LGBT themes in video games

In the history of computer and video games, homosexuality and transgenderism have been depicted in much the same way that Hollywood movies used sexuality and gender. The role of character's sexual orientation or gender identity in the industry has been important, as the western side of the industry tends to lag behind the cultural shifts that have occurred as a result of gay liberation.

Sexual politics

In the 1970s in the United States a gay liberation movement achieved a number of political and cultural successes. One success was the analysis by Vito Russo of depictions of homosexuality in motion pictures in his 1981 book The Celluloid Closet. The methods developed in Russeo's work continue to influence analysis. At the centre of Russeo's methodology was the application of a blend of literary criticism and cultural criticism to pop culture, seeking out the political implications of how pop culture talked about sexuality.

Concepts from sexual politics are fundamental to the analysis and debate over computer game sexual politics. The most important concept is the category of LGBT, a unifying term meant to encapsulate all "Queer" groups: gay, lesbian, and bisexual sexualities, as well as transgender identities. Secondly, there is a presumed link in sexual politics between sexual identity and gender identity, primarily due to the view that alternative sexualities challenge society's traditional gender roles. Thirdly, there is the analytical concept derived from Queer liberation of heteronormativity: that everything in our society is assumed to be heterosexual unless otherwise specified, and that all things not heterosexual should be treated as abnormal and harassed.

Very early electronic gaming

When Russo began to his research in the 1970s, video and computer games were a fairly new force within the popular culture and the software titles published often did not create characters with any type of sexual orientation or gender identity. Characters painted onto pinball machines had little role in the game.

Fictional characters in the early arcade games were usually not human, and lacked gender or sexuality. Many of the games released for the 4-bit video game systems followed this tradition. In these games the player controlled a character without a gender, i.e. Venture or objects such as a mouse, space ship, race car, tank, or a helicopter. It was only when a game allowed the player to control a character with a gender, that the issue of sexual orientation could come forward.

While characters from early computer games were usually human, their gender was either undefined, or left open to an arbitrary choice of the player; in the latter case, the gender rarely had any effect on gameplay. In the adventure game genre, this custom continued well into the 1980s; it was parodied in Zork Grand Inquisitor (1997), which habitually referred to the PC as an "Ageless, Faceless, Gender Neutral, Culturally Ambiguous Adventure Person" (or AFGNCAAP for short).

Pop culture characters

The original Pac-Man was given a gender and a heterosexual orientation with the introduction of his wife Ms. Pac-Man. In many games the player controlled a male character trying to save a damsel in distress (Smurfs, Popeye, etc.). Most of these characters were derived directly from mainstream US pop culture and reflected its heteronormal bias, and the predefined orientation of the character.

The game Donkey Kong was considered advanced in that it not only gave the hero a name, Jumpman (now known as Mario), but a clear ethnic background, gender, sexual orientation and career. The complexity present in Donkey Kong inspired Nintendo and Sega, two companies that recreated the video game industry with games that presented complex characterisations.

Literary adaptations

Computer games in particular often featured characters drawn from classic literature rather than pop culture; for example many games featured Sherlock Holmes or characters from the Arthurian cycle. Again, these characters tend to be predefined as heterosexual. In keeping with the custom of making characters gender-ambiguous, adventure games would often make no reference to the character's sexuality, especially in those rare cases when the character was initially homosexual.

Censorship codes in gaming

The two video game giants of the late 1980s and most of the 1990s were Nintendo and Sega. Both companies felt that the early 8-bit video game industry had failed because of the low quality of the games. Anyone could legally release a game for the Atari, Intellivision or Colecovision systems and the result was a flood of poor games, that sometimes had bugs in them, or even pornographic themes. In 1985, Nintendo introduced a code to prevent these problems from occurring in the future.

The Nintendo Code

In order to legally release a game for a Nintendo system a developer had first to obtain permission from Nintendo. Nintendo reserved the right to preview the games and demand changes before allowing release. They wanted to ensure that no game released for a Nintendo system had objectionable or offensive themes. This gave rise to a highly developed system of censorship.

By 1988, Nintendo had formalized its censorship policy. These strict rules would remain in force until 1999 when Nintendo began to rely on an industry wide ratings board. In many respects, the Nintendo content guidelines were a summary of the list of prohibitions found in the Hollywood Hays Office Production Code, or the Comics Code of Authority. The Nintendo code represented a long running strand of wowserism in United States culture.

A game sold on a Nintendo system could not display or make reference to illicit drugs, tobacco and alcohol, violence against women, blood and graphic violence, profanity, nudity, religious symbols, political advocacy, or "sexually suggestive or explicit content."

