Female Gamers

[Jae Onasi]

The thread title says it all--how do we females view games? How is it similar or different from males? The number of female gamers has jumped rather dramatically in the last 5 years or so--how is that going to affect games? What aspects of games could be more 'female friendly'? What are your favorite games, characters, genres?

 

Anything related to females gaming is fair game here. Guys, you're welcome to chime in, as long as it's relevant to the topic. I don't want to see the "OMG!!11!! I LURV TEH GIRLZ!!11eleventy-one!!11!!1!1!1!!!" posts....

 

Gals, feel free to add your topics, questions, concerns.

 

My first question/issue/beef: Why is Obsidian apparently taking a step back and going to a male-only character in their just-announced Alpha Protocol? While I may appreciate the finer points of male pixel-anatomy, I'd much rather play a female character than look at the back-end of a male character all game.

[Inyri]

From a female perspective I'd say most modern (non-RPG) games are lacking heavily in the story department. I'm past my prime for multiplay; I buy games for single-player now usually. Apparently I get to save my money because there haven't been any good SP games to buy since Republic Commando, probably, and that was even shy on SP content (good campaign, but much too short).

 

Is it unreasonable to expect that a game developer should care as much about the single-player campaign as the multiplay? Perhaps it's just a female perspective, as the lads out there seem to be more interested in shoot'em up. I, however, need a good solid story arc with good gameplay to keep me satisfied. Shooting down the bad guys for me is a way to advance the plot, not simply something to giggle at when blood comes spurting out.

[Jae Onasi]

I'm with you on that one. I got my button-mashing fix out of the way playing Asteroids and Pac-Man. You can only shoot an in-game gun so many times before you realize that really, the only outcome is hit or miss. At least with good stories you have multiple choices that can dramatically alter the outcome, and I find that far more interesting.

[Bee Hoon]

Games like Final Fantasy also leave you no choice with regards to the main character, but they do make up for it by having awesome stories and strong female characters What annoys me a lot is how female pc romances tend to be rather gimped and with far fewer choices than the guys have! *huffs in displeasure* Also, the romanceable characters *always* have to be polar opposites and they frequently bicker over the PC's affections. As someone so eloquently described it, "dogs fighting over a bone". Meh!

[Arcesious]

The problem is that we guys tend to be the ones who make the games more than women do... Sicne so few women are game designers for games like starwars, but there are so many guys, so the game always seems to run out with a more male prosective. That and we guys tend to be naturally more agressive and wanting to have a fighting game, so we enjoy games like that more than the majority of women, and it tends to turn out more of a guys game, as we mostly make it for a male perspective. And when we try to give a game options fro the perspective of a female in the game, we tend to leave it a bit more limited than the guy perspective. It's just that there's a gap between genders, and our understandment of each-other's perspectives aren't that great... If I tried to make a game have both a guy and girl perspective in SP, I'd have trouble, as I still don't understand women... Same for most other guys... And visa versa, if women tried to make a game for guys. That, and the majority of sci-fi gamers are guys, so in the terms of money making, the makers of the game want to make more money, so they make it for the majority's interests instead of for both the 'majority gender' (Male) and 'minority gender' (Female) of gamers. (For lack of better words to say instead of 'majority gender' and 'minority gender')

 

Arcesious, if you hit the return button now and then and put line separations between paragraphs, it will greatly enhance readability.

 

--Jae

[Inyri]

I think you'd be very surprised at how many female game developers there are and how many female gamers there are.

 

We simply tend to avoid being vocal because we don't want to have to deal with hordes of horny 12 year old boys going 'omg bewbs!'

[Jvstice]

I usually do the single player campaigns. A lot of the time, they are specificaly targeted towards a male audience though and as a male, I personally don't mind, but I can see where women might feel pretty slighted by a lot of these games. I do try to follow every possible path in replay throughs if a game is interesting enough to be worth a replay and there are alternate options enough to keep it interesting, though there are some cases I really can't make myself try a few of the possible outcomes.

