I had a chance to watch "Tropes vs. Women in Video Games". I decided to try and approach the subject of women in video games and pose my own solutions. While this may be a bit too detailed for parents, the overall subject is something that everyone should understand. After much controversy the first “Tropes vs. Women in Video Games” video has finally been released. The first 20 minutes is an interesting history lesson on how the “damsel in distress” has been included in video games for decades. No one I have talked to has an issue with any of the points Anita brings up in that portion of the video, since all are backed up with a plethora of examples that are easily understandable.
The problem with female characters in video games is similar to the problem with violence in games in that neither are new issues and neither have really been addressed properly. It is very easy to focus on the sexuality in games, but figuring out the root problem of why female characters in games have such a limited role is much more difficult. The points that Anita brings up in the history lesson are entirely valid. There are plenty of female characters that are weak and helpless. Having played hundreds of games and analyzed dozens of unique female characters, it is my understanding that believable female characters are very difficult to write. In some games it may be the writer’s method of creating a temporary power trip for the main character to try and rescue the damsel, but even when a game includes a non-damsel female character her role is extremely limited. Take Anya in Gears of War or Cortana in Halo: Combat Evolved. Both female characters are well scripted and have excellent roles, but they’re both in non-combat intelligence roles. They help the player analyze the situation and assess the best possible method for continuing forward progress, but due to physical limitations cannot directly assist in taking down enemies. The problem is that creating a believable female character who actively engages in physical combat is almost impossible. There have been a few exceptions in games and movies, but these are extremely rare. Even Ellen Ripley, hailed by science fiction fans as the pinnacle of the bad-ass female character, was more likely to logically sort out a problem with words rather than resorting to force of action. This is one of the reasons why female characters who do prefer brute force over words are more closely identifiable to male characters than their female counterparts. Zelda wasn’t able to actively fight the forces of evil in Ocarina of Time until she became the blatantly masculine Sheik. Similarly Private Vasquez in Aliens was visually more like her male marine counterparts than Ripley, which made her somewhat brutish role believable. Even Samus, hailed by gaming nerds as one of the only good feminine action heroes, is not identifiably female until she removes her helmet. As a kid I was completely surprised to find out that Samus was, in fact, a female character, because her character design has no identifiably female features. But the personality and looks of the female character is only part of the problem. The meat of the issue is that writing a believable female character, no matter what the role, is extremely difficult to do. Male characters are very easy to simplify without losing their believability. Master Chief, main character from the Halo franchise, is a well-written character despite having fewer lines than his female AI counterpart because his actions do actually say more about his personality and his abilities than anything he could ever say. Gordon Freeman, the main character from the Half-Life series, never has a single spoken line but is still able to be a mostly believable character in a series hailed for its incredible story. What Anita failed to mention were those examples where female characters become more badass while still maintaining their overall believability. This is especially obvious when we compare two female characters that I brought up earlier. Cortana and Anya started out in very similar roles but have since digressed into completely different characters. In Halo: Combat Evolved, the first game of the franchise, Cortana is an excellent companion to Master Chief and, while distinctly feminine, maintains the emotional stability necessary for a combat role. When she shows up and surprises 343 Guilty Spark into nearly fainting, her rage at the sputtering AI guardian is so believable that I would not have been surprised if she’d turned the ring’s sentinel guardians against Guilty Spark. But as the games progressed, Cortana was portrayed more and more like the “damsel in distress” that Anita rails so heavily against. While Halo 2 portrayed Cortana as trying to single-handedly hold off both the Covenant and the Flood to prevent the invasion of Earth, Halo 3 made her out to be the woman who needed to be saved by Master Chief. While her weakness may have been understandable had she been human, the fact that she’s an AI meant that her badass personality was completely wrecked with the simple idea of her becoming “tired”. This continues on in Halo 4, where she becomes even more distressed by succumbing to technological decay. Instead of providing valuable assistance to Master Chief like she did in the previous Halo games, she becomes the