Unfortunately, there is a history of portraying Black female characters in Western media as stereotypically masculine and not conventionally attractive compared to their non-Black counterparts. Shame to see Western game developers still feeding into that trope, especially in our supposedly more "woke" era.
I think they are think it's "real" and not a trope. You know, how stereotypes start, but not out of hate but misunderstandings. I'm black and hate chicken and watermelon, but I know a ton who like them, this being both real and a stereotype.
I’m a dark skinned black woman in the US and everything you are saying is 100% true. It’s called colorism. And when we speak up about this topic we get gaslit and silenced. Thank you for bringing this to light and planting the seed for those who don’t believe we go through this.
its not just black women though. look at horizon forbidden west. look at the actress who modeled for alloy, and compare to the result. the character looks nothing like the actress. there's a particularly bad image of alloy laughing that genuinely makes her look like she has gained half her weight and most of it went to her face. and she isnt the only one.
@@marcosdhelenoHe's saying that black women in general get the short end of the stick. There are barely any black female protagonists in gaming and other media and it's more rare for them to be included at all, main character or not. And when they ARE included, half the time it leads to the problems discussed in the video where only light-skinned black women are portrayed as feminine and/or sexy whereas dark-skinned women are often brooding, boring and/or masculine. White women might have an Aloy here and there, but they still have a massive spectrum of representation to pick from and there will never be a shortage of white/light-skinned women in media.
You know the sad thing with Mortal Kombat's Jacqui Briggs? Their concept sketches of her look 100x cooler; she looked really feminine, had cool urban/pan African outfits, and had pretty hairstyles like Afros, long cornrows, and locs. To see her devolve into essentially a female Jax was so disappointing.
what exactly about her is masculine really? i get what you guys are saying in the og video but you cannot look at a black woman and tell her she’s not feminine and think it’s okay.
@rainbowcake3254 Agreed! I agree her portrayal in MKX was kind of lackluster (though I guess in-character for her as a soldier), she looked great in MK11, and didn't strike me as masculine in the slightest. Her costumes with the long locs in particular are really beautiful and elegant.
With Jacqui you can have the starting excuse that she is a military brat that joined the military so that aesthetic permeates her being, which is fine. Except that it doesn't apply to Sonya and Cassie in equal measure, which is very sad.
@@3RayfireRight. If you read their bios, both Sonya and Cassie have mentions of them being attractive. Jacqui's bio doesn't mention her being attractive, but it does have how muscular and strong she is. Interesting note.
I think the Japanese portrayal of black women may have something to do with gyaru culture and Japan's view of foreigners being very outgoing. As for western devs, it might be a result of forced representation, which often leads to stereotypes. It might also have to do with how Japanese and western devs portray women in general. Western devs, by trying to avoid accusations of sexualizing their female characters, often end up making them way too masculine. Japanese devs, on the other hand, try to make their female characters as appealing as possible. At least, that's how I see it.
You are not wrong, Hopfully the west can take a step back and see they went a bit too far in trying not to offend and start making ingaging likable characters again.
There can be a middle ground. They don't have to sexualise characters or make the not look like models but if they do people shoukd he able to complain but shouldn't act like it is wrong. Seriously people should be able to make conventionally unattractive or not model-like female characters like they are able to with male characters. With them being masculine I feel like people just say that about characters they don't find attractive. Like saying a woman with little hair on her face has a beard and is a man. Or saying that women with muscles that don't have fat in places people like are men(sadly I have seen this with real women too)
It also has to do with asian game devs, using black skin as a way to make the characters stand out. Its not a Black character, its a character who is black. Western game devs make a black character, which may sound the same but is very different
I'm glad you brought this up, I've noticed it as well. Black women and men in games are portrayed very differently in Japan vs in the west. Like you said black women are almost always portrayed as butch and masculine and with barely any hair, and the men get portrayed as mostly the same. The Japanese people seem to accentuate what makes us cool, at least to them and the west seems to suck all of our coolness out and make us all the same.
Yeah, they're scared of black coolness because they fear the catch 22. Due to all the virtue signalling backfiring. Like how it happened in the comic "Miles Morales: Thor" went so far it was racist and lame instead of cool. The japanese with their designs aren't scared of the esoteric and the cartoonish. The West is TOO safe and bhind their own trends. Plus they're stuck trying to make dying trends stick
I think its more so that, Japanese developers specifically make the characters and then design it, the characters are “black characters” they are “characters that are black” so there aren’t rules that they “need” to follow they can do what ever they want and this allows for characters are all different styles. Western devs make black characters and that means they have rules women must be strong and proud. And men have to be a “positive” representation. Even though they just end up with 500 characters who look at act the same
@@RusticRonnie The Jp devs really lean into the rule of cool. At this point there's a whole generation of western people that have been starved of it. With so many faux anime knock offs and other projects being so safe its insulting. So the west has an ironic "realism" problem to how they place blackness. Especially the militaristic tropes
Well with the west I don't think they like seeing black men and weman looking cool in video games and movies. They I believe have a certain image in their minds of Black's BEING SLAVE'S AND NOTHING MORE.
@@RusticRonnie Bingo! I think it's ironic that while arguing against stereotypes...a stereotype has been established. Just because all these characters have dark skin, they've all had their cultural significance stripped from them and the narrator just talks about them as if they're "just ni**as", as if all these characters are just colorful versions of African Americans and they actually aren't. Most American games aren't marketed for international audiences, they are made for American sensibilities and those sensibilities are steeped in racist history. Meanwhile these characters that "happen to have dark skin" from Japan aren't African American a lot of the time. When they DO portray African Americans a LOT of the same tropes pop up, for example Sean in street fighter randomly shooting a basketball ball seemingly for no reason other than... he's black. I think it's foolish to believe Japanese Devs just "have more love for black women" which is what's implied from this video.
I LOVE how Japanese artists get so creative with black characters’ hair. Anime and Japanese video games have always been known for some wild hairstyles, and black hair is already so versatile, the combination just makes sense! There’s a lot of great inspiration to bounce off of.
