Slashdot Mirror
On The Feminine Form In Gaming
heartless_ writes "The GamerGirl team over at Gamergod.com has an interesting article delving into a male driven industry. This time the subject of discussion is the sometimes overzealous portrayal of women in games." A well-considered piece, with thoughtful references to the works of Camille Paglia and Naomi Wolf. From the article: "He also highlights several games that, instead of focusing on the female form in its big-breasted glory, showcase women who are intelligent, strong, and powerful. He insists, 'The protagonists highlighted above illustrate that plenty of excitement can be provided by female leads who will, in turn, bring in female gamers - not to speak of richer gameplay options. Additionally, as McIntosh says, most women gamers are "confident enough not to feel threatened" by sexist imagery, merely finding it annoying and disappointing.'"
I like how the site got slashdotted even before comments appeared. Must be something to do with the word "women".
It seems to me that this is stating the obvious: the over-sexualized female avatars in games are there to attract male players, not women. If game makers want to draw in a female audience, they need to have characters that women want to play - and that means strong, complex, and capable... not falling out of her clothes.
I found it ridiculous and frustrating that even in a golf game there were no realistic female avatars to choose from. It's hard to get into a sports game when you're playing a character who wouldn't be able to see past her boobs if she were real. It makes it harder to suspend disbelief and to feel like you're actually in the game.
I think the kind of over-sexualized images you see in games has a negative effect on society's attitudes towards women, but that doesn't have to be the motivation to change it. If game makers would go with the demand and sell games women want to buy, I think the market would take care of itself. The problem arises when there's a kind of feedback loop: games have so far been mostly targetted toward men, and therefore men are the main consumers, therefore there is little incentive to make them more appealing to women. I suspect there are a lot of guys who would prefer having more realistic women in their fantasy senarios - isn't it more fun to fanasize about something that is potentially possible? - but what do I know...
The first section, on the history of the feminine ideal in western film and TV, got me thinking about other cultures.
Really, what would these writers think of fertility idols? Talk about exaggerated body types and... er... attributes (both male and female).
I initially thought that the reason why the ladies have such overinflated love cushions were to differentiate them from other mass of polygons, the idea that all game developers were under sexed males completely escaped me.
I'm still waiting for the game where the idea is to help a rather blessed big breasted lady walk down the street via the use of the mouse to help her from toppling over.
Network Mirror
:)
What's wrong with big-breasted women? They can be smart too! You just need to make sure you that you enjoy "their views" as well as "the view".
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Why can't women who are intelligent, strong, and powerful in games ALSO be big-breasted?
Though I agree that many games feature perfect/nearly impossible Barbie dolls...they feature a lot of Ken's too. How often is the main guy character a perfectly chiseled muscle man?
Go back to the beginning of the comic book or look at the covers of old pulp fiction novels. Women have generally always been drawn as buxom and willowy, giving off that hint of repressed sexuality just waiting to come out. Guys ate it up and still do. Would Wonder Woman be as big a draw if she were flat-chested? Girls would still like her but guys would look elsewhere for their eye candy.
So now that gaming and the Internet are the places you find hordes of adolescent males, is it any wonder the trend continues? And so Lara Croft picks up where Wonder Woman leaves off. It may be the 21st Century, but some things aren't going to change anytime soon, not without some sort of ground-swell by woman gamers/artists.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Yeah sure, lets go and replace all the male game heroes and Hollywood actors with pale, thin geeks instead of bulky, muscular chick magnets, because surely that's sexist too?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
By "confident enough not to feel threatened" I'm sure they mean ""intelligent enough not to feel threatened".
Just how retarded do you have to be to feel threatened by the shape of a video game character?
Yes, current video game imagery - like 90% of the rest of 'entertainment' is pretty damn sexist in its representation of the genders. However like anything else money goes where the suits think the biggest profit will return from. If they don't believe there's profit to be made from a more balanced view, well that's just part of the trade-off of living in a society where people are allowed to make the games they want to, play and watch what they want to, and think what they want to.
I'd rather live in a society where female video game characters are portrayed the way horny teen males wold have them rather than a society where character designs are dictated to you in the name of equality.
He also highlights several games that, instead of focusing on the female form in its big breasted glory, showcase women who are intelligent, strong, and powerful.
