Male Heroes

Dr Kathryn Wright, in her article at womengamers.com, agrees that unfortunately this is and was the case:

Most computer games are created by males, for males. A visit to the local computer store shows that 3D action games, sports games, and military games – obviously targeted towards males – take up most of the shelf space. Until very recently, females rarely appeared in computer games or on game boxes – the overwhelming majority of characters and protagonists are male.

The male role has always been a dominant one. Top Dog. Number One. The Big Cheese. Never has the male ever shown fear, or sadness, or any form of a chink in their indelible armor of goodness or badness. Society is partially to blame here, as many observe the male as a stalwart figure who must hide his emotions, rather than let them fly off the handle and go around crying like a milkmaid. I can understand why gamers wouldn’t want the cyborg from Deus Ex to start weeping when he realizes he’s capped the asses of men who have families, but I still think that the bias of Society is to blame in this context. Females in society are ‘allowed’ to act in this way, and hence they are slated as unlikely heroes in a potential game. Personally, I enjoy a good tear-jerk myself, but only when alone in the warm embrace of nice glass of white zinfandel and some old movies. Uh, what I meant was that I enjoy gratuitous action films and never cried a day in my life. Long live stereotypes!

Bungie has produced several games -- not only the Marathon series, but also Minotaur, Pathways into Darkness, and the Myth series, and is now working on Oni and Halo. The games that Bungie has released so far have been very short on female characters, with one result being a colony ship seemingly having an all-male population. However, I doubt that that is much worse than games featuring insulting portrayals of women. Consider the case of the late Dr. Isaac Asimov, the famous science fiction and science writer. He had been criticized for not including women in many of his earlier stories; his reason was that he was not sure how to write them in a dignified way. Most of the portrayals he had seen in his 1930's adolescence were of women being captured and placed in some great -- and unspecified -- danger by the villains, only to be rescued by the heroes. It seemed to him that the women were simply being transferred from one harem to another.

The male lead is still a dominant one, but a strong cast of leading ladies is slowly joining them. Konoko from Bungie’s Oni has joined the ranks of other female heroines like Lara Croft of Tomb Raider Rynn of Drakkan: Order of the Flame, and the zerg queen Kerrigan in StarCraft: Broodwar, among others. Not only do they continue to pluck our heartstrings, but they are strong characters personality-wise as well. The growing ranks of female gamers has helped spawned this phenomenon, as Dr. Wright describes:

Some companies believe that the creation of new types of games designed specifically for females is not necessarily to bridge the gender gap. Rather, they argue, better marketing of existing game genres to female consumers may be all that is required – i.e. the development of traditional male games with stronger female characters.

Ok, so it’s not a complete acknowledgement of the female consumer presence, but it’s a turn in the right direction. In fact, this decision on behalf of gaming companies is beneficial to all as it allows the game to encompass both sexes, rather than games aimed specifically for a sex. Their numbers will grow, and soon I believe there will be a distinct female heroine presence in the gaming market. Hopefully, this outcome will bridge the gap of the sexes and allow gamers to truly unite under a single banner. You go girl!

Next page: Female Heroes

1 - Female Versus Male Heroes: does sex make a difference?

2 - The Male Heroes

3 - The Female Heroes