Activision denies "lose the chick" report

By Robert Purchese Published 5 August, 2010

"We didn't tell dev to scrap female lead."

Activision has denied "killing" a Black Lotus assassin game by Treyarch (and later resurrecting it as True Crime: Hong Kong) because it had a female hero.

"The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop," the publisher responded to a detailed Gamasutra report, "nor has the company told any of its studios that they cannot develop games with female characters. With respect to True Crime: Hong Kong, Activision did not mandate the gender of the lead character.

"Activision respects the creative vision of its development teams."

Sources alleged that Black Lotus - "a great project internally" - was "killed" because "they don't do female characters because they don't sell". Activision bods apparently demanded the studio "lose the chick".

The year was 2007 and the top selling games were Halo 3, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Assassin's Creed.

"Skewed" focus testing apparently confirmed that the market didn't want Black Lotus, and so the idea of True Crime: Hong Kong was "pushed" on the studio.

"Activision has no room for 'we are making an open-world game with a Hong Kong action movie feel with a female lead,' because that game doesn't exist right now," one source said. "What they do have room for is, 'we are making an open-world game with a gangster main character who can steal cars and shoot people, but it will be in Hong Kong instead of Liberty City. And then they go, 'Hey, GTAIV sold 10 million copies, so that's what we expect from you.'"

Another source added: "If Activision does not see a female lead in the top five games that year, they will not have a female lead. And the people that don't want a female lead will look at games like Wet and Bayonetta and use them as 'statistics' to 'prove' that female leads don't move mass units."

Treyarch, for one reason or another, hasn't wound up as the developer of True Crime: Hong Kong. That's now United Front's baby. The game was formerly unveiled in December last year.

Black Lotus, for the record, was described as a Hong Kong cinema-style assassin game with a Lucy Liu-like main character (modelled around her roles in films Charlie's Angels and Kill Bill). "We were all very proud of what we were trying to make and the team was excited," rued one source. "We made great progress."

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (74) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • macmurphy #1 2 years ago

    Tomb Raider. That is all.

  • iHAZaCHEEZ3burger #2 2 years ago

    Activision in being cunts shocker.

  • Mox #3 2 years ago

    "The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop"

    I am utterly convinced of the veracity of this statement.

  • photoboy #4 2 years ago

    "The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop"

    That's right, Activision just tell them to keep making COD sequels.

  • IkariW #5 2 years ago

    The Video games industry is maturing then?

    :/
    Ikari
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 12:05

  • Paulie_P #6 2 years ago

    The year was 2007 and the top selling games were Halo 3, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Assassin's Creed.

    A bit off topic, but is it not a bit depressing that we're in 2010 and the top selling games will probably be Halo Reach, Modern Warfare 2 and Assassin's Creed 2?
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 12:00

  • BigJonno #7 2 years ago

    @ Paulie_P

    Yes, yes it is. Although I'm willing to give AssCreed2 a pass for being a textbook example of how to do a sequel right; take everything that was crap and make it good, take everything that was already good and make it better.

  • ParanoidZombie #8 2 years ago

    @Paulie: ditto, we're kinda running in circles here: new dead rising, new fable, new gears, new killzone, new fallout, new dead space... Most of these games will be good / great, but it feels safe, and safe = boring IMO.

  • NimbusTLD #9 2 years ago

    Bring back Cate Archer! It would be an FPS, it's set in the Cold War... what could go wrong??

  • jebus #10 2 years ago

    I think the bigger issue is the fact that games are designed by a mixture of committee and focus groups.

  • Wedge1985 #11 2 years ago

    @BigJonno

    Couldn't agree more. Just playing AS2 and its so much better. I don't feel like i'm fighting with the game to get through it. only finished the first one because of the story line (the one continuing into AS2, not the seemingly rushed one).

  • Tiger_Walts #12 2 years ago

    Apparently it's just air hostesses that they drop, not assassins.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 12:14

  • Sunyavadin #13 2 years ago

    You know what?

    For once, I believe them.

    TITS SELL GAMES.

    They wouldn't be so stupid as to forget that.

