Valkyr1983
Banned
Because most developers are male?
Which is probably true in all tech sector areas of the job market?
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Only 3% of games shown at E3 keynotes featured exclusively female protagonists
- Thread starter Spring Drive
- Start date
Because most developers are male?
Which is probably true in all tech sector areas of the job market?
But how many of these are console/PC gamers?
Can we agree that shooter genre is popular especially last gen? If yes, then that's one reason we're not going to get 50:50 ratio because I personally think it just doesn't really work to have a female lead in a military game when almost all members of military are male like this user pointed out.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=207565725&postcount=62
ldcommando
Banned
e3 is a sausage fest
I'm not sure why you are reacting so strongly, it does make sense.
Anyone can enjoy any game they want, but sometimes you might want to play a specific type of game. There are metric fuckton of games made with male characters for male players. Games with female characters? A lot less so. Games with female characters made with a female audience in mind? Yeah, the list has been narrowed down a lot at this point.
So, if you feel like playing one of those games you're shit out of luck because there isn't much out there. It doesn't mean that you can't enjoy the machoest macho game in existence at the same time. However, at the moment games tend to cater to male players a lot more than to female players.
A Link to the Past
Banned
I guess then it must be asked, how adherent are shooting games to reality?
I see we are coming closer and closer to demands for a quota-based video game world. For the one guy, the Detroit game was "too white" (had anyone said it was "too black, that person would have been banned), the next guy blamed Nintendo for Princess Peach being based too much on the traditional "girl" stereotype, now there are not enough games exclusively featuring female protagonists.
Am I the only person who enjoys games regardless of who the characters are as long as a) the gameplay is fun and b) the characters fit into the story (provided there is a story)? I can see why some people want to have accurate minority representation in games, but forcing developers to build games exactly like these people want is probably rather detrimental to the case. When you are only allowed to have strong, powerful women as leads instead of also having females which are emotional, then it's not really about diversity and getting rid of discrimination. If you stay true to the case, you cannot ask just for having minorities represented in a positive light.
Then there are some who argue that characters are not represented in an accurate way, or that stories involve stereotypes, characters exhibit specific characteristics in unrealistic ways. Well, that's what happens - only few games try to be accurate representations of history or today's time. Most games try to be fictional works. It would be best if people did not take themselves so seriously and be fed up with such exaggerations. Am I angry that Germans are always shown as Nazis, brutal and death bringing? Obviously not. Because I know those are just games, not reality. If people actually believe in these stereotypes in reality, it's more an issue of education.
However, if you don't want to support these titles, vote with your wallets, you don't have to buy those titles. I have recently played (or just started to play) Her Story and 1979 Revolution, which both would not have worked nearly as well with bald white men. You get two pretty good titles, and help foster a more diverse game lineup in the industry. As someone who is not into the shipload of FPS titles, I would definitely be up for that - regardless of what the characters are based on.
That's where I agree that there is a problem. Publishers' demands. I have a hard time believing that people do not buy a game once the protagonist is black or female. If that is indeed an issue, there are far bigger problems to tackle.
Well, once there are female leads in a game, those often do not count because they pander to traditional female stereotypes. One example: Style Boutique - because it focusses on the notion that girls focus on style and fashion, whereas boys don't.
Am I the only person who enjoys games regardless of who the characters are as long as a) the gameplay is fun and b) the characters fit into the story (provided there is a story)? I can see why some people want to have accurate minority representation in games, but forcing developers to build games exactly like these people want is probably rather detrimental to the case. When you are only allowed to have strong, powerful women as leads instead of also having females which are emotional, then it's not really about diversity and getting rid of discrimination. If you stay true to the case, you cannot ask just for having minorities represented in a positive light.
