Tropes vs Women in Videogames

[Crybaby Bunting]

[MDK]

Can't wait for them to add women to FIFA

[SeanDMan]

EA added women to NHL 12/13.

[MDK]

But I don't play NHL :@

[Colly]

Were there WNBA players in an NBA Jam or whatever it is now recently? An all star team or similar?

[King Ellis]

Can't wait for them to add women to FIFA

Isn't that what TEOL's character is?

[SeanDMan]

But I don't play NHL :@

But EA publish both FIFA and NHL so don't be surprised if they carry it over. Women's Footie is as big here as women's hockey and, in the States, much more so.

[King Ellis]

You underestimate the laziness of the FIFA development team.

[Vamp]

To be fair its not like the NHL development team are the most active bunch...

[Sousa]

All I got from this thread is that when my daughter stops playing just Minecraft and starts playing more online games, she's going to kick the shit out of all of you.

[GoGo Yubari]

Related, and awesome:

[SeanDMan]

I remember someone doing that for a Zelda game too.

[Quom]

I struggle with these topics. My stance is that video games being produced by big name publishers are at least 90% of the time derivative to the point of adding nothing for male or female gamers. They are a set of experiences which have been created based on market research and a desire to make more money.

The only thing pissing me off is that I didn't steal the idea for this kind of 'insight'. The current trend is moving towards social gaming with quite a few pundits predicting a turn towards the 'pay to win' model popularised on Facebook games (and most frequently played by children and women). The biggest issue faced by money driven games companies is the second hand market and how to keep the game with the initial purchaser. Encourage gamers into micro transactions and they are motivated to retain the disc or you make some money out of the next purchaser. As stated the current market most accepting of this style of game are women and children. It's yet to be seen if the entire demographic would buy consoles, and/or be willing to outlay money for a game beyond the low cost of mobile gaming.

It's most likely that the current crop of kids as a whole are more likely to accept this than the female 'gamers' who are considered gamers despite not owning a console and doing their gaming via facebook or smart phone.

But potentially this woman can now claim she has helped change and shape the industry despite it having nothing to do with her points.

I also find her points quite meh. Games are currently exclusionary because they largely exist as money making ventures, this is their purpose, not some higher art form with some deep meaning. They are created in such a way to safely appeal to all the people they have previously appealed to. A lack of innovation is the issue, not gender and guess who are loathe to innovate? Multinationals who need to justify shit to their shareholders, there's a reason why The Sims has stagnated and has embraced never ending paid content.

It's like moaning that people in cheaply made day time tv aren't believable.

[SeanDMan]

http://www.destiny.gg/n/a-critique-of-damsel-in-distress-part-1-tropes-vs-women-in-video-games/

Destiny responds. This is sure to get more reaction on Reddit than here because Destiny (a guy who makes his living playing video games) tends to get his dick out (sometimes litterally) whenever any controversy in gaming comes out and makes sure everyone knows his opinion.

I find myself, interestingly, despite saying that I largely agreed with Sarkeesian's video and points, largely agreeing with his critiques too. Stuff like...

If you’re going to be criticizing something, especially in regards to a topic as controversial as sexism, editing your videos to strengthen your argument is usually a bad idea.

...I agree with, and I agree with his point that she can't say she's not analyzing things in a vaccuum while she... analyzes things in a vaccuum. She also severely limits the scope of what she looks at to better fit her arguement, which Destiny also somewhat addresses:

It’s good to talk about these problems, as women definitely do face a lot of problems in the gaming industry. I believe that anyone who turns a blind eye to problems like these and pretends that “everything is fine” is doing a disservice to both themselves as players and the entire gaming industry. That being said, i’s equally important to make sure that the problems you are addressing are actual problems, so as not to derail the conversation and steer it towards something of little to no relevance.