I have mixed feelings regarding this. I 100% agree with the base point but too many people in your comments are acting like this is a woke issue when the reality of the situation is that these stereotypes have been reinforced by western media/society for years. Most of our society has a conceptualized idea of blackness for both men and woman. When these devs are creating their characters, they’re typically drawing from said ideas. This is why black characters often times, at least imo, feel as though they they fall into a different sets of pre-made characteristics. Some are music oriented, The Dj, Jazz dude, musician or dancer. Some are sports based, The athlete, jock, boxer, warrior or fighter. And sometimes we even get the nerd, or the shaman or the militant officer. (None of these are inherently bad, and some even draw from history associated with us and our people. Which is actually fairly interesting.) However, my gripe regarding these is that it feels like, most people don’t push the envelope far enough. Japan draws from these associated tropes as well, however they aren’t as held down by this as the west is. Specifically in the sense that they are more willing to veer outside of these associated tropes because it isn’t as ingrained in their society as it is in ours. Thats why, in their recent games especially, we’ve begun to see an increase in distinctive interpretations of black characters, for both men and woman. I should also add, the black woman in western games aren’t inherently bad either. Lifeline and Bangalore are incredibly good characters personality wise, the issue is the over saturation of specific ideas from dev teams across the board. P.s Nobody has to read this part but I just wanted to add it. My favorite character in recent years has been Isaac from the Netflix Castlevania series. This is because he veers away from tropes typically associated with stereotypical ideas of blackness, while still feeling like a believably black character. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Black male character in an animated series express themselves as intelligently as he does, both in his actions and dialogue. The closet thing Ive ever seen to it might be Blade, but theres still a very clear distinction between them. His mannerisms have more similarities to how Dolores carries herself in Kof. I really hope to see more black characters like them. Speaking of, Darli, Dolores Leroy and Nagoriyuki are some of the best designs we’ve gotten for black characters in recent years and I will fight anyone who thinks otherwise lol.
They had to do something with Issac because he was nothing but fodder in game. The problem is the west plays it's so safe it is insulting. Characters being experts or masters just down played as basic, plus a Sue. Like they're also scared of a black character failing, getting hurt, or being wrong. So it just ends up like blackness = blandness
Maybe the right also likes portraying B women as masculine and extremely unattractive but this "woke" western era certainly loves portraying ANY woman as hideous as possible. Girly characters are disappearing en masse, everyone has to be manly AF now.
Thank you, my thoughts exactly! And let's not forget Japan has had mishaps with stereotypes in the past along with weak options for character customization. The more recent designs we've seen this decade have improved for the better.
@@NeroMai right like they will still have just casual minstrel show looking characters and racism. They aren't perfect and I honest don't even think they're any better when it comes to it tbh
I'm so disappointed that the algorithm ONLY just suggested this video. Let me tell you, this is a breath of fresh air as a black female gamer! I love seeing more in games and hope to see these changes happen more often in the future!
SAME it bothered me ever since I was young I want to see famine black women in videos more than masculine because the Majority of black women are literally feminine and super girly like normal girls who love to dress we are literally trend setters in terms of beauty features the reason why are not see as the standard beauty is because of our skin other whiles our features go viral
I believe some of the uniqueness of Japan's portrayal of black women comes from the influence they have from Brazil and maybe even directly from some African countries, instead of only focusing on black women from the United States. Black, mixed, and dark skinned women in Japanese media are often very warm, upbeat, and bouncy, reflecting that South American culture. I think it's very apparent when you consider just how many capoeira dancing, black Brazilian characters have appeared in Japanese fighting games since forever. On a side note, I found it extremely interesting when you mentioned how militarized and cop-like black women's designs are in western videogames. I feel like that could be a full video on its own.
@@KidPoe no they don't. Japanese ppl in general dont. but CAPCOM does. they want money LOL black women in Japan has horrible dating experience because men assume they are masculine or hypersexual.
As a black girl who lived in Tokyo for 3 to 4 years, maybe the younger genration AT TIMES but there is still extremely racist people there especially to black or half black people and kids, yall gotta stop putting Japan on a pedastal
It's nice to hear men point this out because when black women say this we're usually told by black men to get over it and shut up. As if we're seeing things! It's annoying to be gaslit by so many people. So thank you 😊
I've never seen black men do this. Im not saying you're lying but it must be rare and they are not worthy to be speaking on the matter if they're this dense. This is not just something to "get over"... this has been a real problem since the beginning of media entertainment let alone video games. Both black women and men are depicted in stereotypical ways across the board. Usually as the unattractive side kicks or the delinquents in some manner or opposing gender roles... etc. They dont want to "waste" the star attractive roles on black characters and if they can kill two birds with one stone they will combine black diversity with gay diversity and make the black character gay in some way. (Not saying there's a problem with being gay if that's what you are) but making the black character gay being that black characters are already a minority is BS. This is nothing new and it stems from them not hiring enough black developers that have creative power as well as purposefully wanting society and the world to portray black people in a certain light.
