Gender of a protagonist

Shiminay

Atari Jaguar

Evade wrote: »

If they're perfectly happy playing the same game as a hulking dudette sister is that not itself sexism?

I don't know if you're trolling or just not clever enough to spot the very obvious point that being a musclebound dudebro who shoots all the things and saves the day/planet/humanity is a MALE power fantasy. That's not the same as saying "women won't enjoy the game because it's a male power fantasy" but it is saying "this is a game aimed at men."

We don't seem to have many games that are aimed specifically at women.

Lone Stone

No

Depends on the type of game, if it's an rpg type I gotta be male, if it's a game where I play as a girl it doesn't bother me but I would prefer to play As a male can't say why tbh just do.

kunst nugget

I don't care

Shiminay wrote: »

We don't seem to have many games that are aimed specifically at women.

Ironing Simulator 6 with Folding Expansion Pack!

Robert ninja

Shiminay wrote: »

I don't know if you're trolling or just not clever enough to spot the very obvious point that being a musclebound dudebro who shoots all the things and saves the day/planet/humanity is a MALE power fantasy. That's not the same as saying "women won't enjoy the game because it's a male power fantasy" but it is saying "this is a game aimed at men."

We don't seem to have many games that are aimed specifically at women.

I always put it down to just being an easy concept to implement into gameplay. You could make a skinny looking guy/girl in a game and still be able to wield huge weapons and use them to kill lots of enemies. In fact, having an action game that doesn't have ridiculous amounts of killing yet still fun is actually a challenge the industry has been trying to overcome for a long time now (and to be fair has made lots of improvements)

Whether it's Drake from Uncharted or Lara Croft from Tomb Raider, you still end up with a body count that would cause any normal human being to have PTSD with the only realistic sequel being the protagonist in dozens of psychiatric sessions to try and stop them from having a panic attack every time someone pops a can of pringles.

That's not to say there aren't games aimed at men and women alike, that much is obvious. But these tropes that people try and relate to gender issues (like Mario saving the princess) are more often than not just there because they're incredibly easy to design in gameplay and relay the idea to the player.

Lone Stone wrote: »

Depends on the type of game, if it's an rpg type I gotta be male, if it's a game where I play as a girl it doesn't bother me but I would prefer to play As a male can't say why tbh just do.

I usually end up picking a female these days but not all the time. It really just depends on my mood and the character I wish to roleplay. I feel right at home cannibalising and cutting up people in bathtubs in Fallout but only as a character that's not me. It'd be weird to play these games trying to project myself in them... all I'd do is sit around and talk about technology to people in the vaults and try to be nice.

kunst nugget

I don't care

I always pick the female character in desperate hope there'll be the suggestion of lesbian action somewhere later on in the game…

Skerries

I don't care

I think we should have a fat, old black lady with cats as the next protagonist for COD

kunst nugget

I don't care

Skerries wrote: »

I think we should have a fat, old black lady with cats as the next protagonist for COD

Stephen 'Hawkeye' Hawking is my choice. The subtitle could be 'A Brief History of Kicking Ass!'

Links234

I don't care

Crazy Cat Lady Simulator 2015 on Steam Greenlight in 3... 2...

Generic Dreadhead

I don't care

Being a chauvinistic male I like to play as Female characters since It'll be third person and I'll have to look at an arse taking up 15% of the screen so it might aswell be a female arse.

I get to do enough sexist quips and leacherous leering in my real life to not have to play as another male in-game me doing it.

Also if the game requires dancing, well I'd kick all sorts of butt there with my female moves. /s

Evade

Atari Jaguar

Shiminay wrote: »

I don't know if you're trolling or just not clever enough to spot the very obvious point that being a musclebound dudebro who shoots all the things and saves the day/planet/humanity is a MALE power fantasy. That's not the same as saying "women won't enjoy the game because it's a male power fantasy" but it is saying "this is a game aimed at men."

My bad. I thought you meant the gender of the protagonist was what was putting them off, not the genre itself.

Shiminay wrote: »

We don't seem to have many games that are aimed specifically at women.

Is that just down to the over-saturation of shooters? The few girls that game I know of seem to lean more toward RPGs and platformers than anything else.

J. Marston

I don't care

ERG89 wrote: »

The only game I wanted announced at E3 had a female protagonist(I miss you Jade)...I don't ever envisage myself as the lead character though so a female lead is no biggie.
Clementine is as cool now as protagonists get, Lara is great again & a lot of people prefer Femshep so I don't see the problem unless you read & take YouTube commentators seriously

A female photo journalist who helps take care of orphans. Kinda surprising she exists at all if the worry about female protagonists is a real thing in marketing departments.

On another note, I wonder if GTA would ever feature a female protagonist?

jobbridge4life

I don't care

Certainly wouldn't make a difference to whether I played or not. As a child, if there was an option I would normally pick to play as a female not so much nowadays.

