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Women And Sexuality In Gaming (Kotaku/Dragon's Crown Thoughts And More)
- Thread starter ClovingWestbrook
- Start date
Other AI constructs are fully clothed, conspicuously the sultry female remains essentially naked. To me it's even dumber when you consider the origin story of the AI constructs and how they essentially choose their own form. Mostly all of them choose interesting things / people from history - yet we have 'naked woman' as the one you see all the time.
Baller. PhD
Banned
Except it's not? I recently played through the original BioShock again and I don't remember any sexualized women in there. I ran through Spec Ops: The Line before that, same thing. How many blockbuster movie stars are unattractive? TV actresses? How about your local weather lady?
It's not a problem with games, it's a problem with men. That's the world we live in.
MotionBlue
Member
Serious deja vu from this thread.
Do people complain about beer commercials or action movies for the same reason?
Do people complain about beer commercials or action movies for the same reason?
JordanN
Banned
Uh....no? I don't think I suggested that.
Just want to know if Japan is more or less comfortable with their games than the West.
I would like to think games could be more interesting than a 'comic book universe'. Her proportions are fine, but she's essentially naked. You can't see any way that might seem a little out of place?
Mauricio_Magus
Banned
there's a thread like this every week
OK, to back up on my previous post (since I never actually played all the way through any of the Halo games), I'll state here that most of my female friends, if they were given the choice, would absolutely choose to look like the Halo 4 Cortana over some plane-jane fembot. Probably in the same way men would choose to look like Robocop instead of C3P0.
SolidSnakex
Member
Just look at Suda's comment on the subject
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...-the-strange-world-of-suda-51s-killer-is-dead
Conciliator
Banned
The thing about the Dragon's Crown design is that it's just stupid. It's eye-rolling. I'm not offended by it, or if I am it's as a person who thinks video games are great rather than as a feminist. The people saying it's a trope I feel like are dodging the issue, because a sorceress with triple F breasts wearing a barely-there metal thong is not a trope anywhere except video games and heavy metal album covers.
It's a shame because the art style in general is so luxurious. Anyway, the last thing I think is that it should be censored or illegal. I don't know who is saying that, if anyone, but it's not me. I do think it's really dumb.
EDIT: What's-his-face's letter response to Kotaku was very reasonable and likable.
It's a shame because the art style in general is so luxurious. Anyway, the last thing I think is that it should be censored or illegal. I don't know who is saying that, if anyone, but it's not me. I do think it's really dumb.
EDIT: What's-his-face's letter response to Kotaku was very reasonable and likable.
Dusk Golem
A 21st Century Rockefeller
I just want to add that there needs to be a balance with this on any character, man or woman. I do think sexualizing female characters is overdone and should be toned down, but I also think the opposite extreme of calling out any game for sexualizing a female (like the recent Kotaku shenanigans) is childish at best and disgusting at worst. There needs to be a balance; sexualization isn't needed in everything but neither should it not exist. I feel it should exist if it applies with the creative vision of a project. When there is just sexuality for sexuality, we get problems.
I also hate it when good female characters get more sexualized down the road though. Jill is great in Resident Evil 1, but each of her appearances made her more and more sexualized until we got blonde leather-tight 'pull at her chest-piece to defeat her' Jill in Resident Evil 5. Aya was good too, but then in the newest Parasite Eve (Third-Birthday) game, she had a losing clothes mechanic and got naked several times in the game (and even the first game had a random secret shower scene). It's this stuff I am not fond of, not overly exaggerated sexualized male or female characters in an overly-exaggerated type of game.
I also hate it when good female characters get more sexualized down the road though. Jill is great in Resident Evil 1, but each of her appearances made her more and more sexualized until we got blonde leather-tight 'pull at her chest-piece to defeat her' Jill in Resident Evil 5. Aya was good too, but then in the newest Parasite Eve (Third-Birthday) game, she had a losing clothes mechanic and got naked several times in the game (and even the first game had a random secret shower scene). It's this stuff I am not fond of, not overly exaggerated sexualized male or female characters in an overly-exaggerated type of game.
I have two issues, when a the design of a character is completely destroyed trying to be sexy.
Cammy white.
I have no issue with felicia or Morriagan because they make sense. Camry on the other hand just looks like a mess.
Issue number 2, Just because there are some good female characters, doesn't make the bad ones go away, nor do they make them playable.
Cammy white.
I have no issue with felicia or Morriagan because they make sense. Camry on the other hand just looks like a mess.
Issue number 2, Just because there are some good female characters, doesn't make the bad ones go away, nor do they make them playable.
djplaeskool
Member
I'm surprised so few articles note this very easy to make observation.
Max Knight
Member
I don't really see the point of making an AI lifeform female, or humanoid, for that matter.