As a black woman I agree to an extent but here are my thoughts on it. The TL;DR is that while it is a frustrating trend and many more Western developers need to seriously step tf up and out the box when it comes to how they design their Black female characters, there is way more nuance to the situation I've only seen a few people in the comments get into. With that out of the way here are some of my connecting points: 1) Shoutout @BlazeWolf9511 and that particular commment thread because they articulate pretty well a lot of the reasons why I have a limit on how much I agree with this and why this issue goes beyond being just chalked up to the "wokeism" takes I keep seeing in the comments. 2) When it comes to the portrayal & design of characters, especially female characters my ROT question will never be "is it realistic?", as many devs and critics claim as the problem b/c its a dumbass question. Its a videogame. I wouldn't expect it to be super realistic, even if its in a realistic setting. Instead that question is "does it make sense given what we know about the character and the overall vibe in the game?". I will never ever be against a sexy or super feminine character, it just gotta respect or at the very least make sense with *that* character and the game they're in. Like with the example given with Nadine, her background is being born into a paramilitary group and eventually becoming the leader of that same group, hinting that she experienced a life of combat since she was young. Alongside the general tone of Uncharted 4 in mind, it wouldn’t make as much sense for her to behave or even be designed in a "properly feminine." way. 3) Women and femininity are not a monolith. They both come in many forms and female characters don't need to be "properly feminine" to be compelling. At least to me. Not trying to be political just pointing that out b/c current design may be a faulty attempt in respecting that. And before somebody asks: I keep putting feminine in quotes because what it means to be feminine varies between people and cultures. 4) Something else to consider and I didnt see many others point out is that there are concerns around oversexualizing black women in media, which is a serious issue because of its history and real life impact. Again, I'm not trying to get political saying this, I'm just pointing this out. The sad part about that is that their attempt to rectify this they played *HEAVILY* into the black women are masculine stereotype, which, while hinted at in this video, is a conversation and a half in itself but we're not gonna get into that b/c this comment is long enough already.
You eloquently explained my thought process about this video!!!! It's a multilayered issue here. While I agree with his point that there is an oversaturation of masculine black female characters in western game design which falls into the negative stereotype that's been historically perpetuated in the States, I also think that going to the other side of the spectrum of creating more "feminine" presenting female characters could also fall into oversexualization of black women as you mentioned. I think the issue should be instead targeted at the dearth of black female characters in games in general. If there was more of a push to include more black female characters and POC we could have a rich variety of women who present with different characteristics ranging from "masculine" and "feminine" and somewhere in between! This I believe would be more conducive to creativity and uniqueness in design.
@nadiaramsingh5717 Thank you! You've eleoquently stated something that has been on my mind since making this post. There definitely needs to be a need to have more Black and POC women in videogames period. However there needs to be as much quality going into these characters as much as there would be quantity. If there are many characters that are less dimensional than a piece of cardboard or rely on stereotypes, then we will be back to square one with this issue. I think that's why characters like Kimberly are so appealing. She's not only attractive and out of the box design wise but there's a lot to her character.
@@katherinedickerson2334I don't disagree with you on most of that. Tho I still see it as a "woke" issue. As you mentioned it's pushed in the west by other black woman. And woman in general. Issues such as me too, fat acceptance, ableism, and boss females. And these issue are used by companies to pander to what they view is as not people but a demographic. The sooner we show these companies, gov., etc that we aren't gonna accept this and learn to stop putting so much emphasis on race as if it's the only thing that makes us US. THEN WE'LL STOP SEEING THESE THINGS
@capt.bellamy5954 I'm of two minds of this. On one hand, you make a point about how we are more than the demographics companies portray us as, and the soon we get them to cut that nonsense out the better. On the other hand, I disagree with the rest. The TL; DR of why is that woke/wokeism is so overused it takes away from the ability to have meaningful conversations about these sorts of issues in videogames. Here is the full explanation: I still strongly disagree with considering "woke" because people have overused that term for anything that is considered remotely "progressive" or "left-leaning" even when it's actually not. So much so that the term has lost its actual meaning and takes away from meaningful dialog about an issue. Also I'm trying to keep this conversation on the matter as politicaly neutral as it can possibly get because of how intensely polarizing this situation can get which also takes away from the conversation. Plus, I never said that this trend was pushed by black women or women in general. Maybe some but more times than not, they're in the minority. And that's where the biggest problem lies. These companies hear these stories, see that there is growing attention for this issue, and want to capitalize on this attention. They make something to try and address this. But because they don't properly listen to these voices(at best just talking to a few voices within their circles that may not represent the majority), barely do any research and are doing this for their own gain, their attempt falls more than flat. It's half assed and, in some cases, more disrespectful than the stereotypes because it's clear they could have done more and chose not to. The more I think about it, the more it pisses me off because nothing sucks more than seeing potential wasted.
JP developers make the best black characters in their games. Beautiful, colourful and fun to watch. Black women supposed to be beautiful and attractive, and JP devs know how to deliver it.
I don’t think we should depend on Japanese DV deliver (they aren’t good story tellers and anime is proof of that blk women don’t need ever more grotesque hypersexualization, we already have that as it is) and black women don’t have to be “beautiful and attractive” to be a good character that everyone likes.
I'm so happy made this video😭I'm in tears because the shit seems true. When Japan designs a character, they them to be appealing, cool or sexual. Mysterious or confident. They don't hide the fact that they love the characters they are making, in the words of Yoko taro; "I like girls" You see these black female characters in a modern western game, and it makes you question these fool the loss of quality in western game
Western devs do it to fill in the diversity quota so they just copy and recycle the "Generic Black Woman Archetype Number 2" to please the broader Western Twitter audience who's never gonna play the game in the first place. Japanese devs do it when they come up with a design they think would be cool and interesting and are not afraid to experiment and take risks to portray them in a way they seem best. Japanese devs are driven by creative freedom and have enough balls to not cater to all the demographics of people at the same time like Western devs do.
@@yungmuney5903 Blizzard announced that they use a quota to decide whether or not character designs are "diverse" enough. You can look it up for yourself.
@@wrestlinganime4life288 Damn I am in an interracial relationship. Madness. Life really works in mysterious ways. What the issue is, really, is black beauty outside of black people. This is what creates and permeates bad characterisations. Neither Senna nor Lucian have dark brown eyes for example even though most black people do. Thats what makes these changes when portraying black women. For the west, blacks are more common and since being black is not usually associated with something good, they overdo it. Whereas to east creators, being black is cool enough because its very distant.
Like always, i really like your videos about black women in videogames. You are right, the majority of western developers have this tendency to make the dark skinned women masculine. Same thing with their personality, most of them are aggressive and self-assured, i would love to see more sweet/insecure characters. I like some strong women but there should be more variety, seeing the same thing over and over became boring
Thank you for watching, and I appreciate the comment. Yes I agree I sure do wish western devs spread out more because at this point they're making it as a common trope.
