Publishers Told Remember Me Devs that 'Female Characters Don't Sell'

Remember Me was one of the highlights of Gamescom 2012. But before the game got picked up by Capcom, developer Dontnod was advised by potential partners that having a female protagonist would lead to weak sales. Good thing it stuck to its guns.

In an interview with Penny Arcade, creative director Jean-Maxime Moris said, "We had some [companies] that said, ‘Well, we don’t want to publish it because that’s not going to succeed. You can’t have a female character in games. It has to be a male character, simple as that'."

"We had people tell us, ‘You can’t make a dude like the player kiss another dude in the game, that’s going to feel awkward."

Naturally, Moris wasn't exactly enthused by the idea, and decided to keep Nilin as a female. He added that the industry needs to change its mindset. "I’m like, ‘If you think like that, there’s no way the medium’s going to mature.’ There’s a level of immersion that you need to be at, but it’s not like your sexual orientation is being questioned by playing a game. I don’t know, that’s extremely weird to me.

"You can identify with people of the other gender in movies, why could you not in games? The fact that our core target is males 15-25 is not an excuse. We need to be able to create, and respect the audience enough to believe that they can be smart enough to identify with that type of character."

Sexism and orientation in gaming has become a hot topic recently, and surely pressure from companies to make lead characters male "because they sell games" is indicative of how deep-rooted the problem has become. That Moris stuck to his guns is commendable.