dsheinem wrote:The closest thing I can compare the nudity in the game to is something like what I've heard people call "National Geographic nudity" - many women are topless in the games becasue that is the cultural custom (as imagined by the creators), so after a point it isn't especially titillating. Maybe a 13 year old boy would feel differently when playing them (I've only played the games as an adult, but once thought certain issues of National Geographic could function as "Playboy-light" in the days of my emerging puberty [before the internet we had to just make do] ), but the games aren't necessarily created for this audience...but that's a whole other discussion.
First of all, I don't think God of War really commands the cultural service that National Geographic does in order to serve as an accurate comparison.
Playboy, on the other hand, is--in a way--a publication that simply focuses on the female body. (A very unrealistic form of it, but--) One could almost call it a publication of artistic photography, but of course, our culture describes it as pornography.
That, I think, is the long and short of it; God of War isn't meant to create insightful dialogue about differences in cultural norms between modern and ancient/mythological periods. It's a hack-and-slash focusing on brutal combat, and flashy, showy details.
Ultimately it's the creators' decision in what details of the culture to include, and what to overlook. As I mentioned, they could have just as easily made the sex scenes in the game between Kratos and a prepubescent boy. Still just a historical representation of the period, but guess why they didn't do that; For one thing, it would have been extremely controversial. Also it wouldn't fit the hetero-centric tone of the game, nor would it appeal to the target demographic the way boobies do.
I'm not saying that the nudity in the game needs to be taken out or anything, but I do think it borders on denial to say that it wasn't implemented to tantalize and entice their target audience. Whether or not it's successful in achieving that would be a separate issue.
Clearly we're off of the topic that was really at hand, but I just don't have the first-hand knowledge of the game to debate the issue. So I'll concede the rest to you.
dsheinem wrote:pierrot wrote:I am perturbed by the idea that someone would want to see a domineering male figure throw a helpless woman to her bloody death.
Yeah...see I feel like I have worked myself into this awkward position where my effort to explain a differentiation between sexualized violence and the kind of violence that is found (in most instances) in the God of War series makes me sound like some kind of bloodthirsty violence-hound at best or a rape/abuse-fantasy nutjob at worst. Neither could be further from the truth, actually, and I don't want to see women (or men) assaulted in a sexual fashion in the games I play. In the God of War series, even when playing with a critical mindset, I haven't seen that.
I wasn't necessarily directing my comment specifically toward you. I understand that you're not entirely defending the depictions of violence in the game.
However, my association of the God of War series isn't typically with people who say, 'That Kratos: What a clever caricature of an obsessive man-child, fixated on his own self-gratifying pursuit of violence,' it's with people who say, 'Dude, Kratos is such a bad-ass. I love how he's shirtless, so that even girls can enjoy the game.' (Gotta love college--even though I did.)
Actually, this thread has really made me agree much more with you about male privilege in nerd culture, dsheinem.
