Top 10 Female Protagonists in Video Games [WatchMojo's version] - General

[video=youtube;kCLVrRFuvjY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCLVrRFuvjY[/video] These ladies know how to take the lead, and don't need to be second to a male escort.

I.E. Female characters we've seen in other Top 10 lists.

Hate it when someone posts a WatchMojo video, I can't fucking stop watching them now. :v:

Faith from Mirror's Edge is quite possibly the most bland female character I've ever played as.

"But without question the best iteration of Lara has come in the form of her 2013 reboot appearance." Is it because they made her weak and vulnerable like a "real woman"?

How was Chell on the list? She's a complete non-character, Gordon Freeman has more personality than she does.

Oh joy, another WatchMojo list filled with everything cliche and characters that appear on almost every Top 10 list, almost in the same order as well.

Really chell? She hardly has any character at all. She's just a puppet for the player to play as.

Pretty sad that misogynistic characters like Lara, Samus and Faith get hailed as strong female characters when they would be laughed out of any other medium.

[t]http://i.imgur.com/uSpfVYy.jpg[/t]

Oh, fuck. Here it goes. We can't enjoy characters, female or otherwise, without THIS shit happening. I swear to Christ... first page is already rumbling with the extremist, feminist bullshit that everyone hates.

[QUOTE=Jackald;45247976]2013 Lara was terrible, I hate how everyone jerks over how "unsexist" she is compared to old Lara. [img]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10001051/tombraider.png[/img][/QUOTE] 2013 Lara provided depth. Old Lara was cardboard.

[QUOTE=MoonlessNight;45247643]"But without question the best iteration of Lara has come in the form of her 2013 reboot appearance." Is it because they made her weak and vulnerable like a "real woman"?[/QUOTE] This is a common observation made by those who haven't played the game.

Missing out truly great female characters like Cate Archer off No One Lives Forever. The dry sarcasm and whacky 60s atmosphere made NOLF truly great.

[QUOTE=Janus Vesta;45247668]How was Chell on the list? She's a complete non-character, Gordon Freeman has more personality than she does.[/QUOTE] "She only makes the ninth spot, because she's still a silent protagonist, thus lose's marks for personality."

No mention of Heather Mason from Silent Hill 3?

[QUOTE=LegndNikko;45248001]2013 Lara provided depth. Old Lara was cardboard.[/QUOTE] In what way did she have "depth"? I haven't played the game.

Every time one of these lists includes Lara Croft, Chell or Faith it's immediately wrong because all three of these characters are fucking cardboard. Chell is literally built around being a silent protagonist. Faith is bland as fuck. Lara Croft has always been and will always be a shitty characters because the only two things you can do with her is either make her an immense badass that's a stereotype in itself, or make her a weakling that eventually grows into an immense badass - there isn't even a need for Lara Croft to be a good character, she's an excuse to bring the player to pretty locations where weird shit including but not limited to tomb raiding shenanigans happen. To be fairly honest as far as video games go the main character is rarely the most interesting part of any story, which is why there's so few good female playable characters in video games (there isn't that many good male playable characters in video games either). Like, seriously, take the example of Portal. Chell is the most boring fucking character in existence (which was basically a design decision from the start, hence her name), while GladOs is actually a lot more interesting and despite not being the protagonist (as in not being the PC). Hell, GladOs actually has proper character development, she goes through two character arcs in the two games, she has a defined past and her actions have a rhyme and reason. She is a thousand times more interesting than Chell will ever be.

[QUOTE=Dub!;45248028]"She only makes the ninth spot, because she's still a silent protagonist, thus lose's marks for personality."[/QUOTE] ...Yeah, that just makes him look worse. "I know she's a silent protagonist, but I'm putting her on here, anyway."

I like 1990's Lara Croft. A character who is willing to be fun and give out snarky comments is a hell of a lot more appealing than a character whose whole character is struggling though a depressing environment.

