As a trope the Damsel in Distress is a plot device in which a female character is placed in a perilous situation from which she cannot escape on her own and must then be rescued by a male character, usually providing a core incentive or motivation for the protagonist’s quest.

• Check out this site full of videos, images and character bios for Dinosaur Planet
• The Secret History of Super Mario Bros 2 by Chris Kohler at Wired

For more examples of the Damsel in Distress see our Tumblr for this series:
http://tropesversuswomen.tumblr.com

About the Series:

The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects.

This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

Transcript

Clip- Princess Peach: Mario! Ah! Help!

Clip- montage

Welcome to our multi-part video series exploring the roles and representations of women in video games. This project will examine the tropes, plot devices and patterns most commonly associated with women in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective.

This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects.

So without further ado let’s jump right in to the Damsel in Distress.

Let’s start with a story of a game that no one ever got to play.

Back in 1999 game developer RARE was hard at work on a new original title for the Nintendo 64 called “Dinosaur Planet”. The game was to star a 16 year old hero named Krystal as one of the two playable protagonists. She was tasked with traveling through time, fighting prehistoric monsters with her magical staff and saving the world. She was strong, she was capable and she was heroic.

Clip- Dinosaur Planet Trailer Footage
And who might you be, animal girl?
My name is Krystal!

Pretty cool right? Well it would have been, except the game never got released. As development on the project neared completion, legendary game-designer Shigeru Miyamoto joked about how he thought it should be the 3rd installment in his Star Fox franchise instead. Over the next two years he and Nintendo did just that. They re-wrote and re-designed the game, and released it as Star Fox Adventures for the Game Cube in 2002.

Clip- Star Fox Adventures

In this revamped version the would-be protagonist Krystal has been transformed into a damsel in distress and spends the vast majority of the game trapped inside a crystal prison, waiting to be rescued by the game’s new hero Fox McCloud.

The in-game action sequences that had originally been built for Krystal were converted to feature Fox instead. Krystal is given a skimpier more sexualized outfit.

Clip- Star Fox Adventures
Wow. She’s beautiful! What am I doing?!

And yes, that is cheesy saxophone music playing to make sure it “crystal clear” that she is now an object of desire even while in suspended animation – to add insult to injury Fox is now using her magic staff to fight his way through the game to save her.

Clip- Star Fox Adventures

The tale of how Krystal went from protagonist of her own epic adventure to passive victim in someone else’s game illustrates how the Damsel in Distress trope disempowers female characters and robs them of the chance to be heroes in their own rite.

The term “damsel in distress” is a translation of the French “demoiselle en détresse”. Demoiselle simply means “young lady” while détresse means roughly “Anxiety or despair caused by a sense of abandonment, helplessness or danger.”

As a trope the damsel in distress is a plot device in which a female character is placed in a perilous situation from which she cannot escape on her own and must be rescued by a male character, usually providing a core incentive or motivation for the protagonist’s quest.

In video games this is most often accomplished via kidnapping but it can also take the form of petrification or demon possession for example.

Traditionally the woman in distress is a family member or a love interest of the hero; princesses, wives, girlfriends and sisters are all commonly used to fill the role.

Of course the Damsel in Distress predates the invention of video games by several thousand years. The trope can be traced back to ancient greek mythology with the tale of Perseus.

According to the myth, Andromeda is about to be devoured by a sea monster after being chained naked to a rock as a human sacrifice. Perseus slays the beast, rescues the princess and then claims her as his wife.

In the Middle Ages the Damsel in Distress was a common feature in many medieval songs, legends and fairy tales. The saving of a defenseless woman was often portrayed as the raison d’être – or reason for existence – in romance tales or poems of the era involving a ‘Knight-errant’ the wandering knight adventuring to prove his chivalry, prowess and virtue.

At the turn of the 20th century, victimized young women become the cliche of choice for the nascent American film industry as it provided an easy and sensational plot device for the silver screen. A famous early example is the 1913 Keystone Kops short “Barney Oldfield’s Race for a Life” which features the now iconic scene of a woman being tied to the railroad tracks by an evil mustache twirling villain.

Clip- Barney Oldfield’s Race for a Life

Around the same time, the motif of a giant monkey carrying away a screaming woman began to gain widespread popularity in media of all kinds. Notably, Tarzan’s love interest Jane is captured by a brutish primate in Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 1912 pulp-adventure “Tarzan and the Apes”. In 1930, Walt Disney used the meme in an early Mickey Mouse cartoon called “The Gorilla Mystery”.

Clip- The Gorilla Mystery

The imagery was even exploited by the US Military in this recruitment poster for World War I.

But it was in 1933 that two things happened which, 50 years later, would set the stage for the Damsel in Distress trope to become a foundational element in video games as a medium. First, Paramount Pictures introduced their animated series “Popeye the Sailor” to cinema audiences.

The formula for most shorts involves Popeye rescuing a kidnapped Olive Oyl.

Clip- Popeye the Sailor
marry me?!
Oh popeye, help!

Second, in March of that year, RKO Pictures released their groundbreaking hit film “King Kong” in which a giant ape abducts a young woman and is eventually killed while trying to keep possession of her.

Clip-  King Kong
[Screams]

Fast forward to 1981 when a Japanese company named Nintendo entrusted a young designer named Shigeru Miyamoto with the task of creating a new arcade game for the American market.

Originally, the project was conceived of as a game starring Popeye the Sailor, but when Nintendo wasn’t able to secure the rights, Miyamoto created his own characters to fill the void, heavily influenced by the movie, King Kong.

Clip- Donkey Kong

The game’s hero “Jump Man” is tasked with rescuing a damsel, named “The Lady” after she is carried off by a giant ape. In later versions she is renamed “Pauline”.

Although Donkey Kong is perhaps the most famous early arcade game to feature the Damsel in Distress it wasn’t the first time Miyamoto employed the trope. Two years earlier, he had a hand in designing a 1979 arcade game called Sheriff.

Clip- Sheriff

In it a vague female-shaped collection of pixels, referred to as “The Beauty”, must be rescued from a pack of bandits. The hero is then rewarded with a “smooch of victory” for his bravery in the end.

A few years later Miyamoto recycled his Donkey Kong character designs; Pauline became the template for a new damsel named Princess Toadstool and “Jump Man” became a certain very famous plumber.

Clip- Super Mario Bros: The Great Mission to Save Princess Peach
[Screams]

Princess Peach is in many ways the quintessential “stock character” version of the Damsel in Distress.  The ill-fated princess appears in 14 games of the core Super Mario Brothers platformer games and she’s kidnapped in 13 of them.

Clip-  Mario 25^th Anniversary Video

The North American release of Super Mario Brothers 2 in 1988 remains the only game in the core series in where Peach is not kidnapped and also the only game where she is a playable character. Though it should be noted it wasn’t originally created to be a Mario game at all. The game was originally released in Japan under a completely different title called Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic which roughly translates to “Dream Factory: Heart-Pounding Panic”.

Clip: Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic Japanese ad- [Japanese Dialogue]

Nintendo of America thought that the original Japanese release of Super Mario Brothers 2 was too difficult and too similar to the first game so they re-skinned and re-designed Doki Doki Panic to star Mario and Luigi instead.

Clip – Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic

Clip- Super Mario Bros. 2

However the Japanese game already had 4 playable characters, so the designers opted to include Toad and the Princess to fill the two remaining slots, building directly on top of the older pre-existing character models. So really, if we’re honest, Peach is kinda, accidently playable in this one.

Clip- Super Mario Bros 2

Still, she had the awesome ability to float for short distances, which came in really handy especially in the ice levels.

Sadly Peach has never been a playable character again in the franchise. Even with newer games that feature 4 player options, like New Super Mario Brothers Wii and Wii U, the Princess is still excluded from the action. She’s been replaced with another Toad instead as to allow Nintendo to force her back into the damsel role again and again.

Clip- New Super Mario Bros U

Peach does of course appear in many spin-offs such as the Mario Party, Mario Sports and Mario Kart series as well as the Super Smash Brothers Nintendo Universe crossover fighting games. However all of these spins-offs fall well outside the core Super Mario series of platformers. She is the star of only one adventure and we will get to that a little later.

One way to think about Damsel’d characters is via what’s called the subject/object dichotomy. In the simplest terms, subjects act and objects are acted upon. The subject is the protagonist, one the story is centered on and the one doing most of the action. In video games this is almost always the main playable character and the one from whose perspective most of the story is seen.

So the damsel trope typically makes men the “subject” of the narratives while relegating women to the “object”. This is a form of objectification because as objects, damsel’ed women are being acted upon, most often becoming or reduced to a prize to be won, a treasure to be found or a goal to be achieved.

The brief intro sequence accompanying many classic arcade games tends to reinforce the framing of women as a possession that’s been stolen from the protagonist.

Clip- Montage

The hero’s fight to retrieve his stolen property then provides lazy justification for the actual gameplay.

At its heart the damsel trope is not really about women at all, she simply becomes the central object of a competition between men (at least in the traditional incarnations). I’ve heard it said that “In the game of patriarchy women are not the opposing team, they are the ball.” So for example, we can think of the Super Mario franchise as a grand game being played between Mario and Bowser. And Princess Peach’s role is essentially that of the ball.

Clip: Super Mario Galaxy 2
Princess Peach: Mario!

The two men are tossing her back and forth over the course of the main series, each trying to keep and take possession of the damsel-ball.

Clip- Mario Sports Mix

Even though Nintendo certainly didn’t invent the Damsel in Distress, the popularity of their “save the princess” formula essentially set the standard for the industry. The trope quickly became the go-to motivational hook for developers as it provided an easy way to tap into adolescent male power fantasies in order to sell more games to young straight boys and men.

Clip- Montage
Help me! Help me! Help me! Save me! Help! Please help me please!

Throughout the 80s and 90s the trope became so prevalent that it would be nearly impossible to mention them all. There are literally hundreds of examples showing up in platformers, side scrolling beat-em ups, first person shooters and role-playing games alike.

Clip- Montage

Many of these games drew inspiration from the historical myths that we discussed earlier. Medieval legends, Greek mythology and Arabic folk tales were all popular themes.

Let’s take a quick moment to clear up some common misconceptions about this trope. As a plot device the damsel in distress is often grouped with other separate tropes: including the designated victim, the heroic rescue and the smooch of victory. However it’s important to remember that these associated conventions are not necessarily a part of the damsel in distress trope itself.

So the woman in question may or may not play the victim role for the entire game or series while our brave hero may or may not even be successful in his rescue attempt. All that is really required to fulfill the damsel in distress trope is for a female character to be reduced to a state of helplessness from which she requires rescuing by a typically male hero for the benefit of his story arc.

This brings us to the other famous Nintendo Princess. In 1986 Shigeru Miyamoto doubled down on his Damsel in Distress formula with the NES release of The Legend of Zelda. This was the first in what would become one of the most beloved action adventure game franchises of all time.

Clip- Zelda 2 The Adventure of Link Ad ! The legend of Zela continues
Rescue the princess! Zelda! Zelda! Zelda 2 The Adventure of Link! Nintendo! Now you’re playing with power!

Over the course of more than a dozen games, spanning a quarter century, all of the incarnations of Princess Zelda have been kidnapped, cursed, possessed, turned to stone or otherwise disempowered at some point.

Clip- Montage

Zelda has never been the star in her own adventure, nor been a true playable character in the core series.

However it must be said that not all damsels are created equal and Zelda is occasionally given a more active or integral role to play than her counterpart in the Mushroom Kingdom. Unlike Peach, Zelda is not completely defined by her role as Ganondorf’s perpetual kidnap victim and in a few later games she even rides a line between damsel and sidekick. Remember the Damsel in Distress as a plot device is something that happens to a female character, and not necessarily something that the character is from start to finish.

Once in awhile she might be given the opportunity to have a slightly more active role in facilitating the hero’s quest – typically by opening doors, giving hints, power-ups and other helpful items. On rare occasions she might even offer a last minute helping hand to the hero after all is said and done at end of the journey. I call this variant on the theme “The Helpful Damsel”.

Indeed Zelda is at her best when she takes the form of Sheik in Ocarina of Time (1998) and Tetra in The Wind Waker (2003).

Clip- The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

In Ocarina of Time, Zelda avoids capture for the first three quarters of the game. Disguised as Sheik she is a helpful and active participant in the adventure and is shown to be more than capable, however as soon as she transforms back into her more stereotypically feminine form of Princess Zelda, she is kidnapped within 3 minutes. Literally 3 minutes, I timed it. Her rescue then becomes central to the end of Link’s quest.

Clip- The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker

Similarly, in The Wind Waker (2003), Tetra is a feisty and impressive young pirate captain. But as soon as she is revealed to be, and transformed into her more stereotypically feminine form of Princess Zelda, she is told that she’s no longer allowed to accompany Link on the adventure because it’s suddenly “too dangerous” for her. She is ordered to wait in the castle, which she does until she is eventually kidnapped, while waiting obediently in the same spot. It is noteworthy that in the very last stage of the boss battle, she does help Link fight Ganondorf, for a few brief minutes, which is a refreshing change.

Clip- The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass

However the next time Tetra’s incarnation appears in 2007’s The Phantom Hourglass she is kidnapped immediately during the intro. Later she is turned to stone and then kidnapped for a second time.

It’s disappointing that even with her moments of heroism, Zelda is still damsel’ed – she is removed from the action, pushed aside, and made helpless at least once in every game she appears in.

Clip- The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Original Ad

This brings us to one of the core reasons why the trope is so problematic and pernicious for women’s representations. The damsel in distress is not just a synonym for “weak”, instead it works by ripping away the power from female characters, even helpful or seemingly capable ones. No matter what we are told about their magical abilities, skills or strengths they still ultimately captured or otherwise incapacitated and then must wait for rescue.

Distilled down to its essence, the plot device works by trading the disempowerment of female characters FOR the empowerment of male characters.

Clip- Vigilante

Let’s compare the damsel to the archetypal Hero Myth, in which the typically male character may occasionally also be harmed, incapacitated or briefly imprisoned at some point during their journey.

Clip- Montage

In these situations, the character relies on their intelligence, cunning, and skill to engineer their own escape — or, you know, just punching a hole in the prison wall works too.

The point is they are ultimately able to gain back their own freedom. In fact, that process of overcoming the ordeal is an important step in the protagonist’s transformation into a hero figure.

A Damsel’ed woman on the other hand is shown to be incapable of escaping the predicament on her own and then must wait for a savior to come and do it for her.

Clip- New Super Mario Bros Wii

In this way the Damsel’s ordeal is not her own, instead it’s framed as a trial for the hero to overcome. Consequently, the trope robs women in peril of the opportunity be the architects of their own escape and therefore prevents them from becoming archetypal heroes themselves.

Today many old-school damsel games are being resurrected for modern platforms, services or mobile devices as publishers are in a rush to cash in on gaming nostalgia and capitalize on any recognizable characters from years gone by.

For example- SEGA’s 1993 platformer Sonic CD featuring a damsel’ed Amy Rose has been enhanced and made available for download on a wide variety of modern platforms

Clip- Sonic CD

Jordan Mechner’s famous (1984) Karateka and Prince of Persia (1989), originally released for the Apple ii home computer in the 1980s, have both seen modern HD remakes.

Clip- Montage

And the 1983 animated Laserdisc game Dragon’s Lair with ditzy Princess Daphne has been ported to just about every system imaginable

Clip- Dragon’s Lair
Daphne: Please save me! The cage is locked! With a key! The dragon keeps it around his neck! To slay the dragon us the magic sword!

Remember Pauline, damsel from the classic Donkey Kong arcade?

Clip- Donkey Kong

Well she has also been revived, first in 1994’s Donkey Kong for the Gameboy and later in the Mario vs Donkey Kong series for the Nintendo DS. Each game features a re-hashing of the old excuse plot with Pauline is whisked away by the giant ape during the opening credits.

Clip- Mario vs Donkey Kong: Mini-Land Mayhem- Mario!
Pauline: Please help me!

The now iconic opening seconds of the 1987 beat-em up arcade game Double Dragon has Marian being punched in the stomach, throwen over the shoulder of a thug and carried away. In several versions her panties are clearly shown to the player while being abducted.

Clip- Double Dragon

The game has been remade, re-released and ported to dozens of systems over the last 25 years, ensuring that Marian will continue to be battered and damseled for each new generation to enjoy. Most recently Double Dragon Neon in 2012 re-introduced new gamers to this repressive crap yet again, this time is full HD.

Clip- Double Dragon Neon

The pattern of presenting women as fundamentally weak, ineffective or entirely incapable also has larger ramifications beyond the characters themselves and the specific games they inhabit. We have to remember that these games do not exist in a vacuum, they are an increasingly important and influential part of our larger social and cultural ecosystem.

The reality is that this troupe is being used in a real-world context where backwards sexist attitudes are already rampant. It’s a sad fact that a large percentage of the world’s population still clings to the deeply sexist belief that women as a group need to be sheltered, protected and taken care of by men.

The belief that women are somehow a “naturally weaker gender” is a deeply ingrained socially constructed myth, which of course is completely false- but the notion is reinforced and perpetuated when women are continuously portrayed as frail, fragile, and vulnerable creatures.

Just to be clear, I am not saying that all games using the damsel in distress as a plot device are automatically sexist or have no value. But it’s undeniable that popular culture is a powerful influence in or lives and the Damsel in Distress trope as a recurring trend does help to normalize extremely toxic, patronizing and paternalistic attitudes about women.

Now I grew up on Nintendo, I’ve been a fan of the Mario and Zelda franchises for most of my life and they will always have a special place in my heart, as I’m sure is true for a great number of gamers out there. But it’s still important to recognize and think critically about the more problematic aspects especially considering many of these franchises are as popular as ever and the characters have become worldwide icons.

The good news is that there is nothing stopping developers from evolving their gender representations and making more women heroes in future games. It would be great to finally see is Zelda, Sheik and Tetra as the protagonists at their own games… and not just mobile DS games, I’m talking full-on console adventures.

Ok, so we’ve established that the Damsel in Distress trope is one of the most widely used gendered cliché in the history of video games and has been core to the popularization and development of gaming as a medium. But what about more modern games? Has anything changed in the past ten years? Well, stay tuned for part 2 where I’ll be looking at more contemporary examples of the Damsel in Distress trope.  We’ll look at all the dark and edgy twists and turns and see how the convention been used and abused right up until today. And then we’ll check out some games in which developers have tried to flip the script on the Damsel.

I would like to extend a big thank you to all my backers on kickstarter who have continued to support me and helped to make this video series a reality!

TRIGGER WARNING: This video contains a handful of graphic scenes involving violence against women. Parents should preview the video first before sharing with young children.

Links & Resources

• The normalization of violence in heterosexual romantic relationships: Womens’ narratives of love and violence by Julia T. Wood
• Every 9 Seconds: a non-profit committed to Education, Prevention, Intervention & Legislative lobbying to create change in the arena of domestic violence victimization and survivor incarceration worldwide.
• Facts and Statistics about Domestic Violence
• Women in Refrigerators: this is the official WIR website including Simone’s original letter, full list of comic book characters as well as responses from other comic book fans.
• Dear Esther
• To The Moon
• Passage
• Errant Signal – “Edgy” Video Games

For more examples of the Damsel in Distress see our Tumblr for this series: http://tropesversuswomen.tumblr.com

Definitions

The Damsel in Distress: As a trope the damsel in distress is a plot device in which a female character is placed in a perilous situation from which she cannot escape on her own and must then be rescued by a male character, usually providing an incentive or motivation for the protagonist’s quest. This is most often accomplished via kidnapping but it can also take the form of petrification, a curse or demon possession. Traditionally the woman in distress is a love interest or family member of the hero; princesses, wives, girlfriends and sisters are all commonly used to fill the role.

Damsel in the Refrigerator: A combination of the Women in Refrigerators trope and the Damsel in Distress trope. Typically this happens when a female character is killed near the beginning of a story but her soul is then stolen or trapped and must be rescued or freed by the male hero. Occasionally time travel or some other form of resurrection may be involved in the quest to bring the women in question back from the dead.

Disposable Damsel: A variant of the Damsel in Distress trope in which the hero fails to save the woman in peril either because he arrives too late or because (surprise twist!) it turns out she has been dead the whole time.

Euthanized Damsel: A combination of the Damsel in Distress trope and the Mercy Killing trope. This usually happens when the player character must murder the woman in peril “for her own good”. Typically the damsel has been mutilated or deformed in some way by the villain and the “only option left” to the hero is to put her “out of her misery” himself. Occasionally the damsel’ed character will be written so as beg the player to kill her.

About the Series

The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

Spoiler Warning List

Major plot points or endings in the following games:
· Bionic Commando (2009)
· Borderlands 2 (2012)
· Breath of Fire IV (2000)
· Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles (2007)
· Castlevania: Lament of Innocence (2003)
· Castlevania: Lords of Shadow (2010)
· Dante’s Inferno (2010)
· The Darkness II (2012)
· Dead Space (2008)
· Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs The Soulless Army (2006)
· Double Dragon Neon (2012)
· Gears of War 2 (2008)
· God of War: Ghost of Sparta (2010)
· The Godfather: The Game (2006)
· Grand Theft Auto III (2001)
· Hotline Miami (2012)
· Ico (2001)
· Infamous (2009)
· Inversion (2012)
· Kane & Lunch: Dead Men (2007)
· The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2006)
· MediEvil 2 (2000)
· Ninja Gaiden 3 (2010)
· Pandora’s Tower (2011)
· Prey (2006)
· Resident Evil 5 (2009)
· Shadows of the Damned (2011)
· Tenchu: Shadow Assassins (2009)

Transcript

Welcome to the 2nd episode in our multi-part series exploring the roles and representations of women in video games. This project examines the tropes, plot devices and patterns most commonly associated with women in gaming systemic, big picture perspective.

Over the course of this series I will be offering critical analysis of many popular games and characters, but please keep in mind that it’s both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy a piece of media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects.

I just want to caution viewers that as we delve into more modern games we will be discussing examples that employ some particularly gruesome and graphic depictions of violence against women. I’ll do my best to only show what is necessary but this episode does come with a trigger warning. It’s also recommended that parents preview the video first before sharing with younger children.

In our previous episode we explored the history of the Damsel in Distress and how the trope became so pervasive in classic era games from the 80s and early 90s. We also explored some of the core reasons why damsel’ed characters are so problematic as representations of women. So if you haven’t seen it yet, please check that one out before continuing to watch this one.

As a trope the damsel in distress is a plot device in which a female character is placed in a perilous situation from which she cannot escape on her own and then must be rescued by a male character, usually providing an incentive or motivation for the protagonist’s quest.

Now it might be tempting to think the Damsel in Distress was just a product of its time, and that by now surely the trope must be a thing of the past. Well, while we have seen a moderate increase in the number of playable female characters, the plot device has not gone away. In fact the Damsel in Distress has even seen a bit of a resurgence in recent years.

Clip – Montage

The Bouncer– [Screams]
TimeSplitters 2- [Screams]
Rygar: The Legendary Adventure– “Rygar!”
Maximo: Ghosts to Glory- “Silence!”
Castlevainia: Harmony of Dissonance- “Nooo!
Grabbed by the Ghoulies- [Muffled screams]
Resident Evil 4- [Screams]
Red Steel- “You’ve got to get me out of here”
Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword– [Screams]
Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones- [Laughter]
Devil May Cry 4- “Come and get her”
Prototype- “Alex!”
Ghostbusters: The Video Game- [Screams}
Splatterhouse (2010)- “He’s…He’s hurting me”
Alan Wake- [Screams]“Alice?!”
Deadlight- “Help, Please!”
Hitman: Absolution- “Bullet in her head!”
Ninja Gaiden II- “What a dear little bird you are”

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg; suffice it to say the trope is alive and well even today.

Clip- Devil May Cry 4
“Let her go!”

