GRRR FEMINISM and stuff - New Video Released. Fade mad.

Not getting at anything. I just found it interesting.

There's a lot of interesting talking points in the original megadrive library (art style changes, as below, for example): This just happens to be the one which is relevant to this thread.



Though, you'll also find that a significant number of megadrive games are sports titles, or relatively "gender neutral" by way of anthropomorphic animals with attitude.

chalkitdown wrote:

Lotus wrote:

TheTurnipKing wrote:Digging through the Megadrive back catalogue the other day. You know, it has a surprising number of games with female protagonists in there.

Arrow Flash, Burning Force, Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, Zombies Ate My Neighbors, Dahna, Alisa Dragoon, Valis, Alien Storm & El Viento, to name a few.

You're not supposed to remember/talk about those ones.

Are you trying to say there are a fair amount of female protagonists in games compared to male? The ratio must be 100:1 or maybe even less than 1. She mentions good examples of every trope she makes a video on in the actual video, so I'm not sure what you're getting at.

I was being facetious. By the nature of her 'argument', she's going to ignore games that don't fit with the point she wants to put across.

But no, I'm not saying there's a fair amount of female protagonists compared to male. I'm not even sure what a fair amount would be, or if there needs to be fair amount.

I'd argue that at the time of the Mega Drive, most games were incredibly light on story to the point where the main character could be pretty much anything; male, female or indeed anthropomorphic animal. I would imagine you'd find a far higher percentage of male leads in 16 bit RPGs or point and click adventures for instance.

Lotus wrote:I was being facetious. By the nature of her 'argument', she's going to ignore games that don't fit with the point she wants to put across.

When the argument revolves around identifying tropes, surely it's enough to say that many games exhibit said tropes? Games that avoid them don't somehow cancel out those that don't.

I've said before that I really don't understand how anyone could see what she's doing as a bad thing. Even if you don't care about representation in games, at the very least it can't be bad to have more variety.

Mogster wrote:I've said before that I really don't understand how anyone could see what she's doing as a bad thing. Even if you don't care about representation in games, at the very least it can't be bad to have more variety.

People fear change, especially when they've been near exclusively catered to for so long.

It's cognitive dissonance. People love certain games but don't like it when said games are called out for things that are deemed to be bad.

Mogster wrote:I'd argue that at the time of the Mega Drive, most games were incredibly light on story to the point where the main character could be pretty much anything; male, female or indeed anthropomorphic animal. I would imagine you'd find a far higher percentage of male leads in 16 bit RPGs or point and click adventures for instance.

Lotus wrote:I was being facetious. By the nature of her 'argument', she's going to ignore games that don't fit with the point she wants to put across.

When the argument revolves around identifying tropes, surely it's enough to say that many games exhibit said tropes? Games that avoid them don't somehow cancel out those that don't.

I've said before that I really don't understand how anyone could see what she's doing as a bad thing. Even if you don't care about representation in games, at the very least it can't be bad to have more variety.

Because they're merely complaints (often very weakly validated ones) presented with no solutions.

If you feel there is poor minority representation in games, grab a strawberry floating development tool and get creating. The number of gatekeepers in gaming is at an all time low, several platforms have no effective gatekeeper and the few that do don't seem to have any interest in keeping out minority representation.

Alternatively, start a Patreon and complain you've been the target of abuse, and you won't even have to deliver on the promises you made in your initial crowdfunding campaign.

Mogster wrote:I'd argue that at the time of the Mega Drive, most games were incredibly light on story to the point where the main character could be pretty much anything; male, female or indeed anthropomorphic animal. I would imagine you'd find a far higher percentage of male leads in 16 bit RPGs or point and click adventures for instance.

Lotus wrote:I was being facetious. By the nature of her 'argument', she's going to ignore games that don't fit with the point she wants to put across.

When the argument revolves around identifying tropes, surely it's enough to say that many games exhibit said tropes? Games that avoid them don't somehow cancel out those that don't.

Of course, but it's basically just pointing out the obvious and saying "look". From what I can remember, a lot of the games she featured were old games from the 80s and 90s. But even if you disregard that, she's essentially saying "look at these games that featured a storyline/plot device that I disapprove of". Okay, great, so what? There were lots of games that did feature those 'tropes', and lots of games that didn't. I'm sure today there's a much wider range of storylines and angles, and the proportion of those that do feature the trope she's against will be less.

Anyway, she's doing a new series apparently, about masculinity in games. Can't wait.

Also, it needs to be noted that the wording of Tropes vs Women automatically assumes a negative stance towards the use of said tropes, which is utterly fallacious.

