gender and videogames dr ewan kirkland bcuc
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Gender and Videogames Dr Ewan Kirkland BCUC. Videogames are an extremely masculine medium. sexualised representation of female characters. male heroes rescuing helpless females. overwhelming masculinity of the implied game player. Soul Calibre. Dead or Alive. Catwoman. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Gender and VideogamesDr Ewan Kirkland
BCUC
Videogames are an extremely masculine medium
overwhelming masculinity of the implied game player
male heroes rescuing helpless females
sexualised representation of female characters
Soul Calibre
Dead or Alive
Catwoman
Tomb Raider heroine Lara Croft
Donkey Kong
Shadow of Colossus
Vewtiful Joe
Cold Fear
SH4
Mario
Sonic
Dante
Grand Theft Auto
Canis Canem Edit
Gameplay
‘Beating the prostitute, as with other aspects of the game, ties into dominant notions of masculinity and its representation, an aspect of the game that can’t be denied- even if it is contextualised in terms of a supposedly bygone retro-masculinity. The ‘70s drug culture/gangster underworld context operates to sanction the player (of whatever gender) into doing what would be, in reality, for most, unconscionable.’
Can you think of any game titles which presume a female or more feminine gamer?
How does this potentially impact of female gamers, and the female gaming experience?
In what ways does GTA, CEE, or any other videogame presume the player is a heterosexual male?
Active-male-rescue-helpless-female structure
Maximo
How relevant are issues such as narrative or visual design when you play a videogame?
What aspects of the gaming experience are not considered in concentrating on such aspects?
What are the limitations of focusing only on the visual and narrative aspects of gaming?
Context
Gender Construction
Gender Representation
Gameplay
Noah Wardrip-Fruin & Pat Harrigan (eds) (2004) First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game Cambridge, Massachusetts, London: The MIT Press
Barry Atkins (2003) More than a game: The computer game as fictional form Manchester & NY: Manchester UP
Justine Cassell & Henry Jenkins (eds) (1999) From Barbie to Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games Cambridge, Massachusetts & London: The MIT Press
Geoff King & Tanya Krzywinska (2006) Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders: Videogame Forms & Contexts London, New York: IB Tauris
Diane Carr, David Buckingham, Andrew Burn & Gareth Schott (2006) Computer Games: Text, Narrative, Play Cambridge & Malden (USA): Polity Press
game designers
social scientists
media analysts
Narratology / Ludology
narrative or storytelling aspects
Narratologists:
Geoff King & Tania Krywinska (eds) (2002) Screenplay: cinema/videogames/interfaces London & New York: Wallflower Press
traditional forms of audiovisual and narrative media
media texts
games: chess, tag, hide and seek
Ludologists:
criticising the assumptions, arguments and methods of narratologists
rules, structure, formalism
Narratologists don’t understand games
Ludologists v Narratologists:
Narratologist, in emphasising videogames’ similarity to film, television, literature, ignore what makes games games
Narratologists want to reduce games to films
Representation
identification
representation
•history
•personality
Lara Croft (Tomb Raider)
•photo-realistic
•gender, class, ethnicity
character:
cinematic
Does Lara Croft provide voyeuristic pleasure for heterosexual males
Or does the male videogame player playing Lara Croft become feminised through playing as a female character?
Does Lara Croft provide voyeuristic pleasure for heterosexual males
Is Lara Croft something to be looked at, or is she someone to become?
Or does the male videogame player playing Lara Croft become feminised through playing as a female character?
Does Lara Croft provide voyeuristic pleasure for heterosexual males?
Andrew Darley (2000) Visual Digital Culture: Surface Play and Spectacle in New Media Genres London & New York: Routledge
James Newman (2004) Videogames London & New York: Routledge
Henry Jenkins: ‘The character is little more than a cursor which mediates the players’
relationship to the story world’
Helen Kennedy (2002) ‘Lara Croft: Feminist Icon or Cyberbimbo? On the Limits of
Textual Analysis’ in GameStudies Vol 2, Issue 2, December
Espen Aarseth (2004) ‘the dimensions of Lara Croft’s body, already analyzed to
death by film theorists, are irrelevant to me as a
player, because a different-looking body would not
make me play differently… When I play I don’t even
see her body, but see through it and past it.’
Gameplay
ludologists narratologists
audiovisual media texts
remediation, convergence, intertextuality
narratives
rule-based systems
social, cultural, historical meanings of play
games