  • teh_MBK #14 2 years ago

    @macmurphy: Well said, but the recent titles haven't exactly been blockbusters have they...

    @Jebus: Exactly. I think the main problem is that with the last generation, gaming has become a much bigger business and also a lot riskier in terms of development costs. This leaves publishers a lot less willing to take risks with their products.

    Back on topic, I gotta say I'm indifferent to what the gender of the protagonist is. Nine times out of ten the gender is interchangeable anyway.

  • lordofthedunce #15 2 years ago

    "The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop"

    Just what they can't then

  • dr_zoidthrob #16 2 years ago

    Activision - the Danny Dyer of games companies.

  • LetsGo #17 2 years ago

    Tomb Raider aside, don't they have a point?

  • beastmaster #18 2 years ago

    Wonder if R* would ever have the balls to do GTA with a female lead.

    Bayonetta and Tomb Raider are 2 of the best games I've ever played. They would not have been as good with a male lead.

  • ignatiusjreilly #19 2 years ago

    Good for business, bad for creativity.

    Whether or not Activision are making the right choices depends on which you think is more important.

  • Paulie_P #20 2 years ago

    @Bigjonno - I might have to give Assassins Creed 2 a try at some point. I was really put off it by the first game.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 12:29

  • Raznilof #21 2 years ago

    Activision just doesn't seem to be able to catch a break. The real problem with all of this is not so much all the bad news. A very...very...very...small percentage of gamers actually read news or know about the troubled year Activision has had. Well, troubled, financially there's not much to worry about for them.

    The long term danger Activision faces is that real creative and mature talent might think twice before joining them. This won't lead to any sort of decline in the short run, but it is what almost killed EA a couple of years ago after the whole spouse incident. They had serious problems attracting the kind of talent needed to start projects. With all due respect, there's enough people who can do the production of games really well so the continuing of established franchises is a question of initial IP inertia really, and can go on for a couple of sequels still.

    I am not for the "creative freedom above all else" attitude, it makes little sense to make games that score high marks with reviewers and fans, but then don't sell. There's a sweet spot where games are great and commercially viable. Activision still does both well, but with all the bad press, I wonder how many forward thinking developers they can attract for the future.

    edit: typos
    Edited by 2 at 05/08/10 @ 12:33

  • Freek #22 2 years ago

    Another day, another PR nightmare for Activission. You'd almost start to feel sorry for them...almost.

  • mingster #23 2 years ago

    I actually thought this said lose the female lead developer.

  • Stomp224 #24 2 years ago

    Treyarch speaking out against the overlords at Acti too? Who will be left to develop the next COD? :o

    SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN!

    Edit - Spellchecker malfunction
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 12:44

  • kinky_mong #25 2 years ago

    Pfft, fools be forgetting about Cooking Mama. That femme be shifting crazy amounts of units, ya dig?

  • ignatiusjreilly #26 2 years ago

    There are lots of games with female leads that sell quite well.

    Selling well isn't good enough. It's a simple question: would this sell better if it was a female lead or a male lead? Activision will do enough research to answer that question confidently, and there you have your answer.

    Of course focus groups don't always get everything right, but with a £50m budget, why take the risk?

    Blockbuster action movies nearly always have male leads, and they have bigger female audiences than games. If games weren't all about being "badass", it might be different.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 12:48

  • makeamazing #27 2 years ago

    I am sure there are some men who are 25 stone who love playing as a woman in WOW who will be disappointed that Activision have done this, but not me (I am neither fat or play female characters on wow). I generally dont want to play as a female characters in games. Though it was ok in Mirrors edge... so who knows.

    Edit: Wow more people on EG forums without a sense of humour than i thought, either that or more 25 stone men playing female characters than i thought ;)... its just a joke... relax.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 17:52

  • macmurphy #28 2 years ago

    @teh_MBK.

    You're right there haven't been many top selling Tomb Raider games lately but in the nineties they were a phenomenon selling millions. My point was just that if you come up with a world and a mechanic that captivates people the gender of your protaginist does not have to be a hindrance - I'm sure those skimpy shorts sold a few copies instead.

