Is it time for feminists to step off our hobby?

[senordesol]

No, feminists don't need to step off of 'our' hobby (whatever that means). Critique and introspection is how art evolves. It's how you make better artists.

No one is coming to take your games away. No one is going to castrate Call of Duty. The worst -the absolute WORST- that will happen long-term, is that developers will think just a little longer about the roles of female characters in their games.

Oh the horror.

that may well all be true but it doesn't have to be overrepresented by the feminists highlighted in the ongoing saga.

"gaming" doesn't need genuinely radical societal views impressed upon it from the outside by some clique especially given the fact it moderately leans that way anyway.

representations of women in gaming (for example) are regularly taken to task by member of this very forum and in other forums across the net.

what exists "in game and online" is a actually completely different.

and people don't go looking for gaming websites to be lectured on matters socio-political that sound like something for collage campus activists meeting.

there's a reason "the mainstream" is "moderate".

because most people are.

this isn't really about "Feminism".

I'm not sure what you're arguing. Nothing is being 'impressed upon' the industry. There's no board or committee that requires a game to have 'X value of female representation'. And no one is asking for that. All of these critiques, discussions, and 'lectures' are completely optional in their consumption.

If you don't want to be a part of it, you don't have to be.

 

[Jenvas1306]

gaming is younger than literature
gaming is younger than theater
gaming is younger than movies

gaming just had a growth spurt and is growing hair in new and interesting places now
gaming has acne and feels awkward in the suddenly changing body with new weird feelings
gaming wants to be all grown up but doesnt know how and is still afraid of many things
gaming gets bullied, is a bully, is loved, loves, is hated, hates and has a tantrum of its life being ruined everytime something is unpleasant.
gaming makes drama, tons of drama

gaming isnt grown up yet, its a teenager and teenagers are pretty difficult, for themselves and everyone involved with them.

 

[Erttheking]

Video games are one of the few mediums men have left were we can oggle women outside of porn.

Nobody should be able to take that away from men.

Now excuse me while I go play some Dragon's Crown.

Question. If you can get that experience from watching porn, why don't you just watch porn?

Also Game of Thrones.

 

[Racecarlock]

Yes, this is about YOU, isn't it? Not the woman who dared to make a video complaining about the depiction of females in entertainment and getting a shit ton of kitchen jokes, death threats, and rape threats for it. Not the woman who dared submit a game on steam greenlight and then also got death threats and rape threats, then had trouble with her boyfriend which led to the internet slut shaming harder than it ever has before.

But no, clearly WE'RE the oppressed ones in this situation, right? Because anita is jack thompson even though jack thompson got disbarred and anita doesn't even have the powers of a low level lawyer. She dared criticize us from outside of the medium, so she's as bad as all those evil ban games senators, right? Like how christians are oppressed by gay people. Like how muslims are oppressed by women daring to show some ankle.

And no, by the way, I don't think they faked their harassment. Because the evidence to that effect is shoddy at best and I think it's just a bullshit excuse to not take any of the harassment these women are getting seriously.

Games aren't going to be banned, and we aren't an oppressed minority. Stop making shit up.

 

[senordesol]

Take The Last Of Us: for my money, this was one of the inclusive, all-round diverse games ever, with female characters oozing with personality and inner-strength. Ellie is perhaps one of the best written characters in any medium ever, regardless of gender.

So I was pretty surprised to find (as were Naughty Dog, apparently) that the game garnered a not-insignificant amount of criticism for being "sexist".

I have to lift my hand here: I'm one of those who found TLOU sexist.

Ellie was well written and all, but when it comes down to it, she was just another poor frail female character that the usual male, white, straight, mid-40 protagonist must protect and save.

If TLOU wanted to earn my praise, it should have made us play as Ellie. The first minutes of the game, where you play as the Male White Protagonist's daughter, were the best and most original part of the entire game. Now imagine playing the entire game as a little girl all alone with monsters and crazy people. Now THAT will make you feel in danger.

Technically you *did* have to play as Ellie for a while (plus in the DLC). Not the whole game, but a step in the right direction I'd argue.

 

[Schadrach]

Why not have Nintendo do a Mario story where Peach is the main character going out to save Mario? Hell, at least it would shake up the franchise a bit.

They actually did! Super Princess Peach I think it was called. I never played it because I didn't own an original DS at the time, but I remember thinking it looked interesting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Princess_Peach

Didn't sell too badly either, it'd be nice to see something like it again.

...and Saint Sarkeesian hated on this game, because instead of using a typically Mario power up system, she had abilities based on being emotional. Burning with anger, crying streams of tears, that kind of thing. She had a floaty glide thing with her umbrella, and the game play wasn't bad, but wasn't my favorite Mario title either.

As far as the OT, devs should be able to make, and gamers able to play, whatever they want to. Period. Without someone trying to create a shaming campaign for a character, plot, or design offending someone's delicate sensibilities.

