Life is Strange was Rejected by Publishers Due to Gender

There are times when publishers try to be realistic, but instead it comes off as very brutal emotionally. DONTNOD, the team behind Remember Me, apparently faced a few hurdles with the video game industry as they sought a publisher for their upcoming game, Life is Strange. The episodic five-part game, which features a female teen protagonist, is focused on the bonds of teen girls and time traveling (more like rewinding time to affect the past and future). The characters only seemed natural for the part, but some publishers were none too keen on publishing the game. Why?

Because the characters were female. It's a little upsetting to realize this, but some publishers have chosen not to publish Life is Strange because the game will not succeed. Basically, the game would only succeed if the lead character is male. Though there could be other reasons behind the rejection of publishing, it still is a little sore to know that gender affects publishing. Luckily, Square has decided to publish the game, and they haven't minded the gender of the lead character. In a dev diary, employees have stated, "We had other publishers tell us, 'Make it a male lead character.' Square was basically the only publisher that didn't want to change a single thing about the game."



Of course, this wasn't the first time DONTNOD encountered this issue. The same exact problem happened with Remember Me, when publishers rejected the game because of the existence of a female protagonist. Unfortunately, the game didn't sell well, but it was mainly for a completely different reason (bad gameplay).

Maybe someday many publishers will change their minds on the decision to publish based on gender, but for now, we will just have to wait.

Life is Strange is set for release on PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One on January 30th for $4.99 US.