Games for Women

While my stance on equality in the workplace is concrete, my stance on equality in games is far from. I fully intend to make rude, and frankly controversial games at some point. I'd like men with lipstick, butch bikers, crazed women and perverted pathetic men as characters. I'd like the freedom to express that comedy, that reflection of the human race with all it's glorious flaws without being accused that I'm picking on some specific group.

This is why I feel PC has gone too far. We've sadly lost a great deal of understanding and the ability to laugh at ourselves along the way during the fight for equal rights.

 

Funny this topic comes up again. At the risk of sounding like I'm just plugging our company blog, our gamer girl in residence has done two posts on this subject that I think are worth your time to read. The first one had its own forum thread and sparked a rather lively conversation. It's about female characters in videogames and why they generally aren't appealing to actual female gamers. Find the post here:

http://bit.ly/YFOYP0

And the resulting thread here:

http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/173235-Female-characters-in-videogames

She just did a follow up that talks about why the female game market is worth paying attention to for indie devs and the social environment female gamers find themselves in. Find the blog post here:

http://crowquillgames.com/?p=454

And the forum thread here:

http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/177711-Pay-attention-to-female-gamers-make-a-pile-of-cash

Within the next couple of weeks she will be doing a panel discussion with a group of other female gamers asking them what games they like, what they want to see more of in videogames, what they would like to see a lot less of, and in as much as it is possible, giving us indie devs everything we need if we want to develop games that appeal to this market segment. I think some of the answers are going to surprise quite a few of the people around here.

The OP seems to get the fact that the female gamer market is in many ways underserved, which creates a business opportunity for an indie developer. The key is to do it we need to actually talk and more importantly listen to what the people who make up that market segment are trying to tell us. It's a bit hard to find actual women gamers talking about what they want, so I think the blog posts have some value.

Cheers!

 

I had to register when I turned 18 the same as you ~_~ I can be drafted also ~_~ lol

 

Characters are designed to fit in with the world around them, DO NOT expect a game developer to bend the rules of existence just to allow you to play how you want.

 

Yea, because that is how it works in reality?

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2...ember-me-because-of-their-female-protagonists

 

The character fitted into the world around her? Nothing in that article is challenging what i said.

Note: Publisher != Developer.

 

Since there have been quite a few new notes since I was last online yesterday, I'm going to reply to a bunch of them in one note.
On the issue of the draft: My grandfather and two of my uncles were drafted, so no it isn't "fictional". Conscientious objector status can only be gained in certain limited circumstances. And now that many generals are talking about a serious possibility of war with North Korea and the possibility that China will send troops to help North Korea as they did during the first Korean War, the possibility of a draft is becoming a lot more likely (our standing army cannot take on China while fighting in Afghanistan at the same time).
But here's an article by a woman who is also a Marine Captain, Katie Petronio, who actually saw combat during two tours of duty, but she argues _against_ putting women in battle and also points out that military women _aren't_ the ones pushing for women to be allowed in combat (it's civilian political activists who are doing that, for their own agendas): http://www.mca-marines.org/gazette/article/get-over-it-we-are-not-all-created-equal
But if equality is truly the goal, then you would have to extend the draft to women and likewise change the fact that men currently make up over 90% of the workforce in coal mines, foundries, and other dirty, dangerous, menial jobs which feminists are in no hurry to "equalize". If you're just cherry-picking the jobs you want without equalizing occupations you don't like, then you can't claim you're working for equality.
This brings us back to the main issue: some people in this thread are claiming that the entire software industry is guilty of systematic discrimination for not hiring more female programmers, but there simply aren't very many female programmers available to hire. I don't see many women signing up for programming classes or taking part in programming forums online. But I do see a lot of women going into the medical field because they say they are "people persons" who want to help cure people, and likewise I see a lot of women becoming veterinarians because they say they love animals. My younger sister is a biologist, because she likes animals and the outdoors. Were these women discouraged from a career as a programmer by an evil male conspiracy, or is it more likely that they genuinely prefer the fields they've chosen, for the stated reasons they give?
I think we all agree that there are differences between men and women, so isn't it likely that maybe those differences often result in different career choices? I would add that recent surveys have found that only 14% of young women identify themselves as feminists, so apparently most of them do not share feminist goals. They have other goals.

