Why must every game revolve around making my balls feel big?

[Calvar Draveir]

Your issue is with the standard "Hero Cycle", which has been a part of litarature since its beginning.

 

[Rheinmetall]

"personailty-deficient, heavily built, thirty-something white guy". I pictured in my mind Chris Redfield from RE 5... The guy from Gears of War is more like "haevily built with a cartoony way" lol

 

[Unsilenced]

I've kind of wanted to see a war game where "shit pants and run" is a viable strategy.

Objective added: JESUS FUCK SHIT ASS FUCK SHIT GODDAMN FUCK RUN FUCK SHIT RUN OH GOD RUN FUCK SHIT

 

[Indecipherable]

My soapbox about Arcanum is getting a bit lonely - you can finish the whole game (successfully, duh) without killing a single thing.

 

[Starik20X6]

I love the fact that while the stereotypical game protagonist is a meathead, by far the most successful and well known game protagonist is a short, overweight, blue-collar everyman with a moustache.

In all seriousness, I totally agree with the sentiment here. But I kinda get the feeling the problem isn't as bad as people think (that or I'm just playing lots of different games). I look at the pile of games next to my consoles and the protagonists I see are:

- The aforementioned chubby Italian
- Pointy-eared swordsman
- Color-changing blob
- Woman in a suit of power armour
- A rag doll
- Man made of voxels
- Electrically charged delivery boy
- A master thieving racoon
- A boy in a town full of animals
- A pink ball that doesn't stop eating
- An angel
- A gorilla
- A plastic superhero
- Young boy with horns

Cookies for those who can figure out what I'm playing.

 

[Casual Shinji]

A little bit of power fantasy isn't a horrible thing. But the direction of the industry creating things like God of War killing things randomly as if it is glorious, and then having a bunch of women fawn over him in bed, is becoming far too commonplace and feeds an unhealthy mentality. It normalizes something that should not be normalized.

Judging by the setting, what exactly is it that you are taking offense to? The fact that you're killing a meriad of mythological creatures, or the singular goofy sex mini game?

Because in either case it's not something that feels out of place for an ancient Greek setting.

 

[Smithburg]

Hmm doesn't realy fit with my collection. I have a lot of adventure, puzzle, RPG's, and Strategy games so it balances out the meat head missile launchers

 

[Vault101]

I dont mind a "power fantasy" as long as it makes sense in context

ok..Comander shepard is competant to almost inhuman levels...but in a way she/he was simply in the right place and the right time..and obviously the right person for what ever certian people needed (the Aliance, the illusive man)

Fallout New Vegas, aside from the fact that the courier can become insanly powerful both literally and in terms of influence over the mojave wasteland, I can I can sort of see how he/she can end up holding all the cards

Infamous.....the guy can shoot lightning out of his hands..nuff said

Oblivion and Skyrim are the "bad" examples I would use, you can go from nothing to not only the most powerful person in the land..but the god damn leader fo every faction AT THE SAME TIME

obviously this is because of the lack of actual definition for the charachter, a thing alot of people like about the series

its always been my grip...you dont feel like a characheter..but just a thing thats suposed to fill this big void in the game world

games that dont make you feel powerful I say are like Deadspace, Dark souls, hmm mabye others

 

[Brighton_Game_Trader]

This might turn out a bit rant-ish and I make no promises of comprehensibility. You've been warned.

The protagonist is either a blank slate or a badass (if the latter, then extra points if they're a personailty-deficient, heavily built, thirty-something white guy [http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/marcus-fenix-gears21.jpg]). Progressing through the game involves killing or violently defeating large numbers of enemies. As you progress your protagonist gets increasingly powerful, usually through stat increases or the acquisition of equipment and weaponry.

Extra points if you get the girl and save the world.

The point I am laboriously trying to make here is that way too many games constitute little more than a juvenile power fantasy. An endless procession of burly, infallible badasses joylessly curb-stomping hundreds of unambiguously evil enemy redshirts. It's really getting old.

