Twilight was written by a woman too. Being female doesn't mean you can't create a problematic, weak female lead. Then again, its worth noting Pratchett is a more talented writer than Meyer, and much of the creative decisions regarding Lara were not in her hands; it wasn't Pratchett who got to decide what happens to Lara. Basic story decisions, like showing Lara as crying and suffering, would be made by modellers and designers long before she was brought in to put words to it all.
It's a article from Cracked that starts with the words rape culture. It should be taken as seriously as an article on Fox News that starts with a quote from Atlas Shrugged.
I must ask the people who tend to shrug/baulk whenever they see these feminist concepts discussed - what do you make of the fact that more and more websites are coming around to the view female depictions as a problem? The Escapist, Cracked, Rock Paper Shotgun - many of the websites I frequent are now promoting feminist perspectives, and for each, there are readers complaining about how everything is turning into Kotaku. These people previously came to the websites to enjoy the smart insights, but can't now stomach that they are talking about that wacky feminism business; that must create quite a cognitive dissonance.
Also, one can not like the depictions of females in games and still disagree with how an article tries to get that point across, or point out how the examples an article uses don't make sense. And one can very much disagree when an article essentially says "if you disagree with us you're wrong and dumb".
as much as some people are sick of this topic and frankly no matter the topic you will always get people saying "this again can we please stop talking about it" its good for the industry and community. there is a problem with how women are treated and protrayed in games and trying to address that wont hurt
Indeed. I just hope that developers/writers aren't swayed too much by the vocal minority (or even publishers) and can get out the game (or story) that THEY want to get out.
I feel that these topics become useless arguments of "I'm right" "No, I'm RIGHT" and falls short of real discourse. Video games are fiction and fiction is just fantasy, a exaggeration of the creators "vision" of whatever the fuck they want to say. Sometimes they really want to say nothing in particular, have no political or social commentary, they just want to tell a story. And a good story no matter what the content is still a good story. Just because the protagonist may be x-generic male and the plot may be saving y-female-in-distress doesn't detract from it being a good story.
At this point I feel that proponents of the "we need moar strong female leads" should take that as a challenge to write something instead of trying to force others to do it by brow-beating and political correctness bashing.
I don't say that the conversation shouldn't be around but I will say that we're not adding anything by rehashing the same arguments over and over. Someone has to just take initiative and create something different. And more people need to follow that example.
Basically what I feel it boils down to is debate means jack shit without a real action and the only real action isn't to batter down what is already in existence but to build up that which is not. Take fucking risks, do something about it that isn't destructive or abrasive, but constructive and creative.
I disagree, even rehashing the same stuff time, and time, and time again, we're talking about it. It's being talked about, and thus in the eyes of people. We're letting people know we still want female protagonists. It's all some can do.
The problem with making our own stuff, aside from the fact that not everyone has the time, resources, or talent to do that, and no amount of BS will change that is that since when does the industry really pay attention to indie games? I mean seriously? I'm not saying it to crush dreams, but any indie developer that gets the industry to stop being so against women deserves several nobel peace prizes. They'd have shattered te conventional wisdom that women in games harm the game, created a game men and women alike love bringing them together, and made so much money that the industry would have to notice as it's all they care about in the end.
Women getting into the industry to make AAA games? Go for it! But lets not pretend women are necessary for it. Men can write for women, and vice versa. Other mediums prove this like the romantic comedy movies, plus the fact that most of our beloved female figures are created by men in games.
I'm not saying that a person can't make a difference, but I'd say the change needs to happen among those in the industry, producers, developers, etc, that block female protagonists from being made. The people in power over these matters that fight diversity among protagonists need to be replaced by people who aren't so eager to think negative of ethnicity or gender.
Still disagree with that. Lot of guy devs will make what interest them at the current time. Some guys may be curious and want to explore perspective unique to females. It could come at a time that's convenient with the demands of portrayal change but it has nothing to do with that. but it shouldn't be the future burden of all AAA devs to be more politically correct. That's not of their own volition, that's compulsion. ( I.E. I don't have cleavage in games anymore because I'm afraid of the market.)
They'll be open to making more depth nuanced female characters because 'the story' demands it not 48 percentage market compulsions. Babes like Ivy Valentine in Soul Calibur or the weird Dragon Crown sorceress exist in games worlds mostly synonymous with eccentric cultural flash and extreme gender stereotypical warriors. Half-life 2 doesn't have any eye raising visual presentations of women because city 17 is a grounded gestapo controlled future where such a thing would fly in the face of the story that's being created. And it takes indepdendent output. Actual content to change the narrative in the industry. You think hollywood'll magically stop with token babes in films because of people picketing? Or that you could lock Dan Houser in a room and demand rockstar write more politically correct depictions of real world women? It ain't happening. More people have to get involved for entertainment to be diverse, and the winds of change carry everyone else. Cant just expect the boys at the top to concern themselves about every sensibility, they'll just go for broke.
Sure, devs will try and make what it is they want, but lets not overlook that there are people out there that will interfere if thy try to make a female protagonist. Possibly a PoC as well.
http://kotaku.com/investigation-a-video-game-studio-from-hell-511872642
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/123139-Devs-Had-to-Demand-Female-Focus-Testers-for-The-Last-of-Us
http://www.penny-arcade.com/report/article/remember-mes-surprising-connection-to-facebook-and-why-its-protagonist-had
http://popwatch.ew.com/2012/05/01/god-of-war-ascension-multiplayer/ or http://www.gameinformer.com/games/god_of_war_ascension/b/ps3/archive/2012/04/30/sony-unveils-god-of-war-ascensions-multiplayer.aspx
http://uk.gamespot.com/features/fear-of-a-woman-warrior-6404142/
http://www.gamespot.com/news/naughty-dog-insisted-on-female-testers-for-the-last-of-us-6406619
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evI5pF5h8Ck
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=252 a point made in the form of a joke
http://indigitainment.com/2013/05/08/indigenous-determination-in-game-space/
http://www.vg247.com/2013/03/22/beyond-two-souls-dev-asked-to-show-star-holding-a-gun-on-cover-we-catigorically-refused/
http://www.toybox-games.jp/english0107.html
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-03-20-bastion-developer-teases-transistor-for-pax-east
http://lesbiangamers.com/2008/05/farcry-2-female-character-fiasco/
I'm not pushing for PC so much as getting the industry to stop being so hostile to the idea of a female presense in games.
