Do you think a game that sexualizes a Male Main character would sell?

[Eclectic Dreck]

A great many games do sexualize male characters. The catch is, that process tends to look different for males than females. Attempts to play to the male power fantasy for example is, essentially, an attempt to create a persona that males think females find sexually appealing. Demonstrations of strength, accomplishing great deeds, defending the weak: these are the same outward expressions of sexual suitability that hips and breasts are for a female.

 

[Dr. Thrax]

With what you're describing, OP, that'd only sell with the shota crowd.

My personal opinion is that hell yes I'd love some more male eye-candy, but going back to when Mass Effect 3 allowed MShep to bat for the home team, one poster on the BioWare forums went as far as to say that BioWare was "alienating" their "core playerbase, the straight-white-male gamer" and raised such a shitfit over it. Despite the fact that having a same-sex MShep was completely optional, and that in the preceding games FemShep was able to bat for her home team.

Now if we go further into sexualizing the male protagonist, or male characters in general, (More than just the muscle-bound macho man power-trip we get) I can imagine a lot of people saying the same thing when they get denied their TnA in favor of sexualized male characters either due to an insecurity in their sexuality, because they don't like it so nobody else should, or simply because it's not tits and ass.

Still you can see disguised oversexualising in games now *chofh* borderlands 2. Where the bigger breasts a female NPC character have. The more important it is that you go back and see her (elli, moxxi, random people... you see what i mean right?) i don't think this is what they intended to be accused of when making the game dough.

I'm sorry, Moxxi is oversexualized because that's how she was designed, and it was purely comical, digging deeper and examining her as a character (Albeit a side-character) she has her own personality beyond being a pair of tits that you need to talk to to get side missions. Ellie is only sexualized in that she has a rack that could crack your skull open if she turned around too fast, and even then Ellie is properly dressed for her occupation as a mechanic, and again, she has her own personality. Both Sirens, Maya and Lilith aren't really oversexualized ether, yes, Lilith has cleavage showing and she's got pants that hug her ass as if it was a second skin, but that's not exactly what I'd call oversexualizing. Also, name one "random person" that is oversexualized.
You might have gotten away with this kind of claim for another game, say Bayonetta, and even then that's a big maybe with Bayonetta, but it's not going to work with the Borderlands series.

2. I see it as kind of fair. Females get to have these half naked pretty boy twats in twilight. We get to have pixelated chick in gimpy outfits.

Uhh, why can't it be equal opportunity? Men get plenty TnA in movies as well as video games, women get a much smaller amount of man-candy in video games, and a little bit more in movies, mainly action movies (And really? You go for the Twilight twinks? C'mon, Vin Diesel? I could listen to that man read the phone book.. Jason Statham?? Hello???). While yes, there are quite a few more male gamers than female gamers, I'd like to think it would be an equal-opportunity for both genders to get their own form of eye-candy.
I do realize that whoever posted as Matt isn't Matt (Or was it? Aw hell I can't think straight and I'm falling asleep at the keyboard again), and I apologize for having this show up in your inbox.

 

[RubyT]

The main character is a skinny young boy who is constantly in skimpy outfits and having really off-putting shots of his crotch

Who would find that sexy? Outside of some pedophiles.

Men are sexualized in video games. Naturally, that looks different than sexialized women.

 

[Kevin Bennett]

Why not? I couldn't care less if its a guy, girl, or a three headed slime monster as long as the game is fun and the writing is good. Although I have to wonder if girls would want to play it, or if they would prefer the "super cool female hero" kinda thing like Bloodrayne. i know when the first one came out i knew a LOT of females that wanted to look that cool and be able to move like that.

But at the end of the day its just an avatar and as long as the writing was witty and gameplay good? Sure i'd play it, why not?

 

[Aaron Sylvester]

Being a straight hetro male, obviously NO. Unless the gameplay/story is amazing, every time the camera keeps zooming into their ass/crotch and the guy puts on skimpy outfits, the game would be an instant turn-off for me.

My bets are that such a game would be a loss - how do I know? Because if such a game could result in profits, the gaming industry would've milked that idea to death already. But studios/publishers haven't spat out a single game that uses constant male nudity (in revealing outfits or whatever) as an attempt to "over sexualize" them, because sexualization doesn't translate between the genders that easily.