Male heroes could still rescue damsels in distress, but displaying or making reference to homosexuality or cross-dressing was forbidden, as these were seen as sexually explicit issues, similar to rape, nudity and prostitution.

The censorship aspect of the code only applied to software sold outside of Asia. Nintendo of Japan operated under a somewhat more lax set of guidelines, as evidenced by the release in 1987 of a Super Famicom game known as Cho Aniki, which depicted clichéd homosexuals.

In 1988, a creature in Nintnedo's own Super Mario Brothers 2 the miniboss named Birdo was described in the original instruction manual as being transgender, but this error was corrected in later editions of the instruction manual and future appearences of the character. In 1992, the Enix Corporation was ordered to remove a gay bar in Dragon Warrior III, among other content changes, before the game could be sold on a Nintendo system.

Nintendo needed the code to craft a public image whereby Nintendo was seen as only approving wholesome all-American family fun. In part, Nintendo needed to develop this public image because as a Japanese company, they wanted to avoid US racism. By presenting itself as the Disney of the video game industry it could shield itself from accusations that Nintendo was a Japanese invasion that would corrupt American youth by exposing them to Japanese values and culture.

In 1999, the formal Nintendo policy of prohibiting references to homosexuality was lifted with the announcement that Konami's Metal Gear Solid for the PlayStation, would also be released for the Nintendo 64. While, the Nintendo version of the game was cancelled, it signaled a liberalization of the Nintendo censorship code because the game had an enemy with no clear gender and another enemy that admitted to an incestuous homosexual affair. A year later, Rare released Banjo-Tooie for the Nintendo 64 with a gay frog bartender named "Jolly Roger." The gay frog would return as a playable character in the Game Boy Advance game Banjo-Pilot (2005). Rare would also release Conker's Bad Fur Day (2001) for the Nintendo 64, featuring a wild chipmunk with a dirty mouth, who made various dirty jokes in reference to hangovers, homosexuality and even anal sex. Enix re-released Dragon Warrior III for the Game Boy Color and was allowed keep all the original content provided that was given a Teen Rating rating by ESRB.

By 1999, Nintendo had largely given up on its own censorship polices, as long as games were rated by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB).

The Sega code

By 1992, Sega was coming close to claiming Nintendo's first place status in the industry. As with Nintendo, Sega policed the content of games for Sega systems. Unlike Nintendo, Sega's system of censorship was more liberal.

Sega did not fear a racist response from the US gaming public, as its history as an American company that made arcade games for U.S. servicemen stationed in Hawaii prevented it from being seen as a Japanese company no matter who owned it. When making games, Sega faced less cultural pressure than Nintendo to conform to the standards of US pop culture. Due to Nintendo's conservatism, Sega even experienced market pressure to be more liberal.

The Sega content code allowed games to have blood, female enemies, and more sexually suggestive themes. The more liberal code attracted support from third party support from arcade and computer game companies such as Razorsoft, Electronic Arts and Capcom. Games with blood in them had to include a parental advisory label on the game's box. Nudity was still prohibited, but characters did not have to wear as much clothing as a character on a game made for a Nintendo system. In 1993, Sega chose to phase out its content code, and replaced it with the Video Game Ratings Council that would give every game made for a Sega console system a rating of GA, MA-13 or MA-17. This helped to attract even more third party companies with a promise of more freedom, and furthered its image as the cooler alternative to the stuffy, conservative Nintendo. During the brief life of the Video Game Ratings Council, Sega of America censorship of Streets of Rage 3 (produced by Sega of Japan) showed that while Sega wanted to be cooler then Nintendo, they still very nervous about selling a game for the western market with gay and transgender playable characters.

Streets of Rage 3

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Ash (right) in Streets of Rage 3.

In 1994, Sega of America would make various changes to the beat 'em up Streets of Rage 3 from its original Japanese counterpart called Bare Knuckle 3. Among the changes was the removal of the boss named Ash, whose homosexuality was explicity established by the "Village People" attire that he wore. Ash was taken out of the western edition of the game, but remained a playable character with the aid of the Game Genie. Thus, Sega unintentionally became the first major video game company in the west to give the player the option of choosing a gay character.

While Sega of America was leery about releasing a video game with a homosexual character, they publically treated the idea as a harmless joke. In 1994, Saturday Night Live aired a satire of Sega of America's commercials with a fictional game based on the popular movie Philadelphia starring Tom Hanks. Sega of America took no legal action against NBC and the interesting point of this satirical commcercial is that not even the culturally hip Saturday Night Live took seriously the idea of LGBT characters in a video or computer game. Yet, by the early 1990s common themes had already developed in how the industry dealt with sexual orientation.