If developers want to make Ivy Valentines, and Mai Shiranuis, and games like GTA, and other games with topless women, or Bayonetta sequels, I'm not going to try and stop them. I'm a fan of looking at women, too.
Still, can we agree that these overly sexualized portrayals shouldn't be a near relentless norm?
That it might have the hopefully unwanted sideaffect of driving off women new to gaming?
If they want to make a game with all guys, I'm not trying to stop them. I'll be less likely to buy the game though. I'll save my money for more inclusive titles, AKA, Voting with my wallet.
Speaking of voting with my wallet, I've a mild suspicion people have been doing that a very long time leading to a lot of failure in the videogame industry. I.E. Bankruptcies, and general loss of revenue.
Considering the damage the industry's taken , how long until they realize that it might be possible the hostile attitude towards female protagonists might have something to do with it? That if they pandered to women more, they'd be willing to spend more, and maybe have a positive impact in finances?
Hopefully not terribly long with Ubisoft's announcements, and CoD announcing females in multiplayer, and a small smattering of games getting sequels eventually. Whiel it's good news, I'm skeptical of most of it as this cycle happened before, round abouts in the 90's for a few years, then died for longer, only to resurface now.
Right, token women are in chick flicks? Romantic comedies, Twilight, etc.? Alice is Token in the Resident Evil movies? The women in recent horror films are token? The game industry is seriously lagging behind in pretty much every other entertainment media in pandering to both genders.
And guess who dominates the movie industry? Guys.
The book/novel industry is dominated by guys, yet there's plenty of diversity in protagonists.
'd say guys make up the majority of writers.
Women having to get involved isn't necessary. I'm not saying they shouldn't get involved, though! Infact I encourage it, as we need new blood to help create a more egalitarian gaming industry... but pretending that there's guys who can't write for women is a massive absurdity when Lara Croft, Samus, Nilin, probably every last woman in Resident Evil, women in fighting games, women in bioware games, etc. are written by men, or were with likely few exceptions.
The excuse that men can't write fopr women is a crutch for the status quo. The longer we let the industry use this excuse the longer they will, and it might not even be sincere when used.
I find the notion that the game industry can't make female chracters across the spectrum of representation laughable. It has before, it can again. It still is, though in very small doses and teases of a brighter future for female characters.
I'm not looking to force anyone to create female protagonists, I'm just requesting they do, being loud until they do, and am hoping the game industry stops being hostile to the idea of female protagonists. I'm not sure where the heck you got the idea I'm trying to force anyone to do anything.
The hostility is coming more so from spoiled brah gamers.
Not saying that men can't write for women, it shows, and as you can see from Naughty Dog producer Neil Druckmanns comments there are still a lot of guys who want to. Others may just not feel like doing so on certain projects, and that's OK. Only business politics is putting up walls for more female protagonists.
As for failure in the industry. I think thats more to do with faulty budget projections, overspending on marketing campaigns, movie-tie ins that visually have little to do with in-game content, and friggin EA liquidating an obscene amount of creative middle-tier game studios. All those creatives that the publishing giants dismissed over the past decade could've also been your white knights for egalitarianism in games. Hell the original creator of Resident Evil has moved from Capcom to Sega to Bethesda now, and Capcom has wasted a lot o' moola. Monopolies or major players don't have incentives to improve or diversify their content.
Back in PS2 era though there werent too many ,but We had Joanna Dark, Aya Brea from Parasite Eve 1 & 2, Heather Mason in Sh3, we played as Mona Sax in Max Payne 2, Jade from Beyond Good & Evil. Cate Archer from No One Lives Forever, Hana from Fear Effect (perhaps not the most endearing example) These weren't not products of protest, but of natural curiosity, and thats what more inclusion of female protagonists should be 'a just so happens to be' that players are not overtly hit over the head with but that anybody can sink into comfortably and identify with the character, and not have to even think about gender politics in the game, unless the theme of the game is ABOUT gender politics. When these titles were out gender politics wasn't as messy an issue as now. Jap devs were pervy but no one cared as much.
As for books they've the full advantage of 3rd person omniscience, decades of high literary socio-political philosophical critiscm and thought, college teaching emphasis on plot logic, suspense, consistency, believable motives worlds etc which pushes most scandalous pulp entertainment away from NY Times bestsellers list and escorts them gently over to the retarded kids table with the other 'pulp novels' that don't need to make sense, but just service our hormones.
Tom Clancy rarely if ever explored heroine CIA or Black ops female lead heroines in his novels, and coincidentally action hero agents Jack Ryan, Jack Ryan jr, Clark & Ding Chavez from Rainbow Six, mostly had wives working in the healthcare industry. Sure some might've asked him why we wrote like that but I never thought of it as weird. This was the world he created, and I expected some subjectivity going in. He stuck with his schtick and in novels you had more room for 3rd person omni to walk a mile in other characters shoes between chapters anyways, regardless of who you made the hero.
Have you noticed for all the industry articles mentioned the problem comes from the West. We actually had more character diversity opportunity PS2 gen than this one when UK European Japanese, or more independent American titles like Half life and Portal were the real AAA narrative game titans of the industry.
