Tropes vs Women in video games

[mesh control]

Episode One: Damsels in Distress

Anyone watch this?

I'm curious what a few posters here have to say about this.
I like the idea, but I don't think Anita Sarkeesian is the one to host it.



(I am expecting the usual misogynist to come out of the woodwork in the thread. )

[mesh control]

I probably should go through the rest of her videos when I'm angry.

[Temia Eszteri]

Sarkeesian may or may not have provided a solid write-up - I don't really have the bandwidth to allocate towards videos I already have a fairly good idea about so I have no comment - but if nothing else, the fact that someone is doing it is a good start, and with it, perhaps more people will be empowered to start pointing out more of the societal problems pervasive in games and "gamer" subculture.

Though I've a friend who has some particular feelings on the matter, stating the review series is committing what he calls "Magritte's fallacy"; in his words, it's not that the videogames are the problem, it's the sexist attitudes of the gamers themselves. I don't necessarily agree wholly with him - I feel a game is just as much of a problem if it's unreservedly enabling of sexist attitudes - but he offers an interesting viewpoint nonetheless. http://thomaswinwood.tumblr.com/post/44818027345

Of course, now that I've started making a serious statement towards this (as well as sharing someone else's serious statement), shit will really hit the fan, so I think I'll just leave the debating to whoever wants to debate that badly and call this my two cents forevermore in this thread.

[Skykid]

Loooook here now.

Fuck this.

Sexism in Japanese society is one thing: even someone with half a jam doughnut for a brain can see there are critical issues there that affect the roles of women and their power of expression.

But you're going to rag on the damsel in distress? It's a cliche, yes, but not one comprised of primarily negative connotations. As the video touches upon, the damsel in distress is a concept for children present in many forms of media, especially cartoons. It's predominantly a role model tutorial for young boys to embrace heroism, dignity, selflessness and resolve. It's also the simplest possible device for drama - you don't even need a plot, you just need to know that you're going to put it all on the line to save a girl.

I don't see any problem with that. It's a trope that comes from kids stuff: a crude definition of the sexes, yes, but there are positive values in there too.

The video fails to recognise that videogames were primarily a male sport (and still are, just not so predominantly) for most of the industry's life. I'd liken the videogames I grew up with as a similar fantasy tool to a bow an arrow, a toy machine gun or a Supersoaker720. With that in mind, it's not unusual that so many games featured males as leading characters. Also, most of the games commented on are Nintendo games... these people obviously don't understand Japan's hierarchy of the sexes: The girls in the vidyagames have it good.

As the industry has evolved, female characters have become hero figures in hundreds of games, whether ensemble participants or in leading roles, beginning with Tomb Raider. Frankly, I've seen plenty of Princess Peach in Mario games, it's not like she's made to sit backstage smoking cigarettes - she's even had her own starring titles.

There's a little too much in the way of political correctness in the real world, people don't need to start nitpicking over fantasy concepts (and I do consider that YT vid to be exceptionally nitpicky.)

The damsel in distress might have an element of untruth, but it's for the greater good: a platform for creating heroes. And fuck, do kids need more of those in 2013.

Also, Double Dragon gut punch is iconic. Leave that shit alone.

Finally (and this is where the topic goes critical), feminists tend to ignore natural sexuality when creating these kinds of criticisms. I don't think there's an issue with redefining gender roles - I'd even argue it's been done many times over - but ultimately guys aren't always going to feel as strongly about saving or playing alongside a chick that exudes so much machismo she may as well be on testosterone supplements.

[Mortificator]

One of the most common themes in video games is of putting yourself in massive danger to save others. Sometimes you're trying to save your character's female love interest, yeah, but other times it's your family, or your friends, or your species, or your pet frog. In picking at this particular subset of stuff we save, I get the impression of the video's creator looking for examples to prove a point, rather than looking at what's happening and drawing conclusions (especially when I see in the sidebar a video of her fishing for sexism in Christmas lyrics).

[Edmond Dantes]

As the industry has evolved, female characters have become hero figures in hundreds of games, whether ensemble participants or in leading roles, beginning with Tomb Raider.

No love for Samus Aran, Alis Landale, Sayo-chan (aka Pocky), Wonder Momo, Tiat Young, the Sapphire pilots, Terra Branford, Rydia, Yuko the Valis Warrior, Alisia Dragoon, the Valkyrie, and so on and so forth?

