A scene from the video game Uncharted 4: A Thief's End.
A scene from the video game Uncharted 4: A Thief's End.
A QA tester for Uncharted 4: A Thief's End was so upset with the inclusion of a couple of female characters in the game that he had to be asked to leave, the game's director has revealed.
In an interview with new Rolling Stone-affiliated gaming site Glixel, Neil Druckmann revealed the extent to which Anita Sarkeesian's Feminist Frequency videos affected the game's development.
"When I'm introducing and describing a new character to our lead character concept artist, constantly she will ask, 'What if it was a girl?'," Druckmann said.
"And I'm like, Oh, I didn't think about that. Let me think, does that affect or change anything? No? Cool, that's different. Yeah, let's do it."
A scene from the video game Uncharted 4: A Thief's End.
However, this didn't sit well with a few testers on the game, one of whom had to be shown the door.
"You have some sexist focus testers who were really upset by Nadine beating up Nate, and [spoiler redacted]. To the point where we had to ask one guy to leave," said Druckmann.
"In his core, it just affected him. He was cursing, 'Not you, too, Naughty Dog! Goddammit. I guess I'm done with Uncharted [spoiler redacted]. This f***ing b***s***.'"
However, Druckmann also revealed that he disagreed with Feminist Frequency's take on the character of Elena, who the YouTube channel felt was portrayed as an impediment to Nate's adventures.
"The Feminist Frequency review that I just watched, which I actually really enjoyed, talked about this. I disagree with them," said Druckmann.
A scene from the video game Uncharted 4: A Thief's End.
"They said they didn't like how Elena was handled in the story. That she becomes an obstacle to Nathan, that's she's this wet blanket, and she's the thing that's holding him back.
"My interpretation, or at least our intention, is that she's not. The only thing holding Nate back is Nate," he added.
"If anything, Elena is trying to urge him to take this Malaysia job, even though it's illegal. The thing that makes Elena the most upset is that he doesn't include her. That's his biggest flaw in the story, that he ends up lying to her."
In related news, Sony has revealed that Uncharted 4: A Thief's End sold 2.7 million copies in its first week on sale.