What we've seen politically this gen is the American XBOX over-marketing of the casual Broseph-McCall-of-Duty demographic, or the results of AAA in the industry being more American centric focused, and with that is going to come all the presumed advertisement to the typical market.
Think back to 1993. DOOM and early Duke Nukem ( back when the misogyny actually had some underlying satirical point to it) PC games like that did service us guys dark curiosities but they were made in very independent creative atmospheres. All that raw shoot em up, hanging corpses and pentagram wall tags were not topically safe for console market at the time either. but as creators, they weren't worried too much about how subjective or offensive their title was. All games and fiction are at some point subjective. If they pulled back, they could never EVER make a game like that again, even if they decided to not have that content they at least wanted to have on a socio-political level 'the freedom' to make whatever they wanted.
Its painfully obvious that things need to get more egalitarian, but guys that naturally feel inclined to tell guys tales are gonna do so. But is more of an issue where the advertisement and marketing, and publisher's executive hand is focused. Devs don't have as much creative freedom to just explore different lives and topics as they used to in this current climate. The reason we have TloU's Ellie, and Beyond Two Souls Jodie or Bioshock's Elizabeth is because Take-Two and Sony are more universal and receptive to different stories and perspectives. Hell it was Sony that put out GTA on their console in the first place. I say instead of us drawing ire at the artists for perpetuating a status quo instead of making what they love or are naturally inclined to make, it should go to the middle management publishing nay-sayers. The latter are the REAL ones who keep bordering out progressive creativity.
When was the last time a male character in a videogame at first felt weak and desperate without suffering from a bulletwound or "hugepieceofwoodtroughleg" syndrome though? When was the last time a male protagonist cried or seemed helpless and incapable, without imediately freeing themselves thanks to poorly tied ropes or something. I don't play all that many games so I'm sure I must have missed something, cause I can't remember a single one. I think Yahtzee may have a pretty good point when he says that the only emotion your average male protagonist is capable of showing is grizzled determination. Certainly seems true for a lot of them anyway!
Amnesia: The Dark Descent does this quite well, I think. From the very beginning you are made to feel ill-equipped for the task, and even at the very end you still feel pretty small and insignificant. You haven't gained any sort of superweapon that can vanquish the villain--you've got a bit of plan, but you still have to execute it under the pressure.
And at one point you are overwhelmed and captured, and even after you manage to escape the prison cell you have to outrun a pants-shittingly terrrifying enemy. The way you escape actually ends up being kind of clever, but then the moment you start to walk away you're forced to run down a winding corridor like a scared little kid because you have no way to confront the enemies in this game. All you do is run, cower, and do what you must to escape. And any time you think you're getting the upper hand or making a lot of progress, you're taken back down to earth and disempowered again by being put against an enemy you can'd do anything but run from.
When was the last time a male character in a videogame at first felt weak and desperate without suffering from a bulletwound or "hugepieceofwoodtroughleg" syndrome though? When was the last time a male protagonist cried or seemed helpless and incapable, without imediately freeing themselves thanks to poorly tied ropes or something. I don't play all that many games so I'm sure I must have missed something, cause I can't remember a single one. I think Yahtzee may have a pretty good point when he says that the only emotion your average male protagonist is capable of showing is grizzled determination. Certainly seems true for a lot of them anyway!
Amnesia: The Dark Descent does this quite well, I think. From the very beginning you are made to feel ill-equipped for the task, and even at the very end you still feel pretty small and insignificant. You haven't gained any sort of superweapon that can vanquish the villain--you've got a bit of plan, but you still have to execute it under the pressure.
And at one point you are overwhelmed and captured, and even after you manage to escape the prison cell you have to outrun a pants-shittingly terrrifying enemy. The way you escape actually ends up being kind of clever, but then the moment you start to walk away you're forced to run down a winding corridor like a scared little kid because you have no way to confront the enemies in this game. All you do is run, cower, and do what you must to escape. And any time you think you're getting the upper hand or making a lot of progress, you're taken back down to earth and disempowered again by being put against an enemy you can'd do anything but run from.
'Outlast' has the same thing, where your only means of success is running away and cowering.
I'd say "Far Cry 3" did a good job with this, with your character in way over his head and scared at the beginning, and by the end he's gone through so much stuff that he's pretty much become a crazed killer.
That being said, why in the world would you want to play a game where your protagonist, whether male or female, did nothing but cry and wet themselves and then get killed? Why would you want to play a game where they tie your character up or put them in a cell, and there is literally no way you can escape?
That being said, why in the world would you want to play a game where your protagonist, whether male or female, did nothing but cry and wet themselves and then get killed? Why would you want to play a game where they tie your character up or put them in a cell, and there is literally no way you can escape?
I don't think any game about disempowerment is like that, exactly. Yes in Amnesia you do a lot of ducking and hiding and whimpering, but there's still a way out. You may not be able to fight, but you still can make it to the end. The only difference is the character themself isn't completely confident they can make it. Due to the story of Amnesia, you've got even more reasons to not be sure you can or even should make it out alive. Spoilers about the game ahead to elaborate on this:
Daniel, the protagonist, is told at the beginning in a letter from himself that he needs to find Alexander in the castle and kill him. At first, this makes you think Alexander is an evil bastard and you're a victim of his plottings. But you don't know for sure because Daniel's past self drank an amnesia potion and forgot what happened.
Turns out, Daniel was running from a monster which he accidentally unleashed by taking an artifact from Africa. He eventually got in contact with Alexander, who taught him that torturing people was a method of distracting the monster and taking it off his scent. At first he believed he was torturing criminals and murderers, but later on down the line when he chased down and murdered the daughter of a farmer he realized Alexander had been manipulating him and turned him into a monster. He drank the amnesia potion to forget this so he could track down Alexander without the burden of this guilt weighing him down, and he had access to the potion itself had been used in his tortures to make the victim forget past tortures to make new ones even more effective.
