Girls and the games aimed at men

[tobyornottoby]

Someone said on here that blacks, occidentals and homosexuals are also underrepresented in games, and posed the rhetorical question, do we need to compensate for this as well? While he has a valid point, I would answer that blacks, orientals and gays (separately, anyway) do not account for more than half the population of the world.

Actually, orientals do =p

 

[CerealKiller]

I'm not sure what ?...0:3 means, so I really can't address that. I may well say hi to you again in 10-20 minutes, and undoubtedly at that point I will L O L.

...because you like being annoying.Yeah,i did notice it.

Would you like to be friends?

Haha!!I swear i knew you'd ask me sooner or later! xD (next time i HAVE to organise bets about things that i think will happen)
No but thanks for asking!

 

[funguy2121]

ALLrighty then acquaintance. I gotta run to the store. When I get back, we can work together to serve our inherently male needs to kill and blow shit up. Cheers!

 

[CerealKiller]

ALLrighty then acquaintance. I gotta run to the store. When I get back, we can work together to serve our inherently male needs to kill and blow shit up. Cheers!

More generalizations...?!Meh,i'm not surprised really...

So,with other words you'll keep annoying me...Maybe i actually should copy and save this stuff.Amazing...!

 

[Seldon2639]

~Snip~

I did get your point. My point was that it made sense from a meta perspective to put the female player into the mindset of a female soldier: I am a soldier, my gender (for the moment) is irrelevant. It wasn't "fnar, girls just want cute outfits" it was "from a gameplay perspective, as a female gamer, you get to experience some of what a female soldier would experience".

Beyond that, however, comes the fact that in most games you're playing a character. You're not playing you with a gun, you're playing whoever the character is with a gun. I didn't object to playing as Jade in Beyond Good and Evil, because that's what the experience is. I'm playing as her.

Even excluding those points, however, you're ignoring one of the big things (especially about Halo): there's no need to differentiate. We're never shown female elites, so it's entirely possible that the Arbiter was a "female" of her species (and simply seemed male due to our humanocentric viewpoints), and a female spartan in her armor would look just like a male one.

 

[funguy2121]

As for the term "Alpha Male":

The concept of the alpha wolf is well ingrained in the popular wolf literature at least partly because of my book "The Wolf: Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species," written in 1968, published in 1970, republished in paperback in 1981, and currently still in print, despite my numerous pleas to the publisher to stop publishing it. Although most of the book's info is still accurate, much is outdated. We have learned more about wolves in the last 40 years then in all of previous history.

One of the outdated pieces of information is the concept of the alpha wolf. "Alpha" implies competing with others and becoming top dog by winning a contest or battle. However, most wolves who lead packs achieved their position simply by mating and producing pups, which then became their pack. In other words they are merely breeders, or parents, and that's all we call them today, the "breeding male," "breeding female," or "male parent," "female parent," or the "adult male" or "adult female." In the rare packs that include more than one breeding animal, the "dominant breeder" can be called that, and any breeding daughter can be called a "subordinate breeder."
http://scienceblogs.com/clock/2009/08/no_more_alpha_male.php

Alpha, alpha male and alpha dog are colloquialisms. Their usage in normal conversation has outlasted scientific observations of animals.

That's the crazy think about colloquialisms, isn't it? They make their way into the culture at a specific point in scientific understanding, and then retain that meaning while science moves on. Kinda like 'survival of the fittest' became a 'red in tooth and claw' conception of natural selection, but more and more the 'most adaptable' conception of it has become the scientific understanding.

It's like culture--and therefore debates about it like this one--is burdened by not only an Appeal to Nature about the 'real world' of the psychology of the human animal, but by a view of nature that itself is no longer considered by scientists to be valid.

Orwell wrote about this, the gradual degradation of the language by its misuse and (sometimes) intentional abuse. I suppose I should feel guilty about using that kind of flawed language at all, but truthfully, I'm not sure anyone could remove all inaccuracies and traces of bigotry from their language and still be understood.

Don't misunderstand me, I never believed in the idea of the alpha male in the first place, at least not in human beings. The OP was commenting on the term's usage in a game. If I say "alpha male" chances are I'm being coy or waxing poetic or referring to an ideal that someone is trying (in vain) to attain.

 

[mstickle]

~Snip~

I did get your point. My point was that it made sense from a meta perspective to put the female player into the mindset of a female soldier: I am a soldier, my gender (for the moment) is irrelevant. It wasn't "fnar, girls just want cute outfits" it was "from a gameplay perspective, as a female gamer, you get to experience some of what a female soldier would experience".

Beyond that, however, comes the fact that in most games you're playing a character. You're not playing you with a gun, you're playing whoever the character is with a gun. I didn't object to playing as Jade in Beyond Good and Evil, because that's what the experience is. I'm playing as her.

Even excluding those points, however, you're ignoring one of the big things (especially about Halo): there's no need to differentiate. We're never shown female elites, so it's entirely possible that the Arbiter was a "female" of her species (and simply seemed male due to our humanocentric viewpoints), and a female spartan in her armor would look just like a male one.

My point as far a Halo is concerned is that when you are classed as female in the setting you have human female screams. As a male you have male screams, as a male elite you have elite screams. But when you use the elite model with the female setting you still have human female screams. To me it would have made more sense to just use the male elite screams, as you said we have no idea what a female of the species is like - but I doubt it would sound like a human female...

 

[PiCroft]

I agree that women should be catered to more often in games.

I am actually struggling to think of FPSs which have female leads, Perfect Dark which someone has already mentioned being the only one I can think of off the top of my head.

