/2012/06/08/gamer-diary-what-ive-been-playing-may-2012/ A feminist pop culture adventure Fri, 08 Jun 2012 09:13:44 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.6 /2012/06/08/gamer-diary-what-ive-been-playing-may-2012/#comment-2295 Fri, 08 Jun 2012 09:13:44 +0000 http://www.badreputation.org.uk/?p=11110#comment-2295 This may just be my own tendency to over-analyse everything, but I’m not sure I’d be so quick to “pass” Diablo 3 from a feminist perspective. Aside from the Demon Hunter’s boots, the characters of Adria and Leah surely need a little more analysis; on one hand Adria at least breaks away from the traditional fantasy/fairy tale “evil step-mother” trope by being Leah’s birth mother, but on the other, surely there are some issues with her depiction as an evil witch, not to mention her apparent heel-turn from the first game in the series. I’ve had the privilege of watching the interview DVD with the creators, and the discussion of Leah is interesting, not least because it’s very strange watching a bunch of male programmers discuss how hard it is to create a young, likeable, attractive female, but also from a storyline perspective with regards to what happens to her; a thing that is done to her, a total violation by the male antagonist of the series. Speaking of which, how about the fact that that antagonist is now apparently transgender? And what about the depiction of the Witch Doctor, is it racist?

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