Female characters

[Venks]

Really good video. I completely agree that having female npc characters as objectives in the game doesn't make the game's developers misogynistic or mean that it'll make the game's players misogynistic. What it tends to do is create a very shallow, uninteresting story. There needs to be reasons behind these actions.

For example in Super Mario Sunshine Princess Peach isn't 'captured' in the usual way. Baby Bowser thinks that Princess Peach is his mother and that Mario is the bad guy keeping the two of them apart. This explanation made the story very interesting to me and gave me true motivation to see the story to the end. I wanted to know how Baby Bowser came to think of Peach as his mother and what Bowser would have to say about all of this. I really enjoyed the ending of this game.

Then we have Super Mario 3D World. In this game we finally once again have Princess Peach as a playable character, BUT her 'get kidnapped by Bowser' position is replaced by some random character. There's no spoken dialogue what so ever to explain the story. Some pictures are displayed and it seems Bowser is kidnapping pixies and putting them in bottles. Sadly enough I don't think this is a ironic look at Link's behavior in the Zelda series. To me this is simply a hastily created story to create an excuse for the adventure's purpose.

Now when it comes to games, especially Nintendo games, I'm generally playing them for the merits of their gameplay more then their story. But that doesn't mean I do not want a more engaging world. Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee is one of my all time favorite games and I feel that the title's greatest strengths are its atmosphere and story telling. The objectives in that game are your enslaved race and the story you see as you progress through the game makes you emphasize with them. Story-telling can be a very powerful tool in a game developer's kit and I think it is a terrible shame that it is generally the most under utilized tool of them all.

 

[CRogers]

Equating feminism - a movement to ensure equality between the sexes - to bigotry such as racism, means you're not suitable to be in this thread. Don't post in here anymore

I find this an inappropriate comment from a moderator; especially given your comment over a month ago

Luckily, this is changing the more we have these kind of discussions.

Saying that the way to change viewpoints is via discussion, then saying someone can't post here because he disagrees with your/the definition of feminism is inappropriate. Whether he is right or not (I disagree with him, sometimes because of his brashness and phrasing) is irrelevant and hard to say (it depends on who gets to define ~isms and how broadly that definition can go, and whether it is just defined off of ideals or the perception of results). He has a right to critique, even attack, 'feminism' and perceptions of the world.

Now it may be the position of this forum that we shouldn't discuss any issue that is likely to cause offense (political theory, religion, etc.). I'd understand that point, and it may even fall under the heading of rule 4 (don't make members too uncomfortable), but if that is true, let's not pretend we're having a discussion.

Now, to be on topic:

More than anything, the unpractical and unjustified nature of armour and clothes on female characters in games annoys me 

There have been a number of comments like this in the thread and it is a fine problem to have with a game, but isn't the problem the realism and not the sexualization? Would it be better if the game was a sci-fi world where everyone was protected by laser shields and the men wore 'normal' clothes, while the women wore bikinis?

 

[Andar]

Bottom line is in my opinion is that feminism is just as bad as racism and bigotry in the fact that they all require ignorance and narrow-mindedness.

Equating feminism - a movement to ensure equality between the sexes - to bigotry such as racism, means you're not suitable to be in this thread. Don't post in here anymore.

I find this an inappropriate comment from a moderator; especially given your comment over a month ago

No. it's not.
I agree with Aceri in so far as there are some people who take feminism to a distance that they should have their brains examined, but those are onle some people, not everyone talking or working about feminism. There are problems with gender equality, and while several of the feminists are more interested in getting their due instead of true equality between genders, there still are problems in that area that are valid and should not be ignored.


To equal the entire movement with racism - a topic that has absolutely nothing that can be considered valid points - is over the top in my opinion. Because pro-racist-arguements are complete <censored>, but there are true problems with gender equality that should be adressed. And that means that Feminism needs to be discussed, while racism is beyond discussion.


