Task #6: Gender/Race & Ethnicity
Part One:
A game that I found interesting from the gender/race/ethnicity point of view is that default game that comes with the newest console “Wii”. Although the characters in the Wii sports game or “Miis” do not have character personalities, and I wouldn’t consider them avatars because you can’t alter how they act or react by they are merely symbols that a person can use to distinguish one player from another and players don’t necessarily identify with their Mii. Female Miis differenciate from male Miis because of ‘feminine’ long hair and a dress, there is no ‘sexual’ differences between a male and female Mii character. Also, in regards to race and ethnicity all the same shapes, eyes, faces, hair style, hair colour is availaible to any skin colour when creating your Mii. I found this interesting because I feel that because Wii is meant to be a family type game Mii characters are very gender/race neutral and doesn’t discriminate against any race what so ever. I also found it interesting that on the technical side of it, Wii graphics and Mii characters seemed so amature (for lack of a better term). I think that Nindento deliberately decided to make their Mii characters essentially detail-less to have room for improvement (Wii2, Wii Sports 2) and again to encourage and support diversity but not to implement that it is important to recognize that people are ethnically different. Another main reason that I think Nintendo decided to do this is because it is supposed to be a family friendly, child friendly game and over and hyper-sexualized Mii characters would damped the values I believe Nintendo is attempting to instill in their programs. I think that other people may interpret these characters in a different manner, in terms of Nintendo being lazy and not putting any effort in to the characters, and again leaving themselves enough room for improvement and to make more money. I’m curious on how Nintendo feels about this, and how they justify their decisions on Mii characters.
Part Two:
In progress…
