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That's MS. Pirate To You

I have no idea where the cliché of the pirate queen comes from, beyond simple "oh shit, the pirate captain's a girl?!" narrative misdirection. I'm all for a bit of gender equality in positions of power, but I wonder why this progressiveness so often occurs among deadly maritime cutthroats and pillagers.

While certainly not exclusive to games, the idea that the leader of a boat of pirates - or an entire pirate fleet - is a woman is surprisingly ubiquitous in this medium as well. Honestly, at this point, I'd be more freaked out if the mysterious leader of an oddly gregarious pirate band turned out to be a guy. I mean, what if Bikke was a lady pirate wearing a fake beard all this time? It's not like you could tell with 8-bit graphics. Oh god, the veil of reality is shattering all around me! I CAN'T DEAL W-

Sorry. These are pirate queens. A list of them. Have fun.

List items

  • Well, Tetra, but we don't have separate pages for aliases any more. Tetra's probably the first person a regular gamer will think of when it comes to examples of a group of goonish pirates being led by a strong female character. Pity her character loses much of that spark when she turns into Princess Zelda. Maybe that's a condemnation about the passiveness of princesses, I couldn't say for certain. (Man, and only now do I recall that I've made a list about incognito princesses as well.)

  • Despite owning a tramp stamp (there's probably a less offensive name for those things), Kika's a decent character among a sea (pun intended) of nebulous JRPG archetypes that comprise Suikoden IV's cast. Despite her depression over losing her lover, the erstwhile Pirate King, she's an effective and resourceful leader of her pirate band and is a goddamn beast in combat. It's generally recommended you don't bring her along in battles so that the game can retain some resemblance of a challenge. But hey, it's Suikoden IV, so it's not like you'd be spoiling much.

  • Traditionally, female pirates only became so because they pulled a Sweet Polly Oliver and disguised themselves as men. In that sense, Final Fantasy V's Faris Scherwiz is about as accurate a depiction of a true pirate queen as one's likely to find in a game about crystals and chocobos. You kind of get the sense that everyone already knew, though. I mean, it takes the heroes less than a hour, and Butz is a moron.

  • I'll add her to the wiki in a moment, but while there are plenty of female pirates in the sublime Skies of Arcadia, Clara's the only one who is captain of her own airship. She's an obsessed stalker too, but you shouldn't let that diminish her accomplishments. Yes, also, I guess her ship is bright pink and called the Primrose and her all-female crew are explicitly stated to be out to "steal a husband", but she's still a figure of female empowerment, dammit. I probably should've stuck with Belleza for this spot, at least all she did was pose as an exotic dancer to beguile the hero. Good lord, what's the deal with this game?

  • Wario's eternal nemesis. Well, besides Mario. Syrup's perhaps the one person in Wario's world (though she oddly was not in Wario World) that is as obsessed with wealth and power as he is. She'd almost be an effective Peach-esque quasi-romantic interest, if she didn't hate his substantial guts.

  • Another pirate queen that acts as chief antagonist, this time to WayForward's genie heroine Shantae. WayForward's gone from strength to strength over the last decade, and Shantae was really what helped them break out of a stream of constant mediocre licenses.

  • Might be a little unfair to call Chat a Pirate Queen, seeing as she appears to be the only pirate left. Descendant of a legendary pirate, one of few able to pass between Tales of Eternia's dual worlds of Celestia and Inferia, she basically shows up to be "that one JRPG character that has an airship you can borrow" as well as "that one JRPG character that exists for a really dubious subsect of fanart". All right, no more female underage anime pirate captains, I'm starting to feel a bit nauseous.

  • Patty is a female underage anime pirate captain that was added to the PS3 version of Tales of Vesperia, a game I played for 200 hours and still have nightmares about. Apparently her backstory is completely nuts. I envy anyone who knows enough Japanese to experience it for themselves.

  • From underage to considerably overage, the 1000-year old immortal pirate queen Seth is one of the few immortals that refuses to be a mopey sadsack grimly going through the motions as the centuries pass. Lost Odyssey is that kind of game, absolutely, but Seth refuses to let anything get her down. She also seems to despise Jansen Friedh, which is another plus for most people.

  • Beyond being the female Jack Sparrow, Isabela is a formidable duelist and the Designated Bisexual of BioWare's Dragon Age series, and Dragon Age 2 in particular. She's a fun, morally dubious character that - alongside Varric - is the source of most of the game's choice sarcastic quips. If a game ever necessitated ironic detachment from its own participants, it's DA2.
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