While the rest of us are discussing Olgatha the Argonian's cup size, "Gamers with Jobs" are earnestly exploring the Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion gender bias issues currently riling the feminist gamer blogosphere. The controversy seems to stem from two perceived slights that indicate the developers are (in the words of one critic) "blinded by male privilige":
- Oblivion’s character creation system assigns certain bonuses based on gender, which vary from one race to the next. The Prima Strategy Guide notes: “Sadly, only three races offer females with power design advantages…In all other cases, to maximize a given race choice for its best-suited character role, pick the male. Where the stats differ between these sexes, the male gets the better benefit from the difference.”
- All the illustrations for classes and races in the manual are male.
Bethesda's Pete Hines tries to explain it away as offering choice to the gamer, but the ladies aren't buying it. Unsatisfied wiith the mere omission of inflated breasts and dead prostitutes, they want a game where the lizard women can bench press as much as the men:
Though Hines is correct, the majority of the variations, when present, still tend to occur along lines that could be interpreted as following gender stereotypes: a review of the stats reveals that in races where there is a difference, male characters are always stronger and almost always have greater endurance, whereas female characters are always more intelligent, and almost always have greater willpower and personality.
Ah, stereotypes—those useful mental short cuts we all use to make sense of our wacky world. Stereotypes explain why, while none of the girls in my office can beat me at arm wrestling, most can spell Oprah's first name. A few years ago, "Math is hard" Barbie was blasted by critics for turning young girls off to calculus. Will Oblivion teach those same girls that men are dull-witted sword jocks who would rather whack you with a battle axe than engage in stimulating conversation? Furthermore, is the Gay/Lesbian/Bi/Transgendered community too busy counting theirs successes with World of Warcraft to notice that cross-dressing Orcs have been completely left out of this game?
When it comes to political correctness, the PC version of Oblivion is, naturally, a little more PC. There's already an affirmative action mod that equalizes racial attributes for a single gender, accomplishing with a few lines of code what do-gooding social engineers and and burning bras have failed to do in the real world. How long before every aggrieved victim group has it's own special mod? And does Microsoft, as the beacon of progressive corporatism, have a duty to make this stuff available (for 200 MS points of course) on XBLM?
Of course, just when you thought old-fashioned male privilige was on the defensive, Chuck Norris returns to save the day.
[Thanks SickNic]
Share
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
4-08-2006 @ 11:35AM
Daniel D said...
F*&K that PC BULL SHIT the fact is you put a sword in a mans hand and he will kick ass a woman can barely lift the thing let alone put it into someone. Why do you think they never used women for fighting or put them on the frontline because they lack things like testosterone
also women on average are physically weaker than men. Thats not me being sexist its a fact, they lungs are 33% smaller on average and heart they just cant compete on a physical level. Now apply all of these facts to real life and the stats are just about right.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 12:37PM
SickNic said...
Daniel D,
I was in the millitary for several years, and I can tell you, the reason the women aren't allowed in the infantry is not because they are weaker, it is because it would cause sexual tensions between the soldiers, which would get inthe way of missions. Some of the women in the millitary could do much better in their physical fitness tests than some of the men... Not all of the men, but there are some strong women in the millitary.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 2:08PM
CrAzY American12 said...
I tell these feminist rights people to take a hike. Who gives a shit that a video game shows a slite stereotype.
You freakin people never give it a rest. Just stop talking as no one wants to hear from you. Majority of gamers are male.
No one is going to change their game becuase your an idoit and Joe Paterno isn't going to resign from Penn State.
All women activists want is attention.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 2:34PM
Plutoxin said...
Odd, I saw the title and assumed it was regarding all the PC fanboys on the Elder Scrolls forums complaining about Oblivion being to console-ish, ie 'not pc enough.' ;)
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 5:50PM
ozzzy said...
This is kind of interesting, seeing as I never RTFM I didn't realize that women had different stats than men in Oblivion.
Neither of the articles referenced by this post call for a ban of Oblivion. They are just op ed pieces questioning a few aspects of character stats and manual pictures. So #1 please calm down. I'm sure that the developers weren't thinking about these issues during development.
