Hits the nail on the head. Really, do you expect a zombie apocalypse survivor to act any differently when fighting off the horde than a male?Sixcess said:
Criticism of strong women in games
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As fas as i'm concerned, Other M never existed. It's better for everyone that way. From what I've heard from reviews, the story was absolutely HORRIBLE and samus was a needy ***** trying to get the approval of her boyfriend or something. I remember the ZP review most, and i know that Yahtzee never puts games in a good light if he can help it, but sometimes after a ZP i come back thinking "that actually sounds like my kind of game" so i like to think that i don't play games solely on his rants. Anyway, the part that stuck out to me was when Yahtzee mentioned something about Samas not even turning on her varia suit functionality because she wasn't told explicitly to do so.
I really don't know if you saw Other M as a turning point for samuses character but it sounded like a turn for the worst to me. A bounty hunter that will put herself in danger because her boyfriend is a prick doesn't sound like she would last a week, let alone be the hero who fought Mother Brain and Ridley 5 billion times. Basically i'm saying that Other M betrays what she is at her core, a bad ass bounty hunter. She's allowed to have weaknesses, but she's facing personal conflicts that would likely get her KILLED in her line of work in Other M.
Anyways, before that, there was no chance for her characterization. Mario didn't have a character in 8-bit either. After that I can understand being unwilling to give Samus more personality when going to 3D. I mean do people play metroid for the game play or the story? Cause there really was only enough story to justify the games existence in most cases, also look at how badly Other M failed to give her a believable character. She was a SILENT badass, not for some artistic choice but because either there wasn't room for a story, or because the creators were more concerned with gameplay.
I guess i'd better suggest a way to characterize samus though. Like maybe throw her into a situation where the solution isn't shoot everything that moves? Something with some moral ambiguity and then have her decide how to act and tell the player why. I can't think of a good example though.
I really don't know if you saw Other M as a turning point for samuses character but it sounded like a turn for the worst to me. A bounty hunter that will put herself in danger because her boyfriend is a prick doesn't sound like she would last a week, let alone be the hero who fought Mother Brain and Ridley 5 billion times. Basically i'm saying that Other M betrays what she is at her core, a bad ass bounty hunter. She's allowed to have weaknesses, but she's facing personal conflicts that would likely get her KILLED in her line of work in Other M.
Anyways, before that, there was no chance for her characterization. Mario didn't have a character in 8-bit either. After that I can understand being unwilling to give Samus more personality when going to 3D. I mean do people play metroid for the game play or the story? Cause there really was only enough story to justify the games existence in most cases, also look at how badly Other M failed to give her a believable character. She was a SILENT badass, not for some artistic choice but because either there wasn't room for a story, or because the creators were more concerned with gameplay.
I guess i'd better suggest a way to characterize samus though. Like maybe throw her into a situation where the solution isn't shoot everything that moves? Something with some moral ambiguity and then have her decide how to act and tell the player why. I can't think of a good example though.
I guess if all you want is a game where you do nothing but shoot zombies, fine, but even Resident Evil and Left 4 Dead have breaks where the characters talk and reflect.TheRightToArmBears said:
I agree completely with the Samus thing. Master Chief has 3 times the personality Samus does AND a backstory to explain why he's like that, and yet generally he's thought of as a boring character while Samus is thought of as one of the most compelling female characters of all time? Something is wrong with that.
The problem here is that noone is talking about personal preferance, everybody likes thier female characters differently and different games exploit different preferances, some people like whores and some people like cold, disciplined killers and most people prefer somethjng along the continuum of sexuality that lies between those two extremes.
I think you hit the nail on the head. Most male characters are as poorly written as female characters, but because the majority of male characters these days are all adolescent comic book power-fantasy vehicles, maybe the majority of gamers give them a pass. I don't, and try to avoid games that force me to play as yet another chiseled, tough-talking, scruffy-faced badass.TheAmazingHobo said:
The Extra Credit guys brought up another good point--the overwhelming majority of games that have a story are all about combat. And it seems in stories about combat, every character fits one of two roles: participant, or victim. A female (or male) game character who isn't a badass becomes a victim by default, and thus a "weak" character.
I might add Leliana from Dragon Age:Origins to the list. She was far from the most effective party member in combat (archery being pretty weak in DAO until you get the higher level talents and higher tier equipment), but my warrior Warden relied on her to open all the locked chests and disarm all the traps, and her boundless enthusiasm and moral clarity to see our dark quest to the end was greatly appreciated. In banter with other party members, I liked how she tried to be friendly with everyone, if in a teasing way, but when Morrigan pushed her too far--the claws came out.
