9 badass female game heroes that changed everything - gamebasin.com

8/11/2019 9 Badass Female Game Heroes That Changed Everything - GameBasin.com

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9 Badass Female Game Heroes ThatChanged Everythinghttp://www.gamebasin.com/news/9-badass-female-game-heroes-that-changed-everything

Over the years gaming has evolved from being the shut ins favourite pastime to the most

expensive and engaging medium on the planet, with a cavalcade of characters that have (mostly)

matured alongside. The Tomb Raider of 2014 is almost a completely different character especially

aesthetically to that of the old triangular chested explorer of the 90 s, and were all the better

off for it. Sure for every strong female lead who isnt bouncing around like the Dead or Alive girls

theres another whos barely wearing more than a fragment of denim and a tissue bra, but for the

most part gamings current heroines are not looked down upon so much by the majority of players.

Its thanks in part to moving away from the damsel in distress trope and more towards making

female characters the focus of a particular experience without that experience revolving around

the fact that theyre female in the first place. Its about fairness and equality, and whilst were not

suddenly

going

to

mount

the

Equality

Horse

and

start

raining

down

generalised

statements

about

the way women have been misused in the past, its still great to see that the vast majority of

modern female protagonists are a far better representation of how the gender should be shown

overall.

9. Jade Beyond Good And Evil)


2/10

Sadly not enough people have played Beyond Good And Evil in 2014, and despite a very lengthy

development process were nowhere nearer seeing the much discussed sequel either. However

with an Xbox Live Arcade re release in HD and one of the most devoted cult fanbases going behind

it, Beyonds green haired political activist Jade remains a character for the ages. Set in the

beautifully animated world of Hillys, it featured a cast of characters where your best friend is a

giant pig named PeyJ. Jade, PeyJ and her band of brothers then take the fight to the oppressive

DomZ; a sinister organisation whose true intentions arent made known until some way into the

game when youre completely enamoured by the fantastic company youre now keeping. The game

also featured a photography mode that complimented Jades photojournalist skills as you were

tasked with tracking down creatures for the sake of payment, adding a Pokemon style element to

the exploration. However, even though the gameplay was lightyears ahead of its time in some

respects whilst also occasionally dabbling in an Ocarina of Time vibe for the combat its Jades

steadfast approach to her often dire situations that make her an incredibly strong unique

benchmark for female character depictions.

8. Commander Shepard Mass Effect)


3/10

FemShep as shes often referred to could have been just another custom character with no

defining personality, but thanks to a fantastic voice performance from Jennifer Hale theres a

perfect amount of wit, sass, humour and bite in every mood across all three incredible instalments

in the series. It might be a strange one nominating Shepard as a defining character being that with

each person who played the game their own Shepard would have turned out differently but

therein lies the genius of Biowares character design. Regardless of whether you played the

Commander as a kind hearted gentle soul who would do anything to help her crew, or a ruthless

gun toting hellion with a penchant for knocking out journalists, her stature and placement as the

cog that turns the Mass Effect gears never changes. Another great attribute about having a custom

designed character as your main protagonist is it gets around the accusations of sexualisation that

appear so frequently with almost every female character. If you wanted to portray your FemShep

as a angry faced, iron fisted leader you totally could, just as much as if you wanted to give them

the more cutesy blonde hair and blue eyes treatment. Both were more than acceptable, and both

ended up making the time you spent with your Shepard all the more special.

7. Bayonetta Bayonetta)


4/10

Bayonetta remains one of the most divisive characters going in terms of female empowerment,

because on the one hand you can hark back to the Lara Croft example and point out that shes a

strong, justice doling hero that dual wields pistols and kicks demons heads off. But on the other

the sexual grunts and noises are cranked up past 11, and aside from some INCREDIBLY long body

covering hair, shes almost completely naked. However when you look at the events of the game

and the actions Bayonetta gets up to, its clear developer Platinum wanted to put a female

character in a very powerful position. As God of War and Devil May Cry had perfected two sides of

the third person hack n slash genre coin, all they gave us character wise was one ridiculously angry

bald man whod sooner rip your eyes out than finish a conversation and a silver tongued lothario

who dolls out one liners faster than he does bullets. In contrast, wed never had a female action

hero who genuinely felt like she could take on or hang with the aforementioned two, and for all

the complaints of hyper sexualisation, Bayonetta takes on all comers and still ranks among the best.

6. Jill Valentine Resident Evil)


5/10

Starting as they meant to go on (at least until part 4), Resident Evil gave players the choice of playing

as either Chris Redfield or Jill Valentine, the latter of which actually packed more of a punch

throughout the game when it came to combat. Thanks to the two of them being trained special

agents, uniform wise Jill was instantly a well respected and regimented character, as well as a great

choice that many players chose to take on the zombie horde, thanks to a bolstered inventory that

traded damage for being able to hold more items. In the later releases Chris would turn into a

ridiculously over muscled meathead of a character, with Jill also donning a purple catsuit that was

far more revealing than her previous attire. Still, forgetting the current abominations of what once

was, the original Jill was a force to be reckoned with.