#3's comment that the majority of gamers are male so therefore everything should be male-centric is out of touch with the business. Limiting your audience and disregarding the concerns of 51% of America's population is not good business sense. More women are playing games than ever before.
Before getting all pissed off, just remember that these are op ed pieces written by two people. Neither of which are calling for Bethesda's head. In the end, the market will win out whether in the form of mods or game designs.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 6:46PM
Donutta said...
I, too, never RTFM, so I had no idea this was the case too. For the record, I'm playing as a female Dark Elf and I've never had any problems kicking ass.
Really, does it matter all that much?
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 7:01PM
Lone Starr said...
Sicknik, the fact remains, if you took a distribution of males and females and looked at their physical strength, statistically men would be stronger.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 7:21PM
CrAzY American12 said...
ozzy
You talk about me being "out of touch with the business", yet I'm pretty sure this "otrosity" hasn't stoped any games from selling. This has nothing to do with business.
It has to do with people who want their organization to get attention through creating conflict and controversy.
It has apparently worked.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 7:27PM
Geof said...
I'm going to say that I agree with CrAzY American on this one.
People using racism and gender as an excuse for what they do or why something is wrong are really getting old.
Like the congresswomen who attacked a cop. It was because she's black.
(CrAzY American already said this one) A women orginization asking for Joe Pa's resignition for a comment that could barely be misconstrued that way they did.
President Bush's lack of help for Hurricane Katrina because it is primarily a black community.
And now women are targeting video games?
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 10:57PM
ozzzy said...
Well maybe you should focus on one situation at a time. This blog is merely speaking about two writers who made observations. Whereas Rep. McKinney, Katrina, and Penn State are all separate all involve separate groups.
This has everything to do with business. Why sell 1,000,000 units when you can sell 1,500,000 units. Oblivion and other mainstream games are not directed at a niche market.
Apparently someone out there wants these stats to be similar otherwise articles would not have been written, nor would a stat changing mod have been created. I'm making the point that just because you may not perceive this as an issue, others do. In the end the market rules. In 10 years games will cater more towards women because that's where there are more potential customers. Bethesda would change the manual and stats in a second if they knew it could generate more sales.
Reply
4-08-2006 @ 11:47PM
Your moms said...
"People using racism and gender as an excuse for what they do or why something is wrong are really getting old."
People acting like these things don't matter is getting old.
This is a video game, so all the research about lung-size and strength-averages could have been thrown out the window, ignored, and every character could have reached the same level of skill/etc., but now, as they have it, female and male gamers could find that their character might be weaker at later stages if they opt for a female persona in the game of Oblivion. Which leads to a general message being sent to players of Oblivion, conscious or not, that 'females are weaker.' It's a message that gets sent out all the time in media, movies and video games, and young impressionable girls (and boys) can often get the impression that it carries over beyond 'picking a character in a video game.'
I say "It's a f#ckin' game, so even-up the virtual playfield" and remove limits that you guys seem soooo sure are true in real life. The averages you talk about also hold the possibility that you might be one of the weak, chubby video-game playing males in real life that could get beat up by the average woman. I mean, this must be quite a connundrum for a certain subset of players of Oblivion: "These are teh 0nly titzez I get to see, OMG, but I might need the additional strength for my quest, OMG wut to do... Maybe I can put that topless-hax on my male-orc!"
The constant messages of racism, inconsideration, and sexism eventually build-up like so much crap in an air filter, and it does affect perception - some of the comments here are a good example.
I'm trying to say every little bit of bullsh*t can affect your outlook. If tiny things all around you tell you women are weaker, you end up thinking that and immediately assuming it's true, instead of being more open-minded in case-to-case scenarios.
Ah, whatever, you're gonna think what you want, but try to understand why this matters to some people, instead of calling everybody 'teh suxors' or acting like there's some 'agenda' if you disagree.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 12:03AM
Snap said...
Sounds like this is a feminist fan....girl site, not a 360fanboy site.
this wouldn't help sell 500,000 units, so basically, it has nothing to do with the market.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 1:55AM
Justin said...
"male characters are always stronger and almost always have greater endurance, whereas female characters are always more intelligent, and almost always have greater willpower and personality."
