Deathspank a protest against sexism in games

The purple thong worn by the title character in Deathspank was meant as a statement about the degrading depiction of women in games, says Ron Gilbert.

The Monkey Island creator developed the popular title while at Hothead, and the game immediately won praise for its satirical take on modern games.

While Gilbert freely admitted his games are mostly about "silly stuff", that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for serious social commentary.

Of course a purple thong isn’t the most straightfaced way of tackling the issues, but Gilbert’s meaning was quite serious.

"That was really a statement about how I saw videogames and how they depict women," he told Eurogamer.

Gilbert points to box art depictions of women armed to the teeth and dressed for a beach resort.

"It’s like ‘seriously?’ She’s not ready to go into battle wearing that," he said.

"There’s this sort of sexism that I really saw with women in combat games being portrayed as. So I wanted to do that to Deathspank. He wears the thong."