Barrett had been working with old code. He wasn’t aware that at the time, his team had decided to limit the game’s romance options to heterosexual interactions. So when the expo simulation showed two women getting married, news of the lesbian characters quickly spread among E3’s audience of roughly 60,000 attendees.
This homosexual marriage in “The Sims” forecast sexual liberation not possible in other games on display at E3, nor legally recognized across the United States at the time. Today, plenty of games, such as “Stardew Valley” and “LongStory,” allow players to pursue queer relationships or use nonbinary pronouns. Life simulators and role-playing games continue to expand their avatar and relationship diversity.
In many cases, these games have helped many LGBTQ+ players feel seen for the first time.
‘I really felt like I was a powerful person’
Steven Arnold is…
