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Genderplay in Videogames
thenovacrisis writes "Game Girl Advance has an interesting article about the various female characters in videogames. She talks about the important balance between alienation and identification, the Aesthetics of Sexy Girls, and various MMORPGs. An interesting read for all." A lot of games are compared, and issues raised. Good food for thought for character design.
Metriod. Samus is both a complete badass and sexy to boot.
I believe it can be said unequivocably that this kind of attitude ruined the next 5,7, whatever Tomb Raider games. They were empty. That, and the fact that there were so many of them.
Has anyone else noticed that everyone in videogames is idealized? Men are all super muscular or pretty boys, girls are all tall and big breated. Videogames are meant to be an escape, not a acurate depiction of life, that is boring.
The real question is when are we going to see quality X rated games. With engines like those running UT and NWN, not to mention the great artwork, one would expect more that cyber equivalents to paperdolls. >
Looking through this article, I find myself wondering exactly what is going on that this is the first major posting such as this that I've seen. (Or maybe I'm not looking in the right places.)
Of course, games are generally a reflection of what the public demands, but have they also conditioned the public to expect sexy vixen heroines?
Another thing I find interesting is the inclusion of playing crossgender. I tend to do this simply because it helps me learn interaction skills on the other end and thereby get a better play experience all around.
The suggestion towards the end "Set up some rules and let the players play with both the gamespace and the genderspace, however they wish. Don't push girls away from games like Tomb Raider just because you're afraid boys won't like to identify with Lara. Don't insert gratuitous sex - or for that matter, violence. Make it *mean* something. Don't bind gender with too many built-in characteristics, but let girls be girls in your game. Allow a lot of different types of female characters, not just thin, pretty, busty ones." is a great one, and something I think might be incorporated into future RPGs and MMORPGs.
Ba.
Okay. First, I've read both articles and found both to be quite good reads. The Rez Vibrator article was great. The thing has no real obvious applicable shape other than what she did with it. It's like the company said: 'don't waste time on design, their stoners. They'll figure some crazy way to use it.' I don't think the article was any more than a that: an article. It wasn't exploiting the authors sexuality for hits or money.
Second, the genderspace article is NOT screaming in a neo-feminist way for 'equality'. It's simply making what I see as a very good statement about the assumptions and generalizations withing the industries character design. She is not shying away from T&A games, she is simply saying 'hey, girls play games now to, why not some good girl characters that alienate us less?'. She even likes the idea of DOA, it just doesn't appeal to her.
But, you could have RTFA.
Instead you chose to feel emasculated. I think that says WAY more about you than the issue of 'equality'.
Getting diabetes AND salmonella would be a bad weekend.
Looking at the response of gamers so far.
No.
The funny thing is that one person insulted gaming geeks as not every getting any play.
That is odd because many gamers I know are more social and apt to do things outside of computers like actually dating. Other types of geeks like comic book geeks or programmer geeks etc..etc.. tend to stereotypically have a bit more trouble in this regard. Notice it is all a stereotype and I myself fit into a couple of the above categories and I have a wife, kids and I actually weigh under 250lbs.
Everyone wants the ideal. They want to play the bulked bad ass kicking rear and taking names.
Do you really want to play a short hairy balding character with dark circles under your eyes from lack of sleep?
No, that is the villian you kick the crap out of on the third level of the game.
The weird ones are the ones that play the opposite sex and really get into it and off on it. They worry me.
ACK
I dress her up sexy as all out hell.
My #1 motivation is an asthetic appeal to me.
And asthetics, I would rather be looking at that.
You asked about pink or blue undies. I am gonna pretend that I know where you are going with that remark.
I wear pink and blue striped undies.
For one I think that the idea of 'cyberdating' is, in a word, lame.
Seriously.. seriously lame.
Bottom line on this is that if you are talking to a female character on any MMORPG it is statistcly more likely it is really a guy anyways.
