Another thing about female game characters...

[Hides His Eyes]

To the two or three people who have said they are more concerned with characterisation and dialogue than with stances and outfits: as I said before, yes, so am I. But the high heels and bikinis and sexy strutting just put the icing on the lazy-stereotype-overfamiliar-and-frankly-insulting cake. And they would be so easy to change.

As for Christie from Tekken, she stands and moves exactly the same way as Eddie because she's not a new character, she's a new skin for an existing one.

I'll retract the part where I said it's absolutely every female character though. You're right, there are exceptions. But there are still waaaaay too many that do it.

 

[Realitycrash]

Outfits suffer from the same problem. There's nothing wrong with women wearing high heels, but during a fight? Or dangerous adventure in some wilderness or dungeon?

Tifa from FF7, except having ridiculously large breasts, actually wore tennis-shoes, thaiboxing-gloves (or close enough), fought with her bare hands and held a decent fighting stance.


(And how DID Yufi get there?)

 

[Hides His Eyes]

As a female gamer it pisses me off sometimes but what can you do? Characters like Ivy (Soul Cal), for example, just make me shudder and smack my head in shame because that's how a lot of women are portrayed in video games. I rarely see a female character NOT wearing a low cut t-shirt or her boobs hanging out, but that's not to say every game does it.

Yes, Ivy was one of the ones I had in mind. It's the combination of her ludicrously oversized boobs, her skimpy outfit and the fact that she holds her sword down by her knee and I should be able to hit her very easily before she can block, but I can't. She's damn hard It's insulting gender stereotype, lack of martial arts-related realism and unreasonably hard gameplay all in one place. That's why it makes me so cross, I think.

 

[Hides His Eyes]

Outfits suffer from the same problem. There's nothing wrong with women wearing high heels, but during a fight? Or dangerous adventure in some wilderness or dungeon?

Tifa from FF7, except having ridiculously large breasts, actually wore tennis-shoes, boxing-gloves, fought with her bare hands and held a decent fighting stance.

(And how DID Yufi get there?)

Well, Final Fantasy VII is an exception, as it is to so many rules of mediocrity in games

 

[Mallefunction]

Look, until people tell the devs that they want better female characters, they are just going to keep giving us fanservice. As a woman, I personally hate it. I love playing as both male and female characters, but I almost always choose male just so I don't have to stare at some *****'s thong clad ass the entire game.

Say what you want about the men being just as unrealistic, at least they get CLOTHES.

 

[Realitycrash]

Outfits suffer from the same problem. There's nothing wrong with women wearing high heels, but during a fight? Or dangerous adventure in some wilderness or dungeon?

Tifa from FF7, except having ridiculously large breasts, actually wore tennis-shoes, boxing-gloves, fought with her bare hands and held a decent fighting stance.

(And how DID Yufi get there?)

Well, Final Fantasy VII is an exception, as it is to so many rules of mediocrity in games

Guessing Chrono Trigger is as well then?

It strikes me that many females in games have these stances because more often than not, they are magic users, and have this "aloof and above mortals"-attribute and feel about them. And honestly, if I could wield the fires of hell and heal myself from any wound, I'd be standing there laughing at my foes as well.

 

[Realitycrash]

Look, until people tell the devs that they want better female characters, they are just going to keep giving us fanservice. As a woman, I personally hate it. I love playing as both male and female characters, but I almost always choose male just so I don't have to stare at some *****'s thong clad ass the entire game.

As a man, this is pretty much one of the reasons I usually avoid playing females in non-Bioware RPGs and other games. I find them far too silly and far too distracting. It's like trying to play Soul Calibur as Ivy.

I mean..Uh..It's like...Wait, what was I doing now again?

Oh, right. Distraction.

 

[FuzzyRaccoon]

Outfits suffer from the same problem. There's nothing wrong with women wearing high heels, but during a fight? Or dangerous adventure in some wilderness or dungeon?

Tifa from FF7, except having ridiculously large breasts, actually wore tennis-shoes, boxing-gloves, fought with her bare hands and held a decent fighting stance.

(And how DID Yufi get there?)

Well, Final Fantasy VII is an exception, as it is to so many rules of mediocrity in games

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!
Final Fantasy is an exception, not the rule?

Tifa from FF7 isn't wearing a bra, if she is, it's magical and somehow doesn't show. Her skirt is soooo constricting and her boobs should be moving in opposite directions. Her hair is too damn long and it's loose, there's no way that wouldn't get in that way in a fight!

Lulu from FF10, her boobs are popping out of her shirt, her dress makes no sense and leaves nothing to the imagination.

