As a queer woman who has been playing first person shooter/adventure console games for nearly two decades, I jump for joy whenever I hear whispers of any wlw, sapphic or LGBTQIA representation in games. However, I was massively disappointed with Days Gone in this aspect. 

Hear me out. I love a good FPS just as much as everyone else. But when you add LGBTQIA or BIPOC characters to the mix, you take on a new responsibility as a game developer, director, writer, etc to portray these characters in ways that don’t fall into harmful trope categories. I said what I said. These are lines that we can absolutely draw. The video game industry seems to be dragging its heels in correcting this behavior and it’s something I feel like people don’t talk about enough.

Days Gone tells a story of Deacon St. John, a gruff, tell-it-like-it-is, biker for hire in a post-apocalyptic PNW who has lost his wife in a “zombie” outbreak. The game is overbearing in its representation of the “macho” male ego, and any subtle mention of male sensitivity is quickly overshadowed by outbursts of anger or flashbacks/memories of “savior” styled-behavior. It’s enough to make any gamer that does not identify as “male” barf.

Oh, but it gets worse.

Disclaimer: I typically don’t write negative reviews. So take this opinion-piece with a grain of salt. I am a cisgendered, out, queer woman who is simply tired of the boring “dude” rhetoric in video games, especially when the plot of any game is geared toward “saving the woman”. Or when it includes LGBTQIA characters, but they either remain undeveloped just to check a box, or they fall into harmful tropes and are blatantly misrepresented. I’ll explain;

Days Gone unfortunately wormed its way into “cheating bisexual” territory for me when at about the midway point of the game, one of the main characters- a woman named Rikki Patil makes an advance toward the main male character Deacon St. John while in a current relationship with another woman known as Addison Walker. Despite Rikki and Addy’s romantic relationship having its ups and downs, Rikki acknowledges that Addy is her partner and still makes a sexually charged advance (she attempts to kiss him) toward Deacon. The game had me sat staring at the screen asking “Why?” repeatedly. What was the purpose? Does it drive a plot point in someway? No. (Yikes if it did) Does it somehow add more depth to Rikki’s character? Possibly, but good heavens, not in a good way? Bisexual-identified people, especially bisexual women have been haunted by this trope for ages. It portrays them as untrustworthy, flimsy, fickle, and disloyal. I saw no real reason why that needed to be a whole ass cutscene, other than to add to the stereotype. Days Gone, despite its decent mechanics, HUD, weapon wheel, stunning visuals/landscapes, is rife with stereotypical nonsense.

Have I mentioned the misogyny so thick you could choke on it yet?

To be fair, this is a game about MC’s and bikers. One need not be overly familiar with biker culture to recognize certain stereotypes geared at women inherent in their ideology. The game employs the use of flashback cutscenes as a tool to develop the story. You come to learn why Deacon St. John is where he is, why he’s bitter (yawn) and why he’s constantly reliving memories of his thought-to-be-dead wife, Sarah.
It was one cutscene in particular that had me wanting to put the game down and walk away from it forever. I literally had to force myself to pick it back up some weeks later, because my reaction was so strong to the ensuing dialogue between newly-married husband and wife; During a wedding day flashback, Sarah says to Deacon that he should promise her something if they’re to remain married and happy, that he should “ride her as much as he rides his bike”. Imagine my eye roll. That was the defining moment that told me that Days Gone was written for the straight white male. Considering its lack of heroic or “good guy” BIPOC characters, especially. Really, women LOVE to be compared to objects whose sole purpose is to bring pleasure to men. [cue eye roll]

While the game does have its areas that shine, if you’re like me and piss poor writing can put you off a game entirely, I’d still say to give it a try. Just save yourself the nausea of the underlying story. I would recommend Days Gone for its horde mechanics, open-world map, achievement hunting, collecting, side-quests, etc. but… do yourself a favor and just skip most of the cutscenes. The end of the game delivers a twist which for those readily paying attention to the storyline may want to be present for, but as you may guess it wasn’t one that I was overly fond of. The whole storyline is a big “Why?” for me. Terribly executed writing/story and character development but fantastic open-world gameplay elements lands Days Gone at a 3 out of 5 stars for me. 

Obviously, people are going to have different opinions. Male-identified video game connoisseurs may not find a single thing out of order with Days Gone. That would seem par-for-the-course if every game you’ve ever played had a straight white man front and center, defeating the BIPOC villains and saving the damsels in distress. That must be a nice world to live in. As for the real world; women (this absolutely includes trans women because they are- you guessed it: women), queer women, non-binary people, people of color, let’s just say literally everyone else on the planet, ALSO play video games and ALSO deserve to play characters that look and sound like them, just as often. 

This article was written by: