Portrayal of women in video games

Describe how you would “redesign” women in a video game of your own creation so that they are not trapped by sexist stereotypes.

To be completely honest, I could probably count on two hands the amount of times I have played video games. When I stop to think about it though, I have two very distinct visions of generic female video game characters: one is a very distressed princess, waiting nervously for her prince to come to her rescue; the other, a scantily clad, fierce bombshell, saving the world from one bad guy at a time. If nothing else, it is interesting to note the enormous disparity between the two portrayals of women—they are polar opposites, and yet both still manage to perpetuate demeaning stereotypes of women.

While I am certainly no video game expert, I definitely see a need for a more accurate portrayal of women in games. As far as I know, typical women do not wait patiently in their rooms, waiting to be “saved” while their boyfriends ward off enemies in neighboring kingdoms; nor do they run around doing back flips, defeating their enemies with roundhouse kicks while dressed in skin tight leather bodysuits. For representations of women-- animated or not-- to be fair, they must be realistic. I don’t see a huge problem with women being portrayed as beautiful and/or thin, due largely to the fact that beautiful/thin women DO exist. What I do have a problem with is that video game designers assign women characters to unrealistic roles that either perpetuate the thinking that women are subservient, docile and dependent on men OR that they powerful and fierce because due to their intense sexuality.

Women are athletes. Women are scholars. Women are housewives. Women are employees. This is the reality of society and should be what is portrayed through all avenues of media. If I were to design a video game, I would showcase women in one (or a few) of these roles as strong, independent women capable of supporting themselves without relying on an overtly sexualized appearance.