Men Incapable Of Portraying Videogame Women Fairly?

Thanks to GameSpot for its 'GameSpotting' editorial discussing whether men can be trusted to portray women fairly in videogames. The author references Metroid ("I don't appreciate that Samus being a woman is a punch line"), and Ico ("Yorda... [is] this supposedly sympathetic female character in a video game that can do absolutely nothing for herself and is constantly in danger of being kidnapped"), and ends by leveling the charge: "I think men are inherently incapable of doing an adequate job of properly presenting female characters in games."

Comments

No it's not

[M3wThr33]

Samus being a woman is not a joke, it's a realization that a woman CAN do powerful things and CAN be a hero. It's not an insult, it's something that makes you think.

Men are inherently incapable of portraying women

[empaler]

Women are inherently incapable of driving cars
Men are inherently incapable of getting in touch with their feeling
Women are inherently incapable of logical thought

Yeah, let's polarize and call each other names.

I didn't see Samus' gender as a "punchline"...

[b00m3rang]

As a kid I spent quite a while playing this game, had come to know and like this character, and when I found out the hero was female I thought, "Cool, that's unique. I don't see why the ass kicking protagonist /can't/ be a woman." Ever since then, any instance of female action heros has never struck me as being out of the ordinary. I think if anything, it in some way helped break down the gender wall. At least for some of us.

Re:I didn't see Samus' gender as a "punchline"...

[Ayaress]

I always saw it as a way of inviting people to generate their own stereotypes, and then slapping them in the face with them. I'll admit when I was playing Metroid, I thought Samus was a guy for the whole game (I never bothered reading the manual, that may have made it clear, but who reads those anyway?). I was a bit humbled when I found out the truth, and I doubt I was the only one.

Anyway, I think the unfair portrayal of women in video games is more often a side-effect of the sort of material covered in games. GTA delves into gangs and violent crime, where women are often utilized as a source of income, not as gunmen (gunpersons?) or drug runners.

Most RPGs are fixed into the high fantasy, which usually brings with it an aristocracy and/or monarcy, and in history, those have been male dominated (title passes from father to eldest son, daughters are primarily used as a tool to secure alliance or union through marriage to the sons of other aristocrats).

RTS generally involve war, and in human history, that's been the realm of male aggression. That's changing now, but even then, that change is bitterly resisted.

FPS are even moreso. They're entire games that pretty much involve nothing but slaughtering one another. If anything better lends itself to testosterone, I don't know what it is.

There are exceptions in each group, but a lot of those aren't any better.

Square (and for that matter, most RPG makers) has(have) a long history of making their major femalecharacters into love starved twits (Lucca from Chrono Trigger, Kid from Chrono Cross, Terra and Celes from FF6, Mint from Tales of Phantasia, need I go on?).

But when one of them gets off to a good start and look like they'll break the mold, they either end up being even worse (Arche from Tales of Phantasia, who after getting off to a good start ended up not just a twit but a slut to boot) or an anti-stereotype (Ayla from Chrono Trigger) which only serve to accentuate the stereotypical characters they're set next to.

Also, there's not just one way to stereotype a character. Kerrigan from Starcraft, for example. She started out looking like a strong leader, a decent fighter, strong willed, impetuous, etc. Then she goes the way of the love starved twit during the dialog scene at the beginning of the New Gettysburg scenario, and after that, she picks up a completely different female stereotype: The manipulative bitch, playing every single character in the game against each other and then backstabbing her allies the second their job is done.

Of course, all that forces me to ask the question: Are MEN fairly represented in video games?

Seen male characters lately?

[Kris_J]

Male characters in vidoegames are:

• Cigar chomping muscle-brains
• Weasley little pick-pocket wimps
• Corpse-obsessed psychopaths
• Spineless cannon-fodder clones
• Sex-obsessed jocks
• Coke-bottle glasses nerds that love computers

Etc, etc, etc. It isn't a sexism thing, it's a "the story writers are stupider than the game's AI" thing.

It's like this, ya see

[Lord Kano]

When it comes to video games, I am not looking for female characters that I can take home to mom.

I want big titties on a tough as nails ass kicking chick like Lara Croft or B. Orchid, or big titties on a soft helpless babes like the babe in Final Fight or the hookers in GTA:3 and VC.

Video games are like porno, the target market is mostly male. As a result the contents are going to be geared towards male fantasies.

LK

Wrong question to ask

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, not only should it be rather obvious that the majority of game developers lack any and all ability to portray real women AT ALL, but the author of this article choose some really poor choices of women in games to prove his point.

