http://www.octodadgame.com/

It’s free to download. For PC or Mac. It’s easy to play (albeit hilariously difficult at the same time, but not in any way that requires super game playing savvy.) I played through the entire thing yesterday in about an hour or so and many lolz were had. If your dad is anything like mine, he just may have had a videogame heritage too so share your favorite hobby with your dad today and have a dad-friendly laugh together. You won’t regret it. 

Here’s my 3rd installment of sweeping generalizations about the female characters announced for the games at this year’s E3. Sony’s panel was pretty exciting I’ve got to say and here’s what we can expect as far as lady interests in upcoming releases…

PS3 Updates:

The Last of Us

If somebody would like to buy me this game or send me their copy when you’re done, I’d love to check it out. Considering it’s from the Uncharted people I’m assuming it’s not $60 long but it looks great nonetheless. I was excited after hearing about this game at least year’s E3 and it pleases me to hear good things about it.

Beyond Two Souls

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DLQUBTOLmE

I guess Ellen Page is in another game? Seeing it right after The Last of Us was a little bit weird. There are more girls in the world to base a character on guys. But if it had to be someone I’m pretty okay with it being her. This trailer made this game look like pretty much a generic war mission shooter, but you play as Ellen Page so I guess it’s a step in the right direction. Unless there is more to this than meets the eye though, I worry that people will stick with their old faithful generic war shooters rather than take a chance on a $60+ Ellen Page playable character. Here’s hoping as we find out more, there will actually be more to find out about.

Grand Theft Auto 5

We already knew about this but I’ll take a moment to complain anyways. When is GTA going to have a female protagonist? Each night when I go to bed I say a little prayer to the game gods that  they’ll do a 60’s throwback Foxy Brown type character but alas nothing. Even with this new 3 character plot they still can’t be bothered to make ONE of them a woman. I’m sure there will be plenty opportunity to sleep with them and run them over though, so there’s always that. Thanks Rockstar.

The Order: 1886

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alVjdwYWODY

Boasting all in engine graphics, this this trailer was pretty darn cool. The whole alternate timeline steampunk-y vibe and the unseen baddies creeping in the shadows was doing a good job of peaking my interest. Also we have a lady as one of the main characters sitting nonchalantly in the cab who starts kicking ass right alongside her male counterparts. I was really hoping they were straight up fighting a ton of werewolves, but maybe I have just been watching too much Buffy. I’m excited to find out more. It’s cool to see a lot of period specific stuff this year. Maybe that means I’m one step closer to getting my Joseon era RPG. 

inFamous: Second Son

Again, no lady folk. But similarly to Jack Chance in Quantum Break, it’s nice to see a male protagonist that’s not necessarily a type we’ve seen a thousand times before. It’s not exactly all my dreams of equality coming true, and the first inFamous game was one of the most boring games I ever had to sit and watch someone play (after we got it for free after the identity theft crisis on psn) At least it’s a somewhat less generic than normal protagonist so I’ll take it. I will say though, if Aaron Paul was going to be involved in a video game franchise, not making him the protagonist in inFamous 2 was a huge missed opportunity.

The Dark Sorcerer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hxq4VQI_E4

Once again no ladies, but this one was was another winner in my book. As I grew more and more excited at a super epic wizard doing super epic spells and shit, I thought to myself, “The only thing I thought could make it better is if this scene ended as a joke…and then it did. Who knows what this game actually is, but being a wizard is at the top of my list of favorite gamic things, so check out the trailer it’s definitely worth a watch.

Transistor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ni02F7l4lAg

From the creators of Bastion comes the kickoff to the indie games portion of Sony’s announcements. We hear a lovely and haunting female vocalist as they give us a taste of the game’s beautiful and stylized graphics (looking much more cohesive visually than Bastion, which is a good thing.) The cool red-haired protagonist who I guess is a singer, hops around elegantly in a stunning world. This game is a prime example of how just another beacon of hope as far indie games breaking the mold as far as gamic tropes are concerned. Sony’s entire indie game announcement section was one of my favorites of the night. Putting an emphasis on indie developers was just one of the first sucker punches PS4 gave to Xbox one in terms of giving the people what they want. Also, Octodad looks like one of the best things ever. Seriously.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xq49ieePbqQ

