Best Written Female character in Gaming?

[Lugbzurg]

Just yesterday, I was poking around through The Legend of Zelda series, as I am relatively-new to it, and I started looking at the recent release, Twilight Princess. I got something to say. Midna is adorable! She's very expressive and seems rather honest; telling it like it is. Of course, I haven't gotten to actually play the game yet, so my description may not hold complete accuracy.

There's also Kazooie. I particularly liked how she was in the original Banjo-Kazooie. When she spoke, it was often hilarious. However, in Banjo-Tooie, it got much more cruel and totally not funny. It was getting cringe-worthy and embarrassing. So, that takes some points off for me.

Also, I find it really stupid that Alix Vance is somehow on some lists. She's a rather bad character. She has barely any personality, especially compared to the less-important NPCs, and she exists almost purely to make the player feel good about himself. AI is good, but as an actual character... she's kind of insulting, and is more on the level of a "get back to the kitchen" type of female character.

 

[soren7550]

Shepard from Mass Effect, voiced by Jennifer Hale. IMO she worked well because she had the exact same lines (mostly) as maleShep and so was not given any sort of stereotypical female quirks that so many other female characters get saddled with in movies and games.

Also did I mention she was voiced by Jennifer Hale?

This pretty much.

This may be cheating, since Shepard was written to be both male and female, but she's about all I can think of. She pretty much isn't treated any differently than a male Shep would, and she doesn't really act any different as well.

 

[shrekfan246]

I'm going to stick with the same answer I chose last time.

She is one of the primary antagonists your entire way through the game, and yet you never feel like she's flat-out against you, and you can tell that she almost regrets being on the opposing side. You feel sorry for her, yet understand her circumstances and can see why she does what she does. And it all leads up to the final encounter, which was just so well done, not to mention the absolutely devastating cut-scenes that follow.

Thats a lot of stuff to feel for about...


Um...


Man, I will never understand why people cant bother to name the character/series they are talking about in those kind of threads. I am guessing it is metal gear but it took a good 3 mins to guess it right.

Captcha: School is cool. Who the fuck did make me write that man, its cruel.


OP: Ok, I guess my vote goes to Jade (Beyond good and evil) Simply because she is like the only one female main character in a game that I personally played. LOL. Thats so funny and somewhat sad at the same time...

EDIT: Oh wait that actually isnt true because theres Faith and Chell too... Well with the personality they both have they may as well not count at all.


EDIT 2: before some comments on it, I know the thread isnt asking necesarily for main female characters but it just so happens that usually only those can have a little chance to be a good character. Well IMO anyways. To be fair this applies to the vast majory of the characters in general, I mainly rememeber the protagonists of the games I played, the rest usually gets somewhat forgoten xD

Well, generally speaking a lot of people don't actually care enough to read through a bunch of posts before adding their own input, I've found. But yes, it's The Boss from Metal Gear Solid 3.

 

[aguspal]

I'm going to stick with the same answer I chose last time.

She is one of the primary antagonists your entire way through the game, and yet you never feel like she's flat-out against you, and you can tell that she almost regrets being on the opposing side. You feel sorry for her, yet understand her circumstances and can see why she does what she does. And it all leads up to the final encounter, which was just so well done, not to mention the absolutely devastating cut-scenes that follow.

Thats a lot of stuff to feel for about...


Um...


Man, I will never understand why people cant bother to name the character/series they are talking about in those kind of threads. I am guessing it is metal gear but it took a good 3 mins to guess it right.

Captcha: School is cool. Who the fuck did make me write that man, its cruel.


OP: Ok, I guess my vote goes to Jade (Beyond good and evil) Simply because she is like the only one female main character in a game that I personally played. LOL. Thats so funny and somewhat sad at the same time...

EDIT: Oh wait that actually isnt true because theres Faith and Chell too... Well with the personality they both have they may as well not count at all.


EDIT 2: before some comments on it, I know the thread isnt asking necesarily for main female characters but it just so happens that usually only those can have a little chance to be a good character. Well IMO anyways. To be fair this applies to the vast majory of the characters in general, I mainly rememeber the protagonists of the games I played, the rest usually gets somewhat forgoten xD

Well, generally speaking a lot of people don't actually care enough to read through a bunch of posts before adding their own input, I've found. But yes, it's The Boss from Metal Gear Solid 3.

Yeah thats kinda true, but when you are like me and are bored and dont have anything better to do (and the thread is worth a reading), I like to read all the thread if possible...


Well... with the exception of that one thread about old games that people dont rememeber their name or something like that... 100+ pages. Not even I can read all of that, lol.

 

[axlryder]

I haven't found very many female characters that I like in video games who have a lot of dialogue or are strongly identifiable beyond physical appearance, but I'd probably go with Jade, despite feeling like the game kind of jumped the shark at the very end.

That said, there are quite a few characters who I like in games that happen to be female. Marina from Mischief makers (though she did get a fair bit of dialogue), Samus from not Other M, the Journey protagonists as I viewed them as primarily female based on physical characteristics.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

I haven't found very many female characters that I like in video games, but I'd probably go with Jade, despite feeling like the game kind of jumped the shark at the very end.

Given all the boat sequences you might very literally have jumped a few sharks.

 

[DragonKhan95]

Aveline Vallen - Dragon Age 2
Easily one if the finest female characters in gaming.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

I've always wondered why nobody ever mentions Kreia when these conversations crop up. When she is mentioned, it's only ever by one or two people. Part of me is thinking a lot of gamers subconciously overlook Kreia because she's old and unattractive, but the part of me that still has some faith in humanity doesn't want that to be the case...

