This is something that's kind of been bothering me for a while, but I didn't know if it was really brought up on a major scale on this forum yet or not. I know this topic might technically fall under "Mature Discussion" or something, but I'd rather we keep it here as it's an issue that is, unfortunately, present throughout a vast amount of the gaming industry, and even the community that comes with said industry. I'm isolating Smash in particular because I feel that it's something we can all relate to on a Ninendo-themed forum, and it's something that can stimulate the most conversation out of a large portion of games that feature the same problem.
Ever since Little Mac was officially revealed, I couldn't help but feel inadequate because of his design. As you can probably tell from the screenshots below, there's a major thing I take issue with:
If it's not obvious, Little Mac is being portrayed with massive muscles, and being able to uppercut "lesser" individuals that aren't as strong as him. Yes, I understand that some men in real life have these proportions; but is it really necessary to portray a man in such a way in this video game when such a small part of the male population has as well developed muscles as him? It's obvious, in Smash 4, that other males don't need these muscles in order to potentially succeed in a fight. So why take what's commonly viewed as sexually desirable, male muscles, and exaggerate them in such a way that makes players like me feel inadequate? This is obvious pandering to the female audience, and, in essence, down-values Little Mac as a character to just a mass of sex-appeal muscles.
But really, I could look past one instance. Yeah, I get that sex sells, and they might want to appease females/gay men with a single character. But the fact that Little Mac isn't an isolated instance makes me all the more uncomfortable. Below, we also have the likes of the new burly Ike, and the somewhat newly revealed Captain Falcon.
I have the same problem with Ike as I do Little Mac. Ike had a perfect, nonsexual design in the past; why did the developers feel the need to put him on steroids, when his past design was a very moderately depicted character that did him justice on a personal level? Adding MORE overly-toned muscles is something that was completely unnecessary, and does nothing but further pander to a sex-crazed audience that shouldn't exist.
Captain Falcon is even WORSE, being shown in disgusting sexual poses that do nothing but pay disgrace to his series and his character. What guy's rear-end really looks like that? And the nipples and perfect abs make the sexual positions even worse. Yuck.
But it doesn't even end there! Just when you thought the sexist pandering was over with the above three, we get yet ANOTHER instance, being revealed just yesterday:
There is so much wrong with this picture, I hardly know where to begin. First of all, having Shulk in a swimsuit is completely pointless. It has no advantage in combat, and what male would ever wear just a SWIMSUIT into battle? Not only is this completely inaccurate, it's entirely impractical and insulting to other males who might not have the same assets as Shulk. Second of all, this completely discounts Shulk as a character. Having played and enjoyed Xenoblade, Shulk is portrayed as a strong-willed, independent man who is actually rather easy to relate to. But instead, he's been reduced to nothing more than a body and a revealing swimsuit, furthering the insult to an awesome character that I totally didn't make up character traits for in my head. Thirdly, the sexual implications of this picture are DISGUSTING. A swimsuit Shulk getting ready to pounce on a helpless, unconscious Luigi.... I have nothing wrong with subtle gay messaging, but to reduce a character like Shulk to something like this makes me sick to my stomach, especially since I like him so much. Just...... bleh.
Like I said at the beginning, this issue of over-sexualization of the male body isn't exclusive to just Smash; it's rampant in other series, particularly fighting games. I'm not the kind of person that's going to create a petition or anything, but I feel as if this really needs to be said. Do you agree that males are misrepresented in today's gaming industry? And, more importantly, do you endorse this kind of treatment of the male body in future games?
Ever since Little Mac was officially revealed, I couldn't help but feel inadequate because of his design. As you can probably tell from the screenshots below, there's a major thing I take issue with:
If it's not obvious, Little Mac is being portrayed with massive muscles, and being able to uppercut "lesser" individuals that aren't as strong as him. Yes, I understand that some men in real life have these proportions; but is it really necessary to portray a man in such a way in this video game when such a small part of the male population has as well developed muscles as him? It's obvious, in Smash 4, that other males don't need these muscles in order to potentially succeed in a fight. So why take what's commonly viewed as sexually desirable, male muscles, and exaggerate them in such a way that makes players like me feel inadequate? This is obvious pandering to the female audience, and, in essence, down-values Little Mac as a character to just a mass of sex-appeal muscles.
But really, I could look past one instance. Yeah, I get that sex sells, and they might want to appease females/gay men with a single character. But the fact that Little Mac isn't an isolated instance makes me all the more uncomfortable. Below, we also have the likes of the new burly Ike, and the somewhat newly revealed Captain Falcon.
I have the same problem with Ike as I do Little Mac. Ike had a perfect, nonsexual design in the past; why did the developers feel the need to put him on steroids, when his past design was a very moderately depicted character that did him justice on a personal level? Adding MORE overly-toned muscles is something that was completely unnecessary, and does nothing but further pander to a sex-crazed audience that shouldn't exist.
Captain Falcon is even WORSE, being shown in disgusting sexual poses that do nothing but pay disgrace to his series and his character. What guy's rear-end really looks like that? And the nipples and perfect abs make the sexual positions even worse. Yuck.
But it doesn't even end there! Just when you thought the sexist pandering was over with the above three, we get yet ANOTHER instance, being revealed just yesterday:
There is so much wrong with this picture, I hardly know where to begin. First of all, having Shulk in a swimsuit is completely pointless. It has no advantage in combat, and what male would ever wear just a SWIMSUIT into battle? Not only is this completely inaccurate, it's entirely impractical and insulting to other males who might not have the same assets as Shulk. Second of all, this completely discounts Shulk as a character. Having played and enjoyed Xenoblade, Shulk is portrayed as a strong-willed, independent man who is actually rather easy to relate to. But instead, he's been reduced to nothing more than a body and a revealing swimsuit, furthering the insult to an awesome character that I totally didn't make up character traits for in my head. Thirdly, the sexual implications of this picture are DISGUSTING. A swimsuit Shulk getting ready to pounce on a helpless, unconscious Luigi.... I have nothing wrong with subtle gay messaging, but to reduce a character like Shulk to something like this makes me sick to my stomach, especially since I like him so much. Just...... bleh.
Like I said at the beginning, this issue of over-sexualization of the male body isn't exclusive to just Smash; it's rampant in other series, particularly fighting games. I'm not the kind of person that's going to create a petition or anything, but I feel as if this really needs to be said. Do you agree that males are misrepresented in today's gaming industry? And, more importantly, do you endorse this kind of treatment of the male body in future games?
