Blizzard "Trying Not to Oversexualize" Female Overwatch Characters

[Jennacide]

At least Metzen recognizes that wholesale removing sexy character designs is just as dumb an idea as having all females be made to be sexy. That's one of the aspects of the current debates going on that has bothered me greatly. There is this assumption that all feminists are against sex appeal, pornography, and sex in general. This is flagrantly untrue. While I personally won't perform in porn, I have no issue with women that want to of their own volition. (Sexual slavery is a different issue) Some of my favorite character designs are of women that many consider to be "too sexy" like Ivy Valentine or Nami from One Piece. Too many knee jerk reactions are made to their appearance without factoring in if the way they dress matches their personality, which in both cases it does. It adds to their charm. Why should those two be frowned upon while some of my other favorites like LoL's Vi or Leona be considered acceptable?

 

[Winnosh]

Good on Blizzard for trying not to force women to play overly sexy characters. But give them the options too, same for the male ones. I found something strange. I played Neverwinter with my Girlfriend and she actually complained about the lack of sexy female armor. I told her that these were far more realistic.

Her response was" yeah, but they're not as fun."

That's her talking not me. Sometimes women want to be sexy, give them the option but let it not be the only one I say.

 

[Commander Obvious]

So one out of five female characters not being in a form fitting outfit counts as "trying"? That's interesting. Considering that the remaining characters are male gorilla, male tank (why no female counterpart? something like Shale from Dragon Age for example), non-gender specific robot/turret, male assassin dude trying too hard to be dark and mysterious, male cybord-yogi (so far my favorite), and lastly male somewhat sexy archer guy. Admittedly the real issue is with the viewer and not the content, but I can see some people having problems with this.

You're one of those problematic viewers.

 

[DementedSheep]

Not to single you out, but your post encapsulates the usual kind of complaint about male and female character designs. I personally think the standard claim that "Both males and females are portrayed unrealistically, but females are sexualised, the buff men showing flesh are power fantasies so there's no parity!" comes from an idealised post-gender reference point without acknowledging current cultural norms.

I think it's more accurate to say that male and female protagonists in games are depicted not so much as "capable" for men[footnote]Many male protagonists run around with minimal armour and completely under-equipped for the situation they're in, getting killed hundreds of times during a typical campaign playthrough[/footnote] or "desirable" for women, as they're designed to embody a male or feminine prestigious ideal. The idea is that certain male traits carry social prestige - capability, strength, large stature, command of technology, whatever - and these traits don't map directly onto female characters. Female protagonists have a different, "female" set of cool points - and these are generally limited to sex appeal, an aesthetic body type, and an appealing outfit.

That is exactly what that means. Male ideal is generally centred around being a worthwhile human being. Female ideal is a sexual appealing to men and sexual appealing to men involves useless and outright crippling shit that takes away for any other values.

Most men in games don't even run armour in minimal armour. This game has maybe one guy who might count as attractive. Most aren't even human. If anything you get over armoured more often and it's the female version of armour that shows off a ton of skin. Even among your shirtless guys some are sexulized yes but its not that common in western and shit like Kratos, or axe wielding barbarians is less "fuck me" and more "look how physically intimidating I am". If they wanted him to be attractive he who be nicer looking and he would be posed differently.

Condescending and horribly limiting? Possibly, but these limitations weren't invented by videogames - they're cues taken from the wider society we live in. And, anybody tempted to dispute the idea that sex, physique and fashion are key parts of female aspirational culture, please pick up a copy of Cosmopolitan.

"Other people do it so it's ok if we do it". Hmmm that excuse never seems to go down well with anything else and it funny how you can continuously pass the buck and blame everything on nebulas "culture" rather than your own actions in perpetuating that. I never said is was invented by video games but since I game and this a gaming form I'm unsurprising going to talk about game.

If people want to try challenging this, fine. There are many valid reasons to do so. My issue is that in making demands of the game industry we're addressing the symptom rather than the cause. Companies such as Blizzard might be pressured to the point where they become aware of the issue or make lip-service attempts to provide more options, but ultimately they're always going to chase profit - and that means catering to the tastes of the majority.

I'm not "demanding" anything. I'm just sick of people pretending that you're waifish girl sticking her ass and tits out in tights is equivalent to guy who looks like he can bench press a truck and any guy that is capable and heroic regardless of presented sexually. I don't even believe people genuinely can't see the difference between aspiring to be capable and being a good fuck toy and how one of those isn't exactly a great thing.

