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Gender has always been at the forefront of my gaming experience.  In the video game world I am a minority.  I am a female.   The majority of video games are marketed to stimulate then hook the male audience with sex, violence, and/or power.  This is why video games are centered are around the male point-of-view and lead by male characters.  This is not shocking news, nor is it shocking to know I am the only female in this video game culture class.  These facts are not good or bad, but a reflection of where our video game market is ‘as a whole’ at right now.  There are two general ways video games let interact with gender; they enforce old gender biases roles, or let the player explore new gender roles.  There are many games that enforce stereotypical gender roles but this isn’t interesting or new.  In this paper I will explore the video games that pushed the boundaries of gender roles and how far they pushed.
The first games that began to push the boundary of gender roles in video games were ones that offered the option to be a female character.  The first games were Ms Pac Man, Super Mario Bros. 2, and Mortal Kombat 2.  Each of these games explored their female characters differently.
Surprisingly, female main characters happened very early in video game history.  Ms Pac Man was released by Midway in 1981, an unauthorized sequel to Namco’s Pac Man, and was one of the first video games that starred a female character.  Ms Pac Man was the first female but she came with some stereotypical gender roles.  Ms Pac Man was characterized as a female by a red bow on her head, red lipstick on her lips, and a seductive beauty mark.  Other than the avatar, Ms Pac Man’s image was quite different than Pac Man.  As depicted from the arcade cover, the original Pac Man looked like a silly circle running away from an angry ghost where as Ms Pac Man was long legged, high heeled circle running playfully from ghosts who look at her with lust.  Ms Pac Man also features ‘Acts’ after the player finishes 3 mazes.  The first act, “They Meet”, shows Ms Pac Man and Pac Man being chased by ghosts then bump into each other and falling in love.  Second act is “The Chase”, which shows Ms and Mr. Pac Man chasing each other across the screen.  The third act is called “Junior”, a stork drops a little Pac Man in front of Mr. and Ms Pac Man.  This is an example gender roles narrowing the female point-of-view to  revolve around romance/married and having children.  Ms Pac Man comes in this gender role package but contents push the boundaries of gender roles.  A common gender role is that men are stronger physically than women, but in game play Ms Pac Man is no different than Pac Man.  She is not weaker, slower or at all different in ability from Pac Man.  Compared to other gender games of 1981, women characters were painted as damsels in distress.  Donkey Kong stars a male character (later would become Mario) whose sole mission is to save a pink dressed female (later would become Princess Peach).  Ms Pac Man wasn’t made to be a weaker or to push stereotypical gender roles but to improve on Pac Man, having it as “Ms” way to avoid copyright laws.  Midway improved Pac Man’s game play with harder mazes, more complex AI in the ghost, and added fruit as an extra challenge for the player to raise their score.  Ms Pac Man was created to be better than the original Pac Man and succeeds.  This is why Ms Pac Man #20 of IGN best games of all time.  Since Ms Pac Man was made so well it was very popular in the video game culture, which is dominated by males.  This game allows male game players to break gender roles by being a female character and a female character that is equal to her counterpart Pac Man.  Ms Pac Man offers a new experience for male players and is a well-made game.  The box of Ms Pac Man might show a sexy little yellow circle female but the game was made to be challenging and push the boundaries of game play of that time.  Ms Pac Man was female but she wasn’t stereotyped as weaker.
Super Mario Bros. 2 allows the player to be a female or male character.  Super Mario Bros. 2 came out in 1988 in the United States.  This game only has one female character but having the option to be male or female was a new concept.  Super Mario Bros. 2 has four character being Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Peach.  Each character has strengths and weaknesses.  Mario is well-rounded character, Luigi can jump the highest, Toad moves the fastest, and Princess Peach can hover and float when she falls or jumps (using her dress as a parachute.)  Super Mario Bros. 2 makes using male or female character about strategy and not gender stereotypes such ‘weaker’ or ’stronger’.   The focus of choosing a character is based on which character would help the players’ survive more than gender.  The player may choose on gender but the skills of each character contrast drastically making each characters game play a unique experience.  This makes choosing different character based on skills more appealing.  Super Mario Bros. 2 characters are appealing because of their unique skills and not their gender.  This makes the male and female characters equally appealing and invites the player to try different character and different genders.  If a player is a female she can explore being a male character: Mario, Luigi, or Toad. And a male game player can explore being a female character: Princess Peach.  Super Mario Bros. 2 breaks stereotypical gender roles by offering the player to be male or female and their male and female characters are divided by unique skills and not by weaker or stronger which fosters exploration of different genders and breaks stereotypical gender roles.
The last game that started to push the boundary of gender by being one of the first to add females in their game was Mortal Kombat 2 and the series.  Mortal Kombat had 2 female and 14 male characters to choose from.  The two female characters were dressed in leotards, colored knee-high boots, and had their faces cover similar to Sub Zero and Scorpion.  The two female characters are twins, which shows a lack of detail compared to the 14 other unique male characters, but they are given different names, history, and weapons.  Kitana weapon has a feminine weapon, the steel fan.  She is considered the good twin where as Mileena is written as Kitana’ evil twin who uses two Sai (fork like hand weapon, a longer and wider version of Wolverines’ embedded hand blades.)  Mileena being an evil twin adds depth to her character, gender roles painted as kind or nurturing and both of these women are fighters and killers.  These two female characters are integrated as another opponent and in the fights have strength.   The male and female characters fight each other as equals and are to knock each other out regardless of gender.  This breaks a large gender bias of not hitting women because they are weaker or that women are not on the same level as men in fighting skills.  Mortal Kombat 2 has a similar approach as Super Mario Bros. 2 because its characters are based on unique talents and not on overall ‘stronger’ or ‘weaker’.   Female characters do have more leg-oriented strength but they are overall strength is the same as their male opponents.
The above games were the beginning integrating female characters in video games.  They were a good start but they still held strong gender roles and stereotypes.   The game that is at the forefront of breaking and is the most exploration of gender right now is The Sims series by EA Games.  The first Sims’ game was released in 2000.  The player is given a ‘town’ with places to make or put down houses and the player can construct families or play the few pre-made families that come with the game.  Most games usually have a context or plot but in The Sims the player can make their own plot.   The Sims households offer the player to play multiple characters, which are great grounds for explore gender roles and gender interactions.  The Sims also does not have sexuality determined so the player can also explore sexuality.  The construction of families can be made with up to 8 characters being any genders but must have one adult.  The player can make a ‘typical family’ of father, mother, and child.  The player can make a homosexual family with two parents of the same gender and a child.  The player can make any type of ‘family’ or unit they want.  In careers, males and females are offered the same opportunities.  In love, the characters male or female are offered both genders.  The Sims offers extensive gender exploration but there are some boundaries that aren’t crossed.   Clothing is gender based so male have one selection and females another.  Only males and female mating can create a child but there is adoption.  Females are the only ones that can give birth, (though in later editions of The Sims a male can be abducted and become pregnant.)   Females have high-pitched voices and males have low-pitched voices.  The most important feature that the Sims offers it the player explores gender roles are that the player plays alone.  This gives the player openness not to be judged or held by others standards while they explore gender roles.
Gender roles are held by the rules of our society and video games are reflections of how we view our society or how we would like to view our society.  Video games allow us to re-construct or play with the boundaries of our world.  Gender biased rules and roles will stay in tact in our society an in our games until we look beyond them.  When we look beyond gender this is no minority.  Then maybe we will have a chance to see no gender at all.

