Melinda and Tropes vs. Women in Video Games

[0player]

So basically it sounded like the thought construct of "being morally threatened" is enough in its own right to explain all the opinions you don't like.

It's not so much of an opinion he was referring to as unwarranted negativity/mockery.

[HousePet]

I'm all for more character creation options.
I am not for silly arguments and building artificial distinctions between groups.

[Radon26]

for some time now i was thinking that Melinda seems a bit... unresponsive after you make a portal for her.

maybe make a conversation with her after some major events happen?
like after you connect the 2 continents with far-portals.
or after you, well, SAVE THE WORLD...
maybe visit the gates of morning with her.


Also, look from another side. people are saying that she is a trophy you claim after the quest.
Maybe its melinda that is the "evil" one her? think about it.
you do so much for her, but all she does is talk, and sometimes kiss you?
She gets access to a secret fortress and a secret portal to Anglowen (or Derth) where she learns magic (or opens a shop).
no matter how you look at it, there is only a gain for her in manipulating the player, and if you die, well, lot a big loss either.

[Delmuir]

I'm all for more character creation options.
I am not for silly arguments and building artificial distinctions between groups.

I concur, but the distinction isn't artificial. Whether or not it matters to us, it matters to a lot of people, and often in earnest.

As I said, once someone chose a skin-tone and vaguely racial set of features, it ceased to be random, and it ceased to "not matter."

Again, I'm not advocating changing it (although I'd be on board if someone did, as I like aesthetic options even if I don't care about racial symbolism) but your position is once of insistence, and not reason. That's bad-form for an aspiring (or perspiring) scientist.

[HousePet]

I'm not saying that it doesn't matter to people, or that people can't care about it. This game is artificial, and I have no objection to people caring about it.

[MalReynolds]

I appreciate that most everyone has remained pretty reasonable during this thread. Still, I find topics like this very misguided and misplaced--the latter word being more on point, since there is almost no place for this discussion here.

The initial point was that the Melinda scene is sexist, insofar as she's a weak trophy trope with no agency and with built in assumptions.

The thread response which should have been utterly sufficient was on page 1 by Burb Lulls: in Tome there are women besides Melinda that are extraordinarily strong, and there are weak characters that are men. There are more male damsels than female ones.

At that point, the only way to keep insisting on the initial point is to say you think on principle there shouldn't be agency-less women portrayed. As if there is a special entitlement there. It would have to be special, because powerless men show up, and no one has complained.

You might try to say, "Well, why is the only love interest a powerless female?" As for the "powerless" part, I can only imagine the reaction if they made the super wizardress the love interest. "What, so you make the most powerful figure in the game a woman, yeah, thanks, but in the end she just gets together with the player, and she's just a love object dressed up like a woman." There really is no way to win these arguments. (See again the reference to the initial response above which should have stopped this entire thread.)

As for the "female" part: this is, in the end, a role-playing game. You accept that you are a yeek necromancer, but if you're a man or woman who likes men, you really can't step into imagining that you like women? The game developer and the person who wrote the Melinda scene made their choices as to gender. Those choices are harmless, and, in the context of other strong female characters, can only cause offense or trouble to those who would be offended by anything. I could comment here that concepts like the damsel in distress form valuable cultural resources, not just as things to react against or reflect about, but also as ideas to play straight as it were. To unwrite the damsel in distress, for example, is to tell such women (who have and will continue to really exist) that this isn't a way of understanding their situation. That's a complicated deletion, like most proposed cultural deletions, and it needs better arguments than are found here. But I won't pursue that.

So anyway now DG has been petitioned to make changes, and has agreed to this for whatever reasons of his own--fear of being misjudged or a desire to be nice or whatever. And any efforts he makes will be taken directly out of developing actual gameplay. Negative-sum complaints about trivialities. So, thanks.