When you discover this, it sort of makes you wonder if it's even worth saving Daniel's ass. He's as terrified as that girl was, but it's a big turning point with how you regard Daniel as a character. For so long he's been the helpless victim, and now in a way he still is a helpless victim, but you know he is capable of doing terrible things for the sake of self-preservation.
Disempowerment games are not about reveling in being helpless. It's about being helpless, and yet in spite of that finding ways to overcome fear and doubt and continue on. In other games, you feel confident you'll make it to the end because you're well-enough equipped for the task. You build up your weapons and stats so that you walk into the battle confident you will walk out alive. Disempowerment games take away that ability to plan ahead, so you're simply left with hope that you'll keep finding ways to move forward. Which, if you think about it, is a more realistic depiction of how people react to being helpless. When you're vastly outnumbered and outgunned, all you really have is optimism and your own wits.
So to summarize, games about empowerment are about building yourself up to a point where no enemy can hope to defeat you. And disempowerment games are about being in a hole trapped by your enemy and finding a way out of that hole, even if that means digging your hole even deeper (in Amnesia, you slowly descend further into the castle's depths, which makes you even more vulnerable and unsafe).
But there's a middle ground that has near zero competition. It's barely been tapped into. The 10-30 dollar stand alone DLC games. Blood Dragon, Undead Nightmare, liberty city stories, and so forth. The upcoming HD remake of AC: liberation (I hope!) and Ubisoft's general gameplan to go into these games.
I'm not asking for huge games from big companies. I'm just hoping the devs get more freedom. these middle of the road games may help.
But they are already there with their old games that are sold at huge discounts. I understand that, as far as multiplayer dominant games its not the same since community has moved on, but as far as single players games go, it makes no difference and you can get 12+ month old AAA games at 10-30 USD. On PC you can get them even cheaper siche greater competition and piracy drives prices down even faster.
I'm not implying it. I am saying it. Elizabeth is a damsel. She is better written than most damsels, has a fairly well developed character, but for all intents and purposes, much of the story is built around rescuing and protecting her.
Okay, fine, you might have a point, but I think you're undermining quite a bit in order to make your point.
Let's be honest, tropes are an incredibly bad way of analyzing a story because they reduce everything into a "what" question. (What did Booker do? He rescued Elizabeth, therefore she is a damsel.) This is extremely shallow though, as stories are really all about how's and why's. The reasons behind certain actions and in what manner things come to pass. So yes, Elizabeth was locked in a tower which Booker got her out of. But that's not the point of the story. It is a deep analysis of Booker, his past, and how he inevitably turns into a monster, and as such Elizabeth is the moral heart of the story. Indeed, it can be said that she's more of a hero than Booker ever was.
And in the minute to minute events of the game, we have a story in which a man and a woman consistently save each other. I don't know if it can get much better than that.
I feel that these topics become useless arguments of "I'm right" "No, I'm RIGHT" and falls short of real discourse. Video games are fiction and fiction is just fantasy, a exaggeration of the creators "vision" of whatever the fuck they want to say. Sometimes they really want to say nothing in particular, have no political or social commentary, they just want to tell a story. And a good story no matter what the content is still a good story. Just because the protagonist may be x-generic male and the plot may be saving y-female-in-distress doesn't detract from it being a good story.
At this point I feel that proponents of the "we need moar strong female leads" should take that as a challenge to write something instead of trying to force others to do it by brow-beating and political correctness bashing.
I don't say that the conversation shouldn't be around but I will say that we're not adding anything by rehashing the same arguments over and over. Someone has to just take initiative and create something different. And more people need to follow that example.
Basically what I feel it boils down to is debate means jack shit without a real action and the only real action isn't to batter down what is already in existence but to build up that which is not. Take fucking risks, do something about it that isn't destructive or abrasive, but constructive and creative.
I disagree, even rehashing the same stuff time, and time, and time again, we're talking about it. It's being talked about, and thus in the eyes of people. We're letting people know we still want female protagonists. It's all some can do.
The problem with making our own stuff, aside from the fact that not everyone has the time, resources, or talent to do that, and no amount of BS will change that is that since when does the industry really pay attention to indie games? I mean seriously? I'm not saying it to crush dreams, but any indie developer that gets the industry to stop being so against women deserves several nobel peace prizes. They'd have shattered te conventional wisdom that women in games harm the game, created a game men and women alike love bringing them together, and made so much money that the industry would have to notice as it's all they care about in the end.
Women getting into the industry to make AAA games? Go for it! But lets not pretend women are necessary for it. Men can write for women, and vice versa. Other mediums prove this like the romantic comedy movies, plus the fact that most of our beloved female figures are created by men in games.
I'm not saying that a person can't make a difference, but I'd say the change needs to happen among those in the industry, producers, developers, etc, that block female protagonists from being made. The people in power over these matters that fight diversity among protagonists need to be replaced by people who aren't so eager to think negative of ethnicity or gender.
Still disagree with that. Lot of guy devs will make what interest them at the current time. Some guys may be curious and want to explore perspective unique to females. It could come at a time that's convenient with the demands of portrayal change but it has nothing to do with that. but it shouldn't be the future burden of all AAA devs to be more politically correct. That's not of their own volition, that's compulsion. ( I.E. I don't have cleavage in games anymore because I'm afraid of the market.)
