GaryDooton

That's a damn shame - stay strong Patrick, you'll be alright :)

That's not the point - as I said in that last post, it's about women beyond the booth babes themselves and how they might feel about this.

The other, easier to understand issue is that it's unbearably tacky and cheap, and makes me want to vomit into my gaming e-wallet.

@MonkeyKing1969 said:

This is not going away. You can use wit, aspersions, banter, comebacks, contempt, cynicism, derision, digs, disparagement, flouting, irony, mockery, scoffing, scorn, sharpness, and wisecracks but it remains that how women are shown in games is now under more careful scrutiny and discussion. You can point out Patrick dancing or Jeff's knowledge of hip-hop as hippocracy, but in the end they know theri own minds and have no worries

That is not to say the game under scrutiny this year are going away or that even the critics of such games want them to go away. I rather doubt the hope for games to go away, because what most people hope is the the people making games and the people playing games will merely take a more critical eye towards what is made and what is played. Games like Dead or Alive or Lollipop Chainsaw will not go away, and we will see more 'leather nuns' and medieval warrior-women in metal bikinis in future games. But, in all likelihood when we play such game we will be more aware of the tropes that are their basis.

I actually see all the controversy around gaming this year as healthy. It shows core games are being played and viewed by a wider audience. And that wider audience will not unquestionably play or ignore imagery, concepts, dialogue or stories they find troubling. When they don't like something they will say so. No amount of screaming STFU at them will make them stop, like I said above we are passed the point where screaming loudly and being sarcastic will shut anyone up. The tide is turning' folks, you can wade out to punch the relentless waves or you can join the party up on the sand.

Thank you. And I agree with the gaming audience widening point. This flow of questioning and resistance is the sign of change and development of our treasured hobby into something more special, bigger than before.

@EndlessLotus said:

Well, the women are paid and consenting. Objectifying them? Sure.

But they wanted the job....

Yes, but what of women attending the show that aren't "booth babes"? I would feel really awkward and uncomfortable. Hell, I would feel that way as a man, to be honest. Women fucking CHAINED to things? Really? That seems fine to people, does it?

Also, here's some related reading from the man that puts things better than anyone ever does, ever can and ever will, Mr Charlie Brooker: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/17/sometimes-hard-woman-made-pixels

"Last month the creators of the game Hitman drew widespread criticism for a grisly promotional trailer that showed the main (male) character slaughtering a group of S&M killer nuns. Since this was merely the logical conclusion of a deeply boring trend for rubberised female assassins that's been going on since the 1990s, some gamers were surprised by the outcry, and became indignant and defensive, as though someone had just walked in and caught them masturbating to the same goat porn they'd been innocently enjoying for decades, and judging them and making them feel bad."

And before you start, he's a gamer, so don't give it the "he knows nothing" bullshit.

@toots said:

@jakob187 said:

You know...

I'm sitting here and thinking about it...

Isn't this the same website that talks about stabbing dudes in the face and neck? The same website that makes inate sexual references on a regular basis on their podcast and in video content? The same website that spent a lengthy amount of time talking about Peter Molyneux's balls?

I mean, I get it - it's all in the sense of humor. At the same time, it's that immature sense of humor that people continually latch onto, and in turn, the Giant Bomb crew provides us with more and more of it on a daily basis. While we eat it up and beg for more, they are now posting up an article that is basically saying "hey, E3 needs to grow up because boobies shouldn't be at trade shows".

Yet...you guys can get paid for being immature, podcasting via live-stream under inebriated circumstances while other game developers do the same thing, and Jeff can make creepy jokes about games like Otomedius Excellent...and it's somehow magically better than some half-naked chicks trying to get a paycheck at a trade show?

I mean, it's not like the exhibitors are paying these chicks to blow you while you play the game. They are paid to look pretty, just as models ALL OVER THE WORLD are paid to look pretty. If you don't want to play the DS that is attached to the lady, then don't. That's your right...just as much as it's the right of the exhibitors to use scantily-clad women if they want to.

If it makes someone uncomfortable, well hey...guess what? I was made uncomfortable by the Bombcast talk of eating someone's leg. I mean that - I was literally uncomfortable to the point that I kept trying to skip past it...and it kept going and going and going. So, since I'm uncomfortable about you guys talking about eating someone's leg, can you now not talk about cannibalism again?

No. That's just me being uncomfortable with it. It means I skipped ahead and I avoided it, just the same as how you avoided playing DS games attached to some lady.

So...preaching about immaturity in the games industry when your website features a plethora of immaturity...seems like a bit of a double negative, yeah?

I'm not saying you guys aren't intelligent, that you don't talk about serious stuff, that you guys are jerk-offs or anything. I'm saying that if you want to complain about one thing, then you need to complain about everything else and even point the finger back at yourself when it comes to "immaturity in the gaming industry".\

I mean, for fuck's sake, Patrick... This website almost gave Game of the Year to SAINT'S ROW THE THIRD, A GAME THAT FEATURES MORE IMMATURITY THAN ANYTHING I CAN IMMEDIATELY THINK OF! (an amazing game that I thoroughly fucking loved by the way...not to raise the ire of Ryan like I'm Jason Rubin or something)

This about sums it up.

Indeed it does - it sums up the lengths of bullshit some people will go to to not say "but I want to look at pretty girls and don't care about the feelings of women who attend E3 and other such shows, because that might rain on my boner".

Stop being so flagrantly pathetic - Giant Bomb make some silly jokes that are pretty funny and delivered in moderation and with an obvious sense of irony. Sadly, you need a modicum of intelligence to understand that, so it's clearly gone over your head.

The argument of "hey you've talked about violence and balls before so you have no right to question certain practices within the industry" is so painfully ridiculous I don't know where to begin. Also, you're daming them for drinking booze and attempting to equate it to cynically selling videogames by tethering women to handheld consoles? What world do you come from?

