Randy Travis has a song called “Heroes and Friends” which features the line
Your heroes will help you find good in yourself.
which I thought of the other day whilst playing Ultimate Alliance. My husband and I both love video games but generally entirely different genres: he likes first-person-shooters and I like puzzle games. Aside from GTA which I just like watching him play and Prince of Persia, which occasionally requires his hack-and-slash style, we don’t have games that we can play together. So we get our fixes separately. Until someone gave us X-Men Legends (we then bought X-Men Legends II and have now recently acquired Ultimate Alliance). Now we can truly spend quality time together.
For those who don’t know, these games are cooperative games. Up to four different people can play at a time battling joint foes. You can play them on your own, but the computer isn’t as good a team mate. Frequently, there will be places that can only be gotten to by people who have special abilities (flight, bridge-making) so a diverse group is necessitated.
Playing this with Alex is always interesting because we have completely different styles of playing. We also choose entirely different characters. In the first two games, my absolute favorite was Storm: she could fly, strike people with lightening, and was generally a strong woman. She’s really always been one of my (if not the) favorite super-heroes. Heck, she’s even been worshiped as a goddess! Also? The best role Halle Berry has ever had. (Alex’s favorite is Iceman. I’m not certain why, but he knows his strengths and it’s great to have him on my team.) She was also the best choice in the games. Other women I could choose from were Jean Grey (who, while super cool in comics and movies, and 2nd in command under Professor X, isn’t all that powerful a mutant in the games), Rogue (again, not that strong of a character to play as: not real strong, doesn’t have a great radius of power, &c.), and Magma…who’s like 13 and, although very powerful at lower levels, doesn’t upgrade well. Now, of course, I could play as Wolverine, Cyclops, Gambit (my fav. from the comics), or even Iceman. But somehow, although I can make it through the levels just as well (if not better?), I don’t enjoy it quite as much.
I’m sure that the subject of catharsis and voyeurism in video games has been beaten to death, but allow me to add a few more blows.
MUA has more female characters to choose from (to start with, we’ll see how the unlockables go), including ones I’ve never heard of but love playing as. We just created our own “team” including Ms. Marvel (who I think is distantly related to Captain Marvel, but she grew up! since I last read that comic) and Spiderwoman, whose back story I know not but it’s my totem animal, so *shrug*. Alex’s two are Thor (who I like playing as, too, but he’s kinda slow) and Captain America (who I think needs to get out of the 50s).
Some of my other favorite video games include Tekken, DOA, and Bloody Roar, all of which I am physically incapable of playing through without using a female character for 70% of the time. There’s one guy in DOA who’s as fast as a woman but as powerful as a man (which is the trade off most of the time; but Ms. Marvel? totally strong and fast and flies!), but he’s a total ass, so I can’t stand either fighting him or fighting as him.
So why do I feel this need to play as female characters? I was playing a card game with my husband and another couple. We each got dealt 4 character cards and had to choose one to play as. I got one woman and three men and chose the woman; the two men chose men, and the other woman also chose a woman. Clearly it’s not just me.
I was contemplating this phenomenon last night (before I thought it would be a good blog topic…) and thought of the Randy Travis song. Previously, my hypothesis had been something like, “well, I’m not as strong as Ms. Marvel, nor can I strike people with lightening, I must be enjoying pretending I’m someone I’m not”. But post-Travis, I think it may be closer to, “these are great role models who, although living in a world of men (crime, crime fighting, and fighting), still manage to be feminine, sexy, strong, and independent. In fact, they’re not that different from me! Sure I don’t wear crazy spandex and I don’t fly but I do probably wear tight clothes more often than I should and am smart, strong, and independent while fighting (metaphorically) in what is still frequently a man’s world. These are women I can identify with as much as look up to.” (That’s about when I thought it would be a good blog topic.)
The second hypothesis also makes me feel better about choosing women when I play games. I used to get crap from the people I played with (and yes, they were usually guys) and against…until I beat their asses. But, unfortunately, that’s what it took. Incidentally, the man I played the above-noted card game with was one who used to give me crap; he has matured…but he also lost that game. I’m not just choosing to play as a woman because I am one, but because I understand their strengths and weaknesses; because I can identify with them; and because I look up to them. And hey, it’s a game. If I can’t have fun playing it, what the hell am I doing playing it in the first place?