Final Fantasy XV

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nN2rPeL7O8

Aka Advent Children the Game. This new gen Final Fantasy looks BONKERS (but also amazing.) I’m not generally one who gets all too excited over graphics, but the hyper realistic anime characters fall a lot less deep in the uncanny valley than regular people which makes them way cooler in my book. You can only take away so much in terms of what the gameplay will be like but it looks very much like a departure from old FF conventions in terms of game mechanics. The unbelievably cool graphics coupled with some fresh gameplay might be exactly the kick in the pants the Final Fantasy franchise needs. We ladyfolk generally love us some Final Fantasy so I’m not too worried about this one in terms of gender equality. All the guys in FF games are pretty much girls anyways.

Kingdom Hearts III

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npjBHFb0fZM

What can I even say? Disney + Final Fantasy pretty much guarantees an easy sell to lady gamers (myself most definitely included.) This franchise is one of the most ingenious combinations of powerhouse brands that ever existed (in gaming at least) so how could we not be excited? It was right around this point in the presentation that I said to my boyfriend, “If it’s $400 maybe we can get this even though we have no money.” AND THEN IT WAS SO.

Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag

I guess you can play as that cool chick from the Vita game, which is pretty much awesome. Too bad their demo got messed up because of technical difficulties (#somebodyisfired) it’s ok though, they’ll just release another Assasin’s Creed in the next week or so and maybe the demo for that one will work. Seriously though, pirates are neat and I guess you can build your own fleet and watch old peg leg guys puke around a campfire and if you could do all that as a badass pirate lady I’d be up for checking this out.

Elder Scrolls: Online

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-3DNrPeJog

God I loved Skyrim. I loved being a Lizard lady who was also a wizard and I also had a brief but torrid love affair with WOW so I feel like this would be an amazing, but dangerous game for me to purchase. I would love to be able to explore the towns for each race, which is something we haven’t necessarily gotten to do before. Graphics wise it’s rough to see this up against some of the CRAZY intense graphics of something like Watch Dogs but it’s an MMO so what are you gonna do? All and all I’m pretty darn excited for the Beta that I will surely get on my new PS4 that at this point in the evening I have more or less already decided to buy.

Destiny

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBNdrJMwrkc

From Bungie AND Activision comes this unbelievably cool looking Nausicaa-esque world that made me not care how generic the story was. I won’t deny for a second that this game looks amazing. Combining all the best of Halo, Call of Duty, and a little taste of Borderlands even, it’s pretty clear that this is the beginning of what is sure to become a new powerhouse franchise. I really liked in their demo they had a cool Tali looking girl character with an awesome cape, and then had a female player join them who was playing as a huge male character. That’s smarts there guys, way to go. As I watched this demo and grew more and more excited, I also grew more and more worried that a lack of couch co-op will keep this from becoming my new favorite game. IF YOU ARE MONITORING TUMBLR, PLEASE INCLUDE COUCH CO-OP IN DESTINY, IT’S VERY IMPORTANT. The Halo franchise has always understood why couch co-op is so important and I hope to god they don’t forget as it seems like Destiny is going to be a milestone in multiplayer games and I would hate to see it veer from the path of the righteous couch co-op includers. The glitching in the demo was breaking my heart for this one as I honestly couldn’t wait to see more.

From that point on it was the old one-two punch at Xbox until the undeniable knockout of the $399 price point brought it home for the Sony announcements. It’s fascinating to me that announcements they saved as the best for last are things that Sony was probably not even counting as important for the original announcement. Xbox just blew it so badly that they allowed Sony to step in with features they didn’t even necessarily think of as big selling points and BLOW PEOPLES MINDS WITH THEM. Such as being able to play used games or lend friends games you have bought, and NOT having to be online. It’s not so hard to understand what the sensitive points are with gamers and cater to those fundamental desires in a new system and Xbox One really does not seem to give a hoot about the things that are the most important to us, the gamers who made them what they are today. Sony hit all the pressure points in just the right way, for gosh sakes they gave us a new Kingdom Hearts game, they know where our hearts are at and they made us a bunch of happy boys and girls last night.

