I love that the game has two Native American fighters. It just seems neat in a genre that is usually obsessed with East Asian stuff to embrace not just one Indian character but two and a stage to boot. It really dawned on me when I saw Eagle fighting Thunder on Devil’s landing (I can’t remember thunder’s stage’s name). And to be honest I’d like it to actually have even more presence from Indian cultures; as in a kind of specific theme of KI. Another Native American warrior? Sure, I’m certainly down with that, though I’m not sure everyone else would be. What I really think has to happen now is the Wendigo. I know very little about Wendigos. In fact everything I know about Wendigos I owe to ultra-combo forums. But that’s a monster from Indian cultures that this KI needs. It needs a Mollusk too. But I want KI to embrace in an even greater way an influence of Indian cultures in the game. Bring the Wendingo! And in lets get that Josiah Blackeagle Pinkham fella to tell us about them in an illustrated comic. Lord knows I can’t trust everything the nerds on here say.
Yeah, that was a bit hard to understand. But sure, I think we should be mindful of how we have portrayed Indians and I have always been fully supportive of Microsoft and the KI teams decision to respect the Indians attitudes on the matter.
I don’t want to pick a fight with you, but when you talk about sensitive issues it’s critically important that you be factually accurate so that errors of fact don’t distract from the discussion. It doesn’t matter where you are from in the world, there are two continents - North America and South America. These can be grouped and regionalized in many different ways but you can’t just make this one continent to support a discussion.
As far as the level of awareness and empathy for Native Americans I would say this is pretty high in North America. you can argue about whether it’s as high as it should be. As far as genicide I think that’s a very political discussion that’s probably not super helpful. By far the biggest source of mortality for native Americans after European arrival was disease. This included diseases that were introduced by Columbus and spread long before real settlements began.
There’s no question that the arrival of Europeans was a disaster for Native Americans on both continents. If you want to claim that the Spaniards in South America were somehow more benevolent in their interactions with the locals I don’t think history supports your assertion. I would suggest that the biggest difference between north and South America as far as indigenous populations remaining and being integrated into modern society has more to do with the fact that in tropical and sub tropical countries the European settlers died in large numbers of tropical diseases and couldn’t overpopulated the locals. Whereas in the temperate areas the Native Americans died in huge numbers of European disease while the settlers died at a much lower frequency.
Plenty of religious missionaries arrived in North America to convert the natives. They just weren’t as brutal as the Spanish. I’m not sure I would use that as an argument that South American history was more tolerant or accepting of the natives. Likewise plenty of intermarriage has occurred as well. You probably don’t meet many people if mixed Native North American and European heritage in Argentina, but if you actually come to the Western US you will find many. Again you should probably not make inflammatory comments when you don’t know things.
So, I would suggest that instead of throwing stones from your glass house to claim that we all must have forgotten how ■■■■■■ we are in North America with respect to Native Americans, you actually consider the real history of your continent and ours instead of just the local political propaganda.
And in the end none of this changes the fact that it is now 2017 and efforts by MS to raise awareness and include Native American culture in their videogame are only good. Thunder and Eagle are awesome characters that make sense in the context of the game. They are not “token” characters, and I don’t see the downside in including more representation for a group that has not been represented much historically in popular media.
Ok, got it. 7 continent model to you and 6 to me.
There’s a lot of people in the U.S. that don’t show it as prominently but have some native american heritage…it’s almost a running gag that everyone is 1/8 or 1/32 Native, but the truth behind the gag is that several “European” people have that random grandma or great, great grandpa that was part of some native tribe. For example, my grandpa’s grandmother was a member of the Blackfoot tribe. But looking at me you couldn’t tell because there’s too much German, French and Dutch in the genes.
We really doin’ this here? The whole manifest destiny thing is gonna happen in the ki forums?
Aite den.
Lovecraftian has my vote over wendigo …also, Genocide seems wrong
I see. That’s very interesting indeed.
I think that might, in a way, have happened here too.
However the indian populations weren’t big in this particular region.
I’m not going to draw this out any further but I’m sitting in Africa right now at a table full of Europeans and not a single one of them is telling me there is only one American continent. Zero. So I don’t know where you are getting that from.
As far as everyone’s heritage see @WrathOfFulgore’s comment. It’s less obvious driving by but it’s there. And again regardless of cultural acceptance there were simply far fewer Natives in the Northern Hemisphere to mix with.
And by the way, just because I’m getting my blood up here, you can’t post “why are you guys suddenly into Native American culture up there? You murdered them all, unlike down here where we live in peace and harmony. Don’t they teach you anything in school” and then say “I’m not trying to offend anybody.”
OK, I’ll drop it just for the sake of it. I have my point of view, you have yours. Whatever I read from now on will just expand it or make me think different.
The seven-continent model is usually taught in China, India, Pakistan, the Philippines, parts of Western Europe and most English-speaking countries, including Australia[22] and the United Kingdom.[23]
The six-continent combined-Eurasia model is mostly used in Russia, Eastern Europe, and Japan.
The six-continent combined-America model is used in France and its former colonies, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania, Latin America,[24] and Greece.[14]
A five-continent model is obtained from this model by excluding Antarctica as uninhabited. This is used, for example in the United Nations[25] and in the Olympic Charter.[26]
This text can give a hint of why the continent discussion.
The word europeans just gathers a lot of people.
I expressed myself in a bad way. Sorry it ended up being offensive. But I didn’t say they don’t teach anything at school. We are probably taught different. I don’t know if we all live in peace and harmony, we try to do the best we can with what we have.
A female Native fighter with some spiritual magic properties. Maybe she could have her own spirit bird(or animal)
An Indian Chick would be sweet. A Shaman or something? A kind of medicine woman? Heck yes.
But I still want the Wendigo myself. Its been discussed so much here.
And for the record I don’t think MaruMDQ was being understood very well. I think he was kind of trying to agree with me sort of. Yes, there was a genocide of the Native population here in the US; yes there is a huge issue here with acknowledging it; and yes it was a great thing that Microsoft actually respected the attitudes of the Nez Perce unlike the Redskins Football for instance. I don’t think MaruMDQ was fighting with any of that.
Do you mean Indian or Native American which is it
If we were to get another Native American character I would prefer him/her to be from another culture most preferably Inuit. It would be cool to have an Inuit character that bends light with northern light effects.
I’m from Alaska so I think that would be so sick. Some husky sled dogs or a harpoon or something like that to tag Wendigos.
This whole thread is madness lol
If there was one more addition to the roster from Indian cultures, what would DraconianMith suggest?
The Apaches and overall the Apache tribe especially in their area of specialty: Guerilla warfare 
An Aztec War God like Huitzilopoctli.
A Navajo Naagloshii or Skin Walker.
A Wendigo from Ojibway or Chippewa cultures.
A Sasquatch of Salishian cultures.
Time for an American Monster. In a game like this it would be a great oppertunity to use a monster that has not been overdone or done enough. Native American monsters are eerily and psychotically visceral comparing more with Japanese monsters than European ones.
Thats because the Asian market has huge sales
potential, so the Chinese government censors, and
makes Hollywood add Asian stuff.
There have been many movies and games tainted
by this problem.
I agree 100%. ■■■■■■■ amazing level of respect for American Indians. Iron Galaxy and Microsoft took the higher path on this one.