Dragonbums said:
Competitive sports is hardly has an equal demographic or exposure in sports players, despite the fact that just as many women are fans of football and other various sports teams as men. Yet I don't see women's sports being equally popular or as exposed.
Titillation only sells on very specific genres. Which is to say, not most of the industry. Fans don't need titillation to sell fighting games.
Shooters don't need titillation to sell their games, etc. etc.
Titillation is more or less an added extra. There is nothing to gain from it, and there is nothing to lose by removing it from characters that have nothing to do with it.
Sports take place in reality. Thus the people who participate would, quite likely, protest to being treated like a fantasy. Fictional characters don't really have the necessary free will to do that. And, given how often female athletes do end up making news for photo shoots that glorify them in the same vein as video game characters are used for titillation anyways, well, you point is a little lost.
You are right fans don't need titillation at all, and for many games it doesn't fit the theme well. FPS is a great example. Though, since you mention it, I can't think of many FPS where titillation was a key part of the design. In fact, the biggest complaints in games I see are from the fantasy mmo and fighter genre, as well as some grumblings about in MOBA. Games where mechanics are key and everything else is window dressing. Since everything else is not very important, you end up with pandering to the target demographic in order to outsell the competition. Not needed, no, but no real excuse not to try to attract more of the same demographic either. And no, changes in hopes of attracting a demographic that doesn't support the product as it is is not likely in an industry as conservatively run as Gaming's mainstream is.
Dragonbums said:
It's not about one game appealing to all demographics. It's about an entire medium that almost universally appeals to one specific majority, and everyone else can gtfo so to speak.
There is no reason for the game industry as a whole to stamp their feet and refuse to diversify their audience to other potential demographics.
Now which studio caters to what is a whole nother story. I'm not talking about that. I'm not asking GTA to feature a gay lead.
I am hoping however that when a "new and exciting" IP comes around. It's actually that, and not just a continuation of the same blasted thing.
Except, they don't appeal to only one majority, and you are being disingenuous claiming they do.
As said before
Genres appeal to a specific majority in such a fashion, and do so because there is huge slants in the gender split on sales. Go play any simulation or puzzle games, and you don't see what you claim is "universal". Go look at the facebook and mobile market. No, the issue is only as predominant as you complain about in the big budget triple A market, which is built around FPS, Fighters, Fantasy action/rpg and MMO.
Now, when you have 70%+ splits in gender in those genre, which all evidence I have seen in that regard shows there is, then yeah, you will be more likely to get sexualized characters and titillation. Not all mind you, as there are always examples that don't even in those genre, but you see it more often.
So it isn't universally, but Genre based, and not universally in the genre but rather increased odds.
I do agree, some fresh blood in the IP market would be nice, but that is why I call up the indie scene so often, as games made popular there can be picked up and lead to more and better ones.
Dragonbums said:
Everyone responds well to things that sexually attract them. However the argument here is that titillation is needed to sell the game. And more often than not, no it's not needed. At all. Nobody is going to not buy the game because this woman didn't have a boob window.
Unless your making games like Dead or Alive- you are doing it because you want to. Don't try to hide behind sales. If your game is good, you sell it based on the content of your game. Not by something superfluous like a boob shot.
My argument was not that it was needed, please don't misunderstand. My argument was that it was justified for them to use titillation, and that the current direction of the industry would make it hard for them to break that habit.
It is not an all or nothing thing here. No game needs it, that is very true. But the industry likes to hedge its bets as much as possible. It is why they copy what sells well in the first place. Titillation is just one more aspect that will likely appeal to the demographic in general and increase the odds of sales by .0x% according to some study done. Beyond that though, it seems very dismissive of you to presume there needs o be a reason for it in the first place. Could just be the creators wanted to have that as acetic because they liked it (not likely a strong enough reason on its own, publishers tend to be squeezing creative control a lot, but certainly could add to why)
Dragonbums said:
But the thing still stands is that sexual characters were never needed for videogames to sell. They were never needed for them to be appealing. I'm paying for this luxury product too. Why should I be told to sit down and shut up and let the majority get to fully enjoy their $60.00 experience while I get some of the scraps in some aspects?
I never said to sit down and shut up, please stop being disingenuous here. I'm telling you to stop attack the damn mirror and turn around to see the real issue.
As for why you shouldn't get your experience? Well, because no one does. Everyone compromises, you are not special. Now, because you don't share the same tastes as the idealized general demographic, you have a great chance of having to compromise on more, but that is your lot as not having enough financial pull as them.
