Boys, Babes and Button-Bashing.

In terms of where I sit in the gaming demographics, I'm about in the middle. Everything on Facebook can go and hang for all I care, but I'm not a noob-bashing gun-toting trolling WoW madman who can give you a run-down of the schematics of his Counter-Strike weapons while raiding with his level 15 Blood Elf Paladin.

I did my research, don't mock me. And take a look at this. Trolls are perhaps the worst of the gaming community. It is simply so easy to stereotype them.

I've played plenty of games in my time, mostly RPG's and platformers. It's not that I don't like mindless violence - the Oddworld series gave me plenty of that - but its not my first choice. Though in saying that I will proceed to tear you apart on any given Tekken using the time-tested method of button-mashing. First Person Shooters do take a certain kind of skill to become really good at them, hence why most gaming tournaments are either Strategy or FPS-based in terms of content and are mostly full of geeks. Just because I'm a guy doesn't mean I will immediately drool over something with a huge gun, buxom babes and things with impossible amounts of teeth.

Well I might but generally I restrain myself. I don't think gender really comes into it so much as lifestyle, social setting and grouping, interests and stuff like that. I go for RPG's because the writing is generally better. But RPG's do get flak for having scantily-armoured females running round with suspiciously large swords. Of course, some of these deadly destructive dames are actually girls! Good God! say the masses. Girls play games? Never! Well they do. But generally girls aren't well represented in the industry. And the ways that they do get represented aren't always favourable. Not always pornographic but definitely not always flattering. So some male gamers have "elevated expectations" about how their female counterparts should look.

In saying that girl gamers are still somewhat of a novelty. I've personally only ever met two. One was geeky and one was practically a man anyway but she still counts. We simply don't see as many of them here because we have a minute population. In no case should any male gamer expect their female counterparts to look like booth-babes or Lara Croft or their Night Elf... whatever. But it also isn't fair to assume all the guys care about is how hot the protagonist is. Give us some credit.

Booth-babes are paid to wear next to nothing and look good. No, they don't want to know about the time you single-handedly pwned the entire opposing team that time on Halo 2. Lara Croft is made of pixels and is back-breakingly buxom. Night Elves are so tall as to snap in half if they actually existed. They are the fantasy of the gamers, the male and lesbian ones at least. Though in saying that, I've never seen a pin-up of Master Chief for the ladies. Mmm, sexy armoured goodness.

Once again, relevant comic. At least we acknowledge that some of our favourite characters are totally ridiculous.

To defend video games as an industry, most female characters are highly stylised. They fit in with the visual style of their universe. The elves in WoW are very cartoony to put it bluntly. Croft doesn't make a lot of sense but they've made her more realistic lately, partly in response to criticism over her earlier incarnations. Try the 1998 Lara. Oh dear. But not all female characters are busty, blonde and brainless. Can't think of any that are. But I can't really say anything in favour of strong female characters either, because I can't think of many. Feel free to help out here. Some characters might be seen as shallow and brainless because of poor writing and lack of character development - that can kill just about any character, regardless of sex.

I'm not sure how to end this because I don't want to be late for class, so I take a small bow.