Why is the gaming community so damn sexist?

[KentaRawr!]

Help me figure this out, guys.

[Karifean]

Define "the gaming community".

[Mr. Carnelian]

Probably because there are a lot of misogynistic men in it.

[Ayen]

Probably the same reason the rest of the world is sexist.

[FFNut]

Though North American gaming is catching up, most gaming companies are Japanese. Japanese culture is very sexiest and also very subservient towards females. That would be my best guess.

[maybee]

Some men have this attitude that gaming has always been this men's only club and no women can join up. I'm sorry, but video games don't have a men's only sticker on them, they never have, and hopefully never will. Not to mention that Pac- Man was created for women, it was created for women in mind, because girls love food. If guys can enjoy and love love Pac- Man, then girls can enjoy a game about shooting down men with a giant machine gun in a army war base. It doesn't matter if a game was created for a certain gender in mind- men and women have a right to enjoy that game both in equal right. There's no men's only sticker or women's only sticker on video games. Stop acting like there is. If a girl wants to play Metal Gear Solid V then she has that right to do so. If a girl wants to play Sonic Adventure 2- she has a right to do so. If a girl wants to play Animal Crossing New Leaf then she has a right to do so.

/ gets off soapbox.

[Madame Adequate]

Because women won't stop appropriating gamer culture.

[Colonel Angus]

Probably because there are a lot of misogynistic men in it.
I think a lot of those guys are 30+ y.o. virgins who never touched a boob & never will, so they take their anger out on those w/ boobs.

[FFNut]

<<<----- Touched a boob before.

[Randy]

What's your evidence that it is?
I've never seen much worse behaviour than you do in the general population.

There might be some issues caused by the fact that it's a male majority industry though (console and PC gaming at least).
Whenever you have a demographic imbalance, you always get slightly different behaviour than you otherwise would.
But that's not necessarily the same as those people being sexist. As someone who's worked in a female-dominated job for quite a few years, I assure you yet get the exact same kind of attitude in reverse (although it manifests differently between men and women).

A fairly common attitude you always find when one sex is the minority is that people in that minority are much more likely to be defined by that minority status. So you're more likely to hear things like "well you're pretty good....for a girl". If you wanna call that sexism then sure that exists but I see no evidence that it's worse in the games industry than anywhere else. It's also not exclusive to men. Women do that a lot too!

I would also suggest that there's no such thing as "the gaming community". Gaming is a very wide industry now. There really aren't many commonalities that are shared by the whole lot. You realize that when it comes to something like books of movies (you'd probably laugh at the phrase "the movie watching community") yet because you grew up with gaming (I assume) when it was a much smaller and distinct thing, it feels more homogenous. It's really not though. As many people have noticed, the kind of attitudes and culture you find are much more divided by gaming genre than they are by gaming as a whole. Putting the Call of Duty audience in the same category as the Final Fantasy audience is just a mistake.

[Formalhaut]

Because women won't stop appropriating gamer culture.

What do you mean?

[Vyk]

There's lots of journalism about this and lots of movements and way too many anecdotes to try to say it's just this or it's just that. It's not only in game stores it's not only in call of duty or halo matches it bleeds everywhere. One of the things that bugs me the most is how guys in conventions of stores will quiz girls that express an interest in video games or role playing our card battles. Trying to get them to prove they aren't just pretending to like things to get nerdy guys to fawn over them. And I know I've heard stories from members here as well so it's not just in click bait articles or echo chamber reddit threads. I've never personally seen it but I won't deny it likely exists. And it is very sexist and very ingrained in gaming in a lot of places. As for why. I too presume it's embittered virgins lashing out at awesome girls they can't have or some such nonsense

[Psychotic]

I find it fascinating and somewhat relevant we've had posts from three men who are gamers in their thirties eager to make sure, directly or indirectly, that we know they're totally not virgins because virgins are losers.

Is it so surprising that if you define someone's self worth by whether or not they've had sex they start lashing out when they fail to meet those standards? Do you think it is possible to purport to be against sexism and yet judge a person by whether they can "have" a woman or "touch a boob"? Do you not feel those same pressures in the back of your mind when you make sure a Final Fantasy forum full of strangers knows you've had sex?

[Pike]

Because women won't stop appropriating gamer culture.

What do you mean?

He's joking :p

[Formalhaut]

Because women won't stop appropriating gamer culture.

What do you mean?

He's joking :p

Oh, I did kinda think he was being sarcastic, but the lack of a reassuring emoji made me wonder.

Use :p or :spin: or :roll2 more often!

[Crop]

Can't say I know much about it, I just play games and know nothing about the 'community'.

I just can't believe we still live in a world with such petty hate when we're fortunate enough to be the only generation in the entirety of history to have received the ultimate lesson in how to treat your fellow human beings:

"Be excellent to each other" - Bill S. Preston, Esq.

[Sephex]

I've basically ignored the gaming community because of issues like this. I just want to play video games and maybe discuss video games in a positive manner some times. It's sad that even a blah post of mine is making me worry that people with multiple and/or opposing viewpoints will interpret my first sentence in a way that seems to conflict whatever they believe in.

