IN THIS ESSAY I AM GOING TO APPLY A SEMIOTIC ANALYSIS TO BOTH THE TOMB RAIDER AND METROID VIDEO GAME COVERS. THIS WILL INCLUDE THE ANALYSIS OF THE SYMBOLIC AND REPRESENTATION OF THE GAMES COVERS.

I will argue that the games cover of Metroid and Tomb Raider have different effects towards the gaming community. For example on the cover of Metroid, gamers who have never seen the game will presume that the robotic character is male underneath the suit, however the character is a girl. On the games cover of Tomb Raider viewers can easily tell that the character is a girl and that she is over-sexualised.

On my games cover (Widow), you can easily identify that my character is male due to the appearance and the ‘male like clothing’. In my production there is a clear focus on masculinity which is presented through the character having a muscular body type and being ‘buff’. The clothes used on my character heavily signify about: war, action and aggression which is a typical masculine stereotype. Also, on the back over the cover my character can be seen holding a large sword which also signifies, aggression and fighting. In some ways this links to this quote, “As a girl growing up playing games I was always like, why do I have to play as a boy?” because of the typical masculine stereotype which is thought that “men are natural leaders and woman are natural nurturers” which is presented in many other video games such as Super Mario through the use of the ‘danzel in distress’ , being Princess Peach.

Nevertheless I believe, it has always been expected that men are more aggressive and dangerous than woman who are believed to be ‘innocent’ and safe to be around, which I don’t believe is 100% true.

If you haven’t played the game Metroid you would expect from the games cover that the main character is male due to the stereotype of men being the main protagonist and the fact that they are wearing a robotic, fighting suit. However the main protagonist is a female who is very sexualised when the robotic suit is removed, with her wearing skin tight clothing to easily reveal her butt and her body. This links to a study found by MartinaAngelica which states “Boys believe female characters are treated too often as sex objects” which I strongly agree with. This shows that even men believe that woman in video games are over-sexualised and think that woman should be less sexualised by games companies using clothing on woman to be less tight and less revealing.  Summed up, Metroids front cover for the video game can radical as it goes against the patriarchal society.

In the game Tomb Raider (Lara Croft) the main protagonist is clearly visible as a woman but is very over-sexualised even on the main cover of the game with ‘Lara Croft’ wearing skin tight, tiny shorts to reveal her body. “Since Lara Croft blew up gaming culture in 1996 with the first instalment of Tomb Raider, her character has been so predominantly defined by her sex appeal.” As shown in this quote it is clear many viewers believe that Lara Croft is defined and judged through her body and looks that are made from pixels.

In conclusion I believe game designers and companies need to re-evaluate the way woman and male characters are made in video games to prevent woman being sexualised by hetero-sexual men.