Criticism of strong women in games

[Midnight Crossroads]

I like good characters, but I hate the lazy state in which female characters often find themselves in games. When I say good characters, I mean believable people with a variety of traits that work in such a way to make someone that is interesting. If a character makes me reflect on myself, then I tend to like them. These are traits often lacking in female characters in games.

The first problem is the way strong female characters are executed in games. All the character in the world doesn't matter when they're looked at as not a person but as a statement. When one sits down thinks, "Today I shall make a strong female character," one has just made a terrible mistake. That character ceases to matter outside the context of their strength. All their traits go towards that one goal. It's a noble cause, but I feel it is the wrong way to go about it. It would be, in my opinion, a better option to make a character that is believable.

My second issue is the traits given to women and what it implies. Let me provide two examples: Peach in the old Mario games and Samus before Other M. Peach does nothing in the game except get kidnapped. That's the point of the game, you go from castle to castle looking for this woman. Samus is some bounty hunter that goes around kicking ass. If one were to ask which is the strong character, most gamers rooting for strong girls would pick Samus. Why? Does a female have to reject all traits we consider feminine to be strong? Does this mean that femininity is weakness and masculinity is strength? I'm not saying every girl should be some damsel in distress, but how is it less insulting when the girls we hold up as symbols of strength have nothing that marks them as girl besides breasts? To give an example of a strong female character that is actually a woman done right, look at Lady Kaede in Akira Kurosawa's 1985 film, Ran. This woman is a ***** and she brings an entire clan to ruin, and even her husband, a tough as nails samurai, would piss himself if he thought about crossing her.

Third, I don't like that girls are all treated as some barometer of the progressiveness of games. Ivy is bad because she dresses like a whore. Alyx is good because she isn't so much a whore. The world of games seems so hung up on this that I feel it suffocates attempts at making good characters. If girls aren't perfect, they suddenly drag the entire gender down? Putting girls under scrutiny to find out whether they're positive or negative really undermines them. Their will always be girls in games like Ivy, there will always be female Shepards, but there are far, far more people in between who are far more interesting.

 

[hudsonzero]

what about bayoneta she is strong.... what she literary killed god

 

[Woodsey]

"To give an example of a strong female character that is actually a woman done right, look at Lady Kaede in Akira Kurosawa's 1985 film, Ran. This woman is a ***** and she brings an entire clan to ruin, and even her husband, a tough as nails samurai, would piss himself if he thought about crossing her."

And the feminine thing in that is... what, exactly?

Farah from The Sands of Time is the best female character I can think of, along with Alyx Vance (and not because she "isn't so much a whore").

 

[warm slurm]

There are strong female characters who don't do away with their femininity, if that's what you mean. While the Resident Evil series' writing is kind of weak, I think Claire and Jill (pre-RE5) are great examples of that.

 

[TheAmazingHobo]

I actually do not feel this is a issue that is especially or exclusively pertinent to the potrayal of women in video games.
MOST characters in video games are shit,
portrayal wise.
The female characters only stick out because there are, relatively speaking, fewer of them in any position of prominence.

I´m pretty sure, I can provide a "good" female character for every 5 "good" male characters, which should be close enough to ratio of representation.

Edit: I should probably add that I basically agree which much of your sentinent,
it is just my feeling that the implication that the industry has more difficulty coming up with believable females that with believable males is wrong and thus we should work on writing "good" character full stop, not "good" female characters.

 

[Vivace-Vivian]

There are many different kinds of strength. Characters should exhibit different traits in general. So called 'feminine strength' can't quite be defined until we define 'strength' in general. That's a whole other issue...

 

[Mittens The Kitten]

Sheppard is the same character regardless of gender. the same dialogue works just as well for males and females, showing that you need to write for your character's personality, not for thier gender. However, there are exceptions to this, as a female duke nukem would have to be rewritten.

 

[Geekmaster]

IDK.. I suppose..

1: Expect more men than women to be working in the gaming industry. There are a lot of men doing the writing and designing and as such, you get a lot of male mentalities trying to figure out what the essence of strong female character" is.

2: I'm going to tempt fate by claiming that men are naturally more adept at violence and as such it's easier to make them look like action heroes.
Crime statistics back me up, although I'm aware that gender roles and upbring has a lot do with that.

3: Are there a lot of large chested, ultra skinny women in next to no clothes in games? Absolutely but on the other hand I can count the amount of games I've played, where my character was not named either "Handsome Von Attractive of Funny and Fit" or "Steroid McDeathMachine" on one hand.