[Udderdude]

As others have already pointed out, the damsel in distress trope has been a caricature ever since the days of dudley-do-right saving a woman tied to some train tracks while a snickering, mustached villain rubs his hands together. And there's plenty of other "Save the X" tropes as well. Taking it seriously is just dumb.

[Edmond Dantes]

I gotta be honest, my skepticism radar went off the minute I saw the word "Tropes" in the title. But I decided to give it a chance anyway.

I kind of want to do a response video now. While, on the whole I agree that sexism is bad and wrong, what I find almost offensive about this video is that she does a lot of implying. I hate this tactic, the one where the only things they say are barely-controvertible facts, but they present them in a way that implies something larger.

Her example of Dinosaur Planet at the very beginning is a case in point. The whole idea of that is to plant the idea in a viewer's mind that "there are no games starring strong women," without actually SAYING "there are no games starring strong women." That way, if she gets called on it, she can just claim you're reading too much into it. Plausible deniability is such a bitch.

That being said though, perhaps I should wait and see Part 2. She claims she's going to mention games that try to have stronger women. What do you want to bet she's going to make the same mistake SkyKid made and assume Tomb Raider was the first to do that, or that all such games come from western developers (when really Japan was on the boat about that long before the west was)?

[MX7]

I think what we need to ask ourselves regarding the damsel in destress / Proppian hero/princess binary is why are we accepting such a lazy cliché in 2013? There's no getting away from the fact it reeks of gender essentialism, but it's also just not very interesting any more. Mario sort of gets away with it, as the entire ouvre can be seen as homage to the high concept one screen princess/villain/hero exposition of donkey kong (which itself was referencing a then ~50 year old film), but this was a time when exposition was limited to an attract screen.

Some games like ICO and Shadow of the Collosus have played around with this trope, but theyre the exception rather than the rule. Samus may have lacked a Y chromosome, but she had to go incognito. Her cover blown, she was relegated to fetish attire, symptomatic of a masturbatory male gaze.

The real problem I see with videogames at the moment is a shift towards completely irony free hypermasculinity, often devoid of any female presence at all.

[Friendly]

If there is no controversy, then you go and invent one.

PS.
I hate PCness, it's a mental disease.

[MX7]

Finally (and this is where the topic goes critical), feminists tend to ignore natural sexuality when creating these kinds of criticisms. I don't think there's an issue with redefining gender roles - I'd even argue it's been done many times over - but ultimately guys aren't always going to feel as strongly about saving or playing alongside a chick that exudes so much machismo she may as well be on testosterone supplements.

I think it's troubling that the vast majority of videogames are marketed towards a heterosexual male audience, but you're right. I'm unsure as to what you mean by 'natural sexuality', but I'm assuming it's related to heteronormativity.

If we compare videogames to film they're still very much in their infancy, but given the fact that games afford player agency, it's distressing that such a novel media is still preoccupied with rescuing screaming women off of train tracks.

Anyway, interesting video. I may just show it to my students.

[Edmond Dantes]

I think what we need to ask ourselves regarding the damsel in destress / Proppian hero/princess binary is why are we accepting such a lazy cliché in 2013?

Are we? Not being a guy who keeps up with modern gaming, is rescuing women still an oft-used plot device?

It seems to me that if you're not specifically focusing on the "damsel in distress" angle, then you rarely ever see it even within the realms of the classics. I just got done playing Super Bomberman--no distressed damsels there. Before that, I was playing Animaniacs, Thunder Force, Legend of the Valkyrie, Pac-Man, Grandia... fact is, I could go through my entire game collection right now, and only one-third of it would involve saving a particular woman (and even that estimate is being generous).

The real problem I see with videogames at the moment is a shift towards completely irony free hypermasculinity, often devoid of any female presence at all.

Here I will agree with you, and its actually a huge turn-off for me.

[Udderdude]

If we compare videogames to film they're still very much in their infancy, but given the fact that games afford player agency, it's distressing that such a novel media is still preoccupied with rescuing screaming women off of train tracks.

Still? Where are you getting this from? Where's the big list of modern games with "Save the girl" plots that are playing it 100% straight and not just for laughs? I can't think of any. And don't even mention Mario, everyone knows it's practically a joke by now.

