Playing offense
I recently purchased The Orange Box, a five-game set from Valve which includes Team Fortress 2. I might have wasted my money, though, because Team Fortress 2 is all I care to play. It is, in my opinion, the best class-based multiplayer FPS ever made, and I'll have more talk about later on about all the aspects of its design that make it so amazing.
Today, however, I have a different topic of discussion. Team Fortress 2 has 9 characters, each with a very unique persona comprised of their appearance, accent and notable slogans. Wikipedia has a great list of descriptions for these characters, but here's a quick rundown for those of you who don't click links:
- Scout: Spry, hip, New Yorker. White.
- Soldier: Big & stupid. The stereotypical corporal. White.
- Heavy: Enormous & probably a boxer. White.
- Engineer: Texan, got a vocational degree and spends all day building stuff. White.
- Medic: Went to medical school, has a smile that screams marriage material. White.
- Sniper: Aussie, probably wrestles alligators. White.
- Spy: Suave, 007 type. Loves them and leaves them. White.
- Pyro: Covered from head to toe, no idea what he looks like, can't really hear him through the gas mask.
- Demoman: Has an eye patch, carries an empty bottle of Scotch, sounds stupid (listen to him say "Kaboom!", he doesn't pronounce his consonants). Black.
I'm usually not the PC minded type, but everytime I look at the TF2 lineup, I can't help thinking, "why does the drunkard have to be black?"
Yes, it's the same as the old "why does the black guy have to die first?" question, but that still happens. I know that the videogame industry is usually really bad about race when it comes to character design, usually depicting black characters with poor stereotypes, and as far as I see it, TF2 is no exception. To be honest, I like the fact that the designers behind these characters took the time to give each class a unique persona. This is probably the first class-based FPS to do so. I just think they really messed up with the stereotypes.
But I'm going to leave the judgment open to discussion here; when you read the descriptions for these characters, (and maybe when you play TF2), do you feel like this issue is apparent? Does it bother you like it has bothered me?
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huh, interesting - i've never really thought about the presentation of stereotypes regarding races, i think most of the time it's that minorities aren't even included (i could mostly be wrong on this as i don't game that much so out of the games i do know - predominantly white characters) so it's interesting to see how they are portrayed when they are.
it does bug me even though it's one case study, though my main beef is with the representation of almost all women characters in games, but that's an entirely different story all together…
I would say he's a drunk because he's Scottish rather than black. The Scots are not know for there temperence…
I would ask why does the drunkard have to be Scottish?
And in all honesty the answer is because it's that picture that has the biggest comedic impact - and from what I've seen the demoman is the funniest character.
kxj: Even though I haven't been buying too many games lately, the story hasn't changed. Usually it is all white characters, or white and Japanese, and when some minority is included, it's always with some stereotype. There are exceptions but that's all they are.
Anthony: I know it has everything to do with comedic impact; TF2 is a hilarious game. I think it's mostly a matter of insensitivity rather than racism… maybe an oversight, maybe a lousy stereotype.
I dunno, when I think of black stereotypes, I don't really think of drunkards. Same for Scottish stereotypes. Now, if it was an Irish drunk demoman, that might be offensive, especially considering the bombings committed by the IRA.
I'm pretty sure they figured (1) they needed a black guy, but (2) they didn't want to have him be the heavy weapons guy because that seemed obvious (you ever see the movie Doom with the black heavy weapons dude?). So they figured, having the black guy be a drunk Scottish one-eyed explosives nutter was pretty funny. Or maybe it's a reference to that movie, 'The 51st State'. Now, if they made him the scout, that might have been stereotypical (see: Kenyan marathon runners). Or the spy (see: pimps, playas).
You know what would have been nice, if there was an Asian dude. If they really wanted to be stereotypical, they could make the Medic or the Engineer Asian. Although I will say that when I was at Cornell's Engineering school (BS in CS '03), there actually were a lot of fellow Asians.
Back to the topic at hand… TF2 is great fun. It reminds me of when I wasted my entire freshman year playing TFC. When I'm playing, I really don't think of the demoman fulfilling any stereotypes, I just keep an eye out for those damn pyros. And reading the descriptions, I personally don't feel that they are offensive.
As for kxj, well, I dunno. It's fan service! Guys want to see attractive women in games. Generally, one doesn't really see any unattractive men in video games either, right? Not as main characters anyway.
I've gotta go with the Scottish thing on this one. Being Scottish I can vouch for the drunkenness because it's a very bit part of the culture in Scotland (and the UK in general). And yes, our accents make us sound stupid.
I do get what you're saying though but every race (and culture) has a stereotype and it's getting to that point where anything would be seen as offensive. That might be why they made the Pyro impossible to place and covered him up…
You're missing the point. All of the classes in TF2 are ridiculous, exaggerated stereotypes, and the Demoman is no exception. But his character is pretty much entirely based on the idea of the angry, drunk Scotsman, nothing to do with his race. The fact that he's black is just an added joke about the rarity of black Scottish people - especially ones with one eye.