That said, I don't play Halo, and I also don't think Halo 4's Cortana is excessive, if we avoid my above statement and operate under the assumption that it must be the human female form. She's just a voluptuous lady. Big deal.
10101
Gold Member
But it is what it is. It is a comic book sci-fi universe, plenty of which have had naked ladies in them over the years in film and TV (Farscape for example). What is so special about games? And does it really matter?
Bingo.
I see "naked woman" not as perverted, but as one of the most beautiful forms ever seen. Often times angels and goddesses are perceived as nude, because the nude form can be beautiful. So with that in mind, does it not make a little bit of sense that the AI constructs would choose that form?
Just to be clear, I have not played the Halo series, so I don't know anything about its lore.
SolidSnakex
Member
More and more articles i've seen have taken the entire game into account instead of just focusing on one design. Those articles tend to have a favorable opinion (or at least neutral) on the art.
Winterfang
Banned
In my opinion.
Visually a good male character should be cool and a female should be sexy.
Now cool and sexy are very vague words and it means different things to different people.
Visually a good male character should be cool and a female should be sexy.
Now cool and sexy are very vague words and it means different things to different people.
Rekki-Maru
Banned
Claire from RE is fucking hot- but yea this debate is old, it happen a long time ago. guess what? there are more girls/ladies playing games now since tomb raider 1. this shit is like retreading an old forgotten battleground.
SaggyMonkey
Member
It's not like tv and films are really overrun with unattractive males either.
Knux-Future
Banned
It all really depends on context. Just because a character is sexy or whatever alone does not make it bad. Bayoneta was a silly game with an our there world. It works. Dragon's crown every design is cray. It works plus the character isn't a useless timid girl and seems via animations conifrdent as hell.
But in games where characters are just there to be saved and be useless... That's the problem.
Designs alone isn't the issue. That's all I will defend... Artistic design alone should be free to do what they wish.. It's when context comes into play.
I play some games that are.... Interesting and that fit the mold a lot more. Lol.
Hopefully this topic stays civil and awesome...
Hopefully
But in games where characters are just there to be saved and be useless... That's the problem.
Designs alone isn't the issue. That's all I will defend... Artistic design alone should be free to do what they wish.. It's when context comes into play.
I play some games that are.... Interesting and that fit the mold a lot more. Lol.
Hopefully this topic stays civil and awesome...
Hopefully
Yeah, I understand that as successful products of evolutionary biology we enjoy looking at naked women. I also can concede that there might be times were it would make sense, but we are talking about the overwhelming majority of games where all female characters have "made this choice" to wear things that are essentially a second skin. I am dying for examples of interesting female characters that didn't decide to dress like they were going to shoot some weird porno.
I think it might just be the overwhelming majority of the games you are playing.
People who only play Nintendo games, or sports games, or strategy games*, etc are generally not subjected to this kind of thing.
*Catherine The Greats massive bust in Civ 5 being the exception.
I think Samus counts, no one even knew she was a girl until she stripped down to her 8 bit bikini. Now we have the zero suit. I'm telling you, most of GAF is so deep into it they can't see out.
anarchy_panty
Member
Man, I had the biggest crush on Claire Redfield when I was a kid. Goofy red jacket and all.
Someone should make actual statistics based on that. I think it's changing based on my personal experience, although bit by bit. And maybe not just because it's stupid to do so, but it's also bad story-telling and bad character design. And people interested in a good story will get turned off by it.
Anyway, I'm just playing through Tales Of Graces and originally I didn't want to buy the game because I expected a JRPG with exactly the stereotypes (big tits, male heroes rescues girl etc.) mentioned here. I was pleasantly surprised that this is not the case. Right at the start there is a little (it's the childhood arc) girl that is actually extremly powerful and protects one of the main (male) characters. And at the end of the childhood arc she
even dies for that mission
she comes back, I haven't finished it so I don't know how this all works out
Also in the adult part of the story at least till now none of the female characters has big boobs or anything. And those female characters also don't wear any sexualized clothing. And the characters have quite a bit of depth to them.
Thank you for pointing this out, I'll have to check it out. I love a good JRPG.
Nemesis_
Member
Claire had the best softly spoken voice ever. Anyone would have to be dead inside to not have a crush on her. So caring *O*
They actually care about objectification of women in the real world, and not in fiction.
Look at the evolution of a character like Cortana.
To me, this is the pinnacle of bullshit in gaming. Yes, women have breasts, but no way does this make sense in the context. This, to me, is an example of what's wrong with the way women are portrayed in games as much as Dragon's Crown.
It's like Pamela Anderson popping up in your Word 2000 asking if you meant to indent that paragraph instead of that fucking paperclip.
In three of those she looks like a cartoon character
and the other one, she looks like an anatomically correct female.
spandexmonkey
Banned
Arguing over sexuality in a medium devoted to escapism sounds like a waste of time. Lack of representation (no female soldiers in mms, lack of female leads), harmful gender stereotypes (Princess Peach) or enforced gender roles I will continue to think are more important.
