It’s been more than a few years since I’ve done one of these “The Riot Retort” pieces, but I’m bringing it back because there’s just so much material around these days.

In this installment, we’re going to be looking at the “controversy” surrounding the recently announced Ghost of Tsushima sequel, Ghost of Yotei. The article we’re going to be looking at and responding to comes from Ethan Dean over at Dexerto titled “The usual outrage has already hit Ghost of Yotei and it’s beyond tiring.”

People have already started whining about Ghost of Yotei and I’ll give you three guesses why. If you immediately guessed that it’s because there’s a woman in it; congratulations.

Have you ever noticed that anytime a certain segment of the gaming population has complaints or concerns about something it’s considered whining? God forbid gamers express their concerns or skepticism about something; it’s just tiresome whining.

It’s never whining though when the other side tries to organize boycots, ban discussion of games, or actually harass people playing said game (Hogwarts). These are the same people who say “separate the art from the artist” as they hate on a game simply because of the personal beliefs of the woman who created the IP but had nothing to do with the actual game.

I’ve seen a lot of this “whining,” and most of the concerns doesn’t appear to be merely because there’s a woman protagonist in it.

There seems to be this misguided belief that the woke aligned has that non-woke gamers don’t like female protagonist. That’s not true. The issue most are having with Ghost of Yotei isn’t purely because of the woman, but rather the person voicing the character of Atsu in the game. It doesn’t mean she deserves hate but is a valid reason to be concerned about the direction of the game.

Therein lies the problem. For the crime of having a woman in it, Ghost of Yotei looks to have become the official new target of whatever the hell is happening with Dragon Age: The Veilguard.

Again, this is simply not the case. I think it’s acceptable that fans of the first game could be disappointed that a sequel they wanted doesn’t continue the story of the character they loved playing as in the first one.

The concern rest almost entirely on recent history of Sony first party studios upping the wokeness in their sequels and the voice actress starring in Ghost of Yotei. Same actress who provides one of the voices of Rook in Dragon Age: The Veilguard, which is 100% a woke garbage game that will flop. The actress has a history of providing voices in woke games and woke characters.

Typically, it’s worth just ignoring these sorts of conversations, but with the baffling speed at which people have decided to write off Ghost of Yotei, it’s hard to ignore in this instance.

Considering nothing has really been shown of the game, I haven’t seen too many people writing it off. Instead, most people that have even expressed issue with it seem to taking a wait and see approach. Just because folks aren’t clamoring to throw money at the screen doesn’t mean it’s being written off.

After barely three minutes of footage and within only an hour of getting that small morsel, people have started pinning Ghost of Yotei with the usual buzzwords. The game is “woke”, it’s “DEI trash”, you know what I’m talking about.

Are gamers wrong to have this attitude? Sony has upped the wokeness of each sequel they’ve released in recent memory: The Last of Us Part 2, Spider Man 2, God of War: Ragnarok and Horizon Forbidden West.

I saw the reveal and read the reactions. Were some questioning if the game was going to be woke once they saw the female? Of course, and for good reason. In current year one has to be skeptical when Western developers put a female in the protagonist role. They’re usually ugly, non-feminine, and girlboss characters. And people are tired of playing as them, hence the low sales figures.

The real concern about Ghost of Yotei started when Sucker Punch revealed that the character Atsu was being voiced by Erika Ishii, a super woke activist that has had no problem spewing vile BS on social media.

The accusations stem from the fact that new protagonist Atsu has lady parts and according to some, that’s enough to make the whole game untouchable. Obviously, the concept of not touching a woman is very familiar to most people leveling these sorts of criticisms but there’s more to it so let’s unpack.

Complete and utter nonsense. A soyboy white-knighting and claiming others not touching a woman is peak hilarity.

Others aren’t even attempting to mask what is supposed to be the quiet part of these arguments. “No Jin. Female lead. G*y af,” read another pearl of wisdom from these stalwart defenders against the woke mind virus.

