Seems like a double standard to me. I think "sexualization" is largely in the eye of the beholder, ie I suspect that people who are sexually attracted to males would find those characters sexually arousing to some extent.

Since the majority of the population are straight, therefore we can assume most developers AND gamers are straight and since most gamers are male (at least what these kind of games are concerned) I think we can safely assume that the depiction of these sorts of characters aren't meant to be sexual in any way. So why would straight males design buff male characters to straight male gamers? But yes, no doubt does a portion of the gaming community find them quite attractive, but that's not the reason to why they look the way they do.

Samus is half human, half bird-person -- or she used to be, until she also became part jellyfish-dinosaur -- and I'm supposed to worry that her proportions of all things are "unrealistic"?

She's practically an anime character. She's not supposed to be realistic. And yeah, I remember that one time she looked slightly less anime, and that was because -- surprise surprise -- it was an American developer who designed her that way. As opposed to the Japanese creators of the series, who designed her in a Japanese style.

Yeah Nintendo is screwing up their portrayal of Samus. No Super Metroid isn't sexist just because Samus's power suit is destroyed when you die.

And let's not act like male video game characters aren't sexualized all the time. People need to relax.

She was still sexualised in the original.

But sexuality is not inherently an evil. There is nothing wrong with Samus wearing a bikini, or the Zero Suit, or the new Smash costume. The real issue is when her character is degraded, and so far the only offender there is Other M.

Strong, liberated women wear what they like. They just don't turn into incompetent, insecure wimps who need big, strong men to save them.

This is the best way to look at it.

Why are all of these guys who don t like girls writing gaming articles? Have they never seen a Victoria s Secret catalogue? Heck, have they ever seen a grown woman nekkid?

This article is nonsense. Everyone knows that Metroid is a dude and can't crawl.

*Grabs coat and runs off*

I hated how after Metroid Prime 2/Metroid Zero Mission, Samus taking her helmet off at the end of the game was no longer a reward. I really wish they kept her reasonable, Samus would have sold without sex appeal.

a) Tomodachi Life game objectifies Samus more than any other game
b) Samus is based on Ellen Ripley from Alien series who has been in her underwear at some point or other in all of her movies. http://www.joblo.com/moviehotties/images/news-gallery/thumb/CH102113-Ellen-Ripley-HotnessThumb.jpg
c) Samus zero-suit non-sense came later to not have Samus in underwear when without the Power Suit, but it took a life of its own, and now it serves mainly Nintendo fanboy fantasies.