Then there are some who argue that characters are not represented in an accurate way, or that stories involve stereotypes, characters exhibit specific characteristics in unrealistic ways. Well, that's what happens - only few games try to be accurate representations of history or today's time. Most games try to be fictional works. It would be best if people did not take themselves so seriously and be fed up with such exaggerations. Am I angry that Germans are always shown as Nazis, brutal and death bringing? Obviously not. Because I know those are just games, not reality. If people actually believe in these stereotypes in reality, it's more an issue of education.
However, if you don't want to support these titles, vote with your wallets, you don't have to buy those titles. I have recently played (or just started to play) Her Story and 1979 Revolution, which both would not have worked nearly as well with bald white men. You get two pretty good titles, and help foster a more diverse game lineup in the industry. As someone who is not into the shipload of FPS titles, I would definitely be up for that - regardless of what the characters are based on.
That's where I agree that there is a problem. Publishers' demands. I have a hard time believing that people do not buy a game once the protagonist is black or female. If that is indeed an issue, there are far bigger problems to tackle.
Well, once there are female leads in a game, those often do not count because they pander to traditional female stereotypes. One example: Style Boutique - because it focusses on the notion that girls focus on style and fashion, whereas boys don't.
Imperfected
Member
Off the top of my head:
Mafia 3
Watch_Dogs 2
Battlefield 1
Prey
I suppose the jury's sort of out on things like FFXV (is the protagonist sufficiently "Asian" for that to be recognized as his ethnicity, and for that matter, would being Asian make him a minority character when it's a Japanese game to begin with?) and FIFA (how much do you count career story mode in a sports game?).
And, of course, the ongoing discussion over whether having selectable ethnicity options counts in the face of having a chosen ethnic "face" in marketing (Mass Effect 3).
Sure. Games are all about historic/social/scientific accuracy. I don't fully disagree in principle, but it's still a bit of an amusing argument to bring up. That said, we are obviously very, very far away from a 50/50 ratio.
Allonym
There should be more tampons in gaming
My post is about inclusion...? I'm saying I don't expect a woman or minority to be thrown in as a lead just as a token...that's shoehorning. It should be willfully and organically done. You're saying it's rarely done which is acknowledging that it still happens and that's what I don't want. I want women and minorities in games, I have no reason not to, I'm black with a mother, 2 sisters and a girlfriend...why would I want them underrepresented in anything? My point being, it's a problem when people are forced to do something as opposed to it being done voluntarily. I liken this to developers who are forced to churn out the same soulless types of games with no creativity v. that developer actually crafting a game that they want. Developers should be allowed to have their artistic vision shine regardless of if that means the lead character is black, asian, hispanic, male, female, whatever. They already have executives limiting their creativity, who are we to preside over them as well?
truestatic
Member
Many of them do strive for some aspects of authenticity, even if your bullet holes close up after 5 seconds in cover.
Lady Siara
Member
Fair point, something like Mass Effect would have been a better example. A bit better writing all around, a bit more nuanced with regards to gender choice in the story, but still suffering from the reactionary dialogue as opposed to feeling more organic.
That's just something that comes with the territory though. You can't expect something that takes four times the dialogue due to all of the different branching paths (good/evil/male/female) to feel as natural as something that seeks to tell one story from one perspective.
Giving players the choice (of gender or ethnicity) does not necessarily mean that you have to branch out massively. That doesn't work for all games, obviously, not to mention that depending on the game there may be a substantial effort involved that may not be feasible.
Shooters are popular. Real-world, modern day or historical ones aren't the only types though, sci-fi shooters are at least as popular. I think the real-world-military shooter makes up a very small percentage of the total number of PC/console games (albeit a handful of the biggest), certainly small enough that it shouldn't really impact on the male/female lead ratio.
No reason for sci-fi games with teleportation, orbital weapons, powered armour, space marines, mechs and all manner of other fantastical ideas to avoid female combatants, or even ones set in the future in our world. In the same way, fantasy literature and games that use medieval-inspired worlds and equipment often ignore medieval history in terms of the makeup of their units of mercenaries, soldiers, Knights and adventurers too.