Want to make an adventure game where you play a black man in a zombie apocalypse? Awesome.
Want to make a sequel to it where you play as a young black girl? Go for it.
Want to make an action game about a martial artist woman in a futuristic version of France who literally mind-fucks people? Great.
Want to make a first person puzzler about a white woman who's lost her memory stuck in a VR system where the memories of the dead are maintained? Cool.
Want to make a cartoony shooter with an ensemble cast including two female protagonists, a female character who is central to the plot, and a side character who is a young white girl who talks in a mix of urban lingo, fairy tale metaphors and a desire for murder and explosions? Even better.
Want to make a crime sandbox where your character can be almost literally anything, including an option to be an animate toilet? Neat.
Hell, want to make a game where you dig through logs from a disabled spaceship while interacting with two AIs, telling a dystopian story about a culture that fell apart and reacted to stress by creating an actual patriarchy? Sure, why not?
Wan to make a DmC-style beat-em-up where you play a white woman who is a witch and an utter badass, is presented in a fairly sexualized manner but utterly owns her own sexuality? Nifty.
Want to make a very gory beat-em-up about a guy who essentially sells his soul to a foul-mouthed cursed mask in exchange for the power to save his girlfriend from peril? Sure, even if it pisses of Saint Sarkeesian.

All of those are from my personal collection. All but three of those are on my Steam account, two of which weren't available on PC (so I got on PS3) and the other I got the PS3 version of because I couldn't get the physical collector's edition for PC locally. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to identify the games.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

I have to lift my hand here: I'm one of those who found TLOU sexist.

Ellie was well written and all, but when it comes down to it, she was just another poor frail female character that the usual male, white, straight, mid-40 protagonist must protect and save.

If TLOU wanted to earn my praise, it should have made us play as Ellie. The first minutes of the game, where you play as the Male White Protagonist's daughter, were the best and most original part of the entire game. Now imagine playing the entire game as a little girl all alone with monsters and crazy people. Now THAT will make you feel in danger.

To be fair, you do play a significant portion of the game as Ellie, a portion of the game where it is also made amply clear that she can take of herself and help the incapacitated male protagonist. She's also shown not to be frail and does in fact help out in combat by trying to stab enemies that grab Joel and later on by actually using her weapons. And as a matter of nitpick, Joel is mid-50's, this is made clear both by how he looks and in-game dialogue.

Not that I generally disagree with the argument that TLOU, just like Bioshock: Infinite, relied a little too much on having the main character protect a damsel, even if both games took steps to make sure the damsel actually did more than just get in trouble. However, I think there's a time and place for everything and considering the current state of the games industry it is better to applaud well-written female characters than it is to criticize the same characters for essentially being worn gender tropes. Especially when the game goes to great lengths to avoid having the female character in question just be another protection/rescue quest and actually provide assistance, both in gameplay and story.

 

[Muspelheim]

gaming is younger than literature
gaming is younger than theater
gaming is younger than movies

gaming just had a growth spurt and is growing hair in new and interesting places now
gaming has acne and feels awkward in the suddenly changing body with new weird feelings
gaming wants to be all grown up but doesnt know how and is still afraid of many things
gaming gets bullied, is a bully, is loved, loves, is hated, hates and has a tantrum of its life being ruined everytime something is unpleasant.
gaming makes drama, tons of drama

gaming isnt grown up yet, its a teenager and teenagers are pretty difficult, for themselves and everyone involved with them.

This is probably the best summary of the general gaming drama miasma I've seen. Neat job! It's a new, complicated medium in a complicated time, no wonder there is a few growing pains. A lot of running up stairs going "NO ONE UNDERSTANDS ME I HATE YOU!"

Of course, anything worth having is worth aching a bit for.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

If TLOU wanted to earn my praise, it should have made us play as Ellie. The first minutes of the game, where you play as the Male White Protagonist's daughter, were the best and most original part of the entire game. Now imagine playing the entire game as a little girl all alone with monsters and crazy people. Now THAT will make you feel in danger.

You spend some time as Ellie, taking care of a helpless and injured Joel. During that time she shows plenty of self-sufficiency and resolve.

"Sexist" really isn't a fair charge to level at TLOU. "Lousy game play", maybe, but not "sexist".

 

[whiskeystrike]

If people honestly want to see certain sects of gaming hit the door then they need to stop highlighting them. I never heard of any claims against TLOU or Bioshock Infinite being sexist until I read the OP.

 

[Aaron Sylvester]

If only people would realize the simple laws of how consumers and products work:

#1 Does it make money?
#2 Is it legal?
#3 Is it a completely optional purchase?
#4 Is it safe i.e. doesn't cause any direct harm to anyone?

As long as "yes" is the answer to all 4 of the above, the product will continue being produced for the foreseeable future (#1 being key) regardless of what anyone says or does.

...they would quickly realize that feminists are completely harmless. They aren't going to take anything away.

Also within the feminist itself you will find a shit-load of opposing and conflicting views, so can people please stop referring to "feminists" as some kind of united army that is invading? They are a vocal minority. A very tiny minority. Treat them as such.

