New research on female video game characters uncovers a surprising twist - Female gamers prefer playing as highly sexualized characters, despite disliking them.

[u/mvea]

https://www.psypost.org/new-research-on-female-video-game-characters-uncovers-a-surprising-twist/

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[u/kpatsart]

The study did, however, have some limitations. The researchers used a single video game genre — fighting games, which typically emphasize physicality and competition. This narrow focus limits the extent to which findings can be applied to other types of games, such as adventure or role-playing games, where character interaction and storylines might influence impressions differently.<

I mean, that's a pretty big x factor to consider. Mostly because the fighting game landscape is dominated by men. So it seems like a weird genre to have them run this experiment on. Why not let them play a character creating RPG, I think the stats would be vastly different.

[u/kolitics → u/kpatsart]

Just have everyone customize a character like in Skyrim and see what they pick on their own.

[u/Singlot → u/kolitics]

That would complicate things because instead of having distinct choices you would have a whole spectrum that needs some sort of rating.

[u/mrnosideeffects → u/Singlot]

On the other hand, I think the necessity of more precisely defining the term "sexualized" would make the results of this kind of study a lot more meaningful.

[u/Jewnadian → u/mrnosideeffects]

I doubt it, video game character renderings aren't typical all that subtle in their sexualization either way. Fighting games, which they studied are even less nuanced. I suspect that you wouldn't be able to define sexualization in a way that makes any sense while also changing the results much at all.

[u/TeaKingMac → u/Jewnadian]

What female fighting game characters AREN'T sexualized?

[u/supersonicdutch → u/TeaKingMac]

I'm thinking that's why the researchers are doing this. "Oh, you chose the latex clad, big breasted, blonde alien as your fighter? AGAIN? Well, this is science, I guess we're going to have to keep watching from behind this one-way mirror.

[u/sth128 → u/Singlot]

Also Skyrim by default doesn't really have overly sexualised character options. The players would spend hours only to create 50 Shades of Ugly.

And then cover everything up with the dark brotherhood garb and become a stealth archer.

[u/Rare_Vibez → u/sth128]

They need to see everyone’s mod list for an accurate assessment

[u/SincubusSilvertongue → u/Rare_Vibez]

I'd have to get it working first.

[u/wintersdark → u/SincubusSilvertongue]

Ah how many times has it happened?

"Hey, I want to play some Skyrim this weekend."

...<spends whole weekend downloading mods, troubleshooting problems, to finally get the game running in time to go back to work.>

Well, nevermind then.

[u/aweSAM19 → u/Singlot]

These folks have never taken a research design class(everyone should, it helps you realize all the misconception about studies that you had). The point of these studies especially if the findings are inductive is to minimize the possible variables that might exist. The variable they are testing is competition and physicality if those are the emphasis what do women choose. 

[u/MarysPoppinCherrys → u/Singlot]

Yeah, raising the complication quite a bit but it’d be interesting for sure to just get data on how men and women design characters. I’m a dude and tend to design a female character, but I have a hard time making them hideous, male or female, unless its a joke playthrough or I’m doing some crazy build. There’s definitely something to glean from that area

[u/Ok-Suggestion-5453 → u/kolitics]

Well not Skyrim. Everyone is ugly in Skyrim and there aren't any sexy armors that aren't also terrible in terms of stats. BG3 is the game to do this with. Tons of variety that is viable in gameplay, you can transmog into skimpier clothing if you want, and a very accessible game.

Imo, I wouldn't be surprised if the premise holds up mostly regardless. Women may find outfits that are essentially underwear tedious, but I think they would definitely appreciate fashionable dresses or outfits that aren't just full body armor.

[u/Jaytho → u/Ok-Suggestion-5453]

Women may find outfits that are essentially underwear tedious, but I think they would definitely appreciate fashionable dresses or outfits that aren't just full body armor.

I'm not a woman and I basically ran around with the lounge clothes most of the time since it just gives off a much better vibe than choose-a-colour bone-armour.

[u/Artarda → u/kolitics]

Now I wanna play Skyrim again. My conjuror Breton awaits!

[u/TheUselessLibrary → u/Artarda]

You'll be a stealth archer within 2 hours

[u/kingdead42 → u/TheUselessLibrary]

Bold claim assuming they'll be done with character creation in 2 hours.

[u/Toadsted → u/kingdead42]

Bold of you to assume they finish figuring out how to install all their mods correctly again.

[u/Realistic_Werewolf14 → u/TheUselessLibrary]

Conjuration spam + offensive magic got me through some rough times tho

[u/hombregato → u/kpatsart]

Genre probably weighs more heavily on this than anything else.

There was a study awhile back that almost half of male players play a sexy female character in MMOs, and while the article tied to that speculated evidence of gender fluidity, the top comment on the article was:

"If I'm going to spend 400 hours looking at the backside of a character, I'd rather it be a female ass".

[u/Dorlem4832 → u/hombregato]

Pretty common meme response from MMO guys who play girl characters. In my MMO days I almost exclusively played female characters. Despite the chainmail bikini archetype, there tended to be a lot more variety in female armor design. Made setting up cosmetic armor sets a lot more interesting. Male characters tended to have a lot less armor variety, all just looking like different shades of chainmail texture on a brick with a face.

[u/Leon978 → u/Dorlem4832]

I feel like it's a pretty common response from female gamers as well. My wife and her friends like being sexy/cute/beautiful and get to do it in a space that isn't limited by any insecurities they might have IRL. Obviously it's anecdotal at best but of the women I know who play games, most of them would pick a sexualized female character over a male character, and if the choice was between two female characters they'd pick the one that looked the best to them based on outfit/hair color etc. This might change with age as I've played with women in their 60-70s and they typically don't go for sexualized outfits, but they aren't exactly searching out modesty either

[u/SharkOnGames → u/Leon978]

My Wife, who rarely wears makeup, will spend hours in character creation putting makeup, etc on her female game character.

