How so? At least persona has been a very Japanese centric game imo, the settings and source material is Japanese
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Why women criticise sexualised character designs (READ OP)
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Hmmmm, I disagree that it is entirely the same. That one is a cheap and bad joke. The other is inherent in the themes of the game. It's entirely about
is that we are the precursor race to beings who do not entirely understand us, knowing full well how much of a fuck up we are as a species
You didn't answer the question as much as say "the answer is obvious." It clearly isn't to the person you're talking to and doesn't require a treatise. If you can't be bothered to answer feel free to consider the question directed to someone who might be willing.
I'm not referring to developer intent, but the end products, so this doesn't actually address the question.
Then it shouldn't be that hard to throw out examples.
The context of that chain that wasn't about pandering as opposed to choosing tackling specific social topics. Different conversation on a different subtopic.
That seems to suggest if not outright state that you're considering mythological heroism to be explicitly white masculine in nature, whereas the subject itself is not inherently masculine. Furthermore the presentation of this heroes journey as being for males or females is decidedly absent. It also seems to ignore prominent female influences in their specific lore as well as current characters.
The personal series has stories that are primarily not western influenced while the mythologies drawn from are actually rather diverse. NierA might be the only outlier save that it again tries specifically to call into question the typical power fantasy, which is a pretty big point.
What is a white power fantasy to you? It seems like anything that can be associated with a straight white male outlook in any way shape or form even if it doesn't promote that ideal. It seems like you're saying if it's sexist, it's white male power; if it's homophobic, it's white male power; if it uses white culture, it's white male power, if it uses contrast with changing world ideologies it's white male power. Is that an accurate summary of your position?
Among other things - treatment of characters, treatment of race, religion, sexual orientation, women, class, all have a typically conservative, typically western viewpoint. Much of this is a result of cultural imperialism dating back to the end of World War II, in which America effectively forced the Japanese to take on many of these ideas, and I do mean they were forced to do so. In many cases their survival depended on it. But, that has also created many of the problems modern Japan now copes with, including an increasingly strong cultural dysmorphia.
I agree, I wouldn't say it's entirely the same, but it shares similar ideological underpinnings. Just saying that it's bad or doesn't work isn't really a revolutionary statement. I mean, I guess it could be depending on the perspective, but that still doesn't really do a lot for trying to solve the problem or at least acquire a means to approach it. It's a bit more helpless than that, which while it does present the problem well, I think presenting and understanding the problem is basically getting to the starting line of having an actual conversation.
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Yeah Japan might be more open to homosexuality before the western occupation, but it's still a deeply classist and patriarchal society in the past.
This sounds like my relationship with Xenoblade X and the numerous essays I have written (in my head) about it...and the fan comic I was feverishly writing before the project fell off a cliff only for me to finally pick it up again now....
I never said that, nor did I mean to imply it. Whites certainly didn't invent it, but they sure as hell mythologized it extremely strongly.
See, but this creates a compounded issue. You now have an already deeply classist, patriarchal society, being further embedded with classism and patriarchy from a western society. It's basically a double dose of awful.
It's definitely more of a blend of terrible ideologies lol.
I love Japanese media but no thank you at living in that kind of society. If anything the media that critiques it are some of the more interesting stories about Japanese culture. Persona 5 approaches it but it's a very... cis, straight male approach. Or lets just say, it's a very VICE-like approach. :P
I love Japanese media but no thank you at living in that kind of society. If anything the media that critiques it are some of the more interesting stories about Japanese culture. Persona 5 approaches it but it's a very... cis, straight male approach. Or lets just say, it's a very VICE-like approach. :P
I think I provided you with plenty of information via the links as to what some of this is. I'm not going to write what embedded white male values there are for all the different games you mentioned, because as I said before, it would be a treatise. It is there and you don't have to look very hard for it - https://www.polygon.com/2017/4/5/15190808/persona-5-female-main-character-protagonist .
I've already thrown out a bunch.
I never said it was a presentation of the hero's journey. And mythological heroism in the form of the Souls series is certainly taking from Western stories, and I don't know how you can't see that given the visual design and the manner in which the characters present themselves. If you've read any classic European literature the influences taken should be immediately obvious. Hell, even if you haven't they should be immediately obvious in the case of the Souls series.
Given that they present modern Japan, I'd say the Persona series is extremely influenced by Western ideals, because the West (specifically America) has had a huge influence on what Japan looks like culturally, and that is embedded in Persona as a reflection of that.
