I'm kind of annoyed they have turned one of the most badass female video game characters into a wuss... but at the same time it's nice to see a video game that does something different.
I just hope they are aware of the horror that was Other M and they try to avoid the mistakes that game made.
It's a shame because Lara was a nice bit of escapist power fantasy for female gamers and now she has been reduced to being 'protected' by the male demographic...it's a bit...irritating.
They're not making her into a wuss. Jesus, look at some of those screens and trailers. She does some pretty crazy shit.
Here is the thing: Every video game starts you out with a badass main character and it's kinda boring. There is no where for your character to develop. Master Chief doesn't get MOAR AWESOMER as the story progresses because he's at the top of his game at the beginning.
But this is different. This is about the story progression of a normal person in an extraordinary situation and how they transform into a hero over the course of their journey.
And unlike Other M, this is a reboot, so the established continuity can't be relied on. Samus wigging out in Other M was bad because it wasn't consistent with established canon. The Tomb Raider reboot exists independent of the established Tomb Raider canon.
I'm kind of annoyed they have turned one of the most badass female video game characters into a wuss... but at the same time it's nice to see a video game that does something different.
I just hope they are aware of the horror that was Other M and they try to avoid the mistakes that game made.
It's a shame because Lara was a nice bit of escapist power fantasy for female gamers and now she has been reduced to being 'protected' by the male demographic...it's a bit...irritating.
I'm kind of annoyed they have turned one of the most badass female video game characters into a wuss... but at the same time it's nice to see a video game that does something different.
I just hope they are aware of the horror that was Other M and they try to avoid the mistakes that game made.
It's a shame because Lara was a nice bit of escapist power fantasy for female gamers and now she has been reduced to being 'protected' by the male demographic...it's a bit...irritating.
They're not making her into a wuss. Jesus, look at some of those screens and trailers. She does some pretty crazy shit.
Here is the thing: Every video game starts you out with a badass main character and it's kinda boring. There is no where for your character to develop. Master Chief doesn't get MOAR AWESOMER as the story progresses because he's at the top of his game at the beginning.
But this is different. This is about the story progression of a normal person in an extraordinary situation and how they transform into a hero over the course of their journey.
And unlike Other M, this is a reboot, so the established continuity can't be relied on. Samus wigging out in Other M was bad because it wasn't consistent with established canon. The Tomb Raider reboot exists independent of the established Tomb Raider canon.
I'm kind of annoyed they have turned one of the most badass female video game characters into a wuss... but at the same time it's nice to see a video game that does something different.
I just hope they are aware of the horror that was Other M and they try to avoid the mistakes that game made.
It's a shame because Lara was a nice bit of escapist power fantasy for female gamers and now she has been reduced to being 'protected' by the male demographic...it's a bit...irritating.
They're not making her into a wuss. Jesus, look at some of those screens and trailers. She does some pretty crazy shit.
Here is the thing: Every video game starts you out with a badass main character and it's kinda boring. There is no where for your character to develop. Master Chief doesn't get MOAR AWESOMER as the story progresses because he's at the top of his game at the beginning.
But this is different. This is about the story progression of a normal person in an extraordinary situation and how they transform into a hero over the course of their journey.
And unlike Other M, this is a reboot, so the established continuity can't be relied on. Samus wigging out in Other M was bad because it wasn't consistent with established canon. The Tomb Raider reboot exists independent of the established Tomb Raider canon.
Yes but I'd be willing to bet you don't put them on display for all of the world to see. I'm just saying, a tank top and cargo pants are kind of designed to show off a person's body. When a women shows her midriff in a video game, it's kind of obvious that the game designers are trying to sneak in some sex appeal.
