Why women criticise sexualised character designs (READ OP)

LightEntite said:

TBH, i feel like the awareness for what constitutes "ridiculous" in regards to males and females is pretty skewed in conversations that go down the route that this one has.

People love to bring up characters like Quiet, Cindy, Ivy....but these are exceptions, even among sexualized characters. Unless you're willing to dive into the niche anime side of things? There are far fewer examples of hypersexualized characters that exist primarily to be hypersexualized characters worth bringing up.

Some big AAA names, just off the top of my head:

Lara Croft got a massive redesign from what she used to be.
None of Uncharted 4's female leads fits the bill here
Aloy from Horizon shows none of her goodies
Last of Us 2's most recent female lead looks like an MMA fighter
Gears of War threw some women into the mix
Nier Automata's 2B is more "stylish" than "sexualized", though this really just comes down to preference
Mass Effect has no glaring examples i can think of
Zelda in BotW is wearing nothing too gratuitous
Tekken 7's (reoccuring) female leads are ALL wearing more clothing than they used to, even characters like Xiaoyu who were never sexualized to begin with.
Street Fighter V's women are no more ridiculous than their men
Hellblade? Nah
Dishonoured? Nah
Resident Evil 7? Nah
Gravity Rush 2? Nobody seems to complain
Overwatch? Actively tried to avoid this situation

I mean i'm not saying it doesn't happen, it clearly does. But what i'm asking is, with the exception of MGSV and FFXV, I really can't think of any super glaring examples like this.

And honestly? It's only pretty recently that Metal Gear and Final Fantasy have started aiming for the kind of appeal that would have brought them out of the "anime niche" category, where you'll have absolutely no problem finding terrible examples to complain about.

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Tekken 7? The game with girls like Lucky Chloe and Josie?

Gotdatmoney said:

No where on planet earth is this true.

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Not true.

I always smile when a bloke moans that he can't play a game because the design of the male protagonist doesn't appeal to him (he's "too goofy" or "a kid", for example, and the player wants to be some buff, bearded badass), yet doesn't understand the issue with sexualised female designs...

Ketkat said:

Tekken 7? The game with girls like Lucky Chloe and Josie?

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While all the male characters are shirtless buff machines with ripped pants? It's a double standard in some cases. I agree there is a lot of over sexualization in gaming, but it does go both ways, just not as often.

Hey OP, this is a great thread! Thanks for posting it. There's really no better way to put it, and if it's still flying over people's heads at that point, they're probably not worth wasting your breath on. My biggest issue is with people who can't parse the good and the bad from a character. 2B immediately became one of my favorite video game characters of all time. Yet it still felt a little obnoxious having her undies flash on-screen during a big jump, or climbing a ladder. It's a small part of her design that works against her. Then we can look at someone like Bayonetta, where her charms are part of her character. I personally found her a lot of fun, and even her design isn't as bad as it could've been. Yet there's so many times where the game doesn't just let her do her thing, they have to remind you that she's sexy. Sure, I think at some points you know the game is trying to make you laugh more than anything else, but that really just speaks to how little the industry tries to take female characters seriously.

Nobody's fighting for the complete erasure of attractive female characters, hell, far from it! The people who act like there's a chance of fan-service disappearing from games altogether know they're lying to themselves. Plus, I think a strong character can also carry themself in that department (there's a huge chunk of cute boys in video games who don't waste time reminding you they are). It's just the disproportionate amount of female protagonists designed to titillate in the medium. I'll admit, developers seem to be trying their best to work away from that. We've had some pretty cool female protagonists in the last few years, that balance out the decades of sexualized female protagonists. The only place that has developers regularly struggle with this seems to be Japan. And sure, there's no way to communicate 1:1 with them about it if you're not part of the culture. But it's still good to keep the discussion going. The more inviting we make our scene, the better it is for everyone.

rochellepaws said:

This kind of stuff creeping into long standing series without a history of sexualisation is what really bothers me. I don't have any issue with games like Senran Kagura existing, they're open and honest on what they are and the kind of audience they're looking for but please, please, please don't start tarnishing existing franchises with something so cheap and tacky. The changing representation of Samus in smash bros is another example in giving her highly impractical footwear for bounty hunting.

