I get the sense that we won't know what that is until we're looking back on it. Marketing towards women and girls that's more than pink and purple skins on games targeted at men, would probably be meaningful. As would more effort being made to make things less hostile towards women.

But, this is something where until we get there, it's going to be really tough to know what the right bits are. Even just dedicating R&D budgets to figuring out how to make games less hostile towards folks would help greatly.

I'm not really talking about RPGs and such where doing that might require eliminating things that might offend. More games where there isn't any good reason for being hostile. One or two dozen games where it's a male protag and female to be rescued without a counter example the other way around probably sends the message that women's money isn't as good as men's money.

Yeah, and when I look at this I think "everything's fine". That sounds like games catered specifically to a small unsatisfied group of people. In other words a niche. And I think these groups deserve the same kind of treatment as fans of say hardcore turn based strategy games, ultra realistic simulators etc.. Those needs can be satisfied with a small percentage of products specifically designed for that small group, there is no need to alter the products the happy majority is receiving. Trouble starts when the majority is clearly unhappy but I'm not getting that vibe, to be honest.

So yeah, these pro equality/feminism games can clearly be created but IMO they can co-exist with games traditionally targeted at the male audience.

I'm not sure that it's fine, but by the same token, I'm not sure that it's horribly broken either. Apart from communities making more of an effort not to chase women away, I'm not sure that anything else really needs to be done. Most games are effectively unisex when you ignore some of the more superficial avatar choices.

I'm not sure wheter Lara Croft is more feminist icon or sex object. I think that people who focus on here giant boobs kind ignores the fact that in most other aspects she's not any worse of a role model for girls than most of the ones that are male.

She's funny that way. I don't remember anyone specifically making a point of her gender in TR1, 2 and what I've seen of 3 and 4. Within the games' worlds, that is. She gets her guns out, jumps and gets shit done.
However the loading screens in TR1 were already focused on her ass.

I'm pretty sure I'm flogging a dead horse, but I'm getting a last one in before I bow out. :)

She's both, for different people. The only problem is when either of the sides acts or feels like the other is morally wrong.

However, she seems to kill pretty much exclusively men. I bet every monkey and tiger she kills is also male. :P

I hadn't been watching most of those franchises, but this isn't surprising. There's dolts out there that keep focusing on how women aren't 50% of some obscure niche in college and use that as an excuse to further marginalize men in general. It's gotten to the point where about 2/3 of the degrees being awarded are going to women. Even as there's little effort being made to make sure that men aren't left behind as more and more jobs require a degree.

She can't be both, at the same time? Why can't a beautiful woman also be a role model, or an inspiration?

Edit: Sorry, I thought that said sex symbol, not object. That changes the meaning.

Interesting thought. Next time I play one of the games I'll check. Hopefully they lie on their back when they're dead.

Okay, so I just read this follow-up article to the interview. Now I'm pissed. The guy is aware that he might get accused of wishing for censorship and his explanation why giving in to his demands could not be considered censorship is:
a) "because the character designs are not at all crucial to these games' plot or playability"
b) "if anything, they serve to pull people out of the moment by being so preposterous"

Statement A simply ignores the fact that a game's presentation always has some influence on the overall experience, a topic that has been deeply explored and analyzed by quite a few game designers. Same goes for research conducted on the role of avatars in video games, particularly online multiplayer games (which has proven that the appearance of the character one controls as well as other characters has a massive effect on the the player's behaviour and efficiency). Not to mention that the statement implies that the character artist's contribution to the overall game experience is of no value. Even in case of the characters he's actually happy with.

Statement B is clearly a heavily biased and subjective view on the character designs and completely ignores the rights of all the gamers (possibly the majority) who are happy with the sexy female character designs. It also implies that just having additionally a selection of less sexualized female characters is not enough.

