A controversial subject and eggo seem to be responsible for a good deal of this thread. This is not a jab at eggo, by the way.Joeshie post=9.71383.737836 said:
Girl Gamer's Opinion
- Thread starter Mudora
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Who cares if a game is an honest representation of life? Whether proportions of hot - notsohot - ugly people in a game are realistic? That's why I'm playing a game thank you and I do prefer, if given the choice, to look at attractive women and men.
What's bothersome about many depictions to me, is that it flat out isn't hot to just have big breasts. Or little clothing. A game like kongai, I like that they tried to make the women sexy, but I don't seem to agree with them what is sexy.
Regarding the female perspective of having games designed geared more towards men than women, I feel your pain. When I go to a mall I have to pass 6 women's clothing's stores before I find one for men. Alas, there's a reason for both these gender oriented business strategies and while it may be getting a little more balanced, it isn't equal and it won't be.
What's bothersome about many depictions to me, is that it flat out isn't hot to just have big breasts. Or little clothing. A game like kongai, I like that they tried to make the women sexy, but I don't seem to agree with them what is sexy.
Regarding the female perspective of having games designed geared more towards men than women, I feel your pain. When I go to a mall I have to pass 6 women's clothing's stores before I find one for men. Alas, there's a reason for both these gender oriented business strategies and while it may be getting a little more balanced, it isn't equal and it won't be.
I agree with everything, however, we should be saying "women", not "girl" unless you actualy are some 10year old, in which case I am highly impressed by your comfidence and ability to have a less than main stream opinion. Also its not "heroine", its "hero", gender dosen't affect that word and the only possible use of defining further is to discriminate.Mudora post=9.71383.721456 said:
Yet after that I would also like to point out that any vainity (or promotion of) is bad, and the pressure to be matcho form these games is also present, though less prominent than poor treatment of women. I have never seen an adjust bar for a woman for muscle or fat, though I have never played an mmo properly, nor any eastern game, for the above reasons.
Have you noticed that if you pick up trousers as a woman in oblivion they magicly turn into a skirt?
This thread is pretty silly but I still feel the need to make a few points.
Yes I am a female gamer. Been playing since the Atari. I play everything from First Person Shooters to RPGs. For a two year period I worked at Gamestop and am still an active gamer. There has never been a point in my life in which I didn't have a gaming system of some kind, in fact for several years I collected rare systems till frankly I just ran out of room.
Ok, onto the topic. Yes, females are often horridly represented in games, as they are in almost every other aspect. TV, movies, books, Comics any medium you will find a decent percentage of unrealistic females; both in shape and behavior.
Yes. It is indeed just a game however that doesn't excuse it. No I am not crying and bitching and moaning about the situation. A person can express dismay over something and not be pitching a fit. For some reason on the internet people seem to assume extremes. A game should no sooner depict Custer raping a bound Native American woman than it should any other disgusting act and get away with it because 'it's just a game'. Side note, what I just described is a real game.
I find it funny that people assume that just because almost all female gamers are displeased (You'd be hard to find one that is 100% a-ok with Princess Peach and Ivy in behavior and looks) with the appearances of female characters in games does not mean we want the complete opposite. Realistic doesn't instantly equate to obese. Frankly I rather not see obese characters run around but I would like to see females who wear a real suit of armor and not metal lingerie. There is a middle ground, it does exist and we can reach a happy medium.
In many games yes the male character is this overly masculine beefy slab of testosterone. Does that instantly mean that there is equal eye candy for all parties? No. I personally and many of my female friends feel the same way about many male leads in games. Too much muscle can be a bad thing! Facial hair isn't always attractive. Would I like to see more realistic men as well as women? Yes! Some of my favorite male characters tend not to fit into the typical 'beefy hot male'. Snake is in good shape (in MGS2 and well he's still looking pretty good in 4! haha) but not screaming masculinity nearly as much as say... the lead guy from Gears of War who is so manly I'm frankly shocked that you can't see the testosterone ooze from his pours.
I would no sooner pretend to understand what it is like to be male and what various issues a male faces so I would kindly ask that men do the same. A huge amount of pressure is put on women to look a certain way and it would be nice to have some relief from this constant reminder of inadequacy in one of our past times.