After reading that article I have come to the conclusion that the attempted 3 seconds of sexual harassment is pretty much harmless. What I am annoyed about is the developer having no idea what he is saying, with the exception of wanting to make a good origin story and have a character arc for the new Laura in her humble beginnings. It's too bad however that half of the game is pretty much spoiled right then and there from this article and that gameplay demo/trailer at E3; that just cost this game some points from me. I was considering getting the game at $40 dollars if it was any good, but now that's dropped to about $30 dollars considering there will be no surprises for what I am assuming is the first half of the game. I guess the only thing left to look forward to is the "Tomb Raiding" aspect of the game; crossing my fingers that it will be fun. Also to anyone hating this game because it's a reboot of the series, let it go. This is a different Laura in another universe where she will most likely embark on new adventures that don't cross over with original Laura; this will in no way ruin original Laura's image because new Laura is a different person. If you really don't want Laura Croft's name tied to this new Laura, just assume she has a different last name like, I don't know, Laura Thorneberry or something along those lines. Also "You're a Croft, Laura" is so cliche it's pretty much nonexistent.
Interesting interpretation. I won't be buying it because what I've seen makes it look like a QTE laden corridor. On the bright side if they want to make the player protect Croft maybe she isn't going to turn out as irritating as she seemed in the trailer.
I'm kind of annoyed they have turned one of the most badass female video game characters into a wuss... but at the same time it's nice to see a video game that does something different.
I just hope they are aware of the horror that was Other M and they try to avoid the mistakes that game made.
It's a shame because Lara was a nice bit of escapist power fantasy for female gamers and now she has been reduced to being 'protected' by the male demographic...it's a bit...irritating.
Although, amazingly enough, there wasn't any real "fan service" (except the end credits, admittedly) until Legend. Up to that point, pretty much all of her clothing was surprisingly practical for someone who spent all their time demonstrating great agility.
True, I guess you have a point there. Personally I don't really have problem with Lara, I just thought that people had a bit of a problem with it, especially women. Guess that what happened when you try to understand popular opinion.
Great! This is a really evil thing to say, and it will probably not happen, but if very few people bought the new Tomb Raider, then maybe Crystal Dynamics would rather make a new Legacy of Kain game, instead of just making adventures for Lady Croft. Okay, this year, they are trying something new, but still, if this is a success, what's next? Lara's 10 year old adventures, or 70 year old adventures...
I'll admit, before this "controversy", I wasn't even remotely interesting. Now I am, as it appears there might be something deeper to this game. I think I'll pick up the game and see how it implements all these story elements before puffing myself up and going holier-than-thou on everyone's ass.
True, I guess you have a point there. Personally I don't really have problem with Lara, I just thought that people had a bit of a problem with it, especially women. Guess that what happened when you try to understand popular opinion.
On the surface Lara does appear to be a kind of pandering to the male demographic but when you actually play the tomb raider games she is pretty much a badass heroine that can be respected as much as Prophet, Nathan Drake or Adam Jensen.
True, I guess you have a point there. Personally I don't really have problem with Lara, I just thought that people had a bit of a problem with it, especially women. Guess that what happened when you try to understand popular opinion.
On the surface Lara does appear to be a kind of pandering to the male demographic but when you actually play the tomb raider games she is pretty much a badass heroine that can be respected as much as Prophet, Nathan Drake or Adam Jensen.
Cool, but call me crazy I get the feeling that there's a fair amount of female gamers out there that aren't exactly very keen on Lara Croft's character design.
I never liked Lara Croft. She was basically just a mash up of G.I. Joe and Barbie.
I'm interested in this game because it's writing her as an actual character. Yes, she's scared. You would be too in that situation. Yes, she's vulnerable. Every good hero is vulnerable in their origin story.
Now, if they wrote this so that Lara needs to be saved every five seconds by a burly male, that would be a sexist turn for the franchise. Rather, Lara has to save herself. This isn't offensive to women, it's empowering to them. The story is showing how Lara overcomes her initial fear and vulnerability to become a strong, capable hero. She doesn't need someone else to save her. She doesn't need a shoulder to cry on. She has all the strength, all the support she needs in herself.
That's (potentially) what this story is ultimately about. I say potentially because I believe writers maintain the capacity to fuck shit up.
Minimizing her sexual appeal is also a pertinent move. Too often women today are told their sexuality is their best (and sometimes only) weapon. By making Lara less sexualized in this, they're making her sexuality less prominent and instead focusing on her inner strength and resolve. They're making those attribute her true weapons. Again, that isn't offensive, it should be empowering.
Of course, this is all assuming the writers don't totally screw and leave us with another Other M.