No one ever gets my thinking, but I just think arguing is a complete waste of time. DISCUSSING things is not. Problem is no one is interested in a discussing anymore. Only arguments. Us vs them. My "team" is right. It's sad.

[maybee]

Probably because there are a lot of misogynistic men in it.
I think a lot of those guys are 30+ y.o. virgins who never touched a boob & never will, so they take their anger out on those w/ boobs.

What if you are asexual ? Are asexual's angry people ? i'm a pretty angry person


<<<----- Touched a boob before.

Boobs are pretty squishy, maybe they work those squishy stress balls ? If you touch one, they calm you down and you stop being a sexist video gamer. Boobs are a anti-sexist button.

[Mirage]

They might just be. Help a gamer today, let him touch your boobs.

[Psychotic]

The solution to the objectification of women is the objectification of women? Boy is tumblr's collective face going to be red when they find out!

[sharkythesharkdogg]

Because it is a community that (while changing) is still largely made-up of social introverts, socially awkward people, people with low self-esteem, younger people learning how to socialize or older people who never learned, and sexually frustrated people.

Take a person with a low self-esteem, lots of sexual frustration, poor social skills, and most likely some pent-up resentment, put them in an environment that is largely anonymous, and you're left with a person just waiting for a chance to objectify, and demean someone else.

I don't think informing tumblr that female gamers need to let male gamers motor-boat the girls to help break down the walls of discrimination is going to go over too well. Maybe it's just crazy enough to work, though.

[Old Manus]

I know, man. I just want to play Mary-Kate and Ashley's Crush Course in peace.

[Randy]

No one ever gets my thinking, but I just think arguing is a complete waste of time. DISCUSSING things is not. Problem is no one is interested in a discussing anymore. Only arguments. Us vs them. My "team" is right. It's sad.

I don't see much distinction between a discussion and an argument. You just need to avoid arguing with dogmatic and angry people, something the internet has made infinitely harder to do.

[Sephex]

No one ever gets my thinking, but I just think arguing is a complete waste of time. DISCUSSING things is not. Problem is no one is interested in a discussing anymore. Only arguments. Us vs them. My "team" is right. It's sad.

I don't see much distinction between a discussion and an argument. You just need to avoid arguing with dogmatic and angry people, something the internet has made infinitely harder to do.

That's what I was getting at. In your words, the dogmatic and angry people are always at the forefront.

To give an example of how gaming "discussions" usually go, let's use grass vs astroturf as an analogy. Yep, that's weird, but I don't want to go anywhere near gaming. Okay, so in place of any gaming community issue, let's say the "discussion" is between people who prefer playing sports on grass vs people who prefer playing sports on astroturf.

If you are like me, You believe that varying conditions dictate what is best for sports to be played on. But if you say that, the grass people only hear that you are against them and the astroturf people only hear that you are against them.

It's never good enough for those types of people. It's an all or nothing attitude with those types. It's the same thing with politics and religion. There is no room for dissension if you dare question one aspect of a side towards a "discussion," or even try to find a compromise with the other side of the fence.

It's that attitude I can't stand, and that's why I usually keep to myself when it comes to hot button issues. No one wants to hear that you can play on grass and astroturf.

I have typed sentences probably not ever typed by humanity before, so at least there's that.

[Randy]

The solution to the objectification of women is the objectification of women? Boy is tumblr's collective face going to be red when they find out!

Objectification is a complete nonsense concept. All objectification really means is sexual attraction. It's a term that's been invented to try and make it seem like society imposes sexual standards on women but not on men. Which is complete nonsense. It just imposes very different standards on men, which are a bit less visual. But women are constantly judging men based on a set of sexual standards every bit as much as men are women. We just don't have a word for the version women do. But the reason attraction is completely involuntary for nearly everyone on earth is exactly because it is all "objectification". Your brain reduces someone to a combination of factors and makes a judgement based on them. The sooner we stop pretending that's bad, the less pointless anger there'll be.

[Jinx]

The solution to the objectification of women is the objectification of women? Boy is tumblr's collective face going to be red when they find out!

Objectification is a complete nonsense concept. All objectification really means is sexual attraction. It's a term that's been invented to try and make it seem like society imposes sexual standards on women but not on men. Which is complete nonsense. It just imposes very different standards on men, which are a bit less visual. But women are constantly judging men based on a set of sexual standards every bit as much as men are women. We just don't have a word for the version women do. But the reason attraction is completely involuntary for nearly everyone on earth is exactly because it is all "objectification". Your brain reduces someone to a combination of factors and makes a judgement based on them. The sooner we stop pretending that's bad, the less pointless anger there'll be.

No. None of this is right.

Also, when women objectify men, it's called 'objectification'. It is not a gender-specific word.

[Madame Adequate]

I can't say I disagree with what Randy says, everyone I encounter is basically there for my own utility.

[Freya]

The ONLINE gaming community is sexist. (Well I mean the Japanese developers totally are too haha. Such as making lightning's boobs bigger in LR just cause they wanted them bigger, Or making Quiet have a plot point to wear skimpy clothes because that makes it better lol, but that's a whole other topic entirely.)

