Videogame Chicks: Your Digital Fantasy

The videogame industry is heavily geared toward the male gamer - more specifically, the teenage male gamer. Videogame developers know that males aged 14 to 22 are more likely to spend their summer paychecks on entertainment. As such, game development and advertising tend to target that specific consumer group. And that's fine, I get that.

What I don't get is why videogame developers seem to think that they can't sell their games without loading them up with fodder for the adolescent sexual fantasy. It's hard to find a quality game that doesn't have at least one instance of pixilated cleavage. Who am I kidding - it's hard to find any game that doesn't have a little bit of gratuitous sexuality. And some are more blatant than others.

Bloodrayne

Yeah, ok, she's half vampire, and vampires don't really follow the same fashion rules as the rest of us, especially in videogames. But come on - head-to-toe leather and stiletto knee-high boots? I guess those boots do come in handy for slashing monsters and Nazis (somehow she ended up with blades in her heels), but they'd be really hard to walk in, let alone fight in. Just plain silly.

P.N. 03

Granted, this game got terrible reviews, largely because of its over-sexualization of the female lead character. She is incredibly well-built (she should be, I suppose, since she's a robot) and in the demo I played, she evaded an enemy attack with a series of gymnastic flips and jumps, ending in a provocative pose while she shot back at the enemy. Ridiculous. While this game was pretty much a bomb, it proves my point: videogame developers think that all they have to do is to slap a pair of big boobs on a female lead character if they want to make big sales. Thankfully in this case, they were wrong.

Yuna, Rikku, and Payne: Final Fantasy X-2

Again, this videogame didn't get such hot reviews. Honestly, it's not a bad game at its core - it has pretty decent gameplay, and the costume-change system is unique. The problem is that it seems as though Square Enix was trying too hard to make this game appeal to chick gamers, so it ended up feeling a lot like Charlie's Angels and not much like a quality game. It's a bit ironic that the story is so girly, when you take into consideration the lack of clothing on the characters - you'd think that if it were geared toward girl gamers, the characters would at least have the decency to cover up their buttcheeks. Had developers paid more attention to writing an engaging, meaty storyline and less attention to revealing outfits and trying to make the characters more "girly," it could have been on par with some of the quality games in the Final Fantasy series. These women are just embarrassing.

Jessica: Dragon Quest VIII

She's not the main character, but she's the only female in your fighting party. Jessica's actually fairly modestly-dressed in comparison to some other videogame chicks - long skirt, long sleeves, no midriff showing. But her gigantic breasts are barely contained in her skintight shirt, and every time she moves for any reason, be it physical attacks, magic spells, even healing, those breasts start jiggling like a Jell-O mold. Her unique skill set? "Sex appeal." I kid you not. Skills in this set include: blow kiss, hip drop, sexy beam, and hustle dance. Give me a break.

All the women in the Dead or Alive series

I love DOA4. It's a great fighting game. But seriously... does every woman have to have jugs the size of bowling balls? Nobody looks like that. And if anybody actually tried to wear those clothes to fight in, they'd be in serious trouble. You can't fight in stilettos and a long skirt slit up to your crotch. It's just not practical. And the whole DOA Beach Volleyball fiasco - I don't even have the words.

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider series

Lara, Lara, Lara. You had such potential. You could have been one of the strongest women ever to grace a videogame console. Unfortunately, game developers put more emphasis on your huge rack and your sensual lips instead of playing up your intelligence and skills. I got so sick of reading articles talking about the latest Tomb Raider game's graphics - every single one of those articles went on and on about Lara's body, skin texture, full lips, blah blah blah. Each successive Tomb Raider game spirals further into the trap of too much sex and loses respect from serious gamers who are looking for a quality game instead of crap that relies on brand loyalty for sales.

Princess Peach

Shocker, I know. What could be wrong with that most wholesome of videogame princesses? I like Peach, actually. She seems like a nice gal. She dresses demurely enough, and seems to be an all-around good girl. But that's part of the problem. As much as I like Peach, if I'm going to be fair in this criticism of videogame girls, I have to include her. She has no purpose in the Mario universe other than to be saved by Mario. She is the epitome of girliness with her pink poofy dress, golden locks, breathy voice, and cute little tiara. Peach has no mind of her own, and serves merely as an object of Mario's affection. Her only purpose is to fill the role of "damsel in distress," and for that she is a disgrace to videogame chicks everywhere. (Although she is one of my favorites to race in Mario Kart... but that's another topic entirely.)

Bottom line: game developers need to wake up and realize that big boobs are not the most important factor in guaranteeing game sales. Quite the opposite, actually. Give the game a juicy storyline, awesome mechanics, and great graphics, and it will sell much faster and to a much broader audience than something that is thrown together and features slutty digitized females. That kind of thing might appeal to the pre-pubescent set, but serious gamers need a little more substance.