    The sad truth is that big sales figures are often the rewards of games that tick the most boxes. Developers try and appeal to the broadest demographic, and in doing so you may produce a game solidly unspectacular but one that sells by the bucketloads.

    I think there's a danger in trying to look at the homogenisation of top sellers - the way they are often military shooters or big selling sports titles - and claim that it is greedy bastards like Kotick that force this on us. The truth is these are the most popular genres, and companies will always try and make money off the back of this.

    We drive demand as consumers and companies respond. The sad thing is that whilst we lament the poor sales figures of gems like Okami and Ico, if people don't buy them they won't get remade. People will always stick to what they like and know - it's sad but it's human nature. I'll gob off about videogame classics that deserve a market but quite happily drink pissy lager that I know and miss out on classic ales that I don't. We're all lazy to some degree; as a gamer I can't expect everyone else to step out of their comfort zone in gaming when I won't do it in other aspects of my life. It's laziness like this that allows people to stick with the usual, and it's inevitable that comanies will try and give the consumer what they want.

    It's nice that games like Modern Warfare and Halo offer such polished and entertaining experiences - I enjoyed them hugely (I thought MW2 was a bit toss but that's a sepearte post). Developers and suits walk a tightrope between creative freedom and business driven design choices - consumer and critical apathy to the game lie on one side of this balancing act, limited sales lies on the other. Games companies have to make money to keep producing titles, a little bit of focus group testing is inevtable. I'm not saying it's a good thing, but it's the unavoidable cost of maintaing a profitable business.

    I think games like Tomb Raider, and to an extent Metroid, show that people will have female leads - I think you just have to back the design decision up with an outstanding game and possibly some companies find it easier to take the path of least resistance. I'm not trying to excuse this, but I can't slate them for it either.


  • Irien #29 2 years ago

    Would it have been sooo difficult to allow the player to select a gender a la Mass Effect, or Dragon Age, or Oblivion, or....

    The devs could default to female char, but with the option of male, then give the publisher feedback via online data collection (subject to user approval). This would a) give gamers the option and b) provide hard evidence, rather than anecdotal marketting guessworkl!
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 13:06

  • Mox #30 2 years ago

    The thing about that line they walk is that developers and publishers are on different sides of that line, and one of them can tug a hell of a lot harder than the other.

  • NimbusTLD #31 2 years ago

    Still time to change your lead, Hydrophobia devs?

  • tachometer #32 2 years ago

    That's my Halo:Reach pre-order cancelled then!

  • wizlon #33 2 years ago

    There isn't really much diversity in game heroes, I mean what was the last game you played where the hero was wheelchair bound? I feel a Wheels and the Legman game coming on.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 13:12

  • The_Bloody_Kettle #34 2 years ago

    I would like to see more diversity within games story-lines. Most of the time they're all very similar and bore the hell out of me.
    Playing it safe is fine for a while, but when it stagnates the industry you need to stop.

    Then again 'Black Lotus/True Crime:Hong Kong' doesn't sound like my kind of thing at all. Also I can just imagine the female lead in 'Black Lotus' would have been an over-sexualised bimbo wearing a cat suit..

    Diversity please games industry! I'm fed up of Call of Duty and other mindless sequels coming out year on year.

  • darth_paul #35 2 years ago

    ...bah, and then again, its Treyarch, so it would have been pants anyway :p

  • ignatiusjreilly #36 2 years ago

    @Milky1985

    I really doubt Activision are purposefully fixing results, or sacrificing profit to push a sexist agenda.

    More likely the dev teams listened and heard positive feedback, but the cold numbers that came out of the tests showed their target audience still prefered playing as a man.

  • darleysam #37 2 years ago

    "The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop"

    Huh, I'm sure the creative environment was earlier described as ordering at a restaurant, whereby you tell the chef exactly what you want and how to prepare it, and then they go away and make it to your exact specifications, as creatively as they can within that.

    "I want a free-roaming 3rd-person action game set in a sprawling city"
    "Excellent sir, would that be a male or female protagonist?"
    "Well I don't really think anyone likes females.. could I get a dong on there?"
    "Of course sir."

    "The nerve of that waiter. I can't think of a single popular female character. Not one!"

