A series of questions to those who want change in female game roles.

burningdragoon

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Trilligan said:
Hmmm, okay you can stay.

Vault101 said:
if its actually trying to apeal to nerds (which it is in a way) then its a very pathetic effort...the secodn I heard about it I could see it for what it was..this was a "durr hurr nerds" show and to see it as anything else kind of baffles me, its no different to alot of mainstram shows and no amount of "science jokes" would change that

but yeah...don't want to derail this thread

....or mabye we do!


to be fair about the Amy charachter I think it was less "this is a nerd girl" and more "what about a female sheldon?" which I ashamidly amit.....is kind of funny
I don't really know how I feel about TBBT. I mean the 'by nerds, for nerds' thing is way far off. But at the same time how many sitcoms' casts are not generally dysfunctional (from the US anyway, dunno about the rest of the world)? I think it works okay when one of them (usually Leonard) plays the relatively well-adjusted one, or when Sheldon is being especially weird and the others look smooth in comparison.

Really though, the sub-par (or maybe par as far as sitcoms go) writing and terrible nerd stereotyping don't annoy me nearly as much as the chosen attire of The Jewish OneTM.
 

Vault101

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Sep 26, 2010
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burningdragoon said:
I don't really know how I feel about TBBT. I mean the 'by nerds, for nerds' thing is way far off. But at the same time how many sitcoms' casts are not generally dysfunctional (from the US anyway, dunno about the rest of the world)? I think it works okay when one of them (usually Leonard) plays the relatively well-adjusted one, or when Sheldon is being especially weird and the others look smooth in comparison.
well adjusted one?...

be he's not, its always "WAAAAHHHHH WHY WONT GIRLS LIKE ME?" and "DUURR HUUUR NERD CAN'T GET A GIRL" sure he's played as a "straight" man..but a nerd without the same stupid problems he is not

the show see's penny the dumbass as the "well adjusted one"...as the thing said we are suposed to Identify with her
 

burningdragoon

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Ryotknife said:
A person has every right to voice their criticism, but I also have every right to either ignore it or debate it if i feel it is inaccurate.
As true as that is, there isor seems to be to most people much less ignoring and debating than there is vicious dismissal.
 

Something Amyss

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Ryotknife said:
You are implying that all criticism should be considered the honest truth if it comes from a woman in this debate.
No, only that the men who are pitching fits act like adults, instead. There are adult ways to deal with bad criticism, you know.
 

Ryotknife

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Zachary Amaranth said:
Ryotknife said:
You are implying that all criticism should be considered the honest truth if it comes from a woman in this debate.
No, only that the men who are pitching fits act like adults, instead. There are adult ways to deal with bad criticism, you know.
you are demonizing a side, which is JUST as bad as what you are accusing the men of doing. Worse actually, as that closes the minds of both sides as it pushes the debate into us vs them and shuts down any possibility of an intellectual debate.

people shouldnt complain about the lack of an intellectual debate when the person in question is doing everything in ones power to prevent such a thing.
 

burningdragoon

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Vault101 said:
burningdragoon said:
I don't really know how I feel about TBBT. I mean the 'by nerds, for nerds' thing is way far off. But at the same time how many sitcoms' casts are not generally dysfunctional (from the US anyway, dunno about the rest of the world)? I think it works okay when one of them (usually Leonard) plays the relatively well-adjusted one, or when Sheldon is being especially weird and the others look smooth in comparison.
well adjusted one?...

be he's not, its always "WAAAAHHHHH WHY WONT GIRLS LIKE ME?" and "DUURR HUUUR NERD CAN'T GET A GIRL" sure he's played as a "straight" man..but a nerd without the same stupid problems he is not

the show see's penny the dumbass as the "well adjusted one"...as the thing said we are suposed to Identify with her
It happens. It's super rare, but sometimes Leonard's girl problems don't show up and he seems like he could be a real person.

(I didn't read the blog post. It was long and I'm lazy, but I already knew/agreed with the gist of it)


The first time I ever watched the showdamn you TBS for replacing The Office with it I sat there with my mouth open just dumbfounded that the show even existed. I got used to it after awhile. Still pretty bad, but it's "watchable" for me at least.
 

