Makes me frustrated and hopeless, Its quite clear that they do this for the male gaze and whatever its called, but that doesnt justify it and makes me very sick.
Not saying that beautiful characters are bad, but semi naked characters with unrealistic beauty which both have nothing to do with the game at all is terrible, very terriole.
Why ruin a good game for the so called" male gaze" or “sex sells” thing? why?
I feel like a hypocrite and a loser.
Not sure if indie games are any better, itch io is very good, it has great (hidden) gems.
But its also filled with dating games and whatnot, I didnt check the nsfw games, but I wouldnt be surprised if they filled the entire front page.
Anyway, Its a deep issue for me, wanted to vent, thanks for reading.
Not disagreeing, but… have you seen male video game characters? They’re less often half-naked, but usually similarly sexualized.
In fact, video edits about male characters’ appearance are vastly more popular than the ones about female characters’ appearance.
The male characters are also incredibly more unrealistic. At least from my experience. I have yet to meet a guy who looks like Leon Kennedy, Geralt or Adam Jensen. While having met many women who looked exactly like or better than various female game characters.
Some years ago, it may have been the case that female characters were much more sexualized than male characters, due to lack of female gamers. Nowadays though, I feel like it’s nearly equal both ways. The difference is in how the characters are portrayed and received by men and women. Both have, on average, different preferences.
The issue isn’t really with men, female characters or video games. All industries of our entire society are filled to the brim with porn and erotic material. And that’s largely because of capitalism. Porn and anything containing porn sells well. So in a society built around selling and profits, all of that sooner or later becomes the most popular, and the norm.
Capcom literally had a panel filled with women to be absolutely sure they were making Leon as sexy as possible for everyone. He was hand sculpted for one purpose.
And they still gave him that stupid ass haircut?
Like it or not, this is peak male sexy performance. Confirmed by women.
Although I slightly disagree about your claim for how women vs men beauty is presented, I do like/agree with your response. Thank you! 🤍
Used to be a porn addict and its been months since I quit. But I cant remove the guilt and shame I have for myself, so maybe this sexualization is only making it worse for me.
This is a lot more informing of where your head’s at and how/why you feel this way than your original post implies.
I say this as an alcoholic who was not aware of just how much alcohol pervades culture until I got sober.
Because you’re an addict in recovery, you are more likely to see it and take note of it being egregious whereas previously you probably didn’t really notice/accepted it as normal.
The sexualization of so many things in our culture didn’t change, you did, and that’s important to keep in mind.
Best of luck in your continued recovery, from one addict to another.