I'm curious though, what are the demographics for female players? I remember looking stats up once but I think they were for quite a few years ago and I can no longer remember them (plus I'm too lazy to google them)

Metroid

Yeah I know, I went a bit 'tarded for a while and forgot about half of every adventure game I've ever played :/

 

[cl20]

Personally I find that there is a general lack of female NPC's/playable charakters, but then again when it comes to an FPS, I'd prefer being able to customize my guns rather then my charakter. And aslong as that works good, I honestly dont care whether im playing a super soilder or a mexican maid.

 

[Kuchinawa212]

I suppose, but you gotta be sure that they don't turn into a girly game. Sure, I see what your saying, and I agree, they really need to make more of a effort, but it's hard to serve both audiences

Not really. They just need to include more female protagonist options in more games. OP is clearly not looking for more Princess Peach adventures, just more Jill Valentines/Samus Arans.

Indeed, they really need more. And yes, more like Samus Aran example. I don't want to see the ultra busty female protagonist either. Their just needs to be that balance, that I don't think many gamer makers are willing to put in

 

[Halo Fanboy]

If you want proof every time you watch a film or video or advertisement every time there is a pretty,young female in it that is in part the proof, as pretty sells, though it might as well be pseudo-sexism these days but I think its more based on there's more ugly people and ugly people like to watch pretty people so if anything its an ugly world out there .

To actually prove that this is true you would first have to define what would qualify as a "pretty" female. Then be able to show that there is an example in almost EVERYTHING. Then you would also have to determine whether or not it's a glorification of that beauty or something else.

 

[Bakaferret]

It's unavoidable that these "she isn't black enough" complaints translate to "she isn't a sassy black woman from the hood." Reminds me of the way some black people complained that Condoleezza Rice isn't "black enough" (presumably because she is talkin' all educated and shit).

How does one represent a black female anyway? Are black people not individuals? Are they all governed by some genetic programming that makes them act in a specific way? What culture acts as the benchmark for blackness? Is it the African American middle class in America, or perhaps the lower class? Is it Somalia? South Africa? Ethiopia?

Again, let me stress this: I am NOT talking about black "personality". I am strictly talking about physical appearance. I really wish you would pay attention to what I'm trying to say. If I was arguing about how black people are "supposed" to act, I would have said that Rochelle isn't black either, since she doesn't act in a stereotypical way.

Do you really think it's likely that they scrapped their earlier plans for the game and created Sheva entirely from scratch in response to the hilariously retarded racism accusations? It takes a lot of time and money to make that kind of a change, and the complaints were clearly coming from a vocal minority of no importance. The developers also say that Sheva was included from the start.

No. I think that she WAS in from the start, but not as a "black female" character, but rather a generic female sidekick. And are you seriously going to tell me that the whole "RE5 is racist" thing wasn't a big deal? Please. The overall complaint may have started from a minority, but every gaming organization worth their salt was talking about it.

 

[CargoHold]

To be honest, I find it patronising to think that playable female characters are there purely for female gamers.
"Aww, well look at you! You're playing games! Would you like me to girl up the game a little for you and give you a girl character to make you feel included? There you go!"

It's a game. The gender of your character is unimportant if you're enjoying the game and not just the novelty of being a girl gamer. AGH. [I know a Halo-mad 'GURL gamer' who bugs the hell out of me.]

I'm not a fan of the girl gamers that go out of the way to show that they are a girl - you know, "girl" in their gamer tag, say after every game "you were beaten by a girl" and all that. In fact depending on my mood if a guy asks if I'm a girl or a little boy sometimes I take the I'm a boy route just for amusement. That's not to say I don't want people to know I'm a girl, I don't exactly advertise it. I know I wouldn't be the only person using a female even if I was the only female playing at the time, I just wish there was one, simply because I feel like it and in a multiplaer environment that has no story basis there is no real reason why not.

But of course I can live without it too, happily. Just as I've done my entire gaming career. I would never promote "girling up" a game just for a female avatar, I doubt it would be as fun anymore. I'm really not hoping for much of a change, the story should have whatever gender was intended for the story, just a slightly different character model in MP.

Oh, I didn't mean to accuse you of anything like that! Those 'GURL POWER' girl games just annoy the hell out of me. Sorry for the rant- and thanks for agreeing with me, sometimes I really feel like I'm the only one who gets annoyed by things like that.

 

[haaxist]

I get what you're saying. Since I'm a girl, it would be nice if there was an option in more games to play as a female character. However, I don't really get the point in an FPS. I get that you can switch to third person, but if I'm playing a shooter, I'm more worried about not dying than what my character looks like.

However, to totally contradict myself, if I have to play as a guy, I make him as androgynous and girly as possible, or I make him good-looking enough that I don't mind staring at him for the duration of the game. Which is why I liked Resident Evil 4. There were both girl stereotypes in there(ditzy blonde and mysterious *****), but Leon made it all bearable. If I have to stare at someone's ass for 10+ hours, I'd rather stare at a guys ass than a girls ass. Which is what pissed me off about Sheva from RE5, the first thing you see of her is her ass, and most of the camera angles are perfectly placed to showcase her ass or her boobs. And did anyone else think it was odd that the more of her outfits you unlocked, the less clothes you could make her wear?

 

[ShotgunSmoke]

I'm a girl gamer too and I couldn't care less about one alpha male accolade. Just go and enjoy the game.

While playing a FPS, I'm not searching for a reason to call the game "sexist".

 

[mstickle]

I'm a girl gamer too and I couldn't care less about one alpha male accolade. Just go and enjoy the game.

While playing a FPS, I'm not searching for a reason to call the game "sexist".

Why are people taking that statement as serious? What I sad was;

The thing that actually got me think about all this was one of the accolades - ALPHA MALE: Killed most of lower rank, I in jest said to my husband "that's a bit sexist".

So really I don't actually care, it just got me thinking about some other stuff. It seems that people made way too many assumtions from my post. I never referred to any actual sexism other than a joking fashion.