Yvonne Fulmore Beneath the Skyline An Overview and

Yvonne Fulmore Beneath the Skyline An Overview and Analysis of The Urbz: Sims in the City (PS 2, 2004)

Yvonne Fulmore The Sims Series • Created by Will Wright in 2000. • “Virtual dollhouse” of everyday life (Pearce 150. ) • Some Sims series: Sim. City, The Sims 2, The Sims Stories, My. Sims, The Sims 2 Castaway, The Urbz.

Yvonne Fulmore Welcome to the City • "The Urbz: Sims in the City is all about three things: cool city style, building your reputation, and living the dream in a 24/7 city that never sleeps. It gives players the opportunity to create and control their sims in a completely unique way and in a very different environment. ” ~ Sinjin Bain, EA Executive Producer & Vice President (as quoted in Thorsen 2. )

Yvonne Fulmore The Basics • You must choose: – A starting district (or “style”) – A gender, skin tone, and body type. • At the start of the game, you have: – An apartment – 300 simoleons (sim currency) • Your main in-game contact: – Darius (unofficial “city king”) • Your main goals: to gain social status (“rep”) and recover the parts to Darius’ Secret Machine.

Yvonne Fulmore “Rep”: Characters and Interactions • Five pre-made characters live in each district. – Socialize with them to gain “rep, ” or reputation points. • Socializing: Better-received interactions allow you to receive higher “rep. ”

Yvonne Fulmore Ultimate Recipe for In-game Success – Appropriate friendliness – Buy and wear the right clothes – Make friends with everyone + work different jobs = learn even more social interactions – Defeat all “villains” so you can put together the pieces to the Secret Machine and acquire Darius’ apartment

Yvonne Fulmore Urbz as Social Commentary: No Personality Points and The Chameleon Effect • Urbz: Personality points are non-existent – Chameleon effect: “the natural tendency to imitate another person’s speech inflections and physical expressions” (Barco 2. ) • Study by Chartrand Bargh (1999) – No personality options = empty sim/urb

Yvonne Fulmore Commentary on Society’s Ideals: Avatar/Body Design • Exaggerated physical design: over-glamorized women and men – limited body types and skin shades – dress code for women • Question: why?

Yvonne Fulmore Urbz as Culturally Offensive • Both African-American culture and Japanese culture are singled out to be caricatured in Urbz, being largely defined by stereotyping. • Black culture: defined in-game by “Sim-ish” (Pearce term) hip-hop music and gangster culture. – Example: Skyline Beach district • Japanese culture: defined in-game by “Sim-ish” J-pop music and a sushi shop. – Example: Neon East district • The truth: they are mutually exclusive. 1. Black culture ≠ Hip-hop music ≠ Gangster culture 2. Japanese culture ≠ J-pop music ≠ Sushi shops – Urbz is offensive when people come into (and leave) the game believing that these are all the same by definition and are not mutually exclusive.

Yvonne Fulmore Gangster Stereotyping and History • • Truth: Gangster culture exists worldwide, and in America is not exclusive to only one or two cultures. In America, the concept of the stereotypical gangster developed during Prohibition. – Prohibition (1920 s): Gangsters were “invented” by “journalists, fiction writers, and filmmakers” (i. e. the media) to be a representation of “human behavior in a new urban environment. ” ~Ruth as quoted by Sklar, p. 275 Pre-Prohibition Gangster Stereotype: physically powerful, supposedly unintelligent, from a lower economic class background (Pauly 777. ) – “The born criminal validated existing ethnic and racial categories. The rhetoric of class was often coupled with nativism and buttressed by science. ” ~Ruth as quoted by Thomas H. Pauly, p. 777 -78 Post-Prohibition Gangster Stereotype: sharply-dressed, from an upper-class background (Pauly 777. ) – Developed as “an important cultural ferment in its ability to elicit sympathy from a mass public troubled by disruptive urban change and escalating lawlessness” (777. )

Yvonne Fulmore The Gangster Stereotype and Consumerism • Appealed to the consumer – The Post-Prohibition Gangster: “a growing menace and natural by-product of the consumer-driven economy” (Pauly 779. ) • What about now? – Gangstereotypes are used to sell media (movies, music, video games, books, etc. ) • Game examples: NBA Ballers—which has an E rating, and on a higher scale, Grand Theft Auto (Marriott 1 -2. ) • In closing: Supposed acts of crime from ethnic groups did not create the stereotyped “gangster. ” The media did.

