These stories, among many others, did their best to engage me with gameplay, emotion, art style and soundtrack, but one part of these games I will never forget are the characters used to enrich all of these aspects. It was one of the most subtly breathtaking games I've ever played, and still has me apathetically holding my breath for The Last Guardian.Īs a writer, man, human being, art enthusiast and, most importantly, gamer, I love these titles for so many reasons I could never hope to express with a few paragraphs. Throughout the game the lines blur between right and wrong and the focus shifts more toward what a person will do to bring back the ones they love- basically, this game is melancholy incarnate. After each victory, Wander becomes more battle worn and dark, eventually succumbing to what appears to be a demonic possession.
In order to resurrect this person, he must defeat 16 colossi that guard part of the land. The game's protagonist, Wander, is a mysterious warrior we know nothing about other than his quest to save a deceased woman he brings to a forbidden land. Three years later, Shadow of the Colossus came to take all of those lessons on heroism and good guy overcoming the bad guy and turned them upside down. It's a childish title with cliche after cliche, I knew that even back then, but it keeps my eyes glued to the screen for hours at a time with overdramatic proclamations and over-the-top combat to back it up. evil with elements of bravery and the importance of friendship, and 12-year-old me couldn't ask for a better game. Throw in a handful of Disney and Final Fantasy characters, an upbeat and incredibly atmospheric soundtrack and the age old story of good vs. The former has a young boy(about my age at the time) named Sora fighting to rescue two childhood friends from the grips of the darkness, a force that looks to consume all that is good. Move down my gaming timeline several years and I come into contact with two games that I still consider to be some my most influential interactive experiences: Kingdom Hearts and Shadow of the Colossus. At a young age I fell in love with Secret of Mana and the story of a boy from Potos village who had to kill his pet dragon to save the world, a task that also erased one of his best friends from existence. But that's just what I like, and quite frankly, it's what I've almost solely been exposed to for the majority of my life- playing games or not. While I can't answer that question for any of you, I can without a doubt say that a strong male character will always pique my interest the most. Who draws us in the most and grabs our attention? Who best gets our blood pumpin' and our tears flowin' and gets us ready to fight that final boss and watch a sad tale, long journey or hard-fought battle come to a joyous close? But this article isn't about the under representation of women in gaming- it's about who makes the better character. The few that come to mind immediately are Bayonetta, Zero from Drakengard 3, Lara Croft and Samus, which I think more than a few of us all mistook for being a guy until one of our friends said "Actually, that's a chick kicking all that alien ass, man!" It's a sad truth, but many of gaming's greatest heroes have a penis. It would take me quite a while to come up with that many female leads. And in many of those situations there is a woman that needs rescuing or protected. Just off the top of my head I could say Kratos, Jak and Daxter, Cloud, Mario, Marcus Phoenix, Dante, Mega Man, Wander etc.
One huge negative to this male-oriented world is the overabundance of male protagonists that fill the role of main "good guy," the person the spotlight is almost always on and, more importantly, the character that players will spend a vast majority of their time controlling. Men don't have to worry about discrimination based on their sex, they're never sexually harassed online by the opposite gender because of the way their voice sounds and the validity of their "gaming cred" is never on the line because of the chromosomes that make them who they are. There's been much discussion across the internet recently about male privilege in video games.
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