This seems to be a popular topic these days, so I thought I'd put in my two cents. Let me start bluntly. Sexism is rampant in the video game industry. Granted, it's not any less prevalent in other forms of media, but I'm focusing on video games.
There are plenty of forms of it in video games. Whether it be an overt sexualization of the character without offering much else for it, like in a lot of fighting games (see Ivy of the Soul Calibur series), or possibly the less overt refrigerating (referring to a female character that is generally killed off and her death is used as a revenge catalyst for the hero - named after a scene in the Green Lantern comics when Kyle Rayner's girlfriend is killed and literally put into a refrigerator for him to find) of a female character (see Marian from Double Dragon). An even more subtle version of sexism is to have a female character occupy a stereotypical female gender role, such as having a big strong male hero protect the weak female character.
It's also accepted that games with women on the cover of a game don't usually sell as well. Naughty Dog had to fight to keep their female lead on the cover of their most recent game, The Last of Us. How many game covers can you name that have a female on the cover? Not many. And how many are there where a female character is the only one on it? Even less. The only ones I can think of off the top of my head are the Tomb Raider games.
Why is this? It may be because gamers in America are, on average, younger than the rest of the world, so they aren't as mature. They have a hard time seeing female characters as strong characters, instead preferring to see heroes as these ultra-macho aggressive men. But, this seems backwards to me. These forms of entertainment should be telling these kids that women can be leaders and heroes too and can be as much worth as men can in the same positions - maybe some good can come of it. Of course, these lessons should be taught by parents, but that's a different discussion for a different time.
But, let's not get ahead of ourselves. There are a lot of games that present strong female characters, and it's starting to get better than it used to be, and that has a lot to do with the recent popularity of this discussion. It's also important not to accuse games that present strong female characters as sexist (like the aforementioned The Last of Us). Not every game is sexist. We still have a long way to go, but I think we can get there.
