4 ms·

First, women are smaller and weaker than men, on average, and there's nothing wrong with that. Sometimes reality has a conservative bias, you know? (But it woul

by Camillo 14y ago

First, women are smaller and weaker than men, on average, and there's nothing wrong with that. Sometimes reality has a conservative bias, you know? (But it would be more accurate to say that traditional ideas often have some basis in reality.) Second, I don't see why you have to demean all the men and women who are weak and passive. Their lives are perfectly worthwhile too, and they have something to contribute other than brawn and testosterone. Third, boys embraced video games as a pastime when most girls thought it was stupid crap for loser nerds. I think it's great that many more girls are into video games now, and that all the big companies want to make money by selling video games to girls. But don't act as if the large back catalog of boy-oriented games is some sort of social injustice. When the first GI Joe doll for boys (aka "action figure") came out, did people start whining because almost all existing dolls were designed for girls? No. Fourth, there are many girls (but also boys) that would be better served by something other than a simple sprite swap on the same action game idea. But your ridiculously limited ideas of what's good and valuable (big, strong, person! Death to enemies! Woe be the weak!) would leave them high and dry.

XorNot 14y ago
Yes I'm sure in a videogame it's very important it be informed by reality. You know, in a video game where the antagonist is a giant ape throwing barrels at you. Why, whenever someone does something simple like this, does someone feel it sooo important to come and remind us about how on average women have blah blah blah properties.
- Camillo 14y ago
  I am responding to arrrg's comment, not to TFA.
arrrg 14y ago
I think it was pretty clear that I was not talking about muscle strength, you know. (And if you want to get down that route, I’m willing to bet that in general, overweight plumbers have less jumping ability than fit women.) Also, I’m a shy introvert and I certainly do not want to demean anyone who is also that – I don’t think I did, actually. There is nothing wrong with shy and introverted characters, even weak characters or passive ones. That is not the problem. Those characters can all happily exist. The problem is that those characters tend to overwhelmingly be women. In that light, I believe you misinterpreted me completely. I want better storytelling and more complex characters. I have really no problem with that. I do not want video games to again and again and again pick up on the same old lazy stereotype of women as being passive and weak. That’s it.
- BHSPitMonkey 14y ago
  Nintendo's Metroid franchise has already been mentioned, and then there's the Zelda franchise (where despite the fact that the main character is male, Zelda is actually a strong character who tends to be a victim of circumstances beyond anyone's ability to control, and in some instances fights shoulder-to-shoulder with the protagonist), and others outside of Nintendo as well (Tomb Raider?). It may seem like a larger problem than it actually is if you only pay attention to the examples that bother you.
  - arrrg 14y ago
    Zelda? Zelda?! You are ridiculous in bringing that up as a positive example. I’m baffled. Also, Tomb Raider has quite the problematic history (that the new game luckily avoids). Obviously, counter-examples do exist. It has been getting better. All that is true. But we aren’t there yet.
    - BHSPitMonkey 14y ago
      > I'm baffled. I explained myself.
sophacles 14y ago
1) Its not the physically smaller or weaker part that is the problem - how often really do women need men to come rescue them? Is it any more than men needing women to rescue them? Why then are most of the video games, even the puzzle based ones where brains not brawn are the deciding factor, all about saving the women? It seems to me that there is certainly a curious imbalance there. 2) Strawman - parent is not demeaning the "weak and passive" so much as pointing out that a lot of video games present a wide variety of male types, but only the weak and passive female type. This is strange. The women I know seem to fall on a scale ranging from weak and passive to "alpha as fuck", just like the men. 3) Goalpost moving, true scotsman, and strawman rolled up into one: There is no argument here about orienting the games toward a gender, only the portrayal of genders within the games. If you think they are the same, then there is perhaps something else going on as well... basically there is some sort of assumption that games oriented towards boys should only portray men strongly. Which is weird, because how the hell would it appeal less to boys if some of the characters were strong women? 4) Actually a good point. Unfortunately mixed up in some sort of strawman - you are angry that people would like to see strong female characters in action games, so you are accusing the parent of only wanting action gams for kids - which is not evident in that post - and therefore hurting the chance for girls (who apparently can't like action games) to get good games for them. (I'm guessing that your conservative basis in reality suggests that means they need games about vacuuming, cooking and ponies).
- belorn 14y ago
  (going to continue the above structured 4 bullet points) 1) Stories are today more homogeneous then ever before. People used to joke that you could set your clock to a james bond movies, and know what plot, what characters and what events will unfold. Then other movies copied it, and they too could be set to that same clock. Asking for originality is what we consumers should do but it is not what sends money to the bank if you are a producer. I would not know how we even could began fixing this. 2) video games do not present a wide variety of male types. Since when did you see a undecisive, meek, emotional erratic male protagonist? How often is he a gear of wars massive hulk made of 99% muscles, with so low base sounding voice that he likely has a serious sickness in the throat? How often doesnt he act like an emotionalless robot, creating a flood of corpses and steals anything that's not nailed down? 3) while I am not a game developer, I doubt that having strong women would lower the numbers of sales to boys. I don't see anyone arguing this. I do however think that the industry is lazy, and is not going to change their products if they don't have to. Movie producers and game producers are in this aspect very similar, and focus on what ever sold the most yesterday. In media, only books tend to have reached a level of diversity that we as a society is happy with. 4) I don't think the commenter is angry. That would imply intent in a very few written lines. I also think you are missing the point. Stories are complicated, and good stories require more than simple resprite work or pronounce changes. This goes same for making games that present role models for boys as well as girls.
anon808 14y ago
instead of focusing on groups why not focus on individuals. women as a group maybe have specific characteristics, but when was the last time you had to deal with women as a group? you deal with individuals, so why not focus on individuals? I'm sure i could find a woman that's stronger than you, in that circumstance, it doesn't matter that men as a group are on average stronger than women as a group.

