Hello everyone,
this morning I wrote an article about the backlash Ubisoft has been revieving after E3 for not including women in their next gen titles. I thought you guys would find it an interesting read as well so I am posting it here.
Women in videogames.
In the recent days of E3, Ubisoft has gotten overwhelmed with hate for not including female characters in their new games of Assassin’s Creed Unity and FarCry 4.
I can understand people want to see more female characters in an industry mostly reservered for the hardcore male action hero/macho characters.
But the backlash Ubisoft has gotten is wrong, in every sense of the word.
They are accused of discrimination, sexism and bigotry. Just for the fact they did not include a female co-op partner.
But does no one remember Activision, the company that said: “Hey look we have a female soldier now!” as if it was a new feature?
Or that almost every MMORPG has female armor which is purely focused on their breasts with giant cleavage?
Even Mass Effect a game praised for it’s story and engaging universe has females wearing armor which shape around character’s breasts.
But when Halo 4’s female spartan showed no distinctive female features, people complained, because she looked like a dude.
Almost every game to date has females shown as objects, damsels in distress or just plain weaklings.
But we are forgetting that some of the greatest heroes in gaming are female.
We have Samus Aran, Lara Croft, Sarah Palmer who leads an army of super soldiers, Zelda who can handle herself as a mage as well as a pirate. We have the sirens from Borderlands. Female characters in the Elder Scrolls series are assassin’s, warriors, leaders.
I admit these numbers are small compared to the male game heroes.
But all of these are more brave, strong and more deserving of the term hero than some of the male characters.
And now Ubisoft is experiencing crushing criticism for not including a female character, because their deadline is too short to actually include a well thought out, well written, well animated female co-op character.
We are looking at wrong company here, is all I have left to say.
Signing off.