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I have noticed the same with black male characters, who are nearly always portrayed as nerdy and feminine. Can't have black women be feminine, can't have black men be masculine, apparently.
As a mixed, lightskinned guy, I'll say it. Its all about threat. The threat of being one-upped and replace by the other extreme - black women and style go hand in hand from birth and mass culture bites off that style nonstop. Masculine black men, you probably know the tragic stories first hand about dudes having to make themselves Safe to ... Not be a threat to someone else's standing, and risk making the threatened feel obsolete. The hostility I got growing up from the ones that perceived me as a threat was from darkskinned black fellow kids and school administrators and police. The thought of seeing someone Else with too many perceived stacked bonuses is unsettling, terrifying to many. And game devs and artists are regular ass people, not always great at their jobs and such also, etc. Western games are about excellence of the status quo, japanese games tend to be more willing to do some experimental glamorous shit because they aren't trying to define The Box like we do, and they're master remixers. Forspoken was a really pretty and fun game but Fuck the writers directors producers and anyone else who came up with her background / didn't shoot that shit down.
western videogame Black ladies all have shaved or short hair or afros, but japanese videogame Black ladies all have braids or dreads or cornrows… maybe they need to share hairstyles with eachother
In my opinion, western designs of black women and black people in general are more politically driven. Black women have to be strong and assertive leaders who defy stereotypes (while ironically reinforcing them) while Japan is just going "let's make a fun, sexy girl who our predominantly young male audience would want to take home with them" which ironically makes the characters more 3 dimensional
I feel kind of conflicted about this tbh. As a black woman, I do see the problems of western media's constant masculinization of black women, but I think there is more nuance in the issue. One of western media's biggest problems in portraying black women used to be (and in some cases still is) oversexualization and fetishism. Black women were seen as hyperfeminine, and hypersexual, with accentuated curves, skimpy clothes, and seductive mannerisms and personalities. This modern trend of more masculine, conservative black women is an overcorretion with it's own host of problems, but it is still an attempt at correction regardless. Conversely, in Japanese media it almost feels like they're playing catch up, following some of the same trends as western portayls of black women, but at a different pace. I hesitate to call their characters more quality, because they tend to fall into the same issues as older western character tropes. While the designs tend to be more vibrant, they still fall into their own set of tropes. They tend to be flashy and show a lot of skin, even when they're muscular they're still slim, with sexy hourglass figures, and are often shown posing in ways that accentuate their bodies. There's nothing inherently wrong with any of those qualities, and I recognize that some of this has to do with how women are portrayed in Japanese media in general, which is it's own thing, but still, to me Japanese portayls of black women don't feel more quality, a lot of times they honestly just feel like old stereotypes repackaged; the sexy, flashy, exotic brown woman, with a side of more broad racial stereotypes, like being streetwise graffiti artists or hip hop dancers. I think that both sides could benefit from some of what the other has. There should be more of a mix of these character archetypes, instead of developers constantly leaning so hard one way or the other.
@@imthebossmermaid3648this is so annoying when I see other black women do this. It's like they're regurgitate points without considering the structure they are talking about No, we have not been fetishized in video gaming EVER. We are not the object of desire EVER. NOR CURVY. NOR FEMININE. this is not the appropriate argument here, it's just black women trying to pledge their feminist side to the left and remind the world that "Oh, we are the 'progressive' type. We know the Wests game". Do you really babe? Because if you did, you would see the glaring UNDERREPRESENTAION of you in fanatical media. They don't want black women in their fantasies because we are not fantasy material. Whichever way you look at us, especially when these types of black women flood a conversation with "but feminism!" Talking points. Please, if you wanna talk about anything with black feminism, recognize it is different from non black feminism first. Then we can get somewhere.
@@imthebossmermaid3648me too I've never seen black women portrayed as hyperfeminine outside of hip hip videos but they was usually just strippers tho 😂
I feel the same exact way. I want a equal amount of both, both ultra feminine soft and sexy black women and also tough strong tomboy black women exist as well. It’s boring to only have one or the other
The generalization of these designs is because of American trope stereotypes of black women (the sapphire/angry bw) due to slavery when black women were whipped in the fields and stripped, they essentially became masculine unlike their counterparts of other races even tho we are still hypersexualized for our bodies at the same time. And dont get me wrong. They follow us in anime as well. But I feel that there is many better attributes in some japanese games of our portrayals. We are actually allowed to be human, be cute, be sexy without it being for someone else. Though in some games/anime this DOES end up becoming more of a jezebel stereotype like love lab, tokyo 7th sisters and hypersexualizing the black girls no matter the age.
I never really noticed this before. The main thing for me is that each of those examples listed from Japanese games are *_just so damn cool and creative_* And the thing is, _everyone_ can appreciate them and admire their coolness and design. It's just absolutely awesome character design. However this is a part of a larger trend in Japanese games (and anime): all characters from Japanese games look cool and interesting, or exude some sort of character in some way, regardless of ethnicity. The Japanese have always put great effort and focus into their character designs. They put the _CHARACTER_ into character and character design. How many Bayonettas do you see coming from Western devs? How many western video game characters have stood out, are liked, and are memorable, solely because of their character design and not just because of the story or game they are in? Now compare that to memorable and iconic Japanese video game characters. These days Western games, game developers, consumers and journalists, are all focused - if not obsessed - with realism and realistic portrayals, where the Japanese are not. In the Western side of games, there's also a general lack of focus on character design. In Japanese video games, the characters are often the stars of the show. In western games, they're often merely a vehicle for the story or player, often while also aiming to appease game critics and journalists, with artists often having their creative freedom hamstrung. When it comes to black female characters too in Western games, at least these days, there seems to be this mindset of "ethnicity first character second" when it comes to making a "diverse" character set. As if it's the ethnicity that makes the character interesting and what they are. Whereas for the Japanese it's character first, and whatever ethnicity the character happens to be is just what that character happens to be as a consequence of the creative process.
