Jimquisition: Vertigo

WhiteTigerShiro

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Lightknight said:
deathjavu said:
What comes first, the women who play games or the attempts to design games with them in mind? :p
Quick, you're a development studio making a game. The overwhelming majority of your potential client base is male. What gender do you cater to if either if you want to ensure that your studio gets picked up again for a different game or a sequel?

Quick, you're a publishing studio thinking about investing in a game. Do you invest in a game that caters to men or women if over 80% of your potential customer base is male?
Except that studies have shown that men are NOT in the "overwhelming majority", it's just a popular misconception that they are because they're generally more vocal about it.
 

franksands

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RJ 17 said:
Silent Protagonist said:
I wasn't trying to disagree with Jim's point that there is a greater range of character traits used for male characters than female characters. I was criticizing his method of making a lengthy and specific list of criteria and then being angry and judgmental that there are so few female characters that meet it when in fact barely any characters regardless of gender meet his requirements. I don't disagree with the sentiment, just the way in which it was delivered.
Ahhhh, I get your point now. Yeah, I can think of a few off the top of my head, probably some more if I took some time to do a bit of research. I think he was just going for direct opposites for what we see in female characters specifically, but you still do have a fair point.
Ukomba said:
Ukomba said:
Hmm, well here's a list of characters I think meet that criteria:

Amazon in Dragon's Crown.
Lucca from Chrono Trigger.
Okami from Okami.
Peacock from skull girls.
Double from skull girls.
Macha from Chrono Cross.
NeoFio from Chrono Cross.
Poshul from Chrono Cross.
Sprigg from Chrono Cross.
Shale from Dragon Age.
Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic 2.
Bombette from Paper Mario.
Lady Bow from Paper Mario.
Watt from Paper Mario.
Sushie from Paper Mario.
Goombella from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Flurrie from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
Vivian from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Ms. Mowz from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Toadette from Mario Kart.
Birdo from Mario Kart.
Baby Daisy from Mario Kart.
Nana from Ice Climers / Smash Brothers.

That's just what I could come up with off the top of my head from games I've played.
Jack from Mass Effect 2.
Sue Sakamoto from Cave Story.
Gaige from Border Lands 2.
Hildegard von Krone From Soul Calibur IV
Freya from Final Fantasy 9.
Quina Quen From Final Fantasy9???

I don't know. Seems there's a lot that are at least possible. You could even make the case that Purna from Dead island fits the criteria.
Amazon and Jack are pratically naked the whole time.
Jack is future hell's angel biker girl.
Luca is the cute engineer.
Do you actually play with Shale? I've never played Dragon Age.
Quina Queen is a genderless entity
Freya is on a quest to find her lost love

I think from this list the only candidate is Amaterasu (Okami)
 

Abomination

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WhiteTigerShiro said:
Lightknight said:
deathjavu said:
What comes first, the women who play games or the attempts to design games with them in mind? :p
Quick, you're a development studio making a game. The overwhelming majority of your potential client base is male. What gender do you cater to if either if you want to ensure that your studio gets picked up again for a different game or a sequel?

Quick, you're a publishing studio thinking about investing in a game. Do you invest in a game that caters to men or women if over 80% of your potential customer base is male?
Except that studies have shown that men are NOT in the "overwhelming majority", it's just a popular misconception that they are because they're generally more vocal about it.
You are hideously incorrect. He did specifically say "your potential client base is male" alluding to the fact that the AAA industry DOES have a significant majority of male consumers.

The latest "study" about there being a supposedly even split considered someone who plays Bejeweled for 30 minutes every fortnight a "gamer". Rendering the study entirely pointless and inapplicable to economic forecasting for companies.

But I "agree(?)" with Jim here. I want to see ugly, morally grey female protagonists... not because I want to see more females in games - I'm entirely neutral on that, I don't care what gender my PC is - but because I want to see more ugly, morally grey protagonists.
 

BlueHighwind

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Okay, so the character can't be fanservicey or pretty, has to be powerful, can't do everything for a man or personal trauma...

Well, for one, there's Amaterasu, the star of Okami.

Then there's Lucca from Chrono Trigger. Who is more nerdy cute (and made in the 90s before that was fetish) and has no love interest, also invents time travel. Isn't technically the protagonist, but the protagonist is silent. And Jim picked a fighting game character, which can't have a star, so I can pick a playable JRPG character.

Freya from FFIX, who is a rat person, which is about an unattractive as they come. She does have a boyfriend, but she isn't doing everything for him. Also, Quina(?) who may or may not be female, and is definitely ugly as sin.