As the name implies, SimCity 4 is a simulation program. The goal of the game is to create and manage a virtual city. With many useful tools, from city opinion polls to budget management, it can be both challenging and fun to run your own city. In this paper, I will illustrate that while SimCity 4 focuses on simulation, narrative still exists in the form of the city’s creation and evolution.

Upon creating a new city, the player must first choose a terrain to build it on. In this God-mode, the player can do anything he or she wants to the land, from creating mountains to simulating erosion. Once satisfied, the player can then click on the Mayor mode button and begin construction of the city.

SimCity 4 does a good job at setting a realistic groundwork for establishing a city. The most basic requirement is power. When I start a new city, I usually layout an area of farms—the most basic form of industry—followed by a windmill power plant. The farms use very little energy and the use of a windmill provides a clean source of energy.

Next, I layout the residential zones so there can actually be workers on the farms. I tend to space the homes away from the farms to keep up property value. In SimCity 4, all the zones that touch each other share power, and since my residential and farming zones are separate, I need to connect them with a set of power lines, preventing the need to build a new windmill power plant.

Now that I have the basic layout of my city completed, I can look at the possible narrative that SimCity 4 has provided me so far. Even without a formal story of my city, I can still look at its development and current state. Depending on how much I constructed, my city is probably 5 or 10 years old. It is very basic, consisting of farms and homes, without any schools, hospitals, or police stations, and the population is somewhere around 500. While the city is fundamentally sustainable, it has not yet satisfied my ideal cosmopolitan city, so I will continue to construct therefore adding to the narrative of the city, adding to the self-created story of its creation and evolution. This narrative sparked by simulation is similar to Steven Johnson’s childhood experience with his baseball card game.

In Steven Johnson’s book Everything Bad is Good for You, he recalls playing a baseball card game called APBA, which stood for American Professional Baseball Association. Using data and statistics of actual baseball players and particularly complicated instructions, Johnson could play as a baseball manager in fictional baseball games dictated by rolling dice. However, he eventually stopped playing because he felt that it was not realistic enough. “Playing hundreds of simulated games revealed the blind spots and strange skews of the simulation” (Johnson 6). Therefore, the narrative was lacking. Because of the restrictions of the game’s design, Johnson was unable to gain his desired sense of agency. “The game took no notice of where the games were being played…” (Johnson 7). Although the game was complex in numbers and statistics, it was without the elements needed for a narrative. Johnson was unable to experience a simulated season of baseball by traveling to different parks with different environments. As a result, the potential narrative in any simulation is determined by the restrictions set forth by its design.

The design of SimCity 4 establishes restrictions on simulation but not so much that it truly takes anything away from the narrative. Weather, for example, is not a factor. While the player has the ability to manually insert a tornado or earthquake, the element of weather and its effect on the city only exists if desired. I think that this is something that could have been changed. It would certainly add to the challenge of managing a seemingly organic city. Especially beneficial to the narrative would be something like El Niño. The game could notify the player to be prepared before an increase in “natural” weather elements wrecked havoc on the city. Even without the element of weather, however, SimCity 4 does provide other tools that assist in providing a narrative.

One of the tools that I use most often is the data graph. With the ability to change the time scale from one year to 500 years, I can see how my city has progressed since its creation. I can look at many different types of data such as population, city funds, education, pollution, crime, and average lifespan of my citizens. Using this visual aid, I can easily see the growth of my city over time. Even though there is no explicit narration, I have a sense of agency as mayor and realize the amount of work needed to be done to bring my city to its current state. Johnson can relate to this when playing with his nephew an earlier version of SimCity 4, SimCity 2000.

Johnson notes that it’s “the engagement of building your own narrative” that hooks the player into the game (Johnson 33). Not all games need violence and sex to be successful. He recalls playing SimCity 2000 with his nephew and determining how to improve a suffering section of the city. Pretty soon, his nephew said, “I think we need to lower our industrial tax rates.” (Johnson 32) Something about SimCity 4 is attractive to certain players and I think it is clear that it is the narrative sparked by the simulation.

In conclusion, SimCity 4 is a simulation game that allows the player to act as a mayor and create whatever kind of city desired. Establishing some very basic requirements like power and residents to work in the farms, the game excels at providing the player with a realistic sense of agency. Although it is not explicit, the narration in SimCity 4 exists via the construction and management of the city. There are some tools that allow the player to visually see the progress like the data graph, but like Steven Johnson says in his book Everything Bad is Good for You, the game engages the player by “building your own narrative” (Johnson 33).

