Playing with Herstory: Representing Femininity in Historical Video Games

Key insights

6 takeaways

01
The paper proposes six indicators for systematically assessing feminine character representation in historical video games: the link to real historical persons (historical, fictive-representative, or purely fictive), proportion of women, strength of agency, playability as a player character, age diversity, and other diversity such as personal histories, skills, and personalities.
02
The authors argue that historical video games have received far less critical attention than historical texts and films, making systematic evaluation of their representation of women especially important.
03
The analysis of three games shows each has both strengths and weaknesses: This War of Mine offers balanced, individualized playable civilians of varied ages and backgrounds, though only one woman appears in its civilian cast balanced with men.
04
Valiant Hearts uses few women, but sketches them as recognizable historical types tied to wartime employment such as factory work and nursing, supported by embedded historical information; it has only one playable woman, a nurse.
05
80 Days shows the greatest variety of women in fictive roles, including stereotypically masculine occupations, but contains relatively few real historical women.
06
The authors conclude that considerable room for improvement remains and recommend that designers weigh multiple indicators together rather than focusing solely on the number or strength of female characters.

Summary

This paper by Elisabeta Toma and Cosima Rughiniș proposes a set of six indicators for systematically examining how feminine characters are represented in historical video games, which the authors argue has received far less critical attention than historical texts and films. The six topics of inquiry cover the relationship between game characters and real historical persons (distinguishing historical, fictive-representative, and purely fictive characters), the proportion of women, the strength of their agency, whether they can be player characters, their age diversity, and other forms of diversity such as personal histories, skills, and personalities. The authors illustrate these indicators through analyses of three games: This War of Mine, a civilian-centered war game set during the Siege of Sarajevo; Valiant Hearts, a WWI commemorative game with only one playable woman, a nurse; and 80 Days, a steampunk reimagining of Jules Verne's novel with numerous fictive female characters across many occupations and ages.

The analysis finds that each game has both strengths and weaknesses in its construction of feminine characters. This War of Mine offers balanced, individualized playable characters of varied ages and backgrounds, though only one woman appears among its civilian cast in a balanced way with men. Valiant Hearts uses few women but sketches them as recognizable historical types tied to wartime employment such as factory work and nursing, supported by embedded historical information. 80 Days shows the greatest variety of women in fictive roles, including stereotypically masculine occupations, but contains relatively few real historical women. The authors conclude that considerable room for improvement remains, and that future designs should weigh multiple indicators rather than focusing solely on the number or strength of characters.