Blizzard "Trying Not to Oversexualize" Female Overwatch Characters

[mecegirl]

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 :\

You should look up "she who must not me named" older videos. The feminist frequency video series highlighted tropes seen in movies years before it started focusing on video games. It's just that people are so used to movies getting criticized that no one on the internet lost their shit over them.

I mean, this was made by Siskel & Ebert in the 80s.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iz2N6BMOsyQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPgA1OE-XS0

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

It would take a bit more than just that though.

Of course it would.

It's abundantly clear that this issue is simply never going to die until every female in the world has her body type represented in every game.

Hopefully the men won't climb on board with this, because the install size bloat from catering to every female body type would double, and the entire game would wind up being nothing but hours of selecting the body type you want your character to have.

But I've been lucky, I guess. Not lucky in the sense that my specific body has ever been faithfully reproduced in a game - it hasn't - but instead lucky in the sense that developers have always catered to my "power fantasy ideal body" with completely realistic male character models. There's nothing at all unauthentic about Marcus Fenix or any other example of the Hulk in human form.

I know, I know. I have options beyond Marcus Fenix, and women have none beyond slim and svelte. (Except for where they do, but that weakens the argument, so we like to pretend those games don't exist.)

So I'm on board. Fuck the notion that some games are going to exist that don't cater to my exact sensibilities. They need to cater to mine. They need to cater to yours. They need to cater to every individual's. And despite the fact that that's never going to work out - some women, for example, would very much like to look incredibly sexy more so than they would like to look like Cristiane Justino - I'm not going to let the issue rest and play a game until it gives me exactly the validation that I'm looking for.

(And incidentally, I wouldn't point to gymnasts if you're looking for examples of women who look like they could kick in some 6'4" 270 pound dude's teeth. I doubt there are many thirteen year-old boys who'd have much trouble in a bout of fisticuffs with McKayla Maroney. I'm not even sure I'd point to Cristinae Justino. There's a reason MMA ain't mixed gender.)

Because that's why they exist. To validate my life, my body, my political outlook, my feelings, my sensibilities.

It is not a matter of including every body type, but at least body types that actually look like top form ass kicking females. When they make ass kicking guys, they are usually an exaggerated form of a muscular or agile male, the thing is when they make females they don't make them look anything like a muscular female exaggerated or otherwise. The females do not look like female heroes, they really do not even look like females. They look weird.

I am showing gymnasts as being an example of the agile and quick, and strong female super hero. And YES, gymnasts are extremely strong. I was captain of my gymnastics team and at 92 lbs I could lift a 250 lb keg onto a shelf. I actually DID knock a very tall, athletic weight lifter male off balance and continued to knock him out my door when he grabbed my wrists and tried to hold me against my will, so I do know for a fact a small, petite gymnast is strong enough to do exactly that. Yes, I was being attacked by an over 6ft athletic male ( who was actually kicked off the football team for using steroids so he was " bigger" than normal) and managed to knock him back and push him out of my apartment by force.

The thing is WOMEN do look incredibly sexy, in many actual body types. Men and women find women incredibly sexy, that means we can put women in games that look incredibly sexy and still look like women, we do not need to take away from how sexy real women are to make them look weird in games.

Fit, strong, healthy women in top form are not even being portrayed in games, just weird ideas of what someone thinks women should look like, but not what women actually do. I want female heroes to actually look like female heroes. We are not even finding women with the same body shape as what is being presented is the problem. The proportions do not even look human. You can be busty, you can be slender, you can be stout. Just make them look like what that actually means.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

or short stout heavy type gal.

You know, if every game ever to release from now one featured one of these, I think this issue would mysteriously go away.

It would take a bit more than just that though. Make girls legs look like actual girls legs for one, and not some weird overly photo-shopped awkward version of models legs. Even models legs do not actually look exactly like that. If they are going to have the ability to kick someones teeth out, they have to have actual legs that can do so. There is no " gymnast" body type here, no fighter type, not even a ninja type... Gymnasts legs are muscular, not that lanky and thin. That doesn't mean " short and heavy".

