Male gaze, empowerment and the female gamers: The case of “Bayonetta”. A qualitative study on the experiences of female gamers playing the “Bayonetta” game series.

For a considerable amount of time, the issue of female sexualisation in media has been a topic of debate within the academia. To this day, researchers are unable to find a common ground on the conceptualisation of sexualisation. Moreover, the representation of women characters in media, for decades, was seductive and sexualised. Especially, across various video games, the representation of gender was highly stereotypical, as women were portrayed as “sex objects” in exposing attire, while men were depicted as athletic and strong. Such representation, inevitably, leads to sexual objectification, especially of female characters. Nowadays, the stereotypical portrayal of women in games is gradually, as more game companies strive to include female characters that are leading, powerful and independent. Nevertheless, the issue of sexualisation, and the subsequent sexual objectification, of female leads still exist. However, with the rise of female action heroines, such as Bayonetta is evidence of a positive change that is happening in the video game industry in regard to stereotypical representation of women in games. Even though Bayonetta is often critiqued as being the epitome of female sexualisation in games, the fan-base of the game has a huge female audience. Thus, if a character is sexualised for the purpose of the male gaze, then why are so many women appealed to this game? This study uncovers the experiences of female gamers playing the “Bayonetta” game series. This research is of qualitative type, and in-depth interviews were conducted on ten women that played at least one of the games in the “Bayonetta” series. Furthermore, thematic analysis is used as the method of data analysis. As a result of this study, it was concluded that female gamers do not categorize Bayonetta as sexualised, since they perceive sexualisation as a form of exaggerated body features. Moreover, the results suggest that the previous studies on Bayonetta did not consider the context of the game, which is pivotal in its analysis. In addition, female gamers regarded Bayonetta as a feminist character, because of the certain traits that she poses. Finally, female gamers claimed that Bayonetta is an empowering character.