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[Ivan]

There seems be some controversy about what N'Gai Croal had said in an interview about the RE5 trailer. From reading Kotaku comments, it seems that controversy mostly boils down to ignorant jabs at him for "seeing racist subtext where there isn't any" and everyone's favorite mind-numbing arguments like "It's just a game!".

I just wanted to see what the good people of TIGSource thought about the whole thing. I, for one, completely agree with him and was uncomfortable with the trailer since the first time I ever saw it, but it's hard for me to add anything significant to what he already said.

Interview:
http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2008/04/10/newsweeks-ngai-croal-on-the-resident-evil-5-trailer-this-imagery-has-a-history/

Kotaku post:
http://kotaku.com/378535/clearly-no-one-black-worked-on-this-game

[Hideous]

There's a new trailer?! I'm slow.

[Ivan]

No it's about the old 2007 E3 trailer.

[Smithy]

Here's what I get out of this:

The people at Kotaku are mostly idiots.

Of course it's not meant to be a racist game, but to people with no context of the previous RE games it's definitely going to seem that way. I think that's what N'Gai meant when s/he said "there are people and organizations who aren’t very understanding of games that if that imagery is brought to them they’re going to be like, 'Wait, hold up. I don’t know how you could put that out.'"

It's a valid point.

[Corpus]

N'Gai Croal is a Chap. What he says goes. End of story.

Seriously, though, I agree with him.

[Melly]

What kinda name is that anyway? Feels like something out of Star Trek or Cthulu mythos.

[John Nesky]

Japan is, in fact, racist, but the history is different there. N'Gai Croal's interview was about how the history of portrayals of the Spanish didn't have the history of the portrayals of Africans, but Japan has neither.

Which certainly doesn't mean that the game won't cause problems in the west, but Capcom probably didn't intend for it to be interpreted the way it will be interpreted.

[Corpus]

They may be Japanese, but the main character isn't. They'd have to be living under a rock not to be aware of the history between black countries and white European countries (and America).

[Eric McQuiggan]

They may be Japanese, but the main character isn't. They'd have to be living under a rock not to be aware of the history between black countries and white European countries (and America).

You would be surprised. I find it completely believable that they didn't take into account the struggle of black people. The world's not as west-centric as most believe.

Edit: Truthiness

[Chris Whitman]

I don't really know that the problem is history. When discussing racism, a lot of people refer to the slave trade between Africa and Europe as some kind white vs. black conflict. In fact, slave traders in Africa who sold to white Europeans were predominately black or Muslim. It's a misrepresentation of the politics of the time to depict it as a bunch of white people going over there and subjugating the black folk.

The real issue, in my opinion, is the prevalence of racism right here in North America today. In a perfect world, I don't think this kind of thing would be a problem: it would be fine to depict fanciful scenes of people fighting zombies regardless of their race or nationality. However, in the face of endemic racism, we should be acting to break down negative social beliefs to reach that state of equality, rather than pretending that equality already exists. I'm not saying that should be carried to extremes, but I think it is irresponsible to depict something which could easily be used to reinforce racist beliefs, even if that is not the intention of the creators.

[Chris Whitman]

Also, yeah, Japan has a crazy racism problem. As I understand it, though (although I could be wrong), it is largely confined to older people and the upper classes.

[Hideous]

No it's about the old 2007 E3 trailer.

Told ya I was slow. Didn't know about that one.

[moi]

Personally I think it could be interpretated both ways, racist or not. The concept itself doesn't shock me that much. Maybe they should have made the hero a black man too, that would have helped. There are other things that actually bother me more than the race aspect in this trailer (and others japanese games), it's cultural ethnocentrism, for example the point of view they have on the country .
It reminds me of this trailer for a nintendo game that takes place in the african savannah( can't remember the name) and the controllable character (the only human I think) is a white guy in a colonial outfit or sthg like that.

[EDIT] after reading the article,I see my opinion is similar to n'gai's opinion after all, the zombie people are "othered", IMO there is a sort of colonialist view of third world people at work here. And the fact that the hero (all the heroes) is a caricature/archetype of the young aryan military male working for an international overshadowing western organization.
I think the problem comes less from the villagers thatn from the people you're supposed to identify to.

[Eric McQuiggan]

Sorry my friend, Check out Nazi Chic At Wikipedia.

About racism and video games in general though, it seems that Arabic people are the target du jour. They are almost aways far too numerous, poor shots, firing AK-47s with head scarves. Also they love chemical weapons and blowing themselves up. Oh yeah, and they are a step away from weapons of mass destruction, at ALL TIMES. Also their leaders are always crackpots. Honestly I would be hard pressed to tell you where, in Army of Two, the Afghanistan level ends and the Iraq Level begins.

[Alec]

When I first heard about the setting, I thought "meh". But then after seeing the trailer, it did leave me feeling kind of sickened. I doubt that its intentionally made to have that effect, but I'm curious what they'll choose/have to do to get the game released in North America without offending a lot of people.