Sex is something that's popping up a lot in games lately. Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect 2 will have it, Assassin's Creed 2 will have it, and Alpha Protocol will have it. However, this doesn't mean that the sex is being thrust into games for pure titillation. That would be ridiculous.
"I think the focus on sex solely as sex -- or more specifically, the taboo it has -- is pretty ridiculous," says lead designer Chris Avellone. "I don’t see sex in games as an achievement to be earned, but as an experience, and I think Alpha Protocol delivers it as an experience first. There’s a lot of emotional depth in Alpha Protocol from bonding over mutual respect, friendship, questioning traditional loyalty (at points, quite extreme), and even what I would call 'no-mances,' which are devoid of romantic feeling entirely but provide a nice character arc for the player and the target, regardless.
"All of these aspects also change the flow of the game, the story, character’s attitudes, and can cause changes in your companions, missions, objectives, and even expose more of the backstory of you and your love interest."
This seems to be a running theme with developers dabbling in sex. They are all quick to say it's isn't sex for sex's sake. Let's face it, though -- gamers love pointless sexual chicanery, and I'm not entirely willing to believe that all this digital shagging has been included for a thoroughly artistic and higher purpose.
Contest:
10:20 AM on 10.28.2009
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Problem is, a lot of gamers won't care about the development or anything, they'll buy it from sex appeal alone. Hell, Bayonetta's a great example of this, having a character who spends half her time naked in the game.
Doesn't mean that Bayonetta isn't damn fine though. And I guess it was implemented in a clever way too.
I think it's kind of hilarious that the people who are making a game that "isn't enough like Mass Effect" are trying to make fun of Bioware for using sex.
...even what I would call 'no-mances,' which are devoid of romantic feeling entirely but provide a nice character arc for the player and the target, regardless.
Sounds an awful lot like the same pointless sex he's condemning, eh?
Sounds an awful lot like the same pointless sex he's condemning, eh?
No, it doesn't. He's condemning putting sex in the game for the sake of having sex. The point of those no-mances is to provide a character arc.
The medium is maturing, sure, but not in the way we want. We are replacing caution with actual sex, but often not having a point to this sex except to attempt to turn on the player. Rarely is it ever a necessity in the story or implimented correctly. Mass Effect is really the only one where it fit. One could argue the opening scene of God of War worked (as it showed Kratos was little more then an animal with carnal needs), but it was still overdone and gratuitous simply to be gratuitous.
Hopefully developers start to mature as their target audience does.
Its all because of the games rating board i tell you, much like movie and tv censorship. They are turning natural aspects of human life into something "bad" and "nasty". Its quite disturbing how a media can change the general populations opinion on things.
There's no getting around the fact that showing sex instantly takes whatever media's content to a more primal and base chain of thought. It doesn't matter how fanciful the lighting is as we view penetration, or what beautiful colors shimmer from the alien chick's massive breasts as her chest heaves. We're thinking of fucking. The buck stops there.
While nudes may be expressed artfully, fucking is fucking. Don't anybody kid themselves. If we're going to put it in video games - and I disagree with that for its tackiness - let's not pretend it has to do with character arc or any higher cause. Fucking does not imply emotional closeness or anything else that good dialogue or storytelling can express better. Hence fucking is an expletive.
Second, it seems like just an excuse to through in naughty bits on the screen. Which, like many movies constantly fail to realize, that's what porn if for. I don't want to watch a movie because an actress might get half naked, I watch it in hopes the movie is compelling, interesting, or entertaining. I don't want to watch some pointless mini game/ cutscene just because it might have some really curvy polygons.
They can say what they want to justify it, but that's what it will come down too. That's what it always come down too. Sex scenes rarely add anything in movies except that you got to see an actress topless "along with an awful acting performance".
For example, Mass Effect (or to a lesser extent, the Baldur's Gate series or even PS:T)? The romance options you have are offered by people who, in one way or another, find it hard to open up to others; in Mass Effect, all three romance options are continuously avoiding connections in a storyline where isolation and hubris preceded the death knell of an entire civilization. To an English Lit student, sex in such a situation (where sex is a metaphor for intimacy) serves as a milestone in personal development for the benefit of the fictional character.
Lastly, there’s a word for sex for the sake of sex. It’s called pornography.
But is it necessary to SHOW the sex for it to be a "metaphor for intimacy?" There aren't a lot of books where graphic depictions of sex add to the prose. James Jones uses a metaphor about a space man who is stuck to imply that one of his characters can't get off in "From Here to Eternity," but you don't see him writing "he was thrusting his hard dick in and out, and she was bouncing, and expectant, but despite her giggling breasts he could not reach that culmination of the moment." That's just tacky.
If gaming wants to be taken seriously as literature, then gaming must have good stories. There is plenty of good literature that does not have sex in it. Sex does not equal maturity.
Also, assuming sex is a milestone for intimacy is like trusting the frat bro at the party to remember your name when you wake up to him the next morning, hung over.
Sure, with sex being in more games (specifically big IP games) it'll get more exposure and companies will be accused of including it no good reason. Even if it were true, so what? You have to plop down 60 bucks for the game, you can choose what you want to see.
I'm not against sex in games, but let's be honest. The only thing that will probably benefit from its inclusion, will be the sales.
Don't look at me like that. I'm talking in a game, not life.
I agree. Fuck the rest of my arguments. There should be sex if only to alleviate all the goddamn frustration the characters go through. "Really? I spent five days getting the shit kicked out of me and all I get is a 'thanks?'"
LAME!