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Why women criticise sexualised character designs |OT2| I have no pants and I must scream (READ OP)

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Deleted member 19066

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Nemesis162 does draw attention to something that's been bugging me. For all complaints we have about anime games and boy's anime/manga overloaded with tittilation, anime and manga has sizable chunks of it carved out for female authors and audiences. Far more so than video games ever have.

Except for maybe visual novels. If you take a look at the Switch's English VN offerings you've got Steins;Gate, nekopara, and a fuck ton of Otome games.

I think his argument fails in that "otaku" is defined far more narrowly in the west. I haven't seen many women identify as otaku nowadays. Or maybe just on Era? Maybe our perspective is warped here. I try to avoid anime fandom, honestly.
 
Komii

Komii

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Oct 26, 2017
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Sander VF said:
Aren't female Otaku called Fujoshi?
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No, thats for the female 'boys love' genre readers or girls that like gays ships, it lingers a bit on issues similar to men having lesbian fetishes but not necessarily so.

I consider myself as an otaku but my image of otaku was never closed to only the creepy side of the fandom, perhaps weeb fits me better tho. It's similar to how you view the term "gamer" maybe? Some people use it as a diss word but some people legit wanted to turn that into something broader and own it cause otherwise that's how you lose the fight
 
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Xaszatm

Xaszatm

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The issue with trying to use charts to show that Otaku consist of a more diverse template than the stereotype is that it misses the forest for the trees. Of course Otaku is a more diverse group than a stereotype. Gaming is a far more diverse group than the stereotype, yet that is separate to the real issue both have. Both pander disproportionately to one subset audience to the point where even games/anime that aren't exclusively for men will still pander to them
 
Komii

Komii

Member
Oct 26, 2017
12,554
Xaszatm said:
The issue with trying to use charts to show that Otaku consist of a more diverse template than the stereotype is that it misses the forest for the trees. Of course Otaku is a more diverse group than a stereotype. Gaming is a far more diverse group than the stereotype, yet that is separate to the real issue both have. Both pander disproportionately to one subset audience to the point where even games/anime that aren't exclusively for men will still pander to them
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Generalizing them is bad though, i don't like it when i'm put in a box with a bunch of people i hate because people think it's easier or are too mad to bother, i see no problem in trying to come up with better ways to describe that branch of the culture besides it taking some time to think. It's a matter of respect and making the good parts of the group stronger, instead of alienating and erasing them
 
esserius

esserius

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BuddyDharma said:
Nemesis162 does draw attention to something that's been bugging me. For all complaints we have about anime games and boy's anime/manga overloaded with tittilation, anime and manga has sizable chunks of it carved out for female authors and audiences. Far more so than video games ever have.

Except for maybe visual novels. If you take a look at the Switch's English VN offerings you've got Steins;Gate, nekopara, and a fuck ton of Otome games.

I think his argument fails in that "otaku" is defined far more narrowly in the west. I haven't seen many women identify as otaku nowadays. Or maybe just on Era? Maybe our perspective is warped here. I try to avoid anime fandom, honestly.
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Otaku's meaning, at least in Japan, is now generic. To be a fan of anything, whether it's clothes, books, or ice cream, makes you an otaku. "Wotaku" has replaced it as the more extreme form, the kind we'd normally refer to as the basement dwellers, etc.

In a technical sense otaku might be inappropriate as a reference, but in an implied sense (what people on this board mean when they say it), it's entirely correct. Nemesis162 does this pretty much every time, which I'd call sea-lioning mostly due to the fact that while the argument comes from a genuine place (by which I mean Nemesis drinks the Kool Aid proposed about these markets - and probably believes the market is more diverse than it actually is), it's completely misreading the context in which everyone is saying otaku.
 
ItWasMeantToBe19

ItWasMeantToBe19

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Oct 26, 2017
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Primethius said:
Did comic Marvel ever make Captain Marvel interesting?

I like her in the film. But the last thing I remember of her in the comics is Civil War 2...

