The makers of “Resident Evil 5,” to be released sometime next year, have been accused of racist game design.
The game's trailer shows Chris Redfield, a protagonist of past “Resident Evil” games, on the run from swarms of bloodthirsty zombies in a desert African setting. Redfield ducks and dodges his attackers while unloading rounds on them when he has the space, but the pack of pick-wielding undead only seems to swell.
As a fan of the “Resident Evil” series since the first game's release in 1996, my first impression of the fifth installment was that it takes inspiration from the film “Black Hawk Down.” Redfield looks like a U.S. soldier lost in the sun-blasted streets of Somalia.
To survive, he must hide in dark spaces and engage his enemy in a selective manner. Early reports suggest that Redfield's ability to aim will be affected as his eyes adjust from the blinding sun to shadowy interiors and vice versa.
Unlike the American soldiers of “Black Hawk Down,” Redfield won't be taking cover from the gunfire of Somali warlords. Instead of bullets, his enemies will throw axes and sharp blades. And instead of anti-Americanism, they will be driven by an appetite for brains.
It should be noted, however, that Redfield's enemies may not even be zombies. “Resident Evil 4” broke with previous games in the series by replacing the undead with parasite-controlled humans, so next year's title could introduce a new fiendish species.
But early critics of “Resident Evil 5” couldn't care less what type of creature will haunt Redfield throughout the game. They're concerned by the color of his enemies' skin.
Kym Platt of Black Looks, a blog penned by African women about African women, says of the game, “This is problematic on so many levels, including the depiction of black people as inhuman savages, the killing of black people by a white man in military clothing, and the fact that this video game is marketed to children and young adults. Start them young - fearing, hating, and destroying black people.”
The image Platt constructs is indeed unsettling, particularly to an American public that has heard endless stories about police brutality toward blacks and even watched New Orleans officers beat down a black man on TV.
But Platt misrepresents the mission of “Resident Evil 5.” Like all earlier games in the series, the enemies aren't people depicted as inhuman savages, they are inhuman savages. A zombifying virus or cerebral parasite mutates them into mindless creatures of the night.
In the first three “Resident Evil” games, those creatures were mostly white, metropolitan Americans dressed in street clothes, police uniforms and three-piece suits. “Resident Evil 4” was set in the dreary Spanish countryside, where lower-class farmers and villagers swung their axes and pitchforks at the protagonist.
Are the makers of these games to blame for breeding fear and hatred toward whites and Spaniards?
These previous “Resident Evil” foes were actually cast as hapless victims of the true villains of the series: corporations and organized religion.
Their at-all-costs pursuit of money and power is to blame for the bloodshed in the games, and I would expect no different a motive to lie at the heart of “Resident Evil 5.”
And so there is little weight in Platt's implication that the makers of “Resident Evil 5” are racist for setting their game in an African nation where the local population of zombies - or zombie-like creatures - is naturally black.
The ethnic composition of Redfield's enemies seems to be no more than a simple consequence of a much-needed change of scenery for the series. Besides, in “Resident Evil,” the only color that really matters is red.
Staff writer David Wilcox reviews video games for The Citizen. He can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 245 or david.wilcox@lee.net
As a fan of the “Resident Evil” series since the first game's release in 1996, my first impression of the fifth installment was that it takes inspiration from the film “Black Hawk Down.” Redfield looks like a U.S. soldier lost in the sun-blasted streets of Somalia.
To survive, he must hide in dark spaces and engage his enemy in a selective manner. Early reports suggest that Redfield's ability to aim will be affected as his eyes adjust from the blinding sun to shadowy interiors and vice versa.
Unlike the American soldiers of “Black Hawk Down,” Redfield won't be taking cover from the gunfire of Somali warlords. Instead of bullets, his enemies will throw axes and sharp blades. And instead of anti-Americanism, they will be driven by an appetite for brains.
It should be noted, however, that Redfield's enemies may not even be zombies. “Resident Evil 4” broke with previous games in the series by replacing the undead with parasite-controlled humans, so next year's title could introduce a new fiendish species.
But early critics of “Resident Evil 5” couldn't care less what type of creature will haunt Redfield throughout the game. They're concerned by the color of his enemies' skin.
Kym Platt of Black Looks, a blog penned by African women about African women, says of the game, “This is problematic on so many levels, including the depiction of black people as inhuman savages, the killing of black people by a white man in military clothing, and the fact that this video game is marketed to children and young adults. Start them young - fearing, hating, and destroying black people.”
The image Platt constructs is indeed unsettling, particularly to an American public that has heard endless stories about police brutality toward blacks and even watched New Orleans officers beat down a black man on TV.
But Platt misrepresents the mission of “Resident Evil 5.” Like all earlier games in the series, the enemies aren't people depicted as inhuman savages, they are inhuman savages. A zombifying virus or cerebral parasite mutates them into mindless creatures of the night.
In the first three “Resident Evil” games, those creatures were mostly white, metropolitan Americans dressed in street clothes, police uniforms and three-piece suits. “Resident Evil 4” was set in the dreary Spanish countryside, where lower-class farmers and villagers swung their axes and pitchforks at the protagonist.
Are the makers of these games to blame for breeding fear and hatred toward whites and Spaniards?
These previous “Resident Evil” foes were actually cast as hapless victims of the true villains of the series: corporations and organized religion.
Their at-all-costs pursuit of money and power is to blame for the bloodshed in the games, and I would expect no different a motive to lie at the heart of “Resident Evil 5.”
And so there is little weight in Platt's implication that the makers of “Resident Evil 5” are racist for setting their game in an African nation where the local population of zombies - or zombie-like creatures - is naturally black.
The ethnic composition of Redfield's enemies seems to be no more than a simple consequence of a much-needed change of scenery for the series. Besides, in “Resident Evil,” the only color that really matters is red.
Staff writer David Wilcox reviews video games for The Citizen. He can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 245 or david.wilcox@lee.net
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