How Men Ruin Gaming

Let me start off by saying, this is not a full on attack on men. It's a minor attack on men. You see, I myself am a gamer just like millions of women across the globe. And I must admit, I am a sucker for a game with a female lead and/or protagonist. Of course I play all kinds of games, but there's just something special about playing a story with a strong woman at the center of it all. Especially when that woman in represented correctly. When some horny fucker doesn't get their hands on the character design. Let me explain.

After some research, I found that the first ever female protagonist in a game was Billie Sue from the 1982 game, Wabbit. Created by Vietnamese game programmer, Van Mai, the game followed a farmer girl in a shoot em' up. Her goal was to protect her crops from hordes of bunnies coming to chomp on her crops. With the power of rotten eggs, Billie Sue wards them off to keep her crops safe. A simple concept with a plot that's straight forward, and a cute protagonist. But oh did we start to fall from grace.

Obviously we have the trailblazers in gaming like Chun-Li and Lara Croft. They're iconic in their own rights, but there's something they have in common. At one point or another, their designs were made for the male gaze. "What is the male gaze?", you may ask. Well its when a character, usually a feminine character, is made to be sexually appealing to the male audience. It happens all the time in every piece of media you can consume, and it is ever so present in gaming.

Going back to Lara, she wasn't always sexualized. Sure, her body and measurements were extremely unrealistic and unattainable, but her outfit was appropriate for the most part. But then when get to 2008; the year Square Enix published Tomb Raider Underworld. Her base game outfits are okay. Shorts with some minimal cleavage make the clothing socially acceptable. That is until you beat the game and unlock the other playable costumes. A lot of them being bikinis. I mean, who really asked for Lara to be in a bikini? Why would the developers choose to expose and exploit such an empowering character like this?

Mileena's insanely inappropriate outfit for MK9 Photo from Kult of Personality

For the exact reason that MK9 Mileena and Capcom's Morrigan of Dark Stalkers exist. The whole idea that sex sells. It wasn't originally supposed to appeal to a female audience, no. It was supposed to draw in horny men. If they get their rocks off on seeing an animated girl half clothed or in precarious positions, then they'll buy the game and be more invested in the product. I mean Jesus, look at Stellar Blade!

While I played Stellar Blade because I love the hack and slash genre, many players only hopped onto the band wagon because of protagonists look. Which initially isn't the worst thing in the world. Eve (the protagonist) is initially wearing this skin tight latex outfit. Sure, there are some jiggle physics, but that's not the most offensive thing. While I bought the game out of investment in the story and world building, and the interesting enemies that were designed for the game, others fixated on the unlockable and collectible outfits that expose Eve. Furthermore, if you look into the fanbase that have Eve profile pictures that support the game, all they point out is how "hot" Eve is. Not how the game tried to build emotional connections, and how interesting it was that androids believed they were humans. Because they don't care. All they care about is how the blood rushes to their dick when they look up her skirt or at her cleavage.

And god forbid a game developer tries to step away from the norms or what is deemed appealing to the male audience. Take a look at the Intergalactic, a game announced by Naughty Dog back in December of 2024. Instead of overwhelming excitement to see a new game by the developers that brought us The Last of Us and Uncharted, there was nothing but negativity. Why? Because the assumed protagonist isn't "attractive". One twitter user replied underneath the announcement post, "Intergalactic looks lame, uninspiring, and terribly woke. On top of that, it features blatant product placement--Sony, Adidas, Porsche. It represents everything that is wrong with the Western AAA game industry." Another went as far as to post this:

Here's the link in case you don't believe me: https://twitter.com/zim964/status/1867632668969775288

See how disgustingly toxic men are in these communities? Instead of enjoying the game for whatever it is, they are instantly offended that they aren't turned on by the female character. If a woman portrayed as realistic, relatable, or different then it is instantly "woke garbage". These misogynistic, perverted people don't care about anything other than sex, not realizing that the fanbase isn't just them. Women want to be represented accurately, and respectfully. Women are not objects for these bastards to ogle at or judge because we also forget, a lot of these models are based on real people! Imagine how the face models must feel to be oversexualized or degraded in anyway after participating in a project that should be fun.

This isn't to say male characters aren't sexualized and their face models harassed. I think a lot of people remember the whole Leon/Eduard Badaluta from Resident Evil situation. But it seems like it happens a lot less to the male protagonists than the female protagonists.

I started played video games with feminine leads when I was a little girl because I loved playing strong women. Independent women that could handle the most insane situations on their own. Whether people want to acknowledge it or not, media will always empower someone. Video games are apart of that media. Not everyone enjoyed Princess Peach and Zelda (I know they're different now, but they were damsels once upon a time). I loved Jill Valentine and Kassandra from AC Odyssey. And there's a difference between sexy and sexualized!

Oddly enough, I feel Bayonetta is not sexualized. She's constantly in odd positions, yes, but it's not for the enjoyment of the player. I can't explain it very well, but she's an example of a sexy and strong protagonist that doesn't feel like she was created to appeal to a male audience. If that were the case, the franchise would've done as well as Stellar Blade did. Nina Williams from Tekken is sexy, not sexualized. I never feel like her character is over exposed. There are a plethora of leads that are done well and don't feel like they were made to appease to the male audience.

While the industry's gotten better, and the developers have become more progressive, I would hate for that to regress because some may call this "woke". Representation and respect isn't just pandering to a demographic. It's making them feel seen. It gives them something to relate to and an escape that feels personal to them. So if you find this "woke" then that's too damn bad, because we're not gonna stop asking for it.