When will we see a NON-attractive woman in a video-game?

[thespyisdead]

Kaidan Alenko. Such an ugly woman that she had to die every time I played the virmire mission.

wow... never knew that Kaidan was female to male transvestite...(i think you were going for Ashley though...)


OT:
any juggernaut female model from UT03/04...

also those... other things... that look like gimps...in the same game...

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

I give you Clotho from God of War 2!
No, I won't post a picture cause it's kinda NSFW (no matter what you do) and I don't want to ruin my clean slate. #
Gotta work to the top if I want to have a successful reign of terror y'know?

 

[Zantos]

Kaidan Alenko. Such an ugly woman that she had to die every time I played the virmire mission.

wow... never knew that Kaidan was female to male transvestite...(i think you were going for Ashley though...)

I'm not entirely sure, but I think the joke is that Kaiden looks like a girl. A really ugly girl.

OT: This is such a non-issue by this point. We're on 4 pages with surprisingly little repetition. Some of these women, I do wonder if they're just situationally unattractive though. Attractive women just having a bad day. Unless you're Matt Ward, no one looks sexy in power armour. But since we'll never see the Gears girls in flowing ball gowns then I guess it's a moot point.

Ooooh, Matt Ward has reminded me.

Spoiler: Mira from Space Marine

Although apparently someone on the internet disagrees.

Spoiler: Sexy Mira?

 

[The Funslinger]

Roll a female character in Fable 2, and wait.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

Roll a female character in Fable 2, and wait.

Actually as long as you don't put many points in physique then you can end up as a sort of Amazon-esque lady. Tall, but not very buff. Besides, you only need that shit to use swords and Guns+Will powers is always more fun

 

[hermes]

I'll add Chell from portal:

Spoiler

There are loads of female characters in videogames that aren't either supermodels or comedically ugly.

Then again, it seems her beauty sleep treatment worked wonders by the time she got to Portal 2:

Spoiler

 

[wolf thing]

I remember various tomboysh characters and of course old hags (hello Kreia)

However, it seems like there is always at least one pretty character in every game.

this is going to sound really pedantic but atton does say Kreia would have been very attractive in her youth and if you read into the writting enough you discover that the hand maiden might be her daughter who says she "carry's the face of her mother" and the exile say that "her mother must have been very beautiful"

I am so very sorry for being such a nerd

on topic, to me it seems like most main female characters are attractive, which is okay some times but i would like to see both good looking and ugly characters were there looks are used interesting ways and affect the story, similar to the elephant man where there looks and the world reaction to them are studied.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

Rose from the Blackwell series is decidedly average, in the way a REAL person would be (rather than a whale-sized lumbering pile of jelly or a perfectly structured face and body with a few well-placed blemishes).

Ah. I think it's time to admit my huge crush on Rosa Blackwell. She's one of the best written characters in any game and I think she's absolutely hot.

Sticking to WadjetEye games I also really liked Anna in Resonance. Oh how I'll never forgive that scientist asshole.

I can see how she might be attractive (Rosa) in a school-teacher kind of way, though I don't find her so. She's a good character, but I think the Blackwell games aren't very well written on a whole. The dialogue borders on the tedious efforts of a novice writer. Resonance too.

 

[Darken12]

Never. Every woman is attractive to someone.

Non-conventionally attractive? As soon as it stops being a tangible way of raising sales for the industry.

Meaning, it's entirely up to you.

 

[Aris Khandr]

wow... never knew that Kaidan was female to male transvestite...(i think you were going for Ashley though...)

Just as a point of nitpickery, transvestites are those who cross dress (usually underwear) for a sexual kink. Transsexuals are those who get the "x to y" designation.

This tidbit of knowledge you probably didn't actually need was brought to you by seeing the Rocky Horror Picture Show WAY too many times in my youth.

 

[teh_gunslinger]

Rose from the Blackwell series is decidedly average, in the way a REAL person would be (rather than a whale-sized lumbering pile of jelly or a perfectly structured face and body with a few well-placed blemishes).

Ah. I think it's time to admit my huge crush on Rosa Blackwell. She's one of the best written characters in any game and I think she's absolutely hot.

Sticking to WadjetEye games I also really liked Anna in Resonance. Oh how I'll never forgive that scientist asshole.

I can see how she might be attractive (Rosa) in a school-teacher kind of way, though I don't find her so. She's a good character, but I think the Blackwell games aren't very well written on a whole. The dialogue borders on the tedious efforts of a novice writer. Resonance too.

While the plotting in the Blackwell games isn't always the best I think there is some quality to Rosa that I can't help but like. I'm not quite sure what it is and I'll admit that it's purely a matter of taste. Perhaps a vulnerability? I dunno. She just resonates with me. (har har).

As for the writing in general, you're right that there are plenty better writers on print, but the gaming scene of today is generally even worse when it comes to writing.