So first, no it's not. But also, I'd like to ask you a question - what does a power fantasy video game look like for a non (white) male? Can you describe what that might look like? Because if you can't, I'd say it's pretty indicative of what the problem is with the culture. Because while I'd very much like to see what a Brazilian female power fantasy video game might look like, I also know that I probably can't get that. The reason most of these examples of homophobia, of sexism, etc., are described in the manner they are is because that's pretty much all the industry makes. Power fantasies for cisgendered straight (white) males. It's kind of difficult to have a discussion about how political issues affect others when the majority of gamers are only ever exposed to one worldview in the media they consume (whether they know it or not, whether they acknowledge it or not).
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Wait, what? You're gonna have to explain this one. The hero or heroine of the Souls series is fully customizable, and there are plenty of powerful female figures and feminine archetypes (both "traditionally" and non-traditionally feminine).
First article isn't specifically about gaming much less the manifestation of homogeny in tech. The second focuses on options and what they normalize, which doesn't apply to games in which the protagonist is chosen and and brings up the question of what a default should be to not be seen as promoting an agenda (should all character creators start from a random series of attributes or have racial/gendered selections prior to presenting a model?). That said if we're equating a default white to a power fantasy or political move my instinct is to think on it because right now that seems petty and reaching. The 3rd is social in nature, and I hold nothing against it's contents but it doesn't speak to the question asked. The 4th is odd in that it calls attention to a situation where choice could theoretically exist but doesn't and is denied the most common reason for not doing so, a tailor made protagonist. Further it says one gender didn't mind as much as the other not because they got what they wanted, but because they were used to not having the choice. Considering the first article and the way it talks about gender portrayals suggests that protagonists with heavy characterization or specific situations might not work with e gender swap so that is understandable in those cases, but in the case mentioned no one gets what they want, one group complains more and seemingly no one wins save a pyrrhic victory compared to the presentation of actual well created female protagonists. The last makes a good generalized point about the use of marginalized groups, but that leads to my questions at the end of my last post: Does the existence of poor representation of any group, even when not presented to the benefit of whites in that work still get classified by your reasoning as straight, white male politicization? And if so does that mean the term is in no way distinguishable from any form of exploitation of marginalized groups? If so it seems to be a term without meaning.
All that said, the question you're answering is one far different and more broad than what I was asking. What I was asking was what those games did, not industry attitudes as a whole. The latter doesn't answer the former.
Those werent present at the time I started writing that post, but after seeing them edited in I responded above.
Edit: Also again, I feel like the point here conflates Japanese notions about whether a setup feels masculine or feminine and the underlying gender associations with the views of a different and still distinct cultural entity.
See the 2 sections above
I never said it wasn't western, I'm not even sure what you're actually responding to with this. I stated the concepts at the core of the games weren't gendered.
Influence yes, but a large part of this thread has discussed at least one element of significant difference. Unless the argument is that there are no others and the nation has become otherwise fully Americanized to the point of losing it's identity I don't think it fair to conflate influence with overriding.
To your question, does it look different? As a non-white Doom wasn't a power fantasy that I felt excluded me. That's because it didn't evangelize exclusivity, racial superiority, gendered superiority or anything other than the idea of wanting to be badass. But in your explanation it seems that a white power fantasy is at it heart a power fantasy that could have nothing else wrong with it but be classified as such by the fact that the protagonist is white. Perhaps you feel quite differently, but having the Doom slayer be a Brazilian woman doesn't change the idea of the game being about fantasies of personal empowerment rather than ideological empowerment.
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Well, yeah, but in the game we just see her flying so I don't know how that would be a problem if she's not even using it to walk in first place..
I wasn't referring specifically to the player character when I was mentioning the power fantasy of the Souls series. I was referring to the major story arcs being dominated by men, and to the characters that take actions still being predominantly men. That said, upon my own review of the series I will definitely say it has much more representation than most, but I still wouldn't say that it's balanced.
Those aren't really power fantasies though, at least as I interpreted them. Those games deal with a world on the brink of collapse under the weight of the failures of those same individuals and their desperate clinging to their time of power.
The first dark souls is kind of a critique on trying to hold onto power structures just to preserve a status quo that served the few.
I'd say that this sort of story line is very much in line with male power fantasies, even as it presents their rather abject failure. It's a form of historical revisionism that relates to the past as being iconographic and untouchable (via its literal infinite repetition of a world state), Anor Londo perhaps being the best usage of framing past glory, in the same way statues and giant faces carved in walls represent the mythology of a history that was fairly horrific.
