Is Resident Evil 5 really racist?

[Dakinggamer87]

It's not racist end of story.. people really need to chill out.. and just play the game

[grittykitty]

not racist, but prejudiced... against the living impaired. it represents the image that all zombies are crazed and bloodthirsty, as has helped popularize this image in the media. it's a sad reality that many zombies (who preferred to be called "live-agains") live normal lives like you and i, but are ill-represented and thus stereotyped by those who are uneducated. my aunt happens to be a so-called "zombie", but she works a proper job at a bank and lives a normal life in a 2-bedroom condominium in miami beach. other than the occasional maggot and sagging flesh, she lives a normal life. california has led me to be more sarcastic and nonsensical than in texas.

[RCBH928]

Mario is racist against turtles.

[vash23n]

the first resident evil is racist against midwesterners, corporations, and raccoons...

[jfrost]

If taken out of context, RE5 could be considered racist. But that's based off of a few screenshots and trailers where a white cop shoots a bunch of black people. Like Mozgus said earlier, bad move on Capcom's part. I really doubt that game developers at Capcom were wearing white sheets over their heads when putting this game together.

Well, as someone said earlier, even if it wasn't Capcom's intention, the game might have some unintended racism.

[jfrost]

Well said, and you made a great point. It's sad to see that real world racism still exists in America, not to say that we're better than any other country, just that we put ourselves on such a high pedestal in front of the world and yet we still lurk below the sewers. Being up on that pedestal has also made for many overly-sensitive groups of people (I'm also looking at the UK here). What can we do though? Most attempts to write to and email in trying to dissuade them of their views only adds to their arsenal of out-of-context quotes that they can use against the gaming community.

We need more people like you guys and Jim Sterling of Destructiod.com to help sift through the bull$hit. If you haven't heard of him, i suggest you go over to Destructoid and look through his recent RE5 posts

Jim isnt perfect. More than once he's ironically been sensationalist about a story, even when the story turned out to be bullshit. He likes to twist or even completely mislead the headlines, and not always for the sake of a joke. Sometimes he just doesn't do any homework, and posts crap that was proven to be fake within minutes.

He may write some bad stuff, but I like that he does defend games from the gamer point of view. He doesn't try to couch his defense of games in mainstream terms (like, "it might some good effects", "children who play videogames are smarter"). I think this is a much needed role, and I believe that if he's sometimes carried away by sensationalism, that's more than balanced by the media's usual sensationalism about games.

[jfrost]

For some reason, when I first saw this thread, I assumed Holaback had started it...

I hope my spelling is better than his.

[dsheinem]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/16/arts/16evil.html

Thanks - this is a succinct essay on the game which explains why it isn't racist but why it could legitimately be perceived that way by those uninitiated with the series/gameplay/etc.

Both RE5 and RE4 strike me as opportunities for players to negotiate hyper-real landscapes of post-colonial fantasy and fear. In that sense, neither is as striking as Far Cry 2, though they both add an extra horror component (zombies) that the latter game lacks. (These three games obviously aren't alone in providing these kinds of experiences, but they all do it in fairly novel/advanced means.)

That is, as far as the story there's nothing going on here that hasn't been done in countless zombie films based in remote or third-world cultures. How these components might function differently in a game - a medium that is more immediate and interactive - is certainly worth considering.

So they aren't racist per se (at least in the "American" sense of the term). But on the other hand let's not pretend video games are benign expressions somehow free from the traces of deeply rooted cultural ideologies.

[RadarScope1]

Good review by the NYT. Seth Schiesel does a good job for them. Still weird to see an MSM outlet that "gets it."

As was said, it's not overtly racist but it does contain some troubling imagery when you consider historical realities. The main point was the one about American and Japanese points of view -- it's different for every culture. I thought the even better point was about how anything in a game become something you must overcome -- whether its a turtle with wings or a black zombie, it's just an obstacle/enemy as a player you just want to get past them in anyway the game allows.

[the7k]

No reason to beat the game with the race card, especially when there is perfectly good 'bad design' you can beat it with.