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This. Medabots, noooooo...

RM8 said:

It's easy to say this knowing it will never happen, though. This is what happens when you sexualize a male character "too much":
http://www.usgamer.net/articles/mobius-mevius-final-fantasy-hero-too-sexy

And that guy was never Quiet-bad to begin with, lol.

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The difference between how complaints about this guy's design and Cindy were handled still makes me shake my head. Different teams were working on the games and all, but still. People complained about the dude and it was changed ASAP, people complained about Cindy (because her outfit is dumb for someone working at an auto garage in the desert) and the dev team was like "....???? But I don't understand, people say they want strong females in the game but they complain about Cindy???"http://www.harkavagrant.com/index.php/index.php?id=311

Lime said:

Your examples are indicative a nice trend, but we cannot simply erase the history that brought us here. As recent as 2014 you see the trend - a study published this year: http://psycnet.apa.org/record/2016-32591-001






And disregarding sexualization, you have quantitative marginalization of the overall representation (older figures pre-2010):

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Pretty there was a reason why there was a push back in the first place about the minimal number of female protagonists and why characters like Aloy were lauded. Women make up a small portion of the characters in games and commonly sexualized. There's no way that wouldn't be alienating.

Principate said:

SFV women are riduclous come on man. Even in comparison to the previous games. All you have to do is look at Cammy's and idle animations.

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Well yeah, I literally called them ridiculous.

But i mean there's also Case Study Sexy Ryu, Ed, and Urien in the game too

We are sloowly getting better at more equal, more diverse representation but the OP is right. We (the male cis community) need to do better and we need better discussions than just outright ignoring the opinions of the other half of the world.

Weltall Zero said:

Nobody in this thread is saying that people that enjoy sexualized content is a mysoginist (and if anyone does, please feel free to address them directly instead of derailing a thread). The thread isn't even about them, it's about character designs. You spent five paragraphs of persecution complex attacking a strawman.



I really wish everyone in this thread was as honest as you, it would save so much time. :/



If you think sexualization in games is under a bigger scrutiny than, say, movies, you're living under a rock.

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Oh man
Is this stuff also as bad with movies?
50 shades of grey was a big hit as a book and as a movie right? And its pure about sexual submission of a woman to a man
And the female audience loves it

Tigress said:

I think this is the main problem. When the female character is designed specifically to titillate the viewer and that is her purpose... and htat is what you see most female characters as, that's a problem.

Quiet is an interesting one. She's definitely designed for that and they make her do actions for that purpose. But so far from what I've seen, he also gives her personality too (I actually like her as a character but cringe at the parts where she's obviously supposed to just be a sex object. If she were clothed reasonably and didn't have scenes where she's acting like she's a stripper I'd think she was totally fine and a good character). Hell... the game actually lets you play as a female if you want and she actually is dressed reasonably for what she's there for (but she's not given more personality other than being your PC and some lines given to her that are the same as Snake if you were playing him instead).

Red Dead Redemption was horrible about this. Most females were there to be helpless objects to show how evil the other characters were (and for your PC to weakly protest as he watched the villains be horrible to them. They were there just to make the bad guys look more evil. And for occasionally for the player to feel good about himself for saving them or at least wreaking vengeance for them). I think that's one of the reasons I started to really have big issues with the game (just one of the reasons though). To be fair a lot of the male npcs (The villagers) were that too but at least some of them were given bigger roles.

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I mean simply to boil it down. I'm a guy and I really have no problems with boobs ass and skin. But injecting women in games just to exist for the male gaze and no other purpose is just a turn off to me. A female solidier rolling around breathing through her skin being a literal sex object is dumb and to me it's embarassing.

I don't have a problem with a bunch of ridiculously attractive men and women wearing ridiculous costumes doing crazy fantasy game shit "to a point". I have a problem when a game takes place on a spaceship and they inject a virtual strip club just because "tits and ass are great".

LightEntite said:

Well yeah, I literally called them ridiculous.

But i mean there's also Case Study Sexy Ryu, Ed, and Urien in the game too

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Hot Ryu was literally a happy accident (Capcom actually said they didn't design him to be hot), Ed wears MORE clothes than a real boxer (please note how this is never the case for women), and Urien got a suit in case the thong bothers you. There's no male Laura in SFV. Or Male Mika.