They'll be open to making more depth nuanced female characters because 'the story' demands it not 48 percentage market compulsions. Babes like Ivy Valentine in Soul Calibur or the weird Dragon Crown sorceress exist in games worlds mostly synonymous with eccentric cultural flash and extreme gender stereotypical warriors. Half-life 2 doesn't have any eye raising visual presentations of women because city 17 is a grounded gestapo controlled future where such a thing would fly in the face of the story that's being created. And it takes indepdendent output. Actual content to change the narrative in the industry. You think hollywood'll magically stop with token babes in films because of people picketing? Or that you could lock Dan Houser in a room and demand rockstar write more politically correct depictions of real world women? It ain't happening. More people have to get involved for entertainment to be diverse, and the winds of change carry everyone else. Cant just expect the boys at the top to concern themselves about every sensibility, they'll just go for broke.
Sure, devs will try and make what it is they want, but lets not overlook that there are people out there that will interfere if thy try to make a female protagonist. Possibly a PoC as well.
http://kotaku.com/investigation-a-video-game-studio-from-hell-511872642
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/123139-Devs-Had-to-Demand-Female-Focus-Testers-for-The-Last-of-Us
http://www.penny-arcade.com/report/article/remember-mes-surprising-connection-to-facebook-and-why-its-protagonist-had
http://popwatch.ew.com/2012/05/01/god-of-war-ascension-multiplayer/ or http://www.gameinformer.com/games/god_of_war_ascension/b/ps3/archive/2012/04/30/sony-unveils-god-of-war-ascensions-multiplayer.aspx
http://uk.gamespot.com/features/fear-of-a-woman-warrior-6404142/
http://www.gamespot.com/news/naughty-dog-insisted-on-female-testers-for-the-last-of-us-6406619
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evI5pF5h8Ck
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=252 a point made in the form of a joke
http://indigitainment.com/2013/05/08/indigenous-determination-in-game-space/
http://www.vg247.com/2013/03/22/beyond-two-souls-dev-asked-to-show-star-holding-a-gun-on-cover-we-catigorically-refused/
http://www.toybox-games.jp/english0107.html
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-03-20-bastion-developer-teases-transistor-for-pax-east
http://lesbiangamers.com/2008/05/farcry-2-female-character-fiasco/
I'm not pushing for PC so much as getting the industry to stop being so hostile to the idea of a female presense in games.
If developers want to make Ivy Valentines, and Mai Shiranuis, and games like GTA, and other games with topless women, or Bayonetta sequels, I'm not going to try and stop them. I'm a fan of looking at women, too.
Still, can we agree that these overly sexualized portrayals shouldn't be a near relentless norm?
That it might have the hopefully unwanted sideaffect of driving off women new to gaming?
If they want to make a game with all guys, I'm not trying to stop them. I'll be less likely to buy the game though. I'll save my money for more inclusive titles, AKA, Voting with my wallet.
Speaking of voting with my wallet, I've a mild suspicion people have been doing that a very long time leading to a lot of failure in the videogame industry. I.E. Bankruptcies, and general loss of revenue.
Considering the damage the industry's taken , how long until they realize that it might be possible the hostile attitude towards female protagonists might have something to do with it? That if they pandered to women more, they'd be willing to spend more, and maybe have a positive impact in finances?
Hopefully not terribly long with Ubisoft's announcements, and CoD announcing females in multiplayer, and a small smattering of games getting sequels eventually. Whiel it's good news, I'm skeptical of most of it as this cycle happened before, round abouts in the 90's for a few years, then died for longer, only to resurface now.
Right, token women are in chick flicks? Romantic comedies, Twilight, etc.? Alice is Token in the Resident Evil movies? The women in recent horror films are token? The game industry is seriously lagging behind in pretty much every other entertainment media in pandering to both genders.
And guess who dominates the movie industry? Guys.
The book/novel industry is dominated by guys, yet there's plenty of diversity in protagonists.
'd say guys make up the majority of writers.
Women having to get involved isn't necessary. I'm not saying they shouldn't get involved, though! Infact I encourage it, as we need new blood to help create a more egalitarian gaming industry... but pretending that there's guys who can't write for women is a massive absurdity when Lara Croft, Samus, Nilin, probably every last woman in Resident Evil, women in fighting games, women in bioware games, etc. are written by men, or were with likely few exceptions.
The excuse that men can't write fopr women is a crutch for the status quo. The longer we let the industry use this excuse the longer they will, and it might not even be sincere when used.
I find the notion that the game industry can't make female chracters across the spectrum of representation laughable. It has before, it can again. It still is, though in very small doses and teases of a brighter future for female characters.
I'm not looking to force anyone to create female protagonists, I'm just requesting they do, being loud until they do, and am hoping the game industry stops being hostile to the idea of female protagonists. I'm not sure where the heck you got the idea I'm trying to force anyone to do anything.
The hostility is coming more so from spoiled brah gamers.
Not saying that men can't write for women, it shows, and as you can see from Naughty Dog producer Neil Druckmanns comments there are still a lot of guys who want to. Others may just not feel like doing so on certain projects, and that's OK. Only business politics is putting up walls for more female protagonists.
As for failure in the industry. I think thats more to do with faulty budget projections, overspending on marketing campaigns, movie-tie ins that visually have little to do with in-game content, and friggin EA liquidating an obscene amount of creative middle-tier game studios. All those creatives that the publishing giants dismissed over the past decade could've also been your white knights for egalitarianism in games. Hell the original creator of Resident Evil has moved from Capcom to Sega to Bethesda now, and Capcom has wasted a lot o' moola. Monopolies or major players don't have incentives to improve or diversify their content.
Back in PS2 era though there werent too many ,but We had Joanna Dark, Aya Brea from Parasite Eve 1 & 2, Heather Mason in Sh3, we played as Mona Sax in Max Payne 2, Jade from Beyond Good & Evil. Cate Archer from No One Lives Forever, Hana from Fear Effect (perhaps not the most endearing example) These weren't not products of protest, but of natural curiosity, and thats what more inclusion of female protagonists should be 'a just so happens to be' that players are not overtly hit over the head with but that anybody can sink into comfortably and identify with the character, and not have to even think about gender politics in the game, unless the theme of the game is ABOUT gender politics. When these titles were out gender politics wasn't as messy an issue as now. Jap devs were pervy but no one cared as much.
