Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

http://gamergateharrassment.tumblr.com/

Some classic stuff in here. Content warning, language, severe donkey caves.

Tis my fear as well. Assuming it ever gets made, if it bombs then it just reinforces preconceived notions in the industry about lots of things. Adventures games, female protagonists, artsy games, etc. One failure could have drastic consequences. Imagine what would have become of the Marvel Movieverse if the Avengers flat out bombed? Whole thing would have bottomed up and nobody would have ever tried again.

 LordofHats wrote:
I doubt most gamers have an issue with female protagonists

I doubt it either. My point was not that gamers are horrible human beings, it was that the influence attributed by some members here by SJW on video game companies was… vastly overrated.

PhantomViper wrote:
The gamers aren't the ones talking about social issues

Not all of them. A bunch of them are. Either because it is something they feel strongly about or just because they feel the need to answer the journalists accusations.

PhantomViper wrote:
then out of the woodwork come all the SJW types to join the bandwagon and label all gamers as misogynistic Neanderthals.

Yeah. Those nasty evil SJW. Were you not all angry at abusive generalizations a few seconds ago?

PhantomViper wrote:
The gamers aren't the ones talking about social issues, its the media that are talking about it in what appears to be a concerted effort to divert attention from the corruption case, then out of the woodwork come all the SJW types to join the bandwagon and label all gamers as misogynistic Neanderthals. How haven't you understood this already?

It's basically the world's biggest strawman (currently). It's a side issue that certain groups are trying to push as the main issue in order to demonize anyone who dissents.

 Sigvatr wrote:
I am not sure what you are referring to

In relation to that males make up the majority of the population.

According to a latest survey.

Women make up the majority of the gaming scene now.

When given the choice, I typically make female characters for variety' s sake. Or a mix of both genders, when you can have multiple characters (MMOs).

 LordofHats wrote:

 daedalus wrote:
I really liked Beyond Good and Evil.

If you didn't, I'd have to press the doomsday button

EDIT: Good news though is that it took a decade, but apparently Beyond Good and Evil 2 is finally go

Yuck. Itchy!

I do look forward to the new one. I might have to dig out an old copy of the first in preparation. I'll have to see if it's on GOG when I get home from work.

 Sigvatr wrote:
How many good games with strictly female protagonists are out there right now?

I could name a few, but I am biased, and those are usually indie, or at least relatively low-budget games. I guess the two big budget examples that I can think of are Portal, and Mirror's Edge. I have not played Mirror's Edge myself, but I heard it was very good. I am a huge fan of American McGee's Alice.

 Asherian Command wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
I am not sure what you are referring to

In relation to that males make up the majority of the population.

According to a latest survey.

Women make up the majority of the gaming scene now.

Urgh. I cringe whenever I read this :/

It's a great example of extremely poor research. Women make up the most part if you think that everyone who plays Bubble Witch on his mobile phone 1-2 times a week is a gamer. I refer to the main market of actual video games where men are so far ahead in numbers it ain't oretty anymore. It's important to make that distinction because the mobile and the core market use a completely different marketing system.

Rule of thumb: if you see someone quoting the ESA as a main source, said person did not actually thoroughly read the study

 Sigvatr wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
I am not sure what you are referring to

In relation to that males make up the majority of the population.

According to a latest survey.

Women make up the majority of the gaming scene now.

Urgh. I cringe whenever I read this :/

It's a great example of extremely poor research. Women make up the most part if you think that everyone who plays Bubble Witch on his mobile phone 1-2 times a week is a gamer. I refer to the main market of actual video games where men are so far ahead in numbers it ain't oretty anymore. It's important to make that distinction because the mobile and the core market use a completely different marketing system.

Rule of thumb: if you see someone quoting the ESA as a main source, said person did not actually thoroughly read the study

I consider, Gamer a large variety,

I am not sub categorizing any more.

AS the stereotype for gamer is a teenager white boy.

http://online.wsj.com/articles/gaming-no-longer-a-mans-world-1408464249
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/08/22/adult-women-gamers-outnumber-teenage-boys/

They are still a large portion of the gaming population, not necessarily half of it, but it is getting to that point.

I have been spending a bunch of time on Strife these days. I guess the two most active members on the forum are both women. Also when playing with voice chat, I heard some female voices. Also pre-voice change teenage boys, with can sometime be confused with female voice . Not yet the majority, but definitely present.
Also, people only mistake me for a woman on the phone, never on voice chat.

 Asherian Command wrote:
Women make up the majority of the gaming scene now.

Careful with that "statistic". It tends to miss quite a few details, specifically in the breakdown of games and just how much mobile phone games come into it. You look at the big video games (the big sellers on consoles), and the numbers are still overwhelmingly male.

It basically is the same as calling someone a "football player" if he plays football 1-2 times a year. Or calling someone a "runner" if he goes running once every month. Or calling someone a cook because he cooks dinner once a week. Or...you get my point

All links, you linked, however, also use the ESA data so they don't add anything to the table. When using articles, make sure the actual information source differs.