I said at the top that this thread is misplaced in that there is almost no place for this discussion here. The only exception would be if there were some real rather than manufactured issue. DG has a responsibility to not be affirmatively and actually sexist or racist. He has amply passed those tests and need make none of the suggested changes. Never was that commonest response to a forum suggestion more merited than here: "go code it yourself."

PS One of the most annoying verbal tics that happen in these discussions is to take a negative reaction to a point you made and suggest that means the person feels "threatened" by your point. Generally if someone argues against your point, or even if they mock you or heavens forfend say your point is stupid, it's pretty unlikely they feel threatened, as convenient for you as that would be to discount the merit, if any, in their reaction. They probably just think the point you made wasn't very good, or was mockable, or was stupid.

[Grey]

So anyway now DG has been petitioned to make changes, and has agreed to this for whatever reasons of his own--fear of being misjudged or a desire to be nice or whatever. And any efforts he makes will be taken directly out of developing actual gameplay.

I haven't seen him actually agree to change anything. But it's up to him how he chooses to spend his time, based on a multitude of requests. I'm sure he's grown up enough himself to prioritise as he likes and filter out the irrelevant.

Note that the whole romance subplot was put in by DarkGod, with whatever diversion from gameplay coding that required. Same with female beards and red-haired ladies. There are various aesthetic items, serious or not, that merit a bit of polish.

[elboyo]

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... sAreNotBad

This game is not oppressing women by making use of a common trope. If all of the female characters in the game totally helpless victims, then this might warrant changing.

This is not the case. The player (arguably the most powerful entity in the game) can choose male or female. There are capable female NPCs. The helpless escorts are randomly sexed. This argument was already covered on the first page.

I have great respect for the Tropes vs. Women series, but this game is not a flagrant offender by any means. The only really powerful reason to complain about the Melinda quest line, as it is written, is that it is written poorly. I can't speak for the rest of you, but I don't play this game for the plot; I play it for the extraordinarily compelling game mechanics.

That's all I have to say, please don't reply to me and expect a response.

[spottedshroom]

The thread response which should have been utterly sufficient was on page 1 by Burb Lulls: in Tome there are women besides Melinda that are extraordinarily strong, and there are weak characters that are men. There are more male damsels than female ones.

At that point, the only way to keep insisting on the initial point is to say you think on principle there shouldn't be agency-less women portrayed. As if there is a special entitlement there. It would have to be special, because powerless men show up, and no one has complained.

Just because there are non-problematic characters doesn't mean that problematic ones are okay. And what makes Melinda problematic isn't purely that she lacks agency, it's that she gets a lot of character development, and it's almost all stereotypical and negative.

"What, so you make the most powerful figure in the game a woman, yeah, thanks, but in the end she just gets together with the player, and she's just a love object dressed up like a woman." There really is no way to win these arguments.

Not true. Plenty of games do romance options that are nearly universally acclaimed. See for example many of Bioware's offerings.

I could comment here that concepts like the damsel in distress form valuable cultural resources, not just as things to react against or reflect about, but also as ideas to play straight as it were.

Okay, I'll bite. What does the one-note damsel in distress trope add to our cultural richness?

So anyway now DG has been petitioned to make changes, and has agreed to this for whatever reasons of his own--fear of being misjudged or a desire to be nice or whatever. And any efforts he makes will be taken directly out of developing actual gameplay. Negative-sum complaints about trivialities. So, thanks.

The name of this forum is "ideas." People post ideas here, and if the developers like them, they may implement them. Sounds like it's working as intended.

Never was that commonest response to a forum suggestion more merited than here: "go code it yourself."

I'd be happy to do just that, but only if I were given encouragement that the eventual patch would be accepted upstream. I wouldn't want to make just an add-on, though, since I feel like the changes would improve the quality of the game for everyone.

[Effigy]

Bah, someone linked TVTropes. There goes my evening, again...

[0player]

The initial point was that the Melinda scene is sexist, insofar as she's a weak trophy trope with no agency and with built in assumptions.

