Nearly 80% of video game characters are male

[StaceyPowers]

Here is an article discussing a study on diversity in video game characters.

https://www.newsweek.com/nearly-80-video-game-characters-are-male-according-new-diversity-study-1616389

“Nearly 80 percent of video game characters are male, according to a new survey by gaming website Diamond Lobby. Over 100 games from 2017 to 2021 were surveyed, including 10 of the highest selling games from each of the respective years.”

I have to admit that is actually a larger percentage than I thought.

[Shagger]

That actually is quite surprising to me. I play so many games that either let you choose your characters gender of have female leads that I'd even say for me it may even be slightly more in favour of female protagonists. I don't play so many games with female protagonists on purpose, there's jut a lot on female protagonists in the games I happen to enjoy like Tomb Raider, Horizon Zero Dawn or The Last of Us Part II. Of coerce, in the The Last of Us part one the protagonist is male, but that held no relevance to my enjoyment of the game. I suppose the survey will include a lot of sports games (like FIFA and Madden) and military shooters (like COD and Battlefield) that I don't tend to buy and they come out every year, and since so few of those games (especially historical ones) have female protagonists that could be part of the reason why the scale tops the way it does. Look at it this way, there has been 3 Tomb Raider games released in the same time period as 7 COD's. So as alarming as those statistics are, I don't think they are truly reflective of what gamers choose to play.  It's ultimately up to publishers/developers what gender they make thier characters, not gamers.

 

EDIT: I Just had a skim through my installed games on my PC and I genuinely do have more games installed from my library's than have female characters than male, but vast majority are games that let one choose or have a mixture of both. So whilst I can accept the survays numbers as real, I don't think it demonstrated what, in general,  gamer's attitudes tend to be.

 

 

Edited August 22, 2021 by Shagger

[Crazycrab]

I'm not surprised that it's a higher percentage of male characters but It's higher than I thought to.  I guess it includes FPS franchises like Call if Duty where the protagonists are almost always male.

 

I remember that some publishers used to make some of the most pathetic excuses as to why there isn't any female protagonists in their games.  Former Ubisoft Creative Director Alex Amancio once said that "Women are to difficult to animate", bloody ridiculous.  They've also made the excuse that games with woman on the cover don't sell, when at the time they were given half the marketing push.

 

It's obvious when you look at the success of games like Tomb Raider, Horizon Zero Dawn and Life is Strange that female characters are marketable and can make money.

[The Blackangel]

I think one of the reasons that the vast majority of game characters are male is due to gaming history. In the early days of gaming, starting with the Atari in 1977, gaming was targeted at a male base. They knew that guys didn't want to play as a girl. That was too effeminate and would challenge their masculinity. The first game that ever featured a female lead was Ms Pac-Man. And all that was, was Pac-Man with a bow. Other than that, there was literally no difference in the two games. But at the same time, we had games like Custer's Revenge. It was nothing more than a rape simulator, as that was the goal of the game. Look it up if you don't believe me.

And then you have to look at the beginning of games with female leads. The first Tomb Raider showed o woman with a 10" waist and tits bigger than her head. Every 17 year old boys fantasy woman. Thankfully they have gone more realistic with their depictions. We also got Barbie dolls more realistically designed as it gave an unrealistic standard of beauty to young girls. But that's getting off topic.

So since in the early days gaming was targeted to a male base, that mentality has carried over to gaming today. Sure, the amount of games that feature female leads are a billion times more than they were in the beginning, they're still not anywhere near the amount of games with male leads.

[m76]

The article says that 60% of games had both male and female playable characters, then how is it 80% male? Oh, did they count all NPCs? This is clickbait for the sake of clickbait. If henchman were female in games, then they'd cry "videogames glorify violence against women" or some other clickbaity headline.

[m76]

9 hours ago, The Blackangel said:

I think one of the reasons that the vast majority of game characters are male is due to gaming history. In the early days of gaming, starting with the Atari in 1977, gaming was targeted at a male base. They knew that guys didn't want to play as a girl. That was too effeminate and would challenge their masculinity. The first game that ever featured a female lead was Ms Pac-Man. And all that was, was Pac-Man with a bow. Other than that, there was literally no difference in the two games. But at the same time, we had games like Custer's Revenge. It was nothing more than a rape simulator, as that was the goal of the game. Look it up if you don't believe me.

And then you have to look at the beginning of games with female leads. The first Tomb Raider showed o woman with a 10" waist and tits bigger than her head. Every 17 year old boys fantasy woman. Thankfully they have gone more realistic with their depictions. We also got Barbie dolls more realistically designed as it gave an unrealistic standard of beauty to young girls. But that's getting off topic.

So since in the early days gaming was targeted to a male base, that mentality has carried over to gaming today. Sure, the amount of games that feature female leads are a billion times more than they were in the beginning, they're still not anywhere near the amount of games with male leads.

