I think it would go a long way if characters were generally dressed logically, regardless of their sex or “class”. Wizards may be wearing robes, but that doesn’t mean they need to look like they’re naked underneath (I wouldn’t be if I were facing down a dragon). Fighters certainly need armor that actually serves some really protective function. And whoever saw a real military uniform that was designed to show off the curve of a woman’s breasts and where the nipples are? I don’t think that it’s totally unreasonable. I think the characters could be just as visually appealing and certainly far more inviting for some of us to play.

It might be just me, but it seems there’s a long, long tradition in fantasy games and literature of northern “barbarian” types being rather underdressed – whether they’re male or female.

Take a look at Conan, or just do a google image search of the word “barbarian”. It seems to me that, at least in the case of the Guild Wars character, the dress is more or less the equivalent of how males tend to be portrayed in that genre, and have been for over 50 years. Bare torsoes are part of the genre, so I don’t think there’s anything particularly sexist going on in this case.

The others … I’m tempted to agree.

But all I ever got out of him was that women are more beautiful to look at, and the whole target audience bit. As well as the whole “sex sells” thing. Female gamers are becoming more and more a part of the community, and I really think the development teams are failing to acknowledge that. Next to naked men in the ads wouldn’t really make it better…it would be ever bit as silly, but it might buffer the exploitation aspect of it a bit. If the woman’s going to be ridiculously under dressed, might as well make the man dressed in the same fashion.

Or better yet, how about just putting full armor on both genders?

Either way, after a lot of half assed excuses that just summed up to “I’m a guy and I like to look at nearly naked women”, something clicked and he made his “slut” outfit for one of his male characters: cowboy boots, briefs, a bowtie and policeman hat. For which he’s gotten a lot of negative comments.

Along the fighting game not: most games do have a huge focus on breast dynamics. I’ve loved the Tekken series for ages. But even it’s been going downhill. However, even though the girls aren’t exactly dressed for a tournament, at least the guys aren’t any better.

I do have to ask this question, specifically of Jen. Are you saying that a women can’t be sexy wearing actual clothing? I don’t know about anyone else, but I find the thought of a women who’s willing to stand toe to toe with a guy, carry the same amount of armor, sweat it out and still kick ass sooo much more attractive.

Maybe that’s just me.

And the last thing before I end this post, I checked DR because I was making a fighter and I checked to see what the males look like. I was wrong. They start out in some kind of peasant outfit. But the game gives you an option to make them run around shirtless if you want. And the females, the thing you start out in is basic armor but once again, that outfit is the outfit the females wear under everything. So once again, you do have the option of letting her run around in it. I, personally, prefer to have armor on her. Because when you’re being attacked by Fade Lichs or, even worse, Poison Blademasters, you’d want to have at least a little bit of armor.
Anyway, enough of my rambling, I hope I answered all your questions you had for me.

I hear the “they’re just games” argument a lot. I’m well aware that they’re just games. That doesn’t mean that I don’t find a lot of the art ridiculous. If this stuff wasn’t typical, I wouldn’t even be talking about it, but it is. What’s on the box or on the promo art makes a difference. It influences how the game, the company and the industry as a whole is thought of, not to mention how those of us who partake of the industry are thought of. Do you honestly think that the – still very alive and kicking – perception of gamers as overgrown boys with low social skills isn’t influenced by this stuff?

I’m not saying that every girl gamer agrees with my issues with these pieces of art and with art like them. But I’m not a lone voice in the crowd either. There’s plenty of room for lots of ways of thinking. What’s at issue here is that the art is actively driving some of us away when it should be pulling us in and is helping to color the gaming population in ways that maybe we don’t want to be colored (Why do you think no presidential candidate will accept money from a gaming company right now? It’s not because they think we’re all great, wholesome, family-values-supporting, taxpaying voters.) I think it’s an important issue and I’m not the only one talking about it.

I really appreciate you responding, and I would like to hear more from you (especially on the book-videogame thing), but I also hope that you can see why I felt the need to talk about this and why it probably won’t be the last time I do so.

Now as a side note, the whole nipples showing through the clothes thing… that’s not art… its tacky. At least the DR art was tasteful.

As robust as City of Heroes’ character creation is, it sorely lacks the options to make androgynous characters or women with small, insignificant mammaries (no matter how small you try to make them, they are obvious protrusions complete with light effects to highlight curvature). That, along with very limited “andro” clothing and hair styles make the character options very limited in any way that would help lessen the sexuality of the character.

To your posts too about characters, this article (and the witty comments) made me chuckle. http://www.games.net/article/feature/115881/the-top-16-androgynous-game-characters-of-all-time/

All age groups of guys? But anyways, yeah, people buy them, but do they like the covers? Are they put off? Do they buy it because they’re already fans of the author/series/book/whatever and not because they don’t mind the cover art?

Stuff to think about.

Back to the topic. This post made me laugh so hard (“I just want to wrap her in a towel and tell her it’s going to be ok” = choking with laughter), because everything is true. I do think that marketing people are trying to cater to only one demographic, and that’s not working.

What I think is the problem is the lack of practical imagination and the overabundance of completely impractical imagination in the marketing department of things. Surely if they can dream up an outift that looks like it “doesn’t belong anywhere outside of the bedroom”, to quote an article whose URL I’ve forgotten, and put it on a woman who’s out there fighting demons, evil knights, etc., etc., they can put together something sensible. Say, real armor made of proper metal that covers everything that would need to be covered in a situation where there are a lot of people trying to kill you, and not “armor” made of little leather bits. Sometimes it isn’t even leather; it’s some medieval version of spandex. Spandex that’s eight sizes too small.

Conclusion: Whoever puts together these stupid ads had better get wise fast. But I’m one of those girls offended by this sort of stuff; I might be biased. Cough.