See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5b_-TZwQ0I
As for DooM, yes, I think having the character being a Brazilian female would certainly change the frame of what a power fantasy looked like by significantly expanding it. It may or may not look different, but that's kind of my point. It's one thing to say it wouldn't look different, but it's clearly entirely another to actually pull that off. If you think there would be no difference, where are those games? It's clearly not "just a swap" for the devs making the games (after all, if it was such an easy and clear thing to do, why not just... you know, do it?).
The latter doesn't answer it, but it does address it, though the idea that there's going to be a single answer to such a broad question about multiple different games is a bit mystifying to me. Every game has cultural appropriation, has politics, and each addresses them differently. Many address them by means of simply using the dominant culture, and in the case of Japan, there is typically a considerable amount of cultural imperialism to consider in the answering of what any given game's politics represent. There are many unequal relationships in the games you present, a frequent mythologizing of historical issues, and normalizing behavioral patterns that are unhealthy and disempowering to those outside what the game considers or presents as normal.
And again, I also can't really answer the questions you asked without drawing from a larger pool of knowledge and context, because many of the answers you're looking for aren't addressed in or by games.
So again, to both questions, no.
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Isn't anor londo a subversion because in the end it is shown to be entirely an illusion?
Err, it's ok to post spoilers for this old ass game right? :p
Err, it's ok to post spoilers for this old ass game right? :p
I genuinely have no idea what your definition of a power fantasy is.
How would it change the frame of it? Why would it expand it? Nothing in that game was gendered so far as the doom slayer. You could literally mod the opening missions to have a different body for the all of 30 seconds you saw it and the game would need no subsequent change for it. That substitution is easy, so we're at a fundamental disagreement where you seemingly see the making of a choice to mean a specific dependence upon that choice in this case for the rest of the game and I don't. But the fact that that choice was made as it was apparently leaves no possibility of changing you mind so I'm content to leave it there.
As for why it wasn't done, you are a silent, demon destroying force of nature who only evidences anything more than that with the occasional gestures backing up your contempt for the brazen human intrusion into hell and it's costs. None of that is dependent upon and specific race or gender so it may very well have come across as unimportant considering, again, 30 seconds of visual distinction and nothing afterwards.
No, it doesn't address it, as evidenced by our conversation about doom. The overall culture in which a work was created should never be enough to override critique of specific works, the question isn't broad either as you've actually subsequently answered it in respect to 2 games. Answers I fundamentally don't understand or disagree with, but direct answers nonetheless.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PowerFantasy
I don't fully ascribe to this description, but let's use it as a baseline.
From this definition alone, it's pretty clear that a power fantasy is extremely political, but also that it isn't one thing and can be played off multiple different ways.
Except you clearly are a white male in DooM. Do you not see that as promoting a specific gender and race?
I'm not saying the overall culture overrides an individual work's, but that it certainly influences it and that has real ramifications on what games actually communicate.
Sort of yes, sort of no. It doesn't significantly change the layout or presentation of the level in the same way something like Bloodborne or The Evil Within 2 does, so the effect doesn't really have a ton of impact.
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Quite the opposite, that definition makes it something inherently apolitical. Something that can be easily used as part of any and every agenda but caries no inherent agenda. Further the definition doesn't idolize failure despite your application of the trope to those in the Dark Souls universe who have explicitly failed, gone hollow, died or are doomed to do so shortly.
No, everyone has to be something. Where the devs make that decision isn't something inherently prescribed to superiority, much the same way making the doom slayer a Brazilian woman wouldn't be promoting either of those traits (which leaves aside that this iteration of the protagonist not from earth as I understand it).
I agree there, but again when asked about a specific work it doesn't make it impossible to answer.
That's true, but I felt like it still gave rise to that essential question: is the majesty of anor londo earnt, or was it always an artifice to show power?
It didn't break down, but anor londo always felt... fake, and lifeless, which is quite the accomplishment in the world of dark souls. :P
From the wiki: The Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism shows two possibilities of this trope played seriously. In more cynical settings, a person stuck in this situation will never get to stand up against his abusers, always living under their heel and either will become a completely broken person as time passes or just cracked up. In more idealistic settings that person will at some point stand against those who turned his life into a living hell, either verbally or with fists.
