Diversity is in the forefront of Tacoma. It's odd; outside of the disembodied player character Amy, all of the characters are ghosts, AR silhouettes with no visible features. Yet, the player immediately sees a diversity of body types, a consideration seldom seen within several mainstream games. (One example, for instance, are Bethesda RPGs, which for a long time allowed for player creation but still had every old lady or teenager look exactly the same from neck down, mods excluded). However, there is no particular singling out of any of these or similar attributes; it seems just is.
Tacoma and its presentation of the future are aspirational in the way of advocating for (fitting for the creators of Gone Home). As the player explores the station and discovers the story, so long as they take some time to look around, they inevitably find representation of various kinds. There's the queer married couple Bert and Nat working at the station together; there's Andrew's husband and son at home; there's Sarah's spiritual beliefs on display (at least to the player) in connection with her medical training; there's the litany of represented races and ethnicities. None of the seem quite essential in the strictest sense of the word to the plot, which could plausibly proceed similarly without these distinctions that are made. However, they are essential in building the world, and presenting passively to the player as how things should be before they were destabilized the the Venturis corporation. The player does not actively seek or find things to say about, at least not as part of the stated objective of the game (or the employers). The player simply stumbles across it naturally.
That is not to say that the diversity is irrelevant to the plot, or not commented directly on; these traits do in fact contribute to and inform certain story developments. Bert and Nat's relationship lies central, and there is undertone of how people like them are threatened by certain commercial forces (i.e. token representation by commercial entites, describing them as "heroes," despite not truly being effective advocates, especially in light of tropes killing gay characters from the past). Sarah's religious beliefs underly her central moral conflict as the doctor and how she approaches the cryo situation among others. By and large, however, the overall tone remains that of normalcy, which the game presents as an admirable goal even in face of
Diversity of race and gender can certainly be a factor at the forefront of the players' mind during Obra Dinn. Being in the past rather than in the future, and having larger cast whose moments in the spotlight are limited to just moments before death, some concessions to the greater array of diversity in Tacoma are logical. However, there remains a diversity of race and gender there for the player.
Unlike Tacoma, the diversity is not presented as is, but rather is key to the stated objective of the game in identifying all the people. For instance, a character from New Guinea can be identified by his tattoos, whereas a character from Sierra Leone can be identified by his skin color (and lack of a British accent). Almost amusing is the difficulty of identifying the China Topmen, who despite being able to be identified by their feet, probably induced a fair share of guessers.
(A side note is that I was rather surprised by the multinational nature of the crew, and lack of too many explicit hostilities outside those against the Formosans (and that Dane). I don't know much about the era, and it's an international ship, so I can't speak too much to this).
Such serves as a commentary on racial divisions still present. The Chinese sailors likely serve as a commentary on people who struggle to tell people of certain ethnic groups not their own apart. The many cliques of different races (including entertainingly a white character who can be identified by his association with the Chinese clique) speak to such separations in real life (not to say such spaces are bad, but they are still in contrast with the fully integrated Tacoma). Overall, by having the stated objective being identification of people, Obra Dinn forces players to directly confront ways they use race to make conscious judgments in various cases, and how these judgments may not be too separated from the unconscious ones lurking beneath the surface. Despite being like Tacoma in that race and other aspects of diversity are technically the central part of the plot, Obra Dinn could not treat the subject much more differently.
Replying to sodelbo:
I am not contending that Tacoma is perfect in its representation. There is something to be said to how the extent to which it contributes to the narrative might be too little in some sense, and the relation between my assertion that the diversity is aspirational in the face of other more negative parts of the world's presentation of the future. Tacoma may even lean on certain arguably stereotypical of the individual's groups too much (this is a thing that generally warrants some thought across different media). However, I will disagree with the assertion that the characters are too similar to be distinguished otherwise.
To focus on one character with no reference to race, gender, or sexual…
I think in both Tacoma and Obra Dinn, there are enough deviations from the trap that is the "straight cis white man of medium build" character design that most players will be confronted during gameplay with some character (likely multiple) that will be unlike them. While it is important to bring up the face-value diversity, in Tacoma particularly we can see diversity in personality and priority, reflecting culture more so than Obra Dinn: for instance, who is religious? Who takes up issue with seemingly unjust authority? Who takes up music? Ethnicity, gender, and orientations take a backseat to the cultural openness and respect central to why the diversity in Tacoma works so seamlessly. In both of these games, diversity is…
In Tacoma, anyway, I felt like a character's "queerness" and unique nationality was a quick fix for the fact that most of these characters were indistinguishable from one another in terms of personality. The differences in body shape too were crucial because otherwise the player would not have been able to tell who was who. The diversity in this game is skin deep and contributes little to the narrative.
I agree that Tacoma and Obra Dinn treat diversity very differently, but I think it is very interesting that both Tacoma and Obra Dinn are able to demonstrate what you call normalcy and are able to "confront judgements." The figures in both potentially make you want to question their identities, whether that be their race in Obra Dinn or their gender and sexuality in Tacoma. They are both successful in my opinion at making the player self reflect and become aware of personal assumptions and are able to do that not by avoiding the questions, but by answering them and making these figures visible and their identities known.