The very definition of over-sexualized male is up for debate. Feminists tend to label every example of male over-sexualization as "power fantasy", because a powerful male is already considered sexy - society judges a man by what they accomplish, by their strength of character, by their determination...their looks aren't as important as the other factors. "Look at him, now that is a REAL man" people say. In contrast, a powerful female is simply seen as a woman trying to fill a man's role and isn't considered "an amazing woman" unless she's a pretty-face with great tits and ass. It's just how most of the consumers and society sees the situation, so obviously games have followed suit.

A great example is this:

Putting aside that Heavenly Sword is a pretty half-assed game, look at how Kratos's female version turned out to be Nariko, a beautiful girl with a pretty face wearing a thong (does it LOOK like she's ever fucking seen actual war?) as opposed to Kratos being an ugly ************ who is still considered an awesome, sexy, badass male character not because of his looks, but because of what he can do.

 

[l3o2828]

main character is a skinny young boy who is constantly in skimpy outfits and having really off-putting shots of his crotch

Dunno where you come from, but that's not really what "sexualized male" means where I come from. More like "pedophile."

As I'm not particularly interested in looking at a "young boy"'s crotch, it'd have to be a helluva good game to make me buy it anyway.

I only presented this as a parody and satire.
I wasn't trying to tillitate anyone, i was just trying to show boldfacedly how Unsexy and bad videogame characters fanservice can get.

And sorry, that should have been young MAN.
I guess this is what happens when you try to think of really disgusting stuff as for parody then go overboard at 3 am.

 

[JoesshittyOs]

Would you say that games don't already do this? I can name quite a few ruggedly handsome lead characters in games right off the top of my head.

 

[Playful Pony]

Easy. There is enough dreaming girls with an interest in games such as myself out there, I'm sure a decent amount of guys with the like for other guys too! If the game plays well and is enjoyable, most of the crowd interested will come too. I think there are games like this already though, but I'm not sure how overtly sexualized you'd want the character to be X3.

There WILL be a fringe of angry male gamers though. Those people that are always angry about everything done that does not follow the formula of games made in 1995...

 

[debra_ beretta]

Hmm, I'm of the hyperactive, low attention span female persuasion myself and the kinds of games which attract me are massive explosions, guns, bombs, destruction, kittens etc, rather than sexy male characters. I theorised that Techno Kitten Adventure might well be the perfect game for me, so until someone decides to make a bullet hell version of that game, I'll keep waiting.

I think male sexuality is something which is actually quite hard (apologies for the pun) to sell. Sure, you can have your David Beckhams and Daniel Craigs who women lust after, but I think the more lucrative business is female sexuality because it appeals to both men ("ooh, sexy lady!") and women ("ooh, aspirational!"). In the office which I work, both sexes comment on a photo of Beyonce, saying that her boobs look fab, but a photo of Johnny Depp is drooled over by the ladies and the guys just ignore it.

The point I am trying to make is that it would seem that physical female sexuality makes for better business than male. I'd bet that there would be more guys responding to bouncing boobs than chicks responding to a bouncing willy, lols aside.

A lot of male characters are sexy without being specifically designed to physically appeal. My stupid VG crush is Gordon Freeman. Hnng. Get in my pants.

 

[debra_ beretta]

Also, if you want scantily-clad "bad boy" bishies, you might want to hop over to JRPG territory. Plenty of them over there. *remembers Kuja*

D-:

 

[l3o2828]

Also, if you want scantily-clad "bad boy" bishies, you might want to hop over to JRPG territory. Plenty of them over there. *remembers Kuja*

D-:

That's a woman....
<.<
and for the record i don't REALLY want this.
I thought it would be funny to have a very satirical game taking a stab at the exubherant ammounts of Boobage in videogames.

 

[IronMit]

I'm going to use the example of Porn.

Back in the day, male porn-stars looked like Ron Jeremy. Why? Because the porn industry thought men would not want to look at the good looking man and it would 'annoy' them.
Later they discovered that men actually preferred the well -endowed 6pac hunk ...because they super-imposed themselves onto him.

