Upcoming Games Featuring Female Protagonists
- Thread starter RedPanda4
- Start date
There's also The Last of Us: Part II (featuring Ellie as the main, playable protagonist, or so we know so far) as well as Shadow of the Tomb Raider.
Super excited for The Last of Us: Part II. I like how the game is taking the close quarters combat with more detail, such as the ability to dodge/weave incoming attacks, with smarter enemies and an improved stealth system. I also like how we get to see Ellie grow up. It was interesting in The Last of Us, Joel and Ellie almost had a role reversal, of sorts. At the beginning of the story, Joel is a hardened survivor who has essentially left his humanity behind, while Ellie is an innocent girl.
Over the course of their adventure, Ellie is forced to do terrible things (while also experiencing horrific ordeals) in order to survive, becoming a hardened, almost emotionless survivor herself, while Joel regains his humanity and finds a purpose. I'm interested to see the dynamics between Ellie and Joel in Part II.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider... I'm not really looking forward to. I absolutely loved the original 2013 reboot of Tomb Raider, but I was so disappointed with Rise of the Tomb Raider. Maybe I over hyped the game for myself but to tell you the truth, Rise of the Tomb Raider for me, was a chore of a game to play.
Cyberpunk 2077, even though we've seen zero game play, looks and sounds amazing. The setting is great and I love CD Projekt Red, they are fantastic developers. I trust them completely with this one.
I have no interest in Assassin's Creed: Odyssey and Battlefield V. In regards to the controversy of Battlefield V (how people are complaining about female characters/soldiers running around, apparently not being "historically accurate" etc.), they should seriously just get over it. It's just a Goddamn game.
The only thing I found questionable or eyebrow raising in the latest Battlefield V trailer, is one of the characters has a prosthetic arm and a crude looking one at that... I would have thought that any soldier during that time with a missing limb (or/and a prosthetic) wouldn't be allowed to fight and would be discharged? I dunno. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I guess at the end of the day like I said before, it's just a game.
Super excited for The Last of Us: Part II. I like how the game is taking the close quarters combat with more detail, such as the ability to dodge/weave incoming attacks, with smarter enemies and an improved stealth system. I also like how we get to see Ellie grow up. It was interesting in The Last of Us, Joel and Ellie almost had a role reversal, of sorts. At the beginning of the story, Joel is a hardened survivor who has essentially left his humanity behind, while Ellie is an innocent girl.
Over the course of their adventure, Ellie is forced to do terrible things (while also experiencing horrific ordeals) in order to survive, becoming a hardened, almost emotionless survivor herself, while Joel regains his humanity and finds a purpose. I'm interested to see the dynamics between Ellie and Joel in Part II.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider... I'm not really looking forward to. I absolutely loved the original 2013 reboot of Tomb Raider, but I was so disappointed with Rise of the Tomb Raider. Maybe I over hyped the game for myself but to tell you the truth, Rise of the Tomb Raider for me, was a chore of a game to play.
Cyberpunk 2077, even though we've seen zero game play, looks and sounds amazing. The setting is great and I love CD Projekt Red, they are fantastic developers. I trust them completely with this one.
I have no interest in Assassin's Creed: Odyssey and Battlefield V. In regards to the controversy of Battlefield V (how people are complaining about female characters/soldiers running around, apparently not being "historically accurate" etc.), they should seriously just get over it. It's just a Goddamn game.
The only thing I found questionable or eyebrow raising in the latest Battlefield V trailer, is one of the characters has a prosthetic arm and a crude looking one at that... I would have thought that any soldier during that time with a missing limb (or/and a prosthetic) wouldn't be allowed to fight and would be discharged? I dunno. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I guess at the end of the day like I said before, it's just a game.
You also wouldn't have women on the front lines of combat if it was a regimented military force.
However, in a resistance/occupation situation, you take any able body that's capable of picking up a gun and fighting.
That said, it was pretty clearly meant to show off the customization options more than anything else. So we shall see how that game goes. I'll probably get it.
However, in a resistance/occupation situation, you take any able body that's capable of picking up a gun and fighting.
That said, it was pretty clearly meant to show off the customization options more than anything else. So we shall see how that game goes. I'll probably get it.
I might pass. I haven't played a Battlefield game since Battlefield 2 on both PC and PS2. I'd rather play a game like Battlefield on PC, but my poor PC sucks.
Yeah, that's absolutely fair.
I got BF1 and adore it, but even on my rig (which, while good, is creeping up on 6 years old with only minimal upgrades/replacements) it struggles occasionally.
So I'll probably get it on sale.
I got BF1 and adore it, but even on my rig (which, while good, is creeping up on 6 years old with only minimal upgrades/replacements) it struggles occasionally.
So I'll probably get it on sale.
I thought I read Cyberpunk had both a female and male option for the player?
COMaestro
Veteran
That's what I've heard.
What's funny is all the games in the original post have the option to be male or female.
Which, honestly, is probably the best way to do it.
Which, honestly, is probably the best way to do it.
