My Little Eye

I was actually looking forward to playing the new UFC Undisputed 2009 game the other day. Normally I choose to avoid video games, as they are generally filled with strippers, criminals, explosions and boy-humour. But I thought there was a sort of an epiphany in the way of video games recently, with the invention of Rock Band and other games like Fable that are as female-friendly as male. That was the point of Rock Band, to involve everyone - Mom, Dad, sis and bro - and is largely the reason why it was so successful. So then when I nestled into the couch for a long day of playing the new UFC game, boy was I shocked when I couldn't even pick a girl character.




If, on a Saturday UFC event night, you go to your local pubs you will see an assortment of individuals gathered around raucously hooting for the various fighters. Among them are a surprising amount of women, who I would think would quite appreciate muscular naked men grappling each other in a cage. UFC may not have a women's division, but I always assumed it was because it was still a young sport and had not generated enough competitive female fighters yet.

The point of video games is to do things virtually that you could never do in reality. Judging by the amount of detail in the ring girls's breasts as they bounce around the ring, I'm guessing physically generating digitalized females was not the problem, but instead it was a complete disregard for 50 per cent of their target market. It was some ignorant chauvinist jerk sitting in a meeting room brainstorming about the 43 different hairstyles, 16 different styles of eyebrows and the countless angles and degrees of depth that a guy can use to shape his male figher's face, who couldn't even fathom allowing his female fans a chance to create a fighter in her likeness.

If you are going to put that much thought into detail and accuracy (from the cuts on the fighter's faces, to the referee and ring girls), how could you blatantly ignore such a chunk of your market?? Girls not-so-secretly enjoy watching UFC events with their male friends or boyfriends, and they are an integral part of the UFC culture. UFC Undisputed 2009 gets two big thumbs down from me. I guess I'll just go play Fable again.


-- the golden girl