When will game developers realize there are female players too?

[Enigmers]

There's mega popular games like the Sims and bejeweled that target women specificly.

Since when does Bejewelled and The Sims target women specifically? Maybe the men you hang out with won't play them because they're not manly enough, but those are games that can be enjoyed by pretty much any demographic.

 

[cystemic]

you're being too picky. i'm a girl and i perfectly enjoy games that have a male main character, its like arguing that harry potter should be a girl or something. besides if they do end up making more female main characters youll end up with bayonetta boobs covering the entire screen so i prefer having a small tasteful male main character

 

[Enigmers]

meryl silverburgh - commanding officer - metal gear solid

Tanya Pavelovna - Russian Sniper - Cod: Finest Hour

...

*snip*

Another good one for the list is Sniper Wolf, from Metal Gear Solid.

 

[Skeleton Jelly]

You play a game because it's fun and intrigues you.
Why the hell should it matter if you play as a girl or a guy?
It doesn't really matter AT ALL, so you're making a big fuss over nothing.

 

[jamesworkshop]

Better question:
When are some female gamers going to realize that there are plenty of female protagonists in video games?

- grow up.

Count them.
I dare you.

And then you count the amount of games that feature the male as the main character.

Don't go around telling people to grow up when you can clearly see the line.

*snipped it out*

about 10 to 13 of those have been primary characters, the resident evil ones have been main and secondary depending on the game and almost all the rest are from 2D/3D fighters that don't have a traditional devide of primary and secondary characters

He said plenty of female protagonist nothing to say about the ratio between male and female

Quoted again and pointed stuff out;

Sonya Blade - Mortal Kombat, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Lara Croft - Started out as Adventurer, marketed as sex.
Chun- Li - Street Fighter 2, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Mileena - Mortal Kombat, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Nina Williams - Tekken right?, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Christie Allen - ?
Bayonetta - A pair of boobs with legs.
Setsuka - Soul Calibur, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Angel (King of Fighters)
Crimson Viper (Street Fighter)
Joanna Dark - Perfect Dark, Is awesome.
Samus Aran - Metroid, Is awesome.
Kitana (Mortal Kombat), Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Blue Mary (King of Fighters)
Helena (Dead or Alive), Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Baiken (Guilty Gear), Not a Main Character but a playable one (also awesome)
Sophitia Alexandra - Soul Calibur, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Cammy White - Street Fighter, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Nina & Anna Williams - Tekken again?, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Tina Armstrong - ?
Taki - Soul Calibur, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Isabella "Ivy" Valentine - Soul Calibur, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Ada Wong - Resident Evil Minor/Major character, first playable in RE4 right?
Claire Redfield - Resident Evil 2, Yes
Meryl Silverburgh - NOT PLAYABLE
Jill Valentine - Resident Evil (Hate what they did to her in RE5)
Lightning - FF14, from what I've heard, is not the Main character
Sarah Kerrigan - Is not a main character, is a Unit
Cate Archer - ?
Mona Sax - ?
Sonia Belmont - Castlevania Legends, True, but she was announced as Not Canon as well.
Rayne - Sexsymbol.
Elizabeth Greene (Prototype) - ?
Kasumi - Dead or Alive?, then;, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Nariko - Heavenly Sword "We may need you to play Twing-Twang"
Julia Chang - Tekken, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Asuka Kazama - Tekken, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Seong Mi-na - Soul Caliber, Not a Main Character but a playable one.
Lady - Devil May Cry

All those refered to with this line;
"Not a Main Character but a playable one."
Is a Fighting Character. In all Fighting games, everyone are a main character.
But there's also like 20 of them

Therefore, you may only pick 1 Female of each Fighting genre because truthfully, they're all pretty much the same.

Meryl Silverborugh is not, I repeat IS NOT a female PLAYABLE CHARACTER.
Therefore, she is out of the picture.

Suddenly, the list of names you've written have drastically reduced to the following;
Mortal Kombat
Street Fighter
King of Fighters
Perfect Dark
Soul Calibur / Soul Blade
Dead or Alive
Guilty Gear
Metroid
Prototype
Bloodrayne
Resident Evil
Castlevania Legends
FF14
Tomb Raider

6 out of 15 games are Fighters.

Compare those 15 games to the 900 of only the Snes Library.

Fnar Fnar.

