Character Design 101: Part 1: Failures and Successes in Designing Female Characters

Welcome, class, to Character Design 101! I am your professor... um... Professor Wetzel. Let's set aside the syllabus for a minute, as we dive face first into the meat of what we're talking about in this class. As it were, we're diving into the breast meat, mainly because most of the people in this class are men wondering when they'll design busty beauties such as those in Dead or Alive Extreme Beach Bouncy Boo-- I mean, Volleyball 2. See, that's the problem I want to stop right now.

The gaming market is filled with overly voluptuous women, and has been since as far as I can remember. Samus in Metroid, for example, when she loses her armor at the end of the game is in a one piece swimsuit. A more modern example is the ever growing breasts and incredible shrinking costume of Ivy in the SoulCaliber series. At the reverse end of this over done spectrum are female characters who are done to look like everyday women. These are good, except when the designers make a main character that looks like this, and screws her up but making her look weird. What I will list of is a few failures of both of these aspects, then the successes of both of these aspects. We'll start with the failures first.

Failures:

Faith from "Mirror's Edge:" A lot of you maybe asking, "How is Faith a failure?" I even had a friend ask that, but my reasoning isn't because she's flat chested. In fact, that actually is a good design choice figuring that if she was busty, every straight male playing this game would be looking down to see if there were jiggle physics, while Faith would be suffering severe back pain. Instead, Faith's failure lies in a big aspect of what she's supposed to be: inconspicuous. She's a free runner, which is illegal in the game, so instead of blending in like she is supposed to, she has tattoos up one arm and on one eye, wears one red glove, and bright red shoes. Of course she's going to stand out, but no one is supposed to notice her? What doesn't help is the art style being a mix of Aeon Flux and traditional ancient Asian. The combination makes Faith look less human and more alien, especially with the tattoo under her eye. Finally, she's expressionless. An expressionless character makes it harder for the player to empathize with the character's situation, making it harder for the player to care about the character and the game. If we can't tell what Faith is feeling, how are we supposed to care about the over all plot?

Lei Fang from the later "Dead or Alive" games: This is what she's supposed to look like, not the other way. For some reason, Lei Fang, despite being an adult, has the power of going from a B-Cup (in video game standards) to a DD-Cup in months without plastic surgery. I have a theory on this: in Asian games, smaller breasts mean younger. Lei Fang is 19, and has smaller breasts than the 20-30 year-old women in DOA. She's 19 throughout the series, yet her breasts grow with every other game in the series. This is an obvious ploy to get men to buy the game. As a turn, its also derogatory to women. Yes, artists (myself, included) will draw their idealized version of the female body, but we'd be stupid to think that all women should look like that. Not every woman I dated had a perfect 36-24-36 body, just like not every woman dated a guy with a 10 inch Anaconda. Shouldn't our characters in games reflect this, especially when we've established that they aren't supposed to look like a cookie cutter woman in a game?

Ivy from SoulCaliber IV: Again with making breasts bigger. In Ivy's case, she was also made to look more pleasant to the eye, as well. See, Ivy was supposed to look corrupted. What happened? Oh, the big demographic in video games, nerdy guys with nothing better to do (calm down, I'm including myself) thought her corrupted appearance was hurting the game. So, the designers made her "hot." Actually, what the made was an excuse for cleavage. If a design compromises what the character is supposed to be, its a bad design, plain and simple.

Finally, Chloe from Uncharted 2: Among Theives: She isn't on my list because I hate her. She's on my list because she's supposed to be British, but looks either Hispanic, Indian, or Irish (Black Irish, as it were). Not to mention the fact that she's supposed to be sexy, but she's constantly making the duck face, or, as I like to call it, the Daniel Craig "I'm Too Cool" face. Though, Kudos on not making her over voluptuous.

Now for some successes.

Tali'Zorah nar Rayya from Mass Effect: That would be her on the left. Men, try to ignore the picture on the right. Tali is not only one of the most interesting characters in the Mass Effect mythos, but one of the best designed. Her culture reflects that of the human's Muslim culture, except for the race being covered up completely. In the game, this is explained as the race having extremely weak immune systems. The helmet, the tight suit, and the accessories all are designed to support this. Also, her body shape is human enough that we can tell what she is, but alien enough that she doesn't look completely human. As an identifying factor within her race, she was a head covering that is different from anyone else's, unifying her, but making her identifiable.

Elena Fisher from Uncharted: Elena is what the everyday main female should look like. She looks like, well, a woman; an attractive, approachable, everyday woman. She doesn't have huge breasts, nor is she so attractive, you want to die because you'll never see anyone like her. She pretty, but flawed in a human way as well. Like humans should be.

Madison Paige from Heavy Rain: Again, Madison looks like the everyday woman. There's a twist, though. Madison also has the look of someone who has been damaged in some way. Instead of doing nothing, she uses it to grow. There's a hint of sorrow, but also a hint of hope within her. She also is attractive enough that she can turn heads, but at the same time, plain enough that she looks human.

The Lollipop Saw Lady from Condemned 2: She's scary looking. She looks crazy. She has a saw blade painted to look like a lollipop on a stick. Even if she is dressed in a corset and a short skirt, you want to run from her. She's not sexy... she's bizarre. And that's what she's meant to be.

Seeing as we have a few minutes left, I'll conclude today's lecture on this note. There's a time for bouncy, perky women, yes. But not in every game. All women are different, and in that sense, beautiful. Unless they're meant to be freaky. When designing a female character, keep in mind what you want her to show with emotion, her clothes, how she carries herself, and very importantly, how she moves.

Okay, I'm not going to risk taking all your time. Until next time, class dis-MISSed.

Oh, God... that was terrible.