Gaming in Color Review

The queer community has plenty of fun and interesting slang terms and acronyms.  Navigating a dating app is nigh impossible if one can't discern the meaning of "gen vers ddf bear."  One of the more charming, innocuous terms one might come across is "gaymer," a homophonic portmanteau that means, quite simply, a gay person who plays video games.  Why such a word even exists might be puzzling, but Philip Jones's queer gaming documentary, Gaming in Color (on VOD May 19), helps shed some light on why two seemingly unrelated communities have become an important intersection for many people.

At barely over an hour long, Gaming in Color makes the most of every minute.  Jones casts a wide net, anxious to dive into various aspects of queer gaming, including the representation of queer characters within games, the rise of LGBT gaming expos (specifically, the very successful GaymerX), and online bullying.  By having its interview subjects comment across all of these realms, and others, the film does a fine job of painting a thorough picture of what it is to be queer, and a geek.  It also paints a hopeful picture for the future of the industry, which is going through some growing pains as it makes some progress.

The film, which was funded on Kickstarter (and even has some of its backers as interview subjects, which is nifty for a film with such personal subject matter), is straightforward in its construction.  Simple graphics illustrate various ideas and statistics, a repetitive ditty underscores most of the film, and we're treated to equal parts talking heads and footage of games ranging from obscure indie titles to AAA heavy-hitters like  Grand Theft Auto and Super Smash Bros.  (My only complaint from a technical standpoint is how briefly some lengthy quotes linger onscreen, not allowing viewers to actually read them in full.)  That the documentary is so much more substance than style is, in itself, a reflection of what the film (and the gaymer community in general) is hoping to accomplish.  The film and its participants are adamant that they aren't trying to effect sweeping change across all series, platforms, and genres.  They simply want a community that is more open, inclusive, and representative of the diversity that exists within the wider gaming world.  They want to add, not subtract.

Most major releases force players to play as uber-macho straight white men.  Queer protagonists are usually the product of character customization, as in massively-multiplay online games and RPGs like Mass Effect 3.  To be given the option to play as characters that are more like the player than not is a form of validation.  This validation is important because, as the film points out, gaming is often a retreat from the pressures and harsh realities of life.  It's a place to find community, to build social skills, and to walk in someone else's shoes.  If more games featured prominent queer characters, it could build empathy in players who might not have any queer friends or family members.  It's similar to what can happen in other mediums (think of Modern Family, Glee, or Brokeback Mountain), but perhaps has even more power because gaming is an active pastime, allowing players to perhaps relate more deeply to the characters they're controlling and interacting with.

Gaming in Color gives kudos where they're due, calling out games like The Last of Us and Fable 3 for including queer characters and situations, League of Legends for combatting harmful language, and indie games like Dys4ia for being actual, queer games.  Other games like Portal and Minecraft are mentioned for being such radical departures from the general guns-blazing gaming landscape, allowing players to play as they want, to experiment and discover who they are and how they want to play.

The film effectively draws parallels between being a geek and being queer.  Both involve coming out, in a sense.  Both are potential reasons for feeling rejected, weird, or alone.  And both are increasingly tolerated, even celebrated, as Marvel movies dominate the box office, video games make hundreds of millions of dollars in the course of a few days, and gay rights are on the rise.  There's a long way to go, both in representation within games and in the acceptance of a fan base that is primarily (and most vocally) made up of straight men, but the developers, fans, and journalists in the film believe that the years to come will bring greater acceptance.  Inflammatory trolls will always exist, taking refuge in anonymity as they hide from real-world issues and spout hateful slurs, but hopefully that sort of behavior will become less common and will be policed more thoroughly, as with League of Legends' tribunal system, which lets players police repeat offenders.

As Riot Games' George Skeleres puts it, "Most people are not dicks."  It's true, though Internet commenters seem anxious to prove otherwise.  With more queer visibility in gaming, and an ever-growing community (I myself have been finding gaymer friends via various apps and dating sites), hopefully the games we devour will expand further to represent the vibrant, diverse community of gamers that can't put down their controllers.