 

I think what feminist in particular need to grasp is that there is a difference in equal fairness and equal function. Women should be treated with equal fairness, however I don't believe they should always be given equal function.

Women are not good fire fighters, navy seals or professional sperm donors. When it's your family burning up in a house you want the biggest burliest man to break down the door and get them out, most men are not fit to be good fire fighters, so how can women be, considering sexual dimorphism being what it is?

Fairness is a human construct, it doesn't exist in nature. We can only strive to make things more fair, but we can't change the nature of what we are in order to equalize everything.

When it comes to jobs that both men and women are suited for, I believe women should be given equal opportunity, and I agree that often they are not. I'm not all against feminism, I just think feminist need to pick their battles better.

 

Oh boy, here we go.

Yeah, I know where this is going.

You have no evidence to support this as they've never even been allowed to try.

Now you're just being an idiot on purpose.

Except there are plenty of female firefighters.

Except all your examples are either wrong, unproven, or ridiculous attempts to prove a point.

"Pick your battles, everyone. I'm a man, I know what's best for women."

 

Sorry but, it's kind of obvious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERwzqvs7vvU

It is proven in studies that women have approximately 52% the upper body strength as men and 66% the lower body strength. It is also a fact that a man must have higher than average strength for a man to be an effective firefighter. The reason we have female fighters isn't because women are good for the job and can do it just as well, it's because fire fighters are needed so they are recruiting whoever they can: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubBsvaN7bak

I am a human and I can determine these things based on logic, so can female humans.

 

Except here's the thing: being more fit than the average human man? Not a challenge! People are not in a great amount of shape without putting effort into it. What most women need is an extra 15-20% muscle mass than usual to meet any qualifications to be a firefighter. But considering how you just made a bunch of assumptions based on gender and ignoring actual facts I imagine you'll ignore this as well.

 

I don't see videos of women burning through the obstacle course. I see professional fire fighter women unable to complete the course while untrained average guys get through it fine. Maybe you are the one ignoring evidence.

Personally I love the idea of powerful amazon women that can go toe to toe with men, but in reality, that almost always is not the case.

 

Part of the problem with this discussion is that people aren't identifying how complex the issue is; they are applying blanket statements which can never work for a complex issue like this.

1. women are physically weaker and do not have anywhere near the endurance of a male, all other factors being equal (training, etc).
2. women DO mentally just as well if not better than men (testosterone is a blessing and a curse).

With that established that there are firm differences between the sexes, there will naturally be roles where the statistical majority will fall in favour of men - but this does not need to be cut and dried.

WAR:

1. men do make better troops. They march further, their bodies are less prone to damage, their bones are stronger (look it up), have higher testosterone which helps with adrenaline and so forth.

2. women can potentially make far better commanders or generals, and due to sexism and the way the military works - it is hard for women to gain these roles, but no less valid a role for them. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boudica)

So there is a place in war for women AND men. But it doesn't need to be the exact same task. TRUE EQUALITY is providing the same opportunity to both sexes, and judging only the results, not the gender.

I believe things are changing, but it will help everyone a great deal in future arguments if you do not make blanket statements as those are illogical and can never work in an intelligent discussion.

 

So you watched some cherry picked some videos and ignored the fact that in training tests (typically ranging between 50 and 400 entrants) only 70% of people pass? Or that under the same testing (and it was the same testing up until 7 years ago) that women firefighters were steadily rising in number? http://www.nfpa.org/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=955&itemID=23601

But hey, I'm sure those videos you watched are totally representative! Especially considering how, with deeper digging, you'll notice that the pass/fail rates of men and women are within 7.5% of each other!

 

Also if 2 women apply, and only one passes, that's a 50% pass rate.
But if 20 men apply and only half of those pass, it's actually technically a lot more fails for the men, even though on paper it looks the same...

But there's a certain amount of pride at beating men in a 'mans world', often bordering on heroic. I wish my gender tried that hard.

