Matthew94 said:
I see Alyx as good as she is not just there to be "the female" or anything. She's a good female character as she seems normal enough (for a piece of fiction) and doesn't have the fact that she's a woman smothered onto the player.
Why is that good to you? It seems like such a minor attribute to raise a character on. She is, as you would say, a "plain Jane". Just because she DOESN'T do what other games lavish upon, doesn't make her good. It makes her better, but nothing so substantial that one would plant their flag upon.
Which is what I see people do. So many people cite Alyx as a positive/good/strong female character when she is so... basic. If thats what people feel, then I think the road ahead of us is going to be a bumpy one. In any other medium, Alyx is a dime a dozen... but in games she's a landmark.
Matthew94 said:
I get the feeling that we see a good female character as different things.
I see a good female character as one that isn't hampered by being female (unless it is relevant). After that I gauge them on being a good character.
Your comment looks to me that to be a goof female character for you, the character needs to be important and has to be a large part of the plot etc. I ask you, why?
That we do, though I don't want to get into a discussion on tastes or semantics here.
But to answer your question, in ANY narrative, every character contributes to a story to some degree. They all serve a purpose. This purpose and how well its executed determines the strength of a characters presence.
*The peasant with a wife and child who gets killed just so we know the Evil Wizard is in fact evil, is just a tool. The character is throwaway... a visual cue. But he can be strong if his presence had a lasting impact on the reader. Unlikely but possible.
*Meanwhile the Priest and long time friend of the Hero, blesses his weapons and offers wardings to protect him from evil wizardry. He is a character who supports the protagonist through thick and thin, and ultimately sacrificing himself for his friend. This is a supportive character, his role is to keep the hero on the right path and protect him while doing so. While this character is more important to the plot, its quite possible to develop in such a way where his sacrifice is weak and impactless. He can be a weak character despite the importance of his role.
The role of a character in a story is not indicative to their strength as a character.
In my opinion, Alyx plays a utility role over her place in the narrative, which hinders her to a degree. It functions well for the core gameplay, where she offers guidance and some exposition on locales and enemies. She also offers support as a companion in the episodes. But the issue of merely being a utility with expressions comes into effect in Episode 2 when you get ambushed. It was a surprise to see her be maimed, but it wasn't a particularly engaging experience. I encountered dissonance from what the game was trying to make me feel and how I actually felt. For the most part I was glad to have a companion, she filled a void that would otherwise have been me just fumbling about on my own. She added a focus to the, relatively, emergent playstyle (you want to explore, but Alyx will always urge you on). But when she got wounded and death was a possible outcome, I didn't feel any different. It just felt like another scenario to urge me forward.
I realised then that I wasn't involved in Alyx's story, which upon further inspection, seems to be lacking from the get go. She is conduit to which Gordon, the cypher, can learn about the world... and she doesn't transcend that role with exception of 2 moments in the 2nd episode, which both fall flat somewhat as a result.
Matthew94 said:
I take the fact that you compare her to Barney as a good thing. She's seen as "one of the good guys" and as a character in the plot, not as "the strong female or anything".
I don't feel that a female character needs to be overly involved in the plot just to be seen as good. As long as the fact that they are female is not detrimental to them (unless it's a plot reason) then I'm cool with them.
Surely a character who is by your side for well over 3/4 of the series (Hl2 and episodes) and has a genuine reason to be fighting, should have more character to them then the fan service characters like Barney and Dog? I mean, she is by your side for so long and she is the same person right up to the mid point of episode 2, as she was at the start of episode 1. Gordon, the cypher, can't express himself and has no stake in this world before him, but she does... and she doesn't show it very well.
I've played Hl2 and the episodes multiple times, and each subsequent run seems to weaken the strength of her character to me (inversely, I've gradually found Breen to be one of Valves best characters... simply due to the dilemma he faced and the consequences ultimately receives as a result). Once you have memorized the route to take and the enemies you face, her role and presence diminishes drastically. She becomes audio filler and semi-helpful AI.
I'm all for more Alyx's, but I'm not going to applaud people for it. Alyx is a carefully made character, who loses out to some degree because of her utilitarian conception. She is a perfect baseline to engineer and conceive BETTER characters from, but she is not a paragon of female characters in and of herself. She is basic.
Which is ultimately my point, I don't want to tell you that Alyx is bad or not, that's entirely subjective, but I really think people need to save the praise until a character with as much utility as Alyx is matched with a character as impactful as The Boss (or some other well regarded female character) from MGS3. I will shit my proverbial pants on that day.
