Well if they absolutely HAVE to argue, they could at least argue in a mature manner instead of hurling insults at each other.
It Never Ends
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One of the underpinning problems of all of this is that the, "Oh will BOTH sides just shut up" crowd are, whether they like it or not, on the side of the status quo. Truthfully, I suspect more than a few of them know this. They're aware that they have no need to defeat the opposition in open debate. They simply have to deny them a seat at the negotiation table.MovieBob said:
The idea of sweeping the conflict under the rug is itself an attack on those who want change. "I'm sick of hearing the argument, so just let's keep doing what we've been doing." It provides an avenue for the casually-sexist the defend their sexism without declaring it (thus allowing them the luxury of decrying it in others).
Ok tell me what would be so bad about having the future hit games feature more anatomically possible women wearing more practical clothing and not having to do sexy poses every so often?Paradoxrifts said:
There will still be games featuring eyecandy at every turn, it is just that they would not be taken as seriously as the games that don't pander to such a base instinct.
I know you will say "You are in no position to judge whether or not the things I like are crap." I'm not sure how to respond to that.
Exactly. Simply going "can we please just stop talking about this and go back to playing games?", helps no one.Dastardly said:
As far as the "they are just huge breasts, what's the problem?" debate, it IS a problem. It is painting an unrealistic view of what women are supposed to be. It is as bad as having black people in a game always be the criminals, or seen eating fried chicken. Or seeing Hispanic people constantly in sombreros. It is sexism, and should be seen as just as important to get rid of as racism.
As far as censorship goes, it's not censorship, because censorship would be AFTER the product has been made and shipped. If the government censors something, they are censoring it after the fact. Like when that news anchor swore on TV (the one who lost his job after his FIRST day). They didn't censor him to start with. You can hear him in the original video just fine. They censored him AFTER the broadcast was done being made.
What this is is trying to convince people that this kind of objectification is wrong. If more game developers decide to make normal looking female characters, they are not being censored. They are willfully doing it. No one has a gun to their head forcing them to do it.
Plus, what would the effect on the game be? I mean, if we suddenly change to normal looking female characters, and not sexualized ones. Would the core gameplay change? Would the Sorceress as a character, in terms of her moves and how she plays, be ANY different? The answer is no. It would only be an aesthetic change (a physical one).
And honestly, if you are playing video games just to see women with huge fucking breasts bouncing around, I think you are looking at the wrong medium. There are many websites out there for porn. Go find them.
As the video game market becomes more diverse, and not just restricted to male gamers, we need to realize that our industry has, for a long time, been sexist. If we want to evolve, we can't hide our heads in the sand and pretend this doesn't exist. As Jim Sterling said in one of his episodes, "you can talk about the -isms in the industry without hating video games". If we want the public to take video games seriously as an art form, and get their respect, then THIS is something that needs to stop. Because shit like the Sorceress does NOT help our case.
And please, stop with the "stop trying to take our games away" bullshit. No one is taking your game away. Are you a two year old? Again, this would not be taking games away. It would be changing one particular aspect of the game. No one is trying to stop Dragon's Crown from being made. You'll still get your precious game.
Though I agree that the industry is horrifically over-run with this character design and that this really needs to stop, Dragon's Crown is the absolute worst example of how we need to stop objectifying women in every game. Despite the fact that the artist is a bit of a douche, Dragon's Crown should be freely criticized but isn't serious in its representation. The art style is meant to be ridiculous, it's meant to be cartoonish, and if a man sees the Sorceress and says "THAT is what a woman should look like!" That's something wrong with him, not the artist. Men in general won't find her attractive just like Women in general won't find the Fighter in Dragon's Crown attractive. They're ridiculous caricatures that are meant to be laughed at, not fapped to, just as the artist's insensitive gay-joke towards his critic was also ridiculous and not meant to be taken so harshly.Fappy said:
Representation in the gaming industry for women is awful. That's just fact. But Dragon's Crownis meant to be an exaggerated parody of the classic manga art-style, to yell at Dragon's Crown for having objectified characters is like yelling at Airplane! for making light of airborne disasters and post-traumatic stress disorder.