This is just pure revisionist history. There were plenty of games with female leads before tomb raider. That Tomb Raider was the first game with a female lead is  utterly ridiculous.   And who even thinks about the gender of a  dot with a mouth?

[Empire]

At this point it's safer for developers not to include any female characters in their games at all. The worst that can happen is that they'll be accused of not being inclusive. At least they won't be forced to spend money reworking things that feminists are offended by.

They can make a lot of noise - e.g Assassin's Creed, Witcher 3 but at least they won't get banned. (see GTA V).

[Crazycrab]

2 hours ago, m76 said:

This is just pure revisionist history. There were plenty of games with female leads before tomb raider. That Tomb Raider was the first game with a female lead is  utterly ridiculous.   And who even thinks about the gender of a  dot with a mouth?

 

She never said it was, don't put words in people's mouths.  With that being said, outside of tournament fighters like Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat (where the rosters were still mostly male) the only pre Lara Croft popular female human character that I can think of is Samus from Metriod, even that was kept under wraps until the end of the first game. Playable female characters was NOT a common thing at all back then.  I'm sure there other games that I can't think of but to say female characters were rare is not "pure revisionist history", it's the truth.

Edited August 23, 2021 by Crazycrab

[m76]

 

4 minutes ago, Crazycrab said:

 

She never said it was, don't put words in people's mouths.  With that being said, outside of tournament fighters like Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat the only pre Lara Croft popular female human character that I can think of is Samus from Metriod, even that was kept under wraps until the end of the first game. Playable female characters was NOT a common thing at all back then.  I'm sure there other games that I can't think of but to say female characters were rare is not "pure revisionist history", it's the truth.

Mea culpa, I misunderstood, she said "The beginning of games with female leads, the first tomb raider". I interpreted that As in the first game to have a female lead.

Still Tomb Raider is nowhere near the beginning of the history of female leads, so my statement stands.

 

Edited August 23, 2021 by m76

[Crazycrab]

16 minutes ago, m76 said:

 

Mea culpa, I misunderstood, she said "The beginning of games with female leads, the first tomb raider". I interpreted that As in the first game to have a female lead.

 

 

Except she already mentioned Ms Pac-Man, so it's clear that's not what she was saying.  You were intentionally being selective.  When I read it the idea the I got (@The Blackangel is free to correct me if I got the wrong idea) was the Lara Croft was the first playable character to popularize the concept of female leads.  Unfortunately it achieved this by still pandering to the male audience with an over-sexualised depiction of a woman.  All of which is 100% true.

[m76]

Female leads were not anathema to gamers before 1996.

I find it laughable that people think that sexual attraction is a bad thing.

That said I never found Lara Croft's depiction in the early games attractive, I think it was just a bad design from the dark ages of 3D graphics. When your character budget is 150 polygons the best you can do is cones. What you call over sexualized I call idealized. Same as male heroes all had idealized figures unattainable to most average men. I didn't see that as a problem, so I don't know why is it a problem with female characters.

Heros should look like something to aspire to, not average dudes and gals.

 

Edited August 23, 2021 by m76

[Shagger]

On 8/23/2021 at 12:05 PM, Empire said:

At this point it's safer for developers not to include any female characters in their games at all. The worst that can happen is that they'll be accused of not being inclusive. At least they won't be forced to spend money reworking things that feminists are offended by.

They can make a lot of noise - e.g Assassin's Creed, Witcher 3 but at least they won't get banned. (see GTA V).

 

I couldn't agree with you less.

Making an inclusive game (and not just including woman either) isn't nearly as hard as you make it out to be, it just takes a little courtesy and common sense. HZD, Life is Strange, the Tomb Raider, Tell me Why, Mass Effect, Dragonage, even more recent Assassin's Creed games seemed to manage. Are there people guaranteed to piss and moan no matter what? Unfortunately, yes, but that's not a feminist issue, people aligned with the opposite extreme are just guilty of that.

 

I remember a few years ago a DLC was launched for AC Odyssey that was ment to carry on based upon choices one made in the game. Unfortunately, the expansion luached with a bug that meant people who chose to play the female lead and romanced a woman were starting the DLC under "Conditions" that only made sense if your character had romanced a man. People complained about this, Ubisoft apologized for the mistake and it was patched soon after. Were there crazy SJW's who went full tin foil hat on this to turn this into a misogynistic conspiracy against woman and the LGBTQ community when all it was in then was a continuity bug? Of course yes, but in the end it was a mistake, Ubisoft owned, apologized and fixed it, that's the end of the matter... or at least it should have been. In a counter protest that I can't quite believe happened, anti-SJW's attacked Ubisoft after patching this bug for "pandering" to SJW's and somehow forcing a left wing agenda on people, all because they patched a bug. The SJW's may have overacted, but at least they had something to overact to, but these morons who got thier precious little man-feelings hurt because Ubisoft game people an option to play a game as a gay woman would be hilarious if wasn't so stupid. We live in a world where game developers can't even patch bugs without somebody turning it into a social/political controversy.