Spoiler: This is not heavy

The females legs in this game (as with most) do not even look like real female legs...

Gymnasts may be short but certainly not heavy. The problem is their women characters actually do not look like women, not even female Olympians.. not even female fighters.. Not even a top form of these role models that girls aspire to be like. The characters do not look like "girls heroes", they just look weird next to real women. Even their shin to thigh ratio is jacked.

Umm, ok? I was referring to something to a short body builder kind of girl. Y'know, really muscly and stuff. The gymnastic kind of legs would fit better on character like Tracer. But then again the game is very stylized and not every character has been revealed, so we can't really say these girls are all there is. Maybe there is a tanky girl or tall and slender kind of gal.

Short body builder type of girl? You mean a short girl that can lift 250lbs? That means you mean a gymnast.

A fast girl? That is when you look at Olympic track teams for the female body type for speed... and none of the characters look like that either.

Spoiler: Women build for speed.

Super heroes should be similar to actual heroes or at least make sense.
" tanky" girls I would think would be more like female heavy weight boxers, and they are not short.

Spoiler: Female Heavyweight Boxers

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

I've often heard the argument that male and female heroes in video games and comic books are both designed solely to appeal to immature men, the simpering fat-titted stick-insects to excite their nerd boners and the bulging interchangeable six-packs for the aspirational power fantasy. And I've never been convinced of that. Tell me that women never find big muscles attractive and I will call you a liar, because I have glanced at the romance section of my local bookstore and it's a wall of bulging torsos with the heads cropped off.

Ha-ha! Precisely the point I made earlier in this thread.

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.

...what's your point, that real life is underwhelming? We know that, that's why we play video games.

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.

If girls are aspiring to look like highly stylised CG video game characters then they're honestly not very clever. Girls and women are subject to plenty of depictions of idealised female body images, but what makes you think video games come close to top of the list of influences? Also, won't anybody think of those poor 15 year old boys welding chunks of metal to themselves because they're trying to emulate the cool robot character?

Real life isn't underwhelming, there is a reason men and women find women incredibly sexy. We would just like some female heroes that actually look like female Heroes. Your life may be underwhelming, but most play games for a wide variety of reasons, not because we think our lives are underwhelming. LOL

 

[GrumbleGrump]

snip'd

Hmm, I'd go for a bit more muscle though. They ARE the special forces of special forces after all. I agree with you on the runners and heavies though.

I feel a female infiltrator is missing though. I'd love if they went with a very plain, almost unremarkable looking girl, like someone you'd meet on the street (jeans, black hoodie) but with some light armor.

Spoiler: Tangent

Real life isn't underwhelming, there is a reason men and women find women incredibly sexy. We would just like some female heroes that actually look like female Heroes.

Something I find weird is that if what we all supposedly want is sexualization of female characters, then why would we not want more variety in body types? I mean I like an hourglass figure, but to be honest I prefer women with more hips (otherwise known as pear figures). I also like more fit women and it kind of pisses me off when warrior ladies look like they couldn't even lift 40lb (compare Zero Mission Samus with Other M Samus to get a better idea).

I just don't see any logic in opposing change, even in objectification. That's why the argument that gamers oppose change in games doesn't really make sense to me.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

snip'd

Hmm, I'd go for a bit more muscle though. They ARE the special forces of special forces after all. I agree with you on the runners and heavies though.

I feel a female infiltrator is missing though. I'd love if they went with a very plain, almost unremarkable looking girl, like someone you'd meet on the street (jeans, black hoodie) but with some light armor.

I know you can't really see all those muscles under the sleeves, and on small girls they are not as noticeable unless you are flexing, but often they do have more muscle than people think.

Spoiler: Muscular Gymnasts

The Plain girl idea you brought up reminds me of the "secret ninja" kind of thing.