There are many issues of misogyny and an unbalanced appearance in games. I'll use Warhammer. Many of the male avatars are typically large, muscular and frankly unattractive (the high elf males excluded they look like a stiff breeze should snap them in twain a nice break from the norm if a bit extreme) while almost ALL of the females are hyper sexual. Even some of the avatars that aren't extremely sexed up tend to look far more appealing than their male counterparts. It's just yet another unfair standard. It's alright for men to be less than perfect looking but heaven forbid the females look questionable!
I think both sides need to remember something: Men often get tired with women's complaining and men can't even begin to understand the frustration of being female nor should they dismiss it. So I think gals shouldn't constantly bring up this tired old issue (just keep it amid your gal pals they'll understand!) and guys shouldn't so quickly dismiss a woman's feelings on the matter. *shrugs*
Sorry for the verbosity. Insomnia does fun things to my head.
Yes I am a female gamer. Been playing since the Atari. I play everything from First Person Shooters to RPGs. For a two year period I worked at Gamestop and am still an active gamer. There has never been a point in my life in which I didn't have a gaming system of some kind, in fact for several years I collected rare systems till frankly I just ran out of room.
Ok, onto the topic. Yes, females are often horridly represented in games, as they are in almost every other aspect. TV, movies, books, Comics any medium you will find a decent percentage of unrealistic females; both in shape and behavior.
Yes. It is indeed just a game however that doesn't excuse it. No I am not crying and bitching and moaning about the situation. A person can express dismay over something and not be pitching a fit. For some reason on the internet people seem to assume extremes. A game should no sooner depict Custer raping a bound Native American woman than it should any other disgusting act and get away with it because 'it's just a game'. Side note, what I just described is a real game.
I find it funny that people assume that just because almost all female gamers are displeased (You'd be hard to find one that is 100% a-ok with Princess Peach and Ivy in behavior and looks) with the appearances of female characters in games does not mean we want the complete opposite. Realistic doesn't instantly equate to obese. Frankly I rather not see obese characters run around but I would like to see females who wear a real suit of armor and not metal lingerie. There is a middle ground, it does exist and we can reach a happy medium.
In many games yes the male character is this overly masculine beefy slab of testosterone. Does that instantly mean that there is equal eye candy for all parties? No. I personally and many of my female friends feel the same way about many male leads in games. Too much muscle can be a bad thing! Facial hair isn't always attractive. Would I like to see more realistic men as well as women? Yes! Some of my favorite male characters tend not to fit into the typical 'beefy hot male'. Snake is in good shape (in MGS2 and well he's still looking pretty good in 4! haha) but not screaming masculinity nearly as much as say... the lead guy from Gears of War who is so manly I'm frankly shocked that you can't see the testosterone ooze from his pours.
I would no sooner pretend to understand what it is like to be male and what various issues a male faces so I would kindly ask that men do the same. A huge amount of pressure is put on women to look a certain way and it would be nice to have some relief from this constant reminder of inadequacy in one of our past times.
There are many issues of misogyny and an unbalanced appearance in games. I'll use Warhammer. Many of the male avatars are typically large, muscular and frankly unattractive (the high elf males excluded they look like a stiff breeze should snap them in twain a nice break from the norm if a bit extreme) while almost ALL of the females are hyper sexual. Even some of the avatars that aren't extremely sexed up tend to look far more appealing than their male counterparts. It's just yet another unfair standard. It's alright for men to be less than perfect looking but heaven forbid the females look questionable!
I think both sides need to remember something: Men often get tired with women's complaining and men can't even begin to understand the frustration of being female nor should they dismiss it. So I think gals shouldn't constantly bring up this tired old issue (just keep it amid your gal pals they'll understand!) and guys shouldn't so quickly dismiss a woman's feelings on the matter. *shrugs*
Sorry for the verbosity. Insomnia does fun things to my head.
