Girl Gamer's Opinion

[Blayze]

WHY DO YOU THINK WE'RE POSTING ON THIS FREAKIN' FORUM?

In a forum like Gaming Discussion, I was expecting more discussion and less crying from Captain Capslock.

You think anyone would've played Halo if MC looked like he could've benefitted from a few hours on a tred-mill?

Of course. I certainly would have, if I was into the Halo series. Hell, playing as Smith "McAverage" Johnson or Tubby Lumpkins doesn't bother me one bit. You could make a game where you played as someone who constantly sported a PedoGrin and I'd play it if the game was good.

you can't tell me you've never left a lobby or multiplayer match because someone was being a jerk or you just couldn't stand to play with them anymore.

I can. Being surprisingly vindictive, whenever I'm up against a jerk I simply make the effort to out-bastard them. I don't sit there and cry about how my feelings are being hurt.

 

[Invader Ezri]

I wish people would stop making threads like this. I'm a girl gamer, and you don't see me complaining about how females are portrayed in video games. Female characters are typically overdone physically, and its a good guess that they always will be. Deal with it. If you find it insulting, then don't bother playing the game.

 

[jay-ell]

Looks like I'm late to the party, can somebody pour me a drink?

I'm a girl gamer. More precisely, I'm a woman, a freelance game reviewer, and a mommy. I am very near 30, and I have been gaming since 1986. I am almost never offended by the content of a video game, but have been regularly been offended by the attitude of the male gaming community towards women in general and women gamers in particular.

When I was a kid, games were too new (and perhaps too pixelated) to be gender-stereotyped. Boys and girls alike equally despised "E.T." Sure, Pitfall Harry was a guy -- but so was Indiana Jones, who gives a crap? Yeah, it was mildly sexist that the reward for finishing Metroid was to replay the game with Samus in a bikini, and Princess Peach could be the poster child for helplessness the world over, but these are the same themes that pervade literature and film across the ages and across the globe. Besides which, as a player, I enjoy playing as a sexy chick. I like looking at pretty people as much as the next individual, and let's face it -- the female of the species is more appealing than the male. (Except the Prince from Sands of Time. That's a well-reticulated set of splines, if you catch my meaning.)

But a few guy gamers are really pissing in the communal punch. Now let's be clear, I'm not talking about the class acts like you've got in here. I mean real lowlifes. They give the rest of the guy gamers a bad name, and if you ask me, it's up to the dudes to deal with sexist (and often homophobic) assholes as only gamers can: through public humiliation and ridicule.

A personal story: in 2005, I worked full-time at a popular games retail outlet. I would regularly be bypassed by customers who wanted advice on a particular game -- they would literally walk past me to get to a man -- only to have my male colleagues refer the customer back to me, with the comment, "JL's our [RTS/RPG/Adventure/Puzzle/Civ/Sim] expert, let's ask her." I was also routinely asked, "do you work here?" (No, I'm standing behind the counter ringing someone up because the cash register is broken at The Gap.) And, my personal favorite, "Do you play video games?" (No, I just work here because geeks make me horny, tee hee!)

But what annoys me -- what really frosts my cookies -- is when girls and women refuse to come out of the gaming closet for fear of...what, really? Being labeled a geek? Being challenged by so-called "hard-core" male gamers, and then embarrassed? Being expected to *do* something about offensive (to some) gender stereotypes in games, instead of just railing against them in public fora?

When women hide their gaming habits in shame, we perpetuate the stereotypes that game developers have about women. Yes, women play differently than men. Yes, we sometimes play in wholly different genres. But we are a market force, as the ESA found last year when they discovered that 40% of all gamers (and 60% of online gamers) are women. Yes, I'm a woman gamer, and I play The Sims. I play lots of other titles, but all these years later, I still occasionally fire up The Sims 2 and force my electronic puppets to breed. Why do I feel vaguely ashamed to admit that?

Because the male-dominated games media has told me that The Sims is a casual game, and casual gaming is deemed Less Than. (I would argue that The Sims is one of the least casual games of all time, but that's a tale for another time.) Don't get me wrong. I'm part of the male-dominated games media (I regularly write for popmatters.com) and I try to avoid taking review assignments for "typically female" games so that I don't get pigeonholed as a girl-gaming expert or something. But I'm tired of all the posturing and having to defend my preferences -- for thinking games, not shooting games and for strategy over sex -- just because I'm in the (slim) minority.

In short, if women gamers want to become mainstream, we don't need a greater variety of gender-neutral games. We need to announce our preferences (by voting with our Louis Vuitton pocketbooks) and expect game developers to respond to our demands. In other words, we need to grow a collective pair (of ovaries) and start acting like grown women instead of petulant little girls.