How does one "treat" a minority?

By not making such threads about them and by not giving news/editor articles about feminism 50x more views than their average articles.

As you can see, people are failing

You wish people to ignore others you deem a minority?

Never said "ignore". Only said to not give them more 50x more attention than other things.

 

[WindKnight]

Why not have Nintendo do a Mario story where Peach is the main character going out to save Mario? Hell, at least it would shake up the franchise a bit.

They actually did! Super Princess Peach I think it was called. I never played it because I didn't own an original DS at the time, but I remember thinking it looked interesting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Princess_Peach

Didn't sell too badly either, it'd be nice to see something like it again.

I don't know how I missed that... wait yes I do, I think I was teaching and going to uni at the time so that's probably why. But if I still had my DS I would go and get that. I'd like to see that on the Wii though, that looks like that'd be a fun game to play.

Some of the critics said it was too easy, so maybe make it a bit tougher, old school Mario style, but it looks cute.

Also, peaches super powers were emotion based... such as be a super crying woman destroying her enemies with her river of tears, or throw a tantrum at them. Because wimmins has super out of control emotions yaknow.

 

[Artaneius]

They won't leave until we ignore them. We fail miserably so far. I doubt good developers would let some attention-seeking vloggers dictate how to make their games.

More like they won't leave until we give in into their demands. Look how much IRL they whined until they got what they wanted.

 

[Dragonbums]

Are you saying that all feminists who critique videogames don't actually play them? Because there are a fuckon of feminist identifying people who play videogames as a hobby. We are not a mutually exclusive group.

This is the kind of attitude that fosters this overreactive garbage we see now.

Like the bullshit with "causals" vs. Hardcore gamers.

 

[Quadocky]

Feminist critique of film is an established thing that garners no big deal because... its just one form of critique. Heck, even some films are made with Feminist thought in mind (Fight Club for example being a dark satire on masculinity).

There is no reason why Feminist thought should spur such outrage. Unless of course you are some small minded bigoted weirdo with an ax to grind or something. WHICH a lot of popular people on youtube seem to be, much to my disappointment.

 

[carnex]

Video games are one of the few mediums men have left were we can oggle women outside of porn.

Nobody should be able to take that away from men.

Now excuse me while I go play some Dragon's Crown.

Wait, what?
I distinctly remember seeing almost naked women in most major blockbusters.
I distinctly remember reading about naked women doing almost anything in blockbuster books.
I distinctly remember seeing almost naked women in comics from shlock to artistic visual novels.
and i can carry on

Funny thing is, much, if not most of it was aimed at females...

No, we will never lack female bodies and faces to adore. Vast majority of humans, of any sex/gender combination, have a adoration of female shape and face hard coded in them.

gaming is younger than literature
gaming is younger than theater
gaming is younger than movies

gaming just had a growth spurt and is growing hair in new and interesting places now
gaming has acne and feels awkward in the suddenly changing body with new weird feelings
gaming wants to be all grown up but doesnt know how and is still afraid of many things
gaming gets bullied, is a bully, is loved, loves, is hated, hates and has a tantrum of its life being ruined everytime something is unpleasant.
gaming makes drama, tons of drama

gaming isnt grown up yet, its a teenager and teenagers are pretty difficult, for themselves and everyone involved with them.

OK, people, pelase don't stone me over this. But MovieBob actually had a important series of 4 videos about censorship in young and free Hollywood and the "change" in the industry (hint, people changed, industry stayed the same).

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/3679-Hollywood-History-101-Part-1
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/3697-Hollywood-History-101-Part-2
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/3768-Hollywood-History-101-Part-3
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/3797-Hollywood-History-101-Supplemental-The-Code

only this time the "progressives" are crying out loud for censorship. It's a nice piece of education on #gamergate from Bob before he changed or went public with his politics.

 

[Ramzal]

The only issue I have with a feminist critique of game characters is when it's stated "An actual woman wouldn't say this" or "An actual woman wouldn't do that." Since there are a variety of people who dress, act, and conduct themselves in a variety of different ways. A woman wearing short shorts should get the same respect as a woman wearing pants.

Oh that's good to know that one can speak for an entire sex. That being said, this doesn't happen often. Are feminist right about speaking out against characters that literally are ONLY there as a sex object? Sure. But that could be broken down to trying to censor things to the point where a few are comfortable. So for the most part people can say whatever they want to say and play what they want to play.

 

[carnex]

Also, peaches super powers were emotion based... such as be a super crying woman destroying her enemies with her river of tears, or throw a tantrum at them. Because wimmins has super out of control emotions yaknow.

From gender that always complains how men are emotionless beasts that summary comes out as funny. It's a stereotype, but it's hardly a misogyny. Most men don't have emotional swings and breakdowns most female have or at least we don't display it as strongly. We don't really understand that and it's frankly a bit scary since we don't know how to deal with that plenty of times. Result, Super Princess Peach among other things.