 

I remember with VTM: Bloodlines the instructions told you that the higher your seduction feat, then the more likely you could get a human to let you feed off them. Now it made sense that when I'd play a male character, the female NPC's would be the ones throwing themselves at the main character and letting your character drink their blood. But then if you played a female vampire, all of a sudden, every single of of the same NPC's all of a sudden go lesbian and still like your character.

 

Of course not that I minded because it's females I'm attracted to anyway, but I did think that it was kind of unfair to any straight women that would have been interested in the game.

 

Or like the whole Kotor you can have a romance that Bastilla kisses a male Revan, but if Revan's female, then female Revan's romance with Carth is utterly platonic kind of struck me the same way. Carth didnt' really do anything for me, but like I say, it struck me as 1 sided not giving women that play the same options.

[Bee Hoon]

Having written quite a bit from the perspective of a male Revan with reasonable effectiveness, I'd say that the gender divide isn't quite that unbridgeable:P If I can write a believable male character, I'm sure that guys can write decent romances etc for girls if given a little practice

[Inyri]

I'm not insulted that games focus on a male character; I'm less interested in playing a role than I am with seeing how the game unfolds. What gender I am is usually irrelevant. I complain that 'female PC's get the shaft' in terms of story-line, but it doesn't bother me much. I'm just interested in playing through the story itself.

[Jvstice]

Female character does get the shaft in K2. They made her with no taste in men, where male Exile does have some common sense and decent options of people he could actually respect.

 

I mean when your choices are between someone who's undercutting you and trying to get away from you like atton and someone utterly without personality like disciple, vs a sith dedicated to you, a bounty hunter, and an echani warrior you can tell where they put a lot more thought and effort.

[Bee Hoon]

I liked Atton Good stuff for fanfics, as I'm sure numerous authors in the CEC would agree! A good storyline will carry me through the game, but is bad from a roleplaying POV

[Jvstice]

Storytelling POV both are good games. Just I think that a lot of players do put themselves in their main pc's shoes for campaign games and think of them as themselves a lot of the time.

[Web Rider]

I don't personally know a lot of female gamers, though I tend to agree with what is usually labeled as the "female" perspective on games, that they need better stories and more depth. But that may also just be because I'm a writer. I don't however, want to see so much depth and such that we end up with games like Xenosaga, affectionately termed more a movie than a game.

 

I have to admit, in this day and age, I don't understand(short of VERY specific titles or genres), why ANY game would only allow single-gender play.

[MasterWaffle]

Unfortunately my limb dyslexia* translates into bad hand eye co-ordination, making my playing FPS complicated. I enjoy games, but only when I can play them! I doubt this has anything to do with my gender, however. I find the lack of good female characters disappointing. I like kickass empowered women, and I like to see them under a C cup.

I guess it's a good reason for more females to get into game design.

 

...And visa versa, if women tried to make a game for guys...

Oh, I disagree. I think women understand what men would want in a video game, and I expect some males have a good grasp on understanding females, it's just that games are marketed more towards men so the female gamers probably just aren't considered (as much).

I mean, could you imagine that meeting?

 

Employee: I think we need to make Bloodbath Horror Assault IV more marketable towards women. How about we add a female character as a love interest for GoreSlasher EatYourChildren?

Room: O.o;

 

I think it takes a particular kind of women to enjoy video games as they are today. ^^

 

*May or may not be a made up condition

[True_Avery]

Apparently I get to save my money because there haven't been any good SP games to buy since Republic Commando, probably, and that was even shy on SP content (good campaign, but much too short).

...Republic Commando...

Girl, I need to give you a long list of SP games that have been released before and after that silly shooter that are infinitely better.

 

What annoys me a lot is how female pc romances tend to be rather gimped and with far fewer choices than the guys have! *huffs in displeasure* Also, the romanceable characters *always* have to be polar opposites and they frequently bicker over the PC's affections. As someone so eloquently described it, "dogs fighting over a bone". Meh!

A matter of personal taste, really. I personally would have been disappointed in a lot of games if the love arc was simply boy meets girl, and then both fall head over heels in love. That works in chick-flicks, but not so much in a realistic setting.

