No, not that at all. If it was Larry Croft, and he were as vocal, I'd be equally as annoyed. Vocalising thoughts n' such. Its too unrealistic, that or just bad voice acting. Something cringe-worthy about it anyway. Just doesn't seem convincing. Admittedly, watching the trailer again, she's quiet most of the time except for grunts and groans, but 2/3 times when she does talk, I'm rolling me eyes.
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
I actually think her voice is perfect for the role, but the way she makes all those grunts and groans makes it a bit obvious that there is an actress trying to record reactions behind a sound booth, and I don't quite think it's convincing enough.
ok so i haven't seen much of tomb raider since like number 3 back in the times of yore when games were chiseled on stone tablets but
1. lara seems kinda whiny? i don't even mean this in a 'SHE COMPLAINS TOO MUCH' sort of way, more of a 'every noise she makes sounds like im playing a porn game'
2. do women really make that many moany noises when in pain
aaah this looks so great
a good tomb raider game with all this lovely character development and everything b l e s s
also idk i'll have to watch it again but i don't think her grunts/etc sound that bad? maybe it's cause the trailer is just a lot of scenes of her getting her ass kicked so it's all like compiled but during the actual game it'll be more tame
I know it's been stripped back to bare bones and redone, but isn't Lara still a rich bitch brat? She doesn't sound like one IMO. The voice was irking me too. Still, the game looks lush and I got emailed the trailer, so I'll be a contented bugger for now.
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
So apparently, or at least an Australian news site is reporting it as a major thing (which doesn't mean much), some people have taken offence to the attempted rape scene shown in the trailer, and are drawing creative meanings from it that I think are quite radical. Discuss. If I recall correctly, in the process of this attempt, doesn't she beat the shit out of the person or something? Even if she doesn't, what is wrong with portraying what can happen in reality?
Its something I don't get about criticisms of story-writing; how things have to apparently fit and make sense for them to be justified (rape and murder scenes, or anything really). Real life don't work that way. If someone wants to put in something random, let 'em do it. Life is random. Random stuff happens. A friend you seen last is on top of the world, next minute, a meteor hits them and they die. Its entirely possible!
This rape attempt scene isn't even random. Its character building, or rather, character expressing. It shows what bullshit Lara Croft has been through to make her strong, and also shows her nature to survive n' all that stuff. So ignore my last paragraph, it fits fine.
I guess the problem, as ever, is that many people still think games are for children. So whenever there is this kind of content there is a huge uproar, even if the game has an adult rating.
But how would such a scene be executed anyway? Is it going to be like Heavy Rain (which IIRC had a similar scene with that creepy doctor) where you have to time a button press or what? Or is it just a cut scene?
And the other thing, up until now Lara Croft has been quite a cartooninsh game heroine, but this incarnation is trying to be more realistic and for a lone female travelling around all different parts of the world, the threat of rape is very real. It's whether or not they can reconcile this idea of the formerly cartoonish with realism, because lets face it Lara was (along with Tifa) one of gamings first pin-ups. She was sexualised to the point of parody (even though she was kick-ass) and even that wasn't enough for some people.....anyone remember the nude hack? That was gross, it just turned her whole form pink including her backpack which just looked like some sort of growth....
So I can kind of see why people might be bothered by this I think if it wasn't Lara Croft we were talking about there wouldn't be nearly as much of a fuss, like I mentioned before - in Heavy Rain (a game about child murder) there was a scene where
the journalist Madison becomes trapped in a murderers house, where he has been cutting up women and it obviously has a sexual motive
but because she was an unknown character, and it wasn't handled in a graphic way (should you fail to escape) there wasn't too much of an uproar.
But I'd have to see how this actually pans out, its all down to the execution.
This is what they're saying as of yesterday. Kind of contradictory.
The other thing I was thinking about, and its something I've noticed from reading too much damn fanfiction, is that all to often rape/abuse gets used as a lazy way to add 'backstory'.
