Super Mario Brothers 2

After reading, “Does Lara Croft Wear Fake Polygons? Gender and Gender-Role Subversion in Computer Adventure Games,” by Anne-Marie Schleiner, and comparing the various views with the princess from Super Mario Brothers 2, I believe that the creators of the game were not going for the Tomb Raider approach, with sex appeal, but with the approach of just having girls play their game and try to sell the game to both genders. When I compare the two games there is a lot different between how the female characters are seen in the game. Lara Croft is wearing little clothing and her body has been proportioned to a Barbie doll. But with the princess, the only thing that shows that the character is a woman is the dress and the hair. I think that by putting the princess in a big pink dress with blonde hair they were trying to create a character in which younger girls would want to control so they would play the game also. Schleiner states, “the appearance of female heroines in computer games, albeit male constructions of femininity, can be seen as a first step, an invitation for women to play computer games (Schleiner 221-226).” I agree with this statement because when I was younger and playing video games with my little sister, she would only want to play the games with me if there was a girl character or some cute little animal. I also don’t think the when comparing the princess to Mario, Luigi, and Toad that the creators of the game made any real stereotypical statements about women either. The only thing that the princess can do is sort of hover longer then the other characters, which doesn’t seem like a stereotype of women to me. The only real thing in the game that might be somewhat demining to women is the fact that she doesn’t have a name like the other characters; she is just known as the princess.

Works Cited:

Schleiner, Anne-Marie. "Does Lara Croft Wear Fake Polygons? Gender and Gender-Role Subversion in Computer Adventure Games." MIT Press 34.3 (2001): 221-226. Web. 7 Oct 2010.