"Male Protagonist" Tag

[Schorl Tourmaline]

I was in the store earlier today, and I was looking at some games, and after clicking on a game that looked fairly interesting, I noticed in the tags there was one that stated "Female Protagonist". This immediately made me think "Huh, I wonder if there is a male protagonist tag", as far as I could see, there wasn't.

While I personally don't see the point of gendered tags, as I'm in the idea that the gender of the character you play as is not important, I suppose that some people would want to play as, or not play as, particular genders of characters, and since not all games that don't have female main characters default to male protagonists, it might be a good idea to have a "Male Protagonist" tag to identify which ones do, so someone doesn't accidentally play as Gordon Freeman when they were thinking that they'd be playing Alyx, or vice versa.

[Schorl Tourmaline]

AustrAlien2010 původně napsal:

Have you been reporting them tags yet? As we told you to do?

If I were to report them, what difference would it make? I hate to say it, but while the tags are silly and pointless, they are also apt to the games that have them. I doubt Steam would go out of their way to remove a tag for a game that actually explains what is in the game.

[AustrAlien2010]

Nothing. Whatever you do will not make any difference, because you would be fighting windmills, and bringing water to the sea. Regardless, talking about it doesn't do anything either, because the people will not change their behaviour, and they will keep adding those tags anyway, even if it doesn't make sense, they will continue doing this, because they are used to doing that, and they do what they think is right.

You can either join them, and start tagging yourself too, by doing the opposite thing they do, or you can ignore them. That's the only choice you have.

I know its unacceptable, but we can only accept what the majority decides for us what is right, even if its not right, because that's how a group of people works; the majority decides what is good, and what is bad. If the majority is wrong, then we have to accept their failure, because nobody has time to correct all mistakes.

If you follow this thread, and you will see that many people, that have a traditional way of thinking, and their minds cannot be changed with a forum post, because its impossible to reach and change all their minds at once. And even we could, we would still have a legacy of old tags to deal with, that are easily adopted by a new generation. And so, this cycle continues indefinitely. Or at least, so it seems.

[cinedine]

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

However, I don't think anyone plays a game SIMPLY because the protagonist is male or female, and even games that have notable female main characters (Metroid, Tomb Raider, Fatal Frame, ect) are not played because the main characters are female, but because the characters are likable and the gameplay is good.

Yeah ... no. As mentioned before, publishers have a notion that games with female characters (unless sexdolls like Lara Croft initially) don't sell. That notion doesn't come out of the blue. Especially if you combine it with ethnicity or sexual orientation.
There are still more than enough "gamers" who think their ♥♥♥♥ will fall off if they play a female character.

[Crashed]

cinedine původně napsal:

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

However, I don't think anyone plays a game SIMPLY because the protagonist is male or female, and even games that have notable female main characters (Metroid, Tomb Raider, Fatal Frame, ect) are not played because the main characters are female, but because the characters are likable and the gameplay is good.

Yeah ... no. As mentioned before, publishers have a notion that games with female characters (unless sexdolls like Lara Croft initially) don't sell. That notion doesn't come out of the blue. Especially if you combine it with ethnicity or sexual orientation.
There are still more than enough "gamers" who think their ♥♥♥♥ will fall off if they play a female character.

How long until they realized the protagonist of Metroid is female, especially if they started off with the first one?

[davidb11]

cinedine původně napsal:

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

However, I don't think anyone plays a game SIMPLY because the protagonist is male or female, and even games that have notable female main characters (Metroid, Tomb Raider, Fatal Frame, ect) are not played because the main characters are female, but because the characters are likable and the gameplay is good.

Yeah ... no. As mentioned before, publishers have a notion that games with female characters (unless sexdolls like Lara Croft initially) don't sell. That notion doesn't come out of the blue. Especially if you combine it with ethnicity or sexual orientation.
There are still more than enough "gamers" who think their ♥♥♥♥ will fall off if they play a female character.

I don't know what you mean. I've never heard of this idea that publishers would think like that.
And why claim Lara Croft was a sexdoll initially? That doesn't make any sense.

[Tito Shivan]

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

Yeah, but ya see, the entire point of my post was to point out how silly it is to have a separation of male and female protagonists in the first place, because those things really shouldn't matter when it comes to a game.

To you...

To others, it does matter.

Always keep in mind 'gamers' are a WAY more heterogeneous group of people than you can imagine.

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

However, I don't think anyone plays a game SIMPLY because the protagonist is male or female, and even games that have notable female main characters (Metroid, Tomb Raider, Fatal Frame, ect) are not played because the main characters are female, but because the characters are likable and the gameplay is good.