[QUOTE=Ganerumo;45248225]Every time one of these lists includes Lara Croft, Chell or Faith it's immediately wrong because all three of these characters are fucking cardboard. Chell is literally built around being a silent protagonist. Faith is bland as fuck. Lara Croft has always been and will always be a shitty characters because the only two things you can do with her is either make her an immense badass that's a stereotype in itself, or make her a weakling that eventually grows into an immense badass - there isn't even a need for Lara Croft to be a good character, she's an excuse to bring the player to pretty locations where weird shit including but not limited to tomb raiding shenanigans happen. To be fairly honest as far as video games go the main character is rarely the most interesting part of any story, which is why there's so few good female playable characters in video games (there isn't that many good male playable characters in video games either). Like, seriously, take the example of Portal. Chell is the most boring fucking character in existence (which was basically a design decision from the start, hence her name), while GladOs is actually a lot more interesting and despite not being the protagonist (as in not being the PC). Hell, GladOs actually has proper character development, she goes through two character arcs in the two games, she has a defined past and her actions have a rhyme and reason. She is a thousand times more interesting than Chell will ever be.[/QUOTE] The way i see ones like Chell and Faith, though, is that all in all the games weren't about [I]them[/I], per se. Mirror's Edge, imo, was more about the beautiful art style and world and amazing freerunning system more than her and the, admittedly bad, story. Same with Chell, Portal and Portal 2 were all about the Portal system and the story behind GlaDOS and Aperture than they were about Chell and her life. Basically what i'm saying is they were just vehicles for the game playing out around you, rather than decent characters themselves. If any of this makes sense.

[QUOTE=DeVotchKa;45248848]The way i see ones like Chell and Faith, though, is that all in all the games weren't about [I]them[/I], per se. Mirror's Edge, imo, was more about the beautiful art style and world and amazing freerunning system more than her and the, admittedly bad, story. Same with Chell, Portal and Portal 2 were all about the Portal system and the story behind GlaDOS and Aperture than they were about Chell and her life. Basically what i'm saying is they were just vehicles for the game playing out around you, rather than decent characters themselves. If any of this makes sense.[/QUOTE] That's literally what he was saying.

[QUOTE=Jackald;45247976]2013 Lara was terrible, I hate how everyone jerks over how "unsexist" she is compared to old Lara. [img]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10001051/tombraider.png[/img][/QUOTE] [quote]I mean fuck, guys. Instead of crying about entitlement and misogyny, why don't they point to older games like these and go 'this is how you do it'?[/quote] Because character designs that exist almost solely to attract straight male consumers by sexualizing a female character aren't the way to go in an increasingly diverse form of media. I'm not criticizing the creators of Lara Croft (after all, her design is merely a product of the times), but Lara Croft isn't exactly an example of what you should be doing nowadays. [QUOTE=MrHeadHopper;45247996]Oh, fuck. Here it goes. We can't enjoy characters, female or otherwise, without THIS shit happening. I swear to Christ... first page is already rumbling with the extremist, feminist bullshit that everyone hates.[/QUOTE] How the fuck is anything that has been said extremist?

[QUOTE=LegndNikko;45248001]2013 Lara provided depth. Old Lara was cardboard.[/QUOTE] my favorite scene was when Lara killed a deer with a bow and arrow, and in the process, developed the ability to use every gun like John Rambo and developed a killer instinct to kill everyone on the island brutally and violently It's so dense. Every scene in the game has so many things going on.

[QUOTE=Diet Kane;45249150]my favorite scene was when Lara killed a deer with a bow and arrow, and in the process, developed the ability to use every gun like John Rambo and developed a killer instinct to kill everyone on the island brutally and violently It's so dense. Every scene in the game has so many things going on.[/QUOTE] There's a definite disconnect between the story and the gameplay (at least in the early portion), but the game itself said that Lara had been trained to hunt and shoot if I'm not mistaken. Knowing her way around those weapons wasn't all that surprising, even if her relative ease in killing was.

[QUOTE=Jackald;45247976]2013 Lara was terrible, I hate how everyone jerks over how "unsexist" she is compared to old Lara. [img]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10001051/tombraider.png[/img][/QUOTE] wait, how is me(as Lara) putting an arrow in a dudes neck in anyway being oppressed? She's pretty badass for being a 20 something girl. Wimpy my fucking ass.

[QUOTE=Diet Kane;45249150]my favorite scene was when Lara killed a deer with a bow and arrow, and in the process, developed the ability to use every gun like John Rambo and developed a killer instinct to kill everyone on the island brutally and violently It's so dense. Every scene in the game has so many things going on.[/QUOTE] According to the trailer for the new game (the origin story for the origin story) Lara was doing all that shit when she was 14.

[QUOTE=Bread_Baron;45249269]According to the trailer for the new game (the origin story for the origin story) Lara was doing all that shit when she was 14.[/QUOTE] I thought the new one was a direct sequel to the 2013 reboot though? It shows her suffering from PTSD.

[QUOTE=Jackald;45249274]There's a weird disconnect between gameplay and story. In the cutscenes, Lara is a whining mess, in gameplay she's a merciless killer.[/QUOTE] At the end of the game she seems to be coping with what happened really well.

[QUOTE=JeanLuc761;45249284]I thought the new one was a direct sequel to the 2013 reboot though? It shows her suffering from PTSD.[/QUOTE] I just re-watched the trailer and it turns out I couldn't have been more wrong. Damn I fucked up.