STARLIGHTSHOALS'S PROFILE

author=Kylaila
In one particular one, the female characters who HAD a real life of their own dropped it eventually or immediately. It was heart-breaking to see. They just stopped being even a bit interesting. Seriously. One time they even had a girl who was closely bonded with a knight who protected her when the whole (religion gone wrong plot) rest of the bunch turned against her, and he genuinely loved her, and he was ignored the second the protagonist dropped by. The protagonist finished off the fight that had started way earlier, went away - and the young girl went all starry eyes for our protagonist. Who literally already had a wife. And multiple (read: ALL) female side-kick characters fallen for him. Incidentally she was struggling with her own purpose as she was used as a weapon and medium both. You could have had a real nice love-story on the side (or not, wouldn't mind), you could have made her anything really, you could even have her struggle with not having a purpose or being left open with a question, but that solution was really the least interesting one.

Some of the details are different but this sounds eerily similar to Farnese from Berserk, lol...and I love Farnese along with most of the other characters from the manga, but it does make me roll my eyes a little how even in the hyper-dark and gritty world of Berserk, every single lady of all ages, cultures and backgrounds develops a girlish crush on Guts e_e Still pretty much the greatest manga of all time though~ And the female characters are otherwise really well-developed, minus the um...questionable content in some cases ^^;

author=Dyluck
Good article! I think the female lead in my game does manage to follow these 5 steps, so I'm glad :)

Hey, as long as the writer's trying to make a character and not a plot device, that's all anybody can ask for :D

author=boos405
These are really, really good thoughtful points to consider with writing female characters. Thanks for the article. Glad someone bumped it up so I came across it.

Thank you so much for reading it!! ^o^ I'm glad someone bumped it up too, I was really surprised when I got new notifications on it xD

author=suzy_cheesedreams
So (there's a point... sort of?) I think these three are great examples of female characters who defy the stereotypes associated with introversion, compassion, passiveness and femininity while at the same time embodying these qualities in a truer and more relatable sense.

Oh my gosh, thank you so much for the in-depth response, Ms. Suzy!! The funny thing is that Sansa, Yuna, and Garnet/Dagger are all characters I really like too. In the books (don't even get me started on how the show's handled her), Sansa's a much more complex character than people give her credit for and she has enormous amounts of character growth, she's prob'ly one of my top five favorites from the series (Daenerys is the one I relate to the most, though...in the books, not the show. Never the show). I haven't played through all of FFX/X-2 but I really like how Yuna evolves in the second game, it's one reason why I've always been tempted to finish it. And then there's Dagger, who I was actually thinking about while writing Step 4 of this article because she's a strong-willed, feminine, intelligent princess who does NOT immediately fall head over heels for Zidane, and I also like Zidane because even though he's a shameless flirt, he's also a gentleman, not to mention very clever and heroic...by far my favorite male lead in the FF franchise :D

author=Red_Nova
In fact, you can write nearly any step in this article as character flaws rather than traits to avoid entirely. Just as a character unironically chest-deep in cliches is boring, a Mary Sue heroine is flat and uninteresting. Obviously, the article isn't trying to encourage writing more Mary Sues, but to discourage writers to willingly dive into these pitfalls.

Yep yep, exactly!! This is what I was trying to imply in the last paragraph, you can take any of these tropes and make them work if you take a self-aware, realistic approach to them. It's the lazy, thoughtless, unoriginal way that cliches are usually utilized that makes them so annoying.

author=Marrend
For major characters, and sometimes minor characters, it's useful to know, and understand, why a so-called "tough-guy" (regardless of gender) acts tough. Do they actually have something to hide, and the attitude is a barrier they put up to protect themselves? Maybe they have something to prove to someone? Why is that other character meek? Did they witness something they were not supposed to see? Did they experience something that shocked them into ostracizing themselves?

Though, saying that, I've probably fallen into some of the traps outlined in this article. ;_;

I totally agree, these are some of the character traits that a lot of stories skim over the reasons for just because it's "cool" or "convenient" for the character to be that way. People's current personalities are almost always rooted in their past experiences, but unfortunately writers don't always think that through with their characters. :(

And yeah, I'm pretty sure most of us have fallen into the same traps as writers that came before us, because they were the ones who influenced us! But as our talents grow, we have the chance to dig deeper into these things and expand our abilities :D

author=Frogge
That tip about how strong =/= masculine is really great.
On the other hand, I personally relate to female characters whose entire world revolves around guys they like. My entire world revolves around guys I like, lol.

To be honest I also relate to it, when it's explicitly written as an "obsession" rather than a healthy attachment n//n;; In the article I was talking specifically about the cases where the love interest is nothing more than a plot device to further the male character's story in some way, like she's just a "prize" for his heroism, that kind of thing. :3

author=bicfarmer
hard to find good anime these days when they are sunk so deep in these tropes, its pretty sad.

You're gonna make me cry, farmer-san ;-;

Thank you so much for all the comments, everybody!!!