Mike Kayatta said:
Skullgirls Dev Dismisses Cries of Sexism
Reverge Labs claims that scantly clad anime chicks with huge breasts aren't offensive because it was a woman who animated them.
For those of you unfamiliar, Skullgirls is an upcoming 2D fighter in the vein of Marvel Versus Capcom that features an all-girl roster of anime-styled women. Yes, they fight each other, yes, they have breasts, and yes, sometimes when they contort, you can see their panties.
If they're going for the irony market these should at least have been subversive enough to call the game ClicheFighter. Irony without integrity is a saturated scene.
Since trailers surfaced earlier this year, some people have started complaining about the game relying on gimmick and sexual exploitation. Peter Bartholow, lead developer, disagrees, citing the complaints as "misplaced and shallow chivalry."
Developers: they might not be able to communicate why they disapprove of something in a coherent fashion, but when enough of them are objecting to the one thing it is enough reason to flag it for you to scrutinise it and improve on it. Dale Carnegie wrote this nearly a century ago, so its even older than your game's panty flashing gimmick. And its still selling. You like proven business models right?
"Our characters are strong, powerful women who happen to be attractive," Bartholow said in an interview with Eurogamer. "We don't have anyone like [Street Fighter's] Cammy, who wraps her legs around your leg then beats you senseless with her Kegel muscles - or whatever is going on in that Cammy Super. There was a very conscious decision not to do things like that. None of the characters use their sexuality in any aggressive way. It's just a thing they happen to be."
Translation: "Our unique selling point is girl on girl violence. But stylised, since we're not sickos," Peter said to the blogger who'd no idea how to grill an interviewee with harder questions on issues like sex, violence and female self image. "Now observe as I take a swipe at one of the few well known and established strong powerful female characters from a well respected series that we hope to seize market share off. She is, gentlemen, a skank and a bitchwhore."
Still, that hasn't stopped some people from getting offended. Earlier this year at Gamescon in Germany, one fan stopped Bartholow just to tell him how sexist he thought the game was. According to Bartholow, however, the complaint stopped as soon as he explained that a woman had done the animation.
"I'm like, did you know our lead animator is a woman?" he retold. "Then, he's like, that's amazing. It's like I gave him the excuse to think it was okay all of a sudden, or to admit he liked it, which really amused me and seemed emblematic of the entire situation around that."
Translation: "One singular fan who was offended because he disliked how men sexualise women for profit. This resulted in the opportunity to confuse him, without disproving his argument, by proving that women are capable of creating the same shitty situation for other women. While he was still recovering from the realisation that he was more sexist than he though he was (for assuming only a man could be qualified for an art direction job in the videogames industry) he became all meek and embarassed about jumping down my throat. It was awesome, I'm saying this in all my soft news interviews where no one looks like they've read up on debate or gender studies. I just have to make sure that this one piece of criticism is the focus of the majority of all interviews on ClicheFighter. I mean Skullgirls."
Bartholow puts a lot of stock in the fact that a woman, not a man, was the one who handled the animations. "She intentionally lavishes attention on the breasts herself because she thinks it's cool," he explained.
"Without naming the art director, or bringing her out to actually give meaningful commentary in a news piece on an industry in desperate need of a balanced perspective on gender, I shall now proceed to, as our PR approved mouthpiece, give a PR approved overview of her edgy, edgy, sexy work's results, without the slightest possibility that I'm shoving my big hard words into her dainty female mouth. Course if I was doing that, it'd be totally consensual. Cause we're not sickos."
"All the people who seem bothered by it are guys. It's a weird chivalry intent thing that's sort of misplaced and maybe shallow, even, because they see breasts and panty flashes and they go, that's sexist, but I've yet to meet a woman who has complained about it. They're over-thinking it."
"All the people who seem bothered by it are guys, but as I've already said earlier we don't really look in too closely to the criticism leveled at our games. Also women should be seen and not heard, which is why we haven't brought out or even named our art director for her work on this project. Remember when a woman does it, it can't be sexist, like d'uh, y'know?"
The game is set to be released on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network in early 2012. Reverge labs has stated that the fighter will launch with eight characters, and will add more in free DLC updates as the community grows. It's also confirmed that male characters will be added eventually.
"Now, while we're nothing like that Street Fighter 2 game, with that skank Cammy (McBitchwhore), we will be releasing a game offering equal the same experience as Street Fighter 2, with the same incremental approach to an ensemble cast as Street Fighter 2 did, starting in 1991. Remember, this game isn't Street Fighter 2. Its ClicheFight- I mean its Skullgirls. This is a new game. You've never seen anything like it (so long as you're under 20 years old)."
Personally, I think some of Bartholow's arguments are weak, but the better question is, does he need to be making them in the first place? If you're going to design a game starring nothing but cute girls in revealing outfits, you need to be prepared to own it, not justify it. Skullgirls isn't the first game to feature big-breasted women, and certainly won't be the last. What do you think Escapists? Based on what you see in the trailer, do you agree that the game looks like nothing more than offensive fan service?
I think this game is borrowing heavily on a 20 year old game. I think it has a few gimmicks slapped on and Peter Bartholow has realised that if he doesn't start courting controversy fast no one will notice when its released.
I also suspect that the female art director is working on this game to pay the bills and just drew what marketing said. I think that she made it plain clear that she didn't want her name dropped.
I also suspect that the working conditions in the games industry that Extra Credits wrote about absolutely apply to Revenge Labs, and our unnamed art director finds her career between a rock and a hard place on this one.
For what its worth I respect her (if she even exists?) for following her dreams. If I'm skeptical to the point of cynical its because that lead developer just comes across as a smooth talking sleaze talking up a product in this piece to me.