Since the introduction of Tomb Raider video games to the world in October 1996, Lara Croft has proved to be a laudatory heroine within the world of gaming. The strong, determined, and fierce character provides her audience with the opportunity to immerse itself in an environment of mystery and daring triumph. Although traditionally Lara Croft is portrayed as an unfaltering adventurer, her most recent performance demonstrates the human and vulnerable side to her character. Tomb Raider (2013) reimagines the familiar heroine through her origin story; one filled with tragedy, sacrifice, and wavering morals. Through the strife now discovered within Croft’s history, one may question whether Lara Croft still portrays a character of great heroism. Lara Croft’s portrayal in Tomb Raider’s storyline and gameplay influence her transition into a dynamic, relatable character; thus it is through the obstacles faced in her backstory that she becomes a laudatory heroine.
The storyline of Tomb Raider (2013) contributes to Lara Croft’s depiction as a dynamic, believable character. Previously, Croft bravely dived into unknown locations and ruins unflinchingly; the same cannot be said about her portrayal in 2013. Croft is unwillingly tossed into the dangerous environment of the island of Yamatai and must fight for her survival without the opportunity to doubt her instincts. The plot opens with a shipwreck onto an uncharted island, with Lara and her acquaintances immediately exposed to the savagery of its natives. It is the spontaneous struggle between staying alive by any means and maintaining old morals that does not play a part in the old Tomb Raider series, yet plays a crucial role in the growth of Lara within her latest installment. Lara...
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...n, regardless of gender. For the entirety of the game, players will find their courage within Lara rather than watching and admiring her triumphs from the sidelines. The interaction between heroine and gamer revolutionizes the standard at which video game heroes and heroines must live up to. Rather than an image of sophistication that ordinary people may have difficulty reaching, Lara’s newfound vulnerability humanizes her struggles into a culturally accessible archetype.
Works Cited
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Even though I found solace in the female video game characters of my childhood as these icons of Amazonian womanhood, with age I have come to realize that many of these female characters often rely on dated stereotypes. So much so, that many of these female characters become walking tropes, displaying only the most basic of female stereotypes: a love for shopping, makeup, and shoes. Anita Sarkesian, a feminist blogger who critiques anti-woman tropes in video games, created the name of this particular trope, the 'Ms. Male ' character. The 'Ms. Male ' character is defined as a female character with little-to-no personality or defining traits outside of traditionallly regressive “female” characteristics. This allows a game designer to take
Joseph Campbell describes the hero’s journey as a quest where the “hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man” (Campbell 7). The heroine’s quest, according to Valerie Estelle Frankel includes “battling through pain and intolerance, through the thorns of adversity, through death and beyond to rescue loved ones” (Frankel 11). Contrary to the hero’s journey, the heroine’s journey focuses on the “culture on the idealization of the masculine” while the hero’s journey focuses on the adventures. In the inspiring autobiography, I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban, Malala Yousafzai represents a heroine because she goes through the stages of the heroine’s journey as she refuses to be silenced and risks death to confront the Taliban on behalf of the young Pakistani girls that are deprived of education. The stages of the journey include the ordinary world, the call to adventure, the supernatural aid, the crossing of the first threshold, the road of trials, the ordeal, death and rebirth, and the return with the elixir.
Females are often looked down on by society as males stereotypically dominate the roles of machismo and independence, leaving no space for females to demonstrate their own strength. Coraline, a children’s animation intended to be a fantasy but instead a production laced with horror elements, includes numerous female characters that embrace society’s predetermined standards. As the audience follows the journey of the protagonist Coraline, stereotypes of women being dependent and not having a voice are unrefreshingly accepted by the female characters in the film.
Since the humble origins of the video gaming industry, individuals used it as a challenge of their abilities. In modern day, this industry is just a popular as any other media which exists in the mainstream world. Video games reflect society’s changing views of the normalities of which individuals and/or groups must abide to. This is exemplified in the evolving representation of the queer individuals within the virtual world. As the video game industry came into focus, so did the LGBT rights movement. This illustrates that society’s views on the LGBT community were reflected in the video games made, however, it was rare that such characters existed as protagonists until the twenty first century. Due to the extreme lack of asexual and non-binary
Costikyan, Greg. “The Problem of Video Game Violence is Exaggerated.” Video Games. Detroit: Greenhaven, 2003. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Web. 5 Nov. 2005.
This journal article is entirely credible and written by two women who know what they’re talking about. This article discusses how video games form stereotypes about both genders and that they impact both gamers and non-gamers. Men are portrayed as aggressive and women are unsurprisingly portrayed as sex objects. A main issue with this is that video games are mostly played by the younger generation meaning these are the ideas being imbedded into the youth of the world. The...