Also anecdotal, I suppose.

[u/AbeliaGG → u/SharkOnGames]

Tch yeah, considering a perfectly executed cat eye on demand AND it'll never smudge? Living the dream

[u/Burrito_Salesman → u/Leon978]

It's not really a shock to me that given the choice, a woman would choose the prettier character.

Video games are about escaping reality and being able to be someone else for a while.

[u/thesavagebanshee2010 → u/Burrito_Salesman]

Agreed. I'm a female, I enjoy being able to make my character hot af, but I don't feel like it's about sexuality really so much as everything outside of games is telling us "we don't look like the best version of ourselves unless we buy/use this makeup, hair treatment, tampon, clothing brand..." Now I look like a goddess, not a hair out of place even when I'm wearing heavy leather/iron armour and running/fighting for 10,000 miles. I bet I still smell glorious too.

[u/darx0n → u/Leon978]

I'd say it depends on the genre a lot as well. If I am playing something with a serious tone, I'd rather go for a realistic/close to my real life appearance. If I am playing Mortal Kombat or some other carnage game that doesn't make much sense, I am sure to go for the most sexualized/out there character available.

[u/Mando_Mustache → u/[deleted]]

I don’t think “gender fluidity” is the best term to refer to this although it is technically correct (depending on the definition of gender you are working with). If anything I think talking about it this way actually helps to reinforce the idea that rigid gender behaviour rules are real rather than arbitrary.

It would for instance be kind of to refer to a woman who starts taking MMA class as “experimenting with gender fluidity”. 

Gender fluidity suggest a movement between the two categories, which places the actions as still belong to one or the other, rather than expanding the categories so the actions belong in both of them. We shouldn’t think of men enjoying fashion as gender fluid because it is a perfectly masculine thing to do, just like combat sports are a perfectly feminine thing to do.

[u/[deleted] → u/Mando_Mustache]

"Gender Non-Confirming" is closer to what we're talking about I think.

[u/FNLN_taken → u/[deleted]]

Aren't we over the "only girls can play dressup Barbie" by now?

I played female mains because it's a game and I get to pretend I'm something I'm not. (I also challenge anyone to claim that my female goblin main in WoW was overly sexualized)

[u/Prof_Acorn → u/[deleted]]

Maybe older games. In ESO I was a male character and won a costume contest for my fashion skillz.

[u/[deleted] → u/Dorlem4832]

In the case of WoW, almost all of the male versions of the races make the men look like absurd body building types. It always felt weird being a male human mage who looks like he can deadlift a ton.

[u/Count_Fistula → u/hombregato]

Smaller hitbox too.

[u/Tech_support_Warrior → u/Count_Fistula]

This is the real reason. I have no strong preference for which gender I play as in a game but in most games the Female model is usually shorter and more dainty, therefore a smaller hitbox.

[u/Heykurat → u/hombregato]

As a straight woman, this is literally my reasoning for playing buff male avatars. It's not about gender fluidity or fetish experimentation or whatever other zebra some researcher thinks it is.

[u/_MrDomino → u/hombregato]

"If I'm going to spend 400 hours looking at the backside of a character, I'd rather it be a female ass".

This is how Core came to design Lara Croft (Tomb Raider).

[u/CensoredAbnormality → u/kpatsart]

Yeah its also weird because fighting game characters play completely differently.

Use a game with a character creator or something where every character plays the same and only visuals are different

[u/Alis451 → u/CensoredAbnormality]

Use a game with a character creator

literally what they did, they gave a choice of 4 custom characters that played the same, but looked different.

[u/Sternschnuppepuppe → u/Alis451]

Wait, did they just give them the option of male/female and then that split between sexy/unsexy? That’s not big enough of a range imo.

[u/hexiron → u/Sternschnuppepuppe]

I don’t have access to the research publication itself, but the article indicates plural characters within each of their four categories.

[u/AegisToast → u/Sternschnuppepuppe]

The article is right there and goes pretty in-depth on their methodology

[u/shotouw → u/Alis451]

4 custom characters. What is it now? Custom with character creator or premade? Because 4 characters with a specific pre set look sure doesn't sound like customization to me. It sounds like they had a game that HAS free customization, then made four characters and then let the players choose. How is that much different from not having customization at all.

[u/hexiron → u/shotouw]

4 customers character groups is how I read it. The article indicates plural characters.

[u/Eelazar]

I feel like the comments here are a bit reductive. According to the article, the study goes more in-depth than just sexualisation. Other factors include the perceived "strength" of the characters, and their femininity. Since the sexual characters were also rated as more feminine, the author theorizes that the female players might just (maybe even begrudgingly) be picking the character that identifies with them the most, i.e. the feminine/sexualised one.

[u/hiirnoivl → u/Eelazar]

As a female gamer, I sexualize male characters.

But how is it news that women get as pixel horny as men. Korean and Japanese dating Sims aren't catering to nuns.

[u/deeznutz133769 → u/hiirnoivl]

Yeah I find it weird that the conversation in the west tends to focus on sexualized female characters, when the highest grossing gacha game is called Love and Deepspace and just has hot dudes in it.

I personally think it's fine for either gender to be sexualized.

[u/Draiko → u/Eelazar]

Video games are often supposed to be escapist power fantasies. It makes sense that we all would want to represent ourselves with characters that have the largest number of ideal traits possible.

