Which female in a franchise that currently only has male player leads would make for a great protagonist? (Comment your suggestions below!)
I would bring up the 仙剑奇侠传 and the 轩辕剑 series, but they have plenty of female protagonists. In 仙剑奇侠传's case, it's arguable, since the main main characters are predominantly men, but female main characters outnumber male main characters.
仙剑奇侠传:
1 1M 3F
2 1M 3F
3 2M 3F+(0.5-1)F+(0.5-1)F
3A 2M 2F
4 2M 2F
5 2M 2F
5P 6M 4F
6 3M 3F
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I'd like to see a kind of "behind the scenes" alternate perspective type of game that lays out the events of Super Mario Bros. 1 or something from the viewpoint of the kidnapped princess. And since it's from her perspective, she isn't just some hapless, superficial halfwit, but rather a fully-fleshed character that necessarily needs to help her male hero counterpoint from inside the ranks of the evil forces. Like maybe some kind of stealth/puzzle sort of game where she does an "escape the room" thing to get out of her cell, and then sneaks around the castle/dungeon to sabotage, infiltrate, and help the male protagonist by doing things like poisoning/weakening the main boss and thinning out the hordes of minions. Then we see that it was actually the princess' doing that allowed the male protagonist to actually accomplish all these great, seemingly impossible deeds... sort of like a "Rashoman" way of looking at the events of the original games.
It'd also be fun to see inside references to stuff like a goomba getting dressed up like decoy princess.
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Thanks for the well-considered comment! This is the kind of response I always hope to see to my prompts, and too infrequently do. :)
While just a Luigi's Mansion/Mario Galaxy style game would be interesting enough (and more to Nintendo's usual approach), something as rich and subversive as what you describe would be truly delightful. So far we've had Super Mario Bros 2 and Super Princess Peach that have featured the princess as a playable main character, but I don't really see those as being notably different [in terms of being character-driven games rather than shallow reskins] from her party/sports game inclusions. We've yet to see any real exploration of her character (even if her platforming traits do tend to be a bit more interesting than Mario's in both renditions of the usual formula).
Admittedly, character depth is more a thing relatable to Zelda/etc heroines, as Mario games tend to be far more shallow to begin with, but we do still have far a better grasp of the characters of Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, Bowser, and Toad than we do of any of the female characters (if only due to their featured character development within the RPG games). Heck, Daisy hasn't even been in any non-Sports/party game other than Super Mario Land, and she came across the least token of all of the female characters. By contrast, Wario has his own firmly developed franchise by now.. :P
It doesn't have to be based within any overwhelming gesture, or be anything too founded in real world equality representation- but there are some interesting support characters, regardless of their gender, that are too often overlooked within long-running franchises. Given that females overwhelmingly dominate the category of characters that don't receive extra attention, while males tend to be both the initial and spinoff protagonists as a rule (and there are some rather disturbing[ly bigoted] developer/publisher comments as to why that is), there's definitely justification just within fan-based considerations for wanting those characters to be explored more.
If it was just reskins, we've plenty of RPGs that allow gender selection on character development now. In fact, some, like Bioware games, seem to really put effort into making such selections feel immersive. But there're a whole lot of already developed characters within existing franchises that would be amazing to see take lead (especially with an atypically complex and compelling design setup, as per the one you suggested).
inside references to stuff like a goomba getting dressed up like decoy princess.
There can't ever be enough goomba in-jokes.. :D
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Admittedly, character depth is more a thing relatable to Zelda/etc heroines, as Mario games tend to be far more shallow to begin with, but we do still have far a better grasp of the characters of Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, Bowser, and Toad than we do of any of the female characters (if only due to their featured character development within the RPG games)
True, I suppose Nintendo does have a tendency to keep that franchise lore notoriously simplistic and "kid-friendly". To see a more multi-dimensional Peach or Daisy I think we'd have to look towards fan fiction type efforts. But, you never know what might happen down the line... I mean, I never thought films like Force Awakens or Rogue One would have seen the light of day during the disappointing travesty that was the Star Wars prequel trilogy, but here we are with two strong female leads extending a long-standing franchise with nuanced and conflicted characters that successfully explore these shades of gray in a kind of fan-fictionesque way. A goomba can always dream.
Also, I was looking at some gameplay footage of that Peach game... one of her special moves is crying? C'mon, what the hell kind of gender representation is that? https://youtu.be/5-CGF1UEPNw?t=13m33s
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You can see why I'm loathe to consider it as a valid example of a game which explores any degree of character depth. Shallow concepts dominate the game, while character exploration seems so absent that you could easily substitute Mario in for the lead- though then, at least, it'd have a unique statement to make.
