Commander Shepard is Female

[darthzew]

Or at least should be. Allow me to explain.

Slight spoilers ahead.

The first and most obvious reason I can give, is that Jennifer Hale is a better voice actor than Mark Meer. She can lend a much stronger humanity and flexibility to her portrayal than Meer ever could. Sure, male Shepard sounds great when he's making heroic lines or threatening people, but he just doesn't cut it on the human side of things. Jennifer Hale pulls off both and shines doing it.

She's probably the best voice actor of all time*. Look her up if you want to see what all she's done. It's an impressive list.

The second reason is because of the romance with Jacob Taylor in Mass Effect 2. If you get into that, Jacob asks Shepard to share her problems. There are a couple of possible answers, but each of them lend a humanity to the Shepard character that simply isn't present anywhere else. There are other romance plots with emotion, true, but none of them give much of a glimpse into what makes the commander tick.

I think Commander Shepard should have been female from the beginning. Yeah, Mark Vanderloo is a great model for the standard Shep, but what's there is pretty much a standard RPG cutout character.

And on another argument entirely, I feel like Bioware should have given Jennifer Hale the spotlight here. She's done a lot for Bioware. I'm not saying Bioware did anything wrong, just that it would have cool.

And finally, a female protagonist like Shepard would have gone miles for the current big-breasted Lara Croft stereotype prevalent in gaming today. She's exactly what the male character is. It's a powerful argument that video games aren't the sexist things that some people seem to think they are.

I don't want people to think I'm complaining; I'm not. I love Mass Effect. I just think it may have turned out better if they had chosen a female face for the standard Shepard.

Anyway, please, let's discuss this.

*EDIT: Let me just clear this up. I'm a fanboy. I freely admit it. I, however, made a sweeping statement before really thinking about it. My apologies, but I do believe that Hale is up there with the best of 'em.

 

[Fallen-Angel Risen-Demon]

I can't stand femi sheps voice to me it doesn't sound human...

 

[omega_peaches]

Uh...Why not just let you choose your gender?

 

[darthzew]

Most gamers in the shooter/rpg genre are males. Therefore, the default is male. Simple as that.

I guess that's why I wish Bioware would break paradigms. I mean, they've broken a ton with the Mass Effect series; they're revolutionary games, but it could have been more.

 

[reg42]

I didn't read the whole thing, because you lost me when you said Jennifer Hale is a better voice actor. Both actors are very bland in the Mass Effect games; it's quite astonishing really, because the other actors are very good. I dunno, it's almost like the Shepards are trying to be bland.

 

[Grey_Focks]

Most gamers in the shooter/rpg genre are males. Therefore, the default is male. Simple as that.

QFT. Men have an easier time relating to other men, most gamers are men, so voila.

 

[Lolth17]

I agree with you wholeheartedly. I think the female Shepard is infinitely more interesting than the male version. I thought the same thing about female Revan in KoToR. It's just so much more compelling to have a strong, yet vulnerable, female character as the hero in an epic adventure, and frankily, I think Bioware writes their women better than their men, for the most part.

Honestly, that is a HUGE compliment to them, and they really ought to take advantage of that more by making some of their default heroes female. But perhaps it would scare off some part of their market, I don't know.

 

[darthzew]

Uh...Why not just let you choose your gender?

They do, except that in all the trailers, commercials, etc., Shepard is male. If you choose the standard Shepard option, he's male. In the canon, he's male.

 

[Disaster Button]

For awhile playing the first game I thought he was voiced by Jonathan Frakes, I was a little disappointed when I learned otherwise. Meer's voice acting is very hit and miss, sometimes its very good and it other times he seems to give lines the wrong inflection or meaning. I haven't tried being a femi shep yet though.

It would have been nice to see them use femi shep as The Face of Shephard but considering your character probably won't resemble The Face anyway I don't think its incredibly important. The reason they probably used male shep was because most gamers are male and wanted to appeal to them and thought this would do it, or something.

 

[Amnestic]

FemShep>ManShep.

Fact.

I wouldn't mind seeing alternative box arts, some with ManShep and some with FemShep.

Is that too much to ask?

Spoiler

Spoiler

Hawtness.

 

[Tarakos]

The way I see it is: Who's on the cover of the games? Who is in all the trailers? That's right, Mark Vanderloo. So, in review, Commander Shepard is Mark Vanderloo. I kid. I mostly play as a male Shepard, but I have a few serious run-throughs as a chick. I agree that Hale is a somewhat superior VA to Meer, and a female Shepard does have a few things that give her an air of humility. And yeah, she would have trounced Laura Croft as a female role model, but I think that opportunity has passed. All in all, I can't help but think that Shepard, at least for me, is a male. Not to mention love interests. I think that FemShep gets a little screwed over in this department. And finally, good pick for a profile pic. I love me some House!

 

[Woodsey]

Most gamers are men, and most men don't want to talk about their feelings; in-game or not.

 

[Jackalb]

Yes Jennifer Hale is a fantastic voice actor but Commander Shepard will always be a Male to me. Although if they do decide to make a movie or what not and they make Shepard Female in it, I won't complain it'll still be an epic story.

 

[Tourette]

I prefer playing Shepard as a female I have to admit as I do also find it a more satisfying gaming experience, especially when playing as renegade.

 

[Thunderhorse31]

Here's the one flaw I see in your argument: people don't base their entire stories and characters around whose voice they're going to use for the part.
unless your name is Nolan North...

 

[darthzew]

I prefer man Shep, but I feel Meer shouldn't have been used. Who would I suggest? Well, you should read my posts more, it's Nathan Fillion.

That would have been amazing. I'm not he would fit Mark Vanderloo, but that could be fixed but putting Fillion's face in instead.

Either that, or Nolan North would have done well. He seems to have the hero part down, although he may be a little overused.

 

[Keldorn51]

I completed ME1 3 times: first as paragon fem, then paragon male (imported to ME2), then as ren male to see how much of a tosser he could be. While ren male was hilarious, fem Shep was definitely the best acted of the lot. It was great to finally see a strong female lead that didn't have to resort to stereotypes... no, Ruby from Wet was not a strong female lead.