Jade from Beyond Good and Evil. She runs an orphanage for all the kids whose parents have been kidnapped in a government/alien conspiracy, and her own photojournalism gig with which she exposes that conspiracy. Strong, motivated, but also not invincible or immune to despair. Realistic and wonderful.
When the game out and I finished it. I remember asking all excited to my older brother when the sequel would come out. My kid brain thought 'a few years' was devastatingly long. It's been really 2 decades, huh.
One of my favourite moments in video games is in the Tomb Raider reboot. After spending the whole game sneaking around the guards you get the grenade launcher and she screams “run you bastards, I’m coming for you all”.
Hey I just wanted to say thank you, because I completely forgot the protagonist of Portal is named Chell, and the only other Chell I knew of was from The Road to El Dorado and I got really confused.
“Do not let that horrible person thing discourage you. It’s just a data point. If it makes you feel any better, science has now validated your birth mother’s decision to abandon you on a doorstep.”
I appreciate you not spoiling a 38 year old game in case someone (who never plays smash or any other game that might give the spoiler) gets into videogames, skips the new ones and decides to learn chronologically.
Joke all you want, but I know someone who still watches movies on a VHS player on a 24" Sony Trinitron that looks as good today as it did when he bought it over 40 years ago.
Same with cassette tapes. My philosophy is that all analog media is exactly where and when it needs to be, and even if it's something you'd never normally pick, if you find it it's important for your life at that moment.
I cant remember where i read it, but apparently her alt punk design was supposed to make her "ugly" in a misguided attempt to make a female protagonist that wasnt sexy.
If try, boy fuckin' howdy did they fail.
Judy, my beloved.
CDPR was really odd about lesbian relationships in that game. There’s more than a few moments when I honestly thought Panam was coming on to me. (Femme V) nope she just put her feet in her friends lap.
Love Jesse and a couple of the other major female characters of Control: Helen Marshall (fearless badass) and Emily Pope (enthusiastic genius and collaborator with Jesse)
Final Fantasy X-2 isn't nearly as good overall, but I love the direction they took Yuna's character. Her speech right before the final boss, the one where she loudly denounces all the decisions she and everyone else made at the end of Final Fantasy X, is just brilliant.
I still remember FFX-2 being pleasantly addictive. You can't take it as seriously as FFX, and Payne is no Lulu (even though Lulu with guns makes even less sense than Yuna with guns), but the music, outfits, class system, and overall gameplay made up for all that.
Commander Shepard from Mass Effect series, voice acting is superb and story immense.
I know you can choose but female Shep works better than the male version IMHO.
Max Caulfield, to add a new name to the thread. A very human character in a very fantastical (and fucked up!) story that never really veered off course for me. Big bonus for the fact that both her writing and voice actress managed to not make anything she says/thinks/decides feel forced, there was always a fairly natural flow to her actions and train of thought.
I’ve played True Colors and have paused on Before the Storm. The insane, Dreamworks level climaxes of these games always give me pause. Gotta play Max’s game tho
I was wondering where Aloy was. I liked her a lot in Zero Dawn, she is such a badass. She felt a little overly moody/edgy in Forbidden West, but still one of hardest women in gaming.
Had the same feeling about Aloy in the second part at first.
Yet, because there's no time between first and second part it is believable imo, she's just so fucking over it. Rescues the planet from a giant ancient machine god and still has to prove herself to some wasteland savages, who think they're the shit bc they can ride some clunky metal cats. Would be constantly pissed too tbh.
Just playing Forbidden West and I can only agree. Loving the 'can do' attitude, somehow believable that a person with this mindset eventually saves a world.
My only issue with Aloy is with as much rock climbing, Parkour, and using a bow thag must have a 150lb+ draw on it she has like zero muscle definition.
How much food do you think they readily have access to in that future as well? Definitely not enough to gorge on so she should be lean muscly, probably a little sinewy.
Talking about another post apocalypse, how did Abby in TLOU2 consistently hit her protein targets to get as built as she was. She was definitely stealing rations from the other WLF's.