So if you are playing a guy and hitting on women.... you are really.... hitting on....
Like I said I consider it lame anyways.
Something else though. I enjoy the 'role playing' aspect of it. If you don't know what 'role playing' is then you need to talk to your elders. It was all the rage way back then.
While I will never 'byte' and date online like that. I might flirt. What the hell?
Ah well, they need an equal audience and without a share of sexuality to attract the guys, the overly present shades of pink would make most guys run away screaming. At least. To be perfectly honest, I just skimmed the linked article a bit, disregarded it as over-analyzed, mildly feminist propaganda which can be summed up in 5 lines of text. Then I just clicked the link with the word "vibrator" in it. So, cheap pushing of their site... Worked on me at least :(
I hope it doesn't become a hit. I would NOT like to see a picture of CBN in his underwear showing off a new AMP XP 3xxx. (While wearing Intel boxers, hah! I have a warped mind...)
Hate me!
Jeez. I thought the /. crowd was supposed to be a bit intellectual, but most of the posts I've read about this thus far are mostly knee-jerk, anti-PC, mysogony.
The article isn't claiming that she feels victimized or 'whining' about the portrayal of the female body. It's actually quite good, IF you're capable of turning off your 'the world hates me for being a white, middle-class, male' alarms. Show some dignity and don't have a hissy-fit over a woman commenting on gender in games.
Getting to her final comments I think she has some well formed points, and I agree whole-heartedly:
"I don't want to see a shelf of pink boxes of "girl games". I just want to see better games in general - games which are more thoughtful, more provocative, more interesting, with better character design.
Something you hear over and over again in the research around what girls want out of games are themes like "open-ended" and "less-goal oriented" and "co-operative play". These are also the themes which most adult gamers seem to want, too. Talking with my friends who are game developers and designers, they don't want to see bouncy boobs, necessarily (although there's a place for that, sure); they want evolved gameplay, emergent gameplay - with great characters. Set up some rules and let the players play with both the gamespace and the genderspace, however they wish. Don't push girls away from games like Tomb Raider just because you're afraid boys won't like to identify with Lara. Don't insert gratuitous sex - or for that matter, violence. Make it *mean* something. Don't bind gender with too many built-in characteristics, but let girls be girls in your game. Allow a lot of different types of female characters, not just thin, pretty, busty ones.
The end result isn't just going to appeal to women, it'll appeal to a lot of people across the board who want smart, fun, engaging games."
Anyone who likes games can relate. This isn't femi-nazi rhetoric, so allow yourself to ponder it a bit before being a reactionary.
Getting diabetes AND salmonella would be a bad weekend.
I don't understand why you think sexy female characters turn off the female gamers. I would assume given the choice between a sexy character and an ugly character the girl would always take the sexy one.
The male characters in any game are hardly you average geek either... They are all big, muscular, hard-core and handsome.
I'd like to know how she proposes to design a non phallic joystick.
Also, the color scheme is "male friendly"?
How is a primarily colorless (black) console biased towards men? Judging by the number of goth chicks around here I would have thought it was as gender neautral as you could get.
I'm a hardcore RPG gamer. That's not all I like, but every now and then I go off on a major binge.
The problem is this: while a whole bunch of gender stereotyped Lara Croft clones with huge tits and wierd dialog might be great for 13 year old boys, its really jarring to those of us who are buying it more for the escapism than for the battle cleavage.
I don't want to get jarred out of whatever minimal plot they've kludged together by something SOOOO campy I can't even willingly suspend my raucious sarcastic laughter, more less my disbelief.
I'm not saying no softcore and no random bimbos, but it needs to be balanced and used intelligently. (If that isn't inherently contradictory.) The best selling games are those that have either phenominal gameplay, or acceptable gameplay with great plot. Over and over you see games that are technically mediocre and well written crushing games that are technically superior and thematically challenged.
