My virtual gun doesn’t discriminate

While some students spent their spring break partying in warm areas, I saved the world by shooting zombies in Africa.

Resident Evil 5, as the numbered title suggests, is the newest sequel in one of the longest running video game franchises. Each title is pretty much the same: Zombies pop up from around the corner, you shoot them in the head as you scream like a little girl, repeat 200 times and roll credits.

Normally associated with bad dialogue, RE5 has come under controversy for its setting in Africa, where the two protagonists (one white and one black) fend off the hordes of undead, some in ceremonial garb.

Those who try to be politically correct might feel an initial shock at the imagery of a white man in authority shooting at African villagers. But after playing it, a sense of reality reveals that there is nothing racist about the game.

For the other games in Capcom’s flagship series, no one questioned as people of other races were shot with bazookas.

Resident Evil 4, receiving high reviews across the board, is almost virtually the same as its successor except that the plot instead deals with Spanish zombies in Europe.
No great upset was made about the poor depictions of Spaniards in the game, so why does it matter in the new game?

If you’re ever attacked in real life by waves of voodoo zombies armed with chain saws, you will probably not stop and consider whether it’s racially insensitive to defend yourself. This series isn’t about attacking people – it’s about unrealistic plots where one is just as likely to fight a zombie as a killer plant.

What would have been racist is if there hadn’t been minorities in the game. Video games are dominated by white male characters, perhaps because they are created by an industry dominated by white men. For a story taking place in a fictional region in Africa, it would be strange to find the villagers appearing as if they all came from Portland, Ore.

Granted, later in the game caution is thrown into the wind as the player encounters fully garbed tribesman armed with spears and random gibberish. Considering right before this level you have to fight zombie bikers and a giant scorpion-bat, I don’t think anyone takes this game as an accurate depiction of Africa.

Capcom does not have a history of attacking races, and its game doesn’t come off like an attempt to do so. The setting for RE5 merely comes off as a mix between the developers needing to move the game play to a new location to keep things fresh and the history of zombie lore being set in Africa.

What Resident Evil 5 does teach us is that minorities can become zombies, too.