Yvonne Fulmore Dangers of Stereotyping • Reinforcement of misconceptions – Learning from media: “Passive observation may be shown to have some effect on the beliefs or even the actions of an observer” (Penny 80. ) • Presence of caricature = disproportionately high when contrasted with more neutral representations of ethnic groups. – Question: Is it really poking fun at people who make misconceptions about the groups—or at the groups themselves as often embodied in society through negative stereotyping?

Yvonne Fulmore The Urbanite as a Spectacle • Urban culture: missions encourage deviant behavior stereotypically viewed as “urban crime. ” – Examples: graffiti on walls, mug people, break equipment, swear, etc.

Yvonne Fulmore Names with Meaning: Examples of Caricature in Limbo • Portrayal of hip-hop music (when commonly but wrongly used to define Black culture) as absurd. – Example: Ridiculous D. O. G. , Lil’ Bit • Quiet misuse of language – Example: Sushi shop owner Mazuiko (lit. “child of awful-tasting food. ”) • In closing: Within the wrong context, these could be considered offensive. – Concerning context: • • Representation Purpose Disbursement of misinformation Creator’s intentions

Yvonne Fulmore Target Audience: The Irony of Urbz’ Marketing • Although Urbz has more racially diverse characters than any other Sims game, ethnic characters are underrepresented in game screenshots and promotional images in stores and on the Internet.

Yvonne Fulmore Urbz as Mockery of the Console Player • Designed to appeal to the visual demands of (younger) console gamers while also maintaining the typical Sims series appeal (Castro 1. ) – Original Sims: “a domestic drama, or sitcom, depending on how you play” and “a shift in the definition of the author” (Pearce 150 -51. ) – Urbz: loss of this freedom • Urbz caricatures as being so over the top, it suggests that anyone who believes that what they see is “cool” is silly. • Material/shallow nature of entire gaming experience

Yvonne Fulmore Non-Committal Gaming Commitment • Compared to other Sims series games (even on consoles) Urbz is a fairly non-committal gaming commitment. • Verdict: Ease of relationship-building encourages gamers to look at characters as pawns to climb the “rep” ladder.

Yvonne Fulmore Urbz: The Uninspiring • Emphasis on physical appearance/material things • Cliques and cultural stereotyping • Constant unhealthy messages concerning standards of beauty – Not enough customizing ability in character size or skin tone (much like original Sims)

Yvonne Fulmore Urbz: What’s More Inspiring • Game play that is not too challenging • Higher than usual presence of ethnic characters • Questioning of your mission—was it worth it?

Yvonne Fulmore Works Cited • • • • “Caricature, ” Riverside II Webster’s Dictionary. Berkley Books, New York: 1996. “The URBZ: Sims in the City, ” Official Website. Accessed on October 20, 2007. http: //urbzsims. ea. com “Will Wright talks Sim City and The Sims, ” Computer and Video Games, PC News. England: Future Publishing Limited, 2001. Accessed on October 24, 2007. http: //www. computerandvideogames. com/article. php? id=11179 Barco, Torri. “We’re All Copycats. ” Psychology Today Magazine, Nov/Dec 1999. Accessed on November 3, 2007. http: //psychologytoday. com/articles/pto-19991101 -000004. html Castro, Juan. “The Urbz: Sims in the City, ” November 9, 2004. Accessed on October 21, 2007. http: //xbox. ign. com/articles/564962 p 1. html Marriott, Michel. “The Color of Mayhem, in a Wave of Urban Games, ” The New York Times. New York: The New York Times, 2004. Pauly, Thomas H. “The Criminal as Culture. ” American Literary History, Vol. 9 No. 4 (Winter 1997) pp. 776 -778. Sklar, Robert. Review of Inventing the Public Enemy: The Gangster in American Culture, 1918 -1934 by David E. Ruth. The Journal of American History, Vol. 84, No. 1 (Jun 1997), pp. 275 -276. Thorsen, Tor. “The Urbz Rollz Out, ” Yahoo Entertainment. Created November 10, 2004. Accessed on October 20, 2007. http: //videogames. yahoo. com/news-366497 Wardrip-Fruin & Harrigan, Pat, ed. “Representation, Enaction, and the Ethics of Simulation, ” Simon Penny. First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge: 2004. p. 80. Wardrip-Fruin & Harrigan, Pat, ed. “Towards a Game Theory of Game, ” Celia Pearce. First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge: 2004. p. 150 -51. Wardrip-Fruin & Harrigan, Pat, ed. “Videogames of the Oppressed, ” Gonzalo Frasca. First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge: 2004. p. 91. IGN: The Urbz: Sims in the City Images. Accessed on October 20, 2007. http: //media. ps 2. ign. com/media/677567/imgs_4. html