Like lets say this was a man we were talking about, would he have to have survived a rape/attempted rape for him to toughen up? Why does there have to be a sexual element here? Someone can have to fight to survive and become stronger without the threat of rape.
I'm going in circles here....
Though I will say that if what the creators are saying is true there and it doesn't go beyond what we see in that clip then at least its not 'titillating' - which would have been a big worry.
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
Looked like a cutscene, but then again I haven't seen any interface besides the contextual button presses, so it could very much have been a gameplay sequence edited out by the marketing department.
But really, if Crystal Dynamics are mature enough to approach the issue in a well-thought-out manner, I have no problem with this game showing an explicit attempt at rape. Films have done worse, and if the impact can be felt upon Lara Croft's serious-fucking-business character development, I fully support it.
I do see the other side of the argument, but the people on Kotaku calling rape attempts in literature as lazy female character development are being cynical at best, and utterly absurd at worst.
I do see the other side of the argument, but the people on Kotaku calling rape attempts in literature as lazy female character development are being cynical at best, and utterly absurd at worst.
It does depend on how it is handled, I don't think anyone can say that across the board rape/abuse = lazy character development. I guess the problem is that the lazy variety crops up more often and people are jaded?
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
it's social justice warriors screaming about how men always use rape as a backstory because women can only be strong if they get the shit knocked out of them first and
yeah for sure rape is often poorly used in a story, esp when it's used in the place of backstory but this isn't the case
this isn't some fetishised male fantasy scene here it's brutal and horrible and yeah you should feel disgusted and outraged that this is happening to her
but it's not pointless and it's not the whole of her character development
is this the part from the demo. Because it made sense to me.
Lara is a person being brutalized by what's around and the enemies. And they attempt to dominate her through violence and in a brief window, sexually. So she's forced in a situation where she has to do all she can to get out, she kicks him and rips off his ear. She escapes being a victim of a dude who would make her one by becoming a survivor.
It's not sexy, you are suppose to be legitimately scared at that moment. Like the way you were when she fell down onto the pike, only this carries a new weight to it. If it was her whole backstory, or it was presented in a fetishized way I would be worried. But it's not.
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
I do think that the message was conveyed quite poorly by Crystal Dynamics after this footage came out, though. The guy talked about the relationship between the player and Lara Croft as something about "being protective" or somesuch? That Lara Croft requires protection or some bullshit about vulnerability. The Kotaku posters are apparently livid about this entire game and the fact that the PR department managed to make her look like a Metroid Other-M submissive!Samus.
I'm not sure that that's what the writers are actually going for. Sure, some players may feel that female-protection-complex, but it's not a thing that's made consciously and players won't be all "yep, I did it, I saved Lara Croft and turned her into An Hero" by the end of the game. It's more like, "yep, the shit hit the fan, and Lara Croft found the inner strength to save herself and become An Hero".
There is a strong connection between the protagonist and the player, but it's certainly nothing to do with guiding and protecting in this case.
Even if Lara is vulnerable etc, who cares? We can't have perceived weakness in a female character any more? I hate Taylor Swift's songs as much as everyone else, but hell, she should be free to write them =p.
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
No, it's their idea that they turned their favorite pair of sentient tits-with-guns into a submissive weakling. Which, of course, I don't have a real issue with since I personally don't think is actually the case ().
Satsu, BRIAN BLESSED, MIGHTY AND WISE Junpei Iori: Ace Detective, Maccaffrickstonson von Lichtenstafford Frabenschnaben, Polite Krogan, Robert Baratheon
It's also partly why the lady behind Tropes vs. Women kinda annoys me, because she's a prime example of how the media can make mountains out of molehills and thus diminish the far more significant problems in the portrayal of women in videogames, by blowing trivial things out of proportion.
I think it's worth noting that there are plenty of women with "rape" fantasies. Though that always kind of confused me because I'm not sure how well you can categorise it as rape if you're sexualising it like that
).