Tropes, themes and archetypes of GLBT sexuality in games

A number of recurring tropes, themes or archetypes have developed in the gaming industry with reference to GLBT sexuality. These themes or archetypes were often similar to how other forms of popular culture such as Hollywood movie and TV shows dealt with GLBT sexuality.

Comical Gender Confusion

The most common way to deal with GLBT characters was to reveal their sexual orientation through gender inversion. A male character's homosexuality could be indicated by making him a sissy character, with effeminate or flamboyant mannerisms, dress, and speech. This technique was widely used in Hollywood movies (to circumvent the Production Code's ban on "sexual perversion"), and before that in Vaudeville. The underlying assumption is that homosexuals tend also to be transsexual, and therefore possess mannerisms stereotypical of the opposite sex. The censorship codes of Nintendo and Sega limited the usage of gender inversion to exclusion of cross-dressing until 1994.

In 1988, LJN released the Nintendo game titled Beetlejuice, based on the popular movie of the same name. In the movie, Otho (Glenn Shadix) was a heavy-set interior decorator who was clearly gay. The game reminded us that the character was gay by treating him as a sissy: Otho makes a brief appearance in the game where the player must scare him with a mouse.

A few years later, Acclaim would release the second of three Nintendo games based on the popular animated series The Simpsons. In The Simpsons: Bart VS. The World (1991), the player controlled Bart Simpson as he traveled to various global locations to battle the evil Montgomery Burns. In the series, Waylon Smithers was the personal aide to Burns, whose secret gay crush on his boss was a running joke throughout the entire series. Both characters appeared in the game in the opening and ending sequences, although Smithers is simply referred to as Mr. Burns' "Bootlicking Yes-Man." As with Otho, he could appear in a Nintendo game as long as he remained a harmless, asexual, effeminate character.

Computer games had their own sissy characters, used in the same fashion. The major difference was that computer games had more freedom to create these sissy characters closer to the models long since used in Hollywood or in Vaudeville, due to the absence of any universal content code.

Sierra's 1991 game The Adventures of Willy Beamish features a bouncer who has recently gotten out of prison for some unknown crime. The hero refers to him as a "tinker bell" when he is afraid to help fight a group of teenagers in a street gang. Thus the link between homosexuality and effeminacy is made explicit here.

In 1995 Shannara, based on the books written by Terry Brooks, included a snotty and racist gay character: The Seneschal's attire is all purple, and he looks similar to real life actor Tim Curry. This was character was similar to the snotty and racist elfen character in Simon The Sorcerer 2 who not only had the purple attire, but a pansy flower in his hat.

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Screenshot of The Secret of Monkey Island 2.

In most cases computer games introduced homosexuality through situational gender inversion (ususally men cross-dressing) for its for humorous effect; it may allow the programmers to include a scene where two women, one a man in drag, express love for each other. For example, in the second game of Lucas Arts' popular Secret of Monkey Island 2 (released in 1991), the playable character, Guybrush Threepwood, needed to win a pink dress in order to get into his ex-girlfriend's costume party. Guybrush then tried to persuade his ex-girlfriend to give him a second chance, and a piece of a treasure map. The third game in the series (released in 1997) had a much briefer puzzle involving a large pirate wearing a pink dress in a theatre production.

Another example appears in Sierra's Space Quest IV (Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers, from 1991) Roger Wilco had to don drag in order to gain access to a bank account belonging to the "Latex Babes of Estros." While such situational cross dressing had been a popular source of humor in computer games, video games could not include such themes until the creation of the Entertainment Software Ratings Board in[1994. Western consumers had long found humor in male sissy characters, especially when they would done drag.

From the beginning Hollywood movies found having the central character dress up in drag to be a surefire source of humor. Yet more modern movies have also used the crossdressing to offer a liberal social commentary about sexism or homophobia; e.g. Victor/Victoria, Tootsie, To Be Or Not To Be, and The Birdcage. By contrast, computer games only used cross-dressing for its comedic value.

Some computer games focused on the humor value of homosexuality without employing the sissy trope. For example, in Adventuresoft's Simon the Sorcerer series, if Simon is ordered to proposition any male characters, he would remind you that he "prefers blondes". The games also make numerous gay jokes. For example, when two demons get stuck together with glue in the second game (from 1995), Simon remarks that their close contact looks "awfully suspicious." Simon the Sorcerer 3-D (2002) has more gay jokes, directed at a gay knight. Computer games would pepper diologue with gay jokes, along side the sissy characters and the situtaional gender inversion for comic relief. Computer games still introduce homosexuality through this comic rubic.

