A Princess Peach Post

Hi. Guess why I haven’t written anything in so long? Go on…guess! I mean, other than being lazy and unmotivated and busy (somehow all at once). Give up? Okay.

I got a Wii.

Well, technically my sister (also roommate) got a Wii. Same difference. Now, this is actually big news for me: gaming is one of the few aspects of nerdiness that has totally and completely passed me by. I’ve never had much of an interest in it, and Macs are not (to the best of my knowledge, anyway) well known for games anyway. I’ve never had anything other than a computer on which a game might be played. Growing up, my mom thought Nintendos (and the like) were evil, so we were never allowed to have one; none of my close friends did, either.

So you’re reading a blog by someone who, until the age of 24, had never even played a Mario game.

Naturally, being vaguely intimidated by the whole prospect of video games – and boy, that’s a blog entry waiting for a rainy day, right there – we grabbed the one that looked like it was the most similar to those of the mid 80s, which have now seeped so far into the pop culture subconscious that even I was not totally intimidated by the prospect of trying it out. The game turned out to be Super Paper Mario which (as close as I can tell) does indeed basically resemble a typical Mario game (you run around, jump on things’ heads to kill them, and explore different levels until the “plot,” such as it is, ends), with the added bonus of being able to flip into 3D and solve puzzles thataway. It was fairly simple, and I’d guess aimed at, oh, middle schoolers. (That’s a guess, though; I clearly have nothing else to judge by.)

So anyway, yeah, I finally won it.

Now, I can’t really write up a full game review, because I haven’t got more than a vague sense of cultural context, and I really can’t contextualize anything about the gameplay itself. (Um. Except to say the Wii is super fun.) But being me, of course I paid pretty close attention to the treatment of female characters, and I have very happy things to say about that.

Though the gender balance isn’t equal, it isn’t too bad: among the protagonists, there is Princess Peach (who will be my main focus, in just a bit); there’s also Tippi, a “pixl” character, who flits around after Mario and helps him. (The rest of the pixls are gender neutral, as far as I recall.) Among the villains, you’ve got Mimi (one of the bosses) and Nastasia, the super villain’s executive assistant (evidently in charge of scheduling, organization, and mind control, but who you never play against). All in all, of the main group of heroes (assuming you count Tippi—I do, because she’s a plot point) you’ve got two female (one playable) and three male characters; among villains, you’ve got two female (one who you play against) and three male. Though it is worth nothing that both female villains are in support positions to a male character; and, though that isn’t exactly true of Peach and Tippi, it’s still very much Mario’s game and story, in which they play supporting roles.

So, of these various characters, Peach is by far and away the one you spend the most time with. (People interested in learning a lot more about her should check out the Princes Power issue of Cerise.) And, after winning the game, I’m actually quite, quite pleased with her treatment. First off, the fact that she’s rather the epitome of femininity (wearing a frilly pink dress with matching shoes and parasol) doesn’t bother me a bit—I think it’s important that people who choose femininity also get to see that choice validated and represented in a character who is an equal to the men around her, and in SPM, Peach is that. All of the playable characters have special skills: Mario can flip to 3D, Luigi can super-jump, Bowser can breathe fire, and Peach actually has two—using her parasol, she can glide and change direction in mid-air, and she can duck under the parasol to protect herself from nearly any enemy or attack. Her skills are quite useful, and in fact, the game requires you to play as Peach in several circumstances: there are puzzles that can not be solved or bypassed as any other character. (All character skills have corresponding puzzles.) Even better, while there are places where, while you are not forced to play as Peach, she is the best choice… And as close as I can tell, both of the climactic boss battles are such situations. (You’re fighting a much-larger villain and need to get up high and be able to carefully control where you’re jumping; the villains shoot various attacks at you and only Peach can defend against them instead of just dodging.) I think that’s pretty great.

I also think it’s very cool that the creators, while making Peach a playable character the equal of the other three in the game, also clearly kept in mind that she is female. There are two major points where this has a direct impact on the plot. In level three, Tippi is kidnapped by the level’s boss, Francis. Francis is an uber-nerd stereotype (which I found much more annoying than anything relating to feminism in this game, frankly): he’s never talked to a girl (and is only interested in “hot babes,” though it seems clear he’s never spoken to one); he’s only interested in computers, science fiction, and anime; he has no offline friends. At the end of the level, Mario can’t get in to his fortress to fight him, but Peach (as a hot babe) can. Of course Francis doesn’t take her seriously when she requests Tippi back, and immediately tries to romance her. The player can choose several responses to this, ranging from awkwardly flattered to outright pissed, but regardless of which responses are chosen, Peach eventually gets irritated and puts a stop to it…with a bomb. This initiates the boss battle, in which Tippi is recovered.

The meaning is pretty clear: when Peach has a choice between using her femininity to try and manipulate someone to get what she wants, and being directly assertive (dare I even say aggressive?), she picks assertive and will fight when needed. This point is underscored in the final level, when Mimi calls her out as a damsel in distress who needs her boyfriend to save her. Angry that her honor as a princess has been besmirched, Peach challenges Mimi and you enter a boss fight in which you can only play Peach. (Two notes here: one, this was the boss fight I had the most trouble with—that is, because I couldn’t defeat Mimi easily any of the times she appeared, not because I was playing as Peach; two, I do not, however, think it’s coincidence that the female hero fought the female villain, though I think it would have been awesome to see Peach take down the bigger, physically tougher villain.)

Let’s see… Final notes. At the end of the game, the power of True Love saves everyone, a power Tippi seems to have more access to throughout the game than any other characters. Similarly, Nastasia—who is, incidentally, shown as being quite capable, though she also has a crush on her boss—sacrifices herself out of love. But they both get happy endings: Tippi ends up with her true love, where Nastasia learns to live without hers and be happy anyway. (That’s a very minor point, but an interesting one, I think.) Overall, I very much enjoyed the game—obviously I can’t compare it to others or tell you if it fits into general trends, but I generally had a good time playing it, and I think it was quite successful with regards to female characters. I would definitely recommend it to other folks who are, like me, complete and total beginners, looking for somewhere easy and fun to start.