 

Not sure what games you been playing though. I find that female pc romances tend to have much more depth than the male. Again, a matter of personal taste.

 

Why is Obsidian apparently taking a step back and going to a male-only character in their just-announced Alpha Protocol? While I may appreciate the finer points of male pixel-anatomy, I'd much rather play a female character than look at the back-end of a male character all game.

As long as it works, I personally do not care about which gender I play if it has already been assigned from the start. Witcher had a male only lead, and it played well enough around him to make me forget about customization.

 

Shooting down the bad guys for me is a way to advance the plot, not simply something to giggle at when blood comes spurting out.

Haha, I dunno. I find gore to be very amusing if done right.

 

I remember with VTM: Bloodlines the instructions told you that the higher your seduction feat, then the more likely you could get a human to let you feed off them. Now it made sense that when I'd play a male character, the female NPC's would be the ones throwing themselves at the main character and letting your character drink their blood. But then if you played a female vampire, all of a sudden, every single of of the same NPC's all of a sudden go lesbian and still like your character.

Haha, I loved that feature personally. I thought it added to the "this is not human society anymore, and you are not a human anymore" feel of the game. If you are a vampire, what does gender really mean anymore? You aren't going to be having kids, so that removes some chains. Blood is blood, and if you can use otherworldly powers to seduce some tasty girls... why not? I mean, I somehow doubt that vampires would view the world the same way humans do.

 

Although, as you said, the game would probably turn more straight girls off to it. I'm not straight though, so I am probably not the girl to be talking to.

 

Or like the whole Kotor you can have a romance that Bastilla kisses a male Revan, but if Revan's female, then female Revan's romance with Carth is utterly platonic kind of struck me the same way. Carth didnt' really do anything for me, but like I say, it struck me as 1 sided not giving women that play the same options.

I can see where you are coming from, but here is that from my perspective.

Bastila:

I disliked the Bastila arc personally and found it amusing at times, and this is coming from someone who seduced every chick she met in VTM:B.

 

Bastila's love was like a child discovering she had feet. It was suddenly the coolest thing in the world. She wanted to flex it and walk around. Her love was started by the bond, and then set on a roller coaster of hormones and emotion that she had probably been holding back since she was 10.

 

It was like watching a teenage girl, which is exactly what she is. And even though it makes sense, it makes for questionable dialog and a shallow character. Her puppy love was borderline obsessive, and depending on Male Revan's response she would only fall more into that spiral.

 

Most guys I have seen say the Bastila arc was better than the Carth arc because it had more "depth" or had more "love". What Bastila and male Revan had, in my opinion, was passion and hormones. Not love. They had the bond, but not the connection. The male Revan dialog to Bastila is over the top bad, and sounds like a 16 year old boy talking to his high school girlfriend. It felt pushed. It felt needy. It felt immature and high school teenager-y. I found it so silly that I don't play or acknowledge male Revan as a character since my first play through with him.

 

I'm not trying to make a blanket statement here, or be insulting, but finding more depth in an obsessive, needy airhead like Bastila than in Carth or female Revan makes me curious about some of your views on females in general. Not pointing fingers at anyone, but just curious as to the reasons.

 

Carth:

I thought his arc with female Revan was alright. I certainly, to me, felt like it had been worked on more that Bastila's.

 

Carth had lost his wife and assumed he had lost his son. He was betrayed by the man he admired, and many of his comrades. A large portion of his own people turned on the Republic and attacked him. His character was wary, and very introverted due to this. It took the entire game to get him to admit he has growing feels for you, and even that was after the shock of discovering you were the very woman that killed his wife, separated him from his son, and caused the Jedi Civil War.

 

Carth was secretive, introverted, and needed his space. He wanted to reach out, but had problems doing so due to his past. Female Revan comes along and tries to get into his head and understand him. Carth slowly opening up to her piece by piece was part of an inner conflict with himself, so I can see why it didn't go the Bastila route of: "I am a girl and you are a guy! Wanna kiss and stay together forever!"