And while Cel sometimes has a tendency to write harsh sentences ;-), that doesn't change the fact that topics such as this need to be heavily moderated - you're forgetting that this is an official forum by a company, not some private fan site. Which means that there are more laws to be considered than just freedom of speech.


And I'm with Cel in so far as that's better to err on the safe side and restrict extreme opinions in such discussions than to risk a lawsuit against Degica because someone equals an opinion placed in this forum with sentences from the forum's owning company.

 

[Sneakaboo]

In the end it boils down to cultural differences and barking up the wrong tree, well depending on what you are trying to achieve.

Now when a special interest group is starting about a game let's say Dragons Crown ,the media will be on it.

For Western standards this can be quite controversial.

If the game is being Published by a western company they will have to deal with a lot of claims.

In some cases this might hurt their sales, or put a dent in their image.

Some publishers could consider avoiding high risk titles because of this.

Now most games in question are Japanese, usually when people target these games they say 'The game industry'.

Basically dismissing the whole cultural aspect.

If these type of  game sell in Japan they won't change them for the West, they will just withdraw.

This goes especially for the smaller developers.

You can see this already with the JRPG, less and less.

Games like Xenoblade barely make it over.

Thus if you want to impose your morals as a feminist on the gaming industry you should start with the Japanese.

Since most games feminist have problems with are made in Japan.

This you don't do by trying to put pressure on western publishers.

Other wise all you really achieve is that games are not being published here, basically trying to achieve censorship for games that aren't fitting in your moral spectrum.

That and your special interest group might be tossed on a big pile.

That aside Japanese aren't so well know with other cultures or how to portray them.

People in Europe get culture shocks when moving to another country with in Europe.

Now ask an xenophobic country like Japan to understand 'western' morals and cultures.

Now as a gamer I tend to toss special interest groups on one big pile, and rather ignore them or see them gone when it comes to gaming.

I rather have a game like Dragons Crown come out than it being censored.

Selfish perhaps but in the end I care more about the games and freedom of art than people their morals.

Even with loli games I think there should be freedom, even though I think they are distasteful.

Then again I don't believe in  'video games makes you violent or video games makes you a pedo'.

 

[Venks]

To equal the entire movement with racism - a topic that has absolutely nothing that can be considered valid points - is over the top in my opinion. Because pro-racist-arguements are complete <censored>, but there are true problems with gender equality that should be adressed. And that means that Feminism needs to be discussed, while racism is beyond discussion.

Given the context of Aceri's post I think he meant to say sexism, not feminism. And that all hate stemming from ignorance is bad. At least that's what I got from it.

I'm an African American gamer myself and I have to say we don't have much going for us when it comes to the game industry either. It's an awful shame that having the option to have dark skin is something you still don't see in a lot of games. There are definitely a few western RPGs I'm not particularly happy with because in order to have my own skin color in game I have to either be a dark elf or an orc. And then there are games that actually have a black protagonist, but I always have to be from the 'streets' or something to that effect.

I don't think any of this comes from hate or racism. As I said in my earlier post I think a lot of these decisions are formed due to poor story writing. When using stereotypes to quickly throw together a story you're gonna find a game with the only girl in it being kidnapped and the only dark-skinned character an evil mid-boss. I think the thing we really need to fight for in this growing medium is higher quality story telling.

 

[CRogers]

To equal the entire movement with racism - a topic that has absolutely nothing that can be considered valid points - is over the top in my opinion. Because pro-racist-arguements are complete <censored>, but there are true problems with gender equality that should be adressed. And that means that Feminism needs to be discussed, while racism is beyond discussion.

I don't think that was what Aceri was saying. Venks provided one possibility; another is that any movement or ideology that tries to address inequalities in the system by singling out disadvantaged groups for protection/special treatment is in in of itself wrong because it continues the pattern of identifying people not by their individuality or general humanity, but a gender; subsequently the moral basis and assumptions are as bad as bigotry and racism, even if the consequences are far different (something I agree with generally, but there are numerous exceptions that prevent it from being an absolute).

