2013-03-09, 07:36 PM
nikki Wrote:The point that's being made isn't that the idea itself (supporting characters being helpless) is bad, it's that women in video games are almost always put in this position. What's problematic is that all of the characters who are helpless and cannot do anything to change their situation are overwhelmingly female.
There is a major difference between "helpless men" and "helpless women," which is what creates the problematic Damsel in Distress. Male characters who are shown as helpless almost never suffer from the inability to not do something. Even in your prior example of "Mario is helpless," he isn't; he's still running about and trying to change the future outcome of events. He's not powerless, which is what the DiD trope is showing. The point of this trope, as she's said in the video, is that you strip power from a female character. It's not just a one-off, either; you can have examples of characters who were 'strong' but suddenly become Damsel'd in their own ways. Here's a good example of a horrible game story that did this: Final Fantasy VIII. Rinoa starts off fairly weak and is shown as consistently stupid/naive (Quistiss also falls prone to this despite being intelligent, since she gets demoted from her original position; Selphie's obviously bat pomegranate crazy, especially when it comes to trains). Rinoa, however, becomes possessed (strips Rinoa's powers away, Damseling her); she then falls into a coma (strips more power away from Rinoa). These two plot devices (badly) aid Squall's push to 'do something,' because he's looking for a way to save Rinoa (not that anyone will ever know why, since this is a problem of story continuity).
That's what the trope is about. Men generally don't have power stripped from them; they have options taken away, but they're "creative" enough to figure out a new way to solve their problem. Or they're still able to continue their journey and accidentally solve the issue. (Or, if it's a particularly bad storyteller, they forget it all together.) Women, on the other hand, lose their power when Damsel'd; these characters become helpless, useless, powerless and have no opportunities to change their own story. Their strife and struggles are shown as a changing element to the wrong person. In fact, they almost never have anything to say/feel about their detainment/capture. That's the difference.
And while I can think of one game where a male character is shown in this light (Mario is Missing), I also remember that he was not the main focus of the game; your main focus was to answer history questions to replace missing historical artefacts! It wasn't until the end of the game that I even remembered he'd been taken and why I was doing what I was doing. And that's one game out of how many where a male character has been entirely detained with no chance of escape? When women take this role, you're reminded of it at almost every turn. Someone always has to bring it up.
She even mentions that it doesn't, using examples of how Zelda (and her disguises) were strong and helpful characters. The trope itself is that you strip power from someone, even if it's temporarily done. You can see this in a lot of games, but it's the fact that it's overwhelmingly female. Moving up a few years, let's look at FFX. Yuna is a pretty strong character with a lot of development, especially considering she's shown to start out as a fairly dim and unexplored person; she grows as she travels and learns as she meets people. She turns into a Stand Her Ground sort of character, but the problem is that she gets damsel'd at one point in the story to "advance it" (and ironically introduce you to Rikku and the goal of the Al Bhed, even though there were a number of ways this could've been done). She gets kidnapped from the Shoopuf and placed inside a mechanical prison. At this point in the game, she's then rescued by two men (because Wakka and Tidus are the only swimmers at this time, since you've yet to acquire Rikku -- that's not inherently problematic).
That doesn't mean that she's overall weak, and that doesn't mean that she's always useless or helpless. But if it was a male character in Yuna's position (or one similar), he wouldn't need that assistance. He'd have found a way to escape through his own power. (Or it wouldn't have happened to begin with, since she's just snatched up as easily as a donut left sitting on a plate.) Again, that's where the difference comes between the two.
I didn't say they were less important, but let's take a look at that logic versus reality for a moment. We have brawny women, we have women who could wield axes just as easily as the next man, we have women involved in melee sports (boxing, fencing, sword arts, martial arts, and so on).
Look through history: There are women who know how to protect themselves. Women weren't as defenseless as they were turned into through the history books. Many of them, even in the Middle Ages, did the exact same work as their male counterparts. You know who didn't? The upper class women. The overwhelming number of lower class women did much of the same work as their husbands; if they didn't, they wouldn't have survived. Women aren't overwhelmingly weaker. That's why this is annoying.
Also, it's a game. If you're gaining an audience that includes a lot of women (and maybe even some progressive men!), you probably should cater to them a bit more. Some of us girls like to play female characters and prefer melee skills to ranged ones. You've already alienated us when you've shown that the only thing we can do is stand back and shoot arrows at enemies or read books at them until they die.
luigi's mansion has our... i dunno how many games he had by then, let's go with 15-game hero, trapped in a painting and rendered completely and absolutely useless for the whole game, an example of peach being damsel'd, but where she still helps? all the paper mario's, she comunicates with mario and lets him know of what's up in the enemy base.
for that final fantasy example, i can give 5 final fantasies which DON'T adhere to the rule. and one of the funniest cases is FF13, where a female is the damsel in distress, and the hero is HER SISTER.
and that is what moves the story in most games, it's not "oh, my personal object got kidnapped", it's someone close to you, someone you care about. your sister in FF13, FF3 has no damsel at all, FF4 has rosa being kidnapped like nuts, but the hero isn't on it just to save rosa, but also kain, his partner, so he's not doing it to claim "the ball" back, he's in it for his love and his friendship. rydia falls off the boat and when she comes back she literally saves the main character.
FF5 has the princess kidnapped and brainwashed for the large amount of 5 minutes, it also has the hero fall down a hole he can't escape from, until his friendly pirate-queen ally shows up and teases him for leaving her behind before rescuing him.
FF6 has the main character be female, suffering from angsty issues, FF7 has the same thing and introduces tifa and yuffie, whi kick major ass. i haven't played any of the following FF's until 13, but in 12-2 penelo didn't get kidnapped at all for all the time i played.
so yeah, one game has a pure damsel in distress, how could them!
the issue is not about who loses the power, it's about WHY they lose it. look at FE radiant dawn and path of radiance. in path of radiance you play protecting the princess, she is quite literally a damsel in distress, but she's so because of the setting, she's a princess, not a warrior, your group is a group of warriors, the ones who do the fighting. at the very beginning, both your sister and her -male- friend get kidnapped, oh damsel in distress with a guy. but it's because it's the sister of the main character (and brother of a secondary) that you go for them.
then the second game comes and the now queen is able to kick major butt on that one.
what i'm shooting at is, at the very beginning of gaming, there wasn't enough memory to make a complicated plot, and the damsel in distress trope had been going strong since the middle ages. back then also the main demographic of gamers were men. so hey, what could they do back then? monster has kidnapped the princess of the kingdom (and as a princess, nobody expects her to know how to fight back, you know, princess) so let's have someone save her. (why a plumber of all things though... well, i'm sure it would sell better than a mushroom
also, a quick extra. when you go radical about anything, you can then complain about anything. a quick look at FF5, by half of the game your party consists of 3 women and one man. you can think "ok cool" and go on, you can think "oh hey, female power!" and go on, or you can think "of course! men love harem and that's why this is like this, and with a little child for god's sake! shame on you!"