Like, depending on how you interpret Dark Souls, it fits either the idealistic setting (getting back at those who imprisoned you with fists) or the completely broken person setting (if you link the flame you endlessly continue the cycle of a world filled with misery, becoming broken in the process). I don't see how it doesn't fit the definition, nor how the trope is without an agenda, because the paragraph above is clearly describing a character with an agenda. Getting back at those who made your life what it is, seems inherently political to me, as does accepting an eternal misery you can't escape from.
But here's the thing, especially with a first-person shooter: they don't. And more importantly, even if we assume that they do indeed need to be something, the fact that they are extremely frequently white males, is telling of what is perceived as normal, and presents that as the default for race and gender. The reaction against this as being normal is especially telling in the article I presented to you about the reaction of players to randomized characters in PUBG.
I think a lot of that had to do with how empty it was, more than anything else. It's huge and majestic and... empty. Like, there's just a lot of space with nothing in it, and that's probably what leads to that feeling of lifelessness. Still, it's not broken down or degenerated in the same way an average ghost town is (or even the way an average town in Dark Souls is!). It's extremely well kept, like there are invisible Roombas doing all the work. Which I think gives it a creepy feeling, and yes presents the artifice as such, but I always felt the cleanliness spoke to something idealistic about it (even if the illusion presents it as "not real").
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I think that's where you and I diverge mainly on this mythologies bit. To me, the sterility is an incredibly cynical take on what it means to be a "legend". I don't really sense any glorification. But that's mostly my own belief in superficiality.
Speaking of which, that sterile quality also ties somewhat to what we were talking about with nier earlier. Look at the yorha bunker. Sleek, clean, monochrome, solemn like a church, much more high tech than anything we've seen on earth, staffed by these slick, stylish androids, all to boast about the glory of humanity...
all underscored by a track called fortress of lies.
So I'm confused as your original statement of it being a power fantasy stated it wasn't about the protagonist but the surrounding characters who shaped the events you play through. It seems we've pivoted to the protagonist themselves now. And we're still having different meanings of the power fantasy, specifically in regard to the trope. The trope doesn't have the character act out the fantasy, rather, it is the internal fantasy of the character regarding their current struggle, representing their inability to do anything in reality to address the situation. This is the opposite of what the chosen undead does. This is someone who's primary characteristic is being undead and seeking the meaning of what that entails. This isn't undead Bob in accounting fantasizing running down him manager Gwyn with his car because of all the unpaid overtime. The chosen undead is never characterized as fantasizing a (in context) fantastic outcome.
Also, no, there is no agenda in the trope itself, only a situation from which one wants escape. That can be framed for any purpose. Cynicism vs Idealism relates to the ultimate response to the situation which triggers the fantasy itself, but is still not related to anything in dark souls because there is no oppressed dreamer for it to apply to. Even if it did it still makes no judgement on the situation it's used to portray in itself.
They did for that opening scene, which is the only point of reference we have for what the doom slayer looks like. Beyond that no, they didn't, and characteristic of that they again didn't going forward. Also that article about Rust, which so far as I know isn't related to PUBG but I don't know much about PUBG so it could be, becomes something different because that gender and race is your visual representation. In doom your visual representation is the preator suit. Additionally the rust example differ in that there were choices to be made and options to be had but those choices weren't the players to determine.
There is also the question of whether that brief into in doom is worthy of specifically diversifying only yo deny the player visibility of the character they are playing. In the case of a default choice no one is ever more inclusive than any other, we just have this specific one we have an issue with because it's common. If it were anything else I'm almost certain we wouldn't be discussing it despite being just as singular.
Re: "I just want to have fun."
That's basically how I feel about XB2. I just want to enjoy a fun adventure with some Xeno developments at the end without being distracted every time a female character turns her torso.
That's basically how I feel about XB2. I just want to enjoy a fun adventure with some Xeno developments at the end without being distracted every time a female character turns her torso.
Seriously.
I'm in chapter 4, and I'm glad Adenine dropped for me. She's the one design that I liked from their tweets pre-release. Though I didn't notice the weird chain book hanging off her neck. She's got a good design, putting that aside.
It's too bad I'm spending the majority of the chapter chasing after a maid blade with Mythra in my party, who is somehow even less clothed than Pyra and has a tsundere personality with sleep walking shenanigans to boot.
It's too bad I'm spending the majority of the chapter chasing after a maid blade with Mythra in my party, who is somehow even less clothed than Pyra and has a tsundere personality with sleep walking shenanigans to boot.