As for books they've the full advantage of 3rd person omniscience, decades of high literary socio-political philosophical critiscm and thought, college teaching emphasis on plot logic, suspense, consistency, believable motives worlds etc which pushes most scandalous pulp entertainment away from NY Times bestsellers list and escorts them gently over to the retarded kids table with the other 'pulp novels' that don't need to make sense, but just service our hormones.
Tom Clancy rarely if ever explored heroine CIA or Black ops female lead heroines in his novels, and coincidentally action hero agents Jack Ryan, Jack Ryan jr, Clark & Ding Chavez from Rainbow Six, mostly had wives working in the healthcare industry. Sure some might've asked him why we wrote like that but I never thought of it as weird. This was the world he created, and I expected some subjectivity going in. He stuck with his schtick and in novels you had more room for 3rd person omni to walk a mile in other characters shoes between chapters anyways, regardless of who you made the hero.
Have you noticed for all the industry articles mentioned the problem comes from the West. We actually had more character diversity opportunity PS2 gen than this one when UK European Japanese, or more independent American titles like Half life and Portal were the real AAA narrative game titans of the industry.
What we've seen politically this gen is the American XBOX over-marketing of the casual Broseph-McCall-of-Duty demographic, or the results of AAA in the industry being more American centric focused, and with that is going to come all the presumed advertisement to the typical market.
Think back to 1993. DOOM and early Duke Nukem ( back when the misogyny actually had some underlying satirical point to it) PC games like that did service us guys dark curiosities but they were made in very independent creative atmospheres. All that raw shoot em up, hanging corpses and pentagram wall tags were not topically safe for console market at the time either. but as creators, they weren't worried too much about how subjective or offensive their title was. All games and fiction are at some point subjective. If they pulled back, they could never EVER make a game like that again, even if they decided to not have that content they at least wanted to have on a socio-political level 'the freedom' to make whatever they wanted.
Its painfully obvious that things need to get more egalitarian, but guys that naturally feel inclined to tell guys tales are gonna do so. But is more of an issue where the advertisement and marketing, and publisher's executive hand is focused. Devs don't have as much creative freedom to just explore different lives and topics as they used to in this current climate. The reason we have TloU's Ellie, and Beyond Two Souls Jodie or Bioshock's Elizabeth is because Take-Two and Sony are more universal and receptive to different stories and perspectives. Hell it was Sony that put out GTA on their console in the first place. I say instead of us drawing ire at the artists for perpetuating a status quo instead of making what they love or are naturally inclined to make, it should go to the middle management publishing nay-sayers. The latter are the REAL ones who keep bordering out progressive creativity.
Its painfully obvious that things need to get more egalitarian, but guys that naturally feel inclined to tell guys tales are gonna do so. But is more of an issue where the advertisement and marketing, and publisher's executive hand is focused. Devs don't have as much creative freedom to just explore different lives and topics as they used to in this current climate. The reason we have TloU's Ellie, and Beyond Two Souls Jodie or Bioshock's Elizabeth is because Take-Two and Sony are more universal and receptive to different stories and perspectives. Hell it was Sony that put out GTA on their console in the first place. I say instead of us drawing ire at the artists for perpetuating a status quo instead of making what they love or are naturally inclined to make, it should go to the middle management publishing nay-sayers. The latter are the REAL ones who keep bordering out progressive creativity.
More from spoiled Brah gamers? I don't believe that too much. Yes, they are hostile, but the industry is, too. A lot of those links I posted are stories where developers, and producers were involved in the loss of female protagonists.
Granted, this might have been done to cater to them, and it becomes a bit chicken/egg, but the decisions come from the industry, not the consumers more oft than not.
I wholly agree, it's the business end putting up the barriers. Hence why I want Developers to be able to delve into that curiousity so very much! I'm sure there'll be a plethora of stories from them, and variety will come, and topics like these will vanish as opinions diversify with the representation. With greater representation comes the better odds of a woman being able to relate to a protagonist, and be able to show someone that complains that protagonist so it doesn't feel as bad as it is.
You raise solid points on the failure of the industry. I'm just poking a bit at possibilities that might contribute to it.
I wouldn't use the term "white knight," personally as it carries some negativity with it these days thanks to people using it as an attack word/phrase.
You've a point that the liquidated persons could have been the ones making more egalitarian games. I mean, Volition recently went under, and Siants Row stands as one of my favorite games thanks to gender select, LGBT options (mostly in 2, and 4), and generally just being fun. Luckily they were picked up, and I hope they continue on a more egalitarian path.
I don't know if Koei went under and bought, or if they were just bought because they were attractive, but they're pretty nice, too as far as representation goes.
I agree that the 90's was something of a golden era of female protagonists, though saying that female protagonists weren't seeing some of the problems they do now might not be true. It's true we didn't have many female protagonist, but we had a lot of the most memorable ones then. You made a nice list of them!
The thing is that era died, and the natural curiousity got suppressed. I think we're going to have to protest to get that suppression off the natural curiousity.
In otherwords I'm not so much protesting to get more female protagonists, I'm protesting the suppression of creative freedom of developers to make them.
Yeah, I've seen plenty of Jap Pervyness, and weirdness to know it just... happens. I don't blame them, and I appreciate it now and then. Games don't have to be a wholesome, or sane experience.
Heck, Japan makes romance games from a female Point of View! Shame they don't get imported/translated for the west often, if at all.
I've spent many hours with my SO playing Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas, and Vegas 2 with female characters. We still play now and, then. Good times!
