Poll: Should we get rid of Booth Babes?

[monkyvirus]

I don't think it makes gamers look immature I mean to be honest how many non-gamers know what E3 is? We're not exactly going to get bad press over it. More likely the fact we either have hulking males or well-endowed females appearing in games is more damaging to the industry. Not that that makes it right, to be honest I think gamers would respond more favorably to "booth babes" who knew what they were talking about attractive or not. However I don't see it as degrading or anything.

When I went to the Anime Expo in London there was not a booth babe in sight, so it's not really true that EVERY trade show has booth babes (similarly they were lacking when I was at a Toy expo but seeing as that was targeted at 10 year-olds their presence would have concerned me). Anyway evidently in that instance booth babes were seen as unnecessary despite the fact it was probably targeted at a similar demographic as E3.

 

[Grey_Focks]

Heh, I guessed this would be because of the penny arcade comic from the title. I think the issue really depends on how much the women actually do. The indifferent models dressed up as characters standing there awkwardly as geeks ogle them makes me uncomfortable, but if there actually doing stuff, like handing out fliers or telling people about the game, I don't see it as too bad.

agreed with this. I mean, they're really just there for eye-candy, and I assume none of them know anything about the games in question they are modeling for irks me a bit. Then again, is any other form of media different? Movies cast hot actresses for being hot, some "singers" are popular for being hot, car shows have hot girls just standing there, I mean come on.
This is hardly just our "problem". Men likes womens, so bring womens to places you want men to go to, and voila.

 

[MarineSquadDeployed]

I have two things to say.

Firstly, anyone who says something along the lines of "We shouldn't get rid of booth babes because it's providing them with a job" is rationalizing, and rationalizing poorly at that. As if that's the reason we're keeping them around. You can tell yourself that it's doing them a favour, if that helps you, but I'd have to disagree, personally.

Secondly, to those of you who say "car shows/football games/whatever do it too, so I don't see why we should stop!". That's very true, but neither car shows nor football games are media with aspirations towards becoming considered "art". If gaming as a medium wants to join that exclusive club, we're going to have to play by that club's rules. If that means that we're going to have to give up our spuriously justified semi-nudity, then that's probably a sacrifice we're going to have to make.

 

[jamesworkshop]

I have two things to say.

Firstly, anyone who says something along the lines of "We shouldn't get rid of booth babes because it's providing them with a job" is rationalizing, and rationalizing poorly at that. As if that's the reason we're keeping them around. You can tell yourself that it's doing them a favour, if that helps you, but I'd have to disagree, personally.

Secondly, to those of you who say "car shows/football games/whatever do it too, so I don't see why we should stop!". That's very true, but neither car shows nor football games are media with aspirations towards becoming considered "art". If gaming as a medium wants to join that exclusive club, we're going to have to play by that club's rules. If that means that we're going to have to give up our spuriously justified semi-nudity, then that's probably a sacrifice we're going to have to make.

Art likes nakkid womens too

 

[MarineSquadDeployed]

I have two things to say.

Firstly, anyone who says something along the lines of "We shouldn't get rid of booth babes because it's providing them with a job" is rationalizing, and rationalizing poorly at that. As if that's the reason we're keeping them around. You can tell yourself that it's doing them a favour, if that helps you, but I'd have to disagree, personally.

Secondly, to those of you who say "car shows/football games/whatever do it too, so I don't see why we should stop!". That's very true, but neither car shows nor football games are media with aspirations towards becoming considered "art". If gaming as a medium wants to join that exclusive club, we're going to have to play by that club's rules. If that means that we're going to have to give up our spuriously justified semi-nudity, then that's probably a sacrifice we're going to have to make.

Art likes nakkid womens too

Don't tell me you're honestly comparing booth babes to the Birth of Venus...

 

[Hurray Forums]

If women want to get paid to be a walking pair of boobs that's fine, and if men want to be exploited by said walking pair of boobs that's also fine. The practice is pathetic but it makes some people happy and other people money and doesn't really hurt anyone so live and let live I suppose.

 

[ScorpSt]

We tried getting rid of them. Know what happened? Nobody cared about E3 anymore. Granted there were other factors involved but the point is: Sex Sells.

 

[dsmops2003]

Booth babes are nothing but a cheap ploy to get people to go to the booth. Its just advertising. They would not be doing the job if it were in any way degrading to them. If people keep falling for the trick they will stay employed. If we stop caring about them they will go away.

 

[Naheal]

...NO. Booth babes are a cultural thing and people need to be worried less about it.

 

[Dags90]

Don't tell me you're honestly comparing booth babes to the Birth of Venus...

Perhaps not the Birth of Venus, Greek Gods are expected to be painted nude.

However Goya's La maja desnuda is just a naked lady. She has no historical context, it's just a naked women sitting in her bed. It was considered extremely scandalous at the time. Henry Scott Tuke pretty much made artistic soft child porn.

That said, pretty much any artistic medium has examples of porn, at least historically (Rule of First Adopters). I don't really see how booth babes affect the medium, I would say a worse problem is terrible female characterization IN THE GAMES. You know, the whole thing that gaming is based around? Gaming.

I wouldn't mind booth boys though...gender equality!

