A sexy avatar in the game

In the film realm, the word ’gaze’ is always been used to analysis the characters. In some certain ways, the player not only playing with avatar but also watching it. The different between film and video game is, in playing video game, the player needn’t focus on avatar as watching character in the film. In another world, the game is mainly for playing but not watching. The players are more focus on their avatar’s acting but not their appearance. Based on this point, in most of popular games which like Tomb Raider, it’s hard to find many of ‘sexy’ scenes. The outer appearance of Lara is not the key point in the game.

But, using Lara as avatar in the game is a quite smart marketing strategy. She helps the game made more benefit just like a real actress in the film. Since then there are more and more video game like to use ‘sexy’ avatar. Probably the designer wants to earn more relying on their avatar’s ‘porn’. The result in the reality is not always as the original planning, ‘porn’ as a main point in the game didn’t gain a successful marketing reply. By contract, if one game has a little ‘sex’ in it, it always earns more players, especially the male players. Some of contemporary casual games have proved this point. For example in some Texas Hold'em games, the female avatar always been used as reward for the winning gamer. Thus the female image been used as an object which definitely has a problem with women. Basically, this has no different with those ‘saving princess’ games.

The further problem in the future

During the past technology level, the technology used in game can only simulate a similar avatar but not real person. Just like the first generation of Lara, her breast looks more like a triangle in the first version. Thus the reality still can be separated from virtual world. Once the technology could simulate a hyperreal Lara which allows people feel enough to fake ourselves. How will the players deal with this hyperreal? As we mentioned before, the video game are more focus on playing but not watching. The simulation technology used in the game is still in developing. Once the technology could simulate a real person which made the player cannot divide the reality and virtual world. The interaction between player and virtual avatar will stronger than before. The player probably will lose themselves in the game.