In 2001 Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto 2 included a nod to the disco musical band named the Village People when the character goes to "Joey's Garage." Later, in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas the police officers will say various things one would expect from a comical, homosexual character such as "Drop the soap, honey!", "Lets wrestle to submission!", and "I'm on your ass, Daisy!" In this model, homosexuality is a joke, attached to gender inversion but a harmless one.

Sexual Predators

The second theme for dealing with GLBT sexuality arose in the 1990s; the sissy characters were replaced by dark and decadent predatory homosexuals.

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The seedy bar in Rise of the Dragon. Notice the woman "posing as a man, posing as a woman" playing cards.

Rise of the Dragon (Sierra Online - 1990) features a man named "Blade Hunter" on a quest to seek revenge against an Asian crime lord for the drug overdose of the mayor's daughter. His quest took him into various locations in a seedy and corrupt future similar to the one depicted in the movies Blade Runner. In the "Pleasure Dome", homosexuality exists as one of the vices catered to by the establishment. One of the patrons of this bar is a "woman posing as a man, posing as a woman", a clear nod to the 1982 movie Victor/Victoria. Like the assexual male sissy characters that seemed to adopt the typical female gender, this woman adopts a typical male personality of being cold and un-feeling. Later on in the game, Blade Hunter says sweet things to someone whom he thinks is his girlfriend, and is shocked to find out that it is really a man with long hair. After this embarrassing event, the character worries that people may start to call him "Switch Blade."

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Alfred Horner in Dracula Unleashed.

Infinite Adventures produced a FMV game titled Dracula Unleashed (1993, and rereleased on DVD in 2002) with one Alfred Horner as the 'rather odd fellow' who co-owned the bookstore. This would be the first time a sissy character in a computer game was shown as a live actor. However, the character is explicitly homosexual, giving the playable character lecherous glances.

In 1995 The Orion Conspiracy became the first computer game to use the word homosexual as Devlin McCormack lives on a space station, trying to investigate the murder of his son and stop an alien invasion. His investigation leads him through the underworld of the station, where he discovers that his son was a homosexual.

In 1996, Sierra Entertainment released a horror game titled Phantasmagoria 2: A Puzzle of Flesh. This game used FMV similar to Dracula Unleashed, but with much more graphic violence and gore. The playable character in the game was Curtis Craig, a man who was bisexual, demonstrated by the fact that he maintains relationships with his best friend Trevor, his wife Jocilyn, and Therese, a patron at the local S&M club. This would be the first time that the playable character was set up as a bisexual. Creators of the game talked about the mature sexual themes in the game during a 1997 interview.

In 1996, Vic Tokai brought a graphic adventure computer game titled Silver Load over to the PlayStation. Silver Load is a graphic adventure game with plenty of blood and graphic violence; a bizarre tale of a town cursed because their ancestors enacted genocide on an American Indian tribe. It features a gay barber who finds the cowboy hero attractive, and has a sinister, decadent look about him, similar to the gay co-owner of the bookstore in Dracula Unleashed.

In 2001, Capcom resuscitated this dormant theme with Resident Evil Code: Veronica, a game in the survival horror genre. The central antagonist is named Alfred Ashford; at the game's end he is revealed as a "cross-dressing freak" who is obsessed with his sister.

Where as the sissy characters were suppose to make the audience laugh, these predatory characters' homosexuality was intended to shock the audience, making them perceive the characters, and the civilization to which they belonged, as scary, perverse and immoral.

Gays as target practice

Larry 1 (Remake 1991). Inside the bar where if you try and pickup a male patron, you will be killed.

Some games have used homosexuality in terms of gay bashing. Sierra On-line released the first of its many Leisure Suit Larry games in 1987 (it was a graphical adaptation of an older text adventure, from 1981). In this game one plays a sexist, unattractive man trying to seduce attractive women. Early in the game Larry walks into a bar, where he can try to pick up one of the (heterosexual) male patrons, who would in turn kill him. Thus homosexuality was not just a joke, it was deadly. In the 6th game in the series, Larry is flirted by a gay hotel employee. If he accepts his invitation, the game ends.

Other games allowed the player to respond to homosexuality with violence. In 1999, the website Skateboard.com had an online game in which the player shot at an image of professional skateboarder Ed Templeton, who would tell you that he was a "faggot." The real Ed Templeton is not gay, and the game was eventually pulled off the website.