Could also be a problem with women feeling threatened with nothing but perfect looking characters in games. Guys do the same but not nearly as bad.
Women feeling pressured to get implants or be skinny. Maybe we are seeing the pushback to that since more regular looking women are playing. Guys love hot looking characters and some women hate them.
Feminist have taken the issue and shame gaming until Its demands are met. Kinda how I see this right now. We just need more variety and be more tolerant to games outside our normal taste going both ways.
Who said all female video game characters are bad?
The "sequence of videos" (which a single one was released so far) from Anita will even have a chapter about what she thinks are good female characters, which I guess will touch upon some of the same characters the article has.
The problem isn't characters being sexy, the problem isn't even characters only being sexy. Sexy is great. Sexy is never the problem.
The problem is with designs that seem handcrafted to turn women away from the game. The problem is how often game worlds are a men's world. Turning all the women into boys fantasy that make women squeamish is part of it, but there are other issues as women only having certain roles , like being the captured, escorted or always having less health, for example.
And, of course, there are games that do it right, good for them, we need more of them, I don't think I ever saw someone saying that all-the-games are horrible and so we only need a handful of counter-examples and that's it.
The "sequence of videos" (which a single one was released so far) from Anita will even have a chapter about what she thinks are good female characters, which I guess will touch upon some of the same characters the article has.
The problem isn't characters being sexy, the problem isn't even characters only being sexy. Sexy is great. Sexy is never the problem.
The problem is with designs that seem handcrafted to turn women away from the game. The problem is how often game worlds are a men's world. Turning all the women into boys fantasy that make women squeamish is part of it, but there are other issues as women only having certain roles , like being the captured, escorted or always having less health, for example.
And, of course, there are games that do it right, good for them, we need more of them, I don't think I ever saw someone saying that all-the-games are horrible and so we only need a handful of counter-examples and that's it.
You're right, of course, but when I see that it strikes me as unusual that the only AI construct that chose to be naked just happens to be the most common and appear in the form of a perfectly fit human female.
Baller. PhD
Banned
Here, here.
If you polled every single person who played Halo 4 and asked whether they would prefer Cortona to be "naked" or fully clothed, the majority would choose naked. It would be a fucking landslide. So 343 catered to their audience. Boo hoo!
Search your feelings, you know it to be true.
I'm sure he meant the overall atmosphere of Nintendo games don't see this type of situation, which is true. Sure sometimes even Nintendo games will have characters like Samus in a bikini, or Peach and Daisy wearing tights in Mario Tennis, etc. But surely those who mostly just play WRPG's will run into this kind of thing way more often.
That's still a waste of time.
I think it's just cleaner narratively to design characters this way. We kind of tackle something similar to this in my acting classes. The more you put into your character, the more you have to explain yourself. This can be great in acting but in character design it becomes a burden.
Dudebros and men with chizzled pecs are easy to get into any narrative but once you start designing outside of that, suddenly you have to explain yourself. Like Max Payne from the latest game looked that way for a reason. It was easily explained and made sense. But would that same body type fit in a MW game or Uncharted for that matter? Not really. It completely changes your narrative. What happened to that character? Why is he overweight? What happened between Uncharted 2 and 3? Unless you're game is purely about that (or even subtly) then there's really no point. You're talking to yourself.
With that said, I do think women tend to be over sexualized in games. I always hate when it doesn't even make sense. Like even as a guy I know women shouldn't fight in heels and a push up bra may be a little hindering. But again, it tends to be cleaner narratively. A little off and non-sensical in some cases but cleaner.
In summary, if your narrative dictates that your character has to look a certain way then you have a certain responsibility to take more care in what you design. Otherwise, it doesn't really matter all that much.
anarchy_panty
Member
When she gives the goofy jacket to Sherry... My heart melts every time,
This might be the funniest thing I've read all day.
In what fucking bizarre universe would the only two character designs be "fully clothed" or "naked". I'm not even a creative person and I can come up with character designs that would make more sense than being naked and actually still allow for an interesting character.
R_thanatos
Member
Like an endless time loop.
This can't be a real thought that you had.
Edit: Porn, and you know, actually having sex, are very different things from playing a video game. What makes sense in porn does not always make sense in other applications.
ClovingWestbrook
Banned
Do women masturbate to the objectification of men through porn?
So if the developers are making games that don't treat the ladies too well. And people buy those games, should women just deal with or stop playing games all together. That is what you are saying.
Dark Octave
Banned
This argument is so old and tired.
I don't think women have half the problem with sexualized characters that the people who complain about them do.
I don't think women have half the problem with sexualized characters that the people who complain about them do.
Baller. PhD
Banned
...and most dudes would still choose naked. What's your point?