I asked a few Russian Overwatch players what they thought about Zarya in the context of contemporary Russia. Responses were all over the map. Ivan Tomilov, a 22 year-old student in St. Petersburg, agrees that Zarya’s appearance is strikingly non-traditional for Russian women. Dyed hair and muscles, he said, are…

This may be the only good thing to come from this.

It’s moments like these I’m happy for local shops. Was able to head in and get a copy without issue.

Man, you don’t actually read things before responding, do you?

It’s real frustrating too, considering a lot of Gamers can’t seem to look past their own biases and hatred, and acknowledge that yeah, the ‘little guy’ can do shady, illegal stuff too and no, just because he did it to the ‘big guy’ doesn’t then make it honorable or right.

It doesn’t even matter if he paid these freelancers (which, if he’s calling the artists that, and not paying, that’s a whole other set of laws being broken). If they were working for him, he’s responsible.

Even if he is ripping Activison off, good. They deserve it.

It’s funny how Gamers neglect all common sense, for the sake of confirmation bias and feeling good about hating Big Bad Publishers.

So far I’m really digging it. The session attacks remind me of group attacks in FE, and I’m really enjoying the SMT-ification of Chrom, et al.’s character designs. Plus the game is like...hyper colorful. And I’m all about that.

Wait, so you mean Internet monsters were able to take things and manipulate them so, out of context, they achieved their desired effect and led people to believe in something that never existed?

Seems like eating this requires a good lack of self-respect...and I don’t mean that in a bad way.

Looks neat, but...

More proof that “Publishers Are Always Evil, Always” is nonsense. Could you imagine if this team was under direct pressure by its bank rollers to deliver on time and on budget a quality product?

To me this feel more like a solution in search of a problem than the other way around. All of VR does.

Super unrelated but: how do you all find/decide on who to use for these illustrations, and when editorial illustrations are needed?

To be fair, Nintendo doesn't sell their consoles like phones...yet.

Ah, so the, “I know you are, but what am I” defense. So mature and thoughtful. Well-reasoned and impregnable. I guess that means you win...

And I’m sure on any number of Steam sales, it’s been that low or lower.

I don’t see anywhere where I defend them. I just say (over and over) that all your hate towards them amounts to jack shit. Because they’re not in the business of catering to you any longer. And, if the point of a business is to make money, Konami’s doing what’s best for them.

I don’t really know if I ‘long’ for anyone, even people I like and respect, when it comes to gaming. I’m willing to bet more than ‘a few others’ also feel this way. Not as some major, sinful disrespect to devs, but just...it’s reasonable.