I think this is a very important distinction. It is true that most gender-locked games are designed for male PCs, but majority of these games are action based video games and the like. And as there are plenty of people who would prefer to play as female characters in action games, there are also plenty of people who would prefer to play as male characters in romance-focused games, which, on the contrary, tend to be gender-locked to female PCs. This is one of the reasons why I dislike any kind of gender-locking: there will always be people who wonāt be able to play the type of games they like simply because their tastes in games differ from the majority of people (or at least from the assumption of what types of games people of different genders prefer to play).
Itās hard when you prefer something that usually isnāt targeted to you, so avoiding gender-locking games as much as possible will make most of the people happy. Personally, I would rather play a game that felt somewhat unrealistic with a certain gender, than not play this game at all because it ended up being gender-locked for that reason. If an author wants to tell a story of a person who specifically expresses themselves in a traditionally masculine or traditionally feminine way, that also doesnāt mean the game should be gender-locked, since there are people who donāt conform to the norm and could still be included in such a game. In the end of the day, if an author wants to tell a story for a specific gender, thatās completely fine, and no one should dictate how they must write their story. But since weāre talking about interactive fiction games that will be played by a lot of unique and diverse individuals, many of whom would like to self-insert, I believe itās worth thinking outside the box and considering including as many people as possible.
Yes and no. As a straight cisgender man, if you want to play a romance or slice of life game, you just have to look through the overwhelming amount of japanese dating sims that have been made throughout the years. Heck, even Rune Factory and Harvest Moon (both farming sims) originally had only a male protagonist you could play as.
(Though to be perfectly fair, the male protagonists of dating sims have just as many problems as the female protagonists of otome games, though not always for the same reasons.)
For queer or trans men, though? I absolutely agree.
But yeah, just in general, there does need to be more of a variety for everyone. More action-oriented games for women, more chill games for men, and then more of everything for BIPOC and queer people.
I donāt care if the protagonist is gender locked, if anything the most important aspect of a protagonist to me is their likeability and how much I can stomach their pre-established personality. (if the author decides you that you cannot really influence that part of the MC) It probably helps that I do not self insert in any ifs and for the ones that let you create a MC I just choose with what I think is the most interesting way to play but first and foremost I have to like the character if they are pre-established no matter their gender. That usually tends to be the biggest deal breaker for me, if the author takes away my autonomy on how I want to play the MC and railroads me into something I have 0 interest in playing along with, gender locked MC is the least of my issues in that case. But for a general rule I do tend to enjoy IFs more if they let you create a MC, they tend to give you more leeway in what kind of character you want to play.
Iāve always thought that majority of āromanceā games for straight men are more of erotic games, while romance games for straight women contain much more actual romantic parts of relationship. But I donāt know for sure, that was my impression.
Personally, Iām only interested in gay romance, so I had my fair share of struggles finding romance games that allowed me to play as a man and romance other men. So yeah, the vast majority of games are not targeted at all men, but specifically at white cis heterosexual men.
As a cis male, it can be challenging for me to envision my character as a female, but as long as the story is engaging, it doesnāt bother me too much what the MCās gender is.
Admittedly, Iām not an expert in male-centric datings sims either, so itās hard to say specifically what the ratio of erotic games vs. romance games is. Though just glancing over at the whole genre, it does seem like white cishet men do still get a good variety in that category.
Obviously, you could make the argument that the way women are portrayed in menās romance games is still very sexualized, and so it toes the line between romance and erotica even in most cases, but itās hard to say if itās because game developers think that men canāt possibly be interested in romance unless it includes some fanservice and sexy scenes, or if itās due to how women seem to be inherently sexualized to varying degrees in all media. Itās probably a bit of both, really.
And as a counter-argument to that, you could just as easily look at how men are sexualized and fetishized as objects of desire in otome games.
(Though it did still always feel more predatory to me when women were the sources of fanservice then when men were the sources of fanserviceā¦ hard to say if thatās because as a woman myself, I just inherently feel more targeted by it or not.)
Either way, sexualization does seem to be the name of the game even in romance games to an extent? Unless the games are targeting a younger audience. But Iād have to play a lot more dating sims, otome games and just general slice-of-life games to get a whole feel for the ratio of erotic to romantic games and say anything for sure, and man, do I not have the patience nor the time for that, even in the interest of scientific research.