Not like online gaming but the communities online. Places where you can find a similar opinion and then it becomes reinforced via echo chamber. It's what happens on Reddit. It's what happens on Tumblr. It's what happens on twitter. Etc etc.

It happens with political ideologies (never look into yahoo comments, good god.) or music opinions, video games, whatever. This isn't the representation of the whole group, but just what is dominating online discussions. Occasionally you'll run into it in the real world but that is just one person versus however many you've met.

[The Summoner of Leviathan]

Before I go into the question at large, I just want to say a few things.

Introvert does not mean social anxiety or socially awkward. Introverts are pretty much people who get drained from social interaction thus prefer social interaction from a smaller, well known group, with an in-depth conversation. They are internally stimulated too which is probably why they do not like small idle chit-chat and rather more deep conversation. Moreover, studies show that online interactions aren't the same (i.e. as taxing) as face-to-face interactions for introverts. Basically, the internet is a leveling playing field between introverts and extroverts.

tl;dr Shyness or social anxiety is not synonymous with introversion. There are many shy introverts, but not all introverts are shy plus there is such thing as a shy extrovert. This is also forgetting the fact that plenty of people are also ambiverts (like me).


Objectification is a complete nonsense concept. All objectification really means is sexual attraction. It's a term that's been invented to try and make it seem like society imposes sexual standards on women but not on men. Which is complete nonsense. It just imposes very different standards on men, which are a bit less visual. But women are constantly judging men based on a set of sexual standards every bit as much as men are women. We just don't have a word for the version women do. But the reason attraction is completely involuntary for nearly everyone on earth is exactly because it is all "objectification". Your brain reduces someone to a combination of factors and makes a judgement based on them. The sooner we stop pretending that's bad, the less pointless anger there'll be.

Like Jinx said, you are absolutely wrong. You are mixing the idea of perceptual categorization with objectification. Also, you are assuming that all objectification is sexual in nature.

Objectification means to reduce a person with agency into an object that has no agency and that can be owned. In a sense it is the opposite of what we do when we treat our pets like they have human behaviours (anthropomorphization). Historically women have been objectified in Western societies. The whole history of marriage until the modern era is the perfect example of it. Objectification means to take away agency and subjectivity from an individual (think grammatical objects here) and have them dependent on another (the subject/agent) for any decision making. It often means the reduction of the individual into a core concept or ideal in their relationship to the subject as well.

In other words, it is what Mister Adequate said. People become merely objects to the utility of the subject.

As for why the community is sexists?

First, it comes from the technological industry which like many STEM industries have historically been viewed as "male territory" and are only now seeing larger numbers of women in the industry. There is also convenient historical amnesia regarding the fact that women have played large and important roles in said industries.

Second, our generation was socialized in such a way that males were more encouraged to play video games than females. I get the feeling this is changing as our generation are now becoming parents.

Third, video games are usually marketed either in a gender-specific way to young women (think of the explicitly "girly" games) or in a "gender-neutral" way to males (default gender is often assumed male).

Fourth, the two regions known for video game productions (NA/EU and Japan) still struggle in their own ways with sexism in their societies. While gender equality has much work to be done in Japan, let's not pretend that North Atlantic society is a gender equality utopia either.

Fifth, it is the internet where often the loudest, most obnoxious voice gets the attention. It is the home of click-baiting. The more sensational something is, the more clicks it gets. More clicks, more money. :/

These are not in any particular order of importance. x-x;

[sharkythesharkdogg]

The ONLINE gaming community is sexist. (Well I mean the Japanese developers totally are too haha. Such as making lightning's boobs bigger in LR just cause they wanted them bigger, Or making Quiet have a plot point to wear skimpy clothes because that makes it better lol, but that's a whole other topic entirely.)


Quiet's design followed by this claim:


"I created her character as an antithesis to the women characters appeared in the past fighting game who are excessively exposed. 'Quiet' who doesn't have a word will be teased in the story as well. But once you recognise the secret reason for her exposure, you will feel ashamed of your words & deeds. The response of 'Quiet' disclosure few days ago incited by the net is exactly what MGSV itself is."

Made me do this.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJpXI37JYEI

[Psychotic]

The Quiet thing is ridiculous. The reason she dresses like that is she breathes through her skin, and if her skin is covered (eg if she is in water) she can't breathe. This is, of course, why a bikini topped off with ripped fishnets are the most appropriate outfit. Oh, and even though it shouldn't be if we take the game's word for it, it's entirely possible to buy her a smurfing normal uniform.

I feel ashamed of someone's words and deeds Kojima, but they ain't mine. With that said, putting aside that stupid contrived bulltrout Quiet is a really great, likeable and strong female character and I think it's a damn shame that the (entirely justified) controversy surrounding her attire has overshadowed that.

[Fynn]

I think that figurine of her - the one with the squishy boobs and butt - is quite indicative of what exactly the intentions behind her design were. If making her breathe through her skin is the reason - cool, but you still came up with an excuse to objectify and exploit your female character.

[Ayen]

The Quiet thing is ridiculous. The reason she dresses like that is she breathes through her skin, and if her skin is covered (eg if she is in water) she can't breathe.

