I scrolled until I gave up shame on all of you. Play Portal, solve puzzles, there is multiplayer songs and cake.

I also want to throw in Ori and the Blind Forest. I don’t know the gender of Ori for sure, but it’s a little animal.

It’s a beautiful game, with great gameplay, animation, music, story, and I think it would be fun to watch someone else play.

wandersong is a super simple game that she might be able to play. You play a pacifist bard who just is naive, friendly to a fault. The bard is a male, but the villain, supporting cast, it’s quite diverse with some strong females cast in. It’s got a pretty good story and a lot of sesame street level lessons on life in there too. Even starts a conversation on what strength truly is. Totally something you should look at.

Slime rancher is another super chill, might actually be able to play herself, game where you do play as a female protaganist, but much lighter on plot than wandersong. You basically farm cute adorable slimes and it’s genuinely pretty addictive and super relaxing after a shitty day.

Mirror’s Edge you play as a female protagonist. Plot might be a bit steep for her.

If you haven’t played through portal 1 or 2 yet, I bet it could be fun. Glados is silly, Chell (who you play but doesn’t talk) is female and she can help you with the puzzles a bit.

Hmm, some games with a strong female lead that I’ve played:

• A hat in time. Lovely 3D platformer

• Subnautica: Below Zero. Sequel to the original Subnautica but enjoyable without having played the first one. Loved both games.

• Gris

• Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice

• Kena: Bridge of Spirits

• River City Girls: Pixel art beat 'em up

• Horizon Zero Dawn

• The latest Tomb Raider trilogy

• Portal and Portal 2

Kena: Bridge of Spirits is a wonderful game.

Shovel Knight allows you to gender swap all major characters.

Celeste. It’s a platformer with a nice story about anxiety and overcoming one’s fears.

Mario Bros 2 and choose Peach on every level

My daughter just turned 6!

She loves watching, in no particular order:

• Horizon Zero Dawn (when I let her)
• Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart (rivet is a strong female co-lead)
• Bugsnax (lots of characters of various genders)
• Tears of the Kingdom (Zelda is her favorite)
• Metroid (she’s watched Prime Remastered and Dread and loves that Samus is a girl)
• Mario Kart 8 (so she can be peach or Rosalina)
• Kena Bridge of Spirits

She also likes playing Pokemon and Drawn to Life now that she can read.

Beyond good and evil seems like a good title with all the antropomorphic characters and isn’t too violent. I think the political themes will be lost on a 5 year old however

any Metroid

If you have a switch New super Mario bros U deluxe and Super Mario 3D World, both let you play as Peach and Toadette and you can do local co-op so you and her can play together.

Idk if this counts as it’s not visually obvious, but Amaterasu from Ōkami is a fun female protangonist, on account of her being straight up Amaterasu Ōmikami, the sun goddess (and all around top dog) from Japanese mythology. Graceful and elegant and also she’s a big ol’ wolf who does doggy things, which I imagine would delight a 5 year old.

The game’s artstyle is really stylised and pretty, the story is based on Japanese mythology and legends which I’d think would also interest a kid, it’s kinda zelda-like with puzzles and whatnot, and there’s a dedicated woof button. It came out way back in 2006 but at the same time it’s been remastered pretty recently (it’s in capcom’s summer steam sale if you’re going down that route) so you’ve got some choice about which route to go down trying to find it. Try and stick to European versions if you can because apparently the American localisations removed most of the mentions of the fact that Ammy is a girl which imo is a really weird choice because like, that’s a whole ass mythological figure?

While stuff like Tomb Raider is the quintessential example, for a five year old you would probably be better with something more colourful and fun, even if you are the one playing it.

With that in mind my first thought was A Hat in Time although I’ve not played it through to verify end to end appropriateness.

You could also try Mirror’s Edge because bright colours and dynamic movement, I don’t remember it being that violent but maybe on second thoughts consider the safety aspect of introducing a child to the concept of jumping between buildings and maybe I’m talking myself out of this.

Celeste is colourful and fun and honestly at that age I don’t know that she would pick up that much on the heavier aspects of the story which are allegories for anxiety/depression/gender dysphoria. A five year old is basically going to see it as a story with an evil twin I think.

I haven’t played Child of Light but that might be appropriate?

The main character in Crypt of the Necrodancer is a girl called Cadence, although that is one you would really have to enjoy to make it worth it imo. I’m mostly thinking rhythm and bright colours are child friendly again to be honest, but you still have to play what is basically a roguelike mixed with a rhythm game and if that’s not your jam it will be a waste of money.

You can always play a game with selectable skins too, like Spelunky 2 has a few characters you could pick between which all play the same but has a variety of designs you can play as.

Horizon: Zero Dawn would be an excellent choice.