EMGESP said:

Here's the thing though, not every woman finds the sexualization of some female characters in video games an issue. They realize games aren't meant to be taken seriously and just go into them knowing certain levels of absurdity is expected. Again, there are plenty of Feminist friendly games out there, so that is why I don't think its as big of a deal as some would make it. Yes, some female charaters are ridiculously oversexualized (e.g. Bayonetta), but there are a lot of Men and Women who like those type of charatcers. Just look at the Cosplaying community for proof.

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Hex said:

I think the thread title is missing the very important word "some".
As in "Why some women..."
There is not a estrogenical consensus on the matter and in fact some of the more vocal on the issue are males.
Many women could care less.
As has been seen in the five or so threads that have come up on the very same subject in the last day or two, there are vastly differing opinions.

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Obviously there are. I've seen other women say they don't like Bayonetta's heels or they don't like boob amour while I do. Women aren't a hivemind, however, I do find it interesting is that whenever topics like these come up, there are always some men (both of your profiles say male so I'm not assuming) who feel the need to speak up for these 'other women'. That don't really need you to do that for them. Let them speak for themselves. Let them have their own voices.

LightEntite said:

Well yeah, I literally called them ridiculous.

But i mean there's also Case Study Sexy Ryu, Ed, and Urien in the game too

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I mean in comparison to the men. They're far more egregious. I wouldn't feel actively embarassed if a random person saw me playing SFV with the male characters on the screen I would cringe if it was some of the females, jesus.

Cid said:

Oh man
Is this stuff also as bad with movies?
50 shades of grey was a big hit as a book and as a movie right? And its pure about sexual submission of a woman to a man
And the female audience loves it

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Just because you're a woman doesnt mean you dont have sexist or extremely comservative viewpoints regarding societal issues and customs between men and women.

I have understood games making their characters attractive but I have never understood the absolute ridiculousness.
I am a big fan of Lara Crofts new design because it simply makes sense. If I knew nothing about Lara Croft or Tomb Raider and someone showed me a picture I wouldn't think twice about it. If you then told me what she did for a living I would think her outfit makes sense.

If you showed me a picture of Cindy and told me she was a mechanic my response would be "For Halloween?"

Mr.Deadshot said:

Fun thing: I don't know a single women in real life that complains about sexualised characters. I even have a friend who does cosplay of those characters.

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This doesn't even make sense. I have a guy friend that I've never talked about sexism in video games with so now it automatically means that I don't think it's a problem???

Lime said:

A study published this year: http://psycnet.apa.org/record/2016-32591-001

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The study disregards games from 2015 2016 and 2017
And states that

"Results indicate that sexualization has diminished since an observed height in the 1990s."

So for the Quiet haters, things seem to get better for you in general

Raging Spaniard said:

Just because you're a woman doesnt mean you dont have sexist or extremely comservative viewpoints regarding societal issues and customs between men and women.

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I would go that far in this comparison though it's true.

It's an erotic book little different from porn. Just because your sexual inclinations go one way doesn't mean you actually believe that shit.

I think many women appreciate sexy outfits. My sister, my girlfriend, their friends all like kinky outfit mods in Sims 4, and playing stuff like Tera. It's important to treat women as unique individuals, with subjective likes and dislikes. Women this, women that, I don't like that kind of categorization applied to any group. It tends to generalize.

I dont understand the whole "well some women dont mind or even like it".

Some people think women have it better than men.

Some people think racism is dead.

Some people think the earth is flat.

Is something not allowed to be criticiszed because some people in the im group feel differently?

Isnt that the entire point of bringing data and facts to a discussion to prove a point or justify a perspective?

Persephone said:

Marginalised voices are only acceptable if they agree with the majority opinion.

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Basically.

Thank you OP! I've been feeling tired of reiterating my same opinions in every thread about female character design. This thread really hit it, I appreciate you making it :)

Principate said:

I mean in comparison to the men. They're far more egregious. I wouldn't feel actively embarassed if a random person saw me playing SFV with the male characters on the screen I would cringe if it was some of the females, jesus.