Like how she was in the rain that one time and nothing bad happened to her?

They can't even keep their own contrived bulltrout straight. So smurf off, Kojima!

[Sephex]

The Quiet thing is ridiculous. The reason she dresses like that is she breathes through her skin, and if her skin is covered (eg if she is in water) she can't breathe.

Like how she was in the rain that one time and nothing bad happened to her?

They can't even keep their own contrived bulltrout straight. So smurf off, Kojima!

To be fair, when Ocelot is explaining her to you before you can take her on the field with you for the first time that when she showers that is her way of drinking water. She just can't be fully submerged in water for too long like how we can't hold our breath indefinitely underwater.

I agree with people who say that it is obviously a pretty flimsy reason why Quiet is so scantily clad, but as a person who has been constantly been playing the game since day one you sort of get used to it. I think of her more WAY as a character and a valuable asset rather than eye candy. I mean, she's a total bad ass. She basically saved my ass during a boss fight, and if I get caught and decide just to deal with the guards going nuts, she basically takes out people left and right while I easily get away or fight back.

[Freya]

Oh the issue isn't her entire character isn't useful but we didn't need a scene of her stretching in seductive poses cause... okay. I haven't even purchased the game but that was the first thing I saw all over reddit the week of it's release. And not in a ranting way but in a "omg this is hot" way. That's all I knew about that game for a while thanks to fans.

ANYWAY the point wasn't about that game haha, just that some developers encourage that attitude. I'm one of those pro sexiness of everyone kinda people. The difference is while I did get a naked Raiden doing cartwheels, that scene was done for comedic effect while Quiet's whole design, background plot reason for clothing choices, and random stretching animations... are done to be sexually appealing. If you want to make things super mega foxy hot, can we equally oppurtunity the mega foxy hot ness?

Like Square Enix! You give me Yuna in hot pants and (Have an actual quote "Yes, her chest jiggles," explained Nobuhiro Goto. "Since everyone can decide what costume she’ll wear, you can make sure it does (laughs). By the way, since Lightning swings her arm when you change her weapon in the menu screen, that’s a recommended action for sure-fire jiggling! To see it even better it could be useful to equip a small shield. Look forward to it!") but when people throw a fit about the Final Fantasy Mevius guy being too "scantly clad" because male gamers were uncomfortable, you cave in? Like goodness, side body was nothing compared to what you've shown for the ladies.

http://images.eurogamer.net/2015/usgamer/Mobius-FF-Shot-03.jpg

If it's only one sided and we only see results of women being seen this way, men aren't allowed to be shown this way or not encouraged to be shown this way, is it no wonder that groups of fans tend to lean more toward being more sexist against one gender?

I'm an equal oppurtunity mega foxy hotter, if we get bouncing boobs on ladies, let me have side cut outs on a guy, Square Enix! (and other developers)

[Ayen]

I've seen several fans of the game claim her 'poses' break immersion because it's contrast pretty much everything else about the world, and I can certainly see why. You have Big Boss looking like he just crawled out of hell one second, and then Quiet acting like a model in the next. Doesn't work.

[Mirage]

Ahem, freya. Not all of us were uncomfortable :p


I've seen several fans of the game claim her 'poses' break immersion because it's contrast pretty much everything else about the world, and I can certainly see why. You have Big Boss looking like he just crawled out of hell one second, and then Quiet acting like a model in the next. Doesn't work.
This just looked dumb tbh. Not that I even use her. D-dog all the way.

[Sephex]

Absolutely agree with you on Quiet's poses and whatnot. Though I won't lie. To me, they are so over the top that I ended up laughing my ass off the first time I saw it. Don't get me wrong, I totally understand how people are uncomfortable with that.

[Psychotic]

I've seen several fans of the game claim her 'poses' break immersion because it's contrast pretty much everything else about the world, and I can certainly see why. You have Big Boss looking like he just crawled out of hell one second, and then Quiet acting like a model in the next. Doesn't work.Nah, that's the one way in which it does work. Metal Gear Solid has always had that campy, over-the-top GRUFF MANLY MAN and SULTRY TEMPTRESS feel to it. It depends largely if you take it seriously but then I don't know why anyone would be a big fan of the series if they did take it seriously.

There's more equality in Metal Gear Solid than people are giving it credit for. Snake has always had a penchant for popping his shirt off and revealing his honed and toned physique - an idealised version of men that your average Joe isn't going to be able to live up to. Indeed ever since they added camoflauge you've had the option to undress him and go around shirtless.

Freya is right in noting that Raiden's nudity was for humour, and there's other examples of male nudity in MGS such as Johnny in MGS1 or stripping the Marines in the Tanker hold in 2 to their underwear. Is the idea that men's naked bodies are something to laugh at not damaging? Whether it's for humour or sexuality, it's still objectification.

Like I say though, it just depends how seriously you take your Metal Gear Solid.

[NeoCracker]

That Mevius thing reeks of a troll operation. Men in revealing clothes aren't exactly a new thing in Final Fantasy, just look at Vaan from FF XII. Yet Mevius is literally the only time I've seen something like this happen in regards to a male character.