by Camillo 14y ago

XorNot 14y ago

Yes I'm sure in a videogame it's very important it be informed by reality. You know, in a video game where the antagonist is a giant ape throwing barrels at you. Why, whenever someone does something simple like this, does someone feel it sooo important to come and remind us about how on average women have blah blah blah properties.

Camillo 14y ago
I am responding to arrrg's comment, not to TFA.

arrrg 14y ago

I think it was pretty clear that I was not talking about muscle strength, you know. (And if you want to get down that route, I’m willing to bet that in general, overweight plumbers have less jumping ability than fit women.) Also, I’m a shy introvert and I certainly do not want to demean anyone who is also that – I don’t think I did, actually. There is nothing wrong with shy and introverted characters, even weak characters or passive ones. That is not the problem. Those characters can all happily exist. The problem is that those characters tend to overwhelmingly be women. In that light, I believe you misinterpreted me completely. I want better storytelling and more complex characters. I have really no problem with that. I do not want video games to again and again and again pick up on the same old lazy stereotype of women as being passive and weak. That’s it.

BHSPitMonkey 14y ago
Nintendo's Metroid franchise has already been mentioned, and then there's the Zelda franchise (where despite the fact that the main character is male, Zelda is actually a strong character who tends to be a victim of circumstances beyond anyone's ability to control, and in some instances fights shoulder-to-shoulder with the protagonist), and others outside of Nintendo as well (Tomb Raider?). It may seem like a larger problem than it actually is if you only pay attention to the examples that bother you.
- arrrg 14y ago
  Zelda? Zelda?! You are ridiculous in bringing that up as a positive example. I’m baffled. Also, Tomb Raider has quite the problematic history (that the new game luckily avoids). Obviously, counter-examples do exist. It has been getting better. All that is true. But we aren’t there yet.
  - BHSPitMonkey 14y ago
    > I'm baffled. I explained myself.

sophacles 14y ago

1) Its not the physically smaller or weaker part that is the problem - how often really do women need men to come rescue them? Is it any more than men needing women to rescue them? Why then are most of the video games, even the puzzle based ones where brains not brawn are the deciding factor, all about saving the women? It seems to me that there is certainly a curious imbalance there. 2) Strawman - parent is not demeaning the "weak and passive" so much as pointing out that a lot of video games present a wide variety of male types, but only the weak and passive female type. This is strange. The women I know seem to fall on a scale ranging from weak and passive to "alpha as fuck", just like the men. 3) Goalpost moving, true scotsman, and strawman rolled up into one: There is no argument here about orienting the games toward a gender, only the portrayal of genders within the games. If you think they are the same, then there is perhaps something else going on as well... basically there is some sort of assumption that games oriented towards boys should only portray men strongly. Which is weird, because how the hell would it appeal less to boys if some of the characters were strong women? 4) Actually a good point. Unfortunately mixed up in some sort of strawman - you are angry that people would like to see strong female characters in action games, so you are accusing the parent of only wanting action gams for kids - which is not evident in that post - and therefore hurting the chance for girls (who apparently can't like action games) to get good games for them. (I'm guessing that your conservative basis in reality suggests that means they need games about vacuuming, cooking and ponies).

belorn 14y ago
(going to continue the above structured 4 bullet points) 1) Stories are today more homogeneous then ever before. People used to joke that you could set your clock to a james bond movies, and know what plot, what characters and what events will unfold. Then other movies copied it, and they too could be set to that same clock. Asking for originality is what we consumers should do but it is not what sends money to the bank if you are a producer. I would not know how we even could began fixing this. 2) video games do not present a wide variety of male types. Since when did you see a undecisive, meek, emotional erratic male protagonist? How often is he a gear of wars massive hulk made of 99% muscles, with so low base sounding voice that he likely has a serious sickness in the throat? How often doesnt he act like an emotionalless robot, creating a flood of corpses and steals anything that's not nailed down? 3) while I am not a game developer, I doubt that having strong women would lower the numbers of sales to boys. I don't see anyone arguing this. I do however think that the industry is lazy, and is not going to change their products if they don't have to. Movie producers and game producers are in this aspect very similar, and focus on what ever sold the most yesterday. In media, only books tend to have reached a level of diversity that we as a society is happy with. 4) I don't think the commenter is angry. That would imply intent in a very few written lines. I also think you are missing the point. Stories are complicated, and good stories require more than simple resprite work or pronounce changes. This goes same for making games that present role models for boys as well as girls.

anon808 14y ago

instead of focusing on groups why not focus on individuals. women as a group maybe have specific characteristics, but when was the last time you had to deal with women as a group? you deal with individuals, so why not focus on individuals? I'm sure i could find a woman that's stronger than you, in that circumstance, it doesn't matter that men as a group are on average stronger than women as a group.