Let’s face it; the video game world is male dominated. Men buy the games and the main character is often times a male. There are titles that feature a female lead, but those games may have her sexy looking, regardless of how strong she is.
However, Ubisoft’s For Honor breaks that mold, giving the female characters strong armor, ones that you can’t tell they are female at first glance. It’s not that the body has been covered up. It’s that the female armor is consistent with both the armor worn by their male counterparts, but also with the standard of armor worn by all warriors during medieval times.
Each of For Honor’s factions, Knights, Vikings and Samurai have four playable characters, one that is only male, one that is only female and the other two being capable of being either male or female. The peacekeeper, the valkyrie and the nobushi are female exclusives. In fact, during my playthrough of the game, I chose the female to lead off on two of the three factions, being the Vikings and the Samurai
Biologically, each of the female warriors in For Honor is smaller in stature than their male counterparts, but it’s not always as evident that the character is female. When we think of women, we think of flowing blonde hair. However, neither the knights nor the samurai had their hair even showing thanks to their headgear. The Vikings didn’t wear headgear that covered up their hair, but the valkyrie’s hair was tied up in the back. The men also had hair tied up in the back, possibly hinting an attitude of equality within the Vikings ranks.
In an interview with Gamestop, For Honor‘s director Jason VandenBerghe said the game was about making the character whom you want them to be.
“That’s where we start because this game isn’t about us creating characters and imposing them on you. This game is about you. And so what kind of warrior are you, right? You can change the skin color of your Vikings, too. [Do] you want to have a black Viking? Knock yourself out. It’s who are you. I want you to be able to be in that game.”
Unfortunately, For Honor doesn’t reflect reality. In today’s world it’s clear which clothing items represent which gender, but with armor being equally protective for each gender, both men and women can be the warrior they envision themselves to be.
Not to mention that the final boss of the game, Apollyon, a female, will kill you instantly if you don’t parry quick enough.
