Cultivation Effects and Body Image in Gaming

I have to admit there are some beautiful characters in video games.  Not only do they look great but if they were any more photo-realistic and good-looking I might just develop a complex.  The men and women running around saving the nation/world/galaxy from evil are not only fearless, but the finest physical specimens you will ever see.  And that’s a shame.  In a media world where so many of the people we see have atypical body types we find that even our games display this skewed notion of what is beautiful.

The ever-sexy Lara Croft is the standard for female action stars.

Do you remember when the first Tomb Raider came out?  There was a large outcry over Lara Croft.  Simply put, she had very large breasts and a tiny waist.  She was agile as a cat and mean with a shotgun.  Over the years her body has come more in line with the rest of the (real) female world but if you look at her last major release, Tomb Raider Underworld, it’s clear she remains (nearly) as curvaceous and sexy as ever.

Kendra Daniels is smart and sexy, but still a shallow character.

Croft is far from alone.  Many main and secondary game characters all exhibit this same notion of what is beautiful.  When I first played Dead Space, I found myself spending way too much time staring at Kendra Daniels.  Darn EA (the publisher) for putting such a beautiful, and distracting, character in the game! There is an up side however to having so many characters in this category: more content is now available for study.

COG soldier Marcus Fenix from Gears of War

Thanks to this notion of body image and its effects on media consumers, there is quite a bit of research in mass media texts on this subject and rightly so.  However it’s not just the women. The male body image has also been distorted over the years and there seems to be a marriage of the over-aggressive male with the hyper-masculine body type. From a 7-foot tall Master Chief to an overly muscular Marcus Fenix, gamers know some of the greatest heroes in game lore by their physical attributes. Now as a mass media researcher, I have ask what effects, if any, these beautiful people have on gamers.  To put it another way: to what extent do these distorted images effect gamers perceptions of male and female bodies?

I am always cautious about using television theory for video games, but there have been a few studies involving cultivation theory and gaming that may be relevant to this discussion.  Simply put, cultivation theory says that heavy television views will begin to believe that the real world resembles the tv world.  Well, it is not quite that simple, but that is the gist of it.  Now this theory has been applied to violence, racial and gender stereotypes, and body image (to name a few).  The scant few studies available on cultivation and gaming have produced mixed results.  Some reveal minor cultivation in subjects while others only see the potential for it. And while I do not want to go into details about those studies here, I will offer some thoughts about this whole discussion.

First, does genre matter?  For television, cultivation theory asserts that all content carries the same messages.  What matters most is how much someone watches television. If we translate that to video games, then playing a shooter should be same as playing an adventure game.  Likewise, a role-playing game should have the same effect as a racing game.  To be honest, I am not sure if some sports games are applicable but I will table that thought for now.

Second, the intense, visceral experience of game play is such that many times, there is no time to observe much of the environment or characters because we get swept up in the action.  Gamers spend much of their time trying to “survive” in order to beat the level or finish the game.  If you have ever played a few minutes of any recent Call of Duty game, then you know what I mean. How much might the fact that I spend most of my time shooting or trying not to be shot play into or mitigate the possible effects of cultivation?

Call of Duty Black Ops. Is this character realistic enough for cultivation?

Third, I read where the uncanny valley may also diminish the effects of cultivation. The uncanny valley (as it relates to video games) is the notion that when game character models reach the point where they look human, people will notice the little things that are not human in them and be turned off.  However when the characters become human in all areas, then they are accepted again.  Conversely, if game characters only look somewhat human, it is their human qualities that make then endearing to consumers.  So do I need characters that are nearly human in order for cultivation to kick in?  Or is it the case that the inhuman appearance and qualities of these characters leads me away from thinking that the game world is like the real world?

Of course like any other theory, cultivation has its critics (I won’t get into all that here). However I think it is certainly worth while to explore this issue.  While race and violence may vary from genre to genre, it could very well be that body image could be the constant across genres. However consideration must also be given to the engrossing nature of game play, the uncanny valley, the aforementioned genres and other factors.

Commander Shepard Must Die – Again!

I read a blog by Greg Rucka the other week titled “On Reapers, Collectors, Being Called Shepard” and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.  As much as I love Mass Effect 2, I was having some issues with the rebirth of Commander Shepard.  Rucka’s article address many of those concerns, including the idea that there has to be some conversation involving Shepard and her rebirth (I usually play as FemShep and so I use the pronoun “she”).  I hope we get to experience that in ME3.

That is not my main issue, however.

Simply put, Commander Shepard needs to die.  Again.

Now I have played through ME2 four times, finished all the DLC, including “Lair of the Shadow Broker”, and I will argue to anyone who will listen that it is the best game ever.  And yet I can’t escape the notion that because of the way Shepard came back that she should not survive the end of the trilogy.

