Polygon - Games are better without damsels to save

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Claire Hosking has written an opinion piece for Polygon. In it, she argues that games don't need to have damsels in distress to save. And that they are better this way.

The starting point for Claire Hosking is this:

Anita Sarkeesian's Feminist Frequency series has amazing influence for someone who's simply doing what so many have done before - making videos about about their opinions on books, TV, film and video games.... Anthony Burch, Joss Whedon and Tim Schafer - have listened and encouraged their followers to take note, while Saints Row creative Director Steve Jaros has said, "I actually think [Tropes vs. Women creator Anita Sarkeesian's] right in this case" when a video was critical of an aspect of the game.​

Claire Hoskings argues that when a female character has to e.g. rescued by the player she becomes just a thing to fetch. She does so with a quote from Anita Sarkeesian's Tropes in Video Games, part 1:

...[damseling is] a plot device in which a female character is placed in a perilous situation from which she cannot escape on her own and must be rescued by a male character, usually providing a core incentive or motivation for the protagonist's quest. In video games this is most often accomplished via kidnapping but it can also take the form of petrification or demon possession for example."​

Claire Hosking uses two examples from current videogames on how to avoid this:

Games like Bioshock or Gone Home use audio logs and environmental narrative to flesh out characters you're searching for; they're games about entering their world and understanding their life. It's an interesting game design question - there are many, many reasons why a character might be interesting to find or deliberately trying to keep something from you. Every one of them says more about the character than just someone being taken away and locked up.​

And finally, she writes that:

While they are damsels, they exist for others and no longer have their own initiative or interactions......It also frequently portrays love as transactional - save girl, get kiss - rather than something that springs from spending time with a person and getting to know them. None of this makes for good writing. The fact damseling happens overwhelmingly to female characters has a particular meaning in a society that has historically restricted women's freedoms and denied them equal autonomy with men. ​