 

You're going to believe whatever you want and call any evidence "cherry picked". Hippocoder did a better job explaining exactly what I was trying to get at. Ultimately I think people like you do more harm than good to equal rights for genders. Your views are too PC. There are differences people have, there is no point pretending they don't exist or matter, that kind of attitude will always allow bigoted discrimination to exist, the key to equality is to acknowledge differences and accept them.

Take Hippos example. If I go to war and all the best generals turn out to be females because they score better than males at that role, then I accept that difference and don't complain, they earned it, they are suited for it, they deserve it, that's true equality.

 

Except it's not two women applying. Typically it's (big shocker) around 3-5% of the amount of men applying.

 

I just want point out something here, that I haven't seen stated. It has to do with this whole thing of women being sexually objectified, and women not being portrayed as taking control and the lead, and that these are negative qualities unique to women.

I think this argument is from a purely feminine point of view and really completely dismisses the difficulty males can face in this world. Men get objectified just as much as women in this world, just in a different way.

Women feel objectified when men see them as submissive, and purely sexual in nature. Understandable.

But you know I feel objectified when women, and even men, see me as someone who is innately not supposed to be submissive, and is innately supposed to lead, and innately supposed to put my 'feelings' to the side and push on through friction to finish a task, make money or do some other thing. As though every boy wants to leave behind childhood playfulness, sensitivities of emotion and whatnot to develop this strong sense of masculine self-identity, leading, 'getting S*** done', putting themselves to the side and doing as whats needed, providing, and if you don't do that, then your worthless, disposable, because thats what your supposed to do. This is how men are objectified in our culture, through the assumption that they are supposed to do this, and want to do this. Games like Duke Nuken, or any game with a strong and highly successful male leader 'proving' his 'value' by getting S*** done, being an alpha male, holding strong sense of identity, I see this as objectifying men. The man is no longer a human being, with an innate value, rather he is an interchangeable object who's value is based on the utility of his ability to do something and provide resource. If one man can't get it done, the camera goes off of him and onto the one who can get it done. I mean some people have complained about Super Mario Brothers stating that the princess just sits there looking pretty the whole time, but then completely ignores the fact that the game portrays the man as being the one who has to jump over miles and miles of S***, and thats what he's supposed to do, his only reason for existence, and if he doesn't then he is doing something wrong. I mean who's to say mario didn't ever want to just sit there and chill for a bit, lay around in the flowers and ponder existence? A man doing this in the real world would be called a 'loser hippie' of some sort, 'get a job, do something'. The princess carries an innate value by just sitting there, but mario is useless unless he successfully navigates miles of treacherous terrain and monsters, and only then he gets his value by getting the princess. Mario is a disposable human being with multiple lives, that carries no innate value for just being a living human being. He is reduced from a 'human being' into a 'human doing'. Really, in that deal I think mario is the one getting the short end of the stick.

So this entire argument about games objectifying women because women are not portrayed with these certain qualities men are portrayed with. I don't see as an argument for ending the objectifying of women, rather I see it as an argument for women wanting to be objectified in the same way as men are objectified. Which if you've not grown up being a male your whole life, and have never experienced this kind of objectifying, it may seem glorious to be a 'big masculine leading male'. But really it's not, it's dehumanizing to men to expect them to hold up to something grand, and see them as less if they don't, I wish our culture would see men as valuable whether or not we are employed, making money, getting S*** done, and 'providing', AKA jumping over miles and miles of S*** we really don't want to jump over.

Which don't get me wrong here, I am all for gender role reversal so each gender can experience the other side of the equation, and better understand one another, I think this is hugely valuable. I do too direly wish women carried more masculine roles in games and that men carried more feminine roles, or more ideally there weren't gender roles at all. However, this view that there is a huge issue against women because our culture creates and enforces a stereotype that is undesirable for one gender, but then ideal for the other gender? I don't think is true. Whether or not an enforced stereotype is viewed as 'heroic and leading' or 'submissive and docile' I don't think really matters, they are both detrimental, one is really not that much better than the other, they both are making people think they need to try to be something they aren't, and in failing to be that something, they are both making a person feel like they are doing something wrong.

 

You are seriously saying having characters in a game being capable is being "objectifying" instead of glorifying. That is completely and utterly ridiculous at its core and a disgusting misrepresenting of what objectification is. Hell, "OBJECT" is even in the name. Objectification is the act of presenting something as an object. Objectification is the act of making something less human so that you can exhibit a form of ownership over it. What men get is glorification of specific ideals, not ownership by another person or abstracted group.