Oh, and Ms. Pac Man.
 

veloper

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Of the top of my head: the Blackwell series fit Jim's arbitrary criteria without resorting to include non-human characters.

The Blackwell ladies are human and
1 the actual main protoganists in their games,
2 not sexy (one is conservatively dressed nerd with glasses and the other a chain-smoking woman in her late thirties),
3 motivated by something other than a man and
4 not in a survival game.

Pretty good AGs too, the first two games of the series and worth playing. Bonus!
 

LAGG

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Vertigo is made of photographs not polygons, therefore there's no emotion in there. She doesn't fit your pre-requisite list Jim.
 

RJ 17

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franksands said:
RJ 17 said:
Silent Protagonist said:
I wasn't trying to disagree with Jim's point that there is a greater range of character traits used for male characters than female characters. I was criticizing his method of making a lengthy and specific list of criteria and then being angry and judgmental that there are so few female characters that meet it when in fact barely any characters regardless of gender meet his requirements. I don't disagree with the sentiment, just the way in which it was delivered.
Ahhhh, I get your point now. Yeah, I can think of a few off the top of my head, probably some more if I took some time to do a bit of research. I think he was just going for direct opposites for what we see in female characters specifically, but you still do have a fair point.
Ukomba said:
Ukomba said:
Hmm, well here's a list of characters I think meet that criteria:

Amazon in Dragon's Crown.
Lucca from Chrono Trigger.
Okami from Okami.
Peacock from skull girls.
Double from skull girls.
Macha from Chrono Cross.
NeoFio from Chrono Cross.
Poshul from Chrono Cross.
Sprigg from Chrono Cross.
Shale from Dragon Age.
Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic 2.
Bombette from Paper Mario.
Lady Bow from Paper Mario.
Watt from Paper Mario.
Sushie from Paper Mario.
Goombella from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Flurrie from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
Vivian from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Ms. Mowz from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Toadette from Mario Kart.
Birdo from Mario Kart.
Baby Daisy from Mario Kart.
Nana from Ice Climers / Smash Brothers.

That's just what I could come up with off the top of my head from games I've played.
Jack from Mass Effect 2.
Sue Sakamoto from Cave Story.
Gaige from Border Lands 2.
Hildegard von Krone From Soul Calibur IV
Freya from Final Fantasy 9.
Quina Quen From Final Fantasy9???

I don't know. Seems there's a lot that are at least possible. You could even make the case that Purna from Dead island fits the criteria.
Amazon and Jack are pratically naked the whole time.
Jack is future hell's angel biker girl.
Luca is the cute engineer.
Do you actually play with Shale? I've never played Dragon Age.
Quina Queen is a genderless entity
Freya is on a quest to find her lost love

I think from this list the only candidate is Amaterasu (Okami)
Don't know why you quoted me in that, but it got my attention so I'll point out that Amaterasu is a good character. As in, not an "evil/morally questionable one". To be fair, Jim doesn't specifically mention that as one of the 3 requirements, but he does talk about it at the beginning of the episode and points out that Vertigo is one of the "villains" of Primal Rage.
 

franksands

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JarinArenos said:
Okay, so counting Amaterasu, we have... two. And Ammy is, at least, a gorgeous specimen of wolf goddess. The attractiveness isn't even the least bit sexualized though, so she can have the point. Any others?

Um...

Having not played the game, I have no idea about the qualifications, but... Fat Princess?
AFAIK, you don't play with Fat Princess, you just carry her around.

From what I've seen, we have 3: Vertigo, Ammy and Ellie (from the Last of Us)
 

compaqdeskpro

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I don't see how anything could be gained by making a female character unattractive, or a male character for that matter. Grizzled and muscular is alright, Marcus isn't a half bad looking guy, Baird is actually quite good looking. I thought Lara Croft was sufficiently grizzled. How is being attractive a problem? It's a matter of realism too, women are so attractive that it you would have to go out of your way to design an unattractive one.
 

Yuuki

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I'm going to be really frank here, I really wouldn't pick up a game if the protagonist (i.e. the character I'm playing through the whole game) was a woman who was ugly as fuck as intended by the developers. What would even be the point of that? Don't get me wrong, I'm ALL for female protagnists, but why make them "ugly" purely for the sake of variety? What would that achieve, simply saying "look, our female protagnist looks like shit! VARIETY!" Yeah, well done, but it doesn't make me want to buy that game whatsoever.

As a male gamer I'm almost always creating female characters whenever I'm given the option, and then I try to make them look as beautiful as possible (with a few defining traits, there are many kinds of beautiful). That's just how I play.

I daresay I'm not the only one who feels this way, seeing the trends of millions of consumers.