I played the metal gear solid series and In tekken half the male characters fight topless half the time. It doesn't bother me. As long as there aren't slowmotion crotch and arse shots of just the man..i need something else on the screen to look at. Like women, ...or explosions.

 

[Jamous]

Depends. I'd probably buy it (assuming it was done well and the sort of game I -would- actually buy and not the sort of game I just have no interest in.) but I doubt that a great portion of the market would. Think about the sort of 'insults' that are thrown about online; "Gay", "******", etc. etc.
It just doesn't seem like the sort of thing a lot of kids online would go for. (I'm talking about sexualisation paralleling that of females in a lot of games currently, as opposed to just making them kind of sexy. We already have plenty of sexy guys.)

 

[IronMit]

I think male sexuality is something which is actually quite hard (apologies for the pun) to sell. Sure, you can have your David Beckhams and Daniel Craigs who women lust after, but I think the more lucrative business is female sexuality because it appeals to both men ("ooh, sexy lady!") and women ("ooh, aspirational!"). In the office which I work, both sexes comment on a photo of Beyonce, saying that her boobs look fab, but a photo of Johnny Depp is drooled over by the ladies and the guys just ignore it.

The point I am trying to make is that it would seem that physical female sexuality makes for better business than male. I'd bet that there would be more guys responding to bouncing boobs than chicks responding to a bouncing willy, lols aside.

Theres a subtle difference... me and my mates (who are secure about our sexuality) don't bother looking and Johnny Depp because we have no attraction or appreciation of other men's faces.
Brad Pitt in snatch or Christiano Ronaldo's physique we can appreciate. Something to strive for- physical perfection. Super imposing yourself. In rpg's i'm sure people tend to make characters that are better versions of themselves.
Sexualising men would not put me off a game as long as a guys arse isn't the only thing on the screen

 

[debra_ beretta]

Kuja is a guy (at least in the Euro version), I recall him being named as "mystery man" and a couple of occasions where characters remark that "he" looks rather effeminate. Maybe he's got a lady garden under those clothes and is genderqueer, who knows. Despite his ladylike appearance, Kuja has been referred to as male since I can remember playing the game. I think he's a bloody good bad guy, regardless of his gender though. *loved* that game.

 

[dyre]

main character is a skinny young boy who is constantly in skimpy outfits and having really off-putting shots of his crotch

Dunno where you come from, but that's not really what "sexualized male" means where I come from. More like "pedophile."

As I'm not particularly interested in looking at a "young boy"'s crotch, it'd have to be a helluva good game to make me buy it anyway.

I only presented this as a parody and satire.
I wasn't trying to tillitate anyone, i was just trying to show boldfacedly how Unsexy and bad videogame characters fanservice can get.

And sorry, that should have been young MAN.
I guess this is what happens when you try to think of really disgusting stuff as for parody then go overboard at 3 am.

Heh, no worries man. I guess when I read it at 2 am, I just didn't pick up the, uh, subtlety.

OT: While sexualizing women by putting them in ridiculously revealing (and often downright unattractive) outfits is a "thing," I'd say being shirtless is as far as sexualizing males really goes. So, would I play as a shirtless male in a video game? Sure, why not.

 

[Something Amyss]

In a medium filled with homophobic teenage boys who only like to ogle burly men?

Hell no.

 

[aguspal]

FUUUUUU



How about a game that sexualises both genders um?

Obviously, that dosnt means sexualising every single character, just a couple. LOL



Why the fuck every single one of these thread annoying me... I think its because they are always one-sided as hell. Sexualize Woman character, also Sexualize male. Again, not every character, well I guess its ok but that would be another game entirely...



Actually I couldt care less about this whole thing. Back to playing Borderlands 2.


EDIT:

In a medium filled with homophobic teenage boys who only like to ogle burly men?

Hell no.

oh yeah thats another reason of why I dont like those threads. Needless generalization.

 

[Something Amyss]

I think the more lucrative business is female sexuality because it appeals to both men ("ooh, sexy lady!") and women ("ooh, aspirational!").

I'm yet to meet any woman who has ever claimed to find DOA "aspirational."

More than likely, it's due to the male PoV being treated as default.