Monday, December 10, 2007

Congratulations, you're at Uni

[Warning: The text you are about to read contains heady intellectual discourse and is not recommended for anyone made queasy by the discussion of feminist film theory or psychoanalytical signifiers.]

So begins man Joe McNeilly's essay on why "Portal is the most subversive game ever". Basically, what Joe's done is to note that a portal, in Portal, looks kind of like a vagina (that's your psychoanalytical signifier) and is shot from a gun held by the unseen protagonist (feminist film theory).

It's a nice theory, and he's right in that it's nice that Portal uses a female protagonist without either sexualising or providing her with an honorary dick, but... "most subversive game ever"? Surely that award goes to the first RPG to have an NPC provide you with control pad advice then ask what a B button is? After all, Joe, that would be intra-medial interrogation of the conventions of genre through a post-human window of materiality!

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