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Here’s Your Stupid Controversy of the Week |
Listed in: News Tags: controversy, hitman, hitman absolution, Kotaku
A couple of weeks ago, we shared the latest trailer for Hitman: Absolution. The trailer featured Agent 47 violently smashing his way through a bunch of sexy nuns, all of which were wielding some sort of deadly weapon.
As it turns out, the trailer started some sort of minor Internet firestorm. Commenters from around the web lamented the overt “sexism” in the trailer. Take for example, this comment from Kotaku Australia’s Mark Serrels:
“If this is what works, if this is what genuinely sells video games, I just don't want any part of it.”
Or this one, from ThinkProgress’s Alyssa Rosenberg:
“This scene isn’t sexist because the target gets sexual satisfaction out of murdering women. It’s sexist because it creates a setup where we aren’t supposed to take the women in question seriously, and expect to see them killed. The costuming reduces them to meat before a man ever gets his hands on them.”
And another, from NewStatesman’s Helen Lewis:
“By the end of the trailer, I was feeling utterly depressed that once again the games industry was perpetuating the idea that men are do-ers, and women are for looking pretty.”
Of course, this whole thing seems to have surprised the Hitman dev team. Game director Tore Blystad noted in an interview with Kotaku that the folks working on the game didn’t expect any sort of controversy from the trailer in the slightest:
"[The controversy] was a big surprise to us. [The trailer] was not meant to be offensive at all.”
When asked about the accusations of sexism, Blystad continued:
“It was never supposed to be offensive in that way. The Hitman games always come from this kind of cartoony, dark universe... This is no different from those.”
On the one hand, it’s easy to see why people may see the trailer as sexist—those nuns are dressed for sexiness, not for killing. On the other, the argument that the sexed-up appearance of the nuns serves to show Agent 47’s immunity to feminine wiles may have some traction as well.
Wait, is “feminine wiles” also sexist?
Watch the trailer again and let us know where you land:
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Comments
One of the women was black so I guess it's also racist? What a fucking joke!
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its a group of female assasins that want to kill the main character of the game for the game trailer, what they expected?
obiously he was going to kill them as all other assasins and victims of past games, he is supposed to be the best of the assasins of the organisation he works for he wasnt going to die, and actually its the first trailer I see he is hurt by an enemy
obiously they know nothing about games
lara croft killed lot of men portrayed as bad and sometimes stupid on her first 8 games, nobody claimed sexism back then
this political correctness from the "progressive" groups its just stupid it never apply equally, its higly restrictive from creative freedom and gives lot of power to biased people, sorry but the arguments ar beyond stupid like that gay group claiming avatar should be baned because according to them in the future sexual relationship are gay only and the movie dont portray that, they even had some coverage back then
it already coste one scene for spiderman movie and one scene from metal gear 2, if this "controversy" makes one scene or enemy removed from the game I swear I will become a troll in their forums
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but tomb raider was more recognized in a positive way than for its violence, most violence complains back then where for resident evil
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They call em 'nuns' because they don't get none. If you believe they aren't banging the priests, then you are stupid as the whiners are.
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In classic Sword and sorcery theme games marketed to young men, do you REALLY think it's not sexist to have a male warrior fully armored, and have the WOMEN battling in an Iron thong and Bra??? How often is the man in an iron thong that isnt Conan??
When was the last time you saw a man in a modern videogame that looked like a chip and dales stripper?? I guarantee who designed this thought it would be "hot" and that young men would be drawn too it. Its called marketing to your audience.
While I dont believe its the most offensive thing in the world, I also wont get upset if a women looks at it and goes... "really?". Get over yourselves.
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Point taken, i personally think that they are blowing this out of proportion, true the outfits are totally unnecessary and deliberately made to be sexy but why is that such a big deal? IDK what the current rating for the game is but as long as it is rated M the should be allowed to put as much M rated content that they want.
if this were a video of the main character killing babies or raping children then i'd be all ban this shit, but its not, its just a trailer of the main character eliminating his killers who just happen to be sexy nuns.
next thing you know they'll change it to nurses and hospitals everywhere will act up.
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they dont care about the clothes
they are complaining because they think the message is about killing women and that women cant do things compared to men
obiously is nonsense and its not what this game is about
what they expected about a trailer where a group os assasins tried to kill a master assasin?
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Ill still LMAO when some ladies start making game with Beefcake, and stripper men trying to take down the good guy XD
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and about their dressing, well hitman uses enemy cloths to sneak around, the assasins did the same dressed as nuns(actually I expected some catholics to complain because the nuns disguise, I am catholic and not really care), and about the latex cloths, maybe you didnt know it, but videogames try to use characters with certain sexappeal, I remember lot of women saying that the prince of persia was very handsome and liked the art of the game when he appears without shirt, I rememer one guy was upset after those comments and as these complaints is just stupid
you want them to kill the main character? fine, buy the game go to that mission and let them kill you over and over again
happy?
or buy a game with a female main character, you will kill lot of male enemies on those and there are a lot of games like that, funny how nobody really cares about those, and the people that buy those are mostly males, actually I am big fan of tomb raider series since the first one, you have 8 games where you will kill countless of male enemies(special ly the ones for ps2) playig as a cold blood but very cool female character
its a video game, the sexappeal, cool movements and bad ass characters are just part of a show and there are games for all tastes
play and let people play
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