In 1999, Simon & Schuster Interactive gave us Deer Avenger a spoof of the Deer Hunter series, in which a gun-toting deer attacks "stereotypes of various types of men, including rednecks, a jock, a yuppie and an ambiguously gay stereotype." [Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation 1999].

In 2003, Running With Scissors wrote Postal 2 where the PC runs around a small Arizona town killing people of various sizes and races. The player had the option of going into a gay bar and opening fire on gays. The company defended the game by pointing out that the player does not have to kill gay characters and that the gays in the bar will fire back. In reality, all people in all areas of the game can be shot at, and one of the locations happens to be a gay bar; the company has further defended itself saying that those who are out to find something to be offended by will criticize Postal 2.

Gay bars

A gay bar is a symbol of organized gay life and that is something that the industry has been nervous to show. Yet, gay bars have appeared in games. Sierra Online gave us the first peek at a gay bar when it released Police Quest IV (1993, updated in 1996). In this game, created with guidance of former police officer Darryl F. Gates, you play a cop trying to track down the murder of his police partner. His quest led him to discover that his partner had a double life as a cross-dresser at a West Hollywood transgender bar. The game also has a Neo-Nazi who will call you a "mother loving faggot" if you touch him. The game is noteworthy as it tried to offer the realism that would later be found in Grand Theft Auto, but from the point of view of a police officer. Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude, released in 2004, featured another gay bar.

GLBT Normal and Well Adjusted Secondary Characters

Before the introduction of the ESRB, a handful of computer games in the 1980s and early 1990s had GLBT characters that existed as secondary characters but were neither intended as comic relief, nor as indications of the dark and seedy underbelly of the game's environment.

In 1986, Infocom released Moonmist, a text adventure mystery with several possible randomly-selected plotlines; in one of these plotlines the criminal is an artist who is jealous because her girlfriend has gotten married.

In 1992, Sierra On-line produced Laura Bow In The Dagger of Amon Ra which featured a woman from a small town who gets a job for a New York paper in the 1920s. Two of the women she meets are involved in a secret love affair.

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"Charles" (sitting).

In 1993, MicroProse Software released Return of the Phantom with a gay male character named "Charles." While he is certainly an effeminate theatre director, he is also one of the good guys that helps the playable chracter, a French inspector, solve the mystery of the Phantom of the Opera once and for all.

LucasArts would also include a gay uncle who owned a mink factory and raised a girl when her father abandoned her in Full Throttle (1995).

Yet, these were rarities in an the pre-ESRB industry that treated homosexuality as something to laugh at, fear, or even seek to destroy.

After The ESRB

In 1994, the American video and computer game (the later made a brief attempt to develop its own rating system) industry agreed to submit games to the independent ESRB to be previewed and given a descriptive rating. This was in response to criticism by media watchdog interest groups, and politicans who claimed that the sex and violence in certain 16-bit video games, such as Mortal Kombat, Night Trap, and Lethal Enforcers, required government censorship or an industry wide ratings board to keep these games out of the hands of minors. Other nations enacted their own legislation to rate and even ban video and computer games.

The timing of the decision, in terms of how the industry dealt with LGBT characters, is important as in the mid 1990s most developed and democratic nations showed increased tolerance, and support for the civil rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Most progressive and center-left political parties included gay rights concerns in their party's platforms and thus homophobia became seen as something akin to racism, sexism or xenophobia. Thus the video and computer game industry faced this cultural shift at the time when ESRB allowed software developers, especially within the video game industry, to be independent from the content censorship of hardwdare manufactors. Nintendo and Sega would not be held liable for the content that existed in game developed by a third party developer because the consumer would have fair warninig about any objectionable content of every game sold. New comers to the video game hardware manufactoring; Sony and Microsoft would not try and promote a particular company image by imposing content guidlines onto a third party developer.

In 1996, Crystal Dynamics released Blazing Dragons for the PlayStation. It was a graphic adventure game based on a British cartoon where dragons had human emotions and real humans were obnoxious villains. Much like the computer game Sorcerer, Blazing Dragons was influenced by comedians such as John Cleese of the Monty Python comedy team. This game marketed the introduction to the video game industry of the comic models that the computer game industry had been using to reference homosexuality. The game featured a dragon knight whose homosexuality was demonstrated by his effeminacy and vanity, and a entire puzzle involved dressing as the princess of the dragons in order to trick the dragon king into thinking that she has not run away and gotten kidnapped by the humans. When this fails, it falls to the court jester (who also appears to be homosexual) to wear drag; at one point he kisses one of the other dragon knights, while off camera. This game marked the first time when drag, in the comic model, was allowed to appear in video games.