Why not attack the games laced with idiot-centric content like women with oversized breasts who are always the victims.
Samus is the one, true video-game heroin that hasn't, (yet), fallen to the same traps as nearly every other female in most other games. She is strong, silent, confident, and not a sex symbol. (Some may argue that the removing of her suit at the end of a quickly completed game is leaning in this direction, and I could understand that, but I still respect Nintendo for at least throwing her in a modest single piece bathing suite when most other developers would have her sporting a scant bikini or a lace nightie).

Yorda from Ico could be seen as a weak female in a game, but she is still infinitely more interesting and unique as a supporting character than most of the aforementioned bad examples. Her character is successfully timid without becoming a weak, victim-ish sex-symbol.

I can't wait to see more *real* women in games, but this will most likely come with the arrival of more mature developers.

They weren't really trying...

[LincolnX]

"I think men are inherently incapable of doing an adequate job of properly presenting female characters in games." Perhaps you could make that case if they were TRYING to properly represent a female in thier game. But they were not. They typically make games geared towards males. As for Metroid, Samus being female was a small tiny part of the game MOST people didn't know about for the first five years the game was out. I remember hearing Samus was female 3 years after I first played it.

Ico & Yorda

[DarkZero]

Warning: Some moderate (possibly heavy) Ico spoilers will ensue after the quote.

I never finished ICO. Not only did I get stuck at a certain point about halfway through, but more to the point, I grew sick and tired of the girl, Yorda, and her uselessness. This character was so pathetic, it almost made me angry. I admit that this is not the effect the game was intended to have on me or on anyone; however, here's this supposedly sympathetic female character in a video game that can do absolutely nothing for herself and is constantly in danger of being kidnapped. Who better than a man--or in this case, just a boy--to come to her rescue.

If Greg had played Ico all the way through, he would've realized that Yorda was only pathetic because she had been repeatedly injured and abused. The real Yorda was quite a bit more capable, just as the injured, abused Ico was just as pathetic (if not more so) than she was when she was injured.

This is what happens when someone starts their analysis of a game with the words, "I never finished..." That's like watching the first two minutes of the Spider-Man movie, turning your DVD player off, and then devoting two paragraphs to asking why someone would want to watch Peter Parker act like a geeky loser for two hours. If you're going to review or analyze something, you should at least have the maturity to take in the whole thing before gracing us with your ignorant opinion.

Missing the point

[Elkboy]

The problem isn't that attractive female characters are shown, it's rather the very narrow definition of attractiveness that plauges all media. Most attractive women seem to be come from the same mold. I personally find the girl-next-door geeky girl infinitely more attractive, but then again, I'm a geek myself.

Objectification is another problem. I completely agree with the criticism against Lara Croft and how a strong, capable kick ass woman is reduced to drool material by stupid marketing. It's perfectly fine with me to drool over her body, but when that's all there is to her, something's wrong.

As for Yorda in Ico, I agree that not playing the full game is unfair, but she's also a product of a society (Japan) that still is very inequal. I believe her passiveness and inability is as much a game device as it is a reflection of the view of girls in Japan. Compared to other kinds of oppression, Ico is a harmless fantasy for boys in the end. I mean, who hasn't dreamed of being a hero and saving the girl?

Huh?

[Guppy06]

"The author references Metroid ("I don't appreciate that Samus being a woman is a punch line")"

Yeah, that Metroid game, nothin' but a barrel of laughs...

If Samus' sex is a "punch line," what was the joke?

I admit that the character art at the end of the two GBA games makes me roll my eyes (a little too "cheesecake" for my tastes), but here he's arguing that the entire premise is flawed, that her sex is a gimmick no matter what she may look like. This makes me wonder just what he thinks about women in general. He seems to be awfully sensitive to Samus' lack of a Y-chromosone and I wonder if this means that he finds the idea of a woman doing all those things to be unbelievable. After all, he's the only one I've seen who thinks her sex is a "punch line" to begin with.

"each game in the series encourages them to reach the finish line as quickly as possible to catch a glimpse of the woman beneath the suit."

Personally, I try to get the endings so I can catch a glimpse of the person beneath the suit. One of the series' cornerstone is the tantalizingly little information on just who she is and why she does what she does. I'm more interested in situations and facial expressions than her body (and on that note I'm happier with what Retro did with her than what Nintendo has done in the last two GBA installments). I chalk the cheesecake up as a failing by Nintendo to understand just what makes the games popular outside of Japan to begin with, the inability of a group of Japanese programmers to quite relate to gaijin gamers, not a failing of men in general.

Being as sensitive as he is to the pictures at the end, why exactly does the author himself play through the games? How many other gamers here are actually encouraged by the drawings of a scantilly-dressed woman at the end of the game?

Ah, wait a second...

"That's also not what I've been taught by my parents. My mother is a neurologist. Her mother is a physician, as well. The women have always worn the pants in my family, so to speak. Perhaps this helps you understand my perspective."