I can quite honestly say that the reason I don't include Kreia has nothing at all to do with her looks. Not in any way, shape, or form.

No, the reason I don't include Kreia is because I never played KOTOR2.

 

[Facing The Plastic]

Hammer from Fable II was a pretty in depth character I thought.

 

[RandV80]

1. April Ryan (The Longest Journey)

I have to agree with this wholeheartedly. April Ryan literally *is* the game. In terms of actual gameplay Longest Journey is crap. The story is interesting, but not spectacular. Visuals interesting, but far from good enough to hold the game up on their own especially now when they're all shitty low res.

No, you play the game for April Ryan. Her character and story arc are what drives the entire experience and I can't think of a single other game that quite compares.

Not to mention the transformation she goes through in the sequel, Dreamfall. And speaking of Dreamfall Zoe Castillo is a great protege follow up as another legitimate great female character.

 

[TheFederation]

Clementine from the walking dead. it's one of the first times I did something in a game, not because the game told me to, but because i was scared for this character

 

[DioWallachia]

I've always wondered why nobody ever mentions Kreia when these conversations crop up. When she is mentioned, it's only ever by one or two people. Part of me is thinking a lot of gamers subconciously overlook Kreia because she's old and unattractive, but the part of me that still has some faith in humanity doesn't want that to be the case...

Nobody remembers Kreia for the same reason that nobody remembers Strife, Requiem: The Avenging Angel, IJI, Heroes 3 Of Might And Magic, System Shock 2 and Mischief Makers...........nobody played them.

SPECIALLY the first 2 examples, who had to compete with Quake 1 and Half Life 1 respectively.

One thing I found pretty interesting was the concept of Force Bonds that surrounds her and the Exile. When you take into account all the information they give you in the game...

Spoiler

Padme's death in Revenge of the Sith starts to make a lot more sense

It would be if the narrative of the movies (not suplementary material, expanded universe, or whatever) gave the proper exposition about such thing. Sadly i cant recall if it was ever mentioned of explained, and since the new Star Wars movies are going to ignore the expanded universe, its probable that the concept is going to be diched or forgotten.

 

[bootz]

Here my list in no order:
Angel-Wing commander series
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_MGKBleZTY
Zoe Castille and April Ryan-TLJ Series
Kate Walker - Syberia series
Princess peach - Paper mario



I don't really like any characters from bioware. They all seem meh..

 

[pigeon_of_doom]

Maria from Silent Hill 2.

Couldn't it be considered cheating to pick a character who is developed from a male's fantasies and paranoias ?

For me, probably April Ryan, but she does have a huge advantage being in an adventure game in terms of writing quality and opportunity to develop and express character.

 

[Lt._nefarious]

Well, I agree with most of what has been said (apart from Samus, just because she was a bad ass silent protagonist doesn't make her well written just cuz she's female, it makes her lazy like all the male, bad ass silent protagonists) and I don't want to add the the ever growing number of Tali, April, Jade posts so here the best written female characters not yet mentioned...

Heather from Silent Hill 3 - She seemed like a real person going through a personalized hell but still managed to be likable, not to mention she holds her own through most of the game. (and I'm pretty sure she's pro choice what with all the God business at the end)

Rubi from WET - She was a bad ass, she was lady Max Payne only with less moral ambiguity and more evil...

Cortana from Halo - (already mentioned, I know) Because she is amazing. I can't put into words how amazing she is.

And many, many more....

 

[jhoroz]

She may be scary on the outside, but she's just a sensitive, shy goldfish on the inside.

 

[Mikeyfell]

Friedelinde from Agarest War Zero is by far and away the best. Not only in terms of writing her voice actress also delivers the best performance gaming's ever seen, or heard. And it's not what you say it's how you say it, right? But it's still kind of about what you say. And her neuroses, paranoia and just flat inability to understand the basic human emotions of herself or those around her come across aptly in text.

I could go down the whole laundry list of characters from the Agarest games, but I'll spare you because Routier and Dana are also fully rounded characters perfectly defined by their writing. along with pretty much everyone from Record of Agarest War.

moving on to a different genera altogether Jack from Mass Effect 2 is one of the best written characters Bioware has ever put out. Which is odd, because Bioware's usual policy with human characters is that they're the base line and the other races get progressively deeper and more complex, making you wonder why they even bothered putting human characters in the game at all.
But Jack (From ME 2, they totally killed anything that made her interesting by the time ME 3 rolled around) has always stood out as a truly damaged character who uniquely accepted status as a broken person instead of giving in to cliche and trying to transcend the situation through love and happiness and sunshine and butterflies. (I mean, that's exactly what Bioware did to her in ME 3 but, hey, Mass Effect 2 is still there right?)

now to move on to a third genera Clem from The Walking Dead. I'm not going to spoil anything, but that greatly limits what I can say about why she's so well written. Suffice to say she's competent beyond her years, Which is only 7 but that just makes it all the more impressive. She has a firm understanding of what's in her control and out of her control and that's rare even in adult characters who are put in positions of authority.

 

[Auberon]

Should I be disappointed that I didn't see Ravel Puzzlewell anywhere? Scorned woman with solid motivations who seems to be the main antagonist. Black Isle-era RPGs might be tad unknown though.

At least Kreia is there, somewhat of a spiritual successor.