More E3 Coverage by yours truly:

Microsoft Announcements:

http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/52647434311/ladies-of-e3-2013-part-1-microsoft

EA Games Announcements:
http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/52655171844/ladies-of-e3-2013-part-2-ea-announcements

Here’s a quick overview of everything lady related (and some other stuff) that just happened at the EA Games E3 Announcements:

Need for Speed:

As we know, cars have no gender but the whole single into multiplayer feature seems pretty cool, although I’m not sure why you would suddenly change your mind on what mode you want to play mid-level but now YOU CAN! Friends can also taunt you via tablet by flying a helicopter alongside the race. Aaron Paul from Breaking Bad showed up though who is apparently in a movie version of Need for Speed that I didn’t know existed. I really like him, but he didn’t really add cool to the announcement other that him just being there in general because everybody likes Breaking Bad.

Dragon Age: Inquisition

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/10691054/dragon_age_inquisition_trailer_e3_2013_ea_conference/

As a super huge Mass Effect disciple, I was pretty excited to hear about Bioware’s new RPG. The Mass Effect series was, to me at least, a huge step in the right direction as far as gender equality in games and I’ve written about it before (http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/20913553713/femshep-a-step-in-the-right-direction) and I wasn’t let down. In the trailer we see an epic looking female warrior leading the pack and prominently featured multiple times. If I were going to guess, I’d assume they’ll do something similar to Mass Effect where you can choose the gender of your hero. Based on the final line of the trailer, “Will you stand against it, or lead this world to it’s bitter end?” I’m also guessing we’re in for another choice driven RPG and if/when I ever have a new gen console, this is one I’ll be saving my ducketts for.

Next, EA talking about dribbling basketballs, Madden, Fifa, and UFC for a long, long time. I don’t know who Drake is but he had a really big gold necklace with a dog on it. Maybe there are some girls who like Sports games, but I’m not one of them. As for me, I looked at pictures of cats on the internet until they were done talking:

Battlefield 4-

http://www.ign.com/videos/2013/06/10/battlefield-4-live-demo-e3-2013-ea-conference

Featuring such innovations as “Levolution,” “Commander mode,” and “Battle Logs.” I’m not exactly sure what that means but what I took away from it was you can blow up whole building and ride on jetskis. There was a pretty cool review of 64 players all working together on stage. I even saw a few ladies in the mix. The group’s “commander” didn’t use the word “bitch” or “rape” nearly enough to make it a realistic example of gameplay, but it was nice to watch a multiplayer match without that. Honestly, I have been forced to watch so many hours of Battlefield after buying it for my boyfriend that it was hard for me to be too enthused. I was hoping for a couch co-op announcement but wasn’t expecting it, which is pretty much the only way I would begin playing this game. Maybe the tablet feature will be some kind of an answer to the couch co-op conundrum though, but it’s too soon to tell what you can actually do with the tablet other than shoot a big missile (which I admit, is pretty neat.)

Just when I had stopped paying attention I heard an in-game female voice saying, “You’ll back me up right?” at the very end of the gameplay demo. Just when I was ready to write off Dice, they slapped us in the face with not only tease for a female character in Battlefield (who knows if this actually means playable female) but also a kick-ass Mirror’s Edge teaser! I’ve not gotten to play any previous Mirror’s Edge games, but the fact that EA decided to let this be the cherry on the sundae I think is a pretty promising thing. The trailer was absolutely kick ass and I’m ready to go and get that tattoo without knowing anything further about the series. Here’s hoping Faith will be a beacon of hope in this year’s announcements. Oh and also, more Parkour.

http://www.ign.com/videos/2013/06/10/mirrors-edge-sequel-trailer-e3-2013-ea-conference

————————————-
When E3 is over I’ll compile these posts into one big mega post and I’ll add links for trailers as they become available.

