in which I froth in rage forever.

[lassarina]

(Hat tip to synthclarion, who shared via Twitter.)

So, EA encourages you to sexually harass and grope their booth babes at ComicCon. Even better, if you do it the most obnoxiously, then you get to go out for "a SINful" evening with two hot women as a reward!

Someone please whack some sense into whatever marketing asshole thought this one up.I have so many

Comments

[phoenix_crow]

If you ask me it looks like desperate marketing. I looked up the game real quick just to see what the game was like. And with the line up that is coming up right before this game comes out they really don't stand much of a chance at selling this god of war clone.

The game's prime market is for men that wouldn't know a good game if it smacked them in the face, but are more likely to buy a game if it has lots of gore and has a chance of them seeing a side boob. Basically, young casual gaming jackasses.

Really the only chance of them selling this game is the hopes that the media will catch hold of this advertisement (or other ads like it that I'm sure they will come out with) and run with it.
For the same reason people keep watching bad reality TV, people will buy a bad game if it gets bad publicity.

EA was smart for starting up this ad, it focuses on there market group (jackasses). And everyone that doesn't like it are people that would never buy the shitty game there trying to sell.
Will it hurt EA's rep? For gamers it will, for casual gamers it won't. Casual gamers don't know who is making there game, they won't think twice about buying that littlest pet shop game for there kid from a comp that sells another game based on sex and violence. For the most part they don't pay attention.

Sorry about the long post, it started off as a small one and grew.

[lassarina]

Unfortunately, that's not the point I was trying to make. If it was just stupid advertising (like hiring a group of fake-fundies to protest the game at E3, which they also did), I would be annoyed/offended and move on.

The problem with this marketing stunt is that not only does it encourage objectification of women and exacerbates the already-present social tendency to treat women as objects whose intelligence, opinions, emotions, and personality are subordinate to the sexual whims of the nearest male, it deliberately extended that treatment beyond the women EA actually hired. The advertisement suggests that people go find other booth babes to take photos with.

Now, I've been to conventions. I have been most fortunate to usually have a mithrigil with me who is quite good at steering me out of the way of such trouble, but girls at cons are often treated as fair game ANYWAY. EA is taking an already bad situation and making it much, much worse.

I could care less if they make a shitty game or do stupid advertising stunts, but the fact that they are actively encouraging sexual harassment of not only their own employees (for which I suspect they would be legally liable) but also other companies' employees and con attendees, is unforgivable and disgusting.

EDIT: For typos.

[phoenix_crow]

I can't say that I have been to conventions or the like, but it is my understanding that taking photos with "booth babes" is common practice. Perhaps I am wrong? If I am not, then all they are really doing is encouraging people to do what they normally do anyways. I suspect that most of the women know what that they may be asked to have there picture taken with strangers.

I'm not trying to justify what they are doing, I believe they (booth babes) shouldn't be there in the first place. I can understand having people dressed up like characters that are in the game your promoting, but often times booth babes are just there too look pretty. And it might as well be a soft core strip joint. I find it a bit sad that people still find that having them there will help them sell more.

I'm not really that angry at EA, but I am angry at the fact that humanity as a whole still feels that this is still a legitimate way for doing things. There are times I feel as though we might as well be living in caves and smacking women with clubs to find a mate. Just when I feel like we are going to start advancing away from these tendencies, some one shows me that we are really just running in circles. Quite frankly, humans piss me off.

[lassarina]

The problem isn't the taking photos, although that's symbolic of the deeper issues. The poster specifically encourages people to "commit acts of lust" (direct quote) and take photos of THAT. Taking photos with strangers--fine, whatever. Having to stand there while strangers grope you and get their friends to take pictures--not so much. Additionally, the poster then encourages attendees to seek out OTHER booth babes--ones who don't work for EA--and do the same thing. I am quite sure a number of female attendees of ComicCon were "mistaken" for booth babes as well. It's how this sort of Neanderthal undertaking tends to go.

I absolutely agree that booth babes are an idiotic thing to have and shouldn't be there. Sell your game on its own strength, not on the tits you can put next to it.