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Xbox 360 PlayStation 3 News by Robert Purchese
New suggestions that Resident Evil 5 features racist imagery have emerged.
Newsweek games writer N'Gai Croal has hit out at the E3 2007 trailer for the game in an interview with MTV Multiplayer, stating, "Wow, clearly no one black worked on this game."
He continued, "It's like when you engage that kind of imagery you have to be careful with it. It would be like saying you were going to do some sort of zombie movie that appeared to be set in Europe in the 1940s with skinny, emaciated, Hasidic-looking people.
"If you put up that imagery people would be saying, 'Are you crazy?' Well, that's what this stuff looks like. This imagery has a history. It has a history and you can't pretend otherwise.
"That imagery still has a history that has to be engaged, that has to be understood. If you're going to engage imagery that has that potential, the onus is on the creator to be aware of that because there will be repercussions in the marketplace."
The Resident Evil 5 trailer shows protagonist Chris Redfield in a small, poor and dusty village. He is the only white character portrayed in the three minute trailer. The zombies he proceeds to try to kill are black.
"The point isn't that you can't have black zombies. There was a lot of imagery in that trailer that dovetailed with classic racist imagery," Croal said.
"That's the whole thing where only Chris Redfield appears to be human before they turn into zombies; the humanity of other people is in question. It's like you barely see their faces, he doesn't really interact with them, he sort of walks through this thing and it's sort of, 'Is he there? Is he not?'
"It's a very strange thing, and it taps into sort of this very racist iconography. I think that's the only way I'm describing it. I'm not saying that was their intent. But it seems that a lot of people who were up in arms about the trailer couldn't see that and didn't want to engage it.
"I think, again, the point is not that Capcom can't or shouldn't make a zombie game set in what appears to be an impoverished country where the majority of residents are black. I'm not saying that.
"But what I am saying is that if I was Capcom, I wouldn't have suggested to put out that trailer. I would have said, 'You know what, this has tremendous capacity for being misunderstood, and we want to signal that this is not what you might think it is' - and they didn't do that."
Initial reaction to the Resident Evil 5 trailer was mixed, with some people expressing unease at the content, while others dismissed suggestions of any racist connotations.
The game is set for release on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 platforms later this year.
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GrandTheftApu
11/04/08 @ 10:27
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"But what I am saying is that if I was Capcom, I wouldn't have suggested to put out that trailer. I would have said, 'You know what, this has tremendous capacity for being misunderstood, and we want to signal that this is not what you might think it is' - and they didn't do that."
Don't think he would be ideally suited to a career in marketing. |
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He continued, "It's like when you engage that kind of imagery you have to be careful with it. It would be like saying you were going to do some sort of zombie movie that appeared to be set in Europe in the 1940s with skinny, emaciated, Hasidic-looking people.
Er no its not. Its actually like if you set in in Europe in the 1940's with European looking people. What was he expecting to be depicted in an African village? The Welsh? |
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KingOfSpain
11/04/08 @ 10:27
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I normally agree with N'Gai, hes a good guy and writes a lot of good stuff. However, this is a load of crap.
Maybe its a US culture thing. Maybe we don't have the same cultural touchstones on race as they do. Maybe the race relations debate in the 60s and 70s has a lot to do with their outlook and we have never had the same issues. He is looking for racism where there isn't any. Anyway, its all a crock of shit! |
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It's just good direction in the trailer. Kinda like a Bourne film. Matt Damon walking through a city , were everybody looks dodgy no matter what they look like because they could be harmful to him. Croal is looking for racism when it's not there. It's a village, which I've seen many of in news, docs, travel shows without the obvious Zombie infections. The character is on his own, has to aware of everyone. Then the shit hits the fan and off you go Zombie killing. Nothing wrong with that.
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japstersam
11/04/08 @ 10:37
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whaaat the hell is this all about?
the world has gone mental on racism, its set in africa so it has africans, no-one would say it was racist if it was set in england and had english people in it....? thats insane |
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FFS!!! Sod it just leave out any country with mainly coloured people, and just have no blacks in games whatsoever. That way they can't bloody whinge! Would white people moan if the lead guy was black and the infected were white? No.