I also want to throw in if you are looking at Japanese games, you need to look at their culture, specifically what is considered sexy over there. Look at the time games like FF VIII came out, men like Gakct were considered the sexiest men in the country. What women were finding attractive wasn't revealing clothing or things like that, it was the leather looks, effeminate features, and things like that. Squalls design was made tailored to a lot of things that the culture considered to be sexy for women.

Now, it's definitely true there is more appealing to males physical preferences then females, but that's because there are still more men playing these games then women. (Yes, I know about the study that gamers are a majority women, but this takes into account anyone who casually plays face book games. If you are looking at the types of games these arguments are over, it's still mostly male.) It's no surprise that's who these games try harder to appeal to. Same reason you see romance novels almost exclusively market towards women, since they are the ones who read those.

That said, I do think it would be great for more games to offer up some fun fan service for the ladies to enjoy and just go the Swim Route. (For those who dont' know, an animation studio whose name escapes me makes short fan servicy animations to show off new tech, usually of women. One day they said smurf it and instead showed off a bunch of mostly naked men getting wet, and were met with a huge outcry of their female audience to make this a real thing. So Swim was created purely out of fan desire to see half naked boys getting wet, and I think that's great :p) We are starting to see this more with some alternate outfits for fighting game characters, and that's fantastic.

As far as Quite, I know of no one who has played that game that thinks any less of her as a character for how she dresses outside of people who complain about how making women sexy some how lessens them as a character (While I agree with many things he says, see Jim Sterling as an example for saying that). I definately think Kojima was being overly dramatic in regards to him saying everyone bitching about Quite would feel super dumb once they learned why she dressed the way she did, and likely sex appeal was a big part of the decision, but does it really matter if that was the sole reason for her being dressed that way? We still got a character a lot of people really love, and isn't that whats important, having well written characters?

What I really dont' understand here is who is really objectifying these characters? Clearly there was a lot put in to her back story and personality, so the creators aren't just treating her as an object, they are treating her as a character. A large number of fans love her character, and think she's a bad ass, so they aren't the ones objectifying her.

Is it the people who just talk about how hot she is? I mean I've commented about how hot a game character is before, but just because that's the only thing I say sometimes doesn't mean I don't see them as a character, and I don't understand why anyone would make that assumption. I mean have you seen some women talk about some of the Doctors? Hell, some comments on this forum were entirely about how sexy they thought that doctor was and nothing else. Are you assuming they are just objectifying the doctors? Cause I certainly don't, just some women commenting on a dude they find sexy.

The only people I often see who could be argued are actually objectifying anyone are people who don't care at all about the story or characters, but they just treat everything as either something pretty to look at or shoot, so it's not like they are just objectifying women in this case.

I'm honestly not sure at this point what someone even means when they say it's objectifying at this point.

I'll stop her and not go on to the gaming community bit, because I've rambled enough. :p

[Fynn]

The thing about the Möbius dude were also the extremely submissive poses, which have also been sadly toned down.

[Psychotic]

I also want to throw in if you are looking at Japanese games, you need to look at their cultureI don't agree with that. The onus should be on the creator to be sensitive to the audience's cultural values if they intend to release a product in that specific country, not the other way around. If the game stays in Japan, yes, fine. However, if a Japanese developer wants to release their product in the west then they should be sensitive to western views and attitudes.

If they don't want to change or adapt to that, perhaps not wanting to compromise in their creative vision or wanting to provide an authentic cultural experience then they absolutely have the right to do so. They cannot then expect the audience to bend over backwards to accept clashes of culture and have to be prepared to accept challenges from that audience in relation to characters like Cindy and Quiet.

[Shauna]

That said, I do think it would be great for more games to offer up some fun fan service for the ladies to enjoy and just go the Swim Route. (For those who dont' know, an animation studio whose name escapes me makes short fan servicy animations to show off new tech, usually of women. One day they said smurf it and instead showed off a bunch of mostly naked men getting wet, and were met with a huge outcry of their female audience to make this a real thing. So Swim was created purely out of fan desire to see half naked boys getting wet

Just in case anyone is interested, the anime he's talking about here is called Free! and it's done by KyoAni. It's alright.

[DMKA]

It isn't. It's just filled with this crowd of newcomer knee-jerk social justice feminist retards (who are, ironically, the most sexist people on the planet) who call everything sexist.

[Slothy]

It isn't. It's just filled with this crowd of newcomer knee-jerk social justice feminist retards (who are, ironically, the most sexist people on the planet) who call everything sexist.

What the fuckity fuck...

[Freya]

As jinx said

No. None of this is right. lol

[Sephex]

But depending on circumstances, a sport can be played on grass or astroturf.

[The Summoner of Leviathan]

I feel like some people here don't get the difference between a character having sex appeal and being objectified (sexually or not). A character can be hot and still be a rounded character. The problem is when a character is solely reduced to that. A sexy male protagonist who is given full agency via a via being the main character/player character isn't the same as a scantly clad female character who always needs to be rescued by a male and has little to no development. The problem isn't people being sexy. Heck, being sexy or sexual doesn't mean they are being objectified, at least not completely. It is how the character is treated in the narrative and the amount of agency and independence they are given.