Fair enough.
This is exactly why games with a choosable character aren't a replacement for games with a fixed main character. It's why having 49% of games where you can choose your gender doesn't make up for the 3% where you play a female, especially when you take into account that you play a male in 41% of games.
A Link to the Past
Banned
Shiggy, your post was incredibly ignorant and demonstrated either an unwillingness to learn or a need to learn.
1. The difference between pointing out how white Detroit is and how many more black people are present in Dragon Age: Inquisition is that the erasure of black people in media, especially in areas where black people are a majority population, has been a problem for as long as media existed that would feature black people. White people do not have a history of erasure, and statistically speaking, white people are the most overrepresented racial group in video games media.
2. The groups that benefit the most from quotas are white guys. Why do you think Naughty Dog had to fight to have Ellie on the cover? Why do you think Orange is the New Black was adapted into a TV show because the creators couldn't convince Netflix to produce a show that didn't have a white lead?
3. "Vote with your wallet" never means "vote with your wallet." It means "you are criticizing my media, and how damn dare you do such a thing."
4. Did you ever wonder whether that you not caring about gender in games has something to do with never, ever, ever having to find a game that has someone who looks like you? You can't exactly make the argument that in an alternate universe where your gender/racial group is most well-represented you wouldn't care. You can't know this.
1. The difference between pointing out how white Detroit is and how many more black people are present in Dragon Age: Inquisition is that the erasure of black people in media, especially in areas where black people are a majority population, has been a problem for as long as media existed that would feature black people. White people do not have a history of erasure, and statistically speaking, white people are the most overrepresented racial group in video games media.
2. The groups that benefit the most from quotas are white guys. Why do you think Naughty Dog had to fight to have Ellie on the cover? Why do you think Orange is the New Black was adapted into a TV show because the creators couldn't convince Netflix to produce a show that didn't have a white lead?
3. "Vote with your wallet" never means "vote with your wallet." It means "you are criticizing my media, and how damn dare you do such a thing."
4. Did you ever wonder whether that you not caring about gender in games has something to do with never, ever, ever having to find a game that has someone who looks like you? You can't exactly make the argument that in an alternate universe where your gender/racial group is most well-represented you wouldn't care. You can't know this.
truestatic
Member
I still don't think it's a perfect comparison, though. Even when games have a protag of determinate gender, exploring that gender thematically is the exception.
As said, the title is wrong. Too bad they choose to go with that.
Interesting statistics tho. Sad that more of the games that do feature exclusively female protags (and other minorities) didn't show up during conferences. We need to see that they exist and expose them more. I'm happy about half the game letting us choose and that two big sequels switched from marketing the game with male characters to females instead (Dishonored and Mass Effect) even tho it's a choice in the end.
I would love to see more stories about females, but I don't think most of the current studios that make big games centered around males are the right people to make them. They can keep making their God of Wars and Dooms and Call of Duties about "manly men".
Is it odd that I "don't trust them" with making a good game centered around a female character? Or rather, make that female character a good character.
We have games like Life is Strange that as said in the thread, is about specifically a female and it wouldn't be the same with a male protag. We need more of those games by people who can make them.
Interesting statistics tho. Sad that more of the games that do feature exclusively female protags (and other minorities) didn't show up during conferences. We need to see that they exist and expose them more. I'm happy about half the game letting us choose and that two big sequels switched from marketing the game with male characters to females instead (Dishonored and Mass Effect) even tho it's a choice in the end.
I would love to see more stories about females, but I don't think most of the current studios that make big games centered around males are the right people to make them. They can keep making their God of Wars and Dooms and Call of Duties about "manly men".
Is it odd that I "don't trust them" with making a good game centered around a female character? Or rather, make that female character a good character.
We have games like Life is Strange that as said in the thread, is about specifically a female and it wouldn't be the same with a male protag. We need more of those games by people who can make them.
