When some people think of a female character in a video game, there is a stereotypical image that can come to mind: a tall slender figure with a small waist and a large chest usually dressed in a racier version of armor than their male counterpart. For someone like me, who is extremely passionate about both video games and feminism, this is a very real concept that I feel needs to be addressed in one way or another.

For as long as video games have been around, there has been the stereotype for what a woman's role in games should be. More often than not the women in gaming culture are helpless and in desperate need of saving, portraying the only form of escape she has it through a man who will come rescue her.

Now, as a feminist, I am in no way stating that women are superior to men. What feminism is about is equality. What I have an issue with, and I am sure I do not stand alone in this thought, is the unfair unequal depiction women are given in video games.

To break this down into two categories, it would be lumped into the role they're given and how they're shown. I for one have grown extremely tired of women's roles in games as the damsel in distress with a very unrealistic waistline. This has nothing to do with any grief against skinny women or ones with large breasts, it's simply that these are the only way women have been shown as. It's almost as if the women don't please straight male players, what's the point of showing them?

As an avid League of Legends player, I know for sure that this game is one that houses the most revealing clothing and the most disproportioned body parts for female characters. If you pick up any Mortal Kombat game, it won't be hard to see this depiction either. I could write an entire article just on which games show women as sex objects.

However, as time progresses, this depiction while hasn't disappeared, has been taken into consideration. Tomb Raider, a game series featuring a female protagonist named Lara Croft, breaks this mold. As the series was made over time, her body became more proportionate and she is seen solving her own problems, fighting her own battles, and healing her own wounds.

This is something I strongly feel we need more of in games. Women who can slay the bad guys in regular clothes without needing her chest or butt popping out. There is no reason they need revealing clothes to be just as tough as the men. There is nothing about a female demographic that makes it okay to constantly have her in need of saving. Thanks to Lara Craft and other strong female leads, us women are well on our way.