More E3 Coverage by yours truly:

Microsoft Announcements:

http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/52647434311/ladies-of-e3-2013-part-1-microsoft

Sony Announcements:
http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/52724694858/ladies-of-e3-part-3-sony

Last year I took some time post E3 to comb through all the game announcements and scrutinize the way female characters were featured, you know for funzies:(http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/24774834509/ladies-of-e3-the-good-the-same-and-the-ridiculous)

I thought I’d go ahead and do the same thing this year and here’s what I’ve seen so far. I’m trying to keep as up to date as I can but will be adding more/ doing some editing as things are announced:

Sunset Overdrive:

http://kotaku.com/sunset-overdrive-is-the-new-game-by-ratchet-and-clank-d-512310216

Although it mostly features a dude, I saw at least one chick pop up (shown above) at least I’m pretty sure it was a chick. It looks like there may be customizable characters, which is always nifty. Overall the art style looks really fun and cool and the tone of the trailer was very cartoony and I’m totally into that. It’s nice to see anything that’s not blue and orange. I’m not 100% sure what we’re looking at for this game but here’s hoping for couch co-op and I just might thinking about one day wanting to get an xbox one…maybe.

Metal Gear Solid V:

http://kotaku.com/heres-your-first-look-at-metal-gear-solid-v-on-the-xbo-512306397?autoplay=1

Good news no one! Introducing Metal Gear Solid V Heroine, Quiet: “A Sniper deprived of her words,” armed with big ol’ boobs, a big ol’ gun and the inability to speak apparently. Move over Meryl, there’s a new MGS gal in town and she’s ready to undo any positive influence you’ve had over the years! Other than that, the new MGS looks cool I think? Although I worry about the “open world”-lyness of the game. I feel it risks taking the cinematic quality that made IV the great game it was and turn it into too much horse riding to stay on track like Red Dead Redemption. But girls like horses right?

Halo:

http://kotaku.com/halo-coming-to-xbox-one-in-some-form-512325044?autoplay=1

What do you get when you cross Journey, Evangelion, and Halo? Well you get the new Halo game I guess. Bonnie Ross stopped by to let us know that Halo will now be a completely unnecessary 60 frames per second. I always want to be excited that she’s a woman and she’s speaking for Halo but she never seems very excited about the announcements she shares with us. I’m not guessing we’re going to be seeing any glass ceilings being broken in this new Halo game.

Titanfall:

http://kotaku.com/titanfall-respawns-big-xbox-exclusive-is-coming-spri-512333669

From the Call of Duty people comes a pretty cool like game where you can shoot robots while INSIDE robots…or outside of robots if you so choose. During the gameplay demo we got to see a fairly badss looking Rose the Riveter esque woman giving the soldiers their objectives. Unfortunately the playable characters look like your standard fare faceless soldier dudes. It was giving me pretty much a Mass Effect vibe gameplay wise which definitely isn’t a bad thing. And I was just saying the other day that it would be cool to have more games where you play inside of a big mecha. Also, side observation, Pakour seems really IN for all of Microsoft’s game debuts (also prominently featured in the Sunset Overdrive trailer.)

Quantum Break:

http://kotaku.com/with-quantum-break-play-a-personalized-version-of-an-a-512314537?autoplay=1

You might remember this game from the really strange live action trailer from the Xbox one reveal event where a woman has a cryptic conversation with a scary little girl who apparently has some kind of telekinetic or time bending powers. I was immediately hopeful as the prospect of having a super powerful little girl as a protagonist, but unfortunately it soon became clear that wasn’t the case. The trailer revealed today at E3 shows the game’s real protagonist, Jack Choice who has survived some kind of science experiment. Although he’s not a little girl, the trailer shows him teamed up with a pretty tough looking lady, and I was pleasantly surprised at Jack’s overall demeanor. Lacking the superman build of most of today’s protagonists and a softer voice acting performance. Even though we might not have the female protagonist of our dreams, it is nice to see a male protagonist who is a bit less hyper masculine than what we’re used to seeing.  Moving towards more dimensional characters male and female, is really what I’m always hoping for, and we might just find that in Quantum Break. Plus, the creator stressed it’s affinity with a television show, and putting an emphasis on a solid narrative is something I feel is also a big draw for female players, (and many male players too.) I might just be intrigued enough to check it out. Here’s hoping for a little girl starring in the sequel though.

More snap judgements on the fate of female characters announced at this year’s E3 to come!