And that was an awful character. MCU/Comic differences always impress me.
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The issue with big comics is that they randomly make their heroes into authoritarian psychopaths to drum up conflict with other heroes for a crossover event. It's sooooo bad.
 
crienne

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Etrian Oddity said:
That led me to the idea of what makes a good kunoichi (translator's note: kunoichi means female ninja). Any that come to mind? Who are your favorite women ninja in video games that are tastefully done?
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Ibuki (3rd Strike version, before the thigh windows got a little nuts) isn't perfect, but I still really like this design. TBH I still like her SF4 design too, just hate the thigh windows.
sf3rd-ibuki.jpg
 
Morrigan

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Hadok said:
Amicia is a 17 years old girl,and she's the main character in A Plage Tale : Innocence.
And i think her design is great.

You can see her outfit here :
http://cdn.focus-home.com/admin/games/a_plague_tale:_innocence/cosplayguide/Guide_Cosplay_Amicia.pdf

Yeah?
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That looks cool and the game seems interesting too.

Edit: just saw the trailer on Steam, that game looks really good and it's coming out soon too! Wishlisted, thank you for bringing this to my attention. Slight correction, she appears to be 15.
 
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crienne

crienne

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Hadok

Hadok

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Morrigan said:
Edit: just saw the trailer on Steam, that game looks really good and it's coming out soon too! Wishlisted, thank you for bringing this to my attention. Slight correct, she appears to be 15.
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Oh yeah,age was incorrect.(
Yeah it's not a AAA game,but it's one of my most anticipated game of this year.
If you want to see more of the game,the devs and published streamed one hour of the game :
 
esserius

esserius

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7,274
sqwarlock said:
Ibuki (3rd Strike version, before the thigh windows got a little nuts) isn't perfect, but I still really like this design. TBH I still like her SF4 design too, just hate the thigh windows.
sf3rd-ibuki.jpg
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Third Strike was the closest Street Fighter ever got to respectable, as a fighting game and otherwise (which mostly just shows how far off Capcom is).
Pau said:
I really appreciated this comic by Kasia Babis on The Nib and thought this thread might too.
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Yeah, that's accurate. Always the same bullshit.
 
Weltall Zero

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Primethius said:
Did comic Marvel ever make Captain Marvel interesting?

I like her in the film. But the last thing I remember of her in the comics is Civil War 2...

And that was an awful character. MCU/Comic differences always impress me.
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Actually, yes. I never read Marvel Comics but was in a kind of hype after watching Captain Marvel, so I did a bit of research and ended up reading some of the more recent comics. There's five volumes (two collections of two and three volumes respectivel) that are really good, the second collection in particular being my favorite, a fantastic Guardians of the Galaxy-style space opera / galactic romp. That they're actually good is less surprising because they were both written by Kelly DeConnick, a self-described feminist. As a bonus, they're the basis for many of the elements in the Captain Marvel movie (flerkens, two older female mentor characters that were quite obviously composited into Wendy Lawson, one of the volume's "Higher, Further, Faster, More" title being almost verbatim used as the movie's tag line).

I finding it a bit confusing how to refer to them, as each collection is kind-of-unofficially called a volume, but each trade paperback within it is also called a volume, so here's the titles and years of publication to make it easier to look for them:

First collection (Captain Marvel Vol 7)
- Vol 1 - In Pursuit of Flight (2012)
- Vol 2 - Down (2012-2013)

Second collection (Captain Marvel Vol 8)
- Vol 1 - Higher, Further, Faster, More (2014)
- Vol 2 - Stay Fly (2015)
- Vol 3 - Alis Volat Propriis (2015)

Edit: From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_feminist_comic_books
Not being too familiar with Captain Marvel before the DeConnick collections, I was unaware of these other elements originating from her comics as well. I had also forgotten about the name change since it happens in literally the very first issue, but that's yet another feminist element that obviously made to the movie. Really puts into perspective how DeConnick basically made her into the character we see in the movie.
 
