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VS.

this blog was prompted by an article i recently read here on GS. i thoroughly enjoyed it, personally, and it got me thinking about what my own definition of feminism is, and how i feel it pertains to my own gaming experiences. below is a comment i made for this article:

to me, feminism is trying to get the world to see that i just happen to be a female, and not having that be the very first thing cataloged in their brains when i am playing a game online and speak into the mic. it's perfectly OK to realize that i am a female, but it should be just one of the many qualities on my resume, not the primary (or sometimes the only considered) quality.

it's like the good and bad about how nintendo has portrayed samus aran throughout the various series. first, it was totally awesome that the main character in the original metroid just happened to be female, and you didn't find out until the end because--wait for it--it didn't matter! (+1) but of course you only find out about that if you beat the game in enough time for her to lose her space suit and be revealed in a bikini... (-1)

then there was metroid prime, where you get her to take off her helmet at the end, which was really well done. she did not look like a young teeny bopper, what i admired most was her mature and war-torn look, like she had just been through a LOT and was older and wiser, and more tired for it. (+1!) then you get to zero suit samus and the promo drawings for her in SSBB, and she was once again hypersexualized, looking like she was 19 with big bazongas and a ridiculously skin-tight suit (yes i get the need to have a skin tight suit under the armor but COME ON the bazongas were unnecessarily huge, so -1).

it just gets old after a while. i just want a female character in a good game, a game i actually want to play, who just happens to be female, where that's not a big deal, like from what i hear of portal and mirror's edge (i don't care for either game play so i can't quite speak for those, but from what i've read they seem to be what i'm asking for).

keep in mind that this DOES NOT mean i do not play video games because of this, but it really gets old. i still do enjoy gaming, but it degrades the experience slightly each time the sexism is terribly obvious.

also, it doesn't mean that it's ok to hypersexualize men either. i'm not sure what to say about that, except i'm not sure making these brawny characters is so sexual, it's more portraying some stereotypes about what guys might wish to be in some sense (i'm not a guy so i could be wrong), whereas the female sex toys aren't really what us females would like to be.

i also thought this video put it pretty well.

that about sums it up. questions? comments?

-z