Also, the OP question is broad enough that it includes not only how women are represented in the medium but also treated in the community. There's studies that demonstrate how even when playing at the same ability and reading from scripted responses female voices will face more hate than males. Or let's not forget how many threats women more than men too. Or the fact that many female gamers have to often prove themselves as it were.

The community itself is highly divisive. I mean look at the whole elite vs casual tension (just look at some previous posts). There are those who seek to one up every or be somehow better. Whether you like it or not casual Facebook games are video games. I mean you can not like them but doesn't change that. I mean Tetris is a video game and let's face it Candy Crush is not that different from it.

If you want to get all subjective about this I think CoD and its clones as well as Sports genre are about on par with so called "casual games" because really they are just cash cows for the companies. Just one happens to be a lot prettier / better graphics. They're still video games but I don't really get them (co-op COD is fun with friends but only reason I ever tried any of them). But what I look for in a game is different than those who obviously enjoy those games.

[NeoCracker]

I also want to throw in if you are looking at Japanese games, you need to look at their cultureI don't agree with that. The onus should be on the creator to be sensitive to the audience's cultural values if they intend to release a product in that specific country, not the other way around. If the game stays in Japan, yes, fine. However, if a Japanese developer wants to release their product in the west then they should be sensitive to western views and attitudes.

If they don't want to change or adapt to that, perhaps not wanting to compromise in their creative vision or wanting to provide an authentic cultural experience then they absolutely have the right to do so. They cannot then expect the audience to bend over backwards to accept clashes of culture and have to be prepared to accept challenges from that audience in relation to characters like Cindy and Quiet.

The Idea I was getting at there was different cultures may have different preferences in some cases. Squall I used as an example because he was designed in a way to appeal to females, just like the women are designed to appeal to men.

Stateside the more effeminate men aren't as oggled as they are in Japan. So when looking at how often characters are designed to appeal to men as compared to women, you have to take that into account when talking about games from that culture.

And right, Free! was the anime. :p

[The Summoner of Leviathan]

You're mistaking a tree for the forest. Sexism in video games is not about just the sex appeal of the characters. Squall isn't an example of sexism because he is modelled after the Japanese appeal to male androgyny. He is the protagonist of the game. He is given full agency and character growth. Also, I would wager that his looks have less to do with attracting females and more to do with the target audience, male, more reliably identifying with him since as the player you are him. Essentially he was a late 90s idealized Japanese teenager. What Japanese boy wouldn't want to be him?

I am not saying it doesn't go both ways. Merely that it has happened more to women and they have faced much more violence and discrimination within the community. However, dismantling sexist attitudes towards women both in the community and medium will help also to dismantle the problematic portrayals of men.

[Madame Adequate]

But depending on circumstances, a sport can be played on grass or astroturf.

What about astroconcrete?

[Pike]

I'm really fortunate to have had a 99.9% positive experience with the gaming community in general, and I say this as someone who had a really popular gaming website at one point (not trying to say this to brag, just trying to point out that I have a lot of experience with the community.) Thousands and thousands of comments on my site, including anonymous ones, and I can think of exactly one that was negative.

That said I definitely personally know women who have had horrific experiences and it makes me sad; I want everyone's experience to be positive. I just want everyone to be happy playing games and talking about them with other happy people

[NeoCracker]

You're mistaking a tree for the forest. Sexism in video games is not about just the sex appeal of the characters. Squall isn't an example of sexism because he is modelled after the Japanese appeal to male androgyny. He is the protagonist of the game. He is given full agency and character growth. Also, I would wager that his looks have less to do with attracting females and more to do with the target audience, male, more reliably identifying with him since as the player you are him. Essentially he was a late 90s idealized Japanese teenager. What Japanese boy wouldn't want to be him?

I am not saying it doesn't go both ways. Merely that it has happened more to women and they have faced much more violence and discrimination within the community. However, dismantling sexist attitudes towards women both in the community and medium will help also to dismantle the problematic portrayals of men.

I never said he is an example of sexism, I"m saying he's an example of throwing in things for the sake of fan service, a thing that happens commonly for both Genders. When looking at it through the lens of an American, however, you'd miss out on that entirely. That's why it's important to look at the culture.

To expand, you'll see a lot more of the effeminate men in RPG's then other genres of video games. There's another thing to notice about RPG's then other genre's of Video games, and that is they have a higher ratio of Female gamers then other genres. If these male characters were to be made more effeminate just to appeal to the Japanese boys, would that higher rate of effeminate men be more present in more genres? It seems fairly clear it's thrown in as a bit of Fan Service for women.

To respond to your previous post, "A sexy male protagonist who is given full agency via a via being the main character/player character isn't the same as a scantly clad female character who always needs to be rescued by a male and has little to no development."

Outside of games with little to no focus on the story (The Original Legend of Zelda, most non-RPG mario games), I honestly don't know many games I could even apply this too. Final Fantasy IV onward about the only character I can think it could be applied to is Rosa from IV who doesn't get much development. Breath of Fire Series (having played all but IV) I can't think of a female this applies too, No way can you apply this to Zelda from either Ocarina of Time or Twilight Princess,
Bayonetta doesn't even come close to this either. I can find way more examples of this not happening to women then I can find of it actually being the case.

