Quote Originally Posted by The Summoner of Leviathan View Post
She has like zero agency and is just a plot device for Mario. Zelda fairs not much better. Few gaming "heroines" are given their own games, or even developed fully as a character. Often they are just charicatures of women, sexualized objects, plot devices, marginalized (i.e. secondary/tertiary characters), or their sex is rendered insignificant/invisible.
This is exceptionally true of Samus Aran who falls into nearly all of those at the same time. Clad behind that Power Suit you have no idea what her gender is until your reward for being a completionist is her essentially soft-stripping. Then in Other M she pretty much got relegated from being this strong, voiceless, independent bounty hunter into a love interest for Adam. The story behind her is really interested but the games pay it such little attention that it's practically non-existent unless you want to read up on it.

It's very easy to say sales figures aren't important - but publishers are looking for a return on interest so sales figures are sadly quite important.