More E3 Coverage by yours truly:

EA Games Announcements:
http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/52655171844/ladies-of-e3-2013-part-2-ea-announcements

Sony Announcements:
http://videogamegirlfriend.tumblr.com/post/52724694858/ladies-of-e3-part-3-sony

Neat things the Xbox one fundamentally offers:

Change what you’re doing by telling your xbox what to do in order to “instantly get what you want.” It’s pretty scary how many things you can do at the same time. You can buy movie tickets to Star Trek, while watching Star Trek. Voice commands to find shows, watch shows, and find trending shows.

Hopefully everyone who buys xbox lives alone because it’d be hard to have a conversation about anything in front of your xbox without it ruining your night. The kinect sensor will know your particular voice and motions, and will probably rise up and try to kill you in your sleep sooner or later. It seems it will also be had to watch your favorite guilty pleasure TV shows/movies without everyone in North America knowing about it. I still don’t really understand what smartglass is, but I guess it’s going to be better on the xbox one.

New Xbox live: Will have lots and lots of servers. Cloud storage blah blah. Dedicated game DVR to capture and share your best gaming moments. Achievements tell your “own personal game story.” I think they got it right when they mentioned “bragging rights.” It seems like most of the new interactive game features are ultimately catering to creating an all access way to try to prove you are better than everyone else. Although, with everybody so tied up in their own worlds of playing games while you play another game while you watch TV and also surf the internet at the same time, I doubt anyone will even care that other people in the world even exist anymore.

Who needs to play real sports when you have EA Sports? EA showed some videos of some actual athletes talking about actual sports and then tried to correlate that to some new games. Were you the kid who was no good at sports in high school but really good at videogames? Well then the xbox one is for you! EA Sports: “Closing the gap between being a hermit and being a professional athlete with one fell swoop.”

Forza talked about whatever number game they are on and showed some neat cars driving around. I never really got the appeal of racing games without silly bombs and stuff, but whatever floats your boat I guess.

From the creators of Max Payne and Alan Wake comes one of the weirdest trailers I have ever seen for their new game Quantum Break. It starts out with a live action, badly acted cut scene of a woman talking to a strange little girl and that somehow connecting that to huge steamliners breaking bridges in half. I got excited at the prospect of a little telekentic girl as a main character for a game but, from the little bit of gameplay footage they showed it looked like the same generic dude character amidst a bunch of cool looking exploding glass. We’ll have to see about that one.

http://www.ign.com/videos/2013/05/21/quantum-break-debut-trailer

Next up there were some WOMEN speaking! Xbox is already striking back after the PS4 reveal by SHOWING the console (for like 10 straight minutes) AND having women presenters. Some chick talked about how Halo is important I guess and how she liked Game of Thrones (to no crowd reaction at all whatsoever) and then threw it over to a video of Stephen Speilberg talking about the new Halo TV series that’s going to be a thing that exists now. I hope it’s about friends killing eachother for fun to capture the beauty of the real Halo experience.

Also, the new xbox will let people who like taking football really seriously take it even more seriously! Fantasy football stats will update live and you can trash talk via skype while watching the game! Watch out sports bars, drinking at home while you watch the game doesn’t require pants!

The big cherry on the sundae was the new Call of Duty reveal. Featuring…

Brand new characters! (Cut to generic looking black guy solider.)

From the writer/director of Syrianna (seriously one of the worst movies I have ever seen in my entire life. I went for free and almost walked out.)

A Dog!!! The dog is your friend!!! Hooray for dogs!

Really realistic helmets! Swimming with Sharks! Jumping over walls! Leaning! Sliding! Interactive Smoke! Fish!

“You can connect with who you are as a player more than we ever have done in the past” (new customizations include: gas masks, helmets, belts… but still no women.)

They’ve bumped up the graphics so much that you can see the tattoo in your dogs ear and the dirt under your fingernails, however hey couldn’t be bothered to create a playable multiplayer female character. I’m glad to see the franchise making great strides to more seriously include animals in their games thought.

