Video games &Representation

MAC129 - Cyberculture

Economic success: GTA IV

Released April 2008 Day 1 sales: 3.6 million

($310m) Week 1 sales: 6 million

(£500m)

August 2008 Sales: 10 million

June 2009 Sales: 13.2 millionSource:

http://www.vgchartz.com/games/index.php?name=grand+theft+auto+IV

http://vgchartz.com/worldtotals.php?name=&console=&publisher=&genre=&minSales=10&results=25&sort=Total

Historical business A struggle to define a place for

early games (see Marvin, 1988; Poole, 2004)

Historical accounts tend to be lists of names and dates

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First game?

Spacewar! 1962 (Steven Russell)

Tennis For Two 1958 (William Higginbotham)

Cold War kids1950s…. Emerged during a period of intense socio-

economic and geo-political changes: Space Race (USSR) Cold War paranoia (nuclear anxiety) Decline of heavy industry Major changes in life style Advent of domestic mass communication Consumer confidence

Game development… Largely due to

“university computing departments, the military, the interest of the first game developers, the first games and the subsequent development of game playing as an activity embraced largely by young males” (Kerr, 2006: 14; see also Haddon, 1988; 1993)

The console wars http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Console_wars

The console wars today

25.1

53.6

32.5

Sales (millions)

PS3WiiXbox 360

Popular claims about video games Negative associations – health and violence

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCuKQIMg0I4

Columbine shooting: Doom http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1295920.stm

Car-jacking: Grand Theft Auto http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/3680481.stm

Stabbings: Manhunt http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3936237.stm

(Un)popular claims about video games Positive claims?

Surgeons who played games for at least 3 hours a week made ‘37% fewer errors, were 27% faster’ than surgeons who did not play games. (Hall, 2007)

Safe environment to enact fantasy

Creativity of ‘modders’

Games emerge from a cultural context

US military funding? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHLJ

_hZt2ds

Always a ‘politics’ in every representation Representations are never innocent.

Representations are always a ‘construction’ in accordance with the producer’s politics.

Representation and race Black culture as

animalistic, subservient, sexual, violent and dangerous

Resident Evil 5 Race Row

Representations of gender 1950s Women as

domestic, maternal, naïve, consumers, etc

http://www.feministgamers.com/?p=466

http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2008/07/i-write-letters.html

http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2008/07/23/well-that-was-bound-to-happen/

Representation of gender Feminist critics have argued that many media texts

represent women as: Sex objects Dutiful housewives / virginal daughters Mad, bad, dangerous women who need punishment

Are video games any different? Jiggle physics? http://archive.gamespy.com/fargo/january02/jiggle/

See also: ‘Top 10 Boobies in Video Games’ ‘Sexy Video Game Babes’

Game design Studies of digital games have noted a

‘consistent pattern of male technocratic privilege’ Williams, cited in Kerr, 2006: 19

Game development & design, production, marketing & construction, dominated by heterosexual masculine fantasies Gansmo et al, 2003

Gender in games Traditional stereotype of femininity evoked

Relationships Romance Emotions Role-play

Gansmo (2003): little understanding within the industry about how game design might be linked to gender socialisation

Consequences of stereotypes… Games are a ‘prime example of the social

construction of gender’ (Cassell and Jenkins, 1998: 37) and they may significantly influence people’s attitudes towards the use of computers in school or later career choices

Women do play games!? Funk (1993):

75% of females play games at home (90% males) Colwell and Payne (2000):

88% of females aged 12-14 play games regularly ESA (2004):

39% of US gamers are female and females account for 40% of online players.

Krotoski (2004): approx 25% of gamers are female in Europe, compared to

70% in Korea Crawford & Gosling (2005):

Women much less likely to play the older they get

Alexanda (2009): Female console gamers grew from 23 to 28 percent in 2009

25

Krotoski, 2004: 10

The Wii and women? ‘Nintendo's Wii console captures new game

market’ John Sterlicchi, Oct 2007 http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/oct/10/u

snews.internationalnews

Domestic access Access to gadgets in home is not gender

neutral Highly masculine and potentially hostile to

females Is this changing?

www.girlzclan.com www.everground.com www.girlgamer.com http://female-gamer.com/

Domestic context Space

a greater percentage of girls’ play has been centred in or around the home

Time females still spend more time engaged in

domestic labour than males (typically 1.5 hours per day more than males in the UK)

Gaming spaces outside the home Predominantly masculine

environments arcades, pubs, motorway service

stations

Women at LAN parties tend to be in a supportive role

When they do compete the media portrays them as: Exotic Sexualised

Game content Relatively low number of playable female

characters Abundance of stereotypes Masculine themes

The damsel in distress?

Positive moves? 1991: Nintendo release Barbie Game Girl

for Game Boy 1996: Mattel release Barbie Fashion

Designer 2000: The Sims 2003: Linden Research launches Second

Life 2004: The Sims 2 2004: SCEEurope release karaoke title

SingStar on PS2 2006: Sony launches pink PS2 and PSP 2006: Cooking Mama released 2008: Wii Fit released

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Children Now study (2000) 92% games have a male lead (54% female)

50% women portrayed in a stereotypical way.

38% displayed women with significant body exposure (23% breasts; 31% thighs; 15% backsides; 31% stomachs/midriffs)

Female characters defined by ‘disproportionately large’ breasts (38%) and ‘excessively tiny’ waists (46%)

See: http://www.remedialthoughts.com/2008/11/can-women-in-games-ever-be-more-than.html

Positive figures?

Conclusion History of games has been male dominated

Industry can be conservative and not welcome change (can be risky)

Women increasingly more important to the industry

Positive changes ahead?

Sources and further reading Leigh Alexander, 2009, ‘NPD: Female Gamer Population Increasing On Consoles’, Gamasutra,

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=24245 Jo Bryce & Jason Rutter, 2003, ‘Gender dynamics and the social and spatial organisation of

computer gaming’, Leisure Studies, 22: 1-15 Jo Bryce, Jason Rutter and Cath Sullivan, 2006, ‘Digital games and gender’, in Jason Rutter & Jo

Bryce (eds.), Understanding Digital Games, London: Sage. Judith Butler, 1990, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, London: Routledge. Children Now, 2000, Girls and Gaming: A Console Video Game Content Analysis, Oakland, CA:

Children Now J. Colwell & J. Payne, 2000, ‘Negative correlates of computer game play in adolescents’, British

Journal of Psychology, 91: 295-310. G. Crawford & V. Gosling, 2005, ‘Toys for boys? Women’s marginalization and participation as

digital gamers’, Sociological Research Online, 10, (1), http://www.socresonline.org.uk/10/1/crawford.html

T.L. Dietz, 1998, ‘An Examination of violence and gender role portrayals in video games’, Sex Roles, 38 (5-6): 425-42

J. B. Funk, 1993, ‘Re-evaluating the impact of computer games’, Clinical Paediatrics, 32: 86-90 Aleks Krotoski, 2004, ‘Chicks and joysticks: an exploration of women and gaming’, ELSPA white

paper, http://www.elspa.com/assets/files/c/chicksandjoysticksanexplorationofwomenandgaming_176.pdf

Carolyn Marvin, 1988, When Old Technologies Were New. Thinking about Electric Communication in the Late Nineteenth Century, New York: Oxford University Press

Steven Poole, 2000, Trigger Happy: the inner life of videogames, London: Fourth Estate Steven Poole, 2004, Trigger Happy: videogames and the entertainment revolution, New York:

Arcade Publishing G. R. Schott & K.R. Horrell, 2000, ‘Girl gamers and their relationship with the gaming culture’

Convergence, 6: 36-53