Personally I think Capcom should be commended for moving away from the western world and setting their game somewhere new and interesting and showing gamers the more of the world, the fact the infected are black has no bearing other than it's the country the game is set. I never even thought about racism in the trailer until twats like this guy started. In fact I remember watching videos from blacks guys on you tube when all this crap started saying they themselves didn't even think it was racist. GET A GRIP AND LOOK WHERE THE GAME IS SET!!!! |
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UltimateWarrior
11/04/08 @ 10:44
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A lot of you are missing the point. He's not jumping on some racism bandwagon. He's basically saying that in this current climate where racism is still an issue for many, many people worldwide it was ill advised to have a single white man shooting lots of black people. It's easy to dismiss this when we know the background. We know that Chris Redfield is the hero of the series. We know that thsoe black people are zombies. We know that he must be in Africa for a reason. But taken on face value it's a trailer showing a white guy shooting lots of black people and it isn't even made blatantly cleare that they're zombies. Is the guy with a mega phone leading the attack? Is he a zombie? Can zombies still talk? Is he warning Chris? None of this is clear and thus it could easily offend many people who don't know or don't bother to find out the background. That's just the way things are nowadays. We've seen it with MPS and the press that people will jump to conlusions far too easily and this trailer gives people the opportunity to do just that. It's not a criticism of the game or Capcom. It's simply a jutsifiable point that the trailer is ill advised. That's "ill advised" not "blatantly racist."
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This is some load of bollix. I completely agree that Capcom should be commended for setting a game in Africa for a change. Yesterday we had complaints about all black people in games being stereotypes and now today, when the black people in the game are either normal African villagers or zombies there's complaints that this is racism. Is everyone losing there fupping minds.
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No offer about his intellect, but this time he is so NOT right! He is emotional driven. In the end Capcom, just wanted to give the audition a new fresh and cool look of Resident Evil Zombie Action. As they alway tried to do.
And the Trailer is absolute brilliant. Its only function is to reactivate Resident Evil 4 Memorys/Experiences for the audition because it shows the same gameplay mechanics, speed, dramatic etc... The problem is, if those black people like Ngai would see them self as equal as a white man, they would never complain, because why should they? There is the Problem, in your minds. |
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hayisforhorses
11/04/08 @ 10:54
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I remember the first time i saw the trailer, and instant reaction was a sharp intake of breath with that little snakey noise that you make when someone makes a joke that you really shouldnt laugh at. I feel kind of dissapointed and disgusted at the medias response because my initial reaction was right i knew people would take a trailer out of context of the final game and story and go apeshit.
Resident evil is on its umpteenth incarnation counting all the offshoots. Shouldnt we know the score by now, as should N'gai its about zombies, viruses and infections the only reservation i have which may lead me to agree with these comments is the move away from the traditional zombie image. It would be slightly easier to take if the zombies were half eaten rotted out corspses ala Resi 1-3 but they dont in fact they look pretty normal in the images weve been shown. |
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I can see what N'Gai is saying, it will always definitely be percieved the wrong way. Maybe they should have thought about the trailer before releasing it. But personally, i don't percieve it as racist or racism.
Maybeeee, ohhhh..... Capcom knew exactly what the public would think and it would generate publicity. Publicity is publicity, gamers were always gonna buy Resi5 but now it's reaching a wider audience. CONSPIRACY!!?? ooohhhhhh |
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Why wasn't this an issue when it was set in white America. Or southern Europe? Apparently it's only racism when it's in Africa which makes these hypocrites the biggest racists of them all.
Most of Africa is very poor, what should the makers do? Display Africa as super wealthy just because it's more pleasant? The nineties called, they want their left wing extremists with their politically correct bs back. Not only is this guy a racist, he is worse. He is scared of the political correct idiots. I thought we left that behind us when we went into the new millennium.
