The FPS genre and female characters/gamers

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**Monster Rain**

Why don't they just make all FPS characters hermaphrodites?

Everyone wins.

**Redbeard**

Melissia wrote:
Also, I really haven't seen anyone complain about women being targets in Combat Arms or Global Agenda.

Perhaps the obvious response, but I wouldn't complain if you could be a target. ;p (friendly jest, I'm very opposed to violence against women, my mom is a DV counselor)

**Melissia**

Heh. But in all seriousness, both of those games have both male and female models. I'd be playing Combat Arms far more if it wasn't a korean mmo style mess. I'm currently playing the other one right now, and it's quite good, despite being a 3ps (I prefer FPS over 3PS for gameplay).

**halonachos**

Do you really want a female character though? It'll be either unrealistically vague or unrealistically definite.

Ie, Halo Reach and classic Chainmail Bikini.

**Melissia**

Uh, yes. I do want one.

Duh.

halonachos wrote:Halo Reach

Yes. That is EXACTLY what I am asking for. Halo Reach's player character, or something like Shepard from Mass Effect if one has to have a deeper personality for the game.

halonachos wrote:Chainmail Bikini.

No. Chainmail bikini is a male fantasy. I am not male.

**halonachos**

Are you getting what I'm saying?

Vague= Male/female have the same character model, just different voices.
Chainmail bikinis are well, chainmail bikinis, but you can tell that they're female.

**Melissia**

Why do you think I don't?

**Slarg232**

Redbeard wrote: (friendly jest, I'm very opposed to violence against women, my mom is a DV counselor)

You know, I just don't understand that veiwpoint anymore.

Women are men's equals, they can take everything we can and more, supposidly. But god help them if anyone hits a girl. Then it's "OMG, he hit a gurl!"

I mean, I don't hit anyone, unless they hit me first, but still.....

And yes, I am speaking from experiance. This girl in High School decided she was everything a man could be and more, so she decided to hit me for one of my sarcastic remarks, so I slugged her back in the jaw. Guess who got in trouble.

**halonachos**

This topic makes me think though, why do girls want to be shot in videogames? Also, if girls have a smaller character model then that's giving an advantage to the female characters seeing as though there's less of them to hit.

So in fairness, all female characters have to be overweight to make up for the natural thinner bodies.

**Melissia**

You mean just like every single male model has to be the exact same height and build?

What's with the load of rather inane questions all of the sudden?

**asimo77**

I think Slarg232 is a pretty cool guy eh beats wimmin and doesn't afraid of anything

**Melissia**

Listen, I battled sexy supervillains, beating them to within an inch of their life in City of Heroes. I battled superheroines and did the same thing in City of Villains, and then stole their money and used the money to frame them so that they were sent to prison instead of me. My Sisters get shot at and killed regularly in tabletop. I conquered France in the Total War series using a horde of highlander barbarians for laughs. I destroyed entire civilizations in the Civilization series for nothing more than daring to let a single unit cross my border. I bombarded entire worlds until the population became extinct in Hegemonia: Legions of Iron.

Why should I be bothered with having a female soldier be shot at when I've devastated entire worlds by bombarding them until the last speck of sentient life no longer exists on it?

I'm not bothered by it. Women are attacked and killed daily. Hourly. Minutely. Every second. It is a part of reality. War, were it to be personified, is an unkind bastard who does not discriminate between those who can defend themselves and those who cannot. So I'd rather play a woman who can defend herself.

**halonachos**

Melissia wrote:You mean just like every single male model has to be the exact same height and build?

What's with the load of rather inane questions all of the sudden?

Pretty much, if you've played multiplayer for Goldeneye on the 64 you will have noticed the difference between being able to hit Odd Job and Jaws. Odd Job crouched and you couldn't hit him, Jaws crouched and he was the height of a standing person.

Just trying to say that even though it seems like its no big deal to have a different character model it really does. If you make a hit box that's the same for every model even though the character model is different you could shoot to the side of the female model and still get a hit which will in turn be related to a glitch or lag, or players will complain about having a hit box larger than their character model.

**Melissia**

Again, what's with the inane questions?

**whatwhat**

halonachos wrote:Pretty much, if you've played multiplayer for Goldeneye on the 64 you will have noticed the difference between being able to hit Odd Job and Jaws. Odd Job crouched and you couldn't hit him, Jaws crouched and he was the height of a standing person.

lol The character selection screen amongst myself and my friends at the time was basically a race to select odd job first.

**halonachos**

Melissia wrote:Again, what's with the inane questions?

Again its because having a female character model is not as simple a solution as it may seem. People are fickle, as this whole thread has proven, and someone will always complain. If a game based off of the military realistically has no female character models, then that's actually a good thing.