I'm not sure how to interpret this statement. Are you arguing that her parents are or should be or could be sufficient to the task of installing bone-deep self-image beliefs that run contrary to what she sees in every video game, TV show, movie, magazine, and advertisement on a billboard or bus? That, in short, they should somehow overpower the influence of the entire world? Or am I misreading you?psijac said:
Almost all media should be consumed with parental guidance, if not that Parent need to be at least aware for that their children are putting into their brain box.
By your logic if your niece has played with a barbie doll or watched who framed Roger Rabbit then she is already forever ruined
If her parents wanted to raise a girl divorced from the idea of female sexuality a Muslim Country. I am sure their women there don't have any problems with body image.
By your logic if your niece has played with a barbie doll or watched who framed Roger Rabbit then she is already forever ruined
If her parents wanted to raise a girl divorced from the idea of female sexuality a Muslim Country. I am sure their women there don't have any problems with body image.
So you've read the rest of the conversation you're jumping into? Oh, wait, you didn't because if you did you'd specifically realize that I later say that I have no idea how good this game is. Your real problem not being with me or what I have said but being that you are simply internet-rage obsessed and don't bother to use the reading skills you were taught in school.RaikuFA said:
Now since we are simply making assumptions about each other and each other's positions, let me make some assumptions about you. You are so scared that people don't like you that you throw a fit every time someone gives the slightest hint of disliking something you like. You crave external validation so much, that you hunt through forums desperately searching for that reinforcement and you've become so desperate for it that you throw a hissy-fit if you see comments that are anything else than praising your thoughts and ideas. The sad thing is, the only reason you are so desperate for that validation is that you haven't learned any self-confidence. If you had some self-confidence, you might be able to separate a comment on society (which you misinterpreted in the first place) from your own self worth.
As it is, you seem stuck on some sort of identification process that connects you personally to people's thoughts of this game. At any rate, it's not worth it. There is nothing for you to prove to me or for this game to prove to me. My opinion of the game, of you, or even of your ideas has absolutely no bearing on you, the world or what fate holds in store for anyone. I'd suggest you give up on your self-appointed holy quest to defend pseudo-chauvinist imagery because it does you and no-one else any good, but you've probably already stopped reading and are writing some rage based response where you suggest some attribute to me that you believe is an insult but won't have any meaning to me what so ever. However, I appreciate the chance to confirm my belief that no matter what lengths you go to, the internet will always respond with poorly thought out rage. Good job assuring that this process continues.
I agree with you, read enough fanfics to know that.Therumancer said:
Somehow people completely ignore this and seem to simply want their beliefs seen as facts and that other beliefs should not exist. Feminists have caused this, through all there whining and complaining to turn this simple character design, into "controversial news", yet no male character would cause a similar case of news (Unless it was Hitler or something like that).
Wow you showed me with your clever image you found doing a GIS search!! Bravo! You deserve a Pulitzer Prize!!!!!!!!1!Father Time said:And this is why we have Godwin's Law. You just compared scantily clad women to Nazis. The fictional characters are not trying to convey any message or morals, they're just scantily clad and you compare them to Nazis.Mahoshonen said:
And this lesson can be applied to so many other instances, too! If only blacks hadn't gone in droves to watch The Birth of a Nation. They never would have suffered from the resurgance of the Ku Klux Klan!
Okay, psijac, I'm going to have to ask you to point to anything I said that so much as implies I think any one, specific piece of entertainment will constitute the whole of her worldview, or that it will "ruin her forever," whatever that even means. Or actually, don't bother trying to find that statement of mine, because I didn't say any such thing and you're not actually arguing with me or with anything I said; you're conversing with some hysteria-driven strawman you want me to be. I will thank you to stop doing that.psijac said:
But because I have apparently somehow been unclear, let me state my position as explicitly as I know how. It is a deeply ingrained habit of mine to speak in simile and metaphor, so if I am ambiguous at any point during the following explanation, please forgive me for my bad habit and let me know what I can clarify for you.
