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No Female Heroes At Activision? (Gamastura Article)
- Thread starter Jex
- Start date
A woman.gdt5016 said:
Covering games.
Worse than that: she's a feminist, and would like to see games have a lot less testerony "hells ya, brah" bullshit, and explore more different themes and characterisation.
You can probably see why a certain segment of GAF feels threatened by her.
A Human Becoming
More than a Member
Ignis Fatuus
Banned
Company wants to sell product, news at 11.
KingJ2002
Member
diversity is missing in video games period.
it's all bald space marines and aliens.
if there is any gender or race... it's a stereotyped caricature of them
and focus testing doesn't work well when it comes to bringing NEW ideas... then again... new ideas isn't really Activisions forte.
it's all bald space marines and aliens.
if there is any gender or race... it's a stereotyped caricature of them
and focus testing doesn't work well when it comes to bringing NEW ideas... then again... new ideas isn't really Activisions forte.
Blast Processing
Member
You people need to grow up.
As for the article, Activision, greedy assholes though they are, is in the right to do whatever they feel will bring them more money.
As a gamer, if you care anything for originality and such daring and unbelievable things as having a female (gasp! they don't even have penises!) as your game's protagonist, please support devs and publishers who make such cutting-edge decisions with your money.
As for the article, Activision, greedy assholes though they are, is in the right to do whatever they feel will bring them more money.
As a gamer, if you care anything for originality and such daring and unbelievable things as having a female (gasp! they don't even have penises!) as your game's protagonist, please support devs and publishers who make such cutting-edge decisions with your money.
But if there were top-selling games that had female leads, Activision would likely put female leads in their games.
Activision isn't sexist.
They just have no original ideas. They're completely derivative. They're only going to follow market trends and present absolutely nothing new to the table. If you're looking for the future of gaming, don't look at Activision - because they seem to be set at looking at the past and duplicating it.
Activision isn't sexist.
They just have no original ideas. They're completely derivative. They're only going to follow market trends and present absolutely nothing new to the table. If you're looking for the future of gaming, don't look at Activision - because they seem to be set at looking at the past and duplicating it.
More character creation. Seriously! More more more. I'm going to pull a number out of my ass and say that at least 70%, if not more, of games would not be impacted negatively at all by killing the main character the developers created and instead making it a customizable character, ala Mass Effect.
That way, all of the little boys who are afraid to play anything other than a white male won't be threatened, and the people who want actual diversity in gender and race can be tossed at least somewhat of a bone.
And I'm really not all that familiar with Leigh except for a few things, but this
I'm right there with her on.
That way, all of the little boys who are afraid to play anything other than a white male won't be threatened, and the people who want actual diversity in gender and race can be tossed at least somewhat of a bone.
And I'm really not all that familiar with Leigh except for a few things, but this
I'm right there with her on.
captmcblack
Member
The only female leads that tend to sell to dudebro gamers these days are ones like Lara Croft, or as busty ensemble members in JRPGs or fighters.
I wish there were more leads like Jade from BG&E or Faith from Mirror's Edge; they were great characters. Cate Archer from NOLF was awesome, too.
I wish there were more leads like Jade from BG&E or Faith from Mirror's Edge; they were great characters. Cate Archer from NOLF was awesome, too.
However, it's notable that the vast majority of Sierra was closed down after the Activision Blizzard merger.Johann said:
They even sold off most of their IPs to other companies and shut down or spun off most of their studios.
Though it's also worth noting that Sierra itself was very unprofitable at the end...
D
Deleted member 47027
Unconfirmed Member
Oxymoron said:
To be fair, it doesn't make you a feminist or have any kind of female 'agenda' to want less of the mentioned bullshit.
Themes and characterisation are genderless. People can excel at exploring different ones without pidgeonholing it into simple gender wars.
Corran Horn
May the Schwartz be with you
Oh god that was her....lol. Made that shit so hard to listen too...ICallItFutile said:
Blast Processing
Member
I personally feel like Activision is honing in on one particular formula that they feel is going to be a never-ending fountain of cash, Koei/Musou style. And so far, they're not wrong.
We need to get out and show them that we value more than soulless, faceless (literally; just look at the covers of the last 4(!) Call of Duty/Modern Warfare games), repetitive and grindy bro-yeah shooters.