In any case, the reason you see so many "Save the X" plots in games in general is that it's easy to do, flexible, and provides a convinent cover for the gameplay, which is the important part anyway.

Anyway, interesting video. I may just show it to my students.

You should record their reactions and make a drinking game out of how many times they roll their eyes.

The real problem I see with videogames at the moment is a shift towards completely irony free hypermasculinity, often devoid of any female presence at all.

Here I will agree with you, and its actually a huge turn-off for me.

If anything, the industry has been shifting away from this for awhile, and in addition the industry has gotten so huge, that the hypermasculine chest thumping games are far outnumbered anyway. Gears of War is ONE game series, not the entire industry. I guess the other big example are military shooters with all male casts, but nobody expects those to be paticuarly progressive as they're mostly about blowing other people's heads off.

[Skykid]

As the industry has evolved, female characters have become hero figures in hundreds of games, whether ensemble participants or in leading roles, beginning with Tomb Raider.

No love for Samus Aran, Alis Landale, Sayo-chan (aka Pocky), Wonder Momo, Tiat Young, the Sapphire pilots, Terra Branford, Rydia, Yuko the Valis Warrior, Alisia Dragoon, the Valkyrie, and so on and so forth?

They weren't mainstream cultural icons. You're talking about female characters in games who either starred in obscure titles or a few with modest success, many of which didn't even make it out of Japanese domestic territory, during a period when videogames had barely even begun to cross over into the widespread commerciality that began with the advent of the PSX. With the exception of Metroid, which featured a mobile exoskeleton that happened to have a girl inside it, and was more famous for hiding her identity than revealing it; and Terra, who played a bit-part in FF and was as stripped down a personality as most other characters - male and female - up to and including the 16bit era.

I think what we need to ask ourselves regarding the damsel in destress / Proppian hero/princess binary is why are we accepting such a lazy cliché in 2013? There's no getting away from the fact it reeks of gender essentialism, but it's also just not very interesting any more.

I agree to a point, it's a tired trope, for sure, although the majority of the video is obsessing over retro gaming icons and the inequality of their roles and portrayals. To fall back on a hackneyed phrase, they were simpler times, and the damsel in distress was the simplest form of creating a dramatic foundation on which to state an adventure warping down green pipes and jumping off of chocolate blocks.

These days I think there's far more to be concerned about regarding the portrayal of women in videogames than the disservice done to Zelda and Peach in not making them equal with male plumbers and forest elves. Final Fantasy's girls are idiotic, vapid stereotypes; robotic portrayals of idealistic fuck material for lonely closet gamers, echoed in just about every facet of Japanese commercial media, while elsewhere Dream Club and Gal Gun are continuing to raise the country's profile regarding sexual equality into entirely new stratospheres.
On different shores, western gaming continues its preoccupation with men shooting other men from third world countries.

I think it's troubling that the vast majority of videogames are marketed towards a heterosexual male audience, but you're right. I'm unsure as to what you mean by 'natural sexuality', but I'm assuming it's related to heteronormativity.

I think videogames are firmly marketed at heterosexual males because videogaming is ultimately a toy on which you spend hours of your life killing things for imaginary kudos points. Frankly, women know better, and as such I assume their commitment to gaming is far more fleeting when it does occur.

heteronormativity

Had to google it, but yes, that's basically it.

Anyway, interesting video. I may just show it to my students.

I only see it as interesting in its overarching need to nitpick to build a crudely formed argument. The 'damsel' point is, for me, a bit of a cop-out for feminist argument unless it's entirely retroactive.

It's hardly the norm anymore.

[MX7]

Urgh. Every time I hear a man saying that there is no problem with gender inequality, I am instantly reminded of an extremely posh white guy I met in university explaining that racism no longer existed and it annoyed him no end that people kept on going on about it. I'm sorry, but unless you identify as a woman and have experienced discrimination first hand, you do not get to just whisk away the notion of gender inequality.

I think what we need to ask ourselves regarding the damsel in destress / Proppian hero/princess binary is why are we accepting such a lazy cliché in 2013?

Are we? Not being a guy who keeps up with modern gaming, is rescuing women still an oft-used plot device?

