do they mean, "woke"? LMAO
Wuk'Lamat voice is perfect btw
Most criticism had nothing to do with the fact Wuk Lamat's voice actoress is trans. Wokies are just using that to deflect the actual criticism.
True. I didn't know that the English VA was trans until after I was done with the story. I just didn't like their acting or the character of Wuk Lamat. The Japanese VA at least sounded better, but didn't change the problem with the character. Though now that I know that the English VA was trans, they didn't do it for the other languages, and they were noticeably worse, I have to think they were hired not on ability but to check a box.
Your video description is exactly what's wrong with this community. "Oh there's some platonic friendship in the dialogue? They're obviously bi/gay/enby" Like jfc keep that to urself pls
Tell me you didn't actually read the video description, without telling me you didn't actually read the video description
@@FreyaWardYT " Haurchefant is clearly bi, as he is absolutely into the player character, regardless of gender. The Japanese version of the game makes this extremely explicit. This is something of a recurring trend among NPC's. G'raha Tia for example." 🧍 and the entire "fan speculation" part. Should I repeat myself or...
I mean sure, repeat yourself enough and it might actually click for you. Here, I'll make it simple.
Haurchefant's JP lines make it clear that he is incredibly thirsty for the WoL. A cursory glance at a direct translation (even better if you can read Japanaese) will prove this.
I very explicitly reference ships as fan speculation. You're halfway there, just keep reading, and you'll see that I write "jokes aside" in the very next paragraph, before describing the very real trend of progressive sociopolitical commentary in the game.
@@FreyaWardYT lol we all know you're not actually joking about those examples. I mean, just look at you...
@@Miztique Don't throw your back out moving that goalpost
FFXIV was never woke, and it's not now. You are just as reactionary as the people freaking out because they think it's woke.
The problem has nothing to do with Wuk Lamat's voice actor, and anybody latching onto that is just a normie easily swept up in mainstream arguments. The problem is that Wuk Lamat isn't a good character, and there was way too much focus on her. It was like making Jarjarbinks the main character of a Star Wars movie. The trans voice actor is just an easy thing to latch onto for people because it's true that a lot of the time localizers that ruin Japanese media do happen to be trans or trans-adjacent in some way. Unfortunately for whoever voiced Wuk that is not the case here and they'll be blamed for the character itself being bad simply for voice acting it.
You could easily make the point that FFXIV is a right-wing game because it features different races, that are often times insular/traditional and not warm to outsiders. You could argue that Godbert in the Gold Saucer saying that Nanamo should stop using Ul Dah's taxes to support refugees is as well. The fact is that these people are characters that represent ideas that present themselves in the real world. The idea that FFXIV has any sort of political agenda is hilarious.
I always skip dialogue in jrpgs.
There are big differences between open-minded and woke. And I have to disagree, neither Haurchefant nor Graha Tia seem to be bi nor "into" the player (in a romantic or sexual way, i mean), they admire the WoL as a hero and see the WoL as a very deep friend. People can have deep relationships and even feelings for someone without it being romantic or sexual, but as trusted friends.
haurchefant asks to ride you like a stallion in the original jp text brother
There isn't. Woke is and has always been a thought-terminating cliche meant specifically for morons to not have to actually think about topics and could just mindlessly call everything they cannot explain or agree with woke.
@@brenthayes7237 first of all, I've NEVER heard of that EVER being the case in jp text. Secondly, it's the fact that the voice acting is complete garbage, The meaning of woke is having characters like Wuk Lamat who are F being voiced by a trans person for diversity hires. That's why people call it woke, because the actor isn't good. The "accent" is all over the place and they were CLEARLY hired for pure diversity points. Which shouldnt' have even been the case since Yoshi P himself confirmed there were not going to be any LGBT characters.
What Brent said. Now, this is a minor correction honestly - Kyoai, your point remains valid - but yeah, in the original Japanese dialogue dudes' horny AF for the WoL.
I fully agree with your statement about G'raha, though. It's pretty clear his respect for the WoL is for what they've done, and we're not the only character he fanboys over. :D
@@Miztique That actually is the case in the JP version lmao. He's hella horny for the WoL regardless of gender. This has always been the trick of the devil in this case and the most important point however. Wherever Wuk Lamats voice actor is a trans woman or not - we have no way of knowing if she was a diversity hire. The Assumption without evidence that she is - reveals the lie. You would mind not because of the quality of voice action - which is frankly quite good, she carries the entire expansion on that back - but because there is a trans woman involved supposedly. Wuk Lamats accent is insanely consistent. The accent itself isn't even something you have to like because that is something ultimately subjective, but it's absolutely and objectively consistent and high quality through the entire expansion. Absolute nothing burger of an argument. You can pick out her lines from Anywhere in the expansion and they'll fit in just fine.
