A gaming community free from the hype and oversaturation of current releases, catering to gamers who wait at least 12 months after release to play a game. Whether it's price, waiting for bugs/issues to be patched, DLC to be released, don't meet the system requirements, or just haven't had the time to keep up with the latest releases.
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Erica
The Syberia Series
The Longest Journey
Gone Home
Virginia
What remains of Edith Finch
Beyond Good and Evil
Gabriel Knight 3 has shared protagonists that you switch between; one is a woman.
Likewise some of the Broken Sword series
Talos Principle is either non-gendered or whatever you want the protagonist to be.
The first Blair Witch game from 2000
Everyone's gone to the Rapture
Also, holla at whoever said "No One Lives Forever"; that game rules.
One of my top 3 JRPGs, Star Ocean: The Second Story, has a remake coming out early November. In the beginning of the game, you get the choice to play as one of the main characters, a male or a female, each of whom has their own story arc and exclusive party members that can be found during the playthrough.
Most of my suggestions were already mentioned, but PN03 & darkened skye come to mind.
Pedantry aside, if you count the option of selecting a female character, trickstyle, borderlands, super mario bros 2, vigilante 8 second offense, tony hawk 3 (4, underground and probably any in this series but I haven't played them lol)
pn03 looks like bayonetta and vanquish got it going, looks itneresting
Final Fantasy 6. There are technically several protagonists, but the one with the better claim to "main protagonist" is a woman.
Also, Heaven's Vault isn't an old game, but it's not very well known or talked about, so I'll throw it in anyway.
idk what it is about Heaven’s Vault artstyle but something irks me about it, i wish i could say what ti is
Actually not from older generations, but Tacoma and Deliver Us The Moon are a few years old and both are short, sweet space-related narrative games with a female protagonist.
Oni Parasite Eve X-Blades
Siberia 100%.
Now that I think of it, the only not oversexualised female protagonists in retro games (I can think of rn) are from japanese titles. The USSR didn't import video games and Europe and the US were just too conservative ig.