Mogster wrote:I've said before that I really don't understand how anyone could see what she's doing as a bad thing. Even if you don't care about representation in games, at the very least it can't be bad to have more variety.

The lack of variety in videogames is blatantly economic in cause, and has little, if anything, to do with misogyny.

The only way to conclude that misogyny is the cause, is if you start with the premise that all problems are caused by misogyny.

I'm pretty sure the Tropes series has never claimed that misogyny is the cause of sexist tropes. If anything it's laziness. How do we set this guy out on his hero's journey? Oh, just kill his wife.

Lotus wrote:

Mogster wrote:I'd argue that at the time of the Mega Drive, most games were incredibly light on story to the point where the main character could be pretty much anything; male, female or indeed anthropomorphic animal. I would imagine you'd find a far higher percentage of male leads in 16 bit RPGs or point and click adventures for instance.

Lotus wrote:I was being facetious. By the nature of her 'argument', she's going to ignore games that don't fit with the point she wants to put across.

When the argument revolves around identifying tropes, surely it's enough to say that many games exhibit said tropes? Games that avoid them don't somehow cancel out those that don't.

Of course, but it's basically just pointing out the obvious and saying "look". From what I can remember, a lot of the games she featured were old games from the 80s and 90s. But even if you disregard that, she's essentially saying "look at these games that featured a storyline/plot device that I disapprove of". Okay, great, so what? There were lots of games that did feature those 'tropes', and lots of games that didn't. I'm sure today there's a much wider range of storylines and angles, and the proportion of those that do feature the trope she's against will be less.

I don't think it's fair to say she's just just pointing out the obvious. I for one didn't think about a lot of the tropes she's highlighted until I watched her videos, and they've changed the way I view some of the ones I did. There have even been responses from game developers stating that they'll do things differently as a result, so they're clearly having more effect than you imply. Again, I think part of the problem is that they tropes are often used without any thought. Incidentally her damsels in distress videos focussed a lot on older games, but her later ones dealt more with more recent ones. She's covered quite a large range.

TheTurnipKing wrote:Because they're merely complaints (often very weakly validated ones) presented with no solutions.

If you feel there is poor minority representation in games, grab a strawberry floating development tool and get creating. The number of gatekeepers in gaming is at an all time low, several platforms have no effective gatekeeper and the few that do don't seem to have any interest in keeping out minority representation.

The solution to avoiding tropes is to not fall back on those tropes, and we'll have to agree to disagree on the validation thing. I think she's shown plenty of examples, and I've noticed many more as a result.

And I really disagree that critics should be making games rather than doing what they do. Criticism is hugely important to the development of any medium, and it's the engagement of critics and writers/directors/developers/artists that helps push things forward. It examines why the things that work work so well, and indeed brings to light the stuff that doesn't. It helps creators learn from the work of their predecessors and peers in context, and inspires them to build on their techniques. Besides, the detachment of critics from the stuff they critique is kind of important, and I doubt Sarkeesian has some secret game dev skills she's been hiding.

Good criticism is important. The meta narrative of Mcintosh's is that tropes are bad because they're sexist. Not because they're used badly.


And we all know what Femfreq thinks of "toxic masculinity".

The recent debacles over Dying Light (damselling) and Wolfenstein just go to show how little FemFreq understands the medium it's critiquing, taking the same criticisms it applies successfully to other mediums without understanding the ways in which it being a game distinguishes it from those mediums. Narrative is the be all and end all of a narrative medium; NOT an interactive one.

From what I've seen I'm inclined to believe that Femfreq is all about demolishing the stairs, not building a ramp. And that to me is a big big problem.

Bottom line: I feel very strongly that what the medium needs to be more diverse is more creators creating diverse games. And there is only the lowest of low barriers to that creation with a wide variety of tools available to fit virtually every technical skill level. More variety at the top end of the market will only come when it's proven commercially viable at the low end.

So if I'm reading that right gaming should get a free pass on tropes because it's an interactive medium?

It baffles me that people can't understand that DID isn't a character trait, that the prevalence of it is a problem and the difference between characters with agency and those without it. This is writing 101 as well.

PCCD wrote:So wait, gaming should get a free pass on tropes, sexism and the like because it's an interactive medium? What did I just read?

Trelliz wrote:

PCCD wrote:So wait, gaming should get a free pass on tropes, sexism and the like because it's an interactive medium? What did I just read?

Ho ho ho, how chuckleworthy.

But since you brought up the question of agency, how would you even define that in an interactive medium? It's pretty easy in a narrative work, but in a scenario where all kinds of simulated behaviours can alter the outcome?