Nah, actually the initial point was that her character is very bland and only defined by this trope.

"What, so you make the most powerful figure in the game a woman, yeah, thanks, but in the end she just gets together with the player, and she's just a love object dressed up like a woman."

We actually have super powerful women getting it on with some -- *gasp* -- men. No one has complained yet.

PS One of the most annoying verbal tics that happen in these discussions is to take a negative reaction to a point you made and suggest that means the person feels "threatened" by your point. Generally if someone argues against your point, or even if they mock you or heavens forfend say your point is stupid, it's pretty unlikely they feel threatened, as convenient for you as that would be to discount the merit, if any, in their reaction. They probably just think the point you made wasn't very good, or was mockable, or was stupid.

It's not so much about the disagreement, as it is about unwarranted responses, again. And if you have the heart to mock people's desire to be properly represented, there's something to be said for you.

So anyway now DG has been petitioned to make changes, and has agreed to this for whatever reasons of his own--fear of being misjudged or a desire to be nice or whatever. And any efforts he makes will be taken directly out of developing actual gameplay. Negative-sum complaints about trivialities. So, thanks.

You clearly have little idea how game development in principle, and ToME development in particular, works.
(Why am I educating strangers on the internet.)
Skipping the phrase "making actual gameplay", which I think makes no sense, there's a lot of people working on ToME right now, generally solving tasks much more prolonged and complex than adding a handful of chat options. Some technical tasks undergoing development have taken months until now and will take months more.
Right now we're in beta time, which basically means we spend time fixing bugs. (DG also spends time on arcane OpenGL sorcery.) It seriously can be afforded to make a single character in the game a bit more interested and fleshed out. After all, we did afford to make female beards, sprite flips, and artifacts showing up on the player doll -- none of that are "actual gameplay".
If all your arguments amount to "it's useless because I don't feel the need, and you're a terrible person for bringing this up", then it's not even about feeling threatened or whatnot, it's about being arrogant. Which the tone of your speech only supports. And you're the one talking about entitlement in the very same post in which you tell devs how to spend their time? Seriously?
Don't make wild assumptions about devs' schedule and especially their motives. Unlike you, they can understand the concerns that were brought up in this thread without the amounts of straw you need for it.

I could comment here that concepts like the damsel in distress form valuable cultural resources, not just as things to react against or reflect about, but also as ideas to play straight as it were. To unwrite the damsel in distress, for example, is to tell such women (who have and will continue to really exist) that this isn't a way of understanding their situation. That's a complicated deletion, like most proposed cultural deletions, and it needs better arguments than are found here. But I won't pursue that.

Psht yes, because damsels in distress are clearly under-represented in popular culture and we're completely out of luck to find a representation of a powerless, lovin gwoman anywhere. Right. I can see why you won't pursue that.

I appreciate that most everyone has remained pretty reasonable during this thread. Still, I find topics like this very misguided and misplaced--the latter word being more on point, since there is almost no place for this discussion here.

Well, thank you for contributing to the opposite.

I haven't seen him actually agree to change anything. But it's up to him how he chooses to spend his time, based on a multitude of requests. I'm sure he's grown up enough himself to prioritise as he likes and filter out the irrelevant.

Note that the whole romance subplot was put in by DarkGod, with whatever diversion from gameplay coding that required. Same with female beards and red-haired ladies. There are various aesthetic items, serious or not, that merit a bit of polish.

Thanks Grey. (It was on IRC, there was much discussion to be had around this thread -- not the sort that's going on here. I'm not spoiling anything here, though!)

[Stuntofthelitter]

Is there anything left to discuss here? Or anything that someone feels hasn't been properly discussed? At this point if there isn't then I'd personally rather lock it and let it move on.

[elboyo]

Bah, someone linked TVTropes. There goes my evening, again...

