Damsel in Distress... Women in games

[Azisien]

I love the arguments some companies make for not including female avatars in their games for players to customize with. That always seemed like a really small addition to games that opened them up to a much larger audience. Wacky, I know, a lot of players like to make their characters like themselves. Women playing BF3 or COD (for example) must have a hard time with that. Hell, many of my male gamer friends like playing female avatars too. What gives?

Usually something along the lines of "The amount of work required to make a different set of sprites, skins, meshes, animations, etc to include female soldiers in BF3 is not worth the benefit." What? Plenty of games include both. You guys sure you couldn't just like...delay one of your 5 massive DLC packs and just like...fucking add in female avatars if it's so much work? (Which it probably isn't all that much for a large studio).

Also, I just started playing Heart of the Swarm and the story just tears me apart inside. What Blizzard has done to Sarah Kerrigan is just plain sad. Now that they've sexed her up 1000% and created the most unbelievable romance I've ever seen across any media form (okay...excepting possibly Twilight), the game's almost unplayable for me. At least, I'm starting to want to skip cutscenes. It pains me more so because, although it's been a while, I thought Kerrigan was totally bad ass in Brood War. She wrecked everybody's shit and she did it for herself.

[Ryong]

There was a recent discussion about ARMA 3 not including female models which resulted in a gigantic flame war over people not wanting to shoot women and men faking being girls to have fun and fuck with people.

Originally Posted by Azisien

Hell, many of my male gamer friends like playing female avatars too. What gives?

<Insert random comment about waifus and/or staring at virtual asses here>

[Aldurin]

Originally Posted by Ryong

There was a recent discussion about ARMA 3 not including female models which resulted in a gigantic flame war over people not wanting to shoot women and men faking being girls to have fun and fuck with people.

To be fair, ARMA 3 is in Alpha stage (which makes a list of things it lacks rather moot) and even if they don't include female models in the final product, they're more than happy to allow the mods for them, which could go either way depending on if the default mesh is set to "realistic" or "supermodel".

ARMA 2 had civilian female models, though there were a lot of restrictions compared to male civilians rendering them noncombatants by default, which wasn't good. Hopefully BIS doesn't go the same route with 3.

[synkr0nized]

Originally Posted by Azisien

Also, I just started playing Heart of the Swarm and the story just tears me apart inside. What Blizzard has done to Sarah Kerrigan is just plain sad. Now that they've sexed her up 1000% and created the most unbelievable romance I've ever seen across any media form (okay...excepting possibly Twilight), the game's almost unplayable for me. At least, I'm starting to want to skip cutscenes. It pains me more so because, although it's been a while, I thought Kerrigan was totally bad ass in Brood War. She wrecked everybody's shit and she did it for herself.

I grew increasingly unhappy with the campaign as I played through it in SC2. That ending. :/

I currently have no plans to purchase Heart of the Swarm. And that sucks; SC2 is a pretty well-designed RTS. But I am too afraid it will continue going further and further away from the Kerrigan of SC + Broodwar and more to the Kerrigan of Raynor's obsession that he must save.

[Krylo]

Originally Posted by Azisien

I love the arguments some companies make for not including female avatars

Speaking of. . .

[Arcanum]

So I finally got around to watching Anita’s Damsel in Distress video. And then I watched this video that brought up some interesting points. The biggest thing is that for the most part the video game industry isn’t actively sexist. There’s no greater sexist agenda, and they’re just a victim (probably a better word I can use here but it’s early and my vocabulary aint up to snuff) to the social norms established in the past by other media. Of course this does not in any way excuse sexist behavior, but it’s much better than the game industry being all “lol fuck women” to purposefully degrade them. And as said in the rebuttal video, the biggest problem is laziness from both developers and publishers. Nobody wants to pioneer change because it would take too much work and cost too much money. But if Anita’s videos, despite being very one-sided, help rile up consumers and get developers and publishers to notice so they’re more inclined to change the status quo, then I’m all for it.

[Osterbaum]

The only victims here are women. No industry or section of society or individual is a victim just because someone else did it first or because they picked up the habbit somewhere else. It is pervasive and institutionalized in society to such a degree though, that not participating at all might be practically impossible, but resisting it and pointing it out where it exists is something everyone can do.

But if Anita’s videos, despite being very one-sided...

I don't really think they're one-sided. Just educational. Like most, if not all, of the stuff in the videos is fact backed up by evidence ie. not speculation.

[Kim]

Plus, saying they're not "actively sexist" ignores how bigotry and such continues. Bigots generally don't see themselves as bigots. People who contribute to bigotry and oppression don't see themselves as doing so. It's generally not a conscious "fuck women" choice. That doesn't excuse or diminish it. The video game industry is sexist in the exact same way that all cultures are sexist.

[Arcanum]

Victim was just the best word I could come up with at the time (I'm not a morning person). A better term would have been "unwitting accomplice" or something similar to that. As a new form of media you do what you have to in order to stay alive, so video games appealed to the largest demographic they could when starting up. And they did so using methods established by previous media to appeal to that same demographic. Nowadays they're just floating along on what has been established to work in the past, but as I've said I believe that's more out of laziness than deliberate sexism. Very important to note I'm not saying it isn't sexist, because it is, it's just that it's derived from laziness instead of hatred towards women or whatever other ulterior motives one can think of.

resisting it and pointing it out where it exists is something everyone can do.

I agree with this, but Anita's first video was focused on the game industry's past so I was directing my comments towards that past as well. In hindsight every from of media should be pointing at sexism and going "this is bad" but that's not what happened. The best we can do is understand why sexism was so pervasive in the industry at the time and why nothing really changed. And personally I believe it was more out of laziness than anything else.

I don't really think they're one-sided. Just educational. Like most, if not all, of the stuff in the videos is fact backed up by evidence ie. not speculation.

The video is one-sided because it's selective facts. She only shows what will back up her point instead of bringing up counter-points and refuting them.


Gotta love that new ninja post warning.

Plus, saying they're not "actively sexist" ignores how bigotry and such continues. Bigots generally don't see themselves as bigots. People who contribute to bigotry and oppression don't see themselves as doing so. It's generally not a conscious "fuck women" choice. That doesn't excuse or diminish it. The video game industry is sexist in the exact same way that all cultures are sexist.

I agree. But Anita's first video still failed to address the laziness of game developpers and didn't draw a distinction between sexism out of ignorance/apathy and deliberate sexism. Which is a very prevalent thing when it comes to the sexism present in the video games of the 80s and 90s. What I mean is, Anita implies Nintendo went crazy with the damsel in distress thing because they are sexist. But I would argue they went with the damsel in distress because they are lazy. They are still sexist in that second scenario, but it was not the driving force for their design choices.

Of course this in no way absolves them from any sort of blame. They are just as guilty either way. It's just a distinction I wanted to bring up and see what kind of discussion it would create.

[Kim]

Both the distinction you're asking her to make and the counter-arguments you want her to bring up are beside the point and would only be needless distractions from her main point. They'd be nothing more than concessions to sexists seeking to undermine her point.