 

Both him and female Revan were tough people. They both knew there was a situation at hand bigger than both of them. Throwing themselves at each other could only cause problems, as it did with male Revan and Bastila. A platonic friendship is what it looked like, but I have always thought that love was both about loving someone, but also being able to be their best friend.

 

Female character does get the shaft in K2. They made her with no taste in men, where male Exile does have some common sense and decent options of people he could actually respect.

As I said with Bastila and Carth, the male stuff felt more high schoolish while the female felt more too the point and serious. Although, that is just my opinion. I loved the quiet and introvertness of the females in both Kotor games, but that is a matter of personal taste.

 

I mean when your choices are between someone who's undercutting you and trying to get away from you like atton and someone utterly without personality like disciple, vs a sith dedicated to you, a bounty hunter, and an echani warrior you can tell where they put a lot more thought and effort.

Depends. A bunch of girls falling to their knees for you compared to some guys fighting for you seems to be a common gender tool. A lot of guys probably like the idea of a bunch of women falling for you, while the women tend to like guys amusingly fighting over you. I dunno, just something I personally noticed, and more of a matter of opinion than anything.

 

I like kickass empowered women, and I like to see them under a C cup.

Power to ya *high fives*

 

Oh, I disagree. I think women understand what men would want in a video game, and I expect some males have a good grasp on understanding females, it's just that games are marketed more towards men so the female gamers probably just aren't considered (as much).

That is a distinct possibility. There are games that seem to be more suited to a female audience, but I'd agree with you in saying that they are advertised to a (assumed) male audience.

 

I think it takes a particular kind of women to enjoy video games as they are today. ^^

I think it does too. But, as time has passed I've noticed a lot more chicks playing video games. I think you'd be surprised how many of them adore Guitar Hero, for example.

 

The difference is that male gamers tend to be social about it. Female gamers tend to be closet gamers.

[patient_zero]

I think that if they sit and think about it, most (good) male writers can write good female characters, and vice versa. It's just that as games were looked upon as a "boy thing" to begin with, the people making them decided to write to the male audience, ignoring the existing female gamers and excluding potential female gamers who looks at it and think it's "a guy thing". It's improving now, but I'd be lying if I said it was perfect.

 

I can enjoy a wide range of games depending on the circumstance. For single player games I want an in-depth story, good characters, and choice where it's appropriate (Mostly in create-a-hero PC RPGs, story choices in an FPS are for the most part non-existant or superficial). And in games where choice is an option I do appreciate romance as long as it's a sidequest and doesn't seem too forced. For multiplayer games I don't tend to mind the story, as most of my kind of multiplayer games are Mario Party affairs where a story isn't really viable.

 

Speaking specifically of KotOR, I second Avery's distate for Bastila's romance. Females spend their time with Carth helping a broken man overcome his problems and slowly earning his trust, eventually enough that he starts to care for you and falls in love with you. Males talk to Bastila about twice then begin seeing the "hurrrr, you're hot" dialogue options. Even if I try to see those options as for "evil jerk" players trying to lure Bastila away from the Jedi teachings, I still end up feeling that handling her feelings in this way almost undevelops her character.

 

As for the second one? I think I head-desked when handmaiden chucked her clothes off and attempted to brawl me naked in the cargo hold. Then there was the creepily submissive Visas. I realise, however, that those are somewhat parallel to Disciple's "childhood crush that never wore off" and the fact that most of Bao-Dur's lines involve the words "Yes, General?". Combining that with the fact that there wasn't any culminating love scene I suppose I could say I don't think the second one handled romance well. But I suppose this is becoming less to do with female gamers and more to do with me going off on a tangent after reading Avery's post.

[Bee Hoon]

A matter of personal taste, really. I personally would have been disappointed in a lot of games if the love arc was simply boy meets girl, and then both fall head over heels in love. That works in chick-flicks, but not so much in a realistic setting.

 

Not sure what games you been playing though. I find that female pc romances tend to have much more depth than the male. Again, a matter of personal taste.