Some of the pictures I had above earlier in the thread were actually of Female Navy seals.

 

[GrumbleGrump]

Spoiler: Muscular Gymnasts

Holy shit!
Point withdrawn then. I guess you really can't tell when they're competing at the olympics.

 

[mecegirl]

Just to add on to Lil Devil's point.

When it comes to the way women are depicted in video games, on average they seem to be an exaggeration of a female swimsuit model's body. Not saying that swimsuit models aren't fit and don't have any muscle. Its just that it is only enough muscle to look slender but not enough to make them look "masculine". Depending on her popularity developing too much muscle would hinder her career.

Even ballerinas can have significant muscle mass. Especially in their legs. Some end up developing over developed calf muscles just from years of practicing and performing.

Women with a body type "larger" than often seen in ballet, like Misty Copeland, are even more ripped.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY0cdXr_1MA
But that is just what a lot of physical activity does to the human body. Male or female you develop muscle because of it. Which makes it more glaring when it is only the female avatars with bodies that don't look like bodies that have undergone intense training.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Some of the pictures I had above earlier in the thread were actually of Female Navy seals.

No, they weren't. There are no female SEALs. There are no female Rangers, Special Forces, Delta, MARSOC, or even infantrymen or other groundside combat arms MOSes.

There almost inevitably will be some of those (I have my doubts about SEALs; good luck with log PT), but at the moment, there aren't any at all. The Marines just transitioned to equalizing the physical fitness testing requirements for males and females, and had to postpone doing so for a year because well over half of all female recruits couldn't hit the bare minimum pull-up requirements.

You posted, in order, a police officer, female athletes at a "SEAL-like, no for real" training camp, police officers again, two (non-infantry) Marines and a Navy corpsman, and UFC fighters.

That was a picture of actual women in " seal training" regardless of if they actually allow women to be navy seals or not, women have been doing what it takes to become a seal even if they are not " entitled" to receive a title for it yet due to discrimination against them. They have already shown that women can complete seal training fine, and have done everything men have to gain that title, but simply because they are women they have been denied their title as a seal. But that too is changing, and hopefully we will see the women receiving recognition for their efforts very soon as well :
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/military-plans-put-women-combat-positions-article-1.1375467

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Just to add on to Lil Devil's point.

When it comes to the way women are depicted in video games, on average they seem to be an exaggeration of a female swimsuit model's body. Not saying that swimsuit models aren't fit and don't have any muscle. Its just that it is only enough muscle to look slender but not enough to make them look "masculine". Depending on her popularity developing too much muscle would hinder her career.

Spoiler: Bar Refaeli after surgery and after photo shopping

Even ballerinas can have significant muscle mass. Especially in their legs. Some end up developing over developed calf muscles just from years of practicing and performing.

Spoiler: for space

Women with a body type "larger" than often seen in ballet, like Misty Copeland, are even more ripped.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY0cdXr_1MA

But that is just what a lot of physical activity does to the human body. Male or female you develop muscle because of it. Which makes it more glaring when it is only the female avatars with bodies that don't look like bodies that have undergone intense training.

The thing is, even with the first picture, it is a massively photo-shopped cover, after plastic surgery and not what Bar even looks like in reality.
This is what she looks like in reality:

Spoiler: Bar Refaeli after surgery without photoshop

http://www.mindblowingworld.com/bar-refaeli-plastic-surgery/
Having women look like women would definitely be an improvement. Having female heroes look like female heroes would actually be the equivalent of having " male heroes".

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

That was a picture of actual women in " seal training" regardless of if they actually allow women to be navy seals or not, women have been doing what it takes to become a seal even if they are not " entitled" to receive a title for it yet due to discrimination against them. They have already shown that women can complete seal training fine, and have done everything men have to gain that title, but simply because they are women they have been denied their title as a seal. But that too is changing, and hopefully we will see the women receiving recognition for their efforts very soon as well :
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/military-plans-put-women-combat-positions-article-1.1375467

No, they really haven't.