 

Mario in a nutshell, lol

Kind of like a minion.

 

Except not at all because minions actually do something.

 

Wow.... just....wow.....

The complete unashamed sexist attitude you have is .... amazing. No woman (not even a powerful amazon woman) can compete with a MAN (all men, obviously)?

Oh please go on, tell us more. Maybe next you want to start applying this to "logical thinking" because you saw some generalized study on the GREAT DIVIDE between men and women in their logical thinking (oh hey, btw, do you realize who you are talking to?). Which "obviously" proves that women just can't compete with men in jobs that require...thought.

This line of thinking, judging a person by their genitals instead of by their capabilities is what is so completely ridiculous. No, "a man" is not stronger than "a woman". Generally speaking, yes, a man tends to have more upper body strength. Generally speaking women tend to be shorter. Guess what? There are a CRAP TON of people who fall outside of those sweeping generalizations. TONS of people who are capable and willing to do what their personal qualities allow them, but are held back because people like you seem to think you have figured out the world in some ridiculous black and white "male and female" understanding.

Oh, and bravo on throwing "feminist" around as some type of militant irrational woman. Feminism is simply about not being judged and dismissed because you have a vagina. THAT IS IT.

Andddddd, once again, this thread just proves the point of how grossly sexist the industry is You don't even realize you are sexist. To you, this all makes complete sense. It is just "how the world is". You aren't trying to be mean or anything, just, in the way you understand the world... women just don't belong some places (because they are women). Welcome to how sexism works You sir (and a lot posting here) are pretty cluelessly sexist

So, back to games, tell me again how you are going to make games that speak to women when you don't even have the faintest clue of their capabilities and can only see their vaginas and boobs? Lol

 

Here's the bottom line, there will never be gender equality anywhere at anytime. No matter how you cut it, there will be differences because there are differences. The only thing we can do, as individuals, is create some instances of equality when we can in our personal lives.

Also, we're all game devs here. If you want a female character, put her in. I made a level with a female stealth character unintentionally(I bought an assert from the store). However, I liked how it played her so I'll keep it in. If other's don't like it, so what, my income isn't riding on my games, like AAA companies do.

 

You know, I'm actually rather surprised how many devs seem to take this as a social and even personal issue. For me it's strictly a business decision. Here is a quite large segment (almost half!) of the gaming market that is currently being very poorly served by anyone. The big boys, due to entrenched thinking, don't seem to have any inclination to actually do a better job in the short term designing games that attract these players. The people who make up this market segment are getting tired of it and beginning to talk about what they want, even telling us how to attract their business. To me this seems like a no brainer business decision: Go into a large market segment with virtually no strong competition and profit before everyone else figures out they have been walking right past a goldmine!

I am 100% certain the big boys will, in due course, see the error of their ways and start tailoring games to appeal to this market segment. It's just too big and fast growing to keep ignoring forever. At that point it will be as difficult to compete in the market for games that appeal strongly to female gamers as it is to compete in today's FPS market. We indies are not going to compete directly with the AAA studios marketing muscle and enormous budgets. We need to find under served markets and serve them better. We need to be more innovative and do things the big boys aren't doing yet. We survive by handling subject matter the big boys won't touch. For anyone with any business acumen this should be self evident. Which is why I'm rather surprised by many of the reactions I see here. Rather than recognizing the opportunity when it is pointed out and capitalizing on it, a lot of devs seem to see this as the time to bloviate about their point of view on the subject and why they should just go on ignoring a market that's literally begging to be mined.