And since the majority of these titles focus of delivering crude, unsophisticated male power fantasies, developers are largely unwilling to give up the Damsel in Distress model as an easy default motivation for their brooding male heroes or anti-heroes. Remember that as a trope the Damsel in Distress is a plot device used by writers, and not necessarily always just a one-dimensional character type entirely defined by victimhood.

Now and then Damsel’d characters may be well written, funny, dynamic or likeable.

Clip- Psychonauts
“I’m just trying to set you on fire through this stupid hat!”
“What a delightfully mean little brain you have.”

However this extra character development tends to make their eventual disempowerment all the more frustrating. Damsels on the more sassy end of the spectrum may struggle with their captors…

Clip- Hitman: Absolution
“Get away from me!”

… or even attempt an escape on their own but inevitably their efforts always prove futile. Occasionally they may be allowed to offer the hero a last minute helping hand or to kick the bad guy while he’s down but these moments are largely symbolic and typically only happen after the core adventure is over or the danger has passed.

These token gestures of pseudo-empowerment don’t really offer any meaningful change to the core of the trope and it feels like developers just throw these moments in at the last minute to try to excuse their continued reliance on the damsel in distress.

Periodically, game developers may attempt to build a more flushed out relationship or emotional bond between Damsel’d character and the male protagonist. In the most decidedly patronizing examples depictions of female vulnerability are used for an easy way for writers to trigger an emotional reaction in male players.

As we discussed in our first episode, when female characters are damsel’ed, their ostensible agency is removed and they are reduced to a state of victimhood.

So narratives that frame intimacy, love or romance as something that blossoms from or hinges upon the disempowerment and victimization of women are extremely troubling because they tend to reinforce the widespread regressive notion that women in vulnerable, passive or subordinate positions are somehow desirable because of their state of powerlessness. Unfortunately these types of stories also help to perpetuate the paternalistic belief that power imbalances within romantic relationships appealing, expected, or normal.

Ok so we know that the Damsel in Distress is alive and well in gaming but that’s not the full picture, there’s even more insidious side to the story. Over the past decade game companies have been desperately searching for ways to stand out in a market increasingly oversaturated with very similar products. As a consequence we’ve seen a dramatic increase in the number of games attempting to cut through the clutter by being as “dark and edgy” as possible.

So we’ve seen developers try to spice up the Damsel in Distress cliché by combining it with other tropes that involve victimized women. I’ve identified a few of the most common of these trope-cocktails, which join together multiple regressive or negative representations of women including the disposable woman, the mercy killing and the woman in the refrigerator.

The term “Women in Refrigerators” was coined in the late 1990s by comic book writer Gail Simone to describe the trend of female comic book characters who are routinely brutalized or killed-off as a plot device designed to move the male character’s story arc forward. The trope name comes from Green Lantern issue #54, in which the superhero returns home to find his girlfriend murdered and stuffed inside his refrigerator.

This trading of female characters lives for something meant to resemble male character development is of course part of a long media tradition, but the gruesome death of women for shock value is especially prevalent in modern gaming. The Women in the Refrigerator trope is used as the cornerstone of some of the most famous contemporary video games. It provides the core motivational hook behind both the Max Payne and the God of War series for example.

Clip- God of War
“My wife…my child…”

In each case the protagonists’ wife and daughter are brutally murdered and their deaths are then used by the developers as a pretext for their inevitable bloody revenge quest. It’s interesting to note that the reversed scenario, games hinging on a woman vowing revenge for her murdered boyfriend or husband are practically nonexistent. The gender role reversal is so unusual that it borders on the absurd, which is one of the reason’s why this scene from Disney’s Wreck it Ralph is so humorous.

I could do a very long video just exploring this one trope in gaming, but today I want to look at how the Woman in the Refrigerator is connected to the Damsel in Distress and specifically the ways game developers have found to combine these two plot devices. One popular variation is to simply use both tropes in the same plotline so as to have the male protagonist’s wife stuffed in the fridge while his daughter is damsel’ed.

In Outlaws (1997) your wife is brutally murdered and you then have to rescue your daughter.

Clip- Outlaws
“Who did this?”
“They’ve taken Sarah”

In Kane & Lynch your wife is brutally murdered and you then have to rescue your daughter.

Clip- Kane and Lynch
“I’ll find them all before they find Jenny”

In Prototype 2 your wife is brutally murdered and you then have to rescue your daughter.

In Inversion your wife is brutally murdered and you then have to rescue your daughter.

Clip- Inversion
“Leila, where is she?”

In Asura’s Wrath your wife is brutally murdered and you then have to rescue your daughter.

Clip- Asura’s Wrath
“Save her.”

In Dishonored the empress is brutally murdered and you then have to rescue her daughter – though it’s heavily implied that she is your daughter too.

Clip- Dishonored
“Find Emily. Protect her!”

It’s no coincidence that the fridged plot device and the damsel plot device work in much the same way, both involve female characters who have been reduced to states of complete powerlessness by the narrative. One via kidnapping and the other via murder. The two plot devices used together then allow developers to exploit both the revenge motivation and the good old fashioned “save the girl” motivation.

Believe it or not there is another more insidious version of this particular trope-hybrid, which I call the Damsel in the Refrigerator. Now you may be asking yourself how can a fridged woman still be in distress?  Since by definition being fridged usually sort of requires… being dead. Well here’s how it works — The Damsel in the Refrigerator occurs when the hero’s sweetheart is brutally murdered and her soul is then trapped or abducted by the villain. This ‘oh so dark and edgy twist’ provides players with a double dose of female disempowerment and allows developers to again exploit both the revenge motivation and the saving the damsel motivation but this time with the same woman at the same time.

This trope-combination can be traced back to old school sidescrollers like Splatterhouse 2 and Ghouls’n Ghosts but the Damsel in the Refrigerator has definitely become a more popular trend in recent years.

In Medievil 2 your murdered girlfriend’s soul is stolen and you must fight to save her.

Clip- Medievil 2
[Screams]

In The Darkness 2 your murdered girlfriend’s soul is trapped in hell and you must fight to free her.

Clip- The Darkness 2
“Her soul is mine!”

In Shadows of the Damned your murdered girlfriend’s soul is trapped in hell and you must fight to free her.

Clip- Shadows of the Damned
“Yes, help her!”
[Screams]

In Dante’s Inferno your murdered wife’s soul is trapped in hell and you must fight to free her.

In Castlevania: Lords of Shadow your murdered wife’s soul is trapped on Earth and you fight to free her.

The Damsel in the Refrigerator is part of larger trend of throwing women under the bus in increasingly gruesome ways in an apparent attempt to interject what I’ll loosely refer to as “mature themes”. Developers must be hoping that by exploiting sensationalized images of brutalized women it will be enough to fool gamers into thinking their games are becoming more emotionally sophisticated, but the truth is there is nothing “mature” about most of these stories and many of them cross the line into blatant misogyny.

Since what we are really talking about here are depictions of violence against women it might be useful to quickly define what I mean by that term. When I say Violence Against Women I’m primarily referring to images of women being victimized or when violence is specifically linked to a character’s gender or sexuality. Female characters who happen to be involved in violent or combat situations on relatively equal footing with their opponents are typically be exempt them from this category because they are usually not framed as victims.

As I mentioned in our last video the damsel in distress doesn’t always have to be accompanied by a heroic rescue.

Clip- Max Payne 3
“Here I was again, with all hell breaking loose around me, standing over another dead girl I had been trying to protect”

Sometimes the hero fails to save the woman in question either because he arrives too late or because (surprise twist!) she has been dead the whole time.

Clip Montage
Dead Space – “Nicole has been dead this whole time”
Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones (2005)- “No! Kaileena!”
InFamous- “All my powers…and I couldn’t do a thing”
Deadlight- [Cries] “Kill me”

Or in the case of the 2009 version of Bionic Commando, not only has your wife been dead the whole time but, turns out she’s also part of your bionic arm.

Clip- Bionic Commando
“I never wanted you to be involved in this”
“It’s okay, I’ll always be by your side”

Yes you heard that correctly, his wife IS his arm.

But the most extreme and gruesome variant of this trend is when developers combine the damsel in distress with the mercy killing. This usually happens when the player character must murder the woman in peril “for her own good”. I like to call this happy little gem the “Euthanized Damsel”. Typically the damsel has been mutilated or deformed in some way by the villain and the “only option left” to the hero is to put her “out of her misery” himself.

We can trace this one back to the original 1980s arcade game Splatterhouse in which your kidnapped girlfriend is possessed and the player is forced to fight and kill her.

After saving his bitten beloved in Castlevania: Lament of Innocence (2003) the hero must then kill her to gain the power to defeat Dracula.

Clip- Castlevania: Lament of Innocence
“Thank you”

In Breath of Fire 4 (2000) Elina has been turned into a hideous monster and then begs you to kill her.

In Gears of War 2, Dom is motivated to rescue his captured wife Maria. When he finds her, she has been starved and possibly tortured into a catatonic state; and so he shoots her.

In Tenchu: Shadow Assassins…

Clip- Tenchu: Shadow Assassins
“Do it, you must”

…the princess meekly asks the hero to cut her down to get to the villain, which he does.

A particularly egregious example can be found in Grand Theft Auto III (2001) when after you’ve rescued Maria Latore it’s implied that the protagonist suddenly shoots her because she is talking about stereotypically “girly things”.

Clip- Grand Theft Auto III
“I broke a nail, and my hair is ruined! Can you believe it? This one cost me $50!” [Gunshot]

The writers deliberately wrote her character to annoy the player so in the end, the violence against her becomes the punch line to a cheap, misogynist joke.

Sometimes these killings happen via cutscene while other games ask the player to participate directly by pulling the trigger themselves.

In the Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles remake if you don’t rescue Richter Belmont‘s beloved Annette, she will turn into a vampire and you’ll then have to kill her.

Clip- Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles
“Oh my God, Annette, I’m so sorry I didn’t save you. But you know what I do to vampires. What I have to do.”
“No! I’ll make you mine forever!”

The captured women in Duke Nukem 3D beg you to kill them throughout the game. This misogynist scene is regurgitated and actually made worse in the 2011 follow-up Duke Nukem Forever developed by Gearbox.

Another popular Gearbox game, Borderlands 2, also uses this plot twist when Angel asks the player to murder her as a way to try and thwart the villain’s evil plan.

Clip- Borderlands 2
“Destroying the iridium injectors that keep me…alive…will stop the key from charging and it will end a lifetime of servitude”

The end of Alone in the Dark (2008) gives the player the choice between killing your girlfriend yourself…

Clip- Alone in the Dark
“Chose quickly, carrier. Kill her or let her live. You alone can decide!”

…or letting Satan kill her, by being reborn in her body

The Wii game Pandora’s Tower includes one ending in which Elena begs you to kill her before she completes her transformation into a monster.

Clip- Pandora’s Tower
“Please…I beg of you”

Clip-Prey
“Help me, I’m so afraid!”

In the 2006 shooter Prey, when the hero finally reaches his abducted girlfriend she has been hideously mutilated and fused with a monster, which you must fight while she screams for help over and over again

Clip- Prey
“Get away from me, Tommy! She wants me to kill you! I can’t stop it! [Screams]

After being incapacitated she begs you to kill her…

Clip- Prey
“Please, Tommy, let me go”

… and the player can’t advance in the narrative until you shoot her in the face.

These damsel’ed women are written so as to subordinate themselves to men. They submissively accept their grisly fate and will often beg the player to perform violence on them – giving men direct and total control over whether they live or die. Even saying “thank you” with their dying breath. In other words these women are “asking for it” quite literally.

The Euthanized Damsel is the darkest and edgiest of these trope-hybrids but it’s also an extension of a larger pattern in gaming narratives where male protagonists are forced to fight their own loved ones who have been possessed or brainwashed by villains.

When Kratos finds his mother in the PSP game God of War: Ghosts of Sparta, she morphs into a hideous beast forcing you to fight and kill her. An act for which she thanks you with her dying breath.

Clip- God of War: Ghost of Sparta
“Finally, I am free”

After your girlfriend is transformed into a green ogre in Grabbed by the Ghoulies she chases you around trying to get kiss. Later you beat her unconscious before she can be returned to normal.

The final boss in Shadows of the Damned turns out to be your own girlfriend…

Clip- Shadows of the Damned
“Where is my freedom?!”

 …who you must shoot down.  Similar scenarios are replicated in dozens of other tittles as well:

Clip Montage- Resident Evil 5
“Get that device off her chest!”

Although the narratives all differ slightly the core element is the same, in each case violence is used to bring these women “back to their senses”.

These stories conjure supernatural situations in which domestic violence perpetrated by men against women who’ve “lost control of themselves” not only appears justified but is actually presented as an altruistic act done “for the woman’s own good”.
Of course, if you look at any of these games in isolation, you will be able to find incidental narrative circumstances that can be used to explain away the inclusion of violence against women as a plot device. But just because a particular event might “makes sense” within the internal logic of a fictional narrative – that doesn’t, in and of itself justify its use. Games don’t exist in a vacuum and therefore can’t be divorced from the larger cultural context of the real world.

It’s especially troubling in-light of the serious real life epidemic of violence against women facing the female population on this planet. Every 9 seconds a woman is assaulted or beaten in the United States and on average more than three women are murdered by their boyfriends husbands, or ex-partners every single day. Research consistently shows that people of all genders tend to buy into the myth that women are the ones to blame for the violence men perpetrate against them. In the same vein, abusive men consistently state that their female targets “deserved it”, “wanted it” or were “asking for it”,

Given the reality of that larger cultural context, it should go without saying that it’s dangerously irresponsible to be creating games in which players are encouraged and even required to perform violence against women in order to “save them”.

Even though most of the games we’re talking about don’t explicitly condone violence against women, nevertheless they trivialize and exploit female suffering as a way to ratchet up the emotional or sexual stakes for the player.

Despite these troubling implications, game creators aren’t necessarily all sitting around twirling their nefarious looking mustaches while consciously trying to figure out how to best misrepresent women as part of some grand conspiracy.

Most probably just haven’t given much thought to the underlying messages their games are sending and in many cases developers have backed themselves into a corner with their own game mechanics.  When violence is the primary gameplay mechanic and therefore the primary way that the player engages with the game-world it severely limits the options for problem solving. The player is then forced to use violence to deal with almost all situations because its the only meaningful mechanic available — even if that means beating up or killing the women they are meant to love or care about.

One of the really insidious things about systemic & institutional sexism is that most often regressive attitudes and harmful gender stereotypes are perpetuated and maintained unintentionally.

Likewise engaging with these games is not going to magically transform players into raging sexists. We typically don’t have a monkey-see monkey-do, direct cause and effect relationship with the media we consume. Cultural influence works in much more subtle and complicated ways, however media narratives do have a powerful cultivation effect helping to shape cultural attitudes and opinions.

So when developers exploit sensationalized images of brutalized, mutilated and victimized women over and over and over again it tends to reinforce the dominant gender paradigm which casts men as aggressive and commanding and frames women as subordinate and dependent.

Although these stories use female trauma as a catalyst to set the plot elements in motion, these are not stories about women. Nor are they concerned with the struggles of women navigating the mental, emotional and physical ramifications of violence.

Instead these are strictly male-centered stories in which, more often than not, the tragic damsels are just empty shells, whose deaths are depicted as far more meaningful than their lives. Generally they’re completely defined by their purity, innocence, kindness, beauty or sensuality. In short they’re just symbols meant to invoke the essence of an artificial feminine ideal.

Clip- Shadows of the Damned
“Help me!”

In fact these games usually frame the loss of the woman as something that has been unjustly “taken” from the male hero.

Clip- The Darkness II
“So now I take from you”
“Jackie, this is not your fault”
[Gunshot]

The implication being that she had belonged to him – that she was his possession. Once wronged the hero must then go get his possessions back or at least exact a heavy price for their loss. On the surface victimized women are framed as the reason for the hero’s torment, but if we dig a little deeper into the subtext I’d argue that the true source of the pain stems from feelings of weakness and/or guilt over his failure to perform his “socially prescribed” patriarchal duty to protect his women and children.

Clip- Max Payne 3
“And I hated myself for allowing this to happen to her, and our little girl”

In this way these failed-hero stories are really about the perceived loss of masculinity, and then the quest to regain that masculinity, primarily by exerting dominance and control, through the performance of violence on others.

Consequently violent revenge based narratives, repeated ad nauseum, can also be harmful to men because they help further limit the possible responses men are allowed to have when faced with death or tragedy. This is unfortunate because interactive media has the potential to be a brilliant medium for people of all genders to explore difficult or painful subjects.

So to be clear here, the problem is not the fact that female characters die or suffer. Death touches all of our lives eventually and as such it’s often an integral part of dramatic storytelling.  To say that women could never die in stories would be absurd, but it’s important to consider the ways that women’s deaths are framed and examine how and why they’re written.

There are some games that try to explore loss, death and grief in more genuine or authentic ways that do not sensationalize or exploit victimized women. Dear Esther, The Passage and To The Moon are a few indie games that investigate these themes in creative, innovative and sometimes beautiful ways. These more contemplative style games are a hopeful sign but they’re still largely the exception to the rule. A sizable chunk of the industry is still unfortunately trapped in the established pattern of building game narratives on the backs of brutalized female bodies.

Violence against women is a serious global epidemic; therefore, attempts to address the issue in fictional contexts demands a considerable degree of respect, subtlety and nuance. Women shouldn’t be mere disposable objects or symbolic pawns in stories about men and their own struggles with patriarchal expectations and inadequacies.

The “dark and edgy” trope-cocktails we’ve discussed in this episode are not isolated incidents, or obscure anomalies; instead they represent an ongoing recurring pattern in modern gaming narratives. In most cases the damsel’ed characters have simply gone from being helpless, to being dead. Which is obviously not a huge improvement from her perspective.

I know this episode has been a little bit grim, but please join me next time for the 3rd and final installment covering the Damsel in Distress where we’ll take a look at some titles that attempt to flip the script on the damsel and then we’ll go on a quest to find some examples of the elusive “dude in distress” role reversal.

Watch The Damsel in Distress Part 1
Watch The Damsel in Distress Part 2
Watch “The Legend of the Last Princess” mini animation

For more examples of the Damsel in Distress see our Tumblr for this series: http://tropesversuswomen.tumblr.com

Links & Resources

For more info on Ironic Sexism:

• Enlightened Sexism: The Seductive Message that Feminism’s Work is Done by Susan Douglas
• “Hipster Sexism”: Just as Bad as Regular Old Sexism, or Worse? By Kelsey Wallace at Bitch Media
• Retro sexism and über ironic advertising by Feminist Frequency
• A Complete Guide to ‘Hipster Racism’ by Lindy West

For more on gender hacks:

• NES ROM hacks and discourses on gender anxieties by Rachel Simone Weil
• Zelda Staring Zelda by Kenna Warsinske
  
• Father Hacks Zelda for His Daughter, Makes Link A Girl by Mike Hoye (reported by Kotaku)
• Why I Hacked Donkey Kong for my Daughter by Mike Mika
• Sorry Mario Bros by Scott and Casey Goodrow

For more on Fat Princess:

• Shakesville’s Melissa McEwan on Fat Princess
• Well That Was Bound to Happen by Holly at Feministe

Other links:

• Games with exclusively female heroes don’t sell (because publishers don’t support them)
• Spelunky and Sexism at How To Not Suck At Game Design
• PRINCELESS: Save Yourself by Action Lab Entertainment is a smart and witty comic that subverts the traditional damsel narrative and turns the princess into the hero.  The comic can be downloaded at their Comixology page.

Some games mentioned in the video that we recommend:

• Fez
• Where is my Heart?
• Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP
• Thomas was Alone
• Beyond Good & Evil

Damsel in Distress Trope Series by the Numbers

Number of episodes: 3
Minutes of video analysis: 73
Games referenced: 192
Total views so far: 2.2 million

About the Series

The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

48 Total Games Referenced in this episode

Those with Spoilers are marked with an asterisk (*)

Super Princess Peach (2006)
Balloon Kid (1990)
Kya: Dark Lineage (2003)
Primal (2003)
* Beyond Good & Evil (2003)
Aquaria (2007)
Spelunky (2012)
Donkey King: Pauline Edition (2013)
Wind Waker: Gender Pronoun Mod (2012)
Zelda Starring Zelda (2013)
Gish (2004)
* Castle Crashers (2008)
* Eversion (2008)
Machinarium (2009)
Super Meat Boy (2010)
Frobot (2010)
I Must Run (2010)
Flying Hamster (2010)
Rochard (2011)
Sideway: New York (2011)
Zack Zero (2012)
Bean’s Quest (2012)
Hotline Miami (2012)
Labyrinth Legends (2012)
Sang-Froid: Tales of Werewolves (2013)
Gunman Clive (2013)
DLC Quest (2013)
The Other Brothers (2013)
Fist Puncher (2013)
Fightback (2013)
Tiny Thief (2013)
Knightmare Tower (2013)
Guacamelee (2013)
Adventures of Lolo (1989)
Cloudberry Kingdom (2013)
Hoard (2010)
Dokuro (2012)
Fat Princess (2009)
Fez (2012)
Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP (2011)
Where is my Heart? (2011)
Rayman Origins (2011)
Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (2011)
* Earthworm Jim (1994)
* The Secret of Monkey Island (1990)
* Braid (2008)
Thomas Was Alone (2012)
Donkey Kong (1981)

Transcript

Welcome to the 3rd episode in our multi-part series exploring the roles and representations of women in video games. This project examines the tropes, plot devices and patterns most commonly associated with women in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective.

Over the course of this series I will be offering critical analysis of many popular games and characters, but please keep in mind that it’s both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy a piece of media while also being critical of it’s more pernicious aspects.

In our previous two episodes on this topic we’ve discussed how the Damsel in Distress trope has been, and continues to be, one of most pervasive representations of women in gaming, showing up in hundreds of titles from old school classics to more modern day blockbusters.

But what about the reverse? Are there games starring heroic women who must go on a quest to save a dude in distress? Well yes, they do exist. However since female protagonists starring in their own games are already few and far between, adventures in which women work to save men in peril are extremely rare.

Back in our first episode I mentioned that Princess Peach is the star of exactly one platformer. That game is called Super Princess Peach (2006) and it was released in 2006 for the Nintendo DS handheld system.

Clip- Super Princess Peach Ad
“Once upon a time princesses were called to rescue two captured plumbers. They trained intensely to master the skills necessary for survival. If you can stand up to really mean people, maybe you have what it takes to be a princess.”

The premise is a simple inversion of the standard franchise formula with Bowser abducting Mario and Luigi, while Peach is tasked with their rescue this time. So finally, after being kidnapped in 13 separate Super Mario games, Peach gets to be the hero for once! But don’t get too excited because everything else about the game ends up in a trainwreck of gendered stereotypes. Nintendo introduced a new gameplay mechanic for Peach where the player can choose from 4 special powers or vibes as they’re called… and you know what those powers are? Her mood swings. That’s right, Peach’s powers are her out-of-control frantic female emotions. She can throw a temper tantrum and rage her enemies to death or bawl her eyes out and wash the bad guys away with tears. Essentially Nintendo has turned a PMS joke into their core gameplay mechanic.

As if that weren’t bad enough Peach is not even featured in any of the game’s narrative cutscenes. Instead they all focus on the back story of her parasol – who it turns out is really a cursed boy named Perry.

So while it’s definitely nice to see Peach starring in her own adventure, the Dude in Distress role-reversal premise here feels like it’s just intended as a lighthearted joke or niche market novelty.

Similar gender inversion plot devices have been used in a handful of games over the years including Balloon Kid (1991) for the original Game Boy in which Alice must search for her lost little brother. Part of the plot of Kya: Dark Lineage (2003) revolves around finding Kya’s half-brother Frank.

Clip- Kya: Dark Lineage
“How did you-“
“Are you ok?”
“I never thought I’d see you again!”
“Frank! I’m gonna get you out of here!”

