Critics Ruin Video Games? ?Good!

[Machine Man 1992]

Couldn't be bothered to finish reading it, but from what i've gathered, it spews the same kind of nonsence, overly hysterical "GAEMS R TEH SEXIST" annoying crap I've seen a lot of times, in fact, it's worse than a lot of the things I've seen, because those things actually have some form of logical reasoning behind it.

I wouldn't really call the view of women in some of gaming development and it's fanbases exactly ideal, but you really need to understand the difference between sexism, misoginy, and inexperience.

Calling things liek the new Lara Croft or the Cyberpunk 2077 trailer sexist is about as grounded in reality as calling Django Unchained racist, which is to say, none at all. Seriously, this is just getting absurd, yes, the situation is far from ideal, but these wannabe-GAEM-JURNALISTS are seriously far of from the point, creating distance between teh general population and normal, common-senced wantingness for equality, something that is really natural.

Articles like this and trolls like Sarkeesian however, are just pure nonsence with nothing to contribute but illogical misguided whining.

This. A thousand times this.

I am so fucking sick of internet feminism, if I ever see the word "sexism" or "misogyny", I going to vomit acid bile right over my keyboard.

This constant tilting at windmills, these constant witch hunts are bloody ridiculous. What's worse, when there is actual sexist (*hurrgh!*) content, nobody takes it seriously, because of how cheap the terms have become.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

Heheh... Throbbing hot gun love and trans-gendered hellions... This is the best thread ever.

Sounds like a Suda 51 game...

 

[Treblaine]

If the problem was violence, everyone has been awfully quiet about it till now. Or does it just not matter when men are being slaughtered? Most victims of violent crime are males.

Oh for GOD'S SAKE DON'T START THIS CRAP! PLEASE!!

And FTR, even if I wasn't a Cyberpunk 2020 fangirl and didn't know shit about the setting, the CP2077 wouldn't have offended me. In fact, I can't really even think of a video game trailer that ever has, and not that many movie trailers that ever did.

I'm sorry, do you want to have a discussion or don't you?

If you just want to throw your opinions out there, it is very easy to start your own blog and disable comments section.

But this is a discussion forum. I didn't "start this crap", it's entirely relevant. No one can shut down any discussion with "any depiction of violence against women, that's sexism, not shut up and accept what I say without even trying to argue the other side".

 

[Machine Man 1992]

I think I've said this before, but it bears repeating: this guy is an asshole who deserves an eternity of being cockslapped by the colossal spiky death-wang of the Adversary for being the worst kind of white-knighting, ad-hominem spewing dick-brain, to a degree that even Bob Chipman would say "Oh steady on, that's a bit much."

I've never felt such irrational rage directed at another human being since the Bush administration.

 

[Treblaine]

If the problem was violence, everyone has been awfully quiet about it till now. Or does it just not matter when men are being slaughtered? Most victims of violent crime are males.

Oh for GOD'S SAKE DON'T START THIS CRAP! PLEASE!!

And FTR, even if I wasn't a Cyberpunk 2020 fangirl and didn't know shit about the setting, the CP2077 wouldn't have offended me. In fact, I can't really even think of a video game trailer that ever has, and not that many movie trailers that ever did.

I'm sorry, do you want to have a discussion or don't you?

If you just want to throw your opinions out there, it is very easy to start your own blog and disable comments section.

But this is a discussion forum. I didn't "start this crap", it's entirely relevant. No one can shut down any discussion with "any depiction of violence against women,
that's sexism, not shut up and accept what I say without even trying to argue the other side".

Okay, fine. Let's do it. Let's derail it.

Now, mind showing me where I said "Any depiction of violence against women is sexism" as a starter? It'll be rather funny since I was in the "get over it, it's not sexist" camp for that Tomb Raider trailer and the "it's a marketing gimmick to get people talking about it" camp for the Dead Island Riptide kerfluffle.

Whoa whoa whoa, this is my first comment in the thread:

{edit = I'm an idiot, I'm losing track of posts, sorry}

I just want to know why you said:

Oh for GOD'S SAKE DON'T START THIS CRAP!

In response.

Sorry to have gotten off on the wrong foot but I may have taken the wrong impression. I thought you were from the camp (expressed in the OP article) of "how dare you try to argue there isn't sexism/racism here", which I found to be quite a galling stance to take.

I am sorry for that. There may be some confusion here.

I fear I may have misread and misquoted you.

 

[Cheesepower5]

Heheh... Throbbing hot gun love and trans-gendered hellions... This is the best thread ever.

Sounds like a Suda 51 game...

Sounds like something that needs to happen.

 

[bastardofmelbourne]

Can we all agree that the article was stupid and Cyberpunk 2077 is going to be awesome?

Yes? No? Sexism?

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

It's when people mix violence against women with making it sexy that it makes me uncomfortable. Not violence against women.

 

[Rienimportant]

You really don't know anything about the source material, do you?

No, the C-Squad in NIght City do not go around gunning down hookers "for their depraved ways." they do it because people who've grafted so much cyberware on their bodies that it's driven them to go carve up people for fun. For fuck's sake, given Night City's anime-level crime problem, prostitution doesn't even warrant enforcement let alone deploying the most heavily armed and armored band of trigger happy cops the city has. The Cyber Psycho unit is only called out when someone suffers from a very specific form of psychotic rage and begins slaughtering people for being filthy fleshbags that are using up his or her oxygen.

I'm not sure that it really ought to make a difference. Saying that, "Oh, you just don't understand because you don't know the source material" is great and all if it was something that was specifically found in areas dedicated to people who know the source material.
The internet is not one such area. Everyone is here. Including those who have no idea what is going on in the setting of Cyberpunk. As such, it's a trailer marketed towards the general public, who cannot be expected to have any background information on the subject.