I completely agree on the "character first and race/ethnicity second" That's why I love about the character design in Japan because they make their characters more appealing and visually interesting. Male and female should not be the first thing they focus on, it should be on how to create an interesting character that the audience will love or admire. Sadly, western movies or gaming just pander the a curtain group of people to please them.
great points here dynamode! I hadn't realized the colorism in western games was so blatant (don't expect much from them tbh) but you made it so clear. As you pointed out even when making more "masculine" female characters like Darli, Japanese devs do a much better job.
Japanese designers were like "I don't care what her skin is, we gotta make her attractive", based Western designers are worried about "appealing to the male gaze" and made every women look.....screw it I don't wanna talk about it
It seems that most newer western games today are removing anything suggestive, sexual, and feminine for female characters in general. I noticed women in newer western games are looking more masculine and well less like a women. Black people in media hasn't really been portrayed well in general and it's a real shame that in the year 2023 we're still struggling to have well made black characters in western games especially black women.
Yeah it would be funny if it wasn't sad tbh, people started thinking "lets start portraying black people in a more positive way" but all they ended up doing was just portray black people negatively in a different way, i don't think making women, specially black women, unatractive and masculine is a good solution, even thought the woke army aproves of it
I don't really get what you guys are saying, just because they're not feminine doesn't mean they aren't attractive. They don't even have to be attractive 💀. Being feminine ≠ looking hot or appealing but it's expression! I love it either way personally but I do tend to notice that black women in media in particular are the aloof, traumatized, very strong ones.
@@Frutigirl2000Here's some shocking news for you: feminity isn't mutually exclusive with strength, even physical strength. Not one bit. So there's really no excuse for these women to look like Tiffany Stone
@@Frutigirl2000Yeah but why are black women always the ones who have to be “strong”? Why cant we be soft and feminine and sensitive?? We’re always portrayed as some strong women but we don’t wanna be considered as such all the time. It’s exhausting.
@@Asterix_Angel33 I never said I believed so, nor did I say they should. I was just making a comment on how feminine ≠ being attractive and that not every female character has to attune to the male gaze.
I think apex in general is a bad example. Apex Character design is heavy story oriented rather then Looks oriented. This masculine apearence from bangalore is ingramed in her backstory. She is a tough solidier and thats what she looks like and acts like. On the other hand wraith is one of the most white characters. She got experimented on and tortured and thats how she acts. Cold, reserved, not trusting. plus she is ver tomboy-sh. They are complex characters with good character desgin in my opinion
I agree that the West should create a wider variety of feminine and masculine characters and that Black women tend to be portrayed as more masculine (and because of intersectionality what’s empowering for one group of people won’t be for another.) But I also don’t necessarily think that having female characters fight in a bikini equates to more creative or thoughtful character design.
Western devs lean in too far on the masucline black women characters, but the east also leans too far in the opposite direction, there needs to be a balance, not one or the other.
This was awesome, everything I agree to be true. Sadly I rarely see Latina characters in games. Hell, when I do see one, she's Manish and or Mexican or Spaniard. As a Puerto Rican, I'd love to see more PR love. Also, Asian Indians are also a rarity. I can't think of any in any game.
@@srthinkdarauf2064 Puerto Ricans are Latino... What are you on about? As a matter of fact, we are an amalgamation of multiple cultures. My bloodline started with an African slave that gained freedom on the island. Which happened a lot. Were indigenous to the US as well, we were known as the Taino Indians. Our people lived in Southern Florida as well as most of the Caribbean, including Cuba, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Haiti, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, and the northern Lesser Antilles. We were almost wiped out by the Spaniards due to smallpox. We were enslaved by them as well, we needed to mix with them to survive. Spaniards are the closes thing to what you call gringos in our blood. So no... were not closer to gringo community. We are Caribbean... Hispanic and Latino.
there are plenty of such characters, not many PR but still. Well i want to see bulgarian characters, but i guess we will never see that, even if we fight amongs the Ukrainians we wont get recognition.
This generation will never know the real Vanessa Lewis. They barely know the current Vanessa Lewis. They made a muscular black girl and then in the sequel made her light skin and took away her muscles and people didn't care. She was one of the early playable black women characters and they gave her the Michael Jackson treatment, granted she still had the major flaw most Japanese do when designing black girls in that they give them bright colored hair but making a black woman that dark was still not common at the time. And people just forgot that they did this, like this should be a huge crime, the gap between her skin tone is equivalent to some race swaps that happens today and some of you reading this are just only now googling who she is because you don't even know what game she came from.
I think it has to do with opposite ends of the Sexism Spectrum™ about femininity. In Western media, femininity is seen as bad. If a woman is badass, she can't be gentle, soft, and stereotypically feminine; For a woman to be strong and respected she has to act masculine and tough like a man would. Whereas in Japan, pretty much ALL women shown in media have to be sexy and desirable. Both are products of sexism, but black women are impacted more due to racist Western stereotypes of black and brown people being seen as more aggressive and "grown" by default. Women can be hot and have beautiful designs without being reduced to objects or fetishized for being "exotic" (like Mel from Arcane and that Dolores lady you showed) and they can also be strong without having to be masculine to prove their worth. More nuance is needed when designing and writing female characters in order to balance the opposite ends of the spectrum and not fall into either trope.
To clarify I think the characters I mentioned have gorgeous designs, but I just realized the way I worded it might sound like I was calling them fetishized which wasn’t my intention.
Jada Pinkett head or afro is the norm in western portrayals, further bolstering stereotypes. Black women dare not have any attribute that may be misconstrued as white in today's woketopia. The Japanese versions are simply drop dead gorgeous and do a great justice to the exotic beauty of many stunning black women. Great video mate. subbed and liked.
You know its weird because working in a retail store where black women tend to be our highest demographic, they dont tend to have the stereotype short or afro hairstyles. If its short theyre like pixie cuts, bob cuts or dreads. Long hair it can be straight, curly locks etc. Wig or not they chose that hairstyle which i rarely see in video game black women
@@Gin-San101Yoruichi from Bleach, Princess Hibana from Fire Force, Casca from Berserk, Ikumi from Shokugeki, Karui from Naruto, Edward from Cowboy Bebop, Tier Harribel (but some would argue that) but we could keep going though.