It's like Spike Lee complaining about WW2 movies having no black actors, guess what, segregation was still around so black soldiers wouldn't normally be operating in the same unit as white soldiers.

If something is based off of a book, then its a good thing when it sticks to the book.

Just because females are widely underrepresented in FPS's doesn't mean we should enact some cockamanie affirmative action attitude and replace male leads with female leads.

So we'll rule out realistic military shooters for female leads.

Futuristic shooters will either be based on current military(in which case there will be no females) or based on what the developers are thinking about(in which case they may have female leads, but will be based on what they want the hero to look like).

Any shooter based on a movie or book will have a character that resembles the lead protagonist of the book, any game based on history will be the same.

Any game with a female lead will actually have her doing special operations a la assassinations or information gathering kind of things seeing as though that's what females did during WW2 and just about any other war(there was another game where you played a female agent, 'No One Lives Forever' I believe). Think splintercell or that one chick in Iron Man 2 and you'll get a 'realistic' lead female role.

Unfortunately, a stealth element is usually 3rd person and not first so even if you get a female lead it probably won't be for a FPS.

So you come down to if you can explain why women are present in a fight. Why are women fighting along with men if we traditionally don't have that occuring currently? How did it come to be that women were made to participate in as many combat activities as men?

Face it, having women fighting in close combat roles alongside men is against the world's current cultures. Bioshock managed to use a cultural civil war, so there is hope for you.

**Melissia**

It's entirely believable to have a female character in a "modern" FPS, especially one set in the near future, because those things are happening NOW. Women are gaining broader and broader roles in all modern military forces, and we are constantly being put in the line of fire simply because the women of the arms forces are doing the duty requested of them. And in the years to come it will continue to broaden, as the militaries of the modern world cannot reject a skilled soldier just because of gender, just like the military is getting ready to get rid of the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy later this year because it doesn't want to have to throw away talented soldiers just because of their sexuality.

Also?

**** the world's culture. Preferably with jeep. Which has been covered in gasoline and is lit on fire. And is being driven by a rabid kangaroo. Wielding a pair of assault rifles. Which fire the lightning of a god's wrath.

Seriously, games are a method of escaping the troubles of the modern world, not enforcing them. Some people like to do that by solving puzzles. Other people like to do it through roleplaying. Still others like to blow gak up. I fit in all three of those categories. Puzzle solving adventures are often done without a character, and roleplaying adventures have no issue with the subject of gender-- being the most open to gender equality of all of the various genres. But action games are lagging behind. Escaping the doldrums or troubles of life through playing as a badass is a long-standing tradition-- all the way back to pre-biblical times people made up such stories. In the modern world, there's no reason that badass can't also just so happen to be a female.

In fact, I think that makes her a more interesting character than a male in the same position, even a male with the exact same personality, history, backstory, and so on.

**halonachos**

Modern combat roles for women include pilot, and that's pretty much it. Navy has some women in it, but for the most part women are relegated to non-combat roles ie, driving cargo trucks or staying back at base.

So if you want to fly a plane as a female you're good to go, if you want to fly a helicopter you're good to go, if you want to walk around a NAVY ship you're good to go, or if you want to drive a truck you're good to go.

**Melissia**

Again, making a mountain out of a mole hill. Did you not read my last two paragraphs?

halonachos wrote:Modern combat roles for women include pilot, and that's pretty much it. Navy has some women in it, but for the most part women are relegated to non-combat roles ie, driving cargo trucks or staying back at base.

Female soldiers also participate in house to house searches, because the military uses female soldiers to pat down female muslims as in order to not offend their religious beliefs. This is something that was more recently adopted (IE, during the Afghanistan / Iraq wars). Israel formed a non-segregated combat unit in around the year 2000, which has expanded to batallion size, and has women participating in border patrols, anti-air warfare, field intelligence, artillery, and so on.

The duties of female soldiers are constantly being expanded as time goes on.

Equal rights means equal responsibilities, after all.

**Monster Rain**

Melissia wrote:Again, making a mountain out of a mole hill. Did you not read my last two paragraphs?
halonachos wrote:Modern combat roles for women include pilot, and that's pretty much it. Navy has some women in it, but for the most part women are relegated to non-combat roles ie, driving cargo trucks or staying back at base.
Female soldiers also participate in house to house searches,

Which doesn't necessarily equate to clearing rooms and other unpleasant MOUT-related procedures.

If women were held to the exact same physical standards as men in the military, I'd be all for letting them serve wherever they want.

**halonachos**

So, you can get to pat down muslim women congrats. For the most part though, CoD isn't for you and neither is the Battlefield series.