In Primal (2003) Jennifer Tate travels to demonic realms in an attempt to save her kidnapped boyfriend, Lewis. In one of my favorite games of all time, Beyond Good and Evil (2003) Jade’s sidekick, uncle Pey’j, is captured and held prisoner for a portion of the adventure.

It’s probably not a coincidence that the majority of these titles were produced and released during the run of the popular TV show Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) which lead the “girl power” trend in mass media entertainment that briefly took hold in the late 1990s and early 2000s. You might remember Charmed, Sabrina the Teenage Witch or the British pop sensations the Spice Girls who, in many ways, exemplified the phenomenon.

Clip- Spice World
“We’re the Spice Girls yes indeed, just girl power is all we need. We know how we got this far, strength and courage in a wonder bra.”

Over the past decade, however, games featuring the dude in distress gender inversion have been few and far between. One rare example is the 2007 indie game Aquaria, in which Naija travels through an underwater world, making sushi, learning about her past and must eventually rescue her love interest Li.

So what is the difference between traditional narratives that place female characters in powerless positions and stories in which a male character requires rescuing by a woman?

On the surface the Dude in Distress and the Damsel in Distress may appear similar — however they’re not actually equivalent. To understand why they are different we need to examine the broader historical and cultural implications of the two plot devices.

First there’s been no shortage of men in leading or heroic roles in video games or in any other creative medium for that matter. In fact one recent study found that only about 4% of modern titles are exclusively designed around a woman in the leading role. Since men are still largely the default for protagonists, the rare dude in distress plotline does not add to any longstanding gendered tradition in storytelling.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, damsel’ed female characters tend to reinforce pre-existing regressive notions about women as a group being weak or in need of protection because of their gender, while stories with the occasional helpless male character do NOT perpetuate anything negative about men as a group since there is no long-standing stereotype of men being weak or incapable because of their gender.

To help illustrate this point let’s quickly take a look at the indie game Spelunky. Originally released in 2009 the game included a stereotypical damsel in distress as a gameplay mechanic whose rescue rewarded the player with bonus health. The 2012 HD remake of the game for Xbox Live again features the stock character damsel (complete with newly upgraded boob jiggle). However, this time an option was added to the menu that allows players to select a replacement for the default woman in peril by switching to either a Chippendales-style hunk or a dog instead.

Setting aside the fact that – if a female character is easily interchangeable with a dog then its probably a pretty good indication that something is wrong – Merely providing an optional gender-swap is not a quick and easy fix, especially where stock character style damsels are concerned.

The two may appear the same, but they don’t mean the same thing in our culture.  This [damsel] is still a problem while this [dude] is not. Again because one reinforces pre-existing stereotypes about women, while the other does not re-enforce any pre-existing stereotypes about men.

In recent years, we’ve also seen a number of news stories about fans who’ve taken it upon themselves to switch the gender roles in classic era games by manipulating the code. There’s Mike Mika‘s Donkey Kong hack in which Pauline works to save Jumpman. Mike Hoye’s gender bending version of Wind Waker and Kenna Warsinske’s Zelda Starring Zelda, which transforms the princess into the protagonist.

This practice of gender-hacking game ROMS has actually been around for decades. Offering enterprising players the chance to play as a female version of MegaMan or as Princess Peach rescuing Mario with her mermaid power. And thanks to the Internet, game mods and emulators are now much more widely accessible.

Gender hacks like these illustrate how female characters taking on the role of heroic rescuer can directly challenge the status quo and interrupt the established male dominated pattern in gaming.

That said I don’t necessarily think equal opportunity damseling is the answer. Simply reversing the gender roles of a problematic convention so that more men are damsel’ed in more games is not the best long-term solution, even if the practice might be subversive in the short term to help demonstrate a very real gender disparity in the medium. Ultimately we need to think beyond the cliché altogether.

Over the past several years we have seen an explosion of independent development with many new titles drawing inspiration from classic era games. This is an exciting and vibrant trend with enormous potential for innovation — but have games produced outside of the mainstream studio system managed to break the gender mold and avoid damsel’ing? Well we see the trope reproduced in indie, mobile or retro-inspired games like Gish (2004), Castle Crashers (2008), Eversion (2008), Machinarium (2009), Super Meat Boy (2010), Frobot (2010), I Must Run (2010), Flying Hamster (2010), Rochard (2011)…

Clip- Rochard
“John!”
“Skyler! You okay?”

…Sideway: New York (2011), Zack Zero (2012), Bean’s Quest (2012), Hotline Miami (2012), Labyrinth Legends, Sang-Froid: Tales of Werewolves (2013)…

Clip- Sang-Froid: Tales of Werewolves
“Josephine!”

…Gunman Clive (2013), DLC Quest (2013), The Other Brothers (2013), Fist Puncher (2013)…

Clip- Fist Puncher
“You must hunt down the kidnappers. And rescue the missing women”

…Fightback (2013) Tiny Thief (2013), Knightmare Tower (2013) and Guacamelee (2013).

Not to mention the myriad of other mobile games for tablets and smartphones which recycle the excuse plot ad nauseum.

Far from being a thing of the past, the trope now appears to be more popular than ever.

And since mobile, indie and retro inspired games are built upon a legacy of inequality in the medium, the new wave of 80s and 90s nostalgia has brought with it the resurrection of the worst of the old-school Damsel in Distress stereotype. Indeed many of these new titles essentially function as love letters to the trope as a way of paying homage to classic games of years gone by.

This approach is no doubt intended as a kind of shallow meta-commentary on the tired old convention, suggesting developers are only employing the trope because the games that inspired them did so. But this type of “ironic” self-awareness does not challenge or disrupt what the damsel in distress trope says about the role of women in such narratives.

Fat Princess (2009), Hoard (2010), Dokuro (2012) and the aforementioned Spelunky (2009) all include patronizing damsel jokes built right into the gameplay mechanics which turn damsel’ed characters into very literal objects, instead of just narrative ones.

In Spelunky the damsel can be knocked out, picked up, carried around and thrown at enemies before rewarding the player with an extra heart via a smooch of victory (if you manage to get her limp unconscious body to the end of each level while still alive that is).

Fat Princess is essentially one big game of capture the flag but with princesses instead of flags. Teams of up to 16 players work together to rescue their kidnapped princess from the enemy’s castle before the opposing team can save their own princess from your castle. Even worse is the other game mechanic, which allows players to feed their captive princesses slices of cake. The more she eats the heavier she gets, and the more difficult for the other team to carry her back to their own base. Her voice also becomes deeper and less traditionally feminine sounding the bigger you make her.

Clip- Fat Princess
“Hungry!”

Players are meant to find all of this hilarious of course. So the entire premise of this game is basically built around one big sexist fat joke.

Sometimes this type of self-referential humor is referred to as “ironic sexism”. It’s this “I know that you know that I know this is sexist” where the underlying assumption on the part of media makers seems to be that as long as the sexism is overt, obvious or “over-the-top” then it somehow loses its cultural power and is suddenly no longer a problem.

Ironic sexism is dependent upon the false assumption that “people no longer really hold retrograde sexist beliefs” and therefore the very idea of sexism is now just a hilarious joke; but nothing could be further from the truth.

Words like “parody” and “satire” are often thrown around to describe or defend these comedic depictions of yet more helpless female characters. But a simple wink and nod to the audience acknowledging a sexist trope, while actively reproducing that trope, does not automatically grant a free pass to continue exploiting the trope.

Clip- Cloudberry Kingdom
“You call this a rescue?”
“Who said I was here for you, Princess?”
“Um, every medieval fairytale ever written?”

More often than not the ironic humor is just an excuse used by developers as a way try to and have their cake and eat it too (so to speak). They want to use the trope, but not be held accountable for the inherent negative gender implications that come with it.

Incidentally a few games might have the option to play as a woman in multicharacter lineups, but just because you could choose to play her does mean that this is then magically ok.

A handful of other games attempt to get away with reproducing the Damsel in Distress by offering the ability to unlock and play as the damsel’ed character but typically only after the game has first been completed with the default male hero. However these types of token role reversals do absolutely nothing to diminish the issues inherent in using the trope in the first place.

Now, of course, some of the games we’ve been discussing may also be well made or super fun to play (aside from their regressive gender representations) but the widespread resurrection of old school style Damsels in Distress is still an unfortunate trend because it’s absolutely possible to create indie games that appeal to the retro feeling of the 8 bit or 16 bit era without regurgitating the helpless woman as plot device. There are other ways to pay homage or shout out to the past through art style, game play mechanics or level design. Games like Sword & Sworcery (2011), Where Is My Heart (2011), and Fez (2012) are all beautiful and creative retro style games that appeal to a sense of nostalgia without replicating or falling back on the Damsel in Distress.

Of course games attempting to make light of the damsel in distress are not limited to recent indie games but are part of a long tradition in the medium that continues today with popular mainstream titles like Rayman Origins (2011) and Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (2011) for the Nintendo DS. Since comedy, in and of itself, is often confused for subversion or deconstruction in our current media culture, let’s take a moment to unpack the various ways humor has been employed in relation to the trope.

In the 1994 platformer Earthworm Jim the woman in peril waiting at the end of the game is officially called “Princess What’s-Her-Name”. A reference meant to humorously acknowledge the fact that many damsel’ed characters in classic era titles were so unimportant that they either remain unnamed or were otherwise entirely unmemorable.

So the developers of Earthworm Jim noticed that sexist trend, thought it was hilarious and proceeded to make another game in which a woman is completely unimportant. To add injury to insult, when Jim finally reaches Princess-What’s-Her-Name and is preparing to collect his reward, she is randomly killed by a falling cow.

The bad ending of the indie game Eversion (2008) features a similar joke; when the hero finally reaches the princess, she turns into a monster and eats you alive.

A similar end game punchline can also be found in Castle Crashers (2008). After you’ve saved the 4^th princess, and then fought and killed your friends over who gets to claim her, it turns out that she has horrible clown face.

In each case the joke derives from the fact that after completing the long and perilous journey to save his woman, our hero is hilariously cheated out of his “rightful” reward. In other words the comedy comes at the damsel’s expense.

These titles may be attempting to make fun of gaming conventions like the “heroic rescue” or the “smooch of victory” but they don’t fundamentally change, challenge or subvert the Damsel in Distress trope itself. The damsel’ed women remain as disempowered as ever.

Clip- Castle Crashers
“Ah! Help me!”

Now, some will no doubt contend that jokes have no cultural power or significance and should just “not be taken seriously”. This is nothing new, making light of and dismissing gender issues is a sad time honored tradition. But I would argue that this reaction fundamentally misunderstands how humor functions as one of the primary means by which the culture of sexism is maintained and perpetuated.

Mass media entertainment doesn’t just reflect our culture it also works to create it. Sexist jokes in particular serve as a form of cultural permission, which help entrench toxic preexisting attitudes and opinions.

Of course, humor can also be a powerful tool with which to challenge or break down harmful gender myths, but that is much harder to pull off and must be done with careful intentionality.

There is a clear difference between sexist parody and parody of sexism. Sexist parody encourages the players to mock and trivialize gender issues while parody of sexism disrupts the status quo and undermines regressive gender conventions.

Clip- The Secret of Monkey Island
“I’ve come to stop you from marrying Governor Marley”

So for instance when wannabe pirate Guybrush Threepwood finally reaches the kidnapped Elaine Marley in the 1990 adventure game The Secret of Monkey Island, she already has a plan to escape and he ruins it with his attempt to rescue her.

Clip- The Secret of Monkey Island
“Oh, Guybrush, you mad fool! I’m impressed you came to rescue me, but it really wasn’t necessary. I had everything well in hand”

The joke ends up being directed at the protagonist, rather than making fun the damsel’ed woman.

There has been much discussion over the ultimate meaning of the 2008 indie hit Braid but it’s notable as an example of a more dramatic game that plays with the trope. Although the narrative is somewhat abstract, it eventually becomes clear that the damsel has actually been trying to get away from the protagonist the whole time.

Both of these games offer some interesting commentary on the heroic rescue formula. Monkey Island asks, what if the damsel is perfectly capable of orchestrating her own escape and attempts to rescue her just make things worse. Braid asks, in part, what if by trying to save the damsel, it actually makes you the villain?

While these types of games are a refreshing departure from the standard formula, and something I’d generally like to see more of, the focus is still squarely on the male characters and so at their core these games are really deconstructing the player’s assumptions about the traditional hero archetype.

A true subversion of the trope would need to star the damsel as the main playable character. It would have to be her story. Sadly, there are very few games that really explore this idea. So as a way to illustrate how a deconstruction could work let’s try a thought experiment to see if we can create a hypothetical game concept of our own.

Clip- The Legend of the Last Princess- Mini Animation

“Like many fairy tales, this story begins once upon a time with the kidnapping of a princes. She dutifully waits for a handsome hero to arrive and rescue her. Eventually, however, she grows tired of the damseling and decides it’s high time to save herself. Of course if she’s going to be the protagonist of this particular adventure she’s going to need to acquire a slightly more practical outfit. After her daring escape, she navigates the forbidden forest, leveling up her skills along the way. Upon reaching her kingdom, she discovers the inevitable yet unexpected plot twist; the royal counsel has usurped power and were responsible for her kidnapping. Branded a traitor and an outlaw in her own land, she unlocks new disguises and stealth abilities to infiltrate the city walls. She makes her way through the final castle to confront the villainous council, and abolish the monarchy forever.”

A story idea like this one would work to actively subvert traditional narrative expectations. The princess is placed in a perilous situation but instead of being made into the goal for a male protagonist, she uses her intelligence, creativity, wit and strength to engineer her own escape and then become the star of her own adventure.

Now I’m certainly not arguing that all stories must include completely fearless hyper individualistic heroic women who pull themselves up by their bootstraps and never need anything from anyone.

Of course, there is absolutely nothing wrong with offering or occasionally needing assistance.

Clip- Beyond Good & Evil
“Jade! Hang on, Jade! I’m comin’. Free yourself, Jade, I’ll create a diversion.”

The human impulse to help others in need is certainly not a negative thing. It only becomes a problem when acts of altruism are repeatedly presented in heavily gendered ways that are bound up in harmful myths about women as perpetual victims and men as paternalistic saviors.

In fact cooperation and mutual aid are concepts that hold an enormous amount of gaming potential. True co-op games, MMOs and some RPGs offer gameplay possibilities that, if done right, can facilitate a mutual aid style adventure involving people of all genders cooperating. Where is My Heart and Thomas was Alone both employ innovative examples of mutual aid by having a single player control multiple characters working together towards a common goal.

As we’ve established The Damsel in Distress is part of long tradition of mythological narratives dating back through the ages. But those historical roots are no excuse for the continued use of a trope that perpetuates regressive and patronizing myths about women. It’s been 100 years since a woman was first tied to the railroad tracks in this 1913 Keystone Kops short. And it’s been over 3 decades since the hit arcade game Donkey Kong helped entrench the damsel in distress as a default motivation for male heroes in video games as a medium. Yet here we are, still seeing the same old cliche trotted out again and again. It’s long past time to disrupt the established pattern – break the cycle and create new gender paradigms.

The Legend of the Last Princess is a hypothetical game concept created in conjunction with the Tropes vs Women in Video Games web series. This short video illustrates a subversion of the traditional Damsel in Distress narrative by placing the Damsel in the starring role.

This animation was featured in The Damsel in Distress Part 3 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjImnqH_KwM

Watch the whole Tropes vs Women in Video Games series: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLn4ob_5_ttEaA_vc8F3fjzE62esf9yP61

Press Image for Media Use: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anitasarkeesian/10932165865/

Links & Resources

• “Q&A: Pac-Man Creator Reflects on 30 Years of Dot-Eating,” WIRED.
• “Ms. Pac-Man Was Once A Man Named Otto,” Game Informer.
• Doug Macrae on the history of Crazy Otto and Ms. Pac-Man [VIDEO]
• Hers; The Smurfette Principle by Katha Pollitt, New York Times.
• The Smurfette Principle by Nostalgia Chick [VIDEO]
• Tropes vs Women: The Smurfette Principle by Feminist Frequency
• Significant Other: Gendered Identifiers in Video Games by How To Not Suck at Game Design
• “Wired In” unaired TV segment from Media Burn Archive
• Mega Man 1 – 10 Robot Masters image by BlueFirez88
• SuperClaire poster by Heather Sheppard

About the Series

The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

Games Referenced in this Episode

Pac-Man (1980)
Crazy Otto Enhancement Kit Prototype (1981)
Ms. Pac-Man (1982)
Bubble Bobble (1986)
Adventures of Lolo (1989)
Super Monkey Ball Series
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Splitz (2012)
Where’s My Water Series
Where’s My Water: Allie’s Story (2013)
Giant Boulder of Death (2013)
Rogue Legacy (2013)
Ms. Splosion Man (2011)
Ice Climber (1985)
Sonic the Hedgehog CD (1993)
Bit.Trip Runner Series
Bit.Trip Presents Runner 2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien (2013)
Bomberman Series
Super Bomberman 2 (1994)
Mortal Kombat Series
Super Mario Bros. Series
New Super Mario Bros. U (2012)
Bare Knuckle III (1994) [Japan only]
Super Mario All-Stars, Super Mario Bros 2 (1993)
Kirby Series
Kirby’s Return to Dreamland (2011)
Super Punch-Out!! (1994)
Scribblenauts Series
Scribblenauts Unlimited (2012)
Army Men: RTS (2002)
Left 4 Dead 2 (2009)
Sonic Lost World (2013)
Bully (2006)
Mega Man Series
Mega Man 9 (2008)
The Wonderful 101 (2013)
Gauntlet (1985)
Crazy Taxi (1999)
EarthBound (1989)
Call of Duty: Black Ops II Zombies Mode (2012)
Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures (1994)
Donkey Kong Series
Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze (anticipated 2014)
Angry Birds Series
Angry Birds (2009)
Angry Birds Seasons – Hogs and Kisses (2011)
Mario Kart Wii (2008)
Mass Effect Series
Mass Effect 3 (2012)
Thomas Was Alone (2012)
TowerFall (2013)
Knytt Underground (2012)
ScaryGirl (2012)
Ittle Dew (2013)
Lili (2012)

Transcript

In this episode we’re going to shift the discussion away from plot devices to focus on a pattern in character design and conceptualization which I’ve decided to call the Ms. Male Character.

As always it’s important to keep in mind that it’s entirely possible to be critical of some aspects of a piece of media while still finding other parts valuable or enjoyable.

Let’s begin our examination of this trope by traveling back in time to 1980 and the creation of one of the most famous characters in the history of gaming. Initially called Pakku-man in Japan, the name was later changed to Pac-Man when the game hit arcades in the United States.

Incidentally Toru Iwatani, the creator of Pac-Man, has stated in numerous interviews that the game was designed to appeal to women because, and I’m not kidding about this, he said, “When you think about things women like, you think about fashion, or fortune-telling, or food or dating boyfriends. So I decided to theme the game around “eating” — after eating dinner, women like to have dessert.”

Luckily Iwatani’s regressive personal or cultural notions about women are not reflected in the finished game itself. Pac-Man went on to became an international sensation and remains one the most recognizable pop culture icons today – but probably not because women are genetically predisposed to “like eating desserts” more than humans of other genders.

Clip-“Wired In” Unaired TV Series
“Hi I’m Lily Tomlin. I’m a Pac-Man freak. It’s alright, I can talk about it now. ‘Course there was a time where I couldn’t.”

The next year, a group of MIT students created a mod for the original Pac-Man arcade cabinets called Crazy Otto which featured 4 new mazes and a new male hero with little legs. The idea was to sell this “enhancement kit” to arcade owners so they could breathe new life into older Pac-Man machines. But because of a separate lawsuit settlement with Atari, they decided to try and sell Crazy Otto directly to Midway, the US manufacturer of Pac-Man cabinets. As luck would have it, Midway was anxious for a follow-up to Pac-Man and worked to transform the mod into an official sequel.

In an effort to continue appealing to female gamers, Crazy Otto was briefly changed to Pac-Woman, then to Miss Pac-Man before finally becoming Ms. Pac-Man (an 11th hour move designed to avoid potential backlash for the 3rd cutscene which features a child born out of wedlock).

The game hit arcades in the United States in 1982 and was an immediate smash hit becoming the most successful American-made coin-operated arcade cabinet ever produced. Like her predecessor, Ms. Pac-Man quickly achieved widespread cultural prominence and it wasn’t long before she was turned into a special marshmallow and added to Pac-Man’s cereal.

Clip- Ms. Pac-Man Cereal Commercial
“Pac-Man cereal’s got a new surprise. When you look inside- it’s shocking! Shocking pink! It’s new Ms. Pac-Man marshmallow! She’s got a shocking pink bow-Oh!”

Ms. Pac-Man was not only one of the first playable female characters, but she also holds the distinction of being the original Ms. Male Character in video games.

I describe the Ms. Male Character trope as: A female version of an already established or default male character. Ms. Male Characters are defined primarily by their relationship to their male counterparts via their visual properties, their narrative connection or occasionally through promotional materials.

This trope is of course part of a long tradition in visual storytelling. The process of creating Ms. Male Characters out of preexisting male heroes has been especially popular in animation and comic books over the past century. When the female spin-off is an exact duplicate, she is sometime referred to as a Distaff Counterpart. Even though the Ms. Male Character did not originate with video games, developers have made generous and frequent use of the trope over the years especially in games marketed towards young people and general audiences.

Clip- Coleco Mini-Arcade Commercial
“It’s Mr. Arcade!
And Ms. Arcade!
Ms. Arcade? Wow
Eat those dots, Ms. Pac-Man!
Into the tunnel!
That couple’s in love!
Yeah, with Ms. Pac-Man!”

Let’s explore this trope in a little more depth by asking a simple question. How do we know what gender a particular character is? Other than their names, how do we know that the collection of pixels on the right signal male while those on the left indicate female?

Well, in order to differentiate Ms. Pac-Man from her already world-famous counterpart, her creators added a series of stereotypical design elements. With only a few pixels to work with, designers built on top of the original Pac Man template, adding a red bow, red lipstick, an eye with makeup, long lashes and a mole as beauty mark. Even though Ms. Pac-Man is essentially a personified shape, in promotional materials she is presented in high-heels with long legs, jewelry and sometimes a feather boa.

The design elements that were used to transform Pac-Man into Ms. Pac-Man are referred to as feminizing gendered signifiers – the bow, the makeup, the long eyelashes are all specific stylistic choices; they are all part of our culture’s visual vocabulary intended to convey information about gender to the viewer. Game designers use these stereotypical attributes as a sort of shorthand to quickly identify a given character as female.
Childlike hair decorations are by far the most frequented accessory used for this purpose. It’s standard practice for creators to, just, put a big bow on top of an anthropomorphized animal or personified object in order to communicate that the character is not male.

The Bubble Bobble series stars heroes Bub and Bob who are charged with rescuing their female counterparts and respective love interests, Peb and Pab.

Lala is the feminized version of the male hero Lolo in the Adventures of Lolo series.

MeeMee’s fills this role as the main protagonist’s girlfriend in the Super Monkey Ball games.

In Disney’s popular Where’s My Water mobile games, we know that Allie is female because she is the only alligator who wears a bow.

The Adult Swim game Giant Boulder of Death takes the trope to ridiculous extremes by gendering a pink boulder with a giant pink bow before she’s stuffed in the refrigerator to motivate the blue boulder to seek revenge.

Now the interesting thing is that these gendered signifiers are really quite arbitrary and abstract. There’s nothing about a bow in and of itself that is intrinsically or essentially feminine; it’s just a piece of colored fabric, after all. But our society currently assigns a very specific, socially constructed and strictly enforced meaning to that piece of fabric. It’s a symbol that conveys the concept of female (and invokes the idea of girlhood.)