I feel books definitely have the freedoms videogames should have, unless I'm wholly ignorant of the dark underbelly of the book industry. People can generally write what they want, and publishing seems less uptight.
Yep, I generally noticed that these articles had western origins. Even games being made in Asia with western releases in mind were tampered with by western influences, like Deadly Premonition.
The Asian market is far more willing to put in gender select, or give a woman her own game, or make a smattering of characters. I.E. Pokemon, Bayonetta, and Dynasty Warriors.
Heck, Koei even put out a contest to select the next new female officer to be added for Dynasty Warriors. I've never heard of a western company caring that much.
Way of the Samurai series, especially 3, and 4 allow your normally guy samurai to look like pretty much an NPC in the game, man or woman. The script doesn't change, but, well, it's kinda hillarious seeing a little asian woman maul a hundred enemies single handedly. More so when that little asian woman is old, and grey, hobbling around with a 6ft sword pulling off ninja acrobatics, or as a woman wandering around trying to keep her damaged skirt down walking/running awkwardly dual wielding 6ft cleaver like swords. The latter is in WotS3, though. WotS4 went for simpler looking NPCs. Still, the customization is, in ways, far beyond most others with the ability to place accessories anywhere on a person, at near what ever size you want, or even have them hover seemingly in mid air off your protagonist.
WotS in general has some excellent sword fighting mechanics, on a side note.
Also the ability to build your own sword, and hone them to legendary quality is a bonus.
The overpandering to certain demographics such as the Dudebro likely had a hand in the financial woes the industry faces, IMO. Alienating too much audience, niche as they may be adds up. Yeah there are likely larger factors at play, I'll admit that as I had earlier in this post, but I can't deny that getting less money is a factor.
I'm not so sure that you're right about the inability to create another DOOM. Collossal failure as it was, they did make a new Duke Nukem and form what I saw it was racey as the original (though not as good), and Shadow Warrior (originally by 3d Realms. I played it, and enjoyed it despite being asian myself. <.<) is getting a remake with the name Lo Wang being kept.
I will grant that games with satanic symbolism and so forth might meet more resistance than just violence and/or sex, however I think they can likely be made with far less resistance than a female protagonist. Kinda sad, that. <.<
I have no problem if guys want to write for guys. It's part of that creative freedom I want for developers. Heck, if guys get more diversity thanks to creative freedom, I'd be hpapy, too. I do play as guys now and then in games, but it's not always as fun as I'd like due to the blandness most have.
Truth be told, I kinda look forward to GTAV's single player. Of course it helped that GTAV is coming with GTAO which has gender select for the morale boost, but I feel like R* can make a nicely written guy that stands out from the pack. Not sure how many of the 3 protagonsits will meet that, but I'll be glad to look.
Inclusion can be a powerful thing.
The Artists don't really get my ire. I mean some do. Developers, Market testers, and consumers, and well, every level of the industry can sabotage the creation of a female protagonist as much as producers, but yeah, it's usually producers having a hand in things that screws it up for female representation.
My ire isn't spread evenly over every level of the industry, but the industry as an entity has my ire. I recognize that the industry as an enity has redeeming qualities, but it's generally hard to see them thanks to what gets released, what doesn't, and why it happens.
But there's a middle ground that has near zero competition. It's barely been tapped into. The 10-30 dollar stand alone DLC games. Blood Dragon, Undead Nightmare, liberty city stories, and so forth. The upcoming HD remake of AC: liberation (I hope!) and Ubisoft's general gameplan to go into these games.
I'm not asking for huge games from big companies. I'm just hoping the devs get more freedom. these middle of the road games may help.
But they are already there with their old games that are sold at huge discounts. I understand that, as far as multiplayer dominant games its not the same since community has moved on, but as far as single players games go, it makes no difference and you can get 12+ month old AAA games at 10-30 USD. On PC you can get them even cheaper siche greater competition and piracy drives prices down even faster.
The difference is those games aren't necessrily made on smaller budgets where those discounts would make them successes, financially. They aren't really released at sub-50 USD prices, they fall to that point. They are on largely dated technology without innovations brought on by experience with the system. It's somewhat different than buying a standalone DLC.
That article is a brilliant example of the phrase "if you look hard enough for sexism, you will find it". Some feminists can even find sexism/misogyny in a glass of water, it's a rather remarkable ability of theirs. I won't name names, but I'm sure most of us know at least one
That being said, why in the world would you want to play a game where your protagonist, whether male or female, did nothing but cry and wet themselves and then get killed? Why would you want to play a game where they tie your character up or put them in a cell, and there is literally no way you can escape?
I don't think any game about disempowerment is like that, exactly. Yes in Amnesia you do a lot of ducking and hiding and whimpering, but there's still a way out. You may not be able to fight, but you still can make it to the end. The only difference is the character themself isn't completely confident they can make it. Due to the story of Amnesia, you've got even more reasons to not be sure you can or even should make it out alive. Spoilers about the game ahead to elaborate on this:
Daniel, the protagonist, is told at the beginning in a letter from himself that he needs to find Alexander in the castle and kill him. At first, this makes you think Alexander is an evil bastard and you're a victim of his plottings. But you don't know for sure because Daniel's past self drank an amnesia potion and forgot what happened.
Turns out, Daniel was running from a monster which he accidentally unleashed by taking an artifact from Africa. He eventually got in contact with Alexander, who taught him that torturing people was a method of distracting the monster and taking it off his scent. At first he believed he was torturing criminals and murderers, but later on down the line when he chased down and murdered the daughter of a farmer he realized Alexander had been manipulating him and turned him into a monster. He drank the amnesia potion to forget this so he could track down Alexander without the burden of this guilt weighing him down, and he had access to the potion itself had been used in his tortures to make the victim forget past tortures to make new ones even more effective.