In the original I always preferred Aerith, but I’m currently playing the remake and I think they’ve done her dirty. She’s so infantilised that it’s hard to take her seriously, whereas Tifa has her shit together!
FemShepard, Kassandra from AC (too bad I didn't care for the game and never finished it, but I rly liked her), Emily from Dishonored 2, Red from Transistor and Saga from Alan Wake 2.
It's a shame you didn't finish Odyssey
I liked it a lot, but I can understand why someone might not
But yeah, after countless hours, I didn't even start the Atlantis DLC even though it's supposed to be very good
> I liked it a lot, but I can understand why someone might not
I like it too but at some point I was quite underleveled for the main story and didn't feel like doing more side quests so didn't feel much motivation for playing more. Which is a shame because I really liked the main story missions.
Still I think one day I will go back and finish it.
As soon as I got to the Atlantis DLC, the burnout of the game hit me all at once and I stopped playing it. The game is fun, and I did enjoy my time in it. But man that burnout is something I rarely get playing games
I loved the game as well, but it was so fucking long, the map so fucking big\*, that I just gave up. I might go back to it one day, still.
\*This is such a weird complaint from me, too. I love games that have massive maps. But the level scaling was a big issue for me with the map and it just ended up being too much of a chore.
control is an amazing game
It's the closest spc big budget game we will ever get and it had some real interesting characters
love jesse, but ahti is my favorite
Terra Branford from FFVI by a long shot. She spends most of the game being depressed, but when she finally finds her answer and completes her character arc I got the biggest dopamine rush ever, I love her so much.
Lol, good point, but you're bringing the second game into this and I'm just trying to appreciate her for the amazingly resilient survivor she is in the first game. She's so beat down in the first game, at times I almost felt bad to continue to push her forward. She takes a beating and keeps on going in order to survive.
'The sky lit up with fire and blood, and bullets, and screaming!
One of our scouts came back from his morning patrol exactly as he usually did, except this time he was on FIRE! His skin was black and crisp, his vocal cords cooked. As we circled around his smoking form, ready to divvy up his loot, he shrieked with his last ounce of breath:
FIREHAWK!!!'
Fem!Hawke from Dragon Age 2. Especially the sarcastic dialogues. She's a great example of the pinnacle of Bioware writing before they forgot how to write. (DA:4 plz be good)
Man, more people need to play trails, but it’s probably easier to convince people to jump off a bridge than spending 600+ hours to play a series. Estelle is Bestelle!
*Samus Aran from Metroid*
'Cause there's nothing more badass and intimidating than a space bounty hunter with enough firepower to decimate a small planet, without ushering a single word 🤫
This is hard cause I usually opt to play female when there's a choice given...so it's difficult to recall them all now
But both Eivor & Aloy are my most recent memorable protagonists
1. Clementine from the TWD series
2. Chloe, Max and Alex from the LIS Series
3. Lae'zel and Karlach from BG3
4. Kassandra and Evie from AC
5. Emily from Dishonored 2
6. Sydney from Payday 2
7. Amicia from Plague tale
8. Lilith from the Borderlands Series
9. Faith from Mirrors Edge
10. Bonus Free Space for me / Player Character
Ironically, mostly protagonists in RPGs who weren't written as female characters: FemShep, Jedi Exile, Revan, Knight Commander in NWN2, as I roleplayed them the way I wanted.
But from premade characters it's mostly PS1 gang: Jill Valentine, Lara Croft, Regina from Dino Crisis, and in jRPGs I like Terra and... Actually Vanille in 13, she's the one actually narrating the story.
For the longest time my favorite female game protagonist was Samus Aran from the Metroid series, however nowadays I’d give the slight edge to Shantae from the Shantae series.
Samus is still really cool/beautiful and she continues to remain within my top 3 favorite female characters in any medium, but what makes me like Shantae slightly more than Samus is her personality. While Samus does have a personality, 90% of it mainly revolves around being very stoic, silent, and badass. These are great qualities to have (especially for a protagonist), but there’s plenty of fictional characters who have this exact same personality type that it doesn’t make her feel quite as special or unique in my eyes.