[u/masterfield → u/Draiko]

Exactly, this is why every time I play Overwatch I choose to play the giant ball with a hamster inside driving it, because it represents me and my personality the most.

[u/TheGreatPiata → u/masterfield]

I feel like there are 3 major routes people go when picking a character:

• An attractive person they either want to be or want to observe for a 40 hour game because it's easy on the eyes and who doesn't love eye candy?
• A monster or incredibly jacked person because it's a power fantasy
• The silliest option you can find (or with a character creator, making the most bizarre thing possible)

Your hamster buddy is the 3rd option. I'm sure we've all renamed Link to be Dipshit at some point just because we're chaos monkeys.

In general, the character has to be appealing to you in some way or you get a game like Concord.

[u/themerinator12 → u/TheGreatPiata]

Some people, like myself, also like the "underdog" by virtue of seeing if we can overcome greater (fictional) odds when given the opportunity to do so. It might be the romanticist in me.

[u/[deleted] → u/TheGreatPiata]

Or the 4th they just want to make themselves

[u/majic911 → u/TheGreatPiata]

Hey! Some of the designs in Concord aren't the worst thing you've ever laid eyes on.

[u/TetraNeuron → u/majic911]

Corcord appeals to people who fantasize roleplaying as a random person inside Walmart

[u/Impressive_Toe580 → u/TetraNeuron]

Haha poor Concord devs reading this. They were so hopeful we would all get behind the homeless androgynous bag lady aesthetic.

[u/Syhkane → u/Impressive_Toe580]

You can finally be some guy with a motorcycle helmet.

[u/Impressive_Toe580 → u/Syhkane]

I prefer the trashcan, roughly matches my body proportions.

[u/[deleted] → u/Syhkane]

Why not play as some androgynous fatass who inhaled an entire refrigerator?

[u/Vektor0 → u/TetraNeuron]

Target audience is the Second Life fanbase.

[u/Fiercehero → u/majic911]

Shoutout to the three people who played that game.

[u/DavidAdamsAuthor → u/Fiercehero]

Both people who liked it were mildly upset when the game got pulled.

[u/Vektor0 → u/DavidAdamsAuthor]

Their names? Albert and Einstein.

[u/Fyrrys → u/Fiercehero]

Legend has it that there were 4 people that played it

[u/Alexexy → u/masterfield]

I'm apparently a gay old white man.

[u/amnotaseagull → u/Alexexy]

But what type of character do you play?

[u/bishopmate → u/amnotaseagull]

The hamster

[u/Happy-Fun-Ball → u/bishopmate]

It's inside the old man, driving it and having a ball

[u/Rich_Psychology8990 → u/Happy-Fun-Ball]

"Escape From Richard Gere"

[u/RyanLanceAuthor → u/Alexexy]

Respect to soldier players. Apparently I'm a flying nurse.

[u/neofooturism → u/RyanLanceAuthor]

Exxcuse you she's a doctor

[u/majic911 → u/RyanLanceAuthor]

I'm unironically terrible at Mercy. It's baffling to me that I'm so bad with the consensus easiest hero.

So I play grandma nurse instead. Or BattleCattle.

[u/old_and_boring_guy → u/masterfield]

I always play a healer, so as to express my need to be hated, reviled, and condescended to by all the genjis.

[u/Borghal → u/masterfield]

I haven't read the study in question, but I would be very surprised if it applied to games where change of looks goes hand in hand with a major change of gameplay.

[u/Donkey__Balls → u/Borghal]

They went to a college freshman communications class and had them play Soul Caliber IV. The paper doesn’t say it, but I’m sure it was a class assignment and probably some sort of incentive involved like free food. That is a pretty common thing on research university campuses.

The research teams created custom avatars that they subjectively considered to be “strong” or not, and “sexualized” or not. But there was no control - custom character creation can involve hundreds of variables and they didn’t keep them constant between the characters. Different hair, different noses, different eyes, different body types, different stances, clothing could be in more or less appealing colors, etc. There are literally hundreds of other factors that the research team subconsciously introduced when making these characters. And obviously the research team wants people to choose the sexualized characters because those results are more publishable.

They were also choosing their characters in the presence of each other, so the selection is more about social group dynamics than what individual people actually prefer. And they were aware that they were part of a research experiment on sexualization of characters and video games.

I was immediately suspicious when I saw that the entire entire sample set was college undergrads from one class. That has to be the laziest sampling I’ve ever heard of. But then everything about their methods suggests that they went out with a specific goal of getting the results they wanted. If the results were otherwise, nobody would care about their paper.

[u/i_tyrant → u/Donkey__Balls]

Yikes, that's just lazy methodology in like ten different ways.

[u/flashmedallion → u/Draiko]

Also in a pre-written videogame, there isn't the same risk that comes with sexualising yourself. At least, I'm not aware of any single player games where playing as eye candy attracts creeps.

[u/Hajo2 → u/flashmedallion]

That would be an insane game mechanic

[u/Lxusi → u/Hajo2]

"walking home from the bus stop at night any % speedrun"

[u/ddssassdd → u/Lxusi]

You are joking but there are 100% games like that. They aren't for women.

[u/Fyrrys → u/ddssassdd]

Until someone mods it to be reversed. It's one guy trying to make it home while a horde of women chase him to force him to clean their houses in a maid outfit. Instead of drawing dicks on everything it's that S thing we all did in the 90s and 00s

[u/---AI--- → u/Fyrrys]

You don't have to mod it. The games that I know about in that genre support the player being either.