A solution to fix this could be buying art styles from black women and using those designs as inspiration for their character designs. Try using art from a black womens perspective. I noticed that att from black women and men (but mostly black women) tend to be a bit more diverse in terms of different kinds of styles and looks. Youll different kinds of black women with different kinds of hair, facial features, and outfits. Which could help with inspiration without always using the stereotypical look
In history black woman have always been oversexualized and fetishized so it makes sense why video game developers would shy away from that. Also in comparison to certain styles of games comparing mk11 a very dark and mature game to street fighter is a weird comparison. If you think by a black woman covering herself and acting "aggressive" is masculine ur simply upholding the stereotypes society wants us to have. Whether or not she reveals her body or covers it she's still a woman.
This is not why they do that. They do it due to a stereotype of black women being depicted as masculine.. its not a sexualization issue. Otherwise the other lighter characters would be like that too.
No. We need feminine sexy pretty black women. Its more beneficial. Other women get it, why can't we?. The masculine types constantly are not a good look for us.
I think he meant was that most character with black skin nowaday got persuasion of sandpaper, they try to make everyone with darker tone a hardass and difficult to like because the "I was being oppressed and the world hate me" mentality. I maybe being a bias here cuz I'm not from America, but if people want to be invested in the character ideal belief, then make them likeable atleast. 😅
Correction: LIGHT-SKINNED/MIXED black women have historically been sexualized. (The sexualized mulatto). Dark-Skinned black women are historically made to be asexual or outright butch. (The mammy) and this dynamic has not changed...as rap videos have showed us, light-skinned black women are still getting the sexualization treatment. And as movies and video games have showed us, the dark-skinned are still sticking to their gimmick.
I feel as though in order to be uplifted, there’s an idea that black women have to be unbreakable, strong, determined, etc. When black women are praised, it’s usually for these things, and that’s what the beauty is attributed to. These traits are easy to (wrongfully) conflate with masculinity, and I feel like the west has been doing this a lot in an attempt to get away from tropes like damsels in distress or over the top sexuality. In doing so, this subversion to that has itself become a saturated trope. In reality, there is beauty and a unique strength in femininity that I feel is becoming more and more misunderstood as media tries to tell us that physical strength and being very outspoken are the ideal displays of strength for women (often at the expense of men AND women). I really wanna gush over fighting games and why I feel their design philosophy lends itself to variety in character designs, but this long comment would become a book.
I feel like this has less to do with racial biases and more to do with westerner’s fetishization of realism, your average western design tend to be motion captured and sculpted after a real person and not really “designed” like the best they can do, is dress a person in quirky outfit and that’s it While a more stylistic game can just alter and abstract the body to different shapes, which just naturally adds visual appeal to the character Despite me hating overwatch’s visual style, I find symmetra really attractive and she’s one of the game’s darkest skinned characters
its not that htey are sculptured after real people, its that they are uglified AFTER being sculptured. look at the actress that modeled for forbidden west. and then look at the model, its like they took the character and inflated her head to 2x its normal width. it looks NOTHING like her actress who is gorgeous. this is nothing new, and while it was acceptable when mass effect 2 did it with miranda, who had her face beaten with the ugly stick, we could at least look at her and see that its just because bioware was really bad at doing face modeling... its not that acceptable today when they are clearly going beyond for no reason. you cant even use "realism" as an excuse since, like i said, the actress who model for those games are often gorgeous themselves.
@@marcosdhelenoI can't believe how people freaked out when that game was released. She doesn't even look ugly, and I don't mind if a character does or doesn't look like a supermodel.
@@TheNobleFive you talking about alloy? im gonna be honest, my problem is that she has some very uncanny valley features. maybe its the high def model, but they made her look like something does not look right. its kinda hard to ignore from some angles that her face feels artificially inflated. like she is having some alergic reaction that made her face puff up. its specially noticeable around her eyes, that look "wrong". of course, there are angles that make she look good. but there are far more that just feels off.
@@TheNobleFive It's one thing to not look like a supermodel, it's another to have a model lend her face and then make her look nowhere like the model. This also only applies to women too, look at the Fable trailer in the Xbox Games 2023 showcase, Richard Ayoade looks like himself. But the female main character is made more ugly than the model they used.
Yes. People don't understand this. This is why I like the PS1 and PS2 days. They used the graphics they had to form an artstyle. Where as now game studios have realistic graphics now where everything looks samey. Western has always pushed for graphic fidelity. Where as Japanese developers stay with artstyle. People got mad because aloy had minor hair on her face. If you look at a woman through a 4k camera you will definitely see hair on a woman's face. Thing Is you couldn't see the hair on aloys face unless you was zoomed in, in photo mode. It's crazy how people can't tell the difference between games pushing for realism which is like 80% of western games and pushing for artstyle.
Loud, annoying, opinionated, questionable looks, acts like a complete a-hole to absolutely everyone they cross, "strong"... yeah this copy/paste is getting extremely boring on Western media now. Its so lazy and extremely unlikeable.
@@jakeystarsuperI'd suggest the problem isn't that characters are less *attractive* ; God knows the oversexualization of female characters was worse back in the day than anyone would believe if they didn't see it. And by "back in the day" I mean, "From the 90s to the 2010s." But when you overcorrect, and end up with "black women all tend to fall into this stereotype", that's also bad.
Judging by this, id rather have the eastern game companies do Black female characters than America at all. Because with eastern developers, theres alot more diversity in terms of their style, personality and character when designing female black character, than American devs and their same stereotype as being militarised and butchy. In a way, its kinda annoying for developers to keep perpetuing that idea that all black women are masculine, butchy and aggressive. There's much more than that. I like this video homie. Well spot on mate. ♥ 🐀
There is nothing wrong with masculine women. Masculine women and black masculine/tomboy women exist like me, who appreciate seeing these women in media. The problem is that there is little variety, not all black women are the same. We are human beings with unique personalities, styles, ect like anyone else. And yes , seeing nothing but the butch black women in western media is harmful stereotype that plays into the "strong" black woman stereotype, that is a whoooole other conversation.