You can say that videogames are a way to escape the real world, but a lot are based on the real world.

Wait for another game like "No One Lives Forever", it was a fantastic FPS and it had a female lead. Did she wear spandex, yes but it was an amazing game.

The second one had a little less spandex and was still a good game.

An FPS with female leads should be like Metroid or NOLF, not like CoD or Battlefield.

True to physical standards, plus its widely accepted that women have lower upper body strength compared to men. In fact I think there are a lot of roles that are male specific, like pararescue.

**Manchu**

Alright, back on-topic please.

**Melissia**

halonachos wrote:An FPS with female leads should be like Metroid or NOLF, not like CoD or Battlefield.

No, CoD and Battlefield are exactly the types of games that need more female presence.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

halonachos wrote:For the most part though, CoD isn't for you and neither is the Battlefield series.

If you're attempting to dictate my preferences for me...

Do not.

**Monster Rain**

halonachos wrote:So, you can get to pat down muslim women congrats. For the most part though, CoD isn't for you and neither is the Battlefield series.

I actually think that a game that would allow the player to pat down a large number of dusky, foreign women would be highly popular in the 14-18 male demographic.

**BaronIveagh**

halonachos wrote:
Melissia wrote:Again, what's with the inane questions?

Again its because having a female character model is not as simple a solution as it may seem. People are fickle, as this whole thread has proven, and someone will always complain. If a game based off of the military realistically has no female character models, then that's actually a good thing.

It's like Spike Lee complaining about WW2 movies having no black actors, guess what, segregation was still around so black soldiers wouldn't normally be operating in the same unit as white soldiers.

If something is based off of a book, then its a good thing when it sticks to the book.

Just because females are widely underrepresented in FPS's doesn't mean we should enact some cockamanie affirmative action attitude and replace male leads with female leads.

So we'll rule out realistic military shooters for female leads.

Futuristic shooters will either be based on current military(in which case there will be no females) or based on what the developers are thinking about(in which case they may have female leads, but will be based on what they want the hero to look like).

Any shooter based on a movie or book will have a character that resembles the lead protagonist of the book, any game based on history will be the same.

Any game with a female lead will actually have her doing special operations a la assassinations or information gathering kind of things seeing as though that's what females did during WW2 and just about any other war(there was another game where you played a female agent, 'No One Lives Forever' I believe). Think splintercell or that one chick in Iron Man 2 and you'll get a 'realistic' lead female role.

Unfortunately, a stealth element is usually 3rd person and not first so even if you get a female lead it probably won't be for a FPS.

So you come down to if you can explain why women are present in a fight. Why are women fighting along with men if we traditionally don't have that occuring currently? How did it come to be that women were made to participate in as many combat activities as men?

Face it, having women fighting in close combat roles alongside men is against the world's current cultures. Bioshock managed to use a cultural civil war, so there is hope for you.

To Summerize:

The Baron's Fully Illustrated Guide to This Thread!!!!

(For those that need brought up to speed...

Halonachos view of what women in games should be:

Melissia's view of what women in games should be:

Thier opinions of one another's views on this subject:

My opinion of the whole debate:

What I have no doubt the mods will be doing to the thread soon:

Which will lead to us all heading off to other threads to rant...

While Frazz laughs about how silly the whole thing is on all sides

And I'll point out that in the greatest side scroller of all time, women were every bit the equal of men.

**Chongara**

God, and here I thought putting a "No Girls Allowed" sign outside your playhouse went out of style around age 6.

Now, I don't play FPS games in fact I hate them (playing them at least, watching someone play can be kind of fun) for the most part. However I've seen enough of them to know that adding women to roles they aren't widely seen in would hardly be the biggest violations of "Realism" in the genre.

I really wish I could say I was surprised at just how silly the level of resistance to the option of having a female PC being wider spread is.

**Monster Rain**

Well I would say the Baron had the greatest post I've seen in a dog's age just now.

/begins slow clap

**Manchu**

Chongara wrote:God, and here I thought putting a "No Girls Allowed" sign outside your playhouse went out of style around age 6.

I have to say, I'm pretty surprised by this as well. Maybe not surprised.

**Wrexasaur**

Monster Rain wrote:Well I would say the Baron had the greatest post I've seen in a dog's age just now.

/begins slow clap

*Continues slow clap*

Epic.

**Melissia**

Let's see... even if you absolutely have to have it be "ultra-realistic", there's still ways to ahve modern female action heroes. A secret agent, a rebel, a soldier employed by a third world warlord, an Iraqi/Afghani civilian seeking revenge against terrorists in her city, a pilot shot down behind enemy lines, etc.