I believe that most of what children learn, they learn at an unconscious level, through observation of the world around them. For example, no one teaches a child to walk by sitting her down and explaining the mechanics before running her through test trials; the kid just watches, and imitates, and eventually learns it through mimicry.
I believe that everywhere an American looks, there's an image of a woman who fits within a very rigid definition of beauty. I further believe that the way those women are presented is much more likely than not aimed at heterosexual men, as if women exist not as individuals but rather by definition of their relationship to men.
I believe that all of the above factors combine to form a society that is silently and subliminally teaching girls that their value as people is defined by their sexual attractiveness. I believe that the sheer weight of this influence is almost completely overwhelming, to the point that I believe anyone who says "It's the parents' job to teach them different" is speaking from motivations I can't even fathom but that I kind of suspect are based on a territorial desire to maintain the volume of wank material flowing in his direction.
I believe that the Sorceress is just one character. I believe all characters are, individually, just one character. I just so happen to believe that they have an additive effect, so that the Sorceress and Lara Croft and Other M Samus Aran and Tifa Lockhart and Tina Armstrong and Ivy Valentine and all the rest of them combine to send the unambiguous message that women should be valued for their sexual attractiveness first and foremost, and for any other characteristics second if at all.
I believe my niece is just one child, but I believe there are probably a whole bunch of other girls her age who are learning the same things she's learning by the same methods she's learning them, and as such I believe it's perfectly fair to use her as a symbol of all girl-children who are being taught to base their worth on their weight and measurements. I also believe boys are learning the same lessons about how women should be judged, and that it is equally problematic, but for personal reasons I am more concerned with what the girls are learning.
I believe that, though a lot of baggage is being inflicted on girls as we speak, everyone has baggage and the idea that they are "ruined forever" is nothing but useless hyperbole meant to dishonestly depict my position as one that overreacts to the problem so immensely that it should be ridiculed and ignored rather than considered. I further believe that "Muslim women have it worse" is an intellectually harmful idea, encouraging people to accept a base of relativism for their morality so that anyone who can provide an example of something worse than whatever he's accused of will become immune to moral evaluation and judgment.
Those are the things I believe. If you have a problem with them, then I invite you to discuss them with me calmly and rationally, because another thing I believe is that reasonable people can disagree honorably. If, however, you are not interested in an honest exchange of ideas with the intention of increasing one another's understanding, then I invite you to please keep your comments to yourself, as I find such conversations useless and tiresome.
Not necessarily true.Pogilrup said:
The sleek, sexualised design of nearly all of the human characters of Mass Effect with reoccurring screen time did not stop some fans from taking the series so damn seriously that the debacle over the Mass Effect 3 ending went down. There were no ugly humans, overweight humans or freakish humans in the far distant future as envisioned by Bioware. Only science-fiction themed Ken and Barbie dolls all dressed up for space war. Some people took it plenty serious.
The majority of games that utilise a sexualised design aesthetic have their fair share of good-looking blokes to go along with the good-looking babes. Simply because putting fugly male character models up alongside the digital hotties looks jarringly out of place. Outrageously sexualised characters like Ivy Valentine, whom Dragon Crown's Sorceress is clearly parodying, are typically created to be the 'sexy girl' in a field where damn near everyone, male or female, could at least pass for Hollywood ugly.
Again, there is a difference between constructive criticism and a politicised beatdown. It is painfully obvious that a fair amount of the 'criticism' that is being leveled at games from some gamers and game journalists is not only politically motivated, but also doesn't come from a place of genuine affection for the game genres that are coming under attack. As Jason Schreier proved beyond the shadow of a doubt, it all too easy for a person to casually slag a game that they've taken an active dislike to, without having any real understanding of what they're criticising.Pogilrup said:
Because criticising Dragon's Crown for it's depiction of the Sorceress is akin to attributing the positive effect that the film Top Gun [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092099/] had on military recruitment to the spoof parody, Hot Shots! [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102059/], and near damn every single time people go off half-cocked in this manner the commentary box groans under the weight of those who betray their own ignorance of what is being discussed. There is no shortage of people like Mr. Schreier in this world.
