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(Sorry this is long, but I wanted to make sure I documented as much of my stuff as possible so people could double-check what I researched and calculated to reach my conclusion. Stuff in brackets explained at end.)

I was using Google to browse the latest gay-related news stories, and along with learning stuff like Putin's Party unveiling a new straight flag, I noticed an article on IGN called How Gaming’s Breakout Gay Character Came to be, which I checked out. I really only skimmed it, since I didn't have anything new or shocking, and it really only seems to be there to celebrate the legalization of same-sex marriage (a bit late, in my opinion) by providing a history of lgbt characters in video games.

What surprised me about the article was the sheer number of comments: 8044 of them.
Now that sounds like a lot to me, but just to be sure, I took a look at the older articles to see how many had a higher number of comments than that. I didn't find any by the time I gave up, after browsing roughly 1400 entries[1] and getting to an article that was posted more than 24 days and 3 hours as of this second (I'm sorry for my laziness, if anyone finds the newest article with more than 8044 comments, after the one I mentioned, then let me know!) In fact, the only ones that had over 6000 comments were " Sony Reports PlayStation Network Outages ", " 18 Awesome LGBT Characters ", " Who Won E3 2015? – You Decide! – IGN Versus ", and " Nintendo Quiet on NX Console Over Worries of Competitors Taking Ideas ".

Just for a "second opinion", I created as long a list of numbers as permissible (consisting of the number of comments of an article, starting with "How Gaming’s Breakout Gay Character Came to be" and each successively older article that had nonzero comments) and plugged it into wolfram alpha.[2] Here are the results. If you click on the link, you'll get the raw data, the histogram, and even learn that the mean was about 674.2 comments, while the sample standard deviation was about 1405 comments. The number of standard deviations VERY ROUGHLY says how "unlikely" a number is[3] and it turns out that the 8044 figure is about 5.6 standard deviations from the mean. Just to compare, the same number of standard deviations above the mean for the adult male's height is just under 9 and a half feet tall[4] which is roughly 15 inches taller than the tallest confirmed man in history.[5]

So yeah, I feel like it's safe to argue that, mathematically speaking, there are a lot of comments on that one article, and considering the only other lgbt article I found in over roughly 1400 articles came in fifth in number of comments, I think it's safe to say argue that gay-themed articles correlate to a higher number of comments. (If I omitted any data that I shouldn't have, or if I had a major flaw in my data collection process, please let me know!)

The question is, why? I didn't actually browse the comment sections for the 2 gay-themed articles because I wanted to remain as impartial as possible while gathering the data. Are people celebrating the same-sex marriage legalization in the U.S., or is the author for the two articles notorious and only appeared those two times in the last 24 days, or do people just feel like themes such as human sexuality shouldn't exist in games? Why are people (presumably) giving these particular articles so many views, as opposed to other articles? I'm not trying to make claims about what other people are arguing, I'm just trying to understand, and trying to do so by making a bunch of guesses, hoping one of them is at least somewhat close.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and sorry for the length. Again, the reason I write this is not to argue, but listen. Please let me know what you all think.

[1] Calculation here.
[2] Times and number of comments probably have changed after I have posted this.
[3] I realize that statement is a vast over-generalization, and that the data isn't a really a good bell curve, but this post is already long enough, I figured. Sorry.
[4] Calculation here.
[5] Calculation here.

Firstly, I'd like to say that this is quite possibly the best thread this forum has ever been graced with. I love maths more than myself and I would give you more than one upvote if I could. Seriously, you're amazing.

I think the explanation is relatively simple. Firstly, you've got the fact that homosexuality itself is controversial. It's always been a hot-button issue, and the recent gay marriage rulings have thrust it right into the limelight. The total media saturation of homosexuality-related issues in recent weeks means that anyone who didn't have an opinion before likely has one now, and we all know what the story with online comments sections and having opinions is.

Secondly, the intersection of social issues and gaming in particular has become extremely sensitive in the past year or so. You've got GamerGate, feminist critique of popular media; all of that has come together to more or less guarantee that any link between gaming and social activism will be highly controversial. There are people who want politics out of games entirely, people who specifically want progressive politics to be tempered, the opponents of these people, and everyone in between.

In all likelihood, a good number of those 8000 comments aren't even over homosexuality itself -- they'll be over whether or not games and gaming news outlets should be making statements like creating "breakout" gay characters. I mean, look at the tagline: "why it's important to challenge the status quo". That alone raises the question of whether IGN should be concerning itself with the politics surrounding games as opposed to focusing solely on the games themselves. So yes, I suppose they do rustle jimmies, but emphasis shouldn't necessarily be placed on the fact that the topic is gay stuff. If it was about feminism, or transgender rights, or abortion, you'd probably see a shitstorm of similar proportions.

