Your "obvious" solution has been progressing for years... Indeed Sarkeesian cherry picks games that offend her, but ignores that there are quite a few more games where women are protagonists, and /shock horror even dressed appropriately...

It's obviously not good enough for her, or apparently you...

As for your daughter and Mario, no, there's not something wrong with that. There are quite a few games (and more are coming) with female protagonists. Perhaps you should introduce her to Child of Light? Or let her play through the Longest Journey series? Guess what, not every game is going to give you the choice of a male/female protagonist, and I'm not sure why it's required. Honestly, I'd love it if reality TV shows about dumb socialites would disappear from the entertainment spectrum, but sadly I don't get to dictate to the media (or indeed the viewing public) what they should be doing.

In response to your points about the fight, you're right, and it should keep going and we should all try to support it. But Sarkeesian undermines that fight. Not because she dares to speak out, but how she does it. In her attacks, and they are attacks, she tars all male gamers as either deliberately misogynistic or hopelessly naive. That's great, really, you convince people to support you by insulting them continuously?

As for this snide little bit of crap...

"Look, I'm sorry people pointing out to you how fucked up it is how women are sometimes portrayed in games is somehow ruining your ability to enjoy games. But there are serious problems here. Maybe not problems for you, but problems for people like my daughter. "

This is a problem you and Anita share... Presumption. That just because I think she's a hack, that somehow she's ruining my fun (she isn't), that I support a male character domination of the industry (I don't), that there shouldn't be more strong female characters represented (there should) and so on and so forth. You have concocted a scenario in your head and jumped straight to the insults without ever bothering to find out what my opinion on the games (as opposed to the person blasting them) is...

Would it be sexist/misogynist to think that the woman in the article is batshit insane?

http://thelibertydoll.com/2014/08/22/meet-woman-reduce-male-population-90-for-peace/

Not because she's a woman, but because of what she's saying, and how she's saying it. This is why I object to Sarkeesian and think she's a shameful opportunist who's willing to set back feminism in her quest for fame or perhaps relevance..

"You can still have your Damsel/Dude in Distress trope, by the way. I have no doubt lazy developers will continue to use it as a substitute for meaningful story. Just don't expect people not to call out the utter absurdity of it, is all I'm saying."

Oh, it's my trope now... /eyeroll

I can't point out how ridiculous it is to try and kill off a trope that pervades every aspect of human story telling since the dawn of time without it becoming my personal favourite? Pro tip, if you're trying to convince someone of a viewpoint, it usually helps not to be a patronising git... X D

I thought the solution was rather obvious, actually.

You fix things by making games where people are portrayed as... people. Not trophies to be acquired, not sexual objects to be drooled over, and not stereotypes.

You couple that with continued criticism of games that continue to rely on sexist, racist, or homophobic tropes.

And guess what? That's already happening. People have been saying that games need to change for a while before Sarkeesian showed up. Bioware acknowledged the issues and started trying to include more realistic characters in its RPGs years ago--and caught flak for it even back then.

To address your other... points?

My daughter asked me the other day why she can't play as the princess in Super Mario Galaxy 2 (or any of the other Mario games we own). And I had to tell her it's because the Princess got kidnapped. Her response was to ask if she could play as the Princess once we freed her from Bowser. And I had to tell her no.

There is something wrong with that!

After having that conversation with my daughter I fired up Torchlight, where I'm currently playing as a Vanquisher. Vanquisher's are rogue-like ranged characters and can only be female. If you want to be a warrior ("Destroyer" in game terms) or magic user ("Alchemist" in game terms), sorry--it's a men's only club. And not only that, but Vanquisher's--regardless of the armor they wear, must bare their midriff and wearing a mini-skirt showing lots of leg and cleavage (do a google image search for Torchlight Vanquisher to see what I'm talking about). Apparently you can't be a Vanquisher without being a sex pot too.

There is something wrong with that! (To be fair, they got better with Torchlight II and allowed any class to be any gender and allowed the women to cover up with armor OR choose to be sexy).

Society doesn't just change by itself. You're right, society is becoming more accepting of diversity--because people are fighting very hard for it.

Take America's attitude towards homosexuality. Look at the strides made in the last 20 years. That didn't just magically happen. There were TV shows that portrayed homosexuals as human beings worthy of respect. There were lawsuits. There were marches and protests. There were speeches. There were YouTube campaigns like "It gets better." A lot of people worked fucking hard to get the message out that bigotry is not okay.

Look, I'm sorry people pointing out to you how fucked up it is how women are sometimes portrayed in games is somehow ruining your ability to enjoy games. But there are serious problems here. Maybe not problems for you, but problems for people like my daughter.

