256: Hardcore Maleness

[Rowan Kaiser]

Hardcore Maleness

It's time to sift through the coded labels; hardcore means masculine and casual means feminine. Rowan Kaiser thinks that we should recognize the implied sexuality of the labels and switch to a gender neutral term.

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[Le_Lisra]

While you argue your points well my own feeling is that this is a load of bollocks. The transference of the silly game labels to genders just reinforce stereotypes. While there may be trends within genders to support this, there are enough females (and, come to that, males) who do not fall under the pretense shown in this article.

Then again that opinion may be influenced by the people I hang around with, so there.^^

It annoys me that everything has to "genderized" like this.

 

[Booze Zombie]

I'm not too sure if I agree, females play "hardcore" games (I hate that term, by the way) and I'm pretty sure that doesn't suddenly give them "Johnson"(s).

The overly sexual terms in gaming bother me, sure, but they seem to have evolved off into their own little meanings, as far devoid from the original meaning as "fag" is now from it's 1970's meaning.

I had always associated "hardcore" with those who take the hobby of gaming very seriously, not with males.
But that may just be me.

Good article, but I don't agree with everything you say, I suppose the TLDR sentence should be.

 

[Chaya]

Interesting point, but is there really a need to remove the terms in favor of something neutral? It wouldn't change anything, there would still be that definite line between the two. Even if new terms don't come up most people will still consider the difference to be there because they want to. Because they want to feel powerful and stronger, just as you said. It's their problem that they are too narrow minded to accept others. Everybody wants to be unique and as with games they do it under the cover of hardcore and casual differentiability.

I also agree that games should be judged by content, not cover. The reason why I won't play a Barbie game is not because it's all pink and filled with ponies but because it's a terribly bad game. Same goes for the most bloody and weapon loaded shooter, if it sucks beyond repair I won't touch the damn thing.

 

[carpathic]

Oh goody, a feminist examination of games camouflaged as pseudo-intellectualism that "surprise" takes exception to male means of interacting with one another.

I sincerely hope that SOMETIME feminist analysis will move past surface examination and condemnation. Perhaps gamers need this outlet. Certainly society has removed almost all outlets for males to exhaust their more destructive urges and need to compete.

I find the analysis is good, but your summation of your thoughts is shallow. Bravo, on once again just taking the easy way out and blaming people's gender and further propagating empty-intellectualism.

 

[ironduke88]

Wow, that was a little over-the-top don't you think? When someone says hardcore gamer I tend to find it is more based on the competitive level. Sims isn't a competitive game and as such is casual (same with Plants vs Zombies). Multiplayer games (FPS, RTS & RPG) you get competition with other players, single player against the computer (although this toes the line with this particular definition).

It is a difficult concept to really convey properly and I am not sure I am saying it correctly; but when I play PvsZ I am just enjoying playing through without the end goal in mind, hence a casual game.

There really is enough sexualisation already and I think in gaming communities the whole girls don't game thing is massively exaggerated myth. I bet if you did a poll on this site you would find plenty of girls who play any 'hard-core' game that you deign to give the 'title' to.

 

[BlueInkAlchemist]

A well-written article that harps on points already made elsewhere. I enjoyed reading it for the most part, but there's this nagging feeling I have that a dead horse is getting beaten.

 

[Chaya]

It annoys me that everything has to "genderized" like this.

Exactly how I feel. And yeah, the article goes to great lengths to separate the two with nothing but gender. But it is correct that there are the groups and that people too often refer to them.

 

[Seventh Actuality]

As others have said, this article mostly falls down because it isn't true. Isn't there enough sexism in this hobby without making up imaginary divides to be indignant about?

Also, the practice of saying "guns and cars are for MEN" is just as sexist as anything the article complains about. Most gamer girls are down with most of the things you label "male".

 

[Outright Villainy]

It annoys me that everything has to "genderized" like this.

Try doing Film studies for a year, it'd drive you mad.
The attaching of gender to every other concept also drives me up to wall, when looking in depth at something, it seems to trivialise it to think it can be summed up as another clash of the genders. There are macho games for boys, but there are popular games like Mario, Zelda and Portal which are commonly described as hardcore too by most gamers. To say that all gamers mean hardcore to be a another term for macho is just focusing on the 14 year old idiots who play, who just happen to be the most vocal whilst playing. Frankly, I don't think you can make any meaningful analysis of gaming culture on X box live.