I agree very much with Particle Mare on her assessment of the situation. Awesome thread, great research. Her explanation also makes sense. I'd like to throw in my two cents as well, though.
Looking at the other articles, most of them seem to fit the typical categories for what would generate comments. A good portion of gamers would likely end up reading IGN's article on the PSN outage. The E3 article is similar, and the "You Decide" specifically fosters comments. Nintendo NX has been a rather popular topic whenever it's mentioned lately, with the mystery behind it generating lots and lots of ideas as to what it is. That and Nintendo hate (I read a few of the comments; some of the people seem to not be fans of Nintendo) probably contributed to it's huge comment count.
However, list articles like the 18 Awesome LGBT characters, while staples of online news, don't normally generate a huge number of comments, as far as I'm aware. Reading the comments for that, there are a lot of people who seem to be contributing who they think are the best. In as far as I searched (not very far, but I think far enough to get an idea), it was primarily composed of people contributing LGBT characters they liked and secondarily made up of people defending LGBT characters. I actually didn't see any rustled jimmies, surprisingly. I think for this one, there's been such a surge (relatively speaking) of LGBT characters and acceptance that it made a good combination for comments. A single bad comment spawned two or more good ones, and there does seem to be lots of LGBT characters in popular media.
So, to why that one happens to be so commented on. Skimming through the article and those comments, I gleaned a few ideas. First, that article is just a breeding ground for controversy. If you pay close attention, you'll see that different groups have different favorite ideas and favorite words for those ideas. When those words and ideas are brought up in a different group, negative reactions are going to abound. In this case, you have IGN, a huge entertainment media news site, taking on the language of progressives when talking about sexuality and race. That means that many people who read the article and aren't progressive, even if they agree, will have something to nitpick about. If they agree with LGBT rights but not the language used, then they'll have even more to complain about. If you don't agree with LGBT rights then they would have LOTS to say. Also, it's very long, leading to lots of opportunities for "corrections" or disagreements. All this, topped off by the timing (practically everyone went nuts for a few days after the ruling, and the water is still settling after that) gave it not only a lot of room for disagreement, and a lot of people who will disagree, but also a lot of people who have something to say. It a series of (un?)fortunate coincidences that made it so popular, I think.

Anything that deals with sexuality is bound to rustle someones' jimmies. It's an emotionally intensive area for most people.

I am personally more surprised when jimmies get rustled over things that seem irrelevant outside their own context, like fandoms and sports.

I've been a very long-time poster on IGN, here's what I can tell you:

The issue of homosexuality is very salient, and articles are a proxy battleground for the grander issue on IGN. That applies both in the article comment sections and on the forums. People, frankly, see the title and care more. You get a lot of people with strong opinions arguing back and forth, and it really makes the discussion explode in terms of number of comments. IGN's readership consists of engaged teenagers and detached adults. Its mostly the former that actually would wander into the comments in the first place (I mean ask yourself, why would you wander into the comments on IGN, of all places?) It's not that the game is more important or that the article is exceptional. Yes, it does rustle jimmies, but its controversial among the readers. It's not like it's 8000 posts of "get the icky gays out of my games :c", even though there is still a lot of that.

(Thanks for the responses. Sorry this response is a little long! I tried to keep it brief, but I'm not very good at it! My apologies!)

Well, it took me about a week to gather the courage to return to my huge freakin' novel post (mostly because I almost always dread remembering what I posted at 4 in the morning when my mind is most lucid) and I really appreciate the feedback. I knew some of this stuff, but it really did fill in a lot of the gaps, and everyone was a lot more patient with my semi-coherent ramblings than I would have been.

This only leaves me with one last question. Basically, how do we get about making games more relatable to lgbt gamers (which now that I mention it, I have a question to do with gaymers and the gaming community, but I'll save if for another time) without making it seem like it's some sort of agenda being pushed by crazy activists?

I mean, I understand that having gay main protagonists is not only a financial risk that a game company is not required by anyone to undertake, but playing a character with a different sexual orientation from yourself can make the game less enjoyable, especially in games where relationships (be they romantic ones meant for younger audiences, or carnal ones where romance is irrelevant) are more prevalent, which I know from experience. Not to mention the same-sex relationships not exist (due to the setting's counterpart in reality force any gay people into the closet and mimicking the roles of their heterosexual counterparts), assuming relationships are a part of the game in the first place (such as Tetris, Cooking Mama, Electroplankton, etc.) And clearly it wouldn't be right to force creators to make gay characters when they didn't want to, for a number of reasons.