It seems to me that if you're not specifically focusing on the "damsel in distress" angle, then you rarely ever see it even within the realms of the classics. I just got done playing Super Bomberman--no distressed damsels there. Before that, I was playing Animaniacs, Thunder Force, Legend of the Valkyrie, Pac-Man, Grandia... fact is, I could go through my entire game collection right now, and only one-third of it would involve saving a particular woman (and even that estimate is being generous).

Beyond the damsel issue, we have the problem that the vast majority of VG protagonists are male. Now, I can hear the forum's collective scoffing right now, but this is a massive issue. More than half of the population of the world are women, yet why do games (and virtually every other media, though I would argue that games are far more backwards in this regard) adopt this narrow mode of address? What is so troubling about a female protagonist? Why are breaking out of such ridiculously tired gender stereotypes such a problem for some people?

(Regarding Grandia, it's one of my favourite games of all time, but also one I have not played for many years so do excuse any gaps in my memory. Feena is pretty cool in lots of ways, but she does spend the game running around in her underwear...)

Anyway, interesting video. I may just show it to my students.

You should record their reactions and make a drinking game out of how many times they roll their eyes.

Ha, my students are pretty cool this year. I've got one guy doing an essay on representation of women in videogames, and another doing something similar (once he gets round to starting to write it).

[Skykid]

Urgh. Every time I hear a man saying that there is no problem with gender inequality, I am instantly reminded of an extremely posh white guy I met in university explaining that racism no longer existed and it annoyed him no end that people kept on going on about it. I'm sorry, but unless you identify as a woman and have experienced discrimination first hand, you do not get to just whisk away the notion of gender inequality.

I definitely wasn't saying that at all (I made quite a lot of additions to the post in response to comments you made after.) When I said 'it's hardly the norm anymore' I was referring to the 'Damsel in Distress' as a specific device in videogaming. Therefore I can't see the relevance of the YT vid unless its retroactive and acknowledges that. It doesn't though, it seems to treat the issue as current.

[Edmond Dantes]

As the industry has evolved, female characters have become hero figures in hundreds of games, whether ensemble participants or in leading roles, beginning with Tomb Raider.

No love for Samus Aran, Alis Landale, Sayo-chan (aka Pocky), Wonder Momo, Tiat Young, the Sapphire pilots, Terra Branford, Rydia, Yuko the Valis Warrior, Alisia Dragoon, the Valkyrie, and so on and so forth?

They weren't mainstream cultural icons. You're talking about female characters in games who either starred in obscure titles or a few with modest success, many of which didn't even make it out of Japanese domestic territory, during a period when videogames had barely even begun to cross over into the widespread commerciality that began with the advent of the PSX. With the exception of Metroid, which featured a mobile exoskeleton that happened to have a girl inside it, and was more famous for hiding her identity than revealing it; and Terra, who played a bit-part in FF and was as stripped down a personality as most other characters - male and female - up to and including the 16bit era.

I'm at a loss as to why any of this matters. They're still heroic female characters who preceded Lara Croft and defied the typical "woman in distress" gender role. This isn't suddenly untrue just because not everybody knows about them.

Beyond the damsel issue, we have the problem that the vast majority of VG protagonists are male. Now, I can hear the forum's collective scoffing right now, but this is a massive issue. More than half of the population of the world are women, yet why do games (and virtually every other media, though I would argue that games are far more backwards in this regard) adopt this narrow mode of address? What is so troubling about a female protagonist? Why are breaking out of such ridiculously tired gender stereotypes such a problem for some people?

(Regarding Grandia, it's one of my favourite games of all time, but also one I have not played for many years so do excuse any gaps in my memory. Feena is pretty cool in lots of ways, but she does spend the game running around in her underwear...)

(Forgive me, I meant to say Grandia II--that's the only one I've played)

I think I can offer a tentative answer to your question.

The first is a lack of creativity. A lot of writers basically write themselves, or an idealization of themselves. And since most of the writers in the gaming industry are men, they of course write men. This might also be why women are often weaker or helpless. Although, to be fair, in most video games ANYONE who isn't the hero character is often weaker than the hero character.

I've also seen people think that writing women is somehow "different" from writing men. It really isn't, but this may indicate a more culture-wide phenomenon.