"Third, I don't like that girls are all treated as some barometer of the progressiveness of games. Ivy is bad because she dresses like a whore. Alyx is good because she isn't so much a whore. The world of games seems so hung up on this that I feel it suffocates attempts at making good characters. If girls aren't perfect, they suddenly drag the entire gender down? Putting girls under scrutiny to find out whether they're positive or negative really undermines them. Their will always be girls in games like Ivy, there will always be female Shepards, but there are far, far more people in between who are far more interesting."

I wholeheratedly agree.

 

[Sixcess]

How exactly does a female character display her femininity when she's surrounded by slavering alien monsters or zombies intent on rending her limb from limb? The reason they'll act like a man in that kind of situation is simply because that's how anyone would act.

 

[darth.pixie]

Farah from The Sands of Time is the best female character I can think of.

Agreeing with that.

I think that it depends on the characters really. I mean, most game characters laugh in the face of death. Not literally, but in every mission or quest, you can pretty much die. And then they go into another mission. I'm not sure exactly how feminine you can be in those situations. Or even how masculine. It's just survival.

I guess it depends on your idea of 'feminine'.

Also a lot of characters in games don't say much and if they got kidnapped a lot or needed help a lot, it would be annoying, be they male, female or child.

 

[MassiveGeek]

The thing is that, for a character to truly be strong, weaknesses are vital. They need to show more characters who cope with and overwin obstacles and pain in a more realistic fashion.

One of my favorite female protagonists is Heather from Silent Hill 3 - she's a teenaged girl, a very typical teenager I'd say, she wears a skirt and has bleached blonde hair and is overall a cute girl, who is thrown into this turmoil of horror and danger. She doesn't face this charging head first.
... her father(Harry Mason) dies, she's devastated, she breaks down and cries by his corpse. Then she turns her misery to anger, and anger to determination. She acts like a person, even though this is a very absurd scenario, I think she's a very human character. And by conquering her fears and doubts she turns into a very strong character.

Aaand, that's all I have to say about that. Lost my train of thought. ^^'

 

[Littaly]

That's the real tricky part of the whole "women in games" (and other popular media too for that matter) debate. Making a female character that kicks ass is easy, but building a female character instead of just switching the gender on a male one is considerably harder.

It gets even trickier when you consider the fact that video game characters in general don't have very deep personalities. You can say that characters like Samus are just women in men's clothes, strong women stripped of all their female traits. But when the only trait you assign the male character to being with is "badass", does it really matter all that much?

 

[Thaluikhain]

IMy second issue is the traits given to women and what it implies. Let me provide two examples: Peach in the old Mario games and Samus before Other M. Peach does nothing in the game except get kidnapped. That's the point of the game, you go from castle to castle looking for this woman. Samus is some bounty hunter that goes around kicking ass. If one were to ask which is the strong character, most gamers rooting for strong girls would pick Samus. Why? Does a female have to reject all traits we consider feminine to be strong? Does this mean that femininity is weakness and masculinity is strength?

Well, yes. Society has flat out viewed females as inferior for millenia. It is changing, but slowly, and with many backlashes. The traditional female traits were those which are seen as of lesser value, because women were seen of lesser value, simple as that.

On the other hand, yes, I see what you mean. People trying to make "strong female characters" end up with "strong female, characters" instead of "strong characters, female".

I'm not saying every girl should be some damsel in distress, but how is it less insulting when the girls we hold up as symbols of strength have nothing that marks them as girl besides breasts?

Well, what marks a male character? What traits can a male character have, which a female character won't? Beyond Duke Nukem style misogyny, nothing much springs to mind.

In reality, breasts (and other bits) are the only real difference between males and females. Sure, there's alot of social baggage, but that's fairly arbitrary and something really we could do without.

 

[tzimize]

I like good characters, but I hate the lazy state in which female characters often find themselves in games. When I say good characters, I mean believable people with a variety of traits that work in such a way to make someone that is interesting. If a character makes me reflect on myself, then I tend to like them. These are traits often lacking in female characters in games.

The first problem is the way strong female characters are executed in games. All the character in the world doesn't matter when they're looked at as not a person but as a statement. When one sits down thinks, "Today I shall make a strong female character," one has just made a terrible mistake. That character ceases to matter outside the context of their strength. All their traits go towards that one goal. It's a noble cause, but I feel it is the wrong way to go about it. It would be, in my opinion, a better option to make a character that is believable.

My second issue is the traits given to women and what it implies. Let me provide two examples: Peach in the old Mario games and Samus before Other M. Peach does nothing in the game except get kidnapped. That's the point of the game, you go from castle to castle looking for this woman. Samus is some bounty hunter that goes around kicking ass. If one were to ask which is the strong character, most gamers rooting for strong girls would pick Samus. Why? Does a female have to reject all traits we consider feminine to be strong? Does this mean that femininity is weakness and masculinity is strength? I'm not saying every girl should be some damsel in distress, but how is it less insulting when the girls we hold up as symbols of strength have nothing that marks them as girl besides breasts? To give an example of a strong female character that is actually a woman done right, look at Lady Kaede in Akira Kurosawa's 1985 film, Ran. This woman is a ***** and she brings an entire clan to ruin, and even her husband, a tough as nails samurai, would piss himself if he thought about crossing her.

