I feel your frustration on this matter. I personally feel that games need a more diverse cast of characters. The main characters in games are predominantly white males. Other races are generally used as background characters and are relatively stereotypical. Females are poorly represented as large breasted beauties and are rarely protagonists. Games for children, until just recently, just had white characters or anthropomorphic characters.

These patterns make for repetitive themes and games. I believe that games would connect with their audience better if they had a broader range. You and I are evidence of this.

I don’t think we do have objectified men, though. Normally when people talk about “objectified” men they bring up Gods of War or something, but in those instances men aren’t sexualized or objectified the way women are. They are designed, still, for men to look at. Actually objectified men tend to make straight men uncomfortable, and we know how liberal the male gaming audience is.

If we had men who looked like Johnny Weir, who had to get naked to activate their special powers, who’s packages received long, lingering looks from the camera ala Mass Effect 2, we might be able to consider whether, given our patriarchal society, those rare messages were equivalent to the objectification of women, and whether we’d prefer characters of both genders who were people first and sexually desirable second, or not at all. I doubt we will ever have to answer that question, however.

Have you seen Deadwood? I want to play a game as Calamity Jane from Deadwood, but I know I never will because she’s not appealing to the gamer audience. That’s what makes me sad about sexualized women, not that they exist but that they are the only women who are considered protagonist-material.

As a game, it’s one dimensional… however, if that aspect of the game was intentional, it kind of shows the one dimensional way women are often viewed by those who throw cat-calls.

I guess, for me, it’s an interactive statement simulation, not a game… not offensive, and like most good art, causes me to think differently about situations.