Yoshi Ps supposed quote on no LGBT characters is a complete meme. The warrior of light is allowed to be gay and literally marry people of the same sex without any complaint. The three people who're absolutely obsessed with the WoL are all man and make no distinction based on gender. Haurchefant is insanely horny and Aymeric Literally asks you out for a date, where you then have a Private Dinner where he specifically wants it to be so.
The Wanderer's Palace NPC are openly gay that's no secret they literally say they are a couple and no lesser because of their differences. A male lalafell is having uh.. let's say dreams of "questionable purity" about Raubahn, just to name a couple. There's more but its frankly pointless to dig for it - its blatantly there. Openly gay couples have been a thing since at least 2015 in FF14.
The whole problem here is Wuk Lamat and the story pacing.
Her personality is annoying and the voice acting delivery is much worse than other characters. Even her motivational speeches and angry shouts have 0 omph behind them.
They should've hired a better english VA as I've heard only we do have this problem.
as for story pacing there is a lot of useless stuff, I get that the whole xpack is about getting to know everyone and how they live but it could be seriously cut by half and the free space filled with something more interesting. Even by the end of it where we aren't supposed to have a lot of time around we are still walking around learning about farming, come on.
Glad you had the balls to speak up about this.
Nothing wrong with having balls, no need for you to get jealous.
I don't think anything you mentioned makes the game particularly woke at all.
Woke isn't simply when 'gay character exist.' Woke is an ideology. It DOES exist in FFXIV, but I don't think it goes back as far as you say.
One example I found that is unequivocably Woke is that one lopporit in the beast tribe quests that uses they/them pronouns and nobody questions it, they all respect the they/them pronouns. That would be an ideology thing.
X character being gay, or allowing gay couples is just normal. You might say that's progressive, but you'd be hard pressed to say that's Woke.
It just adds to my point that calling something woke is completely meaningless. It can mean anything to anyone
Woke means entirely different things based on who you ask. The existence of gay or even black characters, and their inclusion by itself absolutely has been used an an example of stuff being woke by countless people. Ya'll are not equally good at wearing that mask.
@@crazagres1839 Exactly! It's a thought terminating cliche. It means whatever it needs to mean to the person using it at any given time.
You're an idiot.
@@crazagres1839 No, I think people really know woke when they see it.
I don't think simply having a gay character is considered woke by anyone.
I'm so proud of you for taking a stand on this. You have some real big manly balls to be so courageous. I applaud you.
They're actually quite shriveled and useless, but thanks anyway!
they finally found a different joke. congrats, only took you a decade or so
@@PatrickWDunne It's like the third time I've seen it posted here 🤣
Do I detect a hint of jealousy?
Nothing new about this one. It's honestly pretty tired.
Play with Japanese Dub, problem solved. Woke nonesense aside, its generally superior anyway.
My problem is that the eng voice just sounds tremendously amateurish, like reading a script or like any attempt are emotion sounds off. If it was a minor character cool but considering this msq is 89% wuk lamat it's honestly kinda disrespectful to make the main voice of the expantion someone that on the surface looks like a diversity hire.
Then again eng audio has always been cursed so one could also argue is just normal
Tho Honestly I can agree that most of the usual words from both sides of the political spectrum are just noise at this point with how overused they are, to me people need to separate politics from performance.
One issue is that art, theatrical performances, writing, all of that is inherently political. If you separate politics from art, for example, then you have a meaningless blob.
Our experiences, all of which are acquired as a result of politics (inherently so, as we grow up in a society, which is governed by politics), shape our perspective of the world, and when we put what we see to the canvas or the page or whatever is your medium, we are engaging in politics.
You cannot create art devoid of bias. Not even generative AI can do that -- computer code is anecdotally supposed to be "objective" and even their model is literally all bias! There is no escape, it just happens because you're human and the things that you create, are made by a human.
When you try to distance yourself from politics, you are also inherently making a political statement. Apoliticism, as an idea, is itself a product of the deeply entrenched politics of human civilisations, informed by the perception of the current status quo or an idea that things were somehow "less political" in the past.
The part about this looking like a diversity hire, I'll take as mentioned in good faith, but I do want to point out that had the VA been a cis caucasian woman who was performing poorly, we would not be seeing "diversity hire" at all in this discussion.