I think it's particularly weird that Nintendo are doing this, seeing as they're sort of known as the family-friendly company amongst the three market leaders, as far as their software output goes.

Also, I love the "since when did Giant Bomb become..." comments, because that EXACT sentence, with "Giant Bomb" replaced by whatever site an article questioning the representation of women in the industry (or indeed any artistic or moral issues) arises whenever the poor little narrow-minded, powerful right-forearmed, immature walking wankathons have to stop and think about their hobby for more than twelve seconds.

Also the "BUT WHAT ABOUT VIOLENCE" complaint is really stupid. Yes, I've also heard of violence. It exists, indeed. I do believe that's a totally different issue, though, which I thought was blindingly, maddeningly obvious.

It's as if the sexism issue doesn't exist, purely because there is violence in videogames. It's a view which shows a complete lack of understanding of the problem.

This community needs to grow up, never mind E3.

@biggiedubs: I agree totally, and that was my point entirely: the ubiquity of videogames has brought it in line (or is bringing it in line) with movies - some are "classier" and offer more sophisticated experiences, and some are "dumber" and are designed to ensure as large an audience as possible can enjoy them, and everything in between. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, I think it shows just how broad the industry is in scope these days and how it pervades much of our culture. That's really quite fantastic for fans of gaming, as we have more choice than ever before.

(This post kind of got longer than I expected, but it's interesting. Honest!)

To drag some positives out of the wall of fierce arguments here (or to attempt to take it in a fresh direction), I think the very reason these kinds of discussions are coming up at all is due to an increase in the breadth of interest and the diversification of styles present in videogames today, bringing it closer to being a more legitimate "art form" and drawing it alongside TV shows, movies and books.

Think about it: if someone tells you they love movies, and you love movies too, it is perfectly possible that your respective tastes in movies are incredibly different. This is what is happening with videogames.

For example, last week I watched Alien followed by Aliens for the first time ever (I know, shut up). I adored Alien, the slow, deliberate build of tension, themes and messages being communicated non-verbally, non-obviously to me through lighting, sound and visuals. It was amazing.

However, I hated James Cameron's Aliens. It spends the first 20 minutes doing the movie equivalent of a videogame "hand holding" tutorial section, by cramming in the setup, the story, into that time and using shitty dialogue to say "HERE IS THE BACKSTORY, HERE IS WHAT'S HAPPENING, HERE IS WHERE WE'RE GOING". In the most obvious, explicit way possible.

To draw another parallel, there's a moment in Aliens that can be directly compared to a moment you may experience in a thoroughly focus-tested, large budget, "AAA" title:

As the crew get back on the ship for the first time, to attempt to escape the colony, we see a shot of the docking ramp...thing (the entrance to the ship, basically) and, in the foreground, the sticky Alien goo. For the kind of movie I enjoy watching, this is enough of a clue to tell me they're not alone on the ship: in fact, it's a fucking sledgehammer over the head of a clue. However, to make sure, Cameron makes the actor put his hand in the goo, react and observe it quizzically. OK, we get it, this weird goo stuff is not what you would usually find on this ship. It is incongruous, something is up. Shit is going to go down.

However, Cameron decided to hammer it home to anyone who STILL hasn't got it by making the actor ACTUALLY SAY "HEY, WHAT IS THIS WEIRD GUNKY STUFF?" (or however he puts it). Which made me go "UGH", because I'm a horrible movie snob.

The point is, this can be mapped to, say, a moment in Uncharted 3. You are presented with a climbing puzzle. The first sighting of the goo in Aliens can be mapped to Uncharted in the ledges being more conspicuous and a brighter red than the wall you are to climb. The "actor touching goo" can be mapped to the *HINT* moment where you hit up on the dpad and the camera points at the ledges you are the climb. Finally, the "HEY WHAT IS THIS GOO" moment can be mapped to when you wait even longer and it says "CLIMB THE RED LEDGES TO GET TO THE ROOF".

Although I personally hate being hand held like this, we have to remember that games have come a long way, socially speaking, in the past decade alone. There are arguably more possible variants in taste in gaming than there are in movies these days, and we all know that pretty much everyone watches movies of some kind and had a favourite movie or kind of movie, and this is slowly becoming true of videogames.

TL:DR - although hand holding is desperately annoying to some and seemingly one of the worst trends in gaming today, it is also one of the most encouraging signs that videogaming as a medium is becoming more diverse, more culturally established and more ubiquitous than ever, which can only be a good thing.

Well, to counter useless anecdotal evidence with further useless anecdotal evidence, I have also met Suda51, and he was super nice and a great guy.

*shrug*

As for the calming down of the zaniness - I feel that is the direction the studio is going in some ways, but then look at this Sine Mora thing they've taken on - it sounds very unusual and interesting. It's a common trade-off for anyone, any band, any company, whose success and popularity grows over time. Getting involved with smaller, unusual projects like Sine Mora tells me that the heart of the company hasn't changed.

Let's not forget, this is the guy who wrote a suicide story into a pro wrestling game for the SNES, which is properly crazy.

@buzz_clik I totally thought of the Commando high score music when I read this news, too.

RIP, Mr Tramiel. Commodore is gaming history as far as I'm concerned. It brought gaming into our homes, made it commonplace, widespread, with such a wealth of titles, some which still stand up as enjoyable games today, and not just as five minutes blasts for the nostalgia value.

C64 was the system that kickstarted my lifelong love of games, and is the reason I still game today: it enraptured me so as a kid and I remember the absolute magic of the worlds that came to life in front of me. I would be a significantly different person without it, so I thank you deeply, Jack.

@umdesch4: That link is perfect. Those were my impressions of it, too: looks like ass.