The indie game Rogue Legacy has an interesting system whereby you can be randomly assigned the choice of either male or female heirs to play on each run. The characters are essentially identical both mechanically and aesthetically (except for a very minor difference in their breast plate styles). So far so good, but all the female heirs also have a strangely conspicuous and completely unnecessary lavender colored bow on top of their armour. This is a classic example of put a bow on it!

The colour-coding of characters is another frequently used visual element to signify gender. Typically the dominant color used in the design of the female variant is bright pink (although sometimes a purple or pastel palette may be used).

In the 1985 NES classic Ice Climber, player 1 controls Popo who wears a blue parka. If you have a 2nd player they can control Nana who wears a pink parka.

Amy Rose was designed to be a pink female version of Sonic, especially in her early incarnations.

CommandgirlVideo is the female version of CommanderVideo in the Bit Trip Runner indie game series. Her dominant color is purple, she sports a giant bow on her head, and in Runner 2 she is suddenly and conspicuously busty.

The most commonly used gendered signifiers or feminizing accessories are bows, lipstick, long eyelashes and the color pink, but there are a whole host of other design elements that, in combination, serve the same purpose. Other signifiers used to differentiate women from men are pigtails, high-heeled shoes, painted nails, pronounced makeup (especially blush and eyeshadow), midriff baring outfits, exaggerated breasts with exposed cleavage, and a heart motif in their design or powers.

Pretty Bomber is the protagonist’s adversary and sometimes love interest in the Bomberman series. And just to make absolutely clear there is no confusion about her gender, she is decked out in pink, has a giant heart attached to her head and also throws heart shaped bombs.

Gendered signifiers are not mandatory for the Ms Male Character trope to be in effect but these type of stereotypical attributes do serve to “mark” female characters as decidedly different by virtue of their feminine presentation.

Now just to be clear, there’s no inherent problem with the color pink, makeup, bows or high heels as design elements on their own. And of course people of all genders may choose to wear any of them from time to time in the real world and there is nothing necessarily wrong with that either.

However, when designers choose to use the Ms. Male Character trope and its associated visual stereotypes to specifically distinguish female characters from the rest of the cast in a fictional context, it has a few negative consequences.

One repercussion of constantly relying on feminizing signifiers for character design is that it tends to reinforce a strict binary form of gender expression. The gender binary is an entirely artificial and socially constructed division of male and female into two distinctly separate and opposing classes of human being. The gender binary also erases the continuum of gender presentations and identities that fall outside of the rigid masculine/feminine false dichotomy.

And within that strict binary women are “marked” while men get to remain largely “unmarked”.

In the Mario franchise, the Koopalings were originally described as Bowser’s seven children, all of them are male except for one named Wendy O Koopa. We know she is female because her designers used practically every hyper-feminine frill and accessory available to separate her from her male siblings.

Wendy’s six brothers, by contrast, are “unmarked” by gendered identifiers which means they get to be presented in a variety of creative ways. Ludwig’s design communicates intelligence and arrogance, while Lemmy’s reveals his playfulness and Iggy’s makes him seem maniacal and a little unbalanced. Sadly, Wendy’s identity is limited by the fact that she is covered in superficial gendered signifiers. One look at her and you know she’s female, but not much else.

As with many Ms Male Characters, her defining characteristic is her gender.

Wendy also suffers from a parallel condition I like to call “Personality Female Syndrome” wherein female characters are reduced to a one dimensional personality type consisting of nothing more than a collection of shallow stereotypes about women. She is vain, spoiled, bratty and quick to anger.

Clip- “Reptiles in the Rose Garden”
“I don’t care! I want America for my birthday! I want it, I want it, I want it!”

When female characters are “marked” by obligatory stereotypical identifiers it actively limits the range of available options by enforcing a narrow, restrictive and monolithic model for the portrayal of femininity. Meanwhile, since male characters are allowed to be unmarked it permits a much wider array of possibilities for their designs.

I should note that even though pink and purple are strong gendered indicators when combined with other feminizing visual markers those colors are not the exclusive domain of women. An expanded color-palette is something we do see applied to men on rare occasions as with Kirby, Bomberman or Roy Koopa but they are the exception to the rule and are typically only found in colorful childlike (and extremely male dominated) worlds. But if a bow, lipstick, eyeshadow or heels are placed on an otherwise male-identified character the intention, or at least the result, is typically a homophobic or transphobic joke.

Clip- Super Punch-Out
“Heike Kagero!
Fight!”

There are a few optional design accessories for men like neckties or baseball caps but they don’t hold the same significance. They are not ubiquitous or strictly enforced, and are never really used to “mark” men as “not female” in larger fictional universes dominated by women.

Maxwell is the hero of the popular Scribblenauts series. In the fourth game Scribblenauts Unlimited we are introduced to his twin sister Lily who is basically a feminised copy of Maxwell.

The two are identical except for a series of gendered signifiers designed to “mark” her as a female. In the game we learn that Lily is one of 42 children. All 41 of the other siblings are male and all have some trait or interest associated with their name that serves to define their personality (there’s Artie the artist, Buzz the astronaut, Glum the emo-rocker and so on and so forth) and all are unlockable and playable during the course of the game.

By contrast, Lily’s personality trait is essentially being Maxwell’s twin – she has no associated interest or hobby other than being the female version of the game’s hero. In addition to being a Ms. Male Character, Lily is also a particularly pronounced example of another related trope called the Smurfette Principle.

The term was coined back in 1991 by feminist author Katha Pollitt and is of course named after the only female smurf in Smurfville. The Smurfette Principle is the tendency for a piece of media to include only one woman in an ensemble of male characters. The trope is a pervasive problem in video games, manifesting as the “token chick” in any given grouping of heroes, villains or non-playable characters.

An exceptionally stark example of the trope can be found in the original Mega Man series. Over the course of 10 games there are 78 bosses or robot masters and exactly one of them is female, Splash Woman who appears in the 9th game.

In the Wii U game The Wonderful 101, six of the seven color-coded playable heroes are men. The one exception is, of course, the pink hero, named Wonder-Pink! In addition to her smurfette status, she is also afflicted with “personality female syndrome”:

Clip- The Wonderful 101
“I got in late last night. But there was this party! And then the after-party and then the after-after-party. I needed a major powder break to freshen up before meeting you guys.”

Wonder-Pink is shallow, vain, materialistic and flies into a rage at the drop of a hat.

You can find Smurfettes in just about every genre, from dungeon-crawlers, to racing games, from RPGS, to shooters.

Pollitt sums up the crux of problem nicely in her NYTimes article; “The message is clear. Boys are the norm, girls the variation; boys are central, girls peripheral; boys are individuals, girls types. Boys define the group, its story and its code of values. Girls exist only in relation to boys.”

With that in mind let’s come back to Ms. Pac-Man for a moment. One of the core consequence of the Ms. Male Character trope is that it helps to define women by their connection to men.

So despite her tagline “More than Pac-Man with a bow”

Clip- Ms. Pac-Man Atari 2600 Commercial
“Honey, dontcha know? I’m more than Pac-Man with a bow!”

Ms. Pac-Man’s visual properties are simply an extension of Pac-Man’s original design; she actually kind of is just Pac-Man with a bow. Her simple narrative reinforces the fact that she really only exists in relationship to Pac-Man. She is both his love interest and also the mother of his child.

Dixie Kong is the feminine variant and love interest of Diddy Kong. Note the ponytail and hair ringlets, pink shirt, pink hat, earrings, and eyelashes all to distinguish her from her predecessor. Essentially Ms. Male Characters are feminized imitations or derivative copies of already established male characters. They exist only because of, and in relationship to, their male counterparts.

Ms. Male Characters typically aren’t given their own distinctive identities and are prevented from being fully realized characters who exist on their own terms. This has the, perhaps unintended, effect of devaluing these characters and often relegating them to a subordinate or secondary status inside their respective media franchises, even when they are, on rare occasions, given a starring role in a spin-off or sequel.

One very old and notable example of the Ms. Male Character trope comes to mind. As the story goes, God made Adam in his own image and then later took a rib from Adam’s side and fashioned a woman out of it to be his wife and companion. This Adam and Eve version of the creation myth reinforces a subordinate view of women — man is cast as the original concept and source code for woman who is derived from his body. Essentially Eve is the sequel to Adam, just as Ms. Pac-Man was built from the body of Pac-Man who came before her.

In a male identified society like ours, men are associated and become synonymous with human beings in general. In other words, male tends to be seen as the default for the entire species.

In video games male identification manifests as the tendency for all characters to be male by default unless there is some special reason or specific justification for women to be present in the story.

To help illustrate one of the ways the ”male as default” phenomenon operates in gaming worlds let’s take a look at the mobile mega-hit Angry Birds.

When the game was first released in 2009, the five original birds in the flock were identified by their color and did not include any specific gendered signifiers. Over time, as the game has grown in popularity and the brand has expanded to include numerous spin-offs, real world merchandise and a weekly cartoon series, the birds have been given more distinct personalities and actual names.

Mobile developer Rovio first began gendering birds in February 2011 with the release of their valentine-themed episode for Angry Birds Seasons which includes Ms. Male Character versions of the Red Bird, the White Bird and a Female Pig as love interests. Note the bows, makeup and long eyelashes.

There is a larger unintended consequence to “marking” these birds as female with feminizing gender signifiers; it reinforces that all the other birds and pigs without these specific visual cues are all male by default, unless otherwise noted. The addition of the Pink Bird to the main flock in 2012 further entrenched male as the default setting for the Angry Birds universe.

I should mention that Rovio later stated that the white bird was also female and named her Matilda. This revelation led to a character redesign which has feminized the white bird by adding pink accents, rose cheeks and long eyelashes in the Angry Birds cartoon series – just to make absolutely clear that she is female.

Over in the Mushroom Kingdom we have Toadette who is both a Ms. Male Character and the only woman among the Mushroom people. Her introduction to the Mario-spin off games emphasize the fact that all the other Toads in the entire species are male.

Both the Smurfette Principle and the Ms. Male Character trope create scenarios that reinforce a false dichotomy wherein male is associated with the norm while female is associated with a deviation from the norm.

Everything we have discussed in this episode thus far has been related to visual design or narrative connection. But there is another way that the Ms. Male Character trope can manifest itself, and that is through marketing and promotional materials. A great illustration of this trend can be found in Bioware’s highly regarded Mass Effect series. The games offer players a choice between a male or female version of the protagonist Commander Shepard (each with a range of cosmetic customizable options). The female option is well designed and her overall narrative is also nearly indistinguishable from her male counterpart’s, aside from some of the romance options.

However, if we take a step back from the game experience itself and look at the marketing campaigns for the trilogy, we see that the female variant of Shepard is practically non-existent. In mainstream advertising of the franchise, the male commander is used almost exclusively. His image is front and center on the box covers for all releases including the special editions. He is the one featured in the TV commercials, teasers, trailers, web banners, street posters and print ads and his face appears on most of the magazine covers. All of this positions the male Commander Shepard as the default protagonist of the series.

Clip- Mass Effect Trilogy Trailer
“One man, one very specific man, might be all that stands between humanity and the greatest threat of our brief existence.”

That is how Bioware is selling the Mass Effect experience. Nearly everything about the advertising campaign explicitly tells players that Commander Shepard is a man and by extension associates the official storyline with the male version of the hero. This marketing strategy contributes to the fact that only 18-20% of players choose the female option (despite the fact that Jennifer Hale’s voice acting is widely praised as being far superior).

Clip- Mass Effect 3
“You brought me here to confirm what you already know: The reapers are here.”

Still, the female version has a dedicated fanbase who frequently refers to her as “FemShep”. And although this is meant as an affectionate nickname, it does further highlight her designation as a Ms. Male Character. She is the one with the qualifier attached to her name. She is “Female Shepard” whereas the male version simply gets to be, “Shepard”.

During the advertising of Mass Effect 3, Bioware made a little more effort to include female Shepard with items like an alternate reversible slip cover for the game box (which features the male version by default) as well as a special web only trailer but these gestures feel like an afterthought or niche specialty marketing and hardly what I would call a substantial or equitable inclusion.

While Mass Effect’s advertising strategy might not undermine the story or gameplay, it is a glaring example of how the Ms. Male Character trope can be perpetuated by marketing departments unless careful consideration is given to how gender is represented when advertising games that do offer players a choice.

Now it’s certainly true that in many cases the games starring the female variant are better gaming experiences overall. And taken on their own, each individual example we’ve covered in this episode might seem relatively benign or trivial but the reason this series focuses on tropes is because they help us recognize larger, recurring patterns. Both the Ms. Male Character and the Smurfette Principle have been normalized in gaming and in mass media more broadly. So much so that the two tropes usually pass under the radar and are often reproduced unconsciously – which is part of what makes the myths they perpetuate about women so powerful and insidious in our culture.

The truth of the matter is that there’s really no need to define women as derivative copies of men or to automatically resort to lazy, stereotypical or limiting gender signifiers when designing video game characters.

Clip- Thomas Was Alone
“It was at that moment that Claire realized…she had super powers!”

Claire is a simple blue cube and one of the more memorable characters from the indie game Thomas Was Alone. We know she is female because of her name, her narrative and the pronouns used during gameplay. Claire’s gender presentation doesn’t reduce her to her gender or separate her from the rest of the cast.

Clip- Thomas Was Alone
“Claire needed to come up with a super hero name as soon as possible”

Half of the playable characters in TowerFall are women and the game is also notable for it’s color-code inversion, The Last of the Order wears blue while the Assassin Prince is decked out in pink.

Indie games like the Knytt Underground, Scary Girl, Ittle Dew and the iOS title Lili, all have female characters who resist gendered stereotypes.

Each of these indie games avoids falling back on the Ms Male Character trope or relying on narrow superficial visual markers as a stand in for personality. The visual aesthetics of these female characters displays a range of gender expression and presentation using a variety of hairstyles, colour choices and accessories. Developers can also choose to give players the opportunity to get to know the personality, interests and struggles of their characters. Even with minimal narrative or limited graphics it is entirely possible to make games that feature dynamic women who exist on their own terms.

Sexual objectification is the practice of treating or representing a human being as a thing or mere instrument to be used for another’s sexual purposes. Sexually objectified women are valued primarily for their bodies, or body parts, which are presented as existing for the pleasure and gratification of others.

Press Image for Media Use: https://www.flickr.com/photos/anitasarkeesian/14431537812/

LINKS & RESOURCES

• The Sexy Lie – Caroline Heldman at TEDxYouth@SanDiego
• The Sexual Objectification Spillover Effect
• Objectification by Martha Nussbaum
• How Fantasy Becomes Reality: Seeing Through Media Influence by Karen E. Dill
• It’s time to leave the brothels and strip clubs behind when real victims fuel your narrative by Ben Kuchera
• Sexual Priming, Gender Stereotyping, and Likelihood to Sexually Harass: Examining the Cognitive Effects of Playing a Sexually-Explicit Video Game
• Effects of exposure to sex-stereotyped video game characters on tolerance of sexual harassment
• Objectification leads to depersonalization: The denial of mind and moral concern to objectified others
• Sexualized avatars affect the real world, Stanford researchers find
• The embodiment of sexualized virtual selves: The Proteus effect and experiences of self-objectification via avatars
• The Afterglow of Construct Accessibility: The Behavioral Consequences of Priming Men to View Women as Sexual Objects
• Sexism in online video games: The role of conformity to masculine norms and social dominance orientation

ABOUT THE SERIES
The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

GAMES REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE

Out Run (1986)
Chequered Flag (1988)
Snatcher (1988)
Super Off Road (1989)
GP Rider (1990)
Rise of the Dragon (1990)
Quest for Glory II (1990)
Sunset Riders (1991)
Eliminator Boat Duel (1991)
Lucky & Wild (1992)
Cruis’n USA (1994)
Rave Racer (1995)
Need for Speed: Underground (2003)
Ridge Racer 2 (2006)
Need for Speed: ProStreet (2007)
MX vs ATV Alive (2011)
Forza Horizon (2012)
Mortal Kombat (2011)
God of War: Ghost of Sparta (2010)
Grand Theft Auto V (2013)
The Witcher 2 (2011)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution (2011)
Yakuza 4 (2011)
Hitman: Absolution (2012)
Mafia II: Joe’s Adventure (2010)
The Darkness II (2012)
Dishonored (2012)
Fallout: New Vegas (2010)
Metro: Last Light (2013)
Just Cause 2 (2010)
Sleeping Dogs (2012)
Fable II (2008)
Watch Dogs (2014)
Max Payne 3 (2012)
Far Cry 3 (2012)
Binary Domain (2012)
Shellshock: Nam ’67 (2004)
Fable: The Lost Chapters (2005)/Fable Anniversary (2014)
Grand Theft Auto 4 (2008)
The Godfather II (2009)
Mass Effect 2 (2010)
Hitman: Blood Money (2006)
Red Dead Redemption (2010)
The Saboteur (2009)
Assassin’s Creed IV (2013)
Saints Row (2006)
Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea (2013)
Duke Nukem 3D (1996)
Dragon Age: Origins (2009)
Fallout 3 (2008)
Saints Row: The Third (2011)
Killer is Dead (2013)

Transcript

Clip: Binary Domain
“Sorry all booked up. Too bad too ‘cause I would’ve given a stud like you a free sample”

This episode includes game footage of hyper-sexualized female characters as well as extremely graphic depictions of violence against women.As such this particular video comes with a strong content warning and is not recommended for children.

As always, please keep in mind that it’s entirely possible to be critical of some aspects of a piece of media while still finding other parts valuable or enjoyable.

In November 1971, the year before Atari’s Pong became a sensation, an oddly shaped fiberglass video cabinet appeared in pinball arcades in the United States. That game was called Computer Space and holds the distinction of being the very first commercially sold video game ever made. The coin-operated machine allowed players to fly a crude pixelated rocket ship while shooting down pixelated flying saucers. Promotional materials for the game, however, featured a woman standing passively next to the enclosure wearing a see-through nighty with her underwear visible underneath.

This advertising strategy of using women and representations of women as decorative elements to try and sell games to boys and men soon became the norm for the burgeoning industry. In ad after ad throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s we see women placed on display alongside arcade games, conflating the two and presenting them both as toys to be played with.

In these promotional materials, advertisers are not just selling a product,they are also selling gaming as a lifestyle in which women predominantly exist as passive objects of heterosexual male desire.

These ads contributed to an emergent culture in which women were thought of as ornamental and peripheral to a male gaming experience. And since women were largely already seen as incidental eye candy, it’s not surprising that when female characters started being introduced to more game-worlds,their roles tended to follow similar patterns.

The practice of using hyper-sexualized women as ornamental objects has been especially brazen in the racing game genre.

Notice how the camera moves, how it focuses on and zooms in on specific body parts to highlight the aspects of women meant to be the most important.

Clip: Forza Horizon (2012)
“I knew you couldn’t resist yo.”

I define the Women as Background Decoration trope in video games as: The subset of largely insignificant non-playable female characters whose sexuality or victimhood is exploited as a way to infuse edgy, gritty or racy flavoring into game worlds. These sexually objectified female bodies are designed to function as environmental texture while titillating presumed straight male players.

Sometimes they’re created to be glorified furniture but they are frequently programmed as minimally interactive sex objects to be used and abused.

Clip: God of War: Ghost of Sparta
“Won’t you join us?”

In gaming lingo, the secondary characters populating the virtual environments are referred to as NPCs, short for “non-player characters” or “non-playable characters”. These are figures not directly controlled by the player and whose behaviors and dialog are governed by automated scripts within the game’s code. NPCs can occupy a wide variety of supportive, neutral or non-combatant roles, all with varying degrees of importance or levels of engagement with the protagonist. They can be pedestrians, shopkeepers, quest givers, party members or sidekicks.

However, for the purposes of this trope we’re only concerned with one very particular type of non-essential female NPC. Those specifically designed as a decorative virtual “sex class” who exist to service straight male desire. I classify this subset of characters as Non-Playable Sex Objects.

Non-Playable Sex Objects can usually be found on the sidelines of role playing or open world style games,populating the many virtual strip clubs, red light districts or brothel locations that have become almost obligatory in many so-called “mature” titles.

Such characters are programmed with crude looping sexualized behaviors or dialogue as a way of adding an extra layer of “seedy” flavoring to game universes.

Clip: Dishonored
“Hey sweetheart, you wanna play with me? You’re a lot cuter than my regulars.”

Clip: Fallout: New Vegas
“You like it, huh?”

Unlike other NPCs that exist for purposes outside of their sexuality, Non-Playable Sex Objects have little to no individual personality or identity to speak of,

Clip: Fable II
“I’ll make you wail like a banshee, baby.”

and almost never get to be anything other than set dressing or props in someone else’s narrative.

Clip: Watch Dogs
“Sold.”

This is the essence of what sexual objectification means. And since that concept is at the heart of the Women as Background Decoration trope, let’s take a moment to define it.

As the term implies, sexual objectification is the practice of treating or representing a human being as a thing or mere instrument to be used for another’s sexual purposes. Sexually objectified women are valued primarily for their bodies, or body parts, which are presented as existing for the pleasure and gratification of others.

In some games sexual objectification is fused with the exotification of impoverished women of color. In Far Cry 3 and Max Payne 3, for example, straight white protagonists explore shantytowns located in the global south populated by prostituted women.

Clip: Far Cry 3
“I’m lonely, want to play? You like what you see I can tell.”

The sexually subservient “Asian Prostitute” trope also permeates urban environments in games like Binary Domain and Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

Clip: Deus Ex: Human Revolution
“You come to Hengsha for a good time? Here I am.”

Clip: Binary Domain
“Oh, hello honey. Looking for good time? I can give you good deal.”
“Too bad you have friends along. I’m not into group thing. Come alone next time, I might even give you a freebie to make up for it.”

Clip: Shellshock Nam ‘67
“Love you long time soldier.”
“Suivez-moi GI, give you good time.”

These women speak in broken English and their minimal dialog is designed to invoke shades of ‘sex tourism’ style exploitation.

Scenarios like these are part of a long racist tradition of representing women of color as mysterious and hypersexual creatures who exist as an “exotic spice” to be consumed by the white or western man.

Clip: Fable Anniversary
“If you are looking for something a little more exotic, you will find what you seek with me.”

By the way, games set in the United States are not exempt from this kind of racist exotification.

Clip: GTA 4
“Sick of people saying no? Not here baby.”

Clip: Godfather 2
“Ooh baby, maybe tonight I’ll give you a little taste on the house.”

These scenarios place men in the driver’s seat, so to speak, and sell us the notion that men are always sexual subjects while women are largely sexual objects.

Incidentally this trope also exists in games that may allow players to pick a female avatar. But the presence of a woman inhabiting the role of protagonist, even if well developed, doesn’t do anything to negate the fact that non-playable sex objects are still specifically coded to pander to a presumed heterosexual male ego.

Sexual objectification is, of course, ubiquitous in mass media of all forms…

Clip: Hitman: Blood Money
“Good baby, real good! Now show me those luscious pink lips.”

…but since video games are an interactive medium, players are allowed to move beyond the traditional role of voyeur or spectator. Because of its essential interactive nature, gaming occupies a unique and potentially more detrimental position vis-a-vis the portrayal and treatment of female characters.

A viewer of non-interactive media is restricted to gazing at what the media makers want them to see. Similar to what we might see in video game cutscenes, the audience is only afforded one fixed perspective. But since we’re talking about interactive gameplay within a three-dimensional environment, we need to consider the fact that players are encouraged to participate directly in the objectification of women through control of the player character, and by extension control of the game camera. In other words, games move the viewer from the position of spectator to that of participant in the media experience.

On a very basic level, we can think of non-interactive media as engaging audiences in forms of “passive looking”, while video games provide players the chance to partake in forms of “active looking” or “active observing”.

The opening moments in The Darkness 2, for instance, teaches players how to operate the game’s control scheme by instructing you to actively objectify women in the environment.

Clip: The Darkness 2
“Hey Jackie, check out the rack on the brunette to your right. No, no your other right.”