To each their own, and I have no desire to enter the culture war on either side. As a business decision, I've already started making moves to help me tap this wide open market. It's a bit of business being agnostic; who cares what I do or don't think about the current state of gender equality or which planet different genders are or are not from. The simple fact is this is probably one of the easiest ways to advance my business and I would feel a fool to pass it up. However, to make games that actually appeal to the female gamer market, I realize I can't rely on my own preconceived notions on the subject. The more I've dove into the matter the more I've come to realize I'm pretty much completely wrong in my thinking, and so is just about every other male developer trying to create games for women. To effectively design games to appeal to this market I am hiring female developers and game designers (rare beasts indeed at this point!), talking a lot to other female gamers, and actively doing research on the subject to better wrap my head around this very misunderstood market segment. My art director (who has final say on all matters of visual design) is a woman and has already brought some interesting perspective to the table long before we decided this was a market niche worth pursuing. We will be sharing what we learn on the Crow Quill Games blog, and of course our experience along the way. I'm hoping some other devs see the opportunity as well and start moving in the same direction. If the indies can do a good enough job serving this market and zipping it up, it makes it less attractive to the big boys and might keep them out of it a bit longer.

My thoughts on the subject. Take them as you will.

 

Giving a character multiple lives I see as one of the most radical forms of turning them into a non-human 'object'.

Oh it's just a man, jumping over pits of lava, and dozens of swing balls of spikes, no big deal, thats what he's supposed to do, if he dies, he has multiple lives. Oh whoops? He fell into a pit of lava? Haha, game over. *Cue Mario Theme Music* "Heya itsa me mario, watch me F*** over my life again so that I can try to impress a woman, because thats what ima supposed toa do otherwise ima loser, Haha!" Mario IS portrayed as being completely owned by external forces, and worse yet, a disposable one. If I was in the game of Mario, I would want to be the princess, at least then I wouldn't have to die every 5 minutes of grueling labor.

 

My toaster does something too and my car, microwave, phone etc.

There are plenty of studies on the strengths of average men and women, the facts are common knowledge. In fact I would say that to claim otherwise would be considered making a positive claim. And you know where that puts the burden of proof.

 

So you're moving the goalposts and trying to say that the mechanics are to blame! But in using Mario as an example, you show the real problem: the goal of the game is to rescue the completely passive Princess Peach. Princess Peach, who could just as easily be replaced with a baked potato and have the exact same effect. So no, being Mario is not objectifying. Being Marcus Feenix is not objectifying. Being Nathan Drake is not objectifying. Being Princess Peach is objectifying. Being almost every female character in games is objectifying because of how they're almost universally handled: making them either a target to be rescued or making them a constant source of sex appeal because, in the context of games, that is what women are primarily good for.

Your toaster, car, microwave, and phone can ONLY do something when you tell them to. In the narrative of a game, if something exist in a personified form, it has the potential for agency outside of the action of the game. Those minions still do something and they do something within the confines of that narrative in the context of the game. You're making ridiculous false equivalencies here.

 

I would never risk my life for a baked potato, a person however, that's different.

Mario will stand there until the time runs out and die if you don't tell him to jump his ass over miles of S***. A video game character is no different than a toaster as far as being objectified. Sure we can imagine he is making his own decisions, we may as well imagine that princess peach makes her own decisions and has a personality also.

 

That's because he's an extension of the player. Stop pretending these are in any way the same thing.

 

My toaster is an extension of me when I make toast, a toaster has agency?

In super Mario bros 2 peach is a playable character. So what if she played the one needing to be rescued in the first game? In Luigi's Mansion Mario needs to be rescued.

As far as the damsel in distress that goes back to ancient times in story telling. Just because some games based stories on that doesn't in anyway prevent female characters from being in leading roles.

 

No, it isn't. Stop being deliberately obtuse.

 

Mario is being used as a tool, bottom line.

 

No, he isn't. He is an extension and representation of the player at large. You're trying to redefine what objectification is so you can completely gloss over the fact that female representation in games is undeniably terrible. You can not make the case that displaying men as competent and able to get things done is objectifying because that is the literal opposite of what objectification means.

 

Internet:

Would you agree to that definition? That's what I'm going off of. When you play a video games you don't give a damn if that character falls in lava or gets shot, what if you treated a real person like that? You would never tell somebody to jump over a pit of lava or choose to do that yourself with the same casual attitude as you do it in a game. Because the game character is just a fictional person, they have no real worth, no sentience, they are not a person, you can do with them as you please because they are just an OBJECT for your amusement.

Not only are all video games characters objectified, they literally are just objects (albeit not physical).