I wouldn't go so far as to say what she's saying has little or no relevance, but as I argued earlier, I think it's part of a bigger problem. Destiny agrees:

Hell, let’s just stick to video games, games where plot is actually a central element to the game, and let’s see if we can find any with strong, female roles:

• Baldur’s Gate
• Beyond Good and Evil
• Bioshock
• Civilization
• Devil May Cry
• Diablo 3
• FarCry 3
• Final Fantasy (almost every game)
• Fire Emblem
• Halo series
• Half-Life series
• Heavy Rain
• Mass Effect series
• Metal Gear Solid series
• Mirror’s Edge
• Oni
• Parasite Eve series (the villain AND the main character are powerful women!)
• Perfect Dark
• Resident Evil series
• Saints Row
• Silent Hill 3
• Starcraft series (Kerrigan is incredibly powerful, as is the Matriarch from the Dark Templar)
• Street Fighter series
• Tomb Raider series
• Warcraft
• Xenosaga

When you take a look at the large amount of games that are produced today that actually attempt to construct a decent plot, you’ll find that a large majority of them portray women in a non-helpless light, if women are involved a lot, and that’s saying something when you consider that video games are primarily marketed to men.

A point that Destiny continues to refer to and that Sarkeesian leaves alone is that the games she picked as examples of weak female characterization and character development almost universally also feature weak or non-existent characterization and character development of ANYONE. Games such as Castelvania, for example, gave you a guy with a dagger. At a certain point, you can get a whip. At no point is there any introspectives about your motivation or your emotions. You're just GenericHero. And that's fine, because games back then were lacking in proper characterization of ANYONE. It's pretty telling that almost all of her examples predate the 32 bit consoles never mind modern generation games.

So yeah, I still think she's cherry picking. Again, I await her next video (I can't find the list she posted of her subjects but I remember being more interested generally as the list went on).

[Noah]

Do I even want to know what SheLego is?

[SeanDMan]

http://shop.lego.com/en-CA/Heartlake-Pet-Salon-41007;jsessionid=tUUbWErSz-rbl5izSEpVuA**.lego-ps-3-4

[Vamp]

I'm still not able to watch videos on my computer but man people who are saying "but they just wantz to make the moniez" are really kind of missing the point of feminism. The idea is to reflect on and challenge patriarchal systems and structures, and capitalism is patriarchal, going "these companies are just trying to make money" is kinda missing the actual wider point of what feminism is going on about and putting things in a vacuum. I mean, I get what you mean, but its not really an argument because its on a different plain of discussion. There are other issues raised here which are more interesting, the reflection on limited character development within games, but also then I think there's been a bit of a tendency in this thread to look in a vacuum of video games and not consider that the images of women in video games appear within a patriarchal system and that the image of woman is already under considerable subjugation and has negative elements to it (or so a feminist argument would presumably go). Although I'm still wary that I can't watch the video and the woman might not be a very good critic.

[Sousa]

My daughter has the "Legos but for girls," but she's mostly interested in the camper having a sortie with her Spongebob Flying Dutchman pirate ship, her helicopter, and her T-rex.

[Colly]

Uh, I liked that before realising you wrote Legos. The plural of Lego is Lego.

[Quom]

I'm still not able to watch videos on my computer but man people who are saying "but they just wantz to make the moniez" are really kind of missing the point of feminism. The idea is to reflect on and challenge patriarchal systems and structures, and capitalism is patriarchal, going "these companies are just trying to make money" is kinda missing the actual wider point of what feminism is going on about and putting things in a vacuum. I mean, I get what you mean, but its not really an argument because its on a different plain of discussion. There are other issues raised here which are more interesting, the reflection on limited character development within games, but also then I think there's been a bit of a tendency in this thread to look in a vacuum of video games and not consider that the images of women in video games appear within a patriarchal system and that the image of woman is already under considerable subjugation and has negative elements to it (or so a feminist argument would presumably go). Although I'm still wary that I can't watch the video and the woman might not be a very good critic.

I'd argue that one needs to address the greatest motivating force for the creation of a product. For a large portion of AAA titles the sole purpose of their existence is to make money. End of discussion. To ignore that entirely is to not only piss in the wind but to throw punches at invisible enemies. AAA games are McDonald's they are easy to access, easy to digest and ultimately leave you feeling like you're still hungry. What she's doing is saying 'yes but does it taste good' which is a pointless discussion as that's not why it exists or how it makes money.

You don't change the world by bitching about what's wrong with it, you change the world by offering an alternative. Otherwise all you're left with is undergrad wank.