As a male who is being entertained by a game that consists of stealing cars, beating up people, killing them, running them over, getting high, running illegal drugs, and having sex with prostitutes; the addition of intelligent, strong, and powerful women would definitely add to the entertainment factor over a hot chick with big breasts.
Having worked in the games biz for over a decade I am going to share with you all a secret...
The vast majority of people in the games biz have girlfriends, wifes, or other form of sexual partners.
The amount of time spent on the female form in our games? Close to zero.
Yes, the female form is usually idealized in games.
And for that matter, so is the male.
And while we're at it so are zombies, aliens, vehicles, buildings, and just about everything else we stick in a game.
It is appealing for people to want to portray the industry as patethic little dorks masturbating in their cubicles over bouncing breast physics in games and the poor women of the world soldiering on in the face of such behavior in men ready to throw their cash at the games market if the 'little boys would just grow up and be as mature as women'
Too bad it has no realtion to reality.
40 percent of our time is spent thinking about and implementing what we think would be fun.
40 percent of our time is spent thinking about and implementing what we think would look cool.
And 10 percent of our time is spent think about and talking about where we are going to have lunch.
"...intelligent, strong, and powerful..."
Alyx Vance, for example? She was a brilliant scientist who knew her way with a gun and built huge robots for fun. If she is not a strong female character, I don't know who is.
Crow T. Trollbot
I wonder how many guys just clicked that link hoping to see some examples of these over developed women in video games. I sure as hell know I did. :D
"Women who are intelligent, strong, and powerful" typically look somewhat like Roseanne.
Picture your average tough-as-nails, smart-as-hell nerd grrl. What does she look like? Yeah, that's right, she's around as attractive as the average nerd guy.
Not exactly prime material for game characters.
I'm an RPG geek, but in the games I play, members of both genders are typically attractive. Look at Final Fantasy IX, for example. The male lead (Zidane) is a cute bishy boi, and the female lead (Garnet/Dagger) is a cute girl.
Now imagine Final Fantasy IX with a Zidane looking like the goatse guy and a Garnet/Dagger looking like Tubgirl...
And then, for a REAL shudder, imagine if all the Manthra^H^H^H^H^H^H^HMithra running around Vana'diel in Final Fantasy XI looked like their players...
It's entertainment, people. It's fantasy. It's not supposed to represent "average-looking" women-- OR MEN. The day Duke Nukem has a pot belly and is balding, the day Lara Croft has saggy boobs and wrinkles... well, that's the day the VG Cats people take over all the game studios, I guess...
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
here
via this BoingBoing post
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
* Buy bag of chestnuts.
* Submit article to SlashDot including references to both gaming and large-breasted women.
* Include a link to a reasonably low-volume site using database software to serve articles. (Bonus points if attempt to add streaming video.)
* Wait for server to catch fire, then enjoy roasted chestnuts!
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
In case you haven't noticed, the male characters in games are an over exageration of expected masculine characteristics. The muscles are bigger, the hairlines aren't as receded, the player is expected to be something more than a normal man could ever be. The games themselves stereotype men as having to be able to complete the mission and solve the problem to be successful. In real life, failure is an acceptable result, and the games place unrealistic expectations on men.
Of course men are aware the game is an escape from reality, and don't tend to bitch about such things.
Reviews like these paints some women as jealous bitches who can't stand to play or even see a female video game character with qualities they don't find in themselves.
Very very few of the male gamers out there actually look like Duke Nukem or any of the male characters in todays video games. Even Gordon Freemen, an engineer with glasses who should, by that description alone, be at the top of the geek stereotype, is a buff, cut good-looking individual. Do these unrealistic characters drive away the male populace? Not at all. Part of playing a game is escaping from your ordinary life, and this is enhanced by role-playing as a good-looking, visually appealing character. When given the choice, not many choose an ugly avatar for themselves in the game world.
Now, if every game was designed to attract females as well as males, what would female characters look like? There may be some change, but most, especially those that serve as player representations, wouldn't change much, because females like to roleplay too. They like to imagine they are the incredibly fit and attractive heroine, as opposed to an average-looking everyday character. Bust sizes may be a little less top heavy and closer to the realm of believability, but they will still be on the higher end of the scale. Why shouldn't females be allowed to indulge in as much role-pplay and fantasy as the guys?