Just my opinion.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Or you know what would be even better.. If the Right hand recognized that it can only design for the right hand but bring in someone who understands the left hand to help design something that is fun and usable for both parties. This way you get the balance that you seek, the problem really isn't with the designers as it is with their abstract ideas of themselves playing the game. To them; the game is great, to the left hand the game isn't. The deeper problem is that there needs to be more female game designers who can bring a female point of view to the situation. That is the problem that needs to be addressed and sadly the article doesn't discuss the need for more female game designers, programmers and mathmeticians. It simply says designers need to be more aware. It's an almost hit; They can't be aware all of the time because no matter how hard they try they'll always think that a hot chick with nice boobs even if shes fully clothed is better than your realistic average chick with hair on her legs. Emphasis would be put on females sexual prowess and attributes because thats the way males naturally think. They want to mate with the opposite sex they find ideal.
Also this female complained about artists drawing the pictures but from what i've seen alot of artists for Rpg's etc etc are female and it's the management who happen to be male that wan't to see bikini clad women. I also found it odd that she would except that game where the girls are blantantly being trampled about as beach girls who can barely speak, slapping a volleyball around while those arttibutes are personified. There is even a commercial that shows a bunch of teenage guys sitting around the tv getting a wood over these girls playing volleyball. If those girls were Orc's would they buy the game? Most likely not, i'm not saying the game is bad or should be pulled off the shelves or any nonsense like that i'm just making a correlation of how men view women and how they are personfied in these games.
I'd also like to point out that my girlfriend is a model and she loves playing games, all types of video games infact I believe she is a bit of a video game junkie and she always points out to me that games that operate on the "me man - strong" "me woman - smart" basis usually suck as the outcomes and playability are too predictable for her liking. The most fun games are the games where the characters really aren't objectified in one manner or the next regardless of their looks. She always makes the reference to mario kart and how regardless of how pink and pretty princess is she can still shoot red shells and has super fast acceleration. Also the objectification of what is considered beauty by others when it comes to herself isn't always flattering but usually based on pie in the sky ideas. IE: because she looks good she's a nice person. etc etc..
Anyway i'm gonna start rambling so i'll stop here. The jist is that if women want games that don't objectify them physically they need to take a part in shaping what they think would be a good game and men need to give them the chance to do so. Female designers, programmers, artists; step up.
I like women in my games to have big tits and small waists.
Girls just flock to you don't they?
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. -- Lincoln, Gettysburg Address
A lot of people don't know about games like The Longest Journey.
And personally, I've never heard of Syberia.
The bikini-girl games are the ones that get a lot of press. TLJ, I never would have heard of if a guy at work hadn't had it and offered to let me borrow it.
Here's a novel idea, though.
Women are not sexual tools. They are, however, sexual. Every portrayal of a woman doesn't have to deliberately throw that away in order to be 'serious'. Which seems to have been part of the upshot of the article--it's not inherently evil that these things happen. There just needs to be an awareness that women are people. That even incredibly model-gorgeous women are people.
Okay, granted, I'm not one of them myself. I wear glasses and a size 15. I have hips. I even kinda like my hips. And what the gaming companies may eventually get is that there are women *like* me out there who'd pay through the nose for a character who was strong, deep, and not in the least bit asexual.
The thing about being a woman is that a woman is not somehow gendered but sexless. Trying to insist that we *should* be is no better than saying we should be sexy but mindless.
First, it's been brought up that Duke Nukem, with it's tight-shirted muscle man didn't offend guys the way Tomb Raider offended some women. However, Tomb Raider didn't present the option of paying male strippers. For that matter, you spend all of Tomb Raider starring at Lara read end, while you spend Duke Nukem starring at Duke's boot.
Next, on the whole issue of out-of-place sexuality in games, just think how many gamers were pissed by the Hot tub scene at the Honey Bee in Midgar in Final Fantasy VII. If it had been hot chicks in skimpy swim wear we probably wouldn't have heard as many complaints, but the instant male gamers are forced to deal with a hyper-sexed male game character, they freak.