 

[phylline]

Not really feeling it I got to say.

The devotion to Sarkeesian's drivel as well fighting up imaginary enemies is making it hard for me to take this as serious as the author intended. I am sorry when you start critiquing the Cyberpunk 2077 without any sort of understanding of what the trailer is portraying and then start using it as springboard for another Sexism argument I am going to stop listening.

What was cyberpunk 2077 portraying? I'm sorry, I don't get the damn trailer at all. The premise seems to be "people are getting a lot of implants, people with implants want to kill the meatbags, men in combat gear shooting half naked lady with impractical looking blades coming out of her arms and massive honking tits. Oh and her skin is bulletproof apparently." I'm sorry but what the flying fuck was going on in that trailer? Why did she have to be half naked? Why did she need the F cup? I don't get why that trailer got everyone so hyped for the game, it couldn't turn me off faster.

Why is it people are constantly in a giant uproar about things like this:

Spoiler

But no one cares when you have things like this:

Spoiler

I mean all of them are idealized, none of them are your average man or woman and all of them have their provocative parts exposed (cleavage, belly, abs etc). Sorry but people in video games aren't average. In videogames, people are idealized, it doesn't matter if they're male or female.

I can't find the comic that I was looking for that demonstrates my point pretty well, but the images you've just posted are conforming to a male power fantasy - it's not just the issue that they're idealized.

Anyway, on the topic of this thread... We live in a sexist, racist, etc, society. Video games aren't any more at fault than the general mainstream is. But nor am I going to really drag that out or argue this point to gamers.

 

[phylline]

I can't find the comic that I was looking for that demonstrates my point pretty well, but the images you've just posted are conforming to a male power fantasy - it's not just the issue that they're idealized.

Anyway, on the topic of this thread... We live in a sexist, racist, etc, society. Video games aren't any more at fault than the general mainstream is. But nor am I going to really drag that out or argue this point to gamers.

Great... The same game also has characters who don't conform to the "male power" bullcrap and make them a lot more effeminate.

Spoiler

And women who hold the power

Spoiler

Men and women have different body types, men are generally more muscular than women, and women are deemed attractive by most if they have flat chests and big breasts. All of these things are idealized in games.

You may not have realized this... But pretty much ALL fictional settings and characters are FANTASY. The characters within them are FANTASY. They're going to look the same as the creator's FANTASY.

Hey - I'm not willing to discuss this with you if you begin to condescend me.

I think you may have misunderstood me or I didn't explain myself too well. Yes, they're all idealizations. Yes, women are deemed more attractive to men if they have bigger breasts and buttocks. However, men are generally not deemed more attractive to women if they have absolutely huge muscles (note: absolutely huge). That's more what men aspire to be, because it shows power and the ability to dominate. Yes, they're all fantasy as you quite patronizingly pointed out. But they're quite clearly fantasy tailored to a male target audience which is what people have issue with I think.

Edit: I also don't think you noticed/I didn't make it clear enough that I was talking specifically about the images you posted (and I am aware they're all from LoL). Whilst I think the images you've recently chosen aren't representative of how women and men are painted in gaming generally, I was pointing out the issue with the two images you chose.

 

[Evilpigeon]

However, men are generally not deemed more attractive to women if they have absolutely huge muscles (note: absolutely huge). That's more what men aspire to be, because it shows power and the ability to dominate. Yes, they're all fantasy as you quite patronizingly pointed out. But they're quite clearly fantasy tailored to a male target audience which is what people have issue with I think.

This always bugs me. Can somebody give me a decent explanation of where this comes from? I mean seriously, go find yourself a sample group of men and go:

"Who wants to look like a body builder!"

I doubt you'll see many people put their hands up. It's not an aspirational male fanatasy, it's just not. I really want to know where this bullshit comes from, are there psychological studies out there? Does it come from women trying to translate from their perspective? Most women are significantly more preoccupied with their appearance, hence why they spend so much more money on it, and I could understand trying to find an equivalence. I don't know, is there some genuine research or anything actually backing this up or is it just a convincing sounding falsehood invented at some point by some writer trying to help prove their point.

 

[phylline]

However, men are generally not deemed more attractive to women if they have absolutely huge muscles (note: absolutely huge). That's more what men aspire to be, because it shows power and the ability to dominate. Yes, they're all fantasy as you quite patronizingly pointed out. But they're quite clearly fantasy tailored to a male target audience which is what people have issue with I think.

This always bugs me. Can somebody give me a decent explanation of where this comes from? I mean seriously, go find yourself a sample group of men and go:

"Who wants to look like a body builder!"

I doubt you'll see many people put their hands up. It's not an aspirational male fanatasy, it's just not. I really want to know where this bullshit comes from, are there psychological studies out there? Does it come from women trying to translate from their perspective? Most women are significantly more preoccupied with their appearance, hence why they spend so much more money on it, and I could understand trying to find an equivalence. I don't know, is there some genuine research or anything actually backing this up or is it just a convincing sounding falsehood invented at some point by some writer trying to help prove their point.

I'm not sure if there are studies yet which makes this topic a shaky one, but I don't think the issue is always "do men want to look like this?" as such, nor do I think it's a falsehood - although I fully accept there's only so far I can go with this when there's nothing concrete (yet I don't think there CAN be anything concrete). What do big muscles do and what can they signify? They signify the ability to attain physical power and the ability to dominate. They suggest extreme physical strength. It isn't conforming to what women want in men to attempt to appeal to them sexually (as very big breasts and buttocks do in female characters). Can you please clarify why you brought up women spending more time and money on their appearance?