 

[Phoenix Arrow]

In short, if women gamers want to become mainstream, we don't need a greater variety of gender-neutral games. We need to announce our preferences (by voting with our Louis Vuitton pocketbooks) and expect game developers to respond to our demands. In other words, we need to grow a collective pair (of ovaries) and start acting like grown women instead of petulant little girls.

This was my point, although I have a terrible habit for tangents and not speaking clearly. I've been through my fair share of abuse in my lifetime and as a result I don't like to see other people outcast from then norm, it's just something that really hacks me off. Be it sexism, racism or sexualism (homophobia isn't and accurate word but I promised myself no tangents) I don't think it's fair to be forced to conform and accept what's being given to you. This seems cynical to me seeing that, from a devs point of view, female gamers is a demographic that remains unexploited, but some of the girls I know that enjoy gaming feel sort of shut off to the gaming industry. And if a girl says they're a gamer, a guy would reply "oh..." From my experience, the next question is almost always "so, what's your favourite game?" If you're a girl gamer and this happens to you and bothers you, say Manhunt or Condemned. They will shut up. One girl I know told this guy her favourite game was FFVII and he replied "oh you're one of those girls". And it's always the same guys (usually ugly ones) that will say "back to the wall lads" whenever a gay guy walks past or will shout "why don't you go home?" to a Pakistani. The whole thing pisses me off.

I said I wouldn't do a tangent but I guess I sort of went off on a big one. Meh at least I blew some steam.

 

[Uszi]

I agree: Most female characters are personified as sex objects.
I agree: There's not much we can do about it, because virginal nerds program games, and because virginal nerds eat that crap up.

I need only point to a pie chart, indicating the market share for naked, table-top dancing Night Elves in World of Warcraft to prove my point.

 

[Phoenix Arrow]

Oh you know what? Guys also ask each other what their favorite game is. It's nothing sexist or aimed at hurting women.
There is no glory in victimization.

There is a certain difference between guys talking about games with males friends than females. They take on an almost patronise tone and feel the need to talk down to them about it. One time I was with a female friend who used to play CS:S professionsally, and this guy we were playing against felt the need to explain to her how play an FPS. Ironically, me and her finish 1st and 2nd. Beaten by a girl and gay (well, bi but whatever).
I know there's no glory in victimisation, it's just something I'm impassioned about.

 

[Zer_]

I agree: Most female characters are personified as sex objects.
I agree: There's not much we can do about it, because virginal nerds program games, and because virginal nerds eat that crap up.

I need only point to a pie chart, indicating the market share for naked, table-top dancing Night Elves in World of Warcraft to prove my point.

Ignorance is amazing isn't it? There are in fact very few games today that will portray a woman as a sex object. That doesn't mean they aren't often times generalized.

And if you think all game developers are virginal nerds, then you seriously have no clue. Go work in the industry, even as a QA tester and you'll change your opinions fast.

 

[Iron Mal]

I don't want to sound sexist or mysoginstic (I don't know how to spell that word so don't give me grief you goddamn grammar nazis) when I say this but a point to be made is that there are probably more men/boys that play and develop games than women/girls.

With this firmly in mind it isn't suprising that a) most protaganists are going to be male and b) most female characters are going to fufil male stereotypes or fantasies, even I (a guy) can turn around and say that this has it's problems (i.e: it does alienate female gamers to a certain extent), but these problems do have to be taken in perspective.

Just as female characters in games tend to be outlandishly glamorous with arses like a beachball and boobs so large that they can only be contained by the hands of Odin himself, men also have unrealistic representaions that appear time and time again.

I am a fairly large (as in powerfully built) individual but I can quite safely say that I am nowhere near having the stature of someone like Marcus Fenix, even if I pumped iron constantly, lost my love handles and ate nothing but rice for the next 5 years I still wouldn't be made of solid muscle with a chin that could crack walnuts. It's just not possible.

Final point to be considered, many games are based around conflict, combat and fighting, in modern society, men are more often than not the ones who fufil the role of soldiers even though there are also women who do this too. In games, many soldiers in games are men even though there are women who do this as well.

Disclaimer: In no way do I intend to cause offense or otherwise upset anyone reading the preceeding, if you are bothered or otherwise concerned by what you've just read, you have my apology.

 

[Kaertserif]

I'm sorry but it's not limited to just female characters.
both genders are poorly portrayed still.
most characters still seem hollow, but it is getting better.

 

[heart-plant]

"Don't take what I said out of context. I hate that.