Fran from FF12, who is admittedly a character I actually like, wears craazy high heels, her outfit also leaves nothing to the imagination. Her bunny people all seem to be wearing lingire when you meet them.


Even if we move away from costumes, in FF13 they sort of had to make Lightning out to be asexual, as if a woman needs to be ultra feminine or she can't be viewed as a woman at all.

Even the entire idea of female characters always being supporting positions like archers and healers. Final Fantasy characters are RIFE with this issue. In the FF13-2 cover GI did, it was stated that Sarah would use a sword at the very beginning of the game, but later would use a bow to "preserve her femininity".

Or you can look at the RIDICULOUS way that Garnet from FF9, or Vanille from FF13 moved, throwing their fists from side to side, basically skipping everywhere.

In other words, sorry if this is a little off topic... but please don't pretend that Final Fantasy isn't entrenched in these kinds of hypersexual values.
:/

 

[DementedSheep]

Yeah its something I don't like either. I also don't like how the vast majority of woman who fight in games, flip around the place and do tricks with tech or magic rather than fighting normally. Maybe it?s kind of a fall back on the whole woman are always rouge or mage stereotype.
Having the chick in high heels and tight clothing who flips around or uses magic and poses now and then is not inherently bad assuming we are talking about an OTT style game but its annoyingly common and silly.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Look, until people tell the devs that they want better female characters, they are just going to keep giving us fanservice. As a woman, I personally hate it. I love playing as both male and female characters, but I almost always choose male just so I don't have to stare at some *****'s thong clad ass the entire game.

As a man, this is pretty much one of the reasons I usually avoid playing females in non-Bioware RPGs and other games. I find them far too silly and far too distracting. It's like trying to play Soul Calibur as Ivy.

I mean..Uh..It's like...Wait, what was I doing now again?

Oh, right. Distraction.

Even Bioware's pretty bad - Morrigan, Miranda, etc.

But holy shit, Ivy. Everything that's wrong with female character design in video games in one package. Although hopefully based on Hilde's reception the Soul Calibur people will catch on to the fact that people will like playing female characters even if they aren't designed as sex objects.

 

[Realitycrash]

Look, until people tell the devs that they want better female characters, they are just going to keep giving us fanservice. As a woman, I personally hate it. I love playing as both male and female characters, but I almost always choose male just so I don't have to stare at some *****'s thong clad ass the entire game.

As a man, this is pretty much one of the reasons I usually avoid playing females in non-Bioware RPGs and other games. I find them far too silly and far too distracting. It's like trying to play Soul Calibur as Ivy.

I mean..Uh..It's like...Wait, what was I doing now again?

Oh, right. Distraction.

Even Bioware's pretty bad - Morrigan, Miranda, etc.

But holy shit, Ivy. Everything that's wrong with female character design in video games in one package. Although hopefully based on Hilde's reception the Soul Calibur people will catch on to the fact that people will like playing female characters even if they aren't designed as sex objects.

Morrigan had a decent fighting-stance for a Mage, and Miranda wear whatever armor you give her, and has a decent stance for an archer. What's the problem?

Ivy is pretty bad, yeah, though it annoys me that people seem to forget that men are portrayed almost as bad. Take Maxi from Soul Calibur, for instance. He has long, perfect hair and a ripped body full of muscle, all portrayed like he's some sort of underwear model. Is he any better?

 

[Realitycrash]

Outfits suffer from the same problem. There's nothing wrong with women wearing high heels, but during a fight? Or dangerous adventure in some wilderness or dungeon?

Tifa from FF7, except having ridiculously large breasts, actually wore tennis-shoes, boxing-gloves, fought with her bare hands and held a decent fighting stance.

(And how DID Yufi get there?)

Well, Final Fantasy VII is an exception, as it is to so many rules of mediocrity in games

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!
Final Fantasy is an exception, not the rule?

Tifa from FF7 isn't wearing a bra, if she is, it's magical and somehow doesn't show. Her skirt is soooo constricting and her boobs should be moving in opposite directions. Her hair is too damn long and it's loose, there's no way that wouldn't get in that way in a fight!

In other words, sorry if this is a little off topic... but please don't pretend that Final Fantasy isn't entrenched in these kinds of hypersexual values.
:/

Dude, this wasn't about hypersexual values, it was about how women were portrayed while fighting. Noone is claiming Tifa wasn't oversexualised, just that she had an okey fighting-stance and clothes (technically, a short skirt if it is not too tight is more practical to fight in than a long skirt). If you want to nitpick reality on "that's not practical", we can nuke both male and female.