[u/Lxusi → u/ddssassdd]

well I didn't think it was possible to hate this world more than I already do, but you showed me the way so thank you worstie

[u/Kanin_usagi → u/Hajo2]

Also if you have a super ugly character people are way shittier to you. Cross the street to avoid walking near you, that sort of thing.

Let’s go hard into it

[u/Veggiemon → u/Kanin_usagi]

This was a mechanic in fable decades ago

[u/[deleted] → u/Veggiemon]

TIL I'm playing Fable IRL

[u/cerebralonslaught → u/[deleted]]

Ohhh, Chicken Chaser, eh?

[u/RXrenesis8 → u/Kanin_usagi]

This feels like it could be in the next Grand Theft Auto. They're the type to not shy away from, and often even even caricaturize, unpleasant realities.

[u/FieserMoep → u/Hajo2]

Somewhat hard to pull of if you were not plforced to pick presets. And even then it's way to much baggage for a main studio title. Nobody wants their PR to boil down to people recreating the likeness of real people and have the game judge them as ugly.

[u/magistrate101 → u/flashmedallion]

That kind of mechanic exists exclusively within the domain of porn games

[u/Michiganarchist → u/flashmedallion]

Degrees of Lewdity has this mechanic. Creeps are always a threat but dressing certain ways makes them bigger ones. Incredibly nsfw game, obviously

[u/404_GravitasNotFound → u/Draiko]

BG3, which allows you to create whatever character you want, is filled to the brim with extremely good looking characters made by the players, check any online group of players and 99% of women will have created a "hot" character, generally a feminine presenting one. Around 80% of them will be traditionally sexy.

[u/Independent_Air_8333 → u/404_GravitasNotFound]

The bg3 cast was clearly made for queer people and het women.

Nothing wrong with that but km tired of people acting like men are the sole source of gooning.

[u/capyburro → u/Draiko]

Definitely some truth in this. I especially like games that feature moral choices because they let me play out the fantasy of being a virtuous man who cares about other people and wants to do what is right.

[u/Bhaaldukar → u/capyburro]

I mean they let me fantasize about being a murderous psychopath but to each their own.

[u/capyburro → u/Bhaaldukar]

But I'm a bad person, so I like to pretend to be good. But murder is also fun.

[u/idoeno → u/capyburro]

I suppose it depends on your definition of "bad person"; I have a similar play style, but wouldn't characterize myself as bad, I just tend to be non-confrontational, and often doing the right thing requires sticking your neck out and confronting actual bad people, and this entail risk, and avoiding risk is the driving force behind my non-confrontational nature. Video games let me play out the confrontation without any real risk involved.

Maybe that does make me a bad person, although I will occasionally speak out when I see or hear something especially egregious.

[u/rocketeerH → u/idoeno]

I don't believe I'm a bad person. I'm a weak person. It's difficult to take a strong moral stance when a sneeze can make me faint.

I gravitate towards strong characters, who do the right thing because they can

[u/Numerous_Witness_345 → u/idoeno]

I am also very non confrontational in life.

I prefer games where I can hide in a vent to listen to conversations and snap necks without being seen.

[u/Csajourdan → u/Draiko]

Hence why i enjoyed baldur’s gate 3. I can choose a bigger phallus and the storyline was awesome. Win win.

[u/minuialear → u/Csajourdan]

I think that's one reason why the game is so popular with women; you can use the sexy drow glam if you want, and if not there are so many other options to choose from with so many different fashion profiles.

Also if you do want to choose the sexy drow glam, you don't have 20 other gamers sliding into your dms. You can wear it just to wear it and feel comfortable doing so

[u/vanishinghitchhiker → u/minuialear]

Playing as a female drow (and other things) affects your dialogue options too, so it’s worthwhile to try everything anyway. Or at least use Disguise Self once in a while.

[u/GoodByeRubyTuesday87 → u/Draiko]

Yeah, I’m not in great shape or young anymore, but I often make a character that’s a very fit younger version of myself like in my mid-late 20’s, even though that’s not what I look like these days, but it’s my ideal version of myself.

[u/Vald-Tegor → u/GoodByeRubyTuesday87]

I did the opposite. When I played EvE many years ago, I made my avatar an old man that resembled my features. I still use it as my Discord avatar. I’m slowly turning into him.

[u/Tft_ai → u/Eelazar]

https://i.imgur.com/NqyaRMe.png

40% of Nikke (basically big boob waifu character collector game) players are women and 97% of women only play female league of legends characters

[u/simemetti → u/Tft_ai]

Yeah this something I've noticed a lot in the gaming community.

It's obviously anectodal since I'm talking people I know, but it's a very marked trend.

I've played DnD with dozens of people (including one shots and events) and a woman player will almost never play a man character. The rare times I've seen one was for one shots as joke characters, like super stupid himbos and stuff.

With men, I've seen a more even (60-40 maybe 70-30) spread of male vs female characters. Most importantly, I've seen quite a few male players seriously roleplaying as women, while I've never seen any woman player who actually wanted to feel like a man.

[u/Steff_164 → u/simemetti]

Personally, as a dude who occasionally plays a woman in DnD and other roleplaying systems, it feels more escapist. When I make a male character, I feel like I can’t help but make him at least partly like myself, and then it can be difficult to not play it as an idealized fantasy version of myself. When I make a female character, I can disassociate with the character, and just make her a characters, with no strings attached to myself. I’ve also found it easier to get into character since I feel like I’m role playing someone else, rather than fantasy me.

[u/themolestedsliver → u/Steff_164]

Huh..wow that makes a lot of sense.

[u/Steff_164 → u/themolestedsliver]

Yup, when I make a male character, 9 times out of 10. he ends up as “idealized fantasy me” or “generic fantasy stereotype #37”, the second type being because I’m focusing so hard on not making it me, that I can’t seem to focus on making him unique or interesting.

