The Bittersweetest Thing: The Female Perspective in Game Development
I happen to be fortunate. My team of writers on Dragon Age currently consists of nine people— most of which are female. It’s reached the point that, when we consider new hires and transfers, I tend to joke “ummm, we could use some more testosterone in here…” and give a big goofy grin. Mine is probably the only department that could get away with saying something like that.
And I’m not truly serious about it, anyhow. If having such a large number of women on my team has taught me anything, it’s that you can’t lump them into one category of preferences any more than you could the guys. Yes, there are those among my female writers who are more averse to combat and more attracted to the romance plots… but, you know what? That’s equally true for the male writers. Considering there are those among the women who would be seriously put out if a plot didn’t engage in some serious bloodletting, and who roll their eyes whenever the subject of gooey romance comes up, I think it’s pretty safe to say the stereotype of a “female gamer” doesn’t exist outside of the heads of men.
Which meant I was a little surprised when I learned something new the other day.
We were sitting down to peer review a plot— a peer review being the point where a plot has had its first writing pass completed, and whoever wrote it sits down with the other writers as well as representatives from cinematic design, editing, and level art to hear critique. We’ve all read it first, and written down our thoughts, and go around the table to relate any issues we encountered.
As it happened, most of the guys went first. Typical stuff— some stuff was good, some stuff needed work, etc. etc. Then one of the female writers went, and she brought up an issue. A big issue. It had to do with a sexual situation in the plot, which she explained could easily be interpreted as a form of rape.
It wasn’t intended that way. In fact, the writer of the plot was mortified. The intention was that it come across as creepy and subverting… but authorial intention is often irrelevant, and we must always consider how what we write will be interpreted. In this case, it was not a long trip for the person playing through the plot to see what was happening at a slightly different angle, and it was no longer good-creepy. It was bad-creepy. It was discomforting and not cool at all. And this female writer was not alone. All the other women at the table nodded their heads, and had noted the same thing in their critiques. So we discussed it, changes were made, and everything was better. Crisis averted.
All good, right? That’s what these reviews are for.
Here’s the thing: after the meeting was over, it struck me how sharply divided the reviewers were on gender lines. The guys involved, all reasonable and liberal-minded fellows I assure you (including me!) all automatically took the intended viewpoint of the author and didn’t see the issue. The girls had all taken the other side of the encounter, and saw it completely differently— all of them. As soon as it was pointed out, it was obvious… but why hadn’t we seen it?
And this thought occurred as well: if this had been a team with no female perspective present, it would have gone into the game that way. Had that female writer been the lone woman, would her view have been disregarded as an over-reaction? A lone outlier? How often does that happen on game development teams, ones made up of otherwise intelligent and liberal guys who are then shocked to find out that they inadvertently offended a group that is quickly approaching half of the gaming audience?
For the girls reading that, I imagine a bunch will roll their eyes and say “well, duh, pretty damn often.” But what about the guys? Will the idea make them uncomfortable? Will they come up with excuses, or go right to hostility? Guys, particularly in game development, are a pretty privileged bunch. That’s not meant as an insult; it’s just the way it is. The teams consist primarily of white guys and (shockingly) that’s who we assume our audience is— almost exclusively. But the gaming audience is changing, just as the nature of our games is changing, and perhaps there’s value in appreciating the fact that greater female representation in game development teams has a more practical benefit than equality for equality’s sake alone.
-
8 Words You Should Avoid When Writing
As always, Orwell’s final rule applies: “Break any of...
-
Ultimate Writing Resource List
a massively extended version of ruthlesscalculus’ post
...
-
I love these notes. Old school disney animation guides had the same rules for storyboarding and it’s all very very true.
-
PlayFull version of the My Little Pony ~Tomodachi wa Mahou~ OP theme song, “Mirai Start” by Suzuko Mimori.
-
Fascism and the right to bear arms.
There have been a lot of people lately saying the only thing standing between freedom and fascism is the right of...
Seussical Gaming Book Covers by DrFaustusAU
Check out the captions for the rhymes for each story, created by the artist. They are exceptionally done!
Artist: DeviantArt (via: OTLgaming)
(via damaximos)
Creepy Watson (by tdous)
“I was playing the demo for the new(ish) game, Sherlock Holmes Nemesis, when I noticed that you never see or hear Dr. Watson move. He’s creepy.”
The Gameological Society’s Joe Keiser went shopping for video games in Nairobi and found a ton of PlayStation 2 knockoffs. Like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas: Kirk Douglas:
Full disclosure: this article exists so I can tell you all about Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas: Kirk Douglas….
I’ve seen my share of “fake geek girl” shaming, and just thought having a Fairy Gamer Momma to come to the rescue would be nice. I know they exist, I’ve met plenty who are amazing and could beat my ass at any version of Mario Kart. Give the Gamer Momma in your life a big hug! :D
(via bombasticbookman)
Just some video game dorks. Can you NAME THEM ALL? (probably not, there’s a lot of obscure ones in there!)
