product: toys/games

Katrin sent us a link to a image at GOOD that illustrates the geopolitics of first-person shooter video games. The image was created by a group at Complex to illustrate the way that the changing actual political landscape can be seen in the nationality of villains in video games. Peter Rubin, of Complex, explains, “Gone are the days of all FPSes being either World War II or sci-fi; in the new milennium, developers are on the hunt for enemies that are speculative but still plausible.”

They looked at 20 FPS games from the past decade (unfortunately, they give no details about how those 20 games were chosen

The selected titles:

Return to Castle Wolfenstein (2001): Germany
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Desert Siege (2002): Ethiopia
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Island Thunder (2003): Cuba
Delta Force: Black Hawk Down (2003): Somalia
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Jungle Storm (2004): Colombia
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon 2 (2004): North Korea
Joint Operations: Typhoon Rising (2004): Indonesia
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon 2: Summit Strike (2005): Afghanistan
Delta Force Xtreme (2005): Chad
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter (2006): Mexico
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007): Russia/Afghanistan
Army of Two (2008): Somalia/Afghanistan/China/Iraq
Frontlines: Fuel of War (2008): Russia/China
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009): Russia/Afghanistan/Brazil
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising (2009): China/Russia
Singularity (2010): Russia
MAG (2010): Russia/China/India
Army of Two: The 40th Day (2010): China
Homefront (2011): Korea (They don’t specify if it’s North or South Korea)
Operation Flashpoint: Red River (2011): China

Anyway, it provides a nice little illustration of the way that global politics seeps into this element of pop culture, as well as a snapshot of nations currently perceived as rivals or even enemies of the U.S. — a mixture of old tensions (Russia, Germany), ongoing anxiety about China, and emerging focal points.

Leslee Beldotti sent in this 7-minute video from The Escapist that discusses female characters in video games and how game developers could incorporate women as complex characters rather than stereotypes. Leslee points out that the video somewhat conflates sex with gender in the discussion of biological vs. social behaviors, but it highlights the outcomes of making video games through a gendered lens (sorry about the 30-second intro ad):

On this topic, also see Lisa’s recent post on boob inflation in video games.

Lindsey V., who recently sent in the excellent film clip in which “scientists” “tested” gendered battle gear, also sent us a link to images showing that the breast size of two video game characters — “Ivy” from “Soul Caliber” and, to a lesser extent, Lara Croft from “Tomb Raider” — have increased over time (source).

Ivy:

Lara Croft:

What might drive their ever-inflating breasts?

Speaking in terms of advertising, Sut Jhally wrote that advertisers must:

…now worry about clutter and noise. That is, how do you make your ads stand out from the [5,000] commercial impressions that people are exposed to [every day].  So if you’re Pepsi, you’re not just competing with Coke anymore. You’re competing with every other advertiser who wants our attention. As advertising takes over more and more space in the culture, the job of the individual advertiser gets harder and harder.

Martin Barron and Michael Kimmel make a similar argument about the rise of “extreme” and violent sexual acts in pornography.  The increase in the sheer amount of porn that emerged with the Internet has created a competitive market in which “sexual victimization of women is a currency” (p. 350).  You have to get noticed somehow.

So, insofar as this boob inflation is a trend, we may be able to explain it, at least in part, with the greater number of cultural products.  Proliferation creates conditions in which each one has to up the ante to “stand out” against the “clutter and noise.”

Sources:

• Barron, M., & Kimmel, M.S. (2010).  Sexual violence in three pornographic media. Journal of Sex Research, 37, 161-169.
• Jhally, S. (2000). Advertising at the edge of the apocalypse. In Anderson, R., & Strate, L., Eds. Critical studies in media commercialism. New York: Oxford University Press, 27-39.

Thanks also to Caroline Heldman; I borrowed some of the text in this post from a forthcoming co-authored essay.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Melissa sent in a trailer for the video game, inFAMOUS2.  The game features a white male protagonist who is advised by a bad influence and a good influence.  Melissa notes that these are a black woman dressed skimpily and a white woman dressed (relatively) modestly, respectively.  So here we have, again, an affirmation that black is bad and white is good.

Screenshot:

Trailer (2 minutes):

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Joanna S. sent us a link to an application designed by Jonathan McIntosh where one can “re-mix” toy commercials aimed at boys versus girls.  You choose the visuals of one and the sounds of another, and have fun watching the wackiness.  We can’t embed the fun results, but you might enjoy visiting and playing a few for fun.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

If you are alive these days, and not already part of the undead masses yourself, you probably have noticed a staggering increase of zombie references in film, television, pop culture, videogames and the internet.

For instance, the big screen and small screen have both hosted a plethora of zombie films, e.g., 28 Days Later (2002), Shaun of the Dead (2004), and I Am Legend (2007). On television, we have seen the recent success of AMC’s The Walking Dead. And if you are on a college campus, you have probably seen undergraduates playing “Zombies Vs. Humans,” a game of tag in which “human” players must defend against the horde of “zombie” players by “stunning” them with Nerf weapons and tube socks. In videogames, we have seen the success of the Resident Evil franchise, Left 4 Dead, and Dead Rising. Finally, the internet is awash with zombie culture. From viral videos of penitentiary inmates dancing to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” to post-apocalyptic zombie societies, fansites, and blogs.

But what is the zombie and where does it come from?

What makes the zombie unique from other movie monsters is its unique place of origin. Whereas Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Wolfman all have ties to the Gothic literary tradition, the zombie stands apart in having a relatively recent (and proximal) origin. Theorists of zombie culture (such as Kyle Bishop or Jamie Russell), attribute the origin of the zombie to Haitian folklore and the hybrid religion of voodoo. But the zombie didn’t make its away into American culture until the 1920s and 30s, when sensationalist travel narratives were popular with Western readers. Specifically, W.B. Seabrook’s book The Magic Island, is often credited as the first popular text to describe the Haitian zombie. Additionally, the work of Zora Neale Hurston (specifically her 1937 book Tell My Horse) explores the folklore surrounding the zombie in Haitian mythology.

