I Hate Playing As A Girl

So recently I was having a chat with a friend of mine- a girl, no less- who insisted on maintaining the idea that a Mass Effect movie should star a female protagonist as Shepard.

The reason behind this? Apparently it'd be less 'standard' and give the film a little bit more pizazz or something. Now, if you forget the fact that Shepard is portrayed in all media surrounding the game as male this would maybe have been a feasible idea. Maybe even a good idea. Maybe what the world is waiting for is a science fiction epic with a strong female lead, because- c'mon girls! It's our time to shine!

Doesn't work out so well, does it?

Strong female characters are a necessity in any narrative. They provide a much-needed relief from the often harsher tones of their male counterparts and are generally far more believable as characters as their roles tend to be more thought out (and less 'stock') than the men populating a story. Take the Uncharted games for example:

The male characters are cardboard cutouts made up of primal emotions and witty banter. The women in the game are not only more emotionally valid as characters but are also far less expendable than the men in terms of longevity. They're flat-out required, not only to bolster a sausage-fest of a character lineup but also to provide a little something that writers like to call perspective. Without the female characters the male characters have very little in the way of motivation, emotional attachment or clear bearing. Add to this the obligatory sexual tension of any Hollywood-esque production and you've got a winner.

The trouble comes when the female characters get too strong and become indistinguishable from the male cast members.

Recent megahit Gears Of War 3 features- for the first time in the franchise's short history- playable female characters. Brilliant. That's great for people whowant to play as women. The real issue is that they never actually act in any way different to their testosterone-chugging barrelman buddies. It's a feminist utopia- Anya and Sam (and for 30 seconds aged crone Bernie) can shoot, chainsaw and brutalise just as well as Marcus, Dom and the rest of the motley crew, but…

I don't buy that these two characters have the same physical capabilities.

Furthermore the female characters in Gears 3 fail to provide any kind of narrative balance, which before now they always have done. The character writing in the first two titles was incredible as every character had a clear motivation and a distinctive personality and the female characters had realistic motivations.

Now they seem thrown in- token playables to appease a demographic which until now had apparently not cared about their inclusion.

This situation is quite different to the emergence of Lara Croft in the 90s- back in those days the use of a female protagonist was just as sexist as having them as a prize to be won, if not more. It was all about polygonal cleavage and throwing as many sexual references in as you could (without the irony or self-awareness of modern titles such as Bayonetta) to please a legion of horny young men who didn't yet have the internet to fulfill their fantasies. Creating a character which is so feminine that she becomes a stereotype is abhorrent, but is creating a female character without any clear reasoning for doing so any better?

EA Sports- the fine people behind ingeniously titled game NHL12- recently added female creation functionality to their newest ice hockey game. This is fantastic, right? Of course it is- why shouldn't we be able to recreate our favourite female hockey players like… and… um… Either way, you can make girls now! Which is to say that you can select between either a buxom blonde beauty as your archetype (with no customization of face shape etc) or a recreation of the fan who suggested the female creation option.

Either way, it's nothing compared to the male creation engine.

This is sexist. Moreso than not including them at all. It's like if I invited you to my house, fed everyone else dinner and then gave you only a tenth of the portion and expected you to be fine with it. Also you're the only woman there.

It's just plain insulting. Fortunately WRPGs seem to have the whole female character thing down- the creation options are usually there and usually gender will have a significant impact on the experience provided by the game. Plus, because the characters are what you make them (read: blank canvasses/boring archetypes) it's almost impossible to be sexist while designing a character creation system!

Unless you make the female starter armour a bikini in which case you're just as retarded as whoever decided Super Princess Peach would be a good idea.

If one is to include female characters then they must be as good as the male characters. Not better and especially not worse. Their strengths are naturally going to differ to the male characters, as they should because- as unpopular as this idea may be- a 120lb woman in armour isn't going to be able to hit as hard as a 300lb ex-sportstar wearing the same gear. If you're working in gaming then c'mon, you're at the forefront of an emerging artform and you're going to have to step up to the plate and try to make us believe that your characters are real if we're going to care about them.

We need more Madison Paiges, more Jade from Beyond Good And Evils, more Ada Wongs and- especially- no more Cooking Mamas. If Nintendo can honestly bring out a game called Science Papa and not feel like asses then… Well I don't even know.

Stop abusing women, gaming- you're better than that.

Afterthought: For the love of God don't make your female character/protagonist/whatever smug. Smug female characters who show up the men for being 'hurr durr oh so stupid' only make the writing team look like their trying to appeal to the same kind of people who cheer while watching Loose Women or The View.

Toby Ellis