FemShep

I spend a lot of time complaining about all of the sexism fail to be found in the gaming world, so it’s nice every once in a while to have something to point at as an example of things done right. So BioWare, I know I get down on you for your sexist character designs and for your refusal to promote female avatars as an option in your advertisements. But I can’t stay mad at you forever because you gave me FemShep, possibly the best female character in the history of video games ever.

My Shepards: Teresa (Renegade, obviously) and Alanna (Paragon)

First off, I can’t say how much I love that FemShep isn’t Barbie, like the vast majority of video game women. For one thing, she’s not terribly busty unlike Miranda or Samara, which is awesome. She’s slender, sure, but kicking ass burns a lot of calories. I guess it’s a sad statement about the state of game design when a female flagship character with a flat-ish chest can make me so happy, but there you go.

That’s not to say FemShep is dowdy. So I love it even more that her feminine attributes are never blatantly on display like… well… this:

About as subtle as a brick to the face.

Thank god that they never inflicted that indignity on FemShep. It was bad enough having to put up with Miranda going on about how her looks were part of her genetic modifications designed to “give her an edge”, and it was worse getting shots of Miranda’s ass cleavage or of Jack’s bizarre nipple straps. No, FemShep is definitely female, attractive, and so not on display for your benefit. (Which, of course, makes some male gamers unhappy. To them I say, grow up. You got Miranda, Samara, and Jack. Don’t be ungrateful.)

This is a woman who doesn’t take any guff; she’s out to kick ass and take names:

In a way, it feels to me like FemShep is the realization of the wasted potential found in so many ass-kicking video game women like Samus and Lara Croft. FemShep is not Barbie-fied supermodel who kicks ass in revealing clothing so that male gamers can have their violence with a side of tits and ass. And while the option exists for her to have sexy moments if you pursue a romance, that romance is still on her terms. This isn’t any of the Metroid games, or Dead or Alive, or Tomb Raider. FemShep’s nudity is never a reward for the gamer – it’s part of her story.

As a side note, it is nice to see that the option for romance is still there for FemShep. It would have been easy to make her “one of the boys”, yet another woman who divorces her gender as the price for being a high achiever in a traditionally male role. Sure the romance options were a bit lackluster in the first game, but they certainly made up for that with a vengeance in ME2.

Perhaps the thing I love more than anything else about FemShep is that she’s the boss and everyone knows it. No one ever questions her ability to lead, no one ever makes any suggestions that maybe someone else should be in charge. FemShep is a born leader with the ability to inspire those around her. Despite being surrounded by hyper-competent people, many of whom like Tali, Garrus, or Mordin are leaders in their own right, it feels right that FemShep is in charge.

Guns? She don’t need no stinkin’ guns.

She never winds up playing second fiddle to her team members because in the end it’s all about helping her get the job done. And, ohmigod I can’t possibly articulate how much I love BioWare for this. Honestly, sitting right here I can’t name a single female video game character besides FemShep that is 1) not sexualized 2) in charge and 3) the main character.

And all of this is improved by the massive amounts of choice the player gets in deciding the fate of the universe. FemShep is a character whose decisions affect the entire galaxy, again not a role that you often see female characters in. And she gets to do all manner of epically awesome things. FemShep isn’t just a person – she’s a force of nature. So when people ask me what exactly it is that I do want in games? This. I want this. More of it. A lot more.

With all of this in FemShep’s favor, I can’t imagine why anyone would ever play Male Shepard. Male Shepard is such a stereotyped character – the white space marine messiah figure with a buzz cut and a chiseled jaw. Yawn. That trope is just so tired these days. Give me a female messiah figure who manages to be feminine and still save the universe – way more interesting. The comparison is even more lopsided when you start comparing voice acting. Jennifer Hale’s performance as female Shepard is amazing. Mark Meer is totally bland and uninspiring.

