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 January 3rd, 2006
Is it really possible for me talk about something besides gender and sexuality? Apparently. My piece today at The Escapist, Mainstream Gaming, Mainstream Shopping,” deals with the question of mainstream-ization. Are we losing our unique gamer culture? Are we becoming part of the crowd? Yes. But no worries — in this girl’s opinion, it’s a necessary evil in the move toward future glory. As always, remember that the conversation continues over at The Escapist’s blog. Swing on by! 8 Responses to ““Mainstream Shopping, Mainstream Gaming””Leave a Reply |
 Bonnie Ruberg is a sex, technology, and video games journalist who contributes regularly to publications like The Economist, Forbes, and The Village Voice. By day she's also a comparative literature PhD student at UC Berkeley, where she studies French, English, gender, sexuality, surrealism and perversion. You can reach her at [her first name and last name, all one big word] AT gmail DOT com.
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January 4th, 2006 at 2:30 pm
I was going to post a response in the Escapist blog, but I just noticed this here.
I really enjoyed reading this article. And I do agree that, as hard as it will be, “hardcore” gaming and culture as we know it must be destroyed or let go of. Once gaming becomes a more respectable artform, our culture will be reformed. For the better. :D One question, though; how long do you think that process will take?
Sorry to restate what you said, I just think it’s a great message more gamers should check out. And also, this article has made me a regular reader of this site. Nice to meet you.
January 4th, 2006 at 3:08 pm
Pretty good take on the subject.
As I was saying to a friend this very morning: I’ve been advoctating the necessity to expand and become mainstream for a long time, but I’m going to hate it all the way, every one and last second of it. I’ve already spent too much time cringing on the horror of mainstream music and litterature.
What I can’t stand is the idea of a vast majority of the community being composed of consumers. Not fans. Not (hard-core or not)gamers. Not video game lovers. Not academics (i.e professional lovers). People with no knowledge of the medium going further than what’s needed for their instant gratification. People who’ll adulate a writer, yet in the end will make no difference in the value of a book between the work of the poet and the work of the leatherworker. A mass of people who’ll buy Britney Spear records by millions, and Sylvain Chauveau’s by thousands… Wal-Mart as a culture center.
We need it, if only because it will allow the general commnunity, and by extension the products made for it, to thrive, to be wilder, wider and richer. Because it will allow, like with the book and record market, numerous niche artists to (barely) make a living without compromising their craft, whatever direction it takes (and what directions it will take, freed from the demands of the specialists !). But I know, being an elitist asshole, that I don’t want any of them mainstream people near me babbling inanities on the subject of games.
The necessary peaceful cohabitation will be demanding. :)
January 4th, 2006 at 3:38 pm
Nice to meet you too, Andy. Glad you liked the article. How long do I think it will take? It’s hard to say, especially since there are no definite ends, beginnings, or completes when it comes to this sort of thing. My guess would be, given the change we’ve seen in gaming culture over the last five years, things could be quite changed in another five.
MD^2, couldn’t agree more. And I know totally know that, “Eek, mainstreamers!” feeling; as a lit. student, I have that gag reflex every time I walk in to Barnes and Nobles. I try to hold and back and think positive though, at least in terms of gaming. Books, unfortunately, are another sad, sad story.
January 4th, 2006 at 4:39 pm
Hm, I see.
I too feel an “Aye! The mainstream is here!” reflex, but Bonnie’s on the right track by saying it can be positive. I know a lot of people who are casual gamers, but enjoy fun and innovative games (Katamari Damacy, Resident Evil 4, etc.) just the same.
I personally believe the biggest problem facing inventive games is the fact that there is no advertising spent on them what-so-ever. Imagine a perfect world, where games like Rez got the hype they deserved… *sighs*
January 4th, 2006 at 4:43 pm
I think advertising is just one side of it, though admittedly an important one and one most gamers have the most contact with. In general, it’s nearly impossible for inventive games to get picked up by big-name publishers, which means no big-name money, which means no big advertising. Publishers, for the most part, are only willing to sign on what they know they can sell to the masses, and that causes the stagnation we see at the moment. The people who are trying to push past all that, with innovative approaches to marketing and money needs, are indepedent publishing companies, like Manifesto Games. Whether or nit they’ll succeed, at least right now, has yet to be seen.
January 4th, 2006 at 5:25 pm
I have a somewhat different take on this, since I’ve been a “gamer” since before anybody knew there was such a thing. Born in 1967, grew up with the Odyssey, VCS, home Pong, played Computer Space in a bar while the grown-ups drank and chatted – the whole thing.
While there was platform advocacy and “fandom” back then, mostly we regarded the VCS et alia as a subset of the electronic toy genre that also including shuffling, “talking” robots, Mattel handheld sports games and things like Simon.
We were “mainstream” to begin with, and mostly viewed video games as extensions of existing leisure activities. Sports and racing games were cool because sports and racing were. Fantasy-type games attracted us because we all grew up loving the Marvel Conan series, LOTR, Burroughs and Lovecraft. There was also, of course, D&D.
(Trivia fun-fact: The first computer game review I ever read of the famous WIZARDRY (PGotMO) rpg game was in the long-dead and sorely missed magazine SPACE GAMER in 1981.
The reviewer opined that WIZARDRY was “an excellent simulation… of a terrible D&D session.”)
The VCS and it’s competitors were, of course, even more mainstream than the PS2 is now. They were sold at stores like Sears and JC Penney and were aimed squarely at family-friendly content and style. They were TOYS like boardgames and Matchbox cars, not A/V info-center multihub digital whatsits.
There was also no gender gap. That aspect of gaming would not come around until after the Crash, when Nintendo arrived in force. (PCs, on the other hand, were a boys club from the get-go. If there was a single female in North America who built an Altair from parts, I’ve yet to hear from or about her.)
So what we’re seeing, if indeed it’s really happening and will ‘stick’ this time, is a recapturing of cultural territory once held but then lost. We are (still) rebounding from the Crash.
January 4th, 2006 at 7:16 pm
Hmm, so it seems maybe what we’re going through isn’t an end-all shift, but one more point in a wave. We were mainstream, we were subculture, we are mainstream, we will be subculture. And who knows where we’ll go from there…
January 5th, 2006 at 6:18 am
Interesting Brummbar.
Either I don’t remember/evluate things as they were or the situation was very different in France.
Video games, even in the first so called golden age were not “mainstream”. The market was new an it tried to aim specificaly at children o impose itself. Adds were found in children Bande Dessiné Magazines . Not in papers. Not in women or men mags. Video games were a kid’s thing. Certainly not mainstream in the sense I understand the word. (Looking back into my pile of mags in the basement I found one from 1983 in Spirou, selling a Schneider “Home Computer” i.e a copy of the Videopac Phillips it seems. The add is typical of the “family product” sell strategy. Children are the market aimed here. I know, it’s a bit off period, but I’m sure if I went deeper into the stash I’d find roughly the same things for the preceding years.)
The arcade was perceived a thing of adolescent/young adults (a good look at french fiction from the period [and the following] could show you that), and they were always very few: most of the time, if you wanted to find a pinball or game cabinet you’d have to hit the closest café, which would have one unique game, which was trying to play the role of the billiard table or tabletop fooball, but never really did.
It wasn’t so much Mainstream as nebulous and still trying to find a durable market segment. At least that’s how I see things from here.