If we really wanna get into the nitty gritty sociological reasons, my best guess is that itās probably the leftover dregs of sexist bias aimed at both men and women that you can see all throughout history.
Aka. The idea that women are frivolous and interested in nothing but romance, and that āreal menā are interested in everything but romance. Which possibly links back to the idea that itās a womanās job to take responsibility for anything relationship-related between her and her man, even beyond any reasonable measure, and that a man who shows too much emotion (that isnāt anger) is considered āweakā, even in cases where thereād be no reason to be ashamed of said emotion.
And if we really really wanna get far-fetched and dystopian with this, you could say that even with all the advances in gender equality made up until today, those leftover dregs of inherent sexist bias still trap those two genders into those preconceived roles for them, all the while implicitly teaching them whatās wrong and right for them to do or feel just based on their gender identity; aka. women get only girly romance games because according to society, thatās all women should be interested in, and men get everything but romance games because oh man, we canāt teach men to be too soft and emotional, now can we?
But this is just pure theoretical speculation, and itās probably a conversation best saved for another thread altogether.
I think its a lot about how its portrayed, when ever i see men sexualised like that its shown that theyre actively enjoying it and even seem a touch predatory in the moment
This single paragraph explains my feelings to the T. For a majority of video game history, for those us who arenāt men or masculine aligned, we had to play as men. Times are changing and we should have more variety. If I couldnāt play mass effect as a fem shep, I would have never touched the series.
Hell, Persona is one of my favorite games series but since we canāt play as the fem mc in the new remake, Iām passing on playing it. I donāt mind the male mc but I had a much more fun experience with her. Iām saving my money for P6, which Iām severely hoping has a female mc.
I mean, the game directorās response when asked why they didnāt add a female protagonist to Persona 5 was just, āItās not worth it. Weād have to cut content.ā And his reasoning for Persona 4 was āThe character is supposed to be from a big city, and a male lead role was more suited to that.ā
This conversation suddenly reminded me of a game series that put a big āSIKE!ā moment in one of their installments (danganronpa v3)
I still played it and had fun, but man the disappointment
I love the constant excuses Atlus makes, especially since Maya and P3 Fem mc are very popular with the Japanese and Overseas fandom. Atlus can and could make it work but doesnāt think a female audience is worth anything.
Apparently women donāt live in cities, fantasticā¦.
I remember that. And I remember him saying something like some of the motivations of the Persona protagonists wouldnāt be ārealisticā for a FeMC to have.
To this day, Iām still salty as fuck that Theodore is considered canon while apparently the P3 FeMC isnāt, and I was so genuinely happy to see her in Persona Q2 with the others. Give us more female protagonists, you dicks!
Though iirc I also heard that mmmaybe this specific director was moving on from Persona to go make another game? So itās possible P6 might be different from the previous games. Unless, of course, Iām misrememberingā¦
This is the bs excuses Iām talking about, you can date a doctor and your own high school home room teacher in P5??? They wanna talk about realism?
The only few game series I personally think make 100% sense being gender lock is Yakuza. I love those games and the director said the game is primarily for a male audience. Itās whatever to me. Thatās fine especially considering the culture surrounding the Yakuza. The writing of women in the games is horse crap though.
Hi, I hope this isnāt just repeating what others have said. I didnāt read through all the previous replies.
When Iām given a choice of gender, there is one that I default to, and itās the same deal when Iām given the option to select the gender of the LIs at the start. After Iāve played through a good part of the game, I will restart if something feels off. Thatās the part to be careful of, I think: making assumptions about how someone is going to behave based on selected gender OR writing with one gender in mind then adding another gender as an afterthought.
I have played and enjoyed all variations of gender-locked and gender-selectable games. For female, thereās the WIP Guenevere; for male, thereās Lordās of Aswick; for selectable, thereās the Fallen Hero series (probably because the personality and goals are defined by the author even though the gender isnāt). If locking the MC gender helps you define how others see them while giving them hidden depth, Iām onboard
Iām making a gender locked game myself but yeah, I get the backlash. I wouldnāt play a game if itās gender locked to male, cuz I wanna self insert. In the end itās you who gets to decide the story so it depends on your priorities. Do you want to appeal to a larger audience or do you prioritize something else?