So you’ve got some pretty high expectations to live up to for the third game, BioWare. In the past two games, FemShep has gotten to do some seriously awesome things like kill an ancient machine-god and come back from the dead. Let’s make this a hat trick and not ruin the streak with gratuitous FemShep sexiness, okay? Okay.

>[Warning, this post contains spoilers for Baldur’s Gate, Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect. If you haven’t played them by now and think you might care about being spoiled, turn back now.]

I’ve been playing BioWare games since the original Baldur’s Gate. I played through NWN and a substantial amount of Shadows of Undrentide. I loved KOTOR and KOTOR2 (except for the last three hours), was completely obsessed with Dragon Age (no really, ask my husband), and only just recently discovered the joy that is Mass Effect. (I have plans to play ME2 some day, but for now I’m working on FFXIII.) I love BioWare games for their rich story lines and the staggering amount of freedom that their games allow – especially the more recent ones.

Best of all, I love the well-written and engaging characters. I’ll admit to giggling like a lunatic while playing through the romance plot with Alastair in DA:O. BioWare has definitely mastered the art of creating believable and memorable NPCs. They’re also perhaps the most female-friendly game publisher out there – hence the title. So this is both my love letter and my disapproving stare going out to the BioWare folks. Don’t get me wrong, BioWare. I love you – I need you. You rock my socks. Except for when you don’t.

Rock: Female avatars

So can I say how much I love being able to have female avatars? Because I love it – I really, really do. I do tend to play male characters on second play-throughs, but for my first play-through, I want to have a female character.

You did okay with this in the Baldur’s Gate series. The romance subplots were obviously geared toward male players, but that’s okay. You were still finding your voice. KOTOR was better, but after my first playthrough I still felt like I had missed something important. And then I discovered that only male Revan had the option of romancing Bastila. Don’t get me wrong, Carth was a nice guy and all and I appreciate that a real female romance option was included. I just didn’t find him a very useful character and thus didn’t really do a lot of plot stuff with him. Sorry, Carth.

With Mass Effect and DA:O they totally hit it out of the park. I played both of these with female avatars and thought that the writing was spot on. Both female Shephard and the protagonist of DA:O are strong female characters without anyone ever having to point out that OMG UR A CHICK. After playing these games, I wasn’t left with the feeling that a male-centric plot had been shoehorned into a female avatar and had all the pronouns changed. So kudos, BioWare for including a viable and well-written female protagonist. And also kudos for having the good sense to choose Jennifer Hale as the voice of female Shephard. She kicks seven kinds of ass.

This is what my female Shephard looked like, except mine was more brown and didn’t look goth.

Anti-Rock: Ads don’t feature female avatars

The problem is that from the advertising that BioWare puts out, you’d never know that female avatars are a viable option. Only the canonical male Shephard – a rather boring pasty space marine – is ever shown in ads for the ME series:

Wow. Another white space marine. Yawn.

You’d never get the idea from the ME ads that Shephard’s gender and race are customizable. And it’s the same with DA:O, Dragon Age: Origins – Awakenings (the expansion), and the promos for the upcoming Dragon Age 2. Again, despite being able to choose a female avatar, the ads feature only male avatars.

Given a recent study of how many registered users choose female Shephards over male Shephards in ME2, it’s not too surprising that the marketing bots made this decision, even if it is disappointing

Further Anti-Rock: BioWare mod response to forum complaints

BioWare’s official response to calls on their forums for more (or, you know, any) female avatars in their advertising is pretty mixed too. In one thread, BioWare forum mod Chris Priestly responded to a complaint that ads never feature female avatars with:

While the percentage population of online gaming audence may be growing or higher, the audence for our games is still predominantly male. This does not mean the female gamer, or again, the male gamer who prefers to play a female character is less important, but it should in part explain why some marketing campaigns are targetted as they are.

As I said in another thread, BioWare always has and continues to greatly support and value our female gaming audience. I hope in the (roughly) 8 months between now and launch female gamers find materials in our marketing that they enjoy.

In other words, the ads have male avatars because they’re the ones who buy the games, silly! But don’t worry, we’ll throw you a bone and expect you girls to be content.