I counted the number of female protagonist not the number of games they were in


Lara Croft - Started out as Adventurer, marketed as sex.
* Errm so what how is she now not the protagonist of tomb raider

Bayonetta - A pair of boobs with legs.
* Errm so what how is she now not the protagonist of Bayonetta

Joanna Dark - Perfect Dark, Is awesome.
Samus Aran - Metroid, Is awesome.
* they rule

Ada Wong - Resident Evil Minor/Major character, first playable in RE4 right?
Claire Redfield - Resident Evil 2, Yes
* yes exist as primary and secondary characters depending on the game (same with Jill)

Jill Valentine - Resident Evil (Hate what they did to her in RE5)
Lightning - FF14, from what I've heard, is not the Main character
* face it lightning is the only character on both the disc, the box art and the manual so I say it counts

Cate Archer - ?
* The operative: no one lives forever - lead character

Sonia Belmont - Castlevania Legends, True, but she was announced as Not Canon as well.
* cannon is irelevant still the lead character

Nariko - Heavenly Sword "We may need you to play Twing-Twang"
* ZP FTW...lead character

Rayne - Sexsymbol.
* Errm so what how is she now not the protagonist of Bloodrayne

Recount 12 protagonists

Could also add
Faith - mirrors edge
Rubi mallone - wet
Violetta summers - velvet assassin
Darci stern - Urban chaos
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Therefore, you may only pick 1 Female of each Fighting genre because truthfully, they're all pretty much the same.

Meryl Silverborugh is not, I repeat IS NOT a female PLAYABLE CHARACTER.
Therefore, she is out of the picture.

I wasn't intending the Fighter characters as protagonist I copied the list from an earlier post about the number of female characters in gaming that were not helpless princess they only appeared on the list because they could kick large ammounts of ass, thats why I gave a number rather than specify individual characters as protagonists

 

[Shycte]

I never said that you've said it. I just assumed that the goal always is to make better games. Is it not?

In truth you speak.
But to constantly create better games, that's a feat that not even everyone's beloved Bioware will be able to uphold.

That is true, but I believe that in order for games to improve, the devs must have free hands, and for example be able to choose the gender of their character freely. But as we said, males are the target audience so it get twisted that way. I for one, have no problem playing as females. So lets just leave this one up too the story writers....

And we've reached an understanding.

That is just the problem.
The target audience and the developers narrow minded view.
Which is why I proposed the idea earlier about broadnening their views.

I don't think the problem is the developers are being narrow minded, they are following the market. If the market were to change so would the games.

And that the general public is narrow minded can hardly come to a suprise to anyone.

 

[Matthew Wilson]

Games usually have male characters because they cater to the majority of gamers, sure they can have female characters in games but for violent games such as GTA it's mostly males that play it and they need someone to relate to. On the flipside if they have a female character then people will complain about how woman are conveyed in a violent manner it's unfair. You could argue that you could be given gender choice but then you have the problem of either never mentioning the character's gender which would harm the narrative or creating two sets of dialogue, one for male, one for female which would hurt the budget. In my opinion a game like GTA with a solely female character would be a good change of pace, experimental and might even change opinions of gamers and developers.

 

[jamesworkshop]

meryl silverburgh - commanding officer - metal gear solid

Tanya Pavelovna - Russian Sniper - Cod: Finest Hour

...

*snip*

Another good one for the list is Sniper Wolf, from Metal Gear Solid.

True its easy to forget when Snake is so busy checking out meryl's tail all the time

 

[Snake Plissken]

Game developers do realize that there are female players. You act as if devs are moronic and have totally missed out on the fact that women make up roughly half of the population. That's a stupid assumption. They just don't care.

Oddly enough, I feel similar to you...I can't get behind games that feature FEMALES as lead characters. I hate Tomb Raider, Final Fantasy 13 bored me, Bayonetta just makes me want to play Devil May Cry, and don't even get me started on Onechanbara.

Honestly, how many women do you think want to be portrayed like a man? You can't just change Marcus Fenix into a girl and expect men to buy the game. Once you change the no-no parts, you have to change the ENTIRE GAMING EXPERIENCE. I don't think you really want a game with a strong female lead, you want a game with a female lead that worries about girl stuff. I don't mean to be blunt, but I can't think of a more PC way to say it. I don't want to play "Twilight: The Video Game" any more than you want to play "Tim the Tool-Man Taylor: The Game." You know what everyone likes in games, though? Shooting things. Who does most of the "shooting things" in real life? Men. It's just the way it goes.

 

[Wolfy4226]

Why aren't there more female characters? Because:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MostGamersAreMale

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MostWritersAreMale

Take your pick.