 

I used the terms "SJW" and "Anti-SJW" in this post to distinguish between them is this story, but ultimately they are two Half's of the same stupid, so that's why I call them "professionally offended". Just because of their specific disdains are different, doesn't mean they're both equally self centred, childish, arrogant, ignorant and stupid. That's why I personally don't tolerate the implied narrative that only one side is in the wrong with this, because that just isn't the case. Sadly, the only sound minded people in this sitting the middle are ignored simply because we aren't loud enough. We are drowned out the idiots on either side of us.

 

Back to the meat of the topic though. I have to admit that if I were to take side in this, it would more likely be the side on inclusion because, in the end, me playing a character that's on the LGBTQ spectrum, is female, of an ethnic minority or whatever it happens to be does not affect me. It doesn't matter to me, it's not a threat to me, but what does it mean to somebody who lives thier real life in those shoes? To be represented, acknowledged, to see someone you can relate to put on a pedestal as a empowering character when you're perhaps used to being marginalized and ignored just for being you, it's a wonderful thing. And more importantly, it hurts nobody, except those who just prejudiced, and they can frankly fuck off.i Video games, along with all entertainment media, at least the expressions contained therein that are worth a damn, at least to some extent reflect reality. So the excuse "I don't have a problem with X group, I just don't want them in my video games" doesn't work because your problem isn't X group being represented in your fiction, and that it's represented in reality. That is what we call bigotry, and it is not a valid excuse.

 

I admit this topic is a little triggering for me, I'll also admit it's kind of my failing as well because I'm the one who doesn't get it. I just don't understand who inclusion hurts and why. If inclusion comes at the price of historical accuracy or messing with a long established lore I can see why people would call it out and that they would have a point, but otherwise I just don't see how that hurts anyone. I somehow doubt anyone woke up in the middle of the night with a cramp screaming, "Oh, my leg, my leg! If only they hadn't put a woman on the cover of Battlefield V, then I wouldn't be in this agony!". So this is an open call, if anyone reading this can explain why inclusion hurts you, please do so. Don't be shy. I can't say I won't challenge your explanation, but I promise I will listen to it and give it a fair chance. This has been bugging me for years and I need an answer.

Edited August 11, 2022 by Shagger

[The Blackangel]

55 minutes ago, Crazycrab said:

Except she already mentioned Ms Pac-Man, so it's clear that's not what she was saying.  You were intentionally being selective.  When I read it the idea the I got (@The Blackangel is free to correct me if I got the wrong idea) was the Lara Croft was the first playable character to popularize the concept of female leads.  Unfortunately it achieved this by still pandering to the male audience with an over-sexualised depiction of a woman.  All of which is 100% true.

In a nutshell, that's what I was getting at. Female leads got more popular when Tomb Raider came out. Yes there were female protagonist games where you play as a woman before Tomb Raider. But in my opinion, and from what I've seen, (correct me if I'm wrong) it was Tomb Raider that really got the ball rolling.

 

34 minutes ago, Shagger said:

I couldn't agree with you less.

Making an inclusive game (and not just including woman either) isn't nearly as hard as you make it out to be, it just takes a little courtesy and common sense. HZD, Life is Strange, the Tomb Raider, Tell me Why, Mass Effect, Dragonage, even more recent Assassin's Creed games seemed to manage. Are there people guaranteed to piss and moan no matter what? Unfortunately, yes, but that's not a feminist issue, people aligned with the opposite extreme are just guilty of that.

 

I remember a few years ago a DLC was launched for AC Odyssey that was ment to carry on based upon choices one made in the game. Unfortunately, the expansion luached with a bug that meant people who chose to play the female lead and romanced a woman were starting the DLC under "Conditions" that only made sense if your character had romanced a man. People complained about this, Ubisoft apologized for the mistake and it was patched soon after. Were there crazy SJW's who went full tin foil hat on this to turn this into a misogynistic conspiracy against woman and the LGBTQ community when all it was in then was a continuity bug? Of course yes, but in the end it was a mistake, Ubisoft owned, apologized and fixed it, that's the end of the matter... or at least it should have been. In a counter protest that I can't quite believe happened, anti-SJW's attacked Ubisoft after patching this bug for "pandering" to SJW's and somehow forcing a left wing agenda on people, all because they patched a bug. The SJW's may have overacted, but at least they had something to overact to, but these morons who got thier precious little man-feelings hurt because Ubisoft game people an option to play a game as a gay woman would be hilarious if wasn't so stupid.