Because the other half of the power fantasy is about what everybody else is doing to the protagonist. Or how it has some direct or indirect influence on the protagonist. But the reality is that the story in most power fantasies is never about the character so much as what is being done to them as a result of forces outside their control, and in games, about their quest to, typically, take control back. Actually within the power fantasy (even within the given definition) it is never so specific that the character cannot act out, just that they usually don't, or when they do it is taken to some extreme. It can be an internal fantasy, but it doesn't need to be. The chosen undead is also never given a story, only clues as to what their story was (once) like, or becomes as a result of the player's interaction. The character is never seeking meaning, because the character is just the player, and when they do it's basically only at points where the player has no influence (the beginning and end of the game). And I'm speaking to those points where the player has no influence, to what the character is outside what the player desires them to be. And that's where what the developer provides for us grants insight into what the character is fundamentally, regardless of player influence. It's contradictory, but nevertheless necessary if the player is to be made to believe they have greater influence on the game world. Ultimately, depending on how you interpret the opening or the ending, the character is either highly motivated to take on a grand problem, as they do within every ending, or in the case of linking the first flame, content with the unchanging, looping reality of the world, both of which play into different interpretations of the power fantasy trope.
Escaping a situation and building the means to acquire such escape is an agenda, and presents a politic based on the decisions one makes to get there.
Crossed my wires about the Rust article and the PUBG article (different article, different controversy). Regardless, the example presents how a white male as the default is so expected, so normalized, that even a relatively simple change causes waves. You may not see it as a major change, and that's fine, but that doesn't mean that others do not react extremely negatively to non-white male protagonists. Part of being more inclusive and diverse strongly relates to rewriting "normal" into something that is not only ever one thing.
It is a lie for the characters, but I think it nevertheless presents an idealization of the world that is for itself as much as it is for tearing it down. I think that fundamentally building something up to tear it down is a somewhat flawed storytelling technique, as building it up always takes more time (and thus gets more screentime) than tearing it down. As a sudden system shock the technique can work, but it nevertheless presents a long period of time where the lie is what is presented as stable and safe, no matter how harmful. I'd say that tearing it down either needs as much screen time or more to actually truly strip the preconceived notion away. And that's... well, challenging, especially if the tear down is of something more monumental than ideological.
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It may just be my background in history that filters my interpretation of what most medieval fantasy settings are about.
But there still isn't anyone having the fantasy, and as such the trope doesn't apply. Otherwise we're expanding beyond the definition provided. Many protagonist feel direct or indirect influences from other individuals or forces and have to react in some way but that doesn't invoke the power fantasy trope. The character having a actual power fantasy, regardless of the outcome, invokes that trope. And the chosen undead/unkindled ash is never presented as having such a fantasy. Thus the trope is never invoked no matter what end choice is selected.
The player may be experiencing that trope by superimposing whatever struggles they have onto the situation in the game that they can to a degree control, but that has never been and will never be under the developers control.
I feel like the definition you chose doesn't suite the message you're trying to create, and as a result I can't pick out that message accurately either. You pointed to a trope of characters having a power fantasy and the ways in which that trope is used rather than simple a definition of a power fantasy itself and further seem to be using observations about the context in which that trope is frequently used as part of the trope itself.
Edit: Note sliding scale of idealism or cynicism is an independent trope evoked with or without the power fantasy trope rather than being dependent on it, allowing the player/character to come to a decision in the end without there being a power fantasy involved.
Sure, it's one thing to critique a default but it's another to call something an empowerment for a particular group because the protagonist happens to be of that group. It fundamentally associates character decisions with exclusion from those not of that group, making essentially the same complaint as the Rust players: "It's not for me because it doesn't feature me." IMHO reversing it doesn't make it more or less true.
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The player, or the chosen undead is having the fantasy, depending on your interpretation. It's one that is ultimately futile, but also one the player can take part in.
You seem to have this very pure idea of what a power fantasy is supposed to be, but I can't read your mind and for the last few posts all I've been doing is simply contextualizing Dark Souls as part of the power fantasy trope as presented by TVTropes. What you're saying is that in spite of those contexts it doesn't matter because that's not what a "real" power fantasy is. I'm sure that by your own understanding of what a power fantasy is, the chosen undead in Dark Souls doesn't meet it, but we're discussing a power fantasy as presented by TV Tropes. You've yet to deconstruct why it's not necessary to use the, I presume, agreed upon definition as presented, or why your own definition (which also hasn't been presented) is better.
