Let’s hope the next Star Wars game doesn’t have a gay planet
Tuesday was May 4th, the official day for every Star Wars fan to go nuts and scream ‘May the 4th be with you’ at one another. It was also a fine time for us to look back at past games, including a sexy itch.io one about Sheev Palpatine, and that one with the gay planet in that Star Wars MMO, The Old Republic.
When the Star Wars MMO was first released, players – myself included – were excited at the possibilities of what this could mean. It was created by BioWare after all, and while not every team holds the same values and vision, surely that would mean a much more queer-inclusive world than before.
The disappointment when queer players realized that there were zero options for them in the romance department can not be understated. People were upset, and it didn’t help that any conversation that surrounded the lack of LGBT+ characters and themes in Star Wars: The Old Republic was met with either complete silence or denial. As The Escapist summed up, Community manager Sean Dahlberg even tried to squash the controversy, and only made it worse by implying that the words ‘gay’ and ‘lesbian’ didn’t even exist in Star Wars.
And then Makeb, also known as the gay planet by embittered Star Wars fans, was revealed in the expansion Star Wars: The Old Republic: Rise of the Hutt Cartel.
In this expansion, two gay characters were revealed. The catch was this: they couldn’t be taken with you off-planet as a companion, and after the expansion, there was…very little for them to do. In fact, there was nothing for them to do. Apart from maybe stand there and look pretty. Already the two gay characters included were unique to their straight counterparts – and not in a good way, either.
That’s not even touching on the fact that it was pay-to-be-gay. Seriously BioWare, what the actual hell were you thinking back then?
That said, I want to be fair to the team that handled Star Wars: The Old Republic. As much as I completely resent how almost everything about LGBT+ representation and characters was handled, they eventually did pull it out of the bag with their expansion in 2015’s Shadow of Revan, but only somewhat. The fact that it took BioWare Austin nearly 5 years to include characters in a way that wasn’t negligent to LGBT+ identities is deplorable. Still, credit where credit is due.
But that was a little under 6 years ago. We’re in 2021 now and more than a variety of studios have confirmed that they’re interested and/or are already creating video games for a galaxy far, far away. At the moment, we don’t know enough outside of Massive Entertainment is developing an open-world Star Wars RPG, something that will most likely be years away from now.
If it really will take that long to get another Star Wars RPG – and I’m certainly not counting the KOTOR remake – then I want a Star Wars game that learns from the mistakes of BioWare and their perception of queer identities in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Hell, I want a Star Wars that doesn’t always have me in the role of a raggedy, white dude – full stop.
More importantly: I want a Star Wars that puts the films to shame for their lack of integrity and care for queer audiences. I don’t want another gay planet. I want the Star Wars of the books and comics coming out from multiple, talented authors – the books that have queer, non-binary characters, same-sex couples of both the villain and hero variety.
Queer players deserve to thrive in Star Wars games. You know what we don’t deserve? A gay planet called Makeb.
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