Works Cited

Johnson, Steven. Everything Bad is Good for You. New York: Riverhead Books, 2006. 6-33.

I have always had a positive connection with violent and crude video games. The media has desensitized me to the most graphic situations, and with no hesitance I transform into an array of vicious entities. In order to fill this hunger for destruction, I morph into an assassin who has no problem shooting a civilian point blank just for his clothing (Hitman 2). When I want a different perspective of chaos, I choose a wise guy with an attitude who would decapitate prostitutes because there was nothing else to do (Grand Theft Auto: Vice City), and even a renegade ice cream truck driver who would blow up international monuments just to win a tournament (Twisted Metal 2). I truly have a love for this genre, but I am not sure how my infatuation began. It could be because it is generally a satisfying string of storylines, or because I am a male, and was taught to encompass myself in everything that is masculine. The gender that we choose to associate with in video games plays a role in how we act in reality. “The boys took transgressing prohibitions as proof they weren’t mama’s boys,” (Jenkins, 338). I cannot imagine how I would have turned out if instead I had chosen to play in the mind of the common Barbie, shopping and baking, as opposed to murder and world domination.

The adventurous game is not created with girls interests in mind. Henry Jenkins makes the connection that the micro-world a boy enters in his gaming experience is the equivalent to average backyard play when he was a boy. Our games require an infinite amount of adrenaline “taking us across lakes of fire, through cities in the clouds, along dark and gloomy back streets, and into dazzling neon-lit Asian marketplaces,” (Jenkins, 332). Girls could not handle this disarray of vivid images. Based on stereotypes, they would enjoy a clean and organized environment which they had complete control over, and probably surrounded by pink walls. There has not been enough research on why boys are drawn to violence, and if girls should feel the same attraction. In my opinion, girls probably do dream that they could sometimes be like us (but just as we are with feminism, they are taught to avoid all that is masculine). Parents of boys usually don’t worry about what they are involved in with their friends. It stems down from being able to ride your bike across town to your tree house to what virtual reality he chooses to engulf himself in while everyone in the house is sleeping. “Parents of girls were more likely to express worries about the dangers their children face on the streets and to structure girl’s time for productive household activities or educational play,” (Matthews, 1992). This could be the reason why girls are unable to show public admiration on our genres, and why when they even have video games to play, they relate to their domestic life, even though they despise this, “Nineteenth century girls were apparently as willing as today’s girls to mistreat their dolls, cutting their hair, driving nails into their bodies,” (Jenkins, 337).

It was the literary medium that began to take a female’s expected reality and insert it into a book, which eventually trickled down to video games geared to their supposed liking. It is necessary to keep the Barbie character in behind, because of how widely known she is (even to boys), to be the closest stereotype of a typical girl. This might only be a list of best-sellers, but I counted exactly 20 interactive games under the Barbie moniker. All of them having their narratives we correlate with feminine (Horse Rescue, Fashion Designer, Magic Hair Styler, etc.). This franchise never introduces a “Barbie Kills Terrorists,” edition because there is a line where the two genders are separated. So that there is no sign of bias, I have also looked up a list of successful video games around the time that I was growing up, and the majority that are geared towards girls, have nothing to do with what my interests were at that age. Some examples being: Beauty and the Beast, 101 Dalmatians, and The Little Mermaid.

If I was a female, I wouldn’t want to play video games solely based on how they the gender is portrayed. Hitman 2, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and Twisted Metal 2 are games that I have previously mentioned as stepping stones for my argument, but also provide a negative view of our partners. The following opinions are based on what I think women might interrupt their roles in my genre as. Females are too weak minded to become trained killers. They do not have any tactic or logistical skills to get the job done without being noticed by the enemy. Also, they create chaos, and could not handle the spontaneity of an assassin’s lifestyle, and thus they cannot serve as a romantic interest. The only credible role they have is as intel. They could be seen as a compliment, because this is Agent 47’s only link to mission requirements, etc., but it is the stereotypical receptionist who sits behind a desk, and gets all of her information from her male superiors. Tommy Vercetti is a member of the mob in the 1980’s, whose only contact with females are having sex with or killing prostitutes. Ok, so he objectifies women, but they are of the seedy underworld, so what’s the big deal? I forgot to mention he can also kill civilians. Average dressed women (whom I might add have a very runway-like stroll, curves, and large bust) are also up for random for the taking in random killing sprees the main character might decide to go on if he is bored with the current situation. Grasshopper, Outlaw 2, and Twister are female characters in the Twisted Metal realm, finally, some women that are involved in the main storyline. Don’t be fooled, they are worthless and you won’t get passed the third level. The whole point of the game is to use the arsenal strapped onto your vehicle to destroy your enemies. If you make it through every level (with three lives), you win the tournament and get whatever you want. They all have colorful, yet basically useless special attacks. Grasshopper can jump on top of your car, Outlaw 2 can tazor you, and Twister can “spin you around like a tornado.” Visually, these all seem wonderful, and even though you have females in a main role, they have the worst weapons out of anyone, and unless you use a cheat code, will not make it to the end.

Has succumbing to these extremely graphic visuals made me too masculine? After all of this, I am still unsure of how it began, but I do know what fueled my continuation. Yes, I was afraid of being the “wuss,” the odd man out, the gay one, and even, the “mama’s boy.” “Modern day boys have had to accommodate their domestic confinement with their definitions of masculinity,” (Jenkins, 339). Not only did these games help me to look like I belonged, but was able to toughen me up, and give me a sense that I was grown, and could now take on any roadblock that stood in my way of success. “Such bodily images [of sweat, spit, snot, shit, and blood] reflected by the boy’s growing awareness of their bodies and signified their rejection of maternal constraints,” (Jenkins, 341).