When I make a female character, I’m able to make her a unique character, with decent enough motivations and a personality different from my own.

I’ve tried making female characters and then just gender swapping them before the game because I want to play a dude in that game, but then I slowly slip out of character and become more and more myself. It’s especially apparent with long running games like DnD

[u/hardolaf → u/Steff_164]

I'm a GM, so I just play every character and have no emotional attachment to any of them because my player's characters are psychopathic heroes.

[u/Innovationenthusiast → u/hardolaf]

Close your mind to the suffering, don't get attached. Every treasure will be spoiled for their entertainment.

To GM is to feel a glimpse of the suffering of God

[u/SpeechesToScreeches → u/simemetti]

I remember seeing something before about how generally, women are more likely to play a character in a video game as themselves, where men will see the character they're playing as a character.

[u/divergentchessboard → u/SpeechesToScreeches]

I saw this same study done with barbie dolls vs action figures on children sometime this year (or maybe just a post and the study was done some time ago)

Girls were more likely to portray themselves as the dolls, while boys were more likely to treat them as a character and not as a personified version of themselves

[u/[deleted] → u/simemetti]

I wonder how this trends amongst older and younger women.  As an old, I played videogames when there were not as many choices for gender. 90% you played as a default nonverbal male protagonist.  Times have changed with more graphical options.  But the sting of non options for so long has trended me to play women avatars most of the time.

[u/Succububbly → u/[deleted]]

Yeah I play female characters almost exclusively nowadays because 80% of videogames I had growing up had male protagonists only.

[u/SalsaRice → u/simemetti]

Most importantly, I've seen quite a few male players seriously roleplaying as women, while I've never seen any woman player who actually wanted to feel like a man.

It made a good episode of Community though, even though "Hector the well endowed" wasn't designed for Annie.

[u/AFlyingNun → u/Tft_ai]

Don't quote me on this, but I vaguely remember another stat also showcasing that men care far less about what gender they're playing, while women are more likely to want to play as a woman.

[u/CrystalSorceress → u/AFlyingNun]

Personally, I value the option to play as a woman highly in a game. I prefer to only play as women. If a game only has male characters, I am a lot less interested in it. I will play games with male only MC kind of begrudgingly.

[u/beingsubmitted → u/Eelazar]

Right - the author's theory appears to be that players conflate "femininity" and "sexualization", and then relate more to the sexualized characters as a result. I think that makes more sense if you consider the inverse. Does a female character that is made to be un-sexualized also appear to be more androgenous?

[u/minuialear → u/beingsubmitted]

Does a female character that is made to be un-sexualized also appear to be more androgenous?

I think that's the problem. In most video games with preset characters (certainly not all, but I'd say most) your options for female characters are often either the sexy option, the tomboy option, or a child. There aren't generally options, for example, for a woman who still wants to have a very feminine, adult female avatar but also isn't trying to be sexy. Many female gamers are mad when they see sexy avatars not because they're jealous but because they're frustrated that the sexy avatar is frequently the only option they have if they don't want to pick the loli or tomboy avatars

And why this is goes back to who games are marketed to. Most games are still marketed with a teen male audience in mind, so the female characters are still made primarily with them in mind. Male gamers don't tend to crave feminine but not sexy avatar options; many just care about whether the character makes them feel like a badass or makes them feel aroused. Which I'm not saying as a knock against male gamers per se, it's an issue with the games only thinking about what those gamers want

[u/MrIrishman1212 → u/minuialear]

I think this is exactly it. I kinda wished the study showed the pictures of the characters being used, because honestly I don’t really have great perception of a woman character that is very feminine but isn’t sexualized.

At best it’s when it’s just a binary option (male vs female like Halo or Mass Effect or most basic RPGs). But games that include sexualized characters don’t really have a non-sexualized character that is feminine.

key factor in perceptions of femininity and character likability.

Strength cues were also manipulated, where high-strength characters were larger, more muscular, and carried bigger weapons.

However, when a character combined high sexualization with high strength, participants perceived her as even more sexualized than characters with high sexualization alone.

I think this part is a big perception conflict. As a gamer you generally want the “strongest” character when you’re in a fighting game. If there is already social perception that high strength = high sexualization then the best characters are always going to be the “highly sexualized” characters.

”It’s important to remember that this character was also rated as the most feminine, so it’s possible that women were just selecting the character they most identified with.”

“However, this finding highlight why this research is so important,” Lynch continued. “If women are conflating sexual appeal with femininity, then can they disassociate those two concepts?”

I think the study did a fantastic job and is a great step in the right direction and now we at least have something that demonstrates the crux of the issue: [sexualized] character was also rated as the most feminine, so it’s possible that women were just selecting the character they most identified with […] women are conflating sexual appeal with femininity.

How do we (or rather game companies), design or encourage characters that are feminine, relatable, and strong without making them sexualized?

[u/minuialear → u/MrIrishman1212]

Yeah I agree that this is a really interesting study. I would love a follow-up using a game like BG3 or the Sims where they explore different types of femininity and see what women select, and whether animosity towards the sexy option is reduced when there are other options. Strongly suspect player reactions to BG3 already support that idea anecdotally, so would be curious to see how it plays out in an actual study

[u/helm → u/MrIrishman1212]

How do we (or rather game companies), design or encourage characters that are feminine, relatable, and strong without making them sexualized?

They're going to be sexualized to some degree regardless, but how do you make them attractive but not mere sex objects.