 

[JIst00]

While I do understand where you are coming from, I dont really agree with you at all. For example:

[sub]Wall of text below, I've put it in a spoiler incase your not interested ^^[/sub]

Spoiler

My fiancee and I play WoW together, I introduced it to her, mainly to get her off my back for the hours I was putting in at the time. As time has progressed and we both got more into the game in general, it is her that is the "Hardcore" gamer when it comes to WoW, and it is I that is the "Casual". She beat me to level 80 and currently has 5 characters at that level, and is working on her 6th. All of which damage dealers, and all of which she prides herself on being able to "pwn" the dps tables. She was raiding long before I was. She frequently "rapes the shit" out of people in PvP. She also makes a huge amount of money at Auction with the various professions. She shows all the signs of male dominance that you describe, yet she lacks the genitals and testosterone.

Myself on the otherhand, I enjoy a bit of PvP, and tend to use my hunter as a crowd controler and harasser, I just take pleasure from pissing people off, but I dont PvP very often. I have a few 3 level 80's, a tank, a healer and a damage class. I enjoy being able to be responsible for more than just putting out epic numbers in DPS, I like to be able to control the pace of a run, or be responsible for keeping the group/raid alive. Thing is, I dont raid very often, maybe the weekly if its a quick run, and I perhaps do one dungeon a day for the frost emblems. I tend to spend most of my time exploring the worls, fishing, cooking, working the Auction House, but not anywhere near as successfully as her. I tend to work on my reputations, collect mounts, and generally achievement chase as I am a bit of a collector. I also tend to take my time leveling a lot more, fully completing zones, especially if they are zones I have never previously leveled in. I like to chill out and watch the grass grow a bit more.

Now in our relationship on the whole, I most definately "wear the trousers". I make the most money, make most of the cruicial decisions, after discussion of course, but I usually talk her round, and all the other cliche's of a male-female relationship. She tends to work out our finances, budgets for shopping etc etc. Our shared passion for gaming on the whole is what got us talking in the first place, yet she is a damn sight more competetive at it than me, and woe betide me if I should "own" her while playing (which to my delight i tend to do in PvP or duels).
We have a really great healthy relationship, and maybe its the role-reversal while playing WoW that cintributes to that.

On a side note I remeber reading somewhere, it may have been one of John Funks articles or on another forum, Im not sure, about what classes and specs people tend to play. It turned out in a poll that most female players play as healers, and I think the highest concentration were female Night-Elf Priests, while they guys tend to be mainly male tanks and damage dealers, like Warriors, Rouges and DeathKnights. So, considering this, maybe I just have a crazy partner who is the exception that proves the rule.

 

[Chrono212]

Strange...a backlash on the Escapist? I think Mr. Kaiser has hit a raw nerve.

Alright, 'hardcore' and 'casual' can broadly be defined as masculine and famine. Just like anything could be broadly defined as any other thing. We forget that everyone loves labelling themselves as something good and others they don?t like as something negative. This is just an example and it also happens to fall into another category at the same time.

 

[Deofuta]

Whenever I think of the term Hardcore I normally think of actions that would be considered against the norm. Play yu gi oh at an age past 15? Thats pretty HC (Or as what I normally say, intense). Skip spring fling for the upcoming raid? Pretty intense (although slightly antisocial perhaps.)

Also, the worst are the players that are similar to religious extremists when it comes to games. If the current balance towards a game is geared to them, then all of those that have issue are "carebears", or "wow players" or "gamestoppers" (If someone realizes where I am coming from, have a cookie!) However, if the next patch goes against them, then all of the sudden, the game is broken, the developers hate them/ their product/ life, the list goes on.

Bah, now I need to go strangle a puppy, be back in an hour.

 

[Le_Lisra]

Anecdotal, but:
I know at least 12 females, inlcuding my best friend, who fall right out of any stereotype in there.. which makes me immensely happy.

Its good to read that many here agree with me that this is wrong.