Secondly... well sadly, as SkyKid said, video games are seen as toys for boys. I got to admit, I'm cynical of games that star women because nine times out of ten, the woman is skimpily-dressed or is set up so that she's sexually attractive to the player. Lara Croft herself is a great example--she was marketed from the get-go as being a sex symbol and that's a large part of why she became popular (it certainly wasn't because her games were any good).

Personally, I enjoy female characters more when they aren't being whored out. Which is why I find Alis, Sayo, and the Valkyrie far more respectable than Lara Croft.

[MX7]

Urgh. Every time I hear a man saying that there is no problem with gender inequality, I am instantly reminded of an extremely posh white guy I met in university explaining that racism no longer existed and it annoyed him no end that people kept on going on about it. I'm sorry, but unless you identify as a woman and have experienced discrimination first hand, you do not get to just whisk away the notion of gender inequality.

I definitely wasn't saying that at all (I made quite a lot of additions to the post in response to comments you made after.) When I said 'it's hardly the norm anymore' I was referring to the 'Damsel in Distress' as a specific device in videogaming. Therefore I can't see the relevance of the YT vid unless its retroactive and acknowledges that. It doesn't though, it seems to treat the issue as current.

I wasn't referring to you, sorry! I'm starting to think that internet forums may not be the best medium to get ideas across in. Maybe we should all skype each other and get drunk

The 'damsel in distress' trope may be pretty outmoded in lots of ways, but most narratives still subscribe to very strict character archetypes, with women usually being positioned in a binary to men. This is very much the same in videogames as it is in most media. I'm loathe to link to Wikipedia, but here's a confusing or unclear article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actant

When you start looking at something from a theoretical aspect, it's often easy to become completely disconnected from the topic at hand, but what I would argue is that patriarchy is completely embedded into the dominant ideologies of many media, even on a completely narrative level. Challenging this would be brave in an industry that increasingly doesn't like to take what it perceives as financial risks.

The first is a lack of creativity. A lot of writers basically write themselves, or an idealization of themselves. And since most of the writers in the gaming industry are men, they of course write men. This might also be why women are often weaker or helpless. Although, to be fair, in most video games ANYONE who isn't the hero character is often weaker than the hero character.

This is a really interesting point. In videogames, you control a character of often unbelievable power. This places us in a very active position. Which is quite the opposite of modern videogame's closest analogue, the 80's hypermasculine action film, where we are placed in a very passive role...

[ciox]

Politics are bad enough, combine them with videogames and I don't even know what to call the result.

[system11]

Beyond the damsel issue, we have the problem that the vast majority of VG protagonists are male. Now, I can hear the forum's collective scoffing right now, but this is a massive issue. More than half of the population of the world are women, yet why do games (and virtually every other media, though I would argue that games are far more backwards in this regard) adopt this narrow mode of address? What is so troubling about a female protagonist? Why are breaking out of such ridiculously tired gender stereotypes such a problem for some people?

It's not a problem, it's just how it is. Do you also find it troublesome that Barbie is not marketed towards boys?

Men and women are very different creatures, mentally as well as physically - therefore it stands to reason that they will *tend* to prefer different things. The majority of gamers are male, this is not because games are only marketed at them, it's because women tend not to be as interested in them. Therefore having a majority of male lead characters is an obvious thing to do. The majority of motor racing viewers are male too, same thing. Who cares?

Equality will never happen in terms of media portrayal, until men stop being men and women stop being women. Live with it, changing it is needless meddling. Address things that matter like pay inequality, maternity/paternity leave inequality and so on.

Also - don't forget all the games with strong female characters in them which did actually come out, for example (and I'll stick to 360 here):

Wet
Bayonetta
Venetica
Velvet Assassin
Alice: Madness Returns
Perfect Dark Zero

There are probably a lot more, I just looked on my games shelf for that list. That's skipping several games on the shelf where the 'main' character is male but include prominent female characters, and games where you can choose your gender.

[MX7]

Do you also find it troublesome that Barbie is not marketed towards boys?

Very much so, it promotes gender essentialism. Though I find it much more troubling that such an unattainable body image is being marketed towards girls.

Men and women are very different creatures, mentally as well as physically - therefore it stands to reason that they will *tend* to prefer different things. The majority of gamers are male, this is not because games are only marketed at them, it's because women tend not to be as interested in them.

