Point is, most RPGs are just written so that they are written for male protagonists. See the Gothic series, for example.
Even neutral, gender-irrelevant RPGs are relatively seldom to find.
RPGs are mainly written so that they represent a kind of "rite of passage" or
"Hero Jorney" for men - and not for women.
No-one in the industry knows wht a women's "rite of passage" or a women's
"Hero's Jorney" would look like - because there just don't exist stories or even social scientifc studis for them.
The "Hero's Journey" is basically a male tale. There just doesn't exist a proper female equivalent to it - and most designers just don't care, since dev studios are male-dominated anyway, so why should they bother ?
This is indeed a problem for the industry, and I find it really bizarre that there are so few story-based RPG's that have a female character as the protagonist. "The Hero's Journey" may be what they're following as a guideline, but I don't know why in this day, it's so rare for a game to have a woman take that journey, other that "the developers don't care or it never occurs to them".
It's something that the industry as a whole should really work on fixing.
Rhoda/Rhode should imho have been the blonde from the early
screenshots - because that would hve broken the sexism. A good-looking AND highly successful hunter ? Well, that wouldn't have been expected. But instead the blone became a waitress in the local tavern. Quite a return to the old cliché. And she even complained about men string at hear - meanwhile a blonde Rhode would have just landed her fist into the face of a man staring at her.
I didn't see those early screenshots, so I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. (For one, you're apparently not including Rhode as "good-looking"
).
I also don't see your point. I think Divinity 2 was much better than many other RPG's when it came to gender fairness, and Rhode is a good example. She's basically the most powerful person in the Dragon Slayers, she starts out as the player's boss, and is well respected. She takes down Talana.
Half of Damian's generals are women, there are many female soldiers on both sides of the fight, and Ygerna managed to trap the Divine. There's also the bit with Ursula in FoV who complains about the sexist way the louts of the Prancing Pony treated her that shows some self-awareness.
The existence of the sexy barmaid Elsa doesn't negate Rhode. I don't see anything sexist about her not wanting to attack four professional soldiers with her bare hands, that's just common sense. If Louis didn't interfere, they'd have wiped the floor with the Dragon Slayer - who's supposed to be an even more elite soldier.
No, Divinity 2 isn't perfect in the way it treats women, but it does a lot of things right.
Considering how close we are to the characters - even in games with cameras like NWN or Original Sin, it doesn't make a difference. Why do you need to know the gender/sex of the other characters anyway? And it's often very easy to tell the differences if the animations and models are constructed correctly. In Skyrim, for example, gender differences in armour are minimal for the most part (though there are feminised armours, and even a boob armour piece - Steel, I think) and you can still tell the difference should you need to.
Well, if only for gameplay reasons, being able to identify the gender of an NPC from an isometric perspective would help if you're looking for a specific person. There are ways to differentiate armour without making it skimpy or overly exaggerated, though.
Skyrim is not a great example, though. it depends a lot on the armour type. For example, Lydia in her default Iron/Steel plate doesn't have "boobplate", it looks basically identical to male armour. But a lot of armour in Skyrim is just embarrassing to put your female companions in, like Forsaken or Fur armour which is shamefully skimpy. It makes the "boobplates" in Divinity 2 look more reasonable in comparison.