Exactly, as a queer black woman who’s not very naturally feminine I do like butch and masculine black female characters a lot, especially if they’re still colorful and dynamic yet still tomboys. I just also wish there was an equal amount of feminine and soft black female characters too
what makes it worse is that in that side of the hemisphere they dislike people of that skin tone or have prejudice of some kind, but they still respect them enough to make them an actual person and not a safe stereotype
You bring up some awesome points man. And thank you for exposing more awesome black ladies in games! I never heard of Cannon Spike or Fighting Vipers until now, thanks to you! I'll certainly check them out!
I swear a part of my soul DIES when I see a faux hawk with *SKRONG* arms. I wish media in general would just look through some instagram reels for 3 hours to see that there are PLENTY of Black women with different styles
Was wondering the same thing when watching mortal kombat gameplay, was really underwhelmed but what they did with Jacqui and realized that they do that a lot with black women not just in games but in most media, you hardly EVER see black women especially dark skinned black women being portrayed as cute/attractive, bubbly or feminine-- its exhausting!
I think it comes down to how each culture approaches character design in general. Japan makes their characters look unique and beautiful to make them appealing, and most in the west make their characters as inoffensive as they can, which leads to characters being generic or fall into stereotypes (intentional or otherwise)
I’m so glad to see more people talking about black portrayals in video games. I recently got more into fighting games myself and I noticed how some of them have diverse characters and the black women will be absolutely gorgeous. In games I’ve always wondered why black girls could never be cutesy or anything. Like I’ve never played Overwatch but I love Dva, Juliet Starling, and characters like Princess Peach. I myself am a small black girl that wears revealing or cute stuff but I love cute and edgy things alike, even more I love hyperfeminine characters and it makes me feel bad for not picking any of the black ones. My favorite video game and protagonist I feel will forever be Kat from Gravity Rush and while she’s not explicitly said to be black or anything and their world is made up I know it’s the closest I’ll ever get to a super fem black protag. (They also have pretty npcs)
See I thought I was the only one to think that western gaming companies was doing this. I give a huge amount of respect to Japanese game developers now a days because I remember growing up in the 80’s and 90’s and the portrayal of black people (more men) were the goofy, dumb, big pink lip people. Now I looks and even in anime (minus one punch man) they portray darker skin black people as equal and beautiful or strong leaders.
TLDR: there’s room for improvement on both sides. Yes dark skin black woman tend to be portrayed as more masculine and aggressive.It’s a product of white supremacy in America. There’s no denying that. One thing tho ( I could be wrong) In almost All of the examples of Japanese media there was one thing they had in common They all have a very similar body type (tiny waist, large thighs, butt, and sometimes boobs). It would be nice if Japanese games could have a variety of bodies after all black women’s femininity should not have to be tied to her sexuality. There’s many different hairstyles in the examples that were given but if there’s only one body type on the eastern side too are they any better then the western?
Finding this video after what NetherRealms did to Tanya in MK1. As for why Darli works, it's probably because her design is pretty over the top. Also, she's a pretty likable character.
you're actually so right like wow.. like i don't really have a problem with tomboy black women and such in gaming/media, but they can be designed to be bland and generic in american games while japanese games and media can make them look unique! i think this includes their costume designs as well, because seeing plain old military or police or work outfits just doesn't make them stand out compared to characters out their like kimberly from SF, dolores from KOF, hell, even DOA Lisa has a plain design, but her outfits look really good! She stands out as a black woman too.
To be fair . . . Most Japnese Companies Hire consultants to created character concepts of other cultures. I think with most western video games they tend to have more local Artists hired on not to mention the target demographics for the characters as well. As an Artist with a background in character concept art AND comic Artist and story telling i can say that a lot more thought goes into a characters personality over the color of their skin. I wouldnt say Japan is more ahead af all considering almost all of Japans female characters are all feminine and oversexualized while more masculine femlae characters is actually more progressive than what has been historically done in video games. Though once more it all comes down to the Artists and their ideas, but a lot of people dont really consider how much thought the aritst put into these characters. Hell most people cant even name the artist of their favorite character unless they are SUPER famous already.
I am finding this video one year later but as a women who plays video games, most recent western games portray women in general like this and I'm tired. Why can't I make a big itty big booty woman who can fight and shoot in a skimpy outfit?
Yeah I agree with everything on this video. I've began noticing this pattern too, and ironically enough it actually comes off as kinda racist in of itself. Another good example of western developers creating beautiful and interesting black women is Hirez because of Smite (Yamoja, I'm sure there's plenty of other examples) and Paladins (Imani, they also have Betty who's Afro Latina).
Also let us not forget they are never outright with some of the characters being black in the first place so people try to argue up and down about them being black because of thier own biases against African American women. Or when some characters get lightened horribly like Lisa from DOA who had BOTH happen to her
This video popped up in my feed after I spent some time with Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, and I'm happy to day that I think nature is healing. While obviously inspired by a Japanese game (Jet Set Radio), Team Reptile is a Western dev team, and roughly half of the playable women in the game are black/dark-skinned, all of whom have unique, varied designs that have a clear aesthetic goal. Vinyl - Sleek, streetwear/secret agent look The Eclipse Crew - Futuristic Beyonce vibes Rave - funky techno alt girl Rise - Hyper-fashionista Things are looking up, for sure.
As a white westerner I can appreciate the beauty of a black woman with the highest degree (dying on this hill) But I feel that western developers do not understand black women at all and have this rather dim and stereotypical view on how they are portrayed, even for me I find that kind of tragic. In Japans case, they do make them slightly unrealistic with some design choices but thats a given because Japan is all about zany and cute designs and honestly... I think that is the better deal.
