What is your opinion on Sexism in Video Games? Non-existant? Subtle? Acceptable? or Innapropriate? Are there really any games that push the boundaries of these definitions or does everything maintain a fairly consistent equilibrium with pop culture. While we can point to games like Blood Rain and Tomb Raider, their lead females are designed for male viewers as eye candy appealing to a kick ass girl fetish of sorts. To a lesser extent we see this in Perfect Dark but games such as that obviously allow us a less demeaning depiction of a woman as a means to a kick ass end. What of all the fighting games, the most prevalent of which being DOA which had its own spin off game where all the women were in skimpy swimsuits bouncing and jiggling on the court for the viewer. What about games though like GTA tha depict women as hookers, sluts and bullet practice? Why aren't there playable female characters in games like Gears of War or Halo? Are women by nature meant to be objectified? Are girls meant to know their place in games like Animal Crossing and Nintendogs? What other games can you think of to either support deny such an idea.

I generally don't think about when playing Halo, Gears or similar games, because I'm male, so I'd pick a male character anyway.

I dunno...I can definitely see objectification in plenty of games though.

Left 4 Dead has a girl player!  ...and 3 guys hehe.

Wouldn't guys like a hard ass female character, perhaps as an unlockable in Halo or Gears at least. Heck you could even objectify her and make her wear skimpy clothing to placate to the rest of the trend in gaming. Something about games like Halo and Gears seems oddly greek to me...

Why is there such a prevelance of males picking female characters in MMORPGs?

Why aren't games like Xenosaga with female centric casts more popular in RPGS?

Because they like looking at themselfs and lots of guys give them free stuff because they are girls. Their should be girls in halo but not in gears of war were it is way too bloody

As for the MMORPG thing, I'm inclined to say that it's simply the knowledge that you'll be staring at the character's backside for upwards of thirty hours.

In general, though, guys want stories about guys. MMORPGs are different in that no one really plays them for plot or character development, but Fenix and Master Chief as characters are important to Gears of War and Halo, and Kratos is important to God of War. A female character just wouldn't resonate as much with the largely male gaming population. A female character on a quest for revenge and blood is also just less believable. Call it a result of the patriarchy's social engineering, but that's the way everyone thinks.

I don't see that as sexism, myself. It's not sexist for males to want to see scantily clad women or to want to play male characters, and it's not sexist for developers to give them what they want. To be sexist, something has to actually say something about the relative standing of men and women or about the 'correct' place of women in society. I just don't think that any player of video games looks at them as making the point that only men are suitable for destroying alien fleets and saving the world.

Having female characters in Halo and Gears of War just seems out of place. You don't expect to find women in those situations. Yeah it's possible, but if the designers had to include every type of person in their games so no one would be upset, they'd have to throw in cripples, retards, short people, tall people, Asians, Hispanics, Whites, Blacks, Reds and Purples. You'd have more characters than the developers would ever want to have to build models for. Characters should be designed based on the nature of the story, not so no one feels left out.

As for GTA hookers, you think male hookers will make more sense to the player? Just because one woman is a hooker does not mean every woman is; I don't think the creators are trying to make a statement about the nature of womankind.

Guys relate better to guy characters. Guys make up the majority of gamers. Hence the trend. And big boobs and asses are there because guys like them. Does that make it right? Not anymore than porn is "right." But does that explain the trend perfectly? Sure does.

And for the record, I'm absolutely not sexist. I show women more respect than I think many can claim to (I'll joke around at times but that's just goofin'). I'm just mapping out the logical explanations/arguments here.

Edit - @GotchayeX - Well said. Think you said what I said but better.

What about female players? can't they appeal to female players by making female characters an option like in Megaman ZX, Resident Evil, REsident Evil 2 or Resident Evil 0?

what about samus shes kick ass and i'll play as her even tho im a male

Yeah Samus is neat, I can't wait to see her in the Zero Suit during Smash Bros. You don't get much of a feel for her being a female with that big suit on though. I mean, for all you know that suit could have a mechanized wang.

Well, there WAS Ada from RE4, although I do have to admit that she was eye candy. DOA is the same... all the girls look like they've had surgery (I might sound like a perv here, but how does Ayane, a 16 year old girl, have the second largest set in the entire series?). Look at Samus; her gender is purely for eye candy, even back in the NES days. Personally, I think females are overlooked, but for a good reason. It's not very common to see women running around for revenge or slaughtering monsters. It WOULD be pretty unique if there were such a game like that, but I don't think the developers will do much of it very soon.