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Deleted member 4976

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Oct 25, 2017
13,246
Weltall Zero said:
Actually, yes. I never read Marvel Comics but was in a kind of hype after watching Captain Marvel, so I did a bit of research and ended up reading some of the more recent comics. There's five volumes (two collections of two and three volumes respectivel) that are really good, the second collection in particular being my favorite, a fantastic Guardians of the Galaxy-style space opera / galactic romp. That they're actually good is less surprising because they were both written by Kelly DeConnick, a self-described feminist. As a bonus, they're the basis for many of the elements in the Captain Marvel movie (flerkens, two older female mentor characters that were quite obviously composited into Wendy Lawson, one of the volume's "Higher, Further, Faster, More" title being almost verbatim used as the movie's tag line).

I finding it a bit confusing how to refer to them, as each collection is kind-of-unofficially called a volume, but each trade paperback within it is also called a volume, so here's the titles and years of publication to make it easier to look for them:

First collection (Captain Marvel Vol 7)
- Vol 1 - In Pursuit of Flight (2012)
- Vol 2 - Down (2012-2013)

Second collection (Captain Marvel Vol 8)
- Vol 1 - Higher, Further, Faster, More (2014)
- Vol 2 - Stay Fly (2015)
- Vol 3 - Alis Volat Propriis (2015)

Edit: From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_feminist_comic_books
Not being too familiar with Captain Marvel before the DeConnick collections, I was unaware of these other elements originating from her comics as well. I had also forgotten about the name change since it happens in literally the very first issue, but that's yet another feminist element that obviously made to the movie. Really puts into perspective how DeConnick basically made her into the character we see in the movie.
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Thanks for this. I'm going to check these out!
 
ThatPersonGuy

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I think there's a convo to be had about a lot of the quality elements re: representation in Japanese media, and ngl I'd be lying if I didn't see a ton of widespread generalizations all over this site (using anime as an adjective ought to be outright banned from language). That doesn't erase the existing (and deep running) issues a lot of niche Japanese media has with sexualization, and bringing up one in response to another is "Come On Now" levels of not-the-fucking-point-ism.
 
esserius

esserius

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Oct 26, 2017
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ThatPersonGuy said:
I think there's a convo to be had about a lot of the quality elements re: representation in Japanese media, and ngl I'd be lying if I didn't see a ton of widespread generalizations all over this site (using anime as an adjective ought to be outright banned from language). That doesn't erase the existing (and deep running) issues a lot of niche Japanese media has with sexualization, and bringing up one in response to another is "Come On Now" levels of not-the-fucking-point-ism.
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Except it's not niche Japanese media. Sexism in Japanese culture (video games included) is extremely mainstream. If it was niche there wouldn't be an issue.
 
Redcrayon

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esserius said:
Except it's not niche Japanese media. Sexism in Japanese culture (video games included) is extremely mainstream. If it was niche there wouldn't be an issue.
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Exactly, I mean Nintendo is one of the most beloved companies in one of the biggest media industries on the planet, and has no issue with putting sexualised design combined with gacha elements in Xenoblade and Fire Emblem games. That's not exactly niche when they get advertised on a platform holder's global PR videos.
 
FallenGrace

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Saucycarpdog

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BuddyDharma said:
Nemesis162 does draw attention to something that's been bugging me. For all complaints we have about anime games and boy's anime/manga overloaded with tittilation, anime and manga has sizable chunks of it carved out for female authors and audiences. Far more so than video games ever have.
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You don't see that argument here cause it's a bad argument. It's like refuting complaints of women representation in gaming by pointing to the fact many women play mobile games. Having women engage with the medium doesn't suddenly excuse the sexualization. You're approaching the issue from the the wrong angle.

And, at least for Japanese video games, it is definitely an issue. You got series like Xenoblade, Fire Emblem, and Valkyrie Chronicles embracing the sexualization and fanservice when they didn't use to.
 

Deleted member 19066

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Saucycarpdog said:
You don't see that argument here cause it's a bad argument. It's like refuting complaints of women representation in gaming by pointing to the fact many women play mobile games. Having women engage with the medium doesn't suddenly excuse the sexualization. You're approaching the issue from the the wrong angle.

And, at least for Japanese video games, it is definitely an issue. You got series like Xenoblade, Fire Emblem, and Valkyrie Chronicles embracing the sexualization and fanservice when they didn't use to.
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I wasn't making arguments or excuses. I'm saying there is chunk of a mainstream media form with women authors and audience. Your mobile/AAA demographics comparison doesn't work. Shoujo and josei manga are mainstream and not considered an oddity despite the rampant sexualization and mysogyny in other parts of the industry.
 
