Female protagonists who aren't neccesarily beautiful but whom you like anyway?

[Walrus42]

Linda from Psychonauts.

This. Even though you wouldn't really expect someone called the Hideous Hulking Lungfish of Lake Oblongata to be attractive.

 

[Dorian]

Nameless voiceless female Hero from Fable 2.... at least after what I did. Nothing but strength & will while gaining a collection of scars while loading the spells..... well...... going to the evil end of the sliders wouldn't have made her any more hideous.

 

[Heraklitus]

Almost all of the women in Oblivion. I like the way the people in there in general are pretty varied--going from funny looking to good looking.

 

[The Heik]

ADA from Zone of the Enders

The issue of attraction with her is pretty much non-existent, unless you have the hots for a giant 50-foot walker that can shoot lasers. I know I do, but I love anything that makes a big boom (I blame the demolitions expert in me). At first she's a bit bland, but her development as a character throughout the games is really endearing.

 

[Cpt_Oblivious]

Moira from Fallout 3.
I adore her psychotic cheerfulness. I'd walk through Minefield for her giggling joy.

Moria is the whole reason I blew up Megaton.

Same here.

I hope you both rot in hell in that Tenpenny Tower with that old coot!

Moira! Nooo!

.
Jade is awesome.

I agree.

 

[Xvito]

Moira from Fallout 3.
I adore her psychotic cheerfulness. I'd walk through Minefield for her giggling joy.

Yay, someone else that likes her! She's one of the few good characters in Fallout 3.

Jesus people, are you serious? Ashley Williams? Alyx Vance? Zoey?
They are all very attractive women with perfectly symetrical faces, flawless figures and no physical defects at all. Just because they aren't presented in overtly sexual way, doesn't mean they're not beautiful. I've never seen a plainly unattractive woman as a positive character in a video game.
The truth is good looking people provoke more sympathy and that's why they're always be protagonists.

This here is the truth. I hadn't played Half-Life 2 up until recently. People had said on various forums that Alyx wasn't so pretty, when you I to see her for the first time I was wondering if those people had played the same game as me...

My favorite female character ever... Rikku!

 

[teh_gunslinger]

No Kate Archer (from N.O.L.F)? She is one of the first and actually a controllable character.
Also April Ryan (from the longest journey) which kicked ass.

Kate Archer, besides from being good looking, is also a really great character. She is great. Damn, now I wanna play those games again. Pure gold.

And April... I love (as a fictional character) April Ryan. Poor girl got thrown into waay too much crap. She is great.
I still hope they get their act together and make something to tie up the loose ends (of which there are too fucking many) from Dreamfall.

 

[Thirsk]

April Ryan from the first Longest Journey game. Part of her unattractiveness might be on account of the graphics back in the day, but even that doesn't affect the fact that she dressed in hideous, (though unskanky) clothing and were desperately unable to find a boyfriend.

She were, however, very likeable.

EDIT: Blasted, hadn't seen the mention of her in the post above mine. Mweeh.

 

[Arrers]

Ashley was a bit too racist/religious for my taste.

That was pretty much how I saw Ashley from Mass Effect, that, and the characters she didn't trust were my favourate ones.

The best Examples I can think of are the female characters in the half-life. all the characters in those games are inspired. And Kazooie, of Banjo-Kazooie fame not attractive (she's a bird) and brilliantly sarcastic.

 

[Trivun]

April Ryan and Alyx Vance. Also, Alice in American McGee's Alice. Anyone who's even seen artwork or trailers for the game will understand, even if they've not played it yet...

 

[Jepix]

Maybe... Sophitia from Soul Calibur? *Serious face breaks into pieces*
Seriously
Bastilla from KOTOR. Come to think of it, none of the KOTOR females is "bombshells" in gaming terms.

I have no idea if this counts, but I feel that most of the female RE main characters aren't conventionally attractive, still hot in their own way, but not the way Hollywood shoves down our throats.

I think they made an effort with Ashley, but got it horribly wrong wih the ears. How can you say Ada is not conventionally attractive as well?

I always liked how she covered herself and scolded the player if he/she in anyway tried to take a peak under her skirt... Read it on the internet of course...*cough*

 

[NC3]

Jesus people, are you serious? Ashley Williams? Alyx Vance? Zoey?
They are all very attractive women with perfectly symetrical faces, flawless figures and no physical defects at all. Just because they aren't presented in overtly sexual way, doesn't mean they're not beautiful. I've never seen a plainly unattractive woman as a positive character in a video game.
The truth is good looking people provoke more sympathy and that's why they're always be protagonists.

This really should have /thread.

But alas...

 

[deletemeplease107]

I loved Alyx.
I wished Gordon would fucking talk to her, throw her a damn rope.
I wished she would let her hair down. That would jump her attractiveness WAYYY UP in my opinion.

well in my opinion it would throw her attractiveness way down. we are all different man.

I guess we will never know unless she does in Ep 3
*hopes*

 

[rhaiiatthedisco]

I

Another prime example I think is Hammer from Fable 2. Again she really isn't pretty, infact she's got more muscle than any of the men in the game. But she's got a great sense of humour and a deep thoughtful opinion on the way the world works. She's philiosophical. A real tough and very likebale character all round.

couldn't agree more.
hammer was amazing, simply because she wasn't like the usual perfect looking character games normally have.
she was likeable for being friendly and insightful.
but talked too much.:|

 

[DracheLehre]

Samus aran... Sure she's cute... but she probably has any number psychological problems and can kill your ass if she so pleases.

 

[jedidk93]

Zelda

 

[The Steel Ninja]

Samus wasn't beautiful until they insisted on fan-service.

Ninjad, but so true. I mean she wasn't too amazing in the credits for Return of Samus. 1 Hour 59 minutes missing a couple missile pods, what's yours.

It really wasn't until the new generation of Metroid games (GBA, Prime, and Zero Suit in SSBB) that they gave her magnum tits, bootyliciousness, etc. But what I like about Metroid is that it's only either at the beginning or end you see her real face, except for that it really is gender-neutral (remember how they played it up that it was a dude in the NES manual for the first game). Sure she's uber-hot, but unlike Lara "All I have going for me is my tits, because my gameplay is excrement" Croft, it's harder to constantly objectify her during the course of actual gameplay.

 

[A Raging Emo]

Prof. Anders from Halo Wars.

 

[MrSnugglesworth]

I think Alyx Vance is the epitome of this. She isn't at all unattractive, but you can tell that her being incredibly hot wasn't a priority of Valve's, and she's a better character because of it.

This. She seems like a normal girl who loves her dad and would do anything to help him. This is what caused me to warm to her.