I'm sorry you don't like it, but unless you can pull out an equal stake of money as the demographic they target, then no, you can't reasonable expect the product to suit your taste more then theirs, regardless how little you like the current version. I can't expect to change the likes of Twilight because I dislike it, not it is so damn popular among other people, what makes you think you are entitled to changing how this industry works?
Dragonbums said:
There are more gamers that are above the age of 20, than there are prepubescent boy gamers going into their big boy pants. We are already seeing the negative affects of the gaming industry at large appealing to this demographic as opposed to opening up and diversifying their target audience to suit people with different tastes.
I agree, this is shallow, short sighted and negatively impacts the industry and the hobby of gaming.
That is why I don't support the games and companies I don't like and instead support the ones I do. As a consumer in a democratic society, it is all anyone can rightfully do. trying to make it a social injustice that you don't get the games you want when games themselves are not a right but a luxury made to meet demand is absurd. No one gets what they want, deal with it and support what is closest to it where you can. Pray others share your sentiment.
Dragonbums said:
It would be fanservice if Ashely were a character they just slapped in there in ME3.
However she is not fan service. She was an established and well rounded character that prior to ME3 had a design and attire that reflected and respected the type of person they made her to be.
It's a disrespect to the writing and the character to take all of that away to make her look like a Miranda clone space babe for the same adolescents who couldn't give two shits about what Mass Effect was all about anyway.
Why didn't they do fanservice for Kaidan or Garrus? While all the Mass Effect ladies except Jack, got a boob job, all the men followed the flow of the story and looked more rugged and tired to reflect the current environment.
Don't go waving your dick around claiming to be the next sci fi master piece since Star Wars, if you are going to pull bullshit like this to appeal to horny losers.
Yeah... and I am sure Leia in the bikini in the third movie was totally justified and necessary, yes?
my point stands, all the more for your attempts to complain about it. Even in star wars there was fan service for the sake of it. Also, your distaste for the fan service and sexy characters is leaking through here and poisoning your argument. Calling people who may have reacted well to it "adolescent" does little to make your argument sound like anything but you whining about how games don't cater to your personal tastes and instead cater to a generalized idea of the paying collective beforehand.
Dragonbums said:
And this is why if gaming continues as is, it's going to find itself in a downward spiral fast. They want to appeal to what they perceive as the largest common denominator. Yet all the games that do that well already exist.
Dark Souls wants to make their next game more like Skyrim. Why?
Nobody played Dark Souls for Skyrim. They played it for Dark Souls. If I wanted to play a Skyrim game, then I will go to Bethesda to get my Skyrim fix. I was looking for something different in Dark Souls and that is what I got.
Because, and I feel I am repeating myself here, It. Made. Money.
No.. .that isn't quite fair, NAMCO BANDAI made a great game and the team seems to know what made it great judging from all I saw of the sequel.
Still, Dark Souls was a huge success, but it didn't make Skyrim bank. Skyrim was terrible in combat, and buggy and clunky, but it made boats of money. Dark souls developers obviously want a piece of that. Add to it that a larger world and gameplay like Skyrim seems the natural progression for a game like dark souls in terms of growing as a game. So long as they do not forget what made them successful in the first place, I welcome it. Hell, if I could get skyrim with dark souls combat, I'd be a happy guy, and I know many others feel similar.
There are millions of better examples the Dark Souls, a series that seems to still have its soul. I can understand the frustration, both characters and designs, as well as business decisions in the industry. But this, here, does nothing. If every triple A company out there went belly up tomorrow, we would still have more games then hours in our lifetimes. The triple A industry is not needed, and the indie scene and other markets have been eating away at it for a while. There will always be demand for the blockbuster titles though, and because of that, all the pandering that goes along with them. Best we can do is vote with our wallets and let that speak of what we want as gamers.
Dragonbums said:
You are mixing up attractiveness with sexual appeal. Attractiveness is someone or something that appealing to the eyes. That does not have to be sexual in the slightest
A huh. I suppose that mentioning that not all female characters are sexualized will be a waste of type? Because for all you complain about it as a universal problem, not many actively sexualize female characters any more then males. Oh, you have fan service, to be sure, but I can point to DMC or countless bishounen inspired characters who get the same treatment. No, not as many, because as we already established, that demographic is smaller and not targeted as much. But in terms of quality, well, we do have the likes of this after all.
http://kotaku.com/5533232/romance-games-chesty-men-for-the-ladies
Also worth noting that titillation as pandering to males is done to appeal to a general stereotype about them. It is called lowest common denominator after all. But for women, the pandering is to a different stereotype. While you do have the over the top sexual fanservice with the pretty boy or the brutal badass, you also have, if you will excuse the term, "female" fan service that use character types and tropes equally as shallow, though on a mental level instead of a physical one. These same traits and tropes are what makes fiction like Twilight so popular.
