A couple of people responded to my question about male love interests in videogames by saying they were having trouble thinking of games they'd played with female protagonists. So, in case anyone's interested, here's the list of games I've played in which the main playable character is female!
In cases where control is split between two or more characters, I've taken who's presented as the protagonist into account. Final Fantasy XIII, for example, has you controlling different characters at different times, but the protagonist is definitely Lightning, whereas, although you could argue that Sam is the main playable character of Until Dawn or that Mizuki is the main playable character of AI: The Somnium Files: nirvanA Initiative, those cases aren't clear-cut enough to be listed here. I haven't counted games in which you can choose the protagonist's gender; these are games that were specifically designed around a female main character.
I've listed these games in alphabetical order and included some brief notes about each one, in case anyone's wondering whether to pick any of these games up. I've put asterisks next to games I particularly enjoyed. (Which isn't to say I didn't enjoy the others; there's only one game on this list I'd actively advise against playing (spoiler: it's Beyond: Two Souls).)
I've also only included games I've played myself, not games I've experienced through Let's Plays or watching friends play them, which is why I've omitted Assassin's Creed: Liberation, Danganronpa Another Episode, Life Is Strange: Before the Storm, We Know the Devil and The Zodiac Trial. But then I changed my mind and included We Know the Devil anyway. You can't tell me what to do.
( Videogames I've played with female protagonists. )
I noticed while writing this how often I used the phrase 'young woman' in the game descriptions, so I took a moment to work out who the oldest protagonist in this list actually was. The results were slightly discouraging. By a long way, the oldest of these female protagonists is Chloe of Uncharted: Lost Legacy; I'm having trouble establishing her exact age, but I think she's around forty when the game takes place. I think second place goes to Red of Transistor, at the grand old age of twenty-seven.
In cases where control is split between two or more characters, I've taken who's presented as the protagonist into account. Final Fantasy XIII, for example, has you controlling different characters at different times, but the protagonist is definitely Lightning, whereas, although you could argue that Sam is the main playable character of Until Dawn or that Mizuki is the main playable character of AI: The Somnium Files: nirvanA Initiative, those cases aren't clear-cut enough to be listed here. I haven't counted games in which you can choose the protagonist's gender; these are games that were specifically designed around a female main character.
I've listed these games in alphabetical order and included some brief notes about each one, in case anyone's wondering whether to pick any of these games up. I've put asterisks next to games I particularly enjoyed. (Which isn't to say I didn't enjoy the others; there's only one game on this list I'd actively advise against playing (spoiler: it's Beyond: Two Souls).)
I've also only included games I've played myself, not games I've experienced through Let's Plays or watching friends play them, which is why I've omitted Assassin's Creed: Liberation, Danganronpa Another Episode, Life Is Strange: Before the Storm, We Know the Devil and The Zodiac Trial. But then I changed my mind and included We Know the Devil anyway. You can't tell me what to do.
( Videogames I've played with female protagonists. )
I noticed while writing this how often I used the phrase 'young woman' in the game descriptions, so I took a moment to work out who the oldest protagonist in this list actually was. The results were slightly discouraging. By a long way, the oldest of these female protagonists is Chloe of Uncharted: Lost Legacy; I'm having trouble establishing her exact age, but I think she's around forty when the game takes place. I think second place goes to Red of Transistor, at the grand old age of twenty-seven.
Tags:
- beyond two souls,
- celeste,
- feminism,
- final fantasy,
- final fantasy vi,
- final fantasy x,
- final fantasy xiii,
- forgotton anne,
- forspoken,
- gone home,
- homestuck,
- horizon zero dawn,
- kingdom hearts,
- life is strange,
- life is strange 1,
- life is strange true colors,
- nier automata,
- night in the woods,
- okami,
- oxenfree,
- portal,
- silent hill,
- the last of us,
- uncharted,
- we know the devil,
- your turn to die
