Runes Of Magic To Offer Same Sex Marriage Option
Runes of Magic, a WOW-like free to play MMO, is poised to offer same sex marriages in its game. The game's developer Runewaker Entertainment, announced that in the upcoming expansion, Chapter III - The Elder Kingdoms, players will have the choice to marry. Based out of Taiwan, a country that does not recognize same sex unions in real life, Runwalker is taking a step that many Western developers have been to scared to tackle.
In a statement to VideoGamer.com, Philipp Senkbeil, a representative of Runewalker's Western publisher Frogster explained:
You will be married and somehow connected to the other player... Of course you can only be married with one person at the same time. It's even possible to have gay couples, so no need to just have a male and female character. Two male characters and two female characters can marry each other.There will be some bonuses for (married) players. For example, one could be a ring to teleport to the other person.
The details on all this are still rather sketchy, but we here at GayGamer applaud Runewalker Entertainment's commitment to forwarding the fight for sexual equality in games. I can only hope that larger developers will take note of what this brave company has done and follow suit accordingly.
Fruit Brute
Posted to Hot Stuff, Video Games on 13 April 2010
· Comments (3)
Other stuff like this: gay marriage, mmo, pc, runes of magic
Funcom's ARK program for the game Anarchy Online performs marriage ceremonies for characters, regardless of sex.
They also will change character last names to reflect the marriage.
http://ark.funcom.com/Public/ARKsite?page_id=20
Lineage II allows you to do this. NCSoft allowed it from the minute they allowed marriages in general. Also, they offered benefits as ROM is apparently doing, such as teleporting to one another etc...
So it's really the makers of ROM following NCSoft and other companies as pointed out above.
"For example, one could be a ring to teleport to the other person."
Feeling nostalgic for Nexus:TK. While they probably didn't come up with this ring idea(it probably dates to the MUDs), I wouldn't doubt that they were the first graphical MUD to have it.
At least while I was there, the software didn't support same sex marriage, but they did end up implementing a "blood brother" bond that worked much the same way. Instead of a ring, you got a shiny stone that teleported you to your blood sibling. I remember that while there were a few sophomoric jokes about this, the community on that MMO was generally progressive in their attitudes.
This is the first time I've seen that "ring" mechanic since. I hope it, and the gender neutrality, become an industry standard ^^