Ruud_Luiten
Member
0% of the games showed handicapt christian man with only one feet and six fingers.
Fucking gameindustry!
Fucking gameindustry!
The 3% figure in the title is manipulating the stats a little to exaggerate the narrative, but yeah still an on going concern for sure.
Although the AAA space this year has been ridiculously more progressive than pretty much any year I can remember, and I think that deserves some recognition - it's hopefully only going to get better, as publishers in general seem to be embracing diversity and realising it has little impact on a game's success, in fact audiences seem to crave it more than anything.
Although the AAA space this year has been ridiculously more progressive than pretty much any year I can remember, and I think that deserves some recognition - it's hopefully only going to get better, as publishers in general seem to be embracing diversity and realising it has little impact on a game's success, in fact audiences seem to crave it more than anything.
A Link to the Past
Banned
Um, please don't do that
bobbie424242
Banned
AAA games are mostly designed by big boys for big boys who like their big guns and big splosions. That's why.
truestatic
Member
Women are as few and far between in the video game audience as handicapped christian men with one foot and six fingers, and so deserve no greater representation
Got it.
These posts. Gono, transgendered or just trans women is a less offensive way to say what you're sayin.
A Link to the Past
Banned
Though ironically transgendered is problematic too as it implies that someone "becomes" trans
Angry Fork
Member
They probably are when it comes to game development though, as there seems to be significantly more men who want to be game devs than women.
A Link to the Past
Banned
Is that based on actual "want", or is it based on the fact that the gated nature of the industry resulted in certain people unwilling or unable to climb it?
The article is discussing a specific thing, a thing that is much more serious than people seem to think
Do they make up half the population of the planet and a huge chunk of people buying games? Can't say I've noticed.
Diversity benefits the games industry. No need to look at it solely as a demand for representation in an industry's creative work, rather than also being criticism that will lead to more interesting stories and protagonists alongside (not instead of) the ones we see time and again. It's criticism that makes sense because people love games, I don't see why the wagons need to be circled around having mainly male leads.
A while ago I wrote a comment that discussed this from the perspective of stories, which I think might be enlightening (as it happens, this was in response to FF talking about Dishonored 2 last year)
I've moved on a little from that train of thought now; devs should still tell the stories they want to tell, but stop telling the same damn stories as everyone else. There's too much of the same-old same-old; I'm usually talking about that in the context of gameplay, but I think it also deserves discussion outside that context, instead looking in the context of plots and storylines.
The problem isn't exactly that we've got so many games with male protagonists. The problem is that we're stuck in a rut of only focussing on storylines from a male perspective, which in turn leads to male protagonists - or indeed, a related problem, of being able to choose a female protag who - in storyline terms - is no different from the male one.
But... there's still the commercial aspect. The whole nature of the modern AAA industry is that the financial risk is so high that the's too much fear to break the mould. It's possible that breaking the mould and exploring new storylines from other perspective could bring huge rewards - but that's a massive extra gamble on top of huge financial risk.
I note that the two games singled out as having female leads both did so with the backing of a console manufacturer (and while it wasn't in a press conference, you can add Gravity Rush 2 to that) - which is where the best hope lies for this, I think, since console manufacturers have more of a vested interest in broadening the audience; the risk on an individual game is less for them, provided said game can in turn sell some systems and introduce more people to that ecosystem.
As an analogy, let's talk Nintendo; not in terms of their appeal to the female audience, but in terms of how third-parties views them; we keep seeing "We'll bring games to Nintendo systems if the audience is there", and the onus is then on Nintendo to demonstrate the existence of that audience, to demonstrate that catering to that audience is worth the financial risk.
I would suggest that I think that this is what is currently going on with the likes of Horizon and Re:Core - whether conscious or otherwise, they are being backed by a console manufacturer and as such are serving to demonstrate the existence of a viable audience for games with female leads and female perspectives.