It's really not a stretch to say it empowers one group and disempowers others. Designing a character to meet a certain visual standard is exclusionary of other visual standards. There's no way to escape that. If it wasn't an issue that changes the power dynamic people would not react in the manner they do whenever a protagonist isn't following what has been normalized.
I'm not sure what you mean by pure but a power fantasy should be as simple as having a fantasy about having power, plain and simple, or in the specific case of gaming as a player, something that provides the player with the illusion of having power. The souls games both mechanically and in the lore do not do this to the player character and by extension the player themselves. They want you to feel small in the face of the challenges ahead. The player can reclaim that sense of empowerment but it isn't reinforced by the game itself. The Tvtropes article is a problematic resource because it doesn't try to directly create a clear definition of a power fantasy, but rather the trope of having a power fantasy and does so in relation to other trope. When we're talking about a specific power fantasy and what qualifies it the definition is way too loose. I think that's demonstrated by the logic of working backwards from the Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism characterization of the end choices to say that it's a power fantasy while ignoring the fact that that isn't simply a mechanic of the power fantasy.
The power fantasy as the defined trope is the fantasy of empowerment as opposed to the actuality of empowerment or the reminder of struggle alone. It's the fantasy of power over that situation without immediate accompanying action. Especially within the protagonists context the fantasy of power isn't explicitly present. It's not so much that I'm rejecting your definition, I'm saying you aren't actually abiding by the definition you yourself provided. You're conflating things that aren't the power fantasy with the power fantasy, and then saying that even though the fantasy doesn't exist we're still in the power fantasy because we have cause and effect. That's horribly contrived logic that shoehorns every plot into a power fantasy because stimulus to which a character must respond is the broadest base that storytelling can get.
Yet you're reacting in the manner you are to the choice they made which is fundamentally the same, saying the choice is invalid because of what it happened to be. So then the conclusion is that any predefined protagonist is wrong and a shift in predefined protagonists simply moves the problem. Which is absurd.
One of the most classic definitions of politics, while informal, is about who gets, and who exercises, power. Like, it's right there in the name, and any story about the exercising of power is inherently political.
Also, the stimuli as per TVTropes are specific and not generic, and just because the definition contains other definitions doesn't mean it's void. A definition must by nature come with some context, so saying there's some world in which context-free definitions exist is ridiculous. Your own definition doesn't provide any explanation as to what a power fantasy is simply because it's defining itself by itself, which is like having a dictionary tell you a cat is a cat, rather than a feline mammal. Lastly, you keep calling part of the definition provided as a conflation, but your rebuttal is that, despite being part of the definition, it's not actually part of the definition. You keep explaining away the definition arbitrarily, with every piece of the argument looping around to how the definition isn't actually the definition, while attempting to supplant it with your own understanding.
Where are you getting this from? I never said the choice was invalid, I stated it was exclusionary, which it is. I didn't say it's inherently a negative just that, you know, a defined character comes with a certain politic as a result of exclusion. You are twisting my words to the extreme.
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I've been lazing around and reading the discussion as I believe that esserius is more eloquent than I am and able to say what I would wish to in a more succinct way that doesn't feel perfunctory, which is my problem.
That's my problem. I don't know how to talk to people, really. What I can do, however, is spot when something is disingenuous or manipulative. This was indeed putting words in esserius's mouth as he was talking about exclusionary. Whereas, unfortunately, you've been playing what I call semantics bingo. If a person spends their entire argument hung up on semantics, I feel inclined to think they may not have an argument in the first place.
Semantics is what you do when you don't have an argument, basically.
Esserius has been talking with you in good faith, which is what I initially did. I have to raise caution at this, though, because this is where it steps into territory that needs to be highlighted. This is, basically, silliness. You called it absurd, because it certainly, indubitably is absurd.
But you're the one saying the absurd thing, that has no bearing on the current discussion at hand.
So I'm just wondering, here... What's the angle? Why argue without an argument? I'm really not a fan of semantics bingo.
If semantics bingo is happening, there's usually an angle.
So, here's what I think: You're using semantics to cover up a deep-seated belief that you don't think that the exclusionary attitudes of video games should be challenged. So I'll put it that way.
That's what the discussion should be about.
There are exclusionary, dismissive attitudes afoot in video games. Such as perverted cameras, mistreatment of ethnicities, and even hate speech in some cases (the treatment of autistic people in Dreamfall Chapters et al, as I've brought up elsewhere on this forum).