On the whole issue that people go to games for fantasy, and expect fantasy style characters, I find mostly plausible. However, it breaks my suspension of disbelief when my knight's armor offers as much protection as my female assasin's bikini. Also, when you read classic (aka. good) fantasy and mythology, you don't find hot chicks, you get beautiful women. Helen of Troy didn't have the 'Ass that Launched a Thousand Ships'. Odysseus' Penelope kept well clothed. Tolkein's Arwen could sleep on her stomach. You can still have attractive female character, just try and follow the rules of human anatomy.
Finally, the comments that 'Teenage Males are the video game market' is absolute heresy, considering how many anime fans Slashdot has. You know how the cycle works:
- American Business declares that American's don't like Anime, so they put out a lousy translations with bad voice actors.
- People get pissed by the bad translation and voice acting and don't buy the video.
- Sales come in slow and American Business declares that American's don't like Anime.
Teenage males buy the games because the games are oriented towards teenage males.That's 100% accurate, except you are missing the fact that the fantasy/idealization is almost completely from a male perspective.
"It's Dot Com!"
Having played both genders in Everquest, I have not found this to be true in the slightest. One of my main characters was a female cleric, which I role-played as the aloof, matronly high elf that seemed to fit a "priestess of Mother Tunare", and did not reveal my real-life gender to the other players. With that character, I formed many parties and led them into many adventures. Nobody ever questioned that "she" was in charge.
I can't help but think that the easy authority that the woman who wrote the article found when playing male characters had much more to do with how playing the male avitar influenced her attitude and behavior than anything else. She logged in with the expectation "I'm presenting as a male now, so they will respect my opinions more," and the resulting confidence resulted in a self-fulfilling prophesy.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
The problems with the treatment of women in the game industry aren't new - the work environment for women at Atari was said to be worse than most auto body shops. If you've ever been to E3, it's humiliating - humiliating for me as a man, who doesn't need to have my libido pandered to in order to get me interested in a game (and who generally doesn't expect his libido to inform most of his other activities except, you know, sex.) To see all those bored models dressed in skimpy costumes is just a way of saying "we're an industry and culture completely dominated by the fantasies of frustrated adolescent boys! Don't take us seriously! And girls, just stand there so we can look at you!" It's a horrible, depressing message. It's no wonder that women don't go into the gaming-room, the entire gaming culture has essentially been hostile (and, yes, being the object of constant sexual and romantic attention is hostile, in its way) to women from the get-go.
I have nothing against a little pandering in its sector. If you go to a video store, there's an adult section. But it's not like the entire display rack is filled with bikini models. Pandering to sex drives should be a niche market, not a dominant theme.
If you can get past the comment about "phallic joysticks" (patently ridiculous, supposedly a joke, but didn't apppear to be) you're doing better than i did at first. Saying things like that shows a heavy bent towards a priapic mindset or a staggering lack of understanding of both history (of flight control sticks and video games) and ergonomics.
.. because I don't know if they did.
It gets worse further on, though. The writer states about Tomb Raider: "I never played this game" and then goes on to say "Eidos, you really blew it - you alienated all the girls who would have *loved* this game." Excuse me, but how do you know? You never played it, remember? Maybe the gameplay wouldn't even have been of the sort that girls enjoy? I've never played Tomb Raider either, so I certainly won't bash Eidos for "blowing it" in any aspect of its gameplay
Following along she makes a good point about the DOA Volleyball game, but then blows it with a rant about a barmaid in Baldur's Gate. Okay, I don't know about you... but when I play some game with medieval feel I expect my barmaids (wenches) to be ditzy, busty, and generally exactly like the description she gives. It sounds like a perfect fit in that kind of game to me. Guess what, sluts and whores are real and they are a part of the collective group of women on this planet no matter how embarassed you might be about it.
