In the third entry, your goal as Commander John Shepard (who is by default, surprise surprise, a white guy) is to defeat the god-like Reapers by uniting the most powerful alien civilizations. Take the Mass Effect trilogy, arguably another high point in the current generation of console gaming. Racism is often treated by video games with the complexity of a Saturday morning cartoon. Capcom, the game’s developer, denied the allegations. Recently, in 2009, Resident Evil 5 was criticized for featuring Africans infected by a disease that essentially made them zombies who chased the game’s white protagonist. The history of gaming contains countless entries that are either blatantly racist (see 1982’s Custer’s Revenge, which features a naked and erect General Custer trying to rape a Native American woman tied to a pole) or classics you probably shouldn’t think too hard about ( Punch-Out!! hasn’t aged well). Video games have never been very good with race.
Playing Bioshock Infinite means confronting a time in American history when racism was not just overt, but also a mundane part of society. In one scene you explore an idyllic beach where white elitists talk with disdain about being approached on the street by “Orientals,” while later, you go in search of a Chinese gun maker who the protagonist points out must have “connections” to own his own store. Columbia may be a floating city, but the game boosts its credibility as it bleeds fact into its fictions, establishing its origins in actual historical events.īioshock Infinite presents a number of themes worth discussing-fatherhood, fatalism, American exceptionalism, the mix of church and state, and, later, when things get weird, metaphysics-but its approach to racism is necessary to point out in particular, essential as it is to the setting and narrative. In the Hall of Heroes, you visit two exhibits: The first recounts Columbia’s role in the Boxer Rebellion, complete with grinning Chinese fighters, while the other is set at the Wounded Knee Massacre of 1890, where Comstock and the protagonist took part in the slaughter of an American Indian village. Rather than give up control of the city, though, Comstock and Columbia secede from the U.S. The history of the city-on the surface, eerily clean and peaceful-is told through recordings and kinetoscopes scattered throughout the game, but is also celebrated in one level set in a museum.
Founded by the game’s fanatical antagonist Zachary Hale Comstock, Columbia helps end the Boxer Rebellion and is recalled to Washington, D.C. She’s being imprisoned in the floating city of Columbia, an Aryan utopia where George Washington is worshipped as a saint and American hegemony is not a political ideal but an airborne reality.Ĭolumbia was built on American imperialism and racial superiority. You play as Booker DeWitt, who, in 1912 is charged with finding a girl named Elizabeth. Having just been released at the end of March, the first-person shooter is notable for how it pushes narrative in a relatively young medium not known for being especially deep. In the end, the choice really shouldn’t be a choice at all, and makes one thing clear: This is a rare video game with a point to make about racism. The prize is the first throw at a public stoning for an Irishman and black woman, and you can choose to throw the ball at the couple, or at the entertainer egging you on.
You are handed a baseball and told you’ve won a raffle. An early scene in Bioshock Infinite provides a good litmus test for assholes.
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