Character Gender, and the Picture on the cover.

[Aurgelmir]

So I saw the thread "What gender do you consider Shepard and Hawke"

Which made me think the following "Well they are both male on the cover of the game, so male?"
And this brought me to the question:

Why, if I can choose the gender of my character anyways, are so many game protagonists pictured as a man on the cover?

Why not at least have two covers or something?

 

[JWRosser]

I'm guessing because the larger target audience is male?

I tend to play as both male and female characters, depending on the game.

 

[Indecipherable]

Target audience is male and people tend to associate their character at least loosely with themselves. Multiple covers = more money.

 

[Zenode]

So I saw the thread "What gender do you consider Shepard and Hawke"

Which made me think the following "Well they are both male on the cover of the game, so male?"
And this brought me to the question:

Why, if I can choose the gender of my character anyways, are so many game protagonists pictured as a man on the cover?

Why not at least have two covers or something?

I personally believe its about the Canon of the game, for sequels etc i.e. in Mass Effect/Dragon Age II they are both male

 

[LongAndShort]

Like in some sort of holographic cover? That would be pretty awesome, but probably used as an excuse for raising the price by five bucks.

Still, I agree that there must be a better way. Perhaps getting a little creative and using something other than the main protagonist on the front cover, like Dragon Age: Origins.

 

[Zeema]

So I saw the thread "What gender do you consider Shepard and Hawke"

Which made me think the following "Well they are both male on the cover of the game, so male?"
And this brought me to the question:

Why, if I can choose the gender of my character anyways, are so many game protagonists pictured as a man on the cover?

Why not at least have two covers or something?

i wrote a thread smilier about the Trailers all having the Male character in the game in which you can pick your gender.

i never got it i still fully dont understand

my best guess would be something along the lines of 'The Box Arter enjoys MALE's'

 

[Haxxle]

I think the reason why they don't make two covers to accommodate both sexes would probably be the cost of making two boxes instead of just one. But money is not really an excuse not to picture two sexes of the main protagonist on one cover similar to how the fable covers picture one side depicting 'good' and one side 'bad'.

Anyway, I agree with you all the way.

 

[Meestor Pickle]

The holographic would be really cool, nice idea

 

[D Moness]

Target audience is male and people tend to associate their character at least loosely with themselves. Multiple covers = more money.

How about a reversible covers (seen lot of dvd's do it). one side male version (you use to sell) the back side the female version. So the player can pick what he wants to look at.

 

[Indecipherable]

Target audience is male and people tend to associate their character at least loosely with themselves. Multiple covers = more money.

How about a reversible covers (seen lot of dvd's do it). one side male version (you use to sell) the back side the female version. So the player can pick what he wants to look at.

I'm guessing double sided high quality printing is also expensive and how many players really care enough to do this? I'd wager less than 1% give a crap.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

I personally believe its about the Canon of the game, for sequels etc i.e. in Mass Effect/Dragon Age II they are both male

Well, sadly males heavily outweigh the females in canonical representations. KotOR also had Revan being a canonical male. Jedi Academy even went a step further by having the canonical Jaden be a ~white~ male. In recent Bioware(-ish) history the only canonical female player character has been the Exile from KotOR II, and yes, that was done by Obsidian.

Maybe some of the developers (or the people at Lucas licensing) have a deeply rooted fear of women being more competent than men at galaxy/world saving?

 

[Extragorey]

It's like a signature hero - a figure that we can put a name to. If Shepard looked different in every Mass Effect promo, we'd be like, "Who on earth is that?"

But personally I find that games with a female protagonist on the cover usually (always?) only allow you to play as a female character.
Which is quite odd, I grant you.

 

[Aurgelmir]

Target audience is male and people tend to associate their character at least loosely with themselves. Multiple covers = more money.

How about a reversible covers (seen lot of dvd's do it). one side male version (you use to sell) the back side the female version. So the player can pick what he wants to look at.

I'm guessing double sided high quality printing is also expensive and how many players really care enough to do this? I'd wager less than 1% give a crap.

I mean loads of games come with two covers already, and it would send a nice signal that there is no "set" gender on the character.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

But surely that's no more or less odd than games with a dude on the cover where you can only play a dude?

(Also, the Guild Wars games tend to have females on the cover while you can always play as either gender, so not quite always ;D)

Edit: I ~really~ like Aurgelmir's idea of the double covers. It'd be a good strong step in the right direction. Although I'd still like to see more canonical females come out of create-a-character RPGs.

 

[KingofallCosmos]

As far as I know Shepard is a black man...

If it's a choice, why not just put your other characters on the box art? The protagonist is more meant to be you anyway.

OR just one character that only appears on the cover and not in game; I don't know I like things a bit confusing...

 

[Aurgelmir]

Or why not, you know, not showing characters all the damn time on every single cover?
Seriously look at your game boxes and count the dudes with their faces angled downwards and glaring.

Well I agree. Best covers out there are the Japanese/European Final Fantasy Covers prior to FFXIII

So I saw the thread "What gender do you consider Shepard and Hawke"

Which made me think the following "Well they are both male on the cover of the game, so male?"
And this brought me to the question:

Why, if I can choose the gender of my character anyways, are so many game protagonists pictured as a man on the cover?

Why not at least have two covers or something?

I'd say probably because the guys in marketing think it's better to lead the consumers by the nose through things rather than let them think for themselves.

I always roll male chars anyway, I'm just boring like that.

recaptcha: which eaccompl

On the topic of boring: All these male characters tend to be rather boring