Gonzalo, interesting article, but there was a fairly blantant error in the facts of the article contained in the statement:

"[Princess Peach] has always played the damsel in distress role"

Super Mario 2 featured Prince Peach, Then Princess Toadstool, very actively as part of the main game.

Hi Chris,

You are right. Additionally, Princess Peach fights in Super Smash Brothers. Still, SM2 is sort of the black sheep of the whole series and Super Smash Brothers could barely be called part of the series but I should have probably clarified this further.

I'm glad you liked the article!

Thanks again,

Gonzalo

I really liked reading the article. Sexism is probably the reason why most girls do not play video games. Almost every game is aimed at men.

But iI have to see this article from a mans PoV (im a man), how about the girls PoV?

Most girls ive show this game to, actually have a blast seeing how the princess acts when attacking an enemy...

Yes the princess is stereotipical, show me a video game where the man arent as well... Most of the gamers cannot even pahtom any emotional or physical relationship with any of the game's characters they play.

Each game is supposed to be new role for a gamer beyond is real life, why cant a girl be a princess, and emotional unstable on top of that?

Shes emotionaly unstable ofc... I give you that :P, but you have to see that this game was made in Japan, and girls in japan are a bit different than girls in europe (heck, cosmetics and "man pleasing" was allways big in japan, its cultural for them, not for us, check any product aimed for girls no matter what age, it look like it was targeted for a 4 year old european girl)...

The way I see it, in this game its just easier to spot the sexism than in all of the other games (check WoW's avatar model, everyone is a top model, man are macho and girls are all wiggly and all hot, how many gamers can relate to that? )...

Anyway, nice reading, hope to see more of it...

Nice article--I think it's really insightful about how the female games audience, even when targeted, is condescended to. Henry Jenkins talks about how one of the appeals of games is the "expansion of the player's capacity." So designers assume that men want to be stronger and more potent...and women want to be more emotional? Or,worse, that what women want most of all is the ability to impose their emotions on the outside world?

A side question: is Princess Peach more famous than Samus Aran from Metroid?

Gonzalo,

You would probably be interested in reading some of the comments comming out on the women in game development thread of the IGDA about the article. I believe you can download the achived conversation, but the subject is:

"Princess Peach Sexist?"

There's a thread over at Joystiq on the article with a number of ... intersting comments. I guess I'd call them disappointing more than interesting.

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http://www.klick-game.de/fun-2303.html