Some things that make me nervous overall:

The new xbox in generally seems very catered to one person per household. Luckily you’ll have skype to talk to all the friends you’re never going to leave your house to spend time with now. Although they stress how important connecting with friends/other players via xbox is to them, it seems to me like couch co-op friendly experiences will be very unlikely. Wired discussed games being tied to an Xbox live account so they can’t be passed around among friends and will not read used games. It’s always been bad enough for my boyfriend and I that we have to pay for two xbox live accounts in order to play online together as our own identities. Now, if we want to play the same game in one home does that mean we need to spend $120 for two copies of a new game on top of paying for 2 xbox live memberships every month? Lots of other worrisome questions come to mind: Will the xbox only recognize one of our identities? Cloud saves boast being able to be accessed anywhere, but does that mean you can pull up your stats/profile on a friend’s xbox easily or more likely will that be an impossibility?

What’s important for me personally as a gamer is bringing people together to play, but it seems to me like the new xbox is moving towards “Ready Player One” territory, where your online persona is likely to become your only one. All these new features are well and good but I worry we’ll all be left alone with no one but our xbox to talk to.

Oh well, the future is coming whether we like it or not. I just hope they get a better Netflix app.

Nostalgia and videogames are topics that often go hand and hand when it comes to talking about games on the internet. So many of us have some of our fondest memories about gaming as kids. As an adult I find myself often feeling like I’m drowning in technology not like back in the day when you popped in a cartridge and floated away for the day. Now those same hunks of plastic have become symbols of a simpler time when games were the lynchpin of our best childhood days. Maybe that’s why people take them so seriously now in adulthood. We try to incorporate games into our identities to try to hold on as tightly as we can to the uncomplicated past days when the tediousness of adulthood didn’t interfere with our high scores. Nowadays I find myself having an intense love-hate relationship with the connectivity that the internet has given to the gaming community, and have spent much of my time trying to figure out where all the hostility comes from. I figure the best way to look forward is to begin by looking back, so I decided to take some time to reflect on my own experiences as well as think about the state of the gaming community online today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=q0ygjD04vyU

 I played my first JRPG in 4th grade, (Secret of Mana) and after spending so much time lost in that fantasy world, I only wanted to spend more time there. My sister and I had our own little universe of playing games where I’d watch Donkey Kong Country or Yoshi’s Island over her shoulder, or we’d spend entire weekends slowly working our way together through one of many other JRPG classics like Wild Arms, or many of the Final Fantasy games. Although I loved this hobby with all of my being inside our house, and didn’t consciously avoid talking to other people about them, I just assumed that no one else knew about the games I played, so I never made that connection with anyone outside of my family, (other than the occasional round of Mario Kart or Lion King the video game at a friends house.) This was fine I suppose, as our private little world of gaming was something precious and always a cherished quality sister time activity for us, I never thought that all over the world other people were have the exact same kind of bonding experience over games that we were.

In wasn’t until I was in high school that I discovered another person who had played Chrono Trigger, and was amazed years later, as I found my way into the internet community that my favorite game of all time is kind of a big deal to a lot of other people than just me and my sister. A few years later I attended my first videogame symphony in college, and I cried uncontrollable tears of joy when I got to hear a symphony play Frog’s Theme in a gigantic concert hall, filled with thousands of people who loved the game as much as I did. It was one of the most powerful moments I’ve ever experienced. Having your love for something you thought of as so obscure, validated by a symphony orchestra and a room full of thousands of like-minded people was something that I will never forget. Similarly, when my sister and I did one of our first cosplays as Lucca and Marle, we got to walk around and literally feel the love of everyone else there who loved the game as much as we did. Bonding over this kind of cherished lifelong experience is an a truly amazing thing, and made me so happy to see so many people, who may have been at one time disenfranchised by their favorite hobby, come together and embrace eachother in a positive environment.

This is precisely why I am so hurt by the way that the negativity on the internet towards women and in general overshadows how much good there is out there as well. When we stick together, and build eachother up by bonding over these shared interests, everbody wins. Tearing people down for trying to share something they love with you is pure craziness, no matter how much nerdom street cred they do or do not have. I have spent a lot of time over the past year focusing on the topic of gender and gaming, but it’s really the overall negativity that I see that makes me want to dig deeper to try to better understand what went so wrong online. I feel like most people delve into the internet (especially when it comes to games and other “nerdy” hobbies) to try to reach out to the world in a way they can’t do in their real lives, and that positive connection we seek is out there, but it’s been obscured by so much negativity that a place where people seek solace and connection has instead become a battleground where everyone is considered an enemy until proven otherwise.