Should the variety of female protagonists/antagonists be restricted? Of course not, go nuts. I'm simply describing my own opinion, and I'm just one guy.

Also a female villain is extremely rare for a good reason, it just doesn't click too well most of the time. Anyone watched Dredd 2012? The antoganist was a female, I would argue that the movie writers did the best they could to create a convincing female villain who ugly as fuck (intentionally!). This was the result:
She sends saves upon waves of male henchmen to kill Dredd, and when that doesn't work and Dredd reaches her floor/level she is taken down in literally 5 seconds. Her "final plan" is to explode herself and take Dredd with her, a device she planted in case ANY enemy reached her. So not only is she useless on her own (while Dredd is a one-man-army), she's also not very intelligent.
This brings to question how she became the primary leader of so many violent gangs (heavily male-dominated) to begin with, there was nothing stopping any of her henchmen (or rival gangs) from simply punching her in the face and taking over her organization. She seemed to rely 100% on being protected by her own men. Backstabbing/turning often happens in crime organizations, the leader has to be able to hold their own and she sure as hell couldn't.


bobleponge said:
Sure are a lot of dudes on here acting like they know how women feel about things. Handy Tip: If you are not part of a group, you probably shouldn't assume you know how that group feels, unless someone in that group has explicitly told you how they feel.
85% of the Escapist is males, so you're going to have a ton of males trying to discuss things from a female perspective.
If we were to try and ONLY let females post in these threads, said threads would be ghost towns.
 

franksands

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RJ 17 said:
Don't know why you quoted me in that, but it got my attention so I'll point out that Amaterasu is a good character. As in, not an "evil/morally questionable one". To be fair, Jim doesn't specifically mention that as one of the 3 requirements, but he does talk about it at the beginning of the episode and points out that Vertigo is one of the "villains" of Primal Rage.
Though I love Jack from ME2, I don't she qualifies. Actually none of the female characters of ME2 would serve, since all of them are excessively sexualized.
 

Impluse_101

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Daystar Clarion said:




I like to think that The Boss and Ammy fall into this category.

Have you seen The Boss? She's built like a fucking horse, and Ammy is...

Well she's Ammy!
Amaterasu.
MOTHER TO EVERTHING AND THE SUN ITSELF.

The grand divine of all gods and goddesses...
Is a wolf.

And thats why I like Okami.

On topic:

Gimme a game where you play as a grannie who's decided that she's done living for everythin and goes to reap judgement on villans. Men and Women alone.
 

Ukomba

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franksands said:
RJ 17 said:
Silent Protagonist said:
I wasn't trying to disagree with Jim's point that there is a greater range of character traits used for male characters than female characters. I was criticizing his method of making a lengthy and specific list of criteria and then being angry and judgmental that there are so few female characters that meet it when in fact barely any characters regardless of gender meet his requirements. I don't disagree with the sentiment, just the way in which it was delivered.
Ahhhh, I get your point now. Yeah, I can think of a few off the top of my head, probably some more if I took some time to do a bit of research. I think he was just going for direct opposites for what we see in female characters specifically, but you still do have a fair point.
Ukomba said:
Ukomba said:
Hmm, well here's a list of characters I think meet that criteria:

Amazon in Dragon's Crown.
Lucca from Chrono Trigger.
Okami from Okami.
Peacock from skull girls.
Double from skull girls.
Macha from Chrono Cross.
NeoFio from Chrono Cross.
Poshul from Chrono Cross.
Sprigg from Chrono Cross.
Shale from Dragon Age.
Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic 2.
Bombette from Paper Mario.
Lady Bow from Paper Mario.
Watt from Paper Mario.
Sushie from Paper Mario.
Goombella from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Flurrie from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
Vivian from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Ms. Mowz from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
Toadette from Mario Kart.
Birdo from Mario Kart.
Baby Daisy from Mario Kart.
Nana from Ice Climers / Smash Brothers.

That's just what I could come up with off the top of my head from games I've played.
Jack from Mass Effect 2.
Sue Sakamoto from Cave Story.
Gaige from Border Lands 2.
Hildegard von Krone From Soul Calibur IV
Freya from Final Fantasy 9.
Quina Quen From Final Fantasy9???

I don't know. Seems there's a lot that are at least possible. You could even make the case that Purna from Dead island fits the criteria.
Amazon and Jack are pratically naked the whole time.
Jack is future hell's angel biker girl.
Luca is the cute engineer.
Do you actually play with Shale? I've never played Dragon Age.
Quina Queen is a genderless entity
Freya is on a quest to find her lost love

I think from this list the only candidate is Amaterasu (Okami)
The amount of cloths the character wears is irrelevant. Jack is covered in tatoo's, with a shaved head, and a terrible personality, she is not conventionally attractive. All her lack of clothing doesn't improved her attractiveness, quite the opposite. The same is true for the Amazon. She's far more muscled than the standard conception of beauty, emphasized by the lack of covering cloths.