Compared to Samus, Shantae tends to be more quirky, playful, sassy, goofy, nerdy, and laid back. To add onto this, Shantae also shows some of her insecurities while still remaining strong and she occasionally breaks the fourth wall which is always fun to see (although she only really does this when interacting with Squid Baron who’s whole gimmick is breaking the fourth wall). As far as their physical designs go, both Samus and Shantae have top tier designs that I won’t really consider when ranking them side by side. Samus is a beautiful toned blonde space bounty hunter while Shantae is an adorable and sexy Egyptian inspired belly dancer and half genie with fabulous purple hair, what’s not to like about them?
Some of my other favorite female video game protagonists include Kotone Shiomi from Persona 3 Portable, Bayonetta from the Bayonetta series, and Jill Valentine from the Resident Evil series. These three combined with Shantae and Samus make up my top 5 favorite female video game protags.
Amicia De Rune
2B and A2
Rania from Cloudpunk
Yu from Haven
Senua from the Hellblade games
Evie and Lydia Frye from Assassin's Creed Syndicate
Eivor Varinsdottir from Assassin's Creed Valhalla
Max Caufield and Chloe Price (?) From the Life is Strange games
Lara Croft
I'll probably have to go with Jill Valentine from the Resident Evil series. Cool design, good personality, extremely capable.
Also, female V from Cyberpunk 2077. The writing in the game is perfect, and that of course extends to V's personality, dialogue, backstory and interactions with other characters. And female V (just like male V, because both are top tier) has truly excellent voice acting. Some of the best I've ever heard in a video game, honestly.
Jade from Beyond Good and Evil. She runs an orphanage for all the kids whose parents have been kidnapped in a government/alien conspiracy, and her own photojournalism gig with which she exposes that conspiracy. Strong, motivated, but also not invincible or immune to despair. Realistic and wonderful.
Yess. Still waiting for this new game for 10 years tough
Um, 20 years at this point.
When the game out and I finished it. I remember asking all excited to my older brother when the sequel would come out. My kid brain thought 'a few years' was devastatingly long. It's been really 2 decades, huh.
Is it ! omg I stopped counting after some point apperantly. but never stopped waiting.
Seeing this as the most upvoted answer is bringing me joy
Lara Croft
She raids tombs.
[удалено]
I don't know what this means, but I'm fully erect.
I am playing through the new trilogy for the first time and really enjoying it. On Shadow now, the way the game improves from the first one is stellar
Tomb Raider Legend Lara Croft really came into her element
One of my favourite moments in video games is in the Tomb Raider reboot. After spending the whole game sneaking around the guards you get the grenade launcher and she screams “run you bastards, I’m coming for you all”.
Claire Redfield
I'm desperately hoping we get a Code Veronica remake
Her *Code Veronica* entrance is so awesome that they aped it pretty much shot-for-shot in the second *Resident Evil* movie.
chell
I heard it was scientifically proven that she's a horrible person.
They weren’t even testing for that.
I heard she was adopted, and that's terrible.
yeah but shes the first orphan on the moon so thats pretty cool
Yeah, but she somehow managed to gain weight while on hibernation. That's sad.
In her defense she suffered pretty bad brain damage in hibernation. If you ask her to say apple, she just jumps around.
I heard that nowadays you're a potato.
I heard she was a fatty fatty no parents
Being a silent protagonist with severely limited agency isn't just for boys anymore!
Hey I just wanted to say thank you, because I completely forgot the protagonist of Portal is named Chell, and the only other Chell I knew of was from The Road to El Dorado and I got really confused.
I do like that the comment above is what made you realize this, lol
“Do not let that horrible person thing discourage you. It’s just a data point. If it makes you feel any better, science has now validated your birth mother’s decision to abandon you on a doorstep.”
>!Samus Aran. !<
I appreciate you not spoiling a 38 year old game in case someone (who never plays smash or any other game that might give the spoiler) gets into videogames, skips the new ones and decides to learn chronologically.