Indeed, they just described the world at large. Most stereotypes today come from truths. While they may not apply in any or all situations, they did indeed come from some truths. The statement above is one I find true, though of course not universal, as a male. In fact I run into this daily with my girl - I'm always the one doing the "heavy lifting" and she's always the one who makes sure my grammar is correct. I'm the one lifting weights while she plays Sudoku and does the NY Times crossword.
I had a boss who is Jewish. He's one of the cheapest, untrustworthy people I've met in my entire life. But I have two Jewish friends who detest any Jewish folk that fill out their stereotype.
I also had a Hispanic boss. He engineered the theft of 20 PCs from our stockroom. But I also had a Hispanic friend in high school who, despite being one of the most normal people you could ever meet, won every science fair he ever participated in and is on his way to working in genetics.
I have one female friend who can't protect herself, physically or emotionally, to save her life. I also have another that, if she gets into a physical fight, and does, always wins.
So yeah, there are stereotypes. There always will be, because for whatever reason there are certain attributes that certain races share. Cultural, environmental, whatever. I'm not saying that stereotypes are "acceptable" - I AM saying that I've never known anyone that, say, didn't know someone that fit their stereotype to a T. Stereotypes exists and no matter what any group does to get rid of them, it's really no use.
That being said, there's zero reason why Bethesda should have made the males "better" than the females. All the attributes should have been equally available to both genders in some form or another - there's zero reason for them not to be. It's a fantasy game in a fantasy world. They did screw up, and I really hope that the coming patch fixes this issue.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 2:49AM
Kill Fat People said...
Wait, when did games become politically correct? GTA, Duke Nukem, God of War, I could go on all day. I guess when you can see the inferriority of female characters through discrete numbers it becomes 'objectification'.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 11:11AM
Dies said...
I don't think that developers did it specially. But this f*cking feminism is killing me
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 11:51AM
B. Gates said...
SicNic said
"I was in the millitary for several years, and I can tell you, the reason the women aren't allowed in the infantry is not because they are weaker, it is because it would cause sexual tensions between the soldiers, which would get inthe way of missions. Some of the women in the millitary could do much better in their physical fitness tests than some of the men... Not all of the men, but there are some strong women in the millitary."
Okay , SicNic you were in the military for several years. The history of military organizations goes back thousands of years . being in the modern military for a few years does not make you an expert on why women were not generally handed swords in the dark ages or in Troy or in Sparta or wherever.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 12:59PM
Lake Desire said...
"also women on average are physically weaker than men. Thats not me being sexist its a fact, they lungs are 33% smaller on average and heart they just cant compete on a physical level. Now apply all of these facts to real life and the stats are just about right."
There is a sex that is essentially weaker than the other, however the sports we cherish are ones men excel at are valued more than ones women excel at such as distance running or swimming.
"You freakin people never give it a rest. Just stop talking as no one wants to hear from you. Majority of gamers are male. "
According to ESA, 43% of gamers are female. That is not a small minority.
http://www.theesa.com/facts/gamer_data.php
ozzzy, thank you for actually taking the time to read the original blog posts about Oblivion.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 8:58PM
xCrayolaKranz said...
Ok if I understand this right you people are complaining because a MADE-UP races female character is weaker than the male MADE-UP character. Key word here is MADE-UP.
There had to be some women on the Bethesda staff and they obviously had no problem with the game. People really need to step back and think sometimes at what they are being offended by. There are games that don't even offer female characters how about you complain about them? Thought so.
Reply
4-09-2006 @ 11:21PM
SickNic said...
Im not complaining at all. I just thought it was an interesting read. Of course i know scientifically and on average, males as a gender are stronger than women. I don't see a problem with making male characters stronger in games. It's not like any guys were complaining that all the males have no personallity and little inteligence...
Reply
4-10-2006 @ 12:37PM
Dizz said...
"Im not complaining at all. I just thought it was an interesting read. Of course i know scientifically and on average, males as a gender are stronger than women. I don't see a problem with making male characters stronger in games. It's not like any guys were complaining that all the males have no personallity and little inteligence"
Could not have said it better myself, maybe thats because men just dont care either.
Reply