So, lets tally up here.
In the quantity category, while we do have much more pandering to males, we have funding and demand determining what shows up more often.
In the quality category, we have equal levels of open pandering.
and the final result is that we have the expected amounts of pandering to both genders based on the amount of demand for such games in the first place.
Dragonbums said:
But there is a high demand for it. That's why more of these topics keep cropping up. That's why more of these questions keep getting brought up.
Because there is a growing demand to stop these things and actually do something more creative with their money.
Nothing is stopping a big name studio from making a smaller, niche title, and appealing to that market. Nothing. They just don't WANT to.
The fact that all of these Kicstarters with independent games and a ton of variety are getting successfully funded proves that the AAA business is wasting away an opportunity that is right in their face to gain a lot of money. Having more choice makes everything better in the long run.
However if the game's industry wants to go on it's suicide run to ruination, then they can be my guest.
What is stopping them, as I tried explaining before, is the conservative business practices and a lack of demand. Demand, mind you, is figured out by what sells now, not what people say they might support. And, so you know, they DO try to make smaller, nitch titles and they bomb. Hard. Remember Me is a great example. Hell, one of my favorite games of all time, Beyond Good and Evil, is regarded as a failure because of poor sales. That is the problem here, for all the people saying they want such projects, they are never supported and to a business, all the good intention in the world does not mean shit if the end result is lost money.
Now, kickstarters are great ideas and are a way to break the hold the industry has on gaming, as well as a means to show demand with actual money backing. Kickstarters are a great thing I think, and will probably be what we use should the industry wither away and die. Though, as said before, I doubt it. There will always be demand for the blockbuster, and developers have gotten into the habit of making nothing but them. I can't blame them for that, it makes money and it is decent enough. But it isn't progressive by any means, though who goes to a popcorn flick and expects that in the first place? You want depth and character, you go smaller, either company branches designed to do that specifically or indie stuff that loves it.
Dragonbums said:
Once again, you are mixing up attractiveness and sexiness. They are not synonymous with each other.
A lot of people found FemShep attractive. This is despite the fact that she wears a full set of armor like her male counterpart.
I didn't say ugly people should rule the industry.
No, in this regard, I mean what I said. Or was Megan Fox's role in the transformer movies suppose to be more then eyecandy? Or the bond girls? Or the usual romantic interest in action films?
I keep comparing the games you complain about with Hollywood blockbusters for a reason. The same sort of sexualization you complain about in games is far worse there. A close up of Miranda's ass in clothing in a game would have been a back shot of her naked ass under some feeble excuse to see skin in a movie. This ties back into what I was saying before about it being a cultural thing, not gaming, and that gaming merely meets the demand, not forces it and how it is popular even if not your taste.
Dragonbums said:
And that money will either be staying the same or ever decreasing. There is only so much money you can make pandering to the same bottom of the barrels. Eventually they are going to have to do something fresh, and titillation is a well run dry for them.
Idiots following idiots doesn't always mean something works for them. It just means they are both taking the same path off the cliff.
I agree. But then, I was never disagreeing that the current policy or direction was the best course, merely that complaining about it in gaming specifically was not. And making it sound more like a moral crusade like many around here do only makes it even worse when it comes to trying to address it.
At no point should the discussion been how it is bad or wrong for companies to be using titillation, because that is so engrained into our culture and media that complaining about it in gaming comes off as hypocritically attacking the hobby rather then the source of the issue. Instead, the conversation should have started with and firmly remained about how people wanted more variety. Don't make it about gender, don't make it about politics, don't make it about venting complaints about the ones not doing it right, make it about what you want to see in regards to your next purchase and why they are getting your money because they did something right.
When you complain about the ones doing it wrong, you are dismissed as part of the sea of general internet hate. Worse, you are often ignored because of the assumption that "well, they weren't going to buy it anyways, if all out past history hasn't shown wrong". I keep repeating myself here, but honestly, it is the only way to make people listen. Support things that you like. You will never get the perfect game, but you can support ones that get closer. Gaming is the way it is now, with the biggest titles like movie blockbusters, because of the decades of financial support and response. It was the support that allowed the games to get bigger and more expensive. And while they may often be blowing that expense, the industry is still trying to chase that final dollar as best they can. Titles like Beyond Good and Evil died because people did not support it. And like an animal removed from the herd, it can't affect the next generation of gaming and help it evolve when since it was removed.
It is annoying and frustrating. It may even feel unfair. But it is what it is and the only way it will change is if people invest into it enough to make it profitable to do what you want.