 

[FuzzyRaccoon]

Dude, this wasn't about hypersexual values, it was about how women were portrayed while fighting. Noone is claiming Tifa wasn't oversexualised, just that she had an okey fighting-stance and clothes (technically, a short skirt if it is not too tight is more practical to fight in than a long skirt). If you want to nitpick reality on "that's not practical", we can nuke both male and female.

Yeaaaah, I tried to edit that entry when I realized that I read his statement wrong and pretty much admitted that I moved off topic and was ranting... but it didn't go through and I was too lazy to try again.
x3.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Look, until people tell the devs that they want better female characters, they are just going to keep giving us fanservice. As a woman, I personally hate it. I love playing as both male and female characters, but I almost always choose male just so I don't have to stare at some *****'s thong clad ass the entire game.

As a man, this is pretty much one of the reasons I usually avoid playing females in non-Bioware RPGs and other games. I find them far too silly and far too distracting. It's like trying to play Soul Calibur as Ivy.

I mean..Uh..It's like...Wait, what was I doing now again?

Oh, right. Distraction.

Even Bioware's pretty bad - Morrigan, Miranda, etc.

But holy shit, Ivy. Everything that's wrong with female character design in video games in one package. Although hopefully based on Hilde's reception the Soul Calibur people will catch on to the fact that people will like playing female characters even if they aren't designed as sex objects.

Morrigan was a decent fighting-stance for a Mage, and Miranda wear whatever armor you give her, and has a decent stance for an archer. What's the problem?

Ivy is pretty bad, yeah, though it annoys me that people seem to forget that men are portrayed almost as bad. Take Maxi from Soul Calibur, for instance. He has long, perfect hair and a ripped body full of muscle, all portrayed like he's some sort of underwear model. Is he any better?

Well, Morrigan is mostly an issue re: character design - she's about one sneeze away from a catastrophic wardrobe malfunction.

My opinion about Miranda in a nutshell:

And re: the question of males vs. females in Soul Calibur games being designed as sex objects, you can make a very good case it's a question of intent. Males, when they wear less clothing, generally do so to show how strong they are [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/0f/Astaroth01.png] - sexualization is incidental vs. the goal of the character design. You could make a case that Maxi and Killik are borderline, though.

EDIT: Oh, and I forgot Voldo and his gimp suit. Although the fact that he's played for creepiness and Ivy's played for sex appeal is pretty telling, no?

 

[JediMB]

Or you can look at the RIDICULOUS way that Garnet from FF9, or Vanille from FF13 moved, throwing their fists from side to side, basically skipping everywhere.

I will admit, I giggled quite a lot during the sections of FFIX where Garnet/Dagger was the party leader. The running animation was just so silly-looking.

That said, I still liked the character enough that I would do the level-grinding necessary to use her summons before the plot unlocked them for you. That felt fairly badass.

 

[Hides His Eyes]

Yeah its something I don't like either. I also don't like how the vast majority of woman who fight in games, flip around the place and do tricks with tech or magic rather than fighting normally. Maybe it?s kind of a fall back on the whole woman are always rouge or mage stereotype.

Yep, that is another thing that irritates the hell out of me.

Thanks for the responses everyone, this has turned into a really interesting discussion.

 

[Realitycrash]

Look, until people tell the devs that they want better female characters, they are just going to keep giving us fanservice. As a woman, I personally hate it. I love playing as both male and female characters, but I almost always choose male just so I don't have to stare at some *****'s thong clad ass the entire game.

As a man, this is pretty much one of the reasons I usually avoid playing females in non-Bioware RPGs and other games. I find them far too silly and far too distracting. It's like trying to play Soul Calibur as Ivy.

I mean..Uh..It's like...Wait, what was I doing now again?

Oh, right. Distraction.

Even Bioware's pretty bad - Morrigan, Miranda, etc.

But holy shit, Ivy. Everything that's wrong with female character design in video games in one package. Although hopefully based on Hilde's reception the Soul Calibur people will catch on to the fact that people will like playing female characters even if they aren't designed as sex objects.

Morrigan was a decent fighting-stance for a Mage, and Miranda wear whatever armor you give her, and has a decent stance for an archer. What's the problem?

Ivy is pretty bad, yeah, though it annoys me that people seem to forget that men are portrayed almost as bad. Take Maxi from Soul Calibur, for instance. He has long, perfect hair and a ripped body full of muscle, all portrayed like he's some sort of underwear model. Is he any better?

Well, Morrigan is mostly an issue re: character design - she's about one sneeze away from a catastrophic wardrobe malfunction.