We need to get out and show them that we value more than soulless, faceless (literally; just look at the covers of the last 4(!) Call of Duty/Modern Warfare games), repetitive and grindy bro-yeah shooters.
It does matter. Why do you think she wrote this piece now with a slant against Activision? Clearly this piece was predicated as a slam against Activision for anything Leigh could think up, and once again she cries foul about someone hating women.Xater said:
This piece could have just as easily been about a myriad of companies, but instead it singles out Activision and praises a number of companies for aging titles. This article is whining about women not being in games because of the success of an NFL game, a war game, and Assassin's Creed, a game about a time when most when probably rarely strayed from home unless it was to buy dinner. The article is just stupid, vindictive, and anything but subtle about its agenda.
shidoshi said:
Actually, studies show that in games with character creation tools, such as online RPGs and the Sims, men aren't afraid to play as a female avatar. Some male players are likely to have more female characters than male on their MMO account since they like the 'look' of the women better. Female players, on the other hand, rarely play as male characters since they find it weird and the male characters aren't attractive.
Dude Abides
Banned
oracrest said:
Did you read the article or the OP? She addressed the banal and obvious "Activision is just following the market" argument that the armchair David Ricardos are making.
Blast Processing
Member
Dance In My Blood said:
Funny, I was thinking the same thing about this post!
I agree that Activision isn't particularly sexist, but it's not just an Activision problem, it's an industry problem. I can't think of many memorable strong female characters in videogames, but that's mostly because the industry is almost entirely male. You see the same thing at Pixar: they're a bunch of male geeks, so they don't have many female characters in their movies.pslong009 said:
The onus isn't on us, as gamers, to deal with it. It's on the industry to make an effort to recruit more females to work in it, in art and story and programming, and get viewpoints other than that of a young white male.
chaostrophy
Member
captmcblack said:
THIS.
April from The Longest Journey is another good one.
â Narayan
Member
Holy Hell.ICallItFutile said:
Fire her then give me her job.
Nice.Dizzy-4U said:
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
Faith was pretty bland. Having a small chest doesn't make up for a lack of personality or good character development. That's the problem with video game characters in general, male or female.captmcblack said:
thebaroness
Member
She played Persona 3 Portable as a girl and now is on a rampage about female leads. :/
Not joking, I watch her twitter.
Not joking, I watch her twitter.
Mafro said:
me too, as y'know, she both writes for gamasutra and has an interest in the role of women in games, but i also knew exactly why jexhius didn't include her name in the op. unfortunately his noble attempts to stop posters de-railing the thread by going all ad-hominem because of how ridiculously she acted while drunk, as well as using the opportunity to shit out 'lolololol feminism is dumb loolololol' comments, didn't work.
Jex
Member
Dance In My Blood said:
I'm glad we can get this level of comments on NeoGaf.
Dance In My Blood said:
Well, you're wrong here.
Mainly because it's dealing with reports from "sources" at Activision, about Activsion games, and Activision business practice. Practices, not unique to Activision of course, but this article actually deals with specific games from that publisher.
So no, it had to be about Activision.
Dance In My Blood said:
Very insightful of you. Derp derp, and the like.
You know, it might have been poor judgement for Leigh Alexander to get on that podcast smashed as she was, but I'd really hate if it were me, and people used laughing at some dumb shit I said when I was drunk as a substitute for engaging my arguments and points of view.
No one in the industry knows how to make female leads that aren't cookie cutter tough girl. That can change.
VaLiancY said:
No one in the industry knows how to make female leads that aren't cookie cutter tough girl. That can change.
thebaroness said:
To be fair, her write-up about her feelings on playing a female in P3P on Kotaku made a lot of really interesting and valid points. Also to be fair, I have not yet myself played P3P yet, so I don't know for sure that I will (or will not) feel the same way while playing the female lead.
Complex Shadow
Cudi Lame
Oxymoron said:
take your pic.
Rahxephon91
Banned
I don't think they know how to make male characters that aren't "badass" either.Oxymoron said:
But whatever. Video games are a bushiness, with I feel for many things like artistic creativity a distinct 2nd. So, its not very surprising that Activision follows through with these practices to determine things like game characters.