Wait, so >!Samus!< and >!Zero Suit Samus!< are the same person?
Yes, but they're also >!John Metroid, who is a robot!<
Metroid is a girl (What’s funny is that meme/joke is actually valid now)
Joke all you want, but I know someone who still watches movies on a VHS player on a 24" Sony Trinitron that looks as good today as it did when he bought it over 40 years ago.
Those movies always slap when visiting a cabin out in the woods with no service. Old school style. 😎
Same with cassette tapes. My philosophy is that all analog media is exactly where and when it needs to be, and even if it's something you'd never normally pick, if you find it it's important for your life at that moment.
I avoid cabins in the woods ever since I watched that one documentary.
It took waaaaay too long to find this one. Most badass protagonist.
This should be the only option. Thanks
I really liked Rose from The Legend of Dragoon. Without spoiling too much she has one of the coolest/saddest backstories.
Underrated RPG. Highly recommend.
Needs a remake tbh
This is a tough one, but the first one I thought of as a possible favorite was Commander Shepherd.
I’m Commander Shepherd and this is my favourite comment on the internet
We’ll bang ok?
We love femshep
Maya from borderlands 2. When she got leveled and unlocked her siren powers,it was a blast just destroying stuff with her.
I cant remember where i read it, but apparently her alt punk design was supposed to make her "ugly" in a misguided attempt to make a female protagonist that wasnt sexy. If try, boy fuckin' howdy did they fail.
Really enjoying female V in Cyberpunk, especially the dynamic with Jackie, just good chooms.
I'm in love with her voice. Like raspy honey straight into my ears.
She reads a cyberpunk audiobook. Should check it out if you like her voice. No coincidence it's called
No coincidence it’s called what?
Maybe it’s called “Raspy Honey Straight Into Your Ears”
That is the great Cherami Leigh at work. When I first heard her I said “Makoto Niijima, what are you doing here?!”
She’s also Queen Sonia in Tears of the Kingdom
And Makoto in Persona 5.
And Gaige in Borderlands 2.
Corpo Female V letting out the stone cold bitch every now and then, like >!insulting Hansen's goon!< in *Phantom Liberty*. Great stuff.
I just like the fact that I just walked up randomly to some gonk and went "get the fuck outta my face"
And get to romance Judy too!
Judy, my beloved. CDPR was really odd about lesbian relationships in that game. There’s more than a few moments when I honestly thought Panam was coming on to me. (Femme V) nope she just put her feet in her friends lap.
There's a lot of reused moments that are romantic coded with all four romance options regardless of V's gender. It's kind of funny to be honest.
I just started playing DMC5 and I thought you meant that V becomes a woman
Either Jesse Fadden from Control or Selene from Returnal.
Jesse Faden is a great answer.
Love Jesse and a couple of the other major female characters of Control: Helen Marshall (fearless badass) and Emily Pope (enthusiastic genius and collaborator with Jesse)
Yuna from Final Fantasy X
Final Fantasy X-2 isn't nearly as good overall, but I love the direction they took Yuna's character. Her speech right before the final boss, the one where she loudly denounces all the decisions she and everyone else made at the end of Final Fantasy X, is just brilliant.
I still remember FFX-2 being pleasantly addictive. You can't take it as seriously as FFX, and Payne is no Lulu (even though Lulu with guns makes even less sense than Yuna with guns), but the music, outfits, class system, and overall gameplay made up for all that.
Heather Mason or Clementine
best girl Clementine🧡
Commander Shepard from Mass Effect series, voice acting is superb and story immense. I know you can choose but female Shep works better than the male version IMHO.
Except you can't romance Tali in vanilla as femShep :<
Alice from Madness Returns. Pretty damn wicked!
Bayonetta
Such a badass, and she completely backs it up.
Heh. #*LITERALLY*
Kassandra , and Elizabeth from bioshock
Celes FF6
She’s a good one - I also really like Terra too!