  • hiddenranbir #38 2 years ago

    Even in Hentai games, the lead is always a male.

  • Phishfood #39 2 years ago

    I dunno about other people but if I gotta look at the back of someone for 15-30 hours then it may as well be the back of a woman.

  • LetsGo #40 2 years ago

    @Milky1985 all you've done is named established franchises, which this game was not. Plus advanced wars the main character is a male and Heavenly Sword did not sell well.

    No one can name an original, successful game with a lead female character apart from Tomb Raider and activision is a business after all.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/10 @ 13:44

  • Spekingur #41 2 years ago

    Activision denies practising apartheid in any form.
    You know, Activision, the first step of the problem is the denial of it.

    Also, I approve of Cate Archer.

    I should point out that in Mass Effect 1 and 2 I always played as a female character. I always thought I would be able to use womanly guiles to get my way. Men can't do that. Well, at least not manly men.

  • ignatiusjreilly #42 2 years ago

    @LetsGo

    There aren't many, but there are some.

    Perfect Dark, Portal, Beyond Good and Evil, Metroid, No One Lives Forever. I'm sure there are more.

  • wizlon #43 2 years ago

    Urban Chaos not only had a female lead, but she was also black! Talk about ground breaking. Was a bit of a rubbish game though.

  • RobTheBuilder #44 2 years ago

    "The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop"

    No. They just withold bonuses till they fall into line or quit...

  • RobTheBuilder #45 2 years ago

    What about PN03!!
    Fallout 3 among others lets you choose gender, that's a start.

  • spekkeh #46 2 years ago

    It's an interesting conundrum. It's not inherently wrong to stick to a tried and true format. They're that for a reason, and Activision is a company that needs money to pay its workers. You could even take the philosophical high ground that, as people are still interested in buying games like Super FIFA 11 Road to World Cup spring edition, even if they already own all the other editions for their consoles, that it's a good thing to stick to that formula, as it maximally satiates the masses. Nobody criticizes romance novels like Jane Austen's for sticking to the same formula.

    But just like the expression "pay peanuts, get monkeys", you'll only aspire to mediocrity.

  • spekkeh #47 2 years ago

    I wouldn't exactly lay the blame with focus groups and user testing though. You can slate Hollywood all you like about how it creates forgettable bubblegum imagery, the reason that it's so easy to watch and so good at tweaking your emotions at all the right moments in a movie, just shows the incredible maturity that the science of moviemaking has reached.

  • actionfitz #48 2 years ago

    ""The company does not have a policy of telling its studios what game content they can develop,"

    LOL
    stopped reading after that :)
    Infinity Ward much?

    as in:
    IW: we don't want to churn out another COD so soon.
    Acti: INSUBORDINATION! You're Fired! and we're keeping your bonuses!

    /eyesroll

  • paulf #49 2 years ago

    if the game is good, does the gender of the protagonist really matter?

  • geeza2020 #50 2 years ago

    Activision are so unlucky right now, even if they fell into a barrell full of tits, they would still come up sucking their thumbs :)

  • darth_paul #51 2 years ago

    i know people that are stupid/shallow enough not to play a game because it has a woman as a protagonist (he usually says "you play the chick";). Same goes for black people (San Andreas might have sold less than with a white character)

    the public is, in majority, shallow and stupid. thats a fact, unfortunately

  • Vyggo #52 2 years ago

    You could call it shallow if you want, but I prefer to play as a male lead as well. As it is easier for me to identify with a male, even though (admittedly) I am not a handsome squared jaw hero myself. I also usually prefer music with a male singer and books with a male lead. I even tend to read books written by male authors.

    Hmmm, guess I actually am shallow...

    I am playing through now ME2 with a female character, and Borderlands with the girl (forgot the name). But in both cases I played through the game with a male lead first.

    I think a lot of men or like that, so I think it makes sense for Activision to prefer a male lead in there games. Tombraider is really the only real example of a female lead making a positive difference. And that was because when the first tombraider came out a really sexy looking lady as a lead had never (?) been done before.

  • Shikasama #53 2 years ago

    The problem is when there is a female lead you get the crapstick of representation that was Bayonetta. Or a game called WET.