Profit makes it all ok dose it? cause I could sworn people complain about horrible business practices that are there to make a profit all the time.

That's a bold statement. I'm sure I'd have no trouble at all finding complaints about any female character you care to name.

You entire premise for this seems to be somehow somewhere who isn't even even you or most of the so called "SJW" might complain about something therefore only extremes exist. They don't really get complained about. You don' have articles and threads for most female characters. You get praise for some female characters If you actually want one to look up Keria for KOTOR 2.

Well, I suppose that'd be a good counterpoint if you could point me to male video game players whining endlessly about shirtless male characters in video games. Instead, we seem to not care very much.

For a start depending on context guys will complain about shirtless scenes. Guys complained about this shirtless scene in Thor and I see guys complain about "pretty boys" all the time. In you don't get to too many in games sure, probably because it tends to show of physical ability and power, aren't sexualized to the point where they even have ass on display and it doesn't often come with degrading sexualised poses (how something is actually presented large difference, go figure). I could play a shirtless barbarian girl if she actually looked the part and didn't attack with her ass. I also mentioned that you cross over what consider sexy on a guy and male power far more easily than the the other way around because most of shit considered attractive for men actually relates to power rather than de-powering.

I don't know what that last sentence means, because it doesn't appear to conform to any known rules of English grammar.

Well I dropped a word when typing. What I said was that you can physically sexulize a guy.

Aside from that, you're arguing on purely subjective qualities, using undefined terms like "hypersexualized." It sounds like you believe male characters can be presented any way the creator chooses without crossing that threshold, but only very narrow depictions of females don't cross it. Which circles us back to my "you can't win this argument against people who use these kinds of words" point.

Well I don't know where you're getting that since I've basically just mentioned the same line of traits but I'm surprise you see that since you seem to conflate everyone who has any issue with female representation into one big group and them remove all middle ground in favour of just pretending you can't please anyone. When you emphasis traits that are purely sexual and pose them in a way that is sexual they are sexualzied. It isn't all that subjective. Regardless of whether you have an issue with it Bayonetta is clearly sexulized. Attractiveness is subjective to certain degree. You can find something that not really sexualized attractive.

Point me to some of these girls who look like they kick ass? I've apparently missed 'em all, because I can only think of Samus when she's in her armor. Otherwise, we're talking about the same old Whedon-style "waif-fu" bullshit where the guy falls down when he's hit because he's a trained stuntman, not because 5'4" 115-pound women are throwing around crazy powerful punches.

Yes the likes of Samus in her armour would be one. Another example would be Korra or Aveline or the Gears of Wars girls.

The point being that just because some women do like it doesn't make it a good thing.
And some women not liking it doesn't make it a bad thing, unless your contention is that some women are just doing "being female" wrong.

Not automatically no but you can like things that are negative and plenty of women do. They are still negative just like this is.

Neither does slacktivism, for the record.

That doesn't change anything about the point. This isn't a campaign.

 

[prpshrt]

Why doesn't the movie industry get equal amounts of flak? Just seems like gaming industry is an easier target because it most of the demographic was male at one point.

They do. You just don't see it because you don't spend your time on websites dedicated to it like the Escapist is dedicated to games.

Ah, I see. Thing is I don't recall seeing people like "she who must not be named" (saying her name just irks me...) on the colbert report for movies. Although, you might be right that it might have happened for movies as well and I filtered it out :\

 

[Ticklefist]

Good day Mr. Obvious-Troll, or possible alternate account.

Haha not a chance. I meant what I said.

Edit: About not arguing.

 

[DrOswald]

Nah you went into defensive mode because you were caught in a lie trying to make a game seem sexist. :^)

Good day Mr. Obvious-Troll, or possible alternate account. Your contribution is apreciated.

But just for fun, I'll answer you: I never said I thought the game was sexist, I said the armor was silly. It made my character look stupid and out of place, not cool or even sexy. Maybe some people find that outfit sexy, but I certainly don't...

Listen NoX, I don't want to be rude, but what you wrote in your initial post was at the very least highly misleading. To anyone who plays WoW regularly it was absolutely and immediately clear that you was googled "sexy wow armor" and found a level appropriate set you found particularly egregious and used that for your example, complete with extremely specific complaints that only apply to that very specific set of armor. You set out to make the situation seem as bad as possible in a completely transparent way. People don't react well to that sort of exaggeration.

 

[Someone Depressing]

I think the designs are fairly balanced out, though the only way to "truly" balance it out, by effectively making all stereotypes moot, is more hot dudes.

