Jimquisition: Objectification And... Men?

[ferrishthefish]

Objectification is the reduction of a person to an object.

Let me emphasize the word that everybody seems to have forgotten:

Objectification is the reduction of a PERSON to an object.

PERSON.

Kratos is not a person. He is lines of code. He is an object created for my entertainment (and yours, if you like God of War games), and is therefore very much a "thing" I want to "own." If I hop on Amazon right now, I can purchase the collector's edition of him for $80 + s&h. If I buy every GoW game, I will possess every line of code that can possible be identified as Kratos and will therefore possess HIM in a way that allows me to act out my power fantasies and satisfy my entertainment cravings without ever letting Kratos "initiate" a session or have any say in our player-to-character relationship.

Is buying and possessing a person wrong? Yes.

Is buying and possessing Kratos wrong? No. Why? Because Kratos is NOT a person. He does not exist outside code embedded in a disk or saved in a hard drive. If you disagree, feel free to sue Sony for human trafficking (demigod trafficking?).



With the definition of objectification in mind--and paying SPECIAL attention to the word "PERSON"--Jim's video is simply an assertion that female gamers aren't getting the entertainment they desire out of the video game industry, which is a problem but is a far fucking cry from the dehumanization of the entire gender. Believe it or not, video games are not responsible for prostitution, sex trade, domestic violence, rape, the glass ceiling, the wage gap, etc., so please stop making videos to suggest so.

 

[TAdamson]

snip

But here's an important point. The gaming industry isn't run by one corporation. So who's the one actually excluding anybody? Every company is trying to make money and trying to make what they think sells the most, that seems to make sense. What if the vast majority of them think that selling male-centric content does that? Who's wrong than? What if hundreds of people were organizing parties and most thought pork would be the most liked meat? Is there something wrong with that? Now you can say that they should maybe think of those who don't like pork. But that's where the argument should end, shouldn't it? (and in most cases it doesn't end there unfortunately, it becomes a "let's try to shame and guilt the industry the most we possibly can"-fest)

Well that just it isn't it. It's not just one company. It's a culture problem. The perception, probably true, that games are played primarily by 12 to 25 year old males.

But that's a chicken and egg problem. Are guys, being inherently less social, naturally more likely to play games thus resulting in culture/content that is more male-centric? Or are games played mostly by guys because women are put off by the culture/content of games?

I don't have a real problem with, as you put it, the "let's try to shame and guilt the industry the most we possibly can"-fest, mostly because the industry is made up of companies and you can't really hurt their feelings. But I wouldn't call it shaming. It's more about provoking discussion.

 

[Westaway]

It's like you don't even understand what kind of society we live in. I'll give you a tip. It's a late capitalist society. Meaning, anything, and everything, will be objectified. Complaining about objectification in a capitalist society is pointless.

 

[Professor James]

Off Topic but how many times has he used that DOA beach volleyball clip?

 

[Aardvaarkman]

You're asking that question to someone on the internet? I'm not out to change the world, I can't make a difference.

Point One: I never said it didn't matter.

True, but you did say it was getting too much attention, and then contradicted yourself by saying that you can't make a difference by posting on the internet. So, which is it? Either the internet is ineffective, therefore it doesn't matter if this is getting attention on these boards, or the internet is effective at drawing attention to issues. You can't really have it both ways.

Point Two: The issues I mentioned are slowly killing the notion quality in the industry and the fact that you no longer own what you pay for, you just have a license to use it. I'm going to be frank and say that if someone is self-harming and having psychological issues over the way women are depicted in video games then they need a lesson about reality and fiction and what people are like in the real world. You don't see me upset that I'm not two metres tall with pecs of steel, because I know it's a total fantasy an idealisation.

OK, so the "notion of quality in the industry" is more important than harm to actual people?

I think you might see your latter point differently if you actually were female. Most men don't have to deal with constant leering and sexual attention every single day. For many women, the ways genders are portrayed in games [strong]is[/strong] basically an extension of reality. It's not fiction to be objectified as a woman, it's incredibly common. As a male, you usually aren't being constantly stared at and compared to some ideal male warrior. But women [strong]are[/strong] being constantly stared at and compared to supermodels and idealized game characters.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

.