It is fine to use your very own definition when talking about it, but on a scientific level, it's extremely poor work to use a definition that is as broad as the ESA did. Granted, they do that on purpose as they are biased, but the study bears no scientific value on this question.

 Sigvatr wrote:
It basically is the same as calling someone a "football player" if he plays football 1-2 times a year. Or calling someone a "runner" if he goes running once every month. Or calling someone a cook because he cooks dinner once a week. Or...you get my point

All links, you linked, however, also use the ESA data so they don't add anything to the table. When using articles, make sure the actual information source differs.

It is fine to use your very own definition when talking about it, but on a scientific level, it's extremely poor work to use a definition that is as broad as the ESA did. Granted, they do that on purpose as they are biased, but the study bears no scientific value on this question.

I merely define gamer as one who plays video games.

I mean the last few years the demographic has changed.

I've edited my post above to include a link to a brief 2-3 minute section of the Co-Optional Podcast (not the latest one, the one before that) where they discuss that "data". I love Dodger's response to it. HA!

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I've edited my post above to include a link to a brief 2-3 minute section of the Co-Optional Podcast (not the latest one, the one before that) where they discuss that "data". I love Dodger's response to it. HA!

It was good but I wanted to hear the dogs opinion. Something about the way the dog holds that squeeky toy says that the dog has a very insightful opinion

Oh God that dog. On every pod-cast, never says a thing. Such a waste of space.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Oh God that dog. On every pod-cast, never says a thing. Such a waste of space.

Oh I was talking about Jessie Cox



Just kidding

More seriously, what must his hate mail look like? I imagine its a whole gakton of dick jokes.

In relation to what I was meant to have said.

I meant that in relation to white teenagers, woman are probably larger in the demographic. Because the population of gamers is more diverse than just white.

That is what I was getting at.

(and teenager meaning 13-19 years old)

Most gamers are above the age of 20 now.

 Sigvatr wrote:
It basically is the same as calling someone a "football player" if he plays football 1-2 times a year. Or calling someone a "runner" if he goes running once every month. Or calling someone a cook because he cooks dinner once a week. Or...you get my point

All links, you linked, however, also use the ESA data so they don't add anything to the table. When using articles, make sure the actual information source differs.

It is fine to use your very own definition when talking about it, but on a scientific level, it's extremely poor work to use a definition that is as broad as the ESA did. Granted, they do that on purpose as they are biased, but the study bears no scientific value on this question.

I sometimes ride my 15 year old rusty mountain bike to work. Does that make me a mountain biker?

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
How many good games with strictly female protagonists are out there right now?

I could name a few, but I am biased, and those are usually indie, or at least relatively low-budget games. I guess the two big budget examples that I can think of are Portal, and Mirror's Edge. I have not played Mirror's Edge myself, but I heard it was very good. I am a huge fan of American McGee's Alice.

Remember Me and the latest trying to suck less variants of Tomb Raider come to mind as well. Samus is still around even if Ninja Theory completely screwed up her last game. FemShep was probably one of the best female protagonists in gaming history even if she did have to share top billing for her franchise, but she's still the "default" Shepard to me. A lot of RPGs have strong female characters in a variety of roles, though it's pretty common to keep your main character gender fluid. See Skyrim, Mass Effect and Dragon Age for obvious examples of that. The games are out there, but I'm all for more strictly female protagonists and female stories. I listed some legendary female warriors on the other page. You bet your donkey I'd be in line at midnight for a game about Tomoe Gozen, or a Black Flag clone that would let you conquer the seas surrounding China as Ching Shih till the Imperial government pays you off to disband your fleet.

Wow, I just realized Jesse Cox doesn't have his own Wikipedia article. How the hell did that happen

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
How many good games with strictly female protagonists are out there right now?

I could name a few, but I am biased, and those are usually indie, or at least relatively low-budget games. I guess the two big budget examples that I can think of are Portal, and Mirror's Edge. I have not played Mirror's Edge myself, but I heard it was very good. I am a huge fan of American McGee's Alice.

Remember Me and the latest trying to suck less variants of Tomb Raider come to mind as well. Samus is still around even if Ninja Theory completely screwed up her last game. FemShep was probably one of the best female protagonists in gaming history even if she did have to share top billing for her franchise, but she's still the "default" Shepard to me. A lot of RPGs have strong female characters in a variety of roles, though it's pretty common to keep your main character gender fluid. See Skyrim, Mass Effect and Dragon Age for obvious examples of that. The games are out there, but I'm all for more strictly female protagonists and female stories. I listed some legendary female warriors on the other page. You bet your donkey I'd be in line at midnight for a game about Tomoe Gozen, or a Black Flag clone that would let you conquer the seas surrounding China as Ching Shih till the Imperial government pays you off to disband your fleet.

I think currently there is just this overselling sexual hype going on in the industry. Which is quite sad really. I mean its not that hard. Just dress them so we feel comfortable around them.

 Asherian Command wrote:

I merely define gamer as one who plays video games.

That's my point. You use the broadest possible definition there is. Which is fine to you, personally. It is horrendously wrong, however, on a scientific level and if the ESA states to present statistics on video games, everyone who ever took a single semester in economics / empirical science would be ashamed of himself

 Sigvatr wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:

I merely define gamer as one who plays video games.