While I agree with you all on Bastila's romance being exceedingly silly (I don't look like a kinrath pup! Sulk! Cry! Oh shaddup and snog me nao.); other female romances irked me. One example would be Jade Empire-- while I liked Sky and all, the romance felt rather rushed. NWN2 OC also sticks out like a sore thumb in my memory because of Casavir, who could have been developed much more as a character but was left talking about Old Owl Well until right up till the final boss -.-''' Not to mention that Bishop wasn't a romance option. Cry!

[Pavlos]

While I agree with you all on Bastila's romance being exceedingly silly (I don't look like a kinrath pup! Sulk! Cry! Oh shaddup and snog me nao.); other female romances irked me. One example would be Jade Empire-- while I liked Sky and all, the romance felt rather rushed. NWN2 OC also sticks out like a sore thumb in my memory because of Casavir, who could have been developed much more as a character but was left talking about Old Owl Well until right up till the final boss -.-''' Not to mention that Bishop wasn't a romance option. Cry!

 

All of the NWN2 romances are like that, I'm afraid. They just come out of no where. For Elanee to sleep with my character, all she needed was a wall, the moon, and impending doom. Seeing as how I'd basically ignored her since Shandra came into my party I was more than a little confused...

 

I'm not sure which is worse, Obsidian's creepy stalker doesn't-go-anywhere unrequited love (as seen in KotOR II and MotB) or the painful courting rituals that the BioDevs seem to be obsessed with.

 

I'd probably go with the latter but then I'm an English student and if romance doesn't end with people throwing themselves on spears then it's just not interesting to me .

[stingerhs]

gaming and teh ladies. now there's something that i do like to see. girls tend to just simply have fun while their gaming compared to guys. guys tend to be really competitive, and its not always very fun to play against them especially now that i'm older. girls, on the other hand, mostly seem to play games for the sheer enjoyment of them which is why i prefer to play with them online.

 

granted, that is a bit stereotypical of me to say so, but that does come more from my own observations more than anything, at least with the shooters. i haven't played very many other types of games online to really tell you how they compare to guys in other respective genres, but i can imagine that its a fairly similar attitude: girls play for fun while guys play for competition.

 

again, i'm being stereotypical, but that's really all i have to go on.

[Jvstice]

Haha, I loved that feature personally. I thought it added to the "this is not human society anymore, and you are not a human anymore" feel of the game. If you are a vampire, what does gender really mean anymore? You aren't going to be having kids, so that removes some chains. Blood is blood, and if you can use otherworldly powers to seduce some tasty girls... why not? I mean, I somehow doubt that vampires would view the world the same way humans do.

 

Although, as you said, the game would probably turn more straight girls off to it. I'm not straight though, so I am probably not the girl to be talking to.

 

I can see that to a point. I enjoyed it as it was, but it's not vampires that were indifferent to your gender, but the humans that the vampire main character was seducing for their blood. The only exceptions to people that care about your gender to be seduced, are the malkavian Jenette who only seduced men & male vampires, that guy with the broken down car in santa monica, and later Romeo, who only could be seduced by female vampires.

 

The rest were women who wanted your character if you just dropped the right line, no matter who you were (barring nosferatu). So those human NPC's weren't having a new vampiric life with inhuman motivations. So every single person that happens to be interested in your character isn't gay, isnt' straight, but bi. In an overwhelming majority of cases? Like I say. Didn't bother me, because I did enjoy the game, but I could see how that would limit their market of people that would get it.

 

 

I can see where you are coming from, but here is that from my perspective.

Bastila:

I disliked the Bastila arc personally and found it amusing at times, and this is coming from someone who seduced every chick she met in VTM:B.

 

 

Bastila's love was like a child discovering she had feet. It was suddenly the coolest thing in the world. She wanted to flex it and walk around. Her love was started by the bond, and then set on a roller coaster of hormones and emotion that she had probably been holding back since she was 10.

 

It was like watching a teenage girl, which is exactly what she is. And even though it makes sense, it makes for questionable dialog and a shallow character. Her puppy love was borderline obsessive, and depending on Male Revan's response she would only fall more into that spiral.