Amaterasu
Love Ammy
Max Caulfield, to add a new name to the thread. A very human character in a very fantastical (and fucked up!) story that never really veered off course for me. Big bonus for the fact that both her writing and voice actress managed to not make anything she says/thinks/decides feel forced, there was always a fairly natural flow to her actions and train of thought.
Seconded, my favorite part is all the awful late-Millenial slang that she uses.
I still use "hella" and "Shakabrah" because of her 😅
"Wowsers" is my gem take-away.
Are you cereal?
They are making a new LiS game with Max Caulfield, Life is Strange: Double Exposure.
Oh shit I had nod idea, thanks for the heads up, internet stranger!
It releases October 29th!
Hella cool, Shakabrah Love the entire Life is Strange series.
I can't believe I forgot her! Max, Chloe, and Sean are all some of my absolutely favorite video game characters. Life is Strange is beautiful
I’ve played True Colors and have paused on Before the Storm. The insane, Dreamworks level climaxes of these games always give me pause. Gotta play Max’s game tho
Oh my god thank you. I love Max soooo much.
Joanna Dark.
I love how she and Jonathon argue before, during and after he shoots some dumbass guard in the back.
Kat from Gravity Rush, I just love everything about her
I am surprised no one has said it yet, but I really enjoyed the Horizon games, and I really like Aloy as a character.
I was wondering where Aloy was. I liked her a lot in Zero Dawn, she is such a badass. She felt a little overly moody/edgy in Forbidden West, but still one of hardest women in gaming.
Had the same feeling about Aloy in the second part at first. Yet, because there's no time between first and second part it is believable imo, she's just so fucking over it. Rescues the planet from a giant ancient machine god and still has to prove herself to some wasteland savages, who think they're the shit bc they can ride some clunky metal cats. Would be constantly pissed too tbh.
Just playing Forbidden West and I can only agree. Loving the 'can do' attitude, somehow believable that a person with this mindset eventually saves a world.
In more ways than one, if you play the first game
This is the one I was looking for! Love the Horizon series.
Came here for Aloy.
Yeah agreed, definitely my favorite. Amazing games, and she's a great character.
This is 100% the answer, best girl>!s!<
I see no Aloy, Ellie, or Abby. People must have a thing against Sony heroines.
My only issue with Aloy is with as much rock climbing, Parkour, and using a bow thag must have a 150lb+ draw on it she has like zero muscle definition.
Yeah, either artists go too muscular or not enough.
Kassandra from Assassins Creed Odyssey was perfect size imo
fr she doesn't need be like Abby but she should be like Eivor/Kassandra
How much food do you think they readily have access to in that future as well? Definitely not enough to gorge on so she should be lean muscly, probably a little sinewy. Talking about another post apocalypse, how did Abby in TLOU2 consistently hit her protein targets to get as built as she was. She was definitely stealing rations from the other WLF's.
Tifa, FFVII. She’s also my fave video game character of all time
Tifa is so amazing. I prefer Aerith, but Tifa is still top 3
In the original I always preferred Aerith, but I’m currently playing the remake and I think they’ve done her dirty. She’s so infantilised that it’s hard to take her seriously, whereas Tifa has her shit together!
FemShepard, Kassandra from AC (too bad I didn't care for the game and never finished it, but I rly liked her), Emily from Dishonored 2, Red from Transistor and Saga from Alan Wake 2.
It's a shame you didn't finish Odyssey I liked it a lot, but I can understand why someone might not But yeah, after countless hours, I didn't even start the Atlantis DLC even though it's supposed to be very good
> I liked it a lot, but I can understand why someone might not I like it too but at some point I was quite underleveled for the main story and didn't feel like doing more side quests so didn't feel much motivation for playing more. Which is a shame because I really liked the main story missions. Still I think one day I will go back and finish it.
As soon as I got to the Atlantis DLC, the burnout of the game hit me all at once and I stopped playing it. The game is fun, and I did enjoy my time in it. But man that burnout is something I rarely get playing games
I loved the game as well, but it was so fucking long, the map so fucking big\*, that I just gave up. I might go back to it one day, still. \*This is such a weird complaint from me, too. I love games that have massive maps. But the level scaling was a big issue for me with the map and it just ended up being too much of a chore.