But what about male characters in games that aren't handsome or fit? Rare, but when used, are often playing a stereotype or primarily comic role. The fat man isn't the hero, he's either a hapless shmoe in need of rescue, or a bungling foe that is easily dispatched. Now, female counterparts to these stereotypes exist in the real world, but we never see them in games. Why? Is it because females are objectified? I argue that this is at least in part because developers have too much respect and/or fear of females in general to throw them into a game. White males, being the "majority" and the de facto "ruling class" are fare game for satire and ridicule, but females are still viewed as the injured "minority", and as such are beyond such blatant stereotyping, one of several Sacred Cows if you will.
I'm not trying to pass any moral judgements here on how people in games shoud be represented (for the most part anyways), just trying to type out my own observations. That's just how I see it so far.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Plus, your argument (that because many popular magazines feature pictures of only certain types of women this means that women value that too) is not logically valid. Economics is driving what's on the magazine, and perhaps there are a subset of women who buy the magazines and like the pictures and spend a lot of money, but a large group of other women don't.
First you say it's not valid, then you say economics (in other words, SALES) is what drives them to do it.
Fashion magazines vastly out-sell female-targeted magazines which feature photos of men. Even in the teen market, YM out-sells Tiger Beat by a long shot. This is simple economics pointing out that women like looking at pretty women.
Or perhaps women buy the magazines for other reasons (informative content) and simply tolerate the images.
If there was any truth to that at all, some ambitious publisher could make a killing by publishing an informative women's magazine which doesn't feature all the ultra-expensive photo-shoots of beautiful models. Apart from "Martha Stuart Living" (which has a promotional agenda outside of sales of the magazine itself), I'm at a loss to think of a magazine which even attempts to do so.
Finally, even if many women do have the attitude that the pictures on the magazines are the ideal of female beauty, does that mean it's all okay? No, not necessarily.
It also doesn't mean that it's not okay.
Can you look like Tyra Banks? Probably not, but by the time you are in your mid-twenties one would hope that you've learned to come to terms with that fact. It actually is possible for you to gawk at how shockingly pretty Adrianna Lima is without turning into a quivering mass of self-loathing every time you look in a mirror. Most well-adjusted womwn learn to do so.
But all this is drifting away from my point. It's a very simple point, which is that sexual imagery in media boils down to one very simple truths:
1. Most men like looking at sexy women.
2. Most women also like looking at sexy women.
The (obvious) lesson here:
Women are pretty.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Me, I play Tauren or Gnome. I hate to think what you'd make of that. I've done an elf and an undead, but not on any kind of a regular basis. Everquest, I went Erudite or Barbarian - and my clothing collection was of armor, not lingerie.
I'm not going to deny that a lot of people do what the people you know do, but I think you'll find the same proportion of girl-who-picks-buxom-redhead to guy-who-picks-muscular-heman. It's an overall tendency to pick a character to project yourself in a way that you perceive would be attractive to others or that is attractive to you. It's all about what you want to get out of the game.
Personally, I think that more people choose their characters based on the personality that they want to project, but then again I do tend to play on roleplaying servers so I get a rather skewed view of the mmorpg population.
(And yes, I'm a real life female.)
~ Leilah
Since when did it become taboo to have sexual feelings?
I enjoy a very close, intimate relationship with my wife. She's very sexy to me, and she finds me sexy as well. And, we're both very comfortable with that.
But, we're both human! When we're in public, it's not uncommon for one of us to notice another member of the opposite sex. We frequently mention it privately to the other, as "Wow, he's hot!" or "Damn, she's got a nice butt!".
See, it's ok. We're all born with the urge to reproduce, and we all find other people attractive, and there's no wrong in that. It would only be wrong if I were to ACT on it with somebody other than my partner - get a phone number, go on a date, whatever.
On the Sci-fi channel, it's typical to see an intelligent, forceful guy as captain, a few, strong, sexy females (in leather!) and a few nerdly guys running around, with a scantily clad warrior, armed with a 6 foot sword.
It's interesting. It's a little exotic. It has a little of something for everyone. And, it's mildly erotic.
People like money. People like travelling. People like sex. Why is it ok to have shows and/or video games with money, or travelling, but not portray a little sexiness? I don't want to stare up poontang, wondering where the cervix is, but, as mouse said, "to deny our basic urges is to deny what makes us human!".