I'm sorry but there's not a shred of evidence here, just supposition. I could retort with my own observations that men and women are very similar, that an emphasis on physical differences creates a forced binary, and that I know loads of women who play videogames.

Equality will never happen in terms of media portrayal, until men stop being men and women stop being women. Live with it, changing it is needless meddling. Address things that matter like pay inequality, maternity/paternity leave inequality and so on.

Given that gender inequality is embedded within society, the only way we can address pay inequality and parental leave is by addressing equality in the representation of women in the media. To paraphrase De Beauvoir, we are not born men or women, but we become them. Gender is constructed throughout life, right from the toys we are presented with in infancy to the roles we are expected to take in later life. If there is a fundamental difference between men and women, it has been constructed by media portrayal.

don't forget all the games with strong female characters in them which did actually come out, for example

A simple Google image search shows that pretty much all these characters are clad in skin hugging fetish gear. Hardly a requisite for a strong female character. Creating a strong female character doesn't just meaning tacking on a stereotypically aggressive male archetype onto a character and making sure her tits are rendered properly. Bayonetta has a neat explicit scene of female masturbation that serves as a nice counterpoint to the often phallocentric nature of these games, but even then it seems clumsy and embarrassing.

[Skykid]

My biggest problem with feminism is that I can't determine the endgame, therefore while I agree with elements of inequality that persist in most societies (some more than others) I can't identify with the general approach most feminist arguments take, this video being case in point.

There's actually been a huge amount of progression in terms of civilised society integrating and not dismissing women the way they used to only a hundred years ago. Some of it ends up being surreptitiously sexist masquerading as idolatry, especially in media, but there has still been a marked evolution in attitudes about what women should and shouldn't be able to do or achieve.

And then, I find myself understanding system11's core argument. A lot of gender classification is impressed on us, but animalistic behaviours of males and females will always be the ruling force, and something I can't imagine being undone without genetic engineering.

Personally, I like the machismo of the 80's action figure. I like machine guns and one liners. During that period women had plenty of equally empowering movies doing the rounds, but it always gets thorny when you start attempting to dissect whether or not they provided fair representations (Flashdance for example.)

If you ask me whether or not I think Twilight, a fiction that feminises male heroes (and quickly is becoming the accepted norm) is positive role model material for males, I'd tell you to jump off a bridge. I do not see anything beneficial in driving masculinity into the ground in the same way feminists don't appreciate women being viewed as sex objects.

[system11]

And then, I find myself understanding system11's core argument. A lot of gender classification is impressed on us, but animalistic behaviours of males and females will always be the ruling force, and something I can't imagine being undone without genetic engineering.

Precisely my point. If civilisation ends tomorrow and we start building mud huts again, women will go back to gathering and looking after babies, men will go back to hunting and fighting. There's a collossal wealth of behavioural evidence that suggests an attempt to get girls into action games and boys into dolls is futile and needless. I struggle to understand why acceptance of these differences is seen to be bad or regressive. Pushing the issue of equality past the removal of barriers and actual /unfairness/ makes me wonder what the agenda really is.

The companies just market games towards their expected core market, why wouldn't they?

[HenAi]

(I am expecting the usual misogynist to come out of the woodwork in the thread. )

Hi.

Oh and, more games with weak feminine male characters in need of rescue by strong burly females please.
Also fuck all of this gender equality bullshit. If a woman wants to do what a man does, let her. If she doesn't, let her.
I actually find strong (I guess somewhat masculine?) women attractive, but the notion that the majority of women want to be like that is ludicrous. The same goes for the notion that men should have to encourage women to that. If you'd like your woman to live in the kitchen, then that's fine. If you wonder about low birthrates, here's the reason.

[Mortificator]

The blank slate is a myth. There are observed physical differences between male and female brains. That sexual dimorphism even evolved in our species means it was advantageous for each sex to tend to be more proficient in different behaviors. It's nothing so simple as women like clothes! and men like sports!, but those stereotypes just obscure what's there at a pre-cultural level.

Now, something that is cultural is that women in games are expected to be hot, or a least cute. Female sexualization is a separate isure from female competence, however, and Bayonetta's huge rack and fetish get-up don't diminish her ability to annihilate hordes of enemies.

most of the games commented on are Nintendo games

The video maker should try KOF. There are a fuck-ton of badass female fighting game characters.