Richter1887

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Hadok said:
Amicia is a 15 years old girl,and she's the main character in A Plage Tale : Innocence.
And i think her design is great.

You can see her outfit here :
http://cdn.focus-home.com/admin/games/a_plague_tale:_innocence/cosplayguide/Guide_Cosplay_Amicia.pdf

Yeah?

edit: age corrected.
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Game looked awesome since I saw it months ago. Looks really interesting.

Seems to me western game companies have by large learned to do good female designs, well mostly. I am hoping Japan would do the same thing but I am not expecting much change sadly. From is one of the few who does great character designs (and characters).
 
Pau

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BuddyDharma said:
I wasn't making arguments or excuses. I'm saying there is chunk of a mainstream media form with women authors and audience. Your mobile/AAA demographics comparison doesn't work. Shoujo and josei manga are mainstream and not considered an oddity despite the rampant sexualization and mysogyny in other parts of the industry.
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They are mainstream in Japan but definitely not in the US so most of the stuff we are exposed to is by male authors, for a male audience.
 
sabrina

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Kinanza said:
That reminds me
are there any games that have manly ladies
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It largely depends on what you mean by that. There are definitely some more masculine female characters in some games. Agents of Mayhem has Braddock and Daisy who are each a bit masc in their own way, especially compared to the rest of the cast who are more conventionally feminine.

maxresdefault.jpg

classicdaisy.jpg
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Not a playable character, but Watch_Dogs 2 had Lenni as a prominent figure.
Prime-header3-EMEA_270092.jpg
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So they exist. You just have to look a little harder.
 
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Skittles

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sabrina said:
It largely depends on what you mean by that. There are definitely some more masculine female characters in some games. Agents of Shield has Braddock and Daisy who are each a bit masc in their own way, especially compared to the rest of the cast who are more conventionally feminine.



Not a playable character, but Watch_Dogs 2 had Lenni as a prominent figure.


So they exist. You just have to look a little harder.
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Theres amara in bl3
AgitatedMeagerEasternglasslizard-max-1mb.gif
 
Richter1887

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sabrina said:
It largely depends on what you mean by that. There are definitely some more masculine female characters in some games. Agents of Shield has Braddock and Daisy who are each a bit masc in their own way, especially compared to the rest of the cast who are more conventionally feminine.



Not a playable character, but Watch_Dogs 2 had Lenni as a prominent figure.


So they exist. You just have to look a little harder.
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Far Cry New Dawn has a specialist that is similiar:
Gina_Guerra.JPG

Gina would be going around hip firing an LMG at people similiar to Rambo or Arnold. It looks badass because she would usually be out in the open (as in not taking cover) so it looks just like a scene from Commando or Rambo. I guess you could add her to the "badass moms" list as she has a baby.
 
Xaszatm

Xaszatm

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sabrina said:
It largely depends on what you mean by that. There are definitely some more masculine female characters in some games. Agents of Shield has Braddock and Daisy who are each a bit masc in their own way, especially compared to the rest of the cast who are more conventionally feminine.



Not a playable character, but Watch_Dogs 2 had Lenni as a prominent figure.


So they exist. You just have to look a little harder.
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While Agents of Shield actually is pretty great for women representation, surely you meant Agents of Mayhem here?
 

Deleted member 19066

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Pau said:
They are mainstream in Japan but definitely not in the US so most of the stuff we are exposed to is by male authors, for a male audience.
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Sorry, I was just kinda throwing stuff out there without context. I was just thinking that even if no one can really make a dent in decent female representation in video games (hypothetically speaking - progress is being made) Japanese nerd culture shows there can still be room for female representation in nerd media. Comics are more widely read over there, but they're still considered kinda nerdy as far as I can tell. This strikes me as kinda ironic, since within the Japanese male nerd space, you get a lot poorer female representation, but that doesn't matter in some ways. If you were to compare AAA games to popular manga, it's easy to point out which ones have been treating female characters with more respect. Mortal Kombat, Call of Duty, Assassin's Creed... Heck, I'm playing the Division 2 right and I think notable female characters slightly outnumber male ones.