Level designers also have a suspicious tendency to build stages in which players are required to walk through brothels, strip-clubs or women’s dressing rooms…

Clip: The Darkness 2
“I can make all your dreams come true.”

…in order to advance the story.

Clip: Metro Last Light
“If you wanna look, go left. For touching, go downstairs. Just don’t hurt the girls.”

In the case of The Saboteur, the protagonist’s “home base” is located inside a burlesque club, which, conveniently enough, you can only enter via the women’s changing area.

Clip: The Saboteur
“They ain’t a hidey-hole, this is heaven.

These active viewing mechanics encourage players to collaborate with developers in sexual objectification by enabling gamers to scope out and spy on non-playable sex objects.

Since we are discussing the intersections of objectification and interaction, we also need to consider some more direct aspects of objectification that are not as applicable in traditional mass media.

Building off of philosopher Martha Nussbaum’s work on “objectification theory”, I’ve identified a number of fundamental aspects of objectification including instrumentality, commodification, interchangeability, violability and disposability, all of which are commonly embedded into the gameplay mechanics and programmed behaviors of NPCs in modern immersive titles.

Since instrumentality is a core component of objectification, let’s begin there. In the realm of interactive media I use the term “instrumentality” to refer to the practice of using virtual women as tools or props for the player’s own purposes.

Clip: Assassin’s Creed 4
“I’m terribly well informed about coun-try matters.”

Courtesans in the Assassins Creed series, for instance, are available to be “rented” and used to help you “blend in” to the environment. Once acquired, they can be ordered to flirt with guards to distract them…

Clip: Assasin’s Creed 4
“Alright go.”

…allowing the protagonist to slip by undetected.

Clip: Assasin’s Creed 4
“Come on, I’m a real snake charmer”

Hitman: Absolution features a mission in which the player can create a diversion by picking up and dumping the dead body of an exotic dancer near police officers.

Clip: Hitman: Absolution
“Oh! What the fuck? Ah shit… that wasn’t there a minute ago.”

The first three games in the Saints Row series feature a recurring activity called “snatch”.

Clip: Saints Row
“Now if you could bring me back some of those fine bitches who are turning tricks for other pimps, I could start seeing some real money. But I ain’t asking for something for nothing, I mean you help me out I’ll cut you in on what the bitches make.”

These missions require the player to steal prostituted women, referred to as “hoes” in the game from pimps…

Clip: Saints Row
“Get away from my hoes you little bitch”

…and then deliver them to a brothel or another pimp in return for a cut of their “business”.

In these scenarios instrumentality is heavily linked to the commodification of women. Since objects can be bought and sold, it follows that once women have been turned into objects, their bodies and sexuality can also be bought and sold.

Clip: Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea DLC
“Sexual intimacy is no different than any other commodity, friend. You sell soybeans I sell companionship.”
“That’s disgusting”
“That’s the bible talking pal, that’s your mother talking. What does Ryan say? Petty morality, you can keep it.”

The 1996 game Duke Nukem 3D allowed players to interact with female NPCs by paying them to flash their boobs.

Clip: Duke Nukem 3D
“Shake it baby”

That was almost 20 years ago; today games where the player can buy a lap dance or prostituted women are commonplace.

Clip: Metro: Last Light
“What kind of dance would you like, sweetie? Tell me, don’t be shy. I’m quite imaginative…”

Clip: Fallout: New Vegas
“Hey there, sugar. I’m Dazzle. What can I do for your….or to you? You’re so handsome I might just give you a discount.”

Clip: The Witcher 2
“Care for a little fornication?”

Clip: Fable: The Lost Chapters, Fable Anniversary
“Don’t worry, you’ll see I’m worth every one of those 100 gold pieces.”

Clip: Dragon Age: Origins
“Here they are. Aren’t they beautiful? Remember, thirty silver up front. Go ahead and choose, then.”

Clip: Fallout 3
“Well… for you? A room and some company will run you 120 caps. Up front.”

Clip: Sleeping Dogs
“I got something extra special. Why don’t you buy me a present and I show it to you.”
“Sure, why not?”
“Is it hot in here? I can feel my temperature rising already!”

In both Sleeping Dogs and the Grand Theft Auto franchise, buying and using prostituted women for sex rewards the player with powerups, stat boosts and/or health regeneration.

Clip: Sleeping Dogs
“I may just have to find a new job. You know what they say about ‘coming with the customers’.”

Which means that these women fulfill basically the same function as the beverages the player can purchase from vending machines and convenience stores in these games.

This is a textbook example of another component of objectification referred to as fungibility or interchangeability. Nussbaum explains this as occurring when “The objectifier treats the object as interchangeable with other objects of the same type, and/or with objects of other types.”

Since these women serve an identical or nearly identical “resource” function within the game space…

Clip: Grand Theft Auto V
“Get in, baby!”

…they are created to be interchangeable with any other female NPC of the same type. A fact reinforced when developers simply copy and paste the same character models into various locations throughout the environment.

A line can be drawn from the crude sensationalized misogyny of Duke Nukem…

Clip: Duke Nukem 3D
“You wanna dance?”

…directly to the most recent installment in the blockbuster game series Grand Theft Auto, in which players are rewarded for touching women after purchasing a private dance. This touching mechanic is essentially a mini-game which involves the player groping a stripper to fill their “like meter” without being caught by the bouncer. If that wasn’t bad enough…

Clip: Grand Theft Auto V
“Hi sexy!”

…the player is then rewarded with sex as the dancers will go home with your character for successfully fondling them.

Clip: Grand Theft Auto V
“Follow me, honey!”

These games systematize sexuality in ways that dehumanize women, essentially turning them into vending machines dispensing sex, along with other goods and services. Their worth as characters is measured entirely in terms of what they can give to the player.

Since these women are just objects, there’s no need or reason for players to have any emotional engagement with them. Meaningful relationships or interactions are not even possible. Their programming simply does not allow for it.

When men are depicted using female NPCs as tools or commodities, their actions are portrayed as part of what makes them powerful, which is by extension part of what makes the player then feel powerful. So these interactive algorithms transmit cultural messages of near constant affirmation of male heterosexual dominance, while simultaneously reinforcing the widespread regressive belief that women’s primary role is to satisfy the desires of men (either literally or voyeuristically).

Clip: The Godfather II
“Que guapo! What’s your name, senor?”
“Oh yeah, you might be too much for some other guys, but not me. If I can handle two chicks at once, I can certainly handle you…”
“Whoo- is it getting hot in here, or is it just you?”

This is especially sad because interactive media has the potential to be a perfect medium to genuinely explore sex and sexuality. But that’s not what’s happening here. These interactions set up a transactional relationship in which women are reduced to a base sexual function. It frames female sexuality as something that belongs to others, rather than as something women enjoy for themselves. I’d argue that none of this is really about sex at all, certainly nothing resembling authentic consensual intimacy; publishers and developers are instead selling a particular fantasy about male power centered on the control of women.

Of course, we can’t really talk about sexual objectification without also addressing the issue of violence against women, since the two are intimately connected. Once a person is reduced to the status of objecthood, violence against that object becomes intrinsically permitted.

In many open world or sandbox style games, developers construct their virtual worlds in such a way as to enable players to directly abuse non-playable sex objects.

This ability to violate the bodily integrity of eroticized women for fun highlights two other insidious aspects of objectification, those being violability and disposability.

Violability occurs when, as Nussbaum points out, “The objectifier treats the object as lacking in boundary-integrity, as something that it is permissible to break up, smash, break into.”

Players are often permitted to knock out, pick up, carry and throw around inert female bodies. And depending on the game series, the programmed options for interaction can include assault, mutilation, murder…

Clip: Dishonored
“Please help me!”

…and everything in-between.

Clip: Deus Ex: Human Revolution
“I’m not sure you can afford what I’ll do to you”

Some games explicitly incentivise and reward this kind of behavior by having murdered women drop bundles of cash for the player to collect and add to their own stash.

Clip: Grand Theft Auto IV
“Is this what you had in mind? You don’t wanna make me finish you off!”

The dehumanization caused by objectification inevitably leads us to the concept of disposability, which is defined as “something designed for or capable of being thrown away after being used or used up”.

Clip: Red Dead Redemption
“Hello, miss.”
“Hey minster, is there anything of yours that you’d like to stick into somethin’ of mine?”

The protagonist in the critically acclaimed Red Dead Redemption doesn’t agree to buying sex, instead the game allows players to lasso, hogtie and carry away prostituted women…

Clip: Red Dead Redemption
“Usually I charge extra for this, honey! There’s an easier way you can have me, I ain’t expensive!”

…who continue to suggestively proposition the player even while being held captive.

Clip: Red Dead Redemption
“Hey minster, is there anything of yours that you’d like to stick into somethin’ of mine?”

The game also rewards players with a special achievement trophy called “Dastardly” which is unlocked by placing a hogtied woman on the railroad tracks and then watching as she is splattered by an oncoming train.

When assaulted by the player, non-playable sex objects might scream…

Clip: Dishonored
“I need help!”

cower…

Clip: Sleeping Dogs
“Oh no!”

run away or occasionally offer some form of perfunctory resistance.

Clip: Deus Ex: Human Revolution
“[Screams]”
“You can’t run!”

But regardless of the canned, automated reaction, they are all designed to be expendable, to be used up and then tossed out.

Clip: The Godfather II
“Oh god!”
“Look out!”

Their status as disposable objects is reinforced by the fact that in most games discarded bodies will simply vanish into thin air a short time after being killed.

I should note that this kind of misogynistic behavior isn’t always mandatory; often it’s player-directed, but it is always implicitly encouraged.

In order to understand how this works, let’s take a moment to examine how video game systems operate as playgrounds for player engagement. Games ask us to play with them. Now that may seem obvious, but bear with me. Game developers set up a series of rules and then within those rules we are invited to test the mechanics to see what we can do, and what we can’t do. We are encouraged to experiment with how the system will react or respond to our inputs and discover which of our actions are permitted and which are not. The play comes from figuring out the boundaries and possibilities within the gamespace.

So in many of the titles we’ve been discussing, the game makers have set up a series of possible scenarios involving vulnerable, eroticized female characters. Players are then invited to explore and exploit those situations during their play-through.

The player cannot help but treat these female bodies as things to be acted upon,because they were designed, constructed and placed in the environment for that singular purpose. Players are meant to derive a perverse pleasure from desecrating the bodies of unsuspecting virtual female characters.

It’s a rush streaming from a carefully concocted mix of sexual arousal connected to the act of controlling and punishing representations of female sexuality.

In-game consequences for these violations are trivial at best and rarely lead to any sort of “fail state” or “game over”. Sometimes areas may go on high-alert for a few minutes during which players have to lay low or hide before the game and its characters “forget” that you just murdered a sexualized woman in cold blood.

Clip: Red Dead Redemption
“We gotta get outta here”

These temporary game states are implemented so that acts of violence against NPCs committed by players do not inconvenience or interfere too much with the core gaming experience. High alert serves as a faux-punishment that doesn’t “ruin the fun”, and is in fact actually designed and intended to provide an added rush to the game experience as players try to avoid or mow down law enforcement AI.

Clip: Grand Theft Auto V
“Hey gorgeous, jump in!”

Returning to the Grand Theft Auto franchise, you can buy a prostituted woman, use her for sex, gain the health and stat boost, then murder her to get your money back.

Clip: Grand Theft Auto V
“Hey! You want me? Kill me!’

If caught by the police, the screen will fade to black, and 5 seconds later your character will be standing outside the police station, minus a few dollars or items, but free to go about your business as if nothing happened. Other popular sandbox games employ similar character revival methods.

In this way these systems work to facilitate male violence against women by turning it into a form of play, something constructed to be amusing and entertaining.

Now inevitably whenever these game mechanics are criticized, some gamers try to dismiss and distance themselves from the issue by insisting that they don’t personally partake in the provided options for exploiting virtual women. But whether or not an individual player chooses to use an object for its intended purpose is irrelevant, because that object was still designed and placed in the game environment to fulfill its function.

A toaster is still a toaster regardless of whether or not you choose to make toast with it. It’s still designed for the express purpose of toasting bread. And it still communicates that fact even while sitting unused on your kitchen counter.

Likewise a sex object is still a sex object regardless of whether or not you personally choose to use and abuse her. And that fact, in and of itself, still communicates extremely regressive ideas about women.

Indeed nothing about the design, behaviors or mechanics associated with female characters that serve as background decoration encourages or engenders any sort of human empathy. In fact, quite the opposite, the rudimentary algorithms governing interactions lead the player to interface with these characters in ways that can only be dehumanizing and exploitative. As sexual automata, they don’t have any individuality, they don’t have their own stories, players are never supposed to identify with them or care about them, outside of what they can offer either sexually or materially. They exist on the outskirts of humanity, placed beyond the reach of empathy by their creators.

Typically all the non-essential characters in sandbox style games are killable, but it’s the sexualized women whose instrumentality and brutalization is gendered and eroticized in ways that men never are. The visual language attached to male NPCs is very different since they are rarely designed to be sexually inviting or arousing, and they are not coded to interact with the player in ways meant to reaffirm a heterosexual fantasy about being a stud.

Clip: Sleeping Dogs
“Need a massage? We are one of the few properly licensed clinics in town.”
“Sounds good.”
“Is it your back? Or your shoulders? How about your legs?”

There do exist a handful of games which include a few male gigolos, though they are extremely rare…

Clip: Dragon Age: Origins
“Here they are. Aren’t they beautiful? Remember, thirty silver up front.”

Clip: Fallout: New Vegas
“Santiago is here to please, my prarie flower. Just a few caps and I’m yours.”

…and more often than not, the design and characterization is played for laughs.

Clip: Fable II
“I’m even nicer without these all clothes on.”

Clip: Fallout: New Vegas
“I wouldn’t mind takin’ a bite of you.”

But even if sexualized male NPCs were more prevalent, equal opportunity sexual objectification is still not the solution to this problem, especially considering the existing power differential between men and women in our society. Women are constantly represented as primarily for sex. Men may be sexual too, but they can also be anything else, they are not defined by or reduced to their sexuality and their sexuality is not thought of as something existing chiefly for the pleasure of others. Which means the fundamentally dominant position of men in our culture is not in any way challenged or diminished by the rare male depiction as sex worker.

All the forms of interactive engagement we’re discussing in this episode – the active looking, the instrumentality, the commodification, the violability and the disposability –are embedded in the DNA of some of the most popular video game franchises.

So whereas in traditional media, viewers might see representations of women being used or exploited, gaming offers players the unique opportunity to use or exploit female bodies themselves. This forces gamers to become complicit with developers in making sexual objectification a participatory activity.

So why does any of this matter? What’s the real harm in sexually objectifying women? Well, the negative impacts of sexual objectification have been studied extensively over the years and the effects on people of all genders are quite clear and very serious. Research has consistently found that exposure to these types of images negatively impacts perceptions and beliefs about real world women and reinforces harmful myths about sexual violence.

We know that women tend to internalize these types of images and self-objectify. When women begin to think of themselves as objects, and treat themselves accordingly, it results in all kinds of social issues, everything from eating disorders to clinical depression, from body shame to habitual body monitoring. We also see distinct decreases in self-worth, life satisfaction and cognitive functioning.

But the negative effects on men are just as alarming, albeit in slightly different ways. Studies have found, for example, that after having viewed sexually objectified female bodies, men in particular tend to view women as less intelligent, less competent and disturbingly express less concern for their physical well being or safety. Furthermore this perception is not limited only to sexualized women; in what’s called the “Spill Over Effect”, these sexist attitudes carry over to perceptions of all women, as a group, regardless of their attire, activities or professions.

Researchers have also found that after long-term exposure to hyper-sexualized images, people of all genders tend to be more tolerant of the sexual harassment of women and more readily accept rape myths, including the belief that sexually assaulted women were asking for it, deserved it or are the ones to blame for being victimized.

In other words, viewing media that frames women as objects or sexual playthings, profoundly impacts how real life women are perceived and treated in the world around us. And that is all without even taking into account how video games allow for the more participatory form of objectification that we’ve been discussing in this episode.

Compounding the problem is the widespread belief that, despite all the evidence, exposure to media has no real world impact. While it may be comforting to think we all have a personal force field protecting us from outside influences, this is simply not the case. Scholars sometimes refer to this type of denial as the “third person effect”, which is the tendency for people to believe that they are personally immune to media’s effects even if others may be influenced or manipulated. Paradoxically and somewhat ironically, those who most strongly believe that media is just harmless entertainment are also the ones most likely to uncritically internalize harmful media messages.

In short, the more you think you cannot be affected, the more likely you are to be affected.

Please join me for our next video in which we will continue our discussion of the Women as Background Decoration trope by examining the growing trend of exploiting sexual violence as a plot device in game narratives.

Clip: Hotel Mario
“Oh, here’s the problem- too many toasters! You know what they say, all toasters toast toast.”

The Women as Background Decoration trope which is the subset of largely insignificant non-playable female characters whose sexuality or victimhood is exploited as a way to infuse edgy, gritty or racy flavoring into game worlds. These sexually objectified female bodies are designed to function as environmental texture while titillating presumed straight male players. Sometimes they’re created to be glorified furniture but they are frequently programmed as minimally interactive sex objects to be used and abused.

In part 1 we discussed the concept of Sexual Objectification and looked at a specific subset of non-essential female characters which I classify as Non-Playable Sex Objects.

Press Image for Media Use: https://www.flickr.com/photos/anitasarkeesian/15034097635/

LINKS AND RESOURCES

• It’s time to leave the brothels and strip clubs behind when real victims fuel your narrative by Ben Kuchera
• I’m Being So Sincere Right Now: Gaming as Hyperreality by Quinnae
• Games, Noir and the 17%: Where Are the Women? by Cara Ellison
• Sexual Violence Statistics from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention
• Nearly 1 in 5 Women in U.S. Survey Say They Have Been Sexually Assaulted by Roni Caryn Rabin

ABOUT THE SERIES
The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

GAMES REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE

Assassin’s Creed 2 (2009)
Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood (2010)
Bioshock (2007)
Bioshock 2 (2010)
Dead Island (2011)
Dishonored (2012)
Dragon Age: Origins (2009)
Fable 2 (2008)
Far Cry 3 (2012)
God of War 3 (2008)
Grand Theft Auto IV (2008)
Grand Theft Auto V (2013)
Hitman: Absolution (2012)
Hitman: Blood Money (2006)
Kane & Lynch (2007)
L.A. Noire (2011)
Mafia II: Joe’s Adventures (2010)
Metro: Last Light (2013)
No More Heroes (2008)
Papo & Yo (2012)
Prototype (2009)
Red Dead Redemption (2010)
Saints Row (2006)
Super Mario Galaxy 2 (2010)
The Darkness II (2012)
The Witcher (2007)
The Witcher 2 (2011)
Thief (2014)
Watch Dogs (2014)

Transcript

CLIP: Dragon Age: Origins
“Grab a whore and have a good time”

Welcome to the second part of our mini-series examining the Women as Background Decoration trope in video games. I need to stress that this video comes with a content warning and is not recommended for children. The game footage I’ll be showcasing will be particularly graphic and include scenes of extreme violence against women.

I define the Women as Background Decoration trope as: The subset of largely insignificant non-playable female characters whose sexuality or victimhood is exploited as a way to infuse edgy, gritty or racy flavoring into game worlds. These sexually objectified female bodies are designed to function as environmental texture while titillating presumed straight male players.

In our last video we discussed the concept of Sexual Objectification and looked at a specific subset of non-essential female characters which I classify as Non-Playable Sex Objects.

In this episode we will expand our discussion of the Women as Background Decoration trope to examine how sexualized female bodies often occupy a dual role as both sexual playthings and the perpetual victims of male violence.

CLIP: Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood
“Are you here for the whore?”
“Aiutatemi!”
“I have your money. Let her go.”
“No, take it up with Cesare.”

CLIP: Bioshock 1
“Well if it isn’t long lost Andrew Ryan. Mmmm come here tiger. I thought you had forgotten about poor Jasmine but I’m so glad you didn’t. I’m sorry Mr. Ryan, I didn’t know. I didn’t know Fontaine had something to do with it… ah, wh-what are you doing? No, no don’t please, I loved you, don’t, don’t please, no!”

The marketing blitz surrounding the release of the 2006 game Hitman: Blood Money featured several advertisements depicting the murdered bodies of sexualized women with captions like “Beautifully executed”. Even in death these lingerie-clad women are posed provocatively in a way designed to sexually arouse straight male viewers.

If we compare the Hitman ads featuring female victims to those featuring assassinated men, we immediately notice that male characters are not displayed in sexualized clothing or positions. Maimed female bodies on the other hand are often fetishized and sexually objectified.

The 1940’s pulp-novel-inspired LA Noire used similar images in some promotional materials displaying the sexualized dead bodies of murdered women as a selling point for the game.

This Drop Dead Gorgeous trope, as it’s called, is commonly used in other forms of mass media, especially in fashion advertising. It is the collusion of violence done to women’s bodies and the fact that it is often sexualized. The idea being that a dead woman is still inherently beautiful, even if her body has been maimed, her life stolen from her, something arousing still remains available for male consumption.

CLIP: Dragon Age: Origins
“Well that’s one less elf breeder in the world.”
“A shame though, nice body on that one.”
“She’s still warm, how picky are you anyway?”

Developers regularly utilize the brutalization of women’s bodies, and especially the bodies of female prostitutes, as an indicator of just how harsh, cruel and unforgiving their game worlds are.
In some of the most pernicious examples, dead or mutilated female bodies are used to decorate virtual game environments as a way to invoke a sexually charged creepy mood or edgy atmosphere.

Mafia 2: Joe’s Adventure includes a gun battle which takes place over the dead body of an exotic dancer who moments earlier was performing a routine for the player.

A grisly example can be found in Bioshock 2 where mutilated eroticized female bodies are seen scattered throughout The Pink Pearl bordello area in Siren Alley.

Again we can compare the way the murdered male bodies are displayed and notice the distinct lack of sexualization in their presentation. The male corpses may be designed to evoke a sense of horror or disgust, but it’s not coupled with elements of sexual titillation in the same way that female bodies are.

While playing, gamers are routinely forced to witness graphic scenes of violence against female NPCs as these acts are committed in real time by other game characters.

The opening sequence in Prototype for instance depicts the execution of a nameless crying woman, her dress ripped suggestively to reveal her garter belt.

A similar technique is used to set the mood in The Darkness 2.

CLIP: The Darkness 2
“Hiya Jackie, remember us from the Candy Club? Well, do you?”
“Sure he does.”

The opening scene features two women flirting with the player in first person before they are both slaughtered in front of you.
During one mission in Far Cry 3 the players watch from the sidelines as a pimp beats up a female prostitute of color in a shanty town.

CLIP: Far Cry 3
“Where’s my fucking money bitch?”
“I don’t feel good”
“I’ve got your medicine”
“Please don’t”
“[unclear] little shit”
“My money, what’s this huh? You worthless whore, your fucking pathetic. You’re lucky I don’t kill you.”

The women who fulfill this trope in gaming universes are sometimes designed to occupy minor narrative roles but more often than not they’re just hollow shells, empty representations with little to no personality or individuality to speak of.
Red Dead Redemption includes multiple depictions of assaulted female prostitutes. In the stranger side-mission “Eva in Peril” the protagonist happens upon a Mexican prostitute being beaten.

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“Si, tu eres puta”
“Hey amigo, give it a rest. Enough.”
“Excuse me, gringo.”
“Stop hitting the girl.”
“There you happy now?”

The player can choose to “buy her” from her abuser for 200 dollars to stop the attack, though she is later murdered by her assailant anyway.

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“You like her? You can have her. Yeah, she’s pretty clean and pretty dirty also. She’s yours for 200 American dollars.”
“Mario, you are evil.”
“No, Eva. I’m just a cow herd who can no longer afford the cattle.”