That, too, reveals important details about the political leanings of the people who are commenting on the topic.
@@ruk_necahual I agree except for that begging sentence. "If you separate politics from art, for example, then you have a meaningless blob." this is just insanely untrue it hurts. Not all art is political. Implying so is quite literally the exact opposite of what art actually is. It couldn't be further from correct
@@mentholnewport Art is an expression of perspective and imagination. You cannot create a piece of artwork without implicitly putting a lot of yourself on the table.
It's not that I don't understand the sentiment you're gunning for, but you are shaped by the times that you live in, and that will inform the manner in which you express your creativity.
Even if you're just drawing what you see, like a tree, you are invariably exposing a lot about yourself and your perceptions to the world around you.
Moreover trying to define what art is, is a topic that has been hotly debated for probably thousands of years. Politics also inform that; how many times have viewers not decried some expressions of art as "obscene" or "vulgar" or even just "not art"?
What about, say, the pornographic? It meets all the criteria of, say, film, and is itself an expression, however base one might consider it. Would you consider it art? Does it make a difference if it's drawn, filmed, sculpted in stone or given any other expression than through film?
Why do you feel the way you feel about it?
My point being that anything to do with human perception is inherently going to contain, and be coloured by your personal politics in one shape or form, whether expressing it by creating art, or critiquing it.
@@ruk_necahual This is just false and most of your writing is obtuse word play. You're now broadening the definition of politics in a sort of moving the goal post way. Politics at it's very simplest is the idea and activities that come from making decisions in groups. To say drawing a tree would contains someone's "personal politics" is just unprovable. Art is completely subjective. There is no argument there. No debate. Politics absolutely can be and honestly are usually a part of artwork. I won't deny that at all. But it isn't always politics. When a child draws a smiley face that doesn't contain politics of any sort but is unquestionably art. If we're going to consider being happy a child's "personal politics" then we've fully stepped into delusional territory
@@mentholnewport Well, you're entitled to your opinion. I appreciate reading your perspective, even if we fundamentally disagree.
For me I can say that I don´t like Wuk Lamatn not because of the voice actor I had no idea that she is trans. She sounds like a whiny kid for me. The character only sees what she wants to see and has no grasp what happends or why it happends. Not a suitable character as a leader.
There's no problem with Wuk's voice actor being trans. There's problem with her/him being terrible at that. At first i unironically loved Wuk's voice, but at the latter stages of dt it became nigh abominable. I literally clinged my teeth during the last trial (sickest thing ever) because of Wuk's terrible voice acting.
I don't know whose fault is this, but oh boy, my adoration for Wuk quickly became contempt.
🤡
Literally just watched it...I honestly did like Wuk's voice in the beginning too (first introduction) but yeah...I had to switch to JP real quick and I'm so glad I did. It's honestly like you're playing a completely different game.
I don't see anyone really calling it woke. Mostly just calling out the poor writing this expansion, especially bad writing around Wuk's character. That would transcend language. Also the English VA's performance isn't terrible, just a bit mid. Though after learning the VA is trans that actually made me more impressed with his performance pulling off an accent along with sounding feminine enough to not notice.
i wana get this out there but im gay have a bf and i do love seeing lgbtq+ stuff in games the only thing i dislike is when its shoved down your throat (not making a dirty joke clear your minds) if its like normal stuff normal stuff oh im trans im fine but if its only about that as a main plot thing its iffy with me but stuff like a guy or girl doing the overly gay/lesbian stuff for comady i laugh
People like seeing their struggles represented in a way that provides catharsis. For those that can't relate directly, it can offer a means to educate, or provide an alternative perspective on an issue they may not have thought more about. It's not being shoved down anyone's throat, it's merely asking one to engage and understand with someone from another walk of life
How is something being 'shoved down your throat" when you could simply not buy the game?
Nobody is forcing anybody to consume media.
@@FreyaWardYT yea i understand that and i just wana reiterate i dont mind it just for me if it gets to much i kinda zone out not saying its a bad thing is all and before people think im putting it down im not
@@jaynedoug9453 thats true im agreeing just personaly i dont mind it im ok with it being a partial focus i like playing games with it just not when its allong the lines of there gay/lesbian because we need to hit our quota like the devs put it in for the sake of "quick put gays in for the publicity and nothing else" i understand my comment may does sound like im being negative about it when i ment to try and be positive about it im not good at wording things properly and make myself sound like a jerk
Oof