Sexuality is often explored in video games. Like it or not a lot of them are very sexually oriented. Most of these games are targeted towards the mostly male audience of video game players. In this paper I will explore and add some of my thoughts on this subject.

A good example of this that people know is Grand Theft Auto. There are prostitutes in the game who walk around the streets of the city as if it was an actual city. These women could be picked up by the player at anytime during the game and then taken to your car. In the game sex is even rewarded with health.

Another example is the game series Tomb Raider. The main character Lara Croft is viewed by most women as a feminist icon of sorts because of she is being portrayed as dominant. Also she is like Indiana Jones being she’s a British archaeologist in search of ancient treasures. But the Lara Croft character is also viewed as a sex symbol to male gamers. She has large breasts which most males like on a woman and they are very visible because of the green and/or blue sleeveless top that Lara usually wears.

Lara Croft has even been played by sex symbol American actress Angelina Jolie in the movies that have also been produced from the game, extending the reach of this symbol’s sexuality.

Some other good examples as described on Spike TV’s blog on their website are Beat’ Em & Eat’ Em, Strip Fighter 2, Panty Raider: From Here to Immaturity, Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2, Bone Town, Sexy Beach 3 and Battle Raper II. These are all games Spike lists in their The Top Seven Shamelessly Sexual Video Games list.

Beat’ Em & Eat’ Em is a good example of this because as they describe on their list in it the player controls the women while the man character is on top of a building jerkin’ the gherkin. Your objective as you control the women below him is to get them in position to slurp up the man juices.

Strip Fighter 2 is another good example because it is basically as they describe a Street Fighter knockoff where they take the class one-on-one fighting and just add gigantic boobs to the characters the player fights with.

Panty Raider: From Here to Immaturity is a good example because in it the player is commissioned by aliens to get girls to take off their clothes and pose. This after a group of aliens is shipped a lingerie catalogue from our planet by mistake and spanked it to the point of not being able to anymore as described in the blog. So they want to come to earth to get more pictures of naked women.

Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2 is a good example because in this installment of the series, the Leather Goddesses have given up trying to enslave Earth so they find Planet X and decide to sexually invade its population.

Bone Town is another good example because the point of this game is to try and get as many women as you can which then increases the size of your balls.

Sexy Beach 3 is good to because in it the point of the game is for the player to use their disembodied phantom hand to dress and then jiggle the lady parts of the girls in the game.

Finally another great example is Battle Rapper II where your main objective is to just plain rape the women in the game.

I agree with Henry Jenkins statement in point 6 of the points of comparison between traditional boy culture and contemporary game culture “Complete Freedom of Movement: Video Games as Gendered Play Spaces” pg 341 about boy culture assuming an overtly misogynistic form, directed towards women’s bodies as a site of physical difference and as the objects of desire/distaste where he states “Like the earlier ‘boy culture,’ this scatological imagery sometimes assumes overtly misogynistic form, directed towards women’s bodies as a site of physical difference and as the objects of desire/distaste. Some early games, such as Super Metroid, rewarded player competence by forcing female characters to strip down to their underwear if the boys beat a certain score. Grand Theft Auto, Tomb Raider, Beat’ Em & Eat’ Em, Strip Fighter 2, Panty Raider: From Here to Immaturity, Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2, Bone Town, Sexy Beach 3 and Battle Raper II are perfect examples of his argument.

As Jenkins describes early games, such as Super Metroid, that rewarded player competence by forcing female characters to strip down to their underwear if the boys beat a certain score Grand Theft Auto is similar in that instead of stripping down after beating a score the female players which are usually prostitutes you take into your car. Then when they are in there you could hear them clearly having sex. Then once you are done you kick them out and do whatever with them since you have just gained extra health and energy from having sex with them. Bone Town is also very similar to that in that you try to collect as many women that you can and as you do your ball sizes literally increase.

As I described in the Tomb Raider game yes the female character Lara Croft is the main character and could be seen as a feminist icon of sorts by some females but most of them probably just view the character as more of a sex symbol like the mostly male audience who usually plays the game.

Beat’ Em & Eat’ Em is plain right a perfect example to because the player is getting the women in the right position to slurp the man juices that he is letting down from a building where he is jerkin’ his stuff.

Strip Fighter 2 and Leather Goddesses of Phobos 2 are perfect examples of sexuality and sexism to as Strip Fighter is just a basic rip-off of Street Fighter with all women with gigantic boobs fighting each other and in Leather Goddesses where the female characters in the game generally start unbuttoning their uniform if they go into a general’s car.

Panty Raider: From Here to Immaturity, Sexy Beach 3 and Battle Rapper II are real good and almost perfect examples again because of how the player is told by aliens in Painty Raider to get girls to take off their clothes and pose. Sexy Beach you doing the motions with your disembodied hand to do various things to the women such as rubbing oil on them and Battle Rapper with the obvious mishap of you rapping your way to victory.

Extra Source: http://www.spike.com/blog/7-shamelessly-sexual/74907

Throughout my years of playing video games I have always had a connection to the avatar I am controlling. This not only pertains to me. Anyone who has experience playing video games feels this relationship. There are many emotions that build up due to the avatars actions, personality, situations, etc. The relationship between the video game player and their character is a unique experience, a unique experience in that the player often becomes an alter ego of one self. I will relate my personal experience with the avatar through the games I have played.