So yeah, I realize that there are a number of logical reasons having gay characters in video games isn't exactly easy to do, nor is it reasonable to do it frequently. That said, I still feel like trying to find out a solution that works for everyone, and that just because having gay characters in video games is difficult doesn't automatically mean we shouldn't encourage it a little more as long as it's reasonable. Personally, I don't feel like that my stance is illogical, yet I'm reluctant to bring up the idea, because when I see others bring forth similar ideas, it's met with more hostility or arguments about politics than I'd suspect.

To be fair, I may very well be over-sensitive and even though I don't feel like it's an issue of politics any more than heterosexual relationships are, I guess it may just be a matter of opinion (I don't really know). Also, my expectations are usually lower; I'd be fine with just having roughly having 5% new characters created by American game developers that display any sort of sexual orientation display characteristics that were either asexual (i.e. proactively choosing not to pursue romantic or intimate relationships when presented with the option) or bisexual (i.e. at least one hint of same-sex feelings) or homosexual (even closeted ones, if the context demands, that doesn't actually feature a relationship, but just a few personal thoughts) in nature (and not associate them with any single characteristic such as villainy, being the main character or a side character, ethnicity, intelligence, etc. any more for the other characters when it would be illogical to do so), plus allowing for same-sex relationship options if opposite-sex relationship options exist, as long as the setting of the game would allow it. But this difference in expectations is hard to get out quickly before first impressions are made.

So, in summary, how do I go about talking about the idea of making games just a bit more gay without going overboard with the gay-ing, and acknowledge that it may be not be simple, without giving off the wrong first impression, nor giving off the vibe that I feel the issue is impossible or without any significance, importance, or merit whatsoever? (And without being super wordy like I am here.)

Okay, first, it's worth noting that disagreeing with gay marriage is quickly going the way of disagreeing with interracial marriage. The next generation or two are, at the pace we're going, will have virtually no problem with seeing a lgbt person in the media, and might even head towards the sort of "affirmative action" we have with races and sex. It might become a surprise to not see a lgbt person in a moderately sized cast. Because of this, I wouldn't worry too much about trying not to convince many people – the majority are already convinced.
Secondly, it should be remembered that we're dealing with games. The purpose of games vary from game to game. EA is pretty focused on money. Indies tend to be more focused on either provoking thought and/or doing something for the first time. Also, the cast of games tends to be smaller than 20 – meaning, treating each game as a self contained world, statistically, there wouldn't be any lgbt people. And that's assuming all games are going for realism, and has an opportunity to show that! A lot of lgbt people aren't particularly fond of showing it off outside the Internet, as well. All this leads up to meaning that, if we're going for pure reason, games would only very very rarely – possibly even rarer than now – have a visibly lgbt character! And even then, we're probably looking at something involving player choice (e.g. You can choose to romance someone of the same gender) or a game focusing on issues related to lgbt people.
That's what I think anyways. I'm open to corrections!

I don't believe that there's any reason why games need to be "more gay" in general". At the end of the day, the culmination of all games released forms the landscape of gaming. Games that try to incorporate anything that doesn't directly serve its purpose creates awkward situations, no matter what it is that they're trying to incorporate. I'm not saying "keep social issues out of games", but the developers of games that do incorporate any given issue need to carefully consider what they are implementing and why.

A good example of something needlessly awkward was one of the later episodes of Monk, in which the protagonist, an extremely excessive compulsive detective, is mistaken for a racist when he wipes his hands after shaking the hand of a black man (for those who never watched it, he does so after shaking anybody's hand, or touching just about anything). It's awkward, it didn't serve as a literary device, there was no social commentary to be found in it and so on. Now, it could have done these things, but the character got some dirty looks and that was the end of it.

Now, I'm sure that those more involved in the LGBT community have a long list of ways in which games can be more inclusive. It could come down to the production of games in which sexuality is a central theme to the game, or open world games that feature marriage allowing marriage among those of the same sex, or making characters that are gay or whatever not be defined by that trait. Trying to find opportunities to include such things is really all anybody could ask for. It will be interesting to see how Mirror's Edge 2 ends up, given the consulting that the developers have done for it. The simple production of games that do this will be great for gaming, but not every game needs to make an effort to include every theme. There is no definable rule for how that will happen, since games are creative and their qualities subjective. The gaming world just needs discussion of these topics for them to find their way into games, I really do think that the rest naturally follows.