My views on the controversy over the new Hitman trailer.

[Eamar]

As a feminist, I have absolutely no problem with women being killed in video games (so long as it's not some obnoxious anti-women thing). I'm much more offended by the idea that women are delicate flowers who would never end up in a fight, and I am VERY uncomfortable with the fact that it's generally perceived as ok for a woman to slap a man, but the reverse is some sort of abomination. So bring it on, give us more female enemies. In fact, I hadn't really thought about it before but in games like Mass Effect there seems to be a pretty even split in the enemy NPCs' genders, which is as it should be in that setting. So yeah, more of that please.

What I do have an issue with (and really it's more of a "*sigh* seriously?" issue than actual anger) is the ridiculous sexualisation. Latex nun costumes? Is that really necessary? Fair enough if this was Saints Row or something, but... really? This whole trailer just seems massively desperate. It's pretty obvious that they were hoping to provoke some controversy, though possibly not for the whole "violence against women" thing.

I'm not offended by the trailer, but I think it's tacky as fuck and it does put me off the game. Not that I was really interested in it in the first place.

 

[daveman247]

snip

Meh, just hitman marketing team being a marketing team. They did a similar thing with blood money (the posters of models who had been assassinated). There was a bit of a thing about that too.

Its just attention grabbing, and it worked.


I've realised that i shouldnt judge the game by how it is marketed. Both departments (Developing, marketing) are completely serparate from eachother.

 

[acer840]

I don't see nay controversy in this trailer at all. Sexy Nun Assassin squad isn't exactly "tasteful", but it is defiantly not sexist or explicit. I think what the advertisement is trying to get across is with games (when assassins or assassinations are involved) being about "Creeds", "Imagery", "Beliefs", "Groups" and "Reasons". Where you have this one man, made for one purpose, who has no reasons, motives (besides money) or beliefs. He is just doing it for the money, and he will do it in a suit, or actually camouflage himself into the crowd, as an assassin would do, thus having the "The Original Assassin" at the end. I quite like it and it would get me pumped for the new Hitman game, if I hadn't seen the game-play.

 

[Zen Toombs]

Now this my MY problem with this issue. Why is it that it's okay to murder wave after wave of male enemies, but when they turn female it all of a sudden becomes wrong? So killing men in movies and games = good, killing women = bad. No matter if they're portrayed as murderers out to get you themselves, it's still some how wrong. This is what I think is at the heart of what's wrong with this trailer. Not as much the trailer itself, but the reactions that it's getting.

I didn't find the "murderin some chicks" part of the trailer to be silly. I didn't even mind most of the violence. I did find the gratuitous sexy nun outfits (and by the way, nuns usually don't wear a habit anymore. The only people that do that are people in a sexy-nun costume) and the gratuitous A-Team lineup to be silly.

As a Veteran I find this offensive because at one point in my life I was treated as an expendable tool.

Thank you for your service to your country. *Nod*

 

[Savryc]

Please, there isn't a single game that couldn't be improved with a latex nun squad.

 

[Shiftygiant]

Wait, so the agency sends assassin nuns to kill him? Makes logic. The controversy with the skimpy outfits doesn't make sense to me, personalty. Games are a exaggeration of reality. This game is the perfect example. It's seems to be that the outfits you put the assassins in is more controversial then there jobs or the way they act. Yeah there killed in a brutal manner, but he does this to everyone.

 

[Stripes]

I dont see anything really wrong here. The women are sexualised but they are shown as competent and treated as equals, therefore I cant really see any sexism/objectification.

 

[Riff Moonraker]

I know the trailer just came out, but this is honestly the first I have heard of any controversy with the trailer.

 

[Relish in Chaos]

I think it's the same issue that a game called Final Fight once dealt with back in the late 80s early 90s. In a beat 'em up game where the objective was to take on wave after wave of muscle bond urban criminals. The game suffered fear of controversy when within the line up of bad guys, one of the characters just so happened to be female. When the game was brought over from Japan, the fear was male audiences would feel disheartened by beating up a female characters, no matter if they were made out as enemies there to kill you, and the game would suffer from it. So what they did was turn this female character into a transvestite, making it okay now to beat up a supposed homosexual as long as that character supposedly at one time in its life had male genitalia.

That's a common misconception, one that I admittedly used to share. Poison was always a male. In the instruction booklet for the game, he was described as a "Newhalf", a pre-op or non-op male-to-female transsexual.

You mean she. Male-to-female transsexuals are referred to with feminine gender pronouns, as genitalia does not determine sex.