The potential is there, but it could still end up as horrible as people are afraid it's going to be if the writers don't do their job correctly.
Is that the level where she used her unique physical charms to get close to that Yakuza boss dude to hunt down the next piece of the sword relic?
If so... pretty sure they explained why she had to wear that ridiculous outfit Plus she gets to go all badass on the goons throughout that level after the initial Hitman camouflage rampage.
The developers were too lazy to create new textures/animations for changing the layout of her gadgets and weapons hence why the dress looks ridiculous with all her gear added on... but asides from seeing some pixelated upper thigh there's no difference to her more practical tomb hunting cargo pants and tank top.
That's not why she wore the dress... she wore it because she was attending a formal work party where the Yakuza boss said he would meet her, and things went tits up (hardy har har) from there.
That said, I don't see why she couldn't have worn this instead,
I'm pretty sure this falls under the category of you trying way too hard. To the point where the most offensive thing is the degree to which you think people should be offended.
Let me elaborate.
cynicalandbored said:
I've been following the recent controversy over the Hitman trailer, the one that inexplicably featured bondage nuns getting seven shades of holy water beaten out of them by 47. In my opinion, this description of Lara Croft is even more offensive to women than that.
In the Hitman trailer, overly sexualised women were being beaten up because we're supposed to want to kill them. They are, after all, attempting to murder the game's protagonist, moody anti-hero that he is. In a certain context it makes sense, and it's clearly the glamorisation of violence against scantily clad women that offends, rather than the fact that 47 kills women at all. If they hadn't been wearing fetish gear (or habits) and hadn't been dispatched in super slo-mo then there might have been less negative reaction. You know, if they'd been dressed like hardcore assassins rather than strippers...
First, I should say that I think the Hitman controversy is an over reaction. The implication that this is the first game where the skins they apply to the enemy character models matters this much is ridiculous to me. (Especially after they came out and said that they took inspiration from Quentin Tarantino's Grind House) Now I've never played another Hitman game so I don't know if some of the controversy came from a shift in tone the audience didn't want but that's besides the point. Loads of games have attractive character models, Look at DOA. But it suddenly matters now? It Boggles the mind.
On to Lara.
Isn't this description of the "new" Lara Croft much more offensive to female gamers in particular, and women in general? It manages to imply that large breasts make a woman less human for starters. It also makes a point that gamers (who are ideally supposed to be projecting onto the characters they are playing) will want to "protect" her, because she's "more vulnerable." Yes, you make a woman more realistic by ensuring she's less sexually empowered and needs a lot more looking after by the (presumably target male demographic) gamers that play her. *sarcasm*
There's a little "Trying to have your cake and eat it to" in this paragraph. You're trying to say that Lara is a depiction of the female gender and that the players have to project on to her. Being a satirical mirror and a tabula rasa are opposite functions for a character to play and they literally can't be both at once. Those also are not the only two functions a character can be, there is an entire spectrum and those are just the extremes. And Lara (and most game characters fall somewhere in the middle)
original Lara was a caricature, sexualised to the point of hilarity, and completely unsuitable as an aspirational model of womanhood. But she was at least able to look after herself. She was a bit of a badass, no denying, and that was something she had going for her
To aspire to be new Lara would be the pinnacle of insanity. Here is a young woman who is portrayed as being totally helpless and vulnerable. Yes, she learns to fend for herself. Yes, by the end of the game we can assume she'll be strong and independent with a badass attitude. But what does it take for her to achieve this? This wilting violet of a girl has to be subjected to more hideous torture and brutality than any of us are ever likely to experience.
Women can't be strong, because it's unrealistic.
Women can't be week, because it's unbecoming.
I've found the least offensive female roll modle for you!
Not Bella obviously, Kristen Stewart. She never shows any recognizable human emotion there fore she can never be offensive. Right?
Or is the implication that all women are incapable of emoting also offensive?
Ahhh! is there no pleasing you?
After all, the protagonist in most games, male of female, is a ridiculously badass, fit, attractive, muscular specimen of humanity, who is perfect in almost every way. I know these aren't things we realistically aspire to, as I'm sure most gamers out there do. To believe that you could be exactly like these people, indeed to want to be exactly like these people, is clearly delusional behaviour. But at least they usually have some admirable personality traits, be it confidence, determination, etc... Original Lara was no different. Her body shape was literally impossible to achieve, but at least she wasn't just a pair of breasts bouncing above a hot-pants clad arse.