 

I'll agree with that assessment of Bastilla's personality and romance as opposed to Carths, as well as that Carth's was deeper, and what actually developed in the game was more akin to love instead of puppy love. But her arc did give you more story options as far as how the story turns out overall.

 

1) Bastilla goes dark side and wins you to the dark side from Lehon. She convinces you to kill everything and everyone that matters to you other than Canderous and the droids who follow you unconditionally.

2) She rejects you on Lehon, and when you meet her on the Star Forge, you have the option to redeem Bastilla because you "love" her and she "loves" you

3) You go your separate ways on Lehon, but when you meet on the star forge and redeem her in the fight say that because of everything that's happened you realize that what you had really wasn't love.

4) After going your separate ways ways on Lehon you realize that what you had with her wasn't love, and when you actually fight, you kill her.

5) Or you can not tell Bastilla through all of it that you have any feelings for her, then only admit to feeling something after you beat her and save her from malak and redeem her back to the light side.

 

The only Carth romance options are

1) Side with carth by going light side and make plans to one day build a life together when everything is over.

2) Side with Carth by going light side, but tell him that you're not interested in a life together and just want friendship.

3) Kill Carth whenever you go Dark Side so that you can rule republic space yourself with bastilla as your apprentice.

 

I've tried to get the Juhani dialogue 20 - 30 times too, but never managed to trigger that, so I can only assume there aren't many options for it either.

 

Most guys I have seen say the Bastila arc was better than the Carth arc because it had more "depth" or had more "love". What Bastila and male Revan had, in my opinion, was passion and hormones. Not love. They had the bond, but not the connection. The male Revan dialog to Bastila is over the top bad, and sounds like a 16 year old boy talking to his high school girlfriend. It felt pushed. It felt needy. It felt immature and high school teenager-y. I found it so silly that I don't play or acknowledge male Revan as a character since my first play through with him.

No. I've never thought more depth, and there were times that I thought Bastilla overbearing, and living a lie in the extreme, then blames Revan when he refuses to.

 

Carth is at least honest with himself and has better intentions, but melodramatic in the extreme. There's a reason for HK-47's "Mockery: I can never trust you or anyone ever again" speech. Also, whatever you say to Carth has less impact on overall gameplay than what you say to Bastilla. You have exactly 3 options I've ever found with Carth in at least 50 play throughs i've done. You have 5 options for bastilla that actually affect which characters live and die, the condition that people make it through in the end, and the like.

 

So are the Bastilla dialogues shallower? yes. Which did they put the most thought into though? I'd have to also say the bastilla romance dialogues because those are tied into critical junctures of the plot to a far greater degree.

 

I'm not trying to make a blanket statement here, or be insulting, but finding more depth in an obsessive, needy airhead like Bastila than in Carth or female Revan makes me curious about some of your views on females in general. Not pointing fingers at anyone, but just curious as to the reasons.

 

Carth:

I thought his arc with female Revan was alright. I certainly, to me, felt like it had been worked on more that Bastila's.

 

Carth had lost his wife and assumed he had lost his son. He was betrayed by the man he admired, and many of his comrades. A large portion of his own people turned on the Republic and attacked him. His character was wary, and very introverted due to this. It took the entire game to get him to admit he has growing feels for you, and even that was after the shock of discovering you were the very woman that killed his wife, separated him from his son, and caused the Jedi Civil War.

 

Carth was secretive, introverted, and needed his space. He wanted to reach out, but had problems doing so due to his past. Female Revan comes along and tries to get into his head and understand him. Carth slowly opening up to her piece by piece was part of an inner conflict with himself, so I can see why it didn't go the Bastila route of: "I am a girl and you are a guy! Wanna kiss and stay together forever!"

 

Both him and female Revan were tough people. They both knew there was a situation at hand bigger than both of them. Throwing themselves at each other could only cause problems, as it did with male Revan and Bastila. A platonic friendship is what it looked like, but I have always thought that love was both about loving someone, but also being able to be their best friend.