DoYouEvenLift

Atari Jaguar

Are the devs of this unaware of tomb raider or something?

Sonics2k

Links234 wrote: »

Crazy Cat Lady Simulator 2015 on Steam Greenlight in 3... 2...

I'm offended that she's white Links :P

Links234

Links234 wrote: »

Hell, I'd love to play a game where the protagonist is someone more like Brienne of Tarth

Would that game not be Dragon age : Inquisition

My Inquisitor was female and was most certainly all kinds of badass.

johnny_ultimate

Ahem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbYvqETR-xs

Meant to be pretty good I believe.

ShadowHearth

Atari Jaguar

Calhoun wrote: »

For me it's a yes, depending on the game. RPG type games that I get into I like it being a male protagonist for my own personal immersion.

Other stuff I don't really care.

I voted as I don't care, but you have a very valid point there.

When i play mass effect or dragon age inquisition, I play as male character as that is my direct version of me and how would I act in situation given.
When it comes to games like tomb raider, resident evil or other story driven games I really really really don't care what gender is protagonist.
When it comes to mmorpgs, games like diablo or borderlands I am pretty much exclusively go female characters for some reason.

I think a lot of media and developers making a problem where there is none.

pablomakaveli

Atari Jaguar

Deleted User wrote: »

Would that game not be Dragon age : Inquisition

My Inquisitor was female and was most certainly all kinds of badass.

Cassandra is actually quite like Brienne.

jobbridge4life

I don't care

DoYouEvenLift wrote: »

Are the devs of this unaware of tomb raider or something?

No doubt they view Lara as nothing more than a sexist trope.

CiDeRmAn

I don't care

The thing is, if the character is simply going to be another grunt/space marine it is entirely irrelevant what gender they are.
On the other hand if the character is masculine or feminine in terms of why they are driven to do the things they do in the game then fantastic.
In the otherwise ridiculous testosterone fest Gears of War and its sequels Dom Santiago was surprisingly well put together as a character, with his being a father and a husband being part of his arc, as well as the events that befall him.
The current iteration of Lara Croft seems to do the same thing, in particular the sense of vulnerability of a female and the threat that she suffers simply by having male antagonists attempt to dominate and frighten her, though she of course triumphs.
So, things are not so bleak for a more sensible approach to gender in videogames, but it is up to us the customer to appreciate good games with such well written parts instead of the same old brute tropes.

K.O.Kiki

Atari Jaguar

Sonics2k wrote: »

I'm offended that she's white Links :P

Good reading:
Why do the Japanese draw themselves as white?

Retr0gamer

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

The current iteration of Lara Croft seems to do the same thing, in particular the sense of vulnerability of a female and the threat that she suffers simply by having male antagonists attempt to dominate and frighten her, though she of course triumphs.

Thought Lara in the new game was pretty dreadful and seemed to follow the trope of women that can only become strong Rambo types after suffering some sort of assault; physical, sexual, attempted or a combination of these. It was reather prevailent for a while.

Even Anniversary edition got it wrong as well. With Lara getting colder each time she kills a human enemy (a bit more believable than the reboot but still rather cheesy). Compare that to the first Tomb Raider were Lara is just a bad ass adventurer right off the bat. A women can be like that as well, we don't need some elaborate set up to explain why (we didn't need one for Nathan Drake... although we did eventually get one later on).

CiDeRmAn

I don't care

No, I have to disagree, it is itself a trope that only a male can be tough when needed, and people in the real world only discover that strength after being tested and trained by circumstance, either through formal training or by being thrust into a situation that demands you develop coping mechanisms or submit.
Lara's character had the whole thing speeded up for the games sake, but it was no different than the main character in Far Cry 3, using a tutorial to reflect this need to kill of be killed in a hostile environment.
The manner in which Lara's gender was relevant to the types of force used against her is realistic and reflected in all manner of hostile situations that people find themselves in for real.
Speaking from my own experience in a job where things can get very hostile very quickly, a woman faces threat as well as a man but the nature of the threat, the manner of it's form is different as individuals seek to dominate and use what they can to do so, be it your gender, your inexperience and so on.
I have seen women become powerful adversaries when it comes to fighting for the rights of their child, especially in situations where the assistance is critical, previously they may have appeared like a typical woman in her 20's or 30's but with the fight for what's right another side is revealed and this can be quite startling, for both the mother and the person on the receiving end.
So, in a nutshell, I don't find Lara's transformation from a typical teenage girl to a badass to be particularly jarring or unrealistic.

That said, a whole lot more ridiculous is the murder simulator that is Uncharted, more so that you are rooting for a wisecracking handsome scallywag who essentially butchers 20 or 30 people at every enforced bottleneck in each game, then continues on with the wisecracks, just a good old boy, never meaning no harm.....

kunst nugget

I don't care

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

That said, a whole lot more ridiculous is the murder simulator that is Uncharted, more so that you are rooting for a wisecracking handsome scallywag who essentially butchers 20 or 30 people at every enforced bottleneck in each game, then continues on with the wisecracks, just a good old boy, never meaning no harm.....