COMaestro
Veteran
Obviously, the more narrative-focused a game is, the harder it will be to have a gender option for the protagonist. Uncharted, for instance, I don't think would have worked at first had you been given the option of playing as a male or female, unless they made divergent paths for Nate and Elena, for instance, and you could only get the whole story by playing both characters. Just gender swapping Drake would force changes in the character interactions. It could be done, but it'd be a PITA, and would probably be poorly executed by many developers.
You are correct. The protagonist "V" is a character created by the player and is either male or female.
I also agree with COMaestro that games that allow for a gender swap would be difficult for games with a more narrative-based structure, such as the Uncharted series. RPG's however, like Fallout or Cyberpunk 2077, make a lot of sense.
The_bad_who
Novice
I think it's great that female protagonist have a bigger place in today's games. I just hope it's not just a passing phase thing. For my part, whenever I play an RPG, I go 50% on the time with a female, alternating between male the other 50%. I told someone just a couple days ago that I played Fallout New Vegas as a female originally, and that I murdered Benny in his sleep without lifting a finger with the Balck Widow perk. He sincerely did not know something like this even existed in the game. I can't wait to play The Last Of Us 2 as Ellie. I does bring a whole new perspective as a male when I play a female protagonist in a more scripted game like this.
MichaelLeri
Novice
I think it's rad as hell. It's good to see games spread out and be more progressive. It'll change the types of stories we see as well as the perspective stories take place in. Of course, diversity in the writer's room and dev is important too since it'll make these viewpoints more authentic but this is a great start.
When games offer the opportunity to choose between male and female, I usually go female. My partner watches me play a lot of games (she is a gamer as well but she plays other games - she'll play Overwatch or Kingdom Hearts 2.5 while I'll play Far Cry 5 or God of War, for example), so I usually ask her "Male or female?" and she'll usually say female.
Some games that offer this choice, the female version is so much better than the male, like picking female Shepard over male Shepard in the Mass Effect trilogy.
For Cyberpunk 2077 though, I kinda wanna roll as a male, but we'll see.
While I agree that not EVERY story can let you choose between a male and female character, like God of War for example just wouldn't be the same (or most Dad simulators, for that matter) it has been refreshing to have a variety of protagonists.
Typically, I definitely find I play as female characters more when given the choice, because I find that female voice actors are usually better, they have way better customization options, and because why not?
If I wanted to be a badass white guy with a beard I'd just hit the gym and become Craig.
Typically, I definitely find I play as female characters more when given the choice, because I find that female voice actors are usually better, they have way better customization options, and because why not?
If I wanted to be a badass white guy with a beard I'd just hit the gym and become Craig.
As much as I appreciate that, I can't grow a beard to save my life. I look like a fifteen year old going through puberty.
Dammit! I was so close!
The_bad_who
Novice
Now that's funny! It the same for me. My girlfriend is not a huge gamer, but she likes watching RPGs and what she likes the most is designing the character. She often ask me to go with a female too. She usually sticks around the fist 3-5 hours and then I'm stuck with her design for the other 50!
Tyrranis
Veteran
Well, it doesn't have a traditional male-or-female protag option, but Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night has a female protagonist, and if the met Kickstarter goals are to be believed, there's going to be additional playable characters, so there's that.
In fact, quite a few indie/kickstarted games seem to have female player characters. Indivisible, Bloodstained, Shantae, A Hat in Time...
In fact, quite a few indie/kickstarted games seem to have female player characters. Indivisible, Bloodstained, Shantae, A Hat in Time...
Dex was an interesting indie title, developed by Dreadlocks Ltd. and was also crowd funded on Kickstarter, released in 2015. Dex had a really cool premises, it was a futuristic, cyberpunk RPG that was played in a 2D platforming-style format with awesome digitally painted characters and backgrounds, featuring the blue haired, titular female protagonist, Dex.
I saw the trailer on PSN and fell in love with the game and without even bothering to check reviews, I bought / downloaded the game for my PS4. Unfortunately... Dex is heavily flawed. When I decided to check out reviews later on, I found that most of them were quite mixed.
What I found in Dex, despite the awesome presentation and setting, was an incoherent story, bad writing/voice acting, an unbalanced skill system, lots of bugs (a bug that happened often would see enemies completely untouchable, but they'd still have the ability to hurt me) and no replay value. It was unfortunately a disappointing experience, overall.
If the developers cleaned the game up in terms of skill balance and the almighty amount of bugs, Dex would be an enjoyable game to play, even with its dodgy story and character performances.
The original “Tomb Raider” came out in 1996 and was an industry changer for being one of the rare games to feature an exclusively female protagonist. Now over 20 years later, Lara is continuing to make an impact in games thanks to her role in the rebooted “Tomb Raider” games that feature a more grounded and realistic depiction of the explorer. The games have won awards for their writing and have proven to still be so popular that Microsoft shelled out money to make “Rise of the Tomb Raider” an exclusive title on the Xbox One for around a year. Plex Kodi Lucky Patcher
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