 

I used the terms "SJW" and "Anti-SJW" in this post to distinguish between them is this story, but ultimately they are two Half's of the stupid, so that's why I call them "professionally offended". Just because of their specific disdains are different, doesn't mean they're both equally self centered, childish, arrogant, ignorant and stupid. That's why I personally don't tolerate the implied narrative that only one side is in the wrong with this, because that just isn't the case. Sadly, the only sound minded people in this sitting the middle are ignored simply because we aren't loud enough. We are drowned out the idiots on either side of us.

 

Back to the meat of the topic though. I have to admit that if I were to take side in this, it would more likely be the side on inclusion because, in the end, me playing a character that's on the LGBTQ spectrum, is female, of an ethnic minority or whatever it happens to be does not affect me. It doesn't matter to me, it's not a threat to me, but what does it mean to somebody who lives thier real life in those shoes? To be represented, acknowledged, to see someone you can relate to put on a pedestal as a empowering character when you're perhaps used to being marginalized and ignored just for being you, it's a wonderful thing. And more importantly, it hurts nobody, except those who just prejudiced, and they can frankly fuck off. Video games, along with all entertainment media, at least the expressions contained therein that are worth a damn, at least to some extent reflect reality. So the excuse "I don't have a problem with X group, I just don't want them in my video games" doesn't work because your problem isn't X group being represented in your fiction, and that it's represented in reality. That is what we call bigotry, and it is not a valid excuse.

 

I admit this topic is a little triggering for me, I'll also admit it's kind of my failing as well because I'm the one who doesn't get it. I just don't understand who inclusion hurts and why. If inclusion comes at the price of historical accuracy or messing with a long established lore I can see why people would call it out and that they would have a point, but otherwise I just don't see how that hurts anyone. I somehow doubt anyone woke up in the middle of the night with a cramp screaming, "Oh, my leg, my leg! If only they hadn't put a woman on the cover of Battlefield V, then I wouldn't be in this agony!". So this is an open call, if anyone reading this can explain why inclusion hurts you, please do so. Don't be shy. I can't say I won't challenge your explanation, but I promise I will listen to it and give it a fair chance. This has been bugging me for years and I need an answer.

I agree with you for the most part. I can't say there is anything I disagree with, but I do have a somewhat differing view and a bit of insight.

I'm part of the LGBTQ+ community. Inclusion and invisibility is something we have fought for, for decades. We don't want to be seen as "gay people" or "transgender people". We just want to be seen as people. That said, it's a great leap towards that goal to have games like Tell Me Why that feature a transgender protagonist. But there is harm that comes with every game that features anyone from the LGBTQ+ community in a positive light. It brings out the conservatives and bigots, who intentionally look for us. It's like when the Westboro Baptist Church protests at the Renaissance Festival or a gay mans funeral shouting "God hates fags! All sodomites will burn in hell for your sick perversions" and other bullshit like that. It often puts under a spotlight, which singles us out for attacks, both verbal and physical. While I love playing games that put my community in a positive light, I am also very wary of buying them, even digitally online. If there is one bigot at Steam, that has a problem with me for buying >insert game< due to it having the LGBTQ+ community portrayed positively, then I could be in danger in many ways. We have to watch our backs more than a lot of people.

We want to be included. Male, female, both, neither, gay, bi, lesbian, and anywhere else on the spectrum. We just don't want to be singled out for an attack. That's the only time when inclusion has a chance of being bad in any way.

Edited August 23, 2021 by The Blackangel

[Reality vs Adventure]

5 hours ago, m76 said:

The article says that 60% of games had both male and female playable characters, then how is it 80% male?

80% are male characters with lead roles. 60% are playable characters both female and male not in a lead role. 

[Crazycrab]

2 hours ago, m76 said:

Female leads were not anathema to gamers before 1996.

I find it laughable that people think that sexual attraction is a bad thing.

That said I never found Lara Croft's depiction in the early games attractive, I think it was just a bad design from the dark ages of 3D graphics. When your character budget is 150 polygons the best you can do is cones. What you call over sexualized I call idealized. Same as male heroes all had idealized figures unattainable to most average men. I didn't see that as a problem, so I don't know why is it a problem with female characters.

Heros should look like something to aspire to, not average dudes and gals.

 

 

You see a lot of hero's that are larger the life characters, especially in video games. That's fine but it doesn't suit every narrative.  Take somone like Duke Nukem for example, you could argue that he's cut from the cloth as Lara.  He's an exaggerated caricature of everything a man wants to be.  Muscular, rich, surrounded by beautiful woman... You get idea.  But do really take him seriously?  No.  It's a character that wouldn't work in a game where your expected to get emotionally attached or invested.  He's a joke, and we know he's a joke.  The old Lara was the same.

 

Not every hero needs to be something to one aspires to be.  In many, and I'd even dare to say most narratives require a hero that's more down to earth a sympathetic.