I get it that women are objectified in this industry as they are in every other industry. I get it that it isn't entirely right. I get it that it's a marketing tool to attract a certain target audience. I. get. It. Everyone gets it...

Apparently not, judging by many of the comments in this thread, which frequently consist of denial that there is any problem at all.

 

[Eve Charm]

The industry shouldn't have to be guilt into it. It should see the opportunity on it's own and invest a bit into it. While I'll call 50% bs, It's not hard to tell that their are female gamers and what games they play and how much. Hell why are companies looking into public data like trophies and achievements and gamer profiles to profile not just females but all gamers better. And finally just I don't know ask female gamers what they'd like to see more in games, not guys assuming what females want in games.

Like Xcom enemy unknown, it was an untapped market and they didn't have to throw much money at it and because of it the sales the game had it made a profit. It should be the same for a "female" orientated game. Make a grade B games, don't spend a lot, make it more female but don't scare away the male audience also, *Market it* and see if it sells. See if the fans come out of the wood work to buy it. When companies are throwing money in the fire making games like Star trek and Aliens:CM

Finally making the "other end objectification" isn't going to solve anything. After reading a lot of this thread and if you put together what people are seeming to think female gamers want ((Strong female lead, not afraid to be openly sexual and pursue male characters, males objectified in her eyes, Doing all the work, rescuing and what not)) It really seems what this thread thinks the perfect female gamer game is a hardcore female erotica game... Point missed. Find a better way to find out what people ACTUALLY want.

 

[Arnoxthe1]

Enough with the gender issue shows PLEASE. We've been down this road SO many times. There are many other good topics in gaming that can and should be explored.

Are woman objectified in some games? Yes they are. Can we change it by endlessly babbling about it on a forum? NO.

 

[Tono Makt]

The industry shouldn't have to be guilt into it. It should see the opportunity on it's own and invest a bit into it. While I'll call 50% bs, It's not hard to tell that their are female gamers and what games they play and how much. Hell why are companies looking into public data like trophies and achievements and gamer profiles to profile not just females but all gamers better. And finally just I don't know ask female gamers what they'd like to see more in games, not guys assuming what females want in games.

They SHOULD. But executives in just about every industry (not just games) are notoriously "conservative". Not politically (though many do tend to be political conservatives as well), but in a more broad sense of the term. They have a proposal for a game which is likely to sell 1,000,000 copies and make the company $5,000,000 in profits. They have a proposal for a game which may sell 10,000,000 copies and make the company $75,000,000... or may sell less than $500,000 and cost the company $1,000,000 to make. Almost without exception, the executive is going to choose the first one because that's almost guaranteed money. It's the safe way out, the easy choice.

Finally making the "other end objectification" isn't going to solve anything. After reading a lot of this thread and if you put together what people are seeming to think female gamers want ((Strong female lead, not afraid to be openly sexual and pursue male characters, males objectified in her eyes, Doing all the work, rescuing and what not)) It really seems what this thread thinks the perfect female gamer game is a hardcore female erotica game... Point missed. Find a better way to find out what people ACTUALLY want.

Actually, it sounds like people want Shepard from Mass Effect to be FemShep as the default.

1) Strong female lead
2) Not afraid to be openly sexual
3) Doing all the hard work

Not so much on the objectification of men, but when you hit 3 of the 4 points pretty much dead centre of the target... who knows? Maybe Bioware will take this to heart with the next Mass Effect game and make their new Fem(Shep) the default protagonist, and you can play a dude if you want.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

The fact women have few leading roles would be irrelevant to the objectification case. You can't have every single group being given a leading role in a single game.

Who said they should all be protagonists in any single game? I'm pretty sure the conversation is about games in general.

Otherwise we could go on and say black people or muslims (or almost any type of minority in the western world) are being objectified as well.