Also, who the hell is "Justin"? I have a hard time taking an article seriously when the writer talks about random third parties without any introduction. (I do know who Justin is from reading other stories on the site, but I might as well not from the article. it's bad writing.)
Moving along I see another thing which frustrates me. She makes a comment about the genderless trolls of Tolkien's world and how they are "inherently male." Okay, fine, let's say I take that at face value (I don't, if something is genderless than it is genderless). Then she goes on to say that she "would like to see more experimentation with genderless or gender-ambivalent characters" Well, which is it? Pick one, please.
Okay, other than that she doesn't trip up. However, I have another major gripe with this article and another point which keeps me from taking it seriously. She never mentions the "male stereotype" that is just as easy to find in videogames. Main characters are always buff and bronzed, always fighting their way through situations. Very rarely if ever will you find a male protagonist in a videogame who is a scrawny 5'2" pasty-faced kid with glasses. Or a chubby awkward boy. The main characters as adults and children are idyllic, and anything that diverts from the stereotypical perfection is villainous or sinister (evil genius plotting destruction) or comic relief (fat person struggling to keep up, always wanting to eat).
She really blows it here. Instead of taking the issue of female stereotyping and the overall shallowness of most videogames (I agree with her) and using it as representative of the greater problems with the total lack of realism and sensibility she totally ignores every other slight to every other class of people because, in typical human fashion, she portrays the injustices as directed primarily at her chosen group of identification. It's a very human thing to do, but also extremely frustrating for someone trying to find some subjective analysis and critique where it is sorely needed.
At any rate, if she had just been up front about wanting some more intelligent, realistic, and more engaging games to go with the testosterone infused ones I think this article would have read much better. However she didn't, and the article (and her cred) suffers because she attempted to take a good point and emphasize it with good evidence (ample in the world of gaming) but instead beat it into the ground with some bad examples and a terribly shallow view. It's a definite shame.
you can take the road that takes you to the stars...
"Pandering to sex drives" is a dominant theme in everything in western culture. Its perhaps done in a slightly 'classier' fashion than the game industry in most other cases, but only marginally so, and in fact the more I think about it, not at all. Just look around. Look at a typical magazine section in a store. Almost all of the womens' magazines (e.g. Cosmo, Femina etc) feature sexy, photoshopped women wearing almost nothing. And so do almost all of the (adult) mens magazines (FHM, GQ) etc. So do the magazines for teenage girls. So do the magazines for bikers. So do the porn mags (of course). So do the photography magazines. So do the frikkin comics! Look at television and movies - most of the shows are full of sexy women, and many of the shows don't even try to pretend that they're not just displaying sexy women to attract viewers. Yes, go into a video store and really take a look, you will find that MANY of the non-adult shows are flaunting beautiful women (and NOT just the obvious movies like Blue Crush). Look at the music industry, almost all our female stars are damn sexy. Look at their music videos, they all have to dance around wearing practically nothing, grabbing and touching their breasts and genitals and writhing sexily. Even trade shows in other industries (e.g. mining/defence) have their "booth babes" - some shows may do it slightly classier than others, but a booth babe is a booth babe. No matter how classy she is dressed, you know she is only there for one reason (and its not for her knowledge about the mining or defence industries).
Everybody does this, EVERYWHERE in society, and nobody sees it as out of the ordinary, having long discussions about it on sites like /. In fact, the field of computer games stands out as being quite singular in the fact that people do see it as something unusual (and in some cases see it "as a problem", like this website).
People still seem somehow awed by the idea of sexy women in computer games. Get over it, the whole of western culture is fascinated by boobies. To make a fuss over the fact that this would apply to computer games too just seems prudish (and thus a bit immature) to me. Think about this, does society consider mags like GQ "immature"? No? Then why are tits in computer games considered "immature"?
I bought Baldur's Gate... There are a few "overly-sexy" characters in the game which seemingly are there for men's eyes only. The game itself is outstanding. I played it all the way through with my girlfriend [its cooperative action RPG ... great fun]. I could see she was visibly upset at the jiggling boobies in the game. It totally took away from her experience.