There’s nothing wrong with what that person said. People who liked Ghost of Tsushima wanted more stories involving Jin, a character they liked. Just like people who enjoyed Joel in The Last of Us were unhappy with The Last of Us Part 2.

People are allowed to have issues with things they like getting replaced for “inclusive” reasons. It would be a reasonable bet that Atsu will end up being lesbian too, so yeah, gay af indeed.

Other less reasoned takes (yep, less than that) have referred to Ghost of Yotai as “DEI slop” or a “Ghost of Concord” (good one bro). It’s the same brainrot rhetoric that has plagued games like Assassin’s Creed Shadows or Dragon Age: The Veilguard in their prerelease periods.

It’s too early to make those claims against Ghost of Yotei, although it’s okay to be skeptical that it won’t be, but there’s nothing wrong with calling these games what they are. Everything shown of Shadows and The Veilguard shows that they are going to be woke garbage. Just like Concord was woke garbage. And when The Veilguard flops, and BioWare lays off a large amount of developers, the industry will continue to learn nothing.

How many games have to tank and studios go under before companies realize that what they’re putting out isn’t what people want? The mythical modern audience doesn’t exist.

That’s not to say there aren’t some genuine concerns about these games or Ghost of Yotei. Many players have complained that we aren’t getting a continuation of Jin Sakai’s story and it’s okay to be disappointed about that.

Luckily, I think I can assuage the fears of those players and the ones brigading against this new game because it has a g-g-g-girl in it.

Only a pansy would write it like that.

These gamers aren’t scared of girls or have a problem with female protagonist.

Tomb Raider is a beloved series by men and women alike. Neir Automata, Stellar Blade, and others have all been highly regarded. The First Descendant is doing very well. Evie was well liked in Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, and I think most preferred Kasandra in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (I certainly did). Samus in Metroid, BloodRayne, Peach in Mario 2, and so on and so forth.

It’s 100% disingenuous to pretend that gamers have an issue with female protagonist when clearly the problem lies elsewhere. And it’s also not like it’s just male gamers who have these concerns, plenty of female gamers think woke garbage when they see this stuff too.

Never-the-less, we’re half-way through this and I’ve yet to see mention of Erika Ishii which is a much bigger issue than female protag.

Sucker Punch has not directly stated that Atsu is a Samurai at all. In fact, they’ve gone out of their way not to by describing the protagonist as “a wandering warrior in Feudal Japan”. You’d think folks so concerned with the rich history of Japan would know that Samurai is a title and just holding a katana (or two in Atsu’s case) doesn’t make you one.

Turns out, anyone can pick one up, train with it, and still become a formidable combatant. To get ahead of the next logical fallback, there are documented historical accounts of capable female warriors in Japan including cavalry regiments. The first game even featured a few martially-oriented female characters and nobody seemed to mind then…

He links to a 2013 paper called Women Warriors of Early Japan by Rochelle Nowaki that within the first two paragraphs claims:

“The historic depictions of these females are uncommon, however, because of the changes that grew out of the political and societal turbulence starting in the Kamakura Period.”

“The apparent “paucity of references indicates that women constituted a distinct minority of warriors” but the opposite was more probable as evidence recording their accomplishments were lost to warring practices of the time.”

“The existence and experiences of the onna musha have changed over history and as a result they are now viewed as a curious novelty of the time instead of simply exceptional individuals.”

According to this “historical document” we’re supposed to believe that female warriors in early Japan were a majority but all the evidence of it was lost. That’s what the opposite of “distinct minority of warriors,” means. We’re supposed to just believe that Japanese battlefields were just running rampant with all these female soldiers.

There’s no evidence of it, but it happened, trust me it’s in a book. Tomoe Gozen was for sure a real person and a true story, not a character in a epic poem. She was 100% such a powerful fighter that she was “the equal of a thousand, capable of dealing even with demons or gods.” Right. The Iliad is a true historical account as well. All old books are true, except for the Bible, there’s no evidence for any of that fiction. Complete nonsense.

