@keech I won't pretend I speak for female gamers, but as someone who enjoys good narratives and quality characters in the games I play, your examples aren't offensive at all. Neither are inherently sexist, either. Stereotypical assumptions could be expected in both examples, but they would be without merit. Assuming a strict female mentor is a "cold heartless b****" is something that is impressed upon some strong female characters a a means to signify their deviance from the norm. Doesn't make the character worse, it simply means the audience can more easily be jerks.

What's important is that the characters are complex within a narrative, that they have virtues and flaws. That their sexual assets aren't their sole or primary source of agency within the story. Make them seem believable, and you generally get a pass.

@greenskittles @oldschoolvandal

Aye. I mean, the game industry isn't as bad as Hollywood, where female directors are almost always pushed onto Romcoms if they want to get a decent paying contract.

But even in the game industry, there's this notion that girls will only play simple puzzle games and whatnot. My best friend's ex played fighting games religiously, was a MEAN Akuma. My friend back home is rarely found away from Battlefield 3 when she isn't working. I play the crap out of Virtua Fighter 5 and Dark Souls, as well as more narrative games like Mass Effect and *chuckle* Deadly Premonition ( :D ).

But it's hard to relate to female characters in a lot of games when they're basically writhing sex-toys in human form, with no personality. It's fine that some games include stereotypes because it's hard to get away from them, but when the vast, vast majority of games with prominent female characters have them as practically the same stereotype? That's not fair, it's not enjoyable.

And it would be so easy to avoid if developers would just think about the characters as people, sometimes.

@Whitebloodsun Normally, the only customization regarding body size is height and "weight" which usually only increases breast size only.

Which is unfortunate

@buccomatic

Didn't play much of RDR, but she seems to be well done, yeah. She's not overdone in regards to her sex appeal, and her character's personality seemed pretty good. I'm not saying there aren't good female characters out there. I'm just saying there's an incredible lack of them.

@Darnasian I play games for the gameplay and narrative. If all female protagonists have a narrative centred around their immense busoms, rather than an actually well thought out personality and plot, I get kind of pissed.

No point in playing games just to look t fake 3D models of male or female representations. Not when I could go outside for a few minutes and get that experience.

@Darnasian And that's kind of the problem. There's only a singular notion of a "hot" female character, and it 100% has to do with her body.

That's a pretty terrible idea of beauty that you're vouching for

@buccomatic She's nowhere near hateful in this interview. :\ Like, at all. She just wants likeable, relatable female characters where there's a distinct lack of them in the game industry. No harm in wanting all the character development given to male characters to be offered to female characters as well.

@Whitebloodsun @SEEDman_X

There's nothing wrong with wanting to play "sexy female characters" in games. What's wrong is to want the videogame industry to practically ONLY have "sexy female characters". it's unnecessary, the same way it would be unnecessary if all guys looked like Duke Nukem in videogames.

Most female characters have personalities tied directly to the sex appeal of their bodies. That's pretty crap, in my opinion. Games don't need to be realistic, but if games are providing complex character progression, emotional depth, a variety of body types(though tbh this is still fairly restricted for men, though not AS restrictive as for women) etc. for me, the same should be done for female characters.

@Victorious_Fize - I generally feel that rape isn't a word that should be among the most common taunts and insults, no matter who's playing. I wouldn't wish to censor it, I would simply prefer if gamers decided on less triggering and damaging words. And while it's a vast minority of scenarios, the majority of audible taunts I hear hurled at female fighting game competitors involves "rape". I'll admit I don't watch every stream, but I watch a fair bit. It's like, I can't deem the fighting game community of blatant sexism without a real pattern of sexism, but it's really edged toward confirmation due to the lack of variety in insults hurled at female gamers. Again, I just wish they'd choose different words on their own. It has nothing to do with competitiveness to use the word "rape" in taunts all the time, or to be affected by that word. It's just not appropriate IMO. Insult someone for their ability, I figure.

@Victorious_Fize I'm in agreement. Generally, if women gamers can play well, they're respected like anyone else. I think the fighting game community is great in that regard. However, I also agree with one of the interviewees in that someone should have told Aris to shut up when he was using pretty terrible language, and the fighting game community generally has no filter for what's right an acceptable in taunting other players. Most of the time, it's made in a light, joking manner, but it can get really heavily laid on sometimes, and I think some people need to learn that yelling "rape that *****" to a female gamer is just pretty unacceptable, because rape is a pretty serious issue. What next, making taunting a gamer about his wife's miscarriage? There's great respect between fighting game players who are competitive and give it their all. I'd just like that respect to carry over into the vocabulary of the fighting game community.