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Well, me either. But I think people are way more comfortable viewing the male body in that kind of environment than they are viewing women.

I mean Urien can go out wearing nothing more than a dick wrap, but people are far more likely to complain about Cammy, who comparatively isn't really wearing anything all that extreme, nor is she particularly ill-dressed for the situation.

People complain about R-Mika all the time, but there is NOTHING sexual about Mika's character other than her ridiculous wrestling outfit. Even her ass slap super isn't sexual in nature.

Laura is intentionally egregious and intentionally sexual in nature, there's really no defense for her, but i really don't think there's supposed to be? Juri is the same way. That's their personality though.

Ketkat said:

Tekken 7? The game with girls like Lucky Chloe and Josie?

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I really don't think i'd describe Lucky Chloe or Josie as "highly sexualized"...not when Katarina or Eliza are in the game. Odd choice there lol.

But again, you've got your Steve Fox's and Miguels and...well, pretty much every guy who's shirt you can take off or clothe in chaps.

I think there's nothing wrong with not appreciating a specific aesthetic or sexualization. I don't think that only women complain about sexualised female characters because I do and I'm fairly sure other men do as well.

With that said, I think that some of the people that criticise sexualised female characters lose some of their merit when they point out the sexualisation of female characters in specific games yet ignore that the same applies to the male ones in the very same game.

Look at Dragon Crown as an example. It was highly criticised for its depiction of female characters yet the game's male characters were also highly sexualised and had unrealistic proportions. That isn't to say that the character design is the only thing Dragon Crown did poorly in regard to how it portrayed its female characters, but the way it was criticised lended credence to nay-sayers and trolls alike.

Cid said:

The study disregards games from 2015 2016 and 2017
And states that

"Results indicate that sexualization has diminished since an observed height in the 1990s."

So for the Quiet haters, things seem to get better for you in general

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Yes, I know, but you were talking about "this generation" which started in 2013, so the study includes at least 2 years of this generation. And a diminishment does not mean that the problem isn't there any longer as evidenced by the same study's findiings in regards to primary characters and gender.

Raging Spaniard said:

Just because you're a woman doesnt mean you dont have sexist or extremely comservative viewpoints regarding societal issues and customs between men and women.

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50 shades of grey was a huge world wide hit with women

But it's suddenly no porblem at all when women like to read and see how a woman is totally sexually owned by a man

But Quiet is bad and should have not been in MGSV

:-/

Cid said:

50 shades of grey was a huge world wide hit with women

But it's suddenly no porblem at all when women like to read and see how a woman is totally sexually owned by a man

But Quiet is bad and should have not been in MGSV

:-/

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50 shades is a smut novel by a woman for other woman.

Quiet was a character that was the brainchild of a horny guy for other horny guys.

Can you not see the difference in this?

I would like to add that, in addition to the clothing itself, the character's body is also a major element in terms of how sexualized the character is, and female characters are very rarely ever displayed with the same sort of raw emphasis on power that the male characters are. Even in games with character creation - even in games with body sliders - you're usually not allowed to deviate much from a sexualized ideal, or it is very difficult to make a female character who looks like, say, a crossfit athlete:

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Dragon's Dogma is the lone exception I can think of, and it is a HUGE EXCEPTION. That really shouldn't be the case. If guys are allowed to default to looking like roided up body builders (mind you, this isn't healthy, but it's still better than being a dolled up sex object), the equivalent would be allowing women to look like the female raider from For Honor:



But yeah, that doesn't happen very often. Exceptions upon exceptions. It's a damned shame and I'm tired of being left out of the loop like that. I just want to be able to play characters who represent an ideal that strives for speed and power, something that makes sense for the kinds of things typical video game protagonists do in these games. It's too bloody rare to be given that ability, and I hope it improves over time.

Cid said:

50 shades of grey was a huge world wide hit with women

But it's suddenly no porblem at all when women like to read and see how a woman is totally sexually owned by a man

But Quiet is bad and should have not been in MGSV

:-/

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[edit: the statement below is factually incorrect, I'll leave it cause I own up to my mistakes, haha]

Most women voted for Trump, too. Blanket statements like the one you're making are pretty asinine.