 

No, Mario's personality and sentience is an extension of the player's. I DO care if I die in games because that is an aspect of how extending yourself works. Video game characters are REPRESENTATIVE OF PEOPLE. The fact that you can't realise this on your own either gives me the impression that you're a sociopath or just trying to be intentionally dense so you can dismiss actual issues.

 

You assume every player role-plays that they are Mario.

You DO NOT care if you die in a game the same as if you or somebody else dies in real life... I hope. The fact that you care a little and want to win the game doesn't mean that your character isn't still just a tool to help you achieve that goal.

I'm a sociopath when it comes to fictional characters, I have killed so many fictional people I lost count over a decade ago. I'm worse than Hitler when it comes to fictional people. Real people however... I have great respect for their dignity and life.

How characters are portrayed in a video game is a small issue that can be rectified simply by making games that portray genders more equally, such as with Super Mario bros 2. If you think the industry has an issue with sexist portrayals of women, then nothing is stopping you from making a game that challenges that stereotype.

My whole point is having a game where the main character is portrayed as somebody who kills countless enemies is just as poor of a portrayal of what a decent human being should be as the sexist portrayals, but it doesn't matter, there is freedom of expression, game devs can make their game however they want.

 

Or you could replace mario with a jumping bean, or actually to take this a notch deeper into the philosophical depths, you could replace mario with a sperm, or any male character with a sperm. Because thats all they do is mindlessly run towards the end goal of feminine approval, and there is billions of them to spare, so whats it matter if they get killed, maimed, depressed, crushed dreams, social exile, homeless, or whatever else along the way. At some point, one of them will get to the end of feminine approval and that's all that matters, that one gets there, not the 20 million of them that fell off the path along the way. You may say peach could be a potato, but even as a potato, it would carry way more inherent value and power than mario does.

I want to point out that, I am not saying you are wrong. What I am saying is that this issue of cultural gender stereotypes is negatively affecting both genders. And I am pointing that out because I honestly think the solution has to do with both genders rethinking their relationship to their identity, and the identity of the opposing genders.

This entire thing where, there is some problem, and then the woman complains to the man, because the man knows how to fix it, or because the man did something wrong, and women are supposed to keep complaining until the men or 'patriarchy' does something is a continuation of the very negative gender stereotypes that I think need to be abolished. This very thread is representative of a mode of correcting the problem that needs to go away. If you want a certain female gender stereotype represented in a game, you should make that game, not complain to groups of men that they haven't made that game.

 

Men desperately want to shut women up and convince other men that they should continue to "make games for PEOPLE, there is no sexism", just like white people desperately want to shut minorities up and convince other white people that they should continue to "make games for PEOPLE, there is no racism". People in priviliged positions who have everything designed for them sort of have blinders on; they know that they are "people", and they know they are not evil sexists and racists, therefore, everything they like must be for "people" equally and not specifically for straight white vaguely-christian american men. I mean, sure, all of the main characters in everything they like are straight white vaguely-christian american men, but that's just because PEOPLE really like that, it's just a meaningless coincidence!

Unfortunately, like most social progress, the only way it's going to change is going to be slowly, over time. You will need to drill it into people's heads, no, smash it into their heads, repeatedly, over and over, endlessly, until finally one or two of them slowly come around to the idea that maybe it won't be so horrible if things change a little bit. It will probably take a generation or two. Most straight white vaguely-christian american male developers of today will take a stand that damn it, they are not ever doing anything wrong, and no one will ever convince them otherwise, and anyone who wants any sort of change is an enemy that must be shut down and discredited at all costs. They will occasionally admit that sure, maybe in the decades past, the straight white vaugely-christian american males might have maybe been wrong when they insisted that everything was as it should be and that they weren't actually racist/sexist/whatever, but NOW they have made everything equal so all the minorities need to shut up and let them handle things. Every generation will continue to have an enshrined majority that will continue to think that way and will push back against change; it's a slow process.

 

No, you couldn't replace Mario with any of those things without a severe level of abstraction. They are not in a run to gain feminine approval, they are in a run to gain the female. It isn't about approval, it's about taking back what is perceived as being the player's, aka objectification. These are not hard concepts to grasp, but both you and Khyrid are doing your damndest to try and make it so.