If you honestly believe athletes at a weekend camp are going through this [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CiYEksYQq0], then I dunno what to tell you, except that I've yet to see boats, rock portage, 96 hour sleep deprivation, 3AM swims, and so forth at any of these.

It wasn't a picture of women in SEAL training because women can't even apply in for BUD/S currently. I went to a Larry Vickers pistol class once; that doesn't mean I'm a Delta guy.

No, women cannot currently apply for seals due discrimination, but will be able to gain their title of seal as of 2016, ranger as of 2015. You will have your pictures of women who completed their seal training after that. Showing you pictures of women doing seal training is the closet you can get at this time due to discrimination, not because women are not fully capable and have completed training just as rigorous.Those women doing the seal training are not just anyone, they are Olympians. Women have come a long way in their fight against discrimination in the military, but there is still work to do. For example:
http://www.history.navy.mil/special%20highlights/women/timeline1.htm
http://www.womenmarines.org/wm_history.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/women-combat-three-female-marines-march-history-completing-infantry-training-f2D11632525

The idea that women" are unable to do something" simply because they have not been " allowed" to do something is clearly false, and currently we are witnessing women trickling into these fields once closed to them. It is just a matter of time before we have more fields available and more women in those fields. It is a matter of the women who are capable of being a seal wanting to actually do it to make it a reality.

 

[Strazdas]

The problem is this is what women look like:

While i agree that they went overhead with the first two, the 3rd and 4th of your pictures does look quite close to some of your "kick ass" pictures. Especially the 4th. Besides, i was never arguing that blizzard did it all correctly, merely that form fitting clothing isnt a "Bad thing".

Now imagine that half of them go through the entire game dressed something like this:

Spoiler

If you can, if your soul is not too shriveled, try and imagine how that would make you feel.

Funny thing: GTA: San Andreas has allowed you to walk around with CJ being shirtless, and if you max its muscles in the gym he looks pretty much like that but being in much poorer model because its 2003 graphics. Back then i was a big San Andreas player so i obviuosly observed the community of it and.... turns out a shitload of people went shirtless max muscles. so when presenting with this as an option - people CHOOSE to be dressed like this the entire game. And while granted thats only one game, but it seems to be in direct contradiction to what your claiming.

As far as making me feel something about it? all i felt are poor choices for them as beyond the first city story being shirtless gangbanger really does not fit the story. but thats about it.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

The problem is this is what women look like:

While i agree that they went overhead with the first two, the 3rd and 4th of your pictures does look quite close to some of your "kick ass" pictures. Especially the 4th. Besides, i was never arguing that blizzard did it all correctly, merely that form fitting clothing isnt a "Bad thing".

Did you compare the way women actually look in wet suits to the 3rd picture? OUR BOOBS DON'T WORK LIKE THAT. LOL Form fitting clothing like that does not look like that. Women's boobs are not plastic. It doesn't look like a woman actually looks.

The 4th is even worse.. Those legs belong on a grasshopper, not on a woman. LOL
This is what a woman with speed legs actually looks like:

Spoiler: Fast women

Notice their shin to thigh ratio, their muscle tone, the shape of their legs, hips and ass? That looks nothing like the last character. The last character looks more like she has insect legs than human legs.
In fact if you want to see what those legs look like in form fitting attire:

Spoiler: fast women in form fitting attire

Because that is what women look like.

That is what a female hero should look like.

 

[loa]

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.

Military gear isn't form fitting.
It's just standardized regular ass pants and shirt.
Unless they go scuba diving or something because under water loose clothing slows you down, form fitting doesn't make sense as it actually inhibits your mobility, especially if the suit is being sucked onto the body with a vacuum which is the only possible explanation for how we can even see sepparate boobs.