Yes, you could. And that would be generally true.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

I doubt you'll find many BMW drivers lobbying for BMW to create cheaper cars to allow poorer people to have access to BMW awesomeness.

Are you serious? Do you really think that BMW drivers don't want their BMWs to cost less? I'd say the vast majority of them would like cheaper BMWs so they'd have more money to spend on other things. Only a very small minority of BMW drivers are filthy-rich enough to not care about price. After all, BMW owners are typically in the middle-class.

And yes, I'd say that plenty of BMW owners would want BMW ownership to be more widespread. Because they are well-engineered and have high safety standards. I'd guess most BMW owners also have families, so having more people driving BMWs would mean that their children and other family members would be more protected from being injured or killed by car accidents. Plus having more nice cars on the roads just makes for a more pleasant urban environment than having heaping piles of junk everywhere.

 

[The Material Sheep]

The fact women have few leading roles would be irrelevant to the objectification case. You can't have every single group being given a leading role in a single game.

Who said they should all be protagonists in any single game? I'm pretty sure the conversation is about games in general.

Otherwise we could go on and say black people or muslims (or almost any type of minority in the western world) are being objectified as well.

Yes, you could. And that would be generally true.

I don't know how one objectifies minorities. One can think less off, but objectify? I think that's a pretty odd way of putting it. THEN AGAIN. Objectification is a bizarre word that is not really applicable. It's a charged word. It doesn't really say a ton and just looks mean. Characters are overtly sexualized. Their sexuality is brought to the forefront of their character or is inappropriately looming above her/him at all times. So much so that it breaks the tone of the scene, or makes the character dumb or one dimensional. Outside of the most niche examples, literal objectification is often not the correct term.

So just as objectification is not the majority of the cases of problems in gaming concerning female characters. It's inappropriate and pervasive oversexualization. The issues with the portrayal of minorities in some circumstances, is an issue with being the tokem minority, dehumanization through game mechanics, or just being generally ignorant towards differing groups in a foreign setting. That's not objectification. It has it's own set of issues that need to be addressed but objectification is not one of them.

 

[PirateRose]

Actually, it sounds like people want Shepard from Mass Effect to be FemShep as the default.

1) Strong female lead
2) Not afraid to be openly sexual
3) Doing all the hard work

Not so much on the objectification of men, but when you hit 3 of the 4 points pretty much dead centre of the target... who knows? Maybe Bioware will take this to heart with the next Mass Effect game and make their new Fem(Shep) the default protagonist, and you can play a dude if you want.

FemShep was doing real good till the third game and Bioware decided the audience was a bunch of dudebros that want to masturbate to hot lesbians. If you play the way many female fans played, your only option in ME3 is to be a lesbian because the male LI you picked either had the balls to cheat on Shepard, died, or is made unavailable because Tali. Apparently with the Citadel DLC, Bioware realized this problem, and threw in the femShep sexual harassing/raping James Vega or drunkenly sexing with Javik. That's right boys, female Shepard got special treatment for once in the form of awkward, unwanted one night stands while Male Shepard is stuck with a bunch of boring, stable, sexual relationships. *sarcasm*

I was demanding on the forums that Bioware put in some male strippers since ME1, day one. It's really strange that as openly sexual and powerful as the asari are, they aren't on the receiving end and have a bar with a bunch of male aliens taking it all off so they can make their way through college.

I believe in the end it comes down to one thing, that was made apparent when they describe how they created Thane Krios. He was suppose to be that character that was for female fan service of a sexualized male alien equal to the asari. The following is some explanation behind Thane's appearance:

?The body wasn't as exhausting as the head. This is Matt Rhodes' attempt. You see, we still have some of the old heads on there, but Matt was trying to explore what would happen if we had more flesh showing. That didn't go over well. We weren't very comfortable with the amount of skin." - Game Informer, Drawing Mass Effect 2, The Creation of Thane. [http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/02/09/drawing-mass-effect-the-creation-of-thane.aspx?PostPageIndex=3] (you know, out of context, this quote is glorious)

They decided against having Thane half naked because that made them uncomfortable. The male alien that was suppose to be on par with the sexy asari, couldn't be taken that extra step of sexualization. Meanwhile, the camera is up Miranda's skin tight covered butt frequently(she also has a well detailed camel toe) and Jack is running around with nothing but thin straps holding her boobs. They had to create an alternate outfit for Jack's advertising because her outfit was that revealing. But you know, these women are "sexually open" and it's vital to their "characterizations." At the very least they gave Thane the man cleavage and tried to excuse it for medical purposes. Like I'm sure Samara's reasons are behind her deep, plunging neckline.