Irish people don't get money from the government on St. Patrick's Day.Cheeze_Pavilion post=9.71383.734734 said:
Besides--everybody's Irish on St Patty's day! Celebrations like that and certain others are not about saying "hey, we're this and you're not" is more about "hey, we're this... check it out!" Celebrations of culture are nothing to be frowned upon (and not even included in what I was talking about, for that matter), because its a celebration, not something to emphasis differences. It is also all-inclusive.
The problem with "pride" parades is that they're doing nothing but saying "we're different than you, but we want to be treated equally"; oxymoron? Why yes, it is. You can either be one or the other. If you want to be different then that's cool, but you can't expect everyone to not treat you different. If you want to be the same and equal then come right ahead but you have to take the bad with the good and you can't fall back on being different when it happens.
I hate to ask this, But you don't browse the internet often do you? Japanese women are born like that lol..(I kid, I kid..But you have to tell me there might be 0.1% truth in that. ^.^)Mistah Kurtz post=9.71383.737577 said:You mean the constant and shameless bent-over hanging-tit shots of the slut-dressing Naomi in MGS4?beoweasel post=18.71383.735721 said:My problem with female characters in games (and media) isn't their sexuality, or being portrayed as sexy (Hey, I'm male, I admit I like big boobs and a nice butt.) as long as they don't beat my head over with it (Functional clothing, is all I ask for...armor that actually covers their body for example.)
What annoys me is the female characters that are portrayed as 2 dimensional, like being weak and whiney (Like most of the girls in Japanese RPGs.)
Also, Your never irish on St. Patricks Day unless you drink yourself into a stupor.
Man, I seriously missed this discussion a while ago.
I don't mean to pimp my website, but I've not only discussed a lot of my thoughts on it, but also summarized it in a recent comic arc I have done. For those interested, it starts here: http://www.gamertagged.net/index.php?strip=39 and here: http://www.gamertagged.net/index.php?strip=41.
For those not interested, the basic summary is I think the idea of video games being a male thing is a complete illusion. The developers are not undersexed nerds anymore (well, not all of them, and nerds/geeks themselves are far from undersexed these days), but they insist on carrying on the same illusion.
The major issue is that most of the industry knows how to target a male demographic, and in some cases both male and female demographics (can you say a game like Bioshock is fun only to men? Or how about Harvest Moon? Or Spore?). However, when the industry tries to target the female demographic, well, they just don't know what they are doing, and they also are not aware that nothing special needs to be done. You don't need a game strictly for girls.
What would make girls more interested in games is 1) the attitude in the industry and magazines stop thinking only guys want to play, and 2) fix writing. This needs to be done anyway, but I guarantee you if games had better writing and story more girls would be interested (there's a reason girls tend to be major RPG fans).
I don't mean to pimp my website, but I've not only discussed a lot of my thoughts on it, but also summarized it in a recent comic arc I have done. For those interested, it starts here: http://www.gamertagged.net/index.php?strip=39 and here: http://www.gamertagged.net/index.php?strip=41.
For those not interested, the basic summary is I think the idea of video games being a male thing is a complete illusion. The developers are not undersexed nerds anymore (well, not all of them, and nerds/geeks themselves are far from undersexed these days), but they insist on carrying on the same illusion.
The major issue is that most of the industry knows how to target a male demographic, and in some cases both male and female demographics (can you say a game like Bioshock is fun only to men? Or how about Harvest Moon? Or Spore?). However, when the industry tries to target the female demographic, well, they just don't know what they are doing, and they also are not aware that nothing special needs to be done. You don't need a game strictly for girls.
What would make girls more interested in games is 1) the attitude in the industry and magazines stop thinking only guys want to play, and 2) fix writing. This needs to be done anyway, but I guarantee you if games had better writing and story more girls would be interested (there's a reason girls tend to be major RPG fans).
I just gouged out my eyes.misterprickly post=9.71383.787295 said:The bottom line is... objectification is everywhere and it's not limited to gender.
I mean... how many GUYS saw "the 300" and said to themselves "I need to hit the gym"?
You could have a hero that looks like this...
girls have no problem BUT have a girl that looks like this...
and they won't stop screaming!
YES!!! The double standard is alive and well!
With my cat's claws.