Quite a lot of things stop that from happening on a large scale. Major publishers will outright state that the protagonist can't be female. This means that representation of women at the top levels of game recognition is virtually nonexistent.

 

@MarigoldFleur I have already provided tons of examples of objectified male video game characters, they are fodder, they aren't necessarily an extension of the player, they may be AI and all they are there to do is run out and die. That is objectification. Why do you ignore that?

Anyway, I'm outta here, got video game stuff to do.

 

No, you didn't. You showed a bunch of male characters in games acting of their own volition and context, then called it objectification in a flismy attempt to redefine a word. Your entire set of arguments are like they're pulled right out of an MRA notebook.

 

Whoa, wtf? This thread is entirely ridiculous, but this is the most sexist and racist comment on here so far. Congrats.

 

As you are someone who desperately wants to shut women up and convince other men that they need to continue doing what they're doing since there is no sexism, it doesn't really surprise me that you'd think that.

 

No, it's actually 100% true and this thread is pretty decent proof of it!

 

aaand there goes what little respect I had left for you. The fact that you can't see that statement as sexist, followed by an equally racist comment just proves that you, in fact, are the one with blinders on. There is no point in having any kind of conversation with you on this topic because you can't grasp simple A, B, C logic.

So, people can continue to debate this for amusement, but nothing useful or even insightful will come from this.

 

If you'd care to re-read anything I've posted, my stance... on pretty much everything, is that I don't give a damn what you or anyone else does. I'm not interested in shutting anyone up.

I make games; not to belittle or objectify anyone, but to entertain them and give them a break from their day. Other people also make games. Some I like. Some I don't. It really is that simple. Not everything is an affront to your morality.

 

That's literally how oppression works. It attempts to silence all forms of discourse that bother to try and point out the oppression in a system. You, Khyrid, and techmage are all great examples of this as you try to silence discussion through pointless redirection tactics, appropriating language of the oppressed, and otherwise dismissing claims out of hand.

 

Ah yes, the old "There is no point in having any kind of conversation with you". Certainly the best way to prove you're not trying to shut someone up and ignore their complaints.

 

You could say you couldn't replace Peach with anything but a female. Certainly mario wouldn't jump through all of that to have sex with a potato.

I would admit that there is a weird sort of dynamic at the end of mario where it would go something like "Hey Peach I just risked my ass to save you, can we have sex now" and then this awkward silence would ensue and Peach would be like "Thank you, but no thank you, I'm not into 40 year old midget italian men". But even this exemplifies how the gender stereotypes in Mario are even more F***ed up for men. I'm not just making stabs in the dark here either for the sake of being difficult, these oddities represented in the weird male gender stereotypes of the past 50-100 years you can see all over the place today in culture. Where men think just because they do some great act and put their ass on the line that this is supposed to entitle them to sex. Or how men have lower life expectancy, life expectancy being directly linked stress, making me think men have a greater tendency to put more stress on themselves, because they think thats how they get approval and sex, which in some ways is still true actually. Or men committing suicide at four times the rate of women, which I see as the most objective measurement of depression, because I could only assume the pressures to 'live up to the great capable male stereotype with full agency to get social approval and sex' seems a too impossible of a task to even begin trying to accomplish, so some men fall into a feeling of being a failure and hopeless. There is a whole messed up aspect to the male gender stereotypes where it puts screwy conceptions of male identity into our culture.

Again I want to point out that I am not saying your wrong, but that gender stereotypes is a multi-gender issue in their negative affects on society. Women have to deal with a whole set of negative issues from these things, as do men. It's placed screwy ideals and thoughts in both genders that need to be reworked. To simply state "Women need more of what men have had", I do not think is correct. What men have had for the past 50-100 years is not really ideal either.

 

So we state an opinion and we're oppressing you, but you state an opinion and you're... what? A freedom fighter? Please give an example of how anyone was trying to "shut you up" or even how they could.

If you want to see change, be change. I truly do not give a crap. If you make a fun game, I'll play it. If not, I won't. But this is accomplishing nothing. So please, don't try to pretend that you're making some kind of stance on ideology on an internet forum.

Ignoring someone is now oppression? Sheesh, you guys just really like playing the victim, don't ya?