On-topic, I can't even muster up enough energy to care over the TRULY OUTRAGEOUS objectification of women in this trailer because...I dunno, maybe it's because I'm a man and I'm used to this. No, seriously, no matter what feminists do, this stuff will continue, that's just how it works. We've gone too far down the rabbit hole now.

Ideally, there'd be an equal amount of video game trailers featuring muscular men in assless Gimp suits fighting off an Ellen Ripley-type character, but "gender equality" is nothing more than an idealist's dream in a shitty world where women were born with tits and sexy legs and wear more revealing clothing whereas men just have a dick and wear less revealing clothing.

 

[Khanht Cope]

Checked the link, saw the trailer, found it tasteless. Predominantly the fetishization. It could easily have made a more sensible and agreeable trailer with pretty much the same choreography; but they know exactly what they're doing here.

I dont see anything really wrong here. The women are sexualised but they are shown as competent and treated as equals, therefore I cant really see any sexism/objectification.

That depends heavily on what you choose to perceive.

(and typically on the Escapist; not least of all places; a good 70% of the seemingly mature, well-adjusted males of equal rights/feminist sensibilities here will miss the forest for the trees with a zealous stubborness when their crumpet is subject to scrutiny)

For example; it could be interpreted as a metaphor for male sexual frustration, (particularly in the male gaming demographic) shown in the violent contempt for these 'attractive' and 'sexually powerful' women. The women depicted serving as fodder for this power fantasy.

In any case; I expect this thread has one more page before it becomes another gender-political flame war....

 

[Stripes]

Checked the link, saw the trailer, found it tasteless. Predominantly the fetishization. It could easily have made a more sensible and agreeable trailer with pretty much the same choreography; but they know exactly what they're doing here.

I dont see anything really wrong here. The women are sexualised but they are shown as competent and treated as equals, therefore I cant really see any sexism/objectification.

That depends heavily on what you choose to perceive.

(and typically on the Escapist; not least of all places; a good 70% of the supposedly well-adjusted, feminist/equal rights-leaning males here will miss the forest for the trees with a zealous stubborness when their crumpet is subject to scrutiny)

For example; it could be interpreted as a metaphor for male sexual frustration, (particularly in the male gaming demographic) shown in the violent contempt for these 'attractive' and 'sexually powerful' women. The women depicted serving as fodder for this power fantasy.

In any case; I expect this thread has one more page before it becomes another gender-political flame war....

I dont have a problem with sexualisation, so long as it isnt 'out of place' if that makes sense, so long as it isnt objectification. I think the trailer isnt that deep, its tits and guns much like the first one but whilst there is a lot of sexualisation as part of the marketing, which im not particularily fond of, the second trailer isnt sexist or misoginistic. Theres fetisisation, each to his own on that one, but the women are at least competent and he isnt afraid to hurt them, I see that as treating them as equals rather than being inherently weaker or something.

 

[Khanht Cope]

As I just said, it depends on what you choose to perceive.

In your case, you're choosing to perceive "oh, it's just 'sex-sells' marketing" and that the women are displayed as competent or 'equals'. Whereas someone on the other side may perceive a trailer where 7 sexualized women, all armed to the teeth are killed by 1 man... brutally; and that "dang, ya know? maybe a male power fantasy for sexual frustration is a good marketing strategy for a game audience."

And lets say hypothetically that the more cynical interpretation is closer to the truth; (we're talking about marketing, here) they'd be consciously aware that while they'll always have armies of supposedly indifferent folk like yourself standing up as apologists whenever the question is asked; they can just keep on doing this stuff.

 

[Reaper195]

ffs...chicks in latex BDSM-esque costumes are only hot on the woman I am with. Aside from that, they all look incredibly retared. Still....the trailer was pretty cool.

 

[DustyDrB]

What controversy? It's just a crappy trailer.

 

[ReadyAmyFire]

Watched 1:39 seconds of it and got bored. People expecting to go into a gunfight wearing the least appropriate clothing for the job. The 'V' formation stopped being used as an aerial combat formation mid-battle of Britain (The Luftwaffe called it the 'row of idiots' which, fittingly, is what these ladies look like) but I've no idea why you'd stand like that. Using an obsolete anti-tank weapon on a building, which somehow caused a fuel-like explosion, then a stupid fight scene.

 

[Rule Britannia]

Didn't realise there was a controversy. Good to know.

 

[felbot]

no i dont think that was peoples problem with the game, the problem is that they added some rather shameless sex appeal to a series that had up until that point been rather serious in tone.

I'm sorry, did you not play the Meat House level in contracts or the Heaven/Hell Party in Blood Money?

no i havent, i havent played any hitman game aside from a demo of blood money.

i just wanted to tell the op why i thought people were getting mad about the game, sorry if i offended anyone.