 

[JakeOfRavenclaw]

Excellent article! I think that another facet of this issue is the way we use games as a means of proving social dominance. I just finished my first year of college, during which I hung out with a number of gamers. We played Super Smash Bros in the common room pretty much everyday, and the arguments that sprung up around it were really fascinating to watch. There were accusations that the winner would fail at a "real" game (Call of Duty in this case), of course. But there was also the sense that playing the game against someone who took it very seriously--who was every more "hardcore" than everyone else--drained it of it's fun. I think part of this is the fact that losing to such a person felt emasculating. Of course, trying to reach Alpha Male position through a video game is patently ridiculous. But I think that video games are very much a way to prove one's social status in certain circles. And it is also sort of expected that even if you're not very good (which is my position), you should still have the ability to pick up a controller and drop into a game.

 

[Seneschal]

While I think the article is a little abrasive (and hence fun to read), I do agree on one point - it's preposterous that male gamers are still measuring another's worth by how primitive he behaves. To me, "hardcore" always meant "taking something with a little more devotion than average."

Oh goody, a feminist examination of games camouflaged as pseudo-intellectualism that "surprise" takes exception to male means of interacting with one another.

I sincerely hope that SOMETIME feminist analysis will move past surface examination and condemnation. Perhaps gamers need this outlet. Certainly society has removed almost all outlets for males to exhaust their more destructive urges and need to compete.

I find the analysis is good, but your summation of your thoughts is shallow. Bravo, on once again just taking the easy way out and blaming people's gender and further propagating empty-intellectualism.

The notion that destructive urges and a need to compete are must-have masculine traits sounds like something from the fifties, to be honest. The "boys will be boys"-excuse has no place in a modern society since these needs are expected to mean precisely zero to any civilized 21st century male. And an ordered society comes before a man's urge to wave his dick around the place.

In an ideal world, of course. In truth, we're all SOOOO worried that someone might think we aren't buffed ape-like testosterone bombs that we take unconscious precautions to protect the male mojo - as I'm writing this, I have an image stuck in my head of a true manly MAN coming to the board and smacking me for being such a pussy and writing this post, thus sending my penis-points into the negative. I know it's a staple of guy-culture, but fuck it, I see it as a weakness.

 

[ZephrC]

I absolutely despise the word hardcore and would never use it to describe myself or anyone I like, but this article seems a bit over the top to me. Make of that what you will.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

I just want to say that this all depends on the game and genre you are playing. I have heard the word hardcore used a lot, just as I've heard the word raped thrown around a lot in various games. But in the last half a dozen games I've played online or so, neither has been very prevalent.

Rape is occasionally thrown about in League of Legends, but expressions like steam rolled, crushed, stomped or curb stomped (does that mean anyone using it is a budding Neo-Nazi by the way, seeing as how it originates with American History X) are equally prevalent if not more so. The skilled players are not hardcore, they are either "High ELO" (refering to their in game ranking in the matchmaking) or "Tryhards" (refering to their wish to win at any cost).
In Company of Heroes, you were "pro" and your micro was "godly" or "insane". Never once during my time in CoH did I see anyone use the word "Hardcore".
In Red Orchestra, I've seen neither word used. In general a player is good, a team gets crushed.

What is my point with all these anecdotes? That these words in this article are horrible generalizations and don't have inherently genderized or sexualized meanings. That casual means "feminine" is just silly, as it was also slung around in Company of Heroes and is slung around in League of Legends to denote any player who isn't playing just to win but is playing to have a good time.

I am sorry, but this is the kind of hyperbole that makes me ashamed to be a feminist. What we need isn't more stereotyping and gender-assignment in society, we need less of it.

 

[Clemenstation]

Oh good, more prescribed neutering of language in order to make everything vague to the point of complete inoffensiveness. Not saying that it's okay to hang out on the internet calling people fags, but to be honest these kind of antagonistic people would simply find a way to inscribe negative connotations onto any replacement word you come up with. I'm reminded of Political Correctness, and how the 'acceptable' word for those with special needs changes every five years because it gets loaded up with negative meaning as kids employ it as an insult.

Not sure terminology is the real problem here.

Also, not everybody wants their hobbies hung around their neck as an identity signifier. Video games seem to be the only medium where afficionados have to become missionaries.