Rape and sexual assault are also frequently used as a sort of narrative currency to try and raise the emotional stakes and heighten the dramatic tension for gamers.

CLIP: Metro Last Light
“Come on mama, come on! Spread them legs!”
“Oh please! Don’t! Noooo!”
“Korova, what, you think you’re too good for us?!”
“No! Please! Please, help!”
“Quiet! Shut the fuck up!”

CLIP: Bioshock 2
“I’ve got plans for you!”
“Unhand me at once”
“This is going to be fun.”
“Help!”

Scripted events are typically not part of the game’s main storyline, but are instead designed to seem like random chance encounters. They are meant to make the game world appear more alive or unpredictable and therefore more believable.

In Grand Theft Auto 5 one such chance encounter features a scene evocative of sexual assault in which a young woman is being attacked and held down by two men on the side of the road.

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto V
“Get off of me you old pervert”
“Walk away. Don’t make this your problem.”

The player can rescue her by killing her assailants or simply watch the scene play out in front of them.

These vignettes are not major plot points, instead violence against women is essentially used as a set piece to establish or punctuate the seedy atmosphere of crime-and-chaos-ridden fictional universes.

CLIP: Far Cry 3
“D’you like that? That feel good? Fuck.”

It’s meant to paint the gaming environment with a harsh brush, but it ends up doing so on the backs of women’s bodies, casually sacrificing female characters in the name of setting a ruthless narrative tone.

It’s worth noting that there are striking tonal and thematic similarities between female victims used as background decoration and other tropes we’ve discussed in previous episodes.

The second installment in the Assassin’s Creed series, for instance, features a sequence called “damsels in distress” in which the player must hunt down a man who has murdered a female prostitute.

CLIP: Assassin’s Creed 2
“Come. Join us Ezio! Have a drink, meet the ladies.”
“Murderer! Butcher! He sliced Lucia and stole her money!”
“So Messer Ezio, let’s see just how talented you are. After him.”

During this sequence the killer will run and take a courtesan hostage.

CLIP: Assassin’s Creed 2
“Don’t come any closer or I’ll carve up another one.”

If the player gets too close the assailant will slit her throat and run to the next nameless courtesan, take her hostage, murder her,

CLIP: Assassin’s Creed 2
“It wasn’t my fault. She laughed at me! She made me do it.”

Then grab another, murder her, grab another and another until the player manages to shoot and kill the perpetrator from a sufficient distance.

The Witcher games include a variety of side missions involving the player character attempting to rescue or protect non-playable sex objects from assault or rape by thugs.

CLIP: The Witcher
“Will you help me? I fear the dogs and thugs, but I need to get home.”

CLIP: The Witcher
“Some men are troubling my girls. Take care of it and we’ll compensate you… generously.

In our first episode, I described the Damsel in Distress trope as playing into a form of objectification because traditionally damsel’ed characters become the central object or goal in a competition between men.

CLIP: Super Mario Galaxy 2
“MARIO!”

I explained that in the game of patriarchy, women are not the opposing team; they are actually the ball. Female characters that fall under the Background Decoration trope, however, usually don’t even rise to the level of importance necessary to be pawns in someone else’s game.

Instead these women are brought on stage for the express purpose of being victimized in front of the player, after which their battered bodies are whisked away, swept back behind the curtain, never to be heard from again.

Returning to Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption, in most settlement areas players are treated to randomly triggered events in which female prostitutes are assaulted and murdered by johns amid a torrent of misogynistic slurs. Players are presented with the choice to either intervene and save the woman for a small cash reward or simply watch the attack play out in front of them as part of the entertainment.

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“Help! Someone.”
“Stickin’ whore! I’m gonna cut you a new hole! You think I’m a joke? Go on then laugh, bitch, LAUGH!”

If the player sticks around long enough or leaves and then re-enters the same location the scene will eventually repeat itself again, and again, very much like the animatronic vignettes in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland.

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“Stickin’ whore! I’m gonna cut you a new hole! You think I’m a joke? Go on then laugh, bitch, LAUGH!”

The audience is meant to briefly gasp at these acts of brutality, before their attention is directed elsewhere, towards the next event or set of enemies to be dispatched.

Regardless of the player’s actions in these type of situations, the result always paints women in a regressive light, as they will end up as either “helpless damsels” or “dead victims”.

On a shallow surface level, these vignettes seem to contextualize violence against women in a negative light; however, these narratives are never really about the abused women in question. Instead depictions of female pain and victimhood are flippantly summoned to serve as sideshow attractions in storylines about other things altogether.

In Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs, scripted crime events randomly generate throughout the game’s open world environment, some of which graphically depict incidents of domestic violence.

CLIP: Watch Dogs
“So you think you can just leave me?”
“Jesus, you need to stop following me.”
“Come on babe, don’t be like that.”
“I’ve had it with you, you’re nuts!”
“That’s it, I’ve had it with your lip!”
“Don’t!”
“I’ll teach you!”

These scenes are programmed to repeat themselves randomly dozens of times during gameplay.

CLIP: Watch Dogs
“You think you’re leaving me? Huh?”
“Jesus, you need to stop following me.”
“I’m not done with you, not yet.”
“You need to get out of here right now.”
“I’ll fucking kill you goddamnit.”
“No, don’t!”

If the player reaches the victim within the 10-second intervention window, the woman can be rescued by killing her abuser. However, if the player doesn’t reach her in time, she is murdered and the perpetrator will flee, providing gamers the opportunity to hunt him down.
Tellingly, if the player gets too close to the assault before it occurs, the abuser will be scared off and the player will fail the mission…

CLIP: Watch Dogs
“Hey we need to talk”

…gaining no experience points and no boost to his “reputation” meter.

The only options available are to wait until the assault is in progress, then either take out the perpetrator during the assault, or take him down after the assault has happened.

CLIP: Watch Dogs
“Hey we need to talk”
“There’s nothing to talk about. We’re done, deal with it.”
“You’re so fucking wrong. I’m not done yet.”
“Get away.”

“I gotta stop him now.”

“I’ll scream.”
“Oh I’ll teach you. We’re not done, we are not done!”
“I’ll fucking kill you!”

No game mechanics are provided to call an EMT, administer first aid or check in on the victim.

Meaning that these female characters exist to be assaulted in order to give the player something to do, a reason to chase down the bad guy, exact vigilante justice on him and gain the allotted experience points. After which the women are casually discarded, forgotten by the game and its characters.

Of course, there also exists scripted events involving male npcs, but those encounters are framed in distinctly different ways.

CLIP: Watch Dogs
“This is the place. If this guy is going to act, it’ll be nearby.”
“You’ve got some serious shit to sort out with the boys.”
“Aw man, someone’s playin’ you man!”
“You never fucking learn.”

When the victims are men, sexual objectification and sexual or domestic violence are almost never ingredients in the scenario. Even the countless male thugs and henchmen the player mows down in these games are depicted as active aggressors, not characterized as passive victims.

Plot devices that capitalize on female trauma for shock value function in much the same way as the hitting a child, or kicking the dog, tropes do.

CLIP: Fable 2
“No one defies Thag the impatient!”

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“There you happy now”

It’s casual cruelty implemented as an easy way to deliver a quick emotional punch to the player by presenting attacks on characters specifically designed to appear pitifully vulnerable.

These scenes serve no real purpose in the plot other than to let the audience know that the perpetrators are truly deplorable monsters.

CLIP: Thief
“Never speak of my mother like that again you whore!”

CLIP: The Witcher 2
“Think yourself a hero do you? Sail away and I’ll burn these sluts alive!”

CLIP: Saints Row
“Wanna check out the dental plan bitch?”

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“Don’t be so conventional! Look at that ass, magnificent. I’ll save her for later… or I’ll kill her and all her family, they’re probably rebels anyway.”

So in addition to helping paint a gritty picture for the rest of the game experience, this kind of sexualized violence against inessential female characters is exploited by developers as a sort of cheap one-note character development for the “bad guys”.

CLIP: Dragon Age: Origins
“Let go of me, stop, please!”
“It’s a party isn’t it? Grab a whore and have a good time. Savor the hunt boys.”

CLIP: Red Dead Redemption
“She was just a God dang whore, man. A God dang filthy whore.”

It’s a lazy shorthand for “evil” meant to further motivate the protagonist to take the villain down and help justify the excessive violence committed by the player in these games.

After all, if the random thugs or villains are so heartless and vile they attack helpless women, then the player can feel completely justified and even take pleasure in murdering them in ever more gruesome ways.

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto 5
“Where’s your respect?”
“Thank God. That was so awful. Did you hear what they were saying to me?”

These women and their bodies are sacrificed in the name of infusing “mature themes” into gaming stories. But there is nothing “mature” about flippantly evoking shades of female trauma. It ends up sensationalizing an issue which is painfully familiar to a large percentage of women on this planet while also normalizing and trivializing their experiences.

Sexual and domestic violence is at epidemic levels in the real world; one out of every five women in the United States will be raped in their lifetimes. One in four will be sexually assaulted. And women involved in prostitution are at a much higher risk of violence because they are seen as vessels to be used by others rather than as fully human.

So when games casually use sexualized violence as a ham-fisted form of character development for the “bad guys” it reinforces a popular misconception about gendered violence by framing it as something abnormal, as a cruelty only committed by the most transparently evil strangers. In reality, however, violence against women, and sexual violence in particular, is a common everyday occurrence often perpetrated by “normal men” known and trusted by those targeted.

The truth is that the vast majority of cases are committed by friends, colleagues, relatives, and intimate partners. The gendered violence epidemic is a deep-seated cultural problem present in the homes, communities and workplaces of many millions of women all over the world. It is not something that mostly happens in dark alleys at the hands of cartoon villains twisting nefarious-looking mustaches.

CLIP: Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood
“Who did this?”
“That monster, Malfatto!”
“Did you see him?”
“That way!”

I should also note that the problem cannot be solved by simply finding the bad evil men and killing them all – as these game narratives invariably imply again and again.

CLIP: No More Heroes 2
“This must be Karma. Travis Touchdown.”
“Spare me the mystic crap. I came here to fight.”
“Magnificent. I see the rumors were true.”

Over the past decade or so we have seen a dramatic rise in angry male anti-hero narratives in which the player character is ostensibly a “bad guy”. In some of these games violence against women is then used as character development for the protagonist.

CLIP: Kane & Lynch
“You wouldn’t!”
“That’s enough”
“Whoa, she’s all limp, I didn’t even hit her that hard.”
“Just makes our job easier.”

Grand Theft Auto 4 requires the player to kidnap a woman.

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto 4
“Stop this thing you slimebag”
“Stop being such a fucking bitch. Calm the fuck down or little birdies will be eating your brains off the dashboard tomorrow morning.”

During this mission the protagonist character insults her and beats her unconscious.

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto 4
“You’re fucking with the wrong girl assholes. I’m Gracie Ancellotti and I–”
“Shut up. Peace at last.”

Later the game instructs players to smack her in the face before taking a ransom photo.

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto 4
“Come on Gracie, I want you looking pretty for the photo.”

CLIP: God of War 3
“Lord Kratos, no, please, please leave me be. I beg of you. Show mercy.”
“Hold your tongue”

God of War 3 includes a segment where Kratos pushes a half-naked woman through a level.

CLIP: God of War 3
“Move!”
“Please don’t kill me.”

The protagonist then uses her body to jam open a gate to the next area as she whimpers in protest.

CLIP: God of War 3
“Lord Kratos, do not leave me.”

After she is crushed to death, the player can then return to her body and look at her mangled corpse, at which point a trophy will pop up. This achievement is called “I didn’t do it, but I wish I did”.

All of this is designed to convey that the protagonist is a ruthless, unfeeling, morally corrupt character who is capable of anything. Again, we see female bodies sacrificed as a way to justify the ever more gruesome and extreme violence the player must commit throughout the game.

Some games that capitalize on scenes of sexual violence do so gleefully while other titles may attempt to frame it as something inexorably tragic.

CLIP: Dishonored
“When she was ten her mother traded her for a bottle of wine. Few enter this line of work by choice”

CLIP: Dishonored
“They thought they would be working in a factory by the time they arrived its much too late.”

But simply presenting depictions of women being abused, despondent or suicidal does nothing to make them less sexually objectified and does nothing to challenge patterns of perpetual victimhood.

CLIP: Watch Dogs
“Final call. Sold.”

There is a clear difference between replicating something and critiquing it. It’s not enough to simply present misery as miserable and exploitation as exploitative. Reproduction is not, in and of itself, a critical commentary. A critique must actually center on characters exploring, challenging, changing or struggling with oppressive social systems.

But the game stories we’ve been discussing in this episode do not center or focus on women’s struggles, women’s perseverance or women’s survival in the face of oppression. Nor are these narratives seriously interested in any sort of critical analysis or exploration of the emotional ramifications of violence against women on either a cultural or an interpersonal level.

The truth is that these games do not expose some kind of “gritty reality” of women’s lives or sexual trauma, but instead sanitise violence against women and make it comfortably consumable.

Now, to be clear, I’m certainly not saying stories seriously examining the issues surrounding domestic or sexual violence are off limits for interactive media – however if game makers do attempt to address these themes, they need to approach the topic with the subtlety, gravity and respect that the subject deserves.

Though not about the abuse of women, the 2012 indie title Papo & Yo is an example of a game that respectfully deals with the very serious issue of alcoholism and domestic violence against children.

The game does so by telling its story from the point of view of a protagonist directly affected by the trauma of abuse, not someone on the outside coming to their rescue. It focuses on the journey of a figure who is struggling through a traumatic situation and attempting to deal with the repercussions of violence. It makes that struggle to cope and survive central to both the narrative and gameplay – not peripheral set dressing to a story about something else. And critically, the game employs powerful metaphoric imagery to make its point instead of relying solely on sensationalized or exploitative depictions of the abuse itself.

Papo & Yo is an intense and at times gut-wrenching game that doesn’t sugarcoat or glamorize violence. In this way it’s an honest and emotionally resonant experience for players.

We must remember that games don’t just entertain. Intentional or not, they always express a set of values, and present us with concepts of normalcy. So what do games that casually rely on depictions of female victimhood tell us about women vis-a-vis their place in society?

Well, the pattern of utilizing women as background decoration works to reinforce the myth that women are naturally fated to be objectified, vulnerable, and perpetually victimized by male violence. These games also tend to frame misogyny and sexual exploitation as an everlasting fact of life, as something inescapable and unchangeable.

This dominant narrative surrounding the inevitability of female objectification and victimhood is so powerful that it not only defines our concepts of reality but it even sets the parameters for how we think about entirely fictional worlds, even those taking place in the realms of fantasy and science fiction. It’s so normalized that when these elements are critiqued, the knee-jerk response I hear most often is that if these stories did not include the exploitation of women, then the game worlds would feel too “unrealistic” or “not historically accurate”.

What does it say about our culture when games routinely bend or break the laws of physics and no one bats an eye? When dragons, ogres and magic are inserted into historically influenced settings without objection. We are perfectly willing to suspend our disbelief when it comes to multiple lives, superpowers, health regeneration and the ability to carry dozens of weapons and items in a massive invisible backpack. But somehow the idea of a world without sexual violence and exploitation is deemed too strange and too bizarre to be believable.

The truth is that objectification and sexual violence are neither normal nor inevitable. We do not have to accept them as some kind of necessary cultural backdrop in our media stories. Contrary to popular belief, the system of patriarchy has not existed for all of history across all time and all cultures. And as such it can be changed. It is possible to imagine fictional worlds, even of the dark, twisted dystopian variety, where the oppression and exploitation of women is not framed as something expected and inevitable.

When we see fictional universes challenging or even transcending systemic gender oppression, it subverts the dominant paradigm within our collective consciousness, and helps make a more just society feel possible, tangible and within reach.

For more information on the game visit their website: http://www.swordandsworcery.com/

Transcript: The Scythian – Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

In the debut episode of our series on Positive Female Characters, we celebrate the Scythian, the protagonist of Capybara Games’ 2011 release Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP. This episode examines how Sword & Sworcery employs widely recognizable action adventure game tropes to make the Scythian’s quest feel like the stuff of video game legend, and how in doing so, it asserts that women can fill the role of the mythic hero as effectively as men can.

The hero of the 2011 pixelated adventure game Sword & Sworcery is a brave adventurer known only as the Scythian, and the game tells the story of her quest to collect the three pieces of the golden trigon. Now, if a quest to collect pieces of a magical triangular artifact sounds familiar, that’s no accident. Sword & Sworcery’s trigon is a clear reference to the Triforce of the Legend of Zelda games, and Link’s recurring quest to collect pieces of the triforce is perhaps the most famous heroic quest in the history of fantasy adventure games. By drawing on familiar gaming icons and conventions that many of us already associate with legendary quests and timeless adventures, Sword & Sworcery quietly asserts that women can fill the role of the mythic hero as effectively as men can.

With the aid of a gorgeous and mesmerizing soundtrack, Sword & Sworcery’s retro-inspired visuals paint a pleasantly abstract landscape players can navigate through the simple act of tapping or clicking. And the game tells a traditional yet emotionally resonant story, proving that you don’t need technically impressive graphics to create a world worth exploring and a tale worth telling. In fact, the level of detail is so low on our pixelated protagonist, and our tendency to assume that heroes are male by default is so widely reinforced, that some players have made the mistake of assuming the Scythian is male, at least initially. Thankfully, the game doesn’t resort to clear gendered signifiers like a pink outfit or a pretty bow in her hair, nor does it present her gender as some kind of surprise twist like we see in the original Metroid. In both visual design and writing, Sword & Sworcery is subtle about asserting the Scythian’s gender, though once you acquire the Megatome at the end of the game’s first episode, you’re presented with the thoughts of other characters, who refer to the Scythian using female pronouns.

It’s not just in the visual sense that the Scythian lacks clear definition. We know very little about her history, and nothing about why she has undertaken the quest to defeat an ancient evil. While games often give us images of heroes who are fated to defeat evil forces, it’s rare for these heroes of myth to be women. Like many video game heroes, the Scythian is essentially a silent protagonist, a figure defined primarily by her actions, which makes her a blank slate for all players to project themselves onto. But while we don’t actually hear her speak to other characters, a bit of the Scythian’s personality does come through as her thoughts serve as a kind of narration for the story. Her quest is referred to as a “woeful errand” from very early on, an important bit of foreshadowing that communicates that her task is not a happy one, but the grim nature of her errand doesn’t overshadow the Scythian’s spirit or the tone of the game itself. The character’s quirky, often humorous thoughts, along with the sense of wonder in the world, make this journey magical, delightful and melancholy all at once.

Sword & Sworcery is broken up into a series of short sessions, most of which focus on the Scythian acquiring pieces of the Trigon. There are some simple timing-based combat encounters, but the majority of time is spent exploring the world and solving simple puzzles that require players to pay attention to environmental details like trees, birds, and reflections in the surface of a pond. The game is primarily concerned not with combat and killing but with the natural beauty of the world the Scythian is trying to protect. Using the mysterious power of the Song of Sworcery, players sometimes manipulate the environment in some really surprising ways, creating the feeling that this is a magical world where just about anything can happen.

Ok, at this point, if you haven’t finished the game yet, you should go do that right now… even if getting to the end involves a whole real-time moon cycle mechanic that might take you a couple of months to complete… unless of course you reset the clock on your gaming device… or if you are able to find the special moon grotto location— spoiler alert — we’re about to talk about how the story ends. So, you’ve been warned.

Most video game heroes become more powerful as their quest progresses. This is one way in which Sword & Sworcery subverts expected gaming tropes. There’s nothing in it for the Scythian. She doesn’t gain more health or better gear over the course of the game. In fact, the quest takes a toll on her; she starts the game with five units of health but loses one each time she wins a boss fight, decreasing her overall maximum health as her adventure progresses. This game is not about leveling up or becoming more powerful. And Sword & Sworcery ends with the Scythian doing something Link never has. To rid the world of an ancient evil, the brave hero sacrifices herself.

Unlike the deaths of so many female characters in games which serve the purpose of fueling the development of male characters, the Scythian’s death is tragic because her life had intrinsic value. We projected ourselves onto her and experienced the world through her. In the game’s final moments, we see the people of the region pay their respects to the Scythian, and we mourn her death along with them. She didn’t just exist in relation to another character—she wasn’t just somebody’s wife or sister or daughter–but rather, she existed as an individual, and as a hero. The game’s ending suggests that the Scythian will not be forgotten by the other characters, and the visuals and music work together to elicit a complex assortment of emotions, a sense of celebration of the Scythian’s courage, and a sense of grief at her death.

While the necessity of the Scythian’s sacrifice is worked into Sword & Sworcery’s story from the beginning and lends this particular game an emotional weight its quest might otherwise lack, we certainly don’t want all female heroes to be tragic ones. But we do need more women-centric stories of all kinds. When archetypal fantasy heroes in games are overwhelmingly portrayed as men, it reinforces the idea that men’s experiences are universal and that women’s experiences are gendered, that women should be able to empathize with male characters but that men needn’t be able to identify with women’s stories. Sword & Sworcery gives us a female protagonist and encourages us to see her as a hero first and foremost, one who also just happens to be a woman.

Transcript

Jade: My name is Jade. And I haven’t the foggiest how we’re gonna get out of here.

Jade is the protagonist of the 2003 third-person action adventure game Beyond Good & Evil. She’s a brave photojournalist who sets out to uncover a conspiracy between alien invaders and her own corrupt government.

Jade: They’re coming! Quick, Venn, jump up!

We start getting a sense of who Jade is from the moment we see her, and refreshingly…

Jade: Go tell Pey’j! I’ll take care of the shield.

…she actually looks the part of the active, practical young woman of color who has a job to do.

Computer 1: Shield activated.

We learn about who characters are not just from the things they say and do, but also from how they look: visual design is an important way for game designers to communicate information at a glance about a character’s experience and personality traits. Sadly, women in games are often depicted in wildly impractical, sexualized clothing designed to make them appealing to straight male players. But Jade isn’t designed to fulfill someone else’s fantasy. The midriff top is a little silly, but for the most part, she looks like someone who is dressed to accommodate her own needs. I mean, you don’t get much more practical than cargo pants.

Games often give us heroes who are either fantastically wealthy, like the Bruce Waynes and Lara Crofts of the world, or who at least don’t have practical, everyday concerns about money. But money is not just an abstract concept for Jade. She’s a working class character with real financial struggles. This is established at the very beginning of the game, when we learn that the orphanage’s electricity has been shut off, and Uncle Pey’j’s hovercraft is in dire need of repair.

Computer 1: Shield disabled.
Computer 2: Your Optima account is…

Computer 1: 350

Computer 2: …units short. Your electrical supply has just been blocked.

Jade: You’ve got to be joking!

These are characters who struggle just to make ends meet, and for them, concerns about their economic situation have real implications for their ability to provide for themselves and their adopted family.

Jade: We’re stuck here. No hovercraft, no shield. Optima has cut off the power, the account is empty.

In order to pay the bills, we’re introduced to a mechanic that establishes one of Jade’s creative talents: photography. Throughout the game, she is paid to document and catalogue the diverse animal life on the planet with her camera.

Science Center Director: Hi Jade. I see Secundo already talked to you about the job. The war is taking its toll. We need a complete inventory of all species living on the planet.

Instead of just showing or offhandedly telling us about her skills in cutscenes, the designers have built character development right into the gameplay, giving players a pleasant, nonviolent way of interacting with and appreciating the beauty of the game’s world while simultaneously reinforcing that Jade is a woman of many talents. Edge Magazine insightfully observed that part of what makes Jade so memorable is “the fact that she views this strange world and all of its careworn inhabitants through the lens of a camera, rather than the scope of an assault rifle.”

Pey’j: Hey, Jade! A school of blue scorpion fish!

This not only gives Jade more depth, but also encourages the player to view the lifeforms of Hillys with some measure of respect, rather than seeing them solely as enemies to be destroyed.

