By Adelisa Badzic, Media and Communications, ’24
Video games have been one of the most popular entertainment media in the United States for a long time. Video gaming is for both males and females, but most people will assume it is a male playing a game depending on what game it is.
A game that has spiked up in recent months is called Among Us. This game has received a lot of attention and has been very popular due to social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter where the users promote the game. Users promote the game by sharing memes, their experiences, and how much they enjoy playing the game.
Among Us is a multiplayer game. The game takes place in a space-themed setting on a ship, where players each take on one of two roles, most being Crewmates, and some (can be 1 to 3 based on chosen settings) being Impostors. Imposter’s go through the game by faking tasks trying to fit in with the crewmates, sabotaging the ship, and taking out the crewmates. When a crewmate gets taken out, another crewmate can find him/her and report the body. When a body is reported, it is a meeting where everybody pitches in to find out who the imposter is.
Before the game starts in the lobby, you can choose which color you would like to be, blue, orange, and many more. Automatically depending on which color you chose stereotypes are formed. If you chose pink, you are automatically a girl. This can show the basic stereotypes a girl can go through even by just a color. More stereotypes based on the colors in the game are, Brown is always the first to die. Black is the detective of the crew. Red and blue are always suspicious.
Orange and Cyan are “button lovers” who call emergency meetings for whatever reason. Pink is either the noob or the cute girl who doesn’t know what’s what. Purple is the one who you would’ve never thought is the imposter. White is the quiet one. Yellow and lime are the ones who get voted off first.
These stereotypes can be annoying. Especially as a guy even. Guys can like the color pink, so maybe a guy chooses pink as his character, People need to stick to they/their when not knowing someone’s gender. Many names are unisex for both boys and girls and colors are the same way. There is no reason you should assume someone is a boy/girl and call them him/her. Because even if they are of the gender you assume, maybe they do not identify as that gender. You should never want to offend someone by accident.
These stereotypes in games have always been around whether people see it or not. Being a girl in the gamer community is hard because as soon as you play online and people hear your voice they automatically assume you suck at the game. Being a girl who has an older brother I have been playing video games since I was about 8 and hate being accused of only playing because it is popular. I do it for the fun of it.