In Grand Theft Auto 4 I play Niko Bellic. Being a foreigner to the big city, know as Liberty City, I have a connection to Niko. When I first attended Columbia I was also a newbie to the big city. As the game progresses, Niko confidently learns how the city works. The same goes for myself. Now 22, I have learned a lot about Chicago and can find my way around no problem. Now comes the grueling part. I am a carefree easy-going person in real life. However, when I play as Niko Bellic, I turn into a no nonsense criminal. I have no remorse for the police officer I shot, the old woman I rammed with my car, or the helicopter I blew up with my rocket launcher. I really don’t give a damn. This image is the complete opposite of who I am in real life. So am I a heartless person for acting this way? Not at all. Like I mentioned above, anyone who has video game experience knows that their avatar impacts them during game play. The difference between acting this way in the real world and fantasy is a great one. I can get away with acting like a criminal because Grand Theft Auto allows me to. If Niko gets in trouble with the police, he has options to get them off his tail. He can avoid the patrol cars by viewing the map or he can drive into a Pay ‘N’ Spray garage and get a new paint job. If I were to attempt these unethical actions, I would be in jail within a heartbeat. It feels good to be bad sometimes. Grand Theft Auto 4 allows me to express my raging side.

In the article titled Who Am We by Sherry Turkle, Sherry has examples about my topic. “MUD selves are constituted in interaction with the machine. Take it away and the MUD selves cease to exist: “Part of me, a very important part of me, only exists inside PernMUD,” says one player. Several players joke that they are like “the electrodes in the computer,” trying to express the degree to which they feel part of its space.” Now here are a few examples of real people and MUD’s. “A 21-year-old college senior defends his violent characters as “something in me; but quite frankly I’d rather rape on MUD’s where no harm is done.” A 26-year-old clerical worker says, “I’m not one thing, I’m many things. Each part gets to be more fully expressed in MUD’s than in the real world. So even though I play more than one self on MUD’s, I feel more like ‘myself’ when I’m MUDding.” Creating screen personae is thus an opportunity for self-expression, leading to her feeling more like her true self when decked out in an array of virtual masks.”

Fight Night Round 3 is a boxing game developed by EA Sports. The gamer can choose a wide range of professional boxers to use. I am by no means a boxer, but I enjoy watching the big fights featuring De La Hoya, Hopkins, Pacquiao, and more. I have never been in a boxing ring or had thoughts of throwing down with someone. Through Xbox Live, I can dominate other gamers by using De La Hoya’s left hook or Roy Jones’ quick hands. Since my opponent cannot physically see me I feel invincible like a highly skilled fighter. This comes out usually through trash talking one another to get the adrenaline flowing. I mentioned earlier in my Grand Theft Auto 4 example that I am a easy-going guy and could care less about confrontation and all that bullshit. Yet, when I put on that headset and am playing with a top rank boxer, I feel like a million bucks! No body can mess with me, and if they do prepare to get beat down. When I go back to my daily life I know I am far from my Xbox Live self. I do not think I am alone in this situation. Millions of others play this alter ego role not only through video games.

In the adventure/role-playing game Harvest Moon, you start out as a young man on a farm. The farm was originally your fathers, and now it is yours to revive to life. This is a challenging task that the player is either up for or not. The townsfolk judge you based on how well you keep up with taking care of the animals (cows, sheep, horses, chickens, etc), planting crops, and communicating with them. When I have played these games in the past, I feel as if I am actually raising a farm. I have lived in Illinois all my life but haven’t had any experience in farming. I appreciate a video game like this that takes hard work to progress. Time management is the key to being successful. The player must balance between taking care of the home and participating in activities around town. If the player chooses to avoid their responsibilities then he is forced to move out and the game ends.

In my next game example, I am going to back track a bit and go old school. I never owned an SNES, but one of my favorite games back in the day was Turtles In Time. The concept of saving the city and defeating Shredder couldn’t be any better! The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were the thing when I was young. Every kid wanted to like the turtles, and often pretended to be. As Michelangelo, Raphael, Donatello, and Leonardo fought off the bad guys they would get closer and closer to their goal. The process in order to do so is filled with petty criminals, ongoing levels, and wannabe bosses. Yet, this kept the game fun and challenging. I would get up to about the third level and eventually die. Now that I think of it, Turtles in Times was a difficult game to beat. The music of each level was what I always enjoyed the most in Turtles In Time. It set the tone for what was happening, and what is going to come.

Video games often allow us to escape our daily lives. Daily lives that are filled with a typical nine to five grind. The room for excitement can often be slim to none. Some “experts” are saying video games are frying our brains or make us less social. However, have they proven this theory? Everyone has their own form of expressing their other side or alter ego. Whether it is through alcohol, illegal drugs, peer pressure, etc. Video games are just another form of expressing yourself. The connection to the avatar allows people to escape reality until it is time to face the real world once again.

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Craig Deskins

Semiotics in Video Games

Imagine a virtual game world with no directions. Imagine a game world where actions are solely based off a player’s rationality. In this make believe world of guessing and confusion, it is very possible you would become disoriented and become uninterested quickly. Video game players need signifiers within the game world to help them along. Players need familiar ideologies so that they feel a sense of bonding with the game. They need symbols to tie the whole package together. I strongly believe that symbols are necessary in video games to provide agency within the game environment. Symbols are the largest contributor to agency within a video game. In this paper I am going to explain how symbols cause agency and why they are such an important aspect of our video game experiences. I will do this by providing specific examples from experiences within virtual game worlds and by referencing important articles that relate to this conclusion I have come to.

Agency is an aspect of gaming that is used to describe immersion and believability within a games environment. The most basic symbols can be the most helpful and they provide a large amount of agency to a game. For example, the arrow is one of the most basic and often seen symbols in video games. The arrow not only gives players direction, but it also reinforces player’s attitudes by telling them they are going the right or wrong way. Though the game Bioshock is a symbol ridden game, it can be very confusing finding the correct way to go at times. However, the designers at 2k Boston added an arrow that points in the direction of the correct path. This was extremely helpful, especially in the beginning of the game where frustration often occurs. Without directional help, players would have become confused, and agency would have been lost in the process.

The signifier is the arrow. Our western ideologies tell us to follow arrows, which is the signified. Our society’s this ideology as kids. Road signs will often have arrows pointing in the direction of the road. Cartoon’s have characters tricking other characters by manipulating arrow signs. Western societies are built from the ground up to understand that arrows point to objectives.