I've noticed this as well for awhile now. I should add, I don't think there's anything wrong with a tomboyish look at all BUT the way Western devs do it, it's not very appealing. Pokemon has a ton of examples of pulling this off well. Like Misty (Kasumi) or Bea. I guess Darli Dagger is another example (SamSho needs more love). You even gave an example of a girl who more closely fits the Western style without being ugly. I also noticed that the black Japanese characters have all been very well receieved internationally for the most part. It's for the reason you've said, they've simply made cool characters who are dark (Yoiruichi from Bleach is another example even if you don't wanna call her 'black', she's one of the darker characters in the cast).
I see it as the West makes BLACK characters and the East (and western devs that get it) make CHARACTERS that also happen to be Black. hope that makes sense
I can think of a few factors that might play into this. The first that comes to mind is what TV Tropes calls the "Flawless Token", wherein a minority character is given a blandly positive personality and/or design as an attempt at a positive portrayal. This often fails because the motive is to court that demographic rather than to present an interesting idea. Ironically, as the video points out, this actually combines pretty poorly with a generic, proactive female personality to make for more Masculine, aggressive black female characters, which can actually be closer to certain negative stereotypes that have been applied to them in the past. I think one of the reasons Japan has been killing it recently with their black female designs is that we are seeing a lot of Japanese design sensibilities applied over a lot of the western pop culture that these characters are based off, which inherently makes these characters more 3 dimensional. It's most obvious with Master Raven and Kimberly, who mix ninja aesthetics with hairstyles that black women actually wear, but all the examples mentioned in the video combine interesting Japanese pop culture tropes to minorities that haven't really had much in the way of interesting representation until now.
Im torn on this video because while i feel some great points are made, it also seems to ignore some glaring points. I personally like both types of designs for women, but i will conceit that ive definitely noticed the colorism in making the darker skinned women more "masculine" in the way we understand the term. I think Jaqui from MK is actually way better designed in MK11 than MKX especially since there are a number of wayyy more "feminine" outfits for ger there. It seems like you in general like one design type more and thats okay, but outside of how it's used through colorism I still think masculine designs are fine. I dont need to be attracted to every woman i play or interact with in a game and, me personally, i think masculine leaning women can be very sexy. A good bit of Japanese media designs women the same way we see American comics and graphic novels have designed women for the longest. I have to say tho, you are 1000% correct about the hair. Black hair in video games are at an abysmal level in general (slowly getting better), but Black women have been left with VERY little options that reflect their own hair. I will also agree that in general I'd love more creative designs of weatern game characters, but in general tho. Great video tho 👍🏿
Remember when chubby nerdy girls and chubby black women were ideal crushes? Such as Scooby-Doo’s Velma and Total Drama’s Leshawna? Today, these kind of characters are self-inserts because apparently… Cartoon-crushes are a crime now for “fueling the toxic male-gaze”, they instead dictate to us on what we should like and shouldn’t like.
This is the difference between doing something because you want to and doing something forcefully to fit an agenda. I'm so sick of seeing this copy/paste miserable, know it all character who is a complete arsehole to everyone for absolutely no reason, as if it makes them seem stronger and likeable. It's getting SO boring.
I think that this has less to do with black women in particular and more the general aesthetics of how these games portray race, sex, and nationality. Japanese fighting games often make EVERYONE an over-the-top walking stereotype, often with a healthy dose of fetish fuel, but also make them fun enough to keep people from finding their stereotypes offensive. Western developers are so afraid of being cancelled that they are often more focused on making characters inoffensive than making them interesting.
Good Video dawg 👍🏾. Hopefully someday that Western Game Developers take notes from Japanese Developers. A Female Character can be both Strong and Sexy at the same time the two aren't mutually exclusive. Especially when it comes to Black Female Characters. Keep up the good work.
It ties to colourism and how black women have been seen since slavery as objects and not people, black women weren't allowed to be seen as women but instead seen as labours, nannies or vixens to white men and dark skinned women have always been treated as masculine, dirty, dangerous, unemotional because of how blackness has been treated and seen in our society and in this sense of thinking light skinned has been seen as closer to white and goodness. I am light skinned and I hate seeing how much more we're represented positively in media, I mean storm one of my favourite black characters growing up was dark skinned but every time they cast her in live action she's light skinned. its an inherent bias we have in the west because of our relationship with race and racism it doesn't mean a creator is racist it just mean they aren't seeing the biases/inherent thinking they may have for skin tone and personality/attraction.
If I had to take a guess, I think it's because the artists don't want to make something seen as stereotypical or mocking, there's something of a perceived fine line so that many artists are supposedly afraid to draw black characters. Whereas these perceptions and worries aren't nearly as prevalent in Japan, so they're willing take risks, which is why you'll have these great character designs, but also some notorious designs as well. Just a theory on my end, and it doesn't really explain anything character writing wise.
THANK YOU FOR TALKING ABOUT THIS. It’s so annoying to not see cutesy or colorful or meek black girls in Western Games. Japan is feeding us, and making them cute!
It’s like the western developers have never seen a Black woman, or only saw a picture of the same two Black women and passed it around. Meanwhile, the Japanese developers have a much more varied-and therefore realistic- portrayal of Black women when there are fewer Black women in Japan compared to the West.
The apex one really opened my eyes lmao. I love how they add these characters to avoid tropes and stereotypes, and proceed to inadvertently create that stereotype themselves.
It's because femininity is equated to sex appeal. People have such a hard time separating the two as concepts so making a woman "feminine" is automatically considered as sexualizing her. Western devs opt to hyper-masculinize them and take away any ounce of femininity to make them "modest" to combat sexualization in video games, even at the risk of sacrificing good character design and writing.
Great points. Master Raven’s character is so well designed. Love how she flows with her attacks. And with her hair moving, you can definitely see that the creators put work into making her work
Fanservice is huge in Japan, without commenting on it whether it's good or bad you can find tons hypersexualized female character of any ethnicity in Japanese media, almost every Japanese fighting games female characters are made voluptuous