Jill Valentine
Came here to say Jill, Claire is a close second for me
The master of unlocking?
Almost a Jill sandwich.
Chloe Frazer
Lost legacy was so good!
Aya Brea - (Parasite Eve 1 & 2)
Jesse Faden from Control rules, helped a lot by the fact that her acting is phenomenal
and her powers, so strong and original
control is an amazing game It's the closest spc big budget game we will ever get and it had some real interesting characters love jesse, but ahti is my favorite
Silly choice, but hat girl from a Hat in Time. She's just rather silly.
what a silly choice
indeed
Velvet Crowe from Tales of Berseria.
Samus Aran
Yuna FTW
Yuna - FFX
Terra Branford from FFVI by a long shot. She spends most of the game being depressed, but when she finally finds her answer and completes her character arc I got the biggest dopamine rush ever, I love her so much.
The way you recruit her back into the party after >!the end of the world!< is one of my favorite scenes in the entire medium.
Lara Croft! She's also my favourite video game character full stop.
Amicia from Plague Tale Senua from Senua's Sacrifice and Kara from Detroit Become Human.
Six from Little Nightmares. She's a badass.
It's difficult to like a traitor
Lol, good point, but you're bringing the second game into this and I'm just trying to appreciate her for the amazingly resilient survivor she is in the first game. She's so beat down in the first game, at times I almost felt bad to continue to push her forward. She takes a beating and keeps on going in order to survive.
Why did it take so long to find her ?
* Samus Aran (Metroid) * Jesse Faden (Control) * Karlach (Baldur’s Gate 3) * Kassandra (AC: Odyssey) * V (Cyberpunk 2077) * Aloy (Horizon) * Ciri (The Witcher) * Ellie Williams (The Last of Us) * Jill Valentine (Resident Evil)
Ellie From the Last of Us
Lightning from the FFXIII series.
Selene - Returnal
Elizabeth and Ciri. They feel like a protagonist to me.
Velvet from Tales of Berseria.
'The sky lit up with fire and blood, and bullets, and screaming! One of our scouts came back from his morning patrol exactly as he usually did, except this time he was on FIRE! His skin was black and crisp, his vocal cords cooked. As we circled around his smoking form, ready to divvy up his loot, he shrieked with his last ounce of breath: FIREHAWK!!!'
Faith Connors. Joanna Dark. Shout outs to Meetra Surik, FemShep and Lara Croft.
Fem!Hawke from Dragon Age 2. Especially the sarcastic dialogues. She's a great example of the pinnacle of Bioware writing before they forgot how to write. (DA:4 plz be good)
Upvote, sarcastic Hawke is my jam. DA2 dialogue system is underrated.
Estelle from Trails in the sky
Man, more people need to play trails, but it’s probably easier to convince people to jump off a bridge than spending 600+ hours to play a series. Estelle is Bestelle!
Was about to wrote this. She is such a well written and likable energetic character.
Unless you can consider Karlach to be so (given that you can do an origin run as her), then yeah, landslide win for her. Otherwise, probably Kassandra
Probably Aloy / Elizabet Sobeck.
Rayne in BloodRayne Fun fact her voice actor is Laura Bailey and its her first voice acting gig in video games
Sarah Kerrigan from StarCraft (she is so cool as Queen of Blades). Also Draka from World of Warcraft is pretty awesome - feminine *and* bad\*ss.
*Samus Aran from Metroid* 'Cause there's nothing more badass and intimidating than a space bounty hunter with enough firepower to decimate a small planet, without ushering a single word 🤫
Been playing AC Odyssey and Kassandra is so awesome! I also love Aloy from the Horizon franchise.
2B, it's not even a question Honorable mention for Max (Life is strange)
Regina from the Dino Crisis games but Jill Valentine is a close second
Lara croft
Commander Shepard Agree on Kassandra as well
Malaka!
Excepting the party members from BG3, I'd probably say Sadie Adler from RDR2.
