Phaseknox

I don’t really recall a bunch of users always getting on my case over the years for liking to play as female characters in video games, but I know that they sometimes make fun of me for it because I’m so adamant about it. I seriously didn’t realize that I was coming across like this. You’re the first to bring it to my attention, and I didn’t know that you had this view of me. It’s a bit disheartening to hear. I appreciate you bringing all of this to my attention, because I guess that I’ve been kind of naive to how I’ve been coming across with my views on certain things and how I’ve been presenting them. I know that I can be hardheaded at times and set in my ways, but I do listen and want to do better.

With harassment and death threats? Of course not, I didn’t realize that the hate could be so extreme. That’s different from people just voicing their opinions on what they disagree with or dislike, or not buying the games like you said. It’s worse than I realized. I’m not really familiar with the term soft sexism, this is the first that I’ve heard it referred to me. Multiple people haven’t mentioned it over the years over and over. And pathological, ingrained sexism on a subconscious level? Clearly deep, pathological problems? I didn’t realize that I was coming across like that. And I don’t recall saying that anyone was wrong about anything. However, I don’t deny that I do need to work on myself in some ways.

Fair enough, I didn’t realize that it was just speculation that Mary Jane in Spider-Man 2 was modeled from the insomniac employee because they definitely look a lot alike. But regardless she does look somewhat different and less attractive (IMO) compared to how she looked in the first Spider-Man game, and I don’t know why they changed her. I didn’t make baseless accusations about the motivations of developers, I just gave my personal opinion on how things somewhat appear from my perspective. If others disagree then that’s fine. As for developers they usually only get treated like absolute shit when they do things that go against what their fanbase wants, a good example is Volition and Saints Row. They doubled down during the development of the Saints Row reboot despite fans voicing their dislike with the direction that they were going with it, and look where that got them. Developers don’t always do the right thing, and when they don’t they should be called out on it. I do feel as if I’ve probably had this same conversation too many times at this point, it does feel like going around in circles. I guess that I just can’t resist the topic since I primarily like playing as female characters in games these days. I don’t mean to cause a stir with any of it, I just like to discuss this stuff since I enjoy gaming and talking with other gamers about the hobby. We’re of course not always going to agree or see eye to eye on things, but that just comes with the territory in general. Regardless I still like to get other perspectives on things, because I like to see where others are coming from.

She was only one of many examples that I gave, and I admittedly probably shouldn’t have used her as an example because she does look pretty close to her real life actress who is attractive IMO. The golfers that you can play as in the PGA Tour 2K games ARE make believe characters invented for a video game and not real life golfers. The only sports game that I play is golf, and you’re able to select or create fictional characters in them like in many RPGs. Mary Jane in Spider-Man 2 looks almost exactly like that Insomniac employee that worked on the game, it has to be more than a mere coincidence because Mary Jane didn’t look like that in the first Spider-Man game. She was prettier, and looked more like the real life model that she was modeled from. With that said, I wasn’t aware that the real life model received backlash. It’s not her fault that Insomniac altered her look in the game. I wasn’t aware of this, the harassment clearly wasn’t deserved or justified in any conceivable way. What does the real life model have to do with how Insomniac decided to make Mary Jane look in the game? It’s not cherry picking, the discussion is about western game devs doing it while Asian game devs don’t. I can’t think of a single Asian developed game that has what I consider to be an unattractive female protagonist in it, and I play a lot of Asian developed games. You did give some examples of attractive female characters in western developed games, and so did I. I never claimed that all western developed games feature unattractive female characters, because they clearly don’t. You could be right, I’m not ruling it out. What you said definitely does seem to be the case in some instances, but I do still feel like it’s intentional at times as well. I just can’t look at a female character like the one in the Fable reboot for example and think otherwise. I don’t have regressive gender values, and I’m not sexist. Quite the opposite actually, because sexists refuse to play as female characters in games regardless of what they look like. I just happened to develop what I consider to be a mental condition where I primarily desire to play as female characters in games now as opposed to male ones, and I think that part of it is due to me playing as so many male characters over the years. I got tired of playing as them all the time, and I was also starting to find them less appealing as main characters as well. I tend to prefer the attitudes, personalities and voice actors of female characters. As for what they look like, I just like the characters that I play as in games in general to be what I consider appealing, attractive and cool looking regardless of their gender.