First things first, you would have to first show me where all these games with the anatomically incorrect women who wear impractical clothing are in the current gaming market going back five to seven years. The following stipulations apply.Pogilrup said:
A) The game cannot have been made overseas primarily for a foreign market, and then localised on the cheap before being dumped on the domestic market.
B) If the game does feature an overtly sexualised design aesthetic then that overarching choice of aesthetic needs to be clearly sexist. The game has to have little to none sexualised imagery that might prove pleasing to either women or gay men.
C) Must be a hit game.
And then I want you to take that list, compare it all the other games that were released during that period, and then you can get back to me on that one.
It might help if your rant had anything at all to do with the game at hand. The design *is* the same ridiculously overexagerated style for both genders, and the Amazon that's meant to slice open dragons as opposed to cast spells looks like she can actually do it (hell, she looks more qualified than either of the men, the dwarf would have trouble walking and the warrior couldn't stand period). Also, Marcus Fenix is good design, seriously? He's a joke, another hypersteroid character from an artist who doesn't understand basic human anatomy, at least Dragon's Crown characters aren't billed as realistic.Lee Oyd said:
Only if "we" are the blockbuster and porn audiences.TazTheTerrible said:
Here's an analogy to film: when you want to watch an intelligent production, when you don't want sexual content and you want a piece devoid of stereotypes and old rolemodels, you obviously won't download a porn, but you also won't find what you're looking for in the vast majority of hollywood blockbuster movies.
Triple-A games are the blockbusters of gaming. The publishers cater to young men and their business model revolves around getting as many as possible to part with 60 bucks in the first weeks post release. This locks most of these titles in that simple formula of action plus titilation. AAA is the wrong place to look for maturity.
More cerebral genres like turn-based strategy, puzzle platforming and puzzle adventure are a much better places to look for mature games.
Generally such games are more intelligent and the audiences are more likely to be sympathetic to the issue here. They don't need that shit to enjoy the gameplay.
If action is your main thing, then you'll be mostly resigned to indie games, where the focus is more on gameplay.
Game feminism ignores all the low hanging fruit and that makes it such a terribly lost cause.
You cannot fix japanese fetish fueled games and western triple-A titles in the same way cannot fix pornos and blockbusters. Such games and recordings exist because there are very big, paying audiences in the market for it and as such they will always be catered to with many products. You CANNOT FIGHT this.
What people can do, is SUPPORT such games that they think are mature. The only sacrifice for some will be getting used to more basic graphics and that is all there is to it.
^ Did you just imply blockbusters are for straight white men? Maybe they are. But why? To my knowledge, most of humanity isn't a straight white man.
This is what gamers actually believe.
The Sorceress and Amazon come along actively strutting their stuff in the middle of a forest/dungeon/fortress/whatever for absolutely nobody but the creep on the other side of the fourth wall. If its devs gave the slightest fuck about aesthetic consistency, then why aren't the Wizard, Dwarf and Warrior strutting about in a snug chainmail G-string graciously outlining their thick, throbbing, permanently erect cocks?
<url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/jump/18.406654.16934894>Yes. Exactly. Women are stupid and gay and they hate sex unlike the poor oppressed rational men like you.Smilomaniac said:
This is what gamers actually believe.
Fenix is a stupid hyper-roided dudebro design in a stupid hyper-roided dudebro universe. He's ugly, but he fits.Requia said:
The Sorceress and Amazon come along actively strutting their stuff in the middle of a forest/dungeon/fortress/whatever for absolutely nobody but the creep on the other side of the fourth wall. If its devs gave the slightest fuck about aesthetic consistency, then why aren't the Wizard, Dwarf and Warrior strutting about in a snug chainmail G-string graciously outlining their thick, throbbing, permanently erect cocks?