Yes, the parents should be boosting their self-esteem but do they? So should friends but they go through the same things in the media that they're more concerned about how people see them than the other people themselves. This is why you get all the attractive people at a school in a group and all the less attractive people in other groups. I'm not saying you should blindfold kids and tell them their perfect, noone is, but this ideal body image shouldn't be as important in the media as it is. You get magazines like Heat and err... other ones which show these beautiful woman and say "look! She's put on a pound, what a lardarse". And these are being advertised to a younger and younger and therefore more impressionable demographic. And this is in all types of media, magazines, games, TV, film and even what were upmarket newpapers. This is what my problem is."

Well yes, but you have to agree that obesity is also a major problem affecting the world today. I don't think starving yourself until you're ill is of any use, but I do think that children have to learn to eat healthily and exercise.
The media only chooses the images of thin people because they tend to photograph better, and make the product seem more attractive. This has always happened. I would have thought most people had better things to do than be a media sponge.

 

[Phoenix Arrow]

Well yes, but you have to agree that obesity is also a major problem affecting the world today. I don't think starving yourself until you're ill is of any use, but I do think that children have to learn to eat healthily and exercise.
The media only chooses the images of thin people because they tend to photograph better, and make the product seem more attractive. This has always happened. I would have thought most people had better things to do than be a media sponge.

People are impressional to these sorts of things. It because of the current state of the media that there are disorders like anorexia (on the whole). I accept in the way of advertising to an extent, but the roles magazines and similar outlets have is the one I have a huge problem with. But that's not really relevant to games.

 

[DND Judgement]

i'm sorry but games or any fiction for that matter is a suspension of reality why does it matter what they look like we know that women don't really look like that....

 

[jay-ell]

There is a certain difference between guys talking about games with males friends than females. They take on an almost patronise tone and feel the need to talk down to them about it.

This has been my experience as well. The old saw about business is true in gaming: a woman has to be twice as good to get half as far.

Re: the term "hardcore gamer" being used perjoratively, I admit that I may have come off a bit strong on that. I don't mean to use it as an insult -- I consider myself a hardcore gamer -- but rather put it in quotation marks to indicate that there are some who adopt the term for the purpose of setting themselves apart and, indeed, above other gamers. For some, it's a term of exclusion, used to intimidate and to ridicule. I'm not talking, of course, about the folks around here. I'm talking about the guys at Megagames, for instance [http://www.megagames.com/hardcoregamer.html]. They claim, and I quote, that "A hardcore gamer is usually a male, between 14 - 34 years of age who has gaming in their top priority list, for example, someone who would prefer to play a game instead of sleeping at night or watching TV. Basically a game addict." Let's ignore for the moment that women gamers over the age of 18 comprise a larger percentage of the gaming community than teenage boys and assume for a moment that all of us "old ladies" are, in fact, casual gamers. Megagames goes on to use the large quantity of games played in a year by its constituency of so-defined hardcore gamers to justify game piracy and to exclude casual gamers, "from kids to seniors," from making significant contributions to the games industry.

This is the kind of hardcore gamer that deserves quotation marks -- those who apply the term to themselves to express feelings of superiority over those who (they feel) will never measure up. No offense was intended.

I wish I had more time to discuss this, but real life draws me away for the moment. Please post your rebuttals and rantings and I will gladly attend to them tomorrow.

 

[Phoenix Arrow]

the guys at Megagames, for instance [http://www.megagames.com/hardcoregamer.html]

OK...
OK.
So I'm not a real gamer because I go to sleep and have friends? That's the most ridiculous thing I've heard in my life. To be fair, I don't really know what kind of gamer I am. I mean I have strong opinions on games but I'm not obsessive by any stretch. Who completes 100 games a year? Hmm. I'm starting to think they put that up to have a bit of a dig at their members really. Who knows? It's still ridiculous.

 

[Galletea]

I wish people would stop making threads like this. I'm a girl gamer, and you don't see me complaining about how females are portrayed in video games. Female characters are typically overdone physically, and its a good guess that they always will be. Deal with it. If you find it insulting, then don't bother playing the game.

I'm a gaming woman, and I don't see the problem either. It's the same in film, and even in a lot of literature. Some people seem to have a problem with any simplification of women the strong/weak/immature/sassy types but men are treated the same way.

 

[xitel]

First off, tl;dr.

The reason for the objectification of women in games is that most developers are men, and most of the people that buy games without caring how good they are are men. By this, I mean to say that if a woman looked at a game with a hot guy on the box, they'll be more likely to consider how good the game is before they buy it. It's another point where marketing may be underhanded, but it works.

However, look at recent games like Heavenly Sword, Final Fantasy XII, and the upcoming FF XIII. All of these star women in the main role, and not necessarily scantily-clad dullards either. Then consider games like Mass Effect and Oblivion, games where the character's gender is determined by the player's choices. The demographics of gamers are changing as gaming becomes more mainstream, and the content of games are slowly coming to match that fact.