 

[Adam Lester]

I'm just going to throw this out there, but I think all of us would like some progress when it comes to genders and diversity in video games. But in this age of gamergates, tumblrisms, youtube horrors and twitter meltdowns we've all come to this point where tensions are high on both sides.


There is nary a gamer out there that isn't all for girl power or otherwise. Remember the pre-gender based shitstorm days of gamers far and wide mocking DOA for its eery "jiggle physics" and brandishing pitchforks because Samus developed a lovely case of baby rabies along with those D-cups she traded in her badassery for? And how the fanbase waiting for Half-Life 3 can look to their immediate left to see the cobweb-covered skeletons of those of us who waited...and waited...for Ubisoft to finally release that muck-fothering Beyond Good and Evil Sequel?


The anger and frustration with the gaming industry in regards to this is palpable because it's a new anger. The mainstream gamer culture is still a pretty new thing, and the industry (as well as the fanbase) was pretty homogenous for the longest damned time. Look at some of the guys that "Started it all". Shigeru Miyamoto's 60, Hideo Kojima's 51. Al Alcorn, the creator of Pong is 66. Some of us have Dads older than that. And second wave feminists were too busy fighting some serious oppression up until the early 80s' (until third wave started, splintered and ran that train into a ditch in my humble opinion) to be be bothered with getting into a very, very small and unpopular occupation when there were more pressing matters at hand. So men had the helm, men made games based off of the fiction made popular by men. As fiction becomes more diverse, so do video games and they have and are becoming even more so these days. More women are coming into the industry with some legitimate influence. It should be a good time to be a gamer.


The big question is this. Is it progress, or is it pandering? Does it really change the game play? Now, from the nay side for the coverin' uppins' there is a fear, and it sure isn't feminism. Entertainment mediums have been down some pretty treacherous roads in the past. Ever hear of the "Comics Code Authority"? I doubt anyone here would want video games going through something similar to that.


Imagine a game release being held back because a game had to meet specific standards ranging from racial inclusion to making sure that male, female and everything in between was dressed in a way that ensured that their audience would be unanimously "comfortable" playing as or alongside. Imagine if games casually injected offensive levels of blatant tokenism into their games just to make a sale to the point where it became as eye-rolling and intelligence insulting when they hit the shelves as your grey and brown chad-shooters.


Anyone with a brain between their ears knows that the chances of that happening are pretty slim and that's being generous. Video games are based almost solely in consumerism, so if X sells more than Y, X is going to sell and Y can get bent. But it's happened before and it's scary as hell to see a group of people that seemingly promote the idea of the kind of bullshit the CCA was imposing on comics to come back.


*On an off-hand subject, art is subjective. But imagine an artist or a passionate art fan standing in a gallery and the person next to him/her points and goes "I don't like it. It has too many phallic symbols and your taste in art sucks" while disregarding the amount of time and effort the artist put into it to relay their vision. That's how some folk feel.*


Does anyone really want that? Absolutely not. On the other hand, we shouldn't be shitting bricks every time something like this happens. And that goes for both sides.

 

[wAriot]

How about we just make everyone a voiceless, asexual robot? There, now no one can complain about "oversexualization" or whatever.
At least until AIs become sufficiently advanced and Skynet (*ahem*Google*ahem*) takes over the world.

 

[Adam Lester]

How about we just make everyone a voiceless, asexual robot? There, now no one can complain about "oversexualization" or whatever.
At least until AIs become sufficiently advanced and Skynet (*ahem*Google*ahem*) takes over the world.

Because all the asexual robotkin on Tumblr would get all triggered.

#yesallhumans

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

I'm just going to throw this out there, but I think all of us would like some progress when it comes to genders and diversity in video games. But in this age of gamergates, tumblrisms, youtube horrors and twitter meltdowns we've all come to this point where tensions are high on both sides.