Raging Spaniard said:

Most women voted for Trump, too. Blanket statements like the one you're making are pretty asinine.

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No they didn't. Most white women did. Most women in the US voted for Hillary.

LightEntite said:

I really don't think i'd describe Lucky Chloe or Josie as "highly sexualized"...not when Katarina or Eliza are in the game. Odd choice there lol.

But again, you've got your Steve Fox's and Miguels and...well, pretty much every guy who's shirt you can take off or clothe in chaps.

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How is Tekken 7 not highly sexualized when you're even naming some that you think are worse than what I listed? What's the difference between what the intention behind these characters outfits compared to Ivy's? Is it just that you like these characters so they're okay?

I FULLY agree with the sentiment in OP's post but sometimes its poorly directed at games that do it as an artistic statement.

Take Dragon's Crown. It is clearly a stylized game that tries to capture the late 70s/early 80s swords and sorcery use of bare skin and marble sculped, oily bodies. Its Heavy Metal X Fabio X Frazetta with a Japanese twist.
The use of batshit, over the top sexual poses are totally there as a homage to the trashy/pulpy flavour that defined an era of everything fantasy/sci-fy.
You can argue that its paying homage to an outdated style mostly created by men just to give kids of the pre-internet porn-age something to pop a boner to, but to deny an artist of that creative well (and now established piece of pop-culture) as an artistic foundation for his expression? I cant roll with that either.

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You can't just look at this and go "NO, NO, NO!!! This has no place in a modern world!!!" regardless of general context or the creator's intent.
There is a unique flavour to this era specific art style that while potentially off-putting to some, was legitimized by being adopted by countless renowned and highly influential artists of its time, to the point where it should be admired outside of current sociopolitical issues, when its done properly and with a very clear and strong artistic voice backing it up.

Judging art on a surface level is just a goddamn shame all together. One should take the time to understand the thing they wish to criticize before grouping it with more clearly creatively bankrupt crap meant to bank on shitty social biases.

Principate said:

50 shades is a smut novel by a woman for other woman.

Quiet was a character that was the brainchild of a horny guy for other horny guys.

Can you not see the difference in this?

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The point is
Clearly women, many women, als love sex and male domination in entertainment
As proven bij 50 shades of grey
That why I said that

Cid said:

The point is
Clearly women, many women, als love sex and male domination in entertainment
As proven bij 50 shades of grey
That why I said that

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You got us. Some women like 50 shades of grey, so we can't talk about sexualiziation in games since we obviously love it.

Laiza said:

If guys are allowed to default to looking like roided up body builders (mind you, this isn't healthy, but it's still better than being a dolled up sex object), the equivalent would be allowing women to look like the female raider from For Honor:

But yeah, that doesn't happen very often. Exceptions upon exceptions. It's a damned shame and I'm tired of being left out of the loop like that. I just want to be able to play characters who represent an ideal that strives for speed and power, something that makes sense for the kinds of things typical video game protagonists do in these games. It's too bloody rare to be given that ability, and I hope it improves over time.

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This is a very fair argument. I feel like designers are perfectly willing to drop the "objectification" trend, but are still a bit slow catching on to the "but how is she carrying that axe" side of design when it comes to female bodies.

Although....the best example of this is the recent Last of Us 2 trailer, where the woman looks like she could have easily overpowered the guys in the trailer off physical strength alone....but instead everyone decided to complain about the violence instead....

Principate said:

No they didn't. Most white women did. Most women in the US voted for Hillary.

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Ah, you're right. My bad.

LightEntite said:

I mean Urien can go out wearing nothing more than a dick wrap, but people are far more likely to complain about Cammy, who comparatively isn't really wearing anything all that extreme, nor is she particularly ill-dressed for the situation.

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Again, Urien got a suit. Try putting Cammy in an optional suit for her default costume, it would be seen as censorship, lol. Urien doesn't get constant butt close-ups, and his body didn't get modified to be more sexually appealing coming from his last appearance, as opposed to Cammy getting a boob job. I would say a thong that cuts between your buttcheeks is kind of not optimal for fighting, too, but I guess it could be worse :P

That being said, I don't really dislike Cammy (especially in previous entries) in the way I dislike Mika or Laura, personally speaking.