[Fox]

It isn't. It's just filled with this crowd of newcomer knee-jerk social justice feminist retards (who are, ironically, the most sexist people on the planet) who call everything sexist.

I recall a time not too long ago at a game studio I was working at. We had a character customisation thing in there where you could pick a face to play with. There were about 20 options to choose from. I said "Hey, we only have male faces. We should include some women". The response I was given (from multiple people in the studio) was twofold:

1) "Women are too expensive to add".
2) "We have more important things to be worried about".

The point I'm making - just to make it abundantly clear - is that sexism is not only a problem within the community, but institutionalised in the industry itself. So the representation of women ends up being poor. So few efforts are made to attract more women to buy various games. Which creates a heavily lopsided male-heavy audience.

[Ayen]

That's almost as bad as the 'female models complications' excuse Ubisoft gave a few years back.

[Fox]

That's almost as bad as the 'female models complications' excuse Ubisoft gave a few years back.

Oh it's as bad, definitely. Just much less public!

[The Summoner of Leviathan]

You're mistaking a tree for the forest. Sexism in video games is not about just the sex appeal of the characters. Squall isn't an example of sexism because he is modelled after the Japanese appeal to male androgyny. He is the protagonist of the game. He is given full agency and character growth. Also, I would wager that his looks have less to do with attracting females and more to do with the target audience, male, more reliably identifying with him since as the player you are him. Essentially he was a late 90s idealized Japanese teenager. What Japanese boy wouldn't want to be him?

I am not saying it doesn't go both ways. Merely that it has happened more to women and they have faced much more violence and discrimination within the community. However, dismantling sexist attitudes towards women both in the community and medium will help also to dismantle the problematic portrayals of men.

I never said he is an example of sexism, I"m saying he's an example of throwing in things for the sake of fan service, a thing that happens commonly for both Genders. When looking at it through the lens of an American, however, you'd miss out on that entirely. That's why it's important to look at the culture.

To expand, you'll see a lot more of the effeminate men in RPG's then other genres of video games. There's another thing to notice about RPG's then other genre's of Video games, and that is they have a higher ratio of Female gamers then other genres. If these male characters were to be made more effeminate just to appeal to the Japanese boys, would that higher rate of effeminate men be more present in more genres? It seems fairly clear it's thrown in as a bit of Fan Service for women.

It wasn't said directly but it was addressing the issue of representation of women's bodies in video games which is highly problematic. You cannot claim that a naked male torso is the same as a naked and almost naked woman's. How both are received in both Western and Japanese audiences are vastly different. Culturally how we view a topless man is significantly different how we view a topless woman. Even if both are sexualized they are in very different ways (one is often deemed more obscene than the other). I am not discrediting different cultural values of beauty. I am arguing that how characters, regardless of beauty standards, but on basis of gender are treated in the medium.

As an aside, even though Japanese standards of beauty and fashion obviously do vary from our Western sensibilities there is a strong historical tie between Japan and America in the post-WWII on a cultural and aesthetic level too (e.g. Disney and anime, impressionist movement, Japanese films in the 50s during the USA occupation).

Also, you are misleading the statistics you are referring to. You are primarily talking about fanservice in jRPGs and how it is applied to both genders (and both audiences) but are quoting a 2014 statistic that refers to the WHOLE RPG genre. It is also important to note that most major Western RPG publishers offer games where you can choose the sex of the protagonist (though MMORPGS are still predominated by males). There is an obvious argument that modern RPGs of the last decade have seen a rise of female players not because of fanservice but because there are more options to identify with. Which brings me back to the point about Squall. Squall was highly unlikely to have been a fanservice for female players. Why? Because assuming a historical increasing female playerbase that studies shows has only reached parity in 2010s would indicate that in the 90s there was a significantly higher male playerbase than female. Squall being a "fan service" to the female playerbase seems more of a secondary result of creating a protagonist that the target playerbase could identify/aspire to.

There's also the fact that you are assuming bishounen characters are there for fanservice when in fact it could be functionally identical to the generic white, 20s, buff male protagonist of most Western games. It could be just a cultural difference of the idealized male. Aesthetically different yet functionally the same. Not meant to draw women as much as make men identify with something relatable or idealized about their gender. I mean the biggest complaint companies say about female protagonist is that their usual consumer base won't be able to identify with it or "too expensive" to do.



To respond to your previous post, "A sexy male protagonist who is given full agency via a via being the main character/player character isn't the same as a scantly clad female character who always needs to be rescued by a male and has little to no development."

Outside of games with little to no focus on the story (The Original Legend of Zelda, most non-RPG mario games), I honestly don't know many games I could even apply this too. Final Fantasy IV onward about the only character I can think it could be applied to is Rosa from IV who doesn't get much development. Breath of Fire Series (having played all but IV) I can't think of a female this applies too, No way can you apply this to Zelda from either Ocarina of Time or Twilight Princess,
Bayonetta doesn't even come close to this either. I can find way more examples of this not happening to women then I can find of it actually being the case.