That then can lead into a whole discussion about what 'feminism' is and how the ideology advocates accomplishing its goals. It also gets into how we define 'equality' (opportunity vs. result, usually) and likely a lot of argument over people having very different perceptions of the world.

Or, he could have had a totally different point, but we're just guessing at the moment because he was asked to abstain from posting in the thread, not asked to explain how he defined feminism. He may have crossed a line in the future (by becoming directly insulting), but that doesn't mean he should get shut down before that.

you're forgetting that this is an official forum by a company, not some private fan site.

No, I brought this up, I even highlighted the rule under which it might fall under. If that is the standard I perfectly understand the reason why, but let's just be clear about that. If the thread should be limited to 'writing a female character this way will result in X from Y market, while doing A will result in B, but personally I think approach C is best' while we completely avoid any discussions about the origins of views, moral responsibility of artists/industry, and how entertainment is shaped by while also shaping culture, okay, no problem. But everyone should be limited to such terms, or we're not having a discussion.

 

[Celianna]

Back on topic, we are not discussing anything political here, and what a member meant or didn't mean. Remember this IS a heavily moderated topic and members will be asked to stop posting if it seems they will escalate the topic into a flamewar.

 

[Kurisu]

I took someone's advice to heart that "well-written character can be of any gender without that having any big impact on the story" and after few slight changes the main protagonist of my game is now female

 

[Clareain_Christopher]

@Kurisu

It's a good start, but we don't always have to write gender neutral characters. Check out this video.

There's also this somewhat off-topic, obscure, but very professional video. It talks about male gaze, and how the media exploits depictions of tropes - like overly sexualized women - in order to do well in the box office. It sort of comes down to the question of how can we create a world that can't exploit the lowest common denominator for money.

 

[Xortberg]

I love that Extra Credits video entirely too much. Bookmarking for future reference.

 

[Makio-Kuta]

Those were good videos. That second one really put to word the reasons I never watched past the first Transformers movie-- I couldn't stand that lead character. haha


The Extra Credit one really brings to light some of the things that were being discussed off and on in this thread. The whole idea of creating a good female character VS creating a good character and whether or not Gender Neutral is the right or only way to go. Societal pressures are an important aspect that doesn't get touched on enough. Or experimented with enough. In games with a fictional world there should be more exploration in changing what that fictional societies pressures are. It could make for a really interesting setting if gender based assumptions and norms were flipped on their heads and backwards from what the player expects they'll be walking into. Could certainly make for some powerful statements too.

 

[Ksi]

So, has anyone here heard of the Hawkeye Initiative? If not, check this out... (I should add that some of the pictures in this link are NSFW or Kids)

The basic idea behind it was the way comic book artists drew their female characters in impossibly sexy (and sexist) angles, while the men weren't. Someone went and redrew a picture to illustrate a point, using Hawkeye as the character to show how ridiculous it was and thus, an initiative was born. I highly recommend checking it out if you're in need of a good laugh or don't think womens' poses in comic books and movies are ridiculous and highly suggestive.

Hell, there's this one picture with the Avengers where the men all strike the same pose as the woman and she as them. It's quite the eye-brow raiser.

Things like this count a lot in games, too. Think of the cover art of a lot of games where the woman is always in supplication to the man - who towers over her protectively. There's been progress made on this front, but there are still games where the male characters are shown in prominence while the women are delegated to background shots instead.

 

[Makio-Kuta]

That link doesn't work for me. *disappoint* I got it to work. Just as hilarious as I had hoped. Female depiction in superhero comics...ughhhhh Would have been interesting to see the tables turned.


Whenever I think about female representation on the covers of things, I think of books before I think of games. Dear me, all those silly books with women like...hanging off the dude half clothed while he stands there in a position of power. I know movies were bad for that too. A couple games do come to mind though. :s :s :s That was such a popular imagery it's pretty cliched and I'm glad that that trend has lessened.

 

[Omnimental]

The Hawkeye Initiative is hilarious.