It shouldn't be this way. But I think that's how the marketplace is right now, and I think that's the right way out of this situation - but it's going to take time and care, and it's going to need the console manufacturers to keep reassuring third parties that that audience is out there, and interested, and looking to purchase games that represent their experience.
(All that said: I'm talking solely the AAA marketplace here. It's no coincidence that the likes of, say, Life Is Strange, a lower-budget lower-risk title, is such a good example of a female-led storyline in a modern game)
(Edit: This also follows on nicely from Allonym's reply to me, which I hadn't seen when I wrote this)
Except the numbers (49+3) are down from last year (46+9), i.e. slightly more games with choice and less games with exclusively female leads, so it would have been a bit misleading. Assuming the numbers are accurate, of course.
I just don't see a problem in overrepresentation. Just because a movie has only a white cast, I don't suddenly think that black people are of lesser value. And just because a game is set in a future Detroit, it does not mean that the population has to represent reality, not even if it was based in today's Detroit. Games are not necessarily an accurate representation of reality. And instead of simply calling me out as "ignorant", you could instead argue why you believe fictional works have to represent reality all of a sudden.
I am sorry but I cannot quite follow. Why would white males benefit from quotas? I personally definitely don't benefit from a character in a game being white, Asian, black, a Nazi or whatever.
Why? You can criticise media for sure. But it is rather cynical to have just a very one-sided discussion where you do not accept also negative representation of minorities or where you just say "a game is too white". If you instead argued how a game becomes better by adding a certain character, or how a game has become worse because of certain characteristic, then it would be a more honest and productive discussion. Just always arguing "because I don't like it" or "because I want to see a character like myself in this game" is an argument, but a really bad one.
Are you serious? The last thing I look at when deciding whether to play a game is the outer appearance or gender of the protagonist. I find that entire notion completely ridiculous and don't really have any words on how to reply to that. I am sorry, but when I state that I am against discrimination of all kinds, your comment just feels like an insult. Perhaps you don't realise this when the games you potentially play are just those with male white leads, games which I mostly ignore because I am not interested in that genre.
Imperfected
Member
It's mostly related to the same systemic problems that lead to low female enrollment in STEM programs, since those are the ones that feed into the vast majority of game industry jobs. (There are far, far fewer positions for "pure" designers and traditional fine arts degrees, comparatively.)
If you factor out the positions that draw from CS degrees the gender distribution in the industry, while far from even, becomes quite a bit less tilted.
Angry Fork
Member
bit of both probably
Especially since two of the big one's (Horizon and ReCore) are already among last year's games - repeat offenders, so to say.
(Last year's high profile games centered about a female protagonist were: ReCore, Mirrors Edge: Catalyst, Horizon: Zero Dawn, Rise of the Tomb Raider - Two of those games got released)
Which makes this year's number look even worse in comparison to last year.
truestatic
Member
Your post assumes that none on the other side of that argument are repeat offenders.
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
if they include games like dishonored they have to exclude games that show only the male counterpart but let you choose and that'd probably skew the numbers to look even worse than they are.
PerfectFlaw
Member
I've seen some posts praising the amount of minority main characters and went through the list that was posted. As a Spanish American I'm not feeling well represented in gaming. Taking a quick look at the U.S. census wiki, Hispanics/Latinos (while still being a minority) make up the second largest demographic. Yet I still feel like an after thought in most games.
What really grinds my gears about the situation is characters like Garcia Hotspur used to represent my race/ethnicity/culture. I, nor most people I know, do not talk with an accent or throw random Spanish words into a conversation. Nor do we do a million other things that you would assume if you've never met a Hispanic in person. It's incredibly insulting.
Funnily enough, I feel like Call of Duty has been doing some of the best work in just random normal dudes being Latin. Who didn't love Ramirez? Haha.
What really grinds my gears about the situation is characters like Garcia Hotspur used to represent my race/ethnicity/culture. I, nor most people I know, do not talk with an accent or throw random Spanish words into a conversation. Nor do we do a million other things that you would assume if you've never met a Hispanic in person. It's incredibly insulting.
