Women & Box Art

 

So this is fairly old topic that has recently been brought alight again due to the cover of a GameReactor magazine.

This issue features Joel from The Last of Us however the original art here is a bit different.

That’s right! Ellie is in the original art.

Now then. I’m not, at all, saying that there is some sexism involved here and that GameReactor is being malicious in any way, but it does raise some questions. And thinking back to three games this past year with “BioShock Infinite,” “Remember Me” and, the above mentioned, “The Last of Us” it’s interesting to point out that there were issues with getting female characters into video games.

I don’t know what it is but it seems that there is this aversion to using female characters in games that aren’t either damsel in distress or sexualized. This isn’t true for all games but reports have been released stating the hurdles these developers had to go through just to get the female characters on the cover or as a playable character.

The argument for this is that the majority of gamers cannot relate to a female protagonist. There’s also talk that if there are romance options that the male gamer feels weird which I read more as a homophobic feeling despite the fact the in game relationship is a heterosexual one.

That’s where I begin to question things.

First off, let’s get the obvious homophobic one out of the way. If someone is playing a female protagonist and the character forms a heterosexual relationship in the game’s story and the player has issues then the problem is lying solely with the gamer. The gamer who apparently does not have the ability to differentiate fantasy from reality. Seeing a female protagonist fall in love in a game is no different than in a movie. It’s that character’s story not the players.

The argument is then that since the player controls the character they’re as much a part of them and that’s why it feels weird. That’s still not an acceptable thinking approach and I refer anyone to look up Shakespearian plays and will point at all the roles were played by men which include the female characters. So Juliet Capulet was portrayed by a male who had to act out the role with another male. It’s important to separate yourself from the role enough to enjoy the art at hand which, in the game’s case, is the story.

Now the second part: The argument that gamers cannot relate to a female protagonist and that the game won’t sell as well with a female on the cover.

We need to break our mindset that a game won’t sell because male gamers cannot relate to a female protagonist, the mindset that seems to want to prevent female characters from gracing the cover of box art because it’s not as appealing. This is art. Art should stand on its own and be pleasing despite the gender of the protagonist.

A well designed art cover will generate a lot of interest and get people to pick up the box to see if they will be interested in what the game is about. It shouldn’t be reliant on the gender of the character on the cover. That isn’t how art works.

Games are so desperate to be considered an art form and even if they are considered art by legal standards they still hold themselves back on the social standard by doing things like refusing to put female characters on covers and arguing that gamers cannot relate to female characters.

Gamers aren’t idiots. If the game is good, if it tells a good story and it plays well then I can promise that a female protagonist and female cover art will not hurt sales. People do respect quality.