Science Center Director: From the same family as the scorpion fish. Very difficult to photograph.

While many games center on so-called “heroes” who are out for personal glory or revenge, Beyond Good & Evil’s narrative establishes Jade’s altruistic desire to achieve social justice. It’s worth noting that Jade avoids falling into the tired cliché of the tough as nails, solve-all-problems-with-violence “strong female character” archetype. Her quest is not about her pain, nor is it about taking satisfaction in exacting violent retribution.

Jade: If there’s a way to stop this war, we can’t let it pass us by.

It’s about protecting her world and the people she cares about, and unlike so many one-dimensional brooding heroes who are characterized by their own suffering, Jade does not wear the mantle of hero like a heavy burden; instead she retains her warmth and humanity over the course of her quest.

Pey’j: Ha ha ha! Not bad for a little girl and an old ham!

Jade: We did it Pey’j! Heh. Not bad for an old fart.

Together with Uncle Pey’j, a mechanically savvy anthropomorphized boar, Jade looks after a group of war-orphaned children, sheltering them in a lighthouse on the mining planet of Hillys.Though Hillys is, on the surface, a colorful and inviting place, not all is well in this world. We learn early on that an alien race has been attacking and abducting residents.

Reporter: Here on Hillys, war has once again reared its ugly head, striking the civilian population. Luckily our elite forces have once again arrived in the nick of time. I’m coming to you live from the southern lighthouse shelter. Here is where some of the children whose parents have been captured by the Dons have been taken in by two devoted and courageous Hillyans. Miss, a word for our listeners…

Jade: Uhh…

Pey’j: Yeah, yeah. Well you guys are not what I call as fast as a speeding bullet. Keep doing nuthin’ and next time, thery’ll be nuthin’ left here to see!

Reporter: Cut!

Recruited by a resistance organization called the IRIS network, Jade uncovers a vast conspiracy between the invading aliens and the government, with the corporate news media complicit in covering up the truth.

Mino: Here’s what we know. The victims are kidnapped by Alpha Section agents. They are then taken to the Nutripills factory. Shuttles are then used to take them to the old slaughterhouses. And from there, they are loaded into military cruisers headed for the moon.

There’s a subtle but subversive political dimension to Beyond Good & Evil’s narrative which highlights the importance of questioning mass media messages and challenging institutions of power that perpetuate injustice.

As a member of a resistance group, Jade uses her talents as a photographer to collect evidence documenting the conspiracy,

Science Center Director: Upper floor? Ok, I see where you’re at. We’ll start the deciphering program.

and her combat skills to help rescue kidnapped members of the IRIS Network. But she rarely goes it alone. Jade starts out the game with Uncle Pey’j by her side, and the way the characters interact makes Pey’j feel more like a partner than a mere sidekick.

In this early scene, Jade is trapped until Pey’j appears, throwing her a staff she uses to free herself and overcome the destructive alien force.

Pey’j: Hang on Jade! I’m coming! Free yourself, Jade. I’ll create a diversion.

It may seem like a minor detail, but the fact that Pey’j tells Jade to free herself, instead of doing it for her, is incredibly important. He assists her but doesn’t rescue her. He knows that even in this situation, she’s far from helpless, and the fact that Pey’j treats her as a capable partner encourages us to see her that way, too.

This moment also evokes a sense of mutual respect and partnership between these two characters, in a way that is all too rare for female characters in gaming.

Eventually, Uncle Pey’j is kidnapped, and Jade is determined to rescue him.

As a quick side note, It’s important to point out that a kidnapped male character saved by a woman and a kidnapped female character saved by a man are not equivalent, because while a damsel in distress reinforces longstanding regressive myths about women as a group being weak or helpless specifically because of their gender, a dude in distress does not reinforce any such ideas about men. For more on the relatively rare dude in distress inversion, see part 3 of my videos on the damsel trope.

Many games present an image of bravery and courage that suggests heroes are fiercely independent, rugged individualists. In those games in which heroes do have sidekicks, those sidekicks often serve as cheerleaders and ego boosters for the player, complimenting them on their skill and accomplishments, or as impediments, preventing them from progressing to a new section until they’ve completed some task. In Beyond Good & Evil, Jade’s sidekicks, Pey’j and later Double H, feel not like cheerleaders or roadblocks but like active companions who want to use their unique skills to assist Jade when they accompany her on a mission.

Pey’j: Ha ha! Say when, Jade! Jet boots attack!

There’s a sense of both good-natured humor and respect written into the banter between Jade and her sidekicks: she’s warm but also assertive, and the tone of their interactions makes it clear that they aren’t designed just to make her or the player feel better.

Pey’j: Ok. We’re going to have to keep on our toes now, Jade.

Jade: Don’t worry, uncle Pey’j. We’ll just take some pictures and get home.

The mechanics aren’t significantly different from those associated with sidekicks in many other games: these characters fight enemies and are attacked by enemies; and often their special abilities, Pey’j’s jet boots and Double H’s bull rush, must be used to advance. But because the writing so effectively creates a sense of respect and camaraderie between Jade and her companions, these relationships become much more than simple gameplay interactions.

Pey’j: Thanks, Jade. I’d’ve ended up on a silver platter with an apple in my mouth if it wasn’t for you.

Jade: Mmmm. Shut up. You’re making me hungry. I’m gonna regret saving you.

They become a vital and memorable part of the experience of playing Beyond Good & Evil, and work to emphasize the game’s themes of friendship and cooperation.

For years there have been rumours and even a teaser trailer about a Beyond Good and Evil 2. I hope this actually happens but whether or not that sequel ever gets made, we definitely need more games with warm, compassionate, multitalented characters who have realistic and relatable concerns, and more narratives in which taking a stand against corrupt systems of power is more important than personal gain or revenge.

This episode explores the numerous ways in which the Women as Reward trope manifests in video games. The trope occurs when women or women’s bodies are employed as rewards for player actions, a pattern which frames female bodies and sexuality as collectible or consumable and positions women as status symbols designed to validate the masculinity of presumed straight male players. We then discuss how this trope both reflects and reinforces the pervasive, socially constructed mentality of male entitlement that operates in the background of our culture.

Press Image for Media Use: https://www.flickr.com/photos/femfreq/21029965781

ABOUT THE SERIES
The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

50 GAMES REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE
Alice: Madness Returns (2011)
Asura’s Wrath (2012)
Castle Crashers (2008)
Conan (2007)
Dead Rising (2006)
Defender of the Crown (1986)
Donkey Kong (1981)
Double Dragon (1987)
Dragon’s Lair (1983)
God of War (2005)
God of War 3 (2010)
God of War: Chains of Olympus (2008)
God of War: Ghosts of Sparta (2010)
Grand Theft Auto 4 (2008)
Grand Theft Auto 5 (2013)
Joe & Mac Returns (1994)
Kid Kool (1990)
Lollipop Chainsaw (2012)
Mafia 2 (2010)
Metal Gear Solid 4 (2008)
Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes (2004)
Metroid (1987)
Metroid II (1991)
Metroid Fusion (2002)
Phelios (1990)
Rad Mobile (1991)
Ratchet & Clank (2002)
Resident Evil 5 (2009)
Resident Evil: Deadly Silence (2006)
Resident Evil: Revelations 2 (2015)
Ride to Hell: Retribution (2013)
Rings of Power (1991)
S.P.Y. Special Project Y (1989)
Shadowgate (1987)
Shellshock: Nam’67 (2004)
Sid Meier’s Pirates! (2001)
Splatterhouse (2010)
Stanley Parable (2013)
Super Hang-On (1987)
Super Metroid (1994)
Super Off Road (1989)
Tales of Vesperia (2008)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1989)
The 3rd Birthday (2011)
The Final Round (1988)
The Saboteur (2009)
The Witcher (2007)
The Witcher 2 (2011)
The Witcher 3 (2015)
Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4 (2002)

Transcript

CLIP: Dead Rising
“Fantastic!”

This episode comes with a content warning for game footage involving hypersexualized female characters and is not recommended for children.

As always, remember that it is both possible and even necessary to be critical of the media we enjoy. That’s going to be especially important to keep in mind given the video game franchise we are about to discuss…

In 1987 Nintendo released a 2D action adventure game for their Nintendo Entertainment System which departed from traditional video game conventions. Metroid starred a bounty hunter named Samus Aran who is covered head to toe in the now iconic cybernetic “power suit”. The game’s manual referred to the protagonist with male pronouns and described his identity as “shrouded in mystery”.

Metroid was notable as an early example of a game that employed multiple alternative endings which could be unlocked based on the player’s gaming skill and performance. If the player is able to complete the game in under five hours, a short cutscene will play featuring the protagonist without their armored helmet, revealing that Samus Aran is, in fact, a woman. This was a significant moment in gaming history, especially for many female gaming fans because, at the time, nearly all protagonists were just assumed to be male by default.

Remember this was back before the internet, when you couldn’t just hop online to find out about all the secrets and spoilers, so for many players, the ending of Metroid came as a genuine surprise. Still, the subversion only worked provided players were skilled enough to achieve the surprise ending. In retrospect, Samus’ gender reveal perhaps should not have been as shocking as it was, considering that Metroid is heavily influenced by the Alien films.

Sadly the alternate endings did not stop there; the two “best” endings make Metroid one of the first games to exploit the Women as Reward trope, as both reveal Samus in various states of undress. The better a player does, the more clothing is removed. If the player completes the game in under 3 hours Samus is shown without her armor and in a leotard. If the player finishes in under 1 hour they are treated to Samus in a bikini.

So yes, Samus wasn’t a damsel’ed woman waiting at the end of the game as a trophy; rather, her body itself became the prize awarded to players for a job well done. Later games in the Metroid series continued the convention of rewarding players with endings featuring Samus in various states of undress.

In one sense Samus Aran definitely did subvert traditional gender tropes of the 1980s by taking on the role of intrepid hero. However she and her body were still presented to players as prizes to be won. The convention, of earning access to cutscenes or ending vignettes with eroticized female bodies can be found in many titles over the past 30 years.

CLIP: Phelios
“Apollo”

CLIP: The Final Round
“Whoa! Whoa!”

CLIP: S.P.Y. Special Project Y

CLIP: Joe & Mac Returns
(Audience laughter)
“Oh!”

CLIP: Rad Mobile

We can trace the roots of the Women as Reward trope all the way back to the beginnings of the medium itself. As we discussed in our damsel in distress mini-series, upon successful completion of many arcade games players were rewarded with the related Smooch of Victory trope, so named for the kiss the hero received as a reward for rescuing a kidnapped princess.

Sometimes the prize is blatant as with the Standard Hero Reward in which a king will give his daughter to the hero. On other occasions, it’s taken a step further by employing the parallel Sex of Victory or Rescue Sex trope. Yes, it’s exactly what you think it is: instead of a kiss, sex with the rescued victim is the player’s reward.

CLIP: Ride to Hell: Retribution
“That was gonna get ugly. You saved us!”
“My pleasure, ladies.”
“Thank you, thank you. Thank you.”

CLIP: The Witcher 2
“You saved my life. A bit of joy as recumpence is not too much to ask.”
“I’m intrigued. It’s been a tough day. I think some joy might do me good.”
(Moaning)

We’ve coined the Women as Reward trope to describe a long-running pattern found in interactive media. It occurs when women (or more often women’s bodies) are employed as rewards for player actions in video games. The trope frames female bodies as collectible, as tractable or as consumable, and positions women as status symbols designed to validate the masculinity of presumed straight male players.

There’s some overlap between the Damsel in Distress and Women as Reward but they function differently. While the Damsel in Distress trope uses women as a plot device to motivate male heroes, the Women as Reward trope presents women as a formalized reward mechanism, meaning that the reward is coded into the game system itself. The result of this incentive structure is that access to women’s bodies, women’s affection or women’s sexuality is reduced to a simple equation that guarantees delivery as long as the correct set of inputs are entered into the system.

In this way the Women as Reward trope helps foster a sense of entitlement where players are encouraged to view women as something they’ve earned the right to by virtue of their gaming actions, skills or accomplishments.

This is illustrated in arcade classics like Joe and Mac and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; after players save the damsel in both games, she will bestow a kiss on the character who earned the most points on that stage.

CLIP: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
“I owe you one.”

Entitlement to women is made even more explicit in many versions of Double Dragon. At the end of the game, after the final boss has been defeated and the damsel in distress saved, player one and player two must fight each other over who “gets” to “have” Marian and with her the smooch of victory. Notice that Marian’s desires are not part of the equation, she has no say in the matter; she simply fills the role of a trophy for whichever player is ultimately victorious. This scene serves as inspiration for similar scenarios in more contemporary games like Castle Crashers.

We’ve identified 6 primary ways the Women as Reward trope manifests in video games. Over the course of this episode we will examine each in turn. In addition to the “earned cinematics” we’ve already discussed, we will cover the trope as it relates to Easter Eggs, Unlockable Costumes, Experience Points, Collectibles, and Achievements.

Easter Eggs are intentionally hidden secrets or jokes which developers conceal inside of their games. Like the eggs at a children’s easter egg hunt, these secrets are usually difficult to find but are meant to be discovered as rewards for particularly industrious gamers. Easter Eggs can be hidden messages, items, secret characters or random events, and their inclusion encourages experimentation with the game’s systems and mechanics in order to uncover these extra treasures.

Some can be found inside game environments, while others require a cheat code to unlock. For example, if players input a specific button sequence while starting up the 1991 role-playing game Rings of Power the title screen would change. By pressing down, right, A, B, C and the start button, players were rewarded with an image of a topless woman next to the Naughty Dog logo.

Easter eggs are, of course, not inherently problematic, and gaming history is filled with examples of neat secrets that designers have hidden away for players to discover. But too frequently, Easter eggs are used as another way to reward players with women’s bodies.

Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4 included a secret unlockable character named Daisy, who bore the likeness of porn star Jenna Jameson. Daisy’s sexualized appearance and skateboard tricks are designed as a reward for those players who unlocked her. One way to do that is by entering this code… ( o ) ( o )

Probably one of the most famous Women as Reward easter eggs brings us back to Samus Aran. The original Metroid used a password system to save progress. By inputting the secret code “Justin Bailey” into this system, gamers would unlock a powered-up playable version of Samus wearing only her leotard-style bathing suit. Incidentally this is the same outfit we covered earlier as an end-game reward, only here she has the powers of the Varia Suit and its associated color pallete swap, which changes her hair color to green. Players can then play the entire game as Samus without her space armor. So she ends up exploring a hostile alien world and fighting off deadly monsters in her underwear.

CLIP: Ratchet & Clank
“Welcome to the Hovercon intergalactic hoverboard competition!”

There’s a bizarre easter egg in the original Ratchet & Clank: If the player does a series of side-flips in front of a green-skinned alien, the woman’s breasts will suddenly begin to inflate. The more gymnastics stunts performed, the larger her boobs will become.

There are so many Women as Reward-style easter eggs in the Metal Gear Solid series that it would take several hours to go over them all. First released for the PlayStation in 1998 and then remade for the GameCube in 2004, Metal Gear Solid featured not one but two separate easter eggs that allow players to see Meryl Silverburgh in her underwear.

The second of these easter eggs requires players to follow Meryl into the ladies room and interrupt her while she is changing. If this is done quickly enough the next cutscene will play with Meryl in her underwear.

CLIP: Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes
“Anyway, how did you recognize me in disguise?”
“I never forget a lady”

Jumping ahead to the fourth game, the protagonist is assigned a psychologist for PTSD counseling. During these remote sessions, if players shake their Playstation controller the psychologist’s breasts will bounce and jiggle in response.

CLIP: Metal Gear Solid 4
“Memories began to resurface from his childhood, when he fought for Solidus in the Liberian Civil War.”

Keep in mind that easter eggs are not accidents or glitches. They are intentionally put into the game by the designers, and as a result, indicate the value that the designers themselves place on these female characters. They communicate to players that yes, these women exist for players to exploit or experiment with for their own amusement.

Unlockable outfits are additional costumes earned during gameplay which allow gamers to play dress up with player characters or party members. Alternative “skins” as they are sometimes called come in all shapes and sizes and are typically just cosmetic changes to the character’s appearance, although sometimes they add special abilities.

Many unlockable costumes are cool, wacky or bizarre. But when applied to female characters we see a distinct pattern of revealing, hypersexualized outfits.

Fetishized bunny, cat, maid or nurse costumes are commonly used by developers as a way to pander to an assumed straight male player base.

It’s important to remember that sexualization is not necessarily just about the amount of skin showing, but is instead connected to the question of whether or not a costume is eroticized for the express purpose of titillation.

CLIP: Tales of Vesperia
“Hey, why were you wearing that stuffy-looking suit of armor?”
“Oh? You didn’t like it? It’s pretty sturdy and protects my body quite nicely. See? Look at this beautiful skin, free of bruises and blemishes!”
“Very nice… I’m actually worried where my eyes might wander.”
“You don’t look all that worried to me.”
“I’ve just got a good poker face. So, you’re okay? You don’t mind leaving your armor behind?”
“It’s sturdy, but it’s heavy. Walking around with that on tires me out.”
“Hey, no complaints here. I prefer eye candy to scary armor any day.”

These types of unlockable outfits can be especially pernicious since they often end up undermining women who are otherwise appropriately dressed for active or professional roles. The Resident Evil franchise has been particularly guilty of this over the years. Almost every major release in the series has included the Women as Reward trope.

Resident Evil is a bit unusual in that, since its beginnings in the mid 90s, the franchise has featured a large number of playable female protagonists, most of whom are skilled zombie fighters and have impressive professional resumés, to say the least.

Rebecca Chambers is a police officer and medic in the Special Tactics And Rescue Service. Players can dress her up in “sexy nurse” and cheerleader costumes.

Jill Valentine is a high-ranking Special Operations Agent in the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance, and also the master of unlocking. She can be placed in sexy police woman and sexy pirate outfits.

Claire Redfield is a member of a human rights organization that provides aid during bioterrorism incidents. She can be turned into a motorsport umbrella girl.

Sherry Birkin is a US government agent working with the Division of Security Operations. And here she’s wearing a schoolgirl outfit.

Helena Harper is a Secret Service agent and a former member of the CIA. Her unlockable costumes include another “sexy” police woman complete with mini skirt and garter belt

Sheva Alomar is an agent for the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance, operating in the West African branch. The tribal print bikini outfit is especially disconcerting, because it combines the sexualization of a female character with the racist tradition of exotifying women of color, particularly women of African ancestry. More on that topic in an upcoming video.

As a reward for completing the main game under specific conditions, players gain the ability to shove these female police and special agents into the digital equivalent of those patronizing “sexy” Halloween costumes we see mass produced every year. These ensembles are not only completely inappropriate for the mission at hand, but also reduce otherwise capable characters to sexual objects for the voyeuristic enjoyment of players.

CLIP: Resident Evil: Revelations 2
“None of this makes any sense. What did we do?”
“I wish I could tell ya.”

The latest game in the series, 2015’s Resident Evil: Revelations 2 continues this condescending tradition by offering DLC that puts Claire Redfield into a sexualized cowgirl outfit and forces Moira into whatever the hell that is supposed to be…? The developers call it an “urban ninja” costume? [Sigh.] Meanwhile, the male playable character Barry gets a gentleman’s Commandant alternative costume.

Alternative costumes for men are rarely objectifying. They’re instead presented as “tough guy” power fantasies for other straight men to identify with. And when men are stripped down to their beachwear it’s most often meant as a lighthearted joke.

Shifting to an example of a game that does alternative female costumes right, Alice: Madness Returns features a wide assortment of imaginative unlockable dresses. And if you must go the “bunnygirl” or “catgirl” route, this right here is definitely the way to do it.

In many games experience points, or XP, are earned by completing tasks like defeating monsters or finishing quests. Once enough experience points have been accumulated player characters can periodically level up, making them stronger or giving them access to new abilities.

Unfortunately designers sometimes tie the awarding of experience points directly to sexual interactions with female characters, effectively transforming women into conduits which players can utilize to become more powerful warriors.

In the 2007 game Conan, for example, dozens of half naked “maidens” are chained up throughout the game.

CLIP: Conan
“Take me and crush me with your love!”

When rescued they essentially function as sexualized treasure chests rewarding the player with experience points which are then used to unlock more powerful fighting moves.

CLIP: God of War
“…just a bit longer”
“We’ve reached Athens. Get your things and get out.”

A number of other games tie experience points directly to sex. The God of War games, for instance, established a tradition of including mini-games that reward the player for successfully having sex with one or more women. Completing these little quick-time events earn players red orbs that are used to upgrade attacks and magic.

Beginning with the 3rd game, the Grand Theft Auto series allows players to buy sex from prostitutes…

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto V
“Get in the car.”

…and rewards them by restoring their health meter.

In Grand Theft Auto 5, players are given additional encouragement to solicit prostitutes, in the form of an increase to their character’s stamina rating, which enables those characters to sprint, swim, or ride a bike faster for longer periods of time.

Similarly, in The Witcher 3, Geralt earns a handful of experience points for buying sex from prostitutes, and he earns more points for sex with the “courtesans” in the wealthier districts than with the “strumpets” in the poor parts of the city.

CLIP: The Witcher 3
“Greetings to the honorable gentleman. Welcome, make yourself at home. What have you come for? We’re prepared to fulfill your every whim.”
“I like you. Like how you look, like how you smell.”

When women are used as sexualized experience point dispensers, the sexual scenarios are themselves a reward designed to validate the masculinity of presumed straight male players. But there’s a dual reward here: absorbing these expressions of female sexuality carries with it the ability for male characters to grow stronger, faster and more capable, reducing the women to points in a mathematical equation that directly links the flippant consumption of female sexuality to an increase in male power.

Note that, while the consumption of women makes male characters more powerful it has nothing to do with mutual relationship building. The “relationship,” such as it is, ends with sex, or rescuing the woman. At that point, she has served her purpose. Players have reaped the benefits and her value has been depleted. Like an empty energy drink container, she is simply cast aside after being consumed.

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto V
“That was nice!”

That’s hardly the only problem with female NPCs who are designed to function as sexually objectified set dressing. For more on the myriad of issues with these types of characters, see our two videos on the Women as Background Decoration trope.

Collectibles are virtual items placed or hidden throughout a game world for players to find. Some collectible objects have effects on gameplay, such as boosting player stats or serving as score multipliers. Other collectibles are designed simply to be accumulated to provide a sense of accomplishment. Once acquired, some collectibles unlock concept art or other media fragments that can be viewed later in galleries selected from the game’s menu screen.

When done well, collectibles inspire exploration and replayability. However, when they’re designed to function as an extension of the Women as Reward trope, players are encouraged to view women’s bodies as souvenirs of their adventures.

In the 2010 remake of Splatterhouse players are encouraged to collect ripped-up pieces of photographs of the protagonist’s girlfriend which are strewn around each level. Once the player pieces them together, the completed images consist mostly of private, personal sexual photos.

CLIP: Splatterhouse
“I swear to God, you put this on the internet, and your ass is grass, buster.”

Sometimes the Women as Reward trope takes the form of corporate-branded product placement. For instance 2K Games officially partnered with Playboy to include 50 hidden magazines scattered throughout Mafia 2’s open world environment. Once found, each collectible opens to reveal vintage centerfolds from real 1950s Playboy issues. The discovered magazines are then stored in the game’s inventory and are available to be perused at the player’s whim.

Konami’s Metal Gear Solid series took this trend a step further by actually turning pornography into a weapon. In Metal Gear Solid 4, there are Playboy magazines scattered throughout the game world for players to find. When acquired, the magazines are stored in the game’s weapons inventory (alongside rifles and handguns) and serve a dual purpose. Players can look through the images at their leisure, and also use them to set traps by laying the centerfolds open on the battlefield to distract enemies.