 

[Miles Tormani]

Lightning - FF14, from what I've heard, is not the Main character

Uh, what? This stuck out for me in particular because it shows that you are not getting your facts straight, and instead just pulling accusations out of memory.

Lightning Farron is from Final Fantasy 13, and is, in fact, the main character. She is also a total badass. Also consider that the other female characters in the party, Vanille and Fang, are infinitely more important to the story than Snow, Hope, and Sazh.

Furthermore, you keep saying stuff about how games don't have female leads. We keep mentioning games that do. You say that they're automatically over-sexualized or not well designed. Well, Marcus Fenix is one of the worst character designs I've ever seen (RAWWWRGH I HATE ALL LOCUST BATURDS I HAV NO CHARACTER BUT THAT), but no one seems to care about that.

...Well, no. I lied. Dominic "WHERES MAI WIIIIFE" Santiago is much worse than Marcus.

My example? I only have one. Halo. The biggest gaming hype machine of the decade. It has been exploring the prospect of female leads, right under your nose apparently.

In ODST, Veronica Dare outranks all the other main characters, is playable, and is literally the primary reason for the story.

In Reach, Kat-320 outranks all of Noble Team, save for Carter-259, and is so badass that she didn't let something as petty as losing her arm impede her battle prowess. Additionally, the main character can be female, complete with her own lines. I originally wasn't going to play a female Noble Six, but after hearing everything you said, I think I will anyway just out of spite.

Keep in mind, this may only be one example, but developers have shown a love for copying Halo in part or full. Besides, I can think of plenty other games with female leads that are superior to their male led counterparts.

 

[Daipire]

Why aren't there more female characters? Because:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MostGamersAreMale

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MostWritersAreMale

Take your pick.

Well done sir, I believe I am ninja'd...

 

[jamesworkshop]

Game developers do realize that there are female players. You act as if devs are moronic and have totally missed out on the fact that women make up roughly half of the population. That's a stupid assumption. They just don't care.

Oddly enough, I feel similar to you...I can't get behind games that feature FEMALES as lead characters. I hate Tomb Raider, Final Fantasy 13 bored me, Bayonetta just makes me want to play Devil May Cry, and don't even get me started on Onechanbara.

Honestly, how many women do you think want to be portrayed like a man? You can't just change Marcus Fenix into a girl and expect men to buy the game. Once you change the no-no parts, you have to change the ENTIRE GAMING EXPERIENCE. I don't think you really want a game with a strong female lead, you want a game with a female lead that worries about girl stuff. I don't mean to be blunt, but I can't think of a more PC way to say it. I don't want to play "Twilight: The Video Game" any more than you want to play "Tim the Tool-Man Taylor: The Game." You know what everyone likes in games, though? Shooting things. Who does most of the "shooting things" in real life? Men. It's just the way it goes.

Those games had female protagonists designed for men, why would a soldier like lightning run around flashing her thighs?
You don't need to have a female character to have a game marketed towards women i'm not saying you think that but its seems to be the general idea in this thread that thats the issue despite loads of game have female protagonist that female gamers don't seem to care for


EDit**
" lightning run around flashing her thighs?"

can't believe I missed that pun

 

[Ironic Pirate]

I don't know why you care, as I could play as a genderless, sentient rock if the game was good.

 

[spartan231490]

Maybe females don' make up a majority of players but they are out there. Every no sale of a game relects on the bottom line and I am a no sale on most current games.

Why don't they realize that most women don't want to play as male characters? I mean just switch it around, how many male players would enjoy games if most of the ones available had women as the main character?

Why is it a problem for them to develop games where gender option is allowed?

I, for one, don't purchase games that only allow a male character. I can't even role play a character like this. It's just not fun.

Usually these characters have a romantic interest. Of course the romantic interest is female.
C'mon, maybe some female players can go for this but not this player.

Maybe someone here can help me understand why gender option on MOST games, is not allowed.

I would say that a lot of good games have gender options, and that most of the ones that don't, it doesnt really matter (CoD, or Halo for example). Also, I don't think many guys would have a problem if they had to play as a female, all the guys i know occasionally play female characters in rpg's and mmmo's and even dnd, because it just gets boring otherwise. Honestly, for linear games, it's almost impossible, they would have to redo the whole game really, dif script, dif voice acting, in many cases, a different storyline. Still, i can imagine that it would get frustrating. solution: play rpg's? almost all of them allow gender choice, maybe all of the modern ones.