 

 

As I said with Bastila and Carth, the male stuff felt more high schoolish while the female felt more too the point and serious. Although, that is just my opinion. I loved the quiet and introvertness of the females in both Kotor games, but that is a matter of personal taste.

 

Not greater depth to Bastilla or your relationship as I said before. But the point of an RPG as opposed to other video game mediums is storytelling options. And that by the end, there's definitely the feeling that Revan and Bastilla are committed to make something work if that's the direction you decided to take it. With Carth, the most you can hope for is a hopeful ending in that regard, or you can be platonic. Of course as far as real relationships, I'd rather base one on the same things as female Revan and Carth than male Revan and Bastilla.

 

I see your point, and to in terms of the backstory story-telling by bioware Carth is a much better written and more developed character than Bastilla too.

 

Depends. A bunch of girls falling to their knees for you compared to some guys fighting for you seems to be a common gender tool. A lot of guys probably like the idea of a bunch of women falling for you, while the women tend to like guys amusingly fighting over you. I dunno, just something I personally noticed, and more of a matter of opinion than anything.

Atton's falling all over his knees over female exile just as much as Visas does the male one, except Visas actually comes to believe in the Exile's cause, where Atton obsesses over the exile in spite of both his beliefs and determination to save his own skin. As far as disciple, yes, he's not as needy as handmaiden, but he's also a blander character in general. And then Mira always makes it clear that she could take or leave the male Exile: that she doesn't like him in that way. Exile's falling all over her depending on the dialogue options you choose, but she never does.

While I agree with you all on Bastila's romance being exceedingly silly (I don't look like a kinrath pup! Sulk! Cry! Oh shaddup and snog me nao.); other female romances irked me. One example would be Jade Empire-- while I liked Sky and all, the romance felt rather rushed. NWN2 OC also sticks out like a sore thumb in my memory because of Casavir, who could have been developed much more as a character but was left talking about Old Owl Well until right up till the final boss -.-''' Not to mention that Bishop wasn't a romance option. Cry!

Jade empire's romances were ridiculous. I romanced all 3 of them in the same game, and none of them really cared until I enslaved the zombie/warrior spirit. Then later the only one to decide that the kingdom was worth keeping together was the princess when I decided to put blood in the fountain, and we slaughtered our lovers and rest of the party together before going on to rule the kingdom with an iron fist. In all this, the silk fox never really questioned my main character's sincerity when I played him as such utter scum like that?

[stoffe]

So every single person that happens to be interested in your character isn't gay, isnt' straight, but bi. In an overwhelming majority of cases? Like I say. Didn't bother me, because I did enjoy the game, but I could see how that would limit their market of people that would get it.

 

People wouldn't know that until they've already bought and played the game though, so I don't think it would limit the customer base that much. Especially in a game with such a setting and story where there is so much else that could potentially turn away customers.

 

I remember that I was very skeptical of the game initially before I had tried it. The setting and story didn't sound very appealing from what I had read. Still, I got the game as shipping filler along with another game I wanted, and once I actually played it I never regretted getting it.

 

Sure, there's plenty of the "adolescent adult" material in the game, but that didn't bother me or make the game less worth playing.

[Corinthian]

Here's a hint, lads: Video Game Romances have a range of good ranging from "Oh, this is so awful, I'd rather get kicked in the gonads. Twice." To "Well, on the plus side, she is a looker. So I'll try to ignore the bad dialog and various inconsistencies and get me some video game boobies."

 

Replace Gonads and Shes with Gender-appropriate nouns in the case of women. Although I still don't believe getting kicked in the crotch is as agonizing for women as it is for men, but whatever.

 

The problem is that 1: Most players of video games want to play the bloody game, not spend six hours chatting up some cutout character so they can get some jollies from it. So they make the romances short and quick, without much that's complicated. Usually, you get to shoot or carve someone in the course of it.

 

2: A game with both genders has to integrate at least two love interests for each gender. That's doubling the effort. So they pare it down some more.

 

3: Many games throw in some extra love interests, possibly including homosexual ones. So that makes it even worse. Rather than devoting all their time and effort to making one good romances, they're breaking it up into, say, four chunks.