There are times in Bioshock where the arrow temporarily disappears, and when this happens uncertainty often follows. It can be compared to the first time a teenager drives a car by them selves. The arrow becomes a crutch, and an aspect that is needed to sustain agency while playing Bioshock.

In the article Semiotics for Beginner’s by Daniel Chandler, he quotes the famous philosopher Ferdinand de Saussure numerous times. Saussure invented the concept of semiotics. At one point in this article Chandler quotes Saussure on the concept of the term symbols: Saussure said “Symbols are not proxy for their objects but are vehicles for the conception of objects.” If you break down the meaning of this sentence, Saussure is basically saying that symbols are not substitutes of their visual counter-parts, but vehicles for a separate identity. This theory holds true to all symbols.

In the game Fallout 3, the protagonists wear what is known as power armor. Power armor is a symbol of authority and achievement. It is also a symbol of power. This is comparable with Sassure’s description of symbols. If the power armor was merely a symbol for protection it would not hold as much symbolic merit. There is history and symbolic meaning behind what power armor is and what it does, and it is a vehicle for the conception of those philosophies.

I believe that the ability to understand the concepts symbols represent bring agency to a player. I feel that the average video game player does not want to take the time to dissect the meaning behind what the symbols in games represent. They want the meaning to be a given and to make sense. It gives them agency when they don’t have to think about what a symbol might mean. For instance, what if instead of a directional arrow, the designer decided to use a shoe. The player might not know if the shoe was pointing them in a direction. This would result in a loss of agency due to the player not understanding the meaning of the symbol, and the lack of connection the symbol would have with the game environment.

The most important symbol in our society is also the most overlooked. The letter is an essential symbol in video games. The letter creates the story through words, it provides explanation, and gives direction. The letter is the foundation of a game. Modern video games are becoming more word laden, and have become increasingly story driven. Words and letters help move the story along, and they provide agency by increasing familiarity. The game Grand Theft Auto is a prime example of a word laden video game. Sign are strewn throughout the game world and they provide instruction to the player. In Grand Theft Auto Four one of the signs read “No trespassing. Violators will be shot. Survivors will be shot again.” This is a pretty straight forward symbol. The player feels agency when reading this because they know what it means, and it is not out of context with the game environment.

An example of a game where agency is lost when letters and words are used incorrectly is the game Zero Wing. This game has many famous slip ups in its dialogue, but the most famous is the phrase “All your base are belong to us.” Although this is a game that is translated from Japanese to English, agency is still lost when this sentence is read. Immersion deteriorates when a player is taken out of the game world due to incorrect, or out of place symbols. It is essential that letters and words are used correctly unless they are intended to be used incorrectly for comedy or story depth. Zero Wing was doing neither of these.

As video games have progressed though time they have become intertwined with symbols. Symbols have become an essential category of a game because of the amount of agency that they produce, and the loss of agency that is produced when symbols are not used. Video game players have become attached to the ideologies they have grown up with, and they are represented through signifiers. Symbols are necessary for a game to provide agency. Without symbols, games would be entirely to confusing to play and enjoy.

In Halo 3 I play a biologically augmented super-soldier Spartan 117 or known as Master Chief. The covenant, who are the bad guys, control Earth. The fate of the galaxy hangs in the balance. Skate 2 is a game where I play a skater that comes back home from being in jail for 5 years and finds out that all the old skate spots have been taken down or have skate blockers on them. The goal for the skater is to start practicing again to keep the skills fresh and to take back the city from Mongo Corporation. Mongo Corporation is the business that took over the city and put the skate blockers all over the city and hired more security and police skating routes. In Fight Night Round 3 in career mode, I am a created boxer trying to go up the ranks to be the best. Fighting rivals old, and new and mastering the timing of the controls is the only way I’ll make it to being the greatest of all time until I retire.  Every time I play the games I enter a new world and a new set of rules. The mind set is also changed when playing the game with different avatars and agency to adapt to the environment. In this paper I will explain the experience I see when establishing the relationship of the player to the avatar.

An avatar is a computer user’s representation of himself/herself or alter ego, whether in the form of a three-dimensional model used in computer games, a two-dimensional picture or icon used on the or other communities. In video games is essentially the player’s physical representation in the game world. In most games, the player’s representation is some what fixed, however increasingly games at lest offer a basic character model, or template, and then allow customization of the physical features as the player sees fit.  As I play Halo 3 am I the Master Chief, I must save the world and possible the universe from the Covenant and the all-consuming Flood.

 This is the mindset I seem to engulf myself in as I play the game. I am able to customize the way the armor looks with the colors and badge symbol that is on my amour. I can even change sex if I prefer to play female. I am able to change the helmet size and the way it looks by unlocking special achievements in the game. As I play the game I feel this immersion to the game because I am able to customize the way my avatar looks and thus become connected to the avatar in the games space. Each time I kill an enemy I feel an extra bit of pride because I feel like I am in the amour, because it is customizable and that no one in the world has the same amour as I do because of the customization of the physical features in Halo 3.  As I move my character around shooting other Spartans or elites online or in campaign mode as I’m stomping the begging grunts through the ground, I feel agency because I have identified with my avatar in a way because when I act my avatar acts. When I am holding a controller, it doesn’t feel like a controller but as an extension of my body. I have changed the action of the controller.

In Fight Night Round 3’s career mode, you are able to customize your character even more then in halo.  As I’m playing the game for the first time, I can customize everything about my character. I can change everything from weight and body mass to ear shape and cranial depth with the flick of a thumb. I can customize what my boxer is wearing, if he has tattoos, if his hair is blond or red or any other crazy color. What made Fight Night Round 3 so special to me are the controls of the game.

Fight Night Round 3 is not your typical button mashing boxing game. The right analog stick acts as left and right arm movements, so you literally move the stick in the motion of the desired punch. Quick jabs are accomplished by pressing straight up on the sticks, while a hook comes out and around, just like the motion behind the blow. Using the controller like this makes me feel what my avatar is doing I am doing. I experience the physical movements of using the controller as the avatar is connected to the movements, thus the avatar and I share the same identity and agency.