damsel in distress not through kidnapping but through her decay, and it is because of this that she becomes less of a real character and more a part of a greater objective. Instead of focusing on fighting an alien force like every other Halo game, Halo 4 makes saving Cortana the primary objective. Gears of War’s Anya starts out on a similar path but goes in a completely different direction. In the first two games she is the intelligence officer, providing direct information and instructions to Marcus and Dom in order to help them through pretty much every situation they encounter. When they need her, she’s there, providing whatever she can to keep them going. That changed in Gears of War 3. Instead of continuing to be the “eye in the sky” for the main characters, she puts on the same armor, equips the same weapon, and begins fighting just like everyone else. I may have missed having Anya providing the intelligence necessary to forward the plot in a believable manner, but it would be a blatant lie to say that she wasn’t great in a firefight. The great thing is that she’s not alone. There are a small handful of games with believable female protagonists. Faith from 2008’s Mirror’s Edge was a wall-running escape artist able to ignore gunfire of all types in order to get from point A to point B. Lara Croft from the 2013 reboot of Tomb Raider is also an extremely strong female character who maintains a surprising level of believability. This is a bit ironic since the previous version of Lara Croft painted her as an unbelievably big-breasted “babe” who represented the very pitfall that many writers end up finding themselves in when trying to create an adventurous female. There are two main problems that come up when writers are creating female characters. The first is that a lot of time writers seem to have a problem coming up with believable conversations between any of the characters. Outside of mission-related information, many games fail to have any sort of interaction between the characters. Cortana talks to Master Chief in cutscenes, but aside from the occasional line of dialog there is very little conversation between them. Even Half-Life 2’s glorious in-game conversations are just a small part of the overall gameplay. Most of the time the mute Gordon Freeman is simply shooting his way through enemy after enemy. This wouldn’t normally be very obvious, but it is unfortunately coupled with the fact that game developers seem set on flaunting female characters’ “assets”. While this was especially prevalent in older titles, such as the older Tomb Raider games, newer games are still very likely to focus more on the feminine figure than on her personality. Bayonetta, Rayne from the Bloodrayne series, and pretty much every female character in every Soulcalibur game are all hypersexualized to a borderline pornographic degree. And before you write off this problem as strictly one with Japanese games, take a look at how Cortana has evolved over the years. The changes between the first three Halo games might be written off as greater detail, but the trend clearly shows that her breasts are expanding. In addition, it has become impossible to convince anyone that Cortana is wearing some sort of skin-tight AI suit. At the beginning of this comment I mentioned that Anita did not present any real solution in her “Tropes vs. Women in Video Games” monologue. Since it would be hypocritical if I didn’t at least attempt to present one as well, here’s my idea. There are an abundance of small changes that can be made to make video games seem friendlier to the ever increasing female audience. Including trophies and achievements like God of War’s Bros before Hoes doesn’t translate well with the female audience to say the least. Having massive orgies and lesbian sex scenes may be titillating for the male gamers, but is pretty awkward for those girls brave enough to play. There will always be an audience for Leisure Suit Larry type material, but if we’re trying to be as inclusive as geeks and nerds normally claim to be we should consider whether or not the material actually forwards the storyline or whether it’s simply included for shock value. There are also things that can be done on a much greater level. Since it is unrealistic to say that more games should feature female protagonists, I suggest that game developers spend less time focusing on the female body and more time focusing on the female personality. Take the time to study awesome female characters in video games, movies, books, and other forms of literature and figure out what makes them so great while still maintaining their believability. Find some examples of real women that made an impact on their fields and figure out who they are. I know this is making the problem seem much simpler, but we already know that it’s possible to create believably badass female characters. The trick is using what we already know and applying it to what we’re trying to make.
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The Legendary Carmine
Andrew Clayton (a.k.a. The Legendary Carmine) is SSG's Executive Editor. He toils at the stone to make sure this site brings its readers valuable content on a daily basis. Like what we do? Want to see more? Donate to the site using the button below!
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