Vault101

I'm in your mind fuzz
Sep 26, 2010
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burningdragoon said:
(I didn't read the blog post. It was long and I'm lazy, but I already knew/agreed with the gist of it)
.
I'd recomend it...its a great read

it also brings up the issues with gayness...like with the Amy charachter "oh shes not femininly attractive so therefore= lesbian"
 

mattig89ch

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I have to admit that I wished they start making female characters as equals in games. Every game I've played it seems that they've fallen into the 'Heavy hitter, stronger then any man' archetype or the 'Stay back, and heal us while we (men) go into the fray' type.

I'd like to see a female character who has the same abilities and roles as her male counter parts in games. Characters whos dialog, actions, equipment, is almost exactly the same as her male counterparts.
 

Ryan Minns

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mattig89ch said:
I have to admit that I wished they start making female characters as equals in games. Every game I've played it seems that they've fallen into the 'Heavy hitter, stronger then any man' archetype or the 'Stay back, and heal us while we (men) go into the fray' type.

I'd like to see a female character who has the same abilities and roles as her male counter parts in games. Characters whos dialog, actions, equipment, is almost exactly the same as her male counterparts.
just curious but exactly why is the healer not a valuable member? At least not as valuable as the frontline fighters? Take the gender out of it if you will, the 'healer' is the one who keeps the party together, no healer = death. Making the healer the most vital character in almost every group

In the RPG's especially I've played where the women were the healers I honestly can't fathom how their role is somehow lesser than those of the men? Given that most games with female healers also have female damagers usually I fail to see how the female damagers are superior to their healing counterpart?

League of legends is another quick example, the 'support' role is usually left for the person who goes bot with the ranged carry... the support doesn't get hero kills or even creep kills and if the support sucks... everything can go to hell.

Supportive roles ARE equal to direct roles in my eyes and I am unsure how one is superior than the other when one can't exist without the other? :S
 

Vault101

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Sep 26, 2010
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Ryan Minns said:
just curious but exactly why is the healer not a valuable member? At least not as valuable as the frontline fighters? Take the gender out of it if you will, the 'healer' is the one who keeps the party together, no healer = death. Making the healer the most vital character in almost every group

In the RPG's especially I've played where the women were the healers I honestly can't fathom how their role is somehow lesser than those of the men? Given that most games with female healers also have female damagers usually I fail to see how the female damagers are superior to their healing counterpart?

League of legends is another quick example, the 'support' role is usually left for the person who goes bot with the ranged carry... the support doesn't get hero kills or even creep kills and if the support sucks... everything can go to hell.

Supportive roles ARE equal to direct roles in my eyes and I am unsure how one is superior than the other when one can't exist without the other? :S
suport roles are not "lesser" by any means

it is however (in a way) that annoying thing you get where females...(being the fragile things they are) are "stuck" in suport roles...and I'm not talking about real life but fantasy/fiction settings...I noticed this more watching shows when I was a kid
 

Something Amyss

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Dec 3, 2008
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Ryotknife said:
you are demonizing a side, which is JUST as bad as what you are accusing the men of doing.
No, I'm saying people should behave like adults. Trilligan suggested that men should stop being hostile to criticism, and I agree. You turned it from "stop being so hostile to criticism" to "men must take all criticism as the honest truth," which is not what Trillign said.

I have not demonised a side, only agreed with the notion that wigging out over criticism was wrong and the solution was to be adults. I then went on to say that there are adult ways to deal with criticism that is not "legit." For example, your accusations being false, I did not immediately jump to hostility.

Worse actually, as that closes the minds of both sides as it pushes the debate into us vs them and shuts down any possibility of an intellectual debate.
I'm curious as to how "behave like adults" shuts down both sides. More so how it impacts intellectual debate, as maturity should probably be a part of any legitimate intellectual debate. Can you explain how we can intelligent debates while people are already shouting?

people shouldnt complain about the lack of an intellectual debate when the person in question is doing everything in ones power to prevent such a thing.
Agreed. Perhaps you should take a calmer look at things so as to better understand the situation before you start making broad accusations.

Mortai Gravesend said:
No, calling people out for what they're doing isn't bad at all. Seriously, those are such empty words. "That's just as bad!" Yeah? Well prove it instead of just sounding like you're making some dishonest whiny complaint without anything to back it. Prove it's demonizing instead of accurate too.
Thank you.
 