Now this is interesting. Here he implies that women must "wear the pants" in order to be worth something.

"Alis wears a pink hair band, lipstick, and a skirt, but she's still OK in my book."

I'm as sick of seeing women in pink as much as the next guy, but I didn't realize that actually liking pink is such a black mark against a woman. They can have any favorite color in the spectrum so long as it's not pink?

I think his problem is that he's equating strong female characters with characters acting more male, that men are inherently better and women must act more like men to be better themselves.

Personally, the more I think of what I've seen Samus do so far, I'm not sure if she could have been a man.

Re:RTFA

[analog_line]

It's even a male who wrote it.

And just because a man wrote it, that means it's instantly not polarizing, no matter what it says, and it's automatically considered rational, well thought out, enlightened criticism, regardless of actual merit.

Sure. Pull the other one. It's got bells on.

Huh?? Seems like a cherry-picked sample...

[danaris]

...because I can think of several "fair" portrayals of women in games.

First, let's look at the Final Fantasy series. I can only speak to the ones I've played, so here goes:

• Final Fantasy 6:
  • Tina--strong woman, though she has some emotional baggage due to being only half-human. Never portrayed as particularly "sexy," though she's quite pretty in most official images of her (kind of hard to tell from her sprite ;-) )
  • Celes--definitely a strong woman! She was a general in the army, for Mu's sake! Not only that, but she can use every bit as big a sword as any guy in the game (same goes for Tina).
  • Relm--she may only be 10 (or so; I forget her exact age), but she's awesome. She takes the womanizing Edgar down a few notches with her wit, and has more spirit in her than any roomful of "typical" videogame characters.
  Don't see much to fret over there.
• Final Fantasy 7:
  • Aeri(s|th)--She may not be physically strong, but she certainly has a strong personality. Not to mention she sacrifices her life to save the planet. A bit more stereotypically "weak needs-to-be-protected girl," but hey, some girls really DO need to be protected.
  • Tifa--OK, here we're getting into kind of shaky ground, not for her character, which I think is fantastic, but for her looks, which are a little over the top...take that how you will...especially in FMVs.
  • Yuffie--heh, you've gotta love Yuffie. She's cute, tough, and funny; what more do you want?
  Again, no real indication that men are "incapable" of portraying women fairly.
• Final Fantasy 9:
  • Dagger/Garnet: She's beautiful, tough, strong, and still vulnerable at times. I can find no unfairness whatsoever in the portrayal of Garnet's character. Nor is she visually portrayed as anything stereotypical.
  • Freya: Not particularly feminine (and not even human); however, she's also both strong and sensitive. Included because she's technically female ;-)
  • Eiko: Cross Relm with Yuffie, and you've got Eiko. 'Nuf said.
  Still not seeing much problem here.
• Final Fantasy X/X-2:
  • Lulu: Let's...not go into Lulu too much. She's the first real example so far of a woman I find quite unrealistic.
  • Rikku: Very much like Yuffie, but shows more real emotion than she does. She's genki, she's cute, and she's fighting against a millennium of persecution of her people. (And she's about the same in FFX-2) I really like Rikku ;-)
  • Yuna (FFX): Now, Yuna in FFX is the only main-character girl in the Final Fantasies I've played who is really the shy, quiet, needs-protecting type. She's still far from one-dimensional, though; after all, her motivation is to sacrifice herself to save the world.
  • Yuna (FFX-2): In FFX-2, Yuna is very different, though, interestingly, you can see the seeds of her new self in her old. She has become a strong leader, very energetic--but now her motivation is to find her one true love.
  • Paine (FFX-2): She's kind of Goth, but no one would argue that she's a stereotypical woman of any stripe. No one would want to mess with Paine.

Well, that's all the Final Fantasies I've played through, and in all of that, there isn't a single example of the kind of "unfair" treatment the article was talking about. True, some of them are visually portrayed as "sexy" (though only Tifa, I think, is specifically made sexy without being especially pretty), but this is not at the expense of their character.

Maybe it just goes to show that in the type of action games he's talking about, no one bothers to make the story or characters believable. (I know that's not universally true, but I also know it is true in some cases) RPGs, I have found, tend to make more of an effort than other genres to make their stories and characters if not realistic, at least believable and human. This is probably because their primary purpose is to tell a story.

Dan Aris

Re:I feel sorry for the guy...

[Bluesman]

>Women are not offended by their own genders display of sexuality and power.

Well, ugly women feel threatened by sexy women. I don't think you'll find many attractive women opposed to this sort of thing. This only reminds ugly women of their shortcomings, however. Have you noticed any hard core feminists that are REALLY hot? Probably not.

Re:Unfair!

[mikedaisey]

There is a middle ground--like female characters that are competent without only being sex objects. It really isn't such an impossible thing to wish for.