Funnily enough, I feel like Call of Duty has been doing some of the best work in just random normal dudes being Latin. Who didn't love Ramirez? Haha.
Though ironically transgendered is problematic too as it implies that someone "becomes" trans
I hate the term myself, and actually think trans-sex/transsexual better represents what people go through. Gender short of implies they abandon a set of social constructions associated with one gender because they prefer the other - when in almost all cases it comes down to dissatisfaction with their biological sex/ feeling trapped inside another body.
Using the "transgender" term to me sort of implies it isn't natural, when in fact gender dysphoria is recognised by the medical scene as a REAL biological disorder.
of course there are. especially since we had some sequels this year (God of War, Dead Rising, to a certain degree) - or games based on existing male characters (Spiderman)
But the newly revealed Days Gone and Gears of War 3 are about men (it didn't have to be Fenix' son, did it? Similarly, GoW is setting up Kratos' son, so even if this is Kratos' passing of the torch, the sequel series will be based around a male protagonist.
Kojma's newly revealed game is about a male Norman Reedus.
seeing as Hollywood and the Triple-AAA Gaming industry is in love with low-risk sequels, we should even more, ask for new franchises to skew the gender balance.
What...
And most of the 24 games mentioned were sequels... Yeah, I don't think it's a huge deal. Realistically, it's not likely that there will ever be time when there aren't more male than female protagonists. FF is quick to blame the industry for it and says that it alienates female gamers, but at the same time if most gamers are male this is how it'll be. At best, it's a Catch 22 unless publishers start requiring devs to to only use female protagonists.
A Link to the Past
Banned
What's really interesting to me is that the extremely, factually racist act of removing black people from stories has remained unchanged today - with the sole exception that we no longer call it racism. Now, it's artistic freedom. These "artists" don't have the dignity to erase black people from their works and then call it what it is, racism.
Are you suggesting that the reason Sony wanted Ellie off of the cover wasn't for the sake of pandering to men, and the reason why Netflix turned down a show with a black lead wasn't for the sake of pandering to whites?
Arguments tend to be one-sided when one side has nothing in the way of solid argument.
...
Yes, I agree, you absolutely don't care. Because you don't HAVE to care. And I really, really hope you reflect upon why you are so adamantly against the idea that people who have to constantly settle for and hope for games that represent people like them do. Because people who don't care about representation and people who complain about those who care are categorically separate.
see my above post. That is an excuse for the low number, but doesn't mean it'll get any better, seeing as the newly unveiled games are almost exclusively based around male characters.
We already have those male-protagonist-centric franchises, like Uncharted, Halo, CoD, God of War - so the only way to get more female protagonists, is to either change the protagonist of established franchises (*cough* Zelda) or introduce new franchises around female characters.
And both ReCore and Horizon were unveiled last year.
and it shouldn't be publishers start requiring devs to only use female protagonists. It should devs feeling encouraged to use female protagonists by us, the audience, and publishers not telling them to rather stick with a generic white dude.
He is the Shockmaster of NeoGAF:
And it looks like his career here has been equally long and successful.
BumblebeeCody
Member
Imagine someone who is a muslim as a lead.
Triggerhappytel
Member
I don't agree. Calling out female or minority protagonists as 'shoehorning' sounds an awful lot like assuming white males should be the default.
"Shoehorned"
You ever wonder why white males are never shoehorned into anything? Because we've been conditioned into believing that, that is the default.
……forgetit
Member
Well an important thing to know when looking at census data in the US is that Hispanic isn't considered a race, it's anyone from a Spanish speaking country and they can literally look like anyone. I see what you're saying about more Latinos in games though, gears used to have Dom, but now he's gone, I'm honestly struggling to think of any Latin Americans in games this year, hopefully the industry will do better eventually.