Then in the end, they killed off Thane after a couple of lines of dialogue(they had nothing else better for him but a poorly coordinated fight and "emotionally engaging" death scene), stuck the camera back up Miranda's butt(her side plot is the same as ME2), and covered Jack up a bit more, but put her in a more feminine role. (See ladies, you mature and grow and feel better about yourself when you fill out a motherly role.) They did, oddly, almost completely eliminate the strippers, but they make up for it by making the Traynor romance start out like a soft core, male fantasy lesbian porno. Male Shepard's exclusive gay relationship starts out with a cute, comfortable, safe date with Cortez at the bar. Everyone applaud Bioware for their great maturity in handling homosexual relationships.

 

[The Material Sheep]

Actually, it sounds like people want Shepard from Mass Effect to be FemShep as the default.

1) Strong female lead
2) Not afraid to be openly sexual
3) Doing all the hard work

Not so much on the objectification of men, but when you hit 3 of the 4 points pretty much dead centre of the target... who knows? Maybe Bioware will take this to heart with the next Mass Effect game and make their new Fem(Shep) the default protagonist, and you can play a dude if you want.

FemShep was doing real good till the third game and Bioware decided the audience was a bunch of dudebros that want to masturbate to hot lesbians. If you play the way many female fans played, your only option in ME3 is to be a lesbian because the male LI you picked either had the balls to cheat on Shepard, died, or is made unavailable because Tali. Apparently with the Citadel DLC, Bioware realized this problem, and threw in the femShep sexual harassing/raping James Vega or drunkenly sexing with Javik. That's right boys, female Shepard got special treatment for once in the form of awkward, unwanted one night stands while Male Shepard is stuck with a bunch of boring, stable, sexual relationships. *sarcasm*

I was demanding on the forums that Bioware put in some male strippers since ME1, day one. It's really strange that as openly sexual and powerful as the asari are, they aren't on the receiving end and have a bar with a bunch of male aliens taking it all off so they can make their way through college.

I believe in the end it comes down to one thing, that was made apparent when they describe how they created Thane Krios. He was suppose to be that character that was for female fan service of a sexualized male alien equal to the asari. The following is some explanation behind Thane's appearance:

?The body wasn't as exhausting as the head. This is Matt Rhodes' attempt. You see, we still have some of the old heads on there, but Matt was trying to explore what would happen if we had more flesh showing. That didn't go over well. We weren't very comfortable with the amount of skin." - Game Informer, Drawing Mass Effect 2, The Creation of Thane. [http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/02/09/drawing-mass-effect-the-creation-of-thane.aspx?PostPageIndex=3] (you know, out of context, this quote is glorious)

They decided against having Thane half naked because that made them uncomfortable. The male alien that was suppose to be on par with the sexy asari, couldn't be taken that extra step of sexualization. Meanwhile, the camera is up Miranda's skin tight covered butt frequently(she also has a well detailed camel toe) and Jack is running around with nothing but thin straps holding her boobs. They had to create an alternate outfit for Jack's advertising because her outfit was that revealing. But you know, these women are "sexually open" and it's vital to their "characterizations." At the very least they gave Thane the man cleavage and tried to excuse it for medical purposes. Like I'm sure Samara's reasons are behind her deep, plunging neckline.