Ragsnstitches

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Dec 2, 2009
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Matthew94 said:
I see where you are coming from (not that I didn't from the get go). I still wouldn't go so far to call her a good character... but thats a semantics issue and we've come close enough to an agreement for us to reach a consensus.

I feel Alyx should be treated like a standard to follow, the absolute bare minimum in creating a female NPC. In this sense she is "ok"... an acceptable and functional character. Her role in the game, as I said before, is a utilitarian one, while being tethered to the narrative by very thin strings.

Fuck it, I agree she is a good character, for games. For what she does she does it well and without being hindered by contemporary sociological baggage. Relative to the other games one could marvel at that feat. But because games don't exist in a vacuum I can't help but view her with the same standards as I would want from other mediums. In this sense she is pure vanilla, something basic, something that would goes well with other things but is just plain on its own.

Her mechanical role is great, her narrative role is not... and thats an issue with the writers or the story in general, not because of her gender.

So yeah, I agree, Alyx is a good character for an NPC, she stands up on her mechanical role within the game without being bogged down by social preconceptions. She just isn't very engaging in the narrative.

Vault101 said:
Ragsnstitches said:
She [Alyx vance]doesn't deserve to be on "strong character" lists or even "strong female" lists. You can rate her as a completely neutral/functional character or slightly above average (the average not setting the bar too high) at the very best. Again, not something that should be given a pedestal.
I agree...[b/]AND ITS OK[/b]

seriosuly..its [i/]ok[/i] that Alyx is the charachter she is, she works and fits within the Half Life 2 story....she's not a bad or sexist charachter because she's not a comander shepard for female freeman, she simply is as she is and there is absolutly nothing wrong with that

this seems to be a thing that confuses people...that its "weak or may sue" no, thats not it, for a charachter to be trated pn par with the "default" male they need to take their hits too...
Was the whole of that comment directed at me? I never said she was anything but that she is fine for what she is. My gripe is with people making her more then she is.

As I've said already, I want more Alyx. I also want better written ones with more active roles in the narrative. AS it stands Alyx is just another NPC like Barney... and that's fine (and weird that its some sort of victory for equality in games).

She is confined to a pretty flaccid narrative to begin with (I'm a fan of HL series, but I will not give it credits for narrative), so perhaps my reluctance to laud her stems from that. There are other, better Female characters out there... just better in every conceivable way.

Alyx is fine. I don't want them to change what she is, maybe Ep.3 will flesh out her personality and give her a more, personal, stake in the story. That will be good, thats what I want from her. But as she is she is adequate... and thats it.
 

Vault101

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Sep 26, 2010
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Ragsnstitches said:
Vault101 said:
Ragsnstitches said:
She [Alyx vance]doesn't deserve to be on "strong character" lists or even "strong female" lists. You can rate her as a completely neutral/functional character or slightly above average (the average not setting the bar too high) at the very best. Again, not something that should be given a pedestal.
I agree...[b/]AND ITS OK[/b]

seriosuly..its [i/]ok[/i] that Alyx is the charachter she is, she works and fits within the Half Life 2 story....she's not a bad or sexist charachter because she's not a comander shepard for female freeman, she simply is as she is and there is absolutly nothing wrong with that

this seems to be a thing that confuses people...that its "weak or may sue" no, thats not it, for a charachter to be trated pn par with the "default" male they need to take their hits too...
Alyx is fine. I don't want them to change what she is, maybe Ep.3 will flesh out her personality and give her a more, personal, stake in the story. That will be good, thats what I want from her. But as she is she is adequate... and thats it.
no, sorry.....I was sort of agreeing with and adding to your point, because as I said this is a thing that confuses people, as for her being "just ok", I guess he is..but this is also part of the point I was making..that as soon as a female charachter comes along she has to be "the standard" or female protagonists..which is stilly because theres more than one way to have a female charachter

as for Alyx...umm a "personal" stake in the story?