I have two favorite female characters, one is Alyx Vance because she's strong and isn't overtly one aspect of a hero like too masculine, I guess I'm saying like a normal person. And Heather Mason from SH 3, the character development is perfect, in my humble opinion, she goes from teenage mall rat to a strong person towards the end, and acts like a regular human being if anyone was put in that position.
The problem with female characters is that they explicitly labelled as 'female characters' and not just 'characters'.
Good women are the ones who are normal but on extreme situations can hold their own and have something to say, which is different from the bitches or butches that videogames often have
I feel the problem is that when developing a female character, they skip the development altogether to make them strong.
I mean, if they started with the girl as a weakling who needs help all the time, they'd be labeled as sexist. Not the case when you play as a guy however, since we all love watching the underdog become da uber badass.
I mean, if they started with the girl as a weakling who needs help all the time, they'd be labeled as sexist. Not the case when you play as a guy however, since we all love watching the underdog become da uber badass.
i have an not so often used good example of a strong woman in a video game: bandaid girl from super meat boy.. you might be thinking "wait, bandaid girl was captured.. by a fetus!", but what happens in the end is that she beats the living crap out of said fetus, and also at the hardest level of the game (cotton alley) you play as bandaid girl.
Ok, we need to break down a few things before we complain about the lack of femininity in a female character. Let's start with what it means to be masculine vs feminine.
Traits associated with masculinity: strong, violent, unemotional, protector, provider, dominate, tough, powerful
Traits associated with femininity: weak, fragile, emotional, nurturer, submissive, protected, naive
Now, see why many of us aren't that bothered with seeing characters that are discribed as "male with tits?" Now, if I remember something MovieBob pointed out about Peach he has said that Peach's kidnappings is less to do with the story of the virgin that is to be rescued from a monster that will do everything to her up to and including rape, but is more of a political tactic. He also goes on about another, rather interesting female character from Super Mario Galaxy: Rosalina, who is a seemingly immortal mother-goddess character who is the caretaker of the lumas that rides on a comet. Now, riddle me this: is Rosalina a strong female character?
Course, on Other M, I haven't heard much good about it, and even with the knownledge of it being a prequal game, so
it makes some pychological sense that she would have a PTSD moment at that point. Now, why did we have to have someone else command her to turn on powerups that had been picked up already? Couldn't she just, I dunno, find them and use them then like in every Metroid game before that? Removing Adam and Samus for a second and replacing them with Kain and Dwight, how would you the player feel if Dwight had the rocket jump powerup and found a scenario where he could use it, but couldn't because Kain didn't give him the orders to use them? This is bad, even if you were aware of the Metroid Fusion ending
Traits associated with masculinity: strong, violent, unemotional, protector, provider, dominate, tough, powerful
Traits associated with femininity: weak, fragile, emotional, nurturer, submissive, protected, naive
Now, see why many of us aren't that bothered with seeing characters that are discribed as "male with tits?" Now, if I remember something MovieBob pointed out about Peach he has said that Peach's kidnappings is less to do with the story of the virgin that is to be rescued from a monster that will do everything to her up to and including rape, but is more of a political tactic. He also goes on about another, rather interesting female character from Super Mario Galaxy: Rosalina, who is a seemingly immortal mother-goddess character who is the caretaker of the lumas that rides on a comet. Now, riddle me this: is Rosalina a strong female character?
Course, on Other M, I haven't heard much good about it, and even with the knownledge of it being a prequal game, so
when Samus had a meltdown from seeing Ridley it was the first time she had seen Ridley since the attack on her home long ago
where your onboard computer AI reveals himself to be your old commander and possible love interest Adam.
The thing is, before Other M, Samus was never a compelling character to begin with. She was a one-dimensional character, a black slate with no personality, emotions or even a proper background beyond 'raised by bird aliens and infused with their DNA'. Before Other M we knew nothing about what kind of person Samus is, because the games didn't show this in any substantial way. What does she like or dislike? Does she have hobbies? Does she have friends? What does she feel when on missions? Why does she do what she does anyway? The only real exception is sparing the baby metroid at the end of metroid 2, showing she can show compassion.Guitarmasterx7 said:
All we really knew about Samus are qualities the fandom arbitrarily attributed to her. Fans molded her into a person she wasn't because it wasn't there. And then along came Other M, which game her some background, gave her a personality, emotions and issues. Suddenly she was person with doubts, fears, a desperate desire to get her commanding officers approval and what seem to be signs of an electra complex. Does she kick any less ass because of it? No, not at all, she simply was made into a more three-dimensional character. But the person Other M depicted Samus as didn't conform to the image the fandom had created of her, so they threw a tantrum, going all 'They ruined Metroid!'.