 I feel like our generation is generally feeling pretty lost. Living under piles of debt for degrees that do us next to no good in actually getting a job, especially when it comes to us dumb enough to shoot for the moon and go to school for any kind of creative degree, in a world where we are so easily connected we feel the need to spew our frustration anywhere with a comment box. It’s easy to lose sight of the reason why we are glued to sites like facebook and reddit. We are all just as lost and grasping at anything we can to feel happy and connected and the internet is the hub of all of that interaction. The power of the internet community is insurmountable. We can turn a project no company would back, immortalize a video with the click of a button, spread a piece of news or internet junk across the entire world in minutes. But as a wise man once said, “With great power comes great responsibility.” Each and every one of us has a piece of that power and we need to wield it more carefully.

I can’t claim to be the authority on all things Judge Dredd related by any stretch of the imagination, nor do I claim to be a comic authority in any capacity but I calls em’ like I see em’ and I was surprisingly impressed after finally sitting down to watch the new Dredd adaption. I don’t usually use this space for movie reviews (although I’m thinking of cooking up a new blog perhaps where I do just that) but I decided I wanted to write about Dredd because the entire time I was watching I couldn’t help but constantly think what an awesome video game it would have made, and here are the reasons why:

1. The Non-Specific Protagonist: The character of Judge Dredd himself has been around for years, and has evolved constantly and been tackling by many different artists with completely different styles. All of this has worked because Dredd is a vehicle more so than a character. The story forms around him, which allows the author of each tale featuring him to take it any any direction they may please, and that is a perfect feature for a videogame lead. We all want to embody our character in one way or another, and putting gender aside for a minute, some of the most universally beloved games of all time (at from where I’m standing) feature silent protagonists. Although Dredd isn’t exactly silent, his character’s divisive personality could slip easily into the formula for a triple A game. Many of today’s most popular big box games feature leads with wishy-washy hero character traits, at least with Dredd, we get that neutral quality that allows the masses to become the character, but with over thirty years of experience in ass kicking to back it up.

2. A Masterful Ebb and Flow of Carnage: One of my favorite parts of Dredd was it’s liberal, but tasteful use of action and violence. Now, I have my Master’s degree in film snobbery, which makes many people think that I don’t allow myself to enjoy action-heavy popcorn movies, but that’s not true. The problem I have with a lot of mainstream action movies is that they are often little more than the explosions and visual effects that cost them millions to make. Dredd has the action we crave, but it’s split up with enough tension building exposition that when we finally get to those big action scenes, they taste all the sweeter. Now, videogames (whether it’s fun or boring) often follow this formula too. You walk around for a bit, find out some stuff, shoot a couple guys and then…BOSS BATTLE. Victory always tastes sweeter when you are forced against all odds to creep towards it. (Not to mention, giant chain guns are ALWAYS awesome and Dredd has got that covered too.)

3. The Right Kind of Environment: Dredd takes place in one apartment building. Making a movie (or a videogame I would imagine) in one location allows for extra care to be taken in designing a cohesive mood for the environment you want to create. Dredd’s art design is impeccable. If you watch closely you can see the amount of care that was put into each area of the apartment complex. Especially in a sci-fi world, setting up a strong visual environment is crucial, and this film does a great job of that. Being able to put your all of the focus on one main environment is not only (I would imagine) cost effective from a design standpoint, but it allows for the kind of attention to detail that can make a game really special. In a film you might be able to take brief notice of your surroundings, but with a game you can easily choose to take the time to explore the full wealth of your surroundings. Even if you choose not to, it’s plain to see the difference between a fully realized environment and a game with 8,000 of the same picture on the wall.