And before you mention "think of the children!", I say this as a father of 5, 3 of whom are teens...
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
Consider this quote:
Naomi Wolf is much more blunt. In her book The Beauty Myth, she argues that this very standard of beauty set forth by the media is the primary mechanism of women's oppression by men. She discusses the "suffering caused by trying to meet the demands of the thin ideal"
This would be a great idea, except that laying this all at the feet of men is more than a bit unfair to me. To be sure, the ideal of feminine beauty that is espoused by male oriented media seems extreme -- until you compare it to the images in female oriented media. The male favored image requires surgery, unconscionable quantities of gym time, fasting, and a soupcon of digital touch up. But it's nothing compared to the gaunt images that women pay to consume.
Of course, can say that it's men who run the media companies that produce these images, and you'd be wrong on two counts. The "Cosmo Girl" was the creation of Helen Gurley Brown, after all. But Ms. Brown's sex is not at issue at all. The point is that women and men who run media companies end up doing much the same thing, because they're driven by the same economic forces. The Cosmo Girl wants to have it all. The reason she wants to have it all is because promoting the ideal of having it all pleases the advertisers; it involves not a little buying.
The reason that media female body image is so unrealistic is simple economics. If scarcity enhances value, then the unobtainable must be perceived as infinitely valuable. For the man, the companies inevitably take the general parameters indicating robust healthy child bearing capability and simply nip and tuck it to the edge of impossibility. You meet a woman who looks like that once in a blue moon, and she's definitely not going to be interested in you. Voila! the unobtainable.
For women, the companies produce an image that is starved (never mind this contradicts the male oriented images). A normal woman's homestatic processes will torture her into sumbission long before she reaches this stage. Voia! once more the unobtainable.
It's not the opression of women by men; at least if it is nobody's ever invited me to the meetings where this is arranged. It's not as personal as that. The problem is the antithesis of that. It's completely impersonal. it's economic and thus about systems and performance metrics and quarterly goals, not anything as personally satisfying as domination I'm afraid. And when the putatively immoral male sex is displaced in a position by the putatively superior female sex, there's bound to be very little difference in results. They're just cogs in the machine either way.
I'm not saying that certain main aren't pigs. But that's just the general tyranny of the stupid who've lucked into a little power.
Another aspect of the economics of beauty is age. In traditional societies, age is respected, because it is rare to obtain. In a modern consumer society it's devalued. From an individual's perspective, youth is something that slips away irretrievably but age is something he is very likely to count on a steadily increasing supply of.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
This psychoanalysis of popular culture is really grating. If you're shallow enough to define yourself based on pop-culture, you're every bit the female stereotype that you're rebelling against. If you aren't, then why do you care?
Everybody deals with their stereotype, except perhaps those who are actual models of that stereotype. For example, there are about as many Muslims as Jews in the United States (~5m). When was the last time you saw a Muslim on TV just playing a regular role, that didn't have anything specifically to do with them being Muslim? In contrast, Jews are all over the place, in many roles where (gasp!) you're not even made aware that they're Jewish! There are over 1.5m Indians in the United States. A lot of them are second-generation. When was the last time you saw in Indian on TV that spoke unaccented English? I am an Indian (well, Bengali), who speaks without an accent (I've been here since I was five), and M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs" cameo was weird even for me!
So what's my point here? Everybody is stereotyped in pop culture. Pop culture is superficial by its very nature! The portrayal of people in popular culture is more or less irrelevent. If women are dissatisfied by their place in the world, only they can change it. Yes, there are still boundaries, and yes, those must be broken down, but the bottleneck to womens' advancement today is in many cases women themselves. Consider, for example, higher education. There is an enormous dearth of women in the "hard sciences" and in engineering. Who can be blamed for this state of affairs? Men? Male students have little control over admissions, and male administrators are falling over themselves trying to increase female enrollment. The opportunities are there, yet a female is still a rare sight on an engineering campus. Why? Simply put: because females aren't interested! Women, it appears, don't want to be engineers or scientists or mathematicians, or even philosophers, or historians, or economists, for that matter. These are the professions in which people are respected for their mind. If women don't enter these professions, despite the opportunities available to them, how can they expect to be respected for their intellectual capabilities?
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...