I’m gonna go play MUA now with a clear conscience.
5 responses so far ↓
1 John // Dec 16, 2006 at 9:13 pm
You should consider submitting this (or another post like it) to the next Carnival of Feminist SF. There’s always a gaming section.
This post got me to thinking. I must have had a feminist bent for a long time. I read comics and play video games, two entertainment genres known for their misogynistic and sexually objectifying portrayals of women, but I’ve always been drawn to the smart, independent female characters.
My favorite X-men was Kitty Pryde (aka Shadowcat), who was a young teen girl fighting in a big (mutant) man’s world. Since her superpower was mostly defensive, she often got by wholly on her own natural smarts. She was always fully clothed, and tended to wear jeans instead of
spray-on lingeriespandex. Apparently Joss Whedon really liked her too, because she was an inspiration for his Buffy character (and on Buffy:tVS, Tara and early Willow were my favorite characters).My favorite video game character is April Ryan from The Longest Journey. I don’t like adventure games, but this one had an award-winning storyline and a compelling protagonist. Again, this was a girl who got by entirely on her smarts and spunk.
The kids and I play World of Warcraft, which we can do cooperatively. I tend to play characters that use their brains instead of brawn, and I consciously choose to play women or darker-skinned characters (even though players have the power to customize their appearance, most human avatars are very white–everyone else is purple or green).
So what does this all mean for me? Perhaps I choose to play women not because I am one, but because I can identify with them? (I won an award for a short story with a female protagonist, and the judges were surprised to find that the author was a man.) It’s probably not the whole story. As a hetero male, I’m attracted to these women as well–but not, for some reason, to their more overtly sexually portrayed counterparts.
2 Miko // Dec 16, 2006 at 9:40 pm
I really like B:tVS and Buffy herself, but Willow’s my favorite (and this one time, at band camp…).
Also, one of my favorite comics is 9 Chickweed Lane; the main character is a ballerina and frequently, the whole strip will be dedicated to her beauty and power: strking a pose or stretching her visible muscles. I just found out that the author is a man. I was really shocked by that and for a while, it changed the way I thought about the comic. I got over it, but it was strange how knowing that it was a man made me wonder if he wasn’t celebrating her power and beauty so much as ogling her…
3 Jonathan // Dec 19, 2006 at 11:16 am
the hero…
This has always been a phenomena that has fascinated and inspired me. Within literature, motion picture, gaming, and song, there has always existed the hero - the person who fights for the cause of good in the titanic and ever-present battle between good and evil. It seems to me that within each man or woman, their exists a dark, broken nature which powerfully influences them. If given too much free reign, its influence can become so great that even a person’s conscience and the warnings of friends can be ignored and cut off. This same struggle is found in the macrocosm of the mind - human society (hat tip to Socrates.)
And so the hero fights on two fronts - against his own broken nature, and against the people and movements in their society that have come under the near complete control of the same brokenness and have become twisted at a spiritual level into something inhuman.
What fascinates me? At first, I used to think it was because I wanted to be like the hero in the story - I was inspired to be brave and fight for what is right. As time went on, though, I began to realize that I did not want to be like some of them at all. My fascination and interest was more complex than mere mimicry.
With that realization, I began to think of good heroes in two categories (forget the complexity of the literary anti-hero) - the ‘human’ hero and the ‘perfect’ hero. The human hero is one who’s internal struggle against their own fallen nature is intense and overwhelming - greatly diminishing their ability to do good. The perfect hero is one who appears to have unlimited amounts of virtue - patient, good tempered, wise, long-suffering, not vengeful, impossibly intelligent, etc. that enables him/her to do things impossible for mere mortals. Stories with human heroes give me hope that even though we are all very broken people, it is possible to rise above it (to some limited degree) and do great good. But sadly, even the great good they do has motivations originating within their brokenness (pride, fame, greed, etc.) I didn’t want to be like these people at all. They had the same problems I had, and were no different from me except in circumstance.