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most recently on 11/04/08 @ 12:00
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hayisforhorses
11/04/08 @ 11:01
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Thank god zombies arent real they would be hella upset by the whole series
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I'm curious... if a group of black developers made a game where you killed white zombies, would that be classed as rascist? LOL
Seriously though, I think people read too much into these things, a person is still a person regardless of the skin colour yet had the zombies been white no-one would have complained even if some of the development team had been black. Strikes me as odd. I think the people who have the problem in the first place are the ones who think "Wow, I'm killing a black person, how rascist is that?". Personally, I don't even notice skin colour in games, all I see are people so there's no distinction for me between killing Japanese in, say, Dynasty Warriors 6 or killing nasty "foriegn" terrorists in Call of Duty 4, they're still people (albeit make believe ones!!!). Anyway, going back to Resident Evil 5, I presume that not every zombie you kill will be black, if that was the case then the game could be considered rascist. What about the earlier games which I'm sure featured both zombies both black and white? How do we know that the final version of Resident Evil 5 won't feature people of all different colours? I always assumed the trailer was designed to highlight a very different kind of game, one set in bright daylight and one that was intended to show that it was Africa, thus, explaining why Chris Redfield was killing black zombies in a village. Had they been white it wouldn't have been so obvious... |
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"The point isn't that you can't have black zombies."
Why the fuck not? So it's OK for practically every other zombie film and game to be predominately populated with white zombies, but as soon as you change the setting to Africa, it's racist? What a load of bollocks. How many white people do you expect to see roaming a village in the middle of Africa? I didn't even think about race when I watched the trailer and if anyone's racist it's this guy for assuming other people think the same way as him. He can fuck right off. |
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UltimateWarrior does make a valid point but the way this guy describes the trailer blatantly shows he also thinks it's imagery is racist.
But are Capcom to blame if people choose to make judgments on imagery rather than in it's proper context in relation to the actual story (like the women who originally started this racism thing off). |
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HertzaHaeon
11/04/08 @ 11:11
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I can't believe so many can't even respect a differing opinion. Croal has some good arguments, and what's more, he can see it from a point of view most of you can't. Prejudice and xenophobia aren't rational or obvious, so you can't just claim you're magically free of centuries of racial thinking. Yes, it's been much, much worse, but that means that what remains is subtle and not necessarily obvious. Can't you at least be intellectually honest and admit there are more valid ways than one to look at this?
The Spanish in RE4 are not the same thing. The Spanish haven't been racially persecuted and enslaved. There's simply no equivalent historical baggage or symbolism. The same goes for reversing race roles in the game. The game is not racist because the zombies are black. It's perfectly logical that they are. Nothing about the setup is racist at face value and when you only look at it as a game, with nothing to do with anything else in the world. But that's not how it works. The game doesn't exist in a vacuum, and you can't just proclaim that a white man killing blacks isn't symbolical because there's a watertight barrier between the game and reality. There isn't. When viewed as part of our wider culture, there are some very valid points to make about how the game's imagery relates to real world events that still are very much alive and relevant. I'm definiely not supporting Jack Thompson-like bashing of games, but this isn't like that. Games can't be above all criticism, unlike other culture. If you want games to be accepted as worthwhile culture, these are the discussions we must be able to have about them - preferably without reducing every argument to "OMG THEY WANT TAKE TAEK OUR GAMES AWAY" or "FFS IT'S JUST A GAME". I think you'll find that in most cases, if you show some respect for your opponent's point of view, he will show some for yours as well. The white perspective isn't invalid, but you make it so by disrespecting all differing perspectives and reducing the issue to absolute black and white, if you'll pardon the expression. |
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penguin_overlord
11/04/08 @ 11:14
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I said this would happen. When that video popped up a few weeks ago, I said that the press would pick up on this.
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crazyhorse174
11/04/08 @ 11:17
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Has nobody mentioned yet that the game is developed by a JAPANESE company in JAPAN where people aren't white!?
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Ok this is getting out of hand. I don't think N'Gai is a racist or a "tard". UltimateWarrior makes a very intelligent and valid point.... however I would argue that this trailer is made for fans of the series, just as any trailer to any sequel is. For example if you were to look at a preview to something like the tv show The Wire, you would see that most of the characters are black and most of them are dealing drugs and whatnot. The main cop is a white guy who is out to clean up the streets. If you just saw clips of this show without actually watching it fully you could come to the same conclusion, that this is just the usual racist tv show with black guys as the bad guys and a white hero to save the day. Of course the tv show isn't like that at all, but from a trailer you could make that false assumption. It's not the creator's of the shows fault that everyone doesn't watch their show. I think this whole argument is completely ridiculous and stories like this being spread across the world as news are just going to fuel racism not prevent it. The end.