Great thread - video games seem to be stuck in the 1980s when it comes to their characters and storylines.

Big white blokes with giant weapons save a bunch of small useless women who (if they're really lucky) might be able to use a bow and arrow or some magic.

Worse that that is when they throw in a "token black guy" just like the 80s films did (bar those with Eddie Murphy - he was the dawg).

It's crude, generally tasteless and I can't wait until gaming grows up and cuts this shit out.

Thanks to you, Zhukov for getting people talking about this more.

 

[The Funslinger]

Because a lot of developers are in a sad state of shallow power fantasy pandering. Because apparently lots of guys still want to buy that. I sure as heck wouldn't want to be friends with such a guy.

Also, I hate to make this cultural, but this is mostly a Western thing. To expand on that, even more so a Western AAA company that makes a lot of money off of first person shooters like EA sort of thing.

I don't like such video games, so my wallet stays far, far away from them.

Might I use this as an opportunity to say how disgusting I think God of War is? It's a ridiculous power fantasy, known for things outside of the power fantasy, as women fawning over Kratos and a sex scene. What a pile of rubbish not much different that Duke Nukem.

Maybe there is good gameplay, but God if the theme doesn't suck.

Still, at least Duke Nukem was a satire.

 

[Bvenged]

Yeah, I'm with you on this one. My favourites the one where you play as a regular soldier/squad member who, at the moment of coming under your control, become some god-like fighting machine who saves the world. Though with games like CoD & BF3, one person is not enough so you shift focus between a few of them. It's not a bad concept, I'm not saying be gone with all of them, but there are far too many of them around and still coming out. So a little cut-back should be in order.

Why must every game revolve around making my balls feel big?

- Implying that they were tiny to begin with

 

[OldDirtyCrusty]

Hmmm, in most games with a character editor i tend to create my personal badass first.
I`m having fun to create this kind of stereotype.
Almost every shooter features the big strong military guy, can`t say i mind it at all. It`s all in the hands of the writers and voiceactors to give this type (and all others) a personality out of usual gamestandards.
The main character of Binary Domain comes to my mind. He comes of as the normal military man at first and develops at the end of the story. That was good writing and unexpected to me.

I play alot of the simple minded stuff too and i`m having a great time with it.

Maybe i`m a woman in need of strong arms or maybe i`m a douchebag who likes the eighties/nineties action movies with oneliners, blood, big guys and big guns. If they don`t do those anymore at least i can play them.

 

[gilgamesh310]

I reckon Second Sight has a protagonist that at least comes close to that description.

 

[GmonXyZ]

Hostile interaction is much easier to develop and balance, you shoot -> something explodes -> someone dies.

This also means u pretty much know what animations u will need for certain models and such.. ^^

Summary: Forced Adrenaline Rush versus Induced Adrenaline Rush =D

 

[Aardvark Soup]

Alrighty then, I want to you all to participate in a brief little experiment. I want you to run your eyes along your video game shelf or Steam library and see how many of your games can be accurately described by the following paragraph.

Very well, I'm currently looking at a stack of Nintendo DS games, which are on a shelf positions right above my monitor. Let's take the four games on top (excluding the compilation of 42 board and card games) and see how far they match your description:

Professor Layton and the Curious Village
Protagonist that is...
- blank slate or badass: hmm, not really
+ personality-deficient: yes, in the sense that professor Layton is a very boring character with basically no character flaws. Even the fact that he is unhealthily obsessed with puzzle-solving doesn't stand out because almost every character in the game (major or minor) is this.
- heavility built: nope
+ thirty-something white guy: yep, although he could be older. It's a bit hard to tell.
The game involves...
- killing or violently defeating numerous enemies: you're actually just solving a lot of puzzles
- stronger protagonist through stat increases of equipment acquisition: you can collect hint coins, but that's about it.
- getting the girl
- saving the world

Score: 2/8

Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
Protagonist that is...
- blank slate or badass: not at all.
- personality-deficient: nope, most characters, including the protagonist, have got quite some personality
- heavility built: I wouldn't say so
+/- thirty-something white guy: twenty-something, really; and he was probably supposed to be Japanese-looking in the original while being American in the Western localization. You can't really tell someone's skin colour in this game due to the manga drawing style.
The game involves...
- killing or violently defeating numerous enemies: nope, you just yell at them in court.
- stronger protagonist through stat increases of equipment acquisition
- getting the girl: the female companion is both much younger than the protagonist, and turns out to be his sister; so luckily this isn't the case.
- saving the world: each case revolves around saving a single individual from a false conviction.