As we evolve into a more advanced species, so does our technology, and along with our overly advanced technology, comes video games. They’ve have certainly come a long way since they were first introduced to the main stream audience and have been slowly creeping its way into many daily lives, making them a lot more entertaining and less dull. Video games’ one and only purpose is to entertain. However, it is indeed true that everything is fun and games until somebody gets hurt, and that is exactly what has happened over the years in video games. With the help of our technology, being more developed than ever, video games have also become increasingly sophisticated and overall more close to reality than
Females are still taking the roles of over sexualized and (for lack of a better word) incapable figure for the spectators to have pity on. As Budd Boetticher has put it, "What counts is what the heroine provokes, or rather what she represents. She is the one, or rather the love or fear she inspires in the hero, or else the concern he feels for her, who makes him act the way he does. In herself the woman has not the slightest importance." (). This statement raises question to female character and whether they are in fact in control of their own world or
On June 15, 2001, movie theaters around the globe debuted the highly anticipated movie Lara Croft: Tomb Raider which was heavily based off of the Tomb Raider video game series. The movie’s cast consisted of eight to ten characters ranging from different supporting roles. The main attraction throughout the whole movie without a doubt id Angelina Jolie who plays Lara Croft along with other cast members such as Jon Voight, Chris Barrie, Lain Glen, Daniel Craig, and Noah Taylor. These characters combined along with Angelina Jolie’s role of being a strong diviner woman and outdoing men in combat gives this action packed thriller worth the watch.
Video game industry have been representing female character as sexually objectified or shown as a victim who is in desperate need of help through male protagonist, this portrayal has negative effect on the mind of our generation and the gender roles they identify with.
Many video games portray women as objectified beings, purely used for sex appeal and to attract the larger male gamer population. We also see men idealised in a similar way as well – the males in video games are portrayed as muscly, brawny men. However, we rarely see a scantily clad man in a game, but there is a vast abundance of games which feature women wearing ‘sexy armour’, or a noticeable lack of substantial amount of clothing. This isn’t female-friendly as these games are made for men, causing women to feel alienated and uncomfortable.
Adams, Jill U. Effects of Violent Video Games. The Los Angeles Times. May 3, 2010.
If you were to ask many video game enthusiasts about their favorite female video game heroines, the answers you’d get would be very varied - some will say Lara Croft of the Tomb Raider series, others say Alyx from the Half-Life series, few say Jade from Beyond Good & Evil, a handful will vouch for Chell from Portal, and a lot of old-school folks might just say Ms. Pac-Man. However, there is another video game heroine who has managed to reach into the hearts of gamers, both male and female, proving that she was just as awesome as any celebrated male hero. However, for gamers who were sitting tight in front of their television sets, exploring the desolate planet of Zebes via their Nintendo Entertainment in 1986, it was widely assumed that the famed bounty hunter was male. At the end of the adventure, the big reveal was made - removing her helmet to signify a job well done, Samus Aran, protagonist of the Metroid series, was indeed female. For the purpose of this paper, we’ll analyze the heroics of Samus through three distinct analytical lenses: The Hero’s Journey (from Joseph Campbell), Carl Jung’s archetypes, and through feminist analysis.
The day was April 20th, 1999. During an otherwise peaceful day at Columbine High in Columbine, CO, two seniors—Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold—finally committed an atrocious act. That act had been in the planning for a long time, perhaps even since Harris designed a website for popular, controversial, extremely violent video game Doom in 1996. The Columbine High School shooting is known as the deadliest high school shooting ever, with its death toll of twelve students and one teacher, as well as twenty-four people injured. But little known for some is the fact that the Columbine shooting was what kick started the nationwide controversy over violent video games. Harris, for one, was an avid player of Doom, and some believe that’s what caused him and Klebold to even think of murdering all the people who had, according to Harris’ diaries, simply ‘annoyed’ him. The fallout of this incident was massive, but one of the long-lasting effects has been the worry in people’s minds that there is a connection between video games and violent acts performed by teenagers. Those who do believe that may claim that before the digital age, violent acts—at least those performed by teenagers—were few and far between. (This is an obvious rumor, not a fact.) If that were the case, it’s understandable why some believe that games are causing more violence in today’s youth. Teachers are worried about the issue, as are parents and government officials, and teenagers and game producers are involved in it as well. The issue itself raises many questions: are teenagers so easily affected by images on a screen? Is the world merely a product of its pastimes? If video games really do cause increased aggression in youth, what are people supposed to do about it? Despit...