5. Yuna Final Fantasy X)

Although shes only a playable character inside the games battles, the real hero of Final Fantasy X

was always Yuna, being that the entire story revolves around her and come the games end


6/10

developers Square Enix decided it was hers that was worth continuing into X 2. Of course in doing

so they would end up putting thousands of fans off due to a complete change in her aesthetic,

going from a religious, conservatively dressed sorceress into a twin pistol toting, backflipping

combat specialist. It remains a very strange move all round, and possibly signifies the start of

Square losing their grip on the Final Fantasy ball, as from here on out there wasnt another truly

great game in the series. Yunas character is wonderfully warm and memorable not only for her

spells and tactics on the field, but also in the games cutscenes, her relationship with the main

playable character Tidus was one of the most touching in the franchise. With this being the first

Final Fantasy on the newer generation of consoles at the time, putting Yuna at the forefront of the

narrative was a bold and memorable choice.

4. Samus Aran Metroid)

One of the most important moments in gender portrayals within gaming history belongs to Samus,

although it was always something of a double edged sword in the way it was handled. Featuring

five different endings in the original game, you had to finish the entire thing in under different

amounts of hours to unlock the true identity of Samus, as up until that final shot, every single

player

thought

they

were

playing

as

a

burly

space

marine.

The

positive

side

of

things

is

that

on

the

games third ending, only her space helmet is removed to reveal a big head of hair, which being

you were not playing as Jon Bon Jovi meant all along youd actually been playing as a girl! Score

one for female gamers, right? Wrong. Well, half wrong.


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Another two of the games endings end up showing Samus in more revealing clothing, with the

most hilarious in retrospect being a little pixellated bikini version that appears if you can finish the

game in under an hour. Apparently in development the switch to Samus being a female was

something of an afterthought, but even so this remains one of the biggest bait n switches in

gaming, for (mostly) the best reasons.

3. Lara Croft Tomb Raider)

Of course Lara had to make an appearance, as regardless of how much we cast aspersions on the

way she was handled in the 90 s and early 00 s, ever since Rihanna Pratchett took over on

scriptwriting duties its been a far better, more realistic character all round. Sure the amount Lara

gets beaten throughout the game by characters and the environment is a problem, as it often

labours the point made in the previews by the development team about wanting to protect Lara,

but in the end the take away is that this new version is a character who doesnt need watching over.


8/10

Going back to those initial character models though and the balloon chested artwork that adorned

everything from posters to Lucozade ad campaigns, Official Xbox writer Aoife Wilson has since

remarked that her 10 year old self didnt see the ridiculous body proportions or hear the sexual

noises she only noticed there was a woman, where before there had been a man. Although were

yet to see much footage of Rise of the Tomb Raider, along with the rest of this list it seems the new

more realistic Lara will serve more positively as inspiration to an entire new generation of gamers.

2. Clementine The Walking Dead)

There was always that encroaching feeling that Clementine was going to play a far larger role

following the events of the first season of the Walking Dead games, and come the end of said

season, we were right. The WD games remain some of the most nerve wracking and genuinely

harrowing experiences youll ever have with interactive entertainment, especially being they

deliberately deal in moral grey areas, dishing out scenarios that nearly always come down to

Damned if you do, damned if you dont. Clem though following all the training she received

from Lee in season one has evolved into a young girl who will do whatevers necessary to survive

in the zombie infested wastelands. Although you do have some control over how shes perceived

by

the

other

characters

in

terms

of

dialogue

options

and

actions,

many

secondary

characters

have

come to rely and somewhat depend on her. Shes still the youngest female protagonist ever seen

in a mainstream game, and the fact that she can hold her own against a horde of zombies means

Clem is easily one of the strongest female protagonists in games. Heres to the season two finale

and hoping she makes it out alive!

1. Ellie The Last Of Us)


9/10

Ending on one of the biggest game changing titles in recent memory if not of all time The Last

Of Us Ellie elevated not only the medium of video games into a higher echelon of appreciation on

par with that of films, but it brought to life one of the best casts of characters in gaming history

too. Alongside Troy Bakers fantastically gruff father Joel was Ashley Johnsons curse word flinging

Ellie, a girl who after growing up in an apocalyptic world had an attitude of reckless abandon and

an emerging sense of purpose within it. For those who are still yet to play LoU, lets just say Ellie is

more important to Joel than she thinks as well as the entire worlds populace but the game

manages to create a wonderful bond between you playing as Joel and your time with Ellie. Mostly

down to her saving your hide in a number of spots and leaping in to tackle someone whos trying

to take you out, theres a section where you get to play as Ellie that reverses the protector role

between her and Joel, tasking you with taking on a certain murderous adult character all by

yourself. Ellies take no prisoners attitude and overall bombastic personality hide a really strong

dedicated heart, and her portrayal is one of the main reasons the game topped nearly every critics

list imaginable next year. If Naughty Dog can ever deliver another character on her level in

Uncharted 4, were in for something special indeed.

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9 badass female game heroes that changed everything - gamebasin.com

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