Don’t Hate The Player

This article was originally published by Align Magazine.

By Sydney Seymour 

The allure of video games lies in their ability to transport players to new realities. Gamers simulate and explore fantasy worlds by taking on roles of characters. They create characters, build their strength and skills, gain levels, collect skins, and compete. Players have the power to live in completely different realms; realms in which they can do or be anything they want, even the impossible. For many, video games are an escape. 

Online gaming was introduced in the 1990s when the internet became mainstream. By the 90s, the gaming industry was three decades old and had just suffered from its biggest crash in the market. Revenues dropped 97% and companies went bankrupt. So how did the industry recover and reach its highest-grossing period in the 90s? Companies targeted one specific audience: straight, white males. Back then, online video games were designed by men and for men. Eventually, gender and cultural stereotypes formed within the gaming industry. 

In the 90s, Nintendo introduced its first console, the Gameboy, and sold one million units within a few weeks. The Nintendo 64 and Sony’s PlayStation became the biggest gaming systems of the 90s. In 2002, professors Berrin Beasley and Tracy Collins-Standley, studied gender stereotypes in Nintendo and PlayStation games. They revealed 13% of characters were female. Nearly half of female characters had a big bust and 85% wore a top with a low neckline. Female characters wore less clothing and showed more skin. This carried strong sexual meanings for boys who played these games. According to Beasley and Collins-Standley, boys started to accept the idea women were weak, sexual objects. 

In the 90s, video games such as Super Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog, Legend of Zelda, and more cast young males in lead roles. Female characters were unplayable and unimportant. In 1998, Tracy Dietz from the University of Central Florida examined 33 video games from Nintendo and Sega Genesis. She found no female characters in 41% of the games. Dietz revealed 28% of games portrayed women as sexual objects, and 21% portrayed them as damsels in distress. Female victims needed rescuing and were princesses of a kingdom or threatened by a villain or gang. Hypersexualized bodies and stereotypical roles fueled toxic masculinity. Young male gamers learned to treat women with aggression and violence. 

Even though sexism in games escalated, women played first-person shooters, survival horror, sports games, and action-adventure games. Teenage girls jumped into virtual worlds with sexualized female characters. They played as women with large breasts, slim waists, and exaggerated hips. Young female gamers could have perceived these appearances as healthy bodies. Unrealistic bodies and proportions can harm a player’s body image and self-esteem. 

At the University of Oregon, Galloway is the only female player on their Overwatch esports team. “I struggled with my own body image and playing as this perfect, beautiful character all day does get to you,” Galloway said. “Every female character was super skinny. They had little hourglass shapes; perfect bodies and perfect everything.” 

Today’s misogynistic and immature gamer culture stems from the misrepresentation of women in games. Female gamers experience more toxicity, hate, and harassment compared to male gamers. A certain stigma is attached to being a female gamer. Amanda Cote, a UO professor, interviewed 37 female gamers and found most feel online gaming is still a male-dominated space. Interviewees face assault threats, unwanted attention, trash talk, cheating accusations, and other obstacles. 

Some women block harassers, seek help, or stand up for themselves, while others ignore hate and harassment. Galloway switches between games if they become toxic and plays with people who will defend and support her. She also avoids verbal communication. “I was always afraid to use my mic and communicate,” Galloway said. “I never spoke so I was never harassed.” A 2022 survey by FandomSpot found only 22% of women feel comfortable using their mics to communicate with other players. 

To conceal their identity, female gamers use gender-neutral screen names. According to FandomSpot, 76% of female gamers hide their gender while playing online. Galloway changed her username from ChristyCat to Rain. “I just felt safer under a different identity,” she said. “The few times I would be brave and talk to my teammates, they would say ‘Is that a gamer girl? Do we have an e-girl?’ I thought we were past this.” 

When the term “gamer girl” first emerged, women embraced it and used it to identify themselves and their community. Over time, it picked up negative connotations. It differentiated female gamers from the male-dominated “gamer” culture. Male gamers believed “gamer girls'' weren't real gamers at all. Online players used the term to criticize a female player’s competence and lower their status. Now, female gamers consider their gender to be irrelevant and just want to be called gamers. 

Further, women rely on their skills to prove themselves as hardcore gamers and outplay their male counterparts. “We over-perform to be seen as an equal,” Galloway said. “There’s pressure to play well to break the stereotype. People think because I’m a girl, I’m bad at the game.”

Even though female gamers are as skilled as male gamers, professional gaming spaces exhibit large gender gaps. According to Dexerto, 19% of Twitch streamers are female. Out of the top 100 Twitch creators, three are women. In 2021, the BBC reported 5% of competitive esports players are women. It’s difficult for women to find success within professional gaming because of the lack of female role models and the risk of hate and harassment. 

Out of 3 billion gamers across the world, almost half of them are women, according to the Entertainment Software Association. Yet, gaming spaces perpetuate sexism and stereotypes. The $200 billion industry continues to create content for the male audience, not women and minorities. Toxic masculinity dominates gamer culture. Players are unable to enjoy and engage in all aspects of gaming because of hate and harassment. To overcome its biggest criticisms, the gaming industry needs to realistically represent all identities so players can perceive genders, cultures, and bodies without stereotypes.