You're again infering your own bias in a hobby which is played bi millions of people from a multitude of social, cultural backgrounds and ages from kids to old people.

Stop thinking every gamer fits into the same shoe.

[ElvisDeadly]

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

The tag "Sexy Anime Girls" would be a better tag, because people actually do play games that are essentially waifu collectors, and it would help them find them easier.

Except the tag "Sexy Anime Girls" wouldn't be a very good description of Tomb Raider or Life is Strange or any of the many other games with the "Female Protaganist" tag would it?

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

Would Duke Nukem be any better if Duke was a woman with the exact same personality?

Well we can test that one at least,

https://store.steampowered.com/app/434050/Duke_Nukem_3D_20th_Anniversary_World_Tour/

https://store.steampowered.com/app/562860/Ion_Fury/

[PHOBIE]

A constructive way to go about this was to encourage developers to put more work into character choice, such as male, female, android, robot, kid, young, middle, old. On the other hand some stories just work better with fixed archetypes like grandpa telling a story to kid, like in a demo of a recent toy workshop game.

[Schorl Tourmaline]

ElvisDeadly původně napsal:

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

The tag "Sexy Anime Girls" would be a better tag, because people actually do play games that are essentially waifu collectors, and it would help them find them easier.

Except the tag "Sexy Anime Girls" wouldn't be a very good description of Tomb Raider or Life is Strange or any of the many other games with the "Female Protaganist" tag would it?

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

Would Duke Nukem be any better if Duke was a woman with the exact same personality?

Well we can test that one at least,

https://store.steampowered.com/app/434050/Duke_Nukem_3D_20th_Anniversary_World_Tour/

https://store.steampowered.com/app/562860/Ion_Fury/

Dude, I'm not sure what point you were getting at, but that Ion Fury game looks pretty hype from the trailer.

[ElvisDeadly]

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

Dude, I'm not sure what point you were getting at, but that Ion Fury game looks pretty hype from the trailer.

It's a great, if a little buggy, game if you enjoy a retro shooter.

I just thought it was funny because Ion Fury is pretty much the answer to the question "Would Duke Nukem be any better if Duke was a woman with the exact same personality?" because that's pretty much exactly what it is.

[AustrAlien2010]

What if Bombshell ends up to be a male? I wonder what they will do with the tag. If they would keep it or not.

Also, there are titles such as the Talos Principle, which don't fit in either category.

[davidb11]

Yeah. Shelly in Ion Fury is literally a female Duke Nukem, except she would not chew cigars. :P
That's literally the only difference.

[Garou]

Usually if there is no female protagonist tag it is a male protagonist game or both. But if you want to see games where it is exclusively just a male hero this could be useful. If enough people care.

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

Quint the Alligator Snapper původně napsal:

I think there should be a Male Protagonist tag to complement the existing Female Protagonist tag. And there should also be a tag for Gender Choice, too.

OP, you can help make it a thing by tagging games that way yourself. Other people have also suggested this, so you might be able to make it happen.

Yeah, but ya see, the entire point of my post was to point out how silly it is to have a separation of male and female protagonists in the first place, because those things really shouldn't matter when it comes to a game. The tag "Sexy Anime Girls" would be a better tag, because people actually do play games that are essentially waifu collectors, and it would help them find them easier.

There already is the "Anime" tag, which can then be combined with other tags like Visual Novel or Dating Sim or such.

Perhaps not exactly a search strictly and comprehensively for "Sexy Anime Girls", but I surmise that it works well enough.

Schorl Tourmaline původně napsal:

However, I don't think anyone plays a game SIMPLY because the protagonist is male or female, and even games that have notable female main characters (Metroid, Tomb Raider, Fatal Frame, ect) are not played because the main characters are female, but because the characters are likable and the gameplay is good. Would Duke Nukem be any better if Duke was a woman with the exact same personality? To most people, it would probably make no difference.

Like I mentioned, the tag can be combined with other tags.

For example, if I'm looking for a game where I get to play as a female knight, I can search for Female Protagonist + Fantasy, which gets me close enough where I can look through the individual search results to see which ones star a character wearing armor.

I mean, you could say this about many other tags. People don't play games solely because the game is 2D or 3D, for example, but both of those tags exist. And this even applies to some of Steam's default/original genre tags, which have been applied way too wide to be of much use on their own -- tags like Action, Adventure, Casual, and Indie.

[Gus the Crocodile]

The whole point of the tag system is that tags allow categorisation in ways that matter to some people but not others. People are different, and we prioritise different things. If you're not interested in the distinction a tag is making, you can just... not use that tag to find things. That's fine! That's normal! It doesn't exist so as "not to offend", it exists because people actively wanted it to exist.