Well I don't have much else to do right now, so figured I'd expand some more on my earlier response to TopCat's question of whether video games influenced my (or anyone's) sense of sexual identity.
There were actually lots of female game characters I thought were totally hawt growing up. Tyris Flare of Golden Axe was half the reason I begged my parents for a Sega Genesis until they conceded and got me one for my birthday in 1990, and Blaze Fielding of Streets of Rage, Chun-Li from Street Fighter II, and Sonya Blade from Mortal Kombat were among my other youthful game character crushes. Samus Aran stuck with me more than the others though because, as I've shared before, the original Metroid had been the game that really got me into gaming in the first place and Super Metroid was just such an extraordinary follow-up. I felt like I knew her in a way, almost. She was my I guess people today say "waifu".
The funny thing about it all though was that, honestly, while part of me was attracted to these characters, another part of me also wanted to be them. That was the one of the phenomena that confused me about my sexuality when I was young, and it was true of more than just certain female game characters. There were characters on the original She-Ra cartoon series and later characters in movies that I felt similarly about, among the examples. The truth is that I've never really felt very appealing, and it was a thing for me to wish that I was the characters I, y'know, had the feels for because it made me feel like a hot baaaaaaaabe, as people said back then. I didn't really know what to make of that for a while.
Movies and music were probably just as formative for me though really in terms of my I guess you could say sexual awakening? I'd single out the film Thelma & Louise, which I saw at a friend's house (whereupon I was forbidden from ever watching it again), pre-Trump-era Roseanne (the TV show), and the song Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill were really more helpful than any games around back then were for me in the sense that they made it clear that same-sex attraction was something that other females, grown-up women, experienced too, not just me. I mean in terms of media.
Expansion completed!
Last edited by Jaicee - on 13 May 2020