    If having male main characters avoid the justification of stereotypes that those two examples perepetrate (of gamers being sad, undersexed, a-social weirdos) then I'm with Activision.

  • darth_paul #54 2 years ago

    @ Vyggo
    im just saying that its shallow NOT TO BUY A GAME just because the character is female. Personally, whenever i get to choose, i play as male characters... but i would not ignore a game just because it only offers a female as the only playable gender. I think that a GTA clone in Hong Kong, with a playable female character would have more charm, due to the fact that you could relate what was happening to Kill Bill

  • patchbox360 #55 2 years ago

    i think they probably mean women who aren't sex objects don't shift units because that would be true.

  • scoop #56 2 years ago

    golly

    I remember the days when good games sold well.

    I think they still do, but marketing people don't have "value" in their lexicon.

  • metalangel #57 2 years ago

    Female game characters are great!

    Rubi (WET): midriff, heavy drinking.
    Chun Li: thunder thighs!
    Female Shepard: potentially dykes it out with blue aliens!
    Lara Fucking Croft: GIANT TITS. Everything else quickly became irrelevant.
    Bayonetta: gets NEKKID to attack
    Lilith (Borderlands): ginger Sophie Ellis Bextor!
    Kerrigan: gets tentacle raped. mutates ability to tentacle rape herself.

    I'm struggling to think of a good female lead who didn't suffer some kind of misogynistic wranglings. Female SUPPORT characters, though:

    Oracle: glasses! red hair! in a wheelchair! The world's most disabled game character?
    Sydney (treasure hunter in Fallout 3): kicks butt with custom gun, spends her earnings on booze and sex, sells ammo
    Ashley (Mass Effect): Angry butch racist with everything to prove
    Bonnie MacFarlane: Although past marriageable age, can handle a horse and a gun and wants Marston's love stick DESPERATELY
    Anya Stroud: Desk jockey living in the shadow of her kick-ass mother. Finally trades in the desk for a gun with a chainsaw on it in the third game, and loosens her hair so it gets a bit messy.
    Morrigan: huge tits and Renaissance Fayre speech aside, she sets people on fire!
    A'Kanna the Warrior Queen (Conan): Doesn't take any of Conan's shit. Good with a bow.
    Alyx Vance: Indeterminate ethnicity and corny dialogue makes her a winnar.
    Skylar (The Saboteur): Posh blonde piece with nice car
    Shaundie (Saints Row 2): RAGING skank

    I don't see why any of these decent support characters couldn't be developed into the lead, really.

  • Vyggo #58 2 years ago

    @darth_paul

    I understood what you said. A game without a male lead would have to be extra good for me to buy it. So in certain cases it might have been the deciding factor for me in not buying the game, if I was on the fence already.

    It's an interesting thing though that is probably a good reason for some soul searching on my part.

  • Firefly10 #59 2 years ago

    Jill Valentine - killed the nemesis in resident evil 3

  • mrmonkey1980 #60 2 years ago

    That game sounds like it would be cool. I'd much rather have a female character than a male character in a game. If I'm going to be staing at someone's arse for 15 hours or so then I'd much rather it were female. The problem with games with female leads (Tomb Raider excluded) is that the games aren't good, not that they have female leads! Assassin's Creed would be equally awesome with a female assassin.

  • metalangel #61 2 years ago

    @mrmonkey: That was (arse) one of the reasons given by Core Design for the existence of Lara instead of an early equivalent to Nathan Drake.

  • Bluetooth #62 2 years ago

    It's PC gone mad!

  • skyrend #63 2 years ago

    I don't know about others, but the reason I didn't buy Bayonetta was because the PS3 version was a steaming pile of crap.

  • KDR_11k #64 2 years ago

    Know what? If you want to prove you don't mind make a major PC in the next Call of Duty a woman.

  • miiiguel #65 2 years ago

    I thought this didn't matter (my main ME character is female btw, one of my regular coop Live buddies always plays with female characters), but then I read these comments. Shit... I'm depressed now. I'm not sure I'm enjoying this anymore, too not me.