Do you not believe that there are exclusionary attitudes involved in video game development?
If you do believe that they exist, why try to obfuscate that with semantics-based arguments?
If you don't believe that, how do you respond to the lack of reasonable coverage of women, minorities, and the disabled in video games? That it's a 'poor medium' doesn't cut it as an argument, which I pointed out prior, as that argument didn't fly with films when it was brought up decades ago just as it doesn't fly with video games.
I think there's a simpler truth, here.
You don't want to be taken out of your comfort zone. You're protecting it. I think that's understandable. I see that behaviour from people who seem to have a lack of effective empathy, who can only rely on cognitive empathy to learn the kind of unfair situations other people experience.
If you're not relying on effective empathy, if you can't see things from the other side, you're going to perceive this as us trying to take something from you. In this case, your comfort zone. I'm not going to beat around the bush, here. I learned the folly of that when debating the Alt-Right in the past. It's important to be upfront and challenge things as I see them.
The fact is is that you are relying on semantics bingo and this argument will just go around and around and around ad nauseum. We'll be tossing definitions back and forth because this is basically a filibuster rather than a genuinely respectful discussion.
I don't like that.
The benefit of the doubt really ends with semantics bingo.
And if I'm wrong, which I'm completely open to, then why are you relying on semantics to sustain a faux argument? The fact is is that esserius has been talking about exclusionary, dismissive behaviour in video games development and it's really manipulative to twist that into "everything is invalid, there are no right answers."
Why do that?
As I said, I've spent a long while talking with groups like the Alt-Right and I've become a bit familiar with certain debate tactics. Including semantics bingo. So I had to step in here and say something. Sorry if I'm stepping on anyone's toes.
The games in question, the souls games for this part of the topic, allow everyone to exercise the power it lends to the protagonist while thematically not excluding anyone. But the theme itself is not inherently about empowerment. Also again you're mistaken about the counter argument. Some parts of the context are used to define the trope while others the context in which the trope might be used. For an example of a power fantasy fitting the trope in fiction there is the movie "nick of time" in which there is a scene where the protagonist guns down the individuals manipulating him only to reveal it's just in his head as he's being physically overpowered. That's what this trope looks like. That's what the actual trope is defined as. The Tv tropes page doesn't stop at defining the trope, it also states how it might interact with other tropes. You're taking those statements of interaction with other tropes as part of the definition as well, like you're statement that Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism being invokes justifies classification of this as a power fantasy, but then why does that tropes definition not state or even imply dependence upon or direct relationship with the power fantasy trope?
You're conflating context with definition from a site that provides both, not just the latter.
Edit: Look at the examples in the tropes page itself. They're all dreams or imaginings from the characters themselves. The souls games do not have that.
And no, a fantasy about power is a definition reliant on defining power and fantasy separately, with power being control or authority over a situation or person or group of persons; a fantasy being the conscious an imagining of a situation or scenario differing from ones current reality in some way and a power fantasy being a fantasy about power, or combining their definitions: A conscious imagining of a scenario in which one has control or authority over a situation, person or group people that doesn't reflect the reality of that persons ability or authority. With all terms defined that should address any accusations of cyclic definitions. The reason I left it simple prior was for brevity and the assumption that those words could carry their own definition by the commonality of their use and understanding, but if a more direct definition is desired, it's now presented.
By saying the choice creates a white male fantasy you're prescribing a sociopolitical stance of exclusion to it on top of the insinuation that another racial/national/gender combination having the same fantasy would need to look somehow different with the apparent reasoning that if it didn't they would have chosen something other than white male. For the purpose of this conversation, exclusion isn't a valid stance, thus I said you're calling the choice invalid which for that statement simply means specifically exclusionary.
If semantics is wrong then the conversation about whether something qualifies as a white male power fantasy cannot occur unless both parties happen to perfectly agree on what that entails. We clearly don't in this discussion. In which case the claim becomes unassailable because we can't hash out what the term means, which is fundamentally a semantic argument, yes, but one that the rest of the conversation hinges upon.
If someone thinks someone else isn't using a term right to describe something, hashing out the use and definition of that term is essential to coming to an understanding, and the only other alternative is to not come to that understanding and not having the conversation.
Perhaps to you this isn't a point worth discussing, to me it quite clearly is and continues to be despite your judgement of the validity of the approach or your assessment of good faith. I think being specific and well reasoned about what an issue is when it comes to something like this is important and at times yes, that's going to boil down to semantics.