That's my point. You use the broadest possible definition there is. Which is fine to you, personally. It is horrendously wrong, however, on a scientific level and if the ESA states to present statistics on video games, everyone who ever took a single semester in economics / empirical science would be ashamed of himself

I am a gamer designer. My duty is to entertain and cater to the largest possible audience. OF course I will use the broadest definition. But that does not mean I will exclude any types of games and say. Thats not a game and this is a game.

But anyway we are off topic.

The entire discussion I think is summed up as. Journalists need to learn how to react to their consumer base. How to be unbiased in their reviews. Signing better agreements that say yes we will advertise but it will not influence the games we review. (I.E The Last of Us, Call of Duty, those games were basically paid for to be reviewed and given good advertisement)

I think games need to move on from just being fun. And to entertain. To cater to a wider audience. To have meaning to their stories. To give us a point, to have more than just good guy wins the day, this hero fantasy sorta needs to end. I want games that do more than just empower. I want disempowerment, i don't want to escape, i want to be given examples of how to live, how to do things, I want to change myself for the better. Look up to heroes, that struggle with what they do.

Gaming is slowly moving in that direction, with games like the walking dead, spec ops, mass effect 3 (Believe it or not), and many other disempowerment games.

I mean the market needs to grow, because fun games will always come out and will always be more fun.

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:
I doubt most gamers have an issue with female protagonists

I doubt it either. My point was not that gamers are horrible human beings, it was that the influence attributed by some members here by SJW on video game companies was… vastly overrated.

PhantomViper wrote:
The gamers aren't the ones talking about social issues

Not all of them. A bunch of them are. Either because it is something they feel strongly about or just because they feel the need to answer the journalists accusations.

PhantomViper wrote:
then out of the woodwork come all the SJW types to join the bandwagon and label all gamers as misogynistic Neanderthals.

Yeah. Those nasty evil SJW. Were you not all angry at abusive generalizations a few seconds ago?

Angry? Why do you think I'm angry? I couldn't care less about any side of this mess, I was just trying to explain to you that the only comments regarding social issues that you see from the gamers side is when they are trying to defend themselves from accusation thrown at them by the game media and the SJW types.

I'm mostly just entertained by all the internet drama that this is generating.

Another common stat is:

"Of the players that completed Mass Effect 3, 18% did so as Female Shepard."

It's quite easy to decry 18% as a pretty darn poor stat, or not significant.

On the other hand... Anyone want to send me a 1/5th of their paycheck every month? - I didn't think so. :p

Additionally, it's been 2 years since Mass Effect 3 was released, which had already gained lots of good talk about Femshep so I'm very interested to find out how the stats go for Dragon Age 3. - Assuming they get a good voice actress, I imagine it will be a lot closer to 30% now.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:

I merely define gamer as one who plays video games.

That's my point. You use the broadest possible definition there is. Which is fine to you, personally. It is horrendously wrong, however, on a scientific level and if the ESA states to present statistics on video games, everyone who ever took a single semester in economics / empirical science would be ashamed of himself

what I find horrendously wrong is that if you play enough video games like League of Legends, you become a professional athlete. Athletes, really? Gamer is such an all encompassing term it really means anyone who plays games, that's its definition. But when people research gamers they need the break down between all the types of games.

 Compel wrote:
Another common stat is:

"Of the players that completed Mass Effect 3, 18% did so as Female Shepard."

It's quite easy to decry 18% as a pretty darn poor stat, or not significant.

On the other hand... Anyone want to send me a 1/5th of their paycheck every month? - I didn't think so. :p

Additionally, it's been 2 years since Mass Effect 3 was released, which had already gained lots of good talk about Femshep so I'm very interested to find out how the stats go for Dragon Age 3. - Assuming they get a good voice actress, I imagine it will be a lot closer to 30% now.

And WTF does that prove anyway? If the game gives me a choice, I pick female, and name the character Steve, or Fred, and then give it the manliest voice I can find, because I have a strange sense of humor.

I mean, I'm just under 6 feet tall, and sometimes play dwarves. "Oh my x% of people completed a game playing a dwarf, that amount of the demographic must be short and bearded based upon this!"

sirlynchmob wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:

I merely define gamer as one who plays video games.

That's my point. You use the broadest possible definition there is. Which is fine to you, personally. It is horrendously wrong, however, on a scientific level and if the ESA states to present statistics on video games, everyone who ever took a single semester in economics / empirical science would be ashamed of himself

what I find horrendously wrong is that if you play enough video games like League of Legends, you become a professional athlete. Athletes, really?

That statement is horrendously wrong.

You don't just play a lot of a game to become a pro gamer. Or are you saying that people who play a lot of soccer or basketball are automatically professional? Professional gamers spend more time practicing then any sport out there, often doing 12 hours a day. They do this for far less money (all but the very top have to scrape by on sponsorships for the team). They often have to go to events to represent sponsors too.

Please try to at least think before making silly statements.

BTW, the reason they allowed eSports pro's to be labeled as athletes is so they could get an Atheletes VISA for going to international tournaments.