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The problem is that all the black people in the trailer already look evil before they turn into zombies. Saw anyone smiling, kids playing, etc? NO. I have to agree on this one. RE4 saw you stranded in a cabin with one lunatic zombie and it went from there. This time he enters a whole city with presumably evil inhabitants. And they all look fucking scary, criminal.
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Darren: I'm curious... if a group of black developers made a game where you killed white zombies, would that be classed as rascist? LOL
What about a group of black developers making a game where the main character was white and you shot black zombies (i.e. like RE5), would that be racist? /confused |
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PlugMonkey
11/04/08 @ 11:20
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Hertz: I can respect his opinion, but it seems misinformed. His main complaint seems to be that the line between the living black citizens and the violent undead enemies is ambiguous, which he seems to attribute to racism. But that aspect is exactly the same as the Spanish villagers in RE4. It's not 'zombies' anymore, they completely blurred the line. The violent 'living' black villagers are just at an early stage of exposure.
This isn't a race thing. It's a 28 Days Later thing. The way he talks about the subject, without even mentioning RE4, he gives the impression of not having played it and to be judging the game on the old zombie lore of the earlier games. |
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The enemies in most games are predominately / all white skinned, so isn't Capcom being less racist having a game where the majority of the villains are black people?
Surely it's better to be a core part of the game, rather than being given some sort of token side kick role. It's a bit like when the BBC try not to be racist by giving black actors on Eastenders roles as doctors, coppers and road sweepers, whilst saving all the meaty interesting stuff for white, bald, thug like looking blokes who go on to get all of the popularity and acclaim. |
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doriangray
11/04/08 @ 11:21
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Great post HertzaHaeon, said everything i wanted to say but more eloquently.
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i dont think the game is intending on being racist its just the setting
i think the main problem is that the main character is not black or even mixed. yes you will get some people claiming that it is promoting black on black crime but it would suit the story better. the main issue with media in general is the fact they protray white as being right and any thing else is just a mare tag along or an enemy. its also worrying that a country like japan follow this template with thier games and anime |
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As far as I can see pretty much everyone in this thread is failing to actually read what the guy said. He's not saying it's racist to have black zombies, he's saying that the way that black people are depicted in the trailer *before any of the actual zombies ever turn up* is falling back on racist imagery in order to create an atmosphere of fear.
"The point isn't that you can't have black zombies. There was a lot of imagery in that trailer that dovetailed with classic racist imagery," I think maybe people need to look into that aspect of it before they just dismiss his claims. He's not bashing games. He's not saying it's inherently racist to feature black people as villains. He's saying the imagery employed in the trailer is rather questionable - and I think he's absolutely right. |
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Of course, EVERYBODY knows, that Africa is full of happy, fat people full of love and understanding. That's why everybody just loves Africa.
Why, oh, why are those silly Japanese developers so blind to the reality of our world? We should laugh at their pathetic and rasistic attempt to smudge that great picture. Seriously - yes, it is only a game and I guess just like RE4 it will be set in completely imaginary world, not corresponded with our reality much - I would like to see some unpleasant African realities in this game, the more people to really see it the better. African issues are not exactly the ones you see in headlines often. So I think in case this game will spur some serious controversy and media attention, it will be good thing. Similar to last Rambo film (and I think nobody can accuse Rambo movies from some deep messages or intelectual political agenda :-)) can show some issues in Burma (no matter how simplified) to a broad spectrum of people, many of whom never even heard/remember from school about that country. |
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"As far as I can see pretty much everyone in this thread is failing to actually read what the guy said. He's not saying it's racist to have black zombies, he's saying that the way that black people are depicted in the trailer *before any of the actual zombies ever turn up* is falling back on racist imagery in order to create an atmosphere of fear. "
What racist imagery? Depicting Chris feeling uncomfortable in an environment where he stands out? Depicting people looking at him with suspicion? Depicting him being a fish out of water? These are all common set ups of any horror film where someone is in a place they do not know and where people do not know them. Whether it be the Yorkshire Moors in American Werewolf in London, the backwoods of America or Innsmouth. That does not mean it is racist. |
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