And in another thread asking the same thing, BioWare forum mod Mike Laidlaw said:

We will show her eventually. I don’t have a firm timeline, but we well. And she is -hot-.

Yes. Because that is what I as a female gamer need to know. Is my female avatar going to be hot?

Ugh.

Mitigating Rock: Forum mod who thinks wanting female avatars in ads isn’t crazy talk

Thankfully, contrasting this rather patronizing response we have a thread wherin BioWare forum mod John Epler made many responses in a thread asking to see models of Female Hawke – the protagonist in the upcoming DA2. Among other things, he says:

Honestly, I don’t see a desire for more female-focused attention in development to be an unreasonable request.

No one’s asking for a game and story based around the ideals of second-wave feminism, but merely that we as developers acknowledge that there are more than one audience interested in our product. And I honestly don’t see that as unreasonable in the slightest.

Please keep the gender stereotypes (on both sides of the fence, mind) out of this thread, folks. It’s been pretty productive and positive thus far! Let’s not end up turning this into a ‘men like this’ ‘well women like THIS’ debate.

Phew. Thanks for restoring my faith, John. I mean, I’d buy your games anyway, because they’re just THAT GOOD, but I’d rather not get all resentful about it. So, moving on:

Rock: Female NPCs

BioWare has some of the best female NPCs ever, hands down. From Dynaheir in BG to Bastila in KOTOR to Ashley in Mass Effect, the female NPCs that join your party are well rounded, engaging, and memorable with nary a personality stereotype to be found. Not for BioWare the helpless princess primadonna who needs rescuing. (Okay, excepting Imoen in BG2. But at least she’s your sister and not your love interest.) No, the female characters who join your party are ass-kickers with complex motivations and compelling story lines.

Don’t mess with us. We will ruin your day.

Anti-rock: Sexist character designs

With all of that in mind, why oh WHY the sexist character designs? Seriously!

Okay, so in Mass Effect, one of your party members is Liara – an Asari. (Think blue space elves without the pointy ears.) She wears the same type of form-fitting body suit that all of the human military types do when they’re not all armored up. And while the ‘daughter seeking to atone for the misdeeds of her mother’ story line didn’t do much for me, the fact that she’s a scientist certainly goes against stereotypes. Awesome.

But then you finally meet her mother – Matriarch Benezia. They spend the first few hours of the game building her up as this huge threat and then I’m confronted with massive cleavage. It was one of the most jarring, anti-immersive moments I have ever encountered in a game.

Oh my god, Mom. Are you seriously going out in that? I’m, like, SO EMBARRASSED.

It happens in DA:O as well. The first NPC you meet is Morrigan, an awesomely useful sorceress who is playing some very deep games and has all kinds of hidden motives that the player is left to guess at. The only problem is that she walks around half naked the entire game:

I guess she’s hoping to distract that ogre with her tits.

And of course, Morrigan is prominently featured in a lot of the ads for DA:O.

And what about Leliana – the somewhat crazy assassin turned bard? If you stick with her as a thief, any suit of leather armor that she wears exposes a good portion of her chest. That same armor on a male character covers them up to the neck. Again, WTF? I mean, not wearing pants, fine. It seems like not-pants-wearing is pretty equal opportunity in DA:O, but why the difference?

I find it ironic that Zevran, perhaps BioWare’s sluttiest character ever, is more covered than Leliana.

Maybe Rock?: Leliana redesign

Apparently Leliana gets her own DLC and has gotten a bit of a makeover:

Yay, covered chest! Yay, pants!

So that’s at least mildly encouraging.

So what is it that you want?

I want more female avatars in BioWare’s game ads! (And for that matter, some non-white avatars would be fantastic too.) And I’d like to not have random sexism show up in your character designs. It’s hard to focus on your awesome and compelling stories when I keep getting distracted by irritating random cleavage.

Now go and sin no more! Or I’ll sic Jaheira on you.