FOR EXAMPLE, in the Gameplay video FemFreq used of Hitman, where the unseen player drags hooker corpses she created around, suggesting that it's something the game demands of the player, rather than a result of player agency, which is actively discouraged by the games scoring system?

Trelliz wrote:

PCCD wrote:So wait, gaming should get a free pass on tropes, sexism and the like because it's an interactive medium? What did I just read?

That is amusing, but that's not what feminist frequency is doing.

What Feminist frequency is doing is the equivalent of pointing out how sexist, lazy and male dominated super hero movies have been. And ignoring all other kinds of movies because they don't fit their agenda.

I wish SO much that they would analyse the games they look at from both sides. They have an agenda, that's fair enough, but the way they just steam roll over anything that doesn't back up their opinions drives me crazy.

I want better equality but I can't stand how they are doing it. And now I really regret bumping this thread

Mogster wrote:I'm pretty sure the Tropes series has never claimed that misogyny is the cause of sexist tropes.

Having actually watched a couple of episodes, this is totally false. They do claim that the tropes in question is misogyny surprisingly frequently.

Just because there's one or two examples of a trope being used wel, skewered, inverted or whatever does not excuse examples where they're used poorly, especially when the poor examples are so prevalent that they're the norm. If anything it makes the poor examples look worse by comparison, "yeah we could do better but we just can't be bothered".

Why people are so hell bent on protecting lazy writing with bullshit about the free market or whatever is beyond me.

Nobody is doing that. Who is doing that?

Fade wrote:What Feminist frequency is doing is the equivalent of pointing out how sexist, lazy and male dominated super hero movies have been. And ignoring all other kinds of movies because they don't fit their agenda.

I wish SO much that they would analyse the games they look at from both sides. They have an agenda, that's fair enough, but the way they just steam roll over anything that doesn't back up their opinions drives me crazy.

I want better equality but I can't stand how they are doing it. And now I really regret bumping this thread

The Tropes videos analyse a fair variety of games, but the comparison with superhero movies isn't bad. Part of the reason feminists take issue with the presentation of women in mainstream games is because these are the games that are reaching the most people. It's argued that by consistently presenting women in certain ways, this presentation bleeds its way into society and helps create the idea that it's normal. That's not to say that experiencing sexist content magically makes you sexist, but it's a contributing factor, however small to the way women are viewed in reality. Our views of the world are influenced by the media we consume.

I'm not arguing that the Tropes series is presenting a particularly complex argument, it's pop feminism aimed at a wide audience covering mainstream entertainment, but I think that by highlighting these tropes it's making many more people aware of them, and encouraging developers to avoid them. That's really all it's doing, and all it claims to be doing. It's not meant as a wide reaching "here are good and bad things in games" thing. It's also not arguing that the games it covers are bad games, sexist games, and Sarkeesian starts every episode by reminding the viewer that it's perfectly fine to enjoy games in spite of the tropes within.

Delusibeta wrote:

Mogster wrote:I'm pretty sure the Tropes series has never claimed that misogyny is the cause of sexist tropes.

Having actually watched a couple of episodes, this is totally false. They do claim that the tropes in question is misogyny surprisingly frequently.

I said that misogyny isn't the cause, which TTK stated that Sarkeesian had claimed. Some of the tropes themselves are absolutely misogynistic.

TheTurnipKing wrote:Bottom line: I feel very strongly that what the medium needs to be more diverse is more creators creating diverse games. And there is only the lowest of low barriers to that creation with a wide variety of tools available to fit virtually every technical skill level. More variety at the top end of the market will only come when it's proven commercially viable at the low end.

I disagree. For one thing, indie games tend to reach a different, much more niche market than the big blockbusters, and are often designed for a niche audience too. They're usually much cheaper to make, and don't need to make anywhere near as much money to be successful, so carry far less risk than their big brothers. The success of small indie titles selling a few hundred thousand isn't going to convince EA take the same risk.

Secondly, indie games are already pretty diverse, covering ground that big games tend not to cover at all. Sometimes this is only really possible in a smaller game. Gone Home for one simply isn't blockbuster material, doesn't try to be and doesn't suffer in any way as a result.

Finally, the tropes series isn't specifically asking for more diverse games. There's no reason you can't have a bald space marine save the universe without having to rescue a damsel in distress for instance, or seeking revenge for his murdered wife. Advanced Warfare's campaign wasn't anything special, but it did at least manage to include a female soldier in your squad who wasn't treated any differently to the men. Only one mind, but baby steps.