  • Ternon #66 2 years ago

    I agree with Activision.

    I would never play a female character because I'm a male and not transexual, I want RPG/FPS games to represent me at least to that basic extent of gender to have any kind of immersion.

    Also 95% of gamers are male and not transsexual too.

    Making a lead character would be indeed a very stupid idea, I didn't even bother with Mirror's Edge after I learned that lead character is an asian female.

  • Ternon #67 2 years ago

    I agree with Activision.

    I would never play a female character because I'm a male and not transexual, I want RPG/FPS games to represent me at least to that basic extent of gender to have any kind of immersion.

    Also 95% of gamers are male and not transsexual too.

    Making a lead character would be indeed a very stupid idea, I didn't even bother with Mirror's Edge after I learned that lead character is an asian female.

  • Ternon #68 2 years ago

    I agree with Activision.

    I would never play a female character because I'm a male and not transexual, I want RPG/FPS games to represent me at least to that basic extent of gender to have any kind of immersion.

    Also 95% of gamers are male and not transsexual too.

    Making a lead character would be indeed a very stupid idea, I didn't even bother with Mirror's Edge after I learned that lead character is an asian female.

  • spekkeh #69 2 years ago

    i wonder if he agrees with Activision...

  • uknortherner2000 #70 2 years ago

    @Ternon: I'm a male and not a transsexual either, and guess what? I prefer playing female characters, moreso in those games that offer the choice (Saints Row 2, Oblivion, Morrowind etc), and that doesn't translate to "oh noes! I am teh ghey!" or anything else you may think.

    Also, so what if the lead character in Mirrors Edge is an Asian woman? Who the fuck cares? I think your pathetic comments expose more about your repressed sexual (and racist) feelings than anything else.
    Edited by 1 at 06/08/10 @ 16:28

  • Ternon #71 2 years ago

    This has nothing to do with sexuality or race, just the simple fact that playing as not-male destroys immersion.
    And most players are male..

    And how the hell did you jump from transsexual to gay, they are completely different categories, they couldn't be more different...

    It's all very simple.
    Edited by 1 at 06/08/10 @ 17:26

  • miiiguel #72 2 years ago

    Never play as Sonic as well, or Mario, well play only Gears or Killzone because you realy must be like those guys... like in full of shit and a very uninteresting person. I'm glad I don't know you.

    Do you realy imagine you're the person in the video game, that's actually kinda funny in a pathetic way. Let me guess you do cosplay and stuff. Stab... I killed you! :)
    Edited by 2 at 07/08/10 @ 13:59

  • zgundamfan #73 2 years ago

    "Activision has no room for 'we are making an open-world game with a Hong Kong action movie feel with a female lead,' because that game doesn't exist right now,"

    If 'that game' doesn't exist then surely it would be a good idea to make, since people may be interested in trying something a bit different. (Stranglehold proved that games with HK action style could sell) I mean I can't beleive anyone at activison would think that making another half baked GTA clone would be a good idea.

    "What they do have room for is, 'we are making an open-world game with a gangster main character who can steal cars and shoot people, but it will be in Hong Kong instead of Liberty City. And then they go, 'Hey, GTAIV sold 10 million copies, so that's what we expect from you.'"

    D'OH!! But seriously who made this decision? "they don't do female characters because they don't sell" . Really? Have they never heard of Final Fantasy 13? Parasite Eve? Resident Evil? Or perhaps they should consider Persona 3 Portable: I would imagine that a lot of people who buy that will be playing as the Female MC.

  • aufi #74 2 years ago

    95%? no. [link url=h ttp://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2006/10/7922.ars
    ]http://ar stechnica.com/gaming/news/2006/...[/link]

    as this report and comments after the fact clearly illustrate, women and girl gamers are essentially maligned and ignored by a male-dominated community. an industry at the forefront of the tech wave hates women, and have a ready-made army of neanderthals to support their every decision.

    it's not like the issuer of gender representation exists in a vacuum where games are concerned. creativity, innovation and diversity all lose out in the face of stodginess and misogyny.

    what ever, though. as long as you don't have to "feel like a transexual" because of your avatar.