Critical and context awareness
Clear facts and evidence:
good, positive representation in early games was fairly poor and wasn't seen as important
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Women were often subjected to sexualisation in terms of outfit choice, as well as appearance.
Wasn't a large variety in terms of races in characters, and the ones that were of a different ethnicity often had a stereotype.
however, similar to many other things, it improved over time. Female characters began to develop more complex personalities and backstories, and their sexualisation of their outfits/appearance began to decline (although still being present in a notable amount of games).
Alongside this, ethnic diversity increased as well, with a good portion of them doing a good job at completely ignoring stereotypes and building superb characters (E.g, Ezio)
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Sexuality representation wasn't really an issue but it was also not necessarily well done either. More recently, however, it has started to become a lot more positive.
very recently, with the release of Apex Legends, racial, sexual, and gender representation was practically perfectly shown. Of the eight characters, two are black females, one is a non-binary of unknown race, one is homosexual, and one is a robot
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Asian cultures is something that is very commonly referenced or even used as a source of inspiration. Despite this, a very few number of games actually have a strong presence of any Asian culture. However, there is one game that includes Asian culture very well. That game is Sleeping dogs. In the game, you play as an undercover officer infiltrating a Chinese Triad. However, throughout the story, you become heavily involved with the gang and their lives. The game does a great job at showing that despite the obvious intense violence that takes place within these gangs, the people in them are human, and thus have human emotion. The game deals with this emotion superbly, and does its best to beat any stereotypes and shines a light on the gang life.
'script' being in quotations as I personally feel like I do better when improvising. the 'script' is more of a set of lines that I want to be included in the video, as well as to give the video some degree of order.
The 'script' for the video
Hello, welcome to today's video;
The evolving landscape of video game inclusiveness
What do I mean by this? Well, you probably have noticed, but video games haven't always been... the most accurate in terms of representing different communities. Some would even go as far as saying that these games have even negatively impacted the communities that are represented within them. Or at least, the members of those communities who play said games.
A well known character from a well known game, who is a good example of this representation is Lara Croft from Tomb raider. (talk about appearance in the early game, and how that appearance has developed to be more appropriate and realistic)
This can affect quite a lot of people, as a lot of characters (like Lara Croft) have either near impossibly 'perfect' bodies, or otherwise 'desirable' appearances. Because of this, there is a fairly high chance that people will compare these bodies to real people. And when that happens, some will develop unrealistic expectations. An -albeit, quite dramatised but still entirely possible- example of what this could entail is that someone could develop negative self image issues, such as body dysphoria.
However, these problems are not just limited to sex or gender identity, this misrepresentation can manifest in other groups too. The most notable being: Race, sexuality, religious beliefs, as well as sex/gender as mentioned.
Thankfully, due to us being Human, we generally improve on pretty much everything over time. This also applies to games. Female characters started having less revealing clothing as well as having more diverse and deep personalities, characters with more diversity in regards to their racial background cropped up, and more LGBTQ+ characters came into the picture.
A lot of games allow the player to customise their characters race, gender, and overall appearance. Furthermore, a lot of these games also have potential love interests for the character. This allows the player to choose if they want the ability to romance these characters, which can lead to same sex romantic encounters. Practically all of the games where this is possible, doing this has no real effect on the gameplay or story at all. Similar to how it should be in reality, sexual preference, race, and gender should not affect your experience or quality of life.
A good example of this is the Sims series, where the players characters are not restricted to any sexual preference, and are free to do as they please in regards to this. This is because in game, the things like sex, race, and preference aren't variables that affect potential events, they are simply just tags that suit the players choice.
However, choice isnt just the only option. Some games have characters set personalities. A game that does this well is Apex Legends (talk about Apex Legends using info you wrote down on the right, and any more you can think of). Apex does this all VERY well
This is the briefing for the Unit 4 work.
The development of Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. As clearly seen, firstly she is seen to originally wear slim, figure hugging clothing which also show plenty of skin. Which pronounces her 'desirable' figure. However, more recent games see her swapping to more suitable clothing which covers her up more.
Terrorists in games usually always look very similar to one enough. They usually feature the typical make shift balaclava made from a red flannel towel, and rugged tan coloured militia clothing. Also, in Call of Duty, in the multiplayer they can be heard shouting aggressively when doing things such as reloading/throwing a grenade. However, this is common behaviour in war scenarios regardless.
Sleeping Dogs is commonly compared to the Grand Theft Auto series, as it shares some similarities such as being open world, the player usually commits crimes, third person, etc. However, it is significantly more violent that GTA, and this violence reflects the theme of being in an Asian Triad gang. The game also shows the humanity of those in the gangs, and is a great representation, even if it may not be 100% accurate.
Lilith, from the Borderlands series, is one of the 6 sirens in the universe (only three of which are known). Because of this, she has strong mystical powers. Personality wise, she is very strong willed and her original reason for coming to Pandora was to seek out a fellow Siren that she believed to be there. She shows a strong sense of morality or justice, as she joins the group that fight to bring a more civilised existence to the planet of Pandora. She keeps the more ruthless bandits in their place. She does a good job of being a strong female character who can support herself just fine.
Apex Legends is a battle Royale game, and doesn't really have much of a story. However, it is in the same universe as Titanfall and the characters have their own small section of law. The 4 characters above are part of the 8 playable characters, and these 4 have been the subject of recent debate. You wouldn't know unless you read their extended profiles, but Gibraltar (top left) is gay. Bloodhound (top right) is non-binary. Lifeline (bottom left) comes from a family of wealth, but after learning they got their wealth from profiting off of war, she left to fight in the Apex Games, using her profit to help those less fortunate. Bangalore (bottom right) was a fighter for the in game faction the IMC, where she was ambushed on a mission. She managed to get away, and joined the Apex Games hoping to earn enough money to get back to the IMC mother-base and reunite with whats left of her family