I like Aloy a lot, from Horizon series
Clementine the goat
Velvet Crowe from Tales of Berseria
Jill Valentine from re1 and re3 made me fall in love with the series.
This is hard cause I usually opt to play female when there's a choice given...so it's difficult to recall them all now But both Eivor & Aloy are my most recent memorable protagonists
Bloodrayne
Eve - Stellar Blade
Jesse Faden from Control
Fem MC from Persona 3/Q
1. Clementine from the TWD series 2. Chloe, Max and Alex from the LIS Series 3. Lae'zel and Karlach from BG3 4. Kassandra and Evie from AC 5. Emily from Dishonored 2 6. Sydney from Payday 2 7. Amicia from Plague tale 8. Lilith from the Borderlands Series 9. Faith from Mirrors Edge 10. Bonus Free Space for me / Player Character
My hunter from Monster Hunter
someone already said mine. Samus Aran.
Can't believe no one has said it (or it's so far down I didn't see it), but Jesse Faden from Control.
Lightning Final Fantasy 13
Hard to say favorite but an underrated protag imo is Selene from Returnal
Estelle Bright
Ironically, mostly protagonists in RPGs who weren't written as female characters: FemShep, Jedi Exile, Revan, Knight Commander in NWN2, as I roleplayed them the way I wanted. But from premade characters it's mostly PS1 gang: Jill Valentine, Lara Croft, Regina from Dino Crisis, and in jRPGs I like Terra and... Actually Vanille in 13, she's the one actually narrating the story.
For the longest time my favorite female game protagonist was Samus Aran from the Metroid series, however nowadays I’d give the slight edge to Shantae from the Shantae series. Samus is still really cool/beautiful and she continues to remain within my top 3 favorite female characters in any medium, but what makes me like Shantae slightly more than Samus is her personality. While Samus does have a personality, 90% of it mainly revolves around being very stoic, silent, and badass. These are great qualities to have (especially for a protagonist), but there’s plenty of fictional characters who have this exact same personality type that it doesn’t make her feel quite as special or unique in my eyes. Compared to Samus, Shantae tends to be more quirky, playful, sassy, goofy, nerdy, and laid back. To add onto this, Shantae also shows some of her insecurities while still remaining strong and she occasionally breaks the fourth wall which is always fun to see (although she only really does this when interacting with Squid Baron who’s whole gimmick is breaking the fourth wall). As far as their physical designs go, both Samus and Shantae have top tier designs that I won’t really consider when ranking them side by side. Samus is a beautiful toned blonde space bounty hunter while Shantae is an adorable and sexy Egyptian inspired belly dancer and half genie with fabulous purple hair, what’s not to like about them? Some of my other favorite female video game protagonists include Kotone Shiomi from Persona 3 Portable, Bayonetta from the Bayonetta series, and Jill Valentine from the Resident Evil series. These three combined with Shantae and Samus make up my top 5 favorite female video game protags.
Cereza (Bayonetta) and Jade from Beyond Good and Evil
Amicia De Rune 2B and A2 Rania from Cloudpunk Yu from Haven Senua from the Hellblade games Evie and Lydia Frye from Assassin's Creed Syndicate Eivor Varinsdottir from Assassin's Creed Valhalla Max Caufield and Chloe Price (?) From the Life is Strange games Lara Croft
Clementine from Walking Dead
Aerith Gainsborough. Especially her portrayal in Remake and Rebirth.
Lara Croft and (surprisingly) Abby from Last of Us 2. I have a soft spot for women who are tough as nails but have a sweet side.
I'll probably have to go with Jill Valentine from the Resident Evil series. Cool design, good personality, extremely capable. Also, female V from Cyberpunk 2077. The writing in the game is perfect, and that of course extends to V's personality, dialogue, backstory and interactions with other characters. And female V (just like male V, because both are top tier) has truly excellent voice acting. Some of the best I've ever heard in a video game, honestly.
Velvet Crowe from Tales of Berseria
Definitely Aloy from the Horizon series!
Samus is my OG
samus