Then in the end, they killed off Thane after a couple of lines of dialogue(they had nothing else better for him but a poorly coordinated fight and "emotionally engaging" death scene), stuck the camera back up Miranda's butt(her side plot is the same as ME2), and covered Jack up a bit more, but put her in a more feminine role. (See ladies, you mature and grow and feel better about yourself when you fill out a motherly role.) They did, oddly, almost completely eliminate the strippers, but they make up for it by making the Traynor romance start out like a soft core, male fantasy lesbian porno. Male Shepard's exclusive gay relationship starts out with a cute, comfortable, safe date with Cortez at the bar. Everyone applaud Bioware for their great maturity in handling homosexual relationships.

Kaiden is a decent romance, Garrus is a great romance, and Thane had a very meaningful death and interesting subplot. If you didn't like it that sucks, but it's certainly not the worst part of the game. It wasn't pandering to the straight male audiance. Jacob was a complete brick of a character so I don't see why he was much of a loss but I'll give it to you. Femshep only got two lesbian love interests. If you count the new DLC they added another straight one in James, and that was hardly rape/harassment.

Male shep also got two pretty decent gay love interests. I mean I'm sorry I'm not seeing this completely exclusive pandering to straight males here. Whatever you might disagree with the games direction I just don't think there is much proof to your claims.

 

[PirateRose]

Kaiden, Garrus, and Thane had a very meaningful death and interesting subplot. If you didn't like it that sucks, but it's certainly not the worst part of the game. Jacob was a complete brick of a character so I don't see why he was much of a loss but I'll give it to you. Femshep only got two lesbian love interests. If you count the new DLC they added another straight one in James, and that was hardly rape/harassment.

Male shep also got two pretty decent gay love interests. I mean I'm sorry I'm not seeing this completely exclusive pandering to straight males here. Whatever you might disagree with the games direction I just don't think there is much proof to your claims.

Kaidan has two places he can die, Virmire and the Coup, and actually he can friend zone female Shepard in ME3. That's three points the relationship can be ended before even starting. Garrus is made unavailable if you don't import him as a romance. Thane's death is hallow because in the end, that's all that matters about him, contradicting the lesson from Thane in ME2 that life is much more important. Not a glorious, warrior death, that's why he's scared before the suicide mission, and everything about his relationship in ME3 is just a few words different from a non romanced relationship. Jacob is only viewed as a brick because he is a literally "a nice guy." He has a pretty meaningful, stable relationship with female Shepard if you actually go through it. He is the non-drama, no baggage, down to earth, let's settle down and have kids some day relationship. He is the only male character in ME2 to say "I love you." Then suddenly in ME3 his character is assassinated, he shows the negative side of the "nice guy," tripped, fell and accidentally made another woman pregnant.

Female Shepard has four lesbian options that give her a paragon achievement: Kelly, Liara, Diana, and Traynor. In total of the relationships that give the paragon achievement, female shepard has four homosexual relationships, with two straight ones. Male Shepard has seven straight relationships(Kelly, Liara, Diana, Miranda, Jack, Tali, Ashley), and two homosexual ones, (Kaidan, Steve).

Bioware could have done so much better evening the odds, like what they mostly did in ME2. They could have just had Thane and Jacob with better romantic scenarios alone for ME3 and kept everything else the same! They could have made Vega fully available, or at least comfortable with a one night stand with female Shepard. Don't tell me that whole thing isn't sexual harassment and rape. Just switch the roles, imagine a man talking to a woman like that and trying to pressure her into sex during a party like that. Waiting for the moment she is drunk enough for sex. You know with all the male rights activists running around the escapist forums, you'd think they would pick up on that double standard crap.

 

[Aardvaarkman]

So just as objectification is not the majority of the cases of problems in gaming concerning female characters. It's inappropriate and pervasive oversexualization. The issues with the portrayal of minorities in some circumstances, is an issue with being the tokem minority, dehumanization through game mechanics, or just being generally ignorant towards differing groups in a foreign setting. That's not objectification. It has it's own set of issues that need to be addressed but objectification is not one of them.

I'd disagree. The industry is full of games where you play an all-American hero, and the goal is to mow down as many brown-skinned or other foreign enemies as possible. If that's not objectification, I don't know what is. The non-American characters are literally treated as objects.