1.the state the world is in its personal for almost everyone in the half life universe because "holy shit we are being collectively fucked by aliens"

2. you remember that thing....[spoiler/]the combine killed her father...thats pretty personal..and even before that she was directly involved in the ressitance..she prety much grew up in the world of half life 2[/spoiler]
 

Ryotknife

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Trilligan said:
Ryotknife said:
If you want to be taken seriously you're gonna have to start actually discussing things people say instead of turning any argument you disagree with into some ridiculous strawman.

In other words - nope. Try again.
except you are placing the blame for the entire argument solely on one side.

"
There is one simple, obvious solution to this debate. And, oddly enough, it doesn't exist on the feminist side of the argument.

Here it is, in it's simplistic entirety:

Men - stop being so goddamned offended over criticism

That's it. There you go. All the stupid drains right out of this argument right there."





you could have easily had your message without your hate filled speech.



"There is one simple, obvious solution to this debate.

Here it is, in it's simplistic entirety:

stop being so goddamned offended over criticism


That's it. There you go. All the stupid drains right out of this argument right there"

you specifically targeted men and condemned ALL men by saying they were wrong and stupid. that is SEXIST. I am NOT saying you are, but that statement is extremely sexist. Not only that, but your statement pretty much eliminates any hope for intellectual debate by unjustly demonizing a side (a side that im not even ON).

It is nothing short but blind fanaticism. It is the same @#$% we see in democrat vs republican or conservative vs liberal and frankly im sick of some people doing it, especially when the person in question comes off as self enlightened.

you want to fill the forums with blind illogical hatred? then take it to 4chan. This topic is flammable enough without people throwing jet fuel on the fire and then blaming the other side for burning down the forest.
 

Conner42

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Ryotknife said:
Trilligan said:
Ryotknife said:
If you want to be taken seriously you're gonna have to start actually discussing things people say instead of turning any argument you disagree with into some ridiculous strawman.

In other words - nope. Try again.
except you are placing the blame for the entire argument solely on one side.

"
There is one simple, obvious solution to this debate. And, oddly enough, it doesn't exist on the feminist side of the argument.

Here it is, in it's simplistic entirety:

Men - stop being so goddamned offended over criticism


That's it. There you go. All the stupid drains right out of this argument right there."


you could have easily had your message without your hate filled speech.

"There is one simple, obvious solution to this debate.

Here it is, in it's simplistic entirety:

stop being so goddamned offended over criticism


That's it. There you go. All the stupid drains right out of this argument right there"

you specifically targeted men and condemned ALL men by saying they were wrong and stupid. that is SEXIST. I am NOT saying you are, but that statement is extremely sexist. Not only that, but your statement pretty much eliminates any hope for intellectual debate by unjustly demonizing a side (a side that im not even ON).

It is nothing short but blind fanaticism. It is the same @#$% we see in democrat vs republican or conservative vs liberal and frankly im sick of some people doing it.

you want to fill the forums with blind illogical hatred? then take it to 4chan.
Ugh........

Speaking as a guy, her statement did not offend and I didn't feel like it condemned me. It wasn't a sexist statement, she was just addressing the men who were getting offended by these criticisms, she didn't say ALL men were like this, she didn't even condemn the men who were like this.

In other words, chill dude! If you're not getting offended by all the criticisms about sexism, then this statement doesn't apply to you. But the fact that you're raging at a statement like this kind of shows that you might be one of those people.

And, be honest, how many women do you know that are the ones getting offended by these criticisms that are happening? If there are any, there probably isn't very many.

I mean, seriously, just chill dude!
 

Manji187

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For me it's simple; I want to play a game some day in which the main character is written as an actual female (and not as a man with boobs; Heavenly Sword's Nariko) and in which the pitfalls of "Barbed Wire" (sleazy oversexualization) and "Super Girl" (a lot of things that happen on the screen are, in the end, focused on men) are avoided. It would also be nice if the "she don't need no man" stereotype would be avoided.

Obviously, it's complicated. What is clear though is that the character should have a credible motivation, WHICH IS HER OWN. She should also have agency; i.e. she should not be some ball that exclusively gets tossed around by the forces of nature and the decisions/ actions of men. She can make decisions and act on them while also facing the consequences/ taking the responsibility for those decisions/ actions.

Maybe the new Tomb Raider game will provide some of the above-mentioned characteristics?