Same thing with Indiana Jones though. Indy is pretty prone to butchering people with nary a worry about how it's going to affect him psychologically down the road. Do I care about that when I'm watching the films? Not a bit of it, it's escapism pure and simple. Uncharted is the same for me. Are Indiana Jones and Nathan Drake psychopaths? Most likely but I don't care because I'm not watching these movies or playing these games looking for an exploration of the human condition…

Robert ninja

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Ahem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbYvqETR-xs

Meant to be pretty good I believe.

I bought this during the gog sale. Can't wait to get around to it

CiDeRmAn wrote: »

That said, a whole lot more ridiculous is the murder simulator that is Uncharted, more so that you are rooting for a wisecracking handsome scallywag who essentially butchers 20 or 30 people at every enforced bottleneck in each game, then continues on with the wisecracks, just a good old boy, never meaning no harm.....

I mentioned that earlier, too. Gender issues take a back seat when there's crap like this still within the medium. I'm also convinced that Uncharted is a series in which you play as the villains.

johnny_ultimate

My problem with Tomb Raider reboot was that it was basically just a murder simulator anyway. After that controversial 'first kill', Lara pretty much instantly started accruing a serious body count, and the game failed to adequately explore the motivations or psychological impacts of any of it (there was a perfunctory attempt to explore the physical effects of Lara's accumulated injuries with a brief section where you limped for a bit). For its gritty aesthetics and surface level implementation of various 'survival' mechanics, the game itself was ultimately little more than an Uncharted clone with endless grunts to kill and big explosive setpieces. Nathan Drake's characterisation has always frustrated me, but Naughty Dog have for the most part got on with it without any pretensions of grandeur. Tomb Raider promised something better, even utilising the troubling narrative shortcut of sexual assault to try and get there (which is not a dramatic tool that should never be used, I must stress, but one that has to be done with care and intelligence). What was so disappointing is that it amounted to nothing at all.

K.O.Kiki

Atari Jaguar

Maybe Nathan Drake & Lara Croft are already PTSD-ridden zombies.

After all, how else do you explain them encountering hundreds of baddies in puzzle-locked caverns?

Potatoeman

Shiminay wrote: »

I don't know if you're trolling or just not clever enough to spot the very obvious point that being a musclebound dudebro who shoots all the things and saves the day/planet/humanity is a MALE power fantasy. That's not the same as saying "women won't enjoy the game because it's a male power fantasy" but it is saying "this is a game aimed at men."

We don't seem to have many games that are aimed specifically at women.

You dont have games aimed at women because they dont make up enough of the market to make it profitable. Its alway the AAA market people are talking about, where they dont take many risks anyway.

johnny_ultimate

Potatoeman wrote: »

You dont have games aimed at women because they dont make up enough of the market to make it profitable. Its alway the AAA market people are talking about, where they dont take many risks anyway.

I always wonder whether this is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy at this stage. Is there something innately masculine about the concept of big budget video games? I don't believe there is. Even ignoring the statistics that show it's almost a 50/50 gender split between people who play video games, has there really ever been a case of a big budget game that has totally defied traditional market 'logic' and tried something totally different (as you say, no risks)? If anything, evidence has shown that games that are pretty much 'gender agnostic' can be massive hits - perhaps best illustrated by Nintendo's seemingly improbable success with the DS and Wii. I don't think it's a stretch to say there are millions of women out there who want to play something other than the frankly condescending efforts that have been made when it comes to 'girl games'.

I say gender agnostic because - broken record alert! - I still think dividing games into 'for men' and 'for women' is a fundamentally misguided one. I remain firm in my belief that great culture and entertainment should be - and 99% of the time totally is - able to be enjoyed by anybody sufficiently interested in it, regardless of their sex. Doesn't matter if the creator is a man or woman, or the gender of the protagonist. And it's certainly not about being able to 'relate' to the game (if people relate to the vast majority of video game protagonists, then I'd be worried anyway :pac:). It's about engaging with a work and taking something new and insightful from it. It's why we watch films from different countries. It's why we read books from different times. It's why we (should) play video games with protagonists that are male, female, black, white, gay, straight, African, Japanese, young, old etc... etc...

Robert ninja

^ All the girl gamers I've ever known play the 'manliest' games, anyway. Either in violence or even things with suggestive content like DOA tends to have a higher female player base than other FGs, at least in the casual realm. Bayonetta, Juliet Starling, all the 'oversexualised' characters that get a lot of crap from feminists etc seem, in my experience at least, to be quite popular with women who actually play video games. But it's not clear cut. Someone I know really hates Bayonetta, yet she loves Starling and the game she's in.