Score: 0.5/8

New Super Mario Bros.
Protagonist that is...
+ blank slate or badass: I'd say Mario is a blank slate character.
+ personality-deficient: definitely.
- heavility built: not really.
+/- thirty-something white guy: a white guy indeed, but I've got no idea about his age
The game involves...
+ killing or violently defeating numerous enemies: absolutely, you're constantly murdering Koopa's and Goomba's by brutally stomping them to dead, even when they're just walking around harming nobody
- stronger protagonist through stat increases of equipment acquisition
+ getting the girl: as usual.
- saving the world: I'm starting to think Peach is an awful monarch and the Mushroom Kingdom would be much better off without her, so the contrary is true.

Score: 4.5/8

Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective
Protagonist that is...
- blank slate or badass: not at all.
- personality-deficient: nope.
- heavility built: nada.
? thirty-something white guy: answering this would be spoiler, and indicating that is probably quite a spoiler in itself. My apologies for that.
The game involves...
- killing or violently defeating numerous enemies: you actually do kill someone, and heavily injure another (it's unclear whether he survived). In both cases this was to only way of preventing them to kill someone else, so I'd say it's justified.
- stronger protagonist through stat increases of equipment acquisition: once again not the case.
- getting the girl: even though you might expect this, that doesn't happen for reasons that become obvious in the end.
- saving the world

Score 0/8


So yeah, this sample of my DS collection does not conform to that stereotype. Although the results would probably be quite different if I'd look at my PS3 collection instead.

 

[Bostur]

Video games are fantasies.

Video games are about power ( every meanigful mechainc hinges on the players overcoming an obstacle or challenge.)

They can't not be power fantasises. They can be lesser fantasies if they are ridiculously fucking easy (That Game Company) or have basically no meaningful interaction (Tale of Tales) but they remain fantasies about power.

So aesthetic matches the mechanics. Why do most big time gamers have a lesser interest in sports games. It's the mudane aesthetic. If you aren't inudated with NBA you won't care much about bald black man #1. The aesthetics of videogames, with simulations of war, are generally perfect for what they accomplish.

So the reason some people don't want these "power fantasy" aesthetic and other people do, all boils down to nietzschean philosophy. Slave morality versus the master morality and the Overman.

My thoughts exactly. Even Civilization and Sim City are power fantasies. Controlling cool stuff we can't otherwise control.

There are a few types of games I can think of that does not use power fantasies as their main tool.

1. Games where the object of control is abstract. These provide no power fantasy except for the purely personal satisfaction of being good at the game. Tetris, Checkers, Bejewelled for example. To a lesser extent games where the gameworld is extremely unrealistic, rainbow themed platformers for instance.

2. Games where the gameplay and the story is the same thing. The only genre I can think of is the adventure genre. This is a very different experience though, and maybe deserves to have a genre of its own outside the group of 'games'.

3. Games with very little gameplay, Interactive stories or titles about exploring a world. These are also beyond gaming.

Most games are about being in control, and being in control is a power fantasy. Playing a Flight Sim is very much a power fantasy and the main reason people play them. They want to be a pilot while they play.


I get that there are many ways to design those power fantasies, they don't all have to be about butch male sergeants gunning down aliens. But thats mostly a matter of form. It's nice to have a variety of aesthetics to convey the power fantasy, and I think there is a lot to choose from. But maybe I just ignore the worst stereotypes automatically.