Third, I don't like that girls are all treated as some barometer of the progressiveness of games. Ivy is bad because she dresses like a whore. Alyx is good because she isn't so much a whore. The world of games seems so hung up on this that I feel it suffocates attempts at making good characters. If girls aren't perfect, they suddenly drag the entire gender down? Putting girls under scrutiny to find out whether they're positive or negative really undermines them. Their will always be girls in games like Ivy, there will always be female Shepards, but there are far, far more people in between who are far more interesting.

Missing a question or something for discussion value

OT: I can think of several strong female characters. Farah has been mentioned, but one of my favorite characters from a game ever has not: Jade from Beyond Good and Evil. Strong, caring and resourceful.

The problem with games and strong characters is that females are so often used for motivation; i.e. "help mario bowser caught me again!", instead of storytelling i.e. Farah as a strong female sidekick, or indeed Jade as the main protagonist.

Too many game companies just slap a pair of boobs on their pixels and goes fishing for money, and unfortunately...too often it works.

I dont think a woman has to be masculine to be strong, but often it is the case anyway. In games stuff have to happen, and often you have to do it. Movies are different since the medium can tell stories more passively before we are bored. Action often requires masculinity, in the form of a rocket launcher or a powerful shoryuken

The best games for using strong female characters are RPGs or action-rpgs (like Enslaved. Sure, that red-head was "weak". She had to get a strongboy to do her dirty-work, BUT she was resourceful enough to take advantage of him and use her own strengths. Thats a strong female character. Imo.)

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

Strong women like The Boss are rare but those show us that it is possible to balance softness and power with the concept of being better than men in their world.

People try to adhere to some movie staple perception of them in a few games and those are just boring though. I'd much rather have Bayonetta striptease her way through angels and demons than another cutout badass female soldier whose entire reason of existence is being cool and strong just like boys are but with boobs and a ponytail.

 

[Manji187]

Well...we've got some fairly good role models right? Alyx Vance, April Ryan, Jade.

Personally I like Meryl (the MGS1 Meryl) and The Boss (MGS3).

 

[CosmicSpiral]

My second issue is the traits given to women and what it implies. Let me provide two examples: Peach in the old Mario games and Samus before Other M. Peach does nothing in the game except get kidnapped. That's the point of the game, you go from castle to castle looking for this woman. Samus is some bounty hunter that goes around kicking ass. If one were to ask which is the strong character, most gamers rooting for strong girls would pick Samus. Why? Does a female have to reject all traits we consider feminine to be strong? Does this mean that femininity is weakness and masculinity is strength? I'm not saying every girl should be some damsel in distress, but how is it less insulting when the girls we hold up as symbols of strength have nothing that marks them as girl besides breasts? To give an example of a strong female character that is actually a woman done right, look at Lady Kaede in Akira Kurosawa's 1985 film, Ran. This woman is a ***** and she brings an entire clan to ruin, and even her husband, a tough as nails samurai, would piss himself if he thought about crossing her.

Don't see how that is a problem. I don't know people who played Super Mario Bros. because of any personal connection with Peach. She's just an in-game abstract reason for why the "plot" exists at all.

Because Samus is a protagonist and does things?

Your logic is backwards. Traditionally, the stereotypical "traits" of women were perceived to be weak and men's traits strong. The point of a "strong woman" is that notions of femininity and masculinity no long apply to that individual. The only thing that makes her a "woman" is her sex, and everything else about her personality is her's. Demanding that "strong" female characters have feminine traits is a contradiction.


Lady Kaede is one of the worst examples you could ever choose for this argument. She's perfectly fine as a strong woman In CONTEXT, but her strength can also be seen as the worst traits of typical femininity (jealously, scheming, gaining power through men and personal manipulation, etc.) exacerbated. That's one of the real problems in depicting "strong women" in any medium: many of those are just powerful women with extremely feminine traits that led to their power. They're still trapped by stereotypes.

You're confusing the sexual male/female distinction with the social masculine/feminine distinction.

 

[Strain42]

I would say my favorite female character is She-Hulk from Marvel comics. She is powerful physically, obviously. But she's also built herself up mentally and professionally. She-Hulk is a lawyer, she's a superhero. She's not overly sexed up, she's not treated as a lesser being than her cousin.

She is a near perfect example of what a powerful female character should be.