Greetings my fellow earth creatures!
I have to say that every single time I hear "feminist" I automatically have a stereotypical image pop into my head of a strong, vegetarian, neo-Nazi female burning her bra with a very loud voice yelling at everything and everyone who disagrees with her particular point of view.
To start this blog post, let me start by saying I have the highest respect for womankind. My mother taught me compassion and how to care for others; my father taught me the old style of chivalry (i.e. ladies are always first, stand up when a lady enters the room, etc). I was taught these things not because women are helpless but because it is a way to show respect. I share this so that you all can understand where I come from and why I say the things I do.
Mr. Gonzalo Frasca's article on Super Princess Peach (found here) had some interesting things to say but overall, my personal assessment is that the game itself is ridiculous...seriously what is up with girls/women and the color pink?! Frasca points that out as part of the stereotype but I just finished up a study group with 3 other women....one had a pink hand bag and the other had a can of pepper spray which was in a pink container (no she wasn't threatening me with it).
Is Super Princess Peach a sexist game because it places so much emphasis in the color pink and all of the things Peach can do are the results of emotions instead of real-world attack moves (punch, kick, etc)? I would suggest and argue that the game itself is not sexist but it is a very good example of popular stereotypes which women in general have not done very much to change (pink peppers pray for crying out loud!).
Sexism is defined as "the belief or attitude that one gender or sex is inferior to or less valuable than the other". I would like to point out that this game is targeted toward women and girls...it would be very foolish to create a game whose target audience is being demeaned. Not only foolish but economically unfeasible....who would buy the game?!?! No, I proclaim that the game itself is ridiculous based upon the idea of what it is...a button-mashing, no-story, brain-numbing, stupid-making, pitiful excuse of a game which has been created with the sole purpose to try and capture a demographic that has been woefully under-estimated and under-marketed.
In the college class Media and Society (Journalism 100), there is a section where the topic discussed is how popular media reflects society and also how society reflects the popular media. As an example, who came up with the whole "white picket fence home" idea? Movies were created with the idea of the "perfect home" and that perfect home had a white picket fence. Thus, everyone thought their house should have a picket fence. This idea works both ways: media reflecting society and society reflecting media.
What I am getting at is that games, movies, books, literature, etc. in general reflect what is acceptable to the society. Let me repeat that this is a generalization and not to be taken as universal law. If there is something stereotypical or sexist and we're upset about it, then the strongest statement that could be made is how we will live our lives: do we take a stand? Do we join a rights-movement group? Do we speak out against the offending material? Do we teach our children through our actions the correct and proper way?
That last is the most powerful way to change things: Live our daily lives as examples to our children. Then it doesn't matter what trash Nintendo tries to pawn off on us or what neo-Nazi feminists scream as "the way it should be".
Personally, I’m deeply offended at the game Super Princess Peach on the grounds that it is a moronic, mentally defective attempt at freshening up a franchise because Nintendo can’t come up with better ideas.
Cheers!
Friday, April 24, 2009
Friday, April 17, 2009
An Examination of "Genre and Affect" - Week 3
Greetings my fellow Earthling!
Today's post is an examination of an article written by Diane Carr titled "Genre and Affect in Silent Hill and Planescape Torment"(http://www.gamestudies.org/0301/carr/). To begin with, I would like to specify that I have never actually played Silent Hill (Konami 1999) but I have immensely enjoyed Planescape Torment (Interplay 1999) in times past and continue to do so today.
First, I was really intrigued that Diane Carr would compare and contrast two games whose seemingly only similarity is the year in which they were released. Silent Hill is a horror while Planescape Torment is a Role-Playing Game (RPG) based upon the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons pen, paper, and dice game. Silent Hill is a 3D survival horror game in which the player strives to find where is the protagonist's daughter and solve the mystery of a small town of horror.
The following video shows a brief bit of gameplay in Silent Hill:
Planescape Torment on the other hand is a 2D isometric, fantasy role-playing game wherein the protagonist is a scarred amnesiac traveling across a foreign world accomplishing goals and objectives, gaining followers, and striving to figure out who he is.
A brief video of Planescape Torment is attached:
The difference between the two are contingent upon the goal of the creators of the game. In Silent Hill, the goal is a horror genre game in which the occult and paranormal interrupt and interfere with a normal fellow living in our day and age. On the other hand, Planescape Torment is a fantasy world where the occult and paranormal ARE the normal and the main character is as foreign to us as our world would be to him.
The fascinating thing about these two games is, to accomplish the goals of horror or fantasy RPG fiction, two different methods of presentation and gameplay are involved. As you can see from the video clips, Silent Hill works with creepy music and sound coupled with an at times hurried, frantic pace and gory scenes to build tension. Death equals failure.
