Arcane Wonders Marketing and Sexism upsets me :(

[Cnoedel]

I know this might trigger some negative effects towards me but feel free to discuss my opinion.

So why exactly is Toni Darling exposing herself for the Mage Wars franchise? Everything looks completly arranged, the shirt, her enthusiams... This is just awkward - I don't know her but i suppose she is there because she is an attractive female and for no other reason - I thought AW could do better than getting on the "sex sells" train which dissapoints me (maybe just me). AW is certainly not the only Publisher and won't be the last.

The comments right under the video, having nothing to do with AW, disgust me even more:

"Chronus D. Greed
 
Nice dices =)"

"Алекс Иванов
 
I think Toni is more awesome, when game) And she has a great T-Shirt)) Operator knows what is best to take perspective) Ans so big wonderful eyes!"

This again is just me being offended, sure many of you look at things differently (otherwise such acts of promotions would not happen) and some might even think i have double standards regarding my posts in the "Where are the females" thread. Anyway, I am emotionally attached to this game because I like it a lot thus i am posting this.
My political/philosophical on society are irrelevant to the game itself, but i like to point them out.

AW, you don't need boobs to promote your game, it's awesome on it's own!

[silverclawgrizzly]

Ok I actually went and watched the video just now, have been skipping these lately.

While not exactly going for the sex appeal in my view the video did seem rather pointless. I mean it was just a blonde chic opening a core set and telling people what was in it? Ok I can kinda see how that's cool for people who have never played the game before but it's not super useful overall.

Yes they do some shots over her shoulder while she's looking at stuff, but you don't exactly get to see a lot of cleavage and being a heterosexual male I've sort of programmed myself to notice

Again I don't know if I'd call it sexist so much as having no real goal here other than showing somebody opening a game box. I've seen videos of this type with guys opening games and eh, I guess it's something to do if you got a camera and a free game.

[Cnoedel]

"I mean it was just a blonde chic opening a core set and telling people what was in it"

That sums it up perfectly!

And yes, not much is shown and my issue is rather small because there are much worse examples of sexism in marketing than this one, but i play MW and felt upset by this in special.

"it's something to do if you got a camera and a free game."

If she does it for free because she likes the game and unboxings you are right, but the video appeared on the Mage Wars youtube channel what strikes me as (dumb; sexist; superficial) advertisment.

[silverclawgrizzly]

If it were a dude wearing a t-shirt would you consider it sexist? Or is this due to it's a mildly attractive female? I mean yeah if she were like "Oh Adramelech, you're so hot....let me take off this top" or even if she were just wearing the ole chain mail bikini I could see the sexism argument. Even her cosplay is of one of the more reasonably dressed mages, had she shown up as the Druid however....

I love Mage Wars too, hey we all do right, and this video strikes me as a time filler at worse. Maybe some advertising at best.

[Lord0fWinter]

I'm not sure, but I think this is more directed at her fans than Mage Wars'. On her facebook page she has almost 210k people who "like" her page. On a picture that she posted of her with Mage Wars, she got 850 likes, with multiple people stating that they were interested in learning about the game.

Now I didn't know who she was before this but if the sex appeal helps get more of her fans interested in watching the video, it will in turn make some of them want to learn more about the game and try it out. So, I'm all for it.

After all, it's been proven time and time again that sex appeal helps sales in this country. Like Silverclaw said, its not like she went completely out of her way to do anything overly dramatic or inappropriate. She's just an attractive young female opening up the game box and sharing what's inside with the world. I don't know the data, but I'm quite confident that over 50% of people who play board games are male, and I'm sure many of her fans are, so this will appeal to at least some of them.

[sIKE]

Strikes me as post-modern feminism run amuck honestly, you are disparaging a person who has been successful at least at hobby and I am guessing in to part time work for themselves. Take out the (anti)gender bias from the sentence structure and it shows no sexism one way or the other on their success.

With that said, I do respect your opinion, and can see your point of view. I do hope you are able to respect that I find your opinion upsetting.

[Laddinfance]

So everyone is aware of our plans with Toni leading to GenCon. This first video was designed in a series of videos to show a completely new player experiencing Mage Wars for the first time and continuing to grow throughout the series. Toni's profession is cosplay, and a lot of that bleeds into nerd/geek culture. Our goals as always will be to constantly improve the quality as the series expands. While we understand that some people may not have enjoyed this video as much as others we hope that you continue with the series and Toni's journey to learn our game and present it to new players who've never discovered it in her own unique way.

[silverclawgrizzly]

One day I'd like to be able to list "Cosplayer" as a job title on a resume I think it's totally cool she's making her money dressing up. We got a few down here in my area too who do it for a living.

You know Laddinface just to counter the sexism argument I suggest you hire a studly attractive male to open a box of I dunno Druid vs Necromancer for YouTube. Where do I send my application?

Meh the video was like 5 minutes of my life, I'll watch the next one at least. I'm flat out done watching FiF previews and reviews. I already bought the thing I don't wanna watch other people get to play with it anymore lol.

[ringkichard]

Was this thread moved to Off Topic, or did it start here? This clearly belongs in Player Feedback and Suggestions if not General Discussion.

[Sailor Vulcan]

.

You know Laddinface just to counter the sexism argument I suggest you hire a studly attractive male to open a box of I dunno Druid vs Necromancer for YouTube. Where do I send my application?

That wouldn't counter the sexism argument; it would simply reduce the sexism a bit. That being said, I really don't think the sexism in mage wars is THAT big a deal. It's rather disappointing, sure, but as long as it's just the images that are somewhat sexist and not the characterizations, I fail to see why so many players are so up in arms about it. The level of sexism mage wars currently has is something to be annoyed or exasperated about, not angry. Perhaps because Arcane Wonders is such a wonderful company, some of us might forget that they are not perfect?

The vast majority of well-known movies (at least in the us) don't even pass the bechdel test, but mage wars certainly does, and yet I find it difficult to believe that those who complain about sexism in mage wars on this forum would do so just as much or more for popular American movies. (If they actually do, I apologize for my misjudgment).

Arcane wonders isn't perfect, mage wars has a decent amount of somewhat sexist portrayals of women and it STILL manages to be the most awesome game ever!

Okay. Now roll your eyes and move on.

[Shad0w]

Was this thread moved to Off Topic, or did it start here? This clearly belongs in Player Feedback and Suggestions if not General Discussion.

Just logged in and noticed it off topic. Prob started in OT

[Cnoedel]

I am glad so many participate in the discussion. Will explain my line of thoughts soon and please move this thread to player feedback, my fault - sorry

[Shad0w]

I am glad so many participate in the discussion. Will explain my line of thoughts soon and please move this thread to player feedback, my fault - sorry

NP the move is done.


Now I am going to the the ground work for this thread. I do not mind threads like this but it is for an open discussion of this issue. In the past when similar threads have popped up it turn into a contest about who can yell the loudest from a soap box. If this happens it will be locked and or deleted.

We are not here to attempt to force our ideas onto anybody else in our ever growing community. Carry on the discussion like ration adults and I will have no issue. 

PERSONAL ATTACKS WILL NOT BE TOLERATED.

If you can not abide these rules:
DO NOT POST IN THIS THREAD 

[klaymen]

Maybe it's more of a cultural thing, but here in Slovakia, I haven't seen anyone freak out about sexism - be it over some cosplayer or MW art (as was in another thread somewhere on this forum). Nobody here gives a damn, but maybe it's because nobody here likes to get offended on someone else's behalf.

[ringkichard]

This promotion would be banned from PAX, which is one of the big 3 con orgs in the USA, so I don't think there's any way this wasn't going to be controversial.