And about Samus not being able to use some of her suits functions with approval from her commanding officer. Sure, it's arbitrary and nonsensical, but so is losing your power-ups at the start of the game for some ass-pull reason (if any is even given at all) each and every time. In fact I'd say it makes more sense. Restricting the more powerful abilities of what amounts to a one-man army akin to a weapon of mass destruction makes some sense and is somewhat similar to real-life military procedure. In cases like the morph ball it is still bollocks, but I can see where they're getting from.
chimpzy said:
It's not a prequel, in the timeline, it's right before Metroid Fusion which is the last in the series thus far, so she has seen Ridley multiple times and has been separated from Adam for at least 2+ years hence why none of it really made sense.Mikodite said:
The Prime series is before Super Metroid.
And that's the whole problem, I'm all for giving Samus a backstory and making her human but don't do it in one swoop, much less do that horribly. It's all a placement issue, she had all these breakdowns way after this stuff happened. It's like you spilling some milk on the ground and then coming back like 3 hours later and reacting to it. Many people that don't understand the real complaints probably don't understand the timeline and they're relevant to each other.
I agree. There are mostly only 2 types of female characters in games.
1. Big boobes sluts who usually have really stereotypical personalities (like being abolutely all over the players character and flirting whit them and shizzle or being really muscular and playing "the bad girl" and are usually hard to take seriosly because of the bikini armor they are wearing) Why are these characters made? To sell the game and for eye-candy for men.
2. Normal women, which seem to be still rare but are growing numbers in videogames. Women which will act in situation like every person would, maybe there might be little bit femine over there and crying over there after killing load of zombies or demons, but it would be normal to every person. ! This raises point in my mind. Is there ever made a videogame where a man whould have cried? I am man, i have cried in situations far better than in some videogames. Why is it that women (Second type of women and mostly not playable characters) are nearly always shown in videogames weaker compared to the men? Yeah, in most cases woman might be the fragiler one but this is not the main reason. Reason is that me/most of us/men like to think ourselfes to be the stronger one, we wanna be the Alpha of the genders, and like to think this way.
I seriosly hope that some day gaming indusrty can start to handle their shit and start to make more realistic characters, Male and Female.
1. Big boobes sluts who usually have really stereotypical personalities (like being abolutely all over the players character and flirting whit them and shizzle or being really muscular and playing "the bad girl" and are usually hard to take seriosly because of the bikini armor they are wearing) Why are these characters made? To sell the game and for eye-candy for men.
2. Normal women, which seem to be still rare but are growing numbers in videogames. Women which will act in situation like every person would, maybe there might be little bit femine over there and crying over there after killing load of zombies or demons, but it would be normal to every person. ! This raises point in my mind. Is there ever made a videogame where a man whould have cried? I am man, i have cried in situations far better than in some videogames. Why is it that women (Second type of women and mostly not playable characters) are nearly always shown in videogames weaker compared to the men? Yeah, in most cases woman might be the fragiler one but this is not the main reason. Reason is that me/most of us/men like to think ourselfes to be the stronger one, we wanna be the Alpha of the genders, and like to think this way.
I seriosly hope that some day gaming indusrty can start to handle their shit and start to make more realistic characters, Male and Female.
Maybe I missed it, but I don't see Aya Brea on the list here. Sure she has a breakdown in the first Parasite Eve, but you try not doing so under the circumstances that slowly were tearing apart the city, and you turned out to be one of the few people who could deal with it (meaning you had to deal with creatures that horribly mutated in front of you all alone) at the cost that maybe you might not be human or even really be anything more than a vessel for something greater. Oh, and you get to deal with this on Christmas in New York and it goes on for days, with the only people left either being your friends as they are slowly picked off, or those who want to use the situation for their own agenda.
He'll, I'd have a breakdown after watching the population of a theater burn alive, animals tear themselves into some kind of monster, watch the people filling a stadium turn to jelly, and hear that my best friend's wife was among them (so not even last the first 2-3 days).
She goes on after this hellish nightmare to kill monsters for a day job.
Now, you do have a point that women are horribly underrepresented/misrepresented in games, but it seems to be slowly changing.
He'll, I'd have a breakdown after watching the population of a theater burn alive, animals tear themselves into some kind of monster, watch the people filling a stadium turn to jelly, and hear that my best friend's wife was among them (so not even last the first 2-3 days).
She goes on after this hellish nightmare to kill monsters for a day job.
Now, you do have a point that women are horribly underrepresented/misrepresented in games, but it seems to be slowly changing.