The world of games can make us experience any type of story in the shoes of any type of character. One day, we could be saving humanity from a zombie apocalypse, and the next, planting potatoes and watering onions.
That’s why we came here to pay tribute to these great characters. Powerful, complex and inspiring women. Unfortunately, we will only remember 6 of these amazing characters.
You can learn English with any play style. In any of them, you will find great stories and, nowadays, many of them are carried out by women.
It is precisely because of their stories and dialogues that the games end up having great value for learning English. In addition to making the study more dynamic and interesting, games allow us to learn English in a meaningful and contextualized way. We’ve already talked about this in other blog content, which you can .
1. Samus Aran – Metroid (1986)
How not to mention the one that opened doors for all the armored women that came after?
Samus is an intergalactic bounty hunter and was one of the first female characters to star in a game. The best thing about her story is that she was one of Nintendo’s best secrets: her gender was hidden for most of the first game. You could only find out that she was a woman if you improved her performance in the game.
The faster you were able to finish, the fewer parts of her armor Samus would use at the credits screen. If you beat the game within 3 hours, she would appear in a *bathing suit in the credits. Within an hour, she would be wearing a *bikini.
2. Jill Valentine – Resident Evil (1996)
Resident Evil has a lot of interesting women, but the one who started it all was Jill Valentine. She has all the characteristics that were later implemented in so many other protagonists. Jill is smart, calm and skilled.
After all, you are in a mansion dominated by people infected by a mysterious virus, developed by an even more mysterious company. The best thing to do is stay calm and take a lot of accurate shots. Who wouldn’t want to feel that calm when a bunch of zombie dogs appears? It is precisely this skill that saved his skin several times.
Anyone who has played Resident Evil knows: the first titles always had two protagonists in the story. But with Jill it was different. Jill was the first to have a game just for her: Resident Evil 3, a 1999 game that won a remake in 2020.
3. Lara Croft – Tomb Raider (1996)
There’s no way not to talk about women in games and not mention Lara Croft . She was the reason many women started playing video games. Not only has Lara been starring in Tomb Raider since the 1990s, she’s also been the protagonist of many debates about *sexualization and *female empowerment.
Lara is a strong, beautiful, intelligent and, above all, fearless woman. She loves venturing to tombs and ruins around the world to collect treasure, tackling traps and solving puzzles. Lara is actually a billionaire archaeologist for the British royal family.
4. Yuna – Final Fantasy X (2001)
Yuna first appeared in Final Fantasy X (2001) as a summoner who embarks on a pilgrimage to defeat *Sin. During her journey, she, a *religious, has problems with her own *faith. But with Tidus’ help, Yuna learns that there is more to life than *sacrifice.
However, Yuna really shines in Final Fantasy X-2 (2003), when she becomes a sphere hunter and decides to investigate one of these mysterious items, but ends up embroiled in *political tensions.
5. Bayonetta – Bayonetta (2009)
Bayonetta is one of the few protagonists whose game title bears her name. And that has its reasons! Don’t belittle this witch, because spells are certainly not the only tricks she possesses.
Despite her at least curious clothes, she is a deadly witch, who uses a mix of magical powers, demonic summons and firearms. Ah, those weapons are hidden even in the heels of her boots. In addition, she performs all her punches with a lot of confidence and style, which underscores her courageous and independent personality.
6. Aloy – Horizon: Zero Dawn (2017)
Aloy is strong and determined, a protagonist who lives in a post-apocalyptic universe dominated by machines. She seeks to know her origins, the truth behind her birth and what happened to the world she lives in.
However, Yuna really shines in Final Fantasy X-2 (2003), when she becomes a sphere hunter and decides to investigate one of these mysterious items, but ends up embroiled in *political tensions.
5. Bayonetta – Bayonetta (2009)
Bayonetta is one of the few protagonists whose game title bears her name. And that has its reasons! Don’t belittle this witch, because spells are certainly not the only tricks she possesses.
Despite her at least curious clothes, she is a deadly witch, who uses a mix of magical powers, demonic summons and firearms. Ah, those weapons are hidden even in the heels of her boots. In addition, she performs all her punches with a lot of confidence and style, which underscores her courageous and independent personality.
To do so, she defies the laws of her matriarchal tribe. But, on her journey, she discovers that she is much more important than she thought. She overcomes herself, while learning to respect her ideals in the face of the challenges she faces.
Extra: You must know Microsoft’s Cortana, right? Well, it’s based on a character from Halo, a game produced by (amazingly!) Microsoft.
In the game, Cortana is an artificial intelligence unit that provides backstory and tactical information to the player. It was created from the cloned brain of a scientist with the aim of helping humanity in the war against the Covenant aliens. She is instrumental in preventing the activation of Halo, a set of facilities that would have destroyed all life in the galaxy.
We know that these mentioned characters are just a part of a huge number of iconic characters from the gaming world. With Final Fantasy, for example, we could easily fill this list and many others. But we can say that these would be the main ones, right? Characters who have opened and continue to open doors for so many others.