Even so, Blizzard do seem genuinely sincere about this, and I think that only good things could come from this.

Or nothing. Or nothing could come from this.

 

[Batou667]

That is exactly what that means. Male ideal is generally centred around being a worthwhile human being. Female ideal is a sexual appealing to men and sexual appealing to men involves useless and outright crippling shit that takes away for any other values.

Most men in games don't even run armour in minimal armour. This game has maybe one guy who might count as attractive. Most aren't even human. If anything you get over armoured more often and it's the female version of armour that shows off a ton of skin. Even among your shirtless guys some are sexulized yes but its not that common in western and shit like Kratos, or axe wielding barbarians is less "fuck me" and more "look how physically intimidating I am". If they wanted him to be attractive he who be nicer looking and he would be posed differently.

There are plenty of traits that would make you a "worthwhile human being" which aren't typically masculine, like raising children or caring for the sick.

Also, I'm not claiming men are sexualised as much as women. I'm pretty sure the main point of my last post revolved around that difference in male/female depiction.

"Other people do it so it's ok if we do it". Hmmm that excuse never seems to go down well with anything else and it funny how you can continuously pass the buck and blame everything on nebulas "culture" rather than your own actions in perpetuating that. I never said is was invented by video games but since I game and this a gaming form I'm unsurprising going to talk about game.

Our games don't exist in a vacuum so we should definitely talk about the wider context. I never said it "was OK" - in fact I actually said there are plenty of good reasons somebody might oppose stereotypes and tropes - I'm saying that content in games is a reflection of mainstream culture, so that's where we should look when we're trying to figure out why good=beautiful seems to only be a rule for women, or whether these depictions are harmful, and if it's something the majority have an issue with, etc etc.

I'm not "demanding" anything. I'm just sick of people pretending that you're waifish girl sticking her ass and tits out in tights is equivalent to guy who looks like he can bench press a truck and any guy that is capable and heroic regardless of presented sexually. I don't even believe people genuinely can't see the difference between aspiring to be capable and being a good fuck toy and how one of those isn't exactly a great thing.

Profit makes it all ok dose it? cause I could sworn people complain about horrible business practices that are there to make a profit all the time.

Not to be rude but I actually don't understand a couple of those sentences due to missing words.

Anyway, when did I say a macho man and a sexualised woman are equivalent? I suppose we could say they're both unrealistic and exaggerated depictions of male and female bodies, but that's me pointing out a commonality, not claiming an equivalence.What I do think, though, is that the different ways men and women are portrayed in media (including games) is a reflection of the gender roles and gendered aspirational body images that exist, and have existed, in society long before video games, comic books, and all the other usual sexist bogeymen were created.

And no, I'm not saying profit makes it all OK. I'm saying that as long as a majority of gamers like (or at the very least, don't object to) masculinised men and feminised women, that's how games companies will continue to depict them in games. We're approaching the issue from the wrong direction if we view games companies as existing on some kind of hierarchy of morality - they're amoral, they exist to make money by selling games, end of story. If they include a scantily-clad woman in a game, it's because they think it'll help that game sell to a certain demographic. If they include only modestly-dressed women with sensible proportions in a game, that's because they think that this will be profitable by appealing to a different demographic. Any argument that focuses on agonising over why boobplate exists or whether it's offensive to depict women as more sexualised than their male counterparts is just academic beard-stroking. You want change? Appeal to developer's wallets. You could get them to make a game where the protagonist is a black lesbian in a wheelchair, if only they were convinced that a market existed for it.

Don't mistake my explanation of the status quo for a defence of it. I'm not saying things are perfect.

 

[PirateHeaventime]

Nah you went into defensive mode because you were caught in a lie trying to make a game seem sexist. :^)

Good day Mr. Obvious-Troll, or possible alternate account. Your contribution is apreciated.

But just for fun, I'll answer you: I never said I thought the game was sexist, I said the armor was silly. It made my character look stupid and out of place, not cool or even sexy. Maybe some people find that outfit sexy, but I certainly don't...

When in doubt, just call troll. Just cut your losses man, you were caught in a pathetic lie. Just stop...

 

[cdemares]

For the record, feminism has ruined: Tumblr, the national forestry service, science fiction and fantasy writing, atheism communities, academia, all major western religions, Canada, Sweden, divorce and marriage laws, rape laws...

Major western religions? Marriage and rape laws?

I'm thinking:
- Wives not being slaves
- Painkillers allowed during childbirth
- Sex outside of marriage (including rape) or divorce not making you a pariah anymore
- Rape being acknowledged in marriage
- Rape being prosecuted or even believed
- Women being allowed to initiate divorce
- Domestic abuse laws existing

Feminism has an astounding score-board of making the world less horrible. Where's the ruining?