The game character (Jesse Faden) looks similar to her actress (Courtney Hope), but not exact IMO. Jesse looks less attractive/pretty to me than Courtney. This discussion is about female characters in western developed games looking less attractive, not Asian developed ones so I don’t know why you’re both listing female characters from Asian developed games. And no one said that there are no attractive or fewer attractive looking characters in games in general, just that it seems like female characters are sometimes being made less attractive looking in western developed games which does somewhat seem to be the case to me which I gave some examples of. First of all I never used the term ugly since I don’t think that most of the examples that I gave are ugly per se, just less attractive IMO. Secondly, I do think that in some cases what you’re saying may be correct but it didn’t seem to be a problem for the devs who made the attractive female characters that I mentioned. And it’s been proven that Mary Jane in Spider-Man 2 was partly modeled from a female employee working on the game: Why? I like playing as what I personally consider appealing and attractive looking characters in every game that I play including sports games.

Some examples of western developed games with female characters in them that seem to have been deliberately made less attractive looking (IMO) include: Control, Deliver Us Mars, The Division series, Fable reboot, Ghost Recon Wildlands/Breakpoint, The Last of Us Part II, Mass Effect Andromeda, Outriders, PGA Tour 2K21/23, Rage 2, Returnal, Scars Above, Spider-Man 2, Star Wars Outlaws and Wolfenstein: Youngblood. And look what they recently did to the preexisting female characters in Pokémon GO: Perhaps it’s more noticeable to me since I primarily like playing as female characters in games, but as someone who does it seems to be more blatant and often from my perspective.

I do feel that some western devs have been deliberately making female characters less attractive to thwart the so-called “male gaze” and to prevent the characters from being objectified and sexualized, but attractiveness and sexualization are not one and the same. I almost exclusively like to play as female characters in games these days, and I admit that part of the reason why is because I personally find them to be more aesthetically appealing than male characters. And I’m talking about realistic looking athletic badass female characters, not overly sexualized ones. I prefer playing as acrobatic, agile, fast and quick female characters as opposed to big bulky muscly slow tank male characters. I also tend to prefer their attitudes, personalities and voice actors to their male counterparts as well. Some examples of female characters that I like from the past decade include: Aloy (Horizon series), Aveline de Grandpre (Assassin’s Creed Liberation), Evie Frye (Assassin’s Creed Syndicate), Kassandra (Assassin’s Creed Odyssey), Dani Rojas (Far Cry 6), Katharine (King’s Bounty II), Amicia de Rune (A Plague Tale series), Lara Croft (Tomb Raider survival trilogy) and Chloe Frazer (Uncharted: The Lost Legacy). They’re all realistic looking, naturally attractive (not super models) and not sexualized in any way. With that said, I don’t have a problem with occasional sexy anime style female characters like Bayonetta, 2B and Eve because I like anime. Stellar Blade is an over the top AA Asian developed fantasy horror sci-fi action adventure game that’s not meant to be realistic in any way, so I don’t feel that the characters in it are out of place for what it is.

I started playing Almost My Floor, it’s a 2D side scrolling psychological horror point-and-click adventure game.

I finished Raging Bytes. 2024 Games A Plague Tale: Innocence A Space for the Unbound Avengers Raging Bytes

That’s why it’s not on PS4.

New albums by Dawn of Ashes and Nocturna. @Dodger @DPCyric

I bought the first game back when it came out and quite enjoyed it, but it had a lot of bugs at that time and a gamebreaking one unfortunately ended my progress so I got rid of it. The Royal Edition that includes all of the DLC is currently on sale for $4, so I bought it. I’m looking forward to playing this sequel when I get a PS5.

I started playing Raging Bytes, it’s a 2D top down view pixel art zombie apocalypse game with 3D turn-based combat. It has a retro style charm to it.

I finished Avengers, it was a decent third person action beat ‘em up platformer that could have been a lot better if the single player experience was the focus instead of the co-op/multiplayer live service stuff. 2024 Games A Plague Tale: Innocence A Space for the Unbound Avengers