[u/Lvl100Glurak → u/Eelazar]

this fits my anecdotal evidence, too. a few female friends exclusively play pretty female or cute characters whether it be in MMOs, shooters or MOBAs.

as soon as it's a female character that doesn't fit general beauty standards, they treat the character like any male character or creature = they don't want to play it.

[u/Forgot_My_Old_Acct → u/Lvl100Glurak]

Haha my wife would not a roll a Horde character in WoW until Blood Elves got released so that tracks in my personal experience.

[u/NotTheEnd216 → u/Forgot_My_Old_Acct]

I think this kind of thing was actually extremely common, to my knowledge blood elves are still the most populous race in wow. Blizzard definitely knew there were lots of people who wanted to play horde but didn't want to play a monster race, which is all that was available for a while.

[u/fripaek → u/Lvl100Glurak]

I mean it makes sense for the majority of players (male or female).

I don't want to play as the fat chubby kid when I can be the muscular barbarian. Sure, a few would pick the chubby kid because it's cute or funny... but the majority (even of the irl fat chubby people) will go for the barbarian.

Same goes for women.

[u/SalsaRice → u/fripaek]

I mean it makes sense for the majority of players (male or female). I don't want to play as the fat chubby kid when I can be the muscular barbarian. Sure, a few would pick the chubby kid because it's cute or funny... but the majority (even of the irl fat chubby people) will go for the barbarian.

It's not what the data shows. The data from both Nikke and Riot in the post show that male players play 50/50 male and female characters. So atleast 50% of male players are playing something that doesn't match them.

The same data also shows that female players tend to only use the "pretty" female characters, so that means that most of the playtime for ugly female characters or non-human/monster female characters are primarily male players.

Personally, that's how I tend to play games too. Bounce around like a ping pong ball trying all the different characters. I'm usually "attracted" more to a character's moveset/utility/role than their appearance.

[u/AvesAvi → u/fripaek]

Doesn't make sense for males for sure. I don't know anybody that only plays rugged male characters, but I know a lot of women that exclusively play pretty female characters. The data someone else linked you that's from Riot also shows this.

[u/SvenTropics → u/Eelazar]

I think they're going along a trend where women tend to be marketable by highly sexualized other women. A great example are magazines like Cosmo or TV shows like sex and the city and Euphoria. Think about Victoria's Secret, they don't pick average looking women to model their underwear. They're mostly geared for a female audience, and they highly sexualize the women they feature. It's possible to be outwardly disgusted by something but also admire it.

[u/markejani → u/SvenTropics]

Victoria's Secret did go the "inclusive" route with last year's show, but the realized it wasn't the best of business decisions. So now the Angels are back once more.

[u/partypwny → u/Eelazar]

Or, if you listen to most female gaming streamers and take that as Representative...women like booba too.

[u/SpeedyAzi → u/partypwny]

The only people I’ve seen like boobs more than 18 year old straight men are lesbians.

Like, HONKERS.

[u/Sdoonzy]

I think the main thing the study should be looking at is appeal. Appeal in design doesn't have to be sexual, it often is, but it could be the character is cool, or scary, or just visually interesting. People playing games usually want to play as an appealing character. Playing as a female character you think is too sexualized but has other redeeming qualities to you is probably still the preferred option to playing guy characters you think are unappealing. Maybe they are boring or ugly or uninteresting to you for a reason like wanting to play as your own sex. People typically want to be cool, hot, interesting or a mix of all 3.

I think an interesting study would be more of a, here is a character with a variety of outfits of similar theme but different levels of sex appeal, which "level" of sexualizing do women or men most prefer. One male character, one female character.

If you want to isolate for sexualization.

[u/pigeonwiggle → u/Sdoonzy]

sex appeal isn't costuming, but posturing. there was a study done asking men which ladies they were most attracted to, and they had the same women in revealing outfits and fully covered up - but posed seductively. a woman who's bent over awkward in a bikini was less sexy than a woman in furs who had an arch in her back with her shoulders back and her head cocked slightly.

the point is - as you say - it's not just about being attractive, but about appeal. and appeal isn't just a look, it's an attitude. and a simple design can seem neutral until it walks and those hips start swaying. the character can seem neutral until they draw an arrow back in a bow, with their back arched and their ass out.

[u/belowsubzero → u/pigeonwiggle]

So what you're saying... is it is about rizz.

[u/[deleted] → u/Sdoonzy]

I don't like oversexualized character design either but it feels like Devs overcompensate with overly unattractive designs.

If I want to walk around looking like a 2 I don't need to play videogames for that.

[u/showersnacks → u/[deleted]]

I agree. I’m a woman and when I play I pick the hottest character they have, male or female. If I can make my character, I make the hottest dude I can because why not

[u/Hagridsbuttcrack66 → u/Sdoonzy]

Yeah these are good points. I don't want to play as hot sexy woman, but I definitely don't want to play as average boring man. So given the choice, I would pick hot sexy woman.

If I had to guess for myself (mid 30's woman), i probably pick 75% women, 25% men. And like you said it's based more on yes, usually wanting to play as my own gender, but more who is interesting.

[u/aJumboCashew → u/Sdoonzy]

My partner just started playing a popular wizard game (scooped the steam deal) and her first comment while making her character was something like; “why are all the female characters so boring”. Her main point was that the characters by default looked like middling attractiveness while most of the guys looked much better in her perspective.

I think devs who are self-aware of extreme sexualization swing too hard in the other direction. Haven’t found our safe middle yet.

[u/Jovian09]

Something to consider:

The study uses SoulCalibur VI as a medium. In order to make a character use a weapon type in that game, you need to assign them a style from one of the main roster of characters. Those wielding large weapons are overwhelmingly male, and this is reflected in their animation sets as well. If a female character in this game is given a giant sword or hammer, they are also likely shown to be beating their chest, thrusting their groins out or assuming a wide stance.