There is nary a gamer out there that isn't all for girl power or otherwise. Remember the pre-gender based shitstorm days of gamers far and wide mocking DOA for its eery "jiggle physics" and brandishing pitchforks because Samus developed a lovely case of baby rabies along with those D-cups she traded in her badassery for? And how the fanbase waiting for Half-Life 3 can look to their immediate left to see the cobweb-covered skeletons of those of us who waited...and waited...for Ubisoft to finally release that muck-fothering Beyond Good and Evil Sequel?

The anger and frustration with the gaming industry in regards to this is palpable because it's a new anger. The mainstream gamer culture is still a pretty new thing, and the industry (as well as the fanbase) was pretty homogenous for the longest damned time. Look at some of the guys that "Started it all". Shigeru Miyamoto's 60, Hideo Kojima's 51. Al Alcorn, the creator of Pong is 66. Some of us have Dads older than that. And second wave feminists were too busy fighting some serious oppression up until the early 80s' (until third wave started, splintered and ran that train into a ditch in my humble opinion) to be be bothered with getting into a very, very small and unpopular occupation when there were more pressing matters at hand. So men had the helm, men made games based off of the fiction made popular by men. As fiction becomes more diverse, so do video games and they have and are becoming even more so these days. More women are coming into the industry with some legitimate influence. It should be a good time to be a gamer.

The big question is this. Is it progress, or is it pandering? Does it really change the game play? Now, from the nay side for the coverin' uppins' there is a fear, and it sure isn't feminism. Entertainment mediums have been down some pretty treacherous roads in the past. Ever hear of the "Comics Code Authority"? I doubt anyone here would want video games going through something similar to that.

Imagine a game release being held back because a game had to meet specific standards ranging from racial inclusion to making sure that male, female and everything in between was dressed in a way that ensured that their audience would be unanimously "comfortable" playing as or alongside. Imagine if games casually injected offensive levels of blatant tokenism into their games just to make a sale to the point where it became as eye-rolling and intelligence insulting when they hit the shelves as your grey and brown chad-shooters.

Anyone with a brain between their ears knows that the chances of that happening are pretty slim and that's being generous. Video games are based almost solely in consumerism, so if X sells more than Y, X is going to sell and Y can get bent. But it's happened before and it's scary as hell to see a group of people that seemingly promote the idea of the kind of bullshit the CCA was imposing on comics to come back.

*On an off-hand subject, art is subjective. But imagine an artist or a passionate art fan standing in a gallery and the person next to him/her points and goes "I don't like it. It has too many phallic symbols and your taste in art sucks" while disregarding the amount of time and effort the artist put into it to relay their vision. That's how some folk feel.*

Does anyone really want that? Absolutely not. On the other hand, we shouldn't be shitting bricks every time something like this happens. And that goes for both sides.

As a hobby artist, I have sold quite a bit of art over the years even though it is just a hobby of mine, and I can tell you that someone telling me they do not like some of my art because of how it makes them feel is fine. What is not fine is if my art makes some athletic perfectly healthy and fit girl think she is fat because she is muscular due to how women are portrayed. I actually HAVE made women in paintings that were unfortunately showing women in unrealistic standards and had someone tell me that is what I did. In fact, that is why I am much more aware about these things now when viewing them. THEY WERE RIGHT.

Women and girls for too long have been told they are fat, when they actually have hardly ANY body fat. They are told they are fat when they are muscular and it has been taken far too far over the years in regards to media portrayal of women. Now we do have to make a conscious effort to not reinforce these harmful expectations of women and girls and instead promote healthier images. The idea that a " fit" woman is not attractive, or is " big" is a problem that has to be addressed in our media and unless we stop promoting unhealthy images and expectations on women this will not change.

Spoiler: this is not fat

That isn't fat, that is what a super hero should look like.
The way they make women super heroes, it would be like making this guy the ideal "superhero"

Spoiler: The female characters can kick as much as as this guy...

I am not seeing them withhold the muscles on the male super heroes, only on the females.