Besides the Saints Row IV: Gat Out Of Hell news we've already reported on, another pretty big thing came out of PAX regarding the Volition Studios open-world action franchise. Writer Steve Jaros has responded to the original Saint's Row's inclusion in feminist game critic Anita Sarkeesian's latest video by admitting culpability.
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Anita Sarkeesian's Tropes vs. Women In Video Games series dissects representation of women in video games throughout the decades and across all platforms. In the most recent one, she talked about violence against women as a quick and easy way to make the game world look grittier and more adult. The original Saint's Row was one of many games used as an illustration of this.
The whole interview can be watched over at The Escapist, but it boils down to Jaros saying that in the nearly ten years since the release of the original Saints Row in 2006, the team has become more aware of gender and representation issues in gaming.
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Said Jaros regarding the past and future of the franchise on this issue: "I think that there's some things Saints Row does better than other games, and I think that there are other things that we could have done better. I think that every time that we've done a Saints Row game we've gotten better at it. I think that we always wanted to make sure we do things with fairness, but we've gotten better at it as time goes on."
He went on to say: "I think it's fair to be called out on your s**t [...] I think that it's a sad man that can never be self-reflective. I think that we tried to go and carry ourselves with respect, and try to respect sexuality and respect gender as much as we can, and sometimes we fail but hopefully we'll do better and continue to get better."