Planescape Torment uses extremely descriptive dialogue and details which paint a world of pure imagination. The pace is not frenetic but instead is more meandering from location to location. Because the world is foreign, every effort is employed to immerse the player into the avatar.
Essentially, Diane Carr's overarching objective is to clearly specify differences between the two games and why the differences exist at all. But the lines between genres and game play styles are becoming more and more blurred. For example, Dead Space (Electronic Arts 2008) is a 3d survival horror, third-person shooter lovingly crafted and built with a plethora of RPG elements. These atmospheric conditions are utilized to engulf the player in the sheer horror of the situation and environment.
It really worked well too! I played for about 5 minutes, all alone with my surround sound turned up, at night...yup, just about peed me pantaloons....
Today's post is an examination of an article written by Diane Carr titled "Genre and Affect in Silent Hill and Planescape Torment"(http://www.gamestudies.org/0301/carr/). To begin with, I would like to specify that I have never actually played Silent Hill (Konami 1999) but I have immensely enjoyed Planescape Torment (Interplay 1999) in times past and continue to do so today.
First, I was really intrigued that Diane Carr would compare and contrast two games whose seemingly only similarity is the year in which they were released. Silent Hill is a horror while Planescape Torment is a Role-Playing Game (RPG) based upon the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons pen, paper, and dice game. Silent Hill is a 3D survival horror game in which the player strives to find where is the protagonist's daughter and solve the mystery of a small town of horror.
The following video shows a brief bit of gameplay in Silent Hill:
Planescape Torment on the other hand is a 2D isometric, fantasy role-playing game wherein the protagonist is a scarred amnesiac traveling across a foreign world accomplishing goals and objectives, gaining followers, and striving to figure out who he is.
A brief video of Planescape Torment is attached:
The difference between the two are contingent upon the goal of the creators of the game. In Silent Hill, the goal is a horror genre game in which the occult and paranormal interrupt and interfere with a normal fellow living in our day and age. On the other hand, Planescape Torment is a fantasy world where the occult and paranormal ARE the normal and the main character is as foreign to us as our world would be to him.
The fascinating thing about these two games is, to accomplish the goals of horror or fantasy RPG fiction, two different methods of presentation and gameplay are involved. As you can see from the video clips, Silent Hill works with creepy music and sound coupled with an at times hurried, frantic pace and gory scenes to build tension. Death equals failure.
Planescape Torment uses extremely descriptive dialogue and details which paint a world of pure imagination. The pace is not frenetic but instead is more meandering from location to location. Because the world is foreign, every effort is employed to immerse the player into the avatar.
Essentially, Diane Carr's overarching objective is to clearly specify differences between the two games and why the differences exist at all. But the lines between genres and game play styles are becoming more and more blurred. For example, Dead Space (Electronic Arts 2008) is a 3d survival horror, third-person shooter lovingly crafted and built with a plethora of RPG elements. These atmospheric conditions are utilized to engulf the player in the sheer horror of the situation and environment.
It really worked well too! I played for about 5 minutes, all alone with my surround sound turned up, at night...yup, just about peed me pantaloons....
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
A King of Kong (Documentary)
Hello my fellow Earthlings!
Before I begin, I would like to preface my comments with a brief bit of information about my own personal views. I will leave it in italics so that, if you would like to skip my magnificent moralizing, you may do so.
An acknowledged truth is that our time on Planet Earth is (relatively) brief in the grand timeline of mankind. This means that while we are here, each and every day should not only be treasured but should also be spent accomplishing and doing things to the very best of our abilities. While we are accomplishing these things, there are some achievements which are greater than others. Certainly it is to be understood that this is a very subjective point of view yet it is generally accepted that some actions have a greater impact and benefit on mankind than others.
Therefore, the conscientious individual will not only perform with a maximum of effort at all times, but will also be actively identifying where and how those actions will have the greatest impact and benefit on mankind as a whole. There are individuals in the world who expend a huge amount of effort and have unbelievable talent yet their efforts were not for the benefit of human race. This being the case, all of their accomplishments become nothing more than a tiny foot-note in history which pale in comparison to the consummate completions of others who have given all for the greater good of humankind.
With this foundational understanding of how I personally view the world, it becomes clear when I say that the documentary "King of Kong" displays absolutely one of the worst selfish squandering of skill, talent, and effort which it has been my misfortune to witness.