:)... but that's besides the point. I think the field is missing out on contributions of the female gender and until we stop buying this rubbish the publishers will give it to us cuz it sells. Welcome to Capitalism :{
My point is GOOD GAMES DON'T NEED to throw sex in our face to make us play. I mean really... who played Zork or Space Quest? Was there a ton of sex in those games? Did a lot of people play them? I *know* we can do better than this.
Video games were a gateway for me into computer science and programming as a child... by appealing only to men you add to the problem of pushing the feminine percentages down in this field.
I have to admit that this is because I find somewhat nerdy girls attractive
Clerics do (at times) have more perceived authority than other classes. There are times where clerics are a dime a dozen, but for the most part, a lot of people have the mentality that if you piss your cleric off (no matter what gender), you've gotta stop what you're doing and find another one.
I suppose this has a bit to do with the difference between consequence and intent. In the case of the former, the new-style badass female hero, at least superficially ceases to portray the female gender as subordinate and prone to victimization. However, I feel that sometimes, perhaps even often, this is done the purpose of boosting the "sexiness" of the particular character. I think that one characteristic of the contemporary male worldview is that a certain aggressiveness in females is desirable and sexy. And not that making females sexier, by whatever means, is necessarily a bad thing or a form of discrimination. I think that the intent behind this, though, might be seen as a new way of emphasizing female characters' sexuality in a way that appears to be feminist.
Maybe to put it another way: can I ask the males out there if they think girls with guns is sexy? I used to joke around with my friends about making the ultimate sell-out movie and calling it "Breasts with Guns." It's not just that guys like guns, it's that women with guns is sexy idea. To guys.
And so what if it is? It's okay to be sexy. But seen from another point of view, I think there is a certain novelty factor to the supremely empowered female heroine, and sometimes this is done so deliberately and exaggeratedly as to emphasize their femininity. When I say sexiness, I mean both "sex appeal" in an obvious sense, and more importantly, I also mean the strengh of the sexual identity of the character. I guess what I'm proposing is that the empowered female character appears to the audience first and foremost as a powerful female and only secondarily as a powerful person.
As a comparison I might bring up the Chinese term "nu3 qianq2 ren2", or "strong women", which is used to describe the liberated modern female. You'll often find it used when people mention famous female politicians or busniesspersons. I've talked to some of these women (not really famous, but successful), and they've claimed they don't like the term. Of course, on the surface, it's a term of praise. It lauds courage and success. The problem is that it uses the term woman and emphasizes their gender. There's no corresponding "nan2 qiang2 ren2" ("strong man") term.
I'll admit this isn't a perfect comparison to buffed-out women characters, since there's no obviously stated emphasis of the gender of the character, but I get that feeling nonetheless when I see some of the female characters in videogames and movies and whatnot. It's really hard to pick and choose between examples...it's simply a sensation that I get. This feeling is also reinforced when I know that certain works are created by males for males. It's not fair to say men can't imagine women in a reasonabl sex-objective way, but I do think that this is frequently the case in pop-culture works.
DOAEVB doesn't try to lie to the consumer. It's a game targeted at men. As they called it "a pinup game".
Tomb Raider had what was possibly a new Samus character, strong and independant. EA dumped all of that and turned her into a sex symbol. It was a major disappointement for these girls who wanted someone strong to identify with, not another Barbie clone.
I think they have a point. People like their character to have personality. It's like the Tomb Raider marketing department was run by 15 year olds who missed the whole notion that Women can have thoughts too. I'm not alone either, in a recent Penny Arcade contest (to see which one Gabe would draw) Samus came out way on top.
I read the internet for the articles.
IMO this is one game that got it right. Sex in games is fine as long as it isn't the defining point of the character. In Oni you were aware of the character first and the gender second, it's when the point of the character is to be a sex symbol and not a person that problems arise.