So yeah, the asshole's dream is actually censorship adjusted to his personal preferences and that supposed minority he claims to represent (a minority he's not even part of). People like him should be locked up in a facility that teaches the basics of any modern western society. You know, like democracy or why censorship is a bad thing (and what it is as he clearly doesn't know). His claims and demands remind me of the Comic Code, something that today is almost universally considered a huge mistake which has held back the artistic freedom of comic authors and made the whole medium suffer. Yup, doing the same thing to video games now, that would be a fantastic idea.

And it's funny actually. In some cultures women fight for the right to dress however they want, some of them suffering physically and even dying during this struggle, while this guy's dream is apparently to dress all women in video games in burqas.

Sexyness has never been an issue. You can have perfectly well rounded sexy characters. The issue is about the portrayal of said sexy characters. Lingering ass shots, impractical outfits, etc. At best, it feels cheap and manipulative. At worst, it's undermining the characters or even demeaning to women.

It has also nothing to do with how much or how little flesh is being shown. There are situations where it's perfectly acceptable for the character to dress sexily. However, combat zones, for example, are generally not a good place for high heels or exposing yourself.

Also, relevant: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7290-Objectification-And-Men

And that's the stance that always boggled me.

I always saw feminism like a great achievement for women. Equality of opportunities,equality of rights and freedom. And that's something that I won't contest in any way.

But as feminism advanced in time, it became more and more intrusive, and more and more intolerant.

Equality of rights and opportunities doesn't mean that men and women are biologically, psychologically and sexually the same, or should become the same! Not at all.

Here specifically, we are talking about sexuality.

Men and women are fundamentally not aroused by the exact same things. There are some not so rare exceptions, of course, but generally speaking this is what I think being relevant.

Since the dawn of times men and women carefully chose their partner to ensure that their descendants will be healthy and prepared to the world.
So, for the men, beauty meaned that their progeny will be good looking. Generous breasts and ass meaned fertility. Sensual behaviors meaned that the woman was open to a relationship, and potentially procreation.
For the women, beauty meaned that their progeny will be good looking too. Him being a good hunter would mean that they would never starve. Him being strong physically and morally would mean that their progeny will be strong and survive.

The society has changed of course, and these fundamental roles have changed too.
The sexuality and sexual arousals too... but fundamentally, the core remained the same.

And that's why, saying that "ass shots, impractical outfits etc. feel cheap, manipulative, undermining the characters or demeaning to women" feels extremely wrong to me. These are the really core of why men find women sexually attractive.
If this is not overdone to the point that the game becomes a pornographic one, I don't see why anyone should be ashamed or revulsed by sexualized characters.
The heroine has an outfit or an armor showing cleavage and/or outlining her forms? So what? I don't see her has a sex slave or a sex doll. I find her attractive. That's perfectly normal, and no one should be depicted as a pervert or a "mysoginist pig™" for that. (that's quite the opposite of mysogyny in fact...)
There is no parity with sexualized or not sexualized heros and heroines in that game? Here again I really don't see the problem. Absolute parity isn't equality. The setting, the artistic view of the writers/dev, the public aimed... all of these overthrow that parity "necessity".
Furthermore, the ones who are generally portraying the sexualized characters as unidimensionalled ones (a.k.a sex objects) and shadowing all of their other traits (bravery, magically or martially powerful, agile, smart, sneaky etc.) are generally the radical feminists who can't or don't want to understand other men's desires... or the ones who are directly influenced by that way of thinking. They usually depict theses desires as belittling and abject...wheareas it is the actual opposite! They are in fact perfectly natural and idealising.

All in all, I think that this is a big societal problem. We shouldn't antagonize mens desires to the point that they are considered as devious and enslavering. We shouldn't see parity as equality, since this is reducing men and women to their gender and ignoring their history, their valor and their merit.

Well, I hope that this wall of text will be understandable enough and that syntax or grammatical errors won't be too much of a problem!

Let me guess without even watching this crap

men have no right to feel objectified, because they are not and heavily muscled male characters in games are designed for them because men are shallow and that's what they fantasise about.

how close am i?