CLIP: Metal Gear Solid 4
“Ooh, what’s this? Heh heh heh…heh heh heh…”

In the first Witcher game, players are awarded “romance cards” for successfully seducing each of over two dozen different non-playable female characters.

CLIP: The Witcher
“Let’s take our relationship further.”
“Come home with me. Let me thank you”
“Let’s go.”

Like other examples we’ve talked about, these pornographic collectibles are saved in the player’s inventory and are available to be ogled at anytime. The souvenirs function as a private trophy collection, encouraging players to view these female characters as sexual conquests and acquire as many different flavors of women as possible during their playthrough.

If collectibles in the player’s inventory work as a private trophy collection, then achievements serve as a public trophy case, on display for all to see. Achievements, or trophies, are meta-goal award systems built into most popular gaming platforms. Unlike collectibles, achievements are earned through in-game actions but awarded outside of the game environment itself and have no effect on gameplay. Some achievements are rewarded for skill or completion of tasks while others are arbitrary challenges set up by developers.

CLIP: The Stanley Parable
“Oh, please. Are you really just doing this for the achievement? Click a door five times? Is that all that you think an achievement is worth? No, no, no, no, no. I can’t just give these merits away for such little effort.”

These systems encourage “replayability” and provide players with incentives to spend more time inside the game space experimenting with its environments and characters. By default, your achievements are visible to anyone who views your profile on a gaming platform and thus they allow players to show off their gaming skill or dedication to their friends. In other words, achievements are designed to function as status symbols for gamers.

A whole host of games reward players with trophies for successfully having sex with one or more female characters. A suspicious number of those achievements are called “ladies man”.

CLIP: God of War III
(Giggling.) “The Gods have truly blessed you, Kratos”

Other games in the God of War series use a variety of euphemistic naming schemes for this. In the PS3 version of the original game the trophy is titled “Rockin’ the Boat.” In Ghosts of Sparta players receive the “A Hero’s Welcome” trophy and in Chains of Olympus the award is called “Two Girls One Spartan.”

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto IV
“Oh, Nico! I really like you!”

Some games in the Grand Theft Auto series offer achievements for bedding a “girlfriend.”

CLIP: Grand Theft Auto IV
“I think she likes me.”

Just so we’re clear on what’s happening here, players are receiving a literal trophy for “achieving sex” with a woman. When games such as these award players with achievements or trophies for sexual conquests they are directly reinforcing negative ways of thinking about the dynamics between men and women in our society. By presenting sex as an end goal of men’s interactions or relationships with women, these games frame sexual encounters as challenges to be overcome.

Let me emphasize that the problem here is not necessarily that sex is included in these games. By presenting sex as a goal and then presenting players with an award for accomplishing that goal, these achievements function as a form of trophyism. Simply put, trophyism is the tendency for men to view women as objects to be collected and displayed as status symbols of their sexual prowess or virility. These “trophy women” then serve as a way for men to assert their social status among and relative to other men.

The “fame points” system in the 2004 version of Sid Meier’s Pirates! provides us with a stark illustration of trophyism. In the game, romancing and then rescuing any of the game’s many governors’ daughters not only rewards your pirate with the option to marry her, but also wins him extra fame points. The daughters are largely interchangeable; they don’t even have names, and their value as a reward is tied directly to their appearance. Courting and marrying a “plain” daughter earns fewer fame points than marrying an “attractive” one, and marrying a “beautiful” daughter earns the most points of all. Fame points then directly contribute to the social status your character achieves at the end of the game. Depending on the amount of points accrued, you could end up as anything from a lowly pauper to a powerful governor. Other ways to earn fame points include acquiring wealth and defeating rivals. Like all your swashbuckling escapades, acquiring a woman becomes just another feather in your proverbial cap, functioning to elevate your prestige and renown in society. And since, in the game’s Xbox Live Arcade release, there are achievements for getting married, and for courting governors’ daughters from all four nations at once, these accomplishments also increase your gaming status.

Achievements on Sony Playstation platforms are called “trophies” but back when they were first introduced they were called “entitlements,” which is a fitting name for those that fall into the Women as Reward trope.

Since entitlement, or more specifically “male entitlement,” is the crux of much of what we’ve been discussing in this video, let’s take a moment to define what “male entitlement” actually means. First, the word “entitlement” refers to the conviction that someone deserves something, that they are owed it, that they have a right to it.

By extension, “male entitlement” is the conviction that men are owed something by virtue of their gender. It’s the belief structure that tells men they deserve to have their whims catered to, both culturally and interpersonally. One of the most harmful aspects of male entitlement is the false belief that men have a right to survey and use women’s bodies. This mentality carries with it a corresponding set of expectations about what women should provide for men. It’s a worldview that primarily defines women’s social role as vessels of sexuality, and men’s roles as consumers or patrons of that sexuality.

Unlike access to clean water or health care, which should be considered human rights that all people deserve simply for being human, access to a woman’s affections, her body or her sexuality is not a right owed to anyone, except herself. This should be obvious, but unfortunately male entitlement is a pervasive problem in our culture today.

The male entitlement mindset has a profound impact on how men relate to and interact with women. We see it manifest whenever a man orders a woman to show him her “tits,” or makes demands during an online game that a woman send him nude or sexual photos. We see it in real-world spaces whenever men catcall women on the street. We see it whenever a man gropes a woman at an event or convention. We see it whenever a man expects sex in return for buying a woman dinner. At its most serious, male entitlement is the mentality that serves as the foundation for the epidemics of date rape and sexual assault in our society.

To be clear, this doesn’t mean that every individual man consciously thinks that he has a right to the body of every individual woman he sees. Rather, male entitlement operates in the background of our culture; it’s a socially constructed mentality that is so deeply ingrained that it’s often invisible, operating as an unquestioned base assumption. The critical thing to remember here is that men are not born with this sense of entitlement; it’s a learned way of thinking that shapes the ways men relate to women and women’s bodies.

This attitude is taught through a complex socialization process impacted by a whole host of factors. Families, religions, peer groups, movies, pop-music, mainstream pornography and video games can all play a part in the construction and perpetuation of this mentality. So of course video games on their own are not responsible for singlehandedly creating “male entitlement”; however, because games are interactive systems, they can be programmed to reinforce male entitlement in some unique ways not found in other forms of media.

For instance in Asura’s Wrath, when the player stares at a maiden’s breasts, she’ll try to cover herself up. But if the player keeps staring they will unlock an achievement called “View of the Valley”.

Similarly, in Lollipop Chainsaw the player can unlock the “I swear! I did it by mistake!” achievement for using the game-camera to look up Juliette’s skirt for an extended period of time despite her coy efforts to block players from doing so.

The “Casanova” achievement in The Saboteur can be unlocked for utilizing a mechanic in which players kiss 50 random women on the street without their consent as a form of camouflage to evade pursuing Nazis.

CLIP: The Saboteur
“That’s what I’m looking for.”

These achievements are directly rewarding players for in-game behavior that amounts to sexual harassment. Players are actively being encouraged to think of women’s bodies as something they are entitled to interact with.

That fact, in and of itself, is troubling but it’s just another example of the core problem with the Women as Reward trope. Game systems are designed to provide feedback mechanisms that either punish or reward players for the ways they interact with virtual environments. Because video games are constructed around these formal input/output systems, they can be an especially powerful tool for reinforcing cognitive patterns by modeling and rewarding player behavior.

In a game, you’re not just watching someone else being rewarded with a woman. You, the player, are earning a woman as a reward yourself for the actions you yourself have performed.

Players make the correct inputs into the game; a woman’s affection or her body is the corresponding output. Players go through the process of saving the princess, and the game’s algorithm dutifully rewards them with what they think they are rightfully owed for doing so: whether it be a kiss, a girlfriend, or sexual attention.

Social science indicates that one of the primary ways we learn about the world and our relationships to each other, is through a process of observation and imitation. Human beings also learn by seeing something modeled for us, especially when the modeled actions are accompanied by rewards or punishments.

Video games are uniquely positioned to provide experiences that do all of these things, because in most games, the player occupies both the role of participant, and the role of spectator to their own actions.

In this way the women as reward trope in video games becomes a mechanism through which male entitlement is taught and reinforced in our wider culture. Cognitively, it’s strikingly similar to the expectation that if a man buys a woman a few drinks, then he is owed sex. The money and time for the alcohol and conversation are the inputs, the sexual gratification is the output.

When men’s entitlement-based expectations are not fulfilled they sometimes lash out in resentment or aggression towards women. This is clearly illustrated in the catcalling scenarios I mentioned earlier: street harassers feel entitled to women’s time and women’s attention. If they don’t get the response they feel they are owed, they can become increasingly angry, following their targets, insulting them, groping them, or otherwise aggressively demanding to be acknowledged.

In the gaming community, we see this entitlement-fueled outrage bubble to the surface when some gamers encounter indications that games aren’t made exclusively with their fantasies in mind. Angry public temper tantrums from straight male players have occurred when role-playing games have forced them to interact with gay male characters, or presented them with lesbian characters who were not available as romance options to male avatars.

Angry backlash from straight male players also materializes when Western releases of Japanese games place women in slightly less revealing outfits, or increase the age of young sexualized female characters to 18.

In the same vein, when presented with critical analyses of the poor representations of women in many popular games, this intense male entitlement manifests in aggression, abuse and threats.

As we’ve demonstrated in this episode, the Women as Reward trope is set up to fulfill a very specific male entitlement-oriented fantasy. In many cases game creators may not even realize their mechanics are working to cement this mentality, but when games use a woman’s affection, her body, or her sexuality as a carrot on a stick, they’re actively encouraging men to think of women as objects, prizes, and status symbols.

And it’s not just men who are affected. This ideology of male entitlement seeps into the wider social consciousness of everyone, regardless of gender, a byproduct of which can negatively impact the ways women relate to one another and the ways we think about our relationships to our own bodies, and our own sexuality.

The good news is that because male entitlement is a learned attitude, it can, through education and conscious effort, be unlearned. And game systems are capable of being part of that transformative process. Just as their interactivity makes them a powerful tool for reinforcing male entitlement, so too could that interactivity be harnessed to disrupt antiquated gender dynamics and engage us with game mechanics that explore more equitable interactions between people of all genders.

This video is intended as a supplement to our Women as Reward video, which we recommend watching first: https://youtu.be/QC6oxBLXtkU

Press Image for Media Use: https://www.flickr.com/photos/femfreq/20683012824/

LINKS & RESOURCES

• “Sex Doesn’t Sell After All, Study Says” – Bloomberg Business
• “Do Sex and Violence Sell? A Meta-Analytic Review of the Effects of Sexual and Violent Media and Ad Content on Memory, Attitudes, and Buying Intentions” by Robert B. Lull and Brad J. Bushman

ABOUT THE SERIES
The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

GAMES REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE
Dead or Alive 5 (2012)
Dead or Alive 5 Ultimate (2013)
Enslaved (2010)
Far Cry 4 (2014)
Final Fantasy XIII-2 (2012)
Mass Effect 2 (2010)
The Saboteur (2009)
Saints Row: The Third (2011)
Tekken Tag Tournament 2 (2012)

Transcript

This is a special DLC add-on for our episode examining the Women as Reward trope. If you haven’t seen that video yet, I suggest watching it first before continuing to view this one.

We’ve coined the Women as Reward trope to describe a long-running pattern found in interactive media. It occurs when women (or more often women’s bodies) are employed as rewards for player actions in video games. The trope frames female bodies as collectible, as tractable or as consumable, and positions women as status symbols designed to validate the masculinity of presumed straight male players.

As we discussed in our full episode, this trope manifests in a number of ways including earned Cinematics, Easter Eggs, Unlockable Costumes, Experience Points, Collectibles, and Achievements.

However, the Women as Reward trope can take another, slightly different form. Instead of rewarding players for actions taken within the game environments, this one offers women’s bodies to players as rewards for actions taken in the real world. Namely for forking over real money for DLC or pre-orders that then grant gamers the opportunity to play with and ogle female characters in more sexualized outfits or situations.

DLC is short for downloadable content and can refer to a wide range of additional features or extensions to a preexisting game which can be purchased and downloaded digitally. While DLC can include everything from extra maps to new levels, from more missions to better gear, for the purposes of this trope I’m focusing on costume packs that offer sexualized variants of female game characters for an extra fee.

Final Fantasy 13-2 offered a revealing “beachwear costume” for the game’s protagonist, but unlike the alternative outfits I discussed in the main video this one is not unlockable via gameplay, instead it could be unlocked for 2 dollars and 99 cents. This is only one example but sexualized DLC outfits have become standard practice in some gaming genres.

[Clip: Final Fantasy XIII-2]

In our full video on this trope we highlighted some of the ways mainstream pornography has been seeping into video games as a reward for player actions. The third installment in the Saints Row series pushed this pornification trend even further by partnering with Penthouse magazine.

[Clip: Saints Row: The Third]

When purchased, the resulting DLC offered gamers the chance to add digital versions of real-life “Penthouse Pets” to the player’s gang. Promotional materials read “For the first time in your life, when you call Penthouse Pets, they’ll actually answer.”

Pre-order bonuses are extras awarded to gamers that pay for a game before it has been released. As an incentive, publishers will offer small pieces of largely cosmetic DLC, usually in the form of alternative character skins or unique digital items.

[Clip: Far Cry 4 trailer]
Announcer: “Pre order now for a free upgrade to the limited edition. Includes three extra story missions and a bonus impaler harpoon gun.”

Sometimes different items may be offered by specific retailers. For example you got the “Double Barrel Elephant Rifle” for preorders of Far Cry 4 at Amazon but you got the “Butcher’s Machete” for pre-ordering from Best Buy.

When these same, already questionable, marketing tactics are combined with sexual objectification things start to get really insidious.

[Clip: Tekken Tag Tournament 2 promo]
Announcer: “Pre order offers include two new characters Angel and Michelle, the big bikini bundle, four exclusive Snoop Dog mash tracks, and the special Snoop Dog Stage.”

All pre-order bonus packs of Tekken Tag Tournament 2 included the heavily advertised “Big Bikini Bundle”. [Clip: Tekken Tag Tournament 2 big bikini bundle trailer]. And as an added bonus those who pre-ordered at GameStop stores even received a sultry phone call from one of the female characters in the game. Let’s take a listen.

[Audio clip]
“This is Anna Williams, calling in on behalf of GameStop with some juicy news. Turns out your copy of Tekken Tag Tournament 2 is ready for pickup. Better run along to your nearest GameStop tomorrow morning to pick it up or I might just swipe your copy for myself. And if you happen to have any old games lying around put some of that business savvy to work and trade them in for 30% extra in-store credit when you purchase Tekken Tag Tournament 2. But if you really want to impress me, let’s see how you handle a one-on-one fight. Or to make it interesting, let’s try two-on-one. You game? Either way, I’ll be waiting. Just remember: Power to the Player.”

In this case it’s not just the publisher who is responsible for that embarrassing stunt, Bandai Namco partnered with GameStop to make absolutely sure everyone knew the Tekken franchise was designed with a very specific subset of straight male gamers in mind.

[Clip: Enslaved]

An exclusive outfit called “Sexy Robot Trip” for the female sidekick in the 2010 action-adventure platformer Enslaved was given to players who purchased the game from Best Buy.

[Clip: Dead or Alive 5 Trailer]

Pre-ordering Dead or Alive 5 from GameStop granted players access to a series of white swimsuits and bunny ears with which to dress up the game’s female characters. Meanwhile pre-ordering from Amazon unlocked black versions of these same getups.

Occasionally bonuses are included to encourage gamers to buy a full-priced retail version of a game instead of a less expensive used copy. Gamers who bought a new copy of EA’s The Saboteur were given a ticket with a code for the “midnight show”. This special code did two things, first it allowed access to a burlesque show in a cordoned-off area of the game space. Second, it removed clothing from all the female dancers in the game, making all of them topless.

[Clip: The Saboteur]

Doriss Girl: “Ah, there you are Sean. I have been waiting for you. Come, take a seat. I can’t wait to get started.”

Now, of course, it’s entirely possible for DLC costumes to avoid the Women as Reward trope. For example Mass Effect 2 offered two “Alternative Appearance Packs” that added new clothing and armor for your squadmates which ended up actually providing less sexualized outfits for both Jack and Miranda that are more appropriate for the mission at hand.

Sex sells argument:
When discussing representations of sexualized women the argument I hear most often is the old, adage, “sex sells.” This boring excuse isn’t even accurate.

First, just because people will buy something doesn’t automatically mean that thing has value or isn’t harmful. It’s also not a guaranteed avenue to success.

Second, and more importantly, when it comes to the Women as Reward trope in gaming we are not talking about actual “sex”; the ways women and women’s bodies are turned into trophies for gamers to win or unlock has nothing whatsoever to do with acts of consensual human intimacy. So when people say “sex sells” what they really mean is “sexualization” and “objectification” of women’s bodies sells” or more succinctly and more accurately “sexism sells.” And why does sexism sell? Well because it’s not challenging dominant paradigms, it’s simply reinforcing ideas about male privilege and entitlement to women’s sexuality that are already entrenched in the cultural zeitgeist.

When games offer hyper-sexualized DLC outfits for players to buy, publishers and developers are telling presumed straight male players, in not so subtle terms, “YES, these women do indeed exist primarily as toys to fulfill your personal sexual fantasy”.

This is just one of the ways the Women as Reward trope works to perpetuate regressive ideas about gender. See our full episode for a detailed analysis on this topic.

This is the first episode in season two of Tropes vs. Women in Video Games. For more on the format changes accompanying season two, please see our announcement here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/566429325/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games/posts/1469466

Press Image for Media Use: https://www.flickr.com/photos/femfreq/23844341504

ABOUT THE SERIES

The Tropes vs Women in Video Games project aims to examine the plot devices and patterns most often associated with female characters in gaming from a systemic, big picture perspective. This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. This video series is created by Anita Sarkeesian and the project was funded by 6968 awesome backers on Kickstarter.com

37 GAMES REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE

Alan Wake (2010)
Alice: Madness Returns (2011)
Assassin’s Creed (2007)
Batman: Arkham City (2011)
Batman: Arkham Knight (2015)
Bayonetta (2009)
Beyond Good & Evil (2003)
Binary Domain (2012)
Blades of Time (2012)
Bully (2006)
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 (2014)
Dante’s Inferno (2010)
Devil May Cry 4 (2008)
Gears of War 3 (2011)
Golden Axe: Beast Rider (2008)
Heavenly Sword (2007)
Just Cause 2 (2010)
Kane & Lynch 2 (2010)
Life Is Strange (2015)
Lollipop Chainsaw (2012)
Max Payne 3 (2012)
Metal Gear Solid 4 (2008)
Ninja Gaiden II (2008)
Prince of Persia (2008)
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003)
Red Dead Redemption (2010)
Remember Me (2013)
The Saboteur (2009)
Sleeping Dogs (2012)
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (2008)
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II (2010)
Tomb Raider (1996)
Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness (2003)
Tomb Raider: Underworld (2008)
Watch Dogs (2014)
Wet (2009)
X-Blades (2007)

Transcript

CLIP: Batman: Arkham Knight
“Well handsome, what are we waiting for?”

If you want to get to know a character, learn about their interests, goals, or desires, their butt is probably not going to give you that information. It won’t tell you much about who they are, or what they’re thinking or feeling at any given time. But video game designers often choose to put tremendous focus on the butts of certain characters, while going to almost absurd lengths to avoid calling attention to the butts of others. These carefully crafted choices developers make about camera angles and clothing significantly impact how players think about and relate to these characters.

Third-person games with female protagonists typically display those characters in a way that gives players a full-body view. A classic example of this is the original Tomb Raider games, which are presented from a third-person perspective wherein protagonist Lara Croft’s entire body is visible. In these early Tomb Raider games, Lara’s butt is typically right in the center of the screen, a camera orientation which, along with the sexualized clothing the designers chose to outfit her in, places a tremendous amount of emphasis on that part of her body.

In dozens of third-person games with playable female characters, the character’s butt is brought to the forefront and that’s where the player’s focus is directed. In Batman: Arkham City for instance, the player’s gaze is drawn to Catwoman’s behind, which is emphasized by her costume and exaggerated hip sway.

CLIP: Golden Axe: Beast Rider
“The ceremony! The sisterhood will never forgive me if I am late.”

Golden Axe: Beast Rider makes extremely sure that we notice the protagonist’s butt just before we take control and start playing. And here in Tomb Raider: Underworld, to say that Lara’s butt is being emphasized would be putting it mildly.

CLIP: Tomb Raider: Underworld
“Incredible. The carvings are clearly similar to early Germanic design, but this is far older than the fifth century.”

And this happens all too often.

CLIP: Remember Me
“You can’t miss it.”

Let’s contrast the way that women’s butts are emphasized with the sometimes absurd lengths taken to cover up or hide men’s butts. If some of this footage looks jerky, that’s because in some games, trying to get a glimpse of male characters’ butts can feel a bit like wrestling with the camera.

Common ways men’s butts are hidden are by preventing the player from seeing below the character’s waistline, or employing a more over-the-shoulder camera angle, which has the added benefit of keeping the character’s butt safely out of the frame. The most amusing solution is to simply include a cape, tunic, long coat or very conveniently positioned piece of tattered fabric which actively prevents the player from getting a clear or sustained look at the protagonist’s butt. For the purposes of this video I tried to get a glimpse of Batman’s rear end, but it’s as if his cape is a high-tech piece of Wayne Industries equipment designed to cover up his butt at all costs. I like to jokingly refer to this aspect of a male character’s costume as the strategic butt covering.

Of course, not all games with male protagonists keep the character’s butt obscured or out of frame like these games do. The real issue is one of emphasis and definition; a significant portion of third-person games with female protagonists call attention to those characters’ butts in a way that’s meant to be sexually appealing to the presumed straight male player. In this regard, the way that women’s bodies are depicted is significantly different from the way that men’s bodies are depicted. There are a few examples of male protagonists who are wearing clothing that calls attention to their butts but for the most part, men’s butts, even when visible in the frame, are deemphasized. Plenty of male heroes wear baggy pants or jeans, Uncharted’s Nathan Drake among them, but nothing about his visual design or the jeans he’s wearing encourages you to focus on his butt as some sort of defining aspect of his character.

By contrast, the emphasis placed on the butts of female characters communicates to players that this is what’s important, this is what you should be paying attention to. It communicates that the character is a sexual object designed for players to look at and enjoy. And by explicitly encouraging you to ogle and objectify the character, the game is implicitly discouraging you from identifying directly with her. Strategic butt coverings and camera angles that obscure or de-emphasize male characters’ rear ends are not an accident; they are a conscious decision made with great care, and the flipside of this is that designers often do the opposite when the protagonist is female.

This difference in how male and female characters are framed often extends into the advertisements and box covers. Women’s butts are front and center, and it’s even become a depressing joke that their bodies are twisted and contorted in uncomfortable or unnatural ways so that their breasts and butt can be visible in the same shot. In contrast, when men are depicted from behind, there is great effort taken to cover up their rear end, often with other images or shadows.

Of course, female characters can also be framed in ways that aren’t objectifying. A good example of this is the episodic adventure game Life Is Strange, in which the protagonist’s butt isn’t emphasized or centralized; the camera angles work in conjunction with the story to encourage us to identify with her as a human being. Sadly, the box art for the third-person action-adventure game Beyond Good & Evil emphasizes and sexualizes Jade’s butt. The game itself, however, demonstrates that the Nathan Drake approach of outfitting a character in clothing that doesn’t emphasize their butt and not having the camera center it or focus on it can work just as well to humanize female characters as it does for male characters.

So to be clear, the solution here is not to simply show more butts of male characters. Equal opportunity butt display is definitely not the answer. Rather, the solution is to deemphasize the rear ends of female characters, so that players are encouraged not to ogle and objectify these women, but to identify and empathize with them as people. This is not an impossible task given that game designers do this all the time with their male characters. It’s time they started consistently doing it with their female characters, too.