LightEntite said:

TBH, i feel like the awareness for what constitutes "ridiculous" in regards to males and females is pretty skewed in conversations that go down the route that this one has.

People love to bring up characters like Quiet, Cindy, Ivy....but these are exceptions, even among sexualized characters. Unless you're willing to dive into the niche anime side of things? There are far fewer examples of hypersexualized characters that exist primarily to be hypersexualized characters worth bringing up.

Some big AAA names, just off the top of my head:

Lara Croft got a massive redesign from what she used to be.
None of Uncharted 4's female leads fits the bill here
Aloy from Horizon shows none of her goodies
Last of Us 2's most recent female lead looks like an MMA fighter
Gears of War threw some women into the mix
Nier Automata's 2B is more "stylish" than "sexualized", though this really just comes down to preference
Mass Effect has no glaring examples i can think of
Zelda in BotW is wearing nothing too gratuitous
Tekken 7's (reoccuring) female leads are ALL wearing more clothing than they used to, even characters like Xiaoyu who were never sexualized to begin with.
Street Fighter V's women are no more ridiculous than their men
Hellblade? Nah
Dishonoured? Nah
Resident Evil 7? Nah
Gravity Rush 2? Nobody seems to complain
Overwatch? Actively tried to avoid this situation

I mean i'm not saying it doesn't happen, it clearly does. But what i'm asking is, with the exception of MGSV and FFXV, I really can't think of any super glaring examples like this.

And honestly? It's only pretty recently that Metal Gear and Final Fantasy have started aiming for the kind of appeal that would have brought them out of the "anime niche" category, where you'll have absolutely no problem finding terrible examples to complain about.

Edit:

I mean one of the only really notable games I can think of that really has this issue at large is League of Legends. And League is really just an up-jumped F2P MMO that started off using the "sex object" appeal to draw in players, like most F2P MMOs regularly do.

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But SFV's does completely hypersexualize its women in ways that it doesn't even compared to hot Ryu. The alts for Laura, and Menat are beyond ridiculous and the camera's obsession with the male gaze in supers, victory poses, and intros were so obvious they had to change them from the beta which resulted in the most petty backlash I have every seen. But yes, this generation is better in toning hypersexualization than previous generations. That wasn't the argument to begin with. The argument was to continuously push female design and characterization in games. That is the whole point of critique.

Cid said:

The point is
Clearly women, many women, als love sex and male domination in entertainment
As proven bij 50 shades of grey
That why I said that

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The point is clearly some women like erotic stories that involve erotic domination.

Just like some one like to watch porn that brothers having sex with their sisters, or mothers, or whole family.

Learn the difference between sexual fantasy and reality.

I'll leave out my opinions on niche fanservice games and other things because I'll just go off on a tangent, but I fully agree, OP.

First thing to note, to people who have trouble grasping this concept:

1. Criticizing a game does not mean you hate it, you should actively be critical of all media you consume, and be aware of how it affects you subconsciously. You might think, "I'm an adult, I can tell the difference between reality and fantasy", but you are constantly being bombarded with media and content that reinforces the "women are objects" line of thinking. It's so prevalent in all forms of media, that you aren't even aware of the minor changes to thought and behaviors. This isn't even going into the fact that a lot of this media is targeted to a mainstream audience, including children, who's young minds are still developing and their value and views of the world and themselves are shaped by the media they consume, as are we all, but I'll leave that argument for another day as "Oh look someone crying 'think of the children'" is bound to pop up, it's just something to keep in mind. We aren't the sole consumers of the media we enjoy, and the creators of this content should be, if they aren't already, very aware of it. (Miss me with age ratings bs too, as this stuff appears everywhere, from advertising to cartoons)

2. A critique of something you enjoy is not a critique of you, as a person. You should hold more value in yourself and not define yourself by your consumerism. People critique movies, games, and music I love all the time -- getting defensive and shoving your head in the sand solves nothing, instead, listen, and learn. You might be exposed to a view you were previously unaware of. You might start thinking of things and the media you see in a different light, having gained new perspective, and be more aware and wary of this content, and become a better person for it.