In short, "King of Kong" is a documentary which follows briefly the history of early arcade gaming and then brings the viewer along to see how it is currently being played out. The majority of the documentary dwells laboriously upon the finer details of the arcade game "Donkey Kong" and how one individual, a fine fellow by the name of Steve Wiebe (last name pronounced "WE-BEE"), practices very hard to achieve the World's Highest Score. The previous score, held by archaic arcade gamer Billy Mitchell, was earned in the early 1980s and has stood strong until Mr. Wiebe's unfortunate waste of effort. I won't spoil the ending, but it will certainly have you sitting on the edge of your seat...sort of.
Do not construe that I am suggesting that gaming in general is a waste of effort. I myself am a gamer and have been almost from the time that I could walk. I treasure games. I treasure what we can learn from them and how games can impart a wonderful story.
But this documentary not only showed how gaming can suck many hours from your (short) life, it can also royally ruin social skills. The film displayed how the game ceases to simply be a game and instead grows into a reason for being and a self-identifying label.
The sad truth is, even if someone wins at Donkey Kong and achieves the World's Highest Score, they are still the losers in life because life is not in a game. Life is something that passes an individual by as they are playing the game.
I could only recommend "King of Kong" to viewers as a cautionary tale of what happens when bad film editing is combined with a horrible time-wasting pursuit. In some ways I suppose this film is a double time waster: a waste of time watching a waste of time. The irony would be hilarious if it wasn't so very sad and pitiful.
EDIT: My instructor stated that this brief wasn't supposed to be a review on King of Kong but a response to the concepts and how they relate to the course. I quite like my review so let me simply add that I really hope that King of Kong does not relate to anything in our course or this is going to be a very long quarter.
Before I begin, I would like to preface my comments with a brief bit of information about my own personal views. I will leave it in italics so that, if you would like to skip my magnificent moralizing, you may do so.
An acknowledged truth is that our time on Planet Earth is (relatively) brief in the grand timeline of mankind. This means that while we are here, each and every day should not only be treasured but should also be spent accomplishing and doing things to the very best of our abilities. While we are accomplishing these things, there are some achievements which are greater than others. Certainly it is to be understood that this is a very subjective point of view yet it is generally accepted that some actions have a greater impact and benefit on mankind than others.
Therefore, the conscientious individual will not only perform with a maximum of effort at all times, but will also be actively identifying where and how those actions will have the greatest impact and benefit on mankind as a whole. There are individuals in the world who expend a huge amount of effort and have unbelievable talent yet their efforts were not for the benefit of human race. This being the case, all of their accomplishments become nothing more than a tiny foot-note in history which pale in comparison to the consummate completions of others who have given all for the greater good of humankind.
With this foundational understanding of how I personally view the world, it becomes clear when I say that the documentary "King of Kong" displays absolutely one of the worst selfish squandering of skill, talent, and effort which it has been my misfortune to witness.
In short, "King of Kong" is a documentary which follows briefly the history of early arcade gaming and then brings the viewer along to see how it is currently being played out. The majority of the documentary dwells laboriously upon the finer details of the arcade game "Donkey Kong" and how one individual, a fine fellow by the name of Steve Wiebe (last name pronounced "WE-BEE"), practices very hard to achieve the World's Highest Score. The previous score, held by archaic arcade gamer Billy Mitchell, was earned in the early 1980s and has stood strong until Mr. Wiebe's unfortunate waste of effort. I won't spoil the ending, but it will certainly have you sitting on the edge of your seat...sort of.
Do not construe that I am suggesting that gaming in general is a waste of effort. I myself am a gamer and have been almost from the time that I could walk. I treasure games. I treasure what we can learn from them and how games can impart a wonderful story.
But this documentary not only showed how gaming can suck many hours from your (short) life, it can also royally ruin social skills. The film displayed how the game ceases to simply be a game and instead grows into a reason for being and a self-identifying label.
The sad truth is, even if someone wins at Donkey Kong and achieves the World's Highest Score, they are still the losers in life because life is not in a game. Life is something that passes an individual by as they are playing the game.
I could only recommend "King of Kong" to viewers as a cautionary tale of what happens when bad film editing is combined with a horrible time-wasting pursuit. In some ways I suppose this film is a double time waster: a waste of time watching a waste of time. The irony would be hilarious if it wasn't so very sad and pitiful.
EDIT: My instructor stated that this brief wasn't supposed to be a review on King of Kong but a response to the concepts and how they relate to the course. I quite like my review so let me simply add that I really hope that King of Kong does not relate to anything in our course or this is going to be a very long quarter.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
The Beginnings
Everything needs a beginning and here is my blog's beginning. And I looked around and saw that it was good.
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