A Gendered World of Warcraft

Because over the past year I've lost a friend to the World of Warcraft, I've become distinctly aware of this new social world being created everyday in this massive multi-player online role playing game (MMORPG is what the kids are calling it these days). One of the facets that I'm intrigued by is the construction of gender in this game that literally millions of people of various ages, sexes, and races world-wide access everyday. If this isn't social construction of reality (albeit virtual) I don't know what is. However, there's only so much construction that can go on without the distinct help of the programmers at Blizzard (the WOW design company).

Within the game there are 10 races, each with 9 classes (Blizzard's use of race and class here) of characters. Each of the 10 races has a male and female character that then becomes more visually distinguished once the class is chosen. But even before that, the visualization of gender is fascinating. Of the 10 races, some are "humanoid" (humans and elves, etc) in that the body structure resembles a human while others look more like animals. Here's a picture of a male and female human character.
Of interest to me is the overly muscly, very broad appearance of the male and the "classically" curvy figure of the woman, here pictured with a bare, toned midriff. Impossible not to notice despite her armor are large breasts and a very small waist. Overall, she is also very narrow especially in contrast with the broadness of the male.

Here are several comparison images of the male without armor on. Notice on these the musculature and the body proportions. (Look at the size of the forearms and feet!) And the definition of the musculature is very nearly in-human...this guy's enormous. But his symptoms (including a de-emphasizing of reproductive anatomy) suggest steroid use.

Also interesting to note is the posture. Standing here, he looks oafish almost. Shoulders back, knees bent, flat-footed but even from the side, very broad. Notice that the Blood Elf looks slightly different.

Leaner, slightly slimmer but almost barrel-chested. He looks like he's holding his breath. Noice that his lower body is much slimmer and that the knees are straight. While seemingly over-picky, taken together we still have a very clear picture of "masculinity" here--potentially two similar but unique kinds. I don't play the game myself, but given that each race/class combo provides different skills/tasks, etc, these body differences likely play out in the roles of each character as well (although I don't know for sure.)

Now look at the comparison between humanoid characters by sex. The captioning is tiny but what it says is that the female characters have "high-seated breasts" "thin waist" and "round buttocks" while the males have "broad shoulders and thin hips," "well-muscled arms" and "non-exaggerated buttocks." (Andrea Rubenstein did this analysis; her paper in which it appears is cited at the end of this post.) To me, this suggests a gendering of these forms that speak directly to an over-sexualized female character (noted by the pronounced sexual/reproductive anatomy) in comparison to the male counterpart in which musculature is more prominent than the sexual/reproductive anatomy. Interesting.
Now, look at the female characters in terms of "Centerfold" vs. "BodyBuilder" types. In her article, Rubenstein suggests that the humanoid characters are designed to resemble centerfolds while the non-human characters represent a much more athletic but still gendered female body that looks like a body-builder. Her analytical model looks like this:
Notice that the Blood and Night Elves (top 2 pictures) are generally very slim with tiny waists and large breasts, almost Barbie-esque while the Gnome and Orc characters have broader waist and hips but still large breasts. The orc character has massively defined abs wile the gnome actually appears to have a more pronounced non-toned stomach. Both of the bottom 2 characters are just broader in general as we might expect female athletes to be.

Now consider the male/female comparisons of the non-human characters. This theme continues to play out in the non-humans as well. The male characters appear overly hyper-muscular while the female versions exhibit the same "female" characteristics found in the human comparison. Clearly, there is a story being told to us about what men and women are in this game.
Now, this I find fascinating. Below is a picture comparing the alpha version of characters to the beta characters (seen above.) There was a huge controversy over Blizzard's decision to change the characters physically. But notice the changes. The Tauren (top) female in the alpha version was nearly indistinguishable from the male (even now I can't really tell but I think the female in the left picture is on the left). Look at the difference! And what are they: thinner waist, more pronounced breasts, narrower shoulders.
In the case of the troll characters (though hard to tell here) it's similar. The current troll female is much smaller than the male with a thin waist and pronounced breasts. Also changed are the enormous ears (in the beta made to look much more human) and facial features. Meanwhile, the posture of the male character has become more slumped and with much bigger horns.

The ultimate question is: Who cares? Why is this important? I'm not sure I have answers, but I know gender matters. And the way we imagine what it means to be feminine and masculine and the social expectations that we build on those understandings have VERY REAL consequences. So while some may be tempted to argue that this is "just a game," I'd have to disagree. Based on this rudimentary analysis (and it's certainly not the first) a clear image of "man" and "woman" literally appears before us. What we have to begin to ask is "In what ways does that shape our behavior and expectations outside of the World of Warcraft?" I don't know the answers, but I suspect the ways are many and varied.

Please look at the original article Andrea Rubinstein: Idealizing Fantasy Bodies for what is ultimately a better analysis based on real data. It was featured in a blogpost here. Some great ideas to ponder...and question as well.