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The gay gym in Final Fantasy VII.

In 1997, Squaresoft announced it was going to release the seventh game in its popular RPG series Final Fantasy for the PlayStation and not the Nintendo 64. Final Fantasy VII won praise for its graphics, sound, long and complex storyline, and diverse cast of playable characters, including a black character and three female characters. It was the most popular game in 1997, ensured the success of the PlayStation, and has been cited as one the best video games of all time. In Final Fantasy VII the most noted reference to homosexuality was a quest where the main character Cloud had to cross-dress in order to get into a brothel and rescue Tifa. He needed to get the tailor to make a dress, and go into a gay gym to get a wig. To get Don Corneo to choose him, he also had to obtain ladies' underwear and perfume. The game proved to the video game industry that having references to homosexuality and cross-dressing was not going to be an automatic financial disaster.

In 1997, the Last Express, has you meeting two young adult girls on the train who are almost always in each others company. While at first they appear to be merely close friends, reading the diary of one of them suggests they are lesbians, but there are no explicitly homosexual gestures beyond hand-holding.

In Gabriel Knight 3, it becomes very obvious that two of the characters, Lady Howard and Estelle Stiles, are lesbians. However, nothing is ever made of this other then Gabriel noticing the one bed for two people and say "Gee, isn't that cozy?"

In 1997, JC Research released the role playing game titled Legend of the Ancient Dragon for the PC and PlayStation. In the game the character Lazitz was in love with King Albert. Both men were single and had no interest in women.

That same year, Eidos released The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga for the PlayStation, based on the Marvel comic book character of the same name. In the "Pantheon Saga", the Hulk joined with a family team of superheroes to combat global problems such as terrorism. One of the family members, named Hector, was openly gay. He appears in Eidos' game, although no mention or reference is made to his sexual orientation.

In 1998, Interplay released Fallout 2 featuring the first same-sex marriage in a game.

In 1999, Game Arts released the RPG titled Grandia for the PlayStation; according to XY Magazine, a major character named Justin is bisexual. That same year, Funcom released the computer graphic adventure game The Longest Journey with a lesbian landlady and a gay cop. While the game used a futuristic Blade Runner type setting, the gay characters were not used to show how decadent society had become but were seen as normal and well adjusted secondary characters.

In 2000, Sony released an action RPG for the PlayStation titled Wild ARMs 2. The game involved a story line about Brad Evans and his mysterious military boyfriend Billy. Brad is portrayed in a remarkably unstereotypical manner, as a large-built level-headed 30-year-old man who treats others with great kindness, and does not appear effeminate in any way whatsoever. Brad's boyfriend Billy is smaller in stature, but is also not portrayed stereotypically, nor submissively for his size; his character suffers from immobility and severe head trauma, and he longs to be reunited with Brad, as everyone else hopes for Billy's condition to improve. In these ways, Brad and Billy are portrayed as ordinary people, whose sexuality is irrelevant in their settings and to those around them.

That same year, Acclaim released a racing game titled South Park Rally, the first of several games based on the popular animated series South Park for the Playstation, Nintendo 64, and PC. Big Gay Al, a prominent character in the series, is a playable character in South Park Rally.

That same year Activision released Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force for the PC and PlayStation 2. In the game you could play as a male or a female, and in either case a female would flirt with you. Elite Force was notable in this regard, as the Star Trek franchise has often been attacked for its treatment of gay and lesbian characters on TV.

2001's Shadow Hearts contained a homosexual character, a Chinese acupuncturist known as Meiyuan who improved the weapons of your characters and did so with more enthusiasm for the male characters. Shadow Hearts: Covenant in 2005 also featured gay characters: the two flamboyant Magimel brothers, who were a constant sight throughout the game. One was a tailor who would sew magical clothes when bribed with beefcake trading cards, the other was a vendor for items and weapons. In one optional scene toward the end of the game, a third major character was revealed to be gay; the ensuing offscreen anal sex was largely treated as disgusting, though one female player character called it "beautiful."

Also in 2001, Metal Gear Solid 2 featured a bisexual character, Vamp. The conversation in which this was revealed (by Solid Snake himself) also explains that Scott Dolph was Vamp's homosexual lover. The game does not dwell on this point, and accepts it simply as a factor of the character.

In 2004, LucasArts released Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic, in which a bisexual female Jedi would flirt with another female Jedi, and could even fall in love with your character if played as a female (you could choose to return her affection as well). That same year Fable came out as a long RPG game that followed various characters from cradle to grave. In the game the PCs could flirt with characters of the same sex and enter into same-sex marriages. The game came out for the Xbox.

