Anita Sarkeesian's first episode of "Tropes vs. Women in Video Games," a Kickstarted video series taking a critical look at the portrayal of women in everyone's favorite medium, is out. Entitled "Damsel in Distress," viewers willing to sit down for a hefty 23 minutes and 35 seconds lecture are in for an education on the prolific Peachified stereotype. Don't be weary, she uses plenty of gameplay footage Peach, Zelda and other pop-culture dames. She specifically calls out Nintendo and the face of Nintendto Shigeru Miyamoto for helping develop the Damsel in Distress gaming trope
Sarkeesian's Kickstarter garnered wide-spread attention, eventually earning roughly six times her initial asking amount, but not before being berated and harassed by what she calls "cyber mobs" over the course of the Kickstarter's life. In a TED talk published on her website, Feminist Frequency, she directly attributes her project's success to the attention gained from the misogynistic, organized harassment, which is fitting. Trolls always lose. She ended the run with just under 7000 backers.
"Tropes vs. Women in Video Games" was extended to 12 episodes from an originally planned five due to the over-funding. Serkeesian is also putting together a classroom curriculum on the subject for anybody to use free of charge.
Sarkeesian blogs from her website, Femenist Frequency, about more than just gaming tropes. She "focuses on deconstructing the stereotypes and tropes associated with women in popular culture as well as highlighting issues surrounding the targeted harassment of women in online and gaming spaces." Since her success with video games in particular, she has been invited to developers and classrooms alike to enlighten people on an issue with games frequent in almost any medium out there today.
