Luana Rawlins
I'm telling you, it's hard to live a life wirelessly. I'm not talking about just controllers and all -- I'm talking about lack of connections in general. I didn't realize how much gaming information I culled online until I stopped reading my regular news feeds and such. I'm so behind the times.
I mean, when "Hot Coffee" was splashed all over the news and such, most people jumped up in arms over the whole content issue and the ESRB. Yeah, that was important, but all I could think about was the gender war in gaming and how it affects us as a culture.
Let me explain a bit, okay?
You hear how women complain about how they're misrepresented in games, and how they'd like to be treated as equals as gamers? The first point I agree with to a point -- generally any female in a game will be busty, lusty, and/or barely clothed. As a woman, I'm appalled, but as a gamer I realize that the target audience for these companies is the 18-30 year old male, and many of them really don't want to see a genetically imperfect woman at the helm of their pastime. I can't really blame 'em, either.
The thing that bothers me the most, however, is when these same women take their "I'm a gamer, too!" philosophies and pair them with incessant cam-whoring and such. I'll admit that, to an extent, I've used my gender to get where I am now. I won't go out of my way to put a bad picture of myself up online, but I don't use my sexuality to garner me any extra attention. It's like a double-edged sword, being a female gamer in this time -- you want to be able to keep your femininity, but with all these other women using it as a weapon of sorts to get ahead, you're almost forced to make a choice. Either you suppress your womanly tendencies, accept your status as a "tomboy", and be taken seriously by your peers... or you can be considered a "girl gamer" and automatically be considered a novelty.
Okay, I'll stop now. I just needed to get that out of my system a bit. I mean, guys have it just as bad as women, as far as I'm concerned. How many times have you read the generic "guys, would you rather play this game or have a girlfriend?" statements in your magazines and websites? The only difference between the two, I believe, is that while women are slowly becoming more of an outspoken group of gamers, men have heard these variations on the theme for so long that they've just learned to tune them out.
Okay, now I'll stop with the whole tirade.
As far as actual gaming goes, I recently picked up Harvest Moon: Another Wonderful Life and have been tearing into it. While on vacation in Maryland, I'm going to have the opportunity to play import copies of both Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix and Touch! Kirby (known by all of us North Americans as Kirby: Canvas Curse), and the day I get back I'll be picking up Nintendogs and getting in on the dog-training action with my coworkers and friends.
...man, now that I've looked at that list, I really do look like the stereotypical "girl gamer", don't I? Maybe I should go and pick up a copy of Killer 7 or NCAA Football 2006 to re-establish my "hardcore" cred, huh?