The Atari computer game The Temple of Elemental Evil (2004) made news headlines when it was revealed that the game has an optional story line where the player can rescue a gay pirate and see him marry one of the male player characters.

In 2004, NCsoft released the City of Heroes. The huge multi-player game allowed the player to create his or her own super heroes who fight super villains in over a dozen missions. The game also allowed players to go online and join other super heroes in battle or to just roam the large fictional city. The result is that some online gay guilds have been created where gay players will network with one other and have a gay pride parade, battling characters controlled by homophobes.

Transgender characters in video games 1985 - 1994

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Roxy from Final Fight (arcade version).

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Roxy from Final Fight (Sega CD version).

While gay, lesbian, and bisexual characters frequently appeared in games from the 80s and early 90s, there were relatively few transsexual characters, as the sissy characters and situtional gender inversion was used to label a male character as being gay and not being transgender.

Capcom created Final Fight for the arcade in 1989. The beat 'em up involved the player picking among three fighters on a quest to save the mayor's daughter who was kidnapped by a criminal gang known as Mad Gear. In 1993, Capcom presented Nintendo with a version of the game for the 16-bit SNES. According to David Sheffs' book Game Over, Nintendo stated that Capcom could not have a female enemy as that violated Nintendo's ban on violence against women. Capcom countered that there were no female enemies in the game, revealing that the apparently female Roxy and Poison were in fact newhalfs. The characters were nevertheless removed from the SNES version. However, in 1993, Sega obtained the rights to release the game for their Sega CD. In a sign of Sega's more liberal polices, the female enemies could remain in the game, but with less-provocative clothing; also there could be no indication of their supposed transgendered status.

In 2005, Coin-Op Museum published an online article asserting that the two female characters were not newhalfs, but conventional females. As evidence the article cited Guy's stage in Street Fighter Alpha 2 (Capcom characters would frequently appear in other Capcom games) and the official Capcom artwork in Versus Books' Street Fighter Alpha 2 Strategy Guide.

Transgenderism represents something more fearful to the video and computer game industries than traditional homosexuality, because it tears apart society's gender roles. This threatens to radically alter how society views gender, much more so then the issue of sexual orientation as the cultural impact of the gay liberation movement meant that gay, lesbian and bisexual characters were no longer suppose to be idenitifed by being comical sissies or gender inverts.

This may explain why transgender characters remain quite rare in video and computer game history.

In Nintendo's own Super Mario Brothers 2 they introduced the enemy named Birdo. The original instruction manual for the game stated, "He thinks he is a girl and he spits eggs from his mouth. He'd rather be called 'Birdetta.'" The manual also said that he felt Mario and Luigi were, "So cute, I am NEVER going to let you go!" Future editions of the instruction manual were corrected. In 2000, Birdo was a playable character in Mario Tennis. In that game, the character is described as a "she" who is in love with Mario's (male) pet dinosaur Yoshi.

Gay characters in fighting games

Many fighting games have characters who are either confirmed or suspected to be gay. Having gay male characters in these fighting games can challenge the traditional perception of homosexuals as weak sissies. Nevertheless, hints about a particular character's sexual orientation in a fighting game often take the form of effeminate or otherwise sissifed features, in an otherwise tough and stereotypically masculine character.

The Street Fighter character Zangief has long been thought of as being gay, although this was disputed in Capcom Fighting Evolution, where it was stated that he had a girlfriend (however, this may only indicate that he's bisexual). The Street Fighter character Eagle, who appears in the original Street Fighter as well as in Capcom vs. SNK 2, has however been confirmed to be gay (as a tribute to Queen singer Freddie Mercury), although several of Eagle's quotes obviously displaying his orientation were censored in the US release of the game.

In the Guilty Gear series, the main character Sol Badguy, who is also heavily based on Freddie Mercury, is often rumored to be gay; this has been neither disputed nor confirmed. The character Venom in that game, however, is most clearly in love with his deceased leader, Zato-1, although his feelings do not seem to have been returned.

Being succubi, Lilith and Morrigan Aensland in Capcom's Darkstalkers series have been long portrayed as being rather openly bisexual.

An obscure game known as Groove on Fight is currently the only known fighting game featuring an openly gay couple, the somewhat stereotypical characters Rudolf Gartheimer and Damian Shade.