I dunno if you miss my point or we are misunderstanding each other, but my point is by the mere fact that the player character is most often male they are given more agency than most females present in the story. Moreover, there are a significantly larger amount of games with male protagonist than there are of female protagonists. I mean the whole of NES generation Zelda and Mario games are a perfect example of that (even most of their modern incarnations too). I have been playing Witcher 3 and you meet Triss Merigold who is a badass sorceress who needs no man to help here yet if you skip her side quests and continue onto the next act, she dies. It is a very contrive way of getting the player to follow certain secondary plot points, especially when it breaks with the character's personality. As for sexism in FF, Raistlin wrote a series a while back that discusses the very issue and basically argues that we only see strong female leads in FFXII and FXIII, though even in FFXII it slightly gets comrprimised by the fact that Vaan is the "every man" through which the narrative is told.

[NeoCracker]

These things don't just happen over night. Look as far back as Ms. Pac-man, which was made specifically because of how many female gamers had enjoyed Pac-man, so Ms. pac-man was done as a result of that. Things have commonly been done in response to the rise of female gamers. As far as RPGs...

http://www.rpg.net/columns/advanced-designers-and-dragons/advanced-designers-and-dragons4.phtml

It is in fact about Tabletop RPG's, but it's a style that seems to attract females more then other genres, and it's been something those in the industry have been knowing for years now, it's not something new learned just from that recent study. And your comment still doesn't answer why this is more common in RPG's then other genre's from Japan. If the Idea was just to appeal to males, you'd expect it to be more consistent with other genres, but it's not. I'm not saying it was only there to appeal to women, but I don't think it was something that was entirely unrelated. (Hell, look back to 2009, a full five years before that study came out we saw Gust begin the Atelier Arland Series, which started a long string of Female led Protagonists and is still going on. It's something they have been aware of for quite a while now.)


When you say 'one is more obscene the the other', there is an interesting topic on whether or not a bare womens chest should be seen as different then a bare males chest, but pretty much most modern cultures think an exposed womens chest is obscene, but they are never exposed for the fan service in just about any game. (There are some exceptions with Titles like God of War). As far as I can tell, the genitals them selves are seen as pretty much just as obscene as the other sex. And you can't really blame devs for not just floundering around bare breast like chests, age ratings can make games a pain in the ass to sell, so they are going to keep it within the target audiences rating range. If you feel exposed breasts should be seen the same way as an exposed chest, I don't think talking games is a way that will accomplish that. :p

And different things are sexualized differently because different genders don't always find the same things attractive. Men for example aren't as often attracted to your giant muscle bound body girls. However, women do seem attracted to more muscly men. (Hell, just look at Twilight. That second movie was mostly shirtless men wrestling about. No way was that there for the purpose of men, it was Twilight. :p)


And you are right about publishers not thinking someone can Identify playing as another gender. Those publishers are wrong and dumb. From my understanding the majority of the gaming community I talk too, and even a lot of devs, also think this is dumb. There is a very small number of people who seem to think otherwise, and those people tend to be publishers who quite often aren't part of the gaming community (Many top guys in the big publishing companies were never gamers, just business men).

And yes, the Protagonist has the most Agency out of any of the game characters. Female Protagonists have JUST as much agency as Male Protagonists. Male NPC's have just as much agency as Female NPC's.

That argument you seem to be making is that there is less representation of women lead rolls then there are male lead roles, and to call that objectification is silly. Lack of Representation and Objectification is not the same thing. As I said above, Males and females when given the same roll (As either NPC or PC) are given the same Agency, so it seems to me they are treated pretty equally when given the same rolls.

That said I would love to see more representation, but the lack of that is NOT objectification. IT's a separate issue entirely.

And I know about Raistlin's series, I argued with him about a few points way back then too. I think he got a lot wrong. :p

Edit: I'd also like to point out Big Fish Games, a Steam LIke service with a much higher portion of Female gamers then other services like it, and while it has a lot of casual games, it's also pretty heavily loaded with RPG's, and it's been around since 2002. Women liking RPG's is a thing that has been known for quite a long while now. :p

[Freya]

I feel you're a little bias about JRPGs :eek: and you missed TSoL's point pretty strongly though.

[NeoCracker]

They are the example I used because you can see that companies have been including things like sex appeal for the women audience for some time, as well as trying to include games for women on services they are aware there are higher concentrations of women. The Idea that so many things pander only to men is absurd, and JRPG's are simply the best example of that.

In addition, if I"m missing the point it may well be because of this.
"I feel like some people here don't get the difference between a character having sex appeal and being objectified (sexually or not). A character can be hot and still be a rounded character. The problem is when a character is solely reduced to that." is how he describes objectification originally. That entire last paragraph, however, has NOTHING to do with what he specified as objectification, and entirely about the amount of representation.

Nothing he brought up as an example of objectification there match his own explanation earlier.

[Crop]

An Academia thread in the Gaming Forum? Now I've seen everything!

[Spuuky]

An Academia thread in the Gaming Forum? Now I've seen everything!*Eyes on Each Other

[Christmas]

We need more pointy boobies Lara Croft, man!