 

[Nimzabaat]

So one out of five female characters not being in a form fitting outfit counts as "trying"? That's interesting. Considering that the remaining characters are male gorilla, male tank (why no female counterpart? something like Shale from Dragon Age for example), non-gender specific robot/turret, male assassin dude trying too hard to be dark and mysterious, male cybord-yogi (so far my favorite), and lastly male somewhat sexy archer guy. Admittedly the real issue is with the viewer and not the content, but I can see some people having problems with this.

You're one of those problematic viewers.

I don't have a problem with the character models (psst, you're missing some letters in "oblivious" by the way), I have a problem with Blizzard pretending to be taking any kind of high road. Saying is one thing, doing is something else.

Ah, thats a nice one

Spoiler: Ass Expansion

This does count as trying, it also counts as failing. Seriously though, check out the character models for the game.

Oh well, baby steps Blizzard, baby steps.

 

[Loop Stricken]

I mean, this is how my paladin looks nowadays:

Spoiler

I want those glasses!

Only reason I took up Engineering.

Edit: Yeah, there's a transmog system in the game. It's limited to items that share an armour class, mind you.

That's a good thing, to be honest. Seeing if someones wearing plate or cloth changes how you fight massively.

Well, you say that, but half the bloody cloth designs they've made after Wrath could likely pass for bloody plate armour.

 

[Something Amyss]

Only reason I took up Engineering.

I have this urge to say "Of course! Don't you know anything about science?"

Edit: Yeah, there's a transmog system in the game. It's limited to items that share an armour class, mind you.

Oh. Well, better than nothing.

Triple-A developers don't make them.

Then we don't have parity. I mean, you just pointed out we do have them, and left out one of the primary criteria for comparison.

Obama, gun control, music, film, and television, were not mentioned at all in my post.

I must have missed the part where they needed to be. Do you understand how comparisons work?

Hey why don't you stop putting words into my mouth there chief?

That'll be hard, since I never started doing it in the first place.

Also: I am a liberal.

Liberals can believe in bullshit, too. I'm not afraid to call it in my own ranks.

For the record, feminism has ruined: Tumblr, the national forestry service, science fiction and fantasy writing, atheism communities, academia, all major western religions, Canada, Sweden, divorce and marriage laws, rape laws, any male-only club in existence, and the bill of rights in regards to free speech and due process. Feel free to debate each one point by point, but I feel that would be off-topic for this thread.

Why would I debate a list I'm not even sure is serious?

 

[Kameburger]

Well, that's nice, but I suppose it's sad that this seems to be news-worthy now.

lol they really can't win. To be honest though I much rather here affirmative reports of game developers trying to do the right thing as opposed to the constant bashing of developers doing the wrong thing. I mean encouragement is a lot stronger than punishment.

 

[Strazdas]

So one out of five female characters not being in a form fitting outfit counts as "trying"?

why wouldnt they be in form fitting clothing? fighting with guns is hard enough without your clothes getting in the way. its the reason real life female troops also use form fitting clothes - so they dont flail around and make it harder for you to battle.

 

[Fdzzaigl]

I like what I've seen for the female designs so far in this game. They stay far away from the typical chain swimsuit kind of deal and that can only be a positive in my book.

Seems like the devs are finally getting tired of that lazy armor type as well.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

So one out of five female characters not being in a form fitting outfit counts as "trying"?

why wouldnt they be in form fitting clothing? fighting with guns is hard enough without your clothes getting in the way. its the reason real life female troops also use form fitting clothes - so they dont flail around and make it harder for you to battle.

The problem is this is what women look like:
http://www.shopyourshape.com/body-shapes/

Spoiler: This is what women look like in Form fitting clothing.

Spoiler: This is what women look like that kick ass.

Spoiler: This is what they made instead.

When you actually look at the body types of the women who kick ass for real, it is not anywhere close to the unrealistic body types they portray in games. These women somehow are able to supposedly kick ass in this game do so without muscles.
This is just another one of those games that will give girls a negative self image due to the odd portrayal of the female body types.
They have males portrayed in many shapes and sizes, but not so for the females.

 

[GrumbleGrump]

I think the characters designs are okay. Blizzard themselves said they really weren't even trying to push the envelope on female design. I do think there should be more variety in shapes though, like ibex lady or tall lanky sniper lady robot or short stout heavy type gal.