Gaming N-Editorials

[flameboy]

No not just a collection of N-E's marvellous features but more a place to share great content forum users find elsewhere!

 

The internet is full of fantastic editorials about our amazing hobby and I thought about having a thread to share them? They don't always fit into a game thread or a platform thread as the subject matter can be quite overarching and sometimes there isn't enough to warrant a thread on their ow but they are rife for discussion.

 

So here goes our first is from freelance journalist/editor in chief of gamasutra (last time I checked) Leigh Alexander on the nature of defensive videogamers (ie fanboys I think are a few on here )

 

 

 

Why defensive videogame fanbases display the exact same sensitivity they claim to abhor

 

There are several elements of predictable crowd behaviour when it comes to the highly anticipated launches of huge-budget videogames. First, the game is liable to receive generally high reviews, with minor variations among outlets. Second, the outliers on that narrow range will be subject to scrutiny – the perfect score must have been ‘bought by PR’, while the ‘half-point lower than the median’ score is a travesty whose text Internet commentators must analyse line by line to unveil certain discrepancy and conspiracy.

 

Beyond that, there are other certain triggers: if the outlying review score is written by a woman, the proportionate fervour increases. If the woman dislikes some element of the game readers can correlate to her gender – the portrayal of female characters in the game, to use an obvious example – that objection will become shorthand for her entire opinion, even if the review is generally good.

 

A release the size of Grand Theft Auto V is the perfect showcase for this reliable crowd behaviour, and the gaming community met its launch exactly as expected. Carolyn Petit’s disappointment with some of the game’s misogyny only moderately affected her highly scored Gamespot review, but attracted close to 20,000 comments, most of them outraged, some even abusive. Readers were so eager to disprove misogyny, or censure any complaint thereof, that they surely committed it.

 

It’s strange: a corporate giant publishes a game with a budget of over $260m (that swiftly earns more than $1bn), and gamers act like it needs protection from pesky ‘social issues’. In a recent column I said I find it weird that game fans, once creative outsiders, now demand such frenzied loyalty to expensive tech and corporations. I also find it troubling that the word ‘misogyny’ is such a reliable trigger for consumer rage and defensiveness.

 

I think I’m finally beginning to understand the misconceptions people have about women who want to talk about misogyny in games, though. The release of GTAV brought out a lot of trolls: even before I’d made any comment on the game whatsoever, I received some unsolicited tweets and emails – sometimes addressed to me along with other women who comment on games (Petit, Anita Sarkeesian et al) – protesting that our presumed oversensitivity was an affront to free speech, or that our obsession with ‘political correctness’ was destructive to a creative medium.

 

The presumption that we are an attack force of the offended is an interesting one. I imagine there is a legion of young men out there who see us as Carrie Nation figures – like the militant Prohibitionists that smashed bottles and attacked taverns across America in an attempt to protect its virtue.

 

Of course, I can’t speak for how all other women see videogames, but I think it’s safe to say that ‘sensitivity’ or ‘offence’ aren’t at the root of our complaints about misogyny. It’s not about arbitrary tokenism, either: I think still more fans and industry people alike think women want to mess up videogames by randomly gender-swapping characters, or sticking in a woman character simply because there ‘needs to be one’.

 

The groundswell of hostility that a GTA release can provoke, though, suggests this is still what people think women mean when we talk about our involvement in games. We just want games to be about a broader swathe of the human experience, and half of all human beings are women. But Grand Theft Auto is a story about men, I’m told. Yes, it can be that, but why must it only be that? Can’t everyone agree that more is better, and that different is better too? Especially in an age where most series are about men? That’s really what the pursuit of inclusion in games is about, for me: different and new, adventurous and heroic. Why are gamers so righteous about treading the same ground, dredging up every intellectual argument in the book for why new champions and more mature, nuanced attitudes to representing people don’t make sense?

 

I don’t need to see myself in every game, I don’t need content to be tailored to my preferences, and I don’t want anyone to artificially edit their vision to meet a quota. That’s not what anyone wants. What I’d rather is to feel that I work in a mature and diverse space, one where people don’t throw tantrums about review scores or get into Internet arguments about ‘political correctness’ when all that’s asked for is a consideration of new viewpoints; to add ideas and create alternatives, not adulterate or repress what already is.

 

One of the biggest challenges for new voices in games is to have that simple wish understood, without it being warped through the angry megaphone of those who’d corrupt what we’re saying in order to throw it away. And it’s hard to start and sustain these crucial conversations about what non-traditional game audiences want when a defensive uproar arises at any suggestion that any group – women, minorities, anyone – isn’t being represented thoughtfully or enough.

 

I think it’s the defensive fanbase, not passionate advocates for change in the games space, who are ‘too sensitive’ and obsessed with what they believe is ‘correct’

 

http://www.edge-online.com/features/why-defensive-videogame-fanbases-display-the-exact-same-sensitivity-they-claim-to-abhor/

[EEVILMURRAY]

Here's another piece Leigh did with (I believe) boyfriend Quintin about work, sex and games:

http://derekwheatley.wordpress.com/2013/10/22/feature-gamecity-8-blue-monday-work-love-and-sex/

(additional shamelss website plug)

 

 

Leigh Alexander isn't that bad a singer either. I recorded some drunken karaoke between us all. Awesome night.

[Jamba]

Rob Fahey is one of the only people that I have read that genuinely gives me something interesting to think about from pretty much every article he's written. He has a very balanced view on a lot of things and likes to put questions out there during his articles.

 

Will post some of the better ones when I get a sec.