You're welcome.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... inYourLife

[Mankeli]

The initial point was that the Melinda scene is sexist, insofar as she's a weak trophy trope with no agency and with built in assumptions.

Nah, actually the initial point was that her character is very bland and only defined by this trope.

This is page seven of the dicussion and you still don't acknowledge the implication of sexism that is first mentioned on the very title of this thread? You know, tropes versus women? I suggest that you actually familiarize yourself with some of Anita Sarkeesian's work -not because I'd think that her work is a very accurate description of what is going on on video games in general but because of learning from where the discussion originally originated from.

At that point, the only way to keep insisting on the initial point is to say you think on principle there shouldn't be agency-less women portrayed. As if there is a special entitlement there. It would have to be special, because powerless men show up, and no one has complained.

As for the "female" part: this is, in the end, a role-playing game. You accept that you are a yeek necromancer, but if you're a man or woman who likes men, you really can't step into imagining that you like women? The game developer and the person who wrote the Melinda scene made their choices as to gender. Those choices are harmless, and, in the context of other strong female characters, can only cause offense or trouble to those who would be offended by anything. I could comment here that concepts like the damsel in distress form valuable cultural resources, not just as things to react against or reflect about, but also as ideas to play straight as it were. To unwrite the damsel in distress, for example, is to tell such women (who have and will continue to really exist) that this isn't a way of understanding their situation. That's a complicated deletion, like most proposed cultural deletions, and it needs better arguments than are found here. But I won't pursue that.

Yuo might be interested in this video.The woman on the video is Liana Kerzner, a feminist videogame enthusiast who has, apparently, been writing about women in videogames before anybody even knew who Anita Sarkeesian was.

Anyways, at this point of the video, she makes a point about how the removal of tropish female characters, under some circumstances, actually reduces the plurality of the way women are represented on videogames. It's pretty interesting and maybe the point you were getting at too. Later on the video, she also talks about the real life counterparts of women videogame characters, touching on the same subject you did.

(This video is also pretty heartbreaking in the sense that a person who shares a lot of the views about the mispresentation of women in videogames can actually be a victim of harassment coming from other feminists simply because this person doesn't agree to EVERYTHING Sarkeesian has said but this is OT)

Is there anything left to discuss here? Or anything that someone feels hasn't been properly discussed? At this point if there isn't then I'd personally rather lock it and let it move on.

It seems that we can't even agree on what this thread is a about so I ask that you do close the thread. Also the thread has gotten uglier lately. Someone else can disagree though but this is my opion. Thanks in advance.

[0player]

This is page seven of the dicussion and you still don't acknowledge the implication of sexism that is first mentioned on the very title of this thread? You know, tropes versus women? I suggest that you actually familiarize yourself with some of Anita Sarkeesian's work -not because I'd think that her work is a very accurate description of what is going on on video games in general but because of learning from where the discussion originally originated from.

I take pity upon those who read the title without reading the post. It was a reference. For laughs. That had no relations to the body of the post. And don't worry, I got it.
This not the war you fight, seriously, move on. Last thing we need here is Anita drama.

Anyways, at this point of the video, she makes a point about how the removal of tropish female characters, under some circumstances, actually reduces the plurality of the way women are represented on videogames. It's pretty interesting and maybe the point you were getting at too. Later on the video, she also talks about the real life counterparts of women videogame characters, touching on the same subject you did.

Yeaaaha, you're really just replying to the topic name, aren't you? No one had argued about removal of Melinda or the trope. The complaint was about her ending her story beyond it. It's okay to be tropish; it's questionable to be the embodiment of one very-represented trope.

Also, about feeling threatened, you debunk people for saying that but readily assign DarkGod's decision to the fear of being misjudged. How non-hypocritical of you, really.
Despite what you say, the argument has been settled, and it's people like you who come back and say that it's "impossible to win" and that people will be "upset with more". You know, ye olde goode slippery slope, with marrying goats and stuff.