Vanellope
(via fandomsandfeminism)
He’ll be on the leaderboards in no time.
Animal Crossing and Skyrim.
Uh
Animal Crossing and Harvest Moon
That’s actually always been my dream
Kingdom Hearts and Epic Mickey
SWEET.
Skyrim meets The Binding of Isaac.
…Fu Ro MOM!
Skyrim and Pokemon
….Yes please.
Uhhh…Theatrhythm Final Fantasy and Pokemon Black. I think.
Cool?
Minecraft and Civilization IV.
I have no idea how this would work but it would probably be incredibly awesome.
Borderlands 2 and Mount and Blade: Warband.
Shut up and take my money.
This week I did a Prison Architect interview, which just went live on PC Gamer.
What’s great is Chris Delay talking about Dwarf Fortress’ impact on Prison Architect.
“What I love about it the most is that it’s the opposite end of the sprectrum to most game design projects. He doesn’t really do any game design. A better name for it would be a Dwarf Fortress Simulator, in which you just happen to be able to have fun because it’s an inherently fun scenario.”
Which pins down something I circled endlessly in this article on the “weight” of Demon’s Souls. I argued that in its cruel modelling of the heft of your weapon, your stamina, your brittle bones, your loathing of death, the game actually became more fun. It’s as Delay describes- it skirts more towards “simulating” a fun scenario, rather than pursuing joy first and foremost. It’s the same stuff Far Cry 2, Day Z or Stalker chase with their multifaceted (and, to many, tedious) pursuit of grit, freedom, of actual danger.
Which just gets me thinking that there should be a name for this movement. “Hardcore” is far too vague. Also, too shit. And it conjures an idea of difficulty and impenetrability which might (as in the case of Prison Architect) be entirely untrue. Hm.
Request: Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - Yeto’s Soup
I had planned on doing this soup for a while so when I got a number of requests through for anything from Zelda I thought this seasonal soup would fit in nicely. Also since most of us will be taking part in my favourite activity of pumpkin carving next week it would be useful to have a pumpkin based recipe. I have fond memories of Twilight Princess, it felt a lot more traditional than incarnations such as Wind Waker, although I must admit my favourite Zelda is actually Links Awakening (controversial). Yeto’s Soup comes from Yeto, a rather cuddly looking yeti, in the Snowpeak Ruins. His wife, Yeta, is very sick but you can help by giving Yeto the ingredients for his healing soup. It goes through three stages of strength – a Reekfish creates a Simple Soup, adding an Ordon Pumpkin makes Good Soup and finally adding Ordon Goats Cheese makes it a Superb Soup that restores eight hearts. Obviously I’m going for the full eight heart Superb Soup here.
This recipe serves 3-4.
What you will need:
A large pot, grater, baking tray, frying pan, baking tray, blender or hand blender.
For the Soup:
50g / ¼ Cup Butter
300g / 0.7lbs Pumpkin (Skinned and Choppped)
200g / 0.5lbs Sweet Potato (Skinned and Chopped)
2 Shallots (Chopped)
1 Small Clove Garlic
½ Teaspoon Grated Ginger
500ml / 2 Cups Vegetable/Chicken Stock
1-2 Tablespoons Goats Cheese
70 ml / ½ Cup Cream
75g / ½ Cup Smoked Haddock
75g / ½ Cup Pollock
Salt & Pepper
For the Pumpkin Garnish:
3 Pumpkin Wedges
1 Tablespoon Butter
Salt & Pepper
½ Teaspoon Dried Chilli Flakes
For the Potato Croutons:
Olive Oil
1 Medium Potato
Salt & Pepper
For the Carrot Tops:
5 Small carrots (Stalks On)
1 Tablespoon Butter
Preparing the Soup:
- In a large pot on a medium heat melt the butter. Add the shallots, garlic and ginger and cook until soft. Add the pumpkin and sweet potato chunks and stir well, allowing to cook for another 10 minutes.
- Pour in the vegetable/chicken stock, bring to the boil and simmer until the pumpkin and sweet potato has cooked through. Once cooked transfer to a clean bowl and blend (or use a blender). Return the soup to a clean pot, if it’s too thick then slowly add more vegetable stock until the desired texture is achieved. Set the soup aside while you prepare the garnishes.
Making the Pumpkin Slices:
- Preheat the oven to 200C/392F. Chop the pumpkin wedges into chunks and lay them onto a baking tray, cover with the butter, season and add the chilli flakes. Cook until soft and golden.
Making the Potato Croutons:
- Dice the potato into small cubes and heat some olive oil in a frying pan on a medium heat. Add the potatoes and season to taste, fry until crisp and golden brown.
Making the Carrot Tops:
- Heat the butter in a frying pan on a medium heat. Add the carrots and allow to cook until slightly soft.
Finishing the Soup:
- In a warm frying pan add a little olive oil and heat. Add the smoked haddock and pollock and fry for 1 minute. Pour in the cream and season with salt and pepper, allow the fish to cook for about 5 minutes in the cream.