When you discover this, it sort of makes you wonder if it's even worth saving Daniel's ass. He's as terrified as that girl was, but it's a big turning point with how you regard Daniel as a character. For so long he's been the helpless victim, and now in a way he still is a helpless victim, but you know he is capable of doing terrible things for the sake of self-preservation.
Disempowerment games are not about reveling in being helpless. It's about being helpless, and yet in spite of that finding ways to overcome fear and doubt and continue on. In other games, you feel confident you'll make it to the end because you're well-enough equipped for the task. You build up your weapons and stats so that you walk into the battle confident you will walk out alive. Disempowerment games take away that ability to plan ahead, so you're simply left with hope that you'll keep finding ways to move forward. Which, if you think about it, is a more realistic depiction of how people react to being helpless. When you're vastly outnumbered and outgunned, all you really have is optimism and your own wits.
So to summarize, games about empowerment are about building yourself up to a point where no enemy can hope to defeat you. And disempowerment games are about being in a hole trapped by your enemy and finding a way out of that hole, even if that means digging your hole even deeper (in Amnesia, you slowly descend further into the castle's depths, which makes you even more vulnerable and unsafe).
I was mostly responding to the person who started this mini-thread about how the character gets put into a situation where they can escape and that's common (ie. the getting tied up example), my point being that why would you put them in a situation where they couldn't escape? That design would make no sense.
And I have no problem with a game that "disempowers" the character. Heck, when you really think about it basically every stealth game disempowers the main character, as they make it clear that running in there like Rambo will get you killed quickly, and that taking a subtle and smarter approach is the correct way to go.
I read that article a while back, stumbled upon this neat little gem when I decided to check out what's what...I didn't like it. Mainly because while a few good points were brought up, it seemed to be was parroting Amanda Sarkeesean, who is the equivalent to the Dark Side when it comes to any kind of feminism occurring in the realm of vidya games. There are cliches and patterns that the video game industry has fell into, here are a few of my primary concerns when it comes to the topic, which I've voiced before:
1) A "strong female lead"(SFL) translates into "cold hearted, confrontational ball breaking sociopath" by default. Have any of these people ever met a kick-ass girl in real life before? I beg of you, play Beyond Good and Evil and watch Aliens before creating a SFL.
2) A SFL shall always remain sexless and will never have a love interest, my assumption is because they don't want male gamers catching the gays or because they don't want to cripple whatever weird feelings the gamer has developed towards her during the course of the game.
3) The SFL is either hypersexualized or forced to be as non-threatening as possible when it comes to how she looks, made to cover up her body as if ashamed. There is no in-between. Unless you're Jade from Beyond Good and Evil.
4) No female leads as primary antagonists if the protagonist is male. Because female NPCs are, by default, either support or damsels in distress. Thus negating the possibility of a woman's capability of posing a serious threat because if they did it would run the risk of being considered misogynistic.
The biggest problem is that neither side of the argument of sexism is willing to open up the floor for civil discussion. Those of the gaming community are more times than not either innocently oblivious or just so damned sick of the argument or on edge due to censorship/attention-hungry goons like Sarkeesean and Liberman they'll shout naysayers down. But the other side is just as guilty, swinging at just as many shadows as their opponents and shouting down every disagreement as being either misogynistic or just being dinosaurs trapped in the idea of "back in the day". I will use the tragic tale of Moviebob's bitchy ramblings which have made him an internet-wide joke as a prime example.
Moviebob: Seriously, man. Just start wearing a fucking fedora and change your FB photo to a red equal sign already.
I see only one solution, and that's to do like the gay community did with the film industry...get involved directly and grab it by the balls, clitoris, mangina...whatever the cool kids are sporting these days. Depends on who you're going after. Break off and make video games for your demographic, but don't let it get in the way of telling a good story. Because if you hiss and stamp your feet at white, straight males who (let's be honest here) run the game industry for reasons you only do the following.
*Claim absolute powerlessness in the face of the status quo.
*Leave this in the hands of a bunch of people that either can't or won't correctly represent a demographic.
*Set yourself to be met with either eye rolling and people ignoring what's said because nothing pleases the perpetually offended who have infested any kind of logical civil rights conversation or even worse, a hot steaming cup of weak-assed hand-wringing pandering that will be even more offensive than anything legitimately racist/sexist/homophobic.
I must ask the people who tend to shrug/baulk whenever they see these feminist concepts discussed - what do you make of the fact that more and more websites are coming around to the view female depictions as a problem? The Escapist, Cracked, Rock Paper Shotgun - many of the websites I frequent are now promoting feminist perspectives, and for each, there are readers complaining about how everything is turning into Kotaku. These people previously came to the websites to enjoy the smart insights, but can't now stomach that they are talking about that wacky feminism business; that must create quite a cognitive dissonance.
First, one can see female representation as a problem and still disagree with feminist concepts as an explanation of this problem or as a basis of further action. Second, the reason i personally balk when feminist concepts are discussed is that the quality of the arguments usually is rather low (at least when you have a more natural scientific perspective).
And with websites that really are feminist like RPS or Kotaku (instead of just publishing a few articles about it from time to time which can easily be ignored like Cracked does) i don't see why liking them in the past, when this stuff was less dominant, and not liking them now after they have changed should create cognitive dissonance. Like with every website you frequent and that changes you have to decide whether it's still worth it for you. I, for example, don't read Kotaku anymore as i'm not that into japanese stuff anyway but still read RPS as they have a good coverage of pc games and that makes it worth for me to put up with the other stuff. People just need to learn to not read the websites that they fundamentally disagree with and instead read (and thereby support) they ones they like. You won't totally get away from gender issues, but you sure as hell can find something less extreme than RPS.
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