Having said that, Kojima was rightfully called out on his Quiet bs. It's a shame too, because outside of the absurd-to-the-point-of-hilarity pandering, Quiet is a pretty good character. She's strong, independent, and was constantly outshining me during the game. I gained a lot of respect for her, as a character, IN SPITE of how grossly she was portrayed. Her ridiculous outfit aside, there's also the shower scene (gross), the rain scene (I laughed at it, esp after seeing the edits) and then the helicopter parts where she's shoving her T 'n A in your face constantly, like .. wtf?

I haven't played FFXV so I can't comment on Cindi outside of "man they really didn't even try, huh?"

It's becoming frustrating, because there are many characters who are actually decent characters, and who you grow attached to and enjoy as characters, but they are designed in a way to be nothing more than eye candy. It's frustrating wanting to talk about your favorite women in gaming, because you always have to finish your praise of their writing with "BUT," because you neglected to mention that oh by the way she's wearing 2 pieces of ribbon for clothing and is constantly shoving her ass in your face, or the camera is constantly zooming and moving to "perfect angles" to let you oggle her body, and she is treated by the game as a piece of meat. You relate strongly to a character, and you want to discuss them and how incredible they are, you want to point them out as a rolemodel, but you can't, because of their portrayal and objectification.

Raging Spaniard said:

Most women voted for Trump, too. Blanket statements like the one you're making are pretty asinine.

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Those sort of blanket statements are always distractions.

Off topic, but is that true about the Trump thing? I know more white women did, but I never heard that women in general did. I'm skeptical.

It's not just disrespectful of women, but it's a pretty shitty view of men too that they can't enjoy anything without plentiful amounts of T'n'A.

Cid said:

The point is
Clearly women, many women, als love sex and male domination in entertainment
As proven bij 50 shades of grey
That why I said that

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No we don't. There's a lot of backlash to 50 shades for getting BDSM relationships WRONG to begin with.
50 Shades has a worldwide audience, but they sure as shit aren't here and it's surely not with critics who have frequently and repeatedly bashed its content as being asinine.

Men seem to like wrestling, sports, car racing a lot... I'm sure we can find some general sweeping statement about this obsession men have there.

DarkConfidant said:

Those sort of blanket statements are always distractions.

Off topic, but is that true about the Trump thing? I know more white women did, but I never heard that women in general did. I'm skeptical.

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Nah I was wrong, as corrected above.

Famassu said:

It's not just disrespectful of women, but it's a pretty shitty view of men too that they can't enjoy anything without plentiful amounts of T'n'A.

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Agreed. It also shows that shitty view of men to women and says "this is what they expect and is the norm".

Raging Spaniard said:

Nah I was wrong, as corrected above.

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Ah, I see. Cool. I was shocked for a second.

At least 50 Shades or Grey was written by a woman for women.

Is the argument for why all the tits and ass as nothing but that based on the idea that it's women creating this content for other women?

Because oh boy, I have a bridge to sell you if so.

Laiza said:

I would like to add that, in addition to the clothing itself, the character's body is also a major element in terms of how sexualized the character is, and female characters are very rarely ever displayed with the same sort of raw emphasis on power that the male characters are. Even in games with character creation - even in games with body sliders - you're usually not allowed to deviate much from a sexualized ideal, or it is very difficult to make a female character who looks like, say, a crossfit athlete:



Dragon's Dogma is the lone exception I can think of, and it is a HUGE EXCEPTION. That really shouldn't be the case. If guys are allowed to default to looking like roided up body builders (mind you, this isn't healthy, but it's still better than being a dolled up sex object), the equivalent would be allowing women to look like the female raider from For Honor:

But yeah, that doesn't happen very often. Exceptions upon exceptions. It's a damned shame and I'm tired of being left out of the loop like that. I just want to be able to play characters who represent an ideal that strives for speed and power, something that makes sense for the kinds of things typical video game protagonists do in these games. It's too bloody rare to be given that ability, and I hope it improves over time.

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This is so true too. Male warrior are bulky and muscular because of what they are yet female warriors are curvaceous and with barely any muscles which makes no sense. It's pretty clear the intentions when designing these body types and a big reason why muscled guys aren't fanservice, but power fantasies (something that women are denied to have).