In Skate 2 I noticed that my immersion with the skater that comes back home from being in jail for 5 years is even greater then my created boxer in Fight Night. I wonder was it because I loved skating video games or because this was the most realistic skate boarding game out there? As the intro of Skate 2 started I noticed that my skater still does not have a voice from the last Skate game. When I noticed that my Skater didn’t talk much the player/avatar relationship developed greatly because I noticed that I had to do the talking for my avatar. I had to pull off cool tricks to show the game space and other characters that I mean business since my character in the game never speaks. I realize that with the goals that are presented in front of me, I had to focus hard and get the best score that I could get. Because in the game Skate 2 the cameraman that always follows you, does all the talking for you, which can get annoying at times especially when I fall.

Besides the reason why the relationship between my avatar grown because he doesn’t speak in the game because of the customizations I was able to do. Right after the intro video, you get to customize your skater. You can be a boy or girl, and pick from all kinds of other details. There are piles of clothes and skateboards, and as you earn money you can change up even more. The controls are very intuitive and natural. You hold down on the right stick to crouch, flick it up to ollie, and other directions to do other tricks. The triggers are used to tweak, and you can spin in the air. Grinds are all dependent on where you are facing as you land on the rail or ledge. It’s all fairly simple, but it’s hard to master! Skate 2 is a lot more about finesse, timing and fine controller motions, as opposed to pressing buttons in order to make combos.

  As I play these games the avatar is the character of which we take ourselves and become part of the gaming world. I see that any game where I affect the gaming world or just things with media and where I am able to create an avatar that there is a relationship. I am in control of the avatar and the avatar is not in existence without me. If I cannot have a connection with the avatar from my individual self then there is no relationship and there is no agency.  

Jory Luster Jr.

I.                    Introduction

1.       what are my likes

2.        what drawn my interests top the game

3.       What drown my interests

II.                  Why I recommend to people

1.       Characters in the game

2.       Plot in the game

3.       The game play

III.                What I think that stands out about the game

1.        The history

2.       The important of each character in the game

3.       Power you gain the more problems you have

IV.                 Conclusion

1.       The overall

First the good news. Garou: Mark of the Wolves is new available for Xbox Live Arcade! If you didn’t play it on the Playstation 2, then at least download the demo. Garou is one of the most innovative fighting games of all time and contained SNK’s fighting game storyline that began with Art of Fighting and continued with Fatal Fury. It’s also extremely well balanced since after nine years, only one character has an infinite, the tier list keeps changing, the low-tier characters are worth using and even the bosses are balanced with the rest of the cast. I wish you “good ruck” finding a better fighter.

Now the bad news. Washed up film producer Larry Kasanoff is new suing Midway and their new parent company Time Warner for the rights to the Mortal Kombat franchise which will prevent Warner Interactive and Midway from releasing the now in development MK9 in order for Kasanoff to produce a sequel for Mortal Kombat: Annihilation. A sequel that’s spent twelve years in development and has yet to leave pre-production and promises to be just as awful as the first two movies. Actually, it’ll be worse since Kasanoff’s last film had excessive product placement and nobody wants to see Sub-Zero down a can of Red Bull with the camera focusing in on the label as Subby chugs the energy drink so that he’s pumped and alert enough to fight Shao Kahn.

Let’s not forget that Foodfight was the first film that Kasanoff made in nine years. In that nine year period, Kasanoff only produced the banal Mortal Kombat: Conquest television show that I saw a few clips of when I was flipping through channels and needless to say, it was really, really awful. How awful? It was a syndicated Saturday afternoon TV show. I’ll let that sink in.

Kasanoff’s claims are only backed up by a contract that claims that he owns the rights to the characters when they’re used oustside of the games. However, Kasanoff is now claiming that the characters are completely his since he claims that he developed them as characters.

This is crap for a number of reasons.

Reason one: John Tobias was one of the main screenwriters for the second Mortal Kombat film while he was also working at Midway meaning that Midway still played a hand in creating the story for Mortal Kombat as pertains to the film series.

Reason two: The contract only applied to media outside of the game series.

Reason three: All characters in the game were created by Midway employees and are therefore owned by Midway’s Chicago studio.

Reason four: The Mortal Kombat Team’s lead writer John Vogel is responsible for far more character development than Kasanoff ever was. Kasanoff states that the characters in the game are merely “stock characters” which is a total lie and is completely degrading to Vogel’s job as a professional writer in the video game industry and everything that the man has added to the series over the years. As far as fighting games go, Mortal Kombat is known for paying the most attention to story details and there are numerous threads on the Midway’s forums about the plot of Mortal Kombat. Whereas the story is poorly written and unimportant in SNK’s King of Fighters series, Mortal Kombat has  created a fimrly established canon which is one of the series’ main accomplishments and a big reason why I’ve been a fan for the past fourteen years.

The reason for the suit is because Kasanoff doesn’t want Time Warner to gain control of the rights to the film franchise that Kasanoff hasn’t been working on for the past twelve years. He’s seen what Time Warner did to the Batman film franchise after hiring Christopher Nolan to replace Joel Shumaker and he’s afraid that Time Warner might make a movie that will do the series justice that will be far different than the abortion that Kasanoff will inevitably create. Kasanoff has only produced one watchable film and that was True Lies which was still not the California Governor’s best movie by a long shot. (That honor goes to a tie between Predator and Terminator 2.) In fact, it was one of the only original properties that Kasanoff produced. Most of his movies were sequels or films developed on licensed properties, demonstrating the sheer lack of creativity that this man has.