4. Cool Guns and Gadgets: Ok so let’s be real, in a videogame guns and gadgets are pretty important. Well good news, Dredd has that covered too. I can’t claim to be the expert on his standard issued super badass gun, but I do know it can shoot grenades, smoke bombs, super missiles, armor piercing bullets, all activated by the sound of his voice (perhaps an actual cool use of the Kinect!) This guy has got some cool gear. Simple enough to manage, but diverse enough to make for interesting enough strategic gameplay shooter wise.

(side note: you can totally get this dredd gun replica on etsy which is super neat: http://www.etsy.com/listing/119715906/dredd-3d-lawgiver-mkii-prop-gun-kit)

5. Nifty Effects Possibilities: Slowing down time is pretty cool in games. If the new Max Payne teaches us anything, it’s that slo-mo fighting is still as cool as can be, and Dredd offers a perfect device for implementing this kind of game play. If you haven’t seen the film, a drug called “Slo-Mo” is the villainous substance in question. The film does a great job of peppering in beautifully rendered visual effects sequences in slow motion when the drug is administered. What I would dare to call, a symphony of violence, these scenes are stunning to behold, and surprisingly not overused at all, taking place at only key moments in the film. Granted, the game could easily exploit this and make it a regular feature of the gameplay, most likely with no complaints from me. Just think…a cool effect/special ability that actually has a reason for being in the game, who woulda thunk it!?

Last but not least, my favorite reason why I wish Dredd would be made into a videogame….

6. THE AWESOME FEMALE CHARACTERS: People act as if creating good female characters in games is the riddle of the Sphinx, but awesome female characters have been kicking ass in action movies for years and no one has had an aneurysm about it on the internet. (Hello, where is the female lead in the new Aliens game?) By looking to badass movies for ideas, and not upping the bra size too drastically you have the simple recipe for some great female game characters. You can still have your formulaic male protagonist to put on the box, but by adding a few killer female characters you could create a great game that still sells that doesn’t totally isolate any possible female audience, and maybe won’t even cause you to be tarred and feathered by the internet troll population.  Dredd is a fantastic example of this.

First let’s talk about Lena Headley as “Ma-Ma.” One of the things I loved about this film is how even keeled both the protagonist (Dredd) and the villain are. Neither is ever rattled by the crazy events that are going on all around them. By methodically keeping a level head, both of these characters show that they are not playing around. Even without an in-depth background story, by creating an air of mystery and hardness around these characters, you never need to question who they are, because you already know. Ma-Ma is horrifying and strong. The fact that she is a woman is never brought up as any kind of negative, although the image of her biting off an old enemy’s manhood is revisited several times, her power is unshakable. In my mind, female villains are a great idea for games, but you don’t really see them very often (outside of final fantasy.) If done correctly, it’s a great way for us girls to get our female empowerment on, and it also lets haters defeat a woman at the end of the game so EVERYBODY WINS.

Let’s not forget about Dredd’s cute little blonde sidekick, Olivia Thirlby as Anderson. Although indeed cute and blonde, did I forget to mention that she is also a BADASS? At the beginning of the film I wasn’t sure if she would turn out to be the type of character I’d be gushing about, and found her a little too adorable to be cast in this kind of film, but she proved me totally wrong. The polar opposite of Dredd and Ma-Ma, Anderson clearly has a personality and a conscious. It’s the addition of her more human story to the mix that makes this a truly well rounded film. A bit gun shy and timid at the beginning, she learns quickly to do what needs to be done to do her job, but never forgets her reasons for wanting to be a Judge, and doesn’t lose her humanity in the end. Oh and she also has a superpower (she can read people’s minds…another super incredible and unique gameplay feature I would love to see happen.) Can you imagine the possibilities of the co-op mode for this game? Talk about your perfect formula for a game of all sexes! And guys on the internet liked her character too!

So get out your checkbooks millionaires interested in new game development ventures because sadly, it looks like this movie may be the end of the road. (http://io9.com/5945745/therell-probably-never-be-another-judge-dredd-movie) The main point I want to make here is that there are compromises that can be made as far as putting more/better female characters into games. Just plopping in a random female soldier is a step sure, but what we really need is characters with some depth that both men and women can enjoy playing as or encountering in games. There have been incredible female action stars who women have admired and that men drool over for decades, why can’t games draw from that formula to help take a step in the right direction towards lessening the gender bias in today’s games?