I saw an article where people ranked what they felt were the most important aspects to them in video games. The results were divided by gender. The top 5 of both groups were the same qualities - gameplay, story, characters, etc. - but the female respondents ranked story and characters as the most important aspects in games. To illustrate this result, (iirc) point and click adventure games have a remarkably even male/female playerbase ratio. This ratio is also reflected in the games themselves. There are loads of female protagonists in point and click adventure games, and no one bats an eye. RPGs, too, like Persona and Final Fantasy always seemed to have more balanced demographics, relatively.

Anyhoo, part of what makes video games different from manga is the gameplay. Pretty much every big budget game, and a majority of mid budget ones, use violent conflict as a means of gameplay/story progression. Even if it's as tame as Galaga, 8-bit spaceships blowing up 8-bit spaceships/aliens is still violent conflict. I think it's legitimately hard for developers to come up with a gameplay loop that doesn't involve the physical domination of an opponent. Women just are not as interested in violent conflict as men (no gender essentialism intended - just looking at marketing trends here.) I'm no connoisseur of shoujo/josei manga, but the subject matter and elements that drive the conflict are often drastically different from shounen/seinen manga. Less violent conflict in favor of interpersonal relations. You have far more romance than battle manga.

My takeaway is this - years of pandering to adolescent boys and young men have made video games a boys club, yes. It's gonna take a while to convince curious girls/women that video games have room for everyone. BUT... I think another reason video games don't attract girls/women is because they don't appeal to them in terms of subject matter. Why are mobile games and not AAA console titles much more popular with older women? Because there's a lot of mobile games out there that don't involve shooting people in the face to win. Representation is important - there's no denying that. But I don't think it's the whole battle. I think once gaming branches out beyond using violent conflict as a core principle of their designs THAT'S when you get broad engagement among girls/women. My fiancee loves tasteful sex appeal and murderous leading ladies... but I don't think her tastes are that mainstream among women. I don't think shoujo/josei manga would be as popular as they are if they were as full of battle manga as shounen - only with female-centric stories. I think games as a whole have to branch out - radically.

Any women in the thread have any thoughts? Feel free to ignore all this as I'm mostly pulling this outta muh butt. I'm kinda drunk tipsy and rambling.
 
Weltall Zero

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BuddyDharma said:
My takeaway is this - years of pandering to adolescent boys and young men have made video games a boys club, yes. It's gonna take a while to convince curious girls/women that video games have room for everyone. BUT... I think another reason video games don't attract girls/women is because they don't appeal to them in terms of subject matter. Why are mobile games and not AAA console titles much more popular with older women? Because there's a lot of mobile games out there that don't involve shooting people in the face to win. Representation is important - there's no denying that. But I don't think it's the whole battle. I think once gaming branches out beyond using violent conflict as a core principle of their designs THAT'S when you get broad engagement among girls/women.
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The problem with this notion is that it's self-reinforcing at best, putting the cart before the horse at worst. Subject matter in videogames is male-appealing because they're mostly male-created, not as a natural property of videogames themselves. Conversely, "gaming branching out beyond violent conflict" isn't a given, it's not gaming's "fate" or "natural, inevitable evolution" or anything as grandiose. Games will branch out if players and creators push for it; it won't happen if we sit on our hands hoping for it to happen. Indeed, up until a few years ago, the trend was the exact opposite; homogeneization of genres towards shooters and such.

Neoxon said:
Is it weird that I was never a huge fan of RE3 Jill's design?
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I personally hate it, but RE3 in general is by far my least favorite classic RE.
 
Dary

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BuddyDharma said:
To illustrate this result, (iirc) point and click adventure games have a remarkably even male/female playerbase ratio. This ratio is also reflected in the games themselves. There are loads of female protagonists in point and click adventure games, and no one bats an eye.
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I think a big problem is that games popular with a female audience simply don't get attention in places like this, or games "journalism" as a whole. Indeed, more often than not, they're mocked and belittled. They're not seen as "real" games.

Just look at how often people underestimate Animal Crossing's popularity.
 
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