The perfect hero was much more fascinating to me. He/she would mourn the perfect amount, laugh when it was time, and recover from a broken heart fast enough to overcome the opposition when the time came. Their bravery and perseverance were unquenchable. Their motivations always came from the right place - they are an unstoppable force of good in a world that is too broken to attain to their level. In my youth, this is what I wished to be like. When I grew up, I realized that because of my own brokenness, I could never ever be a person like that. Push and squeeze me with just enough hardship, and awful stuff will inevitably come out. I saw with sadness how I acted during hardship. I will not be brave. I will not endure, I will loose heart. I will fail. My anger will consume me. I will lash out and hurt the people I love the most. But it was then that I realized two things about who the perfect hero was - it was who I was always meant to be; it was who I was originally designed to be before something within me went terribly wrong. Secondly, the perfect hero became a picture not of who I wanted to be one day, but the embodiment of the person I needed to help me fight and escape my own brokenness. In this life, the perfect hero exists, but it can never be me or any other human being.
So what do I see when I read a good book or play a cool video game (World of Warcraft at the moment) or watch a great movie with a hero? Part of my brain appreciates the good storyline and great visual effects, but the much more consuming part of me sees the battle of good and evil from a different perspective in matrix code - one that takes place on the battlefield of the spiritual. It is where all men and women fight and fall - inevitably injured - most of the time mortally, by the destructiveness of their own broken nature, a powerful and unstoppable enemy. I might have taken down a few, but there are always more that follow. In the end, I fail. I am spiritually wounded badly again, fallen, half-dead, on the ground. But from somewhere, hope comes. Onto the spiritual battlefield filled with the dying and the injured comes the one who cannot fail and cannot die. The unstoppable enemies of mine cannot hurt or even effect this one. I simple cry out for help.
In the meantime, when I am renewed, I will become a better solider, but in this lifetime, this titanic battle will never be won by me, but by the perfect hero - the one who cannot fail. I throw in my lot with C.S. Lewis. The great stories are mythical pictures and shadows of the greatest story of all, to which they all point to, not unlike how all loves point to the greatest love of all, true love. To indulge in one will eventually lead to the final and greatest one.
4 Miko // Dec 19, 2006 at 11:48 pm
Jonathan: thank you. I’ve read that about four times; it’s beautiful.
For me, the human hero (which I would place somewhere between your two heroes) was always the more fascinating. Not just more attainable, but more believable. I could believe that Batman really existed because he had failings, was not always perfect, and still did good. Superman, though, has always been a myth for me. He’s otherworldly (literally), perfect, can’t be beat, and so, for me, unbelievable. It wasn’t fun to read about Superman because you know he’s gonna come out on top. Batman might lose. Batman might die. Batman might adopt me…
I think your definition of heroes as fighting two fronts: inner and outer touches on the crux. I started enjoying Greek tragedy when I realized that these heroes and demigods were Batmen. Zeus, for all his womanizing will always be Superman. But Odyseus and Achilles fought against themselves to be the men they thought they should be.
I know I keep going back to Aristotle and I’m not trying to convert anyone, it’s just how my mind works. Aristotle taught that, to be completely happy, we must be completely moral. And to be completely moral, we must follow the example of a completely moral person. But, when it comes down to it, there are no role models for that. And so, he taught, the role model for every moral being is that spark within them that believes that they can be Batman, regardless of the fascination with dark caves, regardless of that one time (only one?) when he made a minor criminal fear death simply to get a point across, regardless of the way he treats Robin (he makes him wear red, green, and yellow!). Aristotle was very like Michael Jackson in that sense. At the end of the day, the perfectly moral person looks back at you from the mirror.
5 Jonathan // Dec 20, 2006 at 10:02 am
Miko, I’ve must read Aristotle! He sounds really amazing with these topics! My philosophy reading has been Socrates for the last 4 months, but as soon as I’m done with The Republic, I’ll switch to him. I’ve almost finished my round of Plato and the stoics.
After reading your comments, there seems to be this hybrid hero of sorts who is totally invincible in one area, but very human in another. I think this hero is the one I enjoy and am inspired (and want to be like) more than the ‘human’ hero. And of course, my feelings towards the perfect hero are more messianic related than a desire to ‘be like’ him or her.
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