Lol, yeah that, and Tomb Raider didn't sell 10 million copies.

I prefer my video game girls easily controllable, I hate wonky controls.

Based on my game collection and comparing to my film collection I would say games are better at including female leads than the film industry.

Of my (admitedly small) film collection only 2 out of 38 have a full female lead (Kill Bill 1&2) while 3 others have more ambiguous leads or a roughy equal lead cast (Fifth Element, V for Vendetta & Serenity) The rest are very definately male leads.

For games, 13 out of 134 have female leads, which is already higher than for films but not the full story because first of all over 30% of my games are totally gender irrelevant (in Burnout or Sim City for example you don't choose a character) Then 12% are essentially equal (ie you get to choose either sex, with minimal (e.g Mass Effect) or no gameplay changes. Then a further 7% allow you to choose different characters but the selection is male centric (mostly local MP games like Mario Kart/TimeSplitters)
The split for games then is more like 13:52 (though a further note is 10 of the male leads are from external sources (Goldeneye/F1 drivers) so it's not really the fault of the games industry)

As I think I have mentioned here before though, TV seems to be much more equal between the sexes, I don't think my tastes in TV genre varies much from my taste in film & game genre(mostly sci-fi/fantasy with drama & comedy) but the TV series I watch are much more likely to have female leads or female dominant casts (in fact of my very favourite series it's almost 50:50 for male:female leads)

Of course it won't! I never complained when playing Beyond 2 Souls, Beyond Good and Evil (weird that the 2 Beyonds are 2 of the rare few with female protagonists), or LoU when I was playing as Ellie. In fact I wouldn't mind a LoU sequel with us playing as Ellie. Samus is awesome. Devs are starting to really get equal gender-wise. There's a lot of strong female characters that aren't even in-your-face about it anymore.

We need more bad ass Bayonetta type females in gaming. 

Its a money thing, men buy more video games than women so developers cather to them is that simple.

Why the hell is there not one single weeding magazine for men? Because most men don't care about it but I'm sure theres a minority of men that do care about weedings but they don't whine in the internet about it.

That Brenna Hill article, blog or whatever was terrible, I'm tired of this white knight interest groups bullshit.

Recent examples from my most favorite genre:
- Rosangela and Lauren Blackwell (the last game of the series which is named after their female protagonists will be released soon)
- Nicole Collard (Broken Sword - first part of the fifth game was released recently)
- Vella (Broken Age - first part of the game was released recently)
- Zoë Castillo and April Ryan (The Longest Journey/Dreamfall/Chapters series - new game is in the works, release expected this year)
- Kate Walker (Syberia series - new game is in the works, release probably next year)
- Ivo (The Book of Unwritten Tales series - new game announced two weeks ago)
- Lilly (Lilly Looking Through - one of the most charming releases of 2013)
- Sadja (Memoria - in my opinion the best p&c adventure game of 2013)
- Erica Reed (Cognition - according to fellow genre fans the best adventure game of 2013)
- Susan Ashworth (The Cat Lady, according to reviewers one of the most original p&c adventure games of 2013)
- Kaitlin Greenbriar (Gone Home, according to reviewers the best graphic adventure game of 2013)
- Nina Kalenkow and Sam Peters (Secret Files series)
- Fay (A New Beginning)
- Edna & Lili (Edna & Harvey series)
- Samantha Everett (Jane Jensen's Gray Matter)

There's also a ton of Nancy Drew games (don't know much about this series, never played one)

"Historic" genre examples:
Zanthia (The Legend of Kyrandia: Hand of Fate) => side note: I wished someone would revive this series
Laverne (Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle)
Valanice and Rosella (King's Quest 7)
Laura Bow (The Colonel's Bequest)
Elaine Marley (Monkey Island series - not a playable character though)

Consoles: Lara, Samus, Joanna Dark, Jade (BG&E), one of the Heavy Rain characters, the Beyond: Two Souls character etc.

I think the balance in games is getting better, and there are numerous very strong female characters in many games, perhaps they aren;t the player character but they are integral to the story and they are not the simple damsel in distress (unlike Mario and Zelda games).

All the Bioware games of the last generation had great female characters, as well as the player's character able to be female or male. And I like that in DA and ME series the gender choice made the game a slightly different experience so it actually encouraged gamers to play as both sexes.

I think there's still too much testosterone in game related media though.

I don't want to sound as a horrible person, but I will admit I tend to not take playing as a female very seriously
Or for that matter in films also,...

Jim Sterling has done some good videos on the female protagonists thing. Much of it I agree with him on. It's a funny industry, where a female playable character isn't right in the circumstances. I think I remember that someone asked the Puppeteer developer why there wasn't a choice in gender of the main character, he said that it's because they didn't consider it and fair enough, I find it more offensive that the reporter would ask such a question, he's insulting not only the writer but trying to make the developers looks sexist for something that isn't, no one asks why Nathan Drake isn't female.

The question would be, would Uncharted have sold as well and produced such a great series if the protagonist was an already strong willed female (who was chasing the weaker report in game who happened to be male)? Tomb Raider I hear you shout but was there any romantic involvement in that? Are male gamers comfortable with playing a female who persues a romance with a male in game? Mass Effect gives you a choice though, and if you are sensible you'd play as female Shep as the voice actor is better.


... In short, let the developers make the game they want and stop asking and stop thinking it's an issue. They have carefully planned it and would like you to get the best from the experience.

There is another thing about female protagonists in game saying they are always hot, sexy, good looking etc and that males aren't desireable like that but then the males aren't exactly unattractive either. They aren't a 40 something over weight balding accountant, Marcus Fenix might be ugly but he's strong and powerful, desireable features.