Race And Representation. D Andre Nicholas

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1 Race And Representation D Andre Nicholas

2 Diversity Currently, video games seek little to overcome the gap in reality and stereotypes for people of color or even gender More openly interactive world games such as Grand Theft Auto and The Sims, have better opportunities introducing colored and female characters Games that involve character creation are typically better at including a broader base of potentially playable poeple

3 Characters Characters are the medium which players use to directly interact with the world the game exists in Until now, most games feature the usual white protagonist. However, recently more companies have worked to release more racially and gender inclusive games Games that don t star these newly diverse characters are having better odds with adding their features into avatar building systems

4 Uncharted 4 The Uncharted series is a long time game featuring Nathan Drake, the suspected white male protagonist throughout the first 4 games In the newest release, The Lost Legacy features not one, but two female leads that are of color that have been introduced in the series Nadine Ross introduced in the latest game is South African, while Chloe introduced in an earlier game is partially Indian nder-diversity-and-inclusivity-with-uncharted-the-lost-legacy.aspx?pageindex=3

5 Assassin s Creed Ubisoft first started its journey into the worlds of Assassin s Creed back in 2007 bringing out more white male identities to play with In the multiplayer of earlier games and other small appearances, very female assassins were even included in the game Liberation, was the first of the Creed games to introduce a half black, half French assassin Aveline as the main character for the story res-how-it-happened

6 Avatar/Creator games Many games open the possibility for racial and sexual diversity through their avatar and character creation system This lets you represent the character, or yourself, to your liking that effectively lasts forever in the instance of that game RPG s like Destiny, Grand Theft Auto V, and those similar to Dark Souls and Skyrim, work greatly with creating and maintaining a sense of identity within the game

7 Quick Questions As the text and other articles iterate, inclusion just for the sake of inclusion is a more of a hindrance than a benefit. Why is inclusion without meaningful reason, harmful? Can personally developed characters, like in avatar systems, rightfully represent the diversity in games? Do these new characters represent a collective group still, or the individual gamer? Games like GTA V and Neir: Automata requires you to switch between characters sometimes at will or based on game progession, how would you say that affects representation?

8 Stereotypical Representation Stereotypes are defined as a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing. Stereotypes are usually formed through several observations passed from person to person until it becomes similar to a fact However, we all know stereos aren t concrete facts, but more so ignorance no one cares to clean up or refine the understanding of

9 Rockstar & GTA Rockstar has been making the overly explicit Grand Theft Auto for generations now, starting in 1997 GTA has always been ridiculed for its excessive content and representation of mostly African American characters Many critique GTA for its boldness and try to condemn it, when there are dark portions of reality we can see too

10 More Questions If games are to represent and relay important messages, why is GTA so ridiculed? Wouldn t this be an exposition of the shady activity that happens around us? Are there not other games that, in some other relative degree, press these social concerns of violence, sex, and other qualities more than GTA? (COD, AC, ) What makes a good representation and inclusion inside of a game? Is it better to present this diversity into a singular character, or spread the qualities across few/many?

Name. Component 1. Section B: Media Industries & audiences. video games SET TEXT: assassin s creed 3 Liberation

Name. Component 1. Section B: Media Industries & audiences. video games SET TEXT: assassin s creed 3 Liberation Name Component 1 Section B: Media Industries & audiences video games SET TEXT: assassin s creed 3 Liberation 1 Assassin s Creed 3 Liberation is only relevant to Component 2: Section B: Media Industries