Female protagonist games

[Steven Pendleton]

I am somewhat surprised that nobody has mentioned Baraduke, which has what's-her-name that married Dig Dug.

[Tanooki]

I never brought it up, and now I see reading back no one else has, but WURM on the NES fits this topic perfect.

 

You play as the female captain of a transforming type tank/fighter ship in this multi-genre game.  You can command your crew in boss fights, in the platforming sections its her with kicks or your pop gun to take out enemies too.  It's an oddly quality game that went under the radar with its terribly 80s box/sticker art and screwball name that had nothing to do with the actual game too.  Strangely given the time, unlike most NES from FC ports, this one kept the anime art entirely and given it's far better for it.

[+GoldLeader]

Here's a few I like... (With selectable female leads).

 

 

     

 

 

 

         

 

 

 

[electricmastro]

1985 also saw when human female protagonists were common in arcade: Ninja Princess, The Fairyland Story, Time Gal, Alien Sector, Cruisin', Flashgal, Mach Rider

[roots.genoa]

It would be interesting to see if there's a cultural phenomenon in Japan that would explains it. For instance, I noticed that a lot of video games using Greek Mythology were released in 1986 and in the following years (Athena, Kid Icarus, Rygar, Legendary Wings, Knightmare, etc.) and Saint Seiya started at the very beginning of that year.

[electricmastro]

8 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

It would be interesting to see if there's a cultural phenomenon in Japan that would explains it. For instance, I noticed that a lot of video games using Greek Mythology were released in 1986 and in the following years (Athena, Kid Icarus, Rygar, Legendary Wings, Knightmare, etc.) and Saint Seiya started at the very beginning of that year.

There were several female lead series before 1986, but one of the most well-known was def Urusei Yatsura. By the time it finished in 1986, it was at 194 episodes.

[CatPix]

Talking about Japan, The Maze of Galious on MSX

Let you play either Popolon or Aphrodite.

 One of the earliest game I remember playing with a female protagonist was Jill of the Jungle, on PC.

A nice lil platformer. I think it's free on GOG.com.

[Tanooki]

Jill. That’s it. Jill of the Jungle. Look at that one.  Anyone can now it was made freeware to grab on GoG.com a year back or two. 

[Keir]

On 7/1/2022 at 12:07 PM, Black_Tiger said:

Gotzendeiner

One of my favorites on the PCE! She looks like your typical damsel in distress on the cover, but when her rescuer fails you have to help her escape.

   

 

Strike Force Cobra on the C64 (also released on the Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum) allows you to pick a team of 4 characters, 2 of which can be women (Stern and Viskova).

   

 

Another of my personal favorites on the C64 (and later many other systems) which also lets you choose from 2 female characters (Wendy and Razor) is Maniac Mansion.

   

 

 

[The Usotsuki]

Girl's Garden

Edited March 6, 2023 by The Usotsuki

[Wayler]

PC's point & click adventure games have a long history with female protagonists. My favourites are Zanthia from Legend of Kyrandia: Hand of Fate 

 

And April Ryan from The Longest Journey

[+atari2600land]

You forgot Shantae, people.

[Flickering Poly]

https://www.mobygames.com/game/group:712/

 

2696 games and counting (no multiple choice games besides where they're all women). 

 

[BrianC]

Typhoon Gal (1985) doesn't come up in that search, though it is listed at MobyGames. 

[electricmastro]

Krion Conquest made me realize how it has one of the few openly female human protagonist games on NES. Not even Metroid showed Samus' face from the start.

 

[Warmsignal]

22 hours ago, electricmastro said:

Krion Conquest made me realize how it has one of the few openly female human protagonist games on NES. Not even Metroid showed Samus' face from the start.

 

 

Faria: A World of Mystery and Danger, Ghost Lion, Arkista's Ring, Athena. All NES games with female human protagonists.

[electricmastro]

23 minutes ago, Warmsignal said:

Faria: A World of Mystery and Danger, Ghost Lion, Arkista's Ring, Athena. All NES games with female human protagonists.

Yeah, but Krion Conquest is a good game. Hahah.

[+x=usr(1536)]

Three pages in and nobody's mentioned Donkey Kong: Pauline Edition yet?

 

 

Or Psycho Soldier, sequel to Athena (and the first arcade game to have a theme song with sung lyrics):

 

 

Gauntlet and its sequels had the Valkyrie as one of the playable characters:

 

 

Not to mention that nearly every fighting game made after about 1990 had at least one selectable female character.

[electricmastro]

Following on from Krion, I realized how Valkyrie no Bōken stands out to me as the earliest Famicom game I've seen where the human female protagonist is clearly shown as female right off the bat, using no face covering like a mask. I'm surprised it isn't brought up more if only for that little factoid.

 

Edited April 25, 2023 by electricmastro

[CatPix]

Unless I missed it, I realized there is one major game that wasn't yet named here... I guess because most of the later games didn't mentionned her ever.

Alone in the Dark let you choose between Edward Carnby or Emily Hartwood.

 

 

Emily Hartwood may be the first 3D playable character. Or at least the first playable one outside of arcade games (but I don't think there were that many 3D arcade games in 1991 with playable human protagonists)

[carlsson]

On 3/6/2023 at 3:41 PM, Keir said:

Strike Force Cobra on the C64 (also released on the Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum) allows you to pick a team of 4 characters, 2 of which can be women (Stern and Viskova).

If we include games featuring a party of characters of which some can be female, we might as well mention PSI-5 Trading Company. It would seem that Jaru, Nargo and Churglik (Scanning department), Tegra (Navigation department), possibly Sheema (Engineering department) and Bru (Repair department) may be your female options, though I'll admit I'm not fully trained in recognizing alien females, or even if alien lifeforms are divided into he-beings and she-beings.

 

Edit: Upon looking at profile pictures from the other versions, I'd eliminate Sheema from that list. He's probably just a dude with long hair.

Edited April 25, 2023 by carlsson

[82-T/A]

Whenever I play games like X-COM (the newer ones), I always include my family in the game. So I add my wife and my daughter. I always make my wife's character dressed really, really, slutty, and my daughter's character will be completely clothed to the point that you can't even tell it's a woman. Hahaha...

 

I had a screen shot that I took where it shows the team on the plane going to an alien location that my wife thought was totally ridiculous. It showed my daughter in full body armor, and my wife in basically a bikini ready to fight aliens.

[carlsson]

It pains me that I made this mock-up more than 6 years ago, but I still haven't got to make the game itself. It still is in my long term plans though.

[Tanooki]

7 hours ago, electricmastro said:

Such a good call.  Valkyrie no Bouken is fantastic.  I've had that famicom cart for some years now, largely inspired though by the PCE title which I owned when I had the system still (and it is on the MINI so I still do in that form.)  It's a well done game, tricky but fair, sorta zelda and not depending how some mechanics work.  As early as that release is, it's fairly deep given the limitations and easily recommended to Zelda/Ys style game fans.

[DavidD]

Did anyone mentioned Infocom's Plundered Hearts?  That had a female protagonist, right?  I think she had a name and everything...