My opinion about Miranda in a nutshell:

And re: the question of males vs. females in Soul Calibur games being designed as sex objects, you can make a very good case it's a question of intent. Males, when they wear less clothing, generally do so to show how strong they are [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/0f/Astaroth01.png] - sexualization is incidental vs. the goal of the character design. You could make a case that Maxi and Killik are borderline, though.

EDIT: Oh, and I forgot Voldo and his gimp suit. Although the fact that he's played for creepiness and Ivy's played for sex appeal is pretty telling, no?

Wardrobe-malfunction or not, she's a mage, and mages tend to wear silly clothes. You could give her whatever clothes you wanted, you know. And she's a shapeshifter, so she usually doesn't spend all her time as a human, making her ignore somewhat what she wears (or so I figure).

Miranda has a tight, slim outfit that looks a bit silly compared to the armor the males get, sure, but I'v seen far worse in space-games.

Yeah, but strenght and bodymass-muscles is how the western world usually vies male sex-appeal. Astaroth is an exception, as he is a monster, but otherwise you can get any of the male protagonists (Muzugi-crap-forgot-his-name, Nightmare, Sigfried, etc) half-naked and show their ripped body and perfect facial-features and hair without any armor.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Wardrobe-malfunction or not, she's a mage, and mages tend to wear silly clothes. You could give her whatever clothes you wanted, you know. And she's a shapeshifter, so she usually doesn't spend all her time as a human, making her ignore somewhat what she wears (or so I figure).

Miranda has a tight, slim outfit that looks a bit silly compared to the armor the males get, sure, but I'v seen far worse in space-games.

Yeah, but strenght and bodymass-muscles is how the western world usually vies male sex-appeal. Astaroth is an exception, as he is a monster, but otherwise you can get any of the male protagonists (Muzugi-crap-forgot-his-name, Nightmare, Sigfried, etc) half-naked and show their ripped body and perfect facial-features and hair without any armor.

See, those are just excuses for Bioware, IMO. If they didn't want to design Morrigan as a sex object, they should have designed her with clothes that someone might actually wear. Same with Miranda, and there's really no excuse for the gratuitous ass shots there, either.

The issue with the muscle mass is that the sex appeal from muscles is incidental - the concept behind, say, Kratos was not "let's give him big muscles so women will love him," it was "let's give him big muscles so he looks strong." The sex appeal for Ivy, on the other hand, is the purpose of the character design.

 

[Mordwyl]

The problem generally stems from a decision that the game requires a female character. If a character happens to be female without it being her defining feature it tends to get taken more seriously both in appearance and personality. A few examples that come to mind:

Spoiler: Agrias Oaks (Final Fantasy Tactics)

Spoiler: Sylvanas Windrunner (Warcraft)

Spoiler: Naija (Aquaria)

 

[Realitycrash]

Wardrobe-malfunction or not, she's a mage, and mages tend to wear silly clothes. You could give her whatever clothes you wanted, you know. And she's a shapeshifter, so she usually doesn't spend all her time as a human, making her ignore somewhat what she wears (or so I figure).

Miranda has a tight, slim outfit that looks a bit silly compared to the armor the males get, sure, but I'v seen far worse in space-games.

Yeah, but strenght and bodymass-muscles is how the western world usually vies male sex-appeal. Astaroth is an exception, as he is a monster, but otherwise you can get any of the male protagonists (Muzugi-crap-forgot-his-name, Nightmare, Sigfried, etc) half-naked and show their ripped body and perfect facial-features and hair without any armor.

See, those are just excuses for Bioware, IMO. If they didn't want to design Morrigan as a sex object, they should have designed her with clothes that someone might actually wear. Same with Miranda, and there's really no excuse for the gratuitous ass shots there, either.

The issue with the muscle mass is that the sex appeal from muscles is incidental - the concept behind, say, Kratos was not "let's give him big muscles so women will love him," it was "let's give him big muscles so he looks strong." The sex appeal for Ivy, on the other hand, is the purpose of the character design.

Eh, Morrigan has some pretty decent clothing, really. It doesn't reveal too much, she doesn't have a huge cleavage and she has pants!

Incidental or not, it is there. And it bugs the crap out of me at times. I eat nothing but healthy food and I work out four days a week, and have been for a long time. I sure as hell am not sporting the same kind of muscles as those guys are.
I'm aware that we are supposed to be playing idealized concepts, but it's equally crappy for both sexes. Atleast in this instance. There are endless examples of other games were women got it worse, especially when it comes to outfits.
Men, though, always tend to be the rugged-yet-handsome muscle-ripped supermen that we normal people can only become in our dreams. So don't say men aren't treated as objects too.