The solution to these problems is not to lambast the people pointing them out. Nor is the solution to sit back and do nothing and hope it all works out for the best. One solution, as I've already stated, is to be openly critical of the messages contained in ALL media (including games). Another solution is to be vocal about the need for more realistic and diverse portrayals of people in ALL media (including games).

You can still have your Damsel/Dude in Distress trope, by the way. I have no doubt lazy developers will continue to use it as a substitute for meaningful story. Just don't expect people not to call out the utter absurdity of it, is all I'm saying.

It looks like the only thing it can really do is help you cheat at Mario Bros and isn't that game pretty played out anyhow?

I remember playing Mario 64 for the first time and thinking, "There is no way the graphics can get any better than this."

Zinedine Zidane lyrics

In 1972, under a scorching June sun
In the French Coastal town of Marseilles
Two Algerian immigrants awaited the birth of their 5th child
Later that day, a star was born

Verse
Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Veron
Suarez, Van Basten, Gianluigi Buffon
Xavi, Iniesta, Drogba, Hazard
Tevez, Schweinsteiger, Steven Gerrard

Alessandro Del Piero, Neymar, Forlan
Ozil, Nakata, Jean-Pierre Papin
Ballack, Van Persie, Beckham, Giggs, Scholes
But the strongest of them all

Chorus
Zinedine Zidane, Zinedine Zidane
Superstar, superstar
Zinedine Zidane, Zinedine Zidane
Superstar, superstar

Verse
Lionel Messi, Gareth Bale, Kewell
Nedved, Maldini, Aguero, Raul
Casillas, Cavani, Benzema, Mandzukic
Mario Balotelli, Zlatan Ibrahimovic!
Lothar Matthaus, Shevchenko, Cantona
Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Romario, Rivaldo, Robinho, Ramirez, KAKA
Falcao, Franck Ribery, Pirlo, Cahill, Kompany
But the strongest of them all

Chorus

Bridge
And he’ll burn through the dark like a fire (Puskas, Eusebio)
So much more than the world was dreaming of wa ya ya (Beckenbauer, Platini, Best)
He’ll fight (Charlton)
And his light (Cruyff)
Will shine on and on and on (Baggio)
Oh, why (Diego Armando Maradona)
With his will to survive (Pele)

Chorus

Outro
Cannavaro, Karagounis, Chicharito, William Gallas
Sanchez, Mark Bosnich, Hulk, Alexi Lalas
Wilkshere, Honda, Busquets, DICKIE, Simao
Thierry Henry, Modric, Vidal
Park Ji Sung, Donovan, Eto'o, Zizou
ZIZOU

Zinedine Zidane, Zinedine Zidane
He is a part of things, he is a part of things

2 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

This video has been seconded as a duplicate; transferring votes to the original video and killing this dupe - dupeof seconded with isdupe by NicoleBee.

Seems to be a *dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Super-Mario-Mercedes-Benz-Car-Commercial-Japan

This video has been nominated as a duplicate of this video by eric3579. If this nomination is seconded with *isdupe, the video will be killed and its votes transferred to the original.

*backup=[...snipped...] from http://www.shacknews.com/article/84702/mario-kart-8-getting-mercedes-benz-dlc-in-japan

Needs http://soundfxnow.com/sound-fx/super-mario-brick-break/ for the first 30 seconds.

I want to play Gottfried Mario 64, but not any of the others.

oh, and, "The Aristocrats!"

Might I suggest to you and @lucky760 "the wages of fear"? My favorite movie, and the introduction of Super Mario (oddly I'm only kind of joking about that) in the 50's. It's about bums in Mexico getting a job driving trucks of nitro glycerin through the jungle to a burning oil well. Remade as "sorcerer" in 77 with Roy Schieder (see the original first) it's still my favorite movie, due largely to the last 30 seconds of the film (I won't spoil it). It's a bit of a slow start, like many older movies are, but it gains speed quite nicely. I still love it even though it's French (and I hold onto my irrational hatred of the French because, well, you gotta hate someone!)
Hope you like it if you try it.
Newt

http://www.dorkly.com/embed/60464/the-hd-fan-remake-of-mario-64-is-a-thing

I never heard of rand-net modem cartridge, nor the video capture cartridge, but did know about most of the other factoids. I was sad that they never released Mega Drive in the US, but with only 6 titles I don't miss it.

It's crazy to think smartphones have way more graphics power and at least 60x as much ram. But what iOS or Android game comes close to Mario 64, DK64, Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, or Conker's Bad Fur Day ?