(Still from I Walked with a Zombie, 1943)

With the development of the motion picture, the zombie became a staple of horror, and a popular movie monster. The zombies of White Zombie (1932), Revolt of the Zombies (1936), King of the Zombies (1941), and I Walked with a Zombie (1943), however, were not the cannibalistic creatures we now know. These zombies were people put under a spell, the spell of voodoo and mystical tradition. In these films, the true terror is not be being killed by zombies, but of becoming a zombie oneself.

Bela Lugosi as ‘Murder’ Legendre, the mad scientist and his zombie slave:

What all these films have in common is their depiction of Voodoo and Haitian culture more generally as dangerous, menacing, and superstitious. Those who study colonial history note that the messages contained in these films present stereotyped versions of Haitian culture aimed largely at satisfying a predominantly white audience. Many of these films also contain an all white cast, with several members in blackface serving as comedic relief for the more “serious” scenes.

It’s interesting to see how the zombie has morphed into the cannibalistic creatures we now know. While the original zombie is a powerful metaphor for fears of the non-white Other and reverse colonization, the contemporary zombie largely reflects contemporary fears of loss of individuality, the excesses of consumer capitalism, environmental degradation, the excesses of science and technology, and fears of global terrorism (especially more recent renditions of the zombie post-9/11).

For instance, George A. Romero’s famous Night of the Living Dead (1968), the first film to feature the flesh-eating zombie, is often remarked as a not-so-subtle allegory to the Civil Rights Era and the militant violence perpetuated by Southern states against the Black protestors, as well as a critique of the Vietnam War. Romero himself has stated that he wanted to draw attention to the war through the images of violence contained in the film.

Cannibal zombies in Night of the Living Dead (1968):

Similarly, the Italian zombie horror film Let Sleeping Corpses Lie (1974) reflects fears of environmental degradation and pollution. In this film, the zombie epidemic is caused by an experimental pest-control machine, which sends radio waves into the ground. Although it solves the local pest problem for farmers, it also reanimates the dead in a nearby cemetery.

Zombie consumers in Romero’s second zombie flick Dawn of the Dead (1978):

Later zombies are used to symbolize the excesses of capitalism and militarism, respectively.  For example, in 28 Weeks Later (2007), we see the decay of social structures across the globe, as institutions that are supposed to protect us inevitably fail to do their job.  In this scene, protagonists attempt to escape the city just before the military firebombs it:

As we can see, the zombie has a unique cultural history and serves as a powerful metaphor for social anxieties. This movie monster might have come out of the Caribbean, but it became a powerful representation of modern fears when it met the silver screen. Perhaps the current failure of global social structures (global terrorism, environmental catastrophes, and the current economic downturn) has prompted the most recent “Zombie Renaissance.” Or maybe we are just gluttons for the “everyman” tales contained in each rendition of the zombie apocalypse, a point made by SocProf several months back. I do not know what the future holds, but one thing is certain: the zombie will continue to haunt us from beyond the grave.

David Paul Strohecker is getting his PhD in Sociology at the University of Maryland. He studies cultural sociology, theory, and intersectionality. He is currently working on a larger project about the cultural history of the zombie in film.

Following up on our cartoon poking fun at the skimpiness of battle gear for women, Lindsey V. sent in a considerably-humorous skit in which two great sports are dressed in the sexy outfits of two genuine-video-game-characters and set to battle.  Hijinks and wardrobe malfunctions insue:

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

In a previous post I discussed A. J. Patrick Liszkiewicz’s suggestion that we play Farmville because we’re polite. Farmville, he argues, is a cooperative game; one needs help from others to get very far.  So you are invited to play by friends, entreated to assist them, and given gifts to encourage your participation.  The game “entangles users in a web of social obligations,” to the point where not playing would be rude or signal an effort to distance oneself from your friends who play.

Well Farmville is old news. Cityville was launched on November 18th, 2010.  Within 24 hours it had 290,000 players.  Within one month it had 84 million players, exceeding the total number playing Farmville, previously the most popular web-based game ever.  Today, more than 100 million people play Cityville.  And I’m one of them.

Well not really.  Bored on a plane flight over the holidays and enjoying free wifi on the plane, I decided to check it out.  And, despite expecting that there was a highly social dimension to the game, I was amazed — ah-mazed — at the pace at which Cityville asked me to publicize my participation and get others to join.  Below are the kinds of entreaties I received every 20 seconds or so.

Each time I achieved a “goal” Cityville suggested that I tell everyone and share coins with friends.  Sometimes Cityville would suggest that I get friends “started” by sending them gifts or help them with a city they’ve already got. It also suggested that I add neighbors and populate my own city with my friends in various roles. You can also visit your friends’ cities, help them out (e.g., harvest for them), or own businesses in their cities.  All of this earns both of you points of various kinds. In fact, Cityville would only let me do certain things if my friends helped me do them. Cityville also told me which of my friends were playing.

Then, despite having at no time clicking on “share” anything, Facebook put the news that I was playing Cityville on my wall (it was probably in the “I agree” contract at the very beginning).  Gwen was predictably surprised:

Finally, after about a week, Cityville got directly into my email inbox to tempt me to play again with FREE CASH!.

So there you have it. Cityville implores, pleads, begs, insists, threatens, and cajoles the user into getting their friends involved. It’s an insidious social network parasite… and it’s contagious…

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.