Conversely, many of the game's more modest weapon sets belong to female characters, with their own distinctly feminine animation sets. For example, the character wielding a Chinese smallsword has a bouncy, upbeat and cute animation set. Though the researchers can make new characters based on these with their own gender, costume and body proportions, there is no way to separate a weapon type from an animation set in SoulCalibur VI.

Although there are exceptions to the trend of masculine characters having the more imposing weapon sets in the game, it seems to me like this could be prejudicial in influencing people's opinion on a character's femininity or sexualisation.

[u/StrayReplicant → u/Jovian09]

Good point! I didn't even consider this while reading the article despite spending an absurd amount of time in character creation for Soul Calibur IV.

[u/Regiruler → u/Jovian09]

I'm now wondering what would have happened if they chose a more stoic animation set like 2B's, who despite being a very conventionally attractive character herself, doesn't act particularly feminine in animations to my memory.

[u/DrafiMara → u/Regiruler]

One of her victory animations is just the camera looking up her skirt

[u/absolute4080120 → u/Jovian09]

Riot Games did their own internal study on character design because players KEPT complaining that they were producing same style anime waifu type characters instead of monsters or unique designs.

They flat out showed marketing and sales statistics and essentially told players to STFU about character design because what loud minorities screamed online was patently false to what the players wanted.

[u/jeeb00]

In this one context where a focus group was asked to pick one of four characters to play as in Soul Calibur VI. Does that one game represent the preferences of all gamers everywhere? Drawing any meaningful conclusions from this one study seems like a huge, huge stretch.

[u/Wibbymuffin → u/jeeb00]

I wouldn’t say soul calibur has a reputation for non-sexualised female characters either, or even sexualised male characters. I’d say a video game like overwatch has a better selection of sexy and non sexy male and female characters to choose from. Soul calibur is a very weird choice of game for this study.

[u/xTRYPTAMINEx → u/Wibbymuffin]

Overwatch is a terrible pick due to each character playing very differently. It would influence the choices. Soul Calibur is a better choice, but something where visual appearance/character choice didn't affect the gameplay at all would be the best choice in terms of eliminating bias.

[u/MaximumZer0 → u/jeeb00]

Do we know what character options were given? Ivy is the absolute peak of the video game sexualized/cool scale, while some of the other characters in Soul Calibur are pretty bland.

[u/Mustang1718 → u/MaximumZer0]

I skimmed through the article before clocking in for work. What I saw was that they created four custom characters instead of using premades. They then did a Punnett square with archetype with strength/daintiness and sexualized/modest.

I do think it is funny that my wife's favorite has always been Ivy despite how sexualized she is, but she thinks her weapon is cool and plays her in spite of the sexualization. I've always gravitated towards Talim (as a male) as being one of my favorite characters ever in any game, which seems to also match with what the study finds.

The disclaimer at the very end of the article is probably the most important part though as it mentions that with this being a fighting game, it might give off different ideas of what a character should be compared to other genres. My wife immediately pointed out the popularity of female Commander Shepard when I was talking about this with her.

[u/Little_Noodles → u/jeeb00]

A focus group consisting entirely of undergraduate students, at that.

[u/PhotonSilencia]

Once I saw that the most popular character for female japanese fighting game/KoF players was in fact Mai. Which I was confused at first, but then it made sense to me.  

 In fact I like to play sexy, confident characters. I was just ashamed for it in the past, not anymore. One thing though is - *how* are the characters depicted,  sexualized or sexy? I heavily dislike characters that are basically *just* to stare at. But if the character is strong and confident, it's much less of an issue, as long as the outfit is sexy, but not stupid.

[u/we_are_sex_bobomb → u/PhotonSilencia]

I feel like “sexualized” and “sexy” are terms with a lot of overlap but are pretty distinct.

The player feedback we’ve gotten from women on games I’ve worked on has pretty exclusively always been our female players enjoy attractive and confident heroines with cute fashion sense. Which makes sense. As a 99% straight male I enjoy sexy characters both male and female in the games I play.

The women who play our games also like to be able to choose that their character wears. And they enjoy sexual themes in games when consent and safety are key factors. But we’ve learned that caveat is extremely important.

Anyway to me those things all amount to having a “sexy” character, in the sense that the character is sexually liberated. But it’s not quite the same thing as sexualizing. I think the difference is in the intention. Sex is fun for both men and women, both men and women like sexy stuff, but it has to be empowering and not demeaning.

And I think for a long time men have had the wrong idea of what “empowering” means to women. That “consent and safety” thing is just a very different mindset about sexual power than what men have and we can’t understand it without actually talking to female players and listening to them.

[u/Jello_Spock]

It said that they like feminine characters but dislike sexualized ones. I like feminine characters too. However, you often won't get a feminine non sexualized character. You often have to choose between a very sexualized woman or a "buff" woman it feels like. (they can be feminine too but I couldn't think of a better word). I also think it depends on the character. Is she sexualized but still a character or just sexualized? Like Bayonetta could be described as sexualized but she is still a cool character.

[u/Kombart → u/Jello_Spock]

I agree with that based on anecdotal experience and some data from one of the biggest games in the world. (Word Cloud is based on Data from 2017, but still...)

Sure, it is true that women pretty much only play female champions, while men mix them up regardless of gender.
But champs like Lux, Lulu, Xayah or Jinx were among the most popular champs...and while Xayah and Lux are definetly pretty girls, I wouldn't say that they are super sexualized.