 

4: Adult romances don't tend to be great material - not as much hormones, you see. So they do adolescent crap, follow in Romeo & Juliet's footsteps. Actually, it's not really their footsteps, it's more like huge gaping potholes in the road where everybody from Romeo and Juliet to West Side Story has walked through.

 

5: The Game devs could devote a lot of time and effort towards...Creating a convincing antagonist! Designing good levels! Interesting enemies! Fascinating, non-romantic dialog! Proper setup! Good missions! Or...a love interest that a significant portion of the playgroup will probably ignore because they just want to carve monsters into general fishbait, 30% of the rest will whine about because they don't like redheads, 10% will write erotic fanfics about, and the other 5% will enjoy it, and another 5% will get through it and then try to ignore it. Not precise numbers for every game.

[Aash Li]

My biggest gripe is that the devs are relying too much on the outdated assumption that most of their playerbase is horny teenage boys. And then proceed to making all the female characters dressed in dental-floss and chainmail bikinis. While I like to have sexy outfits for my characters to dress in when Im not out slaying evil... armour is not one of the things I think needs to be sexy. Its ARMOUR its meant to protect you not make you look like a sex-pot. The obvious exclusion to this is cloth-wearing classes like spell-casters. I dont think every outfit that the arcanist girl wears has to be something youd see an alley-girl traipsing around in. >.< Sure I like the Black Mageweave in Warcrack, especially on a Blood Elf warlock, but its nice to have clothing sets that look like they could protect you from the elements if not a sword strike.

 

Next big gripe is the storylines. I could write a better storyline and quest series than half the crap I see in most MMOs. And the lack of personal development of characters. I want my character to be more than just a bunch of numbers and talent points. I want dialogue choices similar to Kotor.

 

Pirates of the Burning Sea had an absolutely great storylines in it. There was even a romance series in it. Its an MMO and they did it, and quite well. And that quest alone made me love the game... havent played it for a while because it was kinda making me snore. But I still loved that quest; and you werent forced to choose the opposite sex either. I was impressed, pleased and surprised all at the same time when I found that out. :3

 

Grinding... god I hate grinding so much. You want me to stay and play your game? Dont make me grind 80 levels, either through supposed questing or flat-out camping of the same mobs for 10 hours. Not everyone is a gold-farmer from Korea. >.>

[Pavlos]

Adult romances don't tend to be great material - not as much hormones, you see. So they do adolescent crap, follow in Romeo & Juliet's footsteps. Actually, it's not really their footsteps, it's more like huge gaping potholes in the road where everybody from Romeo and Juliet to West Side Story has walked through.

 

I'm sorry to derail this thread but I'd like to know what the plot holes in Romeo and Juliet are.

 

To be honest, if the developers aren't going to do the romance in a realistic way then they may as well just leave it out and divert the energy into something more useful -- like an ending, for example.

[Web Rider]

I'm sorry to derail this thread but I'd like to know what the plot holes in Romeo and Juliet are.

 

To be honest, if the developers aren't going to do the romance in a realistic way then they may as well just leave it out and divert the energy into something more useful -- like an ending, for example.

 

Depending on the game we're playing, a REAL romance is unrealistic. You can't up and go adventuring for a week or suddenly decide to get beat up by vampires and expect to have any sort of stable romance. Now, if you're partner can adventure with you, you run all sorts of risks of them dying, so lets be logical: you're not going to have a stable romance if you leave them at home, and you're not going to keep your partner around if they're just some random person not made for adventuring.

 

Now, if you're sticking to a small town, yeah, sure it(real romantic romance) works.

 

But I have to be honest, in any non-linear single-player RPG, after I do the main quest, after I do a variety of sub-quests, yeah, romance is a really nice way to waste time. It's also a great filler for all those times some NPC says "meet me back here in a week". But yeah, it's FILLER, if I wanted a game for romance, I'd play Leisure Suit Larry(kidding).

 

 

And in response to chainmail bikinis, I personally find an attractively done set of full-body armor much better than a loincloth.