But even on the points I don't myself find particularly interesting or relevant I don't presume to say they aren't important or are non arguments. Esserius and I clearly have a different way of processing this factually. If you can't see me expressing my point as anything but semantic and disingenuous I'm not sure how to help you there.
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Oof, doing Steam discovery queues. I notice myself cringing constantly with these games, I was just greeted by Fate/EXTELLA. This is getting so bad that I'm being very wary of everything with "anime aesthetic" even before seeing any ridiculous, over the top designs. What is even the point of having any clothes with these designs? They cover almost nothing, offer no functionality, just would seem like a hindrance to wear something like that. Why does she dress like this?
Oof, doing Steam discovery queues. I notice myself cringing constantly with these games, I was just greeted by Fate/EXTELLA. This is getting so bad that I'm being very wary of everything with "anime aesthetic" even before seeing any ridiculous, over the top designs. What is even the point of having any clothes with these designs? They cover almost nothing, offer no functionality, just would seem like a hindrance to wear something like that. Why does she dress like this?
Well, the original Fate/stay night was an adult (means hentai) Visual Novel, and you can still clearly see the roots in the newer games.
Oh, well that's a simple explanation. I might have put too much thought into it =) Sometimes I really regret buying and playing Bayonetta. Seems like because of that Steam has entirely wrong impression of what kind of games I want to play =D It pops up constantly in "similar to games you've played" with these hentai recommendations.
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You can fix this to some degree by creating a focused wishlist, since Steam's system seems to take from those first and recommend based on those before other stuff it might have in the system.
Hmm, I have a wishlist of 162 games and I think I have only one game there that has the tag nudity or sexual content and I actually just added it today after I encountered Fate/EXTELLA and others similar to it. It was Leisure Suit Larry 7, which seemed to be added into Steam few days ago.
Edit: On a closer look it seems that Tales of Berseria and Nier Automata also have atleast one of those tags. I'm not really against sexual content and nudity either, it's all about how it's done and what it's part is in the game. So I don't think it helps to filter out those tags either. But I think it's safe to remove Berseria from my wishlist, probably never playing that.
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...*sigh*
Nice for the arms to come together in a motion to emphasize the chest. >.>
Though Takeiuchi's designs in the original VN were nowhere near as bad as the spin off artists stuff from this post eroge era.
I'm so fucking sick of the "well if we're gonna criticize sexualized female characters in video games we might as well criticize violence in video games, and we all know that's just ridiculous!!". No we don't, because that's also a valid conversation that we should be having, and fuck Jack Thompson for ruining that conversation forever.
fuck Nintendo too
fuck Nintendo too
Now I played over 200 hours to XC2 I'll be honest : it's less outrageous I thought in aesthetics because I focus something else in combat (that's when you see those girls the most) BUT in so many cutscenes, Pyra is simply disgusting (and few others, but she is the worst by far). Its not only her outfit, it's all her over shy/ protect me attitude, the way she poses, the way she moves, and even her hypocrite lines about... decency (I didn't laugh at all).
So it still ruined the game for me. That's not why I play to a Xenoblade. It's not the worst flaw of this game in my point of view, but for real, I fear more fan service in the future because of its success.
So it still ruined the game for me. That's not why I play to a Xenoblade. It's not the worst flaw of this game in my point of view, but for real, I fear more fan service in the future because of its success.
I think there was a comment in the other thread regarding the official comment regarding the rear of the figurine was praising the detail of the her shoes. If so, yeah, that's totally what collectors are looking for here...
Seeing this figure though made me wonder something. What WILL they do for the next Smash game? While Rex/Pyra aren't total shoo ins. I have the feeling they'll at LEAST be trophies. Will they be slightly redesigned ala Corrin to keep the all ages rating intact or will they be omitted entirely ala Tharja. I have the feeling "fans" are going to be upset either way. But man what a bad position Sakurai and the dev team must be in.
Same here, man :/ I feel the exact same way.
It's very common for figure-makers to make the chests much larger. I wonder if Nintendo will go down that route.
Didn't Jack take the argument to its logical conclusion? If one believes that harmful media should be banned and that games/rap are harmful media... seems like a clear cut way of thinking.
Yeah, it reeks of the "noble savage".
Didn't Jack take the argument to its logical conclusion? If one believes that harmful media should be banned and that games/rap are harmful media... seems like a clear cut way of thinking.
Yeah, it reeks of the "noble savage".
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