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The new-Hitman embargo broke yesterday, and in short a lot of people think it’s looking pretty f***ing rad. You can read about it here. But forget that, because the real Hitman news is that its existence has created a contender for the weirdest thing ever said, ever, and that is the following, harrowing question posed on Hitman Forum:
“47’s walk animation (his fists) too feminine?”
Don’t try and force any logic into that: I tried, and failed, and now I’ve got PTSD and possibly Gulf War syndrome. The phrasing is obviously something to be cherished forever: it is this generation’s ‘Halo is a pretty cool guy’, only infinitely more creepy. Which, considering Pretty Cool Guy originated on 4chan, is really saying something.
But the real genius here is that someone, somewhere, sat down, looked through the Hitman footage and legitimately went ‘You know what? His hands look too feminine. Like a girl’s. It’s not just me, is it?’ and then maybe, but for the purposes of legal recourse probably didn’t, said ‘It can’t be. Why do they look like that? Why are they so wide? Like a girl’s. There’s too much of a gap when his fist is clenched. What’s meant to go in there? A COCK? Disgusting. His name isn’t Mrs 47, is it? It’s Agent 47, and Agent 47 is not a girl’s name.’
That, or something along those lines. Now, I hear what you’re thinking: ‘Burns, this poor person’s first language clearly isn’t English. Stop being mean and leave all this to Golby.’ But the elaboration – which is almost as hilarious as the question it’s under – makes it clear this person knows what they’re saying. The fact that they triple post – internet shorthand for clocktower shooter – confirms that this simply must be looked into. 47 does not have feminine hands, IOI. He should have manly hands, and manly hands are clenched all the way, clasped in frustration, fingernails cutting into palms, like John Wayne or Arnold Schwarzenegger, not left open, exposed, where an errant phallus could easily slide, circumstances permitting. This will not do.
In fairness to Hitman Forum’s other users, most of them seem as nonplussed as you or I by the assertion that 47 has offended the International Confederation of Manly Hands Arbiter Association (in association with Kleenex Man Size). But the real eye-opener comes when user Mads47 declares that “This has already been discussed to death in a lot of threads, it really don’t need it’s own thread. I know you are new, but as i said this has already been discussed a lot.”
Discussed to death. What is going on over there? Who cares this much? Imagine if you knew people in reality – whom you met with frequently or rarely, but knew well enough to have a conversation with – and every time you saw them they asked you whether you thought the gap between the fingers and palms of a digital person was simply too wide, untenable even? Would you say ‘You know what, you’re right. His hands are a bit wide. Feminine even; you know that because women exclusively clench their fists in such a way as to show off their fingernails’. You would not say that. You would have them shot.
Anyway, weird gender politics aside, it’s easy to chalk this one up to gamers caring wayyyyyy too much about every single element of a game’s design, to the point where trivial bulls*** stops them enjoying the experience itself. It happens a lot – take another look around the Hitman Forum’s other threads and you’ll see people complaining about everything from 47’s face to the length of the animation of his walk, although it seems the gender of the walk itself is not in question. Even the original poser of the hand question in, er, question seems to know that they are “over-speculating”. Anyway, here’s a thought, albeit one that I can’t prove: 47’s hand model is probably that wide so he get a gun into it, and as we all know women don’t use guns, they use knitting needles and rolling pins, so his masculinity is, in fact, assured. Phew, eh?
