How Men Are Depicted in Videogames

As said by the president of Entertainment Software Association,

Michael D. Gallagher, video games are ingrained in our culture
and are important symbolic sites for conveying messages.
Targeting over 1.2 billion male and female players worldwide,
videogames portray men stereotypically in their physique and
behavior. In terms of action and gameplay, games mostly
emphasize on violence and militarism as a form of masculinity. In
terms of body image, videogames usually seem to favor
bodybuilder physiques over other types of muscle tonality.
However, there are some discrepancies in representing
masculinity when referring to different game genres.
In most first-person shooting and open-world games, such as Call
of Duty, Grand Theft Auto, Far Cry and Assassins Creed,
militarized masculinity is dominant. The military-inspired historical
themes depict men as characters who act violently and
mercilessly in open combat in order to conquer and defeat the
enemy. They use varied weapons and machines to secure the
success of their mission. This portrayal links to traits of historical
heroes, such as bravery, sacrifice and righteousness. Their body
is extremely muscular, especially their chest and arms. This type
of muscle tonality is similar to the characters played by Hollywood
actors such as Bruce Willis, Sylvester Stallone and Arnold
Schwarzenegger. Likewise, this physique is comparable to
superheroes produced by Marvel and DC Comics. A great example
is John "Soap" MacTavish, the main protagonist in the Call of Duty
Modern Warfare series. He is an emotionless warrior, a perfected
soldier and an advanced war machine, being an essential member
of the Bravo Team. His large biceps and pectorals are barely
contained by the tight-fitting tops he uses in his missions. As an
effect, this representation of masculinity sets impossible body
standards and implies the fact that violence and brutality is
acceptable as long as you have noble goals.

In sport simulating games, the trend is to represent in the

characters the exact sports figures, replicating their body
physique and facial features. Men are depicted similarly to the
actual professional players: healthy, well-fit, strong and
successful. Through digital rendering, gamers are able to play
with their favorite sports figure such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Zlatan
Ibrahimovi, LeBron James or Tom Brady. Sport games like FIFA,
NBA2K or Madden NFL involve physical violent contact, depicting
the combat between the sides. In wrestling games and fighting
games, men are depicted as macho, brutal and extreme. Such
games emphasize on the weapons they use: their hyper muscular
bodies. This hardly attainable configuration is established by
various companies, such as World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE)
or Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). In racing games,
representations of masculinity are tied with the skill of driving,
fixing and tuning different vehicles: cars, motorbikes,
snowmobiles or motorboats. Men are illustrated as highly
competitive, fast and mysterious, as their body is rarely shown,
the focus being on the automobile. This representation of
masculinity creates the stereotype of the mechanic: every man is
able to upgrade, repair and replace parts of automatic
machineries.
Fantasy role-playing games (RPGs) displays two different types of
men. At the beginning of every RPG, the character is seen as the
eternal boy, a carefree, playful and relaxed individual. As the
protagonist progresses through the plot, he becomes a battleready hero, a violent and fierce warrior. Players can choose
classes for their characters that inherit several abilities and
aptitudes. As shown in popular role-playing videogames like
Dungeons & Dragons or Dragon Nest, the most common classes
are: Fighter, a powerful, enduring combatant, Thief, a stealthy
assassin, Mage, a brawler that features powerful magical abilities
and Cleric, a character specialized in healing and supporting the
warlords. All these classes depict men embracing career paths in
fantasy armies or in bold adventures, opposed to the professions
men adopt in reality. Masculinity is seen as a change from

innocence to maturity, from fragility to boldness, and from peace

to bloodshed. Again, men are depicted as fighters, hunters and
gatherers that rely on their militant aptitudes, emphasizing the
trend of promoting the militarized masculinity.
To conclude, videogames project stereotypical and often
unrealistic images of manhood, with violent and cruel
protagonists, highlighting their sacrifice and bravery and showing
their importance as armed forces and as sentinels in combat.
Most usually, videogames also depict unrealistic physiques,
supporting the hardly attainable ideal of hyper muscular bodies.