Marketing To A Gay Audience

Within the United States there is a perceived market of affluent homosexual young men. In part, companies seeking this pink dollar, seek to present an image of being supportive of gay rights causes or charities. The pink dollar has been a subject of debate within the GLBT community. GLBT supporters of capitalism tend to support private companies seeking the pink dollar, and feel that it will help create a better environment for gay people in and out of the workplace. GLBT supporters of communism or socialism tend to be critical of the pink dollar, objecting to its exclusive focus on male homosexuals, and to the implication that GLBT people should become integrated into American institutions of capitalism and the nuclear family.

The video and computer gaming industry has been slow to grab the pink dollar, with Maxis being the first to to enter into this new market. It is generally felt that young white males (most of whom are heterosexual) are the force driving the industry forward. Hence any effort to market games to anyone else is tied to an industry question, "Will young, white, men want to buy this game?" In the 1990s the industry began to make some efforts to market games to women by creating software titles with strong and independent female characters as seen in Tomb Raider and Resident Evil. The commercial success of both games (and their numerous sequels) does suggest that male gamers are willing to play a female character. Yet, it remains to be seen if a straight male would be willing to play an openly gay or transgender character, as they generally are willing to play sexy and powerful female characters.

The Sims

File:Sims.jpeg

Screenshot of The Sims.

In 2001, Maxis broke new ground with a new television commcerial for its computer game The Sims. Highlighting the ability of the characters to date, the commercial featured an attractive twenty-something man in a nightclub flirting with a woman, until he is suddenly drawn to an attractive man in the club and after a brief pause agrees to date him. The games have become very popular as they allow the player to create their own simulated family, whose members could be either gay or straight and still date, make love, marry and raise children. This is perhaps the first and only time the industry has made any attempt to capture the gay gamer dollar.

Working inside the industry

Little is known about what it is like to work within the industry as a gay person. People within the industry do not want to talk about it, and gay rights organizations have been slow to pay much attention to this billion dollar industry. The result is that much of the information that does come out is in dispute. Online rumors that the first game designed by a transgender person was a racing computer game in 1978 titled Wheeler Dealer and it was for the Apple IIGS have been seen as dubious given the fact that the computer system was not around at the time. In 1996, a Maxis employee named Jacques Servin was fired when he put gay characters into the SimCopter game. Depending on the news source, Servin claims to have done it because he was upset at being grossly overworked at Maxis or as some type of political statement. The firing of an openly gay employee sounds worse then it is, as Maxis would go onto produce the popular and gay-friendly Sims computer games. Yet, for some unknown reason, gay people that worked in the video and computer game industry are cautious about coming forward.

Asian gaming cultures and depictions of GLBT sexuality

Most US games are made for a US audience. However, Japan, Korea and Taiwan all have large gaming industries which produce for local audiences. Many video games are developed in Japan, and some effort has been made at making what could be called 'gay games.' In Japanese popular culture men were often bishounen, who blur gender lines by their long hair, and effeminate features. This was also tied to the success in Japan of comic books and animation with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender characters who are either openly or subtly gay. A select genre of adult pornographic Japanese games exist called H-games. This genre includes gay male and gay female subgenres. This material generally does not make it over to the west in English, and western reviews of the gay male video games tend to see the homosexuality as a gimmick in an otherwise mediocre game. Yet, this may be a source for further study on the issue of gay characters in video and computer games. Unfortunately, homosexuality, while relatively innocuous among celebrities in Japan, is still considered an oddity for an allegedly "average" male or female, due to Japan's very humble social structure.

See also

• Gay rights
• Lesbian and Gay Films
• Hollywood Hays Code
• Entertainment Software Ratings Board
• Television Shows with gay characters

References

• Russo, Vito. The Celluiod Closet. 1981, 1986.
• Sheffs, David. Game Over: How Nintendo Zapped an American Industry, Captured Your Dollars, and Enslaved Your Children.
• Books, Versus. Street Fighter Alpha 2 Strategy Guide. [ud.]
• Victor/Victoria (Film). 1982.
• XY Magazine. "Gaystation" Scott L. Howe. Jul/Aug 2001. page 78.
• Slate. "The Game Of Wife: Gay Marriage Comes To Video Games." April 7th, 2004. http://www.slate.com/id/2098406

External links

Gender and sexual orientation

• All Out Gamers
• Gaymer
• Gay Characters in Video Games
• Gay Marriage Comes to Video Games
• Bloggeer Article
• Megalixir guide to cross dressing in Final Fantasy VII

General information on video and computer games

• Video Game Museum
• MobyGames
• Lost Levels

Nintendo's censorship polices

• Censorship of Maniac Mansion
• Nintendo's 1988 Official Video Game Content Guidelines