 

[The Almighty Grigard]

I'm surprised that nobody has said Rachel yet.

Can I just ask what game that is from? It's the only screenshot I couldn't immediately identify the game it came from.

 

[Jenvas1306]

is anyone familar with League of Legends? in terms of their female characters they have a very clear idea, or they are just re using the same model as a base for them all. Its a constant source of grief for me, as I'd love to play something else without the need to choose a male character...

Spider queen elise sucks....

 

[Macgyvercas]

Oblivion and Skyrim (Unmodded) both feature some pretty hideous women.

Dude, that doesn't count. EVERYONE was hideous in Oblivion.

 

[Macgyvercas]

Kaidan Alenko. Such an ugly woman that she had to die every time I played the virmire mission.

...
...
...Can't tell if joking or serious :/

Probably joking. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.

 

[Fraught]

Voila.

Wait, we don't do that anymore?

[sub]Pretty women...[/sub]

Okay, uhm.

[sub]Blowing out the candles...[/sub]

Well, I generally think that videogames have plenty of unattractive women. I think the mindset of thinking that women are always portrayed in an overly physically flattering light is a stereotype in and of itself.

 

[axlryder]

Average as in you can see an example of this negative trait to x level of severity in a reasonable chunk of the population.

my previous comment takes into account the severity and degree of commonality already. Again, it's also about quantity, trait type and facial balance. If those things are out of whack, bam, ugly person. Not rare.

Given that most people won't have any severe examples of a negative trait, [creating an unattractive person is] doable but it requires you to take an extraordinary number of possible features and tweak them towards the negative

no, no it does not. Please stop trying to engage in hyperbole. You're taking to an artist who actually knows what they're doing. While there are a multitude of variables on a person's face (most of which theoretically could be negative), It only takes about 2-5 substantially negative traits in the normal range, without any positive traits to balance it out. You're also failing to take into account that different kinds of traits are more off putting, regardless of their severity. You seriously don't seem to know what you're talking about here. It's like you WANT to make it so that, unless a person has some kind of physical abnormality, it's rare that they can be viewed as less than attractive. That's simply not the case.

and even then she wouldn't be an example of the average person (average as in the measure of central tendency not average appearance) simply because of the number of negatives.

and yet we're not trying to make an example of the average person. Good god, why do you keep bringing this up? Are you trying to say that OP is requesting too large a volume of something that is too rare to be required for equal representation? Are you making a comment about Alyx? Are you actually saying it's virtually impossible to make someone ugly and average at that same time (no shit). This comment makes no sense in context to my previous conversation and the comment you quoted me with.

My point is this:

1. The distribution of appearance is a Gaussian function. Lots of people who sit somewhere between 4-6 out of 10, far less who trend towards a 2-3 or 7-8, very few 1s or 9s and practically no one who's a 0 or 10.

yes, I'm aware of how averages work. Unfortunately, that's not what we were talking about here. As an integral part of your point, you've done a horrible job presenting it up until now.

2. Average is still pretty damn attractive

no it's not. At least, not based on the hotness scale most guys seem to adhere to. Pretty damn attractive would be like a 7.5 or something. Average (as in 5 out of ten) is "okay looking" to "not necessarily ugly". Perhaps vaguely attractive with enough make up or whatever.

Below average is still going to be at least somewhat attractive.

No it's not. You can have degrees of ugly. There are plenty of people in this world I would not bang but wouldn't call hideous either. Once you start hitting the "4" range it's just a matter of how much alcohol you would need to consume (paraphrasing in brospeak there).

Again using the x/10 scale, 3 or lower is where you'll find genuinely unattractive and at that point you're at least one standard standard deviation from the mean, maybe two.

I'd say 4 is getting closer to that point, given the potential range that exists. and if we're talking about most guys, anything below is a six is no longer considered "attractive". The problem is that you're conflating how difficult it is to "create" a physically unattractive person and how common they are. The other problem is that you're trying to apply standard deviations to a scale which has no actual fixed "average". You're using a scale based on levels of attractiveness, not actual averages of appearances. People say "average", but they mean medium to okay looking. Plain looking. Etc. For all we know, a rating of 4 in the eyes of the public could be the true "average" in terms of what the average person actually looks like. This is especially possible when you take into account all the different ethnic variations and an age range of 18-45.

Provided videogames don't swing excessively to the opposite extreme, you won't find unattractive people (female or male) that often simply because unattractive people don't happen that often.

This sounds like a point directed at the OP. Why you would quote me about it? I have no idea, since I was making a point about how Alyx is "above average" before you quoted me. Are you trying to say because Alyx is just moderately pretty she falls into the "completely average" range? If so, I don't buy it. I also happen to think you're wrong about the occurrence rate of "unattractive" people.