 

[The Material Sheep]

Jacob is a brick because he doesn't really have an arch or much personality outside of... occasional one liners. He's just a well adjusted guy who tags along. Miranda at least some conflict, an arch and a reason for sticking around. I mean you can disagree with her art direction, I certainly did, but that doesn't make the bits of her character invalid. She was far more integral to the story at large, and her internal conflict was partially parallel to Shepards conflict to working with Cerberas.

The fact that Kaiden, and Garrus can be missed doesn't make them NOT exist. It's not Bioware trying to make them less important or use subtext to make you not do them. Kelly isn't a romance in 3 she just kinda talks to you, and you can EASILY miss her romance. Diana Allers in general a joke that hardly anyone liked and is as superficial and rediculous as it gets. No the only two real romance options you get with Shepard in terms of a lesbian relationship, is a pretty tasteful 3 game spanning relationship with Liara, and Traynor. Those are 2 actual relationships. The Vega scene I saw had him being fine with the one night stand, so I don't know where you got that idea. Him waking up in the morning, calling her lola and getting up to make eggs. Didn't seem like that at all.

I just think you've got a very biased preconceived notion of the content and your not going to give it a fair chance because you didn't get exactly what you wanted. In fact you've gone so far as to insult what other people enjoy. I know your angry but you need to stop at your opinion, and leave it there with the insults. Just no need for it and no one wants to really have a discussion with you when you act like that.

 

[The Material Sheep]

So just as objectification is not the majority of the cases of problems in gaming concerning female characters. It's inappropriate and pervasive oversexualization. The issues with the portrayal of minorities in some circumstances, is an issue with being the tokem minority, dehumanization through game mechanics, or just being generally ignorant towards differing groups in a foreign setting. That's not objectification. It has it's own set of issues that need to be addressed but objectification is not one of them.

I'd disagree. The industry is full of games where you play an all-American hero, and the goal is to mow down as many brown-skinned or other foreign enemies as possible. If that's not objectification, I don't know what is. The non-American characters are literally treated as objects.

You keep using that word. I don't think it means, what you think it means. Objectification? Maybe the mooks, but mooks aren't characters. Mooks are objects in every game, movie or story. They, from a plot sense, are literally tools to obstruct the protagonist from a goal. Mooks/Henchmen/En Masse NPC's are an extension of the villain and or villains. Superficial things like the color of the skin of the mooks, or their accent can be justified through story easily. The problems lie in lazy gameplay design, or writing in which it seems the only reason you kill certain mooks is because they are a certain race, or just about anything in Call of Jaurez: The Cartel. Honestly a good example of specific glaring problems with minority presence in games.

I think my point is if you have minority characters, they suffer problems, but none of which are problems of objectification. If your going to sight the slaughter of mooks in fps's or any other combat game, your not making any kind of bold statement. Those aren't characters those are game mechanics. Their aesthetics can inform something about the setting, or game but those characters being literal objects is not a problem most people have issue with.

 

[ferrishthefish]

I was demanding on the forums that Bioware put in some male strippers since ME1, day one. It's really strange that as openly sexual and powerful as the asari are, they aren't on the receiving end and have a bar with a bunch of male aliens taking it all off so they can make their way through college.

I'm asking a serious question, here. Why do you think Bioware should have put male strippers in ME1? Is it because you legitimately believe that female gamers want to see male strippers in games? Or is it just because you think it's "fair" and it satisfies your personal moral code?

 

[PirateRose]

I was demanding on the forums that Bioware put in some male strippers since ME1, day one. It's really strange that as openly sexual and powerful as the asari are, they aren't on the receiving end and have a bar with a bunch of male aliens taking it all off so they can make their way through college.

I'm asking a serious question, here. Why do you think Bioware should have put male strippers in ME1? Is it because you legitimately believe that female gamers want to see male strippers in games? Or is it just because you think it's "fair" and it satisfies your personal moral code?