Luca is cute, but nerdy isn't traditional attractive, which is the point of the video. If John Marston isn't conventionally attractive (I know women who would disagree with that assessment) neither is Luca.

Shale is a party member, and she has possibly the most interesting back story of any of the characters. She's one of my favorites to use too.

Quina Quen's gender is unknown, and put in there for a joke. e_e

Freya isn't "doing something for a man". At one point she is looking for her lost love, but later she's Defending Her Homeland, then goes for Revenge on Brahne, and finally to save the world. How a character starts out their journey doesn't make that their one driving force the entire time.

You can think what you want I'm sure.
 

Clive Howlitzer

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I don't think I can take much more of this stuff being thrown around before my skull collapses in on itself and snuffs out my brain.
 

Depulcator

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Sonya from mortal Kombat would like to have a word with you. Also, a nice chunk of the DOTA and LoL women may have something to say.
 

Aardvaarkman

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Steve2911 said:
Yeah I too can not think of a single example. I was tempted to say Ellie from that bit where you play as her, but I suppose I'm only not thinking of her as attractive because she's too young for me to see her that way. She is the game's protagonist in my eyes though, but I can't honestly count her when she's only playable for an hour of it.
Ellie's as cute as a bug. She'll be smoking hot in her 20s.

There are so many ways they could have made an awkward-looking girl of her age, and she doesn't even have any scars from her dangerous life. I thought that was one of Jim's best points - the contrast between the grizzled, scarred war veteran males, and the women who somehow emerge without a scratch and often don't even need armour.

Though Ellie does have a great personality and is an interestingly-developed character. But agreed on the fact that you only play her for a small part of the game, you mostly see her through Joel's eyes, and much of her role is to help Joel get over his emotional issues, to "fix" the wounded man.
 

Ukomba

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clinicalPsychologist said:
Lightknight said:
As such, throwing bloody FPS titles at women may never get the response it does from men, no matter how capable and plain the female protagonist was made. Because God only knows that women strongly desire to play as some ugly chick as their avatar. Just like I desire to play as some fat slob with an asthma problem.[/sarcasmjoke]
Funny, but Scott Shelby was my favourite character in Heavy Rain, and yeah, (slight spoiler warning)
he is a fat slob with an asthma problem


On another note, even if it maybe is understandable that developers make games with a male audience in mind because that is their biggest audience, I just cannot accept that this argument used in this context always implies that the only thing male gamers want are the same tropes used over and over (both male and female centered) or only hyperattractive women in their games. I think that this assumption is rather sexistic against men.
Want to put that to the test?

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mightyno9/mighty-no-9/posts/611851

Those are possible designs for the Mighty No. 9 heroine. They are letting supporters vote on the design they use. I guarantee you will see very few votes for A or B (the more nerdy looking character). F or H will almost certainly win. I love to see the results based on gender of the contributor. I'll bet the percentages show women voting for the same things the men are.
 

franksands

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Ukomba said:
The amount of cloths the character wears is irrelevant. Jack is covered in tatoo's, with a shaved head, and a terrible personality, she is not conventionally attractive. All her lack of clothing doesn't improved her attractiveness, quite the opposite. The same is true for the Amazon. She's far more muscled than the standard conception of beauty, emphasized by the lack of covering cloths.

Luca is cute, but nerdy isn't traditional attractive, which is the point of the video. If John Marston isn't conventionally attractive (I know women who would disagree with that assessment) neither is Luca.

Shale is a party member, and she has possibly the most interesting back story of any of the characters. She's one of my favorites to use too.

Quina Quen's gender is unknown, and put in there for a joke. e_e

Freya isn't "doing something for a man". At one point she is looking for her lost love, but later she's Defending Her Homeland, then goes for Revenge on Brahne, and finally to save the world. How a character starts out their journey doesn't make that their one driving force the entire time.

You can think what you want I'm sure.
I think the amount of clothes a character has is definitely relevant. Why there weren't any half-naked male characters? Though the Amazon and Jack are unconventional, they are definitely still attractive. Your 20-30 years old with a body that could go on any playboy or men's magazine.
I thought this one through and you're right, Lucca deserves a position as strong non-attractive character

So, the list is growing(from the games i've played): Amaterasu, Ellie, Lucca. Shale looks very interesting