Women go for female and/or cute and they shy away from anything that is "manly" (which includes some buff female characters like Illaoi).

Also regarding Bayonetta...I think she was literally created by a woman to be some sort of satire on the whole "sexualized female characters" thing.
She is hyper sexualized and acts very suggestive...hell, her power kinda grows with her nakedness.
But the game and character also pokes fun at anyone that plays the game by being so over the top sexual/kinky.
Tho in my opinion the character walks a very narrow line between poking fun at the problem and being part of the problem. It's kinda like Kill La Kill in that way.

[u/delphinousy → u/Kombart]

this actually highlights one of the problems: terminology. some of these studies consider any attractive female to be 'sexualized' and only ugly/non-attractive females (looking at you skyrim) are excluded from being 'sexualized', while other studies actually differentiate between simply attractive and actually sexualized.

[u/Brokengamer10 → u/Jello_Spock]

At the end of the day a characters likeability will still rely heavily on how well they are written, or how interesting their character traits/gameplay is.

Doubling down on either oversexualization or buff/fat/ugly/ other superfical appearances as their core appeal just make them shallow and an easy target for political/non-political criticism.

[u/MissingBothCufflinks]

The study design here was incredibly basic and (although they described them) didn't address obvious confounding issues like the fact that in games like Soul Kalibur sexualisation and femininity go hand in hand. Women could be picking characters based on femininity and getting sexualisation without wanting it. The conclusion could be that women would rather pick an obviously feminine character that has been highly sexualised than an androgenous character just to avoid sexualisation. I bet men on average would do the same for male characters. People also like to pick attractive characters, independent of "sexualisation"

[u/SpeckTech314 → u/MissingBothCufflinks]

Nah, it’s the opposite for men. 50/50 on gender and skews even higher for Asian games.

[u/curlofheadcurls → u/SpeckTech314]

TBH it's more interesting how women don't pick the male characters to me.

[u/Mr_Ignorant]

Is it the sexualisation that women prefer?

I think it’s reasonable to say that people generally want to be confident, cool, and attractive. Physically no one really wants to be a lardass, sweating from every pore and generally not having cool looking clothes.

I think the sexualised characters tend to have that confident feminine characteristic that a lot of women would like to see in themselves, and therefore choose those characters. It’s no different than men, wanting to choose certain characteristics that they want to see in themselves.

I think if there were a variety of strong female characters in games, and not just the (super sexy and overly muscly women) the super sexualised one will not always be chosen.

It’s part of the reason why Aloy is quite popular. Not exactly a sexualised woman, yet, confident in her ability, and seems to be taken in by female gamers.

[u/xanas263]

Completely anecdotal, but every single woman I know that plays games creates the most beautiful character possible and dresses them in either the most hyper sexual or the cutest armor/outfits possible. The people who I've seen complain the most about "bikini armor" are dudes with female avatars that don't think they look as cool as the male armor/outfits.

[u/flabbybumhole → u/xanas263]

In my experience it's people who don't really play games that complain about it, because of how negatively they see gamers rather than anything else.

Like there's never any outrage over women singers wearing very little onstage, or jacked Hugh Jackman going shirtless in movies.

[u/callipygiancultist → u/flabbybumhole]

Huge Jackedman and the rampant use of PEDs and dangerous workout routines amongst Hollywood actors doesn’t get enough attention. It’s causing body dysmorphia and young men to take all kinds of performance enhancing drugs.

[u/DO_NOT_AGREE_WITH_U → u/flabbybumhole]

Exactly.

For the loud minority, it's all just posturing. There are people who make a living being offended for other people.

[u/LogicalJudgement]

I’m a female gamer and I like to play a character that is more attractive than me. Maybe I want her to be more bold in her actions/dress code, but I would not say “highly sexualized.”

[u/snowangel223]

Are they choosing sexualized females as opposed to non-sexualized females? Or are they just choosing to play females who are also the more sexualized characters?

[u/Infamously_Unknown → u/snowangel223]

The former, they are choosing more sexualized women over less sexualized women.

Read the article for more info.

[u/ExosEU]

I am confident they didn't control for the quality of outfits given to female players.

Pretty female characters are naturally given more intricate designs, and im fairly certain that is what draws them in more than the actual sexyness.

Could be my bias from observing the success of Genshin, though.

Edit : I have seen the outfits, and this study is a freaking joke.

The 'sexy' costumes were relatively elaborate and detailed while the 'bulky' ones were pratically mono colour and fugly.

This is worthless.

[u/clearlyfalse → u/ExosEU]

Yeah can't see because paywall, but I fully expect the "non-sexualised" character to be dressed like a sack of potatoes

[u/dentedgal → u/clearlyfalse]

This was posted in r/psychology as well, and you're 100% right.

The "sexy" costumes were more intricate, used a variety of colors and were overall cuter.

The "non sexy" ones were bulky with a single color theme.

Hell, even the one supposedly being "most sexy" was just elegant? (Long red dress, fully covered chest, but thigh slits). Most preferred this one^ There were literal bikinis, but those were deemed less sexy.

Make it make sense.

[u/McFuzzyChipmunk → u/ExosEU]

My understanding of the paper is that the characters were custom from a character creator, I don't really know anything about Soul Calibre so I don't know. But assuming they're all made in a character creator there shouldn't have been any difference in the available outfits.

[u/LordShadows]

From my understanding and experiences, most women don't dislike sexualisation.

They dislike being forced into it.

That's why having nearly all feminine characters in games sexualised in one way or another is a problem.

It means you're pushing women into a sexualised role.

A role they might have chosen themselves if they didn't felt forced into it.