In response to “Love Triangle” from The Escapist Forum: Psssh. What? Do you all honestly believe the story of “Beauty and the Beast” became popular because a bunch of GUYS liked it?? This has been going on for centuries. It’s a desire to find something wild and tame it. A pretty common fantasy, really.
I found the article’s grounding in scholarly research to really help strengthen this point though, which is good. I love how Escapist articles in general give thoughtful consideration to the subjects they take on.
Kudos to the Escapist for writing and, more importantly, researching such a thought-provoking, controversial article. Also, kudos to the majority of commenters for their reasonable, thought-out commentary.
Yes, rape fantasies (keyword being ‘fantasies’ – no woman I know wants to be raped) are pretty common among women, as is the fantasy of being ravished by anonymous partners. In that context, the attraction to Pyramid Head in spite of, or because of his ‘thrilling headgear’ makes more sense.
There’s a lot of truth to women wanting to ‘tame the bad boy’, but I wonder if women just want the bad boy as-is. In general, women are held to a stricter moral code than men are. Men, by and large, are encouraged to lose their virginity as soon as possible and to have as many partners as possible. Women, however, are denigrated as sluts if they do the same. I feel that in a society that insists women put their sexual desires on lockdown and subjects women to such moral scrutiny, women will use sexuality to rebel, in the most controversial way possible. So by society’s definition, women (or should I say nice women?) aren’t supposed to be overtly sexual or enjoy violence; which is why Pyramid Head makes for great fantasy fodder for these few women.
Please bear in mind, I’m no scholar – this is just my armchair theorizing.
Also, in a world where tentacle rape enjoys an audience, is a woman’s attraction to Pyramid Head so horrible?
– Jetbaby
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In response to “Endless Snow Day” from The Escapist Forum: The economic worries sound pretty much exactly like the ones described by Sean Malstrom. That the costs run up too high, that growth stagnates because of a lack of audience expansion, that the large companies will be too inflexible to change in time, that the disruption will roll through and destroy a whole lot. However his conclusion differs from yours. Subsidizing the core games with the money from the new market games is bad business, it’s throwing good money after bad. A worthwile investment doesn’t NEED subsidies, at most it needs a loan if you don’t have enough money in the bank yet. A recession amplifies the problems of uncompetitive investments (Malstrom claims a recession hurts mostly the disrupted industries, i.e. those who are in the process of being obsoleted by a new industry like the newspaper is being disrupted by the internet news) and thus increases the damage the disruption does to the incumbents.
There is no way to save core gaming as it is now, let it die and start anew. Let it die along with its B-movie plots, quicktime events, zero difficulty, almost black and white graphical design, excessive violence, DLC, narcism and 600$ consoles. Let the apocalypse happen. This has been foreseen, it is the inevitable end of gaming as we know it. Yet it is not the end of gaming itself, gaming will be reborn in a new form although many companies will have to die on the way.
– KDR_11k
There’s an incoming demographic of young teenagers who have grown up with high-speed internet, stunning graphic, powerful computers and all that kind of thing, and (hopefully) will start to look for something else. I’m talking about the illusive “depth”. Stories which sink hooks into the player’s abdomen and yank. Emotive characters, be they players or NPCs in whom effort has obviously been invested.
I’d like to see this happen. Graphics may keep improving but it’s not really an exponential curve for them. I can see it getting to a point where there’s no-where left to go, and we’re staring at screens which would give Salvador Dali shivers. It’s only fair to the graphics department to equal their effort.
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In response to “A Tale of Two Fan Sites” from The Escapist Forum: Gah, nothing is ever personal on the internet. I don’t say that to people because it’s true, it’s because it’s that or go insane.
The problem is that because all of these interactions are going on in your head it’s easy to lose all perspective on a situation. 9 times out of 10 if I said something that upset someone, I’d sense it immediately and make some joke or apology to show that, although I said something rude, I don’t mean it as some kind of deep personal insult. I’m pissed, or tired, or I’m in a loud cafe, etc.
The first impulse to this is to just assume everyone is an asshole but that can only work for so long. You start to recognize people and the relationship (which is still entirely in your head) continues to evolve until they do something that offends you. And that’s the moment of truth for the interwebs: do you take it personally or do you brush it off?
I try to ground myself when I can but it gets harder the deeper you get. Sometimes you just have to turn it off and remind yourself of the world outside your own brain.
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In response to “The Gloom Box” from The Escapist Forum: That’s all very pseudo-scientific, but the correlation between television watching and depression doesn’t suggest causation and the link to advertising seems totally outside the scope of the research. Judging by what’s described in the article, blaming depression on advertising seems to be pure speculation.
The correlation between increased hours of television viewing and depression is not surprising because it’s predictable; what would be surprising would be if depressed people didn’t watch more television. For a person suffering depression, any active task can be unbearably difficult; severe depression can prevent a person from even getting out of bed. Focusing your mind on a game could be too difficult for someone in the midst of depression. Watching television, on the other hand, is a perfect anaesthetic because, as the doctor said, it allows you to switch off your mind. When your mind is full of pain, switching it off is exactly what you want to do.
For all we know, television might cause depression, but applying Ockham’s razor to the results of this study makes it seem unlikely: watching television wouldn’t have to cause depression to be linked to it.
Did they control for parental and social involvement? People who don’t interact do tend to be depressed and seek nonsocial interests. In 1900’s it would be books. Now it’s TV. So is it the TV that causes depression, or the lack of social interaction? Let’s not jump to conclusions here.
Did you know that genocide occurs in countries with very little video game penetration? Therefore, video games cure genocide. Really, though, it’s other factors such as political and speech freedom, economic and personal security, governmental trustworthiness, and social attitudes that drive both inter-ethnic peace AND video game penetration.
I suspect the same is true with TV watching and depression. Depressed people often have given up on social interaction and feel that they have little energy. TV provides a non-activity that would naturally attract them.
– Veylon
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In response to “And the Winner Is …” from The Escapist Forum: I hope that this trend of aspiration in gaming towards film doesn’t continue. There are too many fundamental differences between the mediums for a blind “progression” to be “successful”, even if we wanted it to be so.
As Labyrinth touched on, the issue of story in games in an interesting one, but it’s by no means integral to all games. When I read what Rahimi said it shocked me. If for nothing else than the fact that some games already do tell, and have told, ‘stories that are “as compelling, insightful and influential as any film, TV show, painting, album or novel”‘.
And on top of this, going back to the idea of games and film being fundamentally different, reviewing and critiquing games can never be created or received in the same way as the equivalent in film; the base reason for this existing in the person’s active role in gaming, and the person’s passive role in film watching. While people may pick up on different things in a film, they are ultimately given the same object to analyse and appreciate, after two hours they’re done. With a game, people may play it for different periods of time – for hours, days, months (both non-stop and as part of a person’s life) – they may complete it or be distracted by other aspects of the game; each experience is different, and more because of the person than the game.
I’m pretty sure that I had more to say, but hunger has overtaken it and my food is now cooked. I hope that my point is relatively clear.
– Xelanath