Perhaps if she had come back to life through more divine means I might have been able to accept this second chance at life.  If God or gods or aliens with fantastic powers (ala Q in Star Trek) were responsible, then perhaps I could suspend my disbelief and play in peace.  This sort of thing happens in graphic novels all the time.  (Jean Grey and Betsy Braddock in X-Men come to mind.) Perhaps I might even have been okay if Shepard had been revived by technology a few moments after her death (a crutch in Star Trek The Next Generation and Voyager).  However in ME2 two years pass between her death and rebirth. Even with the advanced technology available to Miranda Lawson and the Illusive Man, I wonder if I got the same Shepard, my Shepard, back just the way she was before.

In my latest play through, I looked even more closely at the nano-tech that Lawson used to repair Shepard’s body(shown in the above youtube video).  Impressive for sure. That is all well and good, but how can even the most advanced technology restore memory and personality? Moreover, her new lease on life speaks to the issue that the spark that makes her special and unique is somehow anchored to her physical body, or at the very least returns when all the organs and systems begin to work again.

So how can BioWare make this right with me? The first option is to kill Shepard again.  She can go out in a blaze of glory saving all humankind from the Reapers or her body can simply shut down by rejecting the nanotech, but either way I need to see that in the end, nobody cheats death. The second option is to reveal that she really is different, ala the Rucka article. Instead of a simple acknowledgment that “I got better,” there should be some trauma associated with this return to life. Perhaps a darker Shepard could emerge over time. It would great to see her really transform into something more evil or twisted.

BioWare has a rare opportunity to explore the other side of death in Commander Shepard. They have created a character with the potential to be one of the most memorable in any medium. I would love to see her remembered not only for saving humankind, but for being the most human of us all by living, dying, living, and (hopefully) dying.

Christian Iconography in Dragon Age Origins

Numerous reviews of Dragon Age Origins knocked the game for its generous use of blood.  Not so much that the game has copious amounts of blood but rather the way that characters go about their business after battles while covered in it. I have to admit they do look rather silly having conversations with people without even bothering to wipe the blood off their faces and clothes but it doesn’t take too much away from an otherwise excellent game.

While DOA does not shy away from using blood on-screen whenever possible it seems, it also brilliantly uses symbolism in other areas.  In fact, the player does not even need to enter the game to see how well icons foreshadow the horror that is to come.  One need only look at the title screen to see how well developer BioWare has crafted Christian symbols into the mythology of Ferelden.

Christian icons abound in this image.

The dominant portion of this image is the sword in the foreground.  This weapon is not just stuck in the ground, but it is embedded in someone’s chest.  We can see blood runs halfway up the blade.  Visible in the background is another sword. It appears both have been left on the battlefield.  In the background we can see mountains and trees. Dark clouds move overhead.  Darkness shrouds the entire image.

Any analysis of the symbols gets easier thanks to George Ferguson. In 1955 he wrote Signs & Symbols in Christian Art. This work is a masterpiece in Christian iconography.  In it, Ferguson deftly places many items we see everyday into their proper connection with Christianity. Thanks to him, I can look into the overtly religious world of DOA and connect some of the dots to the Christian faith.

For example, Ferguson notes that clouds represent the unseen God. On DOA‘s title page, however, the clouds are a dark mixture of red and black.  Black means death and the underworld but can also represent the prince of darkness, witchcraft, mourning, sickness, and  negation.  In contrast to black, red symbolizes blood as well as the emotions of love and hate. Red also stands for martyred saints. I said before that the scene is quite dark.  Ferguson writes that in Christianity physical darkness represents spiritual darkness.

So before we even begin the game, Bioware presents the image of warfare and carnage, but not just on the physical level.  The rolling dark clouds indicate a spiritual battle taking place in the heavens.  In Dragon Age terms, the Maker and the arch-demons battle in the heavens while man and demon fight on earth. And the outcome seems to be in doubt.

Underneath the clouds we find rocks in the foreground and mountains in the distance.  While shadows shroud the far-off  mountain range, the rocks in the foreground appear brown. Now rocks symbolize the Lord while stones indicate firmness. However brown means spiritual death and degradation, a possible indication that evil prevails. A second indicator of the strength of evil in this game could be that the earth, meaning the Church/Chantry (which feeds man with spiritual faith and offers him shelter) is also covered in shadow.

Which brings me back to the pair of swords in the foreground.  Aside from the obvious connection to the Word of God, swords can also represent numerous saints in Christian history.  The number two stands for the two natures of Christ: human and divine while blood symbolizes life and the human soul as well as martyrs. Curiously, it appears that both swords are embedded in the same person. Furthermore, we cannot tell who that person is and if he was good or evil. Perhaps we were not meant to know.

The wonderful thing about all this analysis is that BioWare might now have known what was going on when they created this title page.  Or perhaps they did.  Whatever the case, I choose to read the page this way and it certainly helps me enjoy the game that much more.