Did some Japanese women know how to handle a sword and fight? Sure, as they did in other places. But it’s never been the norm. Were they leading a battle and slaying men by the hundreds with their superior sword skills in hand-to-hand combat? Not a chance. The women fighters were much more likely to be on horseback as archers.

Again though, to pretend this is the issue most folks are having is to be completely dishonest. Very few have a problem with the game simply because of female warrior. We’ve played as female warriors plenty of times. That doesn’t equal woke.

Will the character be vastly superior to all men, a complete girlboss, and a lesbian? It’s a logical assumption giving the ideals of some of the Sucker Punch staff and who they like to hire, but it’s too soon to know.

We do know that the voice of Atsu, who Sucker Punch brought attention to when they announced that they were thrilled Atsu was played by the “amazing Erika Ishii.” Let’s be honest, most of the discussion turned to woke infested or DEI slop when it became known who was voicing the character.

And people are right to be cautious and assume the worst considering Erika Ishii is a radical loony activist, completely infested with woke ideology, and in desperate need of a heavy dose of Ivermectin to rid herself of the parasites that have rotted her brain.

When your company brings on a super woke activist that has spewed hate and refers to herself as a “queer, non-binary, genderfluid person,” to be the voice of your main character then yeah, you should expect people to think the worst. Especially when you also hire a former Sweet Baby Inc person to be community manager, or all the devs with their pronouns and flags.

If down the line, some janky gameplay footage or anti-consumer inclusions make an appearance, some trepidation is totally valid. Complaining that a game is led by a female character is a little trite though.

And he ends his opinion piece without a single mention of Erika Ishii or why folks may think the game is going to be woke garbage.

Gamers can complain about whatever they want. They are the consumer. The former PlayStation CEO Shawn Layden can be snarky and say “it’s a game, if you don’t like it then don’t buy it” all he wants, but that’s exactly what gamers have been doing.

I don’t think Ghost of Yotei is going to bomb like Concord or being complete ass and underperform like Dragon Age will, but it’s too unknown. People are absolutely fed up with woke garbage being shoved in their face though. And more importantly they’re tired of being talked down to lectured at by people who hate them that are mentally ill.

The modern audience doesn’t exist. We’re supposed to believe that the anti-woke crowd is such an out-of-touch, bigoted minority whose time has passed that can still somehow make games completely flop and cause massive layoffs.

Sony has no good will built up. Sucker Punch has done nothing to warrant optimism towards Ghost of Yotei. Female protagonist isn’t the problem, but anytime woke Western development studios put a female character in the lead and pretend that the woke voice actress is a star they’re thrilled to work with there’s reason to be concerned.

You know what the difference is between the “tiresome” people who are “whining” about this game and the woke on the other side is? These “whining” gamers just won’t buy the game and will roast it on their Twitter page. Whereas the woke side will ban discussion of a game they don’t like, refuse to review it, and bully and harass people who dare stream it and enjoy it (see Hogwarts Legacy).

If Erika Ishii can avoid saying or doing something stupid, and Sucker Punch can ensure the game doesn’t preach an agenda and is just a fun game with a female lead, then all the best. People will buy it and enjoy it. But if Erika gets unhinged and mentally ill promoting the game, or Sucker Punch does make the game woke as hell, then it deserves to flop (and will).

So, no Ethan, the controversy surrounding Ghost of Yotei isn’t largely because of female lead, but rather has everything to do with seemingly woke company and super woke voice actress. It’s dishonest to pretend otherwise.

But we should expect nothing less from a person with clearly shitty takes like believing Dragon Age: The Veilguard will “elevate the franchise (and perhaps the developer) beyond any former glory.”

Only a shill could write a statement like that with a straight face. BioWare was once a beloved studio that made great games. They are a shell of their former self, BioWare in name only, wholly incapable of making even a good game let alone a great one. They’re definitely not back, but they’re certainly destined to be hit with massive layoffs in the coming months after what’s sure to be their third failure in a row.

Hopefully Sucker Punch can learn from them or learn from their PlayStation Studios colleagues right down the road at Firewalk Studios.