[xgunnBlaze]

Also, Double Dragon gut punch is iconic. Leave that shit alone.

Yes. In fact, it is the reason why I kept playing! What an awesome start to a video game.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Is this the shmupforum's celebration of International Women's Day? A lady I heard speaking on the radio today told us we should listen to them on this day. Whatever they have to tell us.

[Ganelon]

The "damsel in distress" trope is a direct result of historically ingrained chivalry and protection of women. There have been plenty of recorded real life instances of men protecting and defending the honor of women. The most recent well-known example was the Aurora shooting shooting where multiple men shielded their female loved ones from bullets. The reverse scenario of women physically defending grown men is almost unheard of, even in developed modern societies where women certainly have the capability.

Also, I was confused about Anita Sarkeesian's disagreement that women are "a naturally weaker gender." Perhaps I'm misunderstanding but I've never heard any scientific study claim that women on average are the size as or equal in strength to men; there seems to be a clear biological difference just with testosterone. If we're talking emotions, then society certainly molds women's roles but that has plenty to do with what women want as well since many of them still voice support for chivalry. I'd say there are clear differences in personal interests: many classic shooters were gender neutral (spaceship vs. aliens/planes with no human representation) yet succeeded in attracting much more men over women.

On another point not really related to the damsel in distress but rather on why the female hero is rare, I like a spread of both genders in my RPGs but I have to say that something inside me disapproves when an RPG that tries to be semi-historically savvy to a middle age setting includes a bunch of female warriors. In real life, it's unlikely there were more than a handful of women in any war, nearly all of which likely pretended they were men. Sure, these circumstances may have been a result of sexist views but that's the actual history. Women aren't helping in modern times either, where agencies such as the US Secret Service are specifically focused on hiring new female members but can't find enough qualified ones who apply.

Therefore, if anything, the majority of fantasy-themed games that offer women characters in abundance are already more fair to quantity of women than in real life. Now, a game's quality of women is a whole other issue that I have no clear opinion on at this time. Perhaps another part of the reason I feel some disapproval is that most female characters in RPGs have woefully unrealistic attire such as short skirts and open midriffs that strike a discord with the surrounding environment.

Anyway, the damsel in distress trope by itself is certainly overused far more than historical instances I know of where a man helped save his love. The point is a fair one, and easily relatable to start the video series with. Overall, the video's production quality is solid and the game coverage has a decent amount of diversity. I thought Sarkeesian's overall tone—besides the end—was well balanced and am surprised that some folks have gone to such lengths to try and quiet her. It's not at all a bad thing to continually assess whether or not fairness has been maintained.

[mesh control]

WELL I LIKE HOW THIS IS SHAPING UP.

MX7 has touched on every point I wanted comment on.

[Sly Cherry Chunks]

Charlie Brooker said it best

But then, some people cling to those stereotypes as if their goolies depend on it. Last week, a female culture critic trying to raise funds on the Kickstarter website for a series of short films exploring the stereotypical treatment of women in games was subjected to a bewildering level of harassment from a peculiarly angry slice of the gaming community. As well as trying to have her Kickstarter account frozen or banned, they subjected her to a barrage of abuse that must have felt like running face-first into a muckspreader.

"Fucking hypocrite slut," quipped one gallant observer. "I hope you get cancer," chortled another. To be fair, it's probably not the notion that games misrepresent the sexes that enrages them. They probably shout this sort of abuse at anything female.

I say "shout". I mean "type". And not in person. Whenever there's an actual woman in the room, they stare intensely at their shoes, internally composing their next devastating online riposte to uppity vaginakind. "WHY MUST THEY TORMENT AND BEWITCH ME SO?", they think, in tearstained capitals. Just as rubberised assassins represent a tiny proportion of women, these idiotic pebbledicks represent a tiny proportion of men. The trouble for the games industry is that on some level it believes it has to pander to these monumental bellwastes. It doesn't, and it'll only gain widespread acceptance when it learns to ignore them.

Sadly, the video doesn't tell us anything we didn't already know. The reaction to it doesn't either - just reinforces the belief that gaming is the exclusive domain of hikikomori beta-males, who will never respect women as long as their right to gaze at pixelated knockers is threatened.

MX7, did you mention that you're a teacher? Maybe theres hope.