The implication of this is that the only way for a woman to develop an attitude and be able to look after herself is for her to undergo unspeakable hardship. And of course to have the big male ego of the gamer caring for her at every step. The fact that this hardship has to be rape as opposed to anything else is truly despicable.
You talk a lot about implications and consequences. Did it even once occur to you that they might be trying to write a character with a compelling arc?. Between reading the first box and the second which sounds like a more interesting character.
The inexplicably perfect superhuman who never fails.
Or, the scared, vulnerable girl who has to adapt to her situation to overcome obstacles.
Because one of those options is way over used and boring as hell.
Men may have been more focused on her breasts, but the fact that she had an attitude was inescapable, albeit an attitude that occasionally spilled over into parody. In some ways original Lara was much more honest than this new, "realistic" Lara.
By "Honest" do you mean "Traditional"?
Because one of the problems game character like that face is that with so many of them having the exact same lack of an arc they have to make themselves distinct and in Lara's case they decided to go with T and A.
The same way that Nathan Drake was a douche bag, or that Master Chief wears power armor, or that Frank West has covered wars (Y'know).
Why couldn't we have a Lara we could try to identify with? I see no fundamental difference between one that men only play because they want to ogle her tits and one men only want to play because they feel the need to take care of the poor little girl. Both models of femininity are equally sexist in my opinion.
How would you make Lara Croft relateable besides from putting her in a situation that would make you uncomfortable, and making her just as uncomfortable? You're telling me that you wouldn't be just that scared if you were being chased around ancient ruins by a bunch of rapists? What would Lara have to do for you to identify with her? Work the same job as you?
You're free to be offended, but I think it's a little weird that you're more offended by the over correction than the actual problem.
Let me get this straight. You think a game where you play as a woman, who gets to kill rapists is sexist?
That's... That's just...Sorry I just had a stroke...
To my knowledge there has never been a game that has covered the subject of rape, and now we have it in a Tomb Raider game, where the main villains are rapists! That's the biggest step towards respectable the games industry has ever seen, and you're trying to poo-poo it by calling it sexist. I... I can't even respond to that.
The only reason I'm defending this so much is that the new Tomb Raider is the only returning IP that actually looked any good at E3, and my third favorite E3 game over all (Sleeping Dogs and Unfinished Swan were one and two in case you cared.)
This also made an IP that I've never cared about seem interesting, and not just interesting, really damn good.
In the sea of uninspired gray brown rehashes that was E3 2012 I'll gladly latch on to a very inspired gray brown rehash. since it's apparently too much to ask for a console game with some color in it!
Okay, so to recap, here are the Feminist Guidelines for Making Videogames:
-Women should be fully clothed. If the nuns who attacked Agent 47 had been wearing bulky beekeeper outfits, the beatings would have been acceptable. Except...
-Women should never be punched, threatened with rape or put in any danger. Oh wait, but then that implies they're weak and can't fight back, so either you have to find that magic perfect ratio of violence against women or not put any females in your game at all.
-Nevermind that she just climbed a mountain with no gear, braved the wilderness, swam in underwater caves, faced killer mummies, spike pits, lava pools, dinosaurs and other people with guns. The overall implication is always that women are weak.
-Don't make breasts large. Don't make breasts small. This is another "damned if you do, damned if you don't" rule.
-Most of all, don't let your male characters help girls, especially if they're in danger and have no conceivable way to fight or escape. This is clearly chauvinism in it's purest form.
cynicalandbored said:
And of course to have the big male ego of the gamer caring for her at every step.
What the fuck? This statement made my heart sink when I read it. Firstly, you're contradicting yourself: Egotism leaves no room for sentimentality and vice versa. Second, it's like you're suggesting that male gamers are too dumb to feel any motivating force beyond "Urg, me save pretty girl!" Just, no. Don't talk about how offensive something is to women, then insult men in the same breath.
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The two aren't mutually exclusive.