- Once the fish has cooked pour the cream mixture into the pumpkin soup, add the goats cheese and stir gently. Warm the soup through on a low heat so the goats cheese can melt.
- Serve and garnish with the potato croutons, roast pumpkin slices and glazed carrot tops.
This is an interesting soup. I’ve never cooked with pumpkin or any type of gourd before, it’s not really as popular a thing to do here as it is in America (I still need to try pumpkin pie). There’s a nice balance of sweetness that’s cut by the sharpness of the goats cheese and smokiness of the fish – it is actually one of the most delicious things I’ve ever tasted. I was not expecting it to be! I originally wanted to use monkfish but I couldn’t source any so I went with fish traditionally used in fish pies. I think the mixture of the smoked and white fish creates an interesting flavour that might mimic an actual Reekfish (despite it being based on a type of salmon). Yeto was definitely on to something with this soup and if it’s hearty enough for the Snowpeak Ruins then it’s a winter winner for me - I can feel my hearts restoring as I type.
Like this? You might also enjoy the Pokémon - Poffins.
Don’t forget! Next week will be the Costume Quest Hallowe’en Special that you all voted for!
Craig Mullins. Without a doubt Craig Mullins has to be one of the best known digital artists of our age. His fusion of traditional/digital methods, thinking, and paint application have inspired and impressed artists all around the world. I go back every so often to look at his website. I know i’ve seen each and every painting already, but it always feels like a new experience because I keep noticing more of his genius each time.
Mullins has a website with a large collection of his work. Check it out, even if you already have.
all this sexy.
all of it
dammit
(via damaximos)
I really like that Mia has kind of a Christina Hendricks-esque figure when you look at her next to some of the other girls in the game. Or that Franziska has a comparatively drastic waist-to-hips ratio when you look at her next to other characters like Dahlia. It’s always an added bonus when they give some body diversity to the female characters that are meant to be attractive instead of just making a “this is the hot girl mold and we’ll only deviate from it to make characters that are explicitly meant to be less attractive” situation.
On that note, I appreciate that they have characters like Lotta who aren’t exceptionally sexy OR intentionally unappealing! She just wears a lot of layers and doesn’t have her body on display! And that there are characters like Ema who also dress fairly conservatively but are still cute and fashionable!
A lot of the time when people say “wow I wish all of the women in this game didn’t look/dress the same”, other people act like you’re trying to take away ALL SEXY LADIES EVER FOREVER. Ace attorney just…. does a lot of things right. Having sporty, utilitarian characters like Lotta doesn’t erase the curvy bombshells in low cut shirts like Mia, having modest business casual field scientists like Ema doesn’t mean Franziska isn’t walking around in a miniskirt. And the girls who do dress provocatively never seem like they’re like… designed that way for the benefit of the hormonal teenage boys playing the games, if that makes any sense? It might be because the focus of the game is looking at people’s faces and you almost never see them from below the ribcage, but like, Mia for example, is a lawyer who dresses kind of like she weekends as a biker mama. It’s kind of an inappropriate way for a lawyer to stock up their wardrobe, but for her, it gives me an impression like “this character is confident and formidable, she knows how to bend the rules and she won’t get pushed around” instead of “Somebody probably thought this was sexy”.
I think part of it has to do with giving all of the characters individual personalities, as well as fashion sensibilities and body types that suit those personalities instead of treating the women like an interchangeable Barbie doll; and part of it has to do with keeping the more offbeat outfits wacky-within-reason instead of just making something completely inappropriate and propping it up with the EMPOWERED PEOPLE WEAR WHATEVER THEY WANT excuse. Like, Mia’s outfit is a little edgy for lawyer garb because it’s basically a corset and a miniskirt with a suit jacket, it’s not some kind of way-out-there latext catsuit and she’s not hanging around the courtroom in her underwear. That and Mia’s the only one who dresses like Mia. (I also appreciate that she’s also got that little pudge-crease across her lower abdomen that thicker women get when they wear tight skirts while smaller girls like Franzika and Daliah don’t, it’s a detail I feel like a lot of designers would skip if they were going for straight-up sexy)
I know I said some stuff along these days a few days ago, but I had a ton of people send me messages about how they felt the Ace Attorney folks really dropped the ball on the women in the game and I feel like that’s just not giving them enough credit, because they are doing a lot of cool stuff.
This is kind of off-topic but I don’t know if I care enough to make a whole separate post about it, so while I’m here I may as well put it out there that I also appreciate the way they manage to do fanservicey stuff with masculine characters that actually looks like fanservice, instead of just being another power fantasy display. It’s not just like “look we made this beefy dude scowl, that’s exactly as sexy as that girl with the bedroom eyes and her ass in the air, right?” instead it’s stuff like this;
Or this;
Pinup art that’s goofy and fun and in-character with tons of personality! My favourite thing!
I just have more fun talking about media that I really like, doing cool things that I appreciate than trying to call out every instance of people making the same mistakes that everyone’s been making since the dawn of pop culture. It gets me excited and inspired instead of angry and pessimistic.