 

[cuddly_tomato]

I think so, if we ever want to be taken seriously as a medium by the more established mediums.

Spoiler: Movies

Spoiler: Music

Spoiler: Literature

Sex sells. By having booth babes, the game publishers know that games media publications are going to focus more on their particular games. The reason that media publications will do this is because they know that the more booth babes on their website, in the magazine, or on their TV show the more traffic, sales, and viewers they will have.

 

[sunburst]

Secondly, to those of you who say "car shows/football games/whatever do it too, so I don't see why we should stop!". That's very true, but neither car shows nor football games are media with aspirations towards becoming considered "art". If gaming as a medium wants to join that exclusive club, we're going to have to play by that club's rules. If that means that we're going to have to give up our spuriously justified semi-nudity, then that's probably a sacrifice we're going to have to make.

I have two problems with this. You're equating the art of video games, the writing and designing, with the business of selling video games. Advertisement campaigns featuring Megan Fox bending over a car haven't affected the artistic integrity of other films. The things businessmen do to convince people to consume products of a specific medium have no bearing on whether other examples of that medium count as art.

Even more importantly than that, gaming is never going to be invited to join that "exclusive club" no matter what gamers and game designers do. The people who think games are not a medium of art are never going to wake up and think, "Gosh, video games sure have come such a long way. I guess I'd better start calling them art." Why should we change our practices and culture in order to follow some arbitrary rules set by a bunch of people who are never going to acknowledge our preferred medium the way we want anyways?

Gaming will only become widely acknowledged as a desired medium for expressing an artistic point once the generational bias against them dies along with the people who grew up before or during video gaming's infancy. Some indisputable works of art would help too.

 

[Skoldpadda]

Let me put it like this:

To the question "Should we get rid of (x) babes?", the answer is always "fuck no, what's wrong with you?"

Hope this helps, I'm available for any further questions you might have.

 

[Dags90]

Sturgeon's Law. 90% of everything is crap. Crap is the rule, great stuff is the exception that breaks that rule. Most movies do use boobies, CGI and chase scenes in order to cover up poor plot or characterization.

I also don't get why something that uses ridiculously proportioned mammaries can't be good. It's not like there's this rule saying ludicrous boobies = bad characterization. I can think of several examples from games and anime. What you're really suggesting is censorship to save the gaming industry "from itself!"

 

[AstylahAthrys]

I could see a benefit for reducing the amount (like at the Nintendo conference yesterday. Did they need a woman for every 3DS?) but for the most part the booth babes are just in good fun and they are getting paid. Personally I would love to see some hot Ezio cosplayer advertising the new Assassin's Creed game but that doesn't appeal to the majority of the gaming demographic. I would love to see less of a focus on booth babes, but I don't see a need to completely eliminate them.

 

[GrinningManiac]

It really depends on what the majority of E3-goers think

The journalists find them awkward, apparantly, but what about the Normal Nerd?

Personally, I've never been, but if I did, it'd be stupid to see bored, hot women wandering about for money, and it'd be excrutiatingly embarrasing if one talked to me or were caught in a photo (who takes photos at these things?) nearby me, so I'd have to explain what they were to people looking at my picture.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

snip

I know that every media has its sex exploitation, but the difference between gaming and films, movies and books is that even if you don't like, say, films, you still know that Transformers 2 isn't exactly representative of film-making as a whole. Not so with videogames. It's entirely possible to convince yourself if you don't play games that all videogamers are sexist, violent, and idiotic, just by the things that are being promoted. We need to shake that image. Not because it matters what those who know nothing about gaming think of us, but because by and large, they're the ones who make the laws.

Really though, it's a problem with us. If gamers stopped buying the game just because the collection of pixels on the front happens to have unrealistically sized tits, or the woman next to the game happens to display the most fleeing attention to you, then we might actually see progression.

But as the biggest market is usually teenager males (although apparently the average gamer is 30), that's probably not going to happen.

Ohh I agree. I wasn't necessarily disagreeing with you, I was just saying that it is everywhere. You are right in that gaming currently lacks the kind of maturity which some other forms of media have (if anyone mentions Mass Effect 2 I will refer you to Mirandas costume, pervert). I don't think that getting rid of booth babes is really necessary, for some games they are basically the best representation of the game there is (DoA, Tomb Raider etc).

But really? When was the last time a CoD or Tenchu game had booth babes? Half the problem might be the publishers, but the other half is definitely the gaming medias penchant for snapping 100 pics of them then splaying them all over their covers. But they know their demographic well. Teen lads have two things on their mind.

1. Dirty pictures.

2. Is anyone going to notice that the household is going through Kleenex like nobodies business?

 

[Ciran]

I really just feel sorry for the chicks, not just because it's a potentially awkward situation to be standing around being stared at, but just standing around doing absolutely nothing but saying hello every once and a while is incredibly boring.

 

[Blackjack 222]

I just think being in a room surrounded by nerds is not the idea of calming for a Female that looks that good, sure she knows she could take any/all of them if they tried anything but being surrounded by that many people gawking at you must be unpleasant.
The girl feels uncomfortable with all the eyes on her, the guys feel uncomfortable near girls anyways but its stacked by her being uncomfortable, the whole thing makes everyone feel weird