Representation of violence and/or women in video games.

Tomb Raider.

how do we recognize this representation within the structure? the game portrays the main character Lara Croft in a very positive light, due to the animation making her very feminine looking, so she is definitely recognizable as a woman, however the nature of the game is very violent and the actions the player has to take to get through the game are conventionally very masculine (shooting animals, people and climbing around everywhere)


the target audience for the first Tomb Raider game would generally be around young teenagers, the BBFC classification is 12, due to the bad graphics causing the game to be less frightening, and you don't really see any references to anything unsuitable for young people to see. 12 is the target audience i think because nobody younger than that would be able to work the controls of the game in all the complicated ways, such as controls of movement and maneuvering the character around, as well as this there isn't anything unsuitable or rude about the game. the game is based around role play, as the player controls the actions of the character, this makes the target audience somebody that would be interested in action games, and role playing within an action story.

i think there may be a few issues around the game, a classic issue would be that young males can perv on the character in the game, as there was a very popular rumor that a code involved in the game structure enables the character to become naked, however this rumor was not true and was hastily put to rest/. she is quite a sexual kind of character, due to her skimpy costume of little shorts and a tight top, as well as the way she makes audio noises when she is jumping around and such, which may be seen as quite sexual.

when you look at the original tomb raider game and then look at the most recent released, it is plain to see that the graphics quality has improved, however they have also changed the appearance of Lara Croft slightly. although she clearly wears the same clothing her face has been made to look more like a model wearing makeup, she is clearly more feminine in her build due to her more skinny looking arms - generally they have tried to make her more attractive, and if anything more realistic to the target audience - which may also affect the rating of the game, due to this increase in sexually attractive characters.