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I remember reading a fan theory how Bowser and Peach are in love, but they can't officially be together because that would mean their kingdoms would have to merge and that would cause a massive social-issues, so instead Bowser "kidnaps" Daisy to spend some quality time with her and Mario (who obviously knows what is going on) "rescues" her so stupid underlings won;t find out about secret relationship and cause major problems.
Which would make game about "imprisoned" Peach a much different game ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
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I read a similar, but different theory which has Mario basically being oblivious to the real going-ons and acting like a mercenary on behalf of the Toads.
That explains why Peach is in another castle so often -> she keeps running to the next one to avoid being "rescued" against her will and is just moving from hideout to hideout until she eventually gets caught.
One could turn that into a game similar to Alien: Isolation, but with a fireball-chucking giant instead of a Xenomorph.
(I'm also pretty sure whoever though up that particular theory has played a bit too much of Braid)
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Uppsie. I blame you for putting to many plant names and thus confusing me :D
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Which would make game about "imprisoned" Peach a much different game ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Fifty Shades of Peach
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...not sure if you should call that custom rule "usual". at least i cant pass it... anyways,.. bump..
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I've been using the same format since at least last September.. how long should I wait until I refer to it as my usual? =O
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oh, you meant that it is your usual rule.
I thought that you were refering to a rule thats widely used among the SG community ;). E.g. just no bans n stuff..
No hard feelings.
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I mean, I think Princess Zelda fits the mark for the whole "warrior princess" trope(Is it a trope? I 'unno). I always thought Zelda was supposed to be really badass in some kind of way (Her OOT disguise, for example, and also Twilight Princess) with Link being kind of just the obligatory hero.
Everyone else is kind of meh although I don't know who Lana, Shroob, or Elincia is. I guess since this sort-of fits the theme, I played Loren the Amazon Princess a while back and the princess in that story is, well, an amazonian princess. I guess that's kind of cheating, eh?
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Princess Daisy... She kicks ass in Mario Party games, and the racing ones, golf ones, etc. she was in. Of course Zelda is winning by far, being the most familiar, but she was kind of wussy a lot, especially in the older ones. Getting kidnapped is... not what usually happens to a protagonist. I forgot what happened to Daisy originally (probably kidnapped too).
EDIT: Yep... she got kidnapped in the Mario Bros movie. Looked it up.
Also... There is a Bayonetta outfit based on her costume.
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Zelda had Wand of Gamelon on Phillips CDI. It. Was Awful.
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To hell with Nintendo, I want these(yeah it's all tv or film, no games):
Star Trek TV show about Captain Kira Nerys, commanding officer of Deep Space Nine post-Bajor's admittance into the Federation.
Star Wars prequel TV show about Mara Jade as the Emperor's Hand.Crackin' skulls and saberin' fools.(Use preexisting comics as a basis.)
Star Wars prequel TV show/movie about Princess Leia Organa's early days in the Rebellion(Alliance to Restore the Republic)
That's a good start.
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Mother Brain. Aside from being unable to move, being a horrible brain monster and lacking any/all personality, it'd be great!
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The poll once more demonstrates how incredibly uneducated I am because I had to Google the majority of these princesses. :D
I was going to answer Zelda but since she is the majority vote, I'm going to throw my support for Princess Elincia instead.
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how incredibly uneducated I am
I'm not sure that's the best poll topic to question your education over. :P
the majority of these princesses
If Nintendo marketed them like Disney does theirs, maybe they'd be more familiar. :P
throw my support
Team Daisy, here :D
Actually, other'n Daisy and Zelda, my following top Nintendo picks'd be non-nobility- but I had to keep the poll trim with some sort of theme. :P
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I'm not sure that's the best poll topic to question your education over. :P
Fair point, but it has just seemed very common for people to question your entire life if you don't know every little thing related to Nintendo and their games. ;D
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Pauline. Her revenge on that filthy ape is long overdue.
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I really want Ciri to get her own game. She had some playable segments in The Witcher 3, of course, but I'd like to see her take the protagonist's mantle.
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In honor of all these princesses competing for your vote, here's a 84p jigsaw to crown the victor.
(My usual rules apply, though cheat-based VAC bans are now locked out as well; if you're affected by that, bring it up with Knsys and let him know that the SGT interface needs to cater more to filtering out only community and trade bans.)
Valar dohaeris.
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