For Kasanoff to be so afraid of Time Warner gaining the rights to a franchise that he has only tarnished the image of and hasn’t utilized for years is beyond immature and given that Kasanoff’s position is reliant on a carefully worded contract that still lists the characters and franchise itself as belonging to Midway, it doesn’t look as though he’s likely to win and if he does, then he’ll be canceling a game that’s currently in progress which will harm both the Midway employees who’ve already been through hell and the fans who simply want to see the next game in the franchise. If worst comes to worst, then Ed Boon would be justified in seeking vengeance against Kasanoff through a challenge of skill and raw physical ability. Boon must challenge Kasanoff to…. MORTAL KOMBAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Justice is served

Sources: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3GUSyiZNp0&feature=channel_page

http://forums.midway.com/future_mortal_kombat_game_discussion/b10741/30201185/p1/?40

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6212579.html

http://www.gamepolitics.com/2009/06/25/mortal-kombat-film-producer-sues-midway-over-ip-rights

Sexuality is often poorly represented in video games, especially the representation of bisexual or gay characters. The inclusion of a character of a bicurious nature are rare occasions, and very disappointing. Sexuality should be avoided in video games until it can mature as a medium. Simply showing a few of the examples of heterosexual and gay characters will more than prove this point.
The best example of the poor representation of sexuality in video games is Grand Theft Auto 4. The primary motivations of the characters in the game are twofold: money and “pussy”. Money is relatively easy to come by, but the affordances in the game are very slim when it actually comes to getting laid for the main character, Niko. The only time in the game he gets laid is after a date, where he gets the option to “try your luck” or go home. Simply from the way he talks, a casual gamer would assume Niko is constantly getting his all important, “pussy”. His cousin Roman is even worse. He constantly drags on and on about “American titties” and such nonsense. Almost every conversation in the game is riddled with such remarks. Not only is this a horrible representation of heterosexuality, but of women as well.
The only female character in the game with real power, Elizabeta, even has an emotional breakdown in which she confides in Niko. Elizabeta gives him a long speech where she explains that she tried to be a tough girl in a man’s world, but couldn’t handle it. Elizabeta then ceases to be a dynamic character at all, but she was already limited by relying on others to do the dirty work. The scene ends with Niko bailing her out of a tight spot as usual, and this fits the bill for most female representations in video games. They are there for eye-candy, nothing more. Even the two women in the loading screens reinforce this, one is “playfully” sucking on a sucker while clad in a skimpy red outfit that leaves little of the female anatomy to the imagination. The limited interactions with women seem to only be a form of an ego aggrandizing male power trip. This is completely counterproductive to the inclusion of women as gaming demographic. As Henry Jenkins points out, “there has always been a healthy degree of ‘crossover’ interest in the games market and that many girls enjoy ‘playing with power’” (Jenkins 359).
The game is even worse when it comes to anything outside of heterosexuality. There are no major gay characters, and the minor characters are absolutely insulting. The first being the infamous “French Tom”, that Niko ends up being forced on a date with. The simple implication that he is “forced” to go on a date is already implying the old argument of homosexuality as a choice, but this is even more insulting for the sheer fact that Niko is only playing along with the end goal of murdering Tom.
Tom himself is a horribly negative representation of a gay male. He cares only about money, in fact Tom even states that the two things he hates the most are “fat and poor people”. Tom doesn’t work, in fact he is a complete freeloader who spends his time and effort grubbing money from different men. He even rants on about how he doesn’t “know this guy named work.” If this isn’t insulting enough to any gay male such as myself, he throws in a horribly high-pitched voice, flamboyant personality, and is completely shallow.
The other minor gay characters encountered throughout the game are no better, and simply reinforce this negative gay stereotype. The gay guys working at the clothes store Perseus are perfect examples. Any interaction will yield a horrible response. Even walking in the door gets Niko a “that’s it baby, just the way I like it! Oooooh”. Buy an article of clothing and receive a “that looks so hot on you”, or “You look soooo hot honey”, possibly even a “there’s a man who knows what he wants!” All the dialogue is horrible, and any player with decent taste will leave the store as quickly as possible.
Grand Theft Auto 4 certainly doesn’t have a monopoly on the skewing of sexuality. Another good example is from the characters of Valkyria Chronicles. The first example I will use of a negative representation of a gay character is Jann Walker. Yet again, there are no major gay characters, though Jann is usually within the squad’s ranks simply because the designers gave him more hit points than some of the others. Jann Walker is one of the regiment’s lancers. These soldiers carry large rocket launchers that resemble a medieval lance. As if this phallic representation wasn’t bad enough in the hands of Jann, he also sports lavender eye shadow as well. Jann has a horribly flamboyant persona to go with the appearance.
His first phrase uttered upon entering the squad isn’t too bad in terms of content, “Hey soldier! I’m Jann Walker. I’ll fight with everything I’ve got.” Everything after that is just awful. Jann has a constant crush on the most masculine character in the game, Largo. In fact, if Jann dies in the course of the game, he laments “Nngh… Largo, I’d always… hoped… your chest could… be my pillow…”. Should the player get sick of Jann, his phrase “Oh, I am going to miss you to death! You give me a call any old time, honey!” is more than enough punishment. His in game sayings are by far the worst however. If you select Jann, you get two phrases “You got it hon!” or “For you? Suuurrre.”
Jann can’t even be taken seriously when killing someone he says “die for me sweetie!” Remind me not to say that if I ever get drafted one day. Jann also says other things like, “I could get lost in those muscles…” or “Largo… you’re the only man for me!” when running past his crush. Finally, Jann can’t even do a good job saving a wounded ally. He shouts “Miss Medic!” in such a high pitched voice that the enemy must think he inhales helium before every word. If the player for some reason chooses to heal Jann, he will end up regretting it after Jann sings “oooooh, that feels great!”.
The representations of gay characters in almost any video game are more than painful enough to warrant a serious look at the direction video games are heading. For video games to be taken seriously as a medium, I believe they must move past these outrageously childish representations of sexuality, and mature to the rich depth already provided in film and theater.