Hypersexualization of Women In Games
Women are sexualized all the time, it is not just a problem that is seen in the gaming industry. But I will say that I personally believe that it is the genre that has it the worst. In the graphic on the right, I took a few video game characters and collaged them to show you just a selection of female characters that are like this. On the top left, you see Katana from Mortal Kombat, all of her outfits that can be chosen are oversexualized. Under her is Lara Croft from Tomb Raider. On the right top to bottom, I include Ivy from Soul Calibur, Morrigan from Dragon Age and lastly Quiet from Metal Gear Solid. Each of the characters I included are barely clothed and we will talk more about that below. It is time to start thinking about the impact that these characters have on players. I think a big question is where we see this. The trend is most prominent in male-oriented fighting games like Mortal Kombat and games rated teen and above. Men, for the most part, run the gaming industry, which includes development roles, writing roles, CEO positions, and even illustration departments. Since men run these departments they are going to create games that they think men want to see i.e hypersexualized female game characters. With that being said, let's talk about clothing. |
Female characters in video games have been hypersexualized for years. Games like Mortal Kombat and Tomb Raider, as mentioned above, feature female characters that are dressed in sexual ways. You have fighting games where women are constantly in battle, Lara Croft is climbing through the jungle and Katana is fighting one on one battles, however, they are still dressed as if they are lounging by the pool. I don’t know about you but if I am climbing through the jungle I am going to wear pants and a shirt not shorts and a shirt that is basically a bra. More often than not any fighting game that you play, women will be clothed in bikini tops and shorts whereas men will be in full body armor or at least clothes that cover them. It is not logical for these female characters to be wearing what they are. Anita Sarkeesian has done countless videos and reports on the way women are treated and portrayed within video games. In a video titled “Lingerie is not Armour - Tropes vs. Women in Video Games.” she discusses a lot about the clothing that women are put in. Sarkeesian talks about how practical clothing is just not there. As an individual who plays games, I would much prefer to have my characters dressed appropriately for the activities they will be involved in. This is not new, women for years have been saying things along these lines. An article done by Becky Chambers on The Mary Sue said, “If I’m a soldier, I want to look like the rest of my squad. If I’m escaping a zombie apocalypse, I want shoes I can run in and clothes that minimize the likelihood of getting bitten”. Women just want to feel like they belong in the game, and are not put in as sexual objects. It is not just video games that do this though, think of movies, how many superhero movies do you see where women are wearing impractical things? Using Wonder Woman as an example, she wears scantily-clad clothing when her duty is to fight other extremely powerful entities and save citizens from danger. Her attire is simply not adequate or protective enough for the type of actions she performs when viewing this from a common-sense standpoint. During her video, Sarkeesian said “Games and other media often work to frame this sexualization as a positive thing for women… but it is not actually empowering because the sexuality these characters exude are manufactured for and, presented as existing for, the presumed straight male player” The player is always presumed to be a male and that is not always the case. Women play games too, and they want to play like men are. They want their characters to actually make sense.
It is not just clothing either, you also have the scenes that females characters are put into. I’m gonna talk about Quiet in Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain. She is a combat expert dressing in basically just fishnets. What gets me laughing is the fact that the game makers say that Quiet has a flesh-eating parasite, which forces her to breathe through her skin hence the more clothes she has on the harder it is to breathe. According to an article by Paul Tassi Kojami the game’s developer said a player should be ashamed if they look at her like that because she is ashamed of herself. So yeah maybe this is the case, maybe we should not be looking at these characters in sexual ways, but with that being said it is more than just the dress. Quiet had cutscenes that were very sexual like the scene where she stretched in a helicopter and her ass is directly in your face, stripped off her fishnets in the rain, or showered inside of a cage looking object while men watched. The scenes have nothing to do with the gameplay at all and are really not needed. They are purely put in to make more interest for men, maybe that is why video game porn is so popular. But the problem isn’t just clothing and cut scenes.
Tropes are another big problem in video games. Females want to be in power too, so why are men always the ones doing the saving? That brings me to my second point. The ”damsel in distress” trope, it is a way to provoke an emotion from male players when they can save the female sidekick or another female character in-game. Anita Sarkeesian did a two-part series on just this trope, you can watch part 1 and 2 here. It is, in a sense, derogatory. Women have the same right as a man to be the savior and the hero, but that is not often seen. My problem with the hypersexualization of females, and using them as pawns, is that this is what is being taught to the people buying these games. When kids are little they watch and play what their parents do. If a child is watching their father play or even playing themselves they are going to see women treated this way and do the same. Let’s take Grand Theft Auto 5 as an example. In the game, you can hire a prostitute, then kill them to get your money back, what is that saying about women in our society? Playing games that portray women as objects leads to an idea that women are less than or not as worthy. We need to stop sexualizing females and make female characters that are just as equal as their male counterparts.
It is not just clothing either, you also have the scenes that females characters are put into. I’m gonna talk about Quiet in Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain. She is a combat expert dressing in basically just fishnets. What gets me laughing is the fact that the game makers say that Quiet has a flesh-eating parasite, which forces her to breathe through her skin hence the more clothes she has on the harder it is to breathe. According to an article by Paul Tassi Kojami the game’s developer said a player should be ashamed if they look at her like that because she is ashamed of herself. So yeah maybe this is the case, maybe we should not be looking at these characters in sexual ways, but with that being said it is more than just the dress. Quiet had cutscenes that were very sexual like the scene where she stretched in a helicopter and her ass is directly in your face, stripped off her fishnets in the rain, or showered inside of a cage looking object while men watched. The scenes have nothing to do with the gameplay at all and are really not needed. They are purely put in to make more interest for men, maybe that is why video game porn is so popular. But the problem isn’t just clothing and cut scenes.
Tropes are another big problem in video games. Females want to be in power too, so why are men always the ones doing the saving? That brings me to my second point. The ”damsel in distress” trope, it is a way to provoke an emotion from male players when they can save the female sidekick or another female character in-game. Anita Sarkeesian did a two-part series on just this trope, you can watch part 1 and 2 here. It is, in a sense, derogatory. Women have the same right as a man to be the savior and the hero, but that is not often seen. My problem with the hypersexualization of females, and using them as pawns, is that this is what is being taught to the people buying these games. When kids are little they watch and play what their parents do. If a child is watching their father play or even playing themselves they are going to see women treated this way and do the same. Let’s take Grand Theft Auto 5 as an example. In the game, you can hire a prostitute, then kill them to get your money back, what is that saying about women in our society? Playing games that portray women as objects leads to an idea that women are less than or not as worthy. We need to stop sexualizing females and make female characters that are just as equal as their male counterparts.