I always thought Peach drove slower in Mario Kart.

Traditional gender roles are constantly exemplified in the media, and video games are no exception. Gaming companies hyper sexualize female characters and portray women as hardly more than helpless or sexual objects.

Gamers play out these roles in a virtual realm. The personification of traditional gender roles only reinforces common female stereotypes. Video games need to stop portraying women as weak and frail because this actually impacts women in the real world.

Crytek, a German video game company, released the game Warface earlier last week. Controversy arose when lead producer Joshua Howard justified the sexualized female characters by saying it was what people wanted to see, according to Wired UK.

It’s disappointing that there’s the perception that gamers want to see female characters in this light, especially when looking at the age of the video game demographic. According to the Entertainment Software Association, 68 percent of gamers are over 18 years of age.

We should understand the impact that hyper-sexualizing videogame characters have on three dimensional women. According to a 2013 report by the Entertainment Software Association, 45 percent of gamers are female. With women in the slight minority of gamers, such portrayal can have real world consequences.

According to a study done by the Department of Communication at Stanford University, women who had avatars dressed up in scandalous outfits seemed more likely to objectify their own non-virtual bodies. Additionally, the women in these avatars were more accepting of rape myths, i.e. the victim had it coming. Obviously, this is a huge problem for our society and does not represent progress for women.

Portraying women as fundamentally weak in videogames started with the classics. In Super Mario Bros., Peach was created to be the damsel in distress. She wore her pink dress and was always kidnapped. Peach was seen as a prize to be won through competition and is hardly part of the male-dominated action. The recurring damsel in distress trope is also seen in Zelda, Starfox Adventures and Duke Nukem.

Feminist and media critic Anita Sarkeesian, created a series of videos that examine the cliché of the damsel in distress female characters over the history of video games. She said the role is just a plot device that disempowers female characters, because they are always the object, never the hero. Sarkeesian claims that the role serves to, “normalize extremely toxic, patronizing and paternalistic attitudes” in society.

If it’s not helpless, it’s sexual. In a screenshot taken from the game Warface, you see a female solider, which at first seems empowering; except for the fact her armor offers little protection to her chest, while the male armor is far more realistic. Warface is just a recent example of sexualized female characters in games. Many modern games such as World of Warcraft, Half Life, Tomb Raider, and Resident Evil all feature strong, yet overly provocative, female characters.

Gender inequality is alive and well, and it is reflected in the video game industry. Perceptions in the media will only reinforce the idea that women are less valued and merely objects. Game companies should evolve gender representation to be more equitable in the future, but until then it is important to be aware of the stereotypes because it does have an impact on how real women see themselves.

-Alyssa Reynolds is a senior communication major from Ferndale. She can be contacted at 335-2290 or by [email protected]. The opinions expressed in this Column are not necessarily those of the staff of The Daily Evergreen or those of Student Publications.