This is screenshot from a new social networking VR named Nurien.
As you can see, we gals are again used as commercial fodder to sell a platform. And as usual, we are portrayed as underage teens who were incredibly lucky in the genetic pool for perfect beauty.
In one of the preview conferences about this platform, the company had a demo of life in-world. It was world of these impossible beauties shopping and running up to all male avatars to flirt. They had immature animations that giggled, shook their heads and wiggled their bottoms like things born in the shallow end of cousin breeding. One video had a bubble headed av dancing like Britney in her jailbait days, then the speaker told the mostly male audience to watch it's face. And laughter was had by all.
It annoys me. That my femininity is dictated by people who will never know what it is to be a woman. That they are imposing these "norms" that tell me what a real woman is supposed to be. I see it constantly in SL, where most women strive to be these fuck fantasies they can't be in RL.
It is so rare to see avs dedicated to showing character in the person behind the screen. Instead we get these weird plastic things with big lips, big tits and big eyes. And the waist is the size of my pinky. The only consolation about SL is that the users are choosing to look like these things.
But I wonder about these new worlds. Most of them, like Blue Mars, are imposing restrictions on what their users can do. They are not given build tools. I wonder how fluid their allowance for avatar creation is.... Since building is restricted, I would deduce that avatar creation is restricted as well. So most of us will be stuck looking like those things in the preview screenshot. And the few changes they throw to us in the newbie character creation screens. Which means we will get to change hair color, skin color and eye color. The rest will be up to "professional" creation artists and whatever they are interested in building.
That isn't the type of VR world I want to live. I want full control over my representation. If I want to be short, plump and not very pretty that is my right as a paying customer. I want to be able to create this myself, and not have to rely on people who will do it for me.
As for the Nurien platform itself, it is beautiful and dedicated to realism. Of course, only the new and powerful computers will run it. Which is typical in an industry that is constantly enforcing early obsolescence on it's customers.
Will Nurien have an economy? Will it have land ownership?
I don't know, there wasn't discussion on those aspects. They were just really interested in showing off their little bimbettes in twirly red skirts. From the looks of it, we must all be content to wiggle our virtual asses down the big catwalks of Nurien life.
Labels: computers, culture, feminism, mmorpgs, sexism, technology, video games