Well, yes I do think female gamers would enjoy that. Straight women tend to enjoy seeing attractive, half naked men. I mean, have you seen some of the fan art the women are making of just the male LIs. Hell, there is this joeblack guy on deviant art posting 3D models of the guys shirtless on motorcycles, just for the fangirls. With the introduction of drell, having few of them dancing on some tables would have been amazing.

And again, for the sake of Mass Effect's own lore, the asari are a sexually open race who find everyone else not their species sexually attractive. You would think with all their power and influence in the galaxy, they would have strip clubs set up for their viewing pleasure, which would mean there should be some male strippers shaking their asses at the bars.

Jacob is a brick because he doesn't really have an arch or much personality outside of... occasional one liners. He's just a well adjusted guy who tags along. Miranda at least some conflict, an arch and a reason for sticking around. I mean you can disagree with her art direction, I certainly did, but that doesn't make the bits of her character invalid. She was far more integral to the story at large, and her internal conflict was partially parallel to Shepards conflict to working with Cerberas.

The fact that Kaiden, and Garrus can be missed doesn't make them NOT exist. It's not Bioware trying to make them less important or use subtext to make you not do them. Kelly isn't a romance in 3 she just kinda talks to you, and you can EASILY miss her romance. Diana Allers in general a joke that hardly anyone liked and is as superficial and rediculous as it gets. No the only two real romance options you get with Shepard in terms of a lesbian relationship, is a pretty tasteful 3 game spanning relationship with Liara, and Traynor. Those are 2 actual relationships. The Vega scene I saw had him being fine with the one night stand, so I don't know where you got that idea. Him waking up in the morning, calling her lola and getting up to make eggs. Didn't seem like that at all.

I just think you've got a very biased preconceived notion of the content and your not going to give it a fair chance because you didn't get exactly what you wanted. In fact you've gone so far as to insult what other people enjoy. I know your angry but you need to stop at your opinion, and leave it there with the insults. Just no need for it and no one wants to really have a discussion with you when you act like that.

Sorry, missed your post the first time.

1. I love Miranda to death. Don't mistake my criticism of her outfit as hate for her. What I hate is that Bioware went all the way for Miranda's sexual appearance, all the way for Jack's sexual appearance, but got too scared to go all the way with Thane's sexual appearance. They were uncomfortable with the idea of a sexualized male character running around the Normandy and hours of missions, but were comfortable with the idea Miranda should have a camera up her butt and a well defined camel toe.

2. Kaidan and Garrus do exist, but the odds of having a relationship with them are stacked negatively against female Shepard. Again, they are the only 2 straight available relationships for female Shepard compared to male Shepard's 7 straight relationships. Combine this with cutting out Thane and Jacob from the previous games, it is very easy for the player to play through all three games and end up with only lesbian options in ME3. It is pretty clear how they prioritized making sure male Shepard relationships were available, intact, and easy to obtain, while female Shepard's relationships were set secondary, are difficult to the point that several male characters seem to actively avoid her in the end (Jacob, Joker, Vega).

3. Kelly and Diana get you paragon achievements. Yeah I agree, they are total jokes for romantic relationships, but a character like Thane doesn't get a paragon achievement. Bioware effectively made it canon that Kelly and Diana are romantic relationships.

Traynor relationships is based on sex in the shower. While Cortez has the cute, safe, comfortable date on the Citidal with drinks and dancing, Traynor feels the need to strip to her underwear and get wet in order to start a relationship. You can't continue her relationship in the Citadel DLC without her getting in her underwear and wet again. Yeah she has the mature, let's settle down and have kids, but her whole relationship is based on male fantasy of lesbians minus the pillow fights.

As for Liara, she is the most powerful person in all of the galaxy and extremely intelligent. Then Bioware reduced her to supportive girlfriend eager to cuddle Shepard, even if Shepard has treated her like crap for two games(believe me, I tested this out). Yeah her relationship is a nice supportive ideal, but she is shoehorned into such a minimalist role for the only squad mate you can't kill for 3 games, it's a horrible crime against nature. I can't take her romance seriously beyond classic nerd bait.