In most games, you could replace the female love interest with an animal companion and the experience wouldn't be very different, because the female character has about as much leverage on the story line as a dog
That doesn't necessarily say it is wrong. So when "objectification" pops up. Sure you could easily make an argument that the woman is being treated as an object (as most unimportant NPCs are), but when "objectification" instantly assumes it is wrong.
Bark, motherfucker, like the dog you are. Woof woof.
Have you never heard something like this? It's a common part of the way women are treated
in the real world, and I don't just mean being called "bitch." Dogs may be treated as pets, but they are not considered human. You can
own a dog, as property, but you cannot
own a woman. And, sorry Neonivek, but I call BS on "Dogs have all the thoughts a person would," unless you're trying to inform me that there are now dogs that can create great art and do calculus.
The
typical portrayal of female companions is qualitatively different from the portrayal of male companions. Loyalty, sweetness, and compassion are character traits, but they do not make up a human being. I am not trying to say that all female characters should be portrayed as fully complex and actualized individuals. But there is a CLEAR difference in majority portrayals between the sexes.
How would you feel about playing a bare-chested male model with a 12-inch cock (with its own physics modeling team to get all the veiny
details) in
every single game you played? To the point where it's seen as a requirement for a good game?
"Dude, they've got a male lead and he doesn't even have a big penis. Not buying."
"Nah, we can't ship this. Why didn't you model that contours of that guy's package to clearly show through his booty shorts? We're alienating our core audience!"
"Male lead? That's too difficult. Cock physics are really hard to model... it'd take a lot of extra work and we're focusing all of our efforts on making sure that the female gameplay is really the best experience it can be."
"Fucking hell, we made a game with a male lead like five years ago. Why are you complaining? Yeah, we didn't market it well and the game is full of bugs, but you assholes are never satisfied."
"Yeah, I know that we could exchange literally every male in this game world with a dildo or a rooster without much changing, but I don't get why you're complaining. Roosters are treated differently from humans in all cultures, but you know, they've got thoughts and feelings and stuff, just like people."
THESE ARE COMMONLY EXPRESSED OPINIONS THE OTHER WAY AROUND. I HEAR THEM CONSTANTLY. PEOPLE, STOP TELLING ME THIS SHIT DOESN'T EXIST AND IT ISN'T A FUCKING PROBLEM. I DON'T CARE IF YOU LIVE IN A VACUUM IN WHICH NO MISOGYNY IS EVER EXPRESSED, BECAUSE THAT IS A BUBBLE, NOT THE WORLD.
I can think of a ton of games with female shopkeepers, witches/sorceress, normal female cardboard cutouts. Shit, I can name off more games with those than games that feature prostitution/strippers in any capacity.
That's fine.
I'll clarify again: there are two problems.
1. Women are overwhelmingly cast as NPCs (objects), very seldom as PCs (humans)
2. Women are overwhelmingly sexualized (a further level of being treated as an object, compounding and entrenching the problem seen in 1)
At its worst, you see the intersection of the issues as follows:
Women are NPCs only, and as NPCs they have the chief role of being sexy. This is an extreme, but we see it often enough.
For the study, not sure I can get behind that. The only people who are going to be worse are people who were already pretty much that way and were just more reserved. Someone who already had strong opinions against that kind of thinking isn't going to be swayed by playing Whore-Murderer 2015.
